The Dem Diatribe Project

Lies, damned lies, and statistics * .... Blah, blah blah.

Alabama Bill Targets Gay Authors It just gets scarier and scarier in Alabama. Hate-mongering, homophobic (Or is he? Perhaps he protests too much?) Republican Alabama lawmaker Gerald Allen says homosexuality is an unacceptable lifestyle and he is out to ban the slightest reference to anything homosexual in literature, be it the author’s sexual orientation, or even the mention of the idea; Except, if it is gay-bashing, of course. The apparently crack-smoking representative states, "I don't look at it as censorship. I look at it as protecting the hearts and souls and minds of our children." If banning books is not censorship, then shut my mouth and call me corn bread. Books by any gay author would have to go: Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote and Gore Vidal. Alice Walker's novel "The Color Purple" has lesbian characters. Allen originally wanted to ban even some Shakespeare. After criticism, he narrowed his bill to exempt the classics, although he...

Are Americans finally getting wise? There are no WMDs in Iraq, nor have there ever been any WMDs in Iraq. We were lied to about Iraq. We are being lied to about Social Security. Basically, we are lied to every time Bush opens his mouth. It is a tragedy that we had to elect him in order to wake up to how much Bush lies. The "axis of evil" IS the Bush Administration. ... But I digress. Half of all Americans, exactly 50%, now say the Bush administration deliberately misled Americans about whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, the Gallup Organization reported this morning. "This is the highest percentage that Gallup has found on this measure since the question was first asked in late May 2003," the pollsters observed. "At that time, 31% said the administration deliberately misled Americans. This sentiment has gradually increased over time, to 39% in July 2003, 43% in January/February 2004, and 47% in October 2004." ... Last week Gallup reported that 5...

As the Senate moves toward a major confrontation over judicial appointments, a strong majority of Americans oppose changing the rules to make it easier for Republican leaders to win confirmation of President Bush's court nominees, according to the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll. ... But by a 2 to 1 ratio, the public rejected easing Senate rules in a way that would make it harder for Democratic senators to prevent final action on Bush's nominees. Even many Republicans were reluctant to abandon current Senate confirmation procedures: Nearly half opposed any rule changes, joining eight in 10 Democrats and seven in 10 political independents, the poll found. ... More ...

This should come as no surprise. Bushies are a mean and vindictive lot. The Inter-American Telecommunication Commission meets three times a year in various cities across the Americas to discuss such dry but important issues as telecommunications standards and spectrum regulations. But for this week's meeting in Guatemala City, politics has barged onto the agenda. At least four of the two dozen or so U.S. delegates selected for the meeting, sources tell TIME, have been bumped by the White House because they supported John Kerry's 2004 campaign. ... Those barred from the trip include employees of Qualcomm and Nokia, two of the largest telecom firms operating in the U.S., as well as Ibiquity, a digital-radio-technology company in Columbia, Md. One nixed participant, who has been to many of these telecom meetings and who wants to remain anonymous, gave just $250 to the Democratic Party. Says Nokia vice president Bill Plummer: "We do not view sending experts to intern...

Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Washington, made the proposal at a news conference yesterday. (Note that the proposal was made in the press; NOT to Democrats directly.) The offer: Democrats agree to the weakened House ethics rules (weakened in order to protect Tom DeLay) and the Republicans on the committee will "vote at the earliest opportunity to empanel an investigations subcommittee to review various allegations concerning travel and other actions by DeLay". The primary objection is to a rule that would automatically dismiss cases in a tie vote -- allowing either party on the evenly divided committee to stop an investigation. As the ethics committee is comprised of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans, one can see how easy, under these new rules, it would be to stop an investigation. Under Hastings' proposal, the Republicans are asking the Democrats to trade their principles for a shady promise of action on DeLay. Here is a quick analysis of what would happen if Dems ac...

As if there is not enough coverage of pope selection already... Frankly I am tired of hearing about the death of the pope, the speculation on who the new pope would be and the announcement of who the new pope is. Now we get to hear all about his childhood, what kind of food he likes and how often he spanks it. Perhaps FOX should start a 24 hour pope network. I suppose that the closer the United States moves toward becoming a theocracy, "all pope, all the time" media coverage should be expected. Of course we cannot forget about all of our other whack job non-catholic religious extremists on the Christian right... but I digress. So forget about the separation of church and state. They will soon be one. It should come as no surprise that the Catholic Church would have their own role in U.S. elections. This is really, rather old news.

Looks like another game of Bush Administration 'Hot Potato'. For the first time since it began issuing the annual global terrorism reports, the US State Department has said it will stop publishing statistics on terrorism activities worldwide, handing over the task to a new government center. I suppose after the State Department got burned last year for outright lying, [The State Department reported a decline in major terror incidents in its annual report last year, and the figures had been used by the Bush Administration as proof that the United States was winning the war on terrorism. The department, however, had to issue a corrected version later which showed an increase in major terror incidents instead.] they decided pass the buck this year: "The government has decided that the National Counterterrorism Center should compile and publish statistical data on terrorism that has previously been included by the State Department in our report," Department spokesman Rich...

Here is a good overview (and a quick read) of the DeLay kerfuffle as well as a little history of similar scandle. EXCERPT: It's a battle with historic parallels in an institution where it is not unusual for partisan power struggles to play out as controversies over ethics - with a powerful leader as target. Democrats' focus on DeLay, for example, mirrors the GOP campaign to topple Speaker Jim Wright (D), but on a much wider scale. Minority Republicans, led by Rep. Newt Gingrich, choreographed a "gathering storm" in the media around Mr. Wright, whose fall from power in 1989 was triggered by a book deal with the Teamsters Union. Mr. Gingrich made a special effort to draw good-government groups, such as Common Cause, to the fight. More ...

Members of the Christian Right are pushing the President and Congress to impeach "activist" judges, cut funding to "activist" courts, and pass legislation like the Constitutional Restoration Act of 2005 - which would seriously limit the power of the Judicial branch, and affirm that [the Christian] God is the sovereign source of "law, liberty, or government." Combined with threats by Republican members of Congress (U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, Tom DeLay) that judges who make politically based decisions may inadvertently bring violence upon themselves and we can start to see where the Christian Right is going with this. They would replace rule of law with the rule of fundamentalism; Christian fundamentalism. This is a two pronged attack: Intimidation of judges with State-condoned violence and legislation to remove Constitutional judicial powers. How is this different than Islamic theocracies?

Note from Democracy for America : If you could say something -- in a big way -- to the people of Congressman Tom DeLay's district in Texas, what would it be? We're looking for a slogan -- something short, something memorable, and something that lets the people of his district know that it's time for him to go. We're buying billboards in the 22nd Congressional District, and if your slogan is selected, it will be part of Democracy for America's big splash in Tom DeLay's backyard. Suggest your Tom DeLay slogan here: http://www.democracyforamerica.com/slogan You have a lot of material to work with, thanks to Tom DeLay himself. Everything is fair game -- his abuse of power, his money-for-influence machine, his corporate shilling, his ethics rebukes, his foreign trips with lobbyists, his huge campaign payouts to family members, his bullying of fellow Congressmen. You can even use his more recent threatening of judges and his wild lashing out at c...

Axis of Evil = Bush+Secret Service It seems that the Bush Gestapo are trying to intimidate artists and museums: (What else is new?) Organizers of a politically charged art exhibit at Columbia College's Glass Curtain Gallery thought their show might draw controversy. But they didn't expect two U.S. Secret Service agents would be among the show's first visitors. The agents turned up Thursday evening, just before the public opening of "Axis of Evil, the Secret History of Sin," and took pictures of some of the art pieces -- including "Patriot Act," showing President Bush on a mock 37-cent stamp with a revolver pointed at his head. More ...

Private GOP tensions over Tom DeLay's ethics controversy spilled into public Sunday, as a Senate leader called on DeLay to explain his actions and one House Republican demanded the majority leader's resignation. Perhaps there is some justice in the world after all. Perhaps good will triumph over evil. Of course, this evil thrives at even higher levels of government than Delay and it is going to take more than a few Republicans growing a conscience to defeat pure evil . The Dems might consider growing a spine.