2008 Elections: Telling The Truth

Was it just yesterday? Or the day before? That senile warmonger John McInsane had the big brass balls to tell Barack Obama he was going to instruct Obama about how peaceful Iraq was and how things are going so fucking well in Iraq? Let's see, here's a few pertinent spittle-fleckings:

[...] McCain added, he [Obama, Ed.] will change his position on the war because of the success the U.S. is having there. “Sen. Obama was driven to his conclusion by ideology, not by the facts on the ground,” McCain said. “Success in Iraq is undeniable.”

The Seattle Times responds with an editorial that basically informs McInsane of what everyone else with a working brain cell already knows: the aged, cranky, nasty old Republican nominee is fuller of shit than a constipated cow. A pertinent snippet:

McCain is having a jolly time pretending he is the only candidate with enough cachet and experience to lead the U.S. on military matters, even offering to squire Obama around Iraq.

McCain's posturing would be silly one-upmanship if the costs of the war in Iraq and at home were not so enormous and never-ending. McCain has the wrong position. He supports continued military involvement in Iraq. Obama, more credibly, vows to end the war and bring troops home.

Kudos to the editorial writer! More than two-thirds of the American electorate is utterly sick and tired of this bogus war. Bombing the helpless populace of a small country that has done nothing to us is nothing less than a war crime. A war crime that has, incidentally, destroyed our economy and is threatening the combined economy of the rest of the world.

Does anybody remember the last time McInsane went to Iraq? March of this year. Protected by about 100 Marines, in full body armour, with helicopter gunships overhead, McInsane was photographed (at taxpayers' expense, of course) strolling about in Baghdad, proclaiming it safe. The old geezer conveniently forgot to mention to anyone during his recent spittle-flecked rant that his army escort would not let him go to the Shorja market where he had his picture taken last year, because it was "too unsafe."

Of course, someone who can't tell Sunni from Shi'a and doesn't even know how many troops we have in Iraq is hardly the authority on the war. If only fate wasn't tempted to give the old man the smackdown every time he opens his mouth and switches feet. Pertinent snippet:

McCain's comments about Mosul being "quiet" have also been criticized. On the day he made them, 30 Iraqis were killed by suicide bombings in the Mosul area.

Meanwhile, the town of Hit, near Baghdad, didn't want to be left out of the rush to smear a little egg on the erstwhile candidate's face. A suicide bomber in that town, no doubt having read or heard McLame's comments, rushed off to glory, taking ten people with him and wounding 12 others.

McLame displayed his usual tin ear on the issue:

McCain, speaking to reporters in Milwaukee, refused to acknowledge a mistake, saying that "I said we have drawn down. And we have drawn down."

Gee, where have we heard that refusal to admit making a mistake before? Oh, yeah, the previous two terms of Gee Dumbya Pumpkinhead.

In an attempt to defend the senile warmonger, his advisers said the flap amounted to nothing more than "nitpicking" about "verb tenses."

"It is the essence of semantics," said a frustrated Randy Scheunemann, McCain's top foreign policy adviser, on a conference call organized by the campaign. "We're having this call about a verb tense."

Wow, they sure have learned their lessons well. They're borrowing from the arsenal of Karl Rove and Bill Clinton. Next they're going to tell us what the definition of "is" is. Good work, kids! No, let's rephrase that: Heckuva Job, Johnny!

In other convincing evidence of the peacefulness of Iraq, thousands of Iraqis turned out to protest the U.S. presence. Intelligence (a quality Mr. McInsane seems dreadfully short on) officials announced today that our progress in Iraq basically sucks wet monkey ass. The scheduled elections are already getting the Sunni mad at each other. Progress! Peace! Missing Limbs! Awakening Councils!

Is there anyone in Iraq that we haven't pissed off yet? Well, maybe McInsane's definition of "progress," "success," "drawdown," and so forth are not exactly the same as Merriam-Webster's or Oxford's OED, or, let's be honest, any fucking body else's.

Tell the truth, Mr. McCain. If you remember how that's defined any more, that is. And don't forget to tell all those American servicemen being blown up in Iraq and Afghanistan why you refuse to sign Jim Webb's GI Bill that would give them better benefits than the pile of steaming crap the Bush misadministration's been trying to feed them for the past X years.

Crossposted over at Out of Iraq Bloggers Caucus

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Caturday!

And yes, we do have a couple of guests. We were going to feature Angel's brother, AreToo, from 922 Cats, but given that Angel has such a long rap sheet that he rather takes the spotlight off AreToo, we feel obliged to carefully plan and assemble AreToo's Guest Post.

So, instead, we give you Reggie! The snorglablest belly this side of the Sierras.


Sister GTG, regular reader and Terrorist Nun, lives with Reggie and Gabby, whose photo may yet show up. Gabby is delicate, slender, and temperamental.

Reggie is a big fat butterball o' Love, as you can see. Tabbies! Long may they reign.

Visiting today from Chuck's place is calico cat Marlin (pretty fishy name for a cat, Chuck!):


Chuck claims Marlin is camera-shy. Check out this very posed picture and tell him what you think. More Marlin:


Chuck, Mrs. Chuck, and Marlin share their impeccable home with a small white bear:


Oops, no, that's NOT a bear. It's a dog! A Pyrenees named Gus. Chuck builds houses, and apparently Gus goes along to make sure everything is done right. Let Chuck tell you for himself.

Damn, that's one big beautiful hunka hunka gorgeous dog.

Have a wonderful Caturday, everyone! Damn, it's freezing here.

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Entertainment

This week's amusing tidbit comes from none other than U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates, the pathetic pawn of a misadministration that has botched everything it touched, domestic and foreign.

According to Bob (let's call him Bob, he forfeited any claim to dignity when he decided to work for this bunch of incompetent clowns), Preznitwit Gee Dumbya (also known as Stupie McPoopyhead, or Commander Codpiece, among other fond noms-de-smackdown) "will leave a "strong and positive legacy" in Asian security."

This remark was made to an apparently impassive crowd at a forum of defence and military officials and security experts known as the Shangri-La Dialogue. To their credit, none of his listeners laughed out loud (LOL'd).

Mr. Gates, it would appear, is not, however, completely impervious to reality. He added (in shame, no doubt):

[...] regardless of controversies over the Bush administration's security policies globally, "actually here in Asia the overall legacy is a pretty straightforward and very positive one."

[...] there was a "significant improvement" in the US-Japanese and US-Indian relationship under Bush.

News to us. Last we heard, when the foo' went to India to address the beneficiaries of his global security policies, the Lok Sabha threatened to pelt him with rotten fruit if he was permitted to speak in the Lower House of the Indian Parliament. As a result, the lickspittles who arranged his visit decided he should speak at the Lal Qila (Red Fort) instead. However, given his reignition of the Crusades and the largely Muslim population of the surrounding area, his security detail were forced to decline the honour and press for an alternative venue. It is our understanding that he ended up giving his speech in the zoo, where his literally captive audience were prevented from flinging souvenirs of their appreciation at him by the majority's lack of proper hands.

As for Japan, it would appear that the Japanese are less open in their sentiment. Perhaps having the current idiot's father puke all over them was a sufficient, if symbolic, warning.

In other, related news, Dr. Zebra, in his analysis of the Preznitwit's health, points out that the Chimperor suffered a syncope:

On January 13, 2002, Bush lost consciousness while sitting on a couch in the White House, watching a football game. His head hit the floor, resulting in an abrasion on his left cheekbone and a small bruise on his lower lip. The incident was blamed on a combination of (a) Bush not feeling well in previous days, and (b) an improperly eaten pretzel. Their combined effect was to slow the President's heart. (The description suggests a vaso-vagal attack.) The period of unconsciousness was brief [28].

Additional information from an article in eMedicine states:

Syncope is defined as a transient self-limited loss of consciousness, usually leading to a fall. It is a subset of a broader range of conditions causing transient loss of consciousness. Syncope is a common medical problem accounting for up to 1% of emergency department visits and is the sixth leading cause of hospitalization for people older than 65 years.

