Accidental Blogger

No Centaurs For The Senator

Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) is a long time champion of "sanctity of human life." He is a staunch opponent of abortion and since his conversion to Catholicism, also of the death penalty, except in rare cases. It is not surprising therefore that Brownback does not support embryonic stem cell research or cloning. All this while I had assumed that his opposition to both stemmed from his "culture of life" philosophy in which making and taking of lives should be left in the hands of the almighty. But now I find out that the senator is also worried about genetic research leading to the creation of human-animal hybrids. To thwart the sudden emergence of mythical creatures like centaurs and minotaurs in the midst of our otherwise peaceful world, Brownback has introduced a bill called the The Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act.

“This legislation works to ensure that our society recognizes the dignity and sacredness of human life,” said Brownback. “Creating human-animal hybrids, which permanently alter the genetic makeup of an organism, will challenge the very definition of what it means to be human and is a violation of human dignity and a grave injustice.”

The Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act would ban the creation of human-animal hybrids. Human-animal hybrids are defined as those part-human, part-animal creatures, which are created in laboratories, and blur the line between species. The bill is modest in scope and only affects efforts to blur the genetic lines between animals and humans. It does not preclude the use of animals or humans in legitimate research or health care where genetic material is not passed on to future generations, such as the use of a porcine heart valve in a human patient or the use of a lab rat with human diseases to develop treatments.

Brownback continued, “This legislation is both philosophical and practical as it has a direct bearing upon the very essence of what it means to be human, and it draws a bright line with respect to how far we can go in attempting to create new creatures made with genes from both humans and animals.

“My background is in agriculture, and for a number of years we have been working with crops and animals to produce a superior soy bean, a superior cow, and so-on. We can genetically engineer safe products and herds that are disease resistant or that possess more desirable attributes. But doing this in plants and livestock is very different than doing this in humans.

“The issue is that when you make changes in the germ-line, such changes are passed along to one’s offspring. You could make a change now that could be passed along through the gene-pool for the rest of humanity. We do not know what the full effect of this could be, and it could be disastrous.

“Tampering with the human germ-line could be the equivalent to setting a time-bomb that might detonate many generations down the line; but once it is set, there is no reversing course.

“I am optimistic that our nation we will make a sound choice for the generations to come. Already, in Louisiana last month, Governor Jindal signed legislation into law that would prohibit the creation of human-animal hybrids. That law is modeled after earlier versions of the legislation that we introduce today.”

All the co-sponsors of the bill are Republican senators (John McCain among them). What is Democrat Mary Landrieu doing here? Trying to outdo Governor Bobby Jindal in political grandstanding, I suppose. But don't they love mermaids in Louisiana?

Senator Jeff Sessions' Southern Discomfort

I happened to catch parts of Tuesday's Senate confirmation hearings for Judge Sonia Sotomayor. The most fascinating exchange of the day took place when Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) questioned the judge. Sessions, a southern right winger, whose own nomination to federal judgeship was blocked in 1986 partially because of his attitude towards racial issues,interrogated Sotomayor about her opinions on race and prejudice. The line of questioning was doggedly vicious, not uncommon for either political party when a candidate from the other side is up for confirmation. But in the case of Senator Sessions, he not only displayed remarkable mean spiritedness but he also inadvertently gave us a glimpse into the one track mind of a bigot who is not quite comfortable dealing with an accomplished woman of color. Of particular interest to Sessions was Sotomayor's statement regarding a "wise Latina woman." Here is an excerpt from the transcript of Tuesday's hearings:

SESSIONS: Welcome. It's good to have you back, Judge, and your family and friends and supporters. And I hope we'll have a good day today, look forward to dialogue with you. I got to say that I liked your statement on the fidelity of the law yesterday and some of your comments this morning.

And I also have to say had you been saying that with clarity over the last decade or 15 years, we'd have a lot fewer problems today because you have evidenced, I think it's quite clear, a philosophy of the law that suggests that the judge's background and experiences can and should -- even should and naturally will impact their decision what I think goes against the American ideal and oath that a judge takes to be fair to every party. And every day when they put on that robe, that is a symbol that they're to put aside their personal biases and prejudices.

So I'd like to ask you a few things about it. I would just note that it's not just one sentence, as my chairman suggested, that causes us difficulty. It's a body of thought over a period of years that causes us difficulties.
And I would suggest that the quotation he gave was not exactly right of the wise Latina comment that you made. You've said, I think six different times, quote, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion." So that's a matter that I think we'll talk about as we go forward."....

SESSIONS: I know one judge that says that if he has a feeling about a case, he tells his law clerks to, "Watch me. I do not want my biases, sympathies or prejudices to influence this decision, which I've taken an oath to make sure is impartial." I just am very concerned that what you're saying today is quite inconsistent with your statement that you willingly accept that your sympathies, opinions and prejudices may influence your decision-making.

So it went on and on about heritage (read "race and gender"), experience and resulting biases that supposedly taint judicial decisions. Later, second guessing Sotomayor's ruling about the New Haven firefighters case, Sessions said to Sotomayor: 

SESSIONS: Judge, there was a -- apparently, unease within your panel. I -- I was really disappointed. And I think a lot of people have been that the opinion was so short. It was pro curiam. It did not discuss the serious legal issues that the case raised. And I believe that's legitimate criticism of what you did.

But it appears, according to Stuart Taylor, a respected legal writer for the National Journal -- that Stuart Taylor concluded that -- that it appears that Judge Cabranes was concerned about the outcome of the case, was not aware of it because it was a pro curiam unpublished opinion. But it began to raise the question of whether a rehearing should be granted.

You say you're bound by the superior authority. But the fact is when the re -- the question of rehearing that 2nd Circuit authority that you say covered the case, some say it didn't cover so clearly -- but that was up for debate. And the circuit voted, and you voted not to reconsider the prior case. You voted to stay with the decision of the circuit.

And, in fact, your vote was the key vote. Had you voted with Judge Cabranes, himself of -- of -- of Puerto Rican ancestry -- had you voted with him, you -- you -- you could have changed that case.

Wait a minute! What was that about Judge Cabranes and his Puerto Rican ancestry?  After raking Sotomayor over the coals for her so-called biases, did Sessions suggest that she, a Puerto Rican by birth, would have done well to vote with a fellow Puerto Rican?  Perhaps Sessions was also chiding her for failing to keep her womanly foolishness in check by not following a man's example?

When at last can we hope to see the last of such lizard-brains like Senator Sessions, the likes of whom continue to contaminate all public discourse with their outmoded ideas and prejudices?

Lincoln out, Christianity In

Having failed in their attempt to inject religion into science education, Texas conservatives have shifted their attention to the state's elementary school social studies curriculum. According to some, school children need no longer learn about national figures such as George Washington and Abraham Licoln or Texas leaders like Stephen F. Austin.  Other public figures, Cesar Chavez and Thurgood Marshall for example, too could be excluded from the study material.  According to the right wingers, the former is an "unworthy role model" for young school children and the latter's life story and influence are deemed "inappropriate." Instead, they would like to emphasize the role of Christianity in founding America and formulating Texas history. I suppose if you can't indocrinate older children with faith based science, it is far simpler to catch them young by way of revisionist history.

AUSTIN — Biographies of Washington, Lincoln, Stephen F. Austin? Not fit reading material for children in the early grades.

Cesar Chavez? Not worthy of his role-model status.

Christianity? Emphasize its importance.

Such suggestions are part of efforts to rewrite history books for the state's schoolchildren, producing some expert recommendations that are sure to inflame Texans, no matter their political leanings.

