Who will win in Pennsylvania?

Will the voters decide?

h/t ellroon.

ARE YOU ON CRACK?

BBC News (h/t WIIIAI):

Israel’s deputy defence minister has said it will be left with “no choice” but to invade Gaza, if Palestinian militants step up rocket attacks.

Matan Vilnai said Palestinians risked a “shoah”, the Hebrew word for a big disaster – and for the Nazi Holocaust.

What’s on the television, then?

Who made this bridge?

Anyone from New York City

Are you glad Rudolph Giuliani was your city’s mayor on September 11, 2001?

Rudolph Giuliani for President of September 11

Do you think Judith gets jealous of September 11?

h/t ellroon.

Is there a pattern developing?

Last update:

• June 25th, 2007

Special comment: “And screwed you are”

This is post #2,000 on Cannablog. Have we made progress since post #1,000?

A musical offering and other observations

[odeo=http://odeo.com/audio/17137793/view]

NTodd is wicked smart.

Something smells in Maricopa County

The Arizona Republic:

Phoenix police on Wednesday released a detailed account of events leading to Friday’s death of a woman from a prominent New York political family, while an attorney for relatives ripped Maricopa County authorities for withholding body parts from an autopsy.

The police chronology describes the last 40 minutes of Carol Gotbaum’s life. Although the account contains scant new information, it includes details supporting police assertions that the arrest was handled properly.

At the same time, the family’s legal team raised a number of questions about the handling of the 45-year-old woman’s body.

“They didn’t give us the complete body,” complained Phoenix lawyer Michael Manning, who represents Gotbaum’s husband, Noah. “They wouldn’t give us the neck, the brain and the heart.”

Congratulations

to PJ @ Groklaw, for winning a Knowledge Masters Award for Innovation from the Knowledge Trust and the Louis Round Wilson Academy.

Are US military generals now shrinking violets?

Mustang Bobby @ Shakesville:

By the way, in all of this, I haven’t heard a word of outrage or a tearful plea for mercy from General Petraeus himself. I’m pretty sure that he didn’t get to be a general in the United States Army by letting a schoolyard name-calling taunt get to him.

Watch MSNBC coverage of George Bush trying to be offended on behalf of his toady:

As for the Democratic members of the senate who voted with the idiots to condemn the first amendment, wake up.

Related post:

• Mandela is very much alive

When was the constitution amended to prohibit cannabis, anyhow?

(h/t Tanya @ Blame the Drug War)

Related post:

• Prohibitia-chloride, take as directed

Support the troops?

(h/t Chet Scoville @ Shakesville)

At the risk of being called incivil in my discourse

Dear Democratic party,

HERE IS HOW TO GROW A SPINE IN ONE EASY LESSON.

Thank you,

Everyone who wants you to stop being Republican footstools.

(h/t Ellroon commenting @ Skippy the Bush Kangaroo)

Guitar lesson

Labor day music

PSoTD asks, “Where’s the outrage?”

How many more should die?

Hat-tip James @ Left End of the Dial v2.0.

More honesty from Mike Gravel on Real Time with Bill Maher (via Nicole Belle @ Crooks and Liars):

What did General Petraeus authorize?

James Glanz and Eric Schmitt write in the New York Times (hat-tip Pygalgia, italics added):

In an interview on Aug. 18, General Petraeus said that with ill-equipped Iraqi security forces confronting soaring violence across the country in 2004 and 2005, he made a decision not to wait for formal tracking systems to be put in place before distributing the weapons.

“We made a decision to arm guys who wanted to fight for their country,” General Petraeus said.

But now, American officials said, part of the criminal investigation is focused on Lt. Col. Levonda Joey Selph, who reported directly to General Petraeus and worked closely with him in setting up the logistics operation for what were then the fledgling Iraqi security forces.

Do you see Mr. Hyde peeking out?

Couldn’t companies do a better job of advertising recalls?