Syncope results from a self-terminating inadequacy of global cerebral nutrient perfusion.

The Idiot-in-Chief has had several falls, starting from the first when he lost a struggle with a pretzel. Doubtless "inadequacy of global cerebral nutrient" is quite believable as an ongoing condition for the Chimperor.

Hope that makes YOUR weekend happy, people!

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Margaret Cho Should Know ...

``A government that would deny a gay man a bridal registry is a fascist state,'' Cho said. ``I urge love without restraints, unless you are into leather, and then by all means use restraints.''
-- Margaret Cho, speaking at the Gay March in Washington, DC on April 30, 2000

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B.A.D. Stroll Through The Blogroll

Today's stroll through the blogroll yields the following treasures:

• Rocky over at Alien Trucker reminds us what Memorial Day is about.
  
  We didn't post anything for Memorial Day this year. The death toll on all sides is just unacceptably high and too damned depressing. Here's last year's post.
  
  
• Over at Blast Off!, Sinfonian keeps America's Wang even safer for democracy by pointing out the divisive planned shenanigans for the coming weekend. Oy, vay!
  
  
• Chuck Butcher, over at Chuck for ... reminds us about the real issue with illegal immigration. Is this how we want to see ourselves?
  
  
• Over at ex-lion tamer, r@d@r talks about the beast that many of us might have felt chewing at our innards.
  
  Let's take our pills, no matter how much we hate to. Let's try not to hurt ourselves. It's hard enough having this invisible suffering etched into one's soft and vulnerable bits.
  
  
• Heywood, over at Hammer of the Blogs, has an instructional post on Nicaragua, the United Fruit Company, and various other pieces of the open-veined history of Latin America.
  
  
• Shaun, over at Kiko's House, has discovered something that is sure to make Michelle Malkin shriek in E above high C.
  
  
• Dizzy Dezi, over at I'm Jus' A Lil' Dizzy! has some choice words for the forced-birthers of Colorado. Ass-kicking at its best, yes!
  
  
• Sungold, over at Kittywampus, has some thoughts about the Catholic Church's response to the ordination of women as priests.
  
  
• Litbrit gives you the background to Shaun's beautiful photograph.
  
  
• And Busted Knuckles, over at Ornery Bastard, has some news that you need a big drink to digest. FUBAR, he sez, and I believe him.

This has been your stroll through the blogroll. La Casa de Los Gatos thanks you for your attention, and craves your indulgence for the paucity of postings. We are happy to report a literary endeavour in the works, but work it is.

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2008 Elections: The Right Hand Knoweth Not

Whose pants the left hand is in. The Keystone Kops are running the military, folks. And with Gee Dumbya in charge, that's probably just one of the things they're running.


The NYT tells us that Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has written an unusual open letter to all those in uniform, warning them to stay out of politics as the nation approaches a presidential election in which the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will be a central, and certainly divisive, issue. Caveat: Login required, it's free. Pertinent snippet:

"the U.S. military must remain apolitical at all times. It is and must always be a neutral instrument of the state, no matter which party holds sway."

"The only things we should be wearing on our sleeves are our military insignia," Mullen wrote.

Did anyone tell him that John McInsane, perennial try-hard for the position of Preznitwit, just released campaign ads with pitchas of General "IPlanToRunForPreznitwitSomeday" Petraeus?

Tsk, tsk, tsk. Another "stumble," Gramps?


Gee, Gramps, you refused to sign the GI Bill authored by Senator Jim Webb because you said soldiers wouldn't keep going back to get shot at if they had better access to education. But you're pretty darn willing to use them to raise a little money, huh? So much for "supporting the troops."

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LGBTQ: Say WHAT?

Excuse me, could these people get any ruder? Or stupider? Are they dumping stupid in the water wholesale where these folks live, or what?

NBC is reporting that the Attorneys General of TEN states are asking the California Supreme Court to delay implementation of its same-sex marriage ruling (by granting a stay) until every hetero troglodyte who has ever seized a bogus issue and used it as a club to whup the LGBTQ community upside the head with has had a chance to expose their chancreous fear and pathetic weenie whining on the issue.

Hello, people! Are you not getting laid regularly or what? Wouldja please just mind your own goddamn fucking, and we do mean fucking, business for a change? Like take your wife or girlfriend or boyfriend or whatever out for a good time and spend a few hours doing the horizontal samba until you experience that longed-for sweaty bliss that comes from rubbing your happy nubbins together.

Stop worrying about other people's private fucking, and yes, we really do mean fucking, lives! Jesus would slap you unconcscious if he could see what you were up to. Oh, yes. It's time to get your happy on and leave other people the fuck alone.

What slightest bit of difference does it make to you or your marriage or your relationship if Adam and Steve or Anna and Eve are happily married? What the hell is that going to do to your sex life or, more likely, the complete and total lack thereof? Can anybody tell me?

The only people who get their shorts in a knot about gay people getting married are people who don't have a sweet patoo to unbunch their undies. Or those who are secretly lusting for Teh Gay in a big way but think some Old Man in Teh Sky is watching them and going to zap their rubbable bits with lightning forEVER for thinking those dirty, dirty thoughts.

Enough already, you pathetic creeps and godbags. Grab your partner, or spend your energy finding a goddamned partner, or buy some really nice toys (available at any of these fine online purveyors, and they'll probably send them to you in a plain brown wrapper if you happen to live in Buttfuck, Missouri) and get your pant 'n sweat on. And for mercy's sake, leave other people's happy humps the hell alone.

Some of the idiotic godbags involved include these miserable spoo-rags of Satan, to paraphrase Maru:

The Campaign for California Families wrote in its petition Thursday that permitting the ruling to go into effect before November could cause "a perfect storm" of legal chaos.

A similar request for a stay was filed last week by the Proposition 22 Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Look, folks, get real. The economy is in the turlet. We need a way to generate some moolah. What better than big ol' gay weddings all over the place. Imagine the money flowing in. Venue rentals. Florists. Licenses. Catering. Wedding garb. Printed invitations. Stamps, fer cryin' out. Balloons, streamers, confetti, shoes, clothes, horses and carriages, limousines, hotel rooms, plane reservations, photographers, video producers, champagne, wine, receptions. Lots of people buying new clothes or getting existing outfits cleaned so they can zip off to some friend's or loved one's fancy-assed wedding. Parties everywhere. Happy people. Smiles on many faces. And, this being a city with precious little parking, lotsa lotsa parking fines. How can you argue with money?

So feck off, you pathetic moralists, you rainers upon parades. Let the people of every stripe of the rainbow have their jollies. You don't like it? Don't marry a gay person. Meanwhile? Shut the fuck up and go find something pleasant to do with your time.

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World: Our Ally Pakistan

So the last we heard Osama bin Laden was hiding out somewhere between Pakistan and Afghanistan, and Pakistan has done a pretty crappy job of trying to find him. Fact is, they've done almost as badly as we.

Then we sent Benazir Bhutto back there with the idea that she could clean up the place and make it kinda sorta look like a pretend democracy, but our good buddy Musharraf just got her killed instead.

Then he told us that some "tribal" folks actually took her out and he had proof, but the proof turned out to be not very convincing.

Now, A.Q. Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program is dropping his own bombshell. Turns out, Musharraf &mdash our good buddy, our pal, our all-out friend Pervy &mdash pressured Dr. Khan into lying about who gave nuclear weapons technology to our good friends &mdash no, waitaminnit, to our Axis of Eevul enemies, Iran, North Korea, and Libya.

It was Pakistan, says ABC. Based on what Dr. Khan is saying, the Pakistani government of Pervez Musharraf asked Dr. Khan to confess to having sold nuclear technology to these rogue states, saying it would get the U.S. off their backs if Dr. Khan would confess.

