Crazed little revolt on the castle grounds..

Crazed little revolt on the castle grounds.. 24 December 2007

Posted by marisacat in Divertissements.
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I have no idea what it is, but it looks appropriate to the season… I found it at the site of an animator [to be precise, he calls himself a “professional stop motionist”], Tennessee Reid Norton, and, in the spirit of the season, ripped it off, but with attribution…

😉

If anyone needs a christmas story, a real one — set in America today, there is this border story… via Counterpunch.

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Comments»

1. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: Ron Paul apparently brought up the link btwn Huck and fascism on Timmeh Sunday:

Ron Paul took a bit of heat the other day when he intimated that Mike Huckabee’s maybe-that’s-a-cross-maybe-it-isn’t Christmas ad had a whiff of fascism to it.

In his appearance on Meet the Press yesterday, Tim Russert brought up the incident, and found Paul eager on the subject. “I think this country, a movement in the last 100 years, is moving toward fascism,” the candidate explained. “Fascism today, the softer term, because people have different definition of fascism, is corporatism when the military industrial complex runs the show, when the — in the name of security pay — pass the Patriot Act … There’s one documentary that’s been put out recently that has generated a lot of interest called ‘Freedom to Fascism.’ And we’re moving in that direction. Were not moving toward Hitler-type fascism, but we’re moving toward a softer fascism.”

Frankly, I see it too, but that’s one reason that I’ve long thought that he would make a strong run. This country is ripe for a scary rightwing populist electoral movement, esp. since the left/labor or so utterly clueless about offering another direction.

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2. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: I finally watched An Unreasonable Man last night. So with Gitlin and Alterman fresh in mind, I read this great rant at IOZ:

Those who chose not to legitimate the shadow-play are, in the new lexicon, defeatists. But the actual defeatist credo of “unprecedented capitulation” has nothing to do with it. In fact, your Donk partisan means quite the opposite: his defeatism is a failure to capitulate to the Cliffs-Notes, Hegelian necessity of the Democratic party as quite literally the sole, singular means of Progress. Having opened the year in triumphant mood given their party’s newly acquired majority, these exhortations started out in a relatively jocular mood, and the odd libertarian or real lefty or Gore Vidalian crank could expect bemused tolerance and even occasional agreement from the responsible Donk mouthpieces. As their party floudered and discontent spread to the ranks, though, a reigning-in was necessary. Discussion quickly turned from ending the wars to enforcing the doxology that only the Democrats could end the wars. But the Democrats aren’t ending the wars, we protested. Well, came the sundry replies with the finger-tapping impatience of a provincial priest lecturing a doubting boy, perhaps you’re not praying hard enough.

As we all see lately, EVERYTHING is about the praying.

Fuckers. I hope they all tear each other to shreds in their pathetic scrambling for ~~power~~ corporate lap-doggery.

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3. marisacat - 24 December 2007: oh Eric Alterman is SO BAD, esp in that documetary, that I am ashamed to be on the same continent with him.

UNFUCKINGBELIEVALBYAPPALLING.

Gitlin, by comparison, was just awful.

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4. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: I was really moved by that doc. I thought it really did a good job of illustrating just how fucked things were in ’00, and how much more fucked they are now.

I’m kinda picking up on an interesting trend. There was a story today on NPR about how the Iowa caucus started (just before Carter ran and used them so well). I’ve also heard/saw/read stories in several places about how recent the primary system is, and how it was originally intended to take the power away from party bosses, who have since used them to completely rape the political process in new and fun ways. I don’t remember this much discussion before about how recent and how artificial the system is.

Shouldn’t hope, but maybe the whole Potemkin process is starting to break down.

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5. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: And to think she keeps insisting that she has the most/best EXPERIENCE:

She replied: “No, it wasn’t Colin Powell. it was Condi Rice. Condi Rice told me specifically when I was still weighing all of the evidence, and I had been to the White House one last time — I think, if I’m not mistaken, it was Oct. 8 — and I’d had the whole presentation by the CIA and others and I hadn’t asked any questions, I had listened. And I went back to my office, and Condi Rice called me and said, You didn’t ask any questions, do you have any questions? I said I only have one: Will you use this authorization to put inspectors back in, so that we can find out whether any of this is true, how much WMD he still has or has reconstituted? She said, Yes, that’s what it’s intended to do. I think Dick might have gotten confused.”

Monitor: And you had no reason to doubt her?

Clinton: “I did not. Because — certainly I didn’t rely on the Bush administration. I did a lot of my own due diligence, I talked to a lot of people in my husband’s administration, I talked to Tony Blair, I talked to a lot of sources, and I had the same question: Do you think he still has these kinds of capacities? And the rationale made sense to me. When we got there after the first Gulf War, he was much further advanced in his nuclear program and we knew he had used chemical weapons. When we discovered his nuclear program in ’91, the inspectors went in and for seven years dismantled everything that they could find. In ’98, he threw the inspectors out, which at least to me raised the possibility that they were getting close to something, and therefore he wanted them out. The Americans and the British bombed every site that he prevented the inspectors from going to that we had a record of, but we had no good intelligence as to what was or wasn’t there. And the idea behind any concern about Saddam Hussein was rooted in his personality and his governing philosophy. He was a megalomaniac.

“Putting inspectors back in — which the United Nations voted for, the Security Council was all in favor of — was a way to really put some checks and balances to find out what he really did have. What we know now is that Bush had no intention of letting the inspections run their course. But the argument of putting inspectors back in, backed up by force — because Saddam never did anything that didn’t have at least the backup threat of force — was not on its face totally illegitimate. So I was willing to give him the authority to do that, and he misused the authority.”

– Sarah Liebowitz and Ari Richter

Fucking moron shouldn’t be given a checkbook or keys to a car, let alone the nuclear button.

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6. ms_xeno - 24 December 2007: The death of the primary farce would be a nice break for this part of the country. Of course, so would the end of the electoral college, a clamping down on national reporting of election results before the West was done voting, etc etc…

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7. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: Chris Clarke with a long, well-argued post about how dishonest many arguments, especially on some blogs, can be, focusing specifically on a recent argument about rape:

Which is exactly right. Generalizations are always trivially refutable, except this one isn’t: To a first approximation, rapists are perfectly aware of the degree to which they are acting without the consent of their victims. Grant the premise of the book, remake society so that assent rather than consent is a necessary precondition of sex, and rapists will merely shift to making sure their victims say “no” in no uncertain terms. If a highly contagious brain virus changed women so that they constantly wanted sex with every man they saw regardless of the setting, rapists would just find some other way to hurt women.

And the fact that women encounter some of those rapists sitting across the table from them at a fancy restaurant, clean-shaven and in an Armani suit and trust-worthy-looking enough to be invited home after, changes none of that.

Ilyka is correct in pointing to the bogus concept of “gray rape” as the underpinning of the book. It’s right there in the capsule summary. Here it is again:

Yes Means Yes! will fly in the face of the conventional feminist wisdom that rape has nothing to do with sex.

snip …

Unless one defines “rape culture” to include only those rapes that occur within an honest context of sexual negotiation involving a man acting in good faith, which is to say excluding all but a vanishingly small percentage of actual rape, the argument that positive assent will eradicate the rape culture is true only in the broadest, most vague sense. And I’m betting that’s why it’s “difficult in some quarters” to discuss whether altering our notion of consent might “dismantle the rape culture.” Have the editors considered the possibility that the women in those “quarters” making it “difficult” might feel that the argument negates their own experience? That it says their experience of rape is wrong or exceptional or misinterpreted? That the argument is, well, myopic?

Have they considered the possibility that the argument, essentially, disappears women who’ve been raped in situations where their expressed lack of consent was the entire point? I’d find it “difficult” to address the proposal levelly myself.

No one denies that rape and sex are linked. They share certain obvious base characteristics. They are, nonetheless, distinct things. “Gray rape” is bullshit. A violent attack is not “sex” simply because the attacker uses his sexual organs as a weapon, or targets the sexual organs of his victims.

An argument by allegory: If someone hits you over the head with a banjo that’s assault, not bluegrass. You can offer the victim all the music appreciation classes in the world. Music appreciation is a fine thing. But it won’t change the culture of violence that allowed the attack.

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8. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: Bible incident draws concerns

ANESVILLE — A Parker High School student tore pages from a Bible in class earlier this month, raising constitutional and ethical issues for school officials and his classmates.

Some students were upset, while others rallied to the cause of free speech.

The student was suspended, his mother said. She was told he couldn’t return to school until he had undergone a psychological evaluation. He was out of school for a week.

“They wanted to make sure he was safe,” the mother said, but she believes he was never a threat to anyone.

snippity snip

Carlson would not confirm the suspension. He said his decisions in the matter were not tied specifically to the ripping of the Bible pages and that other circumstances played into the decision to deal with the student and his family.

The boy’s mother said her son was delivering a speech about a paper he had written for an English class. She said she was “not happy” that her son was disciplined for expressing himself in a class assignment.

The mother said she also wasn’t happy her son ripped the Bible or with the language he used.

“I’m a Christian. He was raised a Christian,” she said. “But he’s struggling right now, and that’s fine.”

Kids should be able to speak their minds, “and I don’t think they helped the matter by suspending my child,” she said.

District officials requested an opinion on the matter from their legal counsel, attorney David Moore. The Janesville Gazette obtained a copy of the opinion, which described the Bible incident.

The opinion states that a student was giving a presentation in class that involved his opposition to religion.

