Death Tax Dead, al-Zarqawi, Iraq's New Ministers, Hagee No Talkee, NATO, Daddy Bush, Fun With the Religious Right, Warbirds Fly High, MSM and PBS .

The Senate has done the right thing by not voting to repeal the extate tax. This is a major victory for most of us, our kids and our grandkids.

However, it's a resounding defeat for 18 of the most avaricious families in America. Together they have pumped into a campaign to abolish the estate tax more than $500 million.

I think that this is the first time since Bush became President that Congress has made an attempt at fiscal responsibility that didn't adversely effect the lower and working classes.

If Congress had put half the effort to take care of the country as a whole, as they have in taking care of Big Business, the rich and the religious right, we'd all be a lot better off.

Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation has a simple and accurate decription of the estate tax.

This is simply not a tax on death. If anything, it is a tax on Paris Hilton.
And let's
not fall for the argument that Paris will be the victim of "double-taxation"
either. First of all, everyone pays taxes any number of times as money cycles
through the economy. Workers pay income, payroll and sales tax. The truth is
that more than half of the value of large estates consists of unrealized capital
gains that would never be taxed without the estate tax.

After many White House reports of his death, it's looks like we've finally, really got Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Long portrayed as the biggest boogy man in Iraq, does anyone really think that his death will lessen the violence in Iraq? Oh, there's a hand up in the back.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush and his military chiefs said Thursday that
killing terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi struck a severe blow to al-Qaida
and opens a new opportunity for the fledging democracy in Iraq.

"This violent man will never murder again," Bush said in the Rose Garden as
he announced the U.S. airstrike on the militant whom Osama bin Laden had dubbed
the "emir," or prince, of al-Qaida in Iraq.

No comments yet from Osama bin Laden.

Iraq has a complete government for the first time in six months. They were able to stop feuding among themselves long enough to name the three top security ministers. Who could have foreseen that security would be an issue in Iraq?

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq's parliament on Thursday approved three new key
ministers, including a Sunni Arab to head the defense ministry, as violence left
at least 19 people dead and 40 wounded, according to police.

The three, including ministers for national security and interior, were
sworn in after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced the death of al-Qaida in
Iraq chief Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Marine Corps Commandant Michael Hagee gave a briefing, but wouldn't say anything.

There seemed to be a substantial risk that Marine Corps Commandant Michael Hagee
would, at the beginning of his Pentagon press briefing yesterday, start crooning
about the halls of Montezuma and the shores of Tripoli.

He was giving the first briefing by a top Pentagon official since fresh
allegations surfaced three weeks ago about Marines killing two dozen Iraqi
civilians in Haditha. But, unable or unwilling to provide information about that
dark episode, he chose to talk "about what it is to be a Marine."

NATO is going to ramp up it's mission in Afghanistan in reponse to increased Taliban activity. And I bet you thought we were the only ones in Afghanistan. It's bound to be better than "stay the course."

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- NATO defense ministers expressed confidence Thursday that
their beefed-up mission in Afghanistan can stem the surge in violence by
supporters of the deposed Taliban
regime.
NATO is increasing its force in Afghanistan from 9,700 to 16,000, with an
expansion into the volatile southern region of the country due to be completed
by late July. The alliance hopes to take on eastern Afghanistan by November,
completing its expansion across the country and increasing its total numbers to
21,000.

Daddy Bush has been working to get rid of Rumsfeld as Secretary of Defense. He even found a retired four star general to replace him. But Daddy forgot that he raised an idiot.

When seven retired generals who had been commanders in Iraq demanded
Rumsfeld's resignation in April, the younger Bush leapt to his defense. "I'm
the decider and I decide what's best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to
remain," he said. His endorsement of Rumsfeld was a rebuke not only to the
generals but also to his father.

The Religious Right didn't get their gay marriage ban amendment, but they still have clout. Macy's removed a window display because some whiners don't understand what living in a free country is all about.

But the store yanked the mannequins from the window after MassResistance, the
conservative group formerly named Article 8 Alliance which has also campaigned
against sex education and gay-themed books in public schools, complained the
display was offensive

.

Now the Religious Right has something to do when they're not trying to run everyone else's lives. A new video game.

When you have nothing but abstinence to look forward to, I guess knocking off a bunch of infidels relieves the pressure.

What's the game actually about? How do you play? I believe the pro-choice, pro-religion Talk to Action blog describes it best:

Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to
remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the
dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military
weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City.
You are on a mission -- both a religious mission and a military mission -- to
convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who
advocates the separation of church and state -- especially moderate, mainstream
Christians. Your mission is "to conduct physical and spiritual warfare"; all who
resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice.

Don't know about you, but this scares the hell out of me. Course, I live right in the big middle of 'em.

What are all the liars that took us into the Iraq mess doing now? They seem to be doing all right.

President Bush has not fired any of the architects of the Iraq war. In fact, a
review of the key planners of the conflict reveals that they have been rewarded
– not blamed – for their incompetence.

OK, which is it? Is the media liberal or are they just lapdogs of the right? Jamison Foser knows.

But if you're angry about this, you should be far more angry that for years, the
media has employed a double-standard in covering progressives and conservatives.
You constantly hear about the Clintons' personal lives on television; you read
about it in the newspaper. John McCain doesn't get the same treatment; nor does
George Bush or Rudy Giuliani. Intrusive, irrelevant tabloid-style coverage of
candidates is wrong. Intrusive, irrelevant tabloid-style coverage of some
candidates, while others are afforded an appropriate zone of privacy is even
worse. And it can't go on.

And the GOP is up to it's old tricks, once again trying to do away with PBS.

WASHINGTON -- House Republicans yesterday revived their efforts to slash
funding for public broadcasting, as a key committee approved a $115 million
reduction in the budget for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting that could
force the elimination of some popular PBS and NPR programs.

On a party-line vote, the House Appropriations subcommittee that oversees
health and education funding approved the cut to the budget for the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, which distributes money to the Public Broadcasting
Service and National Public Radio. It would reduce the corporation's budget by
23 percent next year, to $380 million, in a cut that Republicans said was
necessary to rein in government spending.

And this from the folks that just tried to give billionaires a trillion dollar tax break.

John R. Bolton Needs a Chillpill, Constitution Saved, Secret Prisons, Tuna Warning, Founding Fathers and Stephen Colbert.

I had a big post ready to go this morning, my Blogger froze just before I was able to publish and I lost the whole thing. Sorry 'bout that.

Anyway, when I ran across this article about this worthless, piece of neocon crap reaming out the UN for telling the truth, I'd found the perfect vehicle to vent my frustration.

If you're not familiar with John R. Bolton, he is currently our ambassador to the UN, of which he once said, "if the U.N. secretary building in New York lost 10 stories, it wouldn't make a bit of difference." A typical conservative, he sucks up to the powerful and he's a buttwipe to his subordinates. Like I said a worthless, neocon piece of crap. Here's his bio.

Deputy Secretary General Mark Malloch Brown made some statements in a speech, all true, that sent the emotionally challenged Bolton into one of his famous childish trantrums. Like his boss, he's petulant when he doesn't get his way.

This is what got our UN Ambassador's panties in a wad,

In his speech to a group of foreign policy experts, Malloch Brown said that
the "prevailing practice of seeking to use the U.N. almost by stealth as a
diplomatic tool while failing to stand up for it against its domestic critics is
simply not sustainable. You will lose the U.N. one way or another."

Malloch Brown voiced frustration that the United Nations receives
little gratitude, although it frequently advances U.S. policies from the Middle
East to Africa, where it is currently organizing a U.N. peacekeeping operation
in Sudan.

He said the United Nations' role is "in effect a secret in Middle America,
even as it is highlighted in the Middle East and other parts of the
world."