Well. We know the U.S. government has lied repeatedly to everyone. We know the Pakistani government has lied repeatedly to everyone. And we know that Dr. A.Q. Khan has lied at least once to everyone. The question now is, which of these liars should we believe?

A pertinent snippet:

After his 2004 confession, Pakistani President Musharraf refused to allow U.S. or international experts to question Khan.

"It's none of their bloody business," said Khan, who insisted he would never discuss his past activities with any U.S. investigators.

At least this makes sense now. Why would Musharraf want U.S. or international investigators to have access to Khan, who might just retract his confession? So why is Khan retracting his confession now? Is it because he has prostate cancer and may soon be dead anyway? Is it because Musharraf is now a "toothless tiger"?

Heckuva job, Bushies. Another mess for the new President to clean up. What a bunch of incompetents and fools.

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Best Lines

Heard around teh InnerTubes (thanks, Ted Stevens!):

TiffanyBannedHussein: Has anyone heard if the gas tax holiday was still a go? Neither Hillary nor McCain have spoken about it for weeks.

I am starting to think it was just a gimmick.

New Marcospinelli:

LOL!

If I had a blog, that would go under "Best Lines Heard Around The Nets".

Thank you, TiffanyBannedHussein and New Marcospinelli, and, of course, The Huffington Post.

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Politics: Last One Out

of the White House, please turn off the lights.

Gee Dumbya can just sit in the dark and cry.

Didja think it was gonna be this bad? We sure didn't. It appears the rats Stupie McChimperson surrounded himself with based on "loyalty" instead of competence, are demonstrating the depth of their loyalty. About an inch wide and an inch deep, we reckon.

The WahPoo has termed it an "Exodus of Senior Officials." The rats are running for the exits, and they don't care if they have to leave claw marks on Georgie, Dick, and any other minions Left Behind. Some choice quotes:

With eight months left in President Bush's term, scores of senior officials already are heading for the exits, leaving nearly half the administration's top political positions vacant or filled by temporary appointees, federal statistics show.

[...]

Scandal has thinned the administration's ranks, as well. Dozens of appointee jobs have become vacant since ethical crises at the General Services Administration, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Justice Department, to name a few.

[...]

Leonard E. Burman, a public finance expert at the Urban Institute who served as deputy assistant secretary for tax analysis in the Clinton administration, said unfilled positions do not go unnoticed.

"It's probably important for the morale of the staff, because if there are no replacements for senior-level positions and none in the wings, then it suggests that they are kind of irrelevant," Burman said. "It does kind of signal that the work of that office is kind of shutting down."

Something tells me the blowout party that will be held in January 2009 will be quite the sight to see.

In other, related news, Snotty McFelon, former Bushoid press secretary, has published a "kiss and tell" book with more telling than kissing. He's trashing the entire Bush Misadministration, who are unsurprisingly unhappy about it. Pasty maggot Karl Rove weighed in with this money shot:

Former top Bush advisors Karl Rove and Fran Townsend have disputed McClellan's claims. Rove accused McClellan of sounding like a "left-wing blogger."

True dat. It's just not vituperative enough to sound like a "right-wing blogger."

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2008 Elections: John McCain's VP Pick

Looks like Gramps McCain got out of his rocker long enough to host a roast. He claims it was just hangin' wit his homies. We doubt, we doubt.

Who was on the invite list?

• Bobby Jindal, newly elected Governor of Louisiana.
  
  Mr. Jindal, who converted from Hinduism to Catholicism, is a creepy, repugnant little jerk who would like to keep an eye (or more) on every uterus in the country. Fortunately, his counsel's involvement with one Jimmy Faircloth, who is tied to the Coushatta tribes scandal and uber-creep Jack Abramoff may dampen our fears of this forced-birther gaining power. Pluses: Appeals to the growing power of teh "brown". Minuses: Are you effin' kidding me?
  
  
• Charlie Crist, Governor of Florida.
  
  Petulant homophobe and deeply closeted schlockmeister whose primary talent appears to be that perennial Republican quality of gladhanding the hoi polloi while spouting out of both sides of his pencil neck, Crist has a "dubious" at best sexuality. Of course, in our book he's free to do whatever he likes sexually as long as it involves consenting adults (animals can't consent). What he's not free to do is pander pathetically, cover up Mark Foley's inappropriate actions with underage pages:
  
  
  
  and have his thug buddies release "sex tapes" of him making out with his "girlfriend" in an elevator. Jeez. Are you kidding me? She looks drugged and he's clearly looking at something other than her.
  
  
  Incidentally, Charlie's beard, uh, girlfriend, is married &mdash only, not to him.
  
  Pluses: Looks like a movie star. Minuses: From the Old Movie Stars Retirement Home.
  
  
• Dog-torturer Willard "Mittens" Romney.
  
  Given this pathetic slimeball's inability to connect with any voters with the sole exception, of course, of his fellow Mormons, and the overweening dislike John McCain has for him, we're betting all Mitt's money won't buy him the VP spot.
  
  Pluses: Could probably fund the entire race from his pocket change. Minuses: Americans tend to like dogs and dislike people who torture them; also, he's a Mormon; his wife spends millions on her hobby &mdash dressage &mdash which probly won't go down so well with the growing financially-strapped sector; his whole family suffers from the tendency to look Stepford-Wifeish creepy; the Mormons have been involved in some truly unwholesome scandals lately.

In other news, McCain served up some 1,173 pages of medical records (finally!) to a handpicked cadre of reporters and gave them a mere 3 hours to thumb through them. No copies, no psychiatric records. Cliff Schecter reveals that McCain had a cancer surgery this February. This is a man who's had FOUR previous oncological surgeries. Did it occur to him that he owes it to the people who might vote for him to keep them informed about his apparently precarious health?


Oh, and recent pictures of him look as if he's wearing a colostomy bag. We know you had some precancerous polyps removed recently, John. Did the surgeon take anything else?

Update: Updated with picture. What IS that on his leg?

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Oil, oy! No, no ... there's hope ...

Folks, if you want a hit of hope in your rundown weary system, please get acquainted with Amory Lovins.

"What we thought of as isolated pathologies, scarcities of work or hope or security or satisfaction, are not isolated at all, in fact they're intimately related, they're all caused by the same thing, namely the interlocking waste of resources, of money, and of people." -- Amory Lovins

Fascinating interview with Lovins and Charlie Rose.

And, of course, you can read about him at Wikipedia.

Amory Lovins is the founder and CEO of The Rocky Mountain Institute abundance by design. And there’s lots of great info at their website.

Some excerpts from the website ...

Renewable energy is attracting Wall Street but nuclear power isn't. Why? Simple economics, writes RMI cofounder and chief scientist Amory Lovins in Newsweek.

***

"The unreliability of renewable energy is a myth, while the unreliability of nuclear energy is real. Of all U.S. nuclear plants built, 21 percent were abandoned as lemons; 27 percent have failed at least once for a year or more. Even successful reactors must close for refueling every 17 months for 39 days. And when shut by grid failure, they can't quickly restart. Wind farms don't do that," writes Lovins.

***

Once regarded as being too expensive to construct, a study has found sustainable "green"-rated buildings can actually deliver property developers and investors a higher financial return than more traditional non-green alternatives.

***

Amory Lovins also has a book you can read: Winning the Oil Endgame. The Rocky Mountain Institute describes the book as a detailed roadmap for getting the United States completely off oil by the 2040s, without needing new taxes, subsidies, mandates, or federal laws.

Disclaimer: Ms Manitoba has never even met the guy. Just heard him tonight on the radio during the drive home from work ... and was fascinated.

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Politics: Jesse Ventura Speaks On Gay Marriage

Initially, we disliked Jesse Ventura, but after his comment on religion, we came to respect him for his sheer guts in uttering this statement:

"Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers. It tells people to go out and stick their noses in other people's business."

At the height of the religious godbaggery that has infested this nation's politics, it was a courageous thing to do.

