This entry was posted on
Wednesday, September 1st, 2004 at
10:22 am and is filed
under Uncategorized.

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Date
20040901
An American Election
Time
10:22
Watching the protests? Check out Indymedia, or Truth Out and hold your ground.

Following the RNC? Check out Atrios or Washington Monthly and follow your nose. (Oh, and as Europhobia notes, MPs have yet to return to action, so the Republican convention is available to view on BBC Parliament.)

Need the meat? Read the speeches in full and try to hang on to your lunch.

Yes folks, it’s the All New, All Moderate and Always Friendly Republican Show. This shift is a permanent one. You should place your trust in it. And vote for it. (PS – Don’t forget to vote early! Don’t know how? No sweat! One of our salesmen will call you.)

PS – We need to see more of Jenna and Barbara. They’re on our side. (They just don’t know it yet.)

UPDATE – Some people are having trouble believing the whole ‘Bush cold call’ thing – so here’s a WAV recording of the call to help convince you of its reality.

UPDATE 2 – Scaryduck advises you to stick around until the very end to hear a special message from Dr Hannibal Lecter.

UPDATE 3 – Remember before the DNC, how Rove had his media bum-chums all over the air declaring that it was all going to be a load of Bush-bashing? So the Demycrats were ever so careful to prove them wrong and not bash Bush. Speeches were carefully vetted. Now the RNC is on, it’s open season on Kerry. And ‘girlie men’….

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Date
20040901
John Howard: 2nd to Fall?
Time
10:46
My, my – isn’t this a familiar tactic?

Ha ha ha, let’s all mock the Greens. They certainly have some w-w-wacky ideas. So try to ignore anything odd they may choose to bring up in the next few weeks.

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Date
20040901
How To Think Like An Evil Bastard
Time
12:04
Karl Rove and his dream of a nation under one party.

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Date
20040901
Useful
Time
12:05
Holy cow! Read actual scans of newspapers from around the world.

You won’t find every edition of every paper, but what they’ve managed to put online is pretty damn impressive when you consider the man-hours and the bandwidth involved.

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Date
20040901
The War on Terror
Time
12:36
Guardian – Prisoner ‘A’: no charge, no trial, no conviction and no release date. Welcome to Britain’s war on terror: He is charged with no offence by a British police officer, convicted of no crime by a jury, but judged such a risk to the public by MI5, the security service, that he can be detained until Blunkett judges the ‘war on terror’ is over. No hard evidence has to be produced to back the intelligence service claims.

(Link via Balders, who comments on this and the de-arrest of Abu Hamza.)

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Date
20040901
Predictions
Time
15:13
I think we can expect a crackdown on animal rights activists in the US sometime soon.

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Date
20040901
The War on Terror
Time
15:37
The charitable side of me wants to think that Putin was careful about making claims of terrorism following the recent plane crashes because he didn’t want to do an Aznar, but I think what we’re really looking at here is: “Keep calm (*bang*) everything (*boom*) is under (*kapow*) control!”

BBC – Attackers storm Russian school: An armed gang is holding up to 150 people hostage after seizing a school in southern Russia…. The attackers are said to be demanding the withdrawal of Russia troops from neighbouring Chechnya.

UPDATE – A good site for updates. (Oh, and the Jo Moore inside me says today is a good day to finally leak the images of child torture in Abu Ghraib. If we can sell an Al Qaeda link, we’ll have a perfect goose/gander argument.)

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Date
20040901
The (Now Reluctant) War President
Time
16:50
Greg Palast – Still Unreported: The Pay-off in Bush Air Guard Fix: Here’s what happened. Just after Bush’s election, Barnes’ client GTech Corp., due to allegations of corruption, was about to lose its license to print money: its contract to run the Texas state lottery. Barnes, says the Justice Department document, made a call to the newly elected governor’s office and saved GTech’s state contract. The letter said, “Governor Bush … made a deal with Ben Barnes not to rebid [the GTech lottery contract] because Barnes could confirm that Bush had lied during the ’94 campaign.”

I can’t help but wonder who was paid what to make the relevant records disappear.

(Link via Perfect.co.uk.)

UPDATE – Salon.com – Ben Barnes to break silence on “60 Minutes”: The Republican campaign gets ready for shock waves, as the former Texas official who says he pulled strings to get George W. Bush into the Air National Guard finally goes public.

UPDATE – Guardian – George W Bush’s missing year: Allison’s account corroborates a Washington Post investigation in February that found no credible witnesses to the service in the Alabama National Guard that Bush maintains he performed, despite a lack of documentary evidence. Asked if she’d ever seen Bush in a uniform, Allison said: “Good lord, no. I had no idea that the National Guard was involved in his life in any way.” Allison also confirmed previously published accounts that Bush often showed up in the Blount campaign offices around noon, boasting about how much alcohol he had consumed the night before.

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Date
20040902
Updates
Time
09:02
Shhhh! I’m building….

UPDATE – Oh, OK then….

1. Mars, bitches! The Sun reports on – and the Page 3 girl gets terribly excited about – Signal Candidate SHGb02+14a.

2. Thankfully, I am invulnerable to the strong smell of plastic.

3. This is how the Underground should look (link via Simon).

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Date
20040902
An American Election
Time
12:17
Two juicy RNC links for you:

http://www.rion.nu/

http://www.watchblog.com/

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Date
20040902
Consume!
Time
12:33
Some fruity sweet wrappers for you to enjoy (link via Greasy Chip Butty).

UPDATE – Cheers to Wordlab for letting us in on the gag. This ‘complaint’ was a prank by German students.

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Date
20040902
Ewwww!
Time
12:37
Kerchunk!

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Date
20040902
Music
Time
12:50
Hooray for Mandonna, the all-male tribute act, and AC/DShe, the female tribute band. (Links via The Ultimate Insult.)

Had a two-minute ponder last night and it occured that my personal music project (10 years on the back burner and counting) may be able to come to life via a subversive form of boy band. Pipe dream or possible reality? Well, maybe it’s worth advertising for auditions in order to find out…

Back to the building….

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Date
20040902
We’re Not At Home To Mr Cock-Up
Time
13:03
Bwahahahahahahaha!

Third photo down. Look closely.

Also… She is Miss Universe. You will worship her.

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Date
20040902
Pluggage
Time
13:08
SAVE THE DAY

SUDAN BENEFIT

THU 09.09.2004 : 9pm – 2am

PO NA NA, 75-79 EAST ST, BRIGHTON

Martin & Mike aka Casbah Rockers

Andy & Piers – Wild Combination

Bobby & Chris – Soft Rocks

Papa Freak – White Rhino

Balearic, Disco, Boogie, Italo classics old and new

TIX £10 ADV : MORE INFO – 07832167458 or liza@trainee.me.uk

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Date
20040902
119 (please note correct formatting of date)
Time
14:16
Damn. I wanted to work well into the night tonight, but I can’t.

The Hamburg Cell is on tonight (Thursday), Channel 4, 9pm.

I urge you to make time to see it yourself.

“Some thrillers grip. This one had me in an SAS chokehold. If there is a more important, more urgent story to be told than this, I can’t think of it.” – Peter Bradsaw

More at The Scotsman and the Torygraph. According to this NPR report (audio) , the producers are seeking a US outlet and have talked with a couple of U.S. TV networks.

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Date
20040903
Video
Time
05:57
Can’t sleep. Building.

Here’s something special that started my morning off with a bang:

George W. Bush: The Alternative Campaign Film

(6Mb Quicktime – Link via Taint.org)

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Date
20040903
Flash Music Video
Time
09:33
Almost finished. Building host page. Hang in there.

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Date
20040903
Flash Music Video
Time
10:23
OK, we’re good to go:

George W. Bush: a coward and a liar (450Kb Flash show)

I know you’ll love this one. It’s short, snappy, and downright nifty.

UPDATE:

1. Well said, that man!

2. Michael Moore – Deserters Delight: First of all, thank you for pointing out to all of us that Mr. Kerry was never struck by a bullet. It was only shrapnel that entered his body! I did not know that! Hell, what’s the big deal about a bunch of large, sharp, metal shards ripping open your flesh? That happens to all of us! In my opinion, if you want a purple heart, you’d better be hit by a bullet – with your name on it!

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Date
20040903
Pluggage
Time
12:37
Larry Grant is back on deck. Make with the love.

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Date
20040903
An American Election
Time
12:42
Argh!! The eyes won’t stop following me!

Independent – Bush by numbers: Four years of double standards

I have a short summary of Bush’s speech to hand. It goes: “Follow me if you want to live.” Washington Monthly has more.

Meanwhile, outside in the real world…

IndyMedia – S3 Wrap Up: Hostage Crisis: A State Supreme Court judge today ordered the city to release hundreds of people who had spent as many as 48 hours or more in jail (why so long?) and found the city in contempt of court after it failed to comply. All the detainees had passed through the ad hoc detention center at pier 57 where they had to sleep on a floor slick with motor oil and other toxic residue. Numerous detainees complained of infections, rashes, and chemical burns.

Full text of Bush’s 2004 acceptance speech is here. Also, you might want to spend some time reading his 2000 acceptance speech.

And spare a thought for poor old Zell, who got one rant off his chest and is now out in the cold. Poor darling. (Read some reactions.)

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Date
20040903
Newsflash
Time
13:16
Who’da thunk it?

BBC – Bloody end to Russia school siege

CNN – Death and horror at siege school

Yahoo – Siege School Stormed

Reuters – Comments on Russian school siege

Of interest: Here’s how the BBC is reporting this story to children and here are some comforting thoughts to help them sleep.

Right now, Karl Rove is probably thinking what a nice backdrop this makes for George Bush’s speech.

UPDATE – Public reactions via the BBC website.

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Date
20040903
Video
Time
14:03
I figure you could do with some small amount of cheer. Here’s something reliable from the archives:

David Hasslehoff sings Hooked On a Feeling

Also, this might be of use: How to fold a T-shirt Japanese-style.

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Date
20040903
Inneresting
Time
14:47
How did salt and pepper become the standard table spices?

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Date
20040903
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
14:52
Washington Monthly – Zell Miller Round-Up: At times like this, I wish more people watched the conventions. If more of the country had seen Miller’s ranting, cowardly attack last night, the election would probably be as good as over.

Andrew Sullivan – The Miller Moment: The man’s speech was not merely crude; it added whole universes to the word crude.

Slate.com – Imperial President Opposing Bush becomes unpatriotic: The 2004 election is becoming a referendum on your right to hold the president accountable. That’s the upshot of tonight’s speeches by Vice President Dick Cheney and Zell Miller, the Republican National Convention’s keynote speaker.

Andrew Sullivan – Bush – A Superb Speech: That’s why, despite my deep admiration for some of what this president has done to defeat terror, and my affection for him as a human being, I cannot support his candidacy. Not only would I be abandoning the small government conservatism I hold dear, and the hope of freedom at home as well as abroad, I would be betraying the people I love. And that I won’t do.

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Date
20040903
Dead Blog Holiday
Time
16:07
Farewell, Bykersink, hello Our Man In Hanoi.

PS – Aw, shucks! (looks at floor)

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Date
20040903
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
17:10
Please welcome to the stage the proxy blog for Paddy Tipping and the proxy blog for Paul Keetch. Both have been added to the navbar and the How To Run a ‘Proxy’ Weblog on Behalf of Your MP page.