Malloch Brown said the United States has not done enough to highlight
the United Nations' contributions, citing its role in managing 18 U.S.-backed
peacekeeping operations.

"That is not well known or understood, because much of the public
discourse that reaches the U.S. heartland has been largely abandoned to its
loudest detractors, such as Rush Limbaugh and Fox News," he said at the event
sponsored by the Center for American Progress and the Century Foundation. "To
acknowledge an America reliant on international institutions is not perceived to
be good politics at home."

But, Malloch Brown said, "a moment of truth is coming. Because even as
the world's challenges are growing, the U.N.'s ability to respond is being
weakened without U.S. leadership."

Bolton responded with,

Ambassador John R. Bolton called on Secretary General Kofi Annan to
"repudiate" the speech given by his top aide, Deputy Secretary General Mark
Malloch Brown, or live with "adverse" consequences.

"Even though the target of the speech was the United States, the victim, I
fear, will be the United Nations," Bolton told reporters. "My hope is he looks
at the potential adverse effects that these intemperate remarks would have on
the organization and repudiate it."

Bolton called Malloch Brown's speech a "very, very grave mistake," the
worst by a U.N. official that he had seen in more than 15 years. He said the
address, given in New York on Tuesday, represented a "condescending and
patronizing" attack against the American people.

John Bolton, just another big, Republican pussy whose ass can't back up his mouth.


Not unlike the Senate Republicans who lost theirs today in a sound defeat of their attempt to turn our Constitution into a document of discrimination. Talk about suck ups.

The Senate, as expected, defeated a proposed constitutional amendment banning
same-sex marriage today in a procedural vote that fell far short of the number
required to amend the Constitution.

But like Dana Milbank of the WaPo says, it's the thought that counts. It seems the proponents of the ban didn't give it enough thought. Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.), is the perfect example.

Likewise, Allard held a news conference Monday at which the speakers said
they wanted to reduce the "epidemic level of fatherlessness in America."

"How would outlawing gay marriage encourage heterosexual fathers to
stick around?" was the first question.

Allard skirted the question by saying that "laws send a message to our
children."

The moderator, Matt Daniels of the Alliance for Marriage, tried to find
a question on another subject. But when reporters continued to press Allard on
the link between same-sex marriage and deadbeat dads, Daniels blurted out: "All
right, you know what? We're going to call this press conference to a
close."

All good little fascist leaders like to keep secrets from from the people. Our little leader's secrets are starting to come out.

BERLIN, June 7 -- A European investigator concluded Wednesday that there
are "serious indications" that the CIA operated secret prisons for senior
al-Qaeda figures in Poland and Romania as part of a clandestine "spider's web"
to catch, transfer and hold terrorism suspects around the world.

Dick Marty, a Swiss lawyer working on behalf of the Council of Europe,
the continent's official human rights organization, said at least seven other
European nations colluded with the CIA to capture and secretly detain terrorism
suspects, including several who were ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing.

Bush proudly proclaims his anti-abortion stance, and in his little pea brain there is no conflict with the fact that he doesn't want pregnant women to know about the mercury levels in tuna. The tuna industry thanks him.

Officials at Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, said
they decided to recommend a tuna-free diet for pregnant women based on a Tribune investigative series on mercury in fish and the latest testing by the Food and
Drug Administration.

The FDA and the tuna industry questioned the new advice for pregnant women,
saying their own reviews of government tests show there is no reason to doubt
the safety of canned tuna. FDA officials said they don't plan to warn the public
that some cans of light tuna contain high amounts of mercury because the average
level of mercury in canned light tuna remains low.

Historian Gordon Wood answers questions about our Founding Fathers. Getting to know these guys will make you realize what a bunch of weak sisters we have running the country.

Invoking the Founding Fathers is not just a pastime of history majors; it's an
American obsession. Which is why there's still such a brisk trade in
re-examining the founders' lives. In his latest book, Revolutionary Characters:
What Made the Founders Different, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon Wood
explains how this elite fraternity destroyed any chance of others duplicating
their achievements by making American society more democratic.

And Stephen Colbert goes to college. He gave the commencement address at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. Here's the transcript. Much better than McCain or Condi.

Iraq, Haditha, War Photographers, Hookers on the Hill, Pandering Unleashed, Someone Thinks Bush is Smart and Love Republilcan Style.

OK, we've reached the point in Iraq that something has to be done.

The long hemorrage of our service personnel and our country's wealth is one option, it's what we're doing now. The War President calls it "Staying the course, we are making progress." People with adaquate mental acuity, call it dumb. It's obvious that more of the same is not the answer.

The second option is the "All Out" approach. We blanket the country with troops, declare martial law and kill anyone and everyone that puts a toe out of line. Of course, with this approach we would have to install a dictator with his own private army to keep the country under control. This option would have the benefit of insuring an Iraqi leader that is friendly to the U.S. It's a method we have used extensively in Central and South America. This option has many drawbacks, not least are, that we will be seen as even more of a rogue superpower by the world community and the majority of the American people wouldn't stand for it.

The third option would be to turn the mess we've made over to the UN and let them get in some peacekeepers that know the language and understand the Iraqi people. We would have to pay for this UN peacekeeping force, but since we wouldn't be subsidizing Halliburton, it'll seem like a bargain. The benefits would be that our military could rest and regroup and we could start working on our dismal world image. The main drawback would be having to listen to all the whining from the right.

The last option is "Declare victory and leave." It has it's own benefits and drawbacks, but they're obvious.

If you have any other ideas, I'd be glad to hear 'em.

Even now as I sit here safely at my computer, Iraq is in turmoil. Only a mile away from the one area in Baghdad that we can say is almost secure, gunmen kidnapped 56 people right out in the open.

BAGHDAD, June 5 -- "Turn back," a friend told Haji Abu Shamaa as he walked
Monday morning toward his money-changing shop in the Karkh neighborhood of
central Baghdad, a mile north of the heavily guarded Green Zone. "The Interior Ministry police are rounding up people."

But Shamaa walked on, right into a
swift, coordinated operation unfolding within sight of Iraq's Ministry of
Justice. Gunmen in police uniforms and ski masks had cordoned off the street and
were swiftly shoving captives, four or five at a time, into a dozen waiting
pickup trucks. Fifteen minutes later, the trucks were gone, and so were 56
people.

The Iraqi Prime Minister is pledging to put a stop to the internal strife in that country, but I think he has about as much influence in Iraq as I do.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged Tuesday to push
ahead with efforts to curb rampant sectarian and militia violence after a series
of brazen attacks, including the kidnappings of 50 people in broad daylight in Baghdad.

Police found nine severed heads in fruit boxes in a village northeast of the
capital, which followed a similar grisly discovery there on Saturday.

War photographers are getting the shots that the media, in this country, won't use. But they will become the history of out little misadventure in Iraq.

Again and again throughout this war, amateur photographs have exposed the flaws
of the military's carefully constructed image of discipline. Photographs made
Abu Ghraib a symbol of shame throughout the world. And photographs and video
images are again undermining the military's cherished reputation for calm under
fire and heroic self-restraint.

Newsweek is asking the obvious question, "Did some Marines snap?", but it's still a good article about Haditha. We have Bush, Rumsfeld and some suck-up generals that deserve credit for this.

It is not clear exactly what happened in Haditha on the morning of Nov. 19. One
Marine and 24 Iraqis died, that much is certain. Local survivors say Americans
on a rampage massacred their neighbors in cold blood. The videotaped eyewitness
accounts provided to NEWSWEEK and other news organizations are horrifying, hard
to believe in their sordidness and brutality. The Marines at first said 15
civilians, along with Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, 20, had been killed by an IED,
and that the rest died in a shoot-out with insurgents. But the official story
changed, in part because of a Time magazine exposé in March. Now, according to
congressmen who have been briefed by the Pentagon, the military is investigating
Kilo Company for possible war crimes. Investigators have seen grisly photographs
and are pursuing allegations of a cover-up. Ominously, there are also reports of
atrocities in other places, committed by young soldiers who cracked under the
pressure of a war fought on a battlefield with no front lines, no easy way to
tell civilians from insurgents, and no end in sight.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, it would seem that our part-time Congresspersons are making out OK as full-time prostitutes. $50 million in free trips. That's good benefits for someone who just rubberstamps whatever Crawford, TX' village idiot wants.