And Ventura recently proved yet again that he has no problem stating what he believes.

Love is bigger than government.

"Who the hell are we as a government to tell people who you can fall in love with? I think it's absurd, the fact that it's even being debated."

Ventura proposes a separation of church and state, with across-the-board civil unions at government level, leaving the church as part of the private sector free to sanction marriages.

[...]

"[...] you can't put a civil rights issue on the general ballot in a state and let people vote on it, because if you do that, in the southern states before, you can bet they would have voted to continued slavery."

It's not going to win him lots of friends and admirers, except among the LGBTQ community. But he's right. Many queer folk want the rights that straight folk get when they marry. Some of them also want religious sanction for their union.

Let those who want rights have them. As for those who want rites, that's between them and their religious faction. They'd be better off not letting the godbags take control of their lives, but they're entitled to fight that battle. What they're not entitled to do is insist that the rest of us fight their battle with them.

Just give us our power of attorney, inheritance rights, property rights, tax money, and all that good stuff. Y'all can have the fluff.

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2008 Elections: Say It Isn't So!

Image from the inimitable Maru

Or rather, say it is.

The Phoenix Business Journal is reporting that a joint Gee Dumbya-John McInsane fundraiser at the Phoenix Convention Center had to be canceled due to poor ticket sales and concerns that more anti-war protestors would show up than attendees.

Bush's Arizona fundraising effort for McCain is being moved to private residences in the Phoenix area. A White House official said the event was being moved because the McCain campaign prefers private fundraisers and it is Bush administration policy to have events in public venues open to the media. The White House official said to reconcile that the Tuesday event will be held at a private venue and not the Convention Center.

AH-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA! Oh, please, please, we laughed so hard it hurts. Just think, five years ago the swaggering Chimpy McDoofus "landed" a plane on an aircraft carrier bearing a banner with the words "Mission Accomplished," and those of us who scoffed at it were all but accused of treason.

Today those same people who threatened to tear us limb from limb for finding that despicable little man despicable can't be bothered to cough up a grand or ten to listen to Chimpy hold forth. Not even when the proceeds will benefit the very needy "Republican organs" or the crabby old man who is their current nominee for Pretzeldunce.

Sweet!

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Entertainment: Lucy Makes A LOL

LOLucy

Lucy from 922Cats decided to LOL herself this morning. So we felt obliged to supply a caption. Whatchu t'ink? Feel free to recaption Lucy and add a link to your blog in the comments!

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Politics: Oh Pleez Oh Pleez Oh Pleez Oh Pleez Oh Yes!

Is there a Deity? Does it hear the pleas of its creation? There's a good case to be made for the existence of a Deity that doth listen to the many prayers for good.

The Chicago Trib announced today that ambulatory scumball and professional sleazebucket impersonator KKKarl Rove has been subpoenaed to testify before the House Judiciary Committee about whether the White House improperly meddled with the Justice Department.

He will testify on 10 July about the illegal firings of U.S. attorneys and the dirty tricks involved in the prosecution of ex-Governor Don Siegelman. Rep. Conyers (D-Michigan) issued a statement that is admirably snarky in tone without departing from the professional standards that we expect of our legislators:

"It is unfortunate that Mr. Rove has failed to cooperate with our requests," Conyers, D-Mich., said in a statement. "Although he does not seem the least bit hesitant to discuss these very issues weekly on cable television and in the print news media, Mr. Rove and his attorney have apparently concluded that a public hearing room would not be appropriate."

We congratulate Michiganders for having the good sense to elect Rep. Conyers and to repeat the proof of their intelligence and discrimination as needed. We beg that portion of the electorate responsible for such abominations as Mitch McConnell (KYnYouPeopleQuitAwreddy), John Boner (R-OhGodNotAgain), John Cornyn (R-TXCutsForTehRich), Lindsay Graham (R-SCuzzball), and their ilk, to follow the example of Michiganders and Do The Right Thing. C'mon, there's gotta be way better candidates in each of your states to replace these pathetic lying weaseling proto-skunks. C'mon!

We are off to put our underroos on our heads and caper about singing "Oh, Frabjous Day! Callooh, Callay," and other such entertainments as reflect our overwhelming joy and delight in these developments.

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Politics: The "No-Knock" Warrant Redux

Kathryn Johnston

Back in April of last year, we pointed out that "no-knock" warrants, which take us one step closer to a police state, are an abomination that should be abolished.

Today, we are somewhat pleased to report that one of the Keystone Kops who took part in the ridiculous botched "drug raid" that killed 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston in her own home, has been sentenced to four and a half years in prison. From Raw Story:

Police originally said they had gone to the woman's house after an informant bought drugs there. After searching the home and finding no drugs, the officers tried to cover up the mistake, planting three baggies of marijuana, prosecutors said.

Tesler was convicted of making false statements, but was acquitted of two more serious charges, violating his oath of office and of false imprisonment under color of legal process.

[...]

Two others, Jason R. Smith and Gregg Junnier, have pleaded guilty to state manslaughter and federal civil rights charges. They have been helping investigators in other cases unrelated to Johnston's death and have not yet been sentenced. Federal prosecutors are recommending 10 years and one month in prison for Junnier and 12 years and seven months for Smith.

This shouldn't have to happen. Drug offenses are relatively minor, especially the possession, sale, use, and distribution of marijuana. Such acts hurt nobody except maybe inasmuch as they give rise to petty property crimes.

Personally, we'd rather see our tax dollars implement better training for police officers, greater community outreach, updated police labs for better forensic evidentiary procedures, more foot patrols, and programs that allow police officers to assist communities in identifying dangerous repeat offenders like serial rapists and perpetrators of violent crimes against the person. Theft sucks, getting ripped off by druggies sucks, but putting those miscreants in jail just teaches them better ways to steal and rob and not get caught the next time, and it takes away needed prison room for the psychopathic and sociopathic offenders who know how to work the system and truly fuck with the masses.

Enough already. No-knock warrants are symptomatic of the creeping (and the emphasis is on "creep") fascism that has been infecting the body of the nation for the past eight years. Time to cut out that cancer.

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Natural Disasters: China Update

The latest information on the earthquake that devastated Sichuan province in China is available here.

The Chinese government has cut its national budget in several areas to ensure that victims of the earthquake will have the aid they need to reconstruct their homes and lives. Currently, they have set aside $13 billion in funds for that purpose.

They are also appealing to the world for tents and other temporary housing assistance to shelter the 5.2 million survivors of the earthquake.

The housing ministry Thursday ordered the construction of one million small homes by August 10 made of light steel, plywood and other materials that are both safe in earthquakes and "recyclable." The houses are supposed to last up to five years.

Well, mud in your eye, America. We still haven't rehoused those displaced by Hurricane Katrina. NOLA's survivors wander the nation, displaced, three years later, often unable to meet voter ID requirements because their records disappeared in that terrible event.

And "recyclable," too. What has happened to this great nation? How far have we fallen that China, until very recently an extremely poor nation with nowhere near our educational levels, our healthcare, our robust economy, our military might, our first-rate infrastructure, can take care of a whole devastated province better and faster than we can take care of one city?

Heckuva job, Georgie. The Chinese government is also taking steps to assist the displaced and traumatized population in many different ways, at every level:

At a sports stadium in Mianyang where thousands of homeless are living, more than 1,000 children attended classes in hastily erected tents, reflecting government efforts to restore some semblance of normality.

"Many of the children don't know each other but that's OK. Kids of that age make friends really fast," said geography teacher Chen Qian, 27, as the children stood up to sing the national anthem together.

The health ministry said it had started sending thousands of the most seriously injured people by trains and planes to other parts of China from the overwhelmed hospitals in Sichuan.

Authorities also sent out the first team specialised in treating disabilities, which are expected to afflict many of the 288,431 injured people.

