Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The common perception of Walter Reed is of a surgical hospital that shines as the crown jewel of military medicine. But 5 1/2 years of sustained combat have transformed the venerable 113-acre institution into something else entirely -- a holding ground for physically and psychologically damaged outpatients. Almost 700 of them -- the majority soldiers, with some Marines -- have been released from hospital beds but still need treatment or are awaiting bureaucratic decisions before being discharged or returned to active duty.

They suffer from brain injuries, severed arms and legs, organ and back damage, and various degrees of post-traumatic stress. Their legions have grown so exponentially -- they outnumber hospital patients at Walter Reed 17 to 1 -- that they take up every available bed on post and spill into dozens of nearby hotels and apartments leased by the Army. The average stay is 10 months, but some have been stuck there for as long as two years.

Not all of the quarters are as bleak as Duncan's, but the despair of Building 18 symbolizes a larger problem in Walter Reed's treatment of the wounded, according to dozens of soldiers, family members, veterans aid groups, and current and former Walter Reed staff members interviewed by two Washington Post reporters, who spent more than four months visiting the outpatient world without the knowledge or permission of Walter Reed officials. Many agreed to be quoted by name; others said they feared Army retribution if they complained publicly.

[snip]

On the worst days, soldiers say they feel like they are living a chapter of "Catch-22." The wounded manage other wounded. Soldiers dealing with psychological disorders of their own have been put in charge of others at risk of suicide.

Disengaged clerks, unqualified platoon sergeants and overworked case managers fumble with simple needs: feeding soldiers' families who are close to poverty, replacing a uniform ripped off by medics in the desert sand or helping a brain-damaged soldier remember his next appointment.

"We've done our duty. We fought the war. We came home wounded. Fine. But whoever the people are back here who are supposed to give us the easy transition should be doing it," said Marine Sgt. Ryan Groves, 26, an amputee who lived at Walter Reed for 16 months. "We don't know what to do. The people who are supposed to know don't have the answers. It's a nonstop process of stalling."

Labels: George W. Bush, House Republicans, Iraq, Veterans Affairs

Former Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader said he is considering a presidential run in 2008 and strongly suggested today he would enter the race if Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton wins the Democratic Party nomination.

"She's just another bad version of (former President) Bill Clinton,'' Nader told KGO radio host Ronn Owens in San Francisco.

Asked to describe Clinton, a front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination a year in advance of the primaries, Nader said: "Flatters, panders, coasting, front-runner, looking for a coronation, not taking on the huge waste in the military budget as a member of the Armed Services commission, never going after the corporate crimes against pensions, against workers. ... She has no political fortitude.''

Asked specifically if he would run in 2008, Nader said it is "too early to say. ... (I'm) considering it. We're going to see what the Democrats come up with.''

Nader made the statements in San Francisco while on a book tour to push his new memoir, "The Seventeen Traditions.'' Nader also spoke at the Commonwealth Club in California.

Nader gained more than 2.7 percent of the national popular vote as the Green Party candidate for president in 2000, which some analysts said came primarily at the expense of Democrat Al Gore and helped Republican George W. Bush win the White House. In a second run four years later, Nader gained less than one-half of 1 percent.

Phil Trounstine, who worked as communications director for former Democratic California Gov. Gray Davis, said Nader's hint that he might run for president again may tarnish his reputation as a longtime progressive and consumer advocate.

"To an awful lot of people, Ralph Nader appears to be threatening, once again, to play the role of a spoiled brat whose purpose in life appears to be ... electing Republicans by draining off votes from Democrats,'' said Trounstine, who heads the San Jose State Center for Policy and Research.

Nader's presidential aspirations are viewed by many as evidence that he is on "an enormous ego trip with potentially destructive impact,'' Trounstine said.

Labels: Ralph Nader

Labels: fake news, Fox News, idiocy, The Daily Show

Many of my progressive friends want to prod John Kerry . I agree that he needs to more clearly differentiate himself from Bush and he must not take for granted the votes of veryone fed up with the current regime. Young people and other undecided voters particularly need clarity or else they will be tempted not to vote or to vote for Nader.

However I cant help bt be optimisitc (sic) about Kerry. I think he has more of a common touch that his overly formal speaking style owuld indicate. I like the old photos with John Lennon. I like the emotiuonsl (sic) connection he has to many fellow veterans, and I thought his silent dignififed(sic) appearence at the Reagan library was exactly the right touch.

Rather than more of Sedition's comedy, Goldberg wanted the show to interview former NYC mayoral candidate Mark Green.

After I was gone, Green started showing up on Sedition with such frequency that it led the consistently-favorable magazine TimeOut NY to make its first negative comments about the show, with a dig about Green's frequency as a guest.

While exiting day-to-day operations at Air America, Goldberg will continue in a minor, contractually-based role, working one day a week from home. Through the end of 2006, he'll be paid $400,000 on an annualized basis for his temporary role as "Vice-Chair".

In addition, he'll receive $400,000 in deferred compensation covering 2005, $100,000 to cover 2006 travel and entertainment, plus ongoing clerical support. An initial share award representing 2% of the company will now become fully vested.

Labels: Air America, Danny Goldberg, Janeane Garofalo, Marc Maron, Mark Green, Mike Malloy

Terrorism charges brought Friday against the administrator of a loan investment program claimed that he secretly tried to send $152,000 to the Middle East to buy equipment such as night vision goggles for a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan.

Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari, 53, of Ardsley, N.Y., pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court in Manhattan to an indictment accusing him of terrorism financing, material support of terrorism and other charges. The charges carried a potential penalty of 95 years in prison.

Alishtari, also known as Michael Mixon, was detained pending a court appearance next week after Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan S. Kolodner said Alishtari was a danger to the community and a risk to flee. He was arrested on Thursday in Manhattan, prosecutors said.

Alishtari's court-appointed lawyer, Richard Greenfield, said he was not familiar enough with the case to present a bail package. Outside court, Greenfield declined to comment.

The indictment said Alishtari tried to support terrorists between June and December by accepting an unspecified amount of money to transfer $152,000 that he believed was being sent to Pakistan and Afghanistan to support an Afghanistan terrorist training camp.

He believed the money would be used to fund the purchase of night vision goggles and other equipment, the indictment said.

[snip]

CBS News has confirmed that Alishtari is a donor to the Republican Party, as he claims on his curriculum vitae. Alishtari gave $15,500 to the National Republican Campaign Committee between 2002 and 2004, according to Federal Election Commission records. That amount includes $13,000 in 2003, a year when he claims to have been named NRCC New York State Businessman of the Year.

Alishtari also claims to be a lifetime member of the National Republican Senate Committee's Inner Circle, which the NRCC describes as "an impressive cross-section of American society – community leaders, business executives, entrepreneurs, retirees, and sports and entertainment celebrities – all of whom hold a deep interest in our nation's prosperity and security."

A Westchester businessman and purported peace activist was nabbed by the feds for allegedly plotting to funnel more than $150,000 to terrorists at training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari, an American-born Moroccan from Ardsley, was ordered held without bail yesterday for agreeing to send $152,000 overseas to pay for night-vision goggles and other equipment for terrorists during an FBI sting operation.

The accused terror buyer was nabbed by the FBI Thursday and charged with providing material support to terrorists, as well as money-laundering and wire-fraud charges, which carry a maximum of 95 years in prison.

Prior to his arrest, Alishtari, 53, also known as Michael Dixon, had agreed to cooperate with law enforcement. But the deal fell through before he provided substantial assistance, according to a source close to the case.

Alishtari also is accused of swindling millions of dollars in a bogus Bronx-based loan program.

Defense lawyer David Greenfield entered a not guilty plea on behalf of Alishtari and declined further comment.

Alishtari drew media attention in 2003 for launching an annual movie project in Florida called Global Peace Film Festival.

The self-described activist has also posted poetry on numerous Web sites advocating peace and radical Muslim ideology, as well as personal pledges to dedicate his time and money to stopping child slavery, fraud and violence.

Labels: media, spin, terrorism

Is the health insurance business a racket? Yes, literally — or so say two New York hospitals, which have filed a racketeering lawsuit against UnitedHealth Group and several of its affiliates.

I don’t know how the case will turn out. But whatever happens in court, the lawsuit illustrates perfectly the dysfunctional nature of our health insurance system, a system in which resources that could have been used to pay for medical care are instead wasted in a zero-sum struggle over who ends up with the bill.

The two hospitals accuse UnitedHealth of operating a “rogue business plan” designed to avoid paying clients’ medical bills. For example, the suit alleges that patients were falsely told that Flushing Hospital was “not a network provider” so UnitedHealth did not pay the full network rate. UnitedHealth has already settled charges of misleading clients about providers’ status brought by New York’s attorney general: the company paid restitution to plan members, while attributing the problem to computer errors.

The legal outcome will presumably turn on whether there was deception as well as denial — on whether it can be proved that UnitedHealth deliberately misled plan members. But it’s a fact that insurers spend a lot of money looking for ways to reject insurance claims. And health care providers, in turn, spend billions on “denial management,” employing specialist firms — including Ingenix, a subsidiary of, yes, UnitedHealth — to fight the insurers.

[snip]

Incidentally, while insurers are very good at saying no to doctors, hospitals and patients, they’re not very good at saying no to more powerful players. Drug companies, in particular, charge much higher prices in the United States than they do in countries like Canada, where the government health care system does the bargaining. McKinsey estimates that the United States pays $66 billion a year in excess drug costs, and overpays for medical devices like knee and hip implants, too.

To put these numbers in perspective: McKinsey estimates the cost of providing full medical care to all of America’s uninsured at $77 billion a year. Either eliminating the excess administrative costs of private health insurers, or paying what the rest of the world pays for drugs and medical devices, would by itself more or less pay the cost of covering all the uninsured. And that doesn’t count the many other costs imposed by the fragmentation of our health care system.

Which brings us back to the racketeering lawsuit. If UnitedHealth can be shown to have broken the law — and let’s just say that this company, which is America’s second-largest health insurer, has a reputation for playing even rougher than its competitors — by all means, let’s see justice done. But the larger problem isn’t the behavior of any individual company. It’s the ugly incentives provided by a system in which giving care is punished, while denying it is rewarded.

The U.S. government is at risk of squandering significantly more money in an Iraq war and reconstruction effort that has already wasted or otherwise overcharged taxpayers billions of dollars, federal investigators said Thursday.

The three top auditors overseeing contract work in Iraq told a House committee of $10 billion in spending that was wasteful or poorly tracked. They pointed to numerous instances in which Defense and State department officials condoned or otherwise allowed poor accounting, repeated work delays, bloated expenses and payments for work shoddily or never done by U.S. contractors.

