Saturday, March 11, 2006

Oh, wouldn't it be loverly?

If the Republican nominee for President in 2008 was Bill Frist? Even a Democrat could beat him.

What else is new?

Bush lied (again). He's skated so many times (most recently when he was caught telling us that federal wiretaps always require a "court order" but hasn't been called to account for the NSA warrantless surveillance program that he authorized, and scores of times re-authorized), that it's hard to imagine that he'll be caught in this outrageous prevarication.

Recall, when he sought to justify the Dubai ports deal, he said that port security in the US was handled by the Coast Guard and US Customs? Well, not so. According to a just-revealed Congressional report, the security at US ports is woeful, and many of the defects in security are due to lapses by foreigners: shippers, distant port operators, as well as US port operators who don't report to any federal entity.

Friday, March 10, 2006

Goodbye Knight-Ridder

It's going to come down to Reuters, the (London) Times, the Telegraph and Independent of UK, plus some of the foreign press--disseminated by bloggers--to be responsible for the news now that Knight-Ridder's on the block.

Update: Here's the report of the successful bidder for Knight-Ridder. I don't know what it means in terms of reportage and independence (I gotta tell ya, though, that the San Jose Mercury News is one of the truly independent papers).

Hold onto your hats!

It turns out another Dubai company already provides security to the US Navy and at twelve US ports. It apparently is informed of the movement of our ships, and provides the security barriers at naval installations.

On a cold day...

like today in Santa Barbara (there's snow on the Santa Ynez Mountains, just three hundred yards from my deck!), and I'm delaying my almost-daily run to await a bit of warming, I inevitably find my way to this site, which even on a sunny day is fun. Check it out, including the ever-better Search function. (I put in Kafka and learned a lot about "The Prisoner," saving myself the price of rental of the DVD.)

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

We have met the enemy and he is us

Or, to put Pogo's quote another way, and the NYT did in a recent editorial commenting on Bush's imprisonment without trial of innocents at Gitmo, "Now America is becoming the thing they sought to end."

Tuesday, March 07, 2006

Bush, the softie

Ya gotta admit, Busy does give us a lot of humorous takes.

Has it come to this?

A music festival in Germany has refused a performance by a leading rock group because one of their songs, "God is a Pop Star," might be offensive.

Monday, March 06, 2006

The man is a monster

I'm not talking about this man, an injured (check out the extent of his injuries here) veteran from my hometown in Arizona. I'm talking about the man who sent him to war: George Bush.

I can't believe, it; simply can't believe it

A new rationale (rationalization) for our troops' continued occupation of Iraq, presented without comment by CBS talking-head, Bob Schieffer (what else would you expect from that blockhead): Our troops are needed to keep the peace between Sunnis and Shiites, especially the armed militias of each, because neither group trusts the other. So there you go, we've morphed into guardians of Iraq's peace--from Iraqis.

The sum of all fears

A few days after Bush decides to peddle nuclear technology to India, France decides to sell some to Libya. That's Libya, spelled Muammar Qadhafi, until a year or so ago an inveterate international terrorist. And BTW, France has much better technology to sell than the US does. Its reactors account for a large percentage of their power and are more modern than ours by far.

So--off we go, into a new nuclear race, this one pretending to be for "peaceful purposes." What madness!

Oscars, Iraq-style

Riverbend, from Baghdad, awards "Oscars" for roles played by various actors in current events. She's a serious blogger, revealing in this post a sense of humor, cynical, but funny.