DOWNLOADS: (988)

PLAYS: (3852)

Embed

That popping sound you hear is the heads of NRA loyalists exploding from massive cognitive dissonance, all because of the release this week of a video showing a spokesman for Al Qaeda, Adam Gadahn, urging would-be jihadis to go out and stock up on as many guns as they can get their hands on -- through the gun-show loophole:

America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms. You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?

Of course, we've previously discussed how the gun-show loophole is an open invitation to criminals, particularly in the context of the the drug-cartel violence along the Mexico border, which is in fact being heavily fueled by guns purchased legally in the USA, many of them at gun shows.

As Chris Brown at Media Matters observes:

At gun shows buyers can purchase guns from private sellers without passing a background check. An investigation by the City of New York showed that even buyers that identified themselves as people who "probably couldn't pass a background check" were able to purchase guns at gun shows. The investigation also showed the wide variety of guns available at gun shows.

In addition, people on terrorist watch lists are not forbidden from purchasing guns and many have done just that. Gadahn's instructions come in the wake of Associated Press reporting that showed that more than 200 people with suspected terrorist ties bought guns legally in the United States last year. Following the AP report Representative Mike Quigley introduced an amendment to the Patriot Act that would give the Attorney General the authority to block gun sales to individuals on terror watch lists. The amendment was voted down.

Of course, the NRA remains adamantly opposed to closing the gun-show loophole. Indeed, they also remain opposed to bipartisan efforts to make it tougher for terrorists to buy guns.

One can only conclude that they are objectively pro-terrorist.

Jack & Jill Politics: An important message from Rick Santorum

Words of Power: We live in a nation that has lost touch with reality.

Obsidian Wings: It just should not be possible for our government to kidnap someone, ship him off to Syria knowing that he will be tortured, and then have no one be in any way accountable.

Petrelis Files: That reporters must give up some basic rights if they're denied, or even receive, credentials makes me queasy about how the national debates for presidential candidates will be conducted.

The Washington Independent: Look who's back...

Threat Level: Experts accuse the Bush administration of foot-dragging on DNS security hole

"Loophole King" from this week's SEIU protest at John McCain's campaign HQ. Open thread below....

It was only a few years ago that Arnold Schwarzenegger recalled a sitting governor, promising the end of massive budget deficits. Guess what we have in California this year? Oh, just a measly $20 billion deficit.

Our schools are closing and social services have already been slashed to the bone. And it is just the start of budget season in California. Unfortunately, because Democrats do not hold a two-thirds majority in the state legislature, a small minority of Republicans are able to hold Californians hostage, refusing to raise taxes, no matter how ridiculous the loopholes.

Even, get this... a sales tax loophole for purchasers of yachts and private jets. The Republicans have very much earned the moniker bestowed on them by the Calitics crew: The Yacht Party.

The Courage Campaign has teamed up with the California Nurses Association to create "Yacht Party 2", the second in a series of TV ads designed to re-brand the California Republican Party. This spot is not your traditional political ad. In fact, it's quite non-traditional. And it's got a lot of people talking. In fact, the response to Arianna Huffington's message announcing the ad to Courage Campaign members was so strong, we have already authorized an ad buy in Sacramento. See what you think....

To increase the pressure on Republicans in Sacramento to close this yacht tax loophole, we need to make this "Yacht Party" brand stick. If you like the ad, please contribute to help us expand our buy across California.

Good morning. I'm Lance Mannion and I can get it for you wholesale. Just show up at the back of the warehouse Saturday afternoon. Bring cash. And remember, we don't know each other. I'm Mr Clements and if the guy at the desk asks, you're a friend of Pete's.

Sorry. I shouldn't goof around like that. I'm just the guest host for this week's blog round up, after all. I don't goof around like that on my own blog. At my place we're very serious, my commenters and I. It's all high-minded discussions about Art, and Film, and the Meaning of Life.

The gang at Crooked Timber comes to my blog to have their questions answered and they go home, bewildered and ashamed of their own ignorance, to tear up their diplomas and return their Ph.D.'s.

Speaking of Crooked Timber, John Quiggin is saying over there that it's time to dive back down the memory hole and remember that the looting of Iraq was a part of the original plan.

The New York Times scoops the world on this one: A lot of Republicans don't plan to vote for Hillary Clinton! That comes via Oliver Willis. Also Oliver admits that when forced to choose between a real science guy and a well-known conservative idiot, he reflexively sides with the real science guy. Go figure.

Avedon Carol says that Venezuela is looking a lot more like a democracy than some other countries she could name.

The Armchair Generalist follows up on a story that I missed the first go-round, about a couple of characters who got caught trying to smuggle a pound of uranium through Hungary. Story had the makings of a great thriller, says the Generalist, except for one thing. The uranium turns out not to have been weapons grade material.

Ben Cohen of the Daily Banter reports that Karl Rove is offering campaign advice to Barack Obama and it turns out, says Ben, that advice is not half-bad.

And mystery writer Laura Lippman has been at work copy editing her latest novel and reports on the quotidian details of the process, except that she can't use the word, quotidian, because one of the things she found out while reading her own work is that she overuses it and it has to go, along with via and literally and the extra e that does not belong in acknowledgment.