“In the course of doing so, he stated that no word of the Bible is true, that those who thought so were ‘idiots,’ that he would prove that persons in the class were ‘ignoramuses for believing in the Bible,’ and that the Bible was written by ‘a bunch of old Mesopotamian men with sand up their (expletive.)’

“He further said, ‘See, I can do this to the Bible and not be harmed because it is not true,’ and then proceeded to rip pages out of a Bible,” according to the document.

“Certain parents and students have understandably raised objections to the student’s conduct,” Moore’s opinion continues. “They have framed the question presented in terms of whether Parker High School will permit a student to rip up a Bible in class.”

Moore’s legal opinion is that a student can’t be disciplined only for ripping the Bible, but the school could discipline him for using offensive language and for promoting “negative stereotyping that degrades or flagrantly demeans any individual or group by negatively referring to religion.”

Students have a constitutional right to free expression Moore wrote, but that right must be balanced with the legal rights of other students “not to be denied the benefit of educational programs or discriminated against on the basis of religion.

“In addition, the school has the right to maintain order and discipline …”

They’re not shutting him up, they’re making others SAFE. An excuse I’m seeing used more and more often.

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9. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: Let the mystery be

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10. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: Yippie-ki-yay fellow elves

Ever wonder: what do cultural backlashers do on their days off, you know, when they are not intentionally annoying the rest of us? On December 26, what becomes of the legions of War on Xmas fabricators, like Brent Bozell (The Third, not The Second), who typically start howling on Labor Day that the nation is insufficiently Christmas-y.

The Christmas season is upon us, which means it’s that special time of year for the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State to make sure no wayward city council will allow a whiff of frankincense on government property.”

Oh come on now! At the first whiff of frankincense on government property, the entire building — hell, the entire city — would be evacuated, HazMat and bomb squad crews would be called in, Homeland Security would jiggle the Terror Code Color Chart, and Halliburton would be awarded a $53 billion no-bid, cost-plus contract. Oh, and the DEA would be nosing around too just in case the whiff of frankincense is the first sign of a new designer drug.

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11. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: A xmas story for computer junkies.

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12. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: I couldn’t find the Robot Chicken that the illustration up top came from, but here’s some Xmas goodness.

Hell, have a whole page of it.

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13. wu ming - 24 December 2007: hey all,

i’m about halfway through the shock doctrine, (if you haven’t read that book, i highly recommend it. puts a lot of loose ends together), and i have just given up any last shred of hope for this system to avoid collapse, much less reform itself.

and the collapse won’t free us either, from what i can tell.

i want to believe, but that hope is no longer tenable.

you were right, madman. just thought you should know i’ve taken the plunge.

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14. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 December 2007: I wish I wasn’t.

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15. marisacat - 24 December 2007: merry unxmas… i did a moderation rescue…

sorry for the delay!!

8)

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16. marisacat - 24 December 2007: iirc think the primary/caucus system that we are living under came about from the internal insurgency in the party, between 68 and 72. I assume that McGovern and others have written about the work they did…

To my mind, with hindsight, that is when the party should have split. Becasue as I have posted and Borosage has documented, when Strauss, a biz wing Texas Democrat, took over the DNC following the McGovern loss, he purged the party of any hint of the leftischer [read big red threat, LOL] threat.

And the rest is history…

I made it over to the IOZ post on defeatism that Mdamn links to above… very good. On my way to read The Left Coaster post he riffs off.

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17. marisacat - 24 December 2007: oh brother, it is by paradox (I had thought that slop was from Clinton supporting Soto or one of the others), who claimed to have left the party a few months ago. Think iirc Marie (who used to FP at TLC) posted here that he had left and was going to post at TLC as outside looking in, or some such thing.

Good Grief.

having left them, I could not go back. It would be like signing up for Holy Communion, apologising and applying for retraining for the Joy of the Wafer.

Fuck that shit. [may the reindeer forgive me, LOL]

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18. bayprairie - 25 December 2007: something i ran across at left coaster

About that Lakota secession…

by Turkana

in which turkana echoes “former American Indian Movement activist” meteor blades on russell means.

former? hmmmmmm.

curiouser and curiouser. i wonder what AIM has to say about these comments? knowing how boyos work, id suppose turkana isn’t echoing blades accidentally. smells like a smear russell means campaign to me.

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19. marisacat - 25 December 2007: bay

I had not been to TLC in probably 6, 7, 8 months… and was interested to see Turkana dominates the Holy Holidaze….

One thing about the Boyz, they support the work of the State. “Party” is just a schtick (imo). To put it mildly.

Saw this at Counterpunch on Russell Means and various turning points in the negotiations (well you know) wiht Indian nations.

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20. bayprairie - 25 December 2007: i read that counterpunch article earlier this evening after folllowing your link to the arizona undocumented worker assisters. i note that the russell means article author appears to be a houstonian and involved in an american indian genocide museum. perhaps he’d be interested in the links.

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21. marisacat - 25 December 2007: Italy seeks Condor plot suspects

Among those sought is Argentine ex-military leader Jorge Videla

Prosecutors in Italy have issued arrest warrants for 140 people over a decades-old plot by South American dictatorships called Operation Condor.
One man – 60-year-old Uruguayan former naval intelligence officer Nestor Jorge Fernandez Troccoli – has already been arrested in Salerno, south Italy.

Under Operation Condor, six governments worked together from the 1970s to hunt down and kill left-wing opponents. ::snip::

LINK – BBC

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22. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 December 2007: too bad they never hunt down the fascists when they’re still young.

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23. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 December 2007: Thank you for the Counterpunch link.

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24. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 December 2007: the English right is apparently just as wacko about the “war on Xmas” as our wingers.

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25. Madman in the Marketplace - 25 December 2007: More Judeo-Christian ethics at work:

“Israeli military prosecutors have decided not to take any legal action over Israel’s use of cluster bombs during last year’s war in Lebanon, the army said Monday, closing an investigation into a practice that has drawn heavy criticism from the U.N. and international human rights groups. The investigation determined that Israel’s use of the weapons, which open in flight and scatter dozens of bomblets, was a “concrete military necessity” and did not violate international humanitarian law.”

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26. bayprairie - 25 December 2007: From

Homeless on the High Desert
A Chronicle of the End Times by Thomas Ten Bears

On Lakota Independence…
December 25, 2007 in First Nation

There’s a meme floating around out there that it wasn’t the Lakota who withdrew from treaties with the US, just Russell Means. While I am and long have been a fan of the folks at Wampum, distant cousins and all that, I am a bit disappointed in their take on this.

As spyder, a Lakota, explains in comments:

The Treaty Council membership (the group declaring sovereign independence) is comprised of leaders from each of the seven Lakota tribes: Oglala, Sicangu, Hunkpapa, Miniconjou, Izpaco, Sihasapa (Blackfeet), Ooinunpa. These are religious and medicine leaders of smaller groups on each of the reservations who have over many years tried to maintain cultural, linguistic, religious, and Lakota continuity in the face of assimilation and corrupt trust management.

The seven tribes also are represented by US government sponsored tribal government, elected from enrolled lists (and this now includes many non-Lakota who own land on the reservations purchased from US government trust deals–the Lakota, nor any tribe in the US, actually own their land, it is held in trust with the BIA and Congress having all say).

These local governments answer to the Federal BIA governance and receive funds (or supposed to) and commodities. Tribal government official receive great benefits and dole them out in a spoils system that would make Bushco proud.

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27. marisacat - 25 December 2007: There’s a meme floating around out there that it wasn’t the Lakota who withdrew from treaties with the US, just Russell Means. While I am and long have been a fan of the folks at Wampum, distant cousins and all that, I am a bit disappointed in their take on this.

hmm I kept my distance from wampum, thru what is now years. IMO they were, certainly mbw, aka “abenaki first, democrat second” party operatives.

I got tired of the screeching diatribes from them in 03 primary season. Several people tried to reach afds for fuller better explanations, in particular NYCO tried more than once… mbw/afds and “trout” (who fully outed himself post GE/04 in a diary as a Kerry operative) were operatives in opposition to Howard Dean.

Fine, world is loaded with them. I did not like their methods, however

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28. bayprairie - 25 December 2007: and here ladies and guys is the most laughable piece of horseshit ive read all month. posted for your reading pleasure at dailykos, in a virulent smear thread attached to a cross blog callout post.

yes, progressive sites need to have standards

:::snip:::

by Frederick Clarkson on Mon Dec 24, 2007 at 06:07:02 PM PST

haha.

thats funny. dailykos.

standards.

right.

sometimes clarkson appears to be little more than a dolt, outside of his field of expertise. 😉 perhaps he should read that entire thread a bit more closely with his pwecious standards in mind.

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29. marisacat - 25 December 2007: that diary is hilarious bay….

I did not follow the link to read the [so called] great trangression at MLW…. but too funny.

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30. bayprairie - 25 December 2007: well it’s my take that all the teapot tempest has much more to do with bad blood between two political factions at MLW, and the ongoing fights between them for over the last year, than anti-Semitism. that’s just the bludgeon in this weeks fray. i’ve seen the ugliness from some of those posters over the past year, especially paul whos in the midst of all this. he’s hardly snowy white and neither is the tattletale over at dkos. it goes without saying that they both serve political agendas online.

and poor poor fred. they’re trying to play him like a violin in that thread. if he were a little more in touch with what dkos really represents he’d had have the good sense to move slowly towards the exit as quickly as possible without a word spoken.

wonder if someone tipped him off to it via email?

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31. marisacat - 25 December 2007: bay

yeah agree all points. Seems former MLWers, pro-Israel types, are doing a number. LOL an awkward fandango…

Too funny. Yes Fred should move s l o w l y toward the door then run like a banshee for the hills.

