my sunflower

important issue from the ncsf

Dear Friends, We are appealing Nitke vs. Ashcroft (now Gonzales) to the Supreme Court! The official filing will take place this week. I think we've got an excellent chance of finally overturning the Communications Decency Act, and I hope we'll be able to do it quickly. This law is dangerous because it criminalizes free speech on the Internet. If the law stands, I could lose my website and so could a lot of other artists and educators working in the sexual arena, as well as many BDSM and other alternative sexual groups who have their own websites. If you were ever thinking about sending a check to my co-plaintiff - the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom - to support this lawsuit, this would be a wonderful time. Every donation helps no matter how big or small. Make out your check to NCSF, and write CDA lawsuit in the memo line. Send it to: National Coalition for Sexual Freedom 822 Guilford Avenue, Box 127 Baltimore, MD 21202-3707 Scroll down for the official press release, and thanks for your support! Barbara Nitke FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE National Coalition for Sexual Freedom Contact: Susan Wright, NCSF Spokesperson (917) 848-6544 Supreme Court Appeal for Communications Decency Act Lawsuit August 22, 2005 - New York, NY - Barbara Nitke and the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom have filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court of the District Court's decision in the Communications Decency Act (CDA ) challenge. Their appeal contends the District Court applied an incorrect legal standard for determining whether protected material was improperly banned under the CDA. The District Court also committed legal error in finding that many local communities do not have pre-determined standards of obscenity that can be verified--and then ruling the plaintiffs failed to prove what those standards are. NCSF members and Barbara Nitke have been found by the Court to be genuinely at risk of prosecution under the CDA and their speech has been inhibited according to the decision handed down by the Federal District Court for the Southern District of NY, case #01 CIV 11476 (RMB). However, the three judge panel stated that the over 1,000 images and text by 150+ artists and website owners presented by the plaintiffs was "insufficient evidence" to prove that the variation in community standards is substantial enough that protected speech is inhibited by the CDA. "As an artist, I can only do my work in a free society and that's what this challenge is about," says co-plaintiff Barbara Nitke, a fine art photographer who explores sexual relationships in her work. "We're fighting for the continued right of American artists to do their work and share it with others on the Internet.""NCSF is concerned about this ruling because the court agrees that websites that deal with alternative sexuality are at risk of prosecution," says Susan Wright, NCSF Spokesperson. "Websites and chat groups that include discussions and images of SM, swinging and polyamory, and membership groups that maintain educational websites about adult sexuality are at risk."The CDA contains provisions that ban speech and images from the Internet that any local community in the U.S. could deem obscene, even though that speech would be fully protected elsewhere. The CDA also contains a provision that states that it's illegal to put any obscene material on the web in such a way that minors can access it. However since the Internet can be accessed by anyone with a computer, anything on the web can be accessed by a minor as previously held by the Supreme Court in Reno v. ACLU. NCSF and Nitke maintain that adults have the right to post sexually explicit material on the Internet for other adults to view. NCSF is dedicated to proactively challenging the rise in obscenity prosecutions, including filing an Amicus Brief in support of Extreme Associates, and supporting the Free Speech Coalition's injunction against the expanded record-keeping provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 2257. To contribute to the appeal of the CDA lawsuit, go to:www.ncsfreedom.org/donations.htmNational Coalition for Sexual Freedom - www.ncsfreedom.org Barbara Nitke - www.barbaranitke.com ###A project of NCSF The National Coalition for Sexual Freedom is a national organization committed to creating a political, legal, and social environment in theUnited States that advances equal rights of consenting adults who practice forms of alternative sexual expression. NCSF is primarily focused on the rights of consenting adults in the SM-leather-fetish, swing, and polyamory communities, who often face discrimination because of their sexual expression. National Coalition for Sexual Freedom 822 Guilford Avenue, Box 127 Baltimore, MD 21202-3707410-539-4824media@ncsfreedom.orgwww.ncsfreedom.orgPlease cross post

IRAN'S ANTI-GAY PURGE GROWS

found this via MY personal favorite blog skippy the bush kangaroo

REPORTS OF NEW GAY EXECUTIONS
by Doug IrelandSenior Contributing Editor

There have been reports of a new execution of a gay man in the city of
Arak, Iran, on August 16, and of other executions of four men, ages 17 to 24,
for unspecified "sexual offenses." But it is difficult to confirm these reports
with total accuracy, because of the climate of fear which prevails in the
Islamic Republic of Iran today. The newly-elected, reactionary regime of
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (lower right) has heightened its campaign of
repression of gay people since the worldwide protests against the hanging of two
gay teens in Mashad on July 19, and Iranians -- both gay and straight --are
afraid to communicate with the outside world on these matters...........

we all knew this was going to happen

but not quite in this heavily a manner

Bolton throws UN summit into chaos

Bush's envoy demands 750 changes to reorganisation plans Julian Borger in WashingtonFriday August 26, 2005 The Guardian

John Bolton, Washington's new ambassador to the United Nations, has called for wholesale changes to a draft document due to go before a UN summit next month aimed at reshaping the world body.
Mr Bolton, a long-standing UN critic who was given a temporary appointment by George Bush three weeks ago after the United States Senate failed to agree on his nomination, has proposed 750 amendments to the draft and called for immediate talks on them. The 29-page document has been drawn up by a committee under the UN general assembly president, Jean Ping of Gambia, over the past year, during which time several drafts have been circulated.
Critics complained that the US objections had come towards the end of the drafting process, with only three weeks to go before the summit..................

i don't really know how i feel about this

i do NOT believe a morning after pill should be used as a regular birth control method. that much is sure. however i also don't believe most (if not all) 15 and 16 and 17 year olds are equipped to be parents. if they were afforded the PROPER EDUCATION on birth control IN THE FIRST PLACE, i think most of this would be moot. they would be (if they decided to have sex) taking the proper precautions to begin with. teaching birth control and safe sex is NOT preaching to young 'uns to have sex. it is saying, if you DO have sex........................please take the proper care. in an earlier posting i listed some links to stories dealing with this and the preaching of abstinance (which we all know does NOT work).

