Rumsfeld is casualty of war - "The "agreed" resignation of Mr Rumsfeld appeared to amount to his being fired only a week after Mr Bush insisted that he and Vice-President Dick Cheney were "doing fantastic jobs and I strongly support them"."
Gates Has History of Manipulating Intelligence - "Robert Gates, the former director of the CIA during the presidency of George H.W. Bush who was tapped Tuesday by the president to replace Donald Rumsfeld as Secretary of Defense, is part of Texas's good ol' boy network. He may be best known for playing a role in arming Iraq's former dictator Saddam Hussein with American-made weapons in the country's war against Iran in the 1980s.
Bush Replaces Rumsfeld with... Another Rumsfeld - " Because who but another "Rummy" would stay the course in Iraq with the Bush administration?"
Rove, the grand strategist, faces defeat - "Mr Rove, a voracious reader of political history, should have paid more attention to his cautionary tale in his January speech of what can happen to a dominant party, when its thinking becomes ossified, an entitlement mentality takes over and political power becomes an end in itself. He had been referring to Democrats; he picked the wrong party."
Voting in the absence of Choice - "Too many Americans harbor the illusion that we live in a democracy simply because we have the right to vote. But let us be clear about something: voting matters only where real choices are allowed. It is universally understood that special interest money runs the American political system and thus defines what the choices will be. So we are left to choose between candidates who are financed by special interest money, which any fool can see, is no choice at all."
A Bulk Rate on Printing Subpoenas? - "In each of the nine cases in the past when one party has raised impeachment, that party has benefitted in the next elections. In other cases when a party has failed to press for impeachment when the grounds for it were widely known, that party has suffered. (Remember Iran Contra?) And look at what just happened yesterday."
Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss - "Pelosi is widely tipped to become speaker of the house but she is already on the record as saying that no impeachment proceedings against President Bush, whether it be for deliberately lying a nation into war or being complicit in 9/11, will take place.
"Impeachment is off the table....it's a pledge....it is a waste of time," Pelosi told 60 Minutes recently. ... If George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld are allowed to tear apart the very fabric of America without consequences then what is to stop a President Hillary Clinton or John McCain doing the same? ... Nancy Pelosi voted for the war in Afghanistan, for the Patriot Act, for Homeland Security and against a bill that simply condemned torture of prisoners in Iraq. Pelosi is the pro-torture "savior" who we are told will keep in check the pro-torture Bush administration."
Dobbs: A big 'hallelujah' for American voters - "Voters chose to overturn our current one-party political structure and returned checks and balance to our government. November 7 also demonstrated that the American electorate is far more discerning and independent-minded than either political party or our elites would like to believe. While the Democratic Party was the clear winner, I don't believe for even a moment that the Democrats' ideals prevailed over Republican ideals. Election Day was middle-class America's declaration of independence from a Republican-led administration and Congress that for six years has been telling working men and women and their families in this country to shut up, listen up and go to hell. The middle class just returned the favor and demonstrated discernment while delivering their loud message to Washington, D.C."
'2-Terminator' Arnold to run for Senate? - "Even while ballots are being certified across the country, there's speculation among some California Democrats that freshly re-elected Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will next seek the U.S. Senate currently held by Democrat Barbara Boxer."
Vatican urges Israel to ban Jerusalem gay parade - "The Vatican has often criticized the rise of gay rights as a potential threat to the traditional model of the family. In June, it said gay marriage, abortion, lesbians wanting to bear children and a host of other practices it saw as threats to the traditional family, were signs of "the eclipse of God.""
Intelligent Design Suffers Further Setback in Midterms - "Intelligent design (ID) received a drubbing yesterday, with pro-evolution candidates taking control of the Kansas State Board of Education and strengthening their representation on the Ohio State Board of Education. Many scientists also cheered the defeat of Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA), one of the most politically influential supporters of the ID movement."
Christian Right Agenda In Shambles After GOP Defeat - "“We know that in America the people are with us,” insisted the founder and chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, one of the largest groups in the Christian right. “They’re just confused.”" -- That comment seems to belittle your followers. I'm sure they appreciate that.
Religious right, GOP should stop blaming gays - "According to the Republican Party and the religious right, gay marriage is the single greatest threat to the nuclear family. Let's look at the facts:"
Is marching as a gay the greatest of sins? - "I have always found it puzzling that religious people of all denominations continue to see gay men and women as the single greatest threat to civilization and the ultimate sin. To the Islamic clerics the gay marchers are a greater affront than the thousands who kill in the name of Islam. For religious Christians in America homosexuals are the single greatest threat to the family, even though gays are no more than five percent of the population, while the heterosexual divorce rate stands at 50 percent. So who needs gays to finish off the family when straight men and women are already doing that job admirably?"