The State Board of Education expects to start discussing new social studies curriculum standards this week, with members of the public getting their first opportunity to speak this fall and a final board vote next spring.

The process is a long one with lasting impact: reshaping the social studies curriculum, including history, for 4.7 million Texas public school children.

“This is something that every parent would want to be paying attention to. This will determine whether or not the kids get the education needed to succeed in college and jobs in the future,” said Dan Quinn of the Austin-based Texas Freedom Network. “If we are going to politicize our kids' education, that will put our kids behind other kids when they're competing for college and good-paying jobs on down the road.”

Curriculum standards are updated about every 10 years; the last social studies update came in 1997.

According to a preliminary draft of the new proposed standards, biographies of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Stephen F. Austin have been removed from the early grades, said Brooke Terry of the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

The early draft, which is likely to change multiple times in the coming months, also removes Independence Day, Veterans' Day, and anthems and mottos for both Texas and the United States in a section on holidays, customs and celebrations, she said.

Monday Mixer

Feeling too lazy to write at length on anything (an increasingly frequent occurrence of late). So here are a few links to stories that I heard, saw or read in passing over the last week.

No Smiley Faces On DMV Mugshots:

Few places in Virginia are as draining to the soul and as numbing to the buttocks as the branch offices of the Department of Motor Vehicles. And yet, until recently, smiling was still permitted there.

No more. As part of the DMV's effort to develop super-secure driver's licenses and foolproof identification cards, the agency has issued a smile ban, directing customers to adopt a "neutral expression" in their portraits, thereby extinguishing whatever happiness comes with finally hearing one's number called.

The driver's license photo, it seems, is destined to look like a mug shot.

DMV officials say the smile ban is for a good cause. The agency would like to develop a facial recognition system that could compare customers' photographs over time to prevent fraud and identity theft. "The technology works best when the images are similar," said DMV spokeswoman Pam Goheen. "To prepare for the possibility of future security enhancements, we're asking customers to maintain a neutral expression."

At a Manassas DMV branch yesterday, that translated to a simple directive: "Don't smile."

No Liberty For Democrats:

Liberty University has revoked its recognition of the campus Democratic Party club, saying “we are unable to lend support to a club whose parent organization stands against the moral principles held by” the university.

“It kind of happened out of nowhere,” said Brian Diaz, president of LU’s student Democratic Party organization, which LU formally recognized in October.

Diaz said he was notified of the school’s decision May 15 in an e-mail from Mark Hine, vice president of student affairs.

According to the e-mail, the club must stop using the university’s name, holding meetings on campus, or advertising events. Violators could incur one or more reprimands under the school’s Liberty Way conduct code, and anyone who accumulates 30 reprimands is subject to expulsion.

Hine said late Thursday that the university could not sanction an official club that supported Democratic candidates.

“We are in no way attempting to stifle free speech."

Mixed Race Americans - Fastest Growing Demographic Group

WASHINGTON — Multiracial Americans have become the fastest growing demographic group.

The number of multiracial people rose 3.4 percent last year to about 5.2 million, according to the latest census estimates.

First given the option in 2000, Americans who check more than one box for race on census surveys have jumped by 33 percent and now make up 5 percent of the minority population — with millions more believed to be uncounted.

Demographers attributed the recent population growth to more social acceptance and slowing immigration. They cited in particular the high public profiles of Tiger Woods and President Obama, a self-described "mutt," who are having an effect on those who might self-identify as multiracial.

Measured by percentages, Hawai'i ranked first with nearly 1 in 5 residents who were multiracial, followed by Alaska and Oklahoma, both at roughly 4 percent.

Population figures as of July 2008 show that California, Texas, New York and Florida had the most multiracial people, due partly to higher numbers of second- and later-generation immigrants who are more likely to "marry out."

Rick "Secessionist" Perry: "no" to stimulus money; "yes" to home improvement.

AUSTIN, Texas – While Gov. Rick Perry is criticizing Washington bailouts, state lawmakers are planning to use $11 million in federal stimulus money to help rebuild the badly burned Texas Governor's Mansion.

Approximately $10 million in state tax money will also be spent on a renovation, which is expected to cost about $20 million, officials said Thursday. A House-Senate committee agreed on the expenditures late Wednesday night.

The mansion was burned in an arson fire last summer.

Perry has railed against federal bailouts and what he called the free-spending, power-hungry ways of Washington. In January, he said Texas was endangered by Uncle Sam's "audacity."

Perry spokeswoman Allison Castle released a short, written statement late Thursday when asked about using stimulus money to renovate the mansion.

"We are continuing to work with lawmakers on the budget," she said.

The $11 million for renovations would come out of the $700 million rescue package for Texas, lawmakers said.

"If we're going to fix it up we're going to have to use stimulus money," said state Sen. Steve Ogden, R-Bryan. "We've made a decision to use the stimulus money. This is a good use of it."

The governor has been living in a three-story, limestone home with a heated pool, an outdoor cabana and a guest house.

The state is paying some $9,900-a-month in rent while the Governor's Mansion undergoes renovations, records show.

Smart and not-so-smart judges (Joe)

I don't doubt that some of the "Judge Sotomayor just isn't smart enough to be a justice" criticism is racially tinged. It's probably sexist, too. But I'm not writing to defend Sonia Sotomayor -- I'm writing to defend Clarence Thomas (who I am distinctly not a fan of).

Because, of course, on the left -- and in the rush to defend Sotomayor -- there is crap like this at the Huffington Post:

Speaking of Thomas, I find it interesting that Republicans talk a great game about picking only the best and ignoring racial considerations. Eighteen years ago, Thomas was considered by many to be a lightweight who only got in because Thurgood Marshall was leaving, and Republicans wanted credit for appointing an African American to replace him. They denied this, of course, and said Thomas would go on to greatness. Two decades later, we're still waiting for the guy to ask a question, author a memorable opinion, or be anything other than Antonin Scalia's sidekick.

First, point out that Justice Thomas was appointed because he's black, wrongly suggesting that this means he was appointed only because he's black, i.e. that his race was his sole qualification.

Second, mock his silence at oral arguments. I'm actually more concerned with judges -- especially judges with the tremendous resources that SCOTUS Justices have -- changing their minds based on which side has the more articulate litigator at oral arguments, but that's just me. In any event, no one has ever suggested a plausible theory on how Thomas's lack of questions at oral arguments is meaningfully probative of his intelligence, and I'd be surprised by a compelling argument in favor of it revealing anything about his quality as a judge. Cubias (the HuffPo author) certainly doesn't give us anything along those lines here. Just point it out condescendingly, hope the reader understands the meaning.

Third, well, obviously he must be Nino's stupid sidekick. They're both conservative after all, but Scalia was there first and he's snarky at oral arguments and has written lots of sarcastic and angry dissents in which he is lauded for his style (by lawyers who are terrible writers and have probably never read a word of Atwood or Conrad) for his overuse of italics to emphasize lots of phrases. Scalia is just so damn glib! Plus Scalia's the white one. Ignore all those times where Thomas has disagreed with Scalia. Ignore all those times where Thomas has gotten it substantially more right than Scalia. From what I've seen, Thomas is actually more consistent, which means that he's also more intellectually honest on the bench, if you care about those things. I'd also note here that with respect to this nonsense about "memorable opinions," this disparity isn't really there from a lawyer's perspective, and from a non-lawyer's perspective no one on the current Court wrote Roe, Brown, or Miranda (Kennedy did give us Lawrence, but his talent for getting the juicy opinions lies more with his supermedian-justice status).

