The Vidiot's weekly blog:

What pissed me off this week? 8/1/2005

(updated every Monday at some point during the day)

...'cause I'm angry and my friends are sick of listening to me...

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Vacation is over. Boo-friggin'-hoo. I was just beginning to enjoy myself too.

Well, actually, I enjoyed myself pretty much the whole time, but that's a 'nuther story altogether.

I was a little out of touch, didn't follow the news too closely. Heard bits and pieces every now and again though.

The biggest thing I think is John Bolton's recess appointment to the UN post. My word! What an abuse of power. I didn't approve of it when Clinton did it and I sure as hell don't approve of it when Bush does it. For one thing, the recess appointment was never supposed to be used to do an end-run around Congress. It was supposed to be used in the event of an untimely death or dismissal of an important position holder so that he/she could be replaced quickly if need be. I don't think that's what happened here. Meanwhile, the guy has connections to the whole outing of the CIA agent thing! Also, Bush is stuffing the UN with republican thugs so that we can strong-arm the UN even more!

And what's with that SCOTUS nomination? Roberts? WTF? Gee, and they won't show his papers either. I wonder what Bush Family related skeletons are in his closet.

And CAFTA? Jeebus. Honestly, if Congress is unable to count their votes, why on earth would we think our elections are any better. We're so screwed.

Activism of the Week: Run for local office

but isn't this ruling sorta' unconstitutional?

Excerpt: The Mississippi Supreme Court ruled Thursday the state isn't obligated to help counties pay the legal tabs of the poor charged with crimes.

Specifically, Amendment VI.

Hrmph.

Any of your loved ones (or you?) shop at Wal-Mart? Well, friends don't let friends shop Wal-Mart. Use Costco instead.

Excerpt:But not everyone is happy with Costco's business strategy. Some Wall Street analysts assert that Mr. Sinegal is overly generous not only to Costco's customers but to its workers as well.

Generous to his employees! Heaven forbid! Can't have that!

What did Bush know and when did he know it?

Excerpt; Somehow - nobody knows at the moment - the information in this Top Secret-S/NF document (the identity of Joe Wilson's wife) then migrated from Air Force One to George W. Bush's assistant, Karl Rove, and Dick Cheney's assistant, Scooter Libby. Rove and Libby then immediately began "dialing for dollars" - calling reporters with this juicy bit of Top Secret-N/SF information - in an attempt to politically assassinate Joe Wilson. Which raises the question: "What did the President know, and when did he know it?"

It might all be earlier than we thought, making it way more likely that the leak came from within the administration and not from outside.

Excerpt; As the investigation tightens into the leak of the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, sources tell TIME some White House officials may have learned she was married to former ambassador Joseph Wilson weeks before his July 6, 2003, Op-Ed piece criticizing the Administration. That prospect increases the chances that White House official Karl Rove and others learned about Plame from within the Administration rather than from media contacts. Rove has told investigators he believes he learned of her directly or indirectly from reporters, according to his lawyer.

Let's not lose sight of what's important. Bush lied about the war. This whole Rove/Plame thing is all part of those lies. Stick to the message people.

Excerpt: The Downing Street memo shows, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that Bush and his cronies lied to start the war in Iraq. And rather than fess up, they continue to lie ... or try intimidation tactics.

Let me repeat that: Bush lied about the reasons for war.

Excerpt:In his lawsuit, he says his dismissal was punishment for his reports questioning the agency's assumptions on a series of weapons-related matters. Among other things, he charged that he had been the target of retaliation for his refusal to go along with the agency's intelligence conclusions.

Yet another right-wing talking point derailed.

Excerpt: Immigrants are not swamping the U.S. health care system and use it far less than native-born Americans, according to a study released on Monday.

Shhhh. Don't tell the monkeys.

Thomas Friedman is an asshole.