In a bid to cheer up survivors, organisers announced that they would bring the Beijing Olympic torch through Sichuan from August 3 to 5, making it the final stop before the Games open on August 8.

Wow. You think maybe the Chinese government cares for its people? You think maybe Kanye West was right, when he said George Bush doesn't give a damn about Black people?

For a list of organizations to which you can donate, click here.

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A Good Sex Life

Sex is a very important part of an adult's life, don't you think? Intimacy, closeness, love, affection, warmth, appreciation, those things are all important too. But there's something about fucking someone else, preferably someone you love but in a pinch, anyone who wants to make like a bunny with you, that really gets the old happy juices (and other juices) flowing.

And if you've had the pleasure of getting it on with someone, maybe a partner, maybe a spouse, maybe just a Friend With Benefits, it's hard to accept that that part of your life may not exist any more. Or may be changed forever.

What about injured veterans? Raw Story carries an interesting article today about badly-injured veterans and their sex lives.

You (hell, all of us, except the vets) probably never thought about what injuries might do to a body's sex life. Because, let's face it, most of us go through life not expecting to get so severely injured that we can no longer get it on with our sweet patootie. Right? Who walks around thinking, "Hell, wonder what I'll do if I lose my leg/arm/half my face?" Nobody, that's who. Nobody in their right mind, anyway.

Of all the grievous harms that have come to the people who signed up thinking they would be defending their country, thanks to the lies of a small group of wealthy, powerful, manipulative motherfuckers, this has to be the worst. And you don't even have to lose an arm or a leg to be affected. You could be one of the 600,000 or so vets suffering from TBI (traumatic brain injury) or PTSD, and still find that your sex life might be fucked (so to speak) for a long time.

Psychological and neurological disorders can interfere with behaviors necessary for successful intimacy, such as experiencing and expressing emotion and understanding someone else's needs, the study noted. And anger and aggression, including domestic violence, have been associated with mental disorders.

According to the Veterans Affairs Department's National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, sexual dysfunction tends to be higher in combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder than in those without.

How do we evaluate that kind of stress and pain and suffering and loss? All we can say is, if our sex life got put on hold for reasons not within our control, we'd be one crabby motherfucker, and wherever we lived, they'd better have some damn good gun control laws.


Meanwhile, in other news, that miserable draft-dodging "I had other priorities" POS chickenshit chickenhawk Dick "They call me Dick for a reason" Cheney had the gall to tell Coast Guard graduates today, about the war into which he and his millionaire buddies dragged us:

"The war on terror is a lengthy enterprise, but it does not have to go on forever [,..]".

[...]

"More than that, quitting would be an act of betrayal and dishonor. And it's not going to happen on our watch."

Do these fuckwits have even the first notion of shame?

Crossposted over at Out of Iraq Bloggers Caucus

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Misogyny: Sometimes, Those Goddamned Women

are just bitches, you know, and it's OK to call them that.

All those Hillary Clinton supporters who are planning to vote for McCain now that Obama has made it mathematically impossible for Clinton to win the nomination? Hope you don't mind that your new candidate and his spokesweasels believe in calling a bitch a bitch. Because GOP consultant Alex Castellanos believes in calling women exactly what they are (in his puny little single-brain-celled mind).

When will you people learn that, to Republicans, it is an acceptable part of the national discourse to denigrate women like this? To date, no declared Democrat has ever thought of referring to women as "bitches." For all its sexism, the Democratic Party has lots of women in its ranks, many of them at the very top.

How many high-ranking women in the Republic Party?



If you think Mr. Castellanos is unacceptly derogatory towards women, please let CNN know that you don't appreciate his sexism. Let him go flap his gums on GOP-supported fora. We don't need him on the public, taxpayer-supported airwaves.

What a schmuck.

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2008 Elections: A Quote To Live By

Barack Obama says:

"Change is an energy policy that doesn't rely on buddying up to the Saudi Royal Family and then begging them for oil "

How many times have we said that?

Enough with the jawboning! On to the next round.

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2008 Elections: Who ARE These People, Anyway?

As the Democratic nomination contest drags on endlessly, we find several troubling events on the horizon. For example, a group named Women's Voices Women Vote has been engaging in dubious shenanigans that apparently seem designed to disenfranchise Black American voters in the southern states. The group claims that the misleading robocalls they made were part of an effort to register women voters. Read for yourself and see what you think.

Meanwhile, another "women's" group, the WomenCount PAC recently ran a large, expensive ad in USA Toady titled Not So Fast. See for yourself:

Click to embiggen

Pretty cheeky, eh? We understand about the revolting levels of sexism that have surfaced thanks to Senator Clinton's campaign. Every sexist pig that ever lived, breathed, or crawled felt obliged to comment on the Senator's clothes, hair, laugh, tits, totally irrelevant shit.

But, guess what? Hillary Clinton does NOT speak for all of us. She probably doesn't even speak for half of us. All the women we know support Barack Obama. Now, you may say, "Well, PCat, that's obviously a self-selecting group, after all, as an Obama supporter, clearly you choose to hang out with other Obama supporters." To which we say, "Balderdash." We continued to support Clinton long after our friends, male and female, independent, Democratic, and Republican, had come out for Obama.

It caused a few strained relationships, initially. But as more and more of our friends &mdash even the staunch Republican "never voted for a Democrat in my life, and never will" types switched to the Obama camp, we were finally forced to read the guy's books and Web site and reconsider our support for Clinton.

We inched into that camp toenail by toenail, until La Clinton gave us a huge kick in the tush with her comments about educated "elitists," "working, hardworking white Americans," and the like.

Now we find all kinds of people popping up telling us that Clinton is the only voice that speaks for all women. We thought the whole idea behind the feminist movement was, women have their own fucking voices. They don't need anyone to speak for them. And they don't need to favour someone based only on their gender.

La Casa de Los Gatos declares unequivocally that La Clinton does not speak for us. Barack Obama speaks for us. Nothing could be further from our political positions and our personal preferences than La Clinton, with the exception, of course, of John McInsane.

Thanks to diarist RemarkablyChanel at DailyKos, we find that the WomenCount PAC is funded by Hillary Clinton's best bud, Suzie Tompkins Buell of San Francisco, former CEO of Esprit. Wikipedia includes this little tidbit about Tompkins Buell:

Esprit de Corp. was found by the National Labor Relations Board to have illegally interrogated and intimidated $2-an-hour Chinese workers, and then to have shut down a factory to keep them from unionizing.[9] The Department of Labor found that an Esprit contractor doctored payroll records and refused to pay overtime.[10]

Why would Hillary want to be best friends with such an exploiter of poor working women? How feminist is that?

We took great exception to the ad, and to Ms. Buell's new pet project for her friend Hillary. Should you care to tell these people just what you think of them, you can reach them at womencountpac@gmail.com.

The ad signs off with "We want Hillary to stay in this race until every vote is cast, every vote is counted, and we know that our voices are heard." Well, given how incompetently Hillary has run her campaign, y'all better be prepared to fork out more money to her if you want her to stay in. She's already over $20 million in debt. But more importantly, what is this "every vote is counted" business? It seems to imply that every vote in Michigan and Florida, the two states that have been punished for pushing their primaries up before the dates established by the Democratic Party, must be allocated to Hillary. Well, that just won't do, ladies.

When Hillary was winning, she said those states didn't count. She signed a pledge that the delegates from those states would not be seated. Apparently, her signature was only valid until she discovered she was losing.



We do not want a proven liar and promise breaker representing us. We've had one of those for nearly eight years, and look at the mess he created. Once you lie to us, once you break one promise you made, you've lost our trust. If you can tell one lie, you can tell 935. The last 935 lies told by Gee Dumbya and his cronies mired us in a civil war, killed 4,000 of our country's citizens (and more, and counting), and plunged our wealthy nation into a severe recession.

Do we really need more of that?