The Consumerist:

Hey, contact lens wearers, according to a CDC survey, more than half of you have no clue that Advanced Medical Optics recalled their Complete MoisturePlus lens cleaner. The multipurpose solution fails to protect users from an amoeba that can cause acanthamoeba keratitis. Over 25% of users who contracted the infection required a corneal transplant, and if that doesn’t scare you, consider this quote from the CDC:

“This is just as serious as the fusarium outbreak,” said Lola Russell, a spokeswoman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, referring to an outbreak of fungal eye infections last year that was linked to Bausch & Lomb’s ReNu with MoistureLoc lens cleaners.

Whoever could deserve impeachment if not Bush and Cheney?

Yellow Dog @ Watching Those We Chose:

If Congress doesn’t impeach Bush and Cheney — or given the time constraints, indict and convict them after they leave office — it won’t matter who’s elected president in 2008. It won’t matter if Democrats take the Senate and House with 80-percent majorities. It won’t matter if the republican party is shut out of every national, state and local election for the next three generations.

If Bush and Cheney skate, an even more dangerous precedent than Nixon’s will be set in stone:

The president is King; Congress is a debating club; the judiciary is a joke; the Constitution is as dead as Ozymandias, and The American Experiment is a historical fluke that failed.

Who will defend Alberto Gonzales?

Hat-tip Thehim @ Blog Reload.

John Edwards asks, “What really matters?”

Recovering alcoholic or off the wagon?

Holden Caulfield and Spocko comment on this:

U.S. President George W. Bush (C) is joined by President of the Washington Nationals’ Stan Kasten (L) and Nationals’ General Manager Jim Bowden as they watch the Washington Nationals’ baseball team play in Washington, July 5, 2007. REUTERS/Jim Young (UNITED STATES)

Hat-tip Ellroon.

Hot or not?

Do you pledge allegiance to the flag of the Corporate States of America?

Hat-tip Tengrain.

“There’s a bomb in the building start clearing out”

Who killed Mychal Judge?

What happened to Roosevelt Sims?

At least he wasn’t deported to Mexico. I hope he is found safe before too long.

PHOENIX – A 65-year-old St. Louis man went missing outside Williams, Ariz., after he was kicked off an Amtrak train in the middle of a national forest, Williams police said.

* * *

Police said there is no train station or running water at the crossing, which is about two miles from the nearest road.

Amtrak personnel told police dispatchers that Sims was drunk and unruly.

The Sims family said Sims is diabetic and was going into shock.

* * *

Williams police told CBS 5 that Amtrak has used the abandoned crossing as a drop-off site in the past. Lt. Mike Graham said that whether drunk or not, no one should be dropped off there.

Update: Good news! He’s been found safe!

Sims was found around 9:40 p.m. Thursday night walking along railroad tracks two miles from where he was kicked off the train.

He is in good condition.

An Amtrak spokesperson says while it is an unfortunate situation, the crew acted appropriately by stopping the train and waiting for the authorities.

Sim’s family believes he was treated unfairly.

Anal rape as an instrument of US interrogation

Glenn Greenwald quoting from The Age (Australia):

David Hicks told his family when they visited him at Guantanamo Bay in 2004 that he had been anally assaulted during interrogation by the US in Afghanistan while he was hooded and restrained.

Anyone okay with this? Anyone? Bueller?

If George Bush is incompetent, who is the president?

A Proclamation by the Vice-President of the United States of America

The Office of the Vice President represents the independent, capitalistic and entrepreneurial spirit of America and has done so publicly since 2001. Wherever oil companies and military industrial complexes are repressed, wherever the morality of disproportionate corporate profits is called into question, the Office of the Vice President is there to remind us of that skyrocketing capital gains for the few at the sake of the huddled masses, yearning for decent jobs and nationalized health care, is the American way.

Two hundred and eighteen years ago, the United States Constitution established the Office of the Vice President. It was implicit in the Constitution that future generations of Americans foresee the need for a fourth branch of government to protect the people from the dangers posed by a tripartite system run amok and to protect the upper class from the great unwashed.

The Office of the Vice President is an institution separate and apart from the Executive, Legislative and Judicial Branches. As such, it is not subject to the minor and petty demands of the American people, their representatives in Washington, D.C., or any level of the United States judicial system. The Office of the Vice President has the right to claim Executive Privilege despite being separate and apart from said Branch.