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32. marisacat - 25 December 2007: hmmm wild siberian tiger breaks out at SF Zoo….

past a 15 foot moat and over a 20 foot wall, apparently.

One dead, two badly mauled…

The police are using heat seeking instruments [as night fell] to hunt for other victims.

SF, never boring.

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33. marisacat - 26 December 2007: hmm just noticed this at Pffterpoofters…

why are people shocked at what large animals do? Or small ones?

Just because we lock them in a cage (and Tatiana the Siberian tiger was in a passably decent “enclosure”, open to the air, terrain of a sort to walk around, lie about on, moat and high wall, etc) does not mean they like it — or us.

She said, FU, jumped the wall (HA!!) and headed for the cafe, after killing one. Smart girl, she did what McDonald’s shooters do, they go for “where the families are”.

LOL the most amusing part was that for a while the cops thought all 5 tigers were out.

And the cops shot her… sadly no way around it…

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34. marisacat - 26 December 2007: Zunes has a piece up on Edwards… dated Dec 26, so just posted:

[S]erious Concerns

Despite these positive points, however, Edwards has also taken a number of foreign policy positions that have raised serious concerns among those who are desperately seeking a real alternative to the Bush administration.

As a senator, Edwards distinguished himself as one of the more conservative Democrats through supporting such controversial measures as providing unconditional military aid to the repressive government of Colombia and voting for funding the dangerous and expensive Trident D-5 submarine nuclear missile program. He also voted in favor of an amendment that prohibits the United States from cooperating in any way with the International Criminal Court in its prosecution of individuals responsible for serious crimes against humanity. This vindictive law also restricts U.S. foreign aid to countries that support the ICC and authorizes the president of the United States to use military force to free individuals from the United States or allied countries detained by the ICC.
::snip::

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35. marisacat - 26 December 2007: and a little more from Zunes:

In September 2002, in the face of growing public skepticism of Bush’s calls for an invasion of Iraq, Edwards rushed to the administration’s defense in a Washington Post op-ed [embedded link to Global Security reprint — Mcat]. Apparently aware of public opinion polls showing that a majority of Americans would support a U.S. invasion of Iraq only if it constituted a threat to our national security, he set about to claim just that, insisting that Iraq, which had actually been successfully disarmed several years earlier, had somehow become “a grave and growing threat” and that Congress should therefore “endorse the use of all necessary means to eliminate the threat posed by Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.”

Edwards insisted that “our national security requires” that Congress grant Bush unprecedented war powers to use against Iraq, even though it was located on the far side of the world and posed no threat to the United States. Furthermore, in an apparent effort to undermine respect for the United Nations Charter – which forbids such wars of aggression – in his support for the Bush administration’s quest for U.S. hegemony in the Middle East, he further insisted that “we must not tie our own hands by requiring Security Council action.”

The Bush administration was so impressed with Edwards’ arguments that they posted the article on the State Department Web site.

yes… hard to believe him in his latest incarnation of Southern White Welfare OFfice Manager.

Another DLC pro war, social repression lid on fucking consevative. Still. God, it gets so old.

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36. marisacat - 26 December 2007: page 1, NYT, Hillary.

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37. melvin - 26 December 2007: 35– I got Monster of God for Christmas and have only just begun. The first part is about tigers in India. It looks to be fascinating book in the way that Theroux’s early ones were, packed with all sorts of interesting history, etc, but in terms of the future of predators it is a book of questions, not answers.

His general observation certainly applies to Tatiana:

man-eating is the most fatal of indiscretions

He seems to want to translate the notion of what happens when you remove keystone species from the biome (typically disaster) and ask what happens when you remove the real monsters – as opposed to the imaginary ones – from our world.

It is notable that we lecture India and Russia on saving the tigers while doing very little to save the grizzly. Pace the breathless reports out of Montana, there are maybe ten left in the North Cascades and we do nothing.

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38. marisacat - 26 December 2007: well all four cops pumped their guns into her… I realise she had killed, injured one and moved onto another, from whom they diverted her to come towards them… but I was reminded of something I have read several times about FL and ‘gators…

more people die in FL every year from bee stings and no one hauls off for their gun and an organised revenge hunt for the errant attacking bee(s).

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39. melvin - 26 December 2007: I take your point, but the bees don’t threaten to eat their victims. Probably ladders kill more too.

I was incredibly naive visiting FL, used to take a dip in the canal off the back yard until I noticed a ten footer in it. They really seem to have it in for dogs, much more common than attacks on people.

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40. marisacat - 26 December 2007: small dogs and children… quite tasty and easy to haul off the land…

8)

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41. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 December 2007: being eaten reminds us that we’re not necessarily the top of the food chain … which messes up Gawd’s plan and and breaks the promises in His book, and pisses off the Baby Jesus. There is no choice but to reassert our righteous primacy.

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42. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 December 2007: A Quechua Christmas Carol

Doctor Correa, I should say, with a Ph.D in economics earned in Europe. Professor Correa as he is officially called – who, until not long ago, taught at the University of Illinois.

And Professor Doctor Correa is one tough character. He told George Bush to take the US military base and stick it where the equatorial sun don’t shine. He told the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, which held Ecuador’s finances by the throat, to go to hell. He ripped up the “agreements” which his predecessors had signed at financial gun point. He told the Miami bond vultures that were charging Ecuador usurious interest, to eat their bonds. He said ‘We are not going to pay off this debt with the hunger of our people. ” Food first, interest later. Much later. And he meant it.

Snip

Correa STILL wasn’t done.

I’d returned from a very wet visit to the rainforest – by canoe to a Cofan Indian village in the Amazon where there was an epidemic of childhood cancers. The indigenous folk related this to the hundreds of open pits of oil sludge left to them by Texaco Oil, now part of Chevron, and its partners. I met the Cofan’s chief. His three year old son swam in what appeared to be contaminated water then came outvomiting blood and died.

Correa had gone there too, to the rainforest, though probably in something sturdier than a canoe. And President Correa announced that the company that left these filthy pits would pay to clean them up.

But it’s not just any company he was challenging. Chevron’s largest oil tanker was named after a long-serving member of its Board of Directors, the Condoleezza. Our Secretary of State.

The Cofan have sued Condi’s corporation, demanding the oil company clean up the crap it left in the jungle. The cost would be roughly $12 billion. Correa won’t comment on the suit itself, a private legal action. But if there’s a verdict in favor of Ecuador’s citizens, Correa told me, he will make sure Chevron pays up.

Is he kidding? No one has ever made an oil company pay for their slop. Even in the USA, the Exxon Valdez case drags on to its 18th year. Correa is not deterred.

He told me he would create an international tribunal to collect, if necessary. In retaliation, he could hold up payments to US companies who sue Ecuador in US courts.

This is hard core. No one – NO ONE – has made such a threat to Bush and Big Oil and lived to carry it out.

And, in an office tower looking down on Quito, the lawyers for Chevron were not amused. I met with them.

“And it’s the only case of cancer in the world? How many cases of children with cancer do you have in the States?” Rodrigo Perez, Texaco’s top lawyer in Ecuador was chuckling over the legal difficulties the Indians would have in proving their case that Chevron-Texaco caused their kids’ deaths. “If there is somebody with cancer there, [the Cofan parents] must prove [the deaths were] caused by crude or by petroleum industry. And, second, they have to prove that it is OUR crude – which is absolutely impossible.” He laughed again. You have to see this on film to believe it.

The oil company lawyer added, “No one has ever proved scientifically the connection between cancer and crude oil.” Really? You could swim in the stuff and you’d be just fine.

people are fucking sick.

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43. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: Seems former MLWers, pro-Israel types, are doing a number. LOL an awkward fandango…

Remember, Dhonig is the guy who recycled anti-semitic comments that had been hidden into a new diary. O’Reilly found them and mentioned them on his show. Then Dhonig posed as an aggrieved liberal.

The problem is that reposting hidden comments is not only against the rulz, it’s a bannable offense. Devoting a whole comment to showcasing hidden comments is probably a jailable fence punishable by being put into an orange concentration camp.

So why wasn’t Dhonig banned. He clearly damaged the site’s reputation by providing O’Reilly the opportunity to attack the Daily Kos?

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44. marisacat - 26 December 2007: oh these little Ecuadoreans. They need to get over it!

Here we just set up things like the Susan G Komen Foundation that becomes the default discussion resource for the ONLY cancer that exists, BREAST cancer. And we slap a pink teddy bear on it.

They need to get with the program.

****

I woke from some nap last week to some GURU GYN on some damned wimmens show who, no matter what concer was raised from brain to vulvar, said it all comes from cigarettes.

Tell Ecuador to grow up.

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45. marisacat - 26 December 2007: 43

I remember that excavation now that you mention it.

Well dhonig has never called out someone’s fuck buddy. LOL…

I did go look at the FP after I read the dhonig diary. Lordy. I see DavidNYC is back.

what a joint.

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46. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: Looking at the Hunter comments in the Wall Street Journal, I wonder why he’s so eager to paint the Daily Kos as a hotbed of anti-semtism. After all, most Wall Street Journal readers don’t necessarily know what a “troll” is.

They’re using the mainstream right wing media, O’Reilly and the WSJ, to attack their own (free) content prviders and limit debate.

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47. marisacat - 26 December 2007: I sometimes wonder if, in his dotage, she will have the household staff call him Mr President.

[T]oday, Kerry acknowledges that life after 2004 has been “a big transition.” He recalls, in particular, the days four years ago when he had been given up for dead by the pundits but fought back to win the Iowa caucuses.