Over 5 1/2 years, Republican and Democratic lawmakers accepted nearly $50
million in trips, often to resorts and exclusive locales, from corporations and
groups seeking legislative favors, according to the most comprehensive study to
date on the subject of congressional travel.

From January 2000 through June 2005, House and Senate members and their
aides were away from Washington for more than 81,000 days -- a combined 222
years -- on at least 23,000 trips, according to the report, issued yesterday by
the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity. About 2,300 of the trips cost
$5,000 or more, at least 500 cost $10,000 or more, and 16 cost $25,000 or more.

And what do we get out of the pampered people that are supposed to be representing us? Not much, unless you're in the top one per cent of the richest in the country or you're a homophobic religio-crazy that wants to write discrimination into the Constitution.

Republican voters, are you paying attention?

Because this week's Senate agenda is all about you, with debates scheduled
on same-sex marriage and a permanent repeal of the estate tax.

Over at USNews I just saw what must be the two stupidest statements of the year, by Michael Barone.

Bush Knows His History

We're lucky we had then, and have now, a president who takes bold action and
braves vitriolic criticism to defend our civilization against those who would
destroy it.

I guess being a suck-up pays.

And if that's not enough humor for one day, from Pensito Review,

The Real Threat to Marriage: Top 10 GOP Adulterers

Iraq, Gay Marriage, Estate Tax, Global Warming, Idiots Get Together and Real Morning News.

What are we going to do about Iraq? Before President Bush lied us into an ill-advised invasion, Iraq was a relatively stable, secular country. Albeit, led by a somewhat mad dictator.

Now more than three years after Bush's war to destroy imaginary WMDs/liberate Iraqis/bring regime change/democratize the Mid-East or any of the 27 reasons the Administration has given, Iraq is crumbling in on it self.

50 people have been abducted from a bus stop, 11 students and nine others, all Shiite, were taken from vehicles and murdered on the side of the road, anyone who thinks that we have some kind of control in Iraq is just not paying attention.

Some of the violence that took place this last Sunday:

-Gunmen in a car opened fire on a minibus carrying telecommunications workers to
an area near the Shiite slum of Sadr City, killing four and wounding two.
-Police found 16 bullet-riddled bodies in Baghdad and four in the city of
Tikrit, north of the capital.
-Gunmen in Tikrit killed three police officers
and wounded two others at a checkpoint.
-Gunmen broke into the home of an
Iraqi army soldier, killing him, his two brothers and father and wounding his
mother.
-Two gunmen on a motorcycle killed Muntaha Ali and her husband Helmi
Yaseen in Basra, believed to be employees of a U.S. government agency.

T.E. Lawrence, "Lawrence of Arabia", said of British involvement in Iraq in 1920, "in a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honour". Lawrence also said, and it's still applicable today,

"To make war upon rebellion was messy and slow," in Lawrence's memorable phrase,
"like eating soup with a knife." His own estimate after the war was that the
Turks would have needed 600,000 men to pacify the Hejaz. Today in Iraq, a
similar-sized area, there are fewer than 200,000 coalition troops. Soon there
will be even fewer. It seems Lawrence's central message, that guerrillas are
almost impossible to defeat, is finally beginning to sink in

.

Like My Lai, Haditha and Ishaqi are becoming household names. The latest is accusations that Marines executed a 52 year old, disabled man in Hamdaniyah.

According to accounts given by Hashim's neighbors and members of his family, and
apparently supported by photographs, the Marines went to Hashim's home, took the
52-year-old disabled Iraqi outside and shot him four times in the face. The
assault rifle and shovel next to his body had been planted by the Marines, who
had borrowed them from a villager, family members and other residents said.

Now we have a wife of one of the Haditha Marines that says that they were falling apart after Falluja. If what she says is true, it means that we pushed these men well beyond their limit.

The marine unit involved in the killing of Iraqi civilians in Haditha last
November had suffered a "total breakdown" in discipline and had drug and alcohol
problems, according to the wife of one of the battalion's staff sergeants.

The new Iraqi government is pissed with American conduct in Iraq and even the Brits are letting us know, in the nicest possible way, to get a grip.

Adnan al-Kazimi, an aide to prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, said the government
would also demand an apology from the United States and compensation for the
victims in several cases, including the alleged massacre in the town of Haditha
last year.

The escalation in tensions comes as sources at the Foreign Office confirmed
that the British Government is also urging the Americans to co-operate fully
with comprehensive investigations into the deaths at both Ishaqi and Haditha.

"Stay the course" and White House propaganda won't solve the problems that Iraq is now facing. Gutless Democrats keeping their mouths shut won't help either.

Meanwhile the President is busy protecting the American people from what he perceives as bigger threats than Iraq, gay marriage and an estate tax on the top quarter of the top one per cent of the wealthiest people in the country.

"Ages of experience have taught us that the commitment of a husband and wife
to love and to serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the
stability of society," Bush said in his weekly radio address. "Government, by
recognizing and protecting marriage, serves the interests of all."

It used to be that a majority of Americans approved abolition of the estate
tax. Perhaps they feared they or their business friends would be hit by the
federal tax should their parents die. But this year, estates of $2 million for a
single person ($4 million for a couple) can be passed along tax-free. Only 0.27
percent of estates - those of megamillionaires and billionaires - will face the estate
tax.

Bush is also working hard to convince us that global warming is just a liberal pipe dream.

Some of America's leading climate scientists claim to Panorama that they have
been censored and gagged by the administration.

One of them believes the publication of his report, which catalogues the
unprecedented rate of ice melt in the Arctic, was delayed as Americans prepared
to vote in 2004.

The scientists claim that when Bush came to power in 2000 his administration
selected advice which argued that global warming was not a result of human
activities and that the phenomenon could be natural.

The truly ignorant assed had a convention in Dallas. You can replace ignorant assed with Republicans, if you'd prefer.

It would appear that they really, really want to do away with our Constitution and replace it with some nut preacher with a Bible.

A peek inside this meeting of America haters, also known as the Republican Convention.

SAN ANTONIO, Lt. Col. Brian Birdwell offered a greeting to delegates to the
Republican convention. "It's great to be back in the holy land," the Fort Worth
native said to the cheers of the party faithful.For the 4,500 delegates at last
week's biennial gathering, it was both an expression of conservative philosophy
and religious faith, a melding of church and state.

At Saturday morning's prayer meeting, party leader Tina Benkiser assured
them that God was watching over the two-day confab.

"He is the chairman of this party," she said against a backdrop of flags and
a GOP seal with its red, white and blue logo.

The party platform, adopted Saturday, declares "America is a Christian
nation" and affirms that "God is undeniable in our history and is vital to our freedom."

"We pledge to exert our influence toward a return to the original intent of
the First Amendment and dispel the myth of the separation of church and state,"
it says.

Myth? My shiny red baboon ass.

And finally some good news. Real news in the morning, brought to you by the BBC.

Instead of the usual fluff that's become the bread and butter of such U.S.
network programs as The Today Show
and Good Morning America as well as Fox and Friends, World News Today will
deliver news of serious global import by drawing on the network's vast
resources, including three times the number of reporters stationed around the
world as
CNN.