That problem could worsen, the Government Accountability Office said, given limited improvement so far by the Department of Defense even as the Bush administration prepares to boost the U.S. presence in Iraq.

[snip]

According to their testimony, the investigators:

• Found overpricing and waste in Iraq contracts amounting to $4.9 billion since the Defense Contract Audit Agency began its work in 2003, although some of that money has since been recovered. Another $5.1 billion in expenses were charged without proper documentation.


• Urged the Pentagon to reconsider its growing reliance on outside contractors to run the nation's wars and reconstruction efforts. Layers of subcontractors, poor documentation and lack of strong contract management are rampant and promote waste even after the GAO first warned of problems 15 years ago.


• Pointed to growing Iraqi sectarian violence as a significant factor behind wasted U.S. dollars. Iraqi officials must begin to take primary responsibility for reconstruction efforts, an uncertain goal given widespread corruption in Iraq and the local government's inability to fund projects.

[snip]

Of the $10 billion in overpriced contracts or undocumented costs, more than $2.7 billion were charged by Halliburton Co., the oil-field services firm once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney.

Labels: Dick Cheney, Halliburton, Iraq, war profiteering

Either they knew or didn't know, and what matters is, is that they're there. What's worse, that the government knew or that the government didn't know? But the point I made in my initial speech in the White House about Iraq was, is that we know they're there and we're going to protect our troops. When we find the networks that are enabling these weapons to end up in Iraq, we will deal with them. If we find agents who are moving these devices into Iraq, we will deal with them. I have put out the command to our troops -- I mean, to the people who are commanders, that we'll protect the soldiers of the United States and innocent people in Iraq and will continue doing so.

How do you explain to the thousands of American troops now being poured into Baghdad that they will have to wait until the summer for the protective armor that could easily mean the difference between life and death?

It’s bad enough that these soldiers are being asked to risk their lives without President Bush demanding that Iraq’s leaders take any political risks that might give the military mission at least an outside chance of success. But according to an article in The Washington Post this week, at least some of the troops will be sent out in Humvees not yet equipped with FRAG Kit 5 armor. That’s an advanced version designed to reduce deaths from roadside bombs, which now account for about 70 percent of United States casualties in Iraq.

The more flexible materials used in the FRAG Kit 5 make it particularly helpful in containing the damage done by the especially deadly weapon the Bush administration is now most concerned about: those explosively formed penetrators that Washington accuses Iran of supplying to Shiite militias for use against American troops.

Older versions of Humvee armor are shattered by these penetrators, showering additional shrapnel in the direction of a Humvee’s occupants. The FRAG Kit 5 helps slow the incoming projectile and contains some of the shrapnel, giving the soldiers a better chance of survival.

Armor upgrades like this have become a feature of the Iraq war, as the Pentagon struggles to keep up with the constantly more powerful weapons and sophisticated tactics of the various militia and insurgent forces attacking American troops. But the Army, the National Guard and the Marine Corps have been caught constantly behind the curve.

Unglamorous and relatively inexpensive staples of ground combat, like armor, have never really captured the imagination and attention of military contractors and Pentagon budget-makers the way that “Top Gun” fighter jets, stealthy warships and “Star Wars” missile interceptors generally do.

The Army says it is now accelerating its production of FRAG Kit 5 armor and handing it out to Baghdad-bound units on a priority basis. But it acknowledges that the armor upgrading project will not be completed until summer. Right now, it’s February, and the new American drive in Baghdad has already begun.

A series of recent interviews with current and former Israeli government officials revealed a level of pessimism across the Israeli government that is unprecedented in recent decades. Several senior officials acknowledged unequivocally that Israel lost the war against Hezbollah, and confirmed that this is a widely held view inside the Israeli government -- despite many public pronouncements to the contrary by Israeli leaders.

In light of Israel's close strategic ties with the United States, and particularly with the Bush administration, it has been all but taboo in the past for Israeli officials to openly criticize U.S. policy. But some officials I spoke with also voiced rising fears -- and disapproval -- over the Bush administration's handling of Iraq and Iran. Those officials include octogenarian Rafi Eitan, currently an Israeli cabinet minister, who told me that in the wake of Israel's failed efforts to crush Hezbollah, and with the deepening crisis in Iraq, Israel is in one of the most precarious situations he has ever seen in his seven decades of military and government service. Regarding President Bush's handing of Iraq, Eitan said, "Unless the policy changes, it is hopeless."

The level of gloom inside the Israeli government is accompanied by a creeping sense of paralysis -- one that could be dangerous not just for Israel, but for U.S. interests in the region, and for the Middle East as a whole. A recent conversation with a senior member of Israel's diplomatic corps -- someone with extensive experience in Israel's foreign policy establishment -- left me stunned by the degree of negativity. I have known him personally for several years and have never seen him so down on the country's prospects. "We lost the war," he told me, regarding last summer's conflict. "We all know that," he continued, adding that the failure against Hezbollah is the "core reason" for the deepening pessimism inside the government. This contrasts sharply, of course, with the official government line. As recently as Feb. 1, speaking to an Israeli commission investigating the war effort, Prime Minister Olmert, according to his aides, insisted once again that "Israel won the war."

The senior Israeli diplomat in part blamed Olmert's politics. "Do you know why we lost? Because soldiers don't want to die for these leaders. Who wants to die for Amir Peretz?" he said, referring to the Israeli defense minister, whose qualifications for the job have been called into question. Peretz, the leader of the Labor Party, but who had no real security or defense credentials, was appointed by Olmert last year to ensure the Labor Party's involvement in Olmert's coalition government.