Any promises that Senator Clinton makes on the campaign trail cannot be trusted. If she breaks one promise, she can break another. She promised that Michigan and Florida would be punished by being stripped of 100% of their delegates if they moved their primary dates before a date set by the Democratic Party. They moved those dates, and the Party moved to punish them. At the time she said nothing.

Today because she's losing the contest, she wants those votes to count? What kind of rubbish is that?

If any of you are wondering why the Superdelegates don't move at once to end this ludicrous, long-drawn out campaign, it's because Mrs. Clinton indulges in these types of behaviours. She promises the moon to the supers, and many of these people have personal friendships with her and want to believe her, or are afraid to act against her because of her known predilection for retaliation.

Then she breaks her word, breaks her promise, brings in some of her personal friends like Suzie Tompkins Buell and Haim Saban, who are big money donors to the Democratic Party, and uses them against the party. She gets Ms. Buell to take out ads like this which will inflame the already troubled Clinton supporters who (rightly) believe that their candidate has been subjected to unacceptable levels of sexism. Instead of accepting that the battle is over and moving to force the Old Boys' Network to change its sexist ways, thus benefitting all women in the party, Clinton is working to ensure that she delegitimizes the current front-runner. She convinces her big-money pals to put the squeeze on Democratic Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.

We hold no brief for Pelosi, with whom we have our own slew of problems. But attempting to pressure party leaders by threatening them with money to force them to line up behind you is so unethical as to border on the illegal.

Sending out your wealthy friends to buy superdelegate votes for you is unethical. Senator Clinton, the voice of the people is the deciding factor in the nomination. Not the money your rich friends can throw around.

You really have no respect for the "little people," do you, Senator?

Today, Barack Obama's number of pledged delegates will reach over the 50 per cent point. That makes it mathematically impossible for you to win this contest. We know you won't listen to the voices asking you to step down now, so we won't waste our breath. But at this point, you're nearly 200 delegates (pledged and Super) behind, and there are fewer than 200 Superdelegates left to be allocated.

You won't win this. You won't even catch up. You're like a child who has eaten too much chocolate before bedtime, screaming and fighting and throwing tantrums. These are all excellent qualities in a litigator, Mrs. Clinton. They are not Presidential qualities. Here's hoping that 2012 is an even bigger bust for you than 2008 has been.

Instead of working on the fears of the women who support you, how about ensuring that women's voices really are heard? How about starting a foundation for women to ensure that more of them are elected to positions of power in the party? How about mentoring some of the wonderful young women who are working in the ranks of the Democratic Party, helping to shape their political careers?

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China Offers Special Postage Stamp

It's not being talked about in U.S. newspapers -- yet -- maybe they'll eventually print it. I heard on the BBC news on the radio last night: The Chinese government is printing a postage stamp commemorating the people who died in the earthquake. It will be offered for sale today. Proceeds will be donated to the people in Sichuan Province.

Why couldn't Bush et al come up with this after Hurricane Katrina? Why? Why? Why? Does a Communist government care more about their people than a democratic one? Oops, forgot the quotes ... I meant "democratic" one. (Remember, I believe they stole the election.)

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Osama bin Laden winning?

On my way home from work, I listened to the radio program, It's Your World, sponsored by The World Affairs Council. I only heard part of it. Their guest speaker was Mike Scheuer, former chief of the CIA's Osama bin Laden Unit. Chilling. I was skeptical about some of the things he said. However, this part I agree with: he said that we are losing the war on terrorism mightily. He said it's fine that we make jokes about Osama bin Laden ... but that it is crucially important that we also learn about him and respect him -- so that we can defeat him. Right now bin Laden is winning the war and he is a true leader. What have been bin Laden's goals? Scheuer describes them:
-- To bleed us financially to weaken our economy.
-- To make us spread our military too thin so that basically we don't win anywhere.
-- To cause disunity inside our country. A disturbing dangerous disunity.
Check.
Check.
Check.
All three.
Okay ... the tanker is headed for the bridge. We need a leader who can really turn this thing around.

And, as I've said before, Bush and his cronies are smirking all the way to the bank.

Postscript: Wikipedia has a very interesting article about Michael Scheuer. One of the interesting things he talks about is all the chances the CIA had of assassinating bin Laden during Bill Clinton's presidency -- but Clinton did not want him killed. We have no idea the reasons of course. But it's interesting to think about.

Post-postscript: Michael Scheuer received a Ph.D. in British Empire-U.S.-Canada-U.K. relations from the University of Manitoba. As Ms. Manitoba, I must point this out.

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2008 Elections: The Bad

Connie Schultz, who writes for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, recently put up this article.

Men shouldn’t be telling Hilary Clinton to quit the race
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Connie Schultz
Plain Dealer Columnist

Someone tell me, please, how grown men in 2008 can believe it’s their right - their duty, even - to tell a woman when she should rein in her ambition and go home.

Male columnists, male politicians, male talking heads, male “surrogates” - all of them harrumphing that it’s time for Hillary Clinton to stop it, just stop it, with all this talk of being president.

Who cares if the race is close? So what if millions of Americans believe their yet-to-be-cast votes matter? Voters, schmoters. When was this ever about them?

Hillary Clinton, they insist, must quit.

Well, boys, you’d better sit down for this one: This is no longer the playground of your youth. The girls aren’t sitting in the stands keeping score and cheering whenever you’re at bat. In fact, the girls aren’t girls at all anymore. We’re all grown up, and we are so done with this notion that the trajectory of our lives must end at the border of your comfort zone.

Hillary Clinton marched across that border miles ago, and she is not about to surrender. Not now, anyway, and not ever because you said so. And if you’ve got anything besides hubris knocking around in those heads of yours, you will take note of the potential backfire in your volley.

“OK, now I’m mad,” a friend, Karen, told me last week. “Who do they think they are?”

She supports Barack Obama, but the thought of finger-wagging men telling a woman what to do really set her off. She might change her vote, and anyone reading some of the comments on newspapers’ Web sites and blogs knows she’s not alone.

I’m thinkin’ that’s not where you fellas were going with this one. But I also think I can help.

The problem here is that you don’t understand the tenacity of American women.
It’s not all your fault. Your history books were full of tales of manly men beating each other up and then taking the livestock and womenfolk as prizes. Frankly, you were misled.

You didn’t learn about how women risked their lives birthing babies in open fields and harboring escaped slaves on their flight to freedom. You probably didn’t spend much time on how Alice Paul and her fellow suffragettes were tortured in prison because they dared to picket for the right to vote.

And chances are you’ve never cracked the spine of the book “Women’s Letters: America From the Revolutionary War to the Present” by Lisa Grunwald and Stephen J. Adler. If you had, you would have seen the letter Abigail Grant wrote to her husband, Aszariah, in 1776 after she found out he had been less than heroic in the battle at Bunker Hill.

“Loving Husband,” her note began. “I hear by Capt Wm Riley news that makes me very Sorry for he Says you proved a Grand Coward when the fight was at Bunkers hill & in your Surprise he reports that you threw away your Cartridges So as to escape going into the Battle. . . . [I]f you are afraid pray own the truth & come home & take care of our Children & I will be Glad to Come & take your place, & never will be Called a Coward, neither will I throw away one Cartridge but exert myself bravely in so good a Cause.”

See, that’s the thing. You’ve got to remember that there’s a bit of Abigail Grant in a whole lot of us women. Granted, we hide it well. Most women are all fervor and no fanfare, running everything from companies and campaigns to families and food drives without so much as a plaque with their names on it at the end of it all.

We’re full of fight, too, which is the only way we got the vote, the pill and the right to own property, as opposed to being property. We don’t beat our breasts and brag about this, though, which appears to be part of the problem. Some men apparently still confuse humility with acquiescence, and then they think we need their permission to make a difference.

One mile at a time, Hillary Clinton is clearing a new road, taking hits for the rest of us along the way.

“It feels so personal,” another friend, Mary, told me. “Whenever I hear men bash Hillary, it feels like they’re attacking me.”