It was, he said, “a very exciting time, full of energy, full of hope. There is a piece of me, obviously, that would like to be out there. It’s hard to watch from the sidelines.”

Asked if his time on the national stage will come again, Kerry leaned back and took a breath.

“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know,” he said. “But I am an optimist who feels if you work hard, you’re capable and you stick at it, things can change.”

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48. BooHooHooMan - 26 December 2007: Re Kerry…It’s hard to watch from the sidelines.

Oh buck up Johnny. You get used to it. It’s nominally called citizenship in the US.

Merry WTF, Everybody as every other day, hopefully , if not realistically…
Work done, Provisions in, kid on Holiday,- Mischief amakin’….

Frankly though, this chowhound has a complaint against moiv bayprarie and xeno after that last thread….
Articulate and culinarily gifted???? –> EVILDOERS!

😀

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49. BooHooHooMan - 26 December 2007: Still, I’m dazed-
So Kerry will see kids tazed
from the sidelines instead of the Stage?

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50. marisacat - 26 December 2007: LOL we’re just a Vietnamese village in his eyes.

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51. BooHooHooMan - 26 December 2007: Philly Mayor Gets Big Payday From City
22 hours ago

PHILADELPHIA — Mayor John F. Street is getting more than $111,000 as he leaves office, money that a city official said comes from pay raises that he was entitled to but did not take.

Street had vetoed a pay-raise bill in the midst of an election in 2003, and the City Council overrode it. The mayor, however, chose not to take an increase, which at the time would have raised his salary from $146,000 to $165,000.

Now he has decided to collect it retroactively.

Street referred questions to City Finance Director Vincent Jannetti, who said the mayor is entitled to the money. “He deferred it and held back on it,” Jannetti said.

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52. marisacat - 26 December 2007: going in and coming out that (Street) was a DISGUSTING election.

*************

Just at the moment i am amusing myself with this new commenter at IOZ. Such a party line.

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53. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: Just at the moment i am amusing myself with this new commenter at IOZ. Such a party line.

Although it is impressive how skillfully he/she managed to string out “we don’t have the votes” into four paragraphs.

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54. marisacat - 26 December 2007: From Mike Allen’s Playbook column at politico.com:

COMING TO A FRONT PAGE NEAR YOU:

The Weather Channel forecasts Des Moines will have a high of 32 and a low of 22 on caucus day, with a 10 percent chance of precip. The campaigns are debating who’d be helped and hurt by a blizzard. There are conflicting schools of thought – even within individual campaigns.

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55. marisacat - 26 December 2007: 53

LOL quite a few hoots in here w/r/t D Del Russo.

Enjoy!

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56. bayprairie - 26 December 2007: the LGF post, and thread, on the recent dkos vs. MSOC cross-blog attack.

Nutroots Antisemitism Rampant

funny how the threads are so similar thematically, with the exception that the dkos thread is a bit more hate-filled (runs with scissors especially). its also funny how that operative seems to be able to get screeds he finds disagreeable posted about at LGF with regularity. kind of an operative trick i suppose. do you wonder if he mails LGF the link? i do! lets keep the glasses on and see if he can go for a threepeat.

the dkos thread also reflects very badly on dkos, by my way of thinking. one would assume the management over there would be a little more in tune now with the game that diaryist pulls. this is the second time the diaryist has flung his virtual eggs around and once again he manages to get quite a bit on the dkos public face as well. do you suppose the boyo management will eventually get a clue?

don’t bother going to read the thread at MSOC. its been “carefully archived” and while no longer “visible” to the curious the thread is really still there and available for viewing at some point in the future, after the effortless restore. :::yawn:::

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57. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 December 2007: Impeachment at the Rose Bowl Parade

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58. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 December 2007: Wikileaks of Fallujah.

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59. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: the LGF post, and thread, on the recent dkos vs. MSOC cross-blog attack.

What color do you get if you mix orange and green?

Puke?

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60. Madman in the Marketplace - 26 December 2007: Innocent Icelandic Woman Chained, Held, Tortured by Homeland Security at Airport

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61. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: I’m assuming people saw Cockburn on the Daily Kos because it was at Counterpunch.

But just in case.

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62. marisacat - 26 December 2007: LOL

=^..^=

mrrrow… mrrrow.

I have no idea why he keeps trying to post here… most recent have been “Balloon Animal”, then “Mike Nutabee”…

he used that moniker to try to slam some internal fist fight over at MLW (who can keep track, s/he seems turned on by Girl Fights).

VeronicatheVik and Shadowthief are together over at Pfft. Could be a cage match.

Mike Nutabee | mikenutabee@gmail.com | IP: 67.159.44.138

Bwahahahaha.

http://tinyurl.com/ytfrkh

Dec 18, 10:13 PM — [ Edit | Delete | Unapprove | Approve | Spam ] — ffs! [encore ffs!]

Mike Nutabee | mikenutabee@gmail.com | IP: 67.159.44.138

This is why you don’t put two Siamese fighting fish in the same tank at the pet shop.

http://tinyurl.com/34zc53

http://tinyurl.com/3xbpfn

Or is that loonfish?

At least the Internets haven’t lost their entertainment value.

Dec 18, 9:58 PM — [ Edit | Delete | Unapprove | Approve | Spam ] — ffs! [encore ffs!]

Balloon Animal | balloonanimal@gmail.com | IP: 67.159.44.138

20. BooHooHooMan – 7 December 2007

These tapes exist. Though assuredly some of their first possesors do not….despite the self serving, “move along now, we did our best” nonsense being offered BOTH by the Nazis AND the Vichy…..

You mean “probably” exist. You definitely know they exist? Do tell…are they hidden under the sofa cushions? You seem awfully sure of yourself.

The Investigation needs to go forward to NAME the ENTIRE Command Chain that committed these atrocities. From the torture chambers through the Pentagon, CIA, Justic,e and State, Departments, right through to the White House…

Thanks for the good laugh. Oh my yes, does the investigation need to go forward? Oh my yes, it certainly does…I’m sure that the Bush/Cheney administration and the Democrats in Congress will eagerly pursue this matter to its ultimate end.

By the way, I have an email from an exiled British lord living in Nigeria who needs someone’s bank account access information so that he can temporarily stow $2 million there…you’ll get a 10% commission just for helping him out. I don’t need the money, but you seem to be the trusting sort. I’ll pass it on.

Dec 7, 4:46 PM — [ Edit | Delete | Unapprove | Approve | Spam ] — On your knees!

Balloon Animal | balloonanimal@gmail.com | IP: 67.159.44.138

#117–Bayprairie–is that your version of “America, love it or leave it?”

I’d “be happier in Sweden”.

Why don’t you just call me a Communist and have done with it?

Dec 4, 10:06 PM — [ Edit | Delete | Unapprove | Approve | Spam ] — Staring at the drain………

Shadowthief | shadowthief1962@gmail.com | IP: 67.159.44.138

Hair Club, Americans do tend to listen to you if you have a British accent. That’s not our fault, it’s yours. I cannot believe how many Americans thought Tony Blair would “talk sense” into Bush and Cheney–why, because he’s British? The British Isles practically invented the concept of the twit and has one of the world’s highest proportions thereof in its population.

“Youse guys need to support da attack on dat one country, whatchamacallit–Eeran!”

Sep 6, 11:30 PM — [ Edit | Delete | Unapprove | Approve | Spam ] — The sky above… the earth below

This particular IP is out of Chicago, a different one than the one she/he/it uses out of the Berkeley Alameda School district.

My guess a faker fucker in school admin. Too much time on her its his hands.

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63. Hair Club for Men - 26 December 2007: It’s never a good idea to play stenographer for LGF.

http://themedium.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/26/editors-note-the-ron-paul-vid-lash/

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64. ms_xeno - 26 December 2007: BHHM, No. 48:

I blame bayprairie. She drives me to it.

Total non sequitur:

Finally, a legitimate use for the “Benny Hill” theme.

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65. marisacat - 26 December 2007: what a tangled web… from a NYT update on the big bad cat:

“[S]omething happened to get that cat agitated, to do what it did,” Mr. Mollinedo said. “She was a very mellow cat. I never saw her down in that moat, although she has access to it. Something triggered her to jump out of there, or she grabbed onto something and pulled herself over.”

Mr. Mollinedo said he rushed to the zoo on Tuesday and arrived about 15 minutes after the police. “My first reaction was that one of the staff left the gate open, but I feel comfortable in saying there was no keeper error,” he said.

In June, the state fined the zoo $18,000 for a “serious accident related” safety violation stemming from a mauling of a keeper by the same tiger last December. The authorities criticized the zoo for its facility and procedures.

Mr. Mollinedo said that he had not seen a police report about Tuesday’s events but that he believed, in part based on a discussion with a crime site investigator, that there was blood outside the animal exhibit and blood spots were seen along one of the walkways near a trail leading to the cafe, where the injured brothers were found.

“That tells me there was more than one person at the exhibit when the tiger escaped,” he said.

He said it appeared that the dead teenager and the injured men knew one another. The brothers’ testimony will be crucial, he said. But shortly after the attack, when police officers tried to get their names, “they refused to cooperate,” Mr. Mollinedo said.

When zoo employees realized a tiger was loose, he said, “the zoo shooting team was assembling” with tranquilizer guns. “But when police saw the weapon, they took it away. They had taken control of the scene.”

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66. bayprairie - 27 December 2007: BHHM, No. 48:

I blame bayprairie. She drives me to it.

…the hypnotic allure of borden’s condensed milk made me do it…

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67. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has been wounded in a suspected suicide bomb blast at a rally in Rawalpindi, party officials say.