The senior Israeli diplomat's grievances went beyond the Defense Ministry. He lamented the wave of cronyism, corruption and sexual harassment scandals that have plagued the government in recent times. "We live in a corrupt society, where those with merit don't get anywhere," he said. "It's a very sad time for the Jewish state."

I raised this striking level of gloom with another high-ranking diplomat, who told me he was not surprised to hear of it. "There is a lot of frustration right now," he nodded, "and it's not just felt in the Foreign Ministry." He agreed that it was caused by "all the corruption in the political layers, and the perception in Israel that the war was a failure."

Yet, the roots of the seemingly ubiquitous sense of despair may stem more from the goings-on in the corridors of power in Washington than those in Jerusalem.

[snip]

While the U.S. and Israel clearly are united in the goal of stopping Iran from gaining nuclear weapons, some Israeli leaders have lost confidence in Bush's leadership when it comes to that crucial concern. In the aftermath of the release of the assessment, Uzi Arad, the former director of intelligence at the Mossad, added, "With American attention so much focused on Iraq, it comes at the expense of its ability to blunt the slow Iranian progression toward nuclear capability." Last week, I raised these assessments with Eitan, himself a former spymaster who led the Israeli capture of Adolf Eichmann in 1960, and who was the handler of the infamous spy Jonathan Pollard in the 1980s. "Sooner or later, a year or two, America will go out from Iraq," Eitan said. "Iran will unite with the Shiites of Iraq -- with or without force -- and then with the Shiites of Syria. Is this good for Israel? No, it is bad for Israel."

President Bush said Wednesday that he was certain that factions within the Iranian government had supplied Shiite militants in Iraq with deadly roadside bombs that had killed American troops. But he said he did not know whether Iran’s highest officials had directed the attacks.

“I can say with certainty that the Quds Force, a part of the Iranian government, has provided these sophisticated I.E.D.’s that have harmed our troops,” Mr. Bush said, using the abbreviation for improvised explosive device. “And I’d like to repeat, I do not know whether or not the Quds Force was ordered from the top echelons of the government. But my point is, what’s worse, them ordering it and it happening, or them not ordering it and its happening?”

The pictures released last week of Iraqi high-tech explosives surprised me. These special 'superbombs' that have caused so many US casualties -- they look like they had been assembled in someone's garage...as has been observed here, anyone can make crude and simple EFP munitions in a basic workshop. All you need is a lump of plastic explosive and a piece of copper. Shape the copper into a saucer, put the explosive under it, and you're there. Obviously this will be a lot less efficient, accurate and reliable than something like SLAM (optimal design of the the metal 'lens' is an art requiring a lot of computer power), but you can compensate by making it ten times bigger if you need to.

Maybe the insurgents should be given some credit for being able to build their own gear, or maybe there's more intelligence we don't know. But if EFP mines were being supplied by an outside source, you might expect to see somethng a lot slicker.

Iran does actually professionally manufacture a shaped-charge EFP device. Blogger is playing up right now so I can't get the picture to upload but have a look. It looks nothing like those photos from Sunday's briefing.

Update Sean Paul at the Agonist has some great commenters, and they are busy tracking down some possibilities. It can easily get confusing looking at the various weaponry types and options and trying to figure out which is which. Of course, that's what the Bush administration is relying upon.

One of Sean paul's readers points to this Asia Times article:

An article in Jane's Intelligence Review last month by Michael Knights, chief of analysis for the Olive Group, a private security-consulting firm, reports that the British discovered that there was indeed an organization in Basra engaged in arranging for the purchase and delivery of imported EFPs and that it was composed entirely of police officials, including members of the Police Intelligence Unit, the Internal Affairs Directorate and the Major Crimes Unit. They found that members of the organization followed no specific Shi'ite faction, but included members from all the factions in Basra.

...The EFPs used against US and British troops in Iraq were the centerpiece of the briefing. But the anonymous US officials did not claim that the finished products have been manufactured in Iran. Instead they referred to machining of EFP "components" - referring to the concave metal lids on the devices - as being done in Iran.

Labels: EFPs, George W. Bush, Iran, lies

Labels: Al Franken, Norm Coleman, Senate

Labels: blogswarm, Shakespeare's Sister

“A lot of people are afraid to talk about Christ, which is understandable yet cowardly,” wrote Malkin in a blog title ‘Who is this Jesus character?’ “I think if you look deeper, you see a frightening man. Are we sure we want a man with a well-chronicled drinking problem to lead this great nation?”

Others quickly followed suit.

“Jesus? I just don’t see it. Do we really want a Jew as President? Maybe Lieberman. But I say, make Jesus eat a pork roast on live TV. We want proof that he’s Christian,” wrote Ann Coulter. “You know that the ‘H’ in his name stands for ‘Hussein,’ right?”

“The man … and I use that term loosely. Have you seen his hair? … The man cavorts with prostitutes and has a group of homeless male “disciples.” No, I’m not saying anything. I’m not. Really. I’m not calling him a homosexual whore-chaser. Don’t get me wrong,” said Rush Limbaugh.

“Time and time again, the Democrats pull out sodomites as candidates. Just one look at Christ and you can see he doesn’t have a care in the world, that he doesn’t need to follow Christian doctrine. You know who else feels that way? Anal-loving fudgepackers. Am I saying we should kill Christ? Of course not. God will tend to his ass-loving judgement,” said Catholic League President Bill Donohue in a heavily fact-checked statement.

