Stallio! has a great post on how the Republican party is handing out CDs that will illegally collect your personal data and stash it at an insecure location. He covers the topic pretty well, so it wouldn’t make sense for me to repeat the whole thing.
Beware of Republicans bearing gifts.
Atrios has a dead-on post about the myth of “Big Goverment Liberals.”
I don’t know any “big government liberals” in the sense that Andy means. I don’t know anybody who gets a stiffy at the thought of raising taxes and increasing government spending as a share of GDP just for the hell of it. Liberals I know tend to think there are things government should do and we should, roughly, figure out how to pay for those things, though we’re not entirely allergic to deficit spending. When taxes have to go up to cover interest and debt repayment costs no liberals I know are going to go “YAY! HIGHER TAXES! WOO HOOO!”
For a long time the Left was tarred as idealistic utopians, addicted to ways of doing things no matter what the consequences. I have no real opinion on whether that criticism was ever true, but in any case it’s something which has been embraced wholesale by the Right. They have a small government fetish, and that fetish is linked almost entirely to the top marginal federal income tax rate. Liberals have no such corresponding fetish for “big government” even if they tend to be fans of some government programs conservatives like to demonize as being “big government liberalism.” No one’s going to enjoy sweeping up after Bush’s fiscal train wreck.
The [link deprecated: http://www2.indystar.com/articles/1/243304-2091-127.html] Indy Star reports that our fair metropolis is on the list of cities invited to bid to host the 2008 GOP Convention. Requirements: we have to foot the bill for security.
God no. Please no. I’d rather gargle with motor oil than pay for security for wingnuts. Oh, wait. Can I pay for really crappy security?
For the past couple days, StAllio! has been covering a fun controversy brewing in Indiana politics concerning the “Bloody 8th” congressional district race between Republican incumbent and right-wing loony John Hostetler, and his hottie Democrat opponent, Sheriff Brad Ellsworth.
Ellsworth’s daughter is an IU student, and happened to have a facebook page where she’s alleged to have had pictures of herself holding what might have been a bottle of beer, or might have been a bottle of root beer. I’ve seen the pictures, and I couldn’t tell. Similarly, Maggie Daniels, the daughter of Mitch Daniels, had pictures that appeared to show her engaging in underage drinking on her facebook page.
Fellow IU student Joshua Claybourn has a blog at In the Agora, where someone provided links to these two facebook pages. Claybourn, being a Republican and an employee supporter of Hostettler, proceeded to send the Ellsworth link to the newspapers, while concealing the Daniels link.
Chaos ensued, Claybourn was attacked, then he tried to cover up his involvement, blah blah blah. Go read the story at StAllio’s page, which has been published on Atrios, BTW. I’m so jealous.
“President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all authorized electronic surveillance on a far broader scale.” — Attorney General Alberto Gonzales while testifying before congress on illegal wiretapping
No, I’m not shitting you, he really said that, and you can see the video yourself.
Can I also point out that aside from the fact that there weren’t electronics in Washington’s time — he was also fighting the Revolutionary War. You know, the one we had before the Constitution that makes this stuff illegal. So, technically, if he had some electronics with medium voltage cable, and, you know, so did the British, he would legally have been allowed to wiretap them, on accounta, we didn’t have a government yet.
But can I just point out that Gonzales is one of the brilliant minds running our country?
and you’re invited! If you follow the rules, that is. Taking Down Words reprints a party invitation sent out by the IU GOP group. Poor kids, they don’s seem to know what college is for.