"We really feel there's actually a huge vacuum for us to fill in terms
of global, responsible, impartial reporting," Jeremy Hillman, a BBC World editor
and its outgoing New York bureau chief, told Reuters. "I don't think we expected
to be up there beating Fox and, you know, the main networks, but what we want is
a good, sizable loyal
audience."
The newscast will air on the BBC World News channel as well as the net's
flagship entertainment channel, BBC America.

Right On! BBC

Ishaqi, Haditha, Upset Iraqis, Condi, Details Coming, Bush Has A Secret and Provo, UT.

The military investigation says we did everything right in Ishaqi.

But I think after the embarrassment of having no investigation of Haditha, the military wanted to appear to be on top of things.

And I'd bet that this investigation was more a matter of expedience than an effort to really find out what happened.

NEW YORK The U.S military said Saturday it had found no wrongdoing in the
March 15 raid on a home in Ishaqi that left nine Iraqi civilians dead. But, as
with the apparent massacre in Haditha, will a military "coverup" in this case
come undone? E&P coverage from back in March, and other evidence, suggest
that the official story may soon unravel.

The Iraqi police charge that American forces executed the civilians,
including a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old baby. The BBC has been airing
video of the dead civilians, mainly children, who appeared to be shot, possibly
at close range. Photographs taken just after the raid for the Associated Press
and Agence France-Presse, and reports at the time by Reuters and Knight Ridder,
also appear to back up the charge of an atrocity.

The Iraqis certainly don't agree with the military findings.

BAGHDAD, June 3 -- The Iraqi government and residents of a village where
U.S. soldiers killed as many as a dozen civilians in March took a skeptical view
Saturday of an American investigation that ruled in the troops' favor, saying
they wanted a new probe of the incident.

An aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Iraq would pursue its
own probe into the incident in Ishaqi, a village north of Baghdad, and would
seek an apology if the U.S. soldiers were proved guilty. "We ought to do our own
investigation into this and reach the fact of what happened," Adnan Ali
al-Kadhimi said in a telephone interview Saturday. "Our own conclusion may not
be the same as theirs."

The WaPo is giving Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice credit for the Bush Administration's agreeing to talks with Iran. I think that they had simply ran out of options and didn't really have any other choice.

At the end of March, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice flew to Europe and
had unusual, one-on-one conversations with German Chancellor Angela Merkel,
French President Jacques Chirac and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. She also
attended a meeting in Berlin on Iran at which the Russian and Chinese
representatives denounced the idea of sanctions to halt Tehran's drive toward a
nuclear weapon.

Rice returned to Washington with a sobering message: The international
effort to derail Iran's programs was falling apart. Her conclusion spurred a
secret discussion among Rice, President Bush, Vice President Cheney and national
security adviser Stephen J. Hadley: Should the United States finally agree to
join the Europeans at the negotiations with Iran?

Iran said that they were going to publish the details of the plan to moniter and contain their nuclear program.

The Iranian president said, ""We will record the talks and we will publish them at the appropriate time, so our people will be informed about the details." If Bush said things like that, he might be above 30%.

TEHRAN, June 3 -- President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Saturday that Iran
would publish details of the package of incentives and possible penalties
prepared by the United States and five other major powers aimed at halting
Iran's nuclear program.

In a speech in which he warned Iran's critics against "threats and
intimidation," Ahmadinejad seemed to sweep aside a request by U.N. Secretary
General Kofi Annan to keep the process confidential. Western diplomats had said
they were trying to avoid the appearance of threatening Iran by keeping the
terms of the package as private as possible, especially the specific penalties
Iran might face if it continues to enrich uranium.

While the President of Iran is saying he wants the people to know, our President Bush don't want us to know anything.

WASHINGTON, June 3 — Facing a wave of litigation challenging its
eavesdropping at home and its handling of terror suspects abroad, the Bush
administration is increasingly turning to a legal tactic that swiftly torpedoes
most lawsuits: the state secrets privilege.

In recent weeks alone, officials have used the privilege to win the
dismissal of a lawsuit filed by a German man who was abducted and held in
Afghanistan for five months and to ask the courts to throw out three legal
challenges to the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance
program.

The good news for Bush is that most of the folks in Provo, Utah, just love him.

"When I watch him, I see a man with his heart in the right place," said
Delia Randall, a 22-year-old mother from Provo, the hub of a county that gave
Senator John
Kerry just 11 percent of the presidential vote in 2004. "I like George Bush
because he is God fearing, and that's how a lot of people in this area
feel."

These voters are among the committed Bush supporters who are standing
proudly by him as he tries to reverse the poll numbers that are sliding even in
Utah, hang on to Republican control of Congress, revive his agenda and stabilize
Iraq.

"We don't talk politics because everyone is so one-sided," said Sarah
Rueckert, a mother of three and a Mormon who just moved back to Utah after 10
years of living in places like Chicago, Portland and San Francisco. "They're all
pro-Bush."

DNA, Good Guys Win One, Iran, Ahmadinejad, Misquote?, Sell-Out Senators and A Real Family Values Republican.

They've got our phone records, and they know everything we do on the internet. Now they want our DNA.

I can understand where that could come in handy on some criminal investigations. But the idea of the government, especially this government, having my DNA is just something that needs a little more time and debate. And the government has been less than forthcoming on the growing DNA database they're making now.

With little public debate, state and federal rules for cataloging DNA have
broadened in recent years to include not only violent felons, as was originally
the case, but also perpetrators of minor crimes and even people who have been
arrested but not convicted.

Now some in law enforcement are calling for
a national registry of every American's DNA profile, against which police could
instantly compare crime-scene specimens. Advocates say the system would dissuade
many would-be criminals and help capture the rest.

Hell, if capitol punishment don't dissuade would-be criminals, I doubt if a DNA sample will.

Good news for those of us who believe in seperation of church and state, it's bad news for Bush and the Religious Right. So that makes it double good news.

A federal judge ruled yesterday that Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship
Ministries and the state of Iowa violated the Constitution by setting up a
government-funded program to rehabilitate prison inmates by immersing them in
Christianity.

The case, brought by the Washington-based advocacy group
Americans United for Separation of Church and State, has been widely viewed as a
major challenge to President Bush's faith-based initiative, the White House's
effort to deliver more government funding to religious groups that provide
social services, particularly in prisons.

In even more good news, Iran still hasn't rejected the plan laid out to deal with their nuclear development program. Let's hope that Iran works something out with Germany, Russia and China. Bush seems determined not to reach an agreement and Tony Blair will do as he's told.

TEHRAN, June 2 -- Iranian officials on Friday appeared to be studying a plan
laid out by the United States and five other major powers for the future of the
country's nuclear program but offered no clues on what their decision might be.

In a statement that reflected the public relations challenge Iran faces
after months of insisting it would never scale back its nuclear program,
Mohammad Saeedi, the deputy head of the country's atomic energy agency, told a
student news agency: "Accepting the conditions that America has set at the start
of the talks is almost impossible."

While Bush's numbers tank, his counterpart in Iran is becoming increasingly popular. The Iraqi people feel that Ahmadinejad actually gives a damn about them. And after five and half years we know how Bush feels about us.

Here, ordinary people marvel at how their president comes across as someone in
touch, as populist candidate turned caring incumbent. In speeches, 17-hour
workdays and biweekly trips like the one that brought him here to Central
Province, Ahmadinejad showcases a relentless preoccupation with the health,
housing and, most of all, money problems that may barely register on the global
agenda but represent the most clear and present danger for most in this nation
of 70 million.

The White House said that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was misquoted on his statements about the American violence to Iraq civilians. This announcement was an
excellent example of White House planning.

They couldn't say how or what he was misquoted on.

White House press secretary Tony Snow said that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki
had told U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad that he had been misquoted. But Snow
was unable to explain what al-Maliki told Khalilzad or how he had been
misquoted.

