Gee, wonder what dog was getting wagged with that tail?
UPDATE: Keith Olbermann of MSNBC documents the juxtaposition of terror alert increases with political events unfavorable to the President. The tail really is wagging the dog.
Despite the fact that oil companies made record profits last year, AND the fact that they just got a huge present of tax cuts in the recent “energy” bill, AND the fact that oil companies were throttling their refinery production to boost prices (and profits) before Katrina hit, the house is still considering throwing out the baby with the bathwater and looking at a bill to handout more to oil companies.
John Edwards keeps pointing out that our country doesn’t reward work, it rewards wealth. People who work hard are forced to work harder, while people who sit back on their accumulated money just keep sitting back and accumulating.
UPDATE: This bill came down to a vote in the House, and the Republicans held the vote open (unethical) so they could twist arms and force people to change their votes. It ended up as a shouting match on the floor of the house, with Democrats shouting “SHAME, SHAME, SHAME!” You can see the excitement on video here. The Republicans ended up getting the vote 212 to 210. So not only is our economy going to spiral further downward as oil companies rake in bucks, we’ll have new refineries to pollute our environment, too. Wonderful.
According to a CBS News Poll:
DIRECTION OF THE COUNTRY
Right direction- 26%
Wrong track – 69%
PRESIDENT BUSH’S JOB APPROVAL
Approve
All – 37%
Reps. – 79%
Dems. – 14%
Inds. – 29%
Disapprove
All – 58%
Reps. – 13%
Dems. – 84%
Inds. – 64%
PRES. BUSH JOB APPROVALS
Overall – 37%
Terrorism – 46%
Iraq – 32%
Economy – 32%
Hurricane Katrina – 45%
Recent hurricanes – 46%
DOES PRES. BUSH SHARE YOUR PRIORITIES FOR THE COUNTRY?
Yes – 32%
No – 65%
ECONOMY IS GETTING:
Better – 10%
Worse – 54%
Same – 34%
There’s lots more interesting data there, go and read it.
Alternet has the story: A Doozie of a Recession:
Recessions begin when consumers suddenly discover they can no longer keep pace with their bills. And this one has already begun.
No kidding.
Karl Rove is suddenly not appearing at major White House events (like the Miers announcement) and his lawyer has changed his statements from last Friday’s “Karl is not a target of the investigation” to “no comment.” Also swirling around the blogosphere are rumors that indictments are about to be handed down, and prosecutor Fitzgerald’s office has mentioned that the would mail people a few days ahead of public announcements if that person were going to be indicted.
Steph rubs her hands together in anticipation…
Regarding Indiana’s proposed Orwellian plan to criminalize “unauthorized reproduction”:
State Sen. Patricia Miller, R-Indianapolis, issued a one-sentence statement this afternoon saying: “The issue has become more complex than anticipated and will be withdrawn from consideration by the Health Finance Commission.”
Scott was lamenting yesterday that we look even more like hicks now that the entire country reacted with horror to this idea… but I think it was a very Good Thing. However creepy and dystopian the idea was, it wasn’t a dumb-ass, igner’nt idea… just a totally fascist idea. While that’s not great, what it did do was expose the right-wing, conservative (radical) Republican party for what it really is, which more people really need to catch onto, not just those of us who pay attention to the news every day.
Yep, that’s what state lawmaker Patricia Miller (R) is proposing legislation for here in Indiana. A bill will be heard by the Health Finance Commission intended to restrict any form of “assisted reproduction” defined as “causing pregnancy by means other than sexual intercourse, including intrauterine insemination, donation of an egg, donation of an embryo, in-vitro fertilization and transfer of an embryo, and sperm injection.” These types of reproduction would only be allowed to married women who pass a court petition and receive a “gestational certificate.”
According to the current draft of the legislation, an intended parent “who knowingly or willingly participates in an artificial reproduction procedure” without court approval,”
commits unauthorized reproduction, a Class B misdemeanor.” The criminal charges will be the same for physicians who commit “unauthorized practice of artificial reproduction.”
The married parents who might want to participate in “assisted reproduction” are in for some bad news too: some of the required information includes the fertility history of the parents, education and employment information, hobbies, personality descriptions, verification of marital status, child care plans, letter of reference and criminal history checks. A description of the family lifestyle of the intended parents is also required, including individual participation in faith-based or church activities.