Fourth? Okay, Cubias only did one through three. But I want to put as four here, "Look like a racist." This is really a cumulative thing: 1 + 2 + 3 = 4. This line of attack on Justice Thomas is a fiction designed to discredit or trivialize him, and I'm sick of seeing it.

It would be nice, as liberals seek to defend Sonia Sotomayor from unfounded attacks, if they wouldn't rehash the unfounded, racist attacks on Clarence Thomas.

Maria, I'll never stop saying Maria!

No, this is not a trip down the memory lane to West Side Story but an instance of another irate Republican putting his foot in the mouth regarding Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's pick for the US Supreme Court. Mike Huckabee, one of the GOP presidential contenders of 2008, railed that Maria Sotomayor, coming from the "far left" would turn the Supreme Court into a version of the "Extreme Court." Huckabee called the judge "Maria" - her name is Sonia. What was he thinking?  Was he merely inattentive to the news reports about Sotomayor or does he think that all Hispanic women are named Maria? (What happened to Lupe, Juanita, Teresa or even J. Lo?) 

Huckabee is not alone in making a fool of himself over Sotomayor's nomination. With future elections weighing on their minds most Republican senators are being cautiously cryptic about their opinion of Sotomayor lest they offend Hispanic voters with their rude and injudicious comments. But right wing commentators, erstwhile leaders of the Republican Party and some GOP House members are shooting their mouths off with abandon, calling Sotomayor a racist, ultra leftist activist and intellectual light weight. And all this from some who wanted Harriet Miers, a tsunami force of legal scholarship, on the Supreme Court and some others who broke US laws by writing illegal torture memos.

The story of the life of Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s first nominee to the Supreme Court, reads much like his own. Judge Sotomayor grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx, her father passed away when she was nine, and her mother raised her while working as a nurse.

She was valedictorian of her high school class, and won a scholarship to Princeton where she graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. From there she went to Yale Law School and was editor of the Yale Law Review.

Since then she has been an Assistant District Attorney, a corporate litigator, a District Court judge, and in 1998 was nominated by President Clinton to her current position on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Sounds like the American dream and a person eminently qualified to sit on the highest court in the land, right? Not so says the vocal Republican opposition.

GOP leader Rush Limbaughcalled Judge Sotomayor a “horrible pick,” the “antithesis of a judge,” a “hack,” a “racist,” an “extreme left-wing radical,” an “anti-Constitutionalist” and said that she would be “a disaster on the Court.”

Karl Rove said Judge Sotomayor lacked “intellectual power.”

Senator James Inhofesaid he is concerned that Judge Sotomayor might be unduly influenced by “her own personal race, gender, or political preferences.” I wonder if Sen. Inhofe had those same concerns about Samuel Alito and John Roberts? Probably not.

Former Arkansas Governor and Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee said “Sotomayor comes from the far left and will likely leave us with something akin to the Extreme Court that could mark a major shift.” That was after he finally got her name right.

Pat Buchanan said, "She is not that intelligent."

Former Congressman Tom Tancredo agreed with Chairman Limbaugh, “I'm telling you, she appears to be a racist. She said things that are racist in any other context.”

But the piece de resistance comes from John Yoo, yes THAT John Yoo, who questioned Judge Sotomayor’s “excellence” and “intellect.” For that statement Mr. Yoo is the unanimous winner of the Brass ‘You Know What’ Award for 2009.

Meanwhile a friend forwarded me a list of Judge Sotomayor's more notable professional credentials:

"Be Prepared"

The unsettling events of the past decade - eight years of Bush-Cheney's reign of terror, 9/ 11, an economy in the doldrums, two wars dragging on for years and now a black president in the White House, have some Americans feeling particularly paranoid. Hate groups are quietly increasing their ranks and recruitment efforts, anti-immigration fervor is high, guns and ammo sales have spiked and the Explorer program of the Boy Scouts of America is training teenagers to fight terrorism and illegal immigration.

Although Sir Baden-Powell, the founder of the Boy Scouts movement in America was a passionate pro-military patriot and scouting does have an element of quasi-military regimentation (duty, obedience, honor, patriotism etc), for the most part youngsters in the program are taught values like discipline, teamwork, responsibility and self-reliance. We don't expect scouts to be well armed and combat trained. But apparently, some adults feel that a scout's training should not be limited just to learning  rope knots, lighting campfires, pitching tents and earning merit badges through community service.

IMPERIAL, Calif. — Ten minutes into arrant mayhem in this town near the Mexican border, and the gunman, a disgruntled Iraq war veteran, has already taken out two people, one slumped in his desk, the other covered in blood on the floor.

The responding officers — eight teenage boys and girls, the youngest 14 — face tripwire, a thin cloud of poisonous gas and loud shots — BAM! BAM! — fired from behind a flimsy wall. They move quickly, pellet guns drawn and masks affixed.

“United States Border Patrol! Put your hands up!” screams one in a voice cracking with adolescent determination as the suspect is subdued.

It is all quite a step up from the square knot.

The Explorers program, a coeducational affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America that began 60 years ago, is training thousands of young people in skills used to confront terrorism, illegal immigration and escalating border violence — an intense ratcheting up of one of the group’s longtime missions to prepare youths for more traditional jobs as police officers and firefighters.

“This is about being a true-blooded American guy and girl,” said A. J. Lowenthal, a sheriff’s deputy here in Imperial County, whose life clock, he says, is set around the Explorers events he helps run. “It fits right in with the honor and bravery of the Boy Scouts.”

The training, which leaders say is not intended to be applied outside the simulated Explorer setting, can involve chasing down illegal border crossers as well as more dangerous situations that include facing down terrorists and taking out “active shooters,” like those who bring gunfire and death to college campuses. In a simulation here of a raid on a marijuana field, several Explorers were instructed on how to quiet an obstreperous lookout.

“Put him on his face and put a knee in his back,” a Border Patrol agent explained. “I guarantee that he’ll shut up.”

No matter what the Explorer leaders say about the training being confined to simulated settings, we know that children like to show off their skills to impress others, especially the ones they also enjoy practising. Filled with patriotic zeal and paranoia, some may begin to nurture adventurous fantasies.

Cathy Noriego, also 16, said she was attracted by the guns. The group uses compressed-air guns — known as airsoft guns, which fire tiny plastic pellets — in the training exercises, and sometimes they shoot real guns on a closed range.

“I like shooting them,” Cathy said. “I like the sound they make. It gets me excited.”

What is to prevent Cathy or another Explorer from deciding that the man mowing the lawn next door is an illegal immigrant or the gas station attendant looks like a terrorist and taking matters in his/ her own hands with the hope of becoming the neighborhood hero?  In any case, how is this a good idea, pumping unnecessary fear into young minds and teaching them to take lethal action? We point fingers at fundamentalist Islamic nations for fueling jihadist fires. We claim that the ill education offered by the madrassas is early training for terrorism later in life. What are we then doing through such stupid drills under the aegis of a respectable youth organization like the Boy Scouts? Creating future xenophobic, trigger-happy goons? How can we go about "civilizing" the rest of the world when our elected leaders attack other countries without provocation like the old Soviet Union and torture  prisoners like middle eastern theocracies and third world dicatorships? How safe can we become by ridding ourselves of decency and common sense? Should we now also go down the same road as the Congo, Burundi, Liberia, Sierra Leone and train child soldiers?  How safe will that make us?  And how civilized?

