Bush to Olmert: No international peace convention - "The Olmert-Bush summit which took place in the White House Monday failed to provide any real news. The prime minister said that his stance against an international peace convention was backed by the American president." -- Now isn't that interesting?
Fury in U.S. over Olmert's comments on Iraq war - "Olmert said Israel and other countries in the area should be thankful to the United States and Bush. He said the Iraq war had a dramatic, positive effect on security and stability in the Middle East, as well as having strategic importance from Israel's perspective and that of moderate Arab states."
Bush assures Israel Iran seen as threat - "Visiting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will return to his country with reassurances from the Bush administration that it is not backing down from its view that Iran and its nuclear program are a world threat."
Senate to investigate rendition abuses - "Abuses carried out under the CIA's secret programme of extraordinary rendition are to be investigated by one of the Senate's most powerful committees, it emerged today. The new chairman of the Senate armed services committee, the Democratic senator Carl Levin, revealed that he was "not comfortable" with the rendition system and said it was making the US less secure."
CIA acknowledges existence of presidential order authorizing it to detain, interrogate terror suspects overseas - "In response to an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, the CIA has finally acknowledged the existence of a presidential order authorizing the agency to detain and interrogate terror suspects overseas."
Administration: Detainees Have No Rights - "The Bush administration said Monday that Guantanamo Bay prisoners have no right to challenge their detentions in civilian courts and that lawsuits by hundreds of detainees should be dismissed."
Rumsfeld may face abuse charges - "Donald Rumsfeld, who quit as US defence secretary this week, may face criminal charges in Germany for alleged abuses in Guantanamo Bay and Iraq."
The Carlyle White House - "There is much more to this than Big George simply trying to shove Little George in a different direction, because Big George never travels alone. All of a sudden, two of the elder's main men - James Baker III and Robert Gates - are back in the saddle. Baker has spent the last weeks riding herd over the Iraq Study Group, a collection of old foreign policy hands tasked to come up with a solution to the Iraq debacle. Gates was a member of this group until he was tapped to replace Don Rumsfeld as Secretary of Defense. The Iraq Study Group is slated to produce some tablets of wisdom come December. A third member of the Iraq Study Group, former congressman Lee Hamilton, is the rope that ties this curious historical package together."
Now Daddy Bush Slams Bloggers - "During an appearance with his wife Barbara on Fox News last night, George Bush senior slammed Internet bloggers for creating an adversarial and ugly climate, echoing the rhetoric of fellow Neo-Cons and the White House itself in trashing the reputation of the world wide web."
Intelligence sources question Gates' independence from Cheney, Rumsfeld - "But the Baker vs. Cheney argument does not stand up to scrutiny. Simply put, when Gates served in the administration of President George H.W. Bush, he had far more in common with Cheney than he did with other members of that administration, including those currently involved in attempts to intervene in Iraq policy. The same source, however, cautions that the real action to watch is the newly arrived Democratic majority. The bottom line, the source insists, is that regardless of what Cheney does it will be Congressional oversight, not Gates, that will stand in his way."
Cheney, Libby ask dismissal of civil complaint - "Vice President Cheney's attorneys argue that the suit should be dismissed on various grounds including that, "the Vice President is entitled to qualified immunity," and that Cheney is "absolutely immune from suits for civil damages."" -- Huh?
GOP Leaders to Bush: 'Your Presidency is Effectively Over' - "A growing number of Republican leaders, party strategists and political professional now privately tell President George W. Bush that his presidency "is effectively over" unless he fires embattled White House advisor Karl Rove, apologizes to the American people for misleading the country into war and revamps his administration from top to bottom. "The only show of unity we have now in the Republican Party is the belief that the President has failed the party, the American people and the presidency," says a longtime, and angry, GOP strategist. ... Bush, however, has dug his heels in on Rove. When a GOP strategist suggested last weekend that the President fire Rove, Bush exploded.
"You go to hell," he screamed at the strategist. "You can leave and you can take the rest of these lily-livered motherfuckers with you!" The President then stormed out of the room and refused to meet further with any other party leaders or strategists." -- Nice, George. Is that the sound of panic in your voice?
Stop yawning at Bush's lies - "This is not a matter of vengeance or, God forfend, politics, but of restoring the people's faith in their government. How dare these people lie to you and me and send Americans to die in Iraq for reasons that turned out to be wholly nonexistent? One way to return to the truth is to find the liars. I ask this not for myself but - and I mean it - for the troops."