A really excellent analysis of how many people are affected and how is posted on bopnews.com.
The main intent is to keep lesbians from having kids, but the bill affects unmarried heterosexual women as well, so sit up and take notice single women in Indiana.
Read text of the proposed legislation in this downloadable PDF file.
Article by Laura McPhee in Nuvo
An article about this topic
IndyStar article
The Health Finance Commission
Contact your representative
As several bloggers have pointed out, this legislation would have made Christ’s conception illegal.
“We did want to address the issue of whether or not the law should allow single people to be parents. Studies have shown that a child raised by both parents – a mother and a father – do better. So, we do want to have laws that protect the children,” Miller explained.
Okay — this has got to stop: ” Studies have shown that a child raised by both parents – a mother and a father – do better.”
LIE LIE LIE LIE. BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT BULLSHIT. DEBUNKED DEBUNKED DEBUNKED DEBUNKED DEBUNKED. It’s a blatant falsehood, people. Studies show no such thing. In fact, studies show the exact opposite; that children raised in households with single parents or with two parents of the same gender do just as well, are just as happy and well-adjusted as kids that grow up with a mom and a dad.
WE HAVE TO TAKE THIS FALSE WEAPON AWAY FROM THEM, BECAUSE PEOPLE BELIEVE THIS LIE.
The inquiry into the leaking of a CIA agent’s identity is set to wrap up this week, so the President was quick to nominate a supreme court justice to distract the press from the coming scandal when White House officials will be indicted. Especially since there is new information that Bush and Cheney were actively involved in the Plame outing.
As someone in the blogosphere anticipated… “Hello, President Hastert!” Hee hee.
Quote from CBSNews.com, with internal links to wikipedia for more information on the players in the wide-scale GOP corruption:
The indictment sent a shock wave through the GOP establishment, which is already reeling from a swath of criminal and ethics investigations. Three individuals, eight corporations and two political action committees connected to DeLay have been indicted as a result of the probe. In addition, the government’s top procurement official, David Safavian, was arrested in September for obstructing a criminal investigation into uber-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a close DeLay ally. Abramoff himself is under criminal investigation for defrauding Indian tribes and was indicted for wire fraud in Florida in a separate case. Top White House aides, including Karl Rove and Scooter Libby, have been targeted by a special prosecutor investigating the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame. Representative Duke Cunningham announced he would not run for re-election after overselling his house for $700,000 to a military industry lobbyist; he too has been indicted. FDA chief Lester Crawford resigned unexpectedly after just two months on the job, possibly because of failure to report his wife’s sizable pharmaceutical-industry holdings. And DeLay’s Senate counterpart, Bill Frist, is battling possible insider-trading charges for dumping millions in HCA stock, a company founded by his father and run by his brother, weeks before it plunged in value. The U.S. Attorney in Manhattan and the Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into Frist and HCA in September.
“The fact that Tom DeLay is under criminal indictment and Senate majority leader Bill Frist is under criminal investigation is a historic first,” says Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). “This demonstrates the culture of corruption among the Congressional leadership that has become a cancer on our country.”
Fleshing out that tidbit about David Safavian a bit more: he was the White House’s top federal procurement official, and was in the midst of the lucrative Gulf Coast rebuilding plans when he had to resign to be arrested for the obstruction of justice charge. He’s responsible for giving some of the no-bid contracts to Halliburton and other companies with a track record of corruption. So you know about how the government money for Katrina relief is going to be spent.
Also, Abramoff has links to organized crime, and a mob murder investigation: “3 Arrested in Killing of Businessman With Whom Abramoff Feuded.”
All of these guys have sleazy scandals, and all of them are interconnected, with Delay at the top greasing the wheels with dirty money… for a complete picture of how wide the corruption spreads, read “Beyond Delay: the 13 Most Corrupt Members of Congress” by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
From Reuters: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would allow gay marriage in the state of California.
Now, I’m confused. First the right-wing tells us that the “activist judges” aren’t allowed to rule on gay marriage laws, saying the laws have to be written by congress, the body elected to represent the will of the people. But when congress listens to the will of the people and approves a law allowing gay marriage, Arnold vetos it.
So basically gay people aren’t allowed to be represented by either the court system that is supposed to protect us from injustices, or by the congress that we elected into office. Gay people have no voice in government, in other words.
I keep wondering when I’m going to be herded onto a train.