“Thes psycho liberals. They prop up a Palestinian. A Palestinian, for God’s sake. I have told you and told you — they want to give this country outright to the terrorists so we can all live under Sharia Law. Well not me. Not now, not ever. Keep this hippie freak Palestine suicide bomber away from the White House or he’ll strap a bomb to his chest and finish the job bin Laden started. Call in now and tell me what you think. Or order a bottle of Echinacea. Just $19.99 a bottle, cures what ails ya,” said radio entertainer Michael Savage

George W. Bush, answering a question from ABC's Martha Raddatz about whether there's a civil war in Iraq: "It's hard for me, living in this beautiful White House, to give you a firsthand assessment. I haven't been there. You have. I haven't."

The president has visited Iraq at least twice since the war began, most recently in June 2006.

Labels: George W. Bush, idiocy, Iraq

The number of waivers granted to Army recruits with criminal backgrounds has grown about 65 percent in the last three years, increasing to 8,129 in 2006 from 4,918 in 2003, Department of Defense records show.

During that time, the Army has employed a variety of tactics to expand its diminishing pool of recruits. It has offered larger enlistment cash bonuses, allowed more high school dropouts and applicants with low scores on its aptitude test to join, and loosened weight and age restrictions.

It has also increased the number of so-called “moral waivers” to recruits with criminal pasts, even as the total number of recruits dropped slightly. The sharpest increase was in waivers for serious misdemeanors, which make up the bulk of all the Army’s moral waivers. These include aggravated assault, burglary, robbery and vehicular homicide.

Labels: George W. Bush, Iraq

Labels: Air America, Al Franken, Marc Maron, Sam Seder

The powerful Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr has left Iraq and has been living in Iran for the past several weeks, senior Bush administration officials said Tuesday.

With fresh American forces arriving in Baghdad as part of the White House plan to stabilize the capital, officials in Washington suggested that Mr. Sadr might have fled Iraq to avoid being captured or killed during the crackdown.

But officials also said that Mr. Sadr, who has family in Iran, had gone to Tehran in the past and that it was unclear why he had chosen to leave Iraq at this time. Mr. Sadr’s departure from Iraq was first reported Tuesday night by ABC News.

American and Iraqi officials have said that recent intelligence points to signs of fracturing within the Mahdi Army, and that radical splinter groups who are not under Mr. Sadr’s control could be carrying out commando-style raids and assassinations.

Officials have suggested that these splinter groups could be receiving orders from officials in Iran, but have not offered direct evidence to back up their claims.

Labels: Administration B.S., Iran, Moqdata al-Sadr

I’m afraid that if Atrios declared Shoot Yourself in the Foot Day we might have a lot of liberal bloggers limping around right now.

Labels: bloggers

Labels: Christofascist Zombie Brigade, fascism

I was hired by the Edwards campaign for the skills and talents I bring to the table, and my willingness to work hard for what’s right. Unfortunately, Bill Donohue and his calvacade of right wing shills don’t respect that a mere woman like me could be hired for my skills, and pretended that John Edwards had to be held accountable for some of my personal, non-mainstream views on religious influence on politics (I’m anti-theocracy, for those who were keeping track). Bill Donohue—anti-Semite, right wing lackey whose entire job is to create non-controversies in order to derail liberal politics—has been running a scorched earth campaign to get me fired for my personal beliefs and my writings on this blog.

In fact, he’s made no bones about the fact that his intent is to “silence” me, as if he—a perfect stranger—should have a right to curtail my freedom of speech. Why? Because I’m a woman? Because I’m pro-choice? Because I’m not religious? All of the above, it seems.

Regardless, it was creating a situation where I felt that every time I coughed, I was risking the Edwards campaign. No matter what you think about the campaign, I signed on to be a supporter and a tireless employee for them, and if I can’t do the job I was hired to do because Bill Donohue doesn’t have anything better to do with his time than harass me, then I won’t do it. I resigned my position today and they accepted.

There is good news. The main good news is that I don’t have a conflict of interest issue anymore that was preventing me from defending myself against these baseless accusations. So it’s on. The other good news is that the blogosphere has risen as one and protested, loudly, the influence a handful of well-financed right wing shills have on the public discourse.

Bill Donohue doesn’t speak for Catholics, he speaks for the right wing noise machine. You guys pointed this out, you made a stink, you refused to walk into the same stupid trap that is laid out for liberals and Democrats by the right wing noise machine and I think you made a difference. While loyalty played into the pushback some, the real story is that we liberals are not taking this crap any longer and we’re pushing back. And now that I’m attached to only myself again, I’m ready and eager to join in the pushing back with you. Like Lorraine say, Jesus did not say to shut your piehole.

Labels: Christofascist Zombie Brigade, fascism, John Edwards

North Korea agreed Tuesday after arduous talks to shut down its main nuclear reactor and eventually dismantle its atomic weapons program, just four months after the communist state shocked the world by testing a nuclear bomb.

The deal marks the first concrete plan for disarmament in more than three years of six-nation negotiations, and could potentially herald a new era of cooperation in the region with the North's longtime foes -- the United States and Japan -- also agreeing to discuss normalizing relations with Pyongyang.

