Bush Vows to Correct U.S. Intelligence Flaws

...and I swear my first thought was, "he must gonna resign."

Priestly society to battle abortion
By Bobby Ross Jr., Associated Press  |  April 2, 2005

DALLAS -- A priest who comforted Terri Schiavo's parents and siblings says he's starting the Roman Catholic Church's first society of priests devoted exclusively to ''the Gospel of Life," fighting against euthanasia and abortion.

The Diocese of Amarillo will provide a vacant Catholic high school and dormitory to house the male-only Missionaries of the Gospel of Life, the society founded by the Rev. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life.

''I have long been convinced that God is raising up numerous disciples ready to devote their entire lives to ending the tragedy of abortion, which the bishops have identified as the 'fundamental human rights issue of the day,' " Pavone said in a statement.

Pavone served in recent days as a spiritual adviser to Bob and Mary Schindler. Pavone later described Schiavo's death after her feeding tube was removed as ''a killing."

Ignore them.

Before the Fall

The recent rally of the United States dollar notwithstanding, the greenback has nowhere to go but down. But the Bush administration is betting that foreign investors will continue to invest huge sums in this depreciating currency. How huge? Last month, the government reported that the United States' deficit in international transactions, mainly trade, reached an unprecedented $666 billion in 2004, a 24 percent increase from the 2003 level and, at 5.7 percent of the economy, about two to three times what most economists consider sustainable.

The administration expects foreigners, mainly Asian central bankers, to keep plugging the trade gap because buying American securities increases their exports. It is also assuming that foreign central banks won't risk the losses in their dollar reserves that would occur if they started shunning dollar-based investments. In brief, the United States is betting that it's too big - in other countries' eyes - to fail.

Facing Tough Race, Santorum Moderates
By Mike Allen and Brian Faler
Saturday, April 2, 2005; Page A04

Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) has recently made a series of gestures toward the center as he gears up for a tough reelection race against a moderate Democrat. For one of Capitol Hill's most ardent conservatives, the adjustment has been pronounced enough that the liberal American Prospect sarcastically referred to him as a "man of the people."

Now, the senator has said that he is rethinking the breadth of his support for the death penalty. Santorum told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that he has "felt very troubled about cases where someone may have been convicted wrongly." Santorum, a Roman Catholic, said he still supports capital punishment but agrees with the Vatican that it should be limited. He said DNA evidence should be used where possible and believes that there "probably should be some further limits on what we use it for."

DeLay Wants Panel to Review Role of Courts
Democrats Criticize His Attack on Judges

By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 2, 2005; Page A09

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), under fire from Democrats for what they consider threatening remarks about federal judges, plans to ask the Judiciary Committee to undertake a broad review of the courts' handing of the Terri Schiavo case, his office said yesterday.

DeLay's office did not specify exactly what the majority leader wants the committee to do. The Constitution gives Congress the power to set the areas of authority for federal courts, but it was unclear what could be done by the committee in response to the Schiavo case, in particular.

New Ethics Rules Cost NIH Another Top Researcher
By Michael S. Rosenwald and Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, April 2, 2005; Page A01

James F. Battey, chief of the National Institutes of Health's high-profile human-stem-cell program and director of that agency's deafness institute, will retire in September after more than 20 years at the agency, citing his inability to comply with strict new conflict-of-interest rules that have roiled the NIH internally and prompted a backlash in the broader science and business communities.

Battey is the fourth high-profile researcher to announce plans to leave since the new rules were unveiled in early February and is the first institute director to do so.

Quote of note:

"That evidence was the cornerstone of our case," said Glenn F. Ivey, the Prince George's state's attorney. "It was powerful evidence. I hope this verdict helps our efforts to have the [ballistics identification database] continued and expanded."

Ballistics Database Yields 1st Conviction
Oxon Hill Man Tied To Murder Weapon

By Ruben Castaneda and David Snyder
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, April 2, 2005; Page B01

Evidence linking an Oxon Hill man to a murder weapon -- the equivalent of a handgun's fingerprint -- yesterday helped Prince George's County prosecutors win a first-degree murder case.

Quote of note:

"When you or I walk into a pharmacy with a prescription," she said, "we have to have a strong level of confidence that we're going to walk out carrying the drugs we need. If the drug is in stock, it must be dispensed. End of discussion."

Illinois Drugstores Required to Fill Birth Control Prescriptions
By Stephanie Simon
Times Staff Writer
April 2, 2005

ST. LOUIS   Responding to complaints about a Chicago pharmacist who refused to dispense birth control pills, Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Friday issued an executive order requiring drugstores to fill prescriptions for contraceptives.

Hastert Doubtful on Social Security Bill
House Speaker Says That Passage of Legislation This Year May Be Unlikely
By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 1, 2005; Page A04

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) has acknowledged that President Bush's call for completion of a Social Security bill this year could be unrealistic and that the legislation might have to wait until 2006.

The president's aides immediately responded by saying Bush is committed to winning passage this year. The White House and Republican congressional leaders have said repeatedly that the proposed restructuring of the retirement system is doomed if it does not pass this year, because it will be even more difficult to get Democratic support in 2006, a midterm election year.

I'm not ignoring you guys, seriously. But I have a new tech issue I have to figure out. The site had a temporary blackout today and a total blowout yesterday. The times were when I expect my highest volume, so I may need to increase the number of processes my server can run.

The other thing is, both times I noticed when I was posting something remotely. Hm.

And I've been writing documentation for some stuff you probably don't care about.

It has been suggested I write a book. I think I'm considering it this time.

Buckdancing Negroes and Conservative Groupthink About Black Folks

by Armstrong Baldpate

Conservative groupthink about black folks and the buckdancing negroes that tout it are attacking the black community.

The buckdancing negro is the online columnist who is dedicated solely to getting us to pay attention. Nattily dressed in a Brooks Brothers suit, he stands tall at conservative media venues, studding his speech with racially charged words that solicit knee-jerk reactions from the crowd.

Check out Michelle Maklin's blog. A true conservative voice.

DeLay's Reckless Threat

House leader Tom DeLay has issued a chillingly irresponsible threat against the judges involved in the Schiavo case. Following Terri Schiavo's death, DeLay released a statement warning that "The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior, but not today." This vague and provocative comment came in the midst of a broadside of attacks against those judges   several of them self-described conservatives appointed by conservative presidents   whom DeLay said typified "an arrogant, out of control, unaccountable judiciary." The New York Times reports that Sen. Edward Kennedy called DeLay's statement "irresponsible and reprehensible," and urged that "at a time when emotions are running high, Mr. DeLay needs to make clear that he is not advocating violence against anyone. People in this case have already had their lives threatened." Sen. Kennedy is right. Whatever his agenda or personal political troubles, Tom DeLay must disavow his irresponsible rhetoric.

My April Fools Day thing is at The American