"Be Prepared" is the motto of the Boy Scouts. "For what?"  Baden-Powell was often asked. "Why, for any old thing," he's supposed to have answered. Any old thing, indeed. At this rate of fear mongering, that may no longer include helping little old ladies waiting to cross the street!

The Chicken Hawk Approach To Torture

The loudest support for the unjust Iraq war came from right wing draft dodgers and armchair warriors. Now that Bush-Cheney's torture memos are under scrutiny, some supporters of illegal methods of interrogation are declaring that the decision to define the nature and the morality of torture should be left to non-combatant bureaucrats and not those who have faced the ordeal themselves. Boggles the rational mind but here is a conversation between a couple of commentators on Fox News radio:

ANDREW NAPOLITANO (co-host): You may not know the name unless you live in California. Jay Bybee was a professional researcher for the Justice Department when he authored the principal of -- the main one -- of the torture memos.

President Bush awarded him by appointing him to the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. That's the level of appellate court just below the Supreme Court. He was appointed to the 9th Circuit, which covers the western third of the United States.

There's a lot of pressure on Jay Bybee -- on Judge Bybee, now, because these memoranda, which obviously were not known about under -- during the time of his confirmation came -- came out.

Here's what John McCain had to say about it yesterday.

JOHN McCAIN [audio clip]: A resignation would be a decision he would have to make on his own, but he falls into the same category as everybody else as far as giving very bad advice and misinterpreting fundamentally what the United States is all about, much less things like the Geneva Conventions.

Plus, under President Reagan, we signed a agreement against torture. We're in violation of that.

BRIAN KILMEADE (co-host): Oh, come on. Number one, we all know John McCain is not a lawyer; this guy is. Number two, Judge, you knew at that time, this is --

NAPOLITANO: This is your guy, John McCain.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, now. Come on.

KILMEADE: No, he's not my guy. I like John McCain. I respect him. But there's a lot of issues I don't understand. Plus, he should not be allowed to talk on torture because he is clearly somebody who went through unspeakable pain and punishment --

NAPOLITANO: You mean, he shouldn't be allowed to talk -- he has an opinion like everybody else. He represents the state of Arizona.

KILMEADE: But he was tortured. He was tortured. And --

NAPOLITANO: Therefore, his views on torture are --

KILMEADE: -- are skewed.

NAPOLITANO: -- irrelevant because of what happened --

KILMEADE: -- are skewed.

NAPOLITANO: -- in 'nam? I think his views are particularly telling because he's been through this kind of thing.

KILMEADE: But what do you think he's going to be -- pro-torture --

NAPOLITANO: No.

KILMEADE: -- after he's been through it?

NAPOLITANO: Of course, he's not going to be pro-torture.

KILMEADE: And plus, I don't think this is torture. And they don't subscribe to the Geneva Conventions. We had this debate in 2002. You were on our set -- you were on constantly saying, "Look, they don't -- right -- the way the courts look at it right now, they do not fall under the Geneva Conventions." And that was what they were going under.

NAPOLITANO: I never said they didn't fall under the Geneva Conventions.

This Should Be Fun!

Can't wait to see this happen. But given the physical and moral cowardice of right wing blowhards, it probably won't.

Texas Tea Party

Texas governor Rick "Good Hair" Perry's latest political stunt. 

Sexualizing Fast Food

I have never been impressed by overly sensual/ carnal language applied to food.  I know, I know, sex too is a natural appetite and lust and gluttony can describe urges both above and below the belt. But for some reason, calling a piece of chocolate cake "sinfully delicious" doesn't make me want to eat it more. So it was not a surprise that I found the following article about marketing a burger with overt sexual imagery quite annoying.

When I watch the Carl's Jr. commercial featuring "Top Chef" host and mega-model Padma Lakshmi make hot sweet love to a Western Bacon Cheeseburger, I have many thoughts, some of which, I confess, are not entirely to my credit. The spot features the former Mrs. Salman Rushdie sitting on a brownstone stoop in a clingy sundress hiked up mid-thigh, cramming the giant burger into her educated maw and sucking barbecue sauce from her fingers and wrists. Let's not mince onions here: This is sex with a burger.

You might think that here, at last, television advertising might have crossed some sort of debauched Rubicon, or at least some tripwire at the Federal Communications Commission. Not even close. It's merely the latest chapter in the weird mash-up between sex and diabolically unhealthful fast food.

What gives?

Go ahead and read the whole unappetizing story and take a good look at the model, Padma Lakshmi aka  ex-Mrs. Salman Rushdie #4.  The only sentence you need to pay attention to is the one at the very end.

And so you have the impossibly lean and beautiful Lakshmi wolfing down a 1,000-calorie burger. Now that's hard to swallow.

Call Me "Betty Brown"

A Texas legislator has suggested that Asian Americans should consider changing their given names and adopt something simpler "that’s easier for Americans to deal with.” I understand that foreign names can be a mouthful and a bit confusing across language barriers. Have some Asians themselves confused things further by adopting "American" names for daily usage while keeping their "official" names on some documents?  In any case who says that a citizen has any obligation to make things "easier" for politicians and bureaucrats? (link: Sanjukta)

AUSTIN — A North Texas legislator during House testimony on voter identification legislation said Asian-descent voters should adopt names that are “easier for Americans to deal with.”

The comments caused the Texas Democratic Party on Wednesday to demand an apology from state Rep. Betty Brown, R-Terrell. But a spokesman for Brown said her comments were only an attempt to overcome problems with identifying Asian names for voting purposes. The exchange occurred late Tuesday as the House Elections Committee heard testimony from Ramey Ko, a representative of the Organization of Chinese Americans.

Ko told the committee that people of Chinese, Japanese and Korean descent often have problems voting and other forms of identification because they may have a legal transliterated name and then a common English name that is used on their driver’s license on school registrations.

Easier for voting?

Brown suggested that Asian-Americans should find a way to make their names more accessible.

“Rather than everyone here having to learn Chinese — I understand it’s a rather difficult language — do you think that it would behoove you and your citizens to adopt a name that we could deal with more readily here?” Brown said.

Brown later told Ko: “Can’t you see that this is something that would make it a lot easier for you and the people who are poll workers if you could adopt a name just for identification purposes that’s easier for Americans to deal with?” (emphasis mine)

Democratic Chairman Boyd Richie said Republicans are trying to suppress votes with a partisan identification bill and said Brown “is adding insult to injury with her disrespectful comments.”

Brown spokesman Jordan Berry said Brown was not making a racially motivated comment but was trying to resolve an identification problem.

Berry said Democrats are trying to blow Brown’s comments out of proportion because polls show most voters support requiring identification for voting. Berry said the Democrats are using racial rhetoric to inflame partisan feelings against the bill.

“They want this to just be about race,” Berry said.

Brown has since then issued an apology for making the remarks.

Boneheads

George W. Bush's aristocratic family boasted several dedicated Yalies, many of whom were members of Yale University's ultra secret Skull and Bones Society, home to a number of movers and shakers of America's establishment ruling class. A decades old adventure of one Bonesman Bush is now the basis for a modern day lawsuit. George Bush's grandfather Prescott Bush is said to have robbed the grave of the famous Apache leader Geronimo, for his "skull and bones" as a treasured prize for the  eponymous secretive fraternity. It is tempting to speculate that the same arrogance that plagued the grave-robbing Bush ancestor, may have manifested itself as an atavistic trait in his frat boy grandson whose monumental prank as president nearly turned the nation of Iraq into a graveyard. Geronimo  the warrior, who spent his life fighting against occupiers, can't even turn over in his own grave.  