FDA Delays Morning-After Pill Decision

By LAURAN NEERGAARD, AP Medical WriterFri Aug 26, 7:57 PM ET

The government on Friday put off its long-awaited final decision on whether to sell emergency contraception without a prescription, saying the pill was safe to sell over-the-counter to adults but grappling with how to keep it out of the hands of young teenagers.
In a surprise move, the Food and Drug Administration postponed for at least 60 days a final decision on how to allow nonprescription sales of the morning-after pill called Plan B just to women 17 or older.
"Enforceability is the key question," said FDA Commissioner Lester Crawford.
The drug's maker, Barr Pharmaceuticals, criticized the decision, questioning how the agency could acknowledge that scientific evidence supported nonprescription sales and yet not allow those sales to begin.
"It's like being in purgatory," said Barr chief executive Bruce Downey............

Farmer May Have Caught Legendary 'Chupacabra'

Mysterious Animal Kills Chickens, Turkeys

POSTED: 9:31 am CDT August 25, 2005
UPDATED: 9:47 am CDT August 25, 2005

COLEMAN, Texas -- A Texas farmer may have found what some would call a "chupacabra," a legendary animal known for sucking the blood out of goats............

saw a GREAT x-files episode involving the chupacabra a while ago.

Report: Military women devalued

Pentagon panel says academies tolerate sexual abuse, harassment of cadets

Go to Original
Report: Military Women Devalued By Steven Komarow USA Today
Friday 26 August 2005

Washington - A culture that devalues women in
uniform tolerates rape and sexual harassment at the Army and Navy academies,
according to a Pentagon task force report released Thursday.
"When women are devalued, the likelihood of
harassing and even abusive behavior increases," said the panel of
military officers and civilian experts. It proposed wide-ranging action, from
better admissions screening to revamping antiquated military rape laws.
Congress ordered the review of the Army and Navy
academies after a 2003 investigation at the Air Force academy found sexual
assault "a part of life" for cadets. That investigation arose after almost 150
women came forward to say they had been assaulted by fellow cadets between 1993
and
2003.............

not much more to say. second class citizen status AGAIN

i like him

i have berkeley breathed pictures on my checks

from editor and publisher by way of buzzflash

Berkeley Breathed On His 'Jailed Journo' Comic Strips
By E&P Staff Published: August 24, 2005 2:15 PM ET
NEW YORK On the past two Sundays, Berkeley Breathed, in his comics strip “Opus,” has chronicled the disaster that befalls the Bloom Picayune's “Scruples Boy” after he decides to protect a source for one of the paper's most scandalous stories (the mayor's sex-change operation). This leads Opus -- who has been connected to the Picayune in various capacities since 1982, first in Breathed's popular “Bloom County” -- to jail. There he encounters a hulking cellmate named Mr. Rampaige, who rails against the media for, among other reasons, its coverage since 9/11.While her name is never mentioned in the strips, the figure of jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller certainly hovers over the color panels. E&P wondered what Breathed felt about her current plight, and the inspiration for this month's strips (which are syndicated by the Washington Post Writers Group). Here's what we found out.....................

the big move

i don't care if you like stern or not, that's NOT the point! the point is TELL THE FCC ROBOT RADIO MUST DIE

Sirius Plans Double Dose of Stern

By Paul FarhiWashington Post Staff WriterFriday, August 26, 2005; Page C07

While one Howard Stern radio program may seem like quite enough, the self-proclaimed "King of All Media" appears to be getting ready for all Stern, all the time.
Sirius Satellite Radio, which will begin employing Stern in January, said yesterday that it will devote two round-the-clock channels to the shock jock's show and other material he'll develop, confirming comments Stern made on his syndicated program this week.....

.....Stern's switch to pay radio next year is one of the biggest moves in the medium's history. Sirius is staking a reported $100 million a year on Stern as it tries to close the gap with its bigger competitor, XM Satellite Radio, based in Washington. Sirius has about 1.8 million subscribers, compared with XM's 4.4 million..........

Stern, who has been promoting his move to satellite radio on his current show for months, has said he'll be able to broadcast on satellite without fear of sanction from the Federal Communications Commission. Stern has been subject to numerous FCC fines for violations of commission rules prohibiting sexually oriented "indecent" speech on radio and TV. Last fall, Infinity agreed to pay a record $3.5 million to settle several FCC complaints. The company also agreed to suspend any on-air host who runs afoul of the rules.....

Political Violence Surges in Iraq

Caskets containing the bodies of four followers of Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr are carried through Najaf. (By Khalid Mohammed -- Associated Press)

Two-Day Toll Reaches 100; Third Charter Deadline Missed
By Ellen Knickmeyer and Anthony ShadidWashington Post Foreign ServiceFriday, August 26, 2005; Page A01

BAGHDAD, Aug. 26 -- Political violence surged Thursday along many of Iraq's ethnic and sectarian fault lines, while Shiite and Sunni Arab political leaders haggled past a third deadline without reaching accord on a draft constitution.
As the two-day death toll around Iraq reached 100, fighting between two powerful Shiite militias in the southern city of Najaf subsided, with 19 reported dead overall. The clashes Wednesday night and Thursday between the Mahdi Army, loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, and fighters allegedly linked to the government-allied Badr Organization were the deadliest between Iraqi militia forces since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003................

and on and on and on it goes. where it stops NO BODY knows.

my state is first at something AGAIN

but this time, i'm NOT bragging.