Excerpt; We also need to spotlight the "excuse makers," the former State Department spokesman James Rubin said. After every major terrorist incident, the excuse makers come out to tell us why imperialism, Zionism, colonialism or Iraq explains why the terrorists acted. These excuse makers are just one notch less despicable than the terrorists and also deserve to be exposed. When you live in an open society like London, where anyone with a grievance can publish an article, run for office or start a political movement, the notion that blowing up a busload of innocent civilians in response to Iraq is somehow "understandable" is outrageous. "It erases the distinction between legitimate dissent and terrorism," Mr. Rubin said, "and an open society needs to maintain a clear wall between them."

Holy shit, I guess I'm just one notch less despicable than a terrorist. Fannytastic. Good to know. I always thought that about me. I just needed Thomas Friedman to show me the fuckin' light.

As things go worse and worse for this administration, one can't help but think "what would a caged animal do?"

Excerpt: The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States.  The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. 

I mean, there are some nuclear-type terror drills happening in August.

Excerpt:The largest terrorism drill in North Carolina history is being planned for August and will include a mock attack on the Sunny Point Military Ocean Terminal in Brunswick County.

And we all know what happens when there are terror drills. Terror happens during terror drills.

Gee, the wars sure are costing us a lot.

Excerpt;The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have already cost taxpayers $314 billion, and the Congressional Budget Office projects additional expenses of perhaps $450 billion over the next 10 years.

I wonder where the money is going?

Excerpt: Halliburton announced on Friday that its KBR division, responsible for carrying out Pentagon contracts, experienced a 284 percent increase in operating profits during the second quarter of this year.

Oh.

Hey, remember that movie with Dennis Quaid? The one where global warming goes all nutso? "The day after tomorrow"? Well, funny thing...

Excerpt: Scientists engaged in climate-change research have found the first signs of the slowing of the Gulf Stream current which tempers the climate of Western Europe. The research was reported in the May 16th Sunday Times.

Maybe it has something to do with all the sad whale deaths.

Excerpt: The recent, unprecedented accidental deaths of eight North Atlantic right whales — at least six of which were female — have shaken the belief among experts that the endangered whales were almost on the road to recovery.

Also, and I've been saying this for a while now, heat is energy. Add heat, you get more energy. Hence, crazy ass hurricanes (And I'm not talking about those tawdry, sweet drinks from New Orleans.)

Excerpt:Is global warming making hurricanes more ferocious? New research suggests the answer is yes. Scientists call the findings both surprising and "alarming'' because they suggest global warming is influencing storms now -- rather than in the distant future.

Who was president in 1987?

Excerpt; Rene Welch cut “a deal with the devil,” a deal she recently broke when she went public about her two 1987 encounters with Saudi royals, including two of the bin Laden brothers who claimed the U.S. government was actively involved in pre-arranging 9/11.

The War on Terror morphs into Global Struggle Against the Enemies of Freedom... or WOT becomes GSATEF.

Excerpt: One White House official told the BBC the move did not mark a change of approach, but was intended to give a broader perspective to the "evolving nature" of the struggle.

Please make a note of it.

Oy.

Paranoia. Gotta' love it.

Excerpt: The above human translation supports earlier messages indicating the military is enforcing a mandatory quarantine in Qinhai province related to the H5N1 bird flu outbreak described in Nature and Science two weeks ago.  Additional information is being withheld by China.

Hey, maybe the virus was developed in that underground UFO base in China!

Excerpt: According to the few locals people on the Indian and Chinese side, this is where the UFOs are seen coming out of the ground, According to many, the UFO underground bases are in this region and both the Indian and Chinese Government know this very well.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki weren't dropped to end the war. They were dropped to start the cold war.

Excerpt: Causing a fission reaction in several kilograms of uranium and plutonium and killing over 200,000 people 60 years ago was done more to impress the Soviet Union than to cow Japan, they say. And the US President who took the decision, Harry Truman, was culpable, they add.

Wouldn't be the first or last time there was an unspoken agenda in a war.