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Date
20040903
Newsflash
Time
17:34
Aaaand cue endless lame comments about (giggle) strokes (and – quite possibly – claims that he was watching Zell Miller when the chest pains started).

Clinton To Undergo Emergency Heart Surgery.

Here’s the Republicans’ big chance to go heavy on the compassion; but that joke about bleeding heart liberals must be pretty hard to resist.

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Date
20040906
The War on Stupid
Time
09:54
If Beslan is Russia’s 119 (please note correct formatting of date), then we can expect the next casualty to be common sense.

At the core of this is the blinding effect an atrocity has. And – more often than you may care to admit – a government’s wish to exploit this heartlessly… while labelling those who try to highlight this as heartless.

For some reason, to focus too much on what causes an atrocity somehow affiliates you with it – and suggests you have no feelings for the victims (when blind rage is the only ‘suitable’ response).

There are even those that would be so incensed that they would actually accuse you of supporting the evil-doers and/or having the capacity to undertake an atrocity or two yourself.

So please do excuse me for being a heartless, child-murdering bastard…

Belfast Telegraph – Beslan: The unanswered questions

Observer – Women at heart of the terror cells: Almost all of the more than 12 attacks on Russia in the past year have involved women – ‘black widows’, avenging the deaths of family members in Russia’s conflict in Chechnya. The survivors of the three-day Dubrovka theatre siege in October 2002, where 18 of the 50 terrorists were women, are among those who have suffered at the hands of the black widows.

Slate.com – Chechnya – What drives the separatists to commit such terrible outrages?: As many as 600 people, many of them children, are dead, and hundreds more are injured. The two-day hostage crisis that ended in an 11-hour gunfight is the most horrific in a harrowing chain of terrorist attacks in Russia. Russian officials are saying al-Qaida did it. But the truth is far more complicated.

UPDATE – Oooh, look. I’ve got links to Al Qaida:

Al-Qaida (Wikipedia)

Yahoo! Directory Middle East – Political Groups – Al Qaeda

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Date
20040906
An American Election
Time
10:18
Kevin Drum thinks a liberal sense of fair play is being used against us. Professor Bainbridge begs to differ. Leading Democrats think Kerry should be fighting back. Poll figures like this and talk of Kerry being behind compound the pressure. Several weekend leaders here in the UK pondered on the possibilities of dealing with Bush for the next four years.

Fiction and fear is winning over fact. Is it too early to cry?

ABCNews – Bush Glosses Over Complex Facts in Speech: President Bush glossed over some complicating realities in Iraq, Afghanistan and the home front in arguing the case Americans are safer and his opponent cannot deliver.

New York Times – How Kerry Became a Girlie-Man: Only in an election year ruled by fiction could a sissy who used Daddy’s connections to escape Vietnam turn an actual war hero into a girlie-man. As we leave the scripted conventions behind us, that is the uber-scenario that has locked into place, brilliantly engineered by the president of the United States, with more than a little unwitting assistance from his opponent. It’s a marvel, really. Even a $10,000 reward offered this year by Garry Trudeau couldn’t smoke out a credible eyewitness to support George W. Bush’s contention that he showed up to defend Alabama against the Viet Cong in 1972. Yet John F. Kerry, who without doubt shed his own blood and others’ in the vicinity of the Mekong, not the Mississippi, is now the deserter and the wimp.

George W. Bush: a coward and a liar is a weapon. Use it.

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Date
20040906
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
10:28
By all means, let’s crack down on animal activists. Pay no attention to the large corporations making a killing in the background. They are of no concern to you.

Instead, you should focus on the heartless elite who kill and torture animals.

Torygraph – Blair to force through Bill to ban hunting: Tony Blair will make hunting the “nuclear issue” of the next election by using it to embarrass the Tories and push through fundamental reform of the Lords, it was disclosed yesterday.

With only One Big Issue that can realistically be brought into play before the next general election, Blair has chosen fox hunting. Think about that. And also have a quiet think about what’s been dropped…

The UK Today – Corporate Killing: So the government has decided to shelve its revised legislation on corporate killing until after the next election. Which wouldn’t be too shocking were it not for the fact that Labour have been banging on about this legislation for at least 10 years. And during that 10 year period campaigners reckon that 3,000 workers and 1,000 members of the public have died in work-related incidents yet only 11 companies have been convicted and just 2 directors jailed.

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Date
20040906
The War on Terror
Time
10:30
Miami Herald – Graham book: Inquiry into 9/11, Saudi ties blocked: Two of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers had a support network in the United States that included agents of the Saudi government, and the Bush administration and FBI blocked a congressional investigation into that relationship, Sen. Bob Graham wrote in a book to be released Tuesday.

Also, in case you haven’t seen it yet, SpadeMusic.com has set up a mirror for the Pentagon Strike flash video.

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Date
20040906
Flash Thingies
Time
10:32
Jaws in 30 seconds… with bunnies.

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Date
20040906
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
10:33
Stalker builds better mousetrap.

The cat’s on the roof.

Woof!

Ben Hammersly – The emerging two cultures of the internet: The challenge for the internet community, and especially anyone who wants to make money online, is to make the internet a less evil place. Not in content, but in the struggle to get anywhere at all. Meanwhile, people who can’t filter spam, or block pop-ups, or prevent viruses from spreading, are themselves responsible for these things. There are two cultures growing – those who can filter, and those who can’t – and it may well be up to us who can to help those who can’t to join the modern world, lest they drag everyone back with them.

UPDATE – I will reluctantly include this link for those who may have missed the joke-type thing above.

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Date
20040906
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
10:47
Boris will be live sometime later this week or early next. Hang in there.

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Date
20040906
The Tories
Time
10:48
The votes are in and the winner of Tories in Turmoil, the man you chose to be the next leader of the Tory Party, is… David Blunkett!

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Date
20040906
Pluggage
Time
10:56
You have until this Friday to get an entry in for the Swiss Army Short Story Competition II. If you have a weblog, it’s the closest thing to an outright giveaway there is.

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Date
20040906
The War on Terror
Time
10:58
On Crisis Command last night, there was a perfect example of how Blair’s actions over Iraq have crippled our ability to deal with actual threats against the nation. The tanks-into-Heathrow stunt was actually mentioned specifically when the players were discussing the mobilisation of the army. In the circumstances, this was the right thing to to, but they felt unable to do it because of potentially bad PR.

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Date
20040906
Photoshopping
Time
12:56
Hooray for Dr Bunsen Honeydew and able assistant, Beaker!

I was so inspired, I made this.

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Date
20040906
The (Now Reluctant) War President
Time
15:17
Oh joy. Because John Kerry listed his citations on his campaign website and someone filed the correct paperwork, we have this sideshow to deal with…

SMH – Pentagon to check Kerry war record: In a fresh blow to John Kerry’s flagging presidential campaign, the Pentagon has ordered an official investigation into the awarding of the Democratic senator’s five Vietnam War decorations. News of the inquiry came as two of the first polls released since last week’s Republican convention said President George Bush had opened an 11-point lead over his rival – the widest margin since serious campaigning began. The inquiry is to be carried out by the Inspector-General’s office of the US Navy, for which Senator Kerry served as a Swift Boat captain for four months in 1968, making two tours of duty. He was wounded in action and subsequently awarded three Purple Hearts, a Silver Star and a Bronze Star. But, for the past month, the details of Senator Kerry’s military service in Vietnam have become shrouded in a controversy that the navy now feels warrants a full-blown search for the truth.

Boston.com – Vietnam duality challenges Kerry: The attacks on Kerry by the swift boat group, however, have stunned many in the camp and left Kerry frustrated that the media have not dismissed the charges as unsubstantiated. “What has surprised me is the voracity with which they have tried to attack his heroism,” McKean said. “I have never seen people lie so egregiously and get away with it. This is as close to McCarthyism as you can get in a campaign. The print press has worked hard to discredit it, but television just replays the charges over and over.”

And now this inquiry gives them something else to masticate on. (Cue leap of logic in countless editorials: an inquiry is happening, therefore *something* must dodgy.)

Meanwhile, the Cowardly Liar swaggers on unhindered.

Associated Press – Bush’s National Guard File Missing Records: Documents that should have been written to explain gaps in President Bush’s Texas Air National Guard service are missing from the military records released about his service in 1972 and 1973, according to regulations and outside experts.

This isn’t the pay records that were ‘inadvertantly destroyed’ we’re talking about here, but documents that were supposed to be amongst those released. But weren’t. But don’t go expecting an inquiry into that anytime soon.

UPDATE – Judicial Watch is essentially a tool of Richard Mellon Scaife, who provides almost all its funding.

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Date
20040906
RWCs
Time
15:22
Young Republican Kicks Female Protester – guess which one was arrested….

Also, from the Independent’s RNC diary: At one prayer breakfast I was handed a leaflet advertising RatOutAChurch.org, an organisation which places moles inside liberal churches to monitor the preacher’s comments for any hint of political endorsements.

I’m sure I don’t need to remind you of Bush’s attempt to recruit supporters from 1,600 religious congregations in Pennsylvania.

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Date
20040906
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely! It’s Over!
Time
16:37
Car Bomb Near Fallujah Kills 7 Marines

US warplanes pound Najaf

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Date
20040906
George W. Bush
Time
17:45
George W. Bush struggles to define tribal sovereignty. (Quicktime format. Blogged before as an MP3, but it’s much more fun on video.)

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Date
20040907
How To Think Like An Evil Bastard
Time
09:57
There’s lots of pondering, debating and hand-wringing going on in the liberal camp in the US at the moment. Rove is playing the dirtiest of games, and many people are asking if the time hasn’t come to take the gloves off.

In this very long Fark thread, the words of m00 caught my eye: It’s interesting that the party who is criticizing Bush for trying to win the war on terror even if it violates the founding principles of this country, is suddenly calling for Kerry to win the election even if it violates the founding principles of this country. Winning the election/war isn’t the most important thing. Keeping our values are. If we have to compromise those values to win either, what’s the point? … If Kerry has to become Bush to beat Bush, that’s just as bad as giving up all our freedoms to save them from terrorists.

Meanwhile, here in the UK, some people have decided that the birth of something very promising should be hammered at immediately in order to score a few quick points. Guy nails it with this post:

Para Ingles Ver – Asking for a halt: While I supported Bloggerheads’ call to arms to encourage our elected representatives to take blogging up, it now seems to have spawned out of control. ‘Stalking’ an MP by setting up a blog in their name was a good idea, if only to emphasise to the individual in question that there was a space out there with their name on it – literally. And in some cases they provide a service by informing logged-on people what their MP is up to. But what about when an MP or prospective MP takes up the challenge? Should they be left to get on with it? Take the blog of Lib Dem candidate Jody Dunn in Hartlepool. She’s doing one while there is another which claims to shadow what’s she’s doing but is clearly against what she stands for. Similarly there are the campaigning blogs like Labour Watch and Lib Dem Watch who are scrutinising the parties, from a biased starting point.