Are Democrats Turning A Blind Eye to Civil Liberty? - "The Bush regime perpetrated a coup d'état against the Bill of Rights and the jurisdictions of Congress and the courts. Unless Democrats roll back this coup, Americans have seen the last of their civil liberties. Judging by Democrats' statements in the flush of their electoral victory, Democrats have little, if any, awareness of this critical fact. Democrats are anxious to get on with their agendas and have shown no recognition that the first order of business is to repeal the legislation that permits torture, warrantless detention, and domestic spying. If Bush threatens to veto the resurrection of U.S. civil liberty, the Democrats can impeach Bush as a tyrant as well as for pushing America into an illegal and catastrophic war on the basis of lies and deception. Bush is the most impeachable president in American history. However, the incoming speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has declared impeachment to be "off the table." Obviously, this means that Bush will not be held accountable and that the Bill of Rights is a casualty of the vague, undefined, and propagandistic "war on terror.""
Long Debunked Rumor Validated by Giuliani - "Major questions exist as to why FEMA would deny being in New York City prior to 9/11 without mentioning the 9/12 bioterror drill. These questions must now be addressed as the initial suspicions of those who learned of the Tom Kenney statement have been clearly validated. The coincidental presence of a large FEMA team in NYC at the location, Pier 92, which became the Command Center for the entire emergency operation is disturbing. An alert press and a legitimate 9-11 Commission should have raised this issue long ago." -- Hmmm.
Boxer plans Senate hearings on global warming - "Inhofe rejects a wide scientific consensus that human use of fossil fuels is largely responsible for catastrophic climate change, calling it "the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people." He's accused environmental activists of exploiting people's fears to raise money. And he's blocked legislation aimed at curbing global warming. Boxer, in contrast, is a fiercely liberal environmental activist. She has railed against Inhofe, crusaded for cleaner drinking water and led wilderness protection efforts in her home state and for Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge."
Climate change is as serious as WMD: Annan - "In his valedictory speech to the annual meeting, the UN secretary-general painted a sombre tableau about the effects of climate change, especially on impoverished countries that were least to blame for it."
U.S. In Greenhouse Doghouse - "Sweden, Britain and Denmark are doing the most to protect against climate change, but their efforts are not nearly enough, according to a report released Monday by environmental groups. The United States — the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases — ranked at 53, with only China, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia doing worse."
Listen Up, You Congressional Morons! - "Well, listen up, you morons, particularly those of you in Congress, both coming and going, because I am going to tell you, in plain language and without subtle innuendo, exactly what it is that voters said this past week. ... We are fed up with your bullshit. Let me repeat that in words of one syllable for those of you unaccustomed to listening to your constituents: We are fed up with your bull shit. Admit it - you know the truth when you hear it and this is truth at its simplest and most fundamental level. ... Above all, we are sick to death of being the World's bad guys! We want America once again to be at the forefront of the good guys. We don't need or want to run the world. ... That will do for starters. Accomplish these things and we might just re-elect you next time around to work on an all-new to-do list. Fail and we all fail, because - and make no mistake about this, either - if we go down, we will take you with us ... and it won't be pretty. I, for one, will spend my last pennies on a length of good, solid rope."
U.S. top arms supplier to developing world - "Researchers suggested that the arms trade is now fueled as much by the economic interests of U.S. weapons manufacturers as it is by national security." -- It's always about money.
Bush’s Chernobyl economy; hard times are on the way - "In the next few months, a financial crisis will arise somewhere in the world which will jolt the American economy and trigger a swift and precipitous decline in the value of the dollar. This is not speculation; it will happen and there is nothing that the Bush administration can do to stop it. All of the traditional supports for the dollar have been removed by a shrinking economy, a massive $800 billion account deficit, dramatic increases in the money supply, and the reckless manipulation of interest rates. Now, the noose is tightening."
Democrats May EliminateIRS's Use of Collection Agencies - "Is the IRS's new private tax-collection program heading for an early death?"
Dem Congress may scrap border fence - "The incoming U.S. Congress will review the law mandating 700 miles of fence along the U.S.-Mexico border, and may seek to scrap the plan altogether."
Mid-flight sexual play lands US couple afoul of anti-terrorism law - "A couple's ill-concealed sexual play aboard a Southwest Airlines flight from Los Angeles got them charged with violating the Patriot Act, intended for terrorist acts, and could land them in jail for 20 years."
So what's with all the dinosaurs? - "The world's first Creationist museum - dedicated to the idea that the creation of the world, as told in Genesis, is factually correct - will soon open. Stephen Bates is given a sneak preview and asks: was there really a tyrannosaurus in the Bible?"