For more details: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news

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68. marisacat - 27 December 2007: oh no: Benazir is dead as a result of the wounds, apparently to her neck.

NBC News Break.

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69. JJB - 27 December 2007: It appears that Banazir Bhutto is dead. The NY Times is running a breaking news alert at the top of their main page, above the story that reports her as having been injured.

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70. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Marisacat alert:

No tigers, whether Sumatran Siberian or Bengali were seen at the site of the blast.

Bathetics related to tiger kills on hold for a day. Or so.

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71. JJB - 27 December 2007: Here is the very brief story the BBC is currently running.

While this could have been done by of any number of people, acting in concernt or alone, Musharraff has to be considered high on the list of suspects.

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72. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Anyone requiring bathetics in the War on Terror allies (felled ones that is), Mrs Greenberg is pontificating on the death on NBC News.

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73. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: They’re reporting that she was shot in the neck and killed.

What a mess.

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74. BooHooHooMan - 27 December 2007: Reportedly it was gunfire.

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75. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: On a lighter note: Christmas Unicorn.

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76. marisacat - 27 December 2007: … at least 20 other people died in the attack at the political rally.

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77. BooHooHooMan - 27 December 2007: Cue Cheney.

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78. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Gold is up on the news, per NBC News. Or up on other news.

“flight to quality” they are calling it.

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79. marisacat - 27 December 2007: I’m guessing we are never to be rid of Cheney.

Like the faith based offices in the West WIng.

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80. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: An interview w/ the national archivist who tried to stand up to Cheney

So how did matters escalate?
The challenge arose last year when the Chicago Tribune was looking at [ISOO’s annual report] and saw the asterisk [reporting that it contained no information from OVP] and decided to follow up. And that’s when the spokesperson from the OVP made public this idea that because they have both legislative and executive functions, that requirement doesn’t apply to them.…They were saying the basic rules didn’t apply to them. I thought that was a rather remarkable position. So I wrote my letter to the Attorney General [asking for a ruling that Cheney’s office had to comply.] Then it was shortly after that there were [email] recommendations [from OVP to a National Security Council task force] to change the executive order that would effectively abolish [my] office.

Who wrote the emails?
It was David Addington.

No explanation was offered?
No. It was strike this, strike that. Anyplace you saw the words, “the director of ISOO” or “ISOO” it was struck.

What was your reaction?
I was disappointed that rather than engage on the substance of an issue, some people would resort to that… (why are people SURPRISED by how these fascists act, STILL?!?)

What rules were they saying didn’t apply to them?
The ones that tell you how you mark [classified documents], how you declassify, how you safeguard them, how you store…

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81. BooHooHooMan - 27 December 2007: Neocon Testicles are descending.
So much for Democratic Castration Artists.

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82. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: I wonder how they shot her in the neck … they showed video of her climbing into a heavily armored SUV. The windows looks like ballistic glass that was several inches thick. Did someone roll down a window? A .50 cal armor piercing bullet?

CNN is reporting that oil and gas have shot up, stock futures have plunged.

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83. JJB - 27 December 2007: The NYT is now backtracking a bit:

Suicide Attack on Rally May Have Killed Bhutto

A bomb blast devastated a political rally being held by the Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto near the capital, Islamabad, Thursday, killing several people and seriously injuring Ms. Bhutto, according to witnesses and local television reports. Some reports said she had been killed.

Witnesses at the scene said Ms. Bhutto was fired upon before the blast, and an official from her party said Ms. Bhutto had been badly injured by the explosion.

A local television channel, Geo-TV, quoting Ms. Bhutto’s husband, said Ms. Bhutto had been injured and hospitalized by the blast, which was apparently caused by a suicide attacker.

Hundreds of supporters had gathered at the rally, which was being held at Liaqut Bagh, a park that is a common venue for political rallies and speeches, in Rawalpindi, the garrison city adjacent to the capital.

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84. marisacat - 27 December 2007: what remains is whether it was a stray bullet or there was a sniper in the melee.

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85. marisacat - 27 December 2007: hmmm the BBC news alert used quotes around “died”.

Same with “wounded” in the earlier alert…

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86. JJB - 27 December 2007: More from the BBC, saying she is definitely dead:

Pakistani former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has been killed in a presumed suicide attack, a military spokesman has announced on TV.
Earlier reports said Ms Bhutto had only been injured and taken to hospital.

[snip]

PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar initially said that Ms Bhutto was safe. But later he told the BBC that Ms Bhutto had died.

Another member of the PPP, Wasif Ali Khan, told the Associated Press news agency from the Rawalpindi General Hospital: “At 6:16 pm (1316 GMT) she expired.”

Ms Bhutto returned from self-imposed exile in October after years out of Pakistan where she had faced corruption charges.

Her return was the result of a power-sharing agreement with President Musharraf in which he granted an amnesty that covered the court cases she was facing.

Since her return relations with Mr Musharraf have broken down.

Just refreshed the NYT main page, and the headline reads “Bhutto Killed In Attack On Political Rally,” so I guess there is no longer any doubt.

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87. BooHooHooMan - 27 December 2007: Had to be security detail

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88. marisacat - 27 December 2007: NBC News says it is the Pakistani military that is reporting her death…

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89. JJB - 27 December 2007: MCat, no. 85,

I think those quote marks are just to indicate that someone in an authoritative position has used those exact words. I don’t think they’re meant to indicate any doubt.

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90. JJB - 27 December 2007: Well, I’m sure the Pakistani military would know, they may be the people behind this.

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91. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Wapo says:

Former Pakistani prime minister apparently shot at close range as she was leaving gathering; bomber detonated explosives after shooting.

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92. BooHooHooMan - 27 December 2007: Who Benefits?

Today?…………..USWARCorp + Mush
Tommorrow?……USWARCorp

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93. JJB - 27 December 2007: Gunshots and bombs. They don’t fool around in Pakistan. I guess the “suicide bomber” will play the role of Lee Harvey Oswald. Although if they bothered to take her to a hospital, could the bomb have actually played any part in her death?

They’re still trying to determine how many others were killed, estimates so far range from 14-20.

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94. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Also caption at Wapo… so maybe both gunshot and blast wounds?

Former Pakistani prime minister apparently shot at close range as she was leaving gathering; bomber detonated explosives after shooting.

Local NBC news now saying she was shot in both teh neck and the chest, the killer than detonated the suicide bomb.

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95. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: sorry to keep posting so many random off-topic links, but the center isn’t holding in so many twisted and weird fronts. THIS sums up the leadership in this country really well:

Now, I asked Sam Leff–given his background as an anthropologist studying and writing about the hidden rituals of American sadomasochism–for his take on the CIA’s cover-up of torture videos.

“I have been watching with fascinated horror,” he said, “as America’s S/M patterns of culture have emerged into the open in the Abu Ghraib/Gitmo Bush administration. I’ve been flashing on some clear images of the fratboy reality underlying the White House torture tape controversy.

“Picture this. Bush and Karl Rove sitting around a big plasma screen (drinking beer?) and laughing their asses off watching helpless prisoners drowning under a waterboard, or naked getting cigarette burns, or maybe having analgesic balm applied to their genitals.

“Once the existence of the tapes became known, their cover story is that they were having a big discussion about whether or not to keep or destroy the torture tapes. Like that old pervert, J. Edgar Hoover, the reality is they were getting off looking at them as sadistic porn–over and over. Perhaps sharing them with the ‘frat brothers’ of their inner circle.”

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96. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Always remember we live in a dangerous world.

Pretty sure we are to bow our heads and invoke god. Accept Jeeesuhs Christ as our Lord and Savior.

Or his political representative on earth.

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97. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: via Balloon Juice …

Slogan of graduating class of the Idaho Police Academy: “Don’t suffer from PTSD, go out and cause it.”

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98. marisacat - 27 December 2007: 96

shelved right beside the battle field tapes that are sent to Bush.

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99. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Dennis Perrin:

The disintegration of what passes for the American mind touches everything, right wing polemic included. As ridiculous as it may seem, Goldberg and his fellow National Reviewers are tinsel imitations of that mag’s earlier contributors, James Burnham, Willmoore Kendall, and John Dos Passos among them. You know things are falling apart when one speaks of the “smart” National Review. But when touring NR’s present Corner, such comparisons are inevitable. Small wonder that blowhards like Victor Davis Hanson are held in such high esteem there.

Given all that, liberals owe the likes of Goldberg big time. Without him, or Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, Limbaugh, Hannity, or the rest of the reactionary clown roster, American libs might have to examine their own political biases and failings, as well as critically assess their political heroes. They may even be forced to deal with — gasp! — the corporate/military state, not to mention the global order itself. Ick. Far better to take endless potshots at rightist dopes and dupes, while hoping, praying, that the Dems will deliver some kind of salvation, however imperfect or tainted. Consider it an extension of fantasy football.

The thing is, Goldberg’s not wrong in essence, just incredibly stupid, one-sided, and incomplete in his approach. Democrats and liberals do indeed possess authoritarian traits, and have for some time. I don’t know if I’d call it “fascism,” but when studying the history of liberal politicians and presidents who’ve violently smashed dissent, jailed or deported those deemed enemies of the state, censored political speech, and committed mass murder overseas, “fascism” isn’t all that far from the mark.

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100. JJB - 27 December 2007: BHHM, no. 92,

Actually, we (along with the Brits) were trying to get her into power, either by herself or in a coalition with Musharraff. This is more as if Diem had managed to thwart the coup we launched against him in November 1963.