I think I should take responsibility for the whole ‘stalking’ thing. I didn’t set a good example with Tim Yeo and I started the proxy-blog project when I was feeling more than a little pissed off. The proxy-bloggers have, by and large, been very good about maintaining/adopting a positive/balanced tone, but along the way I’ve taught folks the power of taking politicians to task via weblogs. And some people are now doing this with a hidden – if obvious – agenda (though – thankfully – many of these folks appear to have missed a few important technical or cultural points, and so are doing their shouting from a very quiet corner on teh Interweb).

Take this attack from DunnIn for example, which is not only as vacuous and offensive as calling John Kerry ‘French’… but also pretty hypocritical when you consider that we know nothing about the person doing this level of digging.

Stay with me here, because this isn’t a defence of what I’ve been up to myself, but an attempt to let you know where my head is at…

I’d like to think that I’ve been pretty open with the blogging community. I have political and professional agendas, but they’re clearly stated. There are also a few lines that I won’t cross.

Tim Yeo and the issue of adultery/paternity is one of them.

George W. Bush and the issue of the abortion rumours was another.

Please note the use of the word ‘was’…

A dirty game is being played and Kerry’s hands are tied. Plus, the stakes are pretty damn high.

Perhaps it’s time for someone else to call Bush on this and at least try to extract a denial.

Not purely for reasons of strategy, but because he makes an issue of it.

Common Dreams – For Bush, Abortion Gag Rule is Only the Beginning: One of George W. Bush’s first acts as president — literally on his first full day in office — was to delight conservative supporters by reinstating the Global Gag Rule. The rule prohibits U.S. foreign aid money from flowing to overseas family planning organizations that provide abortion services or even talk favourably about abortion to their patients or the public.

White House – President Bush Signs Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003

Also, the abortion rumour may be an important factor in Bush’s time in the Guard. (If it’s true, the timing suggests that this is why he was rushed off to Alabama.)

Does the end justify the means?

Does this argument even have to made in this case?

How will this impact on the campaign for political weblogging and necessary calls for moderation here in the UK?

My head hurts.

UPDATE – Here’s some background for you. Also, the tone’s a bit rough, but this post is worth noting for its claim that Flynt’s appearance is the only transcript that has ever been erased entirely from the CNN site.

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Date
20040907
Established Media
Time
10:00
Brand Republic – Russian editor fired over use of Beslan hostage photos: The editor of one of Russia’s oldest newspapers, Izvestia, has been fired over publication of pictures of wounded and dead children from the three-day school hostage drama in Beslan. According to sources in the Russian media, the firing of respected editor Raf Shakirov was initiated by the Kremlin, which was infuriated by newspaper coverage of the Beslan hostage drama…. Izvestia published some of the most thorough, probing accounts of the crisis, and it was one of the earliest Russian media outlets to doubt the government’s estimate that about 350 hostages were being held captive in the school… During the crisis, state-owned Russian media tried to ignore what was going on. On Friday, when the drama was coming to an end, two of the main state-owned Russian TV channels did not interrupt their regular programming.

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Date
20040907
Compare and Contrast
Time
10:02
George W. Bush: a coward and a liar

Idiot Son of an Asshole

Dress-Up Dubya

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Date
20040907
Inneresting
Time
10:05
“6079 Smith W! Yes, you! Bend lower, please! You can do better than that. You’re not trying. Lower, please! That’s better, comrade. Now stand at ease, the whole squad, and watch me.”

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Date
20040907
Photoshopping
Time
10:07
Being a partial study of a man who lacks courage, a brain, and a heart….

(Large version posted to B3ta.)

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Date
20040907
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
10:12
Well, Beslan managed to keep boobs of Page 3 for two whole editions, but The Sun tries to make up for it today with three young ladies in a poolside page three-some. They also lead on the front page with Andrew Smith, and take full credit for his resignation based on their hard-hitting report into his staff downloading pornography (and not of the state-approved kind).

The Sun – PM resigns (No, not Tony but the Porn Minister): The man heading the “Ministry of Porn” quit last night, sparking a Cabinet reshuffle and a Downing Street power struggle. Work and Pensions Secretary Andrew Smith resigned 12 days after The Sun told how staff had called up two million pages of internet filth, including child abuse sites, on work PCs. Mr Smith, 53, jumped before he was pushed by Tony Blair.

So there you have it. It was The Sun wot done it. And now they’ve got Brown “under siege”.

Daily Record – Smith is ‘Pushed Out’ for Reshuffle: But insiders said he was forced out to make room in the Cabinet for a reshuffle to enhance the PM’s authority. Blair is determined to signal how serious he is about staying in his job with the reshuffle, expected today. And Smith’s departure has cost Chancellor Gordon Brown a close ally. He failed to make a major impact at the DWP – one of the key portfolios in a run-up to a general election. Hewas seen as a ‘safe pair of hands’ but criticised for a lack of flair and his failure to deal with sensitive issues. Then came the embarrassment of the DWP being branded the Ministry of Porn after thousands of staff were caught looking at indecent sites on office PCs.

You can just smell it, can’t you?

Andrew Smith’s resignation letter and Tony Blair’s reply.

So, here we are, finally heading for a reshuffle. The last time this was due, all we got was a new joker slipped into the pack.

Now we have reports that Alan Milburn is on his way back into the cabinet.

For news and updates, you could do far worse than the proxy blog for Alan Milburn, but I have the feeling I may be keeping an eye on this too…

Guardian – Former Labour allies round on Blair (August 9): Some of Tony Blair’s oldest and closest ideological allies in the Labour party abandon their support for his leadership today, saying he is endangering the viability of the party, eroding trust in politics and embracing a market ideology largely indistinguishable from the Conservatives’…. There are three former cabinet ministers on the board: Alan Milburn, Robin Cook and Clare Short.

Guardian – One Blairite who could yet be Labour’s next leader: Alan Milburn’s prospective return to government, if it happens, would be an event of great and intriguing importance. It might even help to define the shape of British politics for a decade to come. Here’s why. After seven and a half years, Labour clearly does not yet face an overwhelming external challenger. The Liberal Democrats can win almost any by-election that comes their way; Hartlepool, it appears, is currently theirs to lose. But neither the Lib Dems nor the Conservatives have a serious hope of forming the next government, and perhaps not even the one after that. Labour’s chief current challenge, therefore, does not come from without but from within – and could even be called existential. This internal challenge does not mean that Tony Blair’s leadership is under immediate threat, though some would like it to be… Milburn is potentially a big political figure in his own right and Labour has surprisingly few of them. He was a good minister, he talks well and he comes across as a normal human being, as well as someone with a life. He would be one of the few members of the government – Peter Hain is another – who seem instinctively at ease with the scale, diversity and force of the changes that have taken place in British life over the past 20 years.

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Date
20040907
An American Election
Time
10:13
Via BigDaddyMerk, we find a Republican who was turned by the convention. Go and say something encouraging, by all means.

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Date
20040907
Established Media
Time
10:16
Daily Howler – We’re close to having a state-run media: Bush can deceive you as much as he likes. A conquering man sits atop a white horse, and as we saw in the wake of Zell’s speech, your “press” lets him say what he pleases.

The Top 25 Censored Media Stories of 2003-2004

Save the latter for lunchtime.

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Date
20040907
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
10:41
Washington Post – Political Victory: From Here to Maternity:What’s the difference between the protesters outside the Republican convention and the delegates inside? There are many, of course, but one will ultimately skew American politics and the culture wars in the Republicans’ favor, regardless of who has God or reason on her side. It’s the divide between who is having children and who isn’t. (reg reqd.)

Heh. And a totally unrelated link that’s also charting well for some strange reason… Indiana University study: having children significantly lowers parents’ IQs.

New book claims that Bush took cocaine at Camp David

Clinton tells Kerry to shut up about Vietnam

Netflix and TiVo to announce partnership, offer downloadable movies

A Girl’s Guide to Geek Guys

Beslan – a well-written view from the right (sparked by recent comments from Art Spiegelman)

Help Beslan children

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Date
20040907
George W. Bush
Time
10:43
Heh. Nosemonkey notes that Le Monde have started referring to Bush as the ‘outgoing’ President.

Compare this with FOXNews, who are busy declaring the race to be won a little earlier than last time (currently aided as they are by Bush’s alleged 10 point bounce).

UPDATE – Rising Hegemon – Enjoy Your Bounce, ’cause it Ain’t Lasting

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Date
20040907
RWCs
Time
10:58
Be warned that you may need to enable your satire-detector. This one dances very close to the truth…

Linwood Barclay – Latest smear alleges Kerry was AWOL with Bush

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Date
20040907
John Howard: 2nd to Fall?
Time
12:00
Call for Film Submissions for Time to Go John : Real Eviction: an online site for short films, and cinema release feature made up of a series of quality political films, some sad, some funny, some downright shocking. A comedian in front of a live studio audience will contextualise the films and provide links.

The campaign is being run in association with Spinach7 magazine. Heads-up via Anthea.

Now all I needs is a chat with someone who knows about exporting Flash for broadcast…

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Date
20040907
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
14:51
BBC – Blair to reshuffle ‘by weekend’: Tony Blair has said there will be a Cabinet reshuffle by the end of the week – but not on Tuesday as some in Westminster have been speculating.

Keep an eye on the proxy blog for Alan Milburn for updates. Mike’s been on the case since the day before yesterday.

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Date
20040907
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely! It’s Over!
Time
15:18
Back to Iraq – 1,000… almost: Another grim milestone in the Iraq war is imminent. Iraq Coalition Casualties reports there are 998 U.S. casualties as of Sept. 7 at 6 p.m. GMT +0300. By the time you read this, there may be 1,000 or more U.S. dead in Iraq.

Meanwhile…

Guardian – Chalabi nephew loses Saddam trial role: Salem Chalabi, the man organising the trial of Saddam Hussein, has been sacked from his job after allegedly failing to return from Britain to face a murder charge in Iraq…. In an email to the Guardian, he said he had been appointed to the “independent tribunal” overseeing Saddam’s trial for a period of three years – and that its status had been enshrined in Iraq’s transitional administrative law. Without changing that status it was impossible for him to be sacked, he said.

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Date
20040908
Flash Games
Time
09:53
Cow Marathon – instructions are in a foreign language, but you’ll work it out. Worth doing for at least one level if only to see the udder-jigging dance.

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Date
20040908
The War on Terror
Time
09:54
LNR – The cost of (not) running al-Qaeda: A new report suggests that Bin Laden is not in fact the main money-man behind al-Qaeda. But he’s still a very naughty boy.

Speaking of al Qaida, there sure are lots of ways to spell it (see ‘Notes on Naming’). You’d think with all that funding, they could at least sort their branding out.

(Incidentally, there are many ways to spell Al Qaeda, but only one way to pronounce ‘Abu Ghraib’…)

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Date
20040908
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s…. oh FFS…
Time
09:57
Troops need your help to stop Halliburton from getting them killed in order to save a few bob.

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Date
20040908
Activism
Time
09:59
AlterNet – First They Came for the Protesters: In a country that engages in preemptive war against a small nation that had neither the intention nor the ability to attack us, preemptive suppression of dissent is the next logical step…. At the 2000 Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, 420 people were arrested – more than 75 of whom were locked up for sleeping in a large space used for making puppets. It wasn’t until April 2004, almost four years later, that the final arrestees stood trial and were acquitted on all charges.

