random quotes ... to amuse, inspire, enrage:
The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason: The morning daylight appears plainer when you put out your candle.
DRAFT A few big losses. Russ Feingold, the only Senator to vote against the PATRIOT Act, lost. Rick Boucher, Representative from Virginia, a regular supporter of fair use, lost. DRAFT
Wow, the Alabama Education Association has hit a new low: shelling out half a million dollars to a Republican PAC to run attack ads against a gubernatorial candidate … for supporting evolution. Yikes.
Yesterday Rep. Alan Grayson questioned Rep. Paul Broun of Georgia on the meaning of Bills of Attainder, in regards to one of the anti-ACORN bills / amendments floating through Congress. Delightful. I’m linking to it through Glenn Greenwald’s blog, who brought it to my attention, because Greenwald is almost always worth reading.
see below for update 12/19 Obama has appointed the next US Trade Representative, current U.S. Representative Xavier Becerra (D-CA 31); see also Becerra’s House site. Unfortunately, it looks like he’s going to be in the pocket of tank for Hollywood, just as prior USTR’s have been. A few notes from some fast research (“googling”): * [...]
I’m contemplating Bush’s potential pardon of his various underlings for their roles in torture or other illegal actions, and I’m angry. The Presidential pardoning power can be and should be used for humanitarian reasons — for mercy, or for justice, when for whatever reason those are not available through ordinary means. There’s also a good [...]
doing some old school css & cackling about ted stevens. still. even after 24 hours.
Looks like a McCain-Palin supporter was busy at work cleaning up the Sarah Palin wikipedia entry — the day before the announcement was made. The editor claims no conflict-of-interest, although included fact-based information like, “Sarah Palin kept her campaign promises.”
Reading this account of a large “Alaskan Women Reject Palin” rally — reminds me of the massive anti-Gulf War protest in San Francisco in the early 1990s. Almost no media coverage for that protest. Almost no media coverage for this one. And yet, apparently the smaller pro-Palin rally did receive media coverage. I get “if [...]
in the middle of a blogging break (for good reasons! welcome ada marie) i bring you this article from salon.com which is scary as fuck and makes me fear for little ada’s future: Apocalypse Now by Mike Davis. Davis does not buy any of the Gore-style cheerleading that we might avert a climatically disastrous future [...]
an upsetting day. so, reading the news. Farewell to the crown, farewell, the velvet gown, won’t you all come tumbling down? Goodbye to the crown! (Chumbawamba, “Farewell to the Crown”) Nepal votes out their monarchy and institutes a republic. Gyanendra has to vacate the palace within two weeks or face eviction. Also, he had to [...]
The NYT had the germ of an interesting idea today: What I’d Be Talking About if I Were Still Running, op-eds from presidential candidates who have dropped out. It was only a germ because it turned out that the op-eds were only very short, virtually substance-less talking point-level comments. Now if the NYT followed this [...]
My partner and I agree on one thing about the Democratic race: That sexism has played a major role in the treatment of Hillary Clinton. A friend of ours recently pointed out that if the genders were reversed — if Barack Obama were a woman, with little experience but inspiring rhetoric — Obama-as-woman would never [...]
In the tradition of santorum, comes now brownbacking — a verb that describes pandering to Biblical literalists by casting doubt on evolution and science. See Spanish Inquisition for the history of the term.
James Comey’s testimony Tuesday before Congress was riveting.
check out this awesome overpass/sidewalk art at yonkis.com — you have to scroll all the way to the right, and it’s not a flip photo so do it slowly enough to notice the homo sapiens-like creatures … at the shortest point of the wall, at about the 75% mark (L-to-R). The pointer came from pharyngula, [...]
The US copyright lobby (as represented by the “International Intellectual Property Alliance”, a confusingly named consortium of US copyright lobbying groups) has just done a report on the failures of the rest of the world to properly protect its members’ intellectual property. We care, because it submits this report (solicited? unsolicited?) to the US Trade [...]
I really can’t stand it when politicians engage in cheap & sleazy grandstanding, knowing that what they’re doing is actually irrelevant. I’m speaking of Mitt Romney’s “lawsuit” to get the Mass. courts to step in to force the Mass. legislature to vote on an anti-same-sex-marriage amendment. [nyt 11/25] Cheap & sleazy political grandstanding may be [...]
Ah, a fine Sunday morning reading the paper, and trashing media bias and sloppy reporting at the NYT … This annoying NYT article (11/12) on police witness “sanctuary” policies is a perfect example of how articles can be technically “balanced” but still really suck present an imbalanced picture. The police witness sanctuary policies basically tell [...]
The NJ Supreme Court is releasing its SSM decision today @ 3pm. [available at NJSC website] Will they help us out but energize the Republicans and lead to queers being blamed if the Dems don’t take the House or Senate? or will they fuck us over leaving everyone, but us, happy? (And if I’m writing [...]
Joe Conason at Salon explains why the leaders of the religious right don’t care that Republican Christian nationalists are hypocrites, and predicts that they’ll be ba-a-ack: The leaders of the religious right don’t care whether White House hacks love them or laugh at them, because they see themselves as the users, not the used. Winning [...]