Category — Uncategorized

From Danger Room this bit of supposed levity: Army Chief Still Not Dead

“I understand that when Pete came out of retirement [to take over the Army post] his status was changed somehow from retired to deceased,” Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said. “It took General Schoomaker, the highest-ranking officer in the Army, a full six months to iron out the paperwork. Leave it to the Pentagon bureaucracy to prove that you can in fact be brought back from the dead.”

That’s not all, added Schoomaker as he took the podium. He said, “You know, on that letter that I received from finance … when I got called back, the interesting thing was they – it was a form letter, and they had my name in there three times, and each time it was misspelled.”

This was Rumfeld’s Defense Department, Schoomaker assumed the job in August of 2003. If they screw up the paperwork for one the top five generals in the military, what chance do enlisted people have?

Repeating a complaint – why do all of these generals get to retire while the lower rants keep getting hit by stop-loss orders and tour extensions?

CNN contributor Roland Martin gets it – it wasn’t the racism, it was the sexism.

The media kept up with the race side and did their best to ignore that the players were attacked and belittled because they were women and they play really good “roundball”. For those that missed it, not all of the players on the Rutgers team are black.

And while we are on sexism, let’s address the comments issue again. It isn’t the “heat in the kitchen,” it’s the cockroaches. No one should put up with cockroaches in the kitchen, but a sign saying “no cockroaches” isn’t the solution.

From the AP: Man Sentenced For Printing Lewd Stickers

A Byron [Minnesota] man, who distributed sexually vulgar stickers featuring his ex-girlfriend’s name, phone number and address, has been sentenced to four months in jail after pleading guilty to a felony harassment charge.

Thomas Carl Tiedeman, 62, who appeared in Dodge County District Court on March 21, was also ordered to serve five years on probation, perform 32 hours of community service and pay a $100 fine.

The behavior is illegal. It is important to file charges. People can be tracked down using the information their browser, blogging software, and site counters provide. Don’t ignore it; stomp on them.

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The world must apparently struggle along with one fewer white guy on the radio. Most of us already felt there was a surplus of rich, middle-aged, drunks and junkies on the air waves, but the rich white guy demographic that makes up the punditry will go through a period of ashes and sack cloth.

[I know that I’m supposed to refer to rich white guys who abuse drugs and alcohol as Mr. President…whoops chemical dependent, because they get to go to spas and call it rehabilitation, while non-rich, non-white people get thrown in jail, but screw them. I refused to act like I empathize with people who “can’t deal with fame and fortune,’ or to consider it as a better excuse than being poor and desperate.]

I know that it is going to be blamed on the vicious attacks of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, who just couldn’t be satisfied with an apology, well, sorry, but Al and Jesse don’t have that kind of pull. As Steve M. of No More Mister Nice Blog notes, Al and Jesse have been going after rappers for two years without success.

So what happened?

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Chicago Dyke of Corrente has scored a major coup, an interview with Helen Thomas.

Go and read the wisdom of a real reporter.

A New York Times investigative report shows: In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud

Five years after the Bush administration began a crackdown on voter fraud, the Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews.

Although Republican activists have repeatedly said fraud is so widespread that it has corrupted the political process and, possibly, cost the party election victories, about 120 people have been charged and 86 convicted as of last year.

Most of those charged have been Democrats, voting records show. Many of those charged by the Justice Department appear to have mistakenly filled out registration forms or misunderstood eligibility rules, a review of court records and interviews with prosecutors and defense lawyers show.

Voter fraud, tort reform, Social Security melt down – these are lies. They are lies to sell a political agenda and to screw “the little people.” They want to keep “the wrong people” from voting and institute internal passports, just like the Stalinists. They want to help their friends in the insurance industry and screw their enemies, the defense attorneys. They want to give access to the only large source of unplundered money the government holds to the financial markets, and to hell with the workers that money came from.

Every time there is an unbiased study on any of these issues the answer is always the same – there is no “there” there. The claims are bogus. The people making the claims cite anecdotes, not facts, and most don’t want to testify under oath.

The Associated Press has the results of the Pentagon’s review of the problems: Walter Reed review cites money woes, neglect

Money woes and Pentagon neglect are to blame for shoddy outpatient conditions and bureaucratic delays at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, an independent review has concluded.

The blistering report called for major changes in troop care and cautioned that problems probably extend to Army hospitals around the country.

[snip]

Citing lapses in leadership and oversight as main reasons for the problems, the nine-member independent group concluded that the Defense Department was, or should have been, aware of the widespread problems but neglected them because they knew Walter Reed was slated for eventual closure.

In addition, the Pentagon made problems worse by ordering a hold-down on costs and expenses — dubbed “efficiency wedges” — even as Walter Reed began experiencing an influx of thousands of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Two wars in progress and Rumsfeld recommends eliminating a major military hospital, and then cuts its funding. Rumsfeld was never interested in “supporting the troops,” he was interested in reducing the military to low-paid killers, with all of the money going to private companies that were Republan campaign supporters.

He was pushing to eliminate schools, hospitals, and grocery stores on military bases, and anything else that wasn’t directly involved in combat. He was attempting to implement the Soviet military dream of central control through a computer network.

Associated Press report on CNN: Leahy: Aides lying about White House-Justice e-mails

President Bush’s aides are lying about White House e-mails sent on a Republican account that might have been lost, a powerful Senate chairman said Thursday, vowing to subpoena those documents if the administration fails to cough them up.

“They say they have not been preserved. I don’t believe that!” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy shouted from the Senate floor.

“You can’t erase e-mails, not today. They’ve gone through too many servers,” said Leahy, D-Vermont “Those e-mails are there, they just don’t want to produce them. We’ll subpoena them if necessary.”

You have the local copy in your e-mail program, the copy on the sending mail server, the copy on the receiving mail server, and the copy on the recipient’s computer. ISPs do tend to back-up and mirror servers. That doesn’t even take into consideration what a data recovery program can do with “deleted” information.

I don’t think the “Rose Mary Woods” defense is going to work.

CNN on the brief announcement: Gates: Army tours extended by three months.

Gates has extended all war zone deployments to 15 months, but says troops will be “guaranteed” 12 months at their home base between deployments. The troops know they will get the 15 months, but the “guarantees” about home time have been consistently violated.

This really sucks for the lives of the troops. You try to make plans, but they keep moving the goal posts. This is going to be a real hardship on the families, and many won’t survive the changes.

The prudent thing would have been to call for enlistments and expanded the military in September of 2001. No one was certain what was going to happen, but it only makes sense to prepare for a worse case scenario until you know what you face.

Think about what they did – this was supposedly the “greatest challenge the nation ever faced,” but there’s no need for more troops, no reason not to cut taxes, and you should go shopping. Does that make sense to anyone?

Michael at Musing’s musings attempts to explain a small chunk of reality to the “Child in Chief” – Congress controls the money. While Lemme ‘splain. is as complete as one could hope, maybe it needs some small cartoon animals to keep up the interest, perhaps a goat.

Lurch at Main & Central covers the latest attempt by Major General “Baghdad Bill” Caldwell, spokesweasel for MessoPtomainia, to convince the world that the people attacking US forces have to have an external state sponsor, because that’s what Darth Cheney and the neocons believe.

These people can’t understand that the Cold War rules no longer apply, and people can be nasty without having a government behind them. The fact that you can’t bomb anyone and get results may be disappointing, but it’s reality in the current situation.

We went through this a month or so back with the phony weapons show. It was embarrassing when you realize that the guys running this war can’t even create fraudulent evidence that will stand up to a Google search. Come on, guys – the Iranian arms industry has a web site with pictures on it, show a little effort.

Swopa at Needlenose and Kevin Drum at Political Animal cover the leaked report about the Shrubbery trying to create the position of “War Tsar”, or some such stupidity to handle the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The military commanders in those countries report to the Commander of Central Command. The ambassadors report to an Assistant Under Secretary for the region. The purpose of the National Security Council in the White House is to coordinate these things. The National Security Advisor should be making some decisions, and all that is needed is for the President to back his own advisor.

Appointing a new person is extraneous and pointless. If you claim to be the “Commander in Chief”, the “War President”, and the “Decider”, why do you hire someone else to do those jobs? You can’t just say you’re in charge; you have to actually be in charge.

Beyond that, Congress won’t fund it, and the people who are qualified already know that it’s a job for a scapegoat.

The Associated Press reports: Lynch Rescue Added To Tillman Probe

A U.S. House committee announced Tuesday it would hold hearings on misleading military statements that followed the friendly fire death of Pat Tillman in Afghanistan and the rescue of Pfc. Jessica Lynch in Iraq.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said an April 24 hearing would be part of its investigation into whether there was a strategy to mislead the public.

The first victim of war is the truth. I have always felt bad about what Jessica Lynch had to go through, trying to deal with all of the lies that were told about her injuries and “rescue” while trying to recover from the accident and death of friends. She was trying to get the truth out while her government was lying.

Bad things happen to good people, in and out of uniform, but they don’t get any better when you lie about them.

The Shrubbery didn’t invent this problem. The Tuskegee Airmen were only, really recognized for their World War II service recently.

CNN was on at my Mother’s tonight and the burning issue that the bearded guy named for a reindeer felt all of the Presidential candidates should respond to: “what about I-Maus?”

With two wars and major executive departments in melt down, the Puppy wants people trying to become the President of the United States to comment on a burn-out with a microphone who insults women and minorities.

Exactly how does the stupidity of someone on talk radio become the most important political question of the day?

As long as I’m on the media, will someone tell them that Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are not the only two black people in the United States.

Lambert at Corrente writes about a news report that Corporate pet food is killing your cats.

A researcher found a 30% increase in kidney failure in cats during the three month period that the contaminated food was sold. The research was based on information from one of the largest US veterinary hospital chains which had an extra 248 cases of renal failure in cats during the period.

Nicole Belle at Crooks and Liars saw a Los Angeles Times about hearings Senator Dick Durbin is holding to question FDA about food safety.

The contaminated component in the pet food was “food grade,” and could have been used in products for people. We have been told that it wasn’t, but how do we know? The FDA didn’t test the wheat gluten when it came into the country. Apparently the testing started after the fact. People are much larger than pets, and would require more of the product, and possibly more time for renal failure. Since the Shrubbery has gutted most consumer protections, will we even know if there is a sudden spike in kidney failure?