"That is a little too complicated for me to try to read out," Snow said at a
briefing where he was pressed to explain how al-Maliki's remarks were supposed
to have been distorted. "It becomes a little convoluted and so I don't want to
make a real clear characterization because it's a little hazy to me," Snow
said.

Some Senate Democrats are making a deal to repeal the estate tax. Senator Max Baucus of Montana is the ringleader of these sell-out Democrats who know what to give the person who has everything.

Giving the GOP its way would hand a fabulous reward to the country's wealthiest
families but, worse than that, create a $1 trillion hole in future federal
revenue. If this happens, forget about universal health care or other major
social reforms and public investment that Democrats are promising to pursue.

Democrats do not need do anything about the estate tax at this point since the
Bush version expires automatically in 2011. Let the next president decide what
to recommend. For now, Dems merely need to hold the 40 votes to sustain a
filibuster. The caucus overwhelmingly supports that position. The problem is the
handful of potential deserters.
The first chore for activists is to bang on
Baucus--quickly and mercilessly--because a Senate vote is expected next week.
More to the point, grassroots Democrats need to bang on the handful of wobbly
Democratic senators disposed to go along with Senator Sellout or flirting with
the idea. These include the two Nelsons (Bill of Florida, Ben of Nebraska),
Salazar of Colorado, Lincoln and Pryor of Arkansas and--most
shocking--Washington's two usually progressive senators, Cantwell and Murray.
Their state includes a bunch of techie billionaires and the family-owned Seattle
Times that hammers them on the supposed injustice of the estate tax. They need
to know a price will be paid for defection.

And finally, a little humor.

Republican Jim Galley, who is running for Congress as a “pro-traditional
family” candidate, was married to two women at the same time, defaulted on his
child support payments and has been accused of abuse by one of his ex-wives.

“He used to only hit me and now he is hitting my children. I'm very scared
of what my husband is capable of,” Beth wrote.

Military Says Ishaqi OK, Evidence Says Ishaqi Not OK, More Allegations, Schaeffer Rambles, Bush Starts Listening, But Doesn't Understand.

U.S. troops were cleared in the killing of civilians in Ishaqi by a military investigation.

That should be it, case closed no more questions.

The Military, after Haditha, is in hyper-CYA mode. They might have jumped the gun in declaring it's all good in Ishaqi.

There are just too many witnesses, details from the local police and there's even a video tape that the BBC has and it says the tape refutes much of what the investigation claimed.

Unlike the American media, the BBC won't just blow this off.

The video tape obtained by the BBC shows a number of dead adults and children at
the site with what our world affairs editor John Simpson says were clearly
gunshot
wounds.
The pictures came from a hardline Sunni group opposed to coalition
forces.
It has been cross-checked with other images taken at the time of events and
is believed to be genuine, the BBC's Ian Pannell in Baghdad says.

There's just too much coming out of Iraq to take the military investigation a face value.

New allegations made to the BBC.

U.S. troops kicking the heads of decapitated Iraqis around 'like a soccer ball'.

Iraq War Vets talk about random civilian killings.

I think we're just getting started on the inhumanity of our war in Iraq.

Update: The Iraqis aren't too happy with the investigation's findings.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- An Iraqi whose brother was killed by American troops
during a raid north of Baghdad condemned on Saturday a U.S. military
investigation that cleared forces of wrongdoing, as new footage showed that at
least four children were among the victims.

The U.S. military said Saturday it found no wrongdoing by American troops
accused of intentionally killing civilians during a March 15 raid in Ishaqi,
about 50 miles north of Baghdad. As many as 13 Iraqis were killed.

Frank Schaeffer at the WaPo is comparing Mr. Bush's Little War to WWII, a long time conservative pipe dream. His son is in the military and has served two tours in Afghanistan and one in Iraq. He thinks the rest of us should willingly be proud to send our children to an incompetently led war for no reason with an idiot for a Commader-in-Chief. He also feels that we have to have a child serving or we are serving ourselves, to have an opinion.

It's time for the critics of our military to also earn a little moral authority
by volunteering themselves or encouraging their children to do so. Anything less
is nothing more than arm's-length moralizing.

The White House is supposedly opening it's ears to differing opinions. Maybe they should open their minds as well. On Monday Bush will try to make our Constitution a document of discrimination by endorsing the same sex marriage ban amendment.

Ishaqi, Haditha, Iraq Prime Minister Stands Up, War Loses Support, The V.A. and The Wiccan Soldier, Bush Stole Election, Economy, Internet Spying, Etc

Ishaqi, remember it, you'll be hearing a lot about it. While hoping that the slaughter in Haditha is just an isolated incident, along comes Ishaqi.

Reports say that U.S. troops were air-lifted in and then went into one house and killed everyone inside.

The best information I can get says it was 11 people five women, four children and two men. The ages ran from 70 to 3 years old.

Correntewire.com has the Iraqi police report here.

At 230 of 15/3/2006, according to the telegram (report) of the Ishaqi police
directorate, American forces used helicopters to drop troops on the house of
Faiz Harat Khalaf situated in the Abu Sifa village of the Ishaqi district. The
American forces gathered the family members in one room and executed 11 people,
including 5 children, 4 women and 2 men, then they bombed the house, burned
three vehicles, and killed their animals…

The responsibility for this type of criminal behavior goes all the way to the Commander in Chief and that's probably why the White House is so vocal about not being involved in the investigation.

"I'm not involved with the investigation," Bush told reporters following a
Cabinet meeting. "And you shouldn't expect me to be. I expect this investigation
to be conducted independent of the White House, with a full and thorough
investigation."

Even Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki is getting fed up with U.S violence against Iraqis, which he terms as a "daily phenomenon". The only good news for Bush is that there's still a great many Iraqis alive.

In his comments, Mr. Maliki said violence against civilians had become a
"daily phenomenon" by many troops in the American-led coalition who "do not
respect the Iraqi people."

"They crush them with their vehicles and kill them just on suspicion,"
he said. "This is completely unacceptable." Attacks on civilians will play a
role in future decisions on how long to ask American forces to remain in Iraq,
the prime minister added.

He also wants the U.S. to turn over the Haditha investigation file. Smart move, makes him look like more of an Iraqi President than an American puppet.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The Iraqi government will ask the United States for the
files of an investigation into allegations that U.S. Marines killed Iraqi
civilians in Haditha last year, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Friday.

And Bush was so happy that Iraqi leaders will now take his phone calls.

Bush, on the other hand, is so desperate for positive signs that he is happy
just to get a callback from Iraqi leaders. "He wouldn't have taken my phone call
a year ago," Bush said Monday of the new Iraqi parliament speaker. "He's now
taken it twice." Wow, and it only cost $200 billion and thousands of maimed and
dead American soldiers to get the President's call returned.

Meanwhile, American support for the war keeps falling. After news of Ishaqi hits the mainstream news, I think it will take a nose dive.

(Angus Reid Global Scan) – Many adults in the United States continue to question
their government’s decision to launch the coalition effort, according to a poll
by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. 56 per cent of respondents think
going to war with Iraq was the wrong thing to do.

Bush's inept Veteran's Adminstration can lose 26 million SSNs in one night, but it can't get a fallen soldier a proper headstone.

RENO, Nev. -- Not unlike families who choose the Jewish Star of David, the
Christian cross and the Islamic crescent and star to honor their loved ones on
headstones and markers, Sgt. Patrick Stewart's family's symbol of choice for his
memorial plaque also was from his religion: the Wiccan pentacle.

But of all the symbols and faiths recognized by the Department of
Veterans Affairs, Wicca and its emblem -- a circle around a five-pointed star --
are not among them.

The ever helpful V.A. is saying that they're absolutely clueless about when a decision will be made.

VA spokeswoman Jo Schuda in Washington said the request was under review and she
did not know when a decision would be made.

Come on, V.A., this man gave his life for his country, put aside the fact that your boss is scared to death of the Religious Right, get the man a Wiccan headstone.



