One last (?) swipe at the ABC debate from MediaBloodhound, with the "untelevised portion" transcript:

GIBSON: But how wasted were you the first time you heard "I Am the Walrus," Senator [Obama], and did your psychotic drug binge -- which may have caused you to black out for days on end while committing unspeakable acts you don't remember -- add or subtract from your listening pleasure?

OBAMA: Again, Charlie, I'm not sure how this helps get Americans health insurance, brings home our troops, or fixes the economy.

GIBSON: I'll take your response as an admission that pot and acid do, in fact, make this song better....

STEPHANOPOULOS: So [Senator Clinton,] you admit there was no gunfire that day you landed in Bosnia?

CLINTON: Well, you know, George, I've already conceded that I misspoke on that issue....

(STEPHANOPOULOS brandishes a revolver and fires a few feet above Sen. Clinton's head.)

STEPHANOPOULOS: But you would've remembered that, right?

Open Thread below....

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Sergeant: "You are sitting here lying to a police officer." Do you pick up stray pieces of toilet paper from the floors of public restrooms? Was your palm down or up? I could tell it was your left hand...

Craig: "I sit down, um, to go to the bathroom and ah, you said our feet bumped. I believe they did, ah, because I reached down and scooted over and um, the next thing I knew, under the bathroom divider comes a card that says Police. Now, um, (sigh) that's about as far as I can take it, I don't know of anything else. Ah, your foot came toward mine, mine came towards yours, was that natural? I don't know. Did we bump? Yes. I think we did. You said so. I don't disagree with that."

Sergeant: "Okay. I don't want to get into a pissing match here."

Seems that Larry doesn't know what hand his gold ring is on...Sadly, No! has more...

Via The Salt Lake Tribune:

Operators at the Crandall Canyon mine experienced serious structural problems in the mine in March and entirely abandoned work in an area about 900 feet from where six miners remained trapped Saturday.

A memo obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune shows that mine owners were trying to work around "poor roof conditions" before halting mining of the northern tunnels in early March after a "large bump occurred . . . resulting in heavy damage" in those tunnels.

A bump or bounce occurs when the intense pressure on the coal pillars supporting the mine causes the pillars to burst, "sending coal and rock flying with explosive force," according to that National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

The memo indicates that mine operators knew the tremendous pressures of a mountain bearing down on the mine were creating problems with the roof, and they were searching for a way to safely keep the mine from falling in as they cut away the coal pillars supporting the structure.

"It's dangerous. Damn dangerous I would say," Robert Ferriter, now director of the mine safety program at the Colorado School of Mines and a 27-year veteran of the Mine Safety and Health Administration. "What is MSHA doing in all this? They're the ones who are supposed to catch this sort of thing." Read more...

Daily Darfur: The blogosphere won one (as the MSM blinked) -- Fidelity divests from genocide. How do we hold Fidelity's feet to the fire?

Pardon us bloggers for asking, but has George Bush gone completely mental? Maybe this moron magnet will help consolidate the 29 percenters... and speaking of rampant stupidity, what if, in the battle against global warming, we pay people to give us permission to kill trees we were gonna kill anyway? By the way, it turns out a group of New Jersey eighth graders can show support for the troops better than Washington. But you knew that.

Republic of T: The color of net neutrality.

Off the Beaten Path, "the best bloggers are simians" edition: Damned, Dirty Ape!, Gorilla88, Blogmonkey, Monkey Muck, Dr. Zaius.

guest round-up by Blue Gal -- http://bgalrstate.blogspot.com

What are they thinking letting him near heavy machinery?

"I would suggest moving back," Bush said as he climbed into the cab of a massive D-10 tractor. "I'm about to crank this sucker up." As the engine roared to life, White House staffers tried to steer the press corps to safety, but when the tractor lurched forward, they too were forced to scramble for safety."Get out of the way!" a news photographer yelled. "I think he might run us over!" said another. White House aides tried to herd the reporters the right way without getting run over themselves. Even the Secret Service got involved, as one agent began yelling at reporters to get clear of the tractor. Watching the chaos below, Bush looked out the tractor's window and laughed, steering the massive machine into the spot where most of the press corps had been positioned.