See, guys, that’s not good.

Remember: Abigail Grant lives.

We here at La Casa de Los Gatos have never felt this nomination battle was about men telling Hillary Clinton to quit the race. There are plenty of women doing the same.

A lot of nasty misogyny has been directed at Clinton, and there's no excuse for that. It made us support her for longer than most of our friends. We felt it was not OK to reward the anti-feminist and misogynist contingent of the electorate.

But, as we keep saying, we didn't "fall in love" with Obama. In fact, we steadfastly resisted finding out about him or gravitating towards him because he was an unknown, young, new on the scene, and didn't have anything like the vaunted Clinton machine at his command. We were certain he would be crushed outright. Clinton, herself, drove us away. Again and again, she made comments that showed us she outright despised and disparaged us. She permitted her surrogates and allies to disparage, mock, and publicly abuse us. Even as she sent us daily emails requesting our money.

We understand that a lot of women continue to support her, and we empathize with them. We, too, had hoped to see the first female President take office in our lifetime. But given her campaign, we have been forced to conclude that she is not the right candidate. History has seen many powerful female leaders. The Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi comes to mind, as does Eva Peron, Jiang Qing, Indira Gandhi, Golda Meir, Margaret Thatcher, Cory Aquino. None of those women would be our first choice for President, although all of them were capable (capable of what, we'd prefer not to say). We'd rather have an Aung San Suu Kyi, or a Galyani Vadhana or a Shirin Fozdar for a leader &mdash a woman of peace, committed to feminist issues and improving the lives of the poor.

Clinton is not a woman in that mold. The race is over, Obama won, and for Clinton to continue campaigning is just damaging her own legacy, what's left of it. Or so we wrote and told Ms. Schultz.

Regarding your article on men telling Hillary Clinton to quit

You seem to be overlooking the fact that a great many women are ALSO telling her to quit.

Birthing babies is something any animal can do. It doesn't confer any judgment, discretion, wisdom, or intelligence on the birther. The fact of the matter is, Clinton is not a feminist. She is using feminist women to garner votes for herself, but had no compunctions about viciously attacking the women her husband slept with. Is it their fault that her husband couldn't keep his pants zipped?

She's taken money from domestic abuser Chris Albrecht of HBO. A few minutes' research would have told you that Chris Albrecht was arrested for beating his girlfriend in public. I would have thought a feminist would have returned his money immediately.

She touts her husband's experience as her own. "35 years," she says. A good 16 of those years were spent as First Lady of the elected president, or on the corporate board of Directors of WalMart, an organization that has done a great deal of woman-oppressing, not to mention worker-oppressing and union-busting.

But the real issue is that Clinton, for all that she is tough and tenacious, is a deeply flawed candidate. Instead of working with fellow Democrats to pass promised health care legislation while she was First Lady, she set up a war room to crush alternative views of health care, thereby ensuring that we sit here over a decade later with worse health care than before she made her efforts. Her casual remark about "obliterating" a nation of 70 million innocent people deeply disgusts those of us who are not bloodthirsty warmongers. Her comment about having the support of "working, hardworking, white Americans" could not possibly have endeared her to Black Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanic Americans. She has a tin ear.

As a loyal supporter of hers for two decades, I fully expected her to take the nomination. She proved, through her dreadful campaign, that she lacks the organizational skills and temperament to be President. Starting with the largest war chest of all the delegates, the best name recognition, and 200 superdelegates in her pocket, she limps to the finish line over $20 million in debt, with her donors tapped out financially, with fewer states, fewer popular votes, fewer pledged delegates, and fewer superdelegates. How am I to trust her with the keys to the treasury? She was beaten by a nobody!

It is very disingenuous of you to make this nomination battle out to be one between men and women, or feminists and nonfeminists. This is a battle for the future of a rapidly sinking nation. You owe it to your readers to frame the issues honestly.

Thank you.

Should you care to write Ms. Schultz, you can reach her at cschultz@plaind.com.

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LGBTQ: The Good News

George Takei with partner Brad Altman

George Takei, who played Sulu in the original Star Trek series, is now free to marry his longtime partner under the laws of the State of California. Per the New York Post, we find:

Over the weekend, Takei announced on his Web site that he and long-time partner Brad Altman will get married this summer.

"Our California dream is reality," he wrote. "At long last, the barrier to full marriage rights for same-sex couples has been torn down."

This makes us so happy! The only downside to this is that our dear friend Jeyhan passed away before this stupid DOMA-type law was struck down. If he were still alive, he would be married to the partner that he had loved and lived with for over 30 years.

Tell you what heterosexual marriage needs to be defended from: idiots who get married by Elvis impersonators in Las Vegas, pop out kids like salad shooters, beat the crap out of each other and their children who were never consulted on whether they wanted to be born, and then fill the divorce courts and take up everyone's time and energy figuring out which of these selfish swine should have custody of their suffering sprog, while we medicate the poor sprog into a stupor to control their destructive (learned) behaviour.

Bigoted hets who get their pantalones in a wad about people in long-term loving relationships need to just get over their pathetic fucking selves. You're being manipulated by the Religious Reich, who will promise you the moon and give you buffalo chips. Just look at the last batch of rightwing fundie nutcases who took power. Didn't they promise you "faith-based" doodah? What didja get out of it? A bunch of taxpayer dollars, read YOUR goddamned tax dollars, got siphoned off to dubious projects which taught your kids about abstinence even as they were pledging purity with silly rings and getting pranged on a daily basis. Whoop-de-doodah. Was that worth it?

While you were busy praying, they were busy preying. They shipped your jobs overseas, destroyed your pension funds, told you to pay more for less healthcare, sent your kids to two foreign wars to get shot up without adequate protection, and left you with pregnant kids and grandkids to look after. Then they cut your pay (just like American Axle is doing) even though the company made "record profits." Meanwhile, your 401(k) nose-dived because the greedy goddamned corporations couldn't resist the urge to offer you scam packages designed to eat up the equity in your home. And you fell for it, hook, line, and sinker and pulled out that money to finance your knee surgery or that new Humvee, or a wedding in fucking Tahiti, like you really needed those last two.

Now your home is worth less than you paid for it, and the credit card companies have raised the interest rates to 29 and 39 per cent, and if you pay the minimum, you'll be in debt until after your kids are buried. And your son is coming home from Iraq with one leg missing but the VA refuses him disability payments, and your daughter can't get a job except at the Wal-Mart, which means no healthcare or benefits, and you have to help raise your grandchildren.

And all you can worry about is two people of the same gender might, deity forbid, love each other and get married and raise a family? Get real.

In other good news, Ellen de Generes plans to marry her girlfriend Portia de Rossi.

Chew on that, bigots. As for you pinheads who plan to make gay marriage a divisive issue for the general election this year, may the deities you worship cause your reproductive bits to fall off, or out, and leave you all busy looking for them for reattachment purposes right about that time. It would serve you right.



George's response to Tim Hardaway's homophobia is NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!! So watch it at home.

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A Sacred Conversation on Race

The Rev. John Thomas, head of the United Church of Christ, greets members of the Danville congregation after his sermon. Photo by Kimberly White, special to the Chronicle

There is a wonderful article about a congregation in Danville, California - a United Church of Christ congregation -- same denomination as the one lead by Rev. Jeremiah Wright -- the article is in today's online version of the San Francisco Chronicle. (Note: You may need to register with sfgate.com to read it. But, you do not have to pay a fee. It's free.)

The leader of the national United Church of Christ denomination, the Rev. John Thomas, spoke in Danville yesterday and urged congregants to have a national conversation on race.

Here is an excerpt from the article written by Matthai Kuruvila.

"The ugliness we watched on television as media manipulators tried to scare us from voting for an African American candidate by presenting a deliberately frightening caricature of his African American pastor reminded us of how ugly the conversation on race can be," said Thomas, president and general minister of the United Church of Christ.