F.B.I., Using Patriot Act, Demands Library's Records
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
Published: August 26, 2005

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25 - Using its expanded power under the antiterrorism law known as the USA Patriot Act, the F.B.I. is demanding library records from a Connecticut institution as part of an intelligence investigation, the American Civil Liberties Union said Thursday.The demand is the first confirmed instance in which the Federal Bureau of Investigation has used the law in this way, federal officials and the A.C.L.U. said. The government's power to demand access to library borrowing records and other material showing reading habits has been the single most divisive issue in the debate over whether Congress should extend key elements of the act after this year. Because of federal secrecy requirements, the A.C.L.U. said it was barred from disclosing the identity of the institution or other main details of the bureau's demand, but court papers indicate that the target is a library in the Bridgeport area. The A.C.L.U., a leading critic of the Bush administration over the Patriot Act and its antiterrorism policies, brought a lawsuit on Aug. 9 in Federal District Court in Bridgeport on behalf of the Connecticut institution. The suit was filed under seal, and names and other information were redacted in a public version it released Thursday.

who ISN'T a leading critic of bush?

i've always liked bob costas

now i like jonathan kline too (at least on this point)

Costas Not Only Keeps Job But Gets Pat on the Back

CNN President Jonathan Klein has approved the decision by Bob Costas to bail out of the Larry King Live show Wednesday night after producers declined to change the topic of the broadcast, the Natalee Holloway case in Aruba. In an interview with today's (Wednesday) New York Times, Klein remarked, "It's important that we never have an anchor doing a story he does not believe in." Klein suggested that he himself does not believe in the story. He told the Times that cable news outlets have covered it because "It's easy and it's brainless. ... They're looking for an ongoing drama like Law & Order, except Law & Order doesn't do the same plot every night." Klein particularly struck out at rival Fox News Channel, pointing out that on the day earlier this month when 14 marines were killed in Iraq, Fox News's Greta Van Susteren stuck with the Holloway case. "Fourteen Americans dead, and they have Natalee Holloway on," Klein told the Times, adding: "And they're supposedly America's news channel." A spokeswoman for Fox News Channel responded: "If Jon performed as well as he talks he wouldn't have to explain his network's dismal ratings." Meanwhile, the Wilmington, DE News-Journal in an editorial today praised Costas for his "principled refusal" to appear on the show and concluded: "Congratulations to Mr. Costas. You have our respect. You also have our hope that you continue to get work."

laughed my big ol' butt off at this one

by john moe


THIRTY-NINE QUESTIONS FOR CHARLIE DANIELS UPON HEARING"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" for the First Time in 25 Years.

1. The Devil won that fiddling contest, right? 2. Because isn't that totally amazing fiddle feedback thing the Devil plays (which sounds like Hendrix gone bluegrass) a hundred times better than that high-school-band piece-of-crap tune Johnny plays? 3. I mean, come on, right? 4. And since the Devil is so clearly better, why does he lay the golden fiddle on the ground at Johnny's feet? 5. What kind of one-sided bet was that anyway, your eternal soul for a fiddle? 6. Shouldn't it have been something like Johnny's soul or the eradication of Evil? 7. Or maybe a golden fiddle against some object Johnny placed great value upon? 8. If the Devil went down to Georgia 'cause he was looking for a soul to steal, why does he arrange what appears to be an honest competition? 9. Was there actually some hidden theft or scam going on here on the part of the Devil? 10. Then why not explain that, Mr. Daniels? 11. And who was judging that contest? 12. Was it an honor-system kind of thing? 13. With the Devil? .............

my favorite is #24 (i think)

yahhhhhhhhhhhhh

Cindy Sheehan, left, waves to supporters after arriving at Waco Regional Airport in Waco, Texas. Sheehan has returned to Texas and her anti-war vigil outside President Bush's ranch near Crawford. (Photo: AP)

Sheehan Returns To Peace Vigil

(AP) A woman whose son was killed in Iraq returned to Texas Wednesday to resume her anti-war protest near President Bush's ranch after a weeklong absence to care for her ailing mother. About a dozen protesters who have continued the peace vigil picked up Cindy Sheehan at the Waco airport Wednesday afternoon, six days after she flew to Los Angeles when her 74-year-old mother suffered a stroke. "This is where I belong, until Aug. 31, like I told the president," Sheehan said at the airport before driving about 20 miles to the Crawford site. Sheehan began her vigil Aug. 6 on the road leading to Bush's ranch, vowing to stay through his monthlong vacation unless he met with her. Her 24-year-old son, Army Spc. Casey Sheehan, was killed last year in Iraq. Sheehan's protest has encouraged anti-war activists to join her and prompted peace vigils nationwide. She also continues to draw harsh criticism................

the a-hole speaks again

Robertson Apologizes for Calling for Assassination

he doesn't mean it (the apology) so it doesn't count. he showed himself (yet AGAIN) for what he really is. a terrorist who would put contracts out on people if he could get away with it (and didn't have to pay for it) what an azz wipe

By Alan CoopermanWashington Post Staff WriterThursday, August 25, 2005; Page A03

The Rev. Pat Robertson apologized yesterday for calling for the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, saying he spoke "in frustration" over the U.S. government's inaction toward a man who has "found common cause with terrorists." The religious broadcaster's comments Monday on his television show "The 700 Club" unleashed a flood of criticism, not only from the State Department and Venezuela's ambassador but also from some evangelical Christian leaders in the United States. Robertson, 75, at first responded by insisting that his remarks had been misinterpreted by the news media. "Wait a minute, I didn't say 'assassination.' I said our Special Forces should 'take him out,' and 'take him out' can be a number of things, including kidnapping," he said on yesterday's edition of his flagship show on the Christian Broadcasting Network.........

ask w and his friends

there is NO global warming ....... so they just keep revoking (or not passing) laws that were (or could be) put in place to help our (YES OUR) planet. bunch of katsu piedies..........

