See how great this administration is when it comes to foreign affairs?
PANJWAI DISTRICT, Afghanistan — In their biggest show of strength in nearly five years, pro-Taliban fighters are terrorizing southern Afghanistan — ambushing military patrols, assassinating opponents and even enforcing the law in remote villages where they operate with near impunity.
“We are faced with a [...]

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This review from the Washington Post:
One example out of many comes in Ron Suskind’s gripping narrative of what the White House has celebrated as one of the war’s major victories: the capture of Abu Zubaydah in Pakistan in March 2002. Described as al-Qaeda’s chief of operations even after U.S. and Pakistani forces kicked down his [...]

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Lance Mannion:
For the record, I don’t believe all the sharp, greedy bastards are Republicans or all Republicans are sharp, greedy bastards, only that the Republican Party’s one and only economic idea is that the sharp, greedy bastards will make everything all right for all of us so we should all get off their backs.

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Presumption of innocence and all that, but it’s still interesting how many Republican activists are accused of things like this:
EDINBURG — A young girl featured in a controversial television ad during the 2000 presidential campaign testified this week that the man who developed the commercial molested her for years and forced her to watch pornography [...]

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Remember Albert Brooks’ “Lost in America“? “You stand under the nest egg…”
As far as I know, the usefulness of this umbrella is merely symbolic. It’s never worked.

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Ron Suskind is one of those unsung journalists who doesn’t crave the media spotlight, he just does his job. Can’t wait to read this book (oh, and by the way, he says the CIA nickname for Cheney is Edgar - for Edgar Bergen, of Charlie McCarthy fame):
This book augments the portrait of Mr. Bush as [...]

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Mark Crispin Miller:
Contrary to the counterclaims in 1996, there was, as The Nation noted then, copious hard evidence of corporate meddling with the news, and also, even more important, lots of subtler evidence of reportorial self-censorship throughout the media cartel. And yet what stood out as egregious back then seems pretty tame today, now that [...]

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Yeah, this is pretty much my take on Obama, too. All hat, no cattle. Great speaker, doesn’t do much.

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Yesterday I wrote:
Because a kind friend has invited me as her guest, I’m going to be in the L.A. area from the 24th to the 1st. Anyone interested in meeting up, either in L.A. or Santa Monica? If enough people are interested, I might even make it up to the Bay area.
Let’s see if we [...]

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Drove into work today and serendipitously found my Little Village CD wedged down under the seat. This made it possible for me to listen to one of my favorite songs by one of my favorite artists this morning - John Hiatt’s “Don’t Think About Her (While You’re Trying to Drive)”. More than almost any other [...]

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Doug Smith has a good one today about institutionalized lies in the presidency.

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You know, the kind where you hire someone, give them the combination to the safe and then just disappear?
The topic was the largest defense procurement scandal in recent decades, and the two investigators for the Pentagon’s inspector general in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld’s office on April 1, 2005, asked the secretary to raise his [...]

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Hey, who needs privacy, anyway?
Numerous federal and local law enforcement agencies have bypassed subpoenas and warrants designed to protect civil liberties and gathered Americans’ personal telephone records from private-sector data brokers.
These brokers, many of whom advertise aggressively on the Internet, have gotten into customer accounts online, tricked phone companies into revealing information and even acknowledged [...]

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Sounds about right.
Of course, this story wouldn’t be complete without a naysayer from the American Enterprise Institute. I had no idea they even believed in psychiatrists - doesn’t the free market cure all?

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I hadn’t heard this before, but apparently My DD’s Jerome Armstrong was previously charged by the SEC with being a stock tout.

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Truthout is still standing by their original Rove indictment story:
What appears to have happened is that - and this is where Truthout blundered - in our haste to report the indictment we never considered the possibility that Patrick Fitzgerald would not make an announcement. We simply assumed - and we should not have done so [...]

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Interview with RFK Jr. in PR Week:
PRWeek: Have you had any indication that the national media will take another look at this issue?
Kennedy: I had a good indication [June 7]. The New York Times, as its lead editorial, did a piece on [Ohio secretary of state] Kenneth Blackwell’s current efforts to suppress registration drives in [...]

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Just got home from hearing Glenn Greenwald speak at a Drinking Liberally event, nicely organized by my friend Ryan Roat. (Snacks! Sandwiches! NO SMOKE! Yes!!!)
First of all, Glenn told me he read what I wrote about meeting him, and that I thought he didn’t know who I was. “I’m not like that at all, [...]

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Al Gore on Countdown with Keith Olbermann tonight.

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Rolling Stone:
“The Internet for the Left of the Democratic Party has served as a way to mobilize hate and anger — hate and anger, first and foremost, at this President and Conservatives, but then also at people within their own party whom they consider to be less than completely loyal to this very narrow, very [...]

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From CNN: Three members of the 101st Airborne Division are charged in connection with deaths of three detainees in Iraq, U.S. military says.

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Ours is bigger.

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I must have fallen asleep and missed this the first time around, but I truly don’t understand the big fuss over what Linda Hirshman is saying. Or maybe I’m just too old and tired to get it.
Everybody started hating Linda, apparently, when I published an article in the progressive magazine the American Prospect last December, [...]

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Look who isn’t enforcing the hiring laws, and look what they’re blaming it on. (You guessed it - 9/11.)

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North Korea is testing a missile capable of reaching the United States. See how well it works out when Republicans are in charge?

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Libby on the list? Sure looks like it. The only way around it is to impeach someone first…

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Meet author and blogger Glenn Greenwald and discuss his new book How Would a Patriot Act? Defending American Values from a President Run Amok
Monday, June 19, 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Higher Grounds Café in Northern Liberties
631 N 3rd Street / www.highergroundscafe.com
Close to the Spring Garden stop of the Market Frankford El, and right on northbound [...]

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Democrats are finally getting it together:
WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats, seizing on public discontent over the war in Iraq, will offer legislation this week calling for a phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq and a shifting of forces to other nations, where supporters say American soldiers will be less likely to come under attack.
The resolution, crafted [...]

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He screwed that one up, too.

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You can’t talk about this at most of the Big Blogs - certainly not Big Orange. But Steven D over at the Booman Tribune still fights the good fight, and concludes:
Some think that we shouldn’t talk about stolen elections. You’ll only suppress the vote, they tell us. And you’ll hurt our credibility with the national [...]

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