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Date
20040908
Consume!
Time
10:01
From UK Bright Life, the people who brought you the plastic typewriter that could save you £1000.00 ‘on the cost of buying a computer’ (scroll down to see) and the local version of the ‘marketing breakthrough’ that is the GFX-100 indoor TV dish antenna comes what is probably the most useful product ever.

Care for your loved ones long after they’re gone with all-new Monument Cleaner! (It also allows you to show an equal amount of respect and love for your garden ornaments.)

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Date
20040908
119 (please note correct formatting of date)
Time
10:06
The New York Review of Books – Pinning the Blame: The administration fought the commission at nearly every turn – at first denying it sufficient funds, then opposing an extension of time, refusing it documents, trying to prevent Condoleezza Rice from testifying in public. The White House, in a pre-emptive move, told the commission that Bush would not testify under oath, and insisted that he appear along with Vice President Cheney. The main partisan division within the commission, I was told, was over how hard to press the White House for information that it was holding back. In its effort to achieve a unanimous, bipartisan report, the commission decided not to assign “individual blame” and avoided overt criticism of the President himself. Still, the report is a powerful indictment of the Bush administration for its behavior before and after the attacks of September 11.

UPDATE – See also SummerOfTruth.org, which is promoting a series of events to expose 911 failures, lies, and cover-ups.

And yet even more… Newsweek – A Case Not Yet Closed: In the summer of 2002, congressional investigators probing the September 11 terror attacks made a startling discovery. A college professor and longtime FBI informant in San Diego had dealt extensively with two of the 9/11 hijackers. The informant became close to the future terrorists after he’d rented them rooms in his house. The connection raised plenty of questions: What did the informant know about the activities of his housemates? And why hadn’t the FBI said anything about the connection? The discovery led to a closed-door confrontation between the FBI and Florida Sen. Bob Graham, co-chair of the joint House-Senate panel investigating 9/11. Convinced that the bureau was stonewalling, Graham tried to slap the FBI’s chief counsel with a subpoena to produce the informant. “With the subpoena still in hand, I approached him, holding it inches from his chest,” Graham writes in his new book, “Intelligence Matters,” which deals with his efforts to get to the bottom of the 9/11 attacks. “He leaned back from the subpoena as it if were radioactive.” The FBI counsel asked for extra time to see if something could be worked out. In the end, the FBI refused to allow Graham and his colleagues to question a crucial witness.

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Date
20040908
The (Now Reluctant) War President
Time
10:06
TexansForTruth.com are trying to get a ‘Where was Bush?’ ad to air and need your help. You can download a copy of the ad if you like, but the site is very popular today, so your mileage may vary.

UPDATE – Bandwidth exceeded. And then some. New location is here.

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Date
20040908
John Howard: 2nd to Fall?
Time
10:08
Perfect.couk have an excellent overview of the upcoming general election in Australia.

They also point us to faux-blogs for John Howard and Mark Latham.

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Date
20040908
An American Election
Time
10:13
ABCNews – Cheney Says ‘Wrong Choice’ of Kerry Risks Terrorist Attack: Vice President Dick Cheney on Tuesday warned Americans about voting for Democratic Sen. John Kerry, saying that if the nation makes the wrong choice on Election Day it faces the threat of another terrorist attack. The Kerry-Edwards campaign immediately rejected those comments as “scare tactics” that crossed the line.

Read some comments on this from this post at Atrios.

NBC5.com – Republican candidate says Christ would not vote for his Democrat rival: Keyes, who has focused his campaign on abortion, said that his statement about whom Jesus would vote for was based on Obama’s pro-choice votes in the Illinois Senate. (So, yes, there is a kind of demented logic behind it.)

Oh, and ScaryDuck wishes to bring to our attention this prophetic artcile from the Onion, dated 18 Jan 2001:

The Onion – Bush: ‘Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Finally Over’

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Date
20040908
Christianity Watch
Time
10:15
Jesus appears out of nowhere to watch over an urban tree trunk in Wake County, Carolina.

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Date
20040908
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
10:18
The UK Today has a few thoughts (and many links) on the upcoming reshuffle.

Also, there’s this… Guardian – Labour chairman rounds on critics: Ian McCartney, the Labour chairman dogged by speculation that he is about to be sidelined, yesterday hit back at his “unacceptable” anonymous critics and insisted he was still the man for the job.

Oh, and something else at The UK Today erm… today…

This month government ministers will be given the power to duck any awkward questions they may be asked as all unanswered parliamentary questions will be dumped by the end of the October session.

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Date
20040908
Consume!
Time
10:24
Wind From Hurricane Frances for Sale on eBay

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Date
20040908
Established Media
Time
10:28
Nosemonkey has an excellent post here on the Russian government’s blatant attempts to manipulate and restrict coverage of the Beslan hostage tragedy.

Heres’ an old link for you to chew on…

How Democracy Was Subverted in Peru: “What they found was a stunningly bold and effective effort to circumvent three institutions key to maintaining democracy in Peru: the judiciary, the legislature, and the media. ‘Montesinos and Fujimori maintained the façade of democracy—the citizens voted, judges decided, the media reported—but they drained its substance,’ McMillan and Zoido wrote. What’s more, by analyzing the size of the bribes, they demonstrate that the media, or more specifically, television, has become the most forceful of the checks and balances that underpin constitutional government.”

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Date
20040908
George ‘Wibble’ Bush
Time
10:34
Another new headline. Should come in handy….

Reuters – Bush: OB-GYNs kept from ‘practicing their love’: .S. President George W. Bush offered an unexpected reason on Monday for cracking down on frivolous medical lawsuits: “Too many OB-GYNs aren’t able to practice their love with women all across this country.”

Flip-flopping… pah! What about flib-flubbing? FFS… this guy is a total moron and hopeless without Rove pulling his strings.

You can see and hear this gaffe in this 508Kb WMV file.

This latest slip of the tongue reminds me of the old joke about a gynaecologist who says to his patient: “Ah, yes. I can see the problem. Easy to fix, but would you like me to numb you first? Yes? OK, then. Num-num-num-num-num…”

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Date
20040908
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
11:28
First off, a welcome for Emma, who just went live and appears to be planning a final year dissertation based in part on political blogging.

Second, a ‘thank you’ to John Dixon from Adamsdown. He knows why.

Finally, some news. I spent most of last night entering back-dated articles, press releases and parliamentary appearances into the near-to-complete Boris Johnson weblog. Once we sort out the domain/DNS issue, all that remains is to prime the main engine – Boris himself.

The site will go live before this happens (perhaps Friday, with any luck) with a fun activity to keep folks busy while we co-ordinate the whole Westminster/education thing.

UPDATE – Here’s a little something to set you salivating: Boris Johnson – So what’s wrong with clubbing seals?

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Date
20040908
How To Think Like An Evil Bastard
Time
11:49
I’m constantly amazed at the number of people who don’t know the answer to this question: Who is Karl Rove? More here. If the name is new to you, I advise you to Google away and follow your nose.

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Date
20040908
Compare and Contrast
Time
11:58
Two scenes from York Road, Hartlepool:

Police warn Labour activists over street disorder outside the Liberal Democrat HQ.

Charles Kennedy and Jody Dunn accused of making an illegal right-turn.

Also of interest is this article from the last election.

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Date
20040908
The (Now Reluctant) War President
Time
13:40
AP – More Bush Guard Records Released: The Pentagon and Bush’s campaign have claimed for months that all records detailing his fighter pilot career have been made public, but defense officials acknowledged Tuesday they had found two dozen new records detailing his training and flight logs after the AP sued and submitted new requests under the public records law…. The newly released records do not include any from five categories of documents Bush’s commanders had been required to keep in response to the gaps in Bush’s training in 1972 and 1973.

Boston.com – Bush fell short on duty at Guard: The reexamination of Bush’s records by the Globe, along with interviews with military specialists who have reviewed regulations from that era, show that Bush’s attendance at required training drills was so irregular that his superiors could have disciplined him or ordered him to active duty in 1972, 1973, or 1974. But they did neither. In fact, Bush’s unit certified in late 1973 that his service had been ”satisfactory” — just four months after Bush’s commanding officer wrote that Bush had not been seen at his unit for the previous 12 months.

New York Times – Missing in Action: The sheer volume of missing documents, and missing recollections, strongly suggests to me that Mr. Bush blew off his Guard obligations. It’s not fair to say Mr. Bush deserted. My sense is that he (like some others at the time) neglected his National Guard obligations, did the bare minimum to avoid serious trouble and was finally let off by commanders who considered him a headache but felt it wasn’t worth the hassle to punish him. “The record clearly and convincingly proves he did not fulfill the obligations he incurred when he enlisted in the Air National Guard,” writes Gerald Lechliter, a retired Army colonel who has made the most meticulous examination I’ve seen of Mr. Bush’s records (I’ve posted the full 32-page analysis here – 100Kb PDF). Mr. Lechliter adds that Mr. Bush received unauthorized or fraudulent payments that breached National Guard rules, according to the documents that the White House itself released.

The reponse from the White House is an interesting bluff. They assert that Bush would not have been honorably discharged if he had not ”met all his requirements”…

And he wouldn’t have jumped the year-plus waiting list to get in if he hadn’t been exceptionally worthy, I suppose…

Cheers to Mirjam for the heads-up. This ain’t over yet. Then again, maybe it is. A lot counts on whether this makes it to TV screens. That’s another advantage the Swifties had. Warm bodies.

Bush’s AWOL Scandal: Let’s Break Through the Media Barrier

UPDATE – TexansForTruth exceeded their bandwidth. The site can now be accessed here.

You will want to download, print and read the PDF document mentioned above! Below are some extracts from the conclusions:

“Bush’s commander, who according to Bush’s biography was a friend, probably thought Bush lost interest in flying, wanted out of the ANG prior to fulfilling his commitment, and did not press the issue. It is likely that he knew pursuing any corrective action would have brought him much aggravation and been damaging to his own career because Bush was politically well connected in Texas.”

“In the final analysis, the record clearly and convincingly proves he did not fulfill the obligation he incurred when he enlisted in the Air National Guard and completed his pilot training, despite his honorable discharge.”

And I think that’s being rather charitable. As the AP story notes, the new records show his unit joined a “24-hour active alert mission to safeguard against surprise attack” just after he bunked out. I would argue that this is the kind of thing a politically well-connected person would have advance knowledge of.

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Date
20040908
Flash Music Video
Time
14:07
It’s a lie.

What’s AWOL?

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Date
20040908
Bush: AWOL
Time
16:40
Here’s Kevin Drum’s round-up, just in case you don’t like mine.

US readers: Ben Barnes. 60 Minutes. Tonight. 8 pm ET/PT Watch it. Tell your friends. (And tonight is… ladies night… on CBS)

Would someone mind taping it for me and sending it by post? PAL would be great, but I can handle NTSC in a pinch. Drop me a line if you can help, and we’ll talk about postage.

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Date
20040908
An American Election
Time
16:46
John Kerry’s Cincinatti speech and related resources: But then, George W. Bush made the wrong choices. He himself now admits he miscalculated in Iraq. In truth, his miscalculation was ignoring the advice that was given to him, including the best advice of America’s own military. When he didn’t like what he was hearing, he even fired the Army Chief of Staff. His miscalculation was going to war without taking every precaution and without giving the inspectors time. His miscalculation was going to war without planning carefully and without the allies we should have had.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040908
Rebekah ‘Red Mist’ Wade
Time
17:29
It’s official: reading The Sun makes you thick! (Spotted by ScaryDuck.)

