November 24, 2006

THE THINKING SPOT

If everyone who has critiqued the Iraq situaion says the US is just no cutting it, isn't another way of saying this is the the Iraqi resistance is winning?

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Hypocrite of the Week

John McCain might have been riding the Straight Talk Express back in 2000, but now he's definitely a passenger in a Double Talk Taxi....It would take a long feature article to detail how profound McCain's shift has been from a man of integrity to a man of opportunism, but let's just say that McCain has gotten so close to kissing George W. Bush's behind that he's got Joe Lieberman's lipstick on his cheek. (Thanks to BuzzFlash)
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WAR

Tom Hayden: Documents Reveal Secret Talks Between U.S. and Armed Iraqi Resistance…
http://tinyurl.com/yyna23

Bush Visit Threatens to Fracture Iraqi Government --- As the death toll continues to devastate, a powerful legislative bloc loyal to firebrand Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr threatened to withdraw from the government if Iraq’s prime minister attends a coming meeting with President Bush in Jordan next week.
http://tinyurl.com/y646f8

US president has no credibility, unable to initiate Iran attack
http://tinyurl.com/yavbf4

Revolutionary Guards Head: 'US Forces in Middle East 'Extremely' Vulnerable: The commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps has said: If America attacks Iran, its 200,000 troops and 33 bases in the region will be extremely vulnerable, and both American politicians and military commanders are aware of it.
http://tinyurl.com/y5to3a

Iraq Stares Into Face of Civil War - Funeral processions began Friday for the more than 160 people who were killed by car bombs and mortars in Baghdad's largest Shiite district. Hundreds of men, women and children beat their chests, chanted and cried as they walked beside vehicles carrying the caskets of their loved ones. "There is a full-scale sectarian war in the country that the media has not been able to fully project to the world," says Bassam Ali, a political analyst from Arbil.
http://tinyurl.com/y8ws5u

Iraq oil profits reportedly used to back militants: The Iraqi oil ministry has uncovered illegal operations whereby oil products were sold and profits were pooled into financing local militancy, Al Sabah newspaper reported on Wednesday.
http://tinyurl.com/y275ru

Russia Said to Deliver Arms to Iran --- Russia has begun delivery of Tor-M1 air defense missile systems to Iran, a Defense Ministry official said Friday, confirming that Moscow would proceed with arms deals with Tehran in spite of Western criticism.
http://tinyurl.com/vt4rd

THE WHITE HOUSE

Bush's Mysterious 'New Programs' --- But recent developments suggest that the Bush administration may already be contemplating what to do with Americans who are deemed insufficiently loyal or who disseminate information that may be considered helpful to the enemy....Top U.S. officials have cited the need to challenge news that undercuts Bush’s actions as a key front in defeating the terrorists, who are aided by “news informers” in the words of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
http://tinyurl.com/wspg3

In the Shadow of Ho Chi Minh - "President Bush has said many dumb things in defense of his Iraq policy. Citing the Vietnam War as a model, however, is perhaps his most ludicrous yet."
http://tinyurl.com/yyy88l

NOTE: THEY knew THEY were going to be doing nasties. A Senate Mystery Keeps Torture Alive - and Its practitioners Free --- With all the lawsuits over kidnapping and torture marching toward the Bush administration, you might think the top officials running the global war on terror would be worried. A provision quietly tucked into the Military Commissions Act just before it was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush on October 17, would ease any worries they might’ve had...it also exempts the perpetrators, interrogators and their bosses - from punishment all the way back to November 1997."

REVISITING KENNEDY

BBC Claims CIA Involvement in RFK Assassination - New video and photographic evidence that puts three senior CIA operatives at the scene of Robert Kennedy's assassination has been brought to light.
http://tinyurl.com/w8tgj

CABINETS, COMMISSIONS, etc

Pentagon -- Unaccounted Funds -- What would you do if your business or household could not account for 25% of what it spends?
http://tinyurl.com/y5zvls

LEGAL ITEMS

New York Times turns to Supreme Court - The New York Times asked the Supreme Court on Friday to block the government from reviewing the phone records of two reporters in a leak investigation about a terrorism-funding probe.
http://tinyurl.com/yxuphv

Judge to rule on landmark Internet porn law. The law is so imprecisely written it would restrict most adult Internet users to material that is only suitable for children.
http://tinyurl.com/y54c7b

'State secrets privilege' blocks fired translator from suing FBI --- Several months into her contract, she discovered "shoddy" translations relevant to 9/11 created by translators who had "failed the proficiency exams," she says....A report by the Justice Department's inspector general subsequently confirmed that at least one translator had failed the FBI's language proficiency exams. Edmonds says the translator was sent to Guantanamo Bay to translate "the most sensitive terrorist-related information" from interviews of detainees.
http://tinyurl.com/y7badu