Under the deal, the North will receive initial aid equal to 50,000 tons heavy fuel oil within 60 days for shutting down and sealing its main nuclear reactor and related facilities at Yongbyon, north of the capital, to be confirmed by international inspectors.

For irreversibly disabling the reactor and declaring all nuclear programs, the North will eventually receive another 950,000 tons in aid.

The agreement was read to all delegates in a conference room at a Chinese state guesthouse and Chinese envoy Wu Dawei asked if there were any objections. When none were made, the officials all stood and applauded.

The main U.S. nuclear envoy said Washington was satisfied with an agreement on initial steps for North Korea to disarm but called it just the start of the process.

''Obviously we have a long way to go, but we're very pleased with this agreement,'' Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill told reporters. ''It's a very solid step forward.''

North Korea and United States also will embark on talks aimed at resolving disputes and restarting diplomatic relations, Wu said. The Korean peninsula has technically remained in a state of war for more than a half-century since the Korean War ended in a 1953 cease-fire.

The United States will begin the process of removing North Korea from its designation as a terror-sponsoring state and also on ending U.S. trade sanctions, but no deadlines was set, according to the agreement.

Private Saudi citizens are giving millions of dollars to Sunni insurgents in Iraq and much of the money is used to buy weapons, including shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, according to key Iraqi officials and others familiar with the flow of cash.
Saudi government officials deny that any money from their country is being sent to Iraqis fighting the government and the U.S.-led coalition.

But the U.S. Iraq Study Group report said Saudis are a source of funding for Sunni Arab insurgents. Several truck drivers interviewed by The Associated Press described carrying boxes of cash from Saudi Arabia into Iraq, money they said was headed for insurgents.

Two high-ranking Iraqi officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity, told the AP most of the Saudi money comes from private donations, called zaqat, collected for Islamic causes and charities.

Some Saudis appear to know the money is headed to Iraq's insurgents, but others merely give it to clerics who channel it to anti-coalition forces, the officials said.

In one recent case, an Iraqi official said $25 million in Saudi money went to a top Iraqi Sunni cleric and was used to buy weapons, including Strela, a Russian shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile. The missiles were purchased from someone in Romania, apparently through the black market, he said.

Overall, the Iraqi officials said, money has been pouring into Iraq from oil-rich Saudi Arabia, a Sunni bastion, since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq toppled the Sunni-controlled regime of Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Saudi officials vehemently deny their country is a major source of financial support for the insurgents.

"There isn't any organized terror finance, and we will not permit any such unorganized acts," said Brig. Gen. Mansour al-Turki, a spokesman for the Saudi Interior Ministry. About a year ago the Saudi government set up a unit to track any "suspicious financial operations," he said.

But the Iraq Study Group said "funding for the Sunni insurgency comes from private individuals within Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states."

Three or four FBI laptop computers are lost or stolen each month and many times the agency doesn't know whether information on the machines is sensitive or classified, the Justice Department's inspector general said in a report Monday.

Inspector General Glenn Fine said the FBI is reducing thefts and disappearances of weapons and laptop computers, but the bureau acknowledged in a statement Monday that "more needs to be done."

The Boston field office reported a stolen laptop containing software for creating identification badges. The laboratory division at Quantico, Va., said a stolen laptop had names, addresses and phone numbers of FBI personnel.

"Perhaps most troubling, the FBI could not determine in many cases whether the lost or stolen laptop computers contained sensitive or classified information," the report said. "Such information may include case information, personal identifying information or classified information on FBI operations."

Of the 160 laptops lost or stolen over a 44-month period, 10 contained sensitive or classified information. The bureau did not have records on whether 51 others had such data.

The Department of Veterans Affairs began notifying 1.8 million veterans and doctors Monday that their personal and business information could be on a portable hard drive that has been missing from an Alabama hospital for nearly three weeks.

The hard drive may have contained Social Security numbers and other personal information from about 535,000 individuals and billing information on 1.3 million doctors nationwide, the VA said. That's more than 37 times more people than authorities initially believed were affected.

An employee at the VA medical center in Birmingham reported the external hard drive missing on Jan. 22. The drive was used to back up information on the employee's office computer. It may have contained data from research projects, the department said.

U.S. Rep. Artur Davis (news, bio, voting record) questioned why it took the agency so long to begin sending out notification letters.

"I certainly understand that the VA wanted to get a handle on the facts. But it became very apparent very early on that they had a breach of security," said Davis, a Democrat from Birmingham.

Veterans Affairs officials said they were moving as quickly as they could. "We are providing information as we learn it from an investigation," said spokesman Matt Burns in Washington.

The VA first publicly revealed the equipment was missing 11 days after it was reported, saying then that personal information on as many as 48,000 veterans may have been stolen.

The VA said Monday it doesn't have any reason to believe anyone has misused data from the hard drive, which is also at the center of a criminal investigation. The agency offered a year of free credit monitoring to anyone whose information is compromised.

Davis said the department told him that the missing storage unit included the Social Security numbers and names of about 10,000 people, plus another 525,000 Social Security numbers. The information on doctors includes names and Medicare billing codes, he said.

Labels: information security, Veterans Affairs

Republican presidential hopeful John McCain (news, bio, voting record) said Monday he fears an offensive by Iraqi insurgents similar to the Tet offensive by the Viet Cong that sent U.S. casualties soaring in Vietnam nearly 40 years ago.

McCain, a Vietnam war veteran who spent 5 1/2 years as a prisoner of war, said in an interview with The Associated Press that it's not the U.S. presence in Iraq that upsets voters but rather the number of casualties and the possibility those numbers could rise.

Giuliani's answers to abortion questions should always be succinct and to the point. Giuliani is pro-choice. He supports public funding for abortion. He will continue funding for abortions at city hospitals. Nothing more, nothing less.

CHARGE: GIULIANI'S PERSONAL LIFE RAISES QUESTIONS ABOUT A "WEIRDNESS FACTOR." GIULIANI WAS MARRIED TO HIS SECOND COUSIN FOR FOURTEEN YEARS. ALTHOUGH THE MARRIAGE LASTED A LONG TIME, GIULIANI HAD THE UNION ANNULLED ON THE GROUNDS THAT HE DID NOT GET PROPER DISPENSATION FROM THE CHURCH FOR THE MARRIAGE. WHEN ASKED ABOUT HIS PERSONAL LIFE, GIULIANI GIVES A WIDE ARRAY OF CONFLICTING ANSWERS. ALL OF THIS BRINGS THE SOUNDNESS OF HIS JUDGMENT INTO QUESTION -- AND THE VERACITY OF HIS ANSWERS.

Labels: hypocrisy, John McCain, Rudy Giuliani

Labels: Dixie Chicks, music

First, you’d set up a special intelligence unit to cook up rationales for war. A good model would be the Pentagon’s now-infamous Office of Special Plans, led by Abram Shulsky, that helped sell the Iraq war with false claims about links to Al Qaeda.

Sure enough, last year Donald Rumsfeld set up a new “Iranian directorate” inside the Pentagon’s policy shop. And last September Warren Strobel and John Walcott of McClatchy Newspapers — who were among the few journalists to warn that the administration was hyping evidence on Iraqi W.M.D. — reported that “current and former officials said the Pentagon’s Iranian directorate has been headed by Abram Shulsky.”

Next, you’d go for a repeat of the highly successful strategy by which scare stories about the Iraqi threat were disseminated to the public.

This time, however, the assertions wouldn’t be about W.M.D.; they’d be that Iranian actions are endangering U.S. forces in Iraq. Why? Because there’s no way Congress will approve another war resolution. But if you can claim that Iran is doing evil in Iraq, you can assert that you don’t need authorization to attack — that Congress has already empowered the administration to do whatever is necessary to stabilize Iraq. And by the time the lawyers are finished arguing — well, the war would be in full swing.

Finally, you’d build up forces in the area, both to prepare for the strike and, if necessary, to provoke a casus belli. There’s precedent for the idea of provocation: in a January 2003 meeting with Prime Minster Tony Blair, The New York Times reported last year, President Bush “talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire.”

In the end, Mr. Bush decided that he didn’t need a confrontation to start that particular war. But war with Iran is a harder sell, so sending several aircraft carrier groups into the narrow waters of the Persian Gulf, where a Gulf of Tonkin-type incident could all too easily happen, might be just the thing.

O.K., I hope I’m worrying too much. Those carrier groups could be going to the Persian Gulf just as a warning.

But you have to wonder about the other stuff. Why would the Pentagon put someone who got everything wrong on Iraq in charge of intelligence on Iran? Why wasn’t any official willing to take personal responsibility for the reliability of alleged evidence of Iranian mischief, as opposed to being an anonymous source? If the evidence is solid enough to bear close scrutiny, why were all cameras and recording devices, including cellphones, banned from yesterday’s Baghdad briefing?

It’s still hard to believe that they’re really planning to attack Iran, when it’s so obvious that another war would be a recipe for even bigger disaster. But remember who’s calling the shots: Dick Cheney thinks we’ve had “enormous successes” in Iraq.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates insisted again Friday that, despite persistent reports to the contrary circulating in Washington and around the world, the United States is not planning military action against Iran.

"I don't know how many times the president, Secretary Rice and I have had to repeat that we have no intention of attacking Iran," an exasperated Gates told reporters at a NATO meeting in Spain. In fact, he said, the administration has consciously tried to "tone down" its rhetoric on the subject.

Similar statements in recent weeks by President Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and others follow a high-level policy assessment in January that U.S. and multilateral pressure on Tehran, to the surprise of many in the administration, might be showing signs of progress.

Officials highlighted growing internal public and political criticism of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as well as the reemergence, after months of public silence, of Tehran's chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani. Larijani arrived in Munich yesterday for talks with European Union officials.

As a result, new talking points distributed to senior policymakers in the administration directed them to actively play down any suggestion of war planning.

[snip]

Some senior administration officials still relish the notion of a direct confrontation. One ambassador in Washington said he was taken aback when John Hannah, Vice President Cheney's national security adviser, said during a recent meeting that the administration considers 2007 "the year of Iran" and indicated that a U.S. attack was a real possibility. Hannah declined to be interviewed for this article.

Labels: Dick Cheney, Iran

Labels: idocy

In recent weeks senior American officers have condemned Tehran for providing training and deadly explosives to insurgents. In a predawn raid on Dec. 21, U.S. troops barged into the compound of the most powerful political party in the country, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and grabbed two men they claimed were officers in Iran's Revolutionary Guards. Three weeks later U.S. troops stormed an Iranian diplomatic office in Irbil, arresting five more Iranians. The Americans have hinted that as part of an escalating tit-for-tat, Iranians may have had a hand in a spectacular raid in Karbala on Jan. 20, in which four American soldiers were kidnapped and later found shot, execution style, in the head. U.S. forces promised to defend themselves.