Group: Melting Arctic a growing threat

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The rate of ice melting in the Arctic is increasing and a panel of researchers says it sees no natural process that is likely to change that trend.
Within a century the melting could lead to summertime ice-free ocean conditions not seen in the area in a million years, the group said Tuesday.
Melting of land-based glaciers could take much longer but could raise the sea levels, potentially affecting coastal regions worldwide.
And changes to the permafrost could undermine buildings, drain water into bogs and release additional carbon into the atmosphere.
"What really makes the Arctic different from the rest of the non-polar world is the permanent ice in the ground, in the ocean, and on land," said Jonathan T. Overpeck of the University of Arizona and chairman of the National Science Foundation's Arctic System Science Committee that issued the report.............

yikes

Paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division board a C-130 for a training exercise in this April 2005 photo.

remember, he's STILL on vacation. once again i say, SEND THE TWINS OVER

1,500 more troops headed for Iraq

From Larry ShaughnessyCNN Washington Bureau
Thursday, August 25, 2005; Posted: 1:53 a.m. EDT (05:53 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- More troops are headed to Iraq, this time 1,500 paratroopers to temporarily boost military strength during the fall election period, the Pentagon has announced.
Two battalions of the 82nd Airborne Division will deploy in mid-September from their home base of Fort Bragg, North Carolina. They will comprise the 2nd Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment (AIR) and the 3rd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment (PIR).
This is the third time the U.S. has raised troop levels during major political milestones in Iraq. Similar increases were made during the June 2004 transfer to Iraqi sovereignty and again during January's elections.
This deployment and last week's announcement of another increase will raise the troop level to at least 140,000...........

brock peters, a fine actor

is gone. he shall be remembered

Brock Peters of 'To Kill a Mockingbird' Is Dead at 78

Brock Peters, the versatile film and stage actor, singer and producer who first rose to prominence in the 1960's and 70's with his powerful singing voice and poignant screen portrayals of angry, belligerent black men, died yesterday at his home in Los Angeles. He was 78.....

......Among his most striking roles were the lead in the 1972 Broadway musical "Lost in the Stars" and in the later movie, and the minor but striking part of the man wrongfully accused of rape in the film version of "To Kill a Mockingbird," released in 1962.
Mr. Peters's first screen appearances were in two lavish 1950's all-black musicals directed by Otto Preminger. He was cast as Sergeant Brown, the brutal army officer who harasses Harry Belafonte in "Carmen Jones" (1954), and Crown, the equally terrifying Catfish Row villain who stalks Dorothy Dandridge in the 1959 film adaptation of George Gershwin's classic folk opera, "Porgy and Bess." His explosively convincing performances in the roles proved as much a burden as a blessing.
With his dark skin, searing eyes and intimidating scowl, Mr. Peters was quickly type-cast as the archetypal, menacing, black villain on screen. ............

why am i thinking of

the outer limits
and
the twilight zone


A Doll That Can Recognize Voices, Identify Objects and Show Emotion
By MICHEL MARRIOTT
Published: August 25, 2005

Judy Shackelford, who has been in the toy industry for more than 40 years, has seen a lot of dolls. But none, she says, like her latest creation, a marvel of digital technologies, including speech-recognition and memory chips, radio frequency tags and scanners, and facial robotics. She and her team have christened it Amazing Amanda..........

ewwwwwwwwwww

but they really DO work wonders........

Age-Old Cures, Like the Maggot, Get U.S. Hearing
By GARDINER HARRIS
Published: August 25, 2005

WASHINGTON, Aug. 24 - Flesh-eating maggots and bloodsucking leeches, long thought of as the tools of bygone medicine, have experienced a quiet renaissance among high-tech surgeons, and for two days beginning Thursday a federal board of medical advisers will discuss how to regulate them. Leeches, it turns out, are particularly good at draining excess blood from surgically reattached or transplanted appendages. As microsurgeons tackle feats like reattaching hands, scalps and even faces, leeches have become indispensable. And maggots clean festering wounds that fail to heal, as among diabetics, better than almost anything else, although their use in the United States has been slight, in part because of squeamishness. But neither leeches nor maggots have ever been subject to thorough regulation by the Food and Drug Administration. So the medical advisers are being asked to create general guidelines about how they should be safely grown, transported and sold............

yet ANOTHER unbelievable tale.......

but this one is rather funny (not for the doctor who has to defend himself though). i found this by way of bifurcated rivets, another favorite site of mine

Woman Files Complaint After Doctor Tells Her She's Obese

New Hampshire Doctor Outraged By Complaint
POSTED: 5:29 pm EDT August 22, 2005
UPDATED: 6:08 pm EDT August 22, 2005

ROCHESTER, N.H. -- The New Hampshire attorney general is investigating a Rochester doctor because a patient complained that he bluntly told her she needed to lose weight.
Dr. Terry Bennett said that he's outraged by what he calls a baseless complaint. A patient was apparently insulted when Bennett told her that she was obese and could only get healthier by losing weight.
"It's an epidemic in the United States, and it's croaking us," Bennett said.
Bennett said that it's a lecture he gives to many of his overweight patients.......

.................Bennett said he tells obese patients that their weight is bad for their health and their love lives. But the lecture drove one patient to write a letter to the Board of Medicine, which has passed on the complaint to the Attorney General's Office........

a MUST read (please)

(ANOTHER new hero of mine!)

Vets and the Coward

The man who dishonored American veterans by hiding out from the Vietnam War in the Texas Air National Guard added insult to injury this week by shamelessly invoking memories of those who died in war as a pathetic excuse to continue his illegal and failed war in Iraq.
Bush’s lame attempt so disgusted veterans attending the VFW annual convention in Salt Lake City that many of them wore “B.S. Protector” ear muffs during his speech to the group on Monday.
Memo to the dimwit now living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue: When the vets who actually fought for their country stop buying your bullshit you’re in a lot of trouble.....

verrrrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyyy interesting

instead of spending the money on GRAVESTONES and what is UPON them, why not spend the money on the health and well being of our enlisted women and men. why not bring them home SAFE AND SOUND
The gravestones of fallen Americans buried at Arlington National Cemetery during the Iraq war era show a change in style from earlier conflicts, in Arlington, Va., Friday, July 1, 2005. Unlike earlier wars, nearly all Arlington National Cemetery gravestones for troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are inscribed with the operation names, such as 'Operation Iraqi Freedom' and 'Operation Enduring Freedom', which the Pentagon selected to promote public support for the conflicts. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Troops' Gravestones Have Pentagon Slogans


........Families of fallen soldiers and Marines are being told they have the option to have the government-furnished headstones engraved with "Operation Enduring Freedom" or "Operation Iraqi Freedom" at no extra charge, whether they are buried in Arlington or elsewhere. A mock-up shown to many families includes the operation names.
The vast majority of military gravestones from other eras are inscribed with just the basic, required information: name, rank, military branch, date of death and, if applicable, the war and foreign country in which the person served........

i am SO smiling!

i truly believe what robertson said WAS a statement a terrorist would make.