They claim his body was taken by members of Skull and Bones, a secret student society, and are hidden at Yale University.

George W Bush's grandfather and two other members of the group are said to have taken the remains of the Apache warrior Geronimo during the First World War.

However, the society's repeated refusal to comment on the story, or on rumours that new members have to kiss the chief's skull, have prompted the extraordinary lawsuit.

In a court action that names not only Yale and the society, but also Barack Obama and Robert Gates, his defence secretary, 20 descendants of the famous American Indian leader are seeking to recover his remains so his spirit can be laid to rest in his tribal homeland.

Their legal action, filed this week in a federal-district court in Washington DC on the 100th anniversary of his death, will seek to determine the truth of rumours that Geronimo's burial at Fort Sill in Oklahoma was not his final resting place.

Three Bonesmen, including Prescott Bush, served at Fort Sill during the First World War.

The trio were rumoured to have dug up Geronimo's remains in 1918 and took some of them back to Yale where they are supposedly still kept in the society's hall – known as the "Tomb" – on the university campus.

The Skull and Bones, whose illustrious membership has numbered three US presidents including both Bushes, supposedly makes new members kiss the Chiricahua Apache's skull.

Then there is Rick Santorum, the former senator from Pennsylvania whose right wing blather no longer reverberates on the senate floor but is unfortunately still to be heard on the speaking circuit where he continues to spread fear and misinformation about war and peace. On a recent tour of college campuses to "present his idea that Americans do not truly understand why the United States is at war," Santorum tried to explain the conflict in the middle east to students at the University of Nebraska. Mixing politics and religion to make his case, the senator proved that he is ignorant on both fronts.

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum visited the auditorium of the Nebraska Union on Tuesday to present his idea that Americans do not truly understand why the United States is at war.

Santorum is passing through the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as a part of his college campus tour on which he describes to students what he believes are the dangers in not knowing what is going on in the Middle East.

“I talk to college students because I can have an intellectual conversation, and they usually don’t agree with me,” Santorum said. “I like to state my case (to students) and let them decide who to believe.”

Santorum was a member of the United States Senate from 1994-2007. He believes that the Bush administration made a huge mistake in not informing Americans exactly what’s happening with the wars and who America is fighting. He said the Obama administration is making the same mistake.

“America has little information and Bush went out of his way to mystify who the enemy really is,” Santorum said. “Is that true, are we really fighting ‘terrorists?’”

Santorum also gave the audience a lecture on Islam. When he asked the audience who knew the difference between the Sunnis and the Shi’ites, three audience members raised their hands. Santorum said this proved his point – America has been at war with Islam for seven years and doesn’t know the two branches.

Santorum said he supported the war when it was unpopular because he thinks not fighting could destroy western civilization. He said he believes that Muslims are America’s enemy because they read their religion literally and apply it to real life, instead of in historical context.

The lecture continued when Santorum pointed out what he thought were the main differences between Christians and Muslims. Santorum said Christians, who believe in Jesus Christ, never governed or conquered anyone, but Mohammed was a warrior and killed people.

Santorum said he believes Muslims’ religious views cannot be changed or altered, so Middle Easterners reject American, democratic ideals.

“A democracy could not exist because Mohammed already made the perfect law,” Santorum said. “The Quran is perfect just the way it is, that’s why it is only written in Islamic.” (emphasis mine)

Someone needs to inform the senator that the Quran is NOT written in Islamic. Just as the New Testament is not written in the Christian language, the Torah in Jewish, the Gita in Hindu ... nor by the way, the US Constitution in American. And also, Santorum conveniently forgot Christianity's messy Crusades, Inquistion and colonialism.  

Belief in evolution can turn you into a serial killer!

Astounding? No, not according to some anti-evolution, Intelligent Design proponents like Kelly J. Coghlan whose op-ed piece appeared in Houston Chronicle's opinion page last Sunday.

Jeffrey Dahmer, America’s most infamous serial killer who cannibalized 17 boys before capture, gave a final interview to Dateline NBC before his death and explained: “If a person doesn’t think that there is a God to be accountable to, then what’s the point of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within acceptable ranges? That’s how I thought anyway. I always believed the theory of evolution as truth, that we all just came from the slime. When we died, you know, that was it, there was nothing….”

Wow! Jeffrey Dahmer as the expert against Charles Darwin! I am confused as to why the religious right is so focused on the theory of evolution. Is it because scientists are still debating certain aspects of it that the obscurantists feel emboldened to enter the forum with their own fond views of things? Coghlan, generously cedes ground on micro-evolution but goes ballistic when it comes to the macro part. His outburst is in response to the Texas state board of education at last becoming bold enough  to unshackle itself from religious bullies and leaning toward eliminating the "strength and weakness" approach to the teaching of evolution - the Trojan Horse of the Intelligent Designers.

In describing evolution, there are two distinct categories: Micro-evolution and Macro-evolution. Micro-evolution is defined as small changes within the same species such as bacteria becoming resistant to drugs, birds’ beaks changing size and moths changing color. It makes perfect sense that a good designer would design each creature with built-in abilities to adapt to survive. I suspect we are all micro-evolutionists. The debate before the Board is not over micro-evolution.

Macro-evolution, on the other hand, is one species becoming an entirely different species such as a fly becoming a mosquito. Science has never observed macro-evolution; neither has science observed life arising from non-living matter. The debate before the Board is whether macro-evolution and life origin should be taught without “weaknesses.” The answer is no.

The validity of  scientific theories and evidence comes to naught for the believers unless they can relate it to their deistic view of the natural world. But where is the room for conflict in their minds? I don't see it. If after all, one believes in a supreme creator / god, then everything is his /her will. Where is the problem? Why don't they just think of scientists as diligently engaged in deconstructing god's design and treat the science class room as an extension of a theology seminar?  Just leave the rest of us in peace. Problem solved. But since the obscurantists don't seem to have many quibbles with most other scientific theories that explain natural phenomena, one has to wonder about their obsession with the theory of evolution.  Could it be that it has little to do with god but everything to do with ego and their own sense of exceptionalism?  Perhaps not even the man-monkey link bothers them as much as black-white-brown equality of man does? Take a look at this news story about a right wing political cartoon and decide.   

The Villain and the Wannabes

The rudderless and demoralized GOP is thrashing around helplessly, searching for the coherent and authoritative voice of a national spokesperson. So far three hefty bald men have obliged. Two are unelected motor mouths and another has been out of power for mere two weeks and cannot keep his mouth shut.  Worrisome though it may be for Republican office holders, I am deriving some vindictive pleasure in seeing them hoisted by their own petard of arrogance and ignorance.

Rush Limbaugh, the "radio personality" of immense disrepute, has emerged as the clear leader of the right wing. Barack Obama made the mistake of acknowledging that fact. He should have given Limbaugh the cold shoulder instead. Among the long list of idiotic things that Limbaugh has said over the years, he recently added another gem when he made public his hope for Obama to fail as president. Many prominent Republicans came forward to hastily deny and denounce the rash pronouncement. Limbaugh is of course known goods. He has been holding court for more than twenty years and has a considerable fan following. He is doing what he has to do to satisfy his ardent flock and to earn his mega millions. It is the members of the Republican establishment, including George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, who have flattered and feted him over the years and must now put up with his loose lips. Bush even threw a surprise birthday party at the White House for Limbaugh a few days before leaving town last month. The radio host crowed about the honor on his show. So, may be Limbaugh is a bit miffed that he won't be setting foot inside that mansion for parties and sleep overs in at least the next four or possibly eight years.