Thomas' sermon was followed by the first in what is expected to be a series of discussions about race at the 320-member Danville Congregational Church, one of many United Church of Christ churches participating in the effort. Hymns and prayers during the service touched on themes of reconciliation and fellowship with neighbors of all kinds, with an emphasis on race. The service included a collective prayer about the issue.

"Gracious God, as we gather here this day, we are deeply aware of the sin of racial hatred and prejudice that distorts your divine plan for human life," the congregation said in unison. "You created us in divine likeness, diverse and beautiful, but too often, we have failed to see every race and every person as a reflection of your image."

Now this is what Love Thy Neighbor is all about.

And maybe it's time that Christians (and others) got together to have a national conversation about the bigotry directed at lesbians, gay men, bisexual men and women, transgender people ... and my all-time favorite group ... Questioning. A lifetime of questions, deeply explored: what's not to like?

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2008 Elections: Paranoia Sets In

Yaknow, the Republicans, for the past couple of decades, have shown that they march in lockstep to promote the interests of a small core of wealthy, greedy elite.

Note to "low-information" people: The real elite are the CEOs pulling down salaries of $10m and up per year, with personal fortunes in the hundred millions and billions. Yaknow, people like, oh, Cindy McCain, Dick Cheney, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Ken Lay, the Bush family.

We've seen them pander to the Religious Right to pull poor and working-class voters to the polls to vote against their own interest and for the wealthy. We've seen them toss the Religious Right under the bus once they achieved their aim.

Let's face it, the Capital Gains tax benefits only those who have large amounts of capital. If all you have to leave to your kids is the house or the family farm or a couple of million in investments, you don't benefit from repealing the Capital Gains tax. But Cindy McCain benefits a hella lot. And your schools, parks, libraries, roads, bridges, military, hospitals, colleges, dams, levees, and other civil institutions suffer from lack of funding. Which, if your federal, state, and city governments want to keep providing services for you, must be funded somehow. So if Cindy McCain doesn't pay Capital Gains tax, the government cuts the budget for maintenance of, say, the federal highways. Or gives your city or state less money for your 'flu shots. Or your kid, who serves in the military, gets inferior equipment.

It's gotta come from somewhere, right?

So we all know the Republicans have always had this formidable machine, because the Treasury is full of taxpayer dollars and these wealthy, greedy scumballs want to keep siphoning it off. The Dubya years have been the worst illustration of that, as war profiteers and ruthless contractors won no-bid contracts by bribing their friends in the Republican Congress (think Jack Abramoff, Duke Cunningham, people like that). Well, the election's got everyone in a fever, and we're taking our eye off the ball again, people. We're looking at pathetic old John McCain and thinking, "No way in hell is that guy gonna win this thing. Shoot, some days he needs GPS just to find his ass with both hands, a flashlight, and ass-labelled arrows everywhere."

Could be, could be. But what will the immensely powerful and greedy wealthy people do to ensure that our tax dollars keep flowing towards their pockets? Well, one of the remaining candidates has been funded by corporate bigwigs from the charming girlfriend-beater Chris Albrecht (how feminist is that?) to Vinod Gupta, CEO of Info U.S.A. A look at the size of donations handed to Senator Clinton by these hard-headed businessmen tells us a lot right off the bat. People like them are not known for giving money to anybody without expecting something in return. If they done paid for the lady's ticket, she's gonna have to dance with 'em.


Then there's the Other Candidate. Brian told us yesterday that he found Barack Obama before we did. It's true. If not for Bri we'd probably be sitting around going Bar-who? Thanks, Bri.

So there's Barack Obama. He's in the home stretch now, heading for the victory. He has more popular votes than Senator Clinton, more pledged delegates, and more superdelegates. Today a crowd of 75,000 or more turned out to hear him speak in Oregon. He's not beholden to the powerful wealthy and greedy cabal. His fundraising has come from average yobs like us, who send a couple of hundred as they can afford it. 1.5 million small donors funded Obama's campaign.

He's the only candidate of the three in the running who is not owned by the cabal. And he needs every voter, and every vote. Obama and his campaign people have always been pretty respectful of the Clintons, despite Hillary's "kneecapping," "kitchen sink" strategy, and "nuclear strategy." And Obama has told his campaign folks and the world that he is reaching out to Clinton's supporters.

Clinton has displayed no such comity. She is still attempting to delegitimize Obama's success. But what really gets our paranoia chemicals going is, the cabal, with its dirty tricks, its Lee Atwaters and Karl Roves and droves of followers who don't recognize that they are being used and played and tossed aside when the party's over, is undoubtedly planning to use more dirty tricks to hold on to power.

Why not? It's served them well since Eisenhower warned us about the military-industrial complex.

So while bumbling around on the InnerTubes today, we found this:

IMPORTANT
This information is not to be posted to any of our usual forums and should be emailed only to people you know personally andcompletely trust.

Here is the updated game plan.

Step one: Register a bunch of user accounts on lefty blogs.

*Create false identities equally divided between Obama and Clinton supporters. Initially play it cool. Don't make more than two accounts per blog one for each candidate. Too many accounts from the same ip and you will be outed as a sock puppet. Dont do anything drastic that would get you banned. Lurk for a while
at first so you can learn how they talk. Liberals are like a different species. Dont start an all out flame war right away begin with small insults.

The idea is to poison the tone of discussion but do it so slowly that they dont realize where its coming from. You want the liberal sheep to get caught up in it and start doing our work for us.

Step three: As the Democ-rat nomination narrows in on a candidate crank up the heat. The loser ident should start calling for a voter boycott on the winner. You may not be able to peal off voters to our side but demotivating them so they stay home is almost as good.

SPREAD THE WARNING

Now, there are several sites (to which we won't link, but you probably know they exist) that claim to be peopled by supporters of Clinton. Most of them don't have many individual posters or commenters. We've been looking at them periodically, just because we're paranoid.

We've noticed a trend: One or two strong posters, more articulate than the rest, start by praising Clinton and downplaying Obama. That's to be expected. Everyone has a candidate they support and it's a bitter disappointment when one's chosen candidate doesn't win.

But these people then go on to suggest various ways in which the disaffected supporters can protest the nomination of the other candidate. And to no one's great surprise, all these different ways redound to the benefit of the Republicans.

Suggestions are made to shower superdelegates with email. Vicious attacks on Democrats and Democratic politicians, and even the small-d democratic process. The disaffected are urged to vote for McCain, harrass Obama supporters, flood their legislators with mail and calls, turn to Faux News for information and shun all other sources.

What do you think? Sounds pretty fishy to me.

So once again, we urge all our friends, Democrat and Republican alike, not to fall for this type of dirty politicking. Fight fair. Examine each candidate's policies. Don't be swayed by Faux Noise or dubious sources like WingNut Daily. Consider carefully what your own interests are and who best represents them. Don't consider not voting. Vote for Ron Paul or Dennis Kucinich or Nader or Barr or Clinton or Obama or McCain, but don't give up your hard-earned right to vote. Don't sit out this election. Your country stands at a crossroads. She needs every single individual to turn out and do something.

Don't consider violence or harrassment. Consider your favoured candidate and your alternative candidate, and vote. And consider this: the economy is in the pits. The dollar is in the pits. The climb out of those pits is going to be long and hard. Set aside your feelings, whatever they may be, and consider the fate of the nation, and your children, and your children's children. We cannot afford another war. We cannot even afford the two we're currently fighting.

Which candidate will give us peace, and help us rebuild the economy, and leave our nation a better place for all of us? We're not urging you to support any particular candidate. We are, however, speaking against John McCain because we do not think he has a grasp of the enormous issues facing us. We do not think, if he is elected, he has the temperament and the capacity to pull the entire nation out of the quagmire. Any of the other candidates would be preferable.

So choose carefully, and wisely, and well. Because your choice will affect not just you, your family, your friends. It will affect your entire nation, and the citizens of many other nations.

Stumble It!