Why is there a giant elephant penis in my Bible? - "Sorry for the explicit title, but it's really 100% true. As straight laced as many Christians may be about sex, the Bible really can be a sexually frank book. Don't believe me? Read the Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs) and do some research into the metaphors... steamy stuff indeed. So what about the big animal parts then? Well, during my exchanges with various creationists, they've been very adament that dinosaurs are mentioned in the Bible, the Behemoth mentioned in Job being a prime example. Scholars traditionally believe that Behemoth was an elephant, hippo, or rhino, but many creationists say no way- Behemoth is a dinosaur, with the verse "He moves his tail like a cedar" being the one they rest their case on. Little do they know what they're really basing their argument on is a giant elephant penis, and I'll tell you why."
Got God? No way - "Earth below - certainly. Heavens above - he doesn't think so. Langley may be an evangelical, but he's not the typical kind. He's an evangelical atheist. ... "There are misconceptions that atheists hate anyone who is in organized religion, or that atheists are baby killers or old-people killers," she said. "There is a sense that atheists to some extent can't be sensitive to the spiritual views of others.""
Young adults in U.S. abandoning biblical faith - "For example, young adults were more likely than older adults to reject the concept of absolute truth. They were also significantly less likely to believe, as their elders do, that human beings should determine what is right and wrong morally by examining God's principles. Also, young adults were twice as likely as older adults to believe ethics and morality are based on "what is right for the person." Finally, even young Christian adults were more likely than older adults to accept same-sex marriage and premarital sex."
Pope to hold summit on married priests - "The Vatican stressed the meeting would not open a general discussion of the celibacy requirement but would only examine requests for dispensation made by priests wishing to marry and requests for readmission made by clergy who had married in recent years."
3 Christian Groups Move To Condemn Gay Sex - "Faced with rising public acceptance of same-sex relationships, three U.S. Christian denominations are taking strong measures this week to condemn homosexual acts as sinful. ... "In our day and time, no other sin marches so defiantly across our national landscape." -- Jesus.
My Half-Year of Hell With Christian Fundamentalists - "When Polish student Michael Gromek, 19, went to America on a student exchange, he found himself trapped in a host family of Christian fundamentalists. What followed was a six-month hell of dawn church visits and sex education talks as his new family tried to banish the devil from his soul. Here's his story."
Big 3 automakers commit to reducing oil dependence - "The nation's largest automakers told President Bush yesterday they are committed to developing vehicles that use renewable fuels to reduce the country's dependence on foreign oil."
1 Percent of Web Deemed Pornographic - "About 1 percent of Web sites indexed by Google and Microsoft are sexually explicit, according to a U.S. government-commissioned study. Government lawyers introduced the study in court this month as the Justice Department seeks to revive the 1998 Child Online Protection Act, which required commercial Web sites to collect a credit card number or other proof of age before allowing Internet users to view material deemed "harmful to minors."" -- 1 percent? And everyone is up in arms?
Canadian couple forced young girls into sex slavery - " A Canadian couple, described as "evil incarnate" by a prosecutor, were sentenced for kidnapping neighborhood girls and forcing them into sex slavery since 1999."
Still sticking it to the consumer - "These are rights that the entertainment industry will tell you do not exist--witness the RIAA's recent "educational" campaign for students in grades 3 to 8. That campaign counsels that it is always illegal to use a copyright work without permission. It isn't--but so much for the "balance" of fair use that Sherman praises. The collective amnesia the entertainment industry has about its past and recent attempts to limit consumers' rights and technological innovation is nothing short of startling. Beginning with the piano roll at the start of the 20th century, continuing with radio, TV, the VCR, MP3 players and digital video recorders (remember Replay TV?), entertainment companies have tried either to legislate or litigate innovative new technologies out of existence."
Smokers, obese should pay more health insurance: poll - "Most Americans believe smokers and obese people should pay more for health insurance, but they have mixed views on how to help the millions without any health insurance, according to a survey published on Tuesday."
Chocoholics rejoice! More benefits found in heart study - "But chocolate lovers who flunked out of a Johns Hopkins University study on aspirin and heart disease helped researchers stumble on an explanation of why a little chocolate a day can cut the risk of heart attack. It turns out chocolate, like aspirin, affects the platelets that cause blood to clot, Diane Becker of the Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine and her colleagues discovered."
O.J.'s latest: 'If I Did It, Here's How It Happened' - "In a new TV interview and book, O.J. Simpson discusses how he would have committed the slayings of his ex-wife and her friend "if I did it.""
Quote of the Day
"There was never a good war or a bad peace."
~ Benjamin Franklin
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