Run, Barack, Run!

If only to stop Hillary.

From Political Wire:

On Fox News last night, the chairman of Iowa's Democratic party said that Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) is not laying the adequate groundwork for a presidenial campaign in the first caucus state and that many are starting to speculate she may not run if Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) enters the race.

Said Iowa Democratic Chair Rob Tully: "She's been quiet and, you know, there's a question that we all hear is that she may not get in this if Barack Obama gets in. I have never seen a reaction other than Bill Clinton in terms of the excitement that people have to meet Barack Obama. Some people just wanted to touch him."

One other possible reason: According to the Quad City Times, former Democratic state party chairman Dave Nagle said he is concerned candidates might eventually choose not to come to Iowa with Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack (D) in the race.

Jews Lead!

It looks as if the Conservative Jewish Movement is about to sanction gay rabbis and same-sex unions, following the Reform Jewish Movement's lead. Money quote:

Rabbi Kula, author of "Yearnings: Embracing the Sacred Messiness of Life," said the move toward liberalisation among Conservatives "is not something that came down from the top. It came from Jews in the pews ... Jews who had homosexual children and wanted them to be rabbis."

Rabbi Gerald Zelizer of Neve Shalom, a Conservative congregation in Metuchen, New Jersey, a former president of the Rabbinical Assembly who is a contributing columnist for USA Today, said in an essay in that newspaper this year that he backed the 1992 position but now had a different view.

"Conservative Judaism has always taught that we must upgrade our biblical understanding with new scientific knowledge. Contrary to the biblical assumption that gayness is a sinful choice, our best knowledge today indicates that it is as determined and irrevocable as blue or brown eyes ..." he wrote.

Honey, 1992 - 2006

Honey succumbed to cancer this morning. She was 14.

She joined our family in 1998 after losing her first parents to illness. She was an AKC registered Cairn Terrier and often carried herself with that certain extra sophistication.

She was a wonderful girl, my biggest fan and was loved by all who knew her.

But, Who Will Defend Marriage?

TMZ has learned that Pamela Anderson has filed for divorce from husband Kid Rock. Anderson, who is represented by celebrity hotshot lawyer Neal Hersh, cited irreconcilable differences.

The couple was married August 3, 2006. Earlier this month, Anderson suffered a miscarriage.It looks like there was a rush to the courthouse.

Kid Rock also filed divorce papers this morning, 53 minutes before her docs were stamped by the clerk.

Sources tell TMZ both Pam and Kid were in a race to get their papers filed first.

The process server for Kid was at the courthouse when it opened at 8:30 AM and filed five minutes later.

Interestingly, Pam and Kid Rock gave different dates of separation.

She says they split on November 21. He says November 26.

We've learned there was not a prenup, however, the two were married for such a brief period of time it will probably have little impact.

Pam's website offers a short statement confirming the divorce, saying "Yes, it's true. Unfortunately impossible."

More Bad For The Theocracy Movement

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court on Monday refused to take up the issue of school choice in Maine, where a state law bars the use of public funds to send students to private religious schools.

The case could have provided a platform for a court battle over school choice and the separation of church and state.

In Maine, school districts in 145 small towns with no high schools offer tuition for 17,000 students to attend high schools of their choice, public or private, in-state or out-of-state. But religious schools are no longer on the list.

Asking the court to take the case, a conservative group, the Institute for Justice, is representing eight Maine families who would receive public tuition funds but for the fact that their children attend religious schools.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and President Bush's homestate of Texas weighed in, saying in filings to the Supreme Court that the state of Maine is unconstitutionally discriminating against religion.
Vouchers are championed by the president. And many conservatives who call them a ticket out of dismal and dangerous public schools, while champions of public education, say that vouchers divert already-scarce resources from a system badly in need of repair.

Last April, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court ruled that restrictions on tuition vouchers are a valid, constitutional enactment. The court said the state attorney general and the legislature were motivated by a desire to respect and comply with the Constitution rather than any religious hostility.

The Maine court relied on a 2004 U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding a Washington state college scholarship program prohibiting the use of scholarship funds for pursuit of a devotional theology degree.

The Institute for Justice says the Maine case gives the justices an opportunity to make clear that its 2004 decision only carved out a narrow exception to the general rule requiring equal treatment of religious and nonreligious options.

The state of Maine's tuition system goes back to 1879 when nearly all private schools in the state were religious.

But in 1980, the state attorney general said the program violated the U.S. Constitution's Establishment Clause. The Maine Legislature made it law in 1983.

In asking the Supreme Court to take the case, the Maine families cited the court's 2002 decision allowing the use of public funds in inner-city Cleveland to underwrite tuition at private or parochial schools if parents retain a wide choice of where to send their children.

The Maine case is Kevin and Julia Anderson v. Durham School Department, 06-132.

Catholicism Celebrates Irrelevance

This editorial from The National Catholic Reporter Outlines the rapidly growing schism between the church and the people.

But, I've been predicting it for years and it has yet to occur so far.

This is the true legacy Of JPII and Benny. Really sad (in a pathetic come-uppance sorta way)

It is difficult to figure out how to approach these documents. They are products of some realm so removed from the real lives of the faithful one has to wonder why any group of busy men administering a church would bother. They ignore science, human experience and the groups they attempt to characterize. The documents are not only embarrassing but insulting and degrading to those the bishops are charged to lead. The saddest thing is that the valuable insights the bishops have into the deficiencies and influences of the wider culture get buried.

Where is this all going?

No one's come out with a program, but we'll venture yet one more hunch. It has become apparent in recent years that there’s been an upsurge in historical ecclesiastical finery and other goods. We've seen more birettas (those funny three-peak hats with the fuzzy ball on top that come in different colors depending on clerical rank) and cassocks (the kind with real buttons, no zippers for the purists) and ecclesiastically correct color shoes and socks, lots of lacy surplices and even the capa magna (yards and yards of silk, a cape long enough that it has to be attended by two altar boys or seminarians, also in full regalia). In some places they're even naming monsignors again.

It's as if someone has discovered a props closet full of old stuff and they're putting it out all over the stage. ...

Now that's order.

Now that's the church.

Bring up the lights a little higher so all can see.

Before it all fades to irrelevance.

Tidings of Comfort and Joy

When I have to go into the office in suburban Barrington Illinois (about 50% of my workdays find me there) I drive by one of the biggest mega-churches in the country ( and probably the biggest in the state. I have gotten lost several times in the parking lot after having been re-routed for one reason or another (talk about your seventh level of Hell). Democrat Melissa Bean has just won re-election to Congress from this wealthy and traditionally Republican district. As this was a re-election, I guess you could say that she is a cultural leader.

From Political Wire:

"Democrats made large gains in suburbia in this month's elections, pushing Republican turf to the outer edges of major population centers in a trend that could signal trouble for the GOP," reports USA Today."

Democrats carried nearly 60% of the U.S. House vote in inner suburbs in the nation's 50 largest metropolitan areas, up from about 53% in 2002."

It's Official!

From Political Wire:

On the Today Show this morning, host Matt Lauer noted a change in policy at NBC News:

"For months now the White House has rejected claims that the situation in Iraq has deteriorated into a civil war. And, for the most part, news organizations like NBC have hesitated to characterize it as such. But after careful consideration, NBC News has decided a change in terminology is warranted -- that the situation in Iraq with armed militarized factions fighting for their own political agendas -- can now be characterized as a civil war."

Meanwhile, according to the AP, a U.S. military spokesman continues to insist "that nation is not engaged in a civil war."

Update: CNN's John Roberts recently returned from Iraq and says the situation on the ground is even worse than it's portrayed by the media. Political Insider has the transcript.

