:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::

:: 12.23.2004 ::

:: The Dead Red Planet? ::

Mars may be geologically active, new photos imply
Tim Radford, science editor
Thursday December 23, 2004
The Guardian UK

Mars, the red planet, may not after all be the dead planet. New research today by European scientists suggests that volcanoes on Mars last erupted only 2 million years ago and could erupt again.
And dramatic photographs by a high-resolution stereoscopic camera aboard the European spacecraft Mars Express, in the journal Nature, suggest that glacial ice could survive on the western scarp of Olympus Mons, the biggest volcano in the solar system.

Last week, Nature's US rival Science named the confirmation of water on Mars as the scientific breakthrough of 2004. But the revelation that Mars could be geologically "alive" is even more dramatic.

Volcanos eject water and atmospheric gases, recycle mineral nutrients and reshape landscapes. The discovery once again raises the possibility that life might survive on Earth's colder, smaller, dustier neighbour.

"A year or two ago any planetary scientist I know would have said no, Mars has been quiet; it is no longer geologically active," said Alan Moorhouse, of the European spacecraft operations centre in Darmstadt, Germany.

"To find that there has been volcanic activity as recently as 2 million years ago is astounding. In geological terms, 2 million years is yesterday. Anything that happened yesterday can happen again today."

Mars Express began orbiting the red planet in January, after delivering the ill-fated British lander Beagle 2, and began a series of close approaches to map the topography in finer detail than ever before. For the first time, earthbound geologists could study geological features, drainage patterns, evidence of volcanic eruption and traces of ancient ice scars.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 10:01:00 AM [+] ::
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:: More Moore ::

From The Independent
found @ MichaelMoore.com
Republicans and neo-cons call for 'arrogant' Rumsfeld to quit

Only a fortnight ago, the White House announced that President George Bush had asked Mr Rumsfeld, 72, to stay on into his second term. Since then at least four senior Republican senators, as well as William Kristol, the editor of The Weekly Standard, the neo-conservatives' house magazine, have called for his dismissal.

ALSO
"A LITANY OF SERIOUS MISCALCULATIONS" Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois

AND
from Moore's TO DO list
If you've seen Fahrenheit 9/11,' you know how much fun Bush's first inauguration was. Help make this one even BIGGER and BETTER.

posted by me

:: 11:23:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "RE Rummie" ::

Bush Defends Embattled Defense Secretary Rumsfeld
Associated Press
President Bush defended embattled Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Monday, saying the Pentagon chief was doing "a very fine job."

ALSO
IRAQ: Now it’s conservatives who are raising doubts about the war in Iraq and one of its chief architects, Donald Rumsfeld.
Letter to the Editor
from The Santa Cruz Sentinel

President Bush is sounding less and less believable in his public comments about Iraq, and his secretary of defense is paying the price. Democrats have long taken aim at Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, especially after reports surfaced about the mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.

But now Republicans are taking aim at Rumsfeld as well: first Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and the latest, Trent Lott of Mississippi.

At the center of their criticism is a charge that Americans heard from Sen. John Kerry during his campaign for the presidency: that America doesn’t have enough troops, and those troops don’t have adequate provisions.

And other conservative commentators are joining the chorus ...

we’d like to see Bush — or anyone else — explain publicly why the course we’re on in Iraq makes sense, and whether Rumsfeld is in a position to help achieve success.

So far, we haven’t heard it.

AND
Rumsfeld in condolence letter row

posted by me

:: 10:59:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "In the Beginning" ::

NASA to Smack a Comet
From Wired News
The space agency will fire an 820-pound projectile into a comet at 22,000 mph on July 4. The resulting explosion and debris could answer fundamental questions about how planets came to be. By Amit Asaravala.

ALSO from Wired News

Ohio Recount Stirs Trouble
A report that a voting company employee dismantled an election computer before Ohio's recount last week has a congressman calling for an FBI investigation into vote tampering. But an election official behind the report says her words are being misinterpreted. By Kim Zetter.

Making Modern Art Seem Ancient
Scratch Code shows that "new media" art isn't so 21st-century -- many of the works were done decades ago. By Rachel Metz.

posted by me

:: 10:44:00 AM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird (.880)

LEAD STORY
"Freegans" are non-homeless Dumpster divers with a political or at least philosophical commitment not to waste perfectly usable discarded goods, including food, according to reports in Newsday (September) and the Houston Press (November). Most are driven by a belief that too many Americans have a fetishized view of newness, pointing out that restaurants discard much unspoiled food simply because they need to sell even fresher food. (Freegans don't eat table scraps.) Still, many restaurants elaborately protect their garbage from "Dumpstering" foragers, with locks and razor wire or by coating it with bleach. (Not usually counted as freegans are less-philosophical people who obsessively explore trash piles to carry away anything potentially useful.) [Houston Press, 11-25-04; Newsday, 9-29-04]

Things People Believe
(1) Using parts she bought from the estate of a laser-tech engineer, Julie "Jitterbug" Pearce, 23, built a UFO-attracting device for the roof of her home in Duluth, Minn., and told the Duluth News Tribune in August that her machine's triangularly patterned strobe light design, looped radio transmissions, and laser light refracted through a quartz crystal may help signal aliens in the area. (2) In Johannesburg, South Africa, student John Smit, 18, caused a minor curriculum crisis when he willingly took a 30-point deduction on an important English exam because he could not bear to deal with a reading-comprehension question based on a passage from a Harry Potter book, which Smit regards as "witchcraft." [Sioux Falls Argus-Leader-Duluth News Tribune, 8-9-04] [Reuters, 11-1-04]

Compelling Explanations
In a September issue of the London Review of Books, trendy Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zisek made the point that the essential ideological differences in German, French and British-American societies, as noted by G.W.F. Hegel and others, can be represented by their countries' respective toilet designs. The German toilet's evacuation hole is in the front, facilitating "inspection and analysis," but the French design places the hole in the rear, so that waste disappears quickly. The British-American toilet allows floatation, which of course signals that society's "utilitarian pragmatism." Zisek described his theory as an "excremental correlative-counterpoint" to a framework identified with French philosopher Claude Levi-Strauss. [Boston Globe, 9-12-04]

Signs
Among the latest "miracles": a fiberglass statue of Jesus, which washed up on a sandbar on the Rio Grande River near Eagle Pass, Texas, and which has now drawn thousands of worshippers (September); an inflated balloon with a rubber smudge in the image of the Virgin Mary, decorating the car lot of Payne Weslaco Motors, Weslaco, Texas (giving at least one worker there "chills") (August); and the spontaneous falling over of the statue of the Virgin Mary at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church, which was taken to be a holy signal that the church, which had been scheduled for closing by the Boston Archdiocese, should remain open (October). [WOAI-TV (San Antonio)-AP, 9-28-04] [KGBT-TV (Weslaco), 8-31-04] [Boston Globe, 10-11-04]

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 10:44:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Fierce Face-Off" ::

P2P Battle Reaches FTC
From Wired News
The trade commission hears what's right and wrong with file sharing, but there's no guarantee it will institute regulations. Michael Grebb reports from Washington.

ALSO from Wired.com:

Turning the Holidays Green

Media Wish List for 2005
(By Adam L. Penenberg -- you might remember him as the one who broke the Stephen Glass story)

posted by me

:: 10:11:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Please Share Your Ideas with Us" ::

From a TrueMajority e-newsletter
Yes, the elections went the way they did, but a new day (or at least a New Year) is dawning and we’re in the midst of our annual planning process here at TrueMajority. So we’d like to know what types of things you’d like your organization working on in 2005.

We’d like your ideas on issues, on organizing geographically, on campaigns, on partnering, on online and in-person activities. Share whatever ideas you have on how TrueMajority can better serve your needs, provide you with information or opportunities to organize.

We’ve cooked up a way to do that online. It’s fast, easy, anonymous if you’d like…and you can react to the ideas other TrueMajority members have offered so that the ones that make the most sense to the most people can bubble to the top.

So please take a few minutes and let us know what’s on your mind. Just click here.

From the people in the back room who want to know what you think,
The TrueMajority Crew

posted by me

:: 8:59:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Hollywood Wants BitTorrent Dead" ::

From Wired News
The film studios' lobbying arm files lawsuits against the operators of sites and servers that help users of file-sharing networks locate movies and songs. By Xeni Jardin.

posted by me

:: 9:51:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Judge Not for Sale, Despite eBay Listing" ::

NEW YORK (AP) - A Manhattan housing court judge said he was not amused by an advertisement on eBay that listed him for sale - with worldwide shipping included - posted by a disgruntled litigant.

posted by me

:: 10:22:00 PM [+] ::
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:: P2P update ::

Supreme Court to hear P2P case
By John Borland
Staff Writer, CNET News.com

update The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday said it would hear a controversial case on whether file-sharing software companies could be held legally responsible for copyright infringement on their networks.

The court's action is good news for big record labels and Hollywood studios, which have lost successive rulings on the issue in lower courts. They want software companies like Morpheus parent StreamCast Networks and Grokster to be held legally responsible when copyrighted material is swapped using their software.

posted by me

:: 10:11:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "More Questions for Florida" ::

From Wired News
An apparent whistleblower is getting some attention by claiming a Florida official sought vote-changing software. But cautious observers say there's plenty of room for doubt. By Kim Zetter.

posted by me

:: 10:01:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "It's Time to Stop Being Hit" ::

From an e-newsletter
by Michael Moore

Dear Friends,

It is no surprise that the Republicans are sore winners. They have spent the better part of the past month beating their chests, threatening to send to Siberia any Republican who doesn’t toe the line (poor Arlen Specter), and promising everything short of martial law if the Democrats don’t do what they are told.

What’s worse is to watch the pathetic sight of the DLC (the conservative, pro-corporate group of Democrats) apologizing for being Democrats and promising to “purge” the party of the likes of, well, all of US! Their comments are so hilarious and really not even worth recognizing but the media is paying so much attention to them, I thought it might be worth doing a little reality check.

The most people the DLC is able to get out to an event of theirs is about 200 at their annual dinner (where you have to pay thousands of dollars to get in).

Contrast this with the following:

* Total Members of Move On: More than 2,000,000
* Total Attendance at Vote for Change Concerts: An estimated 280,000
* Total Union Members in U.S.: Around 16,000,000
* Total Number of People Who Have Seen “Fahrenheit 9/11”: Over 50 million
* Total Number of You Reading This: Perhaps 10 million or more

The days of trying to move the Democratic Party to the right are over. We lost a very close election (a one-state difference) by running the #1 liberal in the Senate. Not bad. The country is shifting in our direction, not to the right. But the country was attacked and people were scared. They were manipulated with fear. And America has never thrown a sitting president out during wartime. That’s the facts. Oh, and our candidate could have run a better campaign (but we’ll have that discussion another day).

In the meantime, while we reflect on what went wrong, I would like to pass on to you an essay that a friend who works with abuse victims sent to me. It was written by a woman who has spent years working as an advocate for victims of domestic abuse and she sees many parallels between her work and the reaction of many Democrats to last month’s election. Her name is Mel Giles and here is what she had to say…


Watch Dan Rather apologize for not getting his facts straight, humiliated before the eyes of America, voluntarily undermining his credibility and career of over thirty years. Observe Donna Brazille squirm as she is ridiculed by Bay Buchanan, and pronounced irrelevant and nearly non-existent. Listen as Donna and Nancy Pelosi and Senator Charles Schumer take to the airwaves saying that they have to go back to the drawing board and learn from their mistakes and try to be better, more likable, more appealing, have a stronger message, speak to morality. Watch them awkwardly quote the bible, trying to speak the ‘new’ language of America. Surf the blogs, and read the comments of dismayed, discombobulated, confused individuals trying to figure out what they did wrong. Hear the cacophony of voices, crying out, "Why did they beat me?"

And then ask anyone who has ever worked in a domestic violence shelter if they have heard this before.

They will tell you: Every single day.

The answer is quite simple. They beat us because they are abusers. We can call it hate. We can call it fear. We can say it is unfair. But we are looped into the cycle of violence, and we need to start calling the dominating side what they are: abusive. And we need to recognize that we are the victims of verbal, mental, and even, in the case of Iraq, physical violence.

As victims we can't stop asking ourselves what we did wrong. We can't seem to grasp that they will keep hitting us and beating us as long as we keep sticking around and asking ourselves what we are doing to deserve the beating.

Listen to George Bush say that the will of God excuses his behavior. Listen, as he refuses to take responsibility, or express remorse, or even once, admit a mistake. Watch him strut, and tell us that he will only work with those who agree with him, and that each of us is only allowed one question (soon, it will be none at all; abusers hit hard when questioned; the press corps can tell you that). See him surround himself with only those who pledge oaths of allegiance. Hear him tell us that if we will only listen and do as he says and agree with his every utterance, all will go well for us (it won't; we will never be worthy).

And watch the Democratic Party leadership walk on eggshells, try to meet him, please him, wash the windows better, get out that spot, distance themselves from gays and civil rights. See the Democrats cry for the attention and affection and approval of the President and his followers. Watch us squirm. Watch us descend into a world of crazy-making, where logic does not work and the other side tells us we are nuts when we rely on facts. A world where, worst of all, we begin to believe we are crazy.

How to break free? Again, the answer is quite simple.

First, you must admit you are a victim. Then, you must declare the state of affairs unacceptable. Next, you must promise to protect yourself and everyone around you that is being victimized. You don't do this by responding to their demands, or becoming more like them, or engaging in logical conversation, or trying to persuade them that you are right. You also don't do this by going catatonic and resigned, by closing up your ears and eyes and covering your head and submitting to the blows, figuring its over faster and hurts less if you don't resist and fight back.

Instead, you walk away. You find other folks like yourself, 57 million of them, who are hurting, broken, and beating themselves up. You tell them what you've learned, and that you aren't going to take it anymore. You stand tall, with 57 million people at your side and behind you, and you look right into the eyes of the abuser and you tell him to go to hell. Then you walk out the door, taking the kids and gays and minorities with you, and you start a new life. The new life is hard. But it's better than the abuse.

We have a mandate to be as radical and liberal and steadfast as we need to be. The progressive beliefs and social justice we stand for, our core, must not be altered. We are 57 million strong. We are building from the bottom up. We are meeting, on the net, in church basements, at work, in small groups, and right now, we are crying, because we are trying to break free and we don't know how.

Any battered woman in America, any oppressed person around the globe who has defied her oppressor will tell you this: There is nothing wrong with you. You are in good company. You are safe. You are not alone. You are strong. You must change only one thing: Stop responding to the abuser.

Don't let him dictate the terms or frame the debate (he'll win, not because he's right, but because force works). Sure, we can build a better grassroots campaign, cultivate and raise up better leaders, reform the election system to make it fail-proof, stick to our message, learn from the strategy of the other side. But we absolutely must dispense with the notion that we are weak, godless, cowardly, disorganized, crazy, too liberal, naive, amoral, "loose,” irrelevant, outmoded, stupid and soon to be extinct. We have the mandate of the world to back us, and the legacy of oppressed people throughout history.

Even if you do everything right, they'll hit you anyway. Look at the poor souls who voted for this nonsense. They are working for six dollars an hour if they are working at all, their children are dying overseas and suffering from lack of health care and a depleted environment and a shoddy education.

And they don't even know they are being hit.


How true. And that is our challenge over the next couple of years; to hold out our hand to those being hit the hardest and help them leave behind a party that only seeks to keep beating them, their children, and the kid next door who’s on his way to Iraq.

Yours,
Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com
MMFlint@aol.com

P.S. There are only a few hours left if you want to vote for “Fahrenheit 9/11” in the People’s Choice Awards (online voting is cut off at 3pm Eastern Time today). Go to http://www.pcavote.com/voting/film/f01.shtml to vote.

posted by me

:: 9:12:00 AM [+] ::
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:: The Geminids ::

ALL-NIGHT SHOWER
From the St. Paul Pioneer Press

One of the astronomical highlights this month is the Geminid meteor shower. It's one of the best meteor showers of the year, and, unlike most meteor showers, it's visible all night.

It will peak from Monday night to early Tuesday morning. Even in the city, you may see 10 to 20 meteors or "shooting stars" an hour, and in the dark skies of the countryside, you may see more than 40 meteors an hour!

The Gemini meteor shower occurs each year at this time as the Earth, in its orbit around the sun, runs into a debris trail left behind by an asteroid. It's called the Geminid because all of the meteors seem to emanate from the direction of the constellation Gemini the Twins, which will be nearly overhead at midnight.

ALSO
Geminid Meteor Showers Alarm Area Residents
NBC 4.com, DC
WASHINGTON -- A meteor shower that had some startled motorists calling police is expected to continue over the next few days.

Meteors a star-studded show
Brisbane Courier Mail, Australia
WITH television in a summer dry spell and competition for prime DVD rentals fierce, the best show may not be in your lounge room but directly above it tonight.

Be dazzled by December meteors
Astronomy Magazine
The annual Geminid meteor shower, whose peak occurs the night of December 13, usually puts on a great show.

The Geminid Meteor Shower
KCBD-TV, TX
Make hot cocoa. Bundle up. Tell your friends: the best meteor shower of 2004 is about to peak on a long cold December night.

"Year's Best" Meteor Shower Peaks Monday Night
National Geographic
"You can begin to see the Geminids almost as soon as it gets dark," Cooke said. "You won't see many but you'll see them and you can see them all night."

Weird Geminids
Science @ NASA
What are the Geminid meteors? Scientists aren't sure. Perhaps chips off an exotic asteroid or dust from an extinct comet. In either case, they'll soon be here.

posted by me

:: 10:01:00 PM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird (.879)

LEAD STORY
Despite a $7.5 million budget deficit, the city of Berkeley, Calif., bought a 40-foot-long refrigerated trailer last year for the sole purpose of storing shopping carts that had been commandeered by homeless people for their "stuff" but then abandoned. According to a November 2004 report in the San Francisco Chronicle, the city says the freezer prevents vermin infestation while authorities wait (up to 90 days) for the "owners" to reclaim their belongings. Critics of the program said the city should just confiscate the shopping carts, most of which had been stolen from merchants in the first place and almost all of which are never claimed, anyway. [San Francisco Chronicle, 11-16-04]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Election Roundup
In underreported November election returns: Notorious Florida radio shock jock Bubba the Love Sponge Clem lost his race for Pinellas County sheriff, and his Tampa radio competitor "Dave the Dwarf" Flood lost for a conservation-panel seat (but each got nearly 30 percent of the vote). The mayor of Arvin, Calif., Juan Olivares, was arrested the day before polls opened, charged with child molesting. (Voters ousted him.) Peter Stevenson, losing candidate for Vermont lieutenant governor, appeared at the only televised debate with a fake arrow through his head and blood on his clothes. Bruce Borders won, becoming the Indiana General Assembly's only Elvis impersonator. Losing Pennsylvania congressional candidate Arthur Farnsworth, who ran on an anti-tax platform, was arrested three days after the election for tax evasion. [St. Petersburg Times, 11-3-04] [St. Petersburg Times, 11-3-04] [St. Petersburg Times, 11-3-04] [Burlington Free Press, 11-1-04] [New York Times-AP, 11-6-04]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Government in Action
In November, the Federation of American Scientists revealed the existence of a recent U.S. Air Force-paid study of psychic teleportation prepared by true-believing Nevada physicist Eric Davis, who wrote that moving oneself from location to location through mind powers is "quite real and can be controlled." An Air Force Research Lab spokesman defended his agency's use of UFO and spoon-bending reports and Soviet and Chinese studies of psychics, telling USA Today, "If we don't turn over stones, we don't know if we have missed something." [USA Today, 11-5-04]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Recurring Themes
Two months ago, News of the Weird reported on computer technology that would permit quasi-insertive sexual intercourse by a remote user (the Sinulator). In just a short step from that, hunter John Underwood announced in November that he had set up the equipment for "hunters" to fire a rifle over the Internet at deer, antelope and wild pigs on his 330-acre ranch near San Antonio, Texas (but opposition is mounting, and state regulators may step in, although current law is said to be written in a way that could not cover Internet hunting). Underwood would provide animal retrieval and shipping services, and said his business would be especially valuable for disabled sportsmen. [Reuters, 11-17-04]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 6:13:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Sunday Morning ::

Bush's References to God Defended by Speechwriter
President Does Not Claim Divinity Is on His Side, Gerson Contends
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 12, 2004; Page A06

KEY WEST, Fla. -- Like many evangelical Christians, President Bush believes that God is at work in his life. But he has avoided claiming that God is behind his presidency or U.S. foreign policy, his chief speechwriter said.

"The important theological principle here, I believe, is to avoid identifying the purposes of an individual or a nation with the purposes of God," Michael Gerson said. "That seems a presumption to me, and we've done our best to avoid the temptation."

Bush's references to God have drawn criticism both at home and abroad, particularly in the context of the war in Iraq. Boston Globe columnist James Carroll, for example, has argued on the basis of Bush's statements that "the war on which America has embarked is essentially religious," a contention often echoed by commentators in the Middle East.

Gerson acknowledged some rhetorical missteps, such as Bush's remark five days after Sept. 11, 2001, that the United States had begun a "crusade" against terrorism. Gerson said it was an unscripted comment that White House officials quickly realized would reverberate badly in the Arab world.

But on the whole, the speechwriter argued, Bush's references to the role of providence in human affairs have been carefully calibrated and fully within the tradition of American civic religion. He said that Bush, like other presidents from George Washington to Bill Clinton, has expressed trust in God without claiming to understand all of God's ways.

Critics of Bush's religious rhetoric, contacted after the conference, remained skeptical.

Gerson's assertion that Bush does not identify "the purposes of an individual or a nation with the purposes of God" is "a beautiful statement," said the Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, a Baptist minister and president of the Interfaith Alliance. "I would scream for joy if I thought that statement was the guiding principle behind the president's rhetoric."

Gaddy noted that three days after Sept. 11, 2001, Bush said the United States has a responsibility "to rid the world of evil," and that the president later told Congress that God is "not neutral" in the war on terrorism.

"I think he has slipped over the line on many occasions," Gaddy said.

Read the entire artcle here.

ALSO
Supports Bush 100 Percent
Dissident Voice, CA
... God said that President Bush should continue his Global War on Terror and the militarization of the world. ... Good thing President Bush has an open line to God. ...

posted by me

:: 10:01:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Experts: East-West 'meddling' in Ukraine?" ::

A UPI report
By Peter Lavelle

MOSCOW -- UPI's Russia analyst engages experts Edward Lozansky, Vlad Sobell, Janusz Bugajski, Dale Herspring, Andrew Kuchins, Ira Straus, Ethan S. Burger, and Gordon Hahn on the recent charges of "outside meddling" and use of "double standards" concerning Ukraine that have chilled U.S.-Russia relations.

--

UPI: This week U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov traded barbs under the rubric of foreign "meddling" in another country's domestic affairs, as well as calling involvement in a third country's affairs as applying "double standards." Ukraine, still experiencing political turmoil in the aftermath of its failed presidential election runoff, was the focus of this heated exchange.

Irrespective of the media hype surrounding Ukraine's political crisis, there is no doubt the West and Russia have heavily involved themselves in Ukraine's politics. The Kremlin invested larges sums and sent high profile spin-doctors. The West, a bit subtler, financed and trained non-government organizations.

Aren't the West and Russia both guilty of "meddling" and "double standards?" After all, the United States has a very long history of involving itself in foreign elections around the world. Russia also has a longstanding record of being interested in what happens in countries on its borders. Aren't charges of "meddling" and "double-standards" simply public rhetoric signaling dissatisfaction with an election outcome that pleases neither the West nor Russia?

Read more here.

ALSO
Doctors suspect foul play in Yushchenko poisoning
By Emma Griffiths and Reuters
ABC News AU

Supporters of Ukrainian Opposition Leader Viktor Yushchenko are demanding a full criminal investigation after medical tests confirmed he was poisoned during the country's recent presidential election campaign.

Doctors suspect the poison was given to Mr Yushchenko by a third party.

Mr Yushchenko's once healthy looking face is severely pockmarked and grey.

Some reports claim he is in so much pain he needs regular doses of morphine.

Until now the cause of his illness had remained a mystery.

Mr Yushchenko long alleged he was poisoned as part of a plot to kill him, while his opponents suggested he had eaten bad sushi.

Now his doctors say there is no doubt he was poisoned.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 8:45:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Footloose ::

County in Utah Repeals Anti-Dancing Law
ST. GEORGE, Utah (AP) - It's now legal to bring an insane person into Washington County, dance immodestly or let more than 25 mules cross a Virgin River bridge.

posted by me

:: 12:51:00 AM [+] ::
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:: Love That Merry Mongoloid ::

Bush OKs Ruling That May Endanger Species
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration said Friday it will allow developers to complete construction and other projects even after belated discoveries that the work could endanger protected species.

posted by me

:: 12:41:00 AM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird (.878)

LEAD STORY
Eccentric British rock musician Genesis P-Orridge (born Neil Megson) and his wife and partner, Lady Jaye Breyer, are gradually transforming themselves surgically into gender-neutral human beings ("pandrogynous") resembling each other, so that eventually they will be indistinguishable, to demonstrate how overrated gender is as a point of reference. (For example, he wore a lace dress at their wedding, and she dressed as a biker guy, with moustache, and for Valentine's Day 2003, each got breast implants.) P-Orridge told SF Weekly in October that their goal is to jointly become a third person, distinct from either of them. [SF Weekly, 10-27-04]

(Another installment of) Scenes of the Surreal (aka Weird Science)
Archaeologists excitedly announced in October that in examining ruins on the Wittenberg, Germany, property of 16th-century philosopher Martin Luther, they discovered the actual stone toilet on which he composed the manifesto that launched the Protestant Revolution. (Luther suffered chronic constipation and thus spent much of his days on the toilet.) [Chicago Sun-Times, 10-22-04]

The Continuing Crisis
Included among "weapons" allegedly found on inmates at the Grafton prison in Australia, reported in September in Brisbane's Courier-Mail, were four venomous redback spiders that an inmate said were "pets" that were regularly "milked" of venom by inmates in order to produce a toxin that they could inject, to help them get high. [Courier-Mail (Brisbane), 9-7-04]

Recurring Themes
A 47-year-old tribesman from Vietnam, who had relocated to a U.S. government-sponsored Montagnard community in North Carolina to escape persecution, got homesick and headed back to Vietnam in September. However, he lost his papers and is now stranded at Los Angeles International Airport because no country will issue him a visa, in a dilemma reminiscent of that of Merhan "Alfred" Nasseri, who has been chronicled several times in News of the Weird since 1988 (and in the recent movie "The Terminal") and who remains at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris. The tribesman is convinced that his only chance of repatriation will be lost if he leaves the airport, but at press time, he was continuing to examine options while making his home in an airport chair. [Washington Post, 10-19-04]

Creme de la Weird
Among the unsuccessful 2004 write-in presidential candidates (according to a November report on NJ.com): Jack Grimes of Maryland, who admires the leadership methodology of Saddam Hussein but would rely on telepathy and astrology to make tough presidential decisions; Sterling Allan of Utah, who alphabetized and then numbered every word in the Bible and said that the codes he produced told him to return the United States to the gold standard, among other insights; and Randy Crow of North Carolina, who says that despite a government-implanted chip in his brain, his administration would crush the "Omega Agency," which steals from people, which staged the Sept. 11 attacks, and which may have the ability to vaporize everyone. [NJ.com, 9-1-04]

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 2:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Five arrested after Santas brawl" ::

From The Daily Mail UK
Police had to break up a street brawl and five men were arrested following a charity fun run of more than 4,000 people dressed in Santa suits.

The disturbance happened late in the evening following the festive race in Newtown, South Wales.

Police said five men were arrested for assault and public order offences after officers were forced to break up fighting among a large group of people.

Read more here.

Alternate version attributed to The Daily Mail:

Police called to a mass brawl found an army of Santas punching and kicking each other.

Officers had to use batons and CS spray to quell the fight in the centre of Newtown, Powys.

Four were hurt and there were five arrests.

The battle of the Santas followed a 21/2-mile charity run involving more than 4,000 people dressed as Father Christmas. Some of them are believed to have overindulged in alcohol after crossing the finishing line.

The fun run is expected to benefit up to 200 charities and it is hoped that it will exceed last year's total raised of £80,000.

Organisers believe they have broken their own world record for having the most number of Santas in the same place. Last year a mere 3,200 took part.

PC Gareth Slaymaker, community safety officer for North Powys, said: 'Behaviour like this justifies the reluctance by the police to extend the licensing hours for public houses and bars for this type of event'.

posted by me

:: 12:51:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Sleighbells & Whistles" ::

Slip a Geek Book Under the Tree
From Wired News
» Tech gifts needn't be electronic. Geeks and non-geeks alike can enjoy the old-fashioned pleasure of curling up by the fire with a good read. Michelle Delio reviews a passel of new books just in time for the holiday season.

Sample review:

Tales of spam and woe: Technology reporter Brian McWilliams' Spam Kings: The Real Story Behind the High-Rolling Hucksters Pushing Porn, Pills, and %*@)# Enlargements ($23) is not fiction, though it's easy to see how someone might mistake it for a novel with characters like Dr. Fatburn, Terri Tickle, Mad Pierre and the Spam King himself -- Davis Hawke, a chess-geek Jewish neo-Nazi who turned to pushing penis pills only after he sadly accepted the fact that he was never going to be the next Hitler.

But wait, there's more: Jason Vale, a cancer patient who knows beyond a doubt that he was cured by taking Laetrile, a treatment that some cancer specialists dismiss as a toxic fraud. Medical protests aside, Vale wanted to save other cancer patients and make a tidy profit for himself, and he's been spamming ever since. Chances are if you ever received a cancer-cure spam, it came from Vale.

And remember those spams promising $5,000 for information on such time-travel gadgets as a Dimensional Warp Generator? McWilliams tracked the sender down and discovered a mentally disturbed 22-year-old who worked as a spammer specializing in sending out "Free Government Grants" messages by day; by night he e-mailed plaintive pleas for time- and space-travel gear that would help him flee this scary and sad dimension.

McWilliams has written a true crime thriller with just enough geek-pleasing details on how spam outfits work, interspersed into a rich and fascinating tale that documents the lives, loves and motivations of several spammers, as well as the antispam activists who are bound and determined to get these dorks offline and into jail.

If you've ever wondered who is behind those bizarre e-mails that promise you improved body parts, your own harem of nubile and alarmingly eager ladies, and plenty of money for nothing, read Spam Kings. You'll be horrified -- when you're not laughing like a lunatic.

(Revolution in the Valley, Tangent, Mind Hacks: Tips & Tools for Using Your Brain in the World, & User Friendly are also reviewed.)

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 10:23:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "You don't have to move to Canada" ::

Post-Election Stranger Cover Becomes a Collector's Item
Found at the Web site of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies
Requests for the Nov. 11 edition of The Stranger are pouring into the Seattle alt-weekly's offices, largely from readers who found a degree of post-election solace in the issue's unorthodox cover, according to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. The cover features text in a series of colored bars that reads "Do not despair," before reassuring readers that they're part of a "diverse, dynamic, and progressive … urban archipelago" that voted overwhelmingly for Kerry. "People really responded to it," says editor Dan Savage, who wrote the cover text. Incoming requests for the issue number around 500, and that's just the beginning. "People want T-shirts, people want posters," says Savage. [Posted November 30, 2004]
Source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Excerpts from the Seattle PI story:

Kevin Shurtluff, circulation manager at The Stranger, says he's never seen anything like this in his seven years with the Seattle publication (in both delivery and circulation departments).

"It gave people something to rally around," said Shurtluff, who wasn't expecting this sort of response. "A lot of people were feeling glum."

"We provided 100 papers to someone involved with the Democratic Party in Alaska who wanted to bring papers back up for people there. And people wanted multiple copies for people to give their families."

And it's not just extra issues of the paper.

"People want T-shirts, people want posters ... we're not in the T-shirt business," says Stranger editor Dan Savage. But he understands the appeal of the issue.

"The cover is tough-minded. We're trying to put the fight back into people," he said.

"It was really honest. It still had the attitude that we weren't transformed overnight into a weeping bag of slop," said Savage, who said that The Stranger's staff was dismayed at Kerry's loss.

"We were all traumatized by the realization on Nov. 3 and the sense of estrangement from our own country and countrymen and we poured our hearts into this issue."

In processing what all that meant, he said the staff produced an issue that seemed to touch a nerve with their readers.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 9:02:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Don't do it in the middle of the road ::

THE NEXT DNC CHAIR: WHY YOU SHOULD CARE
From an e-newsletter
By Arianna Huffington

This Saturday in Orlando, at a meeting of state party chairs, a parade of potential candidates are going to be making the case for why they should be the next chair of the Democratic National Committee.

I don’t have a candidate. But I do have a litmus test: Anyone raising the idea that the party needs to “move to the middle” should immediately be escorted out of the building. Better yet, a trap door should open beneath them, sending them plummeting down an endless chute into electoral purgatory — which is exactly where the party will be permanently headquartered if it continues to adopt such a strategy.

Among those eyeing the position are Howard Dean, former White House aide Harold Ickes, Texas Rep. Marty Frost, former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, New Democrat Network founder Simon Rosenberg, political strategist Donnie Fowler, and telecom exec Leo Hindrey.

Although less than 450 people will ultimately decide who becomes the next party chair, when the DNC votes on Feb. 12, the outcome will have a profound effect on shaping the party’s future. Will Democrats continue to toe the strategy line of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council that has brought them to the brink of permanent minority-party status? Or will they finally return to the party’s roots and recapture its lost political soul — and the White House and Congress with it?

Welcome to the Great Democratic Party Identity Crisis of 2005.

Ever since the election, Democratic leaders have been crawling over each other in a mad scramble to the middle. Indeed, this is the worst case of midriff bulge since Kirstie Alley stopped by Sizzler’s all-you-can-eat buffet.

“Things are accomplished in the middle. We have to work toward the middle. And I think that that’s clear.” That was new Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on “Meet the Press” this weekend. He didn’t elaborate on what good was “clearly accomplished” in the middle over the past four years, but perhaps he was referring to the invasion of Iraq. Almost makes you long for the spineless bleating of Tom Daschle, doesn’t it?

Last week’s meeting of the 21-strong Democratic Governors Association was similarly an orgy of centrist groping, best summed up by Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who said, “This, for us, is our moment to push an agenda . . . that is centrist and that speaks to where most people are.”

If Gov. Granholm, a rising star in the party, really thinks the center is where the majority of people were located this past election, the Democrats are in even worse trouble than we think. Have these people learned nothing from 2000, 2002 and 2004? How many more concession speeches do they have to give — from “the center” — before they realize it’s not a very fruitful place?

Putting aside for a moment the question of the party’s soul and focusing entirely on hardball politics, running to the middle has been proven to be the single stupidest strategy the Democrats can pursue.

As cognitive psychologist George Lakoff told me: “Democrats moving to the middle is a double disaster that alienates the party’s progressive base while simultaneously sending a message to swing voters that the other side is where the good ideas are.” It unconsciously locks in the notion that the other side’s positions are worth moving toward, while your side’s positions are the ones to move away from. Plus every time you move to the center, the right just moves further to the right.

And if middle-of-the-roadism is such a great vote-getter, why don’t we see Republicans moving there? In fact, framing the political debate in right-left terms is so old, so tired, and so wrong that we need to resist all temptation to do so. There is nothing left-wing about wanting corporations to pay their fair share rather than hide their profits in PO boxes in Bermuda, or in ensuring access to health care now rather than paying the bill at the emergency room later.

That’s why the DNC race is so important. The party needs a chairman able to drive a stake through the heart of its bankrupt GOP-lite strategy and champion the populist economic agenda that has already proven potent at the ballot box in many conservative parts of the country. Just how potent is revealed in “The Democrats’ Da Vinci Code,” a brilliant upcoming American Prospect cover story by David Sirota that shows how a growing number of Democrats in some of the reddest regions in America have racked up impressive, against-the-grain wins by framing a progressive economic platform in terms of values and right vs. wrong. These are not “left” ideas; they are good ideas.

“This,” writes Sirota, “is not the traditional (and often condescending) Democratic pandering about the need for a nanny government to provide for the masses. It is us-versus-them red meat, straight talk about how the system is working against ordinary Americans.” These red-state progressives have brought the Democratic Party back to its true calling and delivered, according to Sirota, “as powerful a statement about morality and authenticity as any of the GOP’s demagoguery on ‘guns, God, and gays.’”

This strategy of economic populism coincides perfectly with what is the most significant shift in Democratic politics in a generation: the astounding growth of a grassroots donor base. Thanks in no small part to the Internet, the Kerry campaign and the DNC raised between them over $300 million from grassroots donors. Kerry alone raised over $71 million from donors who contributed $200 or less. What’s more, the DNC experienced a sevenfold increased in donors — skyrocketing from 400,000 in 2000 to the 2.7 million who contributed in 2004.

This reallocation of power away from lobbyists and big corporate donors will finally allow Democrats to stop taking policy dictation from their corporate financiers and start offering up an alternative vision to compete with George Bush’s. But only if the will is there — which means only if the next DNC chair understands and embraces this tectonic shift.

And only if he promises, at all costs, to stop playing in the middle of the road.

posted by me

:: 9:23:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Musicians Sing Different Tune on File Sharing" ::

From washingtonpost.com
Aside from the few who speak out publicly, musicians typically sit out the debate over file sharing. Now, a new survey has found that most artists don't view unauthorized swapping as a threat to their livelihood.

posted by me

:: 9:51:00 AM [+] ::
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A Stolen Election
The View From My Black Helicopter
from an e-newsletter
by Greg Palast
in The Nation
29 December issue

I'd just stepped out of my black helicopter to read that one of my favorite journalists, David Corn, had attacked my analysis of the vote in Ohio as the stuff of "grassy knoll conspiracy theorists." ("A Stolen Election," The Nation, November 29 issue.)

Oh, my! And all because I wrote that the uncounted ballots in Ohio -- more than a quarter million designated "spoiled" or "provisional" -- undoubtedly contain enough votes to overturn George Bush's "victory" margin of 119,000 out of over 5 million cast.

Corn says, "Palast wrongly assumes that an overwhelming majority of these ballots contain votes for Kerry." Now why would I think such a thing? Maybe because the precinct-by-precinct analysis of "spoiled" votes (those which machines can't count) by Professor Mark Salling of Cleveland State University, the unchallengeable expert on Ohio voting demographics, concludes that "spoiled" punch cards in Ohio cities come "overwhelmingly" from African-American neighborhoods.

The Republican Secretary of State of Ohio does not disagree, by the way; he intends to fix the Jim Crow vote-counting problem in Ohio ... sometime after the next inaugural ball.

The second group of uncounted ballots, "provisionals," were also generated substantially in African-American areas, the direct result of a Republican program to hunt down, challenge and suppress the votes cast in black-majority precincts.

What happened in Ohio is one-fiftieth of a nationwide phenomenon: the non-count of African-American votes, about a million of them marked as unreadable in a typical presidential race. (See, Palast, "Vanishing Votes," The Nation, March 17, 2004.)

I will admit, David, I can't tell you exactly how each of those disenfranchised voters would have cast their ballots. Indeed, one Republican statistician claims these uncounted ballots are cast mostly by African-American supporters of George Bush.

Nevertheless, most of us conspiracy nuts on the Grassy Knoll hold to our wild belief that most black citizens whose ballots were spoiled or rejected tried to vote for the tall guy from Massachusetts.
----------

posted by me

:: 9:17:00 AM [+] ::
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:: The Tillman Tale continued ::

Army Spun Tale Around Ill-Fated Mission
The published account of Pat Tillman's last moments was a distorted and incomplete narrative, according to dozens of internal Army documents obtained by The Washington Post.

posted by me

:: 8:59:00 PM [+] ::
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:: O-H-I-O ::

Challenges Planned to Ohio's Presidential Vote Totals
Associated Press
Monday, December 6, 2004; Page A04
The Washington Post

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Dec. 5 -- When Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell certifies the state's final presidential election results, declaring President Bush the winner by about 119,000 votes, critics say they intend to present two challenges.

Lawyers representing voters upset about problems at the polls plan to contest the results with the Ohio Supreme Court, citing documented cases of long lines, a shortage of machines and a pattern of problems in predominantly black neighborhoods.

In addition, third-party candidates, bolstered by a favorable federal court ruling, plan to file requests for a recount in each of Ohio's 88 counties. About 400 people rallied at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus on Saturday to demand that a recount begin immediately.

Cliff Arnebeck, a Columbus lawyer working for the Massachusetts-based Alliance for Democracy, said overturning the result is not the objective.

"We should verify the accuracy of the vote and the process by which the vote was achieved," he said.

Arnebeck wants Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer to review evidence of election irregularities, an option allowed under state law.

Read the entire story here.

posted by me

:: 9:44:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Images of Fighting in Fallujah Compel at Different Levels" ::

Blogger's Display Is More Graphic Than a Military Slide Show
By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 5, 2004; Page A20

Two photo-rich summaries of the battle of Fallujah -- one produced by the U.S. military in Iraq, the other by an anonymous American blogger -- highlight how the terrain in such counterinsurgency fights can be as much psychological as physical.

Both presentations have gained increasing Internet audiences recently and attempt to convey, among other things, the suffering imposed on Iraqi civilians in Fallujah.

That is where similarities end, however. The military's presentation depicts the fight for Fallujah as a liberation of a city from the insurgents. The Web log posts far more graphic wire service and other photos, and tends to point the finger of blame for civilian suffering at the military.

The military briefing, an electronic slide show that has rocketed around the Internet over the last week, can be read at Soldiers for the Truth and other Web sites, frequently with comments such as, "Why is the DOD not getting this information to the media?" Another version of the briefing was released Friday by the Pentagon and is reachable at www.dod.mil/transcripts/2004/tr20041203-1721.html.