BTW, since what happens in Pakistan directly affects what happens in Afghanistan, it seems appropriate to point out here that this has been by far the bloodiest year for Western forces in that endless conflict. While being fought on a much smaller scale than the war in Iraq, the death toll exceeded 100 for both US (116) and the various NATO powers (114) involved. The total dead for this year (230) is an increase of almost 20 percent over last year, which had previously been the bloodiest year of the war. I don’t suppose there’s any accurate count of how many Afghani civilians have died.

The so-called Afghan Government has expelled two diplomats (one British, the other Irish) for having conducted negotiations with Taliban leaders. Actually, the S-CAG calls everyone opposed to them Taliban, so it’s likely the two diplomats (who are both experienced Afghan hands who speak local languages fluently) were meeting with tribal chiefs/warlords. The Mayor Of Kabul was in Pakistan yesterday, so it’s not clear if he had any input into this decision.

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101. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: The Beast’s 50 Most Loathsome People

5. Nancy Pelosi & Harry Reid

Charges: Graduates of the Neville Chamberlain school of appeasement, the Democratic leadership continues to ignore the constitution-and the American people-by keeping impeachment “off the table” and refusing to defund the war. True pushovers, they’re too stupid, cowardly, weak and outmatched politically to accomplish anything substantive, their “strategy” essentially boiling down to whining a lot while handing Bush whatever the hell he wants. There is just no way that appearing this weak and ineffectual could be any better for them politically than impeachment. Everything that the White House gets away with, it gets away with because congress allows it.

Exhibit A: Failure to woo the two thirds majority needed to override a presidential veto is moot: They could defund the war with a 41-senator budgetary filibuster. But that would take guts and conviction.

Sentence: 2 cups anthrax bisque.

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102. JJB - 27 December 2007: Mcat, no. 94,

So we have Oswald and Ruby embodied in one and the same person. How convenient.

Madman, no. 95,

Remember that Bush was apparently involved in branding frat pledges with a heated coat hanger while at Yale. Whether he did or didn’t do it himself, he was a spokesman quoted in some article about it, explaining it away as no big deal.

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103. marisacat - 27 December 2007: I saw three days ago that Sarko dropped in on Afhganistan… think Prodi did as well.

hellzapoppin’

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104. JJB - 27 December 2007: MCat, no. 103,

Yes, and as I pointed out, Karzai was in Pakistan yesterday.

Lots of best laid plans may have just gang aft agley. Or maybe this was the plan.

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105. JJB - 27 December 2007: Just took a glance at the Robert Burns poem I paraphrased in the last comment. Hadn’t read it since high school. The last two verses seem highly relevant in our present day:

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain;
The best-laid schemes o’ mice an ‘men
Gang aft agley,
An’lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!

Still thou art blest, compar’d wi’ me
The present only toucheth thee:
But, Och! I backward cast my e’e.
On prospects drear!
An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,
I guess an’ fear!

My guess and fear is, if you liked 1968, you’re going to love the coming year. All others are advised to stay indoors and find some suitable pastimes to help you ignore the horror.

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106. Miss Devore - 27 December 2007: Benazir Bhutto assasinated.

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107. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: There were reports that he tortured animals when a child, as well:

Surviving a Family Loss

In addition to church groups, various civic organizations were also active, and one of the local rituals for children was the meetings with cookies and milk at the home of a nice old lady who represented the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

The cookies were digested more thoroughly than the teachings.

“We were terrible to animals,” recalled Mr. Throckmorton, laughing. A dip behind the Bush home turned into a small lake after a good rain, and thousands of frogs would come out.

“Everybody would get BB guns and shoot them,” Mr. Throckmorton said. “Or we’d put firecrackers in the frogs and throw them and blow them up.”

When he was not blowing up frogs, young George — always restless and something of a natural leader — would lead neighborhood children on daredevil expeditions around town, seeing how close they could come to breaking their necks. George also quickly acquired a colorful vocabulary.

“Georgie has grown to be a near-man, talks dirty once in a while and occasionally swears, aged 4 and a half,” his father despaired in a letter to a friend in 1951. In another letter four years later, he lamented: “Georgie aggravates the hell out of me at times.”

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108. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: via Left I on the News:

Stray Bullets

Suheila Hammad held her daughter in her arms before dawn on Tuesday. Outside she heard the U.S. Special Forces and the Iraqi Army in her area just south of Fallujah.

First they raided a home two doors down, blew the doors out and went in looking for their target. The soldiers pulled the family out of the home and the second floor was destroyed, the family said. A picture shows a burned out room and shattered glass.

The soldiers progressed to the second house, searching for their target, an Al Qaida in Iraq member who was believed responsible for attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces.

At the second house in this place, once an Al Qaida bastion, they blew the doors off and pulled the residents from the house. The Iraqi soldiers toyed with them, telling them to raise their arms up, drop their arms and raise them again.

A few soldiers walked away speaking a language the families didn’t understand. It was then that a bullet pierced the window where Suheila held her daughter Hadil. The bullet pierced Hadil’s neck and passed through her, embedding in the wall of the room. No one came into the house and Suheila was too afraid to call out for help, she said.

Hadil bled to death in her mother’s arms. Three men were detained, two were later released. The U.S. military said the man detained is an Al Qaida in Iraq member. There were no reports of Hadil’s death, they said.

No reports, no counting, no recognition.

One thing struck me when I went to see Charlie Wilson’s War (yes, I know it’s a Hollywood over-simplification of a complicated period. It’s a movie … of course it is). There were some striking scenes of Russian helicopters and jets attacking civilians from the air, and some more of refugee camps full of horrible wounded people.

That is US doing that now in at least two countries, how ever much Americans don’t want to face it. We are the Soviets, and the Soviets are us.

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109. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Geez Rudy, the blood probably isn’t even dry yet, you fear-mongering hack.

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110. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Fallujah

a couple days before Xmas I awoke to some episode of Martha Stewart. She had a link up to Fallujah (audio and head shot of her fan) and still shots of US mil (Seabees) arrayed wtih copies of one of her magazines. There proceeded happy talk about painting schools and doing good and then she and the woman platoon leader (or whatever the title) had a nice chit chat about “doing crafts”.

Not kidding.

Probably some similarity to who was it loved rabbits? Mengele?

Fallujah… which we flattened with massive bombing, shot out Red Crescent ambulances, set snipers to shoot people trying to bury the dead — exiled most of the city and erected check points with retinal scans. Barbed wire.

I am sure there is some handy “French Quarter” (Old Town Sunni version), wtih markets, restaurants and Seabees feeding candy to children.

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111. JJB - 27 December 2007: Madman, no. 108,

We are the Soviets, and the Soviets are us.

That’s very unfair . . . to the Soviets. Awful as they were, they never did anything even remotely as bad as the bombing campaign we conducted in Indochina, culminating in the awful period of 1970-73. We dropped 2 million tons of bombs on Laos during those years. That’s half a ton for every single Laotian. And of the 3 Indochinese countries, that was the one we bombed the least! What we were doing on the ground was every bit as horrible. Now we’re waging war directly in Afghanistan and Iraq, and by proxy in Somalia and Pakistan.

I won’t be going to see “Charlies Wilson’s War.” Stanley Heller explained why in Counterpunch yesterday:

Imagine, they made a funny movie about how the US helped turn Afghanistan into a killing field. It’s the film “Charlie Wilson’s War, a ligthearted look of how a skirt-chasing Congressman and a no-nonsense CIA thug helped bring mountains of weapons and money to the fanatic, women-despising “freedom fighters” who gave us 9/11. It’s certainly material for a “laugh riot”.

Heller provides a brief portrait of the slimy, detestable CIA agent played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, BTW. This creep, one Gust Avrakotos by name, is an all-too-typical example of the kind of thugs we’ve unleashed on the world. Someday, I hope to see a movie in which he and others like him are given their due. “The Good Shepherd” was a decent try, but didn’t go anywhere near far enough.

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112. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Huckabee:

Republican Mike Huckabee took his turn Wednesday, going on a pheasant hunt in Osceola, Iowa during which the Arkansas governor made it clear he is no stranger to the great outdoors.

Huckabee’s team brought back three pheasants — one of which the candidate claimed he personally shot — and promised they’d be “cleaned and eaten.”

Huckabee, who polls show continues to hold onto his lead in Iowa eight days before the state’s caucuses — also joked the trip could serve as a metaphorical campaign message. “Don’t get in my way,” he said while pointing to the three dead birds.

“This is what happens…You vote for me, you live. You don’t…there you go.”

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113. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: JJB:

I find it important to stare directly into the face of what we are, in all our hypocrisy, and recognize that it’s ME as well, seeing as in how I was marinated in this culture too.

I understand that other people don’t, or won’t. I also understand that Americans won’t see the undercurrents in the movie that hint at what we were doing wrong, and that lots of Americans (including soldiers), don’t understand that Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket are anti-war movies.

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114. Miss Devore - 27 December 2007: 106-whoops, I’m the late riser today.

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115. marisacat - 27 December 2007: Madman

I caught the film of Huckabee whatever day he went hunting. So christmasy and Christian.

Hubris, gets ’em all.

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116. JJB - 27 December 2007: Mcat and Madman,

I saw that film yesterday on the DC NBC affiliate’s local news show. Pretty repulsive, I must say. They also mistakenly ran it at first as part of a story on Turkish bombing missions against the PKK. You saw Huckabee walking around with this shotgun and heard the reporter talking about him shooting birds while graphics reading something like “Turkey Bombs Iraq” appeared on the screen. I was half-hoping it wasn’t a mistake, and Turkish fighters would come along and strafe Huckabee into the Great Beyond, but no such luck . . .