The Kids Respond

Jesus Of Suburbia. A Mini-Opera for our times.

Next In Line: Our Own Civil War

As of today, the war in Iraq has lasted longer than the U.S. involvement in World War II — three years and just over eight months. “Only the Vietnam War (eight years, five months), the Revolutionary War (six years, nine months), and the Civil War (four years), have engaged America longer.”

Trust, But Verify

The Dems Will Take Power. Will We Accept More Of The Same (at a higher minimum wage)?

Chairman Townshend Issues The Timeless Cry....

Jesus Not Welcome

Not a word about gay people or abortions from Jesus' lips. Lots of talk about the poor and helping others and turning the other cheek and judge not and render unto Ceaser and such.

No Matter.

I hate religion. Individual People do provide some hope though.

Christian Coalition leader resigns: Organization rejects pastor's focus on easing poverty and saving the environment, sticks with opposing abortion and same-sex marriage ...

"The Rev. Joel Hunter, of Northland, A Church Distributed, in Longwood, Fla., said he quit as president-elect of the group founded by evangelist Pat Robertson because he realized he would be unable to broaden the organization's agenda beyond opposing abortion and same-sex marriage. He hoped to include issues such as easing poverty and saving the environment. "These are issues that Jesus would want us to care about," Hunter said. The resignation took place Tuesday during an organization board meeting. Hunter said he was not asked to leave. "They pretty much said, "These issues are fine, but they're not our issues; that's not our base,' " Hunter said. A statement issued by the coalition said Hunter resigned because of "differences in philosophy and vision." The organization, headed by President Roberta Combs, claims a mailing list of 2.5 million. The Florida pastor recently tapped to lead the Christian Coalition of America resigned his position in a dispute about conservative philosophy - more than a month before he was to fully assume his post, he said this week." MORE

Courage? Change? New Drapes.

Alexander Cockburn reminds us of the wisdom of Chairman Townshend ("Meet the new boss, same as the old boss").

From Counterpunch 11/18:

Let's go first to that moment of good cheer on the morning after. Horrible senators like Allen and Burns lost narrow races. The Republicans got a pasting. A man who called Alan Greenspan "a political hack" and George Bush "a liar" will be Senate majority leader. A woman elected to Congress with the help of thousands of San Franciscan homosexuals, some of them married by Mayor Gavin Newsom, would be Speaker. Who wouldn't want Harry Reid instead of Bill Frist, or Nancy Pelosi instead of fatty Hastert?

It's also the role of elections in properly run western democracies to remind people that things won't really change at all. Certainly not for the better. You can set your watch by the speed with which the new crowd lowers expectations and announces What is Not To Be Done. Nowhere was\ there an item on the Democrats' "must do" list saying "Reverse plunge towards fascism. Rescind Patriot Act. Dump the Military Commissions Act. Restore habeas corpus and the Bill of Rights." Pelosi made haste to say: impeachment is off the table.

"Bold new vision" these days means Pelosi pledging a drive to notch up the minimum wage. I don't know about the vineyard, hotel and restaurant that Pelosi co-owns, but the effective minimum wage here in Humboldt country, northern California, is about $10 an hour, which is what you have to promise a young person to mow the yard. The pay-out rises rapidly to $13 an hour if you want to buy the tyke's loyalty for return visits. Maybe on some slave plantation in southern Florida attainment of the federal minimum wage is part of the American Dream , but elsewhere we have to talk about a Living Wage, which is something altogether different.

... Optimists somehow imagine the Baker Report will explode excitingly under the war's partisans and blow them sky-high. It'll do nothing of the sort. There'll be paragraphs of soggy language about the promise of democratic governance and the rule of law in Iraq, raised fingers of warning about the perils of failure, acres of statesmanspeak about the need for multilateral involvement. Probably, Baker andCo think the US should quit Iraq, but can't think of a way of accomplishing this without jump-starting charges across the next two years that America is cutting and runnng and is this any way to run an Empire? McCain's saying that already.

... the stakes are very high, and the party of permanent war ­ represented at its purest distillation in the form of senators like Joe Biden and congressmen like Rahm Emanuel are regrouping for a counter-attack, their numbers refreshed by a phalanx of incoming blue dogs, ranged against the 60-80 "out now" Democrats. You think pro-war Tom Lantos ­ one of the most rabid Zionists in Congress -- will be an improvement on antiwar Jim Leach as chair of the House International Relations Committee? The Democratic foreign policy establishment cannot and will not tolerate the notion of Cut and Run in Iraq.

Expect the Israel lobby to say, post November 7, "We're back, stronger than ever!" Expect reassertions of the essential nobility of the attack that ousted Saddam Hussein, a deprecation of the destruction of Iraq as a society, a minimization of the outrages committed by US forces. Expect a fierce campaign ­ spearheaded by the Democrats and the surviving neocons, to wage a "better" war, evocations of the bloodbath that would accompany "over-hasty" us withdrawal (weird: your 2003 attack triggers the killing of maybe half a million and you claim anti-bloodbath credentials?)

Expect a presidential campaign waged among warmongers, from Clinton through to McCain by way of Giuliani. The voters spoke up, but that's the last chance they'll get, at least at the ballot box, for another two years. Top Democrats to voters: Okay. Enough already. Now shut up! In a few weeks we could be looking at Lieberman, Obama and Clinton holding a joint press conference and saying that no military option should be left off the table when it comes to Iran. They have said it often enough already. Ranged against them will be the peaceniks like James Baker and Brent Scowcroft and maybe Robert Gates, though that man is as slippery as an eel.
Hagel-Edwards in 2008! (Liz Edwards of course.)

And from Counterpunch today:

Imagine a steer in the stockyards hollering to his fellows, "We need a phased withdrawal from the slaughterhouse, starting in four to six months. The timetable should not be overly rigid. But there should be no more equivocation." Back and forth among the steers the debate meanders on. Some say, "To withdraw now" would be to "display weakness". Others talk about a carrot and stick approach. Then the men come out with electric prods and shock them up the chute.

The way you end a slaughter is by no longer feeding it. Every general, either American or British, with the guts to speak honestly over the past couple of years has said the same thing: the foreign occupation of Iraq by American and British troops is feeding the violence.

Iraq is not on the "edge of civil war". It is in the midst of it. There is no Iraqi government. There are Sunni militias and Shia militias inflicting savagery on each other in the awful spiral of reprisal killings familiar from Northern Ireland and Lebanon in the 1970s. Iraq has become Chechnya, headed into that abyss from the day the US invaded in 2003. It's been a steep price to inflict on the Iraqi people for the pleasure of seeing Saddam Hussein die abruptly at the end of a rope.

... Democrats, put in charge of Congress next January by voters who turned against the war, are now split on what to do. The 80 or so members of the House who favor swift withdrawal got a swift rebuff when Steny Hoyer won the House Majority leader position at a canter from Jack Murtha, humiliating House majority whip Nancy Pelosi in the process. But there are still maneuvers to have Murtha capture a significant role in brokering the rapid exit strategy he stunned Washington by advocating a year ago.

Next came Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, who never opens his mouth without testing the wind with a supersensitive finger to test the tolerance levels of respectable opinion. In Chicago on Monday he said there are no good options left in Iraq, but that it "remains possible to salvage an acceptable outcome to this long and misguided war."

This time Obama plumped for the "four to six months" option for "phased redeployment", though the schedule should not be "overly rigid", to give--so the senator said -- commanders on the ground flexibility to protect the troops or adapt to changing political arrangements in the Iraqi government. Then there followed the familiar agenda for America as stern, disinterested broker: "economic pressure" should be applied to make Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds sit down and forge a lasting peace. "No more coddling, no more equivocation."It sounds great as a clip on the Evening News, provoking another freshet of talk about Obama as presidential candidate. Substantively it means absolutely nothing. What "economic pressure" is he talking about, what "coddling", in ruined, looted Iraq? It's all the language of fantasy.