Note the much more innocuous way it was characterized here in the LA Times:

With that, the machine came to life, moving forward on its yellow metal treads, until the president brought it to a halt about 20 feet down the line and started it on a backward turn. When Bush climbed down from the cab, the inner boy was shining through, and a broad, sheepish grin crossed his face.

Inner boy shining? He steered the tractor to right where the press corps were standing. This guy really would have to eat a baby before the media would say something bad.

Will Bunch:

Look, on one hand, the government's more dramatic claims about Padilla and dirty bombs have never panned out. That said, he stands accused of plotting terroristic acts against the United States, and so if that's true, he should be tried as a criminal, and if convicted, he should serve a long time in prison.

But seriously, what is accomplished by this kind of crap? It doesn't make America any safer -- in fact, it does just the opposite, by needlessly dropping respect for the U.S. even lower in the eyes of the world and in the eyes of Muslims. More importantly, it's just flat out immoral and wrong -- regardless of what anyone else thinks.

We should be ashamed.

Talk Left describes the torment of a US citizen named Jose Padilla in her post.

Here's how he got taken to the dentist for a root canal:

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If you're visiting with family over Thanksgiving, and you see children being entertained by a popular animated movie, be sure to remember that, in all likelihood, conservatives believe the cartoons are part of some nefarious liberal plot.

CNN Headline News' Glenn Beck, for example, railed against the animated film Happy Feet this week, calling it "propaganda" and an "animated version of An Inconvenient Truth." Discussing the movie with Bob Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television, Beck went on quite a tirade.

Similarly, Fox News' Neil Cavuto whined incessantly about the movie this week, calling Happy Feet "offensive," "big-time objectionable," and "far left" political propaganda.

Of course, it's not just this movie. From Tinky Winky to Shrek, Shark Tale to SpongeBob, conservatives seem to have an unhealthy fixation on the alleged dangers lurking in animation.

Note to the right: they're just cartoons. It's probably time for a priority check.

-Steve Benen

Bush refused to accept Gregory's question which is very relevant to the discussion about Article III. It was never vague before. As Ezra says,

This is by far the pissiest press conference Bush has given. He's furious. I assume his feet are manacled behind the microphone. Otherwise, he'd be stalking across the stage, tearing apart the podium, and occasionally leaping into the crowd to rip out David Gregory's heart...read on

Download | play -QT Download | play -WMP (h/t Paula)

Digby has more..

Balkinization:

Instead, the question must be placed in its historical and international context -- namely, whether Congress should grant the Executive branch a fairly unbounded discretion to use such techniques where such conduct would place the United States in breach of the Geneva Conventions.

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This day is not the best day for me. I can't stand that Bush is using 9/11 as a stump speech, but I wanted to dedicate this post to the family of Tom Magee. He worked with my father at the IUOE-local 94 for a long time and after my father retired, Charlie was in the Towers, trying to save lives.

Charlie Magee:

John worked with Charles "Charlie" Magee, the Chief Engineer at the Center. Along with the 35 other employees who made up the management staff of the World Trade Center, they began their day high above the bustling city, managing what was a city within the city.--In the Management Office on the 88th floor, the scope of the catastrophe was more evident. John Griffin Jr. and Charlie Magee also thought at first that an electrical substation had blown up. The force of the explosion lifted furnishing into the air. One desk had flown up and landed five feet away. The falling debris and furnishings blocked access to the stairwells. The room began to fill with smoke. John, Charlie and others began to break out windows to get air into the room.

Continue reading »

Okay so where was I, yeah, I hung out on line to get the vibe - even though I donned the button: "I voted Early for John Kerry" - As I walked back to the Kerry tent a battle erupted. A kerchiefed hippie kid held an 8-foot long plywood board in the air in front of the Bush tent. It read, "1200 Americans Killed in Iraq. 10,000 wounded..." The Bush people went nuts. They wrestled with the guy. Swat team went into high gear. The kid was with the Kerry group, which of course was strategically placed four feet to their left.

The sign being eight feet long well, you get the idea. Meanwhile the chanting from the Military Trail drifted into the parking lot. A soaking wet sexy socialite in high heels approached the front door. "I don't have to vote. I just have to use the ladies room. Cops obliged. Doors opened. Line didn’t move. A five-year-old black girl stared in bewilderment at the whole nutty scene. It was in the words of the Sorkin's, a middle-age Jewish couple, "A real happening."