Yoo and Baybee continue to face scrutiny. Another year of Arnie, another wildfire. Speaking of Arnie, it looks like he's given up on running for the Senate, for some reason. Swine flu might return in the winter. Iran's going to look into the sentence for that reporter. SCOTUS thinks the American public should be held responsible for corporate polluters. Gates is eager to give Iran a good fisting. The Patriot Act considers refugees to be terrorists. Will Gitmo still retain its kangaroo court? Anyone feel like menial work at a summer resort? The GOP thinks the public cares about the Dems' handling of Gitmo.
Safety lapses led to a Bayer plant explosion.
Amber alert. Some baby food is worse than junk food. An ex-Clinton Navy official gets busted for possession of child porn.

Jack Bauer has to do time for head-butting a guy. Bullying's bad, mmkay? Another fine gun-nut of the suckonomy.

This is a post that I can agree wik.

All of it to salve the egos of certain politicians and the captains of industry.

When the clip showed Beck, it should have launched into the part where the "Holy Grail" movie switched to the Spanish celebration and all the references to llamas.

2 X wars + massively underfunded VA + cost of treating TBI/cost of treating depression and PTSD =

New England Journal of Medicine claim that many injuries treated as TBI are actually depression and PTSD.

Some of the most injured Soldiers, Sailors and Marines leaving Iraq are going to have their treatment gun-decked in order to save money.

House climate bill could get fast-tracked - http://www.grist.org/article/2009-05-06-clima...

Getting Serious About Clean Energy - http://pr.thinkprogress.org/2009/05/pr2009050...

Rep. Waxman hits back on climate change - http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/rep.-waxm...

Take that Jesus Camp! ABC News: Young Americans Losing Their Religion. New Research Finds Number Who Claim No Church Has Risen Sharply.
- http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=75133...

Health Insurers Try to Scuttle Obama Plan. Insurance Industry Chief Moves to Head Off Government Competitor.
- http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Business/story...
Because they can't compete...they're 'for profit'...if the government runs it, it will be a service...you get what you pay for, instead of letting a corporation representative decide if it should be paid for, hence performed...

Beware of Corporatist Rightwingnut/Republican BS: Killing Us with Kindness; "You simply MUST be vocally and passionately on the side of REFORM ... The status quo is no longer acceptable. If the dynamic becomes 'President Obama is on the side of reform and Republicans are against it,' then the battle is lost ..." – Frank Luntz, GOP polling guru, advising Republicans how to kill healthcare reform
- http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/221...
The blame of course will be shifted to the government or 'entitlement'....instead of the insanely stupid ideology of healthcare 'for profit' which the GOP/Republicans/Right wingnuts/free marketeers espouse, which is in direct contradiction to the Hippocratic oath and the teachings of Christ & other religious beliefs throughout the world...
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/doctors/oath_mod...

'He Kept us safe??' The Legacy of Incompetent Bushevism: "The Federal Bureau of Investigation has improperly kept nearly 24,000 people on a terrorist watch list based on outdated or sometimes irrelevant information, while it missed others with legitimate terror ties who should have been on the list."
- http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/us/07terror...
Yep those anti-war 'raging grannies' boy, oh boy....they were some fearsome terrorizers....whew, thank god they were on the list.... Lets call it what it was/is...a blacklist for anyone against con-servative malfeasance

The Fate of the Yellowstone Grizzly: It's Time to Put the Great Bear Back on the Endangered Species List - http://www.counterpunch.org/peacock05062009.html
The Yellowstone grizzly bear population is once again in serious trouble. During 2008, the bears suffered a double disaster: grizzlies died in record numbers and global warming dealt what could be a death blow to the bear’s most important food source. The Department of Interior’s principal public agency responsible for protecting Yellowstone’s grizzlies is currently incapable of doing so.
The Interagency Team/Committee has become an insular institution deaf to public opinion; it has pandered to state game departments who speciously argue that “socially acceptable” local opinion should replace the best available science to determine where grizzlies may live. With the quality of grizzly habitat eroding due to global warming, the bears will require more public land to roam.
The most important single move government could make is to relist the bear immediately, once more affording the Yellowstone grizzly protection under the Endangered Species Act. Relisting alone will reduce the record human-caused mortality; the government’s proposals will not. Yellowstone’s grizzly bears are in trouble—people are killing them off in record numbers and global warming is burning up the food they need to survive.
The Secretary of the Interior needs to instruct the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service to withdraw their rule delisting the Yellowstone grizzly bear population. Whether the present Interagency Team or Committee is up to this task is another question; they fought for delisting in the face of undeniable threats to bear's future viability as a species. Fresh, outside leadership is urgently needed.

SC court halts thousands of home foreclosure sales - http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_HAL...
"South Carolina's highest court on Tuesday temporarily stopped thousands of pending foreclosure sales in the state to give homeowners more time to take advantage of a new federal program to help them refinance mortgages. The injunction - which mortgage experts said appeared to be the nation's first court-ordered stop for an entire state - prevents judges in South Carolina from finalizing foreclosure sales on properties guaranteed by Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae or any other mortgage company that has signed on to a federal assistance program."
Now...how many of these folks voted against their own best interests and if McSame would have been 'elected' would have been out on the street??????

Rudman: Deus ex Machina on Torture: by Ray McGovern - http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/05/06-13
Both parties have amply soiled the dirty linen that could be hung out. So here's the plan. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, looking toward reelection in 2010, calculates that the last thing he needs is a bonafide investigation that would make him vulnerable to Cheneyesque charges of being weak in the "war" on terrorism. These days, if you take a hard line against torture, you can be made to appear soft on terrorism.
-- Worse still, other prominent Democrats like Sen. Jay Rockefeller and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were given intelligence briefings on interrogation, warrantless eavesdropping, and God knows what else. And they let Bush and Cheney run right over them with nary a whimper.
Then again, lets reevaluate those days....Cheney has 'secret' assasination team, check. Cheney has video-audio on every member of congress due to illegal wiretapping program, check. Yeah...they were threatened by the Bush Crime Family...simple as that. Its what happens when you epsouse the 'unitary executive'...err dictator philosopy...

Informants say Blackwater guards tried to unload arms - http://hamptonroads.com/2009/05/informants-sa...
"Shortly after a 2007 shooting incident in a Baghdad traffic square that left 17 Iraqi civilians dead, Blackwater contractors allegedly transferred a number of machine guns to another contractor who is now charged with trying to smuggle them out of Iraq. The Blackwater contractors wanted to dispose of the weapons before an investigation of the bloody incident began, according to two confidential government informants."
If you haven't seen 'State of Play' yet...you really must go see it...

What we already knew (pathetic): ThinkProgress: Cantor Caves: Republicans Will Be ‘Listening’ To Rush Limbaugh, Not The American Public
- http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/06/cantor-li...
I'm sorry...a party held hostage by a drug addict using an outgoing medium (radio) is headed for the path of the dodo bird...

FDA approves new treatment for brain cancer - http://www.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories...

Cheap health insurance can be costly. More people buying inexpensive plans that don't pay what they expected.
- http://www.seattlepi.com/local/405912_insuran...

Why Are We Surprised When White Preppy Guys Turn Out to Be Serial Killers? - http://www.alternet.org/rights/139834/why_are...
Philip Markoff is just like 85% of U.S. serial killers -- young, white and male. When will we get that these guys are the rule, not the exception?

Bill Gallagher: Michael Moore Takes On The "Beast" Of Capitalism - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/21664

Whither the reptilian Arlen Specter? P.M. Carpenter Exclusively for BuzzFlash.com on Wednesday, May 6. I'm not a Democratic operative or a registered Reactionary, or for that matter even a Pennsylvanian, so at assorted functional levels this is really none of my business. Nevertheless I sure hope Congressman Joe Sestak enters the Democratic primary and thrashes the unholy bejesus out of Sen. Arlen Specter.
- http://blog.buzzflash.com/carpenter/381

Springsteen to Seeger: 'You Outlasted the Bastards' - http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut/432714?r...

Maine legalizes same-sex marriage. You can see why the so-called two Maine "moderate Republican" senators are going to have a hard time staying in the same party as Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindahl.
- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30602151/

UK Independent: Something strange is stirring. Even the young are joining the chorus of concern that this tarnished giant is part of a financial oligarchy that holds the US in its grip, writes Stephen Foley in New York.
- http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/an...

Let's Put This con-servative Meme to Rest: Global Warming ≠ Al Gore - http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/this-...
There's a lot of subtext there, but the main goal is apparently to deny climate science via ad hominem on a single individual. Well, newsflash, Al Gore has been popularizing global warming science for a while, but it's not his theory. Thousands of scientists have been working on it for decades, and whether you like Gore or not has nothing to do with the validity of the science.
"Even If You Don't Like Carl Sagan, the Stars are Still Out There"

Ford Invests $550 Million in Michigan Plant, Says Electric Focus is Coming - http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/ford-...

After the Electric Car, the Electric Plane? Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk is Thinking About It - http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/tesla...

Celebrate World Fair Trade Day on Saturday - http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/world...

Political Irony: http://politicalirony.com/2009/05/07/republic...

Informants Make Blackwater Claims

RALEIGH, NC -- A defense contractor charged with trying to smuggle firearms out of Iraq claimed Blackwater guards asked him to help get rid of weapons after a deadly 2007 shooting in Baghdad, two government informants say in court documents.

The man told one of the informants, a U.S. Army reservist, that Blackwater guards wanted to dispose of the weapons before an investigation began into the September 2007 shooting that left several civilians dead, according to a criminal complaint filed in the smuggling case. The contractor, John Houston, did not work for Blackwater.

Five of Blackwater's guards face manslaughter and weapons charges in the shooting, which prosecutors say was an unprovoked attack on civilians. That shooting strained relations between Baghdad and Washington and led Iraqi leaders to order Blackwater out of the country.

A spokeswoman said the North Carolina-based company, now known as Xe, only recently learned of Mr. Houston's claims and has never been contacted by investigators about them.

"This individual's claims may make for a juicy story, but time may tell a more truthful one," spokeswoman Anne Tyrrell said in a release.

Colin Powel has bad mouthed Limpballs. I guess Colin doesn't want to be a republican anymore....

the WSJ online.

Excellent.

Yep, and when people reply with a 1-finger salute, they'll go to where they can get their news for free, meaning more liberal sources.

These guys are their own worst enemies at times.

The Office of the National Cybersecurity Advisor? Some right wing sites are going all "Obama's gonna read our emails!" about it, and from what I can find, it sounds a little like more Patriot act-type powergrabbing, but that doesn't sound right. Any info out there?