Less clear is the case of Joe Wurzelbacher aka Joe the Plumber, who first emerged as the right wing's favorite poster child during the second McCain-Obama debate. Since then Wurzelbacher has been seen at various right wing national events, even doing a dint as a foreign correspondent during the Israel-Gaza conflict for a conservative website. Now the news blog Politico.com reports that Wurzelbacher attended a closed door strategy meeting of aides to Republican lawmakers to offer his opinions on Barack Obama's economic stimulus proposal. How pathetically lacking in leadership is the GOP and how dim is its political future that Joe the Plumber, whose fifteen minutes of fame should have been long over, is on its economic advisory team?

Call it a pipe dream come true: When members of the Conservative Working Group held their weekly strategy meeting on the Hill on Tuesday morning, they were joined by none other than Joe “the Plumber” Wurzelbacher, who had come to offer his thoughts on the economic recovery bill.

The Senate staffers who showed up at 9 a.m. for the closed-door meeting refused to leak the contents of their discussion with the tradesman-cum-strategist, but Wurzelbacher himself revealed that the advice they soaked up was just good, old-fashioned “common sense.”

Wurzelbacher opposes the stimulus and said he questioned why the government can’t just cut its bills like other people do. He also advised staffers to take a harder line on the legislation: “Republicans on the Hill are afraid of saying too much,” he noted.

Further recommendations from the Karl Rove of the Commode included having “someone go in there and kick some ass.”

One voice that the Republicans probably wish wouldn't be heard but is now booming again, is that of former vice president Dick Cheney, who along with his juvenile boss, can claim the lion's share of the blame for leaving the GOP's future and its reputation in tatters. But unlike Bush, Cheney hasn't left town (the Cheneys have bought a home in Maryland) and if Wednesday's unexpected outburst is any indication, he doesn't plan to fade into the political sunset any time soon. In an interview with Politico.com he lambasted the Obama administration for its plan to close down the Guantanamo Bay prison and for wanting to reverse some of Bush-Cheney's secretive, draconian and often illegal national security measures. The villainous and self righteous Cheney questioned Obama's intelligence and his understanding of national and global issues. And then, as befits his vengeful personality, he predicted that the new president will make "catastrophic" terrorist attacks on America possible by his misguided policies. Rush Limbaugh only hopes that Obama will fail. After merely two weeks of the new president taking office, Cheney has already declared him a failure.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney warned that there is a “high probability” that terrorists will attempt a catastrophic nuclear or biological attack in coming years, and said he fears the Obama administration’s policies will make it more likely the attempt will succeed. 

In an interview Tuesday with Politico, Cheney unyieldingly defended the Bush administration’s support for the Guantanamo Bay prison and coercive interrogation of terrorism suspects. 

And he asserted that President Obama will either backtrack on his stated intentions to end those policies or put the country at risk in ways more severe than most Americans — and, he charged, many members of Obama’s own team — understand. 

“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry,” Cheney said. 

Protecting the country’s security is “a tough, mean, dirty, nasty business,” he said. “These are evil people. And we’re not going to win this fight by turning the other cheek.” ....

In the interview, Cheney revealed no doubts about his own course — and many about the new administration’s. 

“If it hadn’t been for what we did — with respect to the terrorist surveillance program, or enhanced interrogation techniques for high-value detainees, the Patriot Act, and so forth — then we would have been attacked again,” he said. “Those policies we put in place, in my opinion, were absolutely crucial to getting us through the last seven-plus years without a major-casualty attack on the U.S.” 

       

Houstonians Fire Back

Sane and sober minds have reacted with alarm and scorn to the recent harebrained proposal put forward by the Texas legislature to permit hand guns on college and university campuses. In letters to the editor of the Houston Chronicle, a parent, a prospective student and a professor let their views known.

Professor’s plan

As a professor at the University of Houston, I would heartily endorse a bill of the Texas Legislature allowing students to carry pistols into class. I would amend my course syllabus to provide on the first day for both an introduction to the course and a lesson in shooting. If my students were to encounter a dangerous person charging into the classroom — a terrorist, bigamist, extortionist or plagiarist — I would have them form a circle around the miscreant, pull out their pistols, and shoot him. The only problem I foresee is that some of my students might be “C” or “D” students, and they would possibly miss the intended criminal, shooting, instead, their classmates across from them.

This, would, however, be classified as collateral damage, and my students would not be charged with a crime for the death of their classmates.

As an amendment to the bill, I would have the Legislature authorize the installation of artillery cannon at strategic sites on campus. These cannon would enable us to respond to mortar shells being shot into the campus from downtown Houston or other hostile venues. To ensure the accuracy of the artillery, I would ask the computer science department to provide a course of instruction for students in the newly designed GPS/INS (fire-and-forget global positioning systems and internal navigation systems) utilizing military satellites. No prerequisites for this course would be required. The ability to read and forget is an inborn trait.

Irving N. Rothman,

professor of English, University of Houston

"These people are idiots"

And they are evil.  Sen Claire McCaskill (D-MO) said angrily on the senate floor what most Americans are thinking. 

We have a bunch of idiots on Wall Street that are kicking sand in the face of the American taxpayer. They don't get it. These people are idiots. You can't use taxpayer money to pay out $18 billion in bonuses. They owe us some common sense.

But common sense is what the "idiots" don't have - it has been so long since they had to call upon that quality. Following one disaster after another that have rocked the foundations of the American financial sector,the fat cat bankers and financiers came hat in hand, begging for bailouts with public funds. Despite the government pulling their chestnuts out of the fire that the sleaze balls had themselves started, no lesson in shame and humility has been learnt. The financial institutions were bailed out, we were told, so that they can start lending money again to consumers and businesses. But the vultures and jackals of Wall Street still don't understand. Instead of injecting money into the faltering economy, they have been again caught lining their own already bursting pockets. What's the difference between merit pay and scavenging? Don't ask the greedy bastards who paid themselves fat bonuses, took expensive hunting trips and spa vacations, renovated  offices (and bathrooms) in lavish styles befitting a Saudi monarch, shopped around for a $50 million luxury jet  and who knows what else. And they have the chutzpah to continue being stingy when it comes to issuing loans because they want to "invest" their (ours, really) money for maximum growth.

When asked about the unseemly bonuses, Merril Lynch's clueless ex-CEO John Thain said, “You have to believe there’s value in the franchise. If you don’t pay your best people, you will destroy your franchise." Really? Where will those "best people" go if one takes away their ill begotten goodies?  Can they teach school? Can they make anything from scratch? Can they flip hamburgers according to simple specifications barked through the drive-through window? Can they dig ditches? What exactly are they good for except to filch other people's money and make bad decisions based on greed?  Let loose these wonder boys (yes, they are mostly men) of the cloistered and incestuous world of finance into the real world and let's find out how they survive without the crutch of easy money.

Another glib explanation for where the bonuses came from when bankruptcy was looming large, is that they came not from the government bailout funds, but from a "separate pool." What? Do they really think we are buying that  ludicrous baloney -  as ludicrous as claiming that they only peed in a "separate section" of the swimming pool?

  (cartoon by David Horsey)

Update: Maureen Dowd too is fuming about the same idiots.