Breaking old news. If you ever wondered how Bush won reelection in 2004, he didn't, here's the story of Ohio's crooked vote count. Two stories, actually.

Was the 2004 Election Stolen?
Republicans prevented more than 350,000 voters
in Ohio from casting ballots or having their votes counted -- enough to have put
John Kerry in the White House. BY ROBERT
F. KENNEDY JR.

How They Stole Ohio
The GOP 4-step Recipe to 'Blackwell' the USA in 2008 Abracadabra: Three
Million Votes Vanish
BY GREG
PALAST (He's good)

If stolen elections aren't enough, there's the economy that's not doing nearly as good as Bush says it is.

"The slowdown in the housing market and higher gas prices have dampened
auto and other retails sales, and the jobs data indicate the economy is headed
for much slower growth and perhaps a downturn," he added.

"So the question becomes, is the economy really weakening or are the
last two payroll readings just noise or distorted," said Stephen Stanley of RBS
Greenwich Capital in a note to clients

.


To keep your mind off the bad news the Bush Administration wants internet companies to keep a record of all your internet activity for two years. I hope we don't just sit on our butts and let them get away with it.

Top law enforcement officials have asked leading Internet companies to keep
histories of the activities of Web users for up to two years to assist in
criminal investigations of child pornography and terrorism, the Justice
Department said Wednesday.

In Bush's new energy plan, it's the energy efficiency studies that get the ax. Gotta pay for them tax cuts somehow.

If Congress accepts the Energy Department's proposed 2007 budget, it will cut
$152 million - some 16 percent - from this year's budget for energy-efficiency
programs. Adjusting for inflation, it would mean the US government would spend
30 percent less on energy efficiency next year than it did in 2002, the ACEEE
says.

On the night of September 11, 2001 George and Laura Bush still manage to have a laugh.

In a 2003
interview with Ladies Home Journal, Bush told Peggy Noonan that during the
late-night hours of Sept. 11, he and wife Laura were hustled around the White
House in their bedtime clothes because it was thought a jet was going to crash
into the building. “[T]he day ended on a relatively humorous note,” he said. “We
got a laugh out of it.”

And I managed to get a laugh out of this. Is America getting smarter?

Fox News' average prime-time viewing audience tumbled 6%.

Dixie Chicks, Bush Relents, Iraq No Nukes, Haditha, Bush Bite Hand That Feeds Him and Homeland Security?

Despite the right's best efforts at putting the kibosh on their new album, it opened number one with 525,829 copies sold.

Three cute girls showing the world they have what it takes, by handing the blow-hard, testicularly-challenged right's butts back to them on a plate.

Democrat leaders could learn a lot from the Dixie Chicks, but unlike the Chicks, they're a gutless bunch of suck-ups.

Back home, the Chicks were denounced as traitors on right-wing talk radio.
Country music deejays, apparently seeing jingoism as a good career move, not
only denounced the Chicks but refused to play their music. Some said they were
just responding to listeners who threatened to boycott stations that dared to
broadcast the Dixie Chicks' sweet harmonies.

Conservatives may not keep all their promises, but they kept this one. With the
approach of the late May release date for Taking The Long Way, the group's first
album since Maines spoke up in London, the trashing began. At an Academy of
Country Music awards ceremony in March, singer Reba McEntire read a scripted
line about how she could host the event because, "[If] the Dixie Chicks can sing
with their foot in their mouth, then I can do anything!" Rush Limbaugh, Hannity
and the rest of the right-wing ranters picked up the chorus and, by the time of
the CDs finally hit the stores the official line was that the Chicks were
finished as major stars. Country fans would abandon them. Country radio would
not play unapologetic tracks such as the single "Not Ready to Make Nice."
Congressman Kingston --who, it should be said, maintains the most entertaining
offical blog of anyone in Washington--used his "Jack's Blog" to muse that Maines
and her compatriots made a big mistake when they started talking politics.

In a rare case of George Bush not getting his way, the U.S. has joined with five other world powers to offer Iran an incentives package to toe the nuclear line. Now if Bush will just toe the line, we may be saved even more embarrassment for our country.

Diplomats feared Iran would immediately reject any invitation to bargain if
the threat of sanctions was explicit, officials involved in the discussions said
on condition of anonymity because the seven-party negotiations were
private.

The foreign ministers' statement threatens unspecified "further steps"
in the Security Council.

The group's statement also contained no details of the incentives to be
offered to Iran in the coming days. Diplomats previously have said the package
includes help developing legitimate nuclear power plants and various economic
benefits.

According to the head of the IAEA all this is much ado about nothing, because Iran is nowhere close to having nuclear weapons capability. Remember when we went though this same crap with Iraq?

IRAN does not pose an immediate nuclear threat and the world must act
cautiously to avoid repeating mistakes made with Iraq and North Korea, the head
of the UN nuclear watchdog agency said yesterday.

"Our assessment is that there is no immediate threat," the winner of the
2005 Nobel Peace Prize told a forum organised by the Monterey Institute of
International Studies.

Investigators are going to exhume the bodies of the civilians killed in Haditha. We have to do a thorough job on this investigation if we are going to maintain any credibility in the world.

A source close to the inquiry said Naval Criminal Investigative Service
officials have interviewed families of the dead several times and have visited
the homes where the shootings allegedly occurred to collect as much evidence as
possible. Exhuming the bodies could help investigators determine the distance at
which shots were fired, the caliber of the bullets and the angles of the shots,
possibly crucial details in determining how events unfolded and who might have
been involved.

Over at The Nation, the editors agree that this investigation has to be the real deal, if for no other reason than to see how things got this far out of control.

What happened in Haditha and how it was covered up is only half the story. The
rest is yet to unfold: whether Haditha kindles a long-overdue reckoning with the
moral catastrophe of this war or the shock gets defused by low-level
Congressional inquiries; whether Haditha turns out to have been the low point of
the US military venture in Iraq or a foreshadowing of worse to come. What we
need is not the "picture of what happened" promised by the White House but a
full-scale investigation both of the massacre in Haditha and of the climate of
impunity that allowed it to happen and to be ignored for so long.

Of course the chickenhawks on the right see all this as a way for the left to make the troops look bad.

BLAH! BLAH! BLAH! We came, we saw, we whipped ass.
Trying to tar and feather
the entire military based on the alleged misdeeds of a tiny handful of soldiers
is too little, too late. I’d give both my legs to see these dipshits just once -
JUST ONCE - be as concerned about violent crime in my own Goddam
neighborhood.
Just another load of hot air (pardon the pun) from a bunch of
mad, desperate libs who are desperate as hell to claw out anything resembling a
victory in ‘06.
If anything they’re mad as hell that Afghanistan and Iraq are
now Democracies - because that means it blows the moral paradigm they built
around Viet Nam COMPLETELY THE F*CK OUT OF THE WATER and now the spineless
bastards can’t look at themselves in the mirror or sleep well at night.

It's a confused bunch over on the right.



Bush told a business group that that "unscrupulous" employers have contributed to the illegal immigration by hiring illegals. He's right. But it's hard to take him seriously, considering that his immigration plan is nothing more than a way to supply business with cheap labor so they won't have to pay living wages to Americans.

President Bush told the nation's most prominent business group yesterday that
"unscrupulous" employers have contributed to the illegal immigration crisis in
the United States by knowingly hiring undocumented workers, and called for steep
new penalties on those exploiting the shadow economy.

These guys are just flat out too stupid to govern. The nation's capitol and largest city are no longer considered to be major potential terrorist targets. This expert opinion comes from the same Bush Administration that has created enough terrorists over the last three years to become Al Queda's wet dream.