The fake story also got a generous airing on FOXNews, which is quite shocking when you consider how careful both outlets are with their facts.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040908
Photoshopping
Time
17:46
Top notch Bush ‘shop.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Diversions
Time
09:29
Play Spot the Virgin. I got 47%. I suck. (I guess that makes me a technical virgin).

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Date
20040909
Inneresting
Time
09:32
Comparing the signatures of statesmen past and present. Surprisingly, Dubya doesn’t use an ‘X’. Perhaps he finds it hard to spell.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
We’re Not At Home To Mr Cock-Up
Time
09:34
Monroe County Coroner shoots himself while trying to demonstrate gun safety.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Riding High on Blogdex
Time
09:51
Al Gore continues to find his voice – drink deep; soak it up.

Police discover secret-society cinema in Paris – probably a hardline cell of Jerry Lewis fans.

How people read the news – please note the importance of the headline and the poor attention paid to piffling things like details and conclusions.

Media View Kitty Kelley’s Bush Book With Caution – and the Swifties get prime-time. Interesting, no?

Some Ken Jennings news – if you don’t want your Jeopardy viewing ruined, look away now.

Log Cabin Republicans Vote to Withhold Endorsement from President Bush – and I’m sure you can guess why.

Make a pare aeroplane with flapping wings – it beats work.

Should I rip this? – a helpful shart for those lacking a moral compass.

Thunk!

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
10:04
Independent – Milburn agrees election role as Blair faces down Brown: The countdown to a general election began as both Mr Blair and Michael Howard reshuffled their frontbench packs in an attempt to sharpen their parties’ performance. Mr Milburn was appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster after Mr Blair persuaded him to return to frontline politics less than 15 months after resigning his position as Health Secretary to spend more time with his family. Blair aides said Mr Milburn would be Labour’s “policy supremo” in the run-up to the election expected next May. The move threatens to create tensions with the Chancellor Gordon Brown, who is due to take overall charge of the party’s election effort.

Guardian – Familar tantrums – but Blair-Brown political marriage is not over yet: Plenty of Labour MPs would like to see Mr Blair driven from office – for domestic revisionism and foreign adventurism – even if its costs the party 50 Commons seats. Preferably they would like him out before the election, but (on one count) have only 62 signatures, 20 too few to trigger a ballot. He will not walk until he decides he has become a liability. No polling evidence points convincingly to that and Mr Brown has always hesitated to attempt the coup that just might succeed but split the party in doing so. Cowardice or loyalty? MPs disagree.

–

From: Tim Ireland

To: milburna@parliament.uk

Sent: Thursday, September 09, 2004 10:02 AM

Subject: Your campaign strategy

Dear Alan,

Congratulations on your appointment. I can only assume that you stand by the editorial from a recent issue of Renewal that suggests the best way forward for Labour is without a Tory at the helm:

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labour/story/0,9061,1279153,00.html

http://www.expat.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2004/08/11/do1102.xml

If not… well, let’s just say that I hope we can still be friends after the general election.

Cheers

Tim Ireland

www.bloggerheads.com

–

UPDATE – The future of Brown – today!

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Consume!
Time
10:10
As blogged in March: You know those anti-piracy trailers at the start of home videos? The new one over here at Airstrip One by FACT: The Federation Against Copyright Theft (which has also been running in cinemas since February) has a well-evil demon chappie with a maniacal grin processing his pirate videos in a foundry (as you do) and stamping his illegal copies with a big branding iron in the shape of an ‘X’ (as you would expect). The voice-over boldly warns us that “video piracy funds terrorism”…

Guardian – Terrorism, Actually: This is a grave charge – far graver, for example, than one previous anti-counterfeiting cinema ad, which warned that if you bought your videos from the dodgy bloke down the market, he might not give you a refund when the picture quality turned out bad. A sceptic might accuse Fact, which is funded by distributors and cinema chains, of scaremongering to protect industry profits.

The new campaign is even bolder – and has Jonathon Woss onside to help fight the scourge of piracy (which funds terrorism and kills little baby ducklings). Oh, and their photoshopping is crap. Read more here. Have a jolly good laugh here.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Bush: AWOL
Time
11:03
CBS have released fur new documents following their interview with Ben Barnes, the man who helped Bush jump the waiting list and dodge Vietnam in the Air National Guard. Which Bush bunked out of both times his unit was about to see action. (The beaky clucker.)

1. This prime-time report almost got shoved into a graveyard slot on two regional arms of the network.

2. The simplest approach would be to attack Barnes, and you can see this part of the game begin to unfold here and here at Talking Points Memo. They’ve called up the digital brownshirts and they come right out with a full attack on the GOP wesbite. Interestingly, they appear to trying to cast him as a perjurer. But he’s only a perjurer if he did indeed lie to protect their man. It’s partisan politics (not that the Swifites were funded by the Repulicans or anything). And his sudden discovery of a conscience is a flip-flop. It’s pathetic.

Here’s Bush lying his ass off about his departure being above board and here he is claiming that maybe Vietnam would have turned out better if he had been sent.

Here’s Atrios, giving credit where credit is due and here’s Salon doing the same thing.

Lukasiak Study Proves Bush Was Legally AWOL

Now to the guts of it all:

Washington Monthly – National Guard Smoking Gun?: This story is a perfect demonstration of the difference between the Swift Boat controversy and the National Guard controversy. Both are tales from long ago and both are related to Vietnam, but the documentary evidence in the two cases is like night and day. In the Swift Boat case, practically every new piece of documentary evidence indicates that Kerry’s accusers are lying. Conversely, in the National Guard case, practically every new piece of documentary evidence provides additional confirmation that the charges against Bush are true.

Washington Monthly – What Else is the White House Hiding?: The real question now is: what other documents does the White House have? Obviously they’ve had these sitting around for a while, and just as obviously they’ve held them back even though they claimed in February that they had made available every known document related to Bush’s National Guard record.

AMERICAblog – White House Cover Up?: The White House claimed they had released ALL the documents, now tonight, conveniently after 60 Minutes shows the NEW documents on TV, the White House somehow releases the very documents it said it never had? Where did the documents come from, and why didn’t the White House release them BEFORE 60 Minutes exposed their existence? And finally, what else is the White House hiding?

So bang goes the ‘past history’ defence. This story isn’t just about Bush failing to carry out a direct order from his superior in 1972 or the sugar-coating that followed. It’s also about lies, cover-ups and obfuscation. Right now. From the man asking America to trust him on everything from the economy to the war on terror. In places, there are actions that appear to be downright illegal.

I have a busy day today, so please allow me to close with an excellent roundup of this and other issues by Nosemonkey.

Interesting that Bush would want to duck out of debates, isn’t it? Rove obviously knows this is a key weakness. An unscripted Bush is a disaster waiting to happen. (But I’m sure he’s been boning up on tribal sovereignty – just in case.)

For updates, watch:

Atrios

Daily Kos

Talking Points Memo

Washington Monthly

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
The War on Terror
Time
11:54
Buzzflash – Hey, Dick, We Don’t Negotiate With Terrorists: “If we make the wrong choice, then the danger is that we’ll get hit again,” Dick Cheney said on September 7th, threatening the American public that if we elect Kerry and Edwards rather than Bush and Cheney, we’ll be attacked by “terrorists.” But that statement was unambiguously intended to influence our votes by terrifying us. Cheney wants us to vote for him for fear that otherwise we and our loved ones will be subjected to random attacks. By the usual definition of terrorism, Cheney has joined the terrorists.

Also see this inspired photoshop.

So, what’s it to be? Thawing Osama out in October or letting one slip through the net in November?

UPDATE – Boston.com – Bush laments loss of life in Iraq; says United States making progress there: Bush refused to answer questions from reporters. He simply stared at a reporter who asked if he agreed with Vice President Dick Cheney’s assertion that if Democrat John Kerry is elected, “the danger is that we’ll get hit again” by terrorists.

So, are we talking a nasty stare, a pointed stare, or a vacant stare?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
An American Election
Time
11:56
New York Times – Book Unflattering to Bush Draws His Campaign’s Fire: Anticipating a barrage of unflattering accusations and innuendo about President Bush’s personal life in a soon-to-be-published book by the celebrity biographer Kitty Kelley, the Bush campaign has opened a wave of advance counterstrikes intended to undermine her credibility. A representative of the White House recently called Neal Shapiro, president of NBC News, to discourage that network from broadcasting interviews with Ms. Kelley about the book on its “Today” program and on its MSNBC cable program “Hardball With Chris Matthews,” a network executive said.

Bush: a lying cokehead surrounded by liars who don’t want you to know about his cokeheadedness.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Music
Time
12:02
Commander and Thief – a nifty MP3 made up of cleverly edited Bush soundbites.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Updates
Time
12:41
Europhobia has been added to the main navbar (but not site-wide, as this is a headache with the site in its present state).

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Date
20040909
SEO
Time
12:44
iPod World is live. Brand new site, with very little scaling on the Generic Keyword Strategy. A lot will count on good directory listings and link popularity. The former is going to be a tad problematic, especially in the ODP, as this category has no editor (usually means long delays) and this category is already full of ‘podders (dilutes effectiveness of listing).

UPDATE – Also of interest; New Google Toolbar Brings Browse By Name.

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Date
20040909
Anyone But George
Time
12:52
World Wants Bush Out of the White House: Poll (The filthy liberals at the BBC are carrying it, too.)

George Bush, This is Your Life

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Date
20040909
John Howard: 2nd to Fall?
Time
13:19
Perfect.co.uk – Bombing in Jakarta influences Australian election campaign.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Photoshopping
Time
13:22
Quite possibly the best Bush: AWOL ‘shop to date (link via Matt).

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
An American Election
Time
14:42
Bush faces pressure over drugs and draft

dailyKos on what’s rumoured to be in Kitty Kelley’s book on the Bush Family

Book Unflattering to Bush Draws His Campaign’s Fire

Kitty Smells a Rat at CNN

Amazing how these people can attack and run and hide at the same time isn’t it?

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Date
20040909
Rupert ‘The Evil One’ Murdoch
Time
14:49
Bush: AWOL is all over the place, but there is no mention of George W. Bush in today’s Sun. At all. Instead, they choose to inform us that Madonna’s son Rocco just took his first bike-ride without training wheels. No surprises there, but please also note that Bush:AWOL has been big news online for two days now and Fark has yet to run it on the front page. They do, however, find room for the Madonna story. I’m glad I removed Fark from the navbar. The bias is so obvious, it’s painful.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Christianity Watch
Time
14:54
Catholic Voters Given Leeway on Abortion Rights Issue – OMG! Is the Pope French?

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Date
20040909
Sudan
Time
16:13
Heads-up via Toby… tharrrr she blows!

BBC – Powell declares genocide in Sudan

A cynic would question the timing, but you know I’m not like that.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040909
Updates
Time
17:52
Don’t expect a Boris preview tomorrow. The domain process won’t be complete until mid-weekend. Think Monday.

Early meeting and then work-work-workity-work tomorrow, so bloggage may be light.