Excerpt: "You know there was something else going on when that invasion took place. We had some target buildings we were given to destroy. The buildings weren't any type of military threat to us and we kind of looked around and each other and said 'What the hell is this all about?', but we followed orders and blew the buildings up. I really think that grabbing Noriega was a secondary reason for the invasion. There was something else going on."

For some reason, when I read this, I thought of a strange slow-motion action scene.

Excerpt: A team of scientists has discovered a tiny caterpillar in Hawaii that binds snails with silk webbing before devouring them whole.

Where there are farts, there must be life.

Excerpt: If life exists on Titan, Saturn's biggest moon, we could soon know about it - as long as it's the methane-spewing variety. The chemical signature of microbial life could be hidden in readings taken by the European Space Agency's Huygens probe when it landed on Titan in January.

Previous rants

At the very least, point your CNN-loving friends to my links page. Just getting started in reading alternate news sites gets people thinking. I have one friend who was very happy-go-lucky, thinking ol' Greta was telling the whole truth until I opened up his eyes a bit. Now, he's all depressed. He'll get over it. You gotta' get depressed before you get angry and you gotta' get angry before you can accomplish anything. We're all in mourning. We have to move through the steps. But we gotta' hurry it up.

Read. Inform. Spread the word. Even if it means your friends avoid you for awhile. If they really love you, they'll start to listen.

"POSSE COMITATUS ACT" (18 USC 1385): A Reconstruction Era criminal law proscribing use of Army (later, Air Force) to "execute the laws" except where expressly authorized by Constitution or Congress. Limit on use of military for civilian law enforcement also applies to Navy by regulation. Dec '81 additional laws were enacted (codified 10 USC 371-78) clarifying permissible military assistance to civilian law enforcement agencies--including the Coast Guard--especially in combating drug smuggling into the United States. Posse Comitatus clarifications emphasize supportive and technical assistance (e.g., use of facilities, vessels, aircraft, intelligence, tech aid, surveillance, etc.) while generally prohibiting direct participation of DoD personnel in law enforcement (e.g., search, seizure, and arrests). For example, Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETS) serve aboard Navy vessels and perform the actual boardings of interdicted suspect drug smuggling vessels and, if needed, arrest their crews). Positive results have been realized especially from Navy ship/aircraft involvement.

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Who am I?:

I am a biker chick who lives in NYC. This blog is about current events and my left-leaning, acerbic spin on those events. Nobody pays me anything to do this. Nobody tells me what to write. I will NEVER tout anything for anybody's money! EVER!

Use this instead of Google:

Clusty.com

These sites are good at culling stories from a multitude of media sites:

buzzflash.com
unknownnews.net
rawstory.com

Here are some excellent blogs:

Bartcop
Daily Kos
Atrios
Tacitus
Josh Marshall
Two Glasses
Brad DeLong
The Wonkette
Urban Survival
Greg Palast
Mark Crispin Miller

Link exchange:

Ilia Dreams Blog
Iraq War Blog
BushVote.com
Dommecile.com
Funny Farm

media-bias exposed:

dailyhowler.com

these are good left-wing journalism sites:

onlinejournal.com
counterpunch.com
thenation.com
inthesetimes.com
tompaine.com
commondreams.org
truthout.com
guerrillanews.com

a little more to the left:

wsws.org
indymedia.org

different:

whatreallyhappened.com
almartinraw.com

more different :

surfingtheapocalypse.com

really different:

goroadachi.com/etemenanki/

and for godsakes, stay away
from FOX NEWS,  MSNBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC.
It's ALL CRAP!!!
w atch the BBC news
or ITN news instead.

if you must succumb to reading a newspaper: 

www.guardian.co.uk 

or any other paper in another fucking country. All of our newspapers are owned by the same idiots that own the TV stations (and whose companies are diversified in industries that support the war machine) so all of the news is all the same CRAP.