The Department of Homeland Security has ranked the District in a low-risk
category of terrorist attack or catastrophe, putting it in the bottom 25 percent
of U.S. states and territories, as part of a decision that will cost the city
millions in anti-terror funds, according to city and federal officials.

The news came as irate officials from New York and Washington demanded
explanations for why the department slashed funds in a separate urban
anti-terrorism program by 40 percent for the metropolitan areas hit hardest by
the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Ten Commandments, Religious Right Erosion, NonRadical Right, Radical Right, Exxon's Revolting, North Korea Ignored and NewsMax lies.

I don't know if it's just zeal to carry out, what they believe is, God's work or if it's the unmitigated gall to think that, because of their beliefs, they have the right to make us comform to their version of God's will.

But whatever it is, I wish they'd spend more time in prayer or in church and leave the rest of us the Hell alone.

In their latest attempt to show the rest of us that their interpretation of the Bible requires them to get in everyone's face and make a nuisance of themselves, a D.C.-based evangelical Christian group, Faith and Action will unveil an 850 pound granite sculpture across the street from the Supreme Court.

They haven't gotten the proper permits, but that's OK, because they are serving a higher power than the laws of our country.

"At the heart of the Ten Commandments Project is an effort to restore the moral
foundations of American culture," the group says in a brochure at its offices,
where two reproductions of the commandments are on display on the first floor.

But it looks as though, like most of the self-righteous, it's their own moral foundations that need looking after. The Republican Religious Right monolith is starting to crumble from within.

In his consulting room in a suburb of Montgomery, Alabama, gastrologist Randy
Brinson is a worried man. A staunch Republican and devout Baptist, Dr Brinson
can claim substantial credit for getting George Bush re-elected in 2004. It was
his Redeem the Vote initiative that may have persuaded up to 25 million people
to turn out for President Bush. Yet his wife is receiving threats from anonymous
conservative activists warning her husband to stay away from politics.

"They've been calling my house, threatening my wife," said Dr Brinson. "The
first time was on a day when I was going up to Washington to speak to
Republicans in Congress. Only they knew I'd be away from home. The Republicans
were advised not to turn up to listen to me, so only three did so."

The reason he has fallen foul of men whose candidate he helped re-elect is
that he has dared to question the partisan tactics of the religious right.
"Conservatives speak in tones that they have got power and they can do what they
want. Only 23% of the population embraces those positions but if someone
questions their mandate or wants to articulate a different case, for the
moderate right, they are totally ridiculed."

Mr Cizik, an ordained minister of the Evangelical Presbyterian church and
otherwise impeccably conservative on social issues such as abortion, stem-cell
research and homosexuality, believes concern for the environment arises from
Biblical injunctions about the stewardship of the Earth. The movement's
political leadership, however, sees the issue as a distraction from its main
tactical priorities: getting more conservatives on the supreme court, banning
gay marriages and overturning Roe v Wade, the 1973 abortion ruling.

Another Washington lobbyist on the religious right told the Guardian: "Rich
is just being stupid on this issue. There may be a debate to be had but ...
people can only sustain so many moral movements in their lifetime. Is God really
going to let the Earth burn up?"

It's not just the radical religio-crazie's implosion that's hurting the GOP's chances this fall. The less radical Republicans are getting fed up with the excesses of their current crop of politicians.

But millions of conservatives will have a choice. And the closer Election Day
draws, the clearer it becomes that plenty of them will choose not to vote
Republican. Unless something changes dramatically -- and soon -- the GOP is
poised to lose its most reliable voters, and with them any hope of keeping its
congressional majority.

How disgruntled is the party's base? In recent polls, fewer than 70 percent
of registered Republicans said they approve of the way President Bush is
handling his job, a sharp drop from the 90 percent support on which he once
could count. Among self-identified conservatives, Bush's standing is even lower:
Just 51 percent rate his performance favorably, according to the latest New York
Times/CBS poll. At a time when the president's support among Democrats has
shrunk to single digits, and when only 1 independent in 4 gives him a positive
job rating, the last thing he can afford to lose is the goodwill of his core
supporters. But he is losing it

.

Even in Congress, Republicans aren't playing well with each other.

As the midterm elections loom and concern about maintaining their majority
hold on the House increases, rank-and-file Republicans have grown more and more
combative with their leaders and themselves.

In the past two weeks, Republican House members have sparred openly on the
House floor and have criticized their Speaker behind closed doors.

In another example of low-grade rebellion, Exxon stockholders, for the first time in history, went against the board of directors.

Exxon officials said they believed it was the first time in the company's
history that a resolution had been adopted over the objections of the company,
and it was seen as a sign of anger over the board's decision to award outgoing
chief executive Lee Raymond a final-year pay package of $69.4 million and a
retirement lump sum of $98.4 million.

Tillerson was most combative with critics of Exxon's funding of scientists
and institutes that cast doubt on global warming. With reference to the global
warming debate, he said that the phrase "scientific consensus" was an
"oxymoron." And he denounced those who said the company was underwriting "junk
science," arguing that Exxon was simply taking part in the "debate" over global
warming.

How can someone this stupid make so much money?


North Korea wants to negotiate nuclear disarmament. So far, Bush has had no interest in talking to North Korea, preferring to let China and others handle our national security.

In a statement carried by North Korea's state-run Korean Central News
Agency, the Foreign Ministry invited Assistant Secretary of State Christopher R.
Hill to Pyongyang. However, it called on Washington to first prove that it "has
made a political decision to carry out" an agreement struck last year at
six-nation talks in Beijing offering unspecified economic and diplomatic rewards
to North Korea in exchange for its nuclear disarmament.

Previously, the Bush administration has rejected bilateral talks with
Pyongyang, insisting instead on the six-nation framework, also including China,
Japan, Russia and South Korea. North Korea has refused for months to return to
those talks, citing U.S. "sanctions" imposed last year on financial institutions
linked to Pyongyang's alleged counterfeiting operations. Thursday's North Korean
statement reiterated a similar call to lift those financial restrictions.

The right-wing news outlet NewsMax recently reported that Iraq is safer than Washington D.C..
They claim that there's an annualized Iraqi civilian death rate of 27.51 per 100,000.

Naturally, they were wrong. Why do these people want our troops to keep dying?

According to Pentagon’s own data released today, there have been 94 violent
casualties per day in Iraq between February and May of 2006. (see
p.33). That translates into 34,310 deaths per year in Iraq. For an Iraqi
population of about 26.7 million, plus another 150,000 coalition forces, the
violent casualty rate in Iraq is 128 deaths per 100,000.

Iraq, Afghanistan, Anti Anti-Terror, FEC Abstains and Bush Bucks.

President Bush's attempts at imperialism are starting to stink like week old fish. Someone should have told him that it's a lot easier to get into messes than to get out of them.

Now he has two full blown messes on his hands and Bush has no idea of what to do.

So we'll just mark time and keep feeding troops into the Hell that Bush has created until someone tells the War President to just declare victory and leave. That way Bush can save face and troops at the same time.

We're finding out that a lot of lying went on in an attempt to cover up the slaughter at Haditha. In a really lame public relations effort, the Pentagon is ordering troops to undergo "ethics training."

The U.S. military investigation of how Marine commanders handled the reporting
of events last November in the Iraqi town of Haditha, where troops allegedly
killed 24 Iraqi civilians, will conclude that some officers gave false
information to their superiors, who then failed to adequately scrutinize reports
that should have caught their attention, an Army official said yesterday.

We've just found out that our troops killed two women at an observation post. One was on the way to the hospital to give birth. And we watch a bad situation get worse.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. forces killed two Iraqi women — one of them about to give
birth — when the troops shot at a car that failed to stop at an observation post
in a city north of Baghdad, Iraqi officials and relatives said Wednesday

It's hard to understand the confident statements coming from the White House, when we don't even have control in Baghdad.