While the Chief Executive is tasked under the Constitution with the responsibilities as Commander-in-Chief, the Departments of State and Defense fall under the control and purview of the Office of the Vice President. The Office is within its implied rights to determine and drive foreign policy (including, but not limited to, initiating preemptive strikes on sovereign nations and revealing classified information for personal gain), to establish and maintain domestic energy policy, and to ensure an ever-upward spiral for corporate profits.

To celebrate this great Office all day and every day, the Vice President recommends that the American people tell all who question their individual authority: Go fuck yourselves.

THEREFORE, I, RICHARD BRUCE CHENEY, do hereby proclaim that the Office of the Vice President has been and will continue to be immune from prosecution and/or impeachment or other querulous, ad hominem attacks and investigations by the Legislative Branch.

THEREFORE, I, RICHARD BRUCE CHENEY, do hereby proclaim that the Office of the Vice President has been and will continue to direct the Office of the President and rule on matters of foreign and domestic policy.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-fourth day of June, in the year of our Lord two thousand seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-first.

RICHARD B. CHENEY, REX.

How many soldiers should die for homophobia?

Hat-tip Ellroon.

Where is Pedro Guzman?

SignOnSanDiego (June 11):

LOS ANGELES – The family of a mentally disabled man claims that the federal and local governments mistakenly had an American citizen deported and says U.S. officials should help find him in Mexico.

Relatives sued the Department of Homeland Security and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department on Monday in federal court, saying they have been searching for Pedro Guzman in Tijuana for a month.

“My worst fear is that he is no longer living,” said Guzman’s brother, Michael Guzman. “He doesn’t know how to read. He often can’t remember the family phone number. He even gets lost if he gets off the main street in Lancaster.”

Pedro Guzman, 29, of the desert city of Lancaster, was sentenced April 19 to 120 days in jail for a misdemeanor trespassing violation, according to the lawsuit.

It says he was asked about his immigration status in jail and responded that he was born in California. Sometime after that, the Sheriff’s Department identified him as a non-citizen, obtained his signature for voluntary removal from the United States and turned him over to U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement, a divison of the Homeland Security Department, for deportation.

Hat-tip Bryan at Why Now?

Update from Man Eegee:

Here’s where things stand so far in blogtopia (y!sctp) with respect to coverage of Pedro Guzman‘s forced exile and subsequent disappearance:

The Mex Files, Disability Studies – Temple U., UnSpace, Dallas-Fort Worth Immigration Lawyer, And We Shall March, Intersections, BadCopNews, Courage Campaign, TBogg, Rook’s Rant, Guanabee, Left End of the Dial, kid oakland, The Liberal OC, Calitics, Daily Kos, The Latin Americanist, Tejas Cubbie, Why Now?, Beautiful Horizons, Crime Scene KC, Outside the Beltway, The Gimp Parade, Fetch me my axe, States Without Nations, The Bullwinkle Blog, Hullabaloo, scootmandubious, serpentine smile, The Latino Body, nazarian, onefivetwo, cannablog, PREGUNTAVER, All Spin Zone

Extraordinary detention, extraordinary treatment, extraordinary disappearance

Hat-tip Monkeyfister.

Saturday afternoon movie

Full-screen.

Hat-tip Monkeyfister.

Related film:

• Weapons of mass deception

cnurdths

Monica Emmerson, her son, and a sippy cup

Terrorist? You decide.

Hat-tip Donna Woodka.

Update: Cannablog is pleased to join the sippy cup anti-massacre movement.

Update 2: Wow! in the comments below, suggests watching this:

Update 3: A commenter points out that if it had been milk in the sippy cup instead of water…:

As for milk, milk, formula and juice are allowed… perhaps you and Monica Emmerson need to read the rules. These are the same rules that guided my wife and I and we have had nary a problem with sippy cups. http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/children/formula.shtm

Though I’m not sure, on reading these rules it only seems to say she could have milk or juice in the carry-on, not necessarily in the sippy cup, and not water. You have to be very careful reading these rules… I think if Monica had just said it was “nursery water” in the sippy cup they’d have let her go through without hassle, because they were trying to say it was okay if it was milk.