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117. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: BREAKING: Mike Huckabee raptured by the Turkish Airforce!

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118. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: I don’t know whether to laugh, cry or scream:

“I am desperate for change — now, not in 8 years or 12 years, but right now. We don’t have time to wait. We need big change — not just the shifting of power among insiders. We need to change the game, because the game is broken.”

— Michelle Obama, quoted by Vanity Fair.

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119. marisacat - 27 December 2007: pooor Michelle, part of the game.

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120. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: what, the Daley machine AREN’T outsiders?!?!?

Color me shocked!

I wonder what Harold Washington would say to Obama if he had the opportunity.

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121. JJB - 27 December 2007: I lived in Delaware for a little more than 6 years, and during that time developed an opinion of Senator Joe Biden roughly comparable to the one I have of dung beetles: I suppose they have their place in the great cosmic scheme of things, but I cannot imagine why perfectly good DNA should be wasted on them. So imagine my surprise when I looked at Salon.com this morning and read the following:

Speaking to 200 voters at an Italian cultural center here Wednesday night (an impressive crowd for the night after Christmas in a normal political year), Biden declared, “This is one election in your life where you don’t have to wonder what crisis the next president will face.” Moving beyond Iraq, Biden, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, began confidently ticking them off: “Pakistan teetering. Russia moving in an authoritarian direction. Iran malleable but dangerous.”

Aside from that nonsense about “Iran malleable but dangerous,” Spineless Joe is actually making a bit of sense there, and one would hope that his fellow candidates would join him in discussing substantive issues such as that. Unfortunately, we’re undoubtedly going to be subjected to yet more idiotic debate about who’s a better Christian than whom, and whether or not certain candidates are indeed Christians in the first place. If Biden did manage to enjoy an uptick in the polls, MoDo would undoubtedly publish a column making fun of his hair plugs.

Here are some other Biden remarks about his fellow candidates that, self-serving as they are, have more than a bit of truth to them, and probably should have been pointed out by one of the ridiculously overpaid MSM members:

“We have this debate going on about experience and change. And the two candidates with the most money talk about experience and change. I have more experience than all of them, including the candidate who says that she has the most experience. And I’ve changed more things than the guy who’s talking about change.”

I won’t be voting for him, but it is nice to see someone try to actually engage in debate about issues rather than spouting talking points.

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122. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Norman Soloman takes an interview in a direction that Glenn Beck doesn’t appreciate.

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123. JJB - 27 December 2007: Well, there seems to be some difference of opinion as to how Benazir Bhutto was murdered:

Senior officials in Ms. Bhutto’s party said she had finished addressing the rally and was sitting in a car waving at the crowd when she was hit in the head by a sniper in a nearby building. They said the car moved on for another 50 yards before a suicide attacker blew himself up.

Other witnesses described a single assassin opening fire on Ms. Bhutto and her entourage, hitting her at least once in the neck and once in the chest, before blowing himself up. Dr. Abbas Hayat, professor of pathology at Rawalpindi General Hospital where Ms. Bhutto was taken, said doctors tried to revive her for 35 minutes, but that she had shrapnel wounds and head injuries and was in heart failure. He said he could not confirm whether she had bullet injuries.

If the version put forth by those “senior officials” is correct, that sounds a lot more like what would be done by government security services than Islamic fanatics. But then Ms. Bhutto’s party colleagues might have their own axes to grind with Musharraff, and might be trying to make it look as if she was assassinated by his regime. Whatever the case, it’s hard to imagine Pakistan being able to continue as a viable geopolitical entity. I would guess Musharraff uses this as an excuse to reinstitute the state of emergency, and postpone (i.e., cancel) the elections scheduled for next month.

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124. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: I know nothing about this source, so take it as you will:

US to expand mily presence in Pakistan

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125. JJB - 27 December 2007: Two weeks ago, Tariq Ali published an article about Benazir Bhutto in The London Review of Books. Here is the opening paragraph, the penultimate sentence of which has sadly proved to be remarkably prescient:

Arranged marriages can be a messy business. Designed principally as a means of accumulating wealth, circumventing undesirable flirtations or transcending clandestine love affairs, they often don’t work. Where both parties are known to loathe each other, only a rash parent, desensitised by the thought of short-term gain, will continue with the process knowing full well that it will end in misery and possibly violence. That this is equally true in political life became clear in the recent attempt by Washington to tie Benazir Bhutto to Pervez Musharraf.

This is a disastrous turn of events for the Bush administration, as even the NY Times notes in this article on Bush’s reaction to the assassination. As it mentions, we are now tied ever more closely to the severely weakened Musharraff, who would probably suffer Ms. Bhutto’s fate if he were to dare step out in public as openly as she did.

The history of the Bhutto family is an extraordinarily twisted one, as Ali’s article makes clear. Any number of people could be behind her murder. Indeed, she was probably complicit in the murder of one of her own brothers, who’d become a political rival during her second turn as PM (the person responsible for that killing was almost certainly her husband). Still, it’s hard to believe that Musharraff had nothing to do with this. His hold on power is extremely tenuous, and whoever won the election would likely have been able to turn him out of office. Now he is our only viable option for carrying out our policies in that part of the world.

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126. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: OMG

[fixed the link — Mcat]

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127. JJB - 27 December 2007: Madman, no. 125,

The link doesn’t work.

I think a comment of mine that should be no. 122 is in Moderation.

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128. aemd - 27 December 2007: MitM #124

Broken link. What? OMG, What?… 😉
Fix the link, tapping foot….now… 😀

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129. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Getty Images page of photos from the rally today, and the aftermath of the bomber.

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130. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: ooooo, sorry ….

http://www.peta.org/feat/holidaysnowglobe/?celeb=Anna_Wintour

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131. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: The media is a co-conspirator in a con, the Iowa caucuses.

In another area of the museum, I found something more interesting: large cut-out figures of men and women. One looked as heroic as workers did in old Soviet Union statues. He was a reporter, dressed in a perfectly fitted brown sport coat, nicely cut blue jeans and brown loafers. His gray hair was cut short. He had a press pass around his neck and a pad and pen held loosely in his hands. I wondered how he managed to look so good, thinking of my own shaggy hair and heavy winter shoes, my clothes rumpled from being in a suitcase. This cut-out reporter, the accompanying text informed us, “has spent the last two presidential elections covering the caucuses and has discovered Iowa’s best Thai restaurant, martini, burger and round-trip airline schedule.”

Why was he being lionized? Why were his addictions to martinis and heavy food being praised? The answer came in a museum audio recording that explained, “The story of the Iowa caucuses needs to be told. It is our opportunity to shape the view of Iowa that gets reported and beamed around the world. It is the very best platform for the national and international press to experience the surprising things about Iowa that not always are shown.”

In other words, the caucuses are a promotional device, just like the Rose Bowl is a way for Pasadena to pitch itself to the world. The caucuses put Iowa on television, promoting the state to businesses like Google, which is opening a data center in Council Bluffs in 2009, a $200 million investment that will produce 200 jobs.

http://www.iowaindependent.com/magFront.do) one of the Web sites established around the country by the Center for Independent Media to promote independent online journalism. The Independent has citizen journalists—also known as part-timers—filing reports on the caucuses around the state, and Martyn does his own reporting. So it is a plugged-in operation.

I told him I didn’t think much of the caucus system. He likes it. “It forces candidates to compete in a state where it doesn’t take a lot of money to win,” he said. Face-to-face meetings between Iowans and candidates, as reported by the national media, help the nation “pick a good nominee and president.”

But the caucuses aren’t democratic, I said. “Nobody would say they are democratic,’” Martyn replied. “The sense I get [from Iowans] is that “‘this is the game, these are the rules of the game, and don’t argue about the rules in the middle of the game.”

But if political journalists were to explain the rules, the rest of America would know that the caucuses don’t mean much. They are a fraud, like “The Wizard of Oz.”

But explaining the rules is tough. I have spent a career describing complex budget formulas, health care plans and water projects. This is one of the hardest processes I have ever had to explain. It took a long time, and now that I am done, I have no idea whether my editors or readers will know or care what I am talking about.

But the media should try to shed light on the process instead of helping Iowa keep this promotional device alive. Unmask the wizard, journalists, and set America free from the shackles of the Iowa caucuses.

That sentence in bold sums up the problem with so much of how things are done in this country. It’s the reason we’re assaulted with sports metaphors all the fucking time.

“‘this is the game, these are the rules of the game, and don’t argue about the rules in the middle of the game.”

So shut up and play, or sit in the stands … in either case, shut up.

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132. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Creeping Fascism: History’s Lessons

McGovern starts out with a rundown of the spying on US citizens that has been pursued by our gov’t over the last several years, then ties it back to a book by Sebastian Haffner which was published postumously by his family. He was a young lawyer when the Nazis took over Germany:

You don’t have to be a Nazi. You can just be, well, a sheep.

In his journal, Sebastian Haffner decries what he calls the “sheepish submissiveness” with which the German people reacted to a 9/11-like event, the burning of the German Parliament (Reichstag) on Feb. 27, 1933.

Haffner finds it quite telling that none of his acquaintances “saw anything out of the ordinary in the fact that, from then on, one’s telephone would be tapped, one’s letters opened, and one’s desk might be broken into.”

But it is for the cowardly politicians that Haffner reserves his most vehement condemnation. Do you see any contemporary parallels here?