BAGHDAD, May 31 -- For many of the 12-year-olds bent over their final exams
in classrooms where the stifling heat already edged toward 100 degrees by 9
a.m., Wednesday's tests would signal the end of their families' days in Iraq

Sometime after 9 a.m., bullets started flying. The 12-year-olds, well into
their math tests, "were terrified," screaming and sobbing, said Um Bakir, a
mother who recounted the battle. The parent of a sixth-grader, she would
identify herself over the telephone only by her family name, which means mother
of Bakir. She refused to identify her son, citing fears for the family's
safety.

According to Bush's new Domestic Policy Advisor Karl Zinsmeister, "the battle of Iraq is no longer one of war fighting—but of policing and politics."

Iraq's President has declared Basra in a state of emergency. They must need more police and politics. I'd send Zinsmeister, he thinks he's an expert.

BAGHDAD, May 31 -- Alarmed by an explosion of crime and violence in the vital
southern city of Basra, the Iraqi prime minister visited local leaders there on
Wednesday, declared a state of emergency and warned that he would respond to
security threats "with an iron hand."

The bad situation in Afghanistan is picking up momentum as the Afghan patience is wearing thin with Bush and his puppet leader Hamid Karzai.

Something has gone alarmingly wrong in Afghanistan, previously touted as the
Bush administration's one quasi-successful venture in nation-building.
Afghanistan's rising carnage still has not reached Iraq-like levels. But the
trend is running in decidedly the wrong direction. Poorly thought-out American
policies are at least partly to
blame.
Unless Washington starts correcting its mistakes, parts of Afghanistan could
start tumbling back toward the kind of anarchic chaos that once made such areas
an attractive sanctuary for international terrorists like Osama bin Laden.

We did come out and admit that American troops fired into the crowd at the traffic accident, instead of just over their heads. Of course, all those dead and wounded Afghans kind of forced our hand.

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 31 -- U.S. military officials acknowledged Wednesday
that American troops had fired at an angry mob that surrounded the scene of a
traffic accident in the Afghan capital Monday morning. Officials previously had
said the troops fired only into the air.

Trouble in Afghanistan is not just Talibanism, from Pakistan's Daily Times.

There are also reports that much of the money for reconstruction is not being
properly utilised and ends up in Western coffers through salaries and
commissions to Western staff and experts hired for advice. There are also
allegations of corruption. Much of this information is not hidden. Recent
conferences in Kabul have pointed to this rising menace of corruption and
nepotism and Afghans have indicated that they are not happy with the situation.
The logical conclusion is that some people are getting very rich while the
majority is still below the poverty line. Add to that the element of ubiquitous
violence and we have a mix that is highly inflammable. The bombing of the mosque
will add fuel to this fire.

Some getting very rich, while most are in poverty, sounds like the Republicans are in charge over there. Oh yeah, they are.

Things are going so well in the States that Homeland Security is cutting anti-terrorism funds to NYC and D.C.. They're probably just anticipating the repeal of the estate tax. Gotta cut back somewhere. Besides, what's the chance that terrorists would choose New York City or Washington D.C. to attack?

The Department of Homeland Security yesterday slashed anti-terrorism money for
Washington and New York, part of an immediately controversial decision to reduce
grant funds for major urban areas in the Northeast while providing more to
mid-size cities from Jacksonville to Sacramento.

The Federal Election Commission has decided that it is easier to do nothing than something.

The same rules that allowed independent "527" groups such as America Coming
Together and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth to pump more than $400 million into
the 2004 election campaigns will remain in place for now, the Federal Election
Commission announced yesterday, a decision that invites even larger sums to be
spent influencing races this year and in 2008.

Bush received $45,000 in illegal campaign contributions. But, like any good Bush will tell you, there's no such thing as good money or bad money, money is all there is.

TOLEDO, May 31 -- A coin dealer and prominent GOP fundraiser at the center of an
Ohio political scandal pleaded guilty Wednesday to federal charges that he
illegally funneled about $45,000 to President Bush's reelection campaign.

Bush Feigns Diplomacy with Iran, Bush: Haditha? Huh?, Bush Lies and Iran Wants More Power.

The WaPo is calling it "perhaps the biggest foreign policy shift of his presidency". I think the WaPo is being a little naive.

We know from past experience that the Bush idea of diplomacy is, "My way or the highway." This appears to be just more of the same.

In the latest White House stunt to make it look like Bush is willing to negotiate with Iran, we have made demands that the Iranians have repeatedly stated that are unwilling to accept.

And if Iraq is any indication of Bush's phony diplomacy, even if our demands are met, it will make no difference.

By placing conditions that we know won't be agreed to, Bush can now get up and shed his crocodile tears, while he says he tried every means of diplomacy. And he'll conclude by saying that Iran brought this upon themselves.

Condi spent the day laying out the groundwork for Bush's new attempt at fooling the American people. Meanwhile all options remain open, that means the military. Transcript

Now, in perhaps the biggest foreign policy shift of his presidency, Bush has
approved the idea of sitting down at the table with the Iranian government --
one headed by a former student radical who denies the Holocaust. Attached to the
U.S. offer was a stern condition: a verified suspension of Iran's nuclear
enrichment operations. But the offer overturned a long-standing taboo, and it
came from an administration stocked with officials who have made little secret
of their desire to overthrow the government in Tehran.

The administration made this move at a moment of weakness. The president's
public opinion ratings are among the lowest ever recorded for a modern
president, and oil prices have reached record levels, in part because of the
confrontation with Iran. The high price of oil, in turn, has enriched the
Iranian treasury.

Iran responded today, agreeing to talk, but they won't give up their nuclear enrichment efforts.

Iran this morning issued a wary but apparently less than final reply to the Bush
administration's offer. "Iran welcomes dialogue under just conditions but won't
give up our rights," Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said, in remarks quoted
by Iranian state television. "We won't negotiate about the Iranian nation's
natural nuclear rights but we are prepared, within a defined, just framework and
without any discrimination, to hold dialogue about common concerns."

Bush is so busy fund raising that he is out of touch with what's happening. He hadn't even heard of Haditha until a reporter started asking him questions about it.

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush learned of reports that U.S. Marines killed two
dozen unarmed Iraqi civilians only after reporters began asking questions, the
White House said
Tuesday.
Asked when Bush was first briefed about the events in Haditha, an insurgent
stronghold in western Iraq, White House press secretary Tony Snow replied
Tuesday: ``When a Time reporter first made the call.''

In fact, Bush don't seem to know what's going on in his own cabinet. No, he was only lying again.

On May
25th, President Bush said that Treasury Secretary John Snow had not given
him any indication that he was leaving
soon:
PRESIDENT BUSH: Secretary of Treasury
Snow?
Q Has he given you any indication he intends to leave his job any time
soon?…
PRESIDENT BUSH: No, he has not talked to me about resignation. I think he’s
doing a fine job.
In fact, not only had Snow indicated he
was leaving, President Bush had already settled on his replacement. Today, Tony
Snow said that Hank Paulson was offered the job on May 20 and accepted a day
later:
QUESTION: Do you have any tick tock on the
Paulson…
SNOW: Yes. The tick tock is the two of them met on the 20th of May and there
was a conversation. And Hank Paulson accepted the job a day later. That was
subject to clearance. It does take time, especially for a Senate confirmable
position, to complete those. So it did take time to get some of those clearances
wrapped up.

And this ought to really rattle the already confused President. Iran plans to solicit bids for two more nuclear power plants.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran plans to build two 1,000 megawatt nuclear reactors and
will solicit bids within the next two months, a senior official told Reuters on
Wednesday.
The tender will be open to domestic and international
firms.
The decision to build two more nuclear plants comes amid mounting Western
pressure on the Islamic state to suspend its uranium enrichment
work.
"We want to build two nuclear power plants through an international tender,"
said Mohammad Saeedi, deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation.