Credo

OMYWORD! at Politics After 50 talks about labels.

What I want for myself and the world is pretty simple. I want individuals of all shapes and sizes, all orientations and backgrounds, all economic levels and abilities - to have a voice and most importantly, to have rights. I want people to be able to choose their own destiny, their own future, their own lovers, their own path. I want those who've lost their way to be given a hand, whether it be my own, some other individual or organization, or the government's. I want the assault of women around the world to stop. I want children to be safe and protected. I want our governments to serve their people and at the same time, to serve the greater good of all nations and all people. I want conflict, at every level, to be resolved through words and laws and actions and concessions which have been fueled by the fire of righteousness and truth. I don't want war to be the answer, ever. I want commerce to be driven by customer needs, not the greed of the self-serving. I want even the most "evil" of criminals or prisoners to be treated with respect, be given the right to a fair defense and trial, no matter what crime they have committed or have been accused of comitting. I don't want torture or the death penalty to be practiced anywhere in the world, by anyone, at any time. There is no ticking bomb scenario that can convince me otherwise.

Whaaaa?

Rahm Emanuel’s amen chorus at the Washington Post want to present him as a skillful dealmaker who can get things done and who understands the art of compromise. But if his scheme goes into effect, he will do tremendous damage to the administration’s reputation with some of its key constituencies. Will he get anything in exchange? That’s unlikely. Some deal. Some chief of staff.

Also, the Emperor Has No Clothes

Alan Grayson, "crazy" like a fox.

As Avedon says,

Why haven't Democrats been demanding that teaching the Constitution be returned to the classroom, by the way? Why haven't they made a point of saying as often as they can that ever since the Reaganauts and Horowitz started attacking education, fewer and fewer of our students have the first clue what's in the Constitution? Why haven't they been asking: If conservatives claim they love the Constitution so much, why haven't they been demanding it be put back into the public school curriculum everywhere?

Schemata

From No Cats on This Blog, via Group News Blog:  Dante's Internet.

OK, Time to Go Out and Play

Via Mills River Progressive: Washington's Blog's Disquisitions on hope and courage, with quotes.

I don't know about you . . . but I don't have the luxury of giving up hope. When I get depressed, overwhelmed or exhausted by the stunning acts of savagery, treason, and disinformation carried out by the imperialists, or the willful ignorance of many Americans, I will myself into finding some reason to have hope.

Because the struggle for liberty is too important for me to give up.

Both essays are reposted from a couple years ago. The writer may be a libertarian.

Jon Swift Memorial

Cold coffee.  Eeeeeeeewwwwwwwww...

Via Brilliant at Breakfast:  Sadly, No! is running A Very Special Blogroll Amnesty Day in honor of the late Jon Swift, with some unsurprising picks (Doghouse Riley, Driftglass) and some surprising ones (Ephemeral New York?  Why hadn't I run into that before?) along with the confession:

Speaking for myself, I must admit that as I’ve grown longer in tooth on these here Internets, I’ve become a creature of habits (most of them bad, the rest unmentionable) … and one of them is a laziness that has set in, where on 99 out of 100 days I click through the same 10 or so big blogs to catch the general gist of what’s going on, rather then explore the nooks and crannies of the ‘Tubes like I used to do.

As we used to say, AOL.

Ave atque Vale

Terrance of Republic of T on making it legal.  Festive beverages in three days!

In sadder news:  blogger Jon Swift is dead.  (Link goes to skippy's and jurassicpork's eulogies respectively.  Skippy is also posting links to other remembrances.  See also Melissa's note at Shakesville.)

Curious

Jon Carroll, a National Treasure, posted a column on February 3 in which he said he was taking ten or so days off.

I was just wondering...

ETA:  He's supposed to reappear Friday.
EFTA:  He's back.

Related News

In honor of International Women of Color Day (which was yesterday) and Women's History Month (March), I present an exceptional woman of color who just made history.

It’s most fitting that James leads a church with hallowed credentials of its own. James heads St. John African Methodist Episcopal Church in the Falls, the oldest black church in the city, celebrating about 105 years of service to the community.

“I’m the second woman pastor in the history of St. John’s,” said James. The other, the Rev. Jocelyn Hart, left for Philadelphia in 2005.

On Garden Avenue, St. John’s sits on a former Underground Railroad site, not far from the Niagara River.

And Boiled Over

Copied from a comment I made at Echidne of the Snakes:

Unemployment "insurance" is paid into BY THE WORKER. (Which description fits neither Kyl nor Bunning.) IT'S WORKERS' MONEY. YOU SENATORIAL PRATS ARE WITHHOLDING THE WORKERS' OWN MONEY.

(I did apologize for the yelling.)

ETA:  Tinfoil Hattie informs me that in some states, the employer pays into the unemployment system as a cost of doing business.

Revenants

Sherilynn Ifill at The Root:

When lawyers at the highest levels of government twist, obscure and ignore legal principles to reach the conclusions they want, when a legal analysis of detainee treatment is focused not on the prohibition against torture in both the United Nations Convention Against Torture and America's own domestic statutes , but on finding legal justification for inflicting the maximum mental and physical pain, a nation is well on the way to losing its soul.

That makes us the Undead. And it explains the glut of zombies and vampires in popular culture.

Though frankly, nations don't have "souls," only ideals that they fail to adhere to and eventually slough off as unattainable and/or silly on the way to becoming, well, the word(s) that should be here would probably translate as "lacking in honor" or "decadent," and I tend to dislike the connotations of both honor and decadence.  The U. S. may well be the current analog of the Roman Empire, but it's also the barbarians.

Strategic Retreats

I want to yell "Jill!  No-o-o-o!" but I understand the feeling.  distributorcap NY threw in the towel at the beginning of February, but the Senator from Kentucky kindled some of the old fire.  (Aside:  Why are most ex-sports figures who go into government Republican?  Senator Bill Bradley would seem to be the exception, but I think he was somewhat conservative for a Democrat.)

Thinking Liberally

Anthony McCarthy ruminates on the "left" and "secularism" at Echidne of the Snakes.

Joy!  Joy suffusing!
As beams of light through tinted
panes, a song!  Joy!  Joy!

Fainting Couch! Smelling Salts!

Is nothing sacred?

The baker, Louisville-based Little Brownie Bakers, traced the problem to a breakdown of oils. They say:

No one has gotten sick and the company contends that the cookies, though "not up to our quality standards," are safe to eat.

Well isn't that special. Those oils that are breaking down, unfortunately, are trans fats. The nutritional label notwithstanding, food manufacturers are able to make their foods appear healthier on their packaging by manipulating the portion size.

Via Southern Beale.

Don't Get Sick, Part II

Antibiotic resistant bacteria.

Guess What I Missed

But Cara at The Curvature brings it right back to my attention:  5 George Harrison vocals.

(Cara also blogs about transgender issues, rape, abuse, the legal system, and the discourse in the media.  And very well.  But she's on my blogroll onaccountabecause Gratuitous Beatles Blogging.)

OMG

You won't believe your eyes...


Blame credit goes to n6tqs.

Cities in Danger from Earthquakes

...around the world.

More on the Margolis Memo

Scott Horton of Harper's continues to deconstruct the defense of the torture memo:

Let’s be clear about what makes David Margolis tick. He’s not a partisan Republican or a partisan Democrat. He has no real engagement in terms of partisan politics. He represents a culture of craven clientalism in which lawyers are not the champions of the law but instruments in the hands of their employers, dedicated to getting them the results they want. Margolis is prepared to do the bidding of his master, whether his name is Alberto Gonzales or Eric Holder. In the case of the torture memo writers, he also saw a threat to the culture he has promoted at the Justice Department. It would lead, he thought, to internecine warfare within the department between Democrats and Republicans.

Driftglass Invokes the Spirit of Mike Royko

...to, um, educate a Chicago public-television presenter on the finer points of background research and point-making:

I’m just some poor, civilian goof who can recognize a plague when it's at his door, who is sick of watching paid teevee journalism die of spine-rot, and who does this in his spare time. And yet even I – with about 30 minutes of clicking a fucking mouse on my wheezing, old laptop – was able to find out all sorts of fascinating stuff about your skeevy guests and their mendacious claims that were, for some reason, utterly beyond the collective ability of the mighty WTTW to ferret out.

People without exposure to literature published later than 1970 (or with religious or moral strictures equivalent) might find the language Drifty uses to be a trifle strong.

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Early humans, possibly even prehuman ancestors, appear to have been going to sea much longer than anyone had ever suspected.

Via the San Francisco Chronicle, from the New York Times.

Connections

Metsgrrl has written a guide to following the Mets on Twitter; adjust for following your own team if you want to do so.  (I am not a Twit.)

Anniversaire

Mikolaj Kopernik, 537 years young.

Update

Fafblog has had a flurry of posts while I wasn't looking.

Annafdd of Live Journal has video of Stephen Fry arguing a position I'm probably opposed to.

Via Avedon, The Real Tea Partiers:

The real Tea Partiers were in the midst of a burgeoning rebellion whose first martyr was a black man.

The real Tea Partiers defied such danger that they performed their act of protest in silence, returned to their homes in silence, and in large part didn't even know each other's names.

The real Tea Partiers weren't merely whining about having come out on the wrong side of an election.

The real Tea Partiers were protesting the imposition of an economic monopoly by an unelected ruler. 

The real Tea Partiers didn't enjoy the protection of their government as they whined petty complaints, in public, in peace.

State of Me

So here's the deal.  It's Lent.  I'm going to limit my computer use severely (I'm turning into a mole, y'all).  I will probably not be posting as much.  I may try for more essays on serious matters, written offline (and possibly longhand).

Meanwhile, after almost sixteen years, there finally exists a dreamscape for this place.  Too bad it's mostly empty (streets but few buildings).

Also, this morning we had FOG.  Sunday's fog was pretty thick but the other side of the lake was visible.  Today's fog made me nervous about crossing the street.

Enjoy your days.

And About Time

1. Pitchers and catchers report tomorrow!
2. NY Mets get a visit from a Hall of Fame pitcher.

Justice Weeps

Cheney strongly defended waterboarding, the enhanced interrogation technique assailed by Obama and what many consider to be torture.

"I was a big supporter of waterboarding. I was a big supporter of the enhanced interrogation techniques," he said.

Cheney added that he opposed the current administration's move to do away with it.

Right out in public.  [Emphasis mine]

The murderer of Medgar Evers (who also boasted publicly of his acts) was brought to justice 31 years later.

May we not have to wait so long in this case.

Anniversaire

Signor Galilei, 436 years young, restless soul and all.

Celebrants of the Year of the (not Detroit ) Tiger

Gung hey fat choy!