Chavez lashes back at Robertson
The Venezuelan leader fought back against the '700 Club' host.


by Christopher Toothaker (AP)
August 23, 2005

CARACAS, Venezuela - Pat Robertson's call for American agents to assassinate President Hugo Chavez is a ``terrorist'' statement that needs to be investigated by U.S. authorities, Venezuela said Tuesday. The Bush administration quickly distanced itself from the religious broadcaster.
Robertson's suggestion Monday that the United States ``take out'' Chavez to stop Venezuela from becoming a ``launching pad for communist influence and Muslim extremism'' appeared likely to aggravate tensions between the United States and the world's fifth-largest oil exporting country.
Chavez, who was democratically elected, has emerged as one of the most outspoken critics of President Bush, accusing the United States of conspiring to topple his government and possibly backing plots to assassinate him. The United States is the top buyer of Venezuelan oil, but Chavez has made it clear he wants to decrease the country's dependence on the U.S. market by finding other buyers..........

.... At the Pentagon, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said when asked about Robertson's comments: ``Our department doesn't do that kind of thing. It's against the law. He's a private citizen. Private citizens say all kinds of things all the time.''..............

yeah rummy private citizens DO say shite all the time. however, unlike YOUR president the shite WE say doesn't send us off to (an unjust) war.................

well if president bush says it's ok

Secular Iraqi leaders objected Tuesday to the charter draft. A banner in Sadr City read, "One Nation, One People, One Constitution."
then it HAS to be ok!

Secular Iraqis Say New Charter May Curb Rights

By DEXTER FILKINS
Published: August 24, 2005
BAGHDAD,
Iraq, Aug. 23 - Some secular Iraqi leaders complained Tuesday that the country's
nearly finished constitution lays the groundwork for the possible domination of
the country by Shiite Islamic clerics, and that it contains specific provisions
that could sharply curtail the rights of women..........

.....President Bush, in an appearance
in Idaho on Tuesday, asserted that the Iraqi document guaranteed women's rights
and the freedom of religion in a country that in recent decades had only known
dictatorship.
Labeling the Iraqi constitution an "amazing event," he said, "We had a little trouble
with our own conventions writing a constitution." ....................

see georgie thinks it's fine so now i can sleep at night! i'm at peace. after all he is known for both his HONESTY AND HIS GOOD JUDGEMENT (ain't he?)

this is just about the scariest thing

At the recovery centerA young girl lost her leg, and is recovering at the World Vision Recovery Center for escaped children.

i have ever heard of. it is bad fiction. it cannot be real, yet of course we all know it HAS to be real. if indeed pat robertson could wish an end to someone (please understand i do NOT advocate that by any means) why could it not be on joseph kony?


Children of war in Uganda
'We are so tired with this war,' says a 13-year-old escapee, former fighter, and night commuter on the 19-year civil war


By Keith Morrison and Tim Sandler
Dateline NBC
Updated: 1:19 p.m. ET Aug. 22, 2005
"Dateline" traveled to Northern Uganda to report on "night commuters:" tens of thousands of children forced to hide in the night to escape being killed or abducted by rebels. If captured by the rebels, these children of war are torn from their families and forced to become soldiers under the maniacal leadership of Joseph Kony. Who is he? And why is his reign of terror unknown to most people in the world?
Around northern Uganda, little children who don’t find a safe place at night are in danger. And so are adults. People who are found by the rebels can be burnt to death, or beyond recognition. Body parts are cut off — noses, lips, ears, fingers.......

........What makes this stand out from other wars is that it is being fought with children. Children stolen from their families are forced to become soldiers. At the age of 8, or 10 or 12, children forced to kill.
Joseph Kony: 'Worst of the worst' Who steals the souls of children?
His name is Joseph Kony. He imagines he’s a reincarnation of Jesus and calls his group “The Lord’s Resistance Army.” With virtually no popular support, he has increasingly resorted to abducting children to fight for him— against not only government forces but his own civilian people. His army has stolen as many as 30,000 innocent kids since the war began............

pat? send your army of death angels after kony (again, i am NOT advocating killing, i'm making a POINT only) and leave everyone else alone, ok?

THIS is christian?

THIS IN THE NAME OF GOD? (my goddess i say to myself!)

Robertson called for the assassination of Venezuela's president

Pat Robertson, host of Christian Broadcasting Network's The 700 Club and
founder of the Christian Coalition of America, called for the assassination of
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
From the August 22 broadcast of The 700
Club:
ROBERTSON: There was a popular coup that overthrew him [Chavez]. And
what did the United States State Department do about it? Virtually nothing. And
as a result, within about 48 hours that coup was broken; Chavez was back in
power, but we had a chance to move in. He has destroyed the Venezuelan economy,
and he's going to make that a launching pad for communist infiltration and
Muslim extremism all over the continent.
You know, I don't know about this
doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I
think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than
starting a war. And I don't think any oil shipments will stop. But this man is a
terrific danger and the United ... This is in our sphere of influence, so we
can't let this happen. We have the Monroe Doctrine, we have other doctrines that
we have announced. And without question, this is a dangerous enemy to our south,
controlling a huge pool of oil, that could hurt us very badly. We have the
ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that
ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know,
strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert
operatives do the job and then get it over with.

go connecticut!

(Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut's attorney general, right, announced the lawsuit on Monday, appearing with Lt. Gov. Kevin B. Sullivan.)
Connecticut Sues the U.S. Over School Testing

Connecticut sued the federal government yesterday, accusing the Bush administration of being "rigid, arbitrary and capricious" in the enforcement of its signature education law and seeking relief from a requirement that it scrap its own testing program in favor of one the state says will not help children but will cost millions.
The suit, the first by a state to challenge Mr. Bush's No Child Left Behind law, argues that Connecticut is not being adequately reimbursed for the cost of expanding to annual testing from its current schedule of every other year.
Officials said that and other provisions of the law would force Connecticut to spend $50 million of its own money in coming years. The law specifically bans the federal government from imposing mandates without financing them.
"No matter how good its goals, and I agree with N.C.L.B.'s goals, the federal government is not above the law," said Connecticut's attorney general, Richard Blumenthal.
The suit opens a new front in a struggle between the federal government and the many states that have objected to the law, in some cases by passing legislative protests, as in Utah, and in others, such as Texas, by defying federal rulings.
Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat, had sought to persuade other states to join the suit, but without success, although Maine officials said yesterday that they were seriously considering their own lawsuit.........

i don't agree with blumenthal all of the time but he's one tenacious dude i must say!

what the HELL sacrifice did HE make any way?

oh he had to leave his ranch to make this speech. i get it.

from the new york times

Citing Sacrifice, President Vows to Keep Up Fight

SALT LAKE CITY, Aug. 22 - President Bush hailed the sacrifice of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan on Monday and vowed, in a rare reference to the number of American deaths, that the nation owed it to the more than 2,000 Americans killed in the two wars not to end their mission prematurely " Each of these men and women left grieving families and loved ones back home," Mr. Bush said here at the national convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. "Each of these heroes left a legacy that will allow generations of their fellow Americans to enjoy the blessings of liberty."
Then he said he would not bow to growing pressure to withdraw troops immediately from Iraq: "We owe them something. We will finish the task that they gave their lives for."
Mr. Bush made his speech at his first public appearance in

you're DAMN RIGHT we OWE THEM SOMETHING. we owe them their LIVES

bye bye birdie (bushie?????)

from the american research group (don't know a THING about them i must say) via raw story

George W. Bush's overall job approval ratings have dropped from a month
ago even as Americans who approve of the way Bush is handling his job as
president are turning more optimistic about their personal financial situations
according to the latest survey from the American Research Group. Among all
Americans, 36% approve of the way Bush is handling his job as president and 58%
disapprove. When it comes to Bush's handling of the economy, 33% approve and 62%
disapprove.
Among Americans registered to vote, 38% approve of the way Bush
is handling his job as president and 56% disapprove, and 36% approve of the way
Bush is handling the economy and 60% disapprove.
This is the second month in
a row when improving economic ratings have not been matched by higher job
approval ratings for Bush. A total of 24% of Americans now say their personal
financial situations are getting better, up from 17% in July, and 27% say they
believe that their personal financial situations will be better off a year from
now, which is up from 21% in July.................

an evil man is sentenced

( John Hawthorne, widower of Centennial Park bombing victim Alice Hawthorne, and his daughter, Fallon Stubbs, who was injured during the bombing, left the federal courthouse in Atlanta after the sentencing of Eric Rudolph). it is BEYOND me how someone who professes to hold life so dear, can kill. i can understand and accept being against abortion (if you don't want one DON'T HAVE ONE) but to BOMB a clinic and kill people and to bomb a gay club (hey if you don't want to have a life partner of the same gender DON'T) is just NOT comprehensible to me. i just don't get it. the same people screaming to stop abortions are the same people who insist upon capital punishment (most of the time, granted NOT all of the time). your beliefs should be your beliefs for EVERYTHING. You shouldn't pick and choose who you think should live and who you think should die.
Olympics Bomber Apologizes and Is Sentenced to Life Terms

ATLANTA, Aug. 22 - Eric Robert Rudolph, the man responsible for the pipe bomb
explosion at the 1996 Summer Olympics here and three other bombings, offered his
first public apology on Monday at what could well be his last public appearance,
a sentencing hearing attended by about two dozen victims and family members. "I
cannot begin to truly understand the pain that I have inflicted upon these
innocent people," Mr. Rudolph said, reading a statement, adding, "I would do
anything to take back that night."
Still, Mr. Rudolph, who will be imprisoned
for life, spoke only of the bombing at Centennial Olympic Park, which marred one
of Atlanta's brightest moments, killing one person and injuring more than 100. He did not mention two bombings at women's health
clinics in Atlanta, where six people were injured; a bombing at a clinic in
Birmingham in which an off-duty police officer was killed and a nurse was
injured; or a bombing a gay club in Atlanta that left five people
injured.............

Somalia's violence 'catastrophic'

from the bbc:

The lives of Somalis continue to be blighted by a "catastrophic" level of daily
violence and "brutality", says a report by a medical charity.
Medecins Sans
Frontieres (MSF) says that in the town of Galcayo alone, it has treated more
than 500 victims of violence this year.
It runs two hospitals in the town,
which is divided into two areas, controlled by rival warlords.
Somalia has
not had a functioning national government for 14 years.
A transitional
parliament was sworn in on 22 August 2004 but this has failed to end the
anarchy.
'Frightening'
In its northern Galcayo hospital, MSF treated 224
people for gunshots, 135 for knife wounds and another 38 from physical assault
in the first six months of 2005.
It treated 106 people for gunshot wounds
between January and March in its hospital in the south. Most of the victims are women and children.................

insightful column in the washington post by david j becker

Reviving Jim Crow?

Any day now the Justice Department will render
judgment on one of the single most discriminatory pieces of voting legislation
of recent years: a Georgia state law requiring voters to present
one of only six forms of photo identification before they can exercise their
right to vote. Before enforcing this statute, Georgia must get Justice
Department approval by proving that the law will not put minority voters in a
worse position than they were in before the requirement was instituted.
The
facts surrounding Georgia's voter identification requirement cannot be disputed.
Virtually every black legislator opposes the legislation, and most black
lawmakers staged a walkout to protest its passage. Every major civil rights and
minority advocacy group, including the NAACP, and many legal scholars, oppose
the restriction; several have submitted comments to the Justice Department for
consideration.
Additionally, it is surprisingly
difficult to obtain a photo ID in Georgia. Though the state has 159 counties,
there are only 56 places in which residents can obtain a driver's license, and
not one is within the city limits of Atlanta or within the six counties that
have the highest percentage of blacks.
There is also
considerable evidence that photo ID requirements have a disproportionately
negative impact on blacks and other minorities. The Justice Department found as
recently as a decade ago that blacks in Louisiana were four to five times less
likely than whites to have photo IDs.............

again, i'm not surprised this was proposed. let's keep our fingers crossed it does NOT pass.

welcome back - you've got a job!!!