The only time reality enters into Obama's and Democrats' foreign policy advisories is when the subject of Israel comes up. Then there's no lofty talk about "No more coddling", but the utterly predictable green light for Israel to do exactly what it wants--which is at present to reduce Gaza to sub-Chechnyian levels and murder families in Beit Hanoun: this is a Darfur America really could stop but instead is sponsoring and cheering on, to its eternal shame.

The Palestinians are effectively defenseless, even as the US Congress cheers Israel on. What political Washington cannot yet quite comprehend is that Iraq is not Palestine; cannot be lectured and given schedules. America is not controlling events in Iraq. If the Shia choose to cut supply lines from Kuwait up to the northern part of the country, the US forces would be in deep, deep trouble. When the Democrats take over Congress in January, they should vote to end funding for anything in Iraq except withdrawing US forces immediately. If they don't, there's nothing but downsides, including without doubt a Third Party peace candidacy that could well cost them the White House in 2008, or--who knows--the return of Al Gore as the peace candidate, now that Russ Feingold has quit the field. Perhaps that's what Obama was trying to head off.

The Tipping Point

Towards the end of his career, Barry Goldwater saw that his party would ultimately violate ever principle that he stood for.

"Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them...

There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in 'A,' 'B,' 'C,' and 'D.' Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of 'conservatism.'" - Barry Goldwater

Anita O'Day 1919 - 2006

For me, the great thing about being as old as I am is that my listening explorations are no longer tied to the current. In the last five years or so I developed quite an affection for Ms. O'Day. Light one up for her today.

Anita O’Day, whose coolly ebullient and rhythmically assured vocal style made her a premier singer of both the big-band and postwar jazz eras, and whose taste for fast living secured her name as one of jazz’s toughest survivors, died yesterday in Los Angeles. She was 87.

From the late great show Nightmusic:

... Through most of the 1940s, Ms. O’Day ranked among the best of the big-band vocalists. Her first big break came with the Gene Krupa Orchestra, and it was with that band that she had her first hit, a duet with the trumpeter Roy Eldridge called “Let Me Off Uptown.” Though essentially a novelty tune, it was also a bold stroke at a time when black and white musicians were still not commonly heard side by side.

...Her Sunday afternoon performance at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, as captured in Bert Stern’s film “Jazz on a Summer’s Day,” was one of her great offhanded achievements. Turned out in a crisp black dress and ostrich-feathered hat, she sang an insinuating “Sweet Georgia Brown” and a breakneck “Tea for Two,” both with a playful mastery.

61/100

that's my count. How'd You Do?

The All-TIME 100 Albums

G Pride.

Green.

Gay.

We don't talk much here at GT12 about our Irish identity. But being a native of Ireland defined me long before any other professional or personal identities were formed. During my impetuos youth I even carried a distinct fondness for the IRA.

While that didn't last for long, I am still a supporter of reuniting Ulster with the Republic. Most of you, it is safe to assume, know little of Irish history. Let me assure you that any complaints 18th century American colonists had toward King George were childish whinings compared to 800+ years of abuse, exploitation and even passive-genocide (Black 47) practiced by the British Crown upon the Irish people.

Anyway, this weekend I ran accross this Obit in the NY Times:

Frank Durkan, Irish Advocate, Dies at 76

Published: November 19, 2006

Frank Durkan, who as a lawyer, writer and political spokesman carved out a reputation as a fierce and clever defender of Irish nationalists, died on Thursday in Greenwich, Conn. He was 76.

As an Irish Republican, I enjoyed these graphs:

One of his famous clients was George Harrison, the Irish Republican Army’s main gunrunner in the United States for many years. During Mr. Harrison’s trial in 1982, the prosecutor accused him of having run guns for the previous six months.

Mr. Durkan rose to tell the judge that his client was deeply insulted, and said, “Mr. Harrison has been running guns for the last 25 years at least.”

The lawyer was able to convince the jury that the Central Intelligence Agency was behind the scheme. Mr. Harrison and his four co-defendants, who had been caught with about 50 machine guns and other weapons, were found not guilty.

Mr. Durkan accomplished this legal legerdemain by eliciting the testimony of Ramsey Clark, the former attorney general, who said that the C.I.A. routinely denied involvement in activities they wanted to cover up. Mr. Durkan then persuaded the jury that the agency’s denial in fact represented affirmation.

In the 1981 case of Desmond Mackin, whom Britain wanted extradited to stand trial on charges of shooting one of its soldiers, Mr. Durkan succeeded by convincing a federal magistrate that the shooting was a political act. Mr. Mackin was not extradited because the extradition treaty between the United States and Britain had a political-exemption provision.

But the reason I'm posting on this came in the last two paragraphs:

When openly gay men and women were excluded from Manhattan’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, he refused to take part. In 2004, Newsday reported that he marched instead in a parade of gay men and women in Queens.

“The Constitution says everybody is equal,” he said in an interview. “I don’t have to know much more.”

Being Gay is nice, but it does not beat being Irish. Slainte' Frank.

Say No More

Two words: Dick Cheney.

-- Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), quoted by U.S. News and
World Report, explaining why Democrats wont push to
impeach President Bush when they take control of
Congress next year.

More Science

Mr G. Baker sends us this today, adding extra comment and perspective to the previous post (below).

Religion has never been on the right side of science. Never. There is no excuse for allowi ng them to have any say in it's teaching.

Free-for-All on Science and Religion

By GEORGE JOHNSON

Maybe the pivotal moment came when Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, warned that “the world needs to wake up from its long nightmare of religious belief,” or when a Nobelist in chemistry, Sir Harold Kroto, called for the John Templeton Foundation to give its next $1.5 million prize for “progress in spiritual discoveries” to an atheist - Richard Dawkins, the Oxford evolutionary biologist whose book “The God Delusion” is a national best-seller.Or perhaps the turning point occurred at a more solemn moment, when Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York City and an adviser to the Bush administration on space exploration, hushed the audience with heartbreaking photographs of newborns misshapen by birth defects - testimony, he suggested, that blind nature, not an intelligent overseer, is in control.

Somewhere along the way, a forum this month at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, Calif., which might have been one more polite dialogue between science and religion, began to resemble the founding convention for a political party built on a single plank: in a world dangerously charged with ideology, science needs to take on an evangelical role, vying with religion as teller of the greatest story ever told.

Carolyn Porco, a senior research scientist at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo., called, half in jest, for the establishment of an alternative church, with Dr. Tyson, whose powerful celebration of scientific discovery had the force and cadence of a good sermon, as its first minister.

She was not entirely kidding. “We should let the success of the religious formula guide us,” Dr. Porco said. “Let's teach our children from a very young age about the story of the universe and its incredible richness and beauty. It is already so much more glorious and awesome - and even comforting - than anything offered by any scripture or God concept I know.”

She displayed a picture taken by the Cassini spacecraft of Saturn and its glowing rings eclipsing the Sun, revealing in the shadow a barely noticeable speck called Earth.

There has been no shortage of conferences in recent years, commonly organized by the Templeton Foundation, seeking to smooth over the differences between science and religion and ending in a metaphysical draw. Sponsored instead by the Science Network, an educational organization based in California, and underwritten by a San Diego investor, Robert Zeps (who acknowledged his role as a kind of “anti-Templeton”), the La Jolla meeting, “Beyond Belief: Science, Religion, Reason and Survival,” rapidly escalated into an invigorating intellectual free-for-all. (Unedited video of the proceedings will be posted on the Web at tsntv.org.)

A presentation by Joan Roughgarden, a Stanford University biologist, on using biblical metaphor to ease her fellow Christians into accepting evolution (a mutation is “a mustard seed of DNA”) was dismissed by Dr. Dawkins as “bad poetry,” while his own take-no-prisoners approach (religious education is “brainwashing” and “child abuse”) was condemned by the anthropologist Melvin J. Konner, who said he had “not a flicker” of religious faith, as simplistic and uninformed.

After enduring two days of talks in which the Templeton Foundation came under the gun as smudging the line between science and faith, Charles L. Harper Jr., its senior vice president, lashed back, denouncing what he called “pop conflict books” like Dr. Dawkins's “God Delusion,” as “commercialized ideological scientism” - promoting for profit the philosophy that science has a monopoly on truth.

That brought an angry rejoinder from Richard P. Sloan, a professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia University Medical Center, who said his own book, “Blind Faith: The Unholy Alliance of Religion and Medicine,” was written to counter “garbage research” financed by Templeton on, for example, the healing effects of prayer.

With atheists and agnostics outnumbering the faithful (a few believing scientists, like Francis S. Collins, author of “The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief,” were invited but could not attend), one speaker after another called on their colleagues to be less timid in challenging teachings about nature based only on scripture and belief. “The core of science is not a mathematical model; it is intellectual honesty,” said Sam Harris, a doctoral student in neuroscience and the author of “The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason” and “Letter to a Christian Nation.”

“Every religion is making claims about the way the world is,” he said. “These are claims about the divine origin of certain books, about the virgin birth of certain people, about the survival of the human personality after death. These claims purport to be about reality.”

By shying away from questioning people's deeply felt beliefs, even the skeptics, Mr. Harris said, are providing safe harbor for ideas that are at best mistaken and at worst dangerous. “I don't know how many more engineers and architects need to fly planes into our buildings before we realize that this is not merely a matter of lack of education or economic despair,” he said.

Dr. Weinberg, who famously wrote toward the end of his 1977 book on cosmology, “The First Three Minutes,” that “the more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless,” went a step further: “Anything that we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done and may in the end be our greatest contribution to civilization.”

With a rough consensus that the grand stories of evolution by natural selection and the blossoming of the universe from the Big Bang are losing out in the intellectual marketplace, most of the discussion came down to strategy. How can science fight back without appearing to be just one more ideology?

“There are six billion people in the world,” said Francisco J. Ayala, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Irvine, and a former Roman Catholic priest. “If we think that we are going to persuade them to live a rational life based on scientific knowledge, we are not only dreaming - it is like believing in the fairy godmother.”

“People need to find meaning and purpose in life,” he said. “I don't think we want to take that away from them.”

Lawrence M. Krauss, a physicist at Case Western Reserve University known for his staunch opposition to teaching creationism, found himself in the unfamiliar role of playing the moderate. “I think we need to respect people's philosophical notions unless those notions are wrong,” he said.

“The Earth isn't 6,000 years old,” he said. “The Kennewick man was not a Umatilla Indian.” But whether there really is some kind of supernatural being - Dr. Krauss said he was a nonbeliever - is a question unanswerable by theology, philosophy or even science. “Science does not make it impossible to believe in God,” Dr. Krauss insisted. “We should recognize that fact and live with it and stop being so pompous about it.”

That was just the kind of accommodating attitude that drove Dr. Dawkins up the wall. “I am utterly fed up with the respect that we - all of us, including the secular among us - are brainwashed into bestowing on religion,” he said. “Children are systematically taught that there is a higher kind of knowledge which comes from faith, which comes from revelation, which comes from scripture, which comes from tradition, and that it is the equal if not the superior of knowledge that comes from real evidence.”

By the third day, the arguments had become so heated that Dr. Konner was reminded of “a den of vipers.”

“With a few notable exceptions,” he said, “the viewpoints have run the gamut from A to B. Should we bash religion with a crowbar or only with a baseball bat?”

His response to Mr. Harris and Dr. Dawkins was scathing. “I think that you and Richard are remarkably apt mirror images of the extremists on the other side,” he said, “and that you generate more fear and hatred of science.”

Dr. Tyson put it more gently. “Persuasion isn't always 'Here are the facts - you're an idiot or you are not,' ” he said. “I worry that your methods” - he turned toward Dr. Dawkins - “how articulately barbed you can be, end up simply being ineffective, when you have much more power of influence.”

Chastened for a millisecond, Dr. Dawkins replied, “I gratefully accept the rebuke.”

In the end it was Dr. Tyson's celebration of discovery that stole the show. Scientists may scoff at people who fall back on explanations involving an intelligent designer, he said, but history shows that “the most brilliant people who ever walked this earth were doing the same thing.” When Isaac Newton's “Principia Mathematica” failed to account for the stability of the solar system - why the planets tugging at one another's orbits have not collapsed into the Sun - Newton proposed that propping up the mathematical mobile was “an intelligent and powerful being.”

It was left to Pierre Simon Laplace, a century later, to take the next step. Hautily telling Napoleon that he had no need for the God hypothesis, Laplace extended Newton's mathematics and opened the way to a purely physical theory.

“What concerns me now is that even if you're as brilliant as Newton, you reach a point where you start basking in the majesty of God and then your discovery stops - it just stops,” Dr. Tyson said. “You're no good anymore for advancing that frontier, waiting for somebody else to come behind you who doesn't have God on the brain and who says: 'That's a really cool problem. I want to solve it.' ”

“Science is a philosophy of discovery; intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance,” he said. “Something fundamental is going on in people's minds when they confront things they don't understand.”

He told of a time, more than a millennium ago, when Baghdad reigned as the intellectual center of the world, a history fossilized in the night sky. The names of the constellations are Greek and Roman, Dr. Tyson said, but two-thirds of the stars have Arabic names. The words “algebra” and “algorithm” are Arabic.

But sometime around 1100, a dark age descended. Mathematics became seen as the work of the devil, as Dr. Tyson put it. “Revelation replaced investigation,” he said, and the intellectual foundation collapsed.

He did not have to say so, but the implication was that maybe a century, maybe a millennium from now, the names of new planets, stars and galaxies might be Chinese. Or there may be no one to name them at all.

Before he left to fly back home to Austin, Dr. Weinberg seemed to soften for a moment, describing religion a bit fondly as a crazy old aunt.

“She tells lies, and she stirs up all sorts of mischief and she's getting on, and she may not have that much life left in her, but she was beautiful once,” he lamented. “When she's gone, we may miss her.”

Dr. Dawkins wasn't buying it. “I won't miss her at all,” he said. “Not a scrap. Not a smidgen.”

Remembering Galileo

In a "are we going to repeat those mistakes again' kinda way.

Oliver "Buzz" Thomas is a Baptist minister and author of an upcoming book, 10 Things Your Minister Wants to Tell You (But Can't Because He Needs the Job).

It's an interesting read. I do think that they've already gone too far to reclaim credibility.

From USA Today:

What if Christian leaders are wrong about homosexuality? I suppose, much as a newspaper maintains its credibility by setting the record straight, church leaders would need to do the same:

Correction: Despite what you might have read, heard or been taught throughout your churchgoing life, homosexuality is, in fact, determined at birth and is not to be condemned by God's followers.

Based on a few recent headlines, we won't be seeing that admission anytime soon.

Last week, U.S. Roman Catholic bishops took the position that homosexual attractions are "disordered" and that gays should live closeted lives of chastity. At the same time, North Carolina's Baptist State Convention was preparing to investigate churches that are too gay-friendly. Even the more liberal Presbyterian Church (USA) had been planning to put a minister on trial for conducting a marriage ceremony for two women before the charges were dismissed on a technicality. All this brings me back to the question: What if we're wrong?

Religion's only real commodity, after all, is its moral authority. Lose that, and we lose our credibility. Lose credibility, and we might as well close up shop.

It's happened to Christianity before, most famously when we dug in our heels over Galileo's challenge to the biblical view that the Earth, rather than the sun, was at the center of our solar system. You know the story. Galileo was persecuted for what turned out to be incontrovertibly true. For many, especially in the scientific community, Christianity never recovered.

This time, Christianity is in danger of squandering its moral authority by continuing its pattern of discrimination against gays and lesbians in the face of mounting scientific evidence that sexual orientation has little or nothing to do with choice. To the contrary, whether sexual orientation arises as a result of the mother's hormones or the child's brain structure or DNA, it is almost certainly an accident of birth. The point is this: Without choice, there can be no moral culpability.

 

Robert Altman 1925 - 2006

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Robert Altman, the caustic and irreverent satirist behind "M-A-S-H," "Nashville" and "The Player" who made a career out of bucking Hollywood management and story conventions, died at a Los Angeles Hospital, his Sandcastle 5 Productions Company said Tuesday. He was 81.

Here's the 8 minute opening shot from 'The Player'.

You Know He's Right

Suicidal? Maybe. Showboating? Definately.

But Right.

From CNN

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Americans would have to sign up for a new military draft after turning 18 if the incoming chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee has his way.

New York Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel said Sunday he sees his idea as a way to deter politicians from launching wars. He believes a draft would bolster U.S. troop levels that are currently insufficient to cover potential future action in Iran, North Korea and Iraq.

"There's no question in my mind that this president and this administration would never have invaded Iraq, especially on the flimsy evidence that was presented to the Congress, if indeed we had a draft, and members of Congress and the administration thought that their kids from their communities would be placed in harm's way," Rangel said.

Rangel, a veteran of the Korean War who has unsuccessfully sponsored legislation on conscription in the past, said he will propose a measure early next year.
In 2003, he proposed a draft covering people age 18 to 26. This year, he offered a plan to mandate military service for men and women between age 18 and 42. It went nowhere in the Republican-led Congress.

Everybody Talks About It, But Nobody Does Anything

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction," - Pascal, Pensees.

Michael Moore's Peace Proposal

Hat tip to Tom from TX for sending me this almost simultaneously with my hearing it on the radio.


A Liberal's Pledge to Disheartened Conservatives
November 14th, 2006

To My Conservative Brothers and Sisters, I know you are dismayed and disheartened at the results of last week's election.
You're worried that the country is heading toward a very bad place you don't want it to go.

Your 12-year Republican Revolution has ended with so much yet to do, so many promises left unfulfilled.

You are in a funk, and I understand. Well, cheer up, my friends! Do not despair. I have good news for you. I, and the millions of others who are now in charge with our Democratic Congress, have a pledge we would like to make to you, a list of promises that we offer you because we value you as our fellow Americans. You deserve to know what we plan to do with our newfound power -- and, to be specific, what we will do to you and for you.

Thus, here is our Liberal's Pledge to Disheartened Conservatives:

Dear Conservatives and Republicans, I, and my fellow signatories, hereby make these promises to you:

1. We will always respect you for your conservative beliefs. We will never, ever, call you "unpatriotic" simply because you disagree with us. In fact, we encourage you to dissent and disagree with us.

2. We will let you marry whomever you want, even when some of us consider your behavior to be "different" or "immoral." Who you marry is none of our business. Love and be in love -- it's a wonderful gift.

3. We will not spend your grandchildren's money on our personal whims or to enrich our friends. It's your checkbook, too, and we will balance it for you.

4. When we soon bring our sons and daughters home from Iraq, we will bring your sons and daughters home, too. They deserve to live. We promise never to send your kids off to war based on either a mistake or a lie.

5. When we make America the last Western democracy to have universal health coverage, and all Americans are able to get help when they fall ill, we promise that you, too, will be able to see a doctor, regardless of your ability to pay. And when stem cell research delivers treatments and cures for diseases that affect you and your loved ones, we'll make sure those advances are available to you and your family, too.

6. Even though you have opposed environmental regulation, when we clean up our air and water, we, the Democratic majority, will let you, too, breathe the cleaner air and drink the purer water.

7. Should a mass murderer ever kill 3,000 people on our soil, we will devote every single resource to tracking him down and bringing him to justice. Immediately. We will protect you.

8. We will never stick our nose in your bedroom or your womb. What you do there as consenting adults is your business. We will continue to count your age from the moment you were born, not the moment you were conceived.

9. We will not take away your hunting guns. If you need an automatic weapon or a handgun to kill a bird or a deer, then you really aren't much of a hunter and you should, perhaps, pick up another sport. We will make our streets and schools as free as we can from these weapons and we will protect your children just as we would protect ours.

10. When we raise the minimum wage, we will pay you -- and your employees -- that new wage, too. When women are finally paid what men make, we will pay conservative women that wage, too.

11. We will respect your religious beliefs, even when you don't put those beliefs into practice. In fact, we will actively seek to promote your most radical religious beliefs ("Blessed are the poor," "Blessed are the peacemakers," "Love your enemies," "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God," and "Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."). We will let people in other countries know that God doesn't just bless America, he blesses everyone. We will discourage religious intolerance and fanaticism -- starting with the fanaticism here at home, thus setting a good example for the rest of the world.

12. We will not tolerate politicians who are corrupt and who are bought and paid for by the rich. We will go after any elected leader who puts him or herself ahead of the people. And we promise you we will go after the corrupt politicians on our side FIRST. If we fail to do this, we need you to call us on it. Simply because we are in power does not give us the right to turn our heads the other way when our party goes astray. Please perform this important duty as the loyal opposition.

I promise all of the above to you because this is your country, too. You are every bit as American as we are. We are all in this together. We sink or swim as one. Thank you for your years of service to this country and for giving us the opportunity to see if we can make things a bit better for our 300 million fellow Americans -- and for the rest of the world.

 

Amen

From MSNBC:

The larger danger for Hillary is that for all the novelty of her gender, she becomes a variation on former vice president Walter Mondale in 1984—strong on organization but weak on passion, a candidate of the past instead of the future. And Clinton Fatigue may be lurking in the party's central nervous system. If Hillary were elected and re-elected president, it would mean the presence of a Bush or a Clinton on every ticket from 1980 to 2016—36 years.

Torture Confirmed

From Crooks and Liars:

CIA Acknowledges Bush Signed Directive

Drip, drip, drip….the facts are coming out…

Unfortunately, the MSM doesn't seem as concerned with the exposure of the truth as much as the lying denials they received from the Bush Administration some months ago, nor question why the CIA didn't make this acknowledgement until after the election.

International Herald Tribune :
The CIA has acknowledged for the first time the existence of two classified documents, including a directive signed by President George W. Bush, that have guided the agency's interrogation and detention of terror suspects.

[..]The contents of the documents were not revealed, but one of them is "a directive signed by President Bush granting the CIA the authority to set up detention facilities outside the United States and outlining interrogation methods that may be used against detainees," the civil liberties union said, based on its review of published accounts.

The second document, according to the group, is a Justice Department legal analysis "specifying interrogation methods that the CIA may use against top Al Qaeda members." Read on…

Our Work Is Not Done

Jeeesusss H. Christ!!!

From Crooks and Liars:

Another Worrying Bush Appointee
By: Nicole Belle @ 7:15 PM - PST
In yet another appointment made apparently from Bizarro World, Bush has named Dr. Eric Keroack the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs, overseeing the Office of Family Planning.
AlterNet :

He's a favorite guest speaker at meetings of the National Right to Life Committee. He's on the medical advisory council for the notorious Leslee Unruh's National Abstinence Clearinghouse, whence he expounds on such topics as the physical and emotional consequences of premarital sex.

He teaches that there is a physiological cause [pdf link] for relationship failure and sexual promiscuity — a hormonal cause-and-effect that can only be short-circuited by sexual abstinence until marriage.[..]

He's the full-time medical director for A Woman's Concern, a chain of Boston area crisis pregnancy centers, where he spreads all the usual lies about abortion and uses ultrasound scans as a tool to influence the decisions of women who might be considering abortion.

He was one of the "experts" who determined that federally funded abstinence education programs must mention contraceptives only in relation to their failure rates and promote abstinence until marriage.

[..]Keroack works his heart out for the Christian right. And it
appears that, as of Monday morning, he'll be working for us, too. Read on…

(Read the rest of this story…)

The Sigh

Colbert, the day after the glorious Democratic victory.

Memories

Colbert calls the election:

Kid Power

I am sooo not in line:

We'll Believe It When We See It

From ThinkProgress:

The White House Bulletin, a service of Bulletin News, reports that White House senior political adviser Karl Rove — aka “Bush’s Brain” — may soon be on his way out:

The rumors that chief White House political architect Karl Rove will leave sometime next year are being bolstered with new insider reports that his partisan style is a hurdle to President Bush’s new push for bipartisanship. “Karl represents the old style and he’s got to go if the Democrats are going to believe Bush’s talk of getting along,” said a key Bush advisor.

Other elements are also at play: The election yesterday of Sen. Trent Lott to the number two GOP leadership position in the Senate is also a threat to the White House and Rove, who worked against him when he battled to save his majority leader’s job after his insensitive remarks about Sen. Strom Thurmond.

And insiders report that Bush counsel Harriet Miers isn’t a fan, believing that Rove didn’t do enough to help her failed Supreme Court nomination among conservatives. In fact, one top West Wing advisor said that the unexpected ouster of Rove aide Susan Ralston over ethics questions was orchestrated by Miers as a signal to Rove to leave. The advisor said that Rove is aware of the situation and that a departure might come in “weeks, not months.” A Rove ally, however, noted that he has a record of out-witting his critics.

Early this year, Rove gave up his role of overseeing policy development to focus more on politics with the approach of the fall midterm elections.

Rove said prior to the midterm elections that he had “the math” to prove the Republicans would win back the House and Senate.

Rove’s predictions were proved wrong, earning him a public sniping at the hands of President Bush who said: “I obviously was working harder in the campaign than he was.”

Ruth Brown 1928 -2006

The Woman whose voice funded the early years of Atlantic Records and so, also, funded the birth of Rock and Soul and all that is holy died on Friday in Las Vegas.

From the NY Times.

Ruth Brown, the gutsy rhythm and blues singer whose career extended to acting and crusading for musicians’ rights, died on Friday in Las Vegas. She was 78 and lived in Las Vegas.

.....The cause was complications following a heart attack and a stroke she suffered after surgery, and Ms. Brown had been on life support since Oct. 29, said her friend, lawyer and executor, Howell Begle.

.....As the 1950s began, Ms. Brown’s singles for the fledgling Atlantic Records — like “(Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean” and “5-10-15 Hours” — became both the label’s bankroll and templates for all of rock ’n’ roll. She could sound as if she were hurting, or joyfully lusty, or both at once. Her voice was forthright, feisty and ready for anything.

....Ms. Brown was the best-selling black female performer of the early 1950s, even though, in that segregated era, many of her songs were picked up and redone by white singers, like Patti Page and Georgia Gibbs, in tamer versions that became pop hits. The pop singer Frankie Laine gave her a lasting nickname: Miss Rhythm.

....Ms. Brown began to speak out, onstage and in interviews, about the exploitative contracts musicians of her generation had signed. Many hit-making musicians had not recouped debts to their labels, according to record company accounting, and so were not receiving royalties at all. Shortly before Atlantic held a 40th-birthday concert at Madison Square Garden in 1988, the label agreed to waive unrecouped debts for Ms. Brown and 35 other musicians of her era and to pay 20 years of retroactive royalties.

....Although her hits had supported Atlantic Records — sometimes called the House That Ruth Built — she was unable at one point to afford a home telephone.

Why They Lost

And it wasn't the charm of Barak Obama.... It was a yearning for the center. Religion has been as tarred by the right as tolerance has been by the left.

Lifted from Andrew Sullivan:

.... an email sent by Republican candidate, Rae Hart Anderson, who lost his race for a seat in the Minnesota Senate to a Democratic Hindu. Money quote:

The race of your life is more important than this one--and it is my sincere wish that you'll get to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. He died for the sins of the world, yours and mine--and especially for those who accept His forgiveness. His kingdom will come and His will be done--on earth as it is in heaven. There's more....I love belonging to the family of God. Jesus is the way, the truth and offers His life to you and each human being. Pay attention...this is very important, Satveer. Have you noticed Jesus for yourself...at some moment in time, yet??? ...

Jesus Christ lives in His earth family by His Spirit. He said He'd be back, and He said it first. You could invite Him to make the race of your life 'eternal'. God waits to be gracious to each person that knows they need to be forgiven. Do you? I think you do.

And some Republicans are still asking why they lost. The denial continues.

Truth Out!

What an election brings:

General [Eric] Shinseki was right that a greater international force contribution, U.S. force contribution and Iraqi force contribution should have been available immediately after major combat operations," - General Abizaid, finally contradicting Rumsfeld, under oath.

Science Schmience

Even here in the Land O' Lincoln, where the last Republican-held State Government job just went to a Democrat w/ mob-ties, the right wing soldiers on....

Gay penguin book shakes up Ill. school

By JIM SUHR, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 45 minutes ago
SHILOH, Ill. - A picture book about two male penguins raising a baby penguin is getting a chilly reception among some parents who worry about the book's availability to children — and the reluctance of school administrators to restrict access to it.

The concerns are the latest involving "And Tango Makes Three," the illustrated children's book based on a true story of two male penguins in New York City's Central Park Zoo that adopted a fertilized egg and raised the chick as their own.

The Rest Here.

See? Research!

Well, Pete Townshend has finally released his report on porn. You rember, the one he said he was researching when he got in trouble for paying for access to kiddie porn? Of course you do.

The Smoking Gun has it here.

Play guitar Pete.

Mr Unity

"I would describe his leadership as Rumsfeldian in its competence."

-- James Carville, quoted by the Atlanta Journal Constitution, on DNC Chairman Howard Dean. Carville "likened the Democratic takeover of Congress to the civil war battle at Gettysburg, which the Union army won but failed to pursue the Confederate army when it retreated."

The Circle Of Life

Homosexual Animals Out of the Closet

From male killer whales that ride the dorsal fin of another male to female bonobos that rub their genitals together, the animal kingdom tolerates all kinds of lifestyles.

A first-ever museum display, "Against Nature?," which opened last month at the University of Oslo's Natural History Museum in Norway, presents 51 species of animals exhibiting homosexuality.

"Homosexuality has been observed in more than 1,500 species, and the phenomenon has been well described for 500 of them," said Petter Bockman, project coordinator of the exhibition.
The idea, however, is rarely discussed in the scientific community and is often dismissed as unnatural because it doesn't appear to benefit the larger cause of species continuation.

"I think to some extent people don't think it's important because we went through all this time period in sociobiology where everything had to be tied to reproduction and reproductive success," said Linda Wolfe, who heads the Department of Anthropology at East Carolina University. "If it doesn't have [something to do] with reproduction it's not important."

More

Trent Appeal

One Florida rep seems to have put his finger on why Trent Lott has been resurrected:

From Hotline On Call:

“White rednecks” who “didn’t show up to vote for us” partly cost GOPers their cong. majorities, Rep. Adam Putnam (R-FL) told fellow Republicans today. And Putnam, seeking the post of GOP conference chair, chided ex-Chair J.C. Watts (R-OK) [an African-American - GT12] for ruining the conference’s ability to serve its members.

Three Republicans in the room independently confirmed to the Hotline the substance and context of Putnam’s remarks. But Putnam’s chief of staff insists that the remarks were taken out of context.

Is It Too Early For This?

No. This is how we should start the holiday season. They've been perfect from the beginning.

And Baby It Hurts! Pt 1

Midnight Rambler, 1972. This is what Blues Opera might look like. In two parts.

Part 2

Finish it up!

The Greatest Video

It's been a busy week. Happy Friday!

 

Str8 2 HL

Language Now Outdated!

New Zealand students may 'text-speak' in exams

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) -- New Zealand's high school students will be able to use "text-speak" -- the mobile phone text message language beloved of teenagers -- in national exams this year, officials said.

Text-speak, a second language for thousands of teens, uses abbreviated words and phrases such as "txt" for "text", "lol" for "laughing out loud" or "lots of love," and "CU" for "see you."

Now That That's Over

2008 is only two years away.

Would-be presidents are scrambling to the field so soon thanks to a genuine power vacuum in both political parties. For once, it is not hyperbole to call an election one of the most important ever, as politicians tend to say every four years — especially when it’s their moment to make history.

Craig Crawford handicaps all the contenders here. We are talking thorough here folks.

Well, Yeah

Youve heard of IslamaFascists - I think we now have
Christian fascists. What is the definition of a
fascist? Not only do they want to beat you, but they
want to destroy you in the process... if things keep
going the way things are going locally and statewide,
it is going to be more and more difficult for
Republicans to recruit candidates. We have elements of
the party who are moral absolutists, who take the
approach that if you dont take my position every step
of the way, not only will I not support you, but I
will destroy you, -  Republican Chairman Steve Salem
from Woodbury County, Iowa.

Look West!

Its not just for Andrew Sullivan anymore.
This is the America that Ed Schultz is tapping into
(more successfully than Air America). This is the
America that will give Gay people the rights of
marriage as long as the straight folk get to keep the
word for themselves. This is the America that will
turn its back on James Dobsons thought thugs as long
as the Dems avoid trying to empty their gun racks.
>From The New Republic -
Earlier this year, Republican Conrad Burns, locked in
a tough struggle to defend his Montana Senate seat,
cut a not-terribly-original ad attacking his
Democratic challenger. Jon Tester joins liberal judges
opposing proven anti-terror programs, is against the
Patriot Act, and his position on Iraq is constantly
changing, the script read. But, if Burnss line of
attack--the Democrat as flip-flopping friend of
activist judges with no appetite for fighting
terrorism--was decidedly familiar, the response from
his opponent was anything but. Nearly all of Montanas
legislators, including 51 Republicans, want to replace
the Patriot Act because it lets federal government
agents search our bank accounts, medical records, even
our gun sales--for whatever reason, Testers campaign
countered.
A Democrat outflanking a Republican on gun rights? It
sounds odd. But that was exactly Testers strategy--and
it worked. On Tuesday, Tester narrowly defeated Burns,
meaning that Democrats now control both Senate seats
in Montana, a staunchly conservative state. 
Testers victory, combined with Democratic advances
across the Mountain West this week, signals a major
shift in American politics. Support for Democratic
candidates in the region has surged in the past four
years.
Prior to the 2002 election, Democrats controlled no
governorships in the band of states that stretch along
the spine of the Rockies from Mexico to Canada. But,
by this year, they controlled four; and, on Tuesday,
they added one more. In addition, over the past four
years, Democrats have taken over legislatures in
Colorado and Montana. 
This shift can be partly explained by demographics: An
influx of Latino immigrants, high-tech professionals,
and upscale refugees from both coasts certainly has
boosted Democratic prospects in the region.
But the more important explanation is ideological. The
leave us alone agenda that once worked so well for
Republicans in the Mountain West is now benefiting
Democrats like Tester. Western voters--always wary of
government intrusion--have grown increasingly
distrustful of a GOP identified with deficit spending,
the religious right, and humanitarian intervention
abroad.
Democrats have responded by fielding candidates like
Tester who support gun rights, oppose gay marriage,
and attack the Bush administration for expanding the
reach of government. 

Test

blogger upgraded. This is a test of e-mail posting.

Ed Bradley 1941 -2006

Cool, Classy and Possessing of Great Integrity. Also the only major news guy who I actually met (Carter June '76 Primary, Toledo OH).

Not So Fast, Georgie

From CNN:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- John Bolton's prospects for staying on as U.N. ambassador essentially died Thursday as Democrats and a pivotal Republican said they would continue to oppose his nomination.

It was another blow to President Bush, two days after Democrats triumphed in elections that will give them control of Congress next year. On Wednesday, Bush had announced that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, a polarizing figure and face of the Iraq war, would step down

This Would Be A Problem For The Dems

The man had good ads and ran a clean campaign. A very different face for the GOP.

Steele May Seek to Head RNC

Defeated Maryland Senate candidate Michael Steele (R) is considering "a bid for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee," according to The Fix. "Steele would not challenge current RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman, but chatter among Republican insiders is that Mehlman has made clear for months that he might not return to his current post."

It's Sooo Hard To Act Butch

Of Course this:

Mehlman to leave RNC

CNN's John King just reported that Ken Mehlman will be leaving as chair of the Republican National Committee (i.e., head of the Republican party) by the end of the year. Apparently Kenny's just tuckered out. According to King, "He's been on the gerbil wheel, as one of his close friends put it, for well in excess of six years now and he's tired."

Has nothing to do with this:

Partial transcript of Bill Maher's Live appearance on Larry King Live:

BM: A lot of the chiefs of staff, the people who really run the underpinnings of the Republican Party, are gay. I don't want to mention names, but I will Friday night...


LK:You will Friday night?


BM: Well, there's a couple of big people who I think everyone in Washington knows who run the Republican...


LK: You will name them?


BM: Well, I wouldn't be the first. I'd get sued if I was the first. Ken Mehlman. Ok, there's one I think people have talked about. I don't think he's denied it when he's been, people have suggested, he doesn't say...


LK: I never heard that. I'm walking around in a fog. I never...Ken Mehlman? I never heard that. But the question is...


BM: Maybe you don't go to the same bathhouse I do, Larry.

When CNN re-aired the interview later that night, they edited out Larry King and Bill Maher's discussion of Mehlman's potential homosexuality.

Say Goodnight Ken. Oh, and while you're still here, why does your staff think of Gerbils when they think of you?

Just asking.

Gay Is Gonna Gitcha Everytime

Jon Stewart exposes the 'holes' in the anti-gay gay lifestyle

 

We Ain't Ready For Reform

From the Chicago Tribune:

U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) has decided against a run for Chicago mayor in 2007, avoiding a potential showdown with Mayor Richard Daley, sources in Jackson's camp said Wednesday.

Abra Cadabra

From Washington Monthly:

...Christina Larson documents the pain of the Club for Growth's Pat Toomey. It seems the Club took a poll before the election and they didn't like the results:

"Two-thirds agreed with the notion that the GOP used to be the party of fiscal responsibility and limited government but was not today. By an 11-point margin, likely voters expressed greater confidence in Democrats to handle select fiscal matters responsibly. “We have lost our brand,” Toomey bemoaned."

Get real, guys. The Club for Growth and its ilk have never cared a tenth as much about lower spending as they have about lower taxes. They know perfectly well that if a Republican administration actually cut spending to match its tax cuts it would get voted out of office for the next century.

And they've never cared. They just want low taxes (the easy part of fiscal responsibility) without the spending cuts (the part that gets you voted out of office). It's similar to the GOP's Iraq strategy: they want the glory of winning a war, but without the pain of making the hard choices it would take to actually do so.

At the moment, the Republican Party is the Party of Magic. That's the brand they need to fix.

51

Webb Too!

51

Webb wins. I love my country

Homo Phobia?

Two words, as in fear of Homos. Andrew Sullivan reports that BillO and David Frum are both refusing to debate conservatism with him.

See, authoritarians are just chicken-hearted bullies.

MO 2000 in miniature

Remember when John Ashcroft lost his Senate seat to a dead guy?.....

Dead woman wins county commissioner's race
S.D. candidate gets 100 votes; official says voters knew she was deceased

PIERRE, S.D. - A woman who died two months ago won a county commissioner's race in Jerauld County on Tuesday.

Democrat Marie Steichen, of Woonsocket, got 100 votes, defeating incumbent Republican Merlin Feistner, of Woonsocket, who had 64 votes.

Jerauld County Auditor Cindy Peterson said she believes the county board will have to meet to appoint a replacement for Steichen. Peterson said she'll check with the state's attorney to be sure that's the process.

Quote of the Day

One French Man-On-The-Street (via The A/P):

“Americans are realizing that you can’t found the politics of a country on patriotic passion and reflexes,” he said. “You can’t fool everybody all the time — and I think that’s what Bush and his administration are learning today.”

Solid South? Forget em...

From Political Wire.

A Regional Realignment

Thomas Schaller, author of Whistling Past Dixie: How Democrats Can Win Without the South, sent Political Wire this analysis of the midterm results several hours before the polls even closed yesterday.

There seems to be a developing narrative which suggests that expected Democratic victories this year are somehow the result of Democrats "running as conservatives." Republicans, and conservative Republicans in particular, have an obvious stake in perpetuating such a narrative. But it is patently untrue.

Pull back the lens and what appears to be happening this year is a regional-ideological partisan correction in which Rockefeller-Ford Republicans are purged from the NE/NW Rust Belt, and prairie progressives pick off selected seats in the Far West. The regional realignment over the past 40 years, which slowly converted Dixiecrats into Republicans, has now entered its final stage, as voters north of the Mason-Dixon line and west of the Mississippi provide a countervailing response to the southern-led Republican majority.

This transformation is occurring at the Senate, House and gubernatorial levels. Indeed, because Rust Belt Republicans will be replaced by progressive Democrats, regardless of the final totals tonight, the 110th Congress, in both chambers, will become more progressive as the Democratic shares grow and more conservative as the Republican shares shrink. As just one indication of this trend, consider this stunning fact: If Pelosi gets her majority, for the first time in 52 years, the party with a minority of House seats in the South will the majority party chamberwide.

Rock The Vote

Although only my father would call "Dance With Me" and "Still The One" Rock.

Ex-Rocker John Hall Wins Upset in NY Congressional Race

NEW YORK John Hall, leader of the rock group Orleans that recorded such hits as "Still the One" and "Dance With Me," has won a stunning upset in his race for Congress in upstate New York, narrowly defeating Republican incumbent Sue Kelly 51%-49%.

Hall's views on the differences between political and music journalists were recently profiled on E&P Online. At one point, he had to struggle to be taken seriously by the press as a policy man. He ended up gaining the endorsements of all four top dailies in his district.

The upset was more surprising, as this contest was never on the national Democratic Party's list of most likely pickups.

Hall closed his victory speech by singing Steven Van Zandt's song "I Am A Patriot." [ I soooo love that song - GT12] Numerous musicians played benefits for Hall throughout the campaign, though he was still badly outspent by his opponent. They included Bonnie Raitt, Steve Earle, Pete Seeger and Jackson Browne.

Hall, who ran as an antiwar candidate, is also an environmental activist and drew wide labor backing. He was a key organizer of the fabled "No Nukes" concert and movie in 1979.

He recently appeared on the Colbert Report and fared well, even singing "Still the One" with the host, in an appearance that was seen as drawing much interest in the campaign.

Tester Claims Victory

Jon Tester (D) declared victory this morning over Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT), according to the Great Falls Tribune."Following the resolution of a software issue in Butte, which proved there was not a large number of unaccounted for votes as was feared, Tester's camp declared victory. The final numbers in Butte had Tester's margin increase by 700 votes, increasing his statewide lead more than 3,000 votes. Meagher County has yet to report, but it is expected less than 900 votes will come from that precinct."

Well, That Was Quick

GOP officials: Rumsfeld stepping down

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, architect of an unpopular war in Iraq, intends to resign after six stormy years as Secretary of Defense, Republican officials said Wednesday.

MT VA Update

Political Wire just received this from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee:

Montana Vote Situation: Jon Tester leads Conrad Burns by approximately 1,700 votes (as of 11am EDT) and counting. In Silver Bow County (Butte), a Democratic stronghold, votes are still being counted but Tester is winning there with 66% of the vote. We expect to gain the majority of these uncounted votes and to add to Tester's margin.

Montana Process: When the counting phase is completed, a canvass will verify the vote tallies. That process could take as long as 48 hours, and must begin within three days and end within seven. Unless the canvass shows the margin to be within 1/4 of 1%, there is no recount. As the loser, Burns would have to request the recount. When the votes are all counted, we expect to be outside that recount margin.

Virginia Vote Situation: Jim Webb is up by approximately 8,000 votes and once the provisional ballots are counted, we expect Webb's margin to increase. (Please note that VA absentees were included in the tallies from last night.)

Virginia Process: A canvass is underway to verify the results and we expect that process to finish within a day or so. To be in recount, the margin needs to be less than 1% and Allen (as the loser) would have to request it. Because of Virginia voting laws, the margin would have to be much tighter than it currently is to see any change in the outcome. Given the current margins, that is highly, highly unlikely.

More Great (or at least good) News

I knew that I shouldn't trust FoxNews.

Mr G. Baker sends us this:

Cancel the Funeral: 'Studio 60' Isn't Heading Off Into the Sunset Just Yet

Despite the assurances from those in-the-know around the blogosphere that the struggling freshman NBC hour "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" was mere hours away from cancellation with its low ratings and extravagant $2 million-per-episode pricetag, the opposite now in fact appears to be true. While not yet official, key industry sources are confident that NBC will, in the next few days, announce the show's pickup for its back nine episodes (giving it a full season complement of 22) in the wake of two consecutive Mondays of upwardly-trending numbers.

Here's the rest.

Equal Time

Let's read Fred Barnes (a man whose jeans visibly rise when he thinks about our Dear Leader).

It starts like this:

THIS ONE IS PRETTY EASY TO EXPLAIN. Republicans lost the House and probably the Senate because of Iraq, corruption, and a record of taking up big issues and then doing nothing on them. Of these, the war was by far the biggest factor. Unpopular wars trump good economies and everything else. President Truman learned this in 1952, as did President Johnson in 1968. Now, it was President Bush's turn, and since his name wasn't on the ballot, his party took the hit.

And ends like this:

Conservatives won't want to hear this, but the Republican who maneuvered his way into the most impressive victory of the election was California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Okay, he's sui generis. But he won a landslide victory after moving to the center, while holding onto conservatives by not hiking taxes. Just think if he were eligible for the White House in 2008. Even (some) conservatives would be clamoring for him to run.

Nothing very surprising in and of itself. What is interesting is that the message was so clear that W-Worshippers are unable to miss it.

I'm sure W will though.