Until then, here’s a copy of the latest document to be released by the White House. The implications should be clear. (Sorry the fonts are a bit dodgy.)

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Date
20040910
In The News
Time
10:00
The ‘And Finally…’ war continues to escalate – dog shoots man.

Not only, but also… miracle dog walks in way likely to scare most sensible people (2Mb WMV file).

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
10:02
MAS – Few Detainees Given Hearing at Guantanamo Bay: The Pentagon has admitted for the first time that at least one of the nearly 600 prisoners currently held by the U.S. government at Guantanamo Bay was incorrectly determined to be an “enemy combatant” the Navy Secretary announced on Wednesday.

New York Times – Army Says C.I.A. Hid More Iraqis Than It Claimed: Army jailers in Iraq, acting at the Central Intelligence Agency’s request, kept dozens of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison and other detention facilities off official rosters to hide them from Red Cross inspectors, two senior Army generals said Thursday. The total is far more than had been previously reported.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
The War on Terror
Time
10:06
This seems to suggest that the War on Terror isn’t as important as embarrasing Putin….

Guardian – The Chechens’ American friends: The Washington neocons’ commitment to the war on terror evaporates in Chechnya, whose cause they have made their own.

Also, via cheeky monkey Nick Barlow, we have this from Rum and Monkey… There Is No Pressing Need To Panic!

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Date
20040910
Bush: AWOL
Time
10:48
Are some of latest Bush documents forged?

If so, then was the fraud perpetrated by CBS, or this just a smoke-screen? Were the documents fed to CBS as a deliberate attempt to create a smoke-screen? In other words, have CBC been Morganed?

After all, these documents being fakes do not add up to a vindication of Bush, only a very big distraction.

LGF (wingnut central) – Bush Guard Documents: Forged: There is absolutely no way that this document was typed on any machine that was available in 1973.

DailyKos – TANG Typewriter Follies; Wingnuts Wrong: Against my own better judgment, but because I believe that the more rapidly charges are countered, the better, I spend a goodly portion of the last day researching — shudder — typewriters of the ’60s and ’70s. As everyone on the planet no doubt knows by now, the hard-right of the freeper contingent — specifically, LittleGreenFootballs, a site which frequently is cited for eliminationist rhetoric and veiled racism, and PowerLine, a site linked to with admiration by such luminaries as Michelle Malkin and Hugh Hewitt — discovered that if you used the same typeface, you could make documents that looked almost — but not exactly — like the TANG documents discovered by CBS News. This qualifies as big news, of course, so from those two sites, the story has spread into the mainstream media through the usual channels, most notably Drudge, NRO, etc. I do not believe there is any truly “new” information here, but I hope to condense it in one easy-to-digest reference. So here are some point-by-point findings re: the “forgeries”….

ABCNews – Son of Late Officer Questions Bush Memos: “I am upset because I think it is a mixture of truth and fiction here,” said Gary Killian, son of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, who died in 1984. Gary Killian, who served in the Guard with his father and retired as a captain in 1991, said one of the memos, signed by his father, appeared legitimate. But he doubted his father would have written another, unsigned memo which said there was pressure to “sugar coat” Bush’s performance review.

ABCNews have also dug up a quote from Killian’s widow. We can only assume that they’ll draw the line on digging up Killian. (Boy, they sure move fast when they want to, don’t they?)

Drudge also springs into action alerting the world to the CBS internal investigation. (And if there’s an investigation, then something *must* be dodgy, etc. It’s all about *focus*, baby.)

Take a mo. Cleanse your palate with some satire and then some hard questions about the crayons used by TANG in 1973. Right. Back we go….

Pacetown – But Why?: Why someone would attempt to bring attention to Bush’s service record at this point of the game? That’s the easy question. But why create a forgery (and let’s assume that’s what they are) if it’s going to be such a bad one?

Washington Monthly – Evening Update: At this point, there are enough legitimate questions about these memos that I really think CBS is going to have to provide additional information if they want them to be taken seriously.

CBSNews – New Scrutiny Of Bush’s Service: CBS stood by its reporting. “As is standard practice at CBS News, the documents in the 60 Minutes report were thoroughly examined and their authenticity vouched for by independent experts,” CBS News said in a statement. “As importantly, 60 Minutes also interviewed close associates of Colonel Jerry Killian. They confirm that the documents reflect his opinions and actions at the time.” The White House distributed the four memos from 1972 and 1973 after obtaining them from CBS News. The White House did not question their accuracy.

But why didn’t they question their accuracy? The documents suggest that Bush used his influence to skip service and have his records diddled. Did the White House not question the authenticity of the documents because this sounded so entirely plausible or was this a set-up? You have to wonder…

Washington Post – Some Question Authenticity of Papers on Bush: A senior CBS official, who asked not to be named because CBS managers did not want to go beyond their official statement, named one of the network’s sources as retired Maj. Gen. Bobby W. Hodges, the immediate superior of the documents’ alleged author, Lt. Col. Jerry B. Killian. He said a CBS reporter read the documents to Hodges over the phone and Hodges replied that “these are the things that Killian had expressed to me at the time. These documents represent what Killian not only was putting in memoranda, but was telling other people,” the CBS News official said. “Journalistically, we’ve gone several extra miles.” The official said the network regarded Hodges’s comments as “the trump card” on the question of authenticity, as he is a Republican who acknowledged that he did not want to hurt Bush. Hodges, who declined to grant an on-camera interview to CBS, did not respond to messages left on his home answering machine in Texas.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Viral Marketing
Time
10:53
Create your own mariachi song.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Consume!
Time
10:56
Psst! Wanna buy a watch?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Europe
Time
10:57
Europhobia – Robert Kilroy Silk: Twat: Having gone to Brussels as an MEP (yep, voters are stupid), announced he’s going to “wreck” Europe (prompting incoming Commission president Jose Manuel Durao Barroso to laugh out loud), “get our country back” and all sort of other headline-grabbing populist crap, he’s now said that he aims to “change the face of British politics forever”. Well, that’s nice and patriotic, isn’t it, you fake tanned buffoon?

(*sniff* – you had me at ‘twat’…..)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
George W. Bush
Time
11:01
One. Simple. Question. But who will get there first?

(If that 2nd question seems familiar, here’s why.)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
11:03
Now, we’re getting down to business….

Alan Milburn’s staff post on the proxy-blog about how busy they’ve been lately. Go and say something nice.

Do bloggers need to fear the whips? Well, that question may be answered sooner rather than later. Tom Watson, the first blogging MP, is now a whip himself (scroll down to bottom).

The preview of the Boris Johnson blog should be live on Monday. Some tweaking will be required once the domain is assigned (it’s an MT back-end thing) so perhaps Tuesday. Do hang in there.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Photoshopping
Time
11:09
Did you catch Alastair Campbell on They Think It’s All Over last night?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
An American Election
Time
11:18
LNR – Cheney and Bush: using NLP to hoodwink America: Basically, in boiling down their message to this single point of fear, and constantly associating this fear with the flimsiness of the flip-flop, the Republicans are using simple Neuro Linguistic Programming techniques to baffle and control a nation. NLP is all about implanting ideas through suggestion, through patterns of speech – anchoring emotions and forcing thoughts. Bush and Cheney are not trying to reason with the electorate, they are programming them using fear, using keywords, repetition, reinforcement, and threats.

Funnily enough, I agree. From Bloggerheads Fri, August 06, 2004: Blair was very careful not to lie outright about the Iraq/terror connection (that didn’t exist), but he used the word ‘terror’ and Iraq’ or ‘terror’ and ‘Saddam’ or ‘terror’ and ‘weapons of mass destruction’ in the same sentence more times that I can count. This careful and deliberately proximal use of key phrases and concepts painted a false – and useful – picture.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Flash Games
Time
11:24
Save the kittens! (Link via The Ultimate Insult.)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Bush: AWOL
Time
13:39
TANG Forgery Source Revealed!

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
13:59
OK, now I’m angry… from today’s Independent (Pandora – not online, sorry): The race to succeed Peter Mandelson as the MP for Hartlepool later this month is turning into a dirty tricks campaign that would make even the Prince of Darkness blush. Labour’s first piece of election literature – to be formally released at the weekend – was printed yesterday, and duly leaked to Pandora. It is devoted to a character assassination of the Lib Dem candidate, Jody Dunn. Headlined “outrage at Lib Dem candidate’s insult to town”, the leaflet repeats an entry in Dunn’s internet diary in which she is supposedly rude about Hartlepool. Describing an afternoon campaigning with Simon Hughes, Dunn noted: “Everyone we met was either drunk, flanked by an angry dog, or undressed.” Labour now claims that “the Lib Dem from Darlington has insulted the people of Hartlepool”. Dunn, for her part, is livid at being targeted by a negative campaign. “This leaflet is sad and ridiculous. The weblog reflects what happens on the campaign trail”, said a spokesman yesterday.

You can see the relevant entry on Jody’s blog here.

This attempt to run a campaign on xenophobia alone is bad enough, but I find the exploitation of a weblog in this way to be particularly irksome.

I’m also not a big fan of the anonymous dipwits who are trying to overwhelm Jody’s blog in the comments. Who are probably the same people.

Here’s a lesson for you Jack: You cannot come charging in on someone’s personal webspace and/or into an online community and deliberately try to disrupt it, intimidate visitors, stifle discussion and spread discord – and then defend that with bleatings about your right to free speech.

I’ve been trying to stay out of Hartlepool, but I’m sorely tempted to get involved at this stage.

(Cheers to Peter for the heads-up.)

UPDATE – Meanwhile, Ros Taylor channels Comical Tommy – or does he?

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Date
20040910
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
15:19
Scotsman – Lord Butler says weapons evidence ‘very thin’ : In his first public comments since publishing the results of his inquiry in July, Lord Butler said the weakness of a government dossier on the threat posed by Iraq had “come home to roost” as no such weapons had been found. Lord Butler told the House of Lords that he and his inquiry team had not doubted that Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, had acted in “good faith in concluding that Saddam Hussein had concealed stocks of chemical and biological weapons.” He pointed out that most other countries and Hans Blix, the former chief UN weapons inspector had shared that view…. “How grave a fault that was in the context of the lead up to the war is a matter on which people will and should reach their own conclusions,” Lord Butler added.

There you go. See? It’s up to us. Now if only we had a choice in the next general election, we could sort this out for ourselves…

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Anyone But George
Time
16:37
“What if Bush wins?”

No, really. What if Bush wins?

Secret-service agents used to stop reporters talking to anti-Bush protestors

Bush Vs. Jesus

More on the Font Follies

Chew on some numbers.

And, just in case you missed it; someone, somewhere must ask George W. Bush this one simple question. Link, donate, and dare to dream.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040910
Only Interesting To Bloggers
Time
17:22
Uh-oh.

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Date
20040911
119 (please note correct formatting of date)
Time
09:50
Happy anniversary.

Independent – We should not have allowed 19 murderers to change our world. (Requires subscription. Use BugMeNot or check out robert-fisk.com, where it should appear sooner or later.)

UPDATE – Yup, there you go.

Today, you should spare a thought for the victims. All of them.

By my reckoning, there’s about 90,000 dead (and a few million besides ‘merely’ suffering) because of the way this unique mix of tragedy and spectacle has been ruthlessly exploited by the Bush administration in the pursuit of power and profit.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
The Bush Administration
Time
10:55
(deep breath)

OK, here we go…

UPDATE – This post now available on a permanent page for linkiness.