ELECTION ITEMS

When Votes Disappear - we’re in danger of becoming a digital-age banana republic. Congressional race, the evidence strongly suggests that paperless voting machines failed to count thousands of votes, and that the disappearance of these votes delivered the race to the wrong candidate,"
http://tinyurl.com/y3v8p4

Jennings Contests Election Results
http://tinyurl.com/yd9dme

ECONOMY

Free Trade Arithmetic for Progressives - the loss of manufacturing jobs and the downward pressure on wages in the sector has the effect of lowering wages for the entire 70 percent of the workforce that lacks a college degree."
http://tinyurl.com/y77gds

The idiocy of the RIGHT has no limit: Is Alan reenspan "DBCB"? Former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan is now delivering a speech on the lecture circuit where he states that the housing bubble created under his watch at the Fed was really the result of the Berlin Wall coming down, and not because he pumped massive liquidity into the monetary system.
http://tinyurl.com/y3cxf9

US Dollar Drops Sharply...Experts: Concerns That Economy Will “Continue To Weaken”...
http://tinyurl.com/uz7qn

CONGRESS

New Democratic Majority Roils Lobbying Industry - The Democrats' takeover of Congress this month has turned official Washington upside down. Labor and environmental representatives, once also-rans in congressional influence, are meeting frequently with Capitol Hill's incoming Democratic leaders. Corporations that once boasted about their Republican ties are busily hiring Democratic lobbyists. And industries worried about reprisals from the new Democrats-in-charge, especially the pharmaceutical industry, are sending out woe-is-me memos and hoping their GOP connections will protect them in the crunch.
http://tinyurl.com/y3mpto

Prescription Drug Battle Looms for Next Congress - Alarmed at the prospect of Democratic control of Congress, top executives from two dozen drug companies met here last week to assess what appears to them to be a harsh new political climate, and to draft a battle plan. Hoping to prevent Congress from letting the government negotiate lower drug prices for millions of older Americans on Medicare, the pharmaceutical companies have been recruiting. Democratic lobbyists, lining up allies in the Bush administration and Congress, and renewing ties with organizations of patients who depend on brand-name drugs.
http://tinyurl.com/y5xz79

Top House Democrats to bar military draft plan
http://tinyurl.com/y53w2t

DOMESTIC

After 15 Months, Katrina Victims Spend Thanksgiving in Trailers -- Many people who were living with family members or staying in hotels at government expense last year have since moved out or been evicted.
http://tinyurl.com/u9dlv

ENVIRONMENT

NASA okays the polluting of outer space with space station waste:
http://tinyurl.com/tkhgm

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

One laptop per child project ships first 10 computers:
http://tinyurl.com/y4j4dv

MILITARY

16,000 Single Mothers Serving in Iraq - More than 155,000 women have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://tinyurl.com/y7xcb9

MEDIA AND JOURNALISM

Thanks - No, Seriously --- Molly Ivins writes: "It's time to give thanks, and I want to start off with a great, big thank you for the top American movement conservatives and all the fun we've had since Election Day. I know I promised not to gloat after this election was over, but I'm not talking unseemly gloating - I'm talking about moments so brilliantly hilarious the only option is to put your head down on the desk and howl."
http://tinyurl.com/y6ptwb

Blogs can control who sees what online
http://tinyurl.com/y82jes

EDITORIALS - OPINIONS

Bob Novak: Rumsfeld's Firing “Connotes Something Deeply Wrong” With Bush's Presidency...
http://tinyurl.com/y6zptp

HEALTH

San Francisco to ban children's toys made with toxic chemicals; bisphenol A and phthalates targeted:
http://tinyurl.com/y6bg6x

Anemia drug found to cause fatal heart attacks and strokes:
http://tinyurl.com/y44hwe

U.S. hospitals fail basic hygiene standards; infections worsen:
http://tinyurl.com/yxjrfa

Cranberries show remarkable health benefits in studies:
http://tinyurl.com/t5v25

Ruptured disk surgery as effective as waiting, study finds:
http://tinyurl.com/y6q2kh

Financial ties between FDA, drug companies could get even stronger with new "pay to play" TV advertisement review service:
http://tinyurl.com/yygxbb

Fatty fish consumption found to slash risk of dementia, Alzheimer's:
http://tinyurl.com/w924p

Popular contact lens solution recalled due to sterility problems:
http://tinyurl.com/vrfn8

SPECIAL INTEREST ITEMS

NASA okays the polluting of outer space with space station waste:
http://tinyurl.com/tkhgm