NOT

is this how we welcome back our troops? TYRANT CAPTOR IN A HOLE

this poor kid was one of the ones who found saddam. he's back home now, away from the war. he cannot find a job. are you surprised? i'm not

August 22, 2005 -- Jeans Cruz never thought he would have a tough time finding a job with a résumé like his: computer training, nursing skills, military experience — and capturing Saddam Hussein.
The 24-year-old Bronx man was among the unit of Army soldiers who in late 2003 hauled the fallen Iraq dictator from the tiny rat hole he cowered in after the U.S. invasion.
Now Cruz has been dis charged from the Army, and civilian life has been hard. The husband, father and war hero can't seem to find employment.
"I'm trying to get a job. I have a lot of things to put on my résumé," he told The Post last week. "I thought it would be pretty easy, with my background, but it hasn't."
The retired Army specialist was one of the soldiers of G Troop, 10th Cavalry, a reconnaissance unit of the 4th Infantry Division, which spent days staking out a small farm believed to be Saddam's hideout. ...............

i wonder how they are going to attempt to discredit HIS two purple hearts........

Sen. Hagel sees echoes of Vietnam in Iraq
White House rejects Republican’s claim that war has destabilized Mideast


WASHINGTON - A leading Republican senator and prospective presidential candidate said Sunday that the war in Iraq has destabilized the Middle East and is looking more like the Vietnam conflict from a generation ago.

Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, who received two Purple Hearts and other military honors for his service in Vietnam, reiterated his position that the United States needs to develop a strategy to leave Iraq.
Hagel scoffed at the idea that U.S. troops could be in Iraq four years from now at levels above 100,000, a contingency for which the Pentagon is preparing........

more from the big fat stupid-head

from media-matters (who are NOT little pimple-faced kids working at wannabe websites)

Apparently stung by criticism and inundated with what he calls "far more hate mail than I usually get" over comments he made on August 15, nationally syndicated radio host Rush Limbaugh lashed out, apparently at Media Matters for America, describing us on his August 18 show as "little pimple-faced kids that are working at wannabe websites." On August 16, Media Matters first reported that Limbaugh compared the actions of war critic Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, to Bill Burkett, the retired Texas Air National Guard officer who provided CBS' 60 Minutes with unauthenticated documents regarding President Bush's National Guard record. Asserting that Sheehan's "story is nothing more than forged documents," Limbaugh said, "Cindy Sheehan is just Bill Burkett."
Limbaugh claimed on August 18 that his comments were taken "out of context" and that he simply meant that "[t]he whole event [Sheehan's protest] is staged" and that "all she is is an opportunity like Bill Burkett was an opportunity, to bash Bush." But in our initial report, we provided the full August 15 Limbaugh quotation:
LIMBAUGH: I mean, Cindy Sheehan is just Bill Burkett. Her story is nothing more than forged documents. There's nothing about it that's real, including the mainstream media's glomming onto it. It's not real. It's nothing more than an attempt. It's the latest effort made by the coordinated left.
Limbaugh did not seem to think the comments were out of context when he posted a shorter version of the statement as a stand-alone quotation in the "members only" section of his own website................

chilling

Under US noses, brutal insurgents rule Sunni citadel

Guardian gains rare access to Iraqi town and finds it fully in control of
'mujahideen' Omer Mahdi in Haditha and Rory Carroll in BaghdadMonday August 22,
2005 The Guardian
The executions
are carried out at dawn on Haqlania bridge, the entrance to Haditha. A small
crowd usually turns up to watch even though the killings are filmed and made
available on DVD in the market the same afternoon.
One of last week's
victims was a young man in a black tracksuit. Like the others he was left on his
belly by the blue iron railings at the bridge's southern end. His severed head
rested on his back, facing Baghdad. Children cheered when they heard that the
next day's spectacle would be a double bill: two decapitations. A man named
Watban and his brother had been found guilty of spying.
With so many alleged
American agents dying here Haqlania bridge was renamed Agents' bridge. Then a
local wag dubbed it Agents' fridge, evoking a mortuary, and that name has stuck.
A three-day visit by a reporter working for the Guardian last week
established what neither the Iraqi government nor the US military has admitted:
Haditha, a farming town of 90,000 people by the Euphrates river, is an insurgent
citadel.

corruption in iraq?

say it ain't so.............. Millions embezzled at Iraqi ministry

British officials are seriously concerned about the level of
corruption in the Iraqi defence ministry, after the embezzlement of vast amounts
of money earmarked for the country's security forces.
Officials from the
British Ministry of Defence had already warned US and Iraqi authorities against
the squandering of money - and have been proved right, on a catastrophic scale.
A report compiled by the Iraqi Board of Supreme Audit has concluded that at
least half, and probably more, of $1.27bn (£700m) of Iraqi money spent on
military procurement has disappeared into a miasma of kickbacks and vanished
middlemen - or else has been spent on useless equipment.

quite interesting

Spain gets first married priest

A Roman Catholic bishop on the Spanish island of Tenerife has ordained a man as a Catholic priest despite the fact that he is married with two children.
The 64-year-old former Anglican pastor, David Gliwitzki, was ordained in La Laguna on the Canary Island...................