FACT: George W. Bush somehow jumped a 12-18 month waiting list to join the Air National Guard. This allowed him to avoid service in Vietnam.

By a month. Despite lower-than-average test results, Bush was somehow given priority over others and accepted into the Guard a month before he became eligible for the draft. The records (eventually) released by the White House clearly show they he opted out of service overseas. You don’t have to dig any further, or consider and more of the information below to conclude that George W. Bush did his best to avoid service in Vietnam. His best defence for this action is as follows:

“I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment, nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes.” – President George W. Bush – 1990

Please note that in this quote he makes no excuses for wanting to avoid service in Vietnam.

FACT: George W. Bush cannot fully account for his time served following his transfer to Alabama.

Even when you ignore questions about why he was transferred, and that the only witness they could dig up ‘proving’ that he served didn’t actually see him do so, you are left with the following; despite this being a major issue and the armed forces having a fetish for record-keeping, no records have been produced that conclusively proved that he fulfilled his obligations.

FACT: George W. Bush never saw combat

Whether you accept the version that he was AWOL or that he was on approved leave, the fact remains that Bush was absent from his units in Alabama and Houston at precisely the same time these units were assigned active home-defence duty.

FACT: George W. Bush lied about seeing combat.

“I’ve been to war. I’ve raised twins. I’d rather go to war.” – President George W. Bush – 2002

‘Nuff said. (Oh, but there’s another lie about the amount of time he served here.)

FACT: The White House has – at the very least – been less than forthcoming with pertinent documents.

The White House has claimed to have released ‘all’ of the records relating to Bush’s military service. On the three occasions that they have released varying sets of records. That’s three times they’ve released ‘everything’, folks. This is suspicious on its own. Even more suspicious is their claim that the records that (theoretically) could prove Bush served his time in the Guard were ‘inadvertently’ destroyed.

FACT: The White House also released their own versions of the allegedly faked documents.

The documents that currently have interwebbers bickering about typefaces, proportional fonts and superscript do not prove any of the above. Nor does their being fake disprove any of the above. All they suggest is that Bush used his political influence (which was considerable even at that time) to dodge service and have the record “sugar coated” in order to hide this. That they were also released by the White House – without challenge – following their release by CBS suggests one of two things.

1. That they somehow knew the documents were fake, but wanted to see CBS discredited on this matter.

2. That they did not inspect challenge the documents because they considered their version of events to be entirely plausible.

The documents – even though they have yet to be conclusively debunked – are already being used as ‘proof’ that George W. Bush was not AWOL. It is already being asserted – without proof – that they originated from the Kerry camp. This particular aspect of one very big distraction is particularly telling because…

FACT: Republicans supported the Swift Boat attack on John Kerry.

Knowing full well how dodgy Bush’s service record was, the Republicans did not discourage the Swifites. Far from it. The Swift Boat Veterans for the ‘Truth’ were funded by high-level Republican donors and even enjoyed legal advice from a lawyer working for George W. Bush’s election campaign.

Media outlets that were friendly to the Bush administration helped to enhance their profile and sell their story. This story was based on a pack of lies and has been debunked on a number of fronts (as opposed to just one debunking – possibly – in the case of questions about George W. Bush’s military record), but the impression of doubt remains due to the way the story was sold by a willing media.

As incredible as it may seem, this system works.

John Kerry’s outstanding service record is a problem.

Solution: cast doubt, use media muscle.

George W. Bush’s less-than-exemplary service record is a problem.

Solution: cast doubt, use media muscle.

Take a close look at the outright lies used to distort some facts and the doubt used to cloud others, then consider the following….

Why is this important?

It shows George W. Bush was a liar, a cheat, a coward, a scoundrel, and a poor servant to the people of the United States.

It suggests heavily that George W. Bush is a liar, a cheat, a coward, a scoundrel, and a poor servant to the people of the United States.

Iraq, the economy, health, the environment, and the so-called War on Terror; all of these issues and more are presented by the Bush administration using the same outright lies, the same clouding and the same use of media muscle.

Even bigger lies – or concepts, if you will – (adjusts glasses, taps pipe) are used to hide these lies from their people…

Liberal Media – You may see some differing opinions in print, but rarely on television. And television is what counts. Yet we are assured that the liberal media is all-powerful, and hides a frightening agenda. The lie of the liberal media makes people afraid of biased influence, when in truth it is the accusers who show bias bordering on the criminal. Those who do not work to feed Bush’s lies directly to the public are actually crippled by this lie, for fear of being seen as biased. Please note the multi-faceted use of fear, when you also consider…

The War on Terror – If the war is against terror, why does the Bush administration use terror against its own people? Here comes another lie; those who question the War on Terror don’t believe in the terrorist threat or are on the terrorist’s side. Sometimes both. I’m here to tell you that the threat of terrorism is real, but the War on Terror is a lie. And George W. Bush is the living embodiment of this lie.

George W. Bush Will Protect You – No he won’t. It’s an illusion. A lie. George W. Bush himself is an illusion. He lives, breathes and survives on lies. He is the creation of a man that most Americans have never heard of and/or do not pay nearly enough attention to; Karl Rove.

You Cannot Trust Bush-Haters – My personal favourite. There are people who ‘hate’ Bush, and therefore lack perspective. They are not to be trusted, as they have an agenda. Their hate blinds them to the truth.

I’ve seen the truth, but it’s the lies that are blinding.

I refuse to be crippled by the claim that I am an unreasonable person guided by hate.

I refuse to accept the charge that I am putting people at greater risk by questioning the Bush administration.

I’m also realistic enough to know that the defeat of Bush is the just the start.

Even a complete unmasking and humiliation of this idiot will only serve to partially weaken the machine behind him. But that’s where the war against this machine starts.

Question what you see and hear, by all means – but don’t allow yourself to be distracted by a battle – a feint – over proportional fonts.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
An American Election
Time
11:01
Running Scared – It’s Good to Be King: Because then, the rules don’t apply to you. Or at least it would seem so in Florida. The St. Petersburg Times reports that, against all probability, George W. Bush missed the filing deadline to get on the ballot in Florida. The deadline was Sept. 1, but because that’s when the RNC was, they didn’t file the papers until Sept. 2. This apparently won’t stop the GOP though, and the Democrats are already folding under.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
The Interweb
Time
11:02
Goatse appears on front cover of Time.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
11:03
There you go… y’see? It was all a happy accident… oh, and somehow more defensible because they only authorised torture (lite) for one or two prisoners (who were no doubt really, really bad men) and this isn’t quite as bad as chopping someone’s head off….

MSNBC – Rumsfeld defends Pentagon in abuse scandal: Amid allegations he fostered a climate that led to the prison abuse scandal, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Friday that the military’s mistreatment of detainees was not as bad as what terrorists have done. “Does it rank up there with chopping someone’s head off on television?” he asked. “It doesn’t.” Rumsfeld acknowledged once again that he had approved harsher interrogation methods for suspects captured in the global war on terrorism, but said the rules were meant only for the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, facility for terrorist suspects and had nothing to do with Iraq, where the prison scandal first emerged.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
RWCs
Time
11:09
Swifties come right out and say it; they wanted to go public with “one version of the truth”….

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Date
20040913
Guantanamo Bay
Time
11:11
Air Force Spy Trial to Proceed Despite Modified Evidence.

Keep up the facade, at all costs.

Guardian – Rumsfeld’s dirty war on terror: The CIA analyst had been sent there to find out what was going wrong. He was fluent in Arabic and familiar with the Islamic world. He was held in high respect within the agency, and was capable of reporting directly, if he chose, to George Tenet, the CIA director. The analyst did more than just visit and inspect. He interviewed at least 30 prisoners to find out who they were and how they ended up in Guantánamo. Some of his findings, he later confided to a former CIA colleague, were devastating.

(I’m amazed they’re not strapping the detainees to roofs as Hurricane Ivan passes over. That’d settle the question of guilt and the ‘their God, our God’ matter once and for all.)

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Date
20040913
RWCs
Time
11:19
Another poor soul, blinded by hate.

Evil Sheep also has some issues.

There’s only one language these people understand.

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Date
20040913
South West Trains
Time
11:32
South West Trains have finally admitted that they can’t cope with passenger levels. A new timetable is on the way; prepare to suffer.

UPDATE – Same again from the BBC. This issue has a lot of people hitting the search engines; traffic on my South West Trains page is heavy. Almost (dare I say it) congested.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040913
George W. Bush
Time
11:38
Does he not know where his heart is, or is putting your hand over your liver an even greater sign of respect shown only by alcoholics?

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Date
20040913
Sillyvision
Time
12:00
Happy Days To Return! Further proof (if you need it) that all is right with the world.

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Date
20040913
Updates
Time
13:14
This morning’s post on the AWOL ‘forgeries’ now has its own page.

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Date
20040913
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
13:29
Please ignore this. It can’t possibly be true, because these images are fake.

Independent – MoD faces more than 40 cases of abuse and killings in Iraq: British lawyers are now taking court action over more than 40 cases of alleged abuses and killings by British troops in Iraq – including fresh claims that unarmed civilians were murdered, tortured or recklessly shot.

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Date
20040913
An American Election
Time
14:53
Bush visits Swift Boat donor. Thanks, buddy.

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Date
20040913
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
15:43
Washington Post – Key General Criticizes April Attack In Fallujah

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Date
20040913
The Bush Administration
Time
16:42
Guardian – Colin Powell in four-letter neo-con ‘crazies’ row: A furious row has broken out over claims in a new book by BBC broadcaster James Naughtie that US Secretary of State Colin Powell described neo-conservatives in the Bush administration as ‘fucking crazies’ during the build-up to war in Iraq.

Boston.com – Powell targets terror comment: Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said yesterday he believes Senator John F. Kerry would, if elected president, respond to terrorism “in a robust way,” challenging a comment made last week by Vice President Dick Cheney.

If Powell’s not careful, he’s going to miss out on his pardon…

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Date
20040913
He Speaks French, You Know…
Time
17:00
Mr. Cheney, answer the question!: Dick Cheney and George Bush have tried to mislead the American people about a direct link between Iraq and September 11th. They are playing the politics of fear to cover up their failed policies on the economy and Iraq. Yesterday, Secretary Powell said he sees no direct link between Saddam Hussein and what happened on September 11th. Dick Cheney needs to answer the question: Who’s telling the truth – you or Colin Powell?

Moulton woman says she lost job for sporting Kerry sticker on car.

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Date
20040914
Bush: AWOL
Time
09:55
Blogdex is today saturated with links to articles or posts from right-wing bloggers who are either backslapping each other for the ‘good’ they’ve done and the credit they’ve received for it, bitching about the media not crediting them (and/or (*gasp*) denigrating them as “right-wing nuts”), or desperately trying to track down the source – all the while operating with a blind spot that means they won’t even consider Karl Rove as a suspect.

For the record: I don’t care if they’re bloggers or journalists or both. The primary sources are ultra-right-wing and cannot be trusted to carry out anything close to an independent investigation. Not that this is what is going on here. What we’re really looking at is one big cloud of smoke.