In the elections of March 4, 1933, shortly after the Reichstag fire, the Nazi party garnered only 44 percent of the vote. Only the “cowardly treachery” of the Social Democrats and other parties to whom 56 percent of the German people had entrusted their votes made it possible for the Nazis to seize full power. Haffner adds:

“It is in the final analysis only that betrayal that explains the almost inexplicable fact that a great nation, which cannot have consisted entirely of cowards, fell into ignominy without a fight.”

The Social Democratic leaders betrayed their followers—“for the most part decent, unimportant individuals.” In May, the party leaders sang the Nazi anthem; in June the Social Democratic party was dissolved. (hmmmm, that sounds familiar)

The middle-class Catholic party Zentrum folded in less than a month, and in the end supplied the votes necessary for the two-thirds majority that “legalized” Hitler’s dictatorship.

As for the right-wing conservatives and German nationalists: “Oh God,” writes Haffner, “what an infinitely dishonorable and cowardly spectacle their leaders made in 1933 and continued to make afterward. … They went along with everything: the terror, the persecution of Jews. … They were not even bothered when their own party was banned and their own members arrested.”

In sum: “There was not a single example of energetic defense, of courage or principle. There was only panic, flight, and desertion. In March 1933, millions were ready to fight the Nazis. Overnight they found themselves without leaders. … At the moment of truth, when other nations rise spontaneously to the occasion, the Germans collectively and limply collapsed. They yielded and capitulated, and suffered a nervous breakdown. … The result is today the nightmare of the rest of the world.”

This is what can happen when virtually all are intimidated.

Our Founding Fathers were not oblivious to this; thus, James Madison:

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. … The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.”

We cannot say we weren’t warned.

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133. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Creeping Fascism: History’s Lessons

McGovern starts out with a rundown of the spying on US citizens that has been pursued by our gov’t over the last several years, then ties it back to a book by Sebastian Haffner which was published postumously by his family. He was a young lawyer when the Nazis took over Germany:

You don’t have to be a Nazi. You can just be, well, a sheep.

In his journal, Sebastian Haffner decries what he calls the “sheepish submissiveness” with which the German people reacted to a 9/11-like event, the burning of the German Parliament (Reichstag) on Feb. 27, 1933.

Haffner finds it quite telling that none of his acquaintances “saw anything out of the ordinary in the fact that, from then on, one’s telephone would be tapped, one’s letters opened, and one’s desk might be broken into.”

But it is for the cowardly politicians that Haffner reserves his most vehement condemnation. Do you see any contemporary parallels here?

In the elections of March 4, 1933, shortly after the Reichstag fire, the Nazi party garnered only 44 percent of the vote. Only the “cowardly treachery” of the Social Democrats and other parties to whom 56 percent of the German people had entrusted their votes made it possible for the Nazis to seize full power. Haffner adds:

“It is in the final analysis only that betrayal that explains the almost inexplicable fact that a great nation, which cannot have consisted entirely of cowards, fell into ignominy without a fight.”

The Social Democratic leaders betrayed their followers—“for the most part decent, unimportant individuals.” In May, the party leaders sang the Nazi anthem; in June the Social Democratic party was dissolved. (hmmmm, that sounds familiar)

The middle-class Catholic party Zentrum folded in less than a month, and in the end supplied the votes necessary for the two-thirds majority that “legalized” Hitler’s dictatorship.

As for the right-wing conservatives and German nationalists: “Oh God,” writes Haffner, “what an infinitely dishonorable and cowardly spectacle their leaders made in 1933 and continued to make afterward. … They went along with everything: the terror, the persecution of Jews. … They were not even bothered when their own party was banned and their own members arrested.”

In sum: “There was not a single example of energetic defense, of courage or principle. There was only panic, flight, and desertion. In March 1933, millions were ready to fight the Nazis. Overnight they found themselves without leaders. … At the moment of truth, when other nations rise spontaneously to the occasion, the Germans collectively and limply collapsed. They yielded and capitulated, and suffered a nervous breakdown. … The result is today the nightmare of the rest of the world.”

This is what can happen when virtually all are intimidated.

Our Founding Fathers were not oblivious to this; thus, James Madison:

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. … The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.”

We cannot say we weren’t warned.

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134. JJB - 27 December 2007: Just stopped by Little Orange Footballs to see whether or not the Bhutto assassination was resonating at all in that hermetically sealed echo chamber. Not a single front page post regarding it. There is, however, a recommended diary. Topping the list in that feature, incidentally, is an Extremely Important Diary from Maximum Leader entitled “Taking a hard line on ratings wars”:

We know for a fact that the hardcore candidate partisans are coordinating with each other to uprate troll comments and downrate non-troll comments, depending on whether said comments are favorable or unfavorable to their candidate. This pack behavior has become pretty obvious, and we are in the process of identifying the worst offenders.

Those partisans will find (or have already found) their ratings abilities yanked, regardless of which candidate they support. That punishment may or may not be rescinded after the primaries. It’ll depend in large part on how pissed off I remain at the ratings abusers.

That’s it, in its entirety. One more purge. Can’t ever have enough of those.

Other exciting Recommended Diaries include “Obama’s brilliant new stump speech,” “Edwards Closing Ads,” and “This diary sucks, but you’ll recommend it anyway.”

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135. JJB - 27 December 2007: The Bush Administration has, for the most part, responded to the Bhutto assassination by spouting the verbal equivalent of watery oatmeal (“The United States strongly condemns this cowardly act by murderous extremists who are trying to undermine Pakistan’s democracy,” burbled Boy George, “The deadly results of this attack will no doubt test the will and patience of the people of Pakistan,” blathered Condi), but one comment by Scott Stanzel, the Administration’s Designated Liar, caught my attention:

“I’m aware that al-Qaida may have claimed responsibility,” Stanzel said. “I’m aware of news reports of that. But I don’t have any specifics for you on that.. . . Whoever perpetrated this attack is an enemy of democracy and has used a tactic that al-Qaida is very familiar with, and that is suicide bombing and the taking of innocent life to try to disrupt the democratic process.”

I have been surfing the Web all day for news about this, and I have yet to see one reference to anyone, including al-Qaida, claiming responsibility for Ms. Bhutto’s murder. In fact, the latest BBC story says specifically that no one has yet done so. And the NY Times is still stating that anonymous party colleagues of Ms. Bhutto are claiming that she was shot by a sniper operating from a building prior to the explosion. If this is the case, the shooter could obviously not be the suicide bomber, if indeed there was a suicide bomber.

Details here.

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136. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Getty photog witnessed the attack:

John Moore, a photographer for Getty Images, said Bhutto was standing through the sunroof of her vehicle, waving to supporters, when two shots rang out.

Bhutto fell back into the vehicle, and almost immediately a bomb blast rocked the scene, sending twisting metal and shrapnel into the crowd, he added.

Police sources told CNN the bomber, who was riding a motorcycle, blew himself up near Bhutto’s vehicle. Watch aftermath of the attack. »

Bhutto was rushed to Rawalpindi General Hospital — less than two miles from the bombing scene — where doctors pronounced her dead.

Her body was removed from the hospital — carried above a crowd of supporters — late Thursday night, about six hours after the assassination.

Chaos erupted at the hospital when former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif arrived to pay his respects to Bhutto less than three hours after her death.

Hundreds of Bhutto supporters crammed into the entrance shouted and cried, some clutching their heads in pain and shock. Sharif called it “the saddest day” in Pakistan’s history. “Something unthinkable has happened,” he said.

CNN is showing video of riots and burning cars (for what it’s worth … I trust nothing on face value from them).

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137. JJB - 27 December 2007: Madman, no. 135,

The riots have been reported on the BBC website. All too believable, I’d be shocked if there weren’t a good deal of violence. This business about the motorcycle is a new wrinkle, and it seems unlikely such a person would have been the shooter.

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138. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: Eyescapes.

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139. marisacat - 27 December 2007: sorry for the delay, let

Madman and

JJB (2 I think) out of Moderation…

fixed Madman’s link…

8)

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140. JJB - 27 December 2007: FWIW, the following update can be found at the Global Affairs blog:

“aftermath: Riots are being reported in various cities. Rawalpindi is in chaos. Cable and cell phone services has been suspended in most of the country. Rumors are flying of curfews. No word from Musharraf, yet.”

The video I have seen of Ms. Bhutto’s casket being carried by her supporters suggest that there is going to be an enormous reaction to this all through the night and tomorrow as well. Apparently, there was a gun battle between supporters of Nawaz Sharif, the other main opposition leader and either the police or another political party. Several people were killed as a result of that.

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141. Madman in the Marketplace - 27 December 2007: CNN and Pakistans ambassador are pushing the Al Queda thing really, REALLY hard, as is that retired Army general on MSNBC.

Gotta turn it off for a while. Tired of the endless spinning and promotion of American militarism.

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142. melvin - 27 December 2007: 135– There is this this. One phone call.

Breathlessly reported at orange by Pumpkinlove

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143. NYCO - 27 December 2007: “Unthinkable”? really? Come on, who didn’t see the headline today and know it was only a matter of time. Is anyone — ANYONE — at all surprised that Bhutto is dead?

It’s almost like all of this stuff has been foreordained. I mean, the whole past six years (at least) has unfolded as predictably as your average afternoon serial.

And so is the coming ~~depression~~ recession. And the ineffectual presidential term that will soon be upon us.

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144. marisacat - 27 December 2007: new thread…………..

LINK

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145. Assassino! « Marisacat - 27 December 2007: […] Pulling this from Madman forward from the last thread: Madman in the Marketplace | Getty Images page of photos from the rally today, and the aftermath of the bomber.Dec 27, 10:41 AM — Crazed little revolt on the castle grounds.. […]

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