if he had enough time

to ride a bike with lance, he DAMN WELL HAD ENOUGH TIME TO MEET WITH CINDY (and lance, YOU should have known better)

not a very popular 'tude to have in utah

from the salt lake tribune via raw story

Rocky's call to protest Bush makes vets see red

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson called for "the biggest demonstration
this state has ever seen" to protest President Bush's appearance Monday before a
national veterans convention. "This administration has been
disastrous to the country," Anderson said Friday. "If people could organize and
speak out in an effective manner from the reddest state in the country, that
would garner a lot of attention." In an e-mail Wednesday to
about 10 activist leaders, the maverick mayor of Utah's capital called for a
diverse demonstration to greet Bush when he speaks to the Veterans of Foreign
Wars at the Salt Palace Convention Center. The mayor plans to join the
protesters. "There should be a collaboration of
health-care-provision advocates, seniors, the [gay, lesbian and bisexual and
transsexual] community, anti-Patriot Act advocates and other civil libertarians,
anti-war folks, pro-Social Security advocates, environmental advocates,
anti-nuclear-testing advocates, and anti-nuclear-waste-shipment-and-storage
advocates," the mayor wrote in the e-mail. The mayor's
message drew a howl of outrage from Mike Parkin, senior vice commander of
Veterans of Foreign Wars Atomic Post 4355 in Salt Lake City.
''Excuse my French, but - that son of a bitch!'' he said. "It makes the mayor
look very, very unpatriotic. It makes him look despicable."
Parkin said such demonstrations, particularly against the Iraq war, give comfort
to America's enemies and will be particularly offensive to the 13,000 to 14,000
veterans gathering at the convention. "I voted for the son of
a bitch and I'll never vote for him again," said the Vietnam War veteran.
..........

why is it people accuse others who protest this war (reminiscent of viet nam anyone) of being UNPATRIOTIC? the big boys LIED to us to get into this war. kerry was accused of being all SORTS of things, yet he did MORE THAN ONE tour of duty in viet nam and cheney and bush and the rest o' the good ol' boys seems to come up with deferments left and right. was THAT patriotic? i support my country. yet i have the RIGHT (by constitution and law) to speak my mind. pretty soon will it be illegal for me to actually do so?

bringing some color to a little texas town

A Texas Town Nervously Awaits a New Neighbor

GREENVILLE, Tex. - "Blackest Land, Whitest People." Until the mid-1960's,
those words were painted on the water tower and on a sign near the square in
this North Texas town, a once-segregated cotton-ginning center. Joe A. Bobbitt,
the county judge in Greenville, still has photographs of the water tower and the
sign on the wall of his office here. "It's part of our infamy," said Judge
Bobbitt, 59, seated in a large red leather chair stitched together by inmates of
the Texas penal system. "If you try to hide history, then you cannot change."
The people of Hunt County, a largely rural area of which Greenville is the
county seat, are about to get a rare opportunity to break with the past. The
Redeemed Christian Church of God is a fast-growing evangelical church with
mostly black adherents but that espouses a multicultural mission. Founded in
Lagos, Nigeria, in 1952, it is building its North American headquarters on the
outskirts of Greenville.
The church's goal, according to its mission
statement, is to establish parishes within five minutes' driving distance of
every family in every city and town in the United States. It is now about 250
parishes closer to its goal.
The church has paid more than $1 million for
about 500 acres of land in Floyd, an unincorporated community of about 100
people, almost all of them white, a few miles from Greenville.
.................

more on 'intelligent' scmintelligent design

Politicized Scholars Put Evolution on the Defensive

i wouldn't use the word 'scholars', i'd use the words madwomen and madmen........(p.s. i don't want to burst your balloons, but guess what THE WORLD IS ROUND)


from the nytimes

............Mainstream scientists reject the notion that any controversy over evolution even exists. But Mr. Bush embraced the institute's talking points by suggesting that alternative theories and criticism should be included in biology curriculums "so people can understand what the debate is about."
Financed by some of the same Christian conservatives who helped Mr. Bush win the White House, the organization's intellectual core is a scattered group of scholars who for nearly a decade have explored the unorthodox explanation of life's origins known as intelligent design.
Together, they have mounted a politically savvy challenge to evolution as the bedrock of modern biology, propelling a fringe academic movement onto the front pages and putting Darwin's defenders firmly on the defensive.
Like a well-tooled electoral campaign, the Discovery Institute has a carefully crafted, poll-tested message, lively Web logs - and millions of dollars from foundations run by prominent conservatives like Howard and Roberta Ahmanson, Philip F. Anschutz and Richard Mellon Scaife. The institute opened an office in Washington last fall and in January hired the same Beltway public relations firm that promoted the Contract With America in 1994............

soldier's angels

Capt. Charles Ziegenfuss and Kathleen Bair, a Soldiers' Angels volunteer, at Walter Reed. She sat with the injured Iraq veteran until family arrived. (By Michael Williamson -- The Washington Post)

The captain was airborne somewhere between Germany and Walter
Reed Army Medical Center in Northwest Washington, he was badly injured, and she
knew almost nothing about him.
Kathleen Bair, a human resources manager for a
Baltimore bookbinding company, made child-care arrangements for her two sons, 16
and 9, on that day in late June, canceled her hair appointment and drove the 45
minutes to the hospital. Capt. Charles Ziegenfuss had arrived. He was on a
stretcher in intensive care. An explosion in Iraq had blown him open three days
before. Great masses of flesh were missing from his arms, his legs. His face was
pockmarked from the blast of shrapnel and grit. They pulled a three-inch nail
out of him. She sat beside him for hours. When he could open his eyes, she told
him his family was on the way. Then she sat down again, waiting.
Sometimes,
that's all the crush of volunteers who have flocked to help the nation's wounded
soldiers can do. Sit. Wait. Hold hands.

if we cannot 'hold hands' with our soldiers in person, let us do it in our hearts and minds and by our paper and pens. PLEASE

butoh

thank you for sharing jean


Butoh: The Darkness Amongst the Joy

.............This happens to be a dance of life and death. Without the measure of sorrow, there is no life. Without the measure of life there is no death. Within the dark, light shines even brighter. Butoh is striking. Anyone who has seen any type of the presentation of it would be able to tell you that. The first time I saw it I was intrigued. I had studied Japanese as a young child growing up and never had I seen the stark, confronting style of butoh, in anything that I was exposed to. I decided to discover more about Butoh. And this, after weeks of study is what I have seen; darkness amongst the joy, sorrow amongst the light.........