Readin', Writin' & Packin' Heat

After twenty long years, the Texas legislature's number one obsession, dismantling the teaching of evolution in science classes (see here and here), has recently run into problems.  So members of the reactionary right in that august body have turned their attention to improving another tool of higher education - gun rights. Conservative lawmakers of my state, with the support of our moronic governor, Rick "Good Hair" Perry, are writing legislation that will loosen restrictions on the state's gun laws. Texas already allows licensed gun owners to carry concealed weapons. Now the same gun owners may be able to brandish them in public. The "wild west" proposition will also make it legal to carry guns on university campuses. Not surprisingly, sane and sober people are alarmed.  

AUSTIN — Michael Guzman, a 25-year-old Texas State University senior and Marine veteran, takes his Kimber Ultra Carry II handgun just about everywhere he goes. Except to school.

Texas lawmakers, how­ever, are crafting ways to allow licensed handgun owners to tote their guns more easily. One proposal would let guns be carried on campuses, and another would allow licensed handgun owners to openly brandish their guns in public. Together, the two issues are likely to be the most contentious gun-related laws of the session.

State Sen. Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio, is preparing the campus concealed-carry gun measure. He calls it a “safety protection bill” for students and faculty.

“I don’t want to wake up one morning and hear on the news that some madman went on a Texas campus and picked off Texas students like sitting ducks,” Wentworth said. “I’m doing what I can to prevent that from happening in Texas.”...

Gov. Rick Perry is among those supporting the notion of letting adult students bring handguns on campus if they are licensed to carry them. The issue has been met with opposition from gun-control advocates, university officials, campus law enforcement and some lawmakers.

Earlier this week, the University of Texas at Austin’s student government overwhelmingly passed a resolution supporting their campus gun ban and calling on “elected officials in Texas to oppose attempts to eliminate campus weapons bans.”

“I don’t want to return to a 19th-century Wild West urban atmosphere for Texas,” said state Rep. Lon Burnam, D-Fort Worth. “I oppose both concealed-carry on campus and open-carry, but psychologically open-carry is the worst by far because of the implications it has when you’re walking down the street.”

Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, said he has not seen the bills but would not be inclined to support guns on campuses. “I think it’s an issue of safety,” he said. “Will that improve or diminish the safety of students? My gut instinct is most members would say it actually diminishes the safety of faculty and staff. … They didn’t pass it before, and they don’t have as good a chance for passing it now.”

Why stop at arming only the universities? After all, there have been more lethal shoot outs in American high schools than on college campuses. Why not also allow guns in high schools? Oops, I forgot. Some tough Texans already did that!

A Food Review (Sujatha)

so bad, that it's good!

"Look at this Richard. Just look at it: [see image 1, above].

I imagine the same questions are racing through your brilliant mind as were racing through mine on that fateful day. What is this? Why have I been given it? What have I done to deserve this? And, which one is the starter, which one is the desert?

You don’t get to a position like yours Richard with anything less than a generous sprinkling of observational power so I KNOW you will have spotted the tomato next to the two yellow shafts of sponge on the left. Yes, it’s next to the sponge shaft without the green paste. That’s got to be the clue hasn’t it. No sane person would serve a desert with a tomato would they. Well answer me this Richard, what sort of animal would serve a desert with peas in:"

The apoplectic passenger who composed the above is the next James Beard awardee for food writing, for sure.

Shoemanship - bringing down the curtain on a reign of (t)error

Denied respect and attention at home, George W. Bush recently made an unannounced visit to Iraq, hoping I am sure, to perform a victory lap of sorts in the last few remaining days in office. What greeted him there was not the confetti of a ticker tape parade, but two flying shoes aimed at his head by Iraqi journalist, Muntazer al-Zaidi who called Bush a "dog" and described the projectiles as "gifts" from Iraqi widows and orphans. Acquainted as I am with a national culture of shoe throwing, let me tell you that the contempt expressed by the gesture is far greater than a pie in the face or being pelted by rotten tomatoes and eggs. I experienced conflicting emotions while watching the video (see here). Despite my nearly eight years of uninterrupted anger at Bush-Cheney, I flinched a bit at the spectacle and the blunt message of condemnation. I also felt a grudging admiration for Bush's athletic reflex in dodging the speeding footwear and at the same time wondered about the lack of agility of the Secret Service men who allowed the second shoe to fly (Iraqi president Maliki reached out to deflect the missile but missed). However, I was not at all surprised by Bush's clueless and  unrepentant response to ABC's Martha Raddatz with whom he spoke about the incident. Bush thinks that the insulting message was interesting and the Iraqis and the Iraqi press, not he, were humiliated by the action of the irate journalist who merely wanted to get on TV! Or perhaps Bush took it all in stride, smug as he is in the knowledge that truckloads of shoes thrown at him cannot match the injury and insult he has inflicted on Iraq. Read the whole interview for Bush's thoughts on the Iraq war / Al Qaida. He leaves no doubt that his presidential philosophy has been one of lies, alibis and defiance and his governing style, that of ducking and weaving.

Martha Raddatz: Let's start with what just happened. And that is someone threw a shoe at you, whether it's an Iraqi reporter?

President Bush:Yeah, I think it's a reporter. At least that's what they told me on the way out, that it's a person who works in the Iraqi press, stands up and throws his shoe. And it was amusing. I mean, I've seen a lot of weird things during my presidency and this may rank up there as one of the weirdest. On the other hand, I do remember when the president of China came to the South Lawn, and a member of the press corps started yelling. I think it was Falun Gong slogans at the Chinese president. So this happens and it's a sign of a free society.

Raddatz: It's also considered a huge insult in this world, the sole of a shoe, throwing a shoe.

Bush: I guess. Look they were humiliated. The press corps, the rest of the Iraqi press corps was humiliated. These guys were just besides themselves about, they felt like he had disgraced their entire press corps and I frankly, I didn't view it as, I thought it was interesting, I thought it was unusual to have a guy throw his shoe at you. But I'm not insulted. I don't hold it against the government. I don't think the Iraqi press corps as a whole is terrible. And so, the guy wanted to get on TV and he did. I don't know what his beef is. But whatever it is I'm sure somebody will hear it.

The media and blogs are abuzz with the story - numerous variations of "the other shoe dropping" are making the rounds. In my opinion, the other shoe dropped long ago - with revelations about missing WMDs, Abu Ghraib, rendition of prisoners for torture, corruption in the Justice Department and the manipulation of CIA intelligence. But if that were not enough, in an interview with ABC's Jonathan Clark, Dick Cheney, the master cobbler of the Bush administration sent the last shoe flying at our faces.

KARL: But you've heard leaders, the incoming Congress, saying that this policy has basically been torture and illegal wiretapping, and that they want to undo, basically, the central tenets of your anti-terrorism policy.

CHENEY: They're wrong. On the question of terrorist surveillance, this was always a policy to intercept communications between terrorists or known terrorists, or so-called "dirty numbers," and folks inside the United States to capture those international communications....

On the question of so-called torture, we don't do torture. We never have. It's not something that this administration subscribes to. Again, we proceeded very cautiously. We checked. We had the Justice Department issue the requisite opinions in order to know where the bright lines were that you could not cross.

The professionals involved in that program were very, very cautious, very careful -- wouldn't do anything without making certain it was authorized and that it was legal. And any suggestion to the contrary is just wrong. Did it produce the desired results? I think it did.

I think, for example, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was the number three man in al Qaeda, the man who planned the attacks of 9/11, provided us with a wealth of information. There was a period of time there, three or four years ago, when about half of everything we knew about al Qaeda came from that one source. So, it's been a remarkably successful effort. I think the results speak for themselves.