Time to end “Most Favored Nation” status yet?

Children’s toys, above, poisoned with lead paint.

(Article from the Consumerist forwarded by my wife.)

What if God smoked cannabis?

Related posts:

• Judge the tree by the fruit
• For the want of a reply…

Whose mission?

Hat-tip Ellroon.

Is milk good or bad? Yes. Definitely, or not.

Hat-tip Chester.

Monica Goodling admits breaking the law

She didn’t mean to do it.

Remember, she has immunity. Whatever acts she undertook they were not of her own devising, she was working for people who wanted it done.

Hat-tip Paul Kiel.

Who are these Faux “Dems”?

Booman writes:

The Dems have promised to produce something that will be signed by Memorial Day.

I certainly hope that this is not true, and would hope to expose whoever made such a promise as an idiot or a Republican, but I repeat myself.

Related post:

• The word of the day is “fauxism.”

What do you think?

Via Misty:

HLS Class of ’82 calls for an independent counsel

An open letter to Alberto Gonzales, published May 15, 2007 in the Washington Post. Via Specious Reasoning, hat-tip Phoenix Woman.

Dear Attorney General Gonzales:

Twenty-five years ago we, like you, graduated from Harvard Law School. While we arrived via many different paths and held many different views, we were united in our deep respect for the Constitution and the rights it guaranteed. As members of the post-Watergate generation who chose careers in law, we understood the strong connection between our liberties as Americans and the adherence of public officials to the law of the land. We knew that the choice to abide by the law was even more critical when public officials were tempted to take legal shortcuts. Nowhere were we taught that the ends justified the means, or that the freedoms for which Americans had fought and died should be set aside when inconvenient or challenging. To the contrary: our most precious freedoms, we learned, need defending most in times of crisis.

So it has been with dismay that we have watched your cavalier handling of our fredoms time and again. When it has been important that legal boundaries hold unbridled government power in check, you have instead used pretextual rationales and strained readings to justify an ever-expanding executive authority. Witness your White House memos sweeping aside the Geneva Conventions to justify torture, endangering our own servicemen and women; witness your advice to the President effectively reading Habeas Corpus out of our constitutional protections; witness your support of presidential signing statements claiming inherent power to wiretap American citizens without warrants (and the Administration’s stepped-up wiretapping campaign, taking advantage of those statements, which continues on your watch to this day); and witness your dismissive explanation of the troubling firings of numerous U.S. Attorneys, and their replacement with others more “loyal” to the President’s politics, as merely “an overblown personnel matter.” In these and other actions, we see a pattern. As a recent editorial put it, your approach has come to symbolize “disdain for the separation of powers, civil liberties and the rule of law.”

As lawyers, and as a matter of principle, we can no longer be silent about this Administration’s consistent disdain for the liberties we hold dear. Your failure to stand for the rule of law, particularly when faced with a President who makes the aggrandized claim of being a unitary executive, takes this country down a dangerous path.

Your country and your President are in dire need of an attorney who will do the tough job of providing independent counsel, especially when the advice runs counter to political expediency. Now more than ever, our country needs a President, and an Attorney General, who remember the apt observation attributed to Benjamin Franklin: “Those who would give up essential Liberty to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” We call on you and the President to relent from this reckless path, and begin to restore respect for the rule of law we all learned to love many years ago.

Yours truly,

[Ffty-six signatories]

THESE SIGNATORIES ARE ALL MEMBERS OF THE HARVARD LAW SCHOOL CLASS OF 1982

Tuesday night movie

Hat-tip Len Hart.

Related post:

• The word of the day is “Fauxism”

Tell the moon, don’t tell the march hare

Do I hear an amen?

Does this make you angry?

Hat-tip Mimus Pauly.

Related post:

• Osama bin Laden is a free man

“I just know that they would not do that.”

Hat-tip Ellroon, who has more video.

Related post:

• “I now understand I was involved in a conversation with the president.”

Can you see the whole lion?

Click to enlarge, and back up a few paces if it helps.

Related posts:

• Am I the only one who sees a lion on the left?
• Medicine man