A competing vision of the Fallujah operation is presented by the blog titled "Iraq in Pictures," which Krohn says is far more similar to what Iraqis, and the Arab world, see on their satellite news channels.

Read the entire story here.

posted by me

:: 10:13:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Musharraf: Bin Laden's Location Is Unknown" ::

Pakistani Presses U.S. on Rebuilding Afghan Army
By Robin Wright and Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writers

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said yesterday that the search for Osama bin Laden has gone completely cold, with no recent intelligence indicating where he and his top lieutenants are hiding.

More than three years after al Qaeda's attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon killed almost 3,000 people, Musharraf insisted that Pakistani forces are still aggressively pursuing the world's most notorious terrorist. But he acknowledged that recent security force operations and interrogations have been able to determine only one fact -- that bin Laden is still alive.

"He is alive, but more than that, where he is, no, it'll be just a guess and it won't have much basis," Musharraf said in an interview with Washington Post editors and reporters. Pressed on whether the trail had gone cold, he said, "Yes, if you mean we don't know, from that point of view, we don't know where he is."

The United States shares major responsibility, Musharraf suggested, because the U.S.-led coalition does not have enough troops in Afghanistan, which has left "voids."

Read more here.

M e a n w h i l e . . .

U.S. to boost Iraq troops
Increase of 12,000 to highest level of war
By ROBERT BURNS
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON - The United States is boosting its military force in Iraq to the highest level of the war - higher than during the invasion in March 2003 - in order to bolster security in advance of next month's national elections in January.

The 12,000-troop increase is to last only until March, but it says much about the strength and resiliency of an insurgency that U.S. military planners did not foresee when Baghdad was toppled in April 2003.

Brig. Gen. David Rodriguez, deputy operations director of the Joint Staff, told reporters Wednesday that the American force will expand from 138,000 troops today to about 150,000 by January.

The previous high for the U.S. force in Iraq was 148,000 on May 1, 2003, when President Bush declared that major combat operations were over and most soldiers thought the war had been won. The initial invasion force included thousands of sailors on ships in the Persian Gulf and other waters, plus tens of thousands in Kuwait and other surrounding countries.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 9:51:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Tillman Death Probed" ::

The former Arizona Cardinal and U.S. Army specialist died unnecessarily after a series of errors and missteps by Army commanders and troops, according to documents obtained by the (Washington) Post.

posted by me

:: 9:31:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "Chomsky: 2004 Elections" ::

The elections of November 2004 have received a great deal of discussion, with exultation in some quarters, despair in others, and general lamentation about a "divided nation." They are likely to have policy consequences, particularly harmful to the public in the domestic arena, and to the world ...

posted by me

:: 2:45:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "WHY HAVEN'T THEY COUNTED A QUARTER MILLION VOTES IN OHIO?" ::

From a Greg Palast e-newsletter
Live nationwide on Pacifica radio and at KPFT.org
Jesse Jackson and Greg Palast

On Saturday, from 6pm-9pm EST, Rev. Jackson joins investigative reporter Greg Palast to ask what happened to nearly a quarter million votes, overwhelmingly from African-American precincts, not counted in Ohio.

For BBC Television, Palast uncovered the fake felon list that swiped the election in 2000; this year, his report on BBC television broke the story of the secret Republican "caging" lists that bent the November race.

The smell of Black ballots burning is hard to ignore. We need your help to continue this investigation into the votes not counted in Ohio, New Mexico and Florida. Behind the by-line "Greg Palast" in Harper's, The Nation and the Guardian is an investigative team that is now running perilously low on funding. While Greg Palast has donated 100% of his royalties from his bestseller, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, to the effort, we're still in the red.

We're asking you to keep this investigation going by making a $50 tax-deductible donation to the Palast Investigative Fund ... in return we'll send you as a thank you, the blistering documentary, "Bush Family Fortunes" on DVD, signed by reporter Palast. The film is taken from Palast's award-winning investigate broadcasts for BBC Television - the story of the Bush-Bin Laden connection, the shoplift of the vote in Florida, the secret plans for "Operation Iraqi Liberation" and other reports that you can't see on your Fox-ified TV. Donate before December 10 and receive your signed DVD before Christmas via first class mail.

Catch the new flash animation from Bush Family Fortunes here.

This is the film Jesse Jackson says, "You must see." That Senator John Edwards calls "Important and disturbing." Katherine Harris says Palast's reporting is, "Twisted and maniacal." Maybe that's why Noam Chomsky says Palast, "Upsets all the right people."

Other gift choices in return for your tax-deductible donation, all shipped within a week of donation via first class mail:

The Book: "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: New Special Election Edition," (Penguin 2004) signed by the author, for a minimum $50 donation.

The Cards: "Joker's Wild: Dubya's Trick Deck" - Tarot-sized four-color cards ... the illustrated satirical version of The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, for a minimum donation of $25, signed by the author.

The Audio Book: The five CD set from Penguin books of "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" read by the author with Ed Asner, Alec Baldwin, Jello Biafra, Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo, Amy Goodman, Jim Hightower, Cynthia McKinney, Alexandra Paul and Shiva Rose -- for a minimum donation of $100.00

The Whole Enchilada: For a minimum donation of $200, we'll send you a signed copy of the Special Election Edition of the book plus a signed copy of the cards, plus a signed copy of the 5-CD audio book, plus a signed copy copy of the DVD, "Bush Family Fortunes."

We don't take corporate money. We don't have big funders. Our readers keep us alive. If interested, you can donate here.

posted by me

:: 2:21:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Bushwhacked nation update ::

Environmentalists Lose on Spending Bill
WASHINGTON (AP) - From an Alaska land swap to tours of a Georgia barrier island, business interests bested environmentalists in battles that shaped Congress' $388 billion spending bill.

posted by me

:: 6:47:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Life After Red Herring ::

High-Tech Publisher Tries 'Blogozine'
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - After Red Herring sank into the dot-com morass last year, Tony Perkins considered resurrecting the magazine that helped establish him as a Silicon Valley sage.

posted by me

:: 6:21:00 PM [+] ::
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