Here’s a bunch of links; mainly collected here for my reference. At the top is the only link worthy of headline inclusion, because this headline Says. It. All.

Memos debate eclipses content

http://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110005611

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/13/opinion/13safire.html

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/007814.php

http://wizbangblog.com/archives/003652.php

http://timblair.spleenville.com/archives/007454.php

http://beldar.blogs.com/beldarblog/2004/09/some_credential.html

http://instapundit.com/archives/017736.php

And now, a quick word from the ultra-left:

Take names – the memos are not forgeries: Now, I think it’s time for us to take names. Hold the people that are pushing this dishonest diatribe accountable. Not just the bloggers and Drudge, but also those within the mainstream media who chose to run with the forgery angle before all of the facts were in.

(Thread also contains the following true – if rather defeatist – statement: “the Bush corporate media has done its job and the word FORGERY is firmly planted in the minds of the sheep”)

The final word I leave to Counterspin Central: The next phase of “Memogate” will be to pin it all on the Democrats, particularly on John Kerry. (In fact, it’s already started.) If you want to know why this issue matters, and why you have to keep e-mailing all the stories that debunk the “forgery” theory to your local press with angry defiance, that’s it. Remember, whether the memos themselves were typed versions of Killian’s own handwritten notes, or forgeries, is irrelevant. (Worth reading in full, this one. Click and consider.)

UPDATE – An excellent and detailed overview of the ‘forgery’ sideshow from Ornicus: Rather hilariously, all of these critics are doing themselves exactly what they’re accusing CBS of doing: Running with “facts” and “analysis” that are materially false and ultimately bogus, and rushing them out without double-checking them.

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Date
20040914
Flash Games
Time
09:57
Play all the Yeti games in one amazing round of snowbound sports; it’s the Ylympics!

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Date
20040914
RWCs
Time
09:58
A nifty link from Shane (who has also given me some thoughts to ponder): Who in your family or community has donated to Kerry or Bush?

Should keep the violence ticking over. Let me know how you get on.

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Date
20040914
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely! It’s Over!
Time
10:06
Newsweek – It’s Worse Than You Think: As Americans debate Vietnam, the U.S. death toll tops 1,000 in Iraq. And the insurgents are still getting stronger

Time – Mission Still Not Accomplished: The Bush Administration would prefer to avoid any bloody showdowns until after the U.S. presidential election in November, but it faces hard decisions now. The crisis on the ground imperils prospects for Iraq’s national elections in January, the results of which could determine how quickly the U.S. can draw down its troop levels. For a legitimate vote to go forward, U.S. and Iraqi forces must soon wrest back control of the country. But there are no easy ways to do that.

Back To Iraq – It’s Worse Than You Think… :And in the midst of all this violence, most of the Iraqi Interim Government is out of town. Security Advisors, heads of important ministries and the chief of the new Mukhabarat are all mysteriously absent. The Iraqi security forces are a joke, with the much talked about Fallujah Brigade disbanded for being feckless and – worse – riddled with insurgents who were being paid and trained by the U.S. Marines. Thousands of Iraqis are desperate to get a new passport and flee the country. These are often the most educated Iraqis – the have the money to get new passports and travel – so the brain-drain will accelerate. The poor and the disenfranchised are finding their leaders in the populist and fundamentalist Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr or in the radical Islam of the jihadis, who are casting a long shadow on this formerly secular country. Iraq has its own home-grown Wahhabists now, something it didn’t have 18 months ago. In the context of all this, reporting on a half-assed refurbished school or two seems a bit childish and naive, the equivalent of telling a happy story to comfort a scared child. Anyone who asks me to tell the “real” story of Iraq – implying all the bad things are just media hype – should refer to this post. I just told you the real story: What was once a hell wrought by Saddam is now one of America’s making.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
In The News
Time
10:27
Fathers 4 Justice have struck again, with nationwide television coverage last night and the front page of every newspaper this morning:

The only problem? Apart from the occasional paragraph, and maybe this BBC piece, coverage is limited almost entirely to the security implications. The same result they got from their Commons protest.

One of the main problems is those damn costumes.

The thing about comic books is that the artists don’t have to deal with things like the reality of sagging spandex. Even when huge budgets are thrown and creating ‘real’ versions of those costumes for movies, mileage can vary. (Take a look at the closing scene of Batman Forever. Batman and Robin run toward the camera in slow motion, dramatically backlit and shrouded in mist. But the whole illusion is shattered by Batman’s rubber ears bouncing around like a pair of rubber penises.)

If you’ve ever dressed up in one of these costumes for any period of time (or seen anyone dressed up in one of these costumes for any period of time) you will know that even the ones with enhanced muscle tone do very little to sell a convincing illusion. You don’t end up looking like a superhero; you end up looking like a goofball in a costume.

That’s one of the main reasons why the media aren’t grabbing onto the responsible-but-hard-done-by father angle. This story is over the moment one of these guys is pictured atop any structure in tights. Because they look like an irresponsible goofball in a costume.

(The other reason is that the media simply don’t like attention seekers. Particularly successful ones. Dammit, they worked hard to get where they are and they’ll be damned if they’re going to give a voice to a jumped up, self-styled…)

Another thing I noted from the BBC coverage is that they really seem whipped these days. Not only did the Very Real Threat of Terrorism get woven in throughout the story, the BBC also noted how reasonable the police were being by giving the intruder glasses of water.

Clue-by-Four: The police kept giving him water because they knew that sooner or later he would have to expel the excess fluid.

*sigh*

But I will close by saying something about security issues, myself:

Fathers 4 Justice do have something in common with terrorists, in that very few people are asking why they do what they do.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
The Political Weblog Movement
Time
10:28
Gnnnnnnnnn*

Shouting about it isn’t going to do any good; it just has to be dealt with.

There will be no preview of Boris today. The domain thing has proved to be a more complicated issue than it first appeared. Even if I can (finally) get people moving on it today – which I probably can’t – it won’t propagate through the system until well into tomorrow.

Still, that does mean that during the education process tomorrow we can post anything we like, as the blog is still only visible in the temporary staging area.

So that’s a lemon for you, some slightly tart lemonade for me. Sorry about that.

UPDATE – If you wish to keep yourself busy, drop by and say hello to Jody Dunn. Sensible people are finally starting to outnumber the shouty Labour flunkies (who actually appear to be one person operating out of his – possibly taxpayer funded – webshed).

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Date
20040914
Photoshopping
Time
10:36
A Batman bandwagon is already rolling on the B3ta messageboard. It may prove distracting.

UPDATE – Couldn’t help it. Sorry. (Posted to B3ta.)

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Date
20040914
Consume!
Time
10:38
What a great vehicle. It not only chews through the gas, it gives you no choice but to drive and park like a selfish bastard.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
The War on Stupid
Time
11:52
Putin exploits terrorism threat in grab for power. Sound familiar?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
Music
Time
14:04
Go, Mrs Miller, GO! (Poke around Frank’s Vinyl Museum as much as you please, but do *not* leave Mrs Miller’s page without checking out Downtown.)

UPDATE – I know it requires ReallyCrapPlayer, but some things transcend personal format issues. (Oh, do take the time to discover The Beatle Barkers, too.)

UPDATE 2 – I’m spoiling you today. Here’s a bunch of classic TV theme tunes.

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Date
20040914
Activism
Time
15:36
Brian Haw to appear before magistrates today.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
An American Election
Time
16:45
Houston Chronicle – Guns for votes: It’s truly a dark day: White House watches law sunset and waits for endorsement of NRA.

New York Times – Kerry Faults Bush for Failing to Press Weapons Ban: Mr. Bush said during the 2000 campaign that he supported the ban on 19 types of semiautomatic weapons passed in 1994, and he has repeatedly pledged to sign an extension if it reaches his desk. But the National Rifle Association – which backs his re-election – was eager to let the ban lapse, and Mr. Bush did nothing to push Republican leaders in Congress on the issue.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
Christianity Watch
Time
16:59
Hooray! The pill is a ‘chemical abortion’! (The first person to use the word ‘pre-emptive’ gets a slap.)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
South West Trains
Time
17:06
ITV – South West Trains’ drivers to strike: The union said the dispute flared over the attempted imposition of new working rotas without agreement.

It doesn’t say that this has anything to do with the new magic timetables, but you can bet that it does.

Cheers to BigDaddyMerk for the heads-up.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
Tony ‘King Blair
Time
17:12
Tony Blair draws another line under Iraq and suck up to the unions at the same time: “Even if I’ve never been away, it’s time to show I’m back.”

Pfft!

(I leave any further comment to Perfect.co.uk)

UPDATE – No I don’t. Please note how gracefully he refuses to apologise for Iraq and links it to 911. Again. Full text of his speech (minus the uncomfortable silences) here.

Balders is sure to have something to say about this sooner or later. Keep an eye out.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
The End of Democracy
Time
17:18
One for Simon, because he once asked for details that I was unable to give at the time…

The Raw Story – Instant election replay: Suppressing minority voters: In 2000 , an estimated four million Americans were disenfranchised. Those citizens were disproportionately impoverished or from minority racial groups. An improperly conducted purge of voter rolls in Florida caused thousands of legal voters to be turned away at the polls. Police officers set up checkpoints near polling places, stopped African-American drivers, and forced them to step out of the vehicle and show I.D. Non-English speaking and handicapped voters were denied assistance in filling out their ballots. First-time Haitian American voters were denied the right to place their vote. Minority voters were told that they could not vote without photo I.D. in violation of the law. These and many other illegal and unethical acts, particularly in the state of Florida, changed the results of the presidential election and the course of our nation.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Date
20040914
It’s War! It’s Legal! It’s Lovely!
Time
20:10
Guardian – “He’s just sleeping, I kept telling myself”: On Sunday, 13 Iraqis were killed and dozens injured in Baghdad when US helicopters fired on a crowd of unarmed civilians. G2 columnist Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, who was injured in the attack, describes the scene of carnage – and reveals just how lucky he was to walk away.

WARNING – This is a disturbing account, complete with a disturbing image. In other words, you won’t be able to draw a line under it in a hurry.

More here at Metafilter and a detailed report here. (But remember, if you read these and look at the pictures or videos linked therein, you’re only helping the terrorists.)

Independent – US missile attack kills 13 civilians in Iraq: “The helicopter fired on the Bradley to destroy it after it had been hit earlier and it was on fire,” said Major Phil Smith of the 1st Cavalry Division. “It was for the safety of the people around it.”…. The US military said that a Kiowa, a light reconnaissance and attack helicopter, fired rockets at the Bradley to destroy weapons and ammunition on board. But it is evident from the al-Arabiya video that the rockets landed among people standing or walking far away from the Bradley.

PS – It’s 12 points for an ambulance. Can you say “Whoa, Dude!”?

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Date
20040914
Updates
Time
20:13
A bit of general housekeeping and the shift of Washington Monthly to the nav-bar. As part of the update, the nav-bar link to Europhobia is now site-wide.

I’ve provided some extra bloggage this afternoon and evening because there probably won’t be much tomorrow.

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Date
20040914
SEO
Time
21:37
Page 3 – Model Propaganda is now getting a bunch of quality search results for everything from ‘page 3’ (UK only) through to ‘page 3 girls’ to ‘sun page 3’ (internationally)… and the more you link to it, the better these results get. Cheers all.