And I think those who allege that we've been involved in torture, or that somehow we violated the Constitution or laws with the terrorist surveillance program, simply don't know what they're talking about.

KARL:Did you authorize the tactics that were used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?

CHENEY: I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared, as the agency in effect came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do. And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it.

KARL:In hindsight, do you think any of those tactics that were used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and others went too far?

CHENEY: I don't.

Putting Lipstick On A ... What Now?

George W. Bush will disappear from the national scene in just a few more weeks. Actually, we have seen so little of him in recent days that it sometimes feels like he has already bid us adieu. A simple Google search of the archives (key words: Bush, Bush-Cheney) will show, Accidental Blogger owes its birth and sustenance to the misdeeds and blunders of the Bush administration. Outraged citizen bloggers had realized long ago what Bush stood for and the devastating political legacy he is going leave behind. We recorded our thoughts and dire predictions for all to see.  What was considered the view of the "extreme left" only a couple of years ago, is now the opinion of the mainstream media and the general public. Bush-Cheney's approval ratings bottomed out some time ago and have stayed there.  Dubya is going out in a smog of disgrace, having failed abysmally in war and peace. Even the publishing industry which carelessly offers book deals to anyone who has garnered the obligatory fifteen minutes  (sometimes less) of fame or infamy is shying away from a G.W.B. memoir. It is not a surprise therefore that Bush would like to exercise some editorial control over his legacy any which way he can. For a start, departing Bush aides have received a memo instructing them to speak well of their boss. The memo highlights the positive achievements of the Bush presidency.

WASHINGTON — In case any Bush administration officials have trouble summing up the outgoing president's record, the White House is providing a few helpful suggestions.

A two-page memo that has been sent to Cabinet members and other high-ranking officials offers a guide for discussing President George W. Bush's eight-year tenure during their public speeches.

Titled Speech Topper on the Bush Record, the talking points state that Bush "kept the American people safe" after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, lifted the economy after 2001 through tax cuts, curbed AIDS in Africa and maintained "the honor and the dignity of his office."

The document presents the Bush record as an unalloyed success. It mentions none of the episodes that detractors say marred his presidency: the collapse of the housing market and major financial services companies, the flawed intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq war, the federal response to Hurricane Katrina or the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

In a section on the economy, speakers are invited to say that Bush cut taxes after 2001, setting the stage for years of job growth. As for the current economic crisis, the memo says that Bush "responded with bold measures to prevent an economic meltdown."

A copy of the memo was obtained by the Los Angeles Times' Washington, D.C., bureau. A spokesman for Bush said Monday that the White House routinely sends out suggestions to officials and allies on ways to talk about the administration's record.

"What we have in mind with these documents is we feel the president's many accomplishments haven't been given the attention they deserve and in some cases have been purposely ignored," said Carlton Carroll, a White House spokesman. "This was put together to help the president's supporters counter a lot of these claims and lay out the significant accomplishments he has made over the last eight years."

No one is required to recite the talking points laid out by the White House, Carroll said.

In case the aides are too embarrassed or forgetful about reciting the talking points, Bush is taking measures to put on record his own version of the Bush legacy. Since no one else is paying much heed to his navel gazing, Bush recently spoke with a friendly interlocutor - his own sister Doro Bush Koch. 

Home Invasion in Houston

Burglars were not the only culprits. A Sikh family was terrorized by Houston police officers after reporting a burglary in the home. It is more than seven years since 9/11/2001.  One would have hoped that by now, American law enforcement had been educated and trained to learn the simple fact that "turban" does not necessarily equal "terrorist."

The Harris County Sheriff's Office is investigating allegations that deputies harassed a family of Sikhs whose home was burglarized last week.

Family members say the deputies handcuffed them, roughed them up and taunted them instead of taking a report on the break-in.

One deputy reportedly asked them if they'd "heard about the bombings in Bombay." Another allegedly said he had been to Kuwait and "knew about Muslims."

Since 9/11, misperceptions about Sikhs' religiously mandated turbans and beards have led to an increase in discrimination against Sikhs, according to the New York-based Sikh Coalition.

The family reported the incident to the Coalition, which called for the sheriff's office to fire the four deputies involved and issue a formal apology to the family.

"The allegations, if they're true, are certainly intolerable and inconsistent with our policies," said sheriff's spokesman John Legg.

The deputies could face anything from disciplinary action to termination, Legg said. He declined to release their names pending further investigation.

The rest of the disgraceful story here.

My Tailor is from Mumbai!

It is human nature to want to find a personal connection to triumph and tragedy. Cries of solidarity, "Today we are all Americans," (here, here and here) were heard from all over the world after 9/11/2001. John McCain declared, "Today we are all Georgians," during the recent Russian-Georgian conflict (although there is reason to believe that Georgia attacked first). Being an Indian by birth, the Mumbai tragedy is of course somewhat more personal to me than it is to the average American, Japanese or Argentinian. But I can hardly claim, "Today I am ... or we are all Mumbaikars."  [Mumbaikar= Bombayite] I cannot in all honesty, quite imagine what the death and injury of the victims mean to them and to their families. But we try to empathize by imagining ourselves facing the same terrifying ordeals that the victims must have encountered.  Several of my friends, all of whom know that I come from Delhi, have called in the last few days to inquire if everyone in my family was alright. The first thing that I myself asked my sister and my journalist brother-in-law was if every one they know in Mumbai was safe. Not everyone was. A former colleague of my BIL is presumed dead. She was in a room in the Taj Hotel that was adjacent to the one where the terrorists had initially gathered on the 6th floor. Text messages from her cell phone went out for nearly two hours following the first conflagration, after which there was no further communication. Does the death of this journalist whom I had never met and which made me quite sad, turn the Mumbai incident into a personal experience for me? I don't think so, unless you compute "personal" in a very loose six degrees of separation kind of way.

We are NOT all Mumbaikars today but it is a polite way to show solidarity by saying that we are. But of course, there are several genuine Mumbaikars within the Indian American community and anxiety was understandably widespread among them when the news of the carnage first broke. Houston Indians gathered at the city's India House to offer prayers and express support for India. Among them were many from Mumbai whose "personal" stories are reported in today's Houston Chronicle.   

Namit spoke of the purple prose of Indian writers in the aftermath of the attack in Mumbai. How about some pale yellow journalism? While reading the Chronicle's general human interest story, I came across a ridiculously irrelevant piece of trivia:

Despite a decade or more of bombings and suicide attacks in their native city, former Mumbai residents said the carnage that began Wednesday and ended Saturday with nearly 200 deaths outdid their worst imaginings. They joined with religious and civic leaders at Houston's India House cultural center on Sunday.

"This attack wasn't an attack on India. It wasn't an attack on Westerners. It was an attack on humanity," said Harris County Judge Ed Emmett, who wore a gray suit tailored for him during a visit to Mumbai. [emphasis mine]

Now, Judge Emmett, a very active public official who was responsible for the evacuation plan during Hurricane Ike, is I am sure, sincerely outraged by the terrorist incident in Mumbai. But what in the whole wide world, does his gray suit tailored in Mumbai have to do with anything? I don't blame Judge Emmett for wearing his desi suit during the visit to India House and I don't even mind that he may have mentioned it to his Indian audience and to the reporter. However, why did the reporter choose to report it? How many degrees of separation are there between the judge, his tailor in Mumbai and a terrorist act?

Who's the Turkey? (Sujatha)

Who's the real turkey here?

A Sin Against the Lord

A church in Kansas is warning Americans to expect divine retribution for electing Barack Obama president.