Some view the spiraling attacks as a strand in a worrisome pattern. At least one former White House official contends that some Bush advisers secretly want an excuse to attack Iran. "They intend to be as provocative as possible and make the Iranians do something [America] would be forced to retaliate for," says Hillary Mann, the administration's former National Security Council director for Iran and Persian Gulf Affairs. U.S. officials insist they have no intention of provoking or otherwise starting a war with Iran, and they were also quick to deny any link to Sharafi's kidnapping. But the fact remains that the longstanding war of words between Washington and Tehran is edging toward something more dangerous. A second Navy carrier group is steaming toward the Persian Gulf, and NEWSWEEK has learned that a third carrier will likely follow. Iran shot off a few missiles in those same tense waters last week, in a highly publicized test. With Americans and Iranians jousting on the chaotic battleground of Iraq, the chances of a small incident's spiraling into a crisis are higher than they've been in years.

It‘s going to be a great campaign for us. We‘re all very excited about it, Mike. As you know, the primary calendar has changed a little bit. California has now said they are moving up to the 5th of February. Florida says they‘re moving up to January 29th. We‘re at the point that a year from today we will almost have a nominee for the Democrat and Republican Party.

BARNICLE: Well, I was going to ask you about the timing of that.

MCAULIFFE: Yeah.

BARNICLE: So what happens to New Hampshire and Iowa, given this projected new primary calendar?

MCAULIFFE: That‘s a good question, because if you have these huge, megastates like a California and New Jersey as well as Michigan, are now saying they are a going to move up, Iowa an New Hampshire always important. The early contests, Hillary, as you know, going to Iowa this weekend. They‘ll have an important play. But also if you are aye collecting delegates, you are going to have to have a lot of money to compete in the big state that are just going to come 10 days later.

So it‘s going to be a massive expenditure of funds to try and compete in all these different contests.

BARNICLE: Well, California and Florida, are those dates set if stone?

Have they been moved up?

MCAULIFFE: Well, they both have said their legislators are going to move them up and people have to be prepared. So we‘re planning accordingly as I‘m sure other campaigns are. But until this calendar is set you‘re not exactly sure where you‘ll commit your resources.

So right now you have got of course Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, the early states and then there will be a whole mixture, literally you could have 40 percent of the delegates chose in a week ending on February 5th, which I predict now, Michael, we will have a nominee of the Democratic Party.

We‘re at the point that a year from today we will almost have a nominee for the Democrat and Republican Party.

So, whether or not how dramatic this change will be, or is, what it’s caused by, are things that honest people, I think, can disagree with, and I really personally, having been a journalist, the first thing I was always cautioned by when someone was claiming, well, everybody is on my side, or everybody says this, or there is a total consensus, almost always when people said that to me over my years as a journalist, it wasn’t true. It was that there were honest people who disagreed and significant disagreement on such issues. We don’t know what those other cycles were caused by in the past. Could be dinosaur flatulence, you know, or who knows? We do know the CO2 in the past had its time when it was greater as well. And what happened when the CO2 was greater since then and now? There have been many cycles of up and down warming. So with that said, I think that we’ve had a great discussion today.

Labels: health care

In her first presidential campaign visit to the early voting state, Clinton focused on her plans to revive struggling small-town economies, provide universal health care and make college more affordable. But at a town hall meeting in rural Berlin and at a boisterous gathering of some 3,000 people in the state capital, Concord, Clinton was peppered with questions about Iraq.

Most of the questions were cordial, and Clinton was loudly cheered when she repeated her pledge to end the war if she is elected president next year. But several attendees challenged the New York senator to explain how she could reconcile her sharp criticism of the war with her vote to authorize the original invasion.

"Aren't you trying to have it both ways?" asked a man in Concord.

Clinton acknowledged "a great deal of frustration and anger and outrage" over the war, and said she was working hard in the Senate to pass legislation capping troop levels in Iraq. She also vowed to try to bring to a vote a resolution disapproving of President Bush's planned troop increase.

"I'm still in the arena," she said — an apparent riposte to a Democratic rival, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards. Like Clinton, Edwards voted to authorize the invasion, but he has become a staunch war critic since leaving the Senate in 2004.

"It's very easy to go around and say, 'Let's end the war,'" Clinton added. "If we had a Democratic president we would end the war."

Her toughest question came in Berlin, a struggling mill town in northern New Hampshire.

Roger Tilton, 46, a financial adviser from Nashua, N.H., told Clinton that unless she recanted her vote, he was not in the mood to listen to her other policy ideas.

"I want to know if right here, right now, once and for all and without nuance, you can say that war authorization was a mistake," Tilton said. "I, and I think a lot of other primary voters — until we hear you say it, we're not going to hear all the other great things you are saying."

In response, Clinton repeated her assertion that "knowing what we know now, I would never have voted for it," and said voters would have to decide for themselves whether her position was acceptable.

"The mistakes were made by this president, who misled this country and this Congress," Clinton said to loud applause.

Later, Tilton said he was not satisfied with her answer and was inclined to support either Edwards or Sen. Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record), D-Ill., who announced his candidacy Saturday.

"U.S. policy must be clear and unequivocal: We cannot, we should not, we must not permit Iran to build or acquire nuclear weapons...In dealing with this threat ... no option can be taken off the table."

Labels: Hillary Clinton, Iran, Iraq