A New Social Gospel - "The most common request I received was, "We need to meet with the president on Sudan"—not on gay marriage. This reflects a head-snapping generational change among evangelicals, from leaders like Falwell and Robertson to Rick Warren, focused on fighting poverty and AIDS in Africa, and Gary Haugen, confronting rape and sexual slavery in the developing world. Since leaving government, I've asked young evangelicals on campuses from Wheaton to Harvard who they view as their model of Christian activism. Their answer is nearly unanimous: Bono."
Humanists urged to promote values - ""The term humanism is complete in itself. It does not need any adjectives. Humanists can be emotional but never irrational," he said, urging the young participants to try and understand the difference between `religion' and `spiritualism'."
Bush eyes Democrats for help on amnesty - "President Bush yesterday said he will team up with Democrats to pass an immigration bill with a guest-worker program that his own party blocked this year, and his Republican opponents predicted a bloody intraparty fight but said they cannot stop such a bill from passing."
Attack of the Perv Trackers - "Just a few years ago, satellite tracking of convicts was a newfangled alternative to house arrest. Now, the number of American ex-offenders tracked through GPS-equipped ankle bracelets will likely triple to more than 30,000, thanks to the passage of a California ballot measure." -- It always begins with the mantra: protecting the children.
What the Democrats' win means for tech - "On a wealth of topics--Net neutrality, digital copyright, merger approval, data retention, Internet censorship--a Capitol Hill controlled by Democrats should yield a shift in priorities on technology-related legislation."
FCC backtracks on 2 charges of indecency - "It may be OK to swear on a news show, but profanities on other programs are still verboten, the Federal Communications Commission announced Tuesday."
Oh, the (Lack of) Humanity - "I don't know what this guy's particular problems were or why he landed on the street. Maybe he's a psychological train wreck. Maybe he inherited his addictions, or created his own. Maybe he's a war veteran who never readjusted to civilian life. Maybe his dot-com stock options weren't worth the paper they were printed on and he was dumb enough to think that they would be. Or maybe he's one of a growing number of people who simply dropped out, unable to cope with the insane pressures of modern life. That last one should not be overlooked as a contributing factor to what is an increasingly dysfunctional society. A lot of people are feeling the effects of a world that simply moves too damned fast. Most of us deal with the pressure and ignore the vague sense that life could be better than it is; a few Type A's even thrive on the chaos. But a lot of folks can't handle it. Or don't want to."
'Helicopter parents' try to help their kids land jobs - "Some parents are writing their college-age kids' resumes. Others are acting as their children's "representatives," hounding college career counselors, showing up at job fairs and sometimes going as far as calling employers to ask why their son or daughter didn't get a job. It's the next phase in helicopter parenting, a term coined for those who have hovered over their children's lives from kindergarten to college. Now they are inserting themselves into their kids' job search -- and school officials and employers say it's a problem that may be hampering some young people's careers." -- Pathetic.
More college students taking Web courses - "Roughly one in six students enrolled in higher education — about 3.2 million people — took at least one online course last fall, a sharp increase defying predictions that online learning growth is leveling off."
Norway, Iceland, Australia said best places to live - "Norway, Iceland, Australia, Ireland and Sweden rank as the best five countries to live in but Africa's quality of life has plummeted because of AIDS, said a U.N. report released on Thursday. The United States was ranked in eighth place, after Canada and Japan, in the report that rates not only per-capita income but also educational levels, health care and life expectancy in measuring a nation's well-being."
Could our big brains come from Neanderthals? - "Neanderthals may have given the modern humans who replaced them a priceless gift -- a gene that helped them develop superior brains, U.S. researchers reported Tuesday. And the only way they could have provided that gift would have been by interbreeding, the team at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the University of Chicago said."
A better way to make seawater drinkable - "Researchers at University of California at Los Angeles have come up with a membrane that can filter salt and impurities out of seawater more efficiently and for less money than current systems, which potentially could help with the world's looming water problems."
Christopher Walken to Play Ozzy Osbourne - "Motley Crue lead singer Vince Neil told ABC News Radio in an exclusive interview that the 63-year-old Oscar-winning actor will make a cameo appearance as Osbourne in "The Dirt," a movie based on the band's controversial 2001 autobiography." -- I know, I know, this should be over on the comet.
Quote of the Day
"Every generation must resist the temptation to believe that it lives in the most dangerous time in American history."
~ Ron Paul
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