Done for today. Send tips and suggestions to lance AT lancemannion DOT com. And remember. The loading dock. Saturday. Act casual. And wear a necktie so I'll know you.

Please go and see this new movie about the way the government uses the media to sell war after war after war. It's a brilliant flick that dissects the great propaganda machine which is a curse to our democracy.

War Made Easy reaches into the Orwellian memory hole to expose a 50-year pattern of government deception and media spin that has dragged the United States into one war after another from Vietnam to Iraq. Narrated by actor and activist Sean Penn, the film exhumes remarkable archival footage of official distortion and exaggeration from LBJ to George W. Bush, revealing in stunning detail how the American news media have uncritically disseminated the pro-war messages of successive presidential administrations...read on

The Village Voice would have you believe that it paves the way for some sort of international tribunal. I'm just hoping it doesn't go down the memory hole unnoticed...

While the Democratic Congress has yet to begin a serious investigation into what many European legislators already know about American war crimes, a particularly telling report by the International Committee of the Red Cross has been leaked that would surely figure prominently in such a potential Nuremberg trial. The Red Cross itself is bound to public silence concerning the results of its human-rights probes of prisons around the world-or else governments wouldn't let them in.

But The New Yorker's Jane Mayer has sources who have seen accounts of the Red Cross interviews with inmates formerly held in CIA secret prisons. In "The Black Sites" (August 13, The New Yorker), Mayer also reveals the effect on our torturers of what they do-on the orders of the president-to "protect American values." Read on...

This interview is one of the reasons why America is so uninformed about serious issues in our country. Kyra Phillips is really engaged in the Utah mining disaster and has a genuine passion about the story, but instead of asking the real questions to Murray about the dangerous mining conditions he promoted after he denied them---she treated him like a folk hero. The Huffington Post has more...

Download | play Download | play

Murray: A rumor was started by the United Mine Workers. It's false statements they have made. False statements from the beginning. But I've watched them for 50 years and they have preyed on the tragedy of miners and their families to put out false information to organize their union.

Murray always has the time to bash the United Mine Workers as much as he can and then he praises CNN for the wonderful job they are doing.

Again, why was this not included in CNN's coverage?

Robert Murray insists that his company did not change the mining plan at Crandall Canyon after purchasing a joint interest in the mine last August. But documents obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune clearly contradict Murray's assertion, and show that Murray's company sought and received approval from federal regulators to make a significant, and, experts say, risky change to the mining strategy...read on

Isn't that more important than trying to defend your coverage? I understand that there is great suffering in the lives of the families that have to deal with this nightmare and our hearts reach out to them, but when are we supposed to have serious conversations on serious issues?

Continue reading »

Greetings from The Heretik reporting from his Desk at the Mouth of Hell TM. First question: how many corners have to be turned before Bush admits he is going in circles? And how long is too long? Iraq is no longer a war, just bad marketing. Bush can't even sell it to his own party anymore. Pay no attention to the blood.

Stone walls do not a prison make . . . but it seems to be a White House strategy in danger of bricking out. The executive may not be as privileged as he thinks.

Land of the Free, Home of the Brave Update: Is it safe? " The Bush administration has failed to fill roughly a quarter of the top leadership posts at the Department of Homeland Security, creating a "gaping hole" in the nation's preparedness for a terrorist attack or other threat." When you consider how much time the Bushies took to fill attorney spots with loyal lawyers for political reasons, the hole here is even more gaping. Consider the priorities. In the attorney case competent people were fired to make room for cronies while at Homeland Security the incompetent can't even make time to hire anyone. Is it all the Curse of Brownie ?

The Latest from Terror Times Today: Hello, my name is not Mustafa. Or Ali. Plus I'm OK, You're All AQ .

Panic in Detroit (or is it Salem 1692?) or is it DC? There's a whole lot of shaking going on. And plenty of reasons.

Don't miss the Rose Garden Rockers . And skip on over and wish happy birthday. There will be no Harry Potter and the Altar of the Stupid Girls out next summer. Plus Santorum and " unfortunate events."  Now pause and consider beauty.  It remains around us, waiting, always waiting.

Send hot links to The Heretik at joe.ivory.mattingly AT gmail DOT com.

AP Via Yahoo:

A judge on Monday voided a 10-year sentence for a man accused of having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old girl when he was 17. He instead gave Genarlow Wilson a 12-month misdemeanor sentence with credit for time already served.

Wilson's original sentence, for aggravated child molestation, was widely criticized on the grounds it was grossly disproportionate to the crime, and state lawmakers later passed a law to close the loophole that led to the 10-year sentence.

A jury found the honor student guilty in 2005 of aggravated child molestation for having oral sex with a 15-year-old girl during a 2003 New Year's Eve party involving alcohol and marijuana. Although the sex act was consensual it was illegal under Georgia law. Read more...

In the Bizarro World of Purity Balls and abstinence only sex education we live in, this was a positive sign of progress back to reality. The new sentence may save the day for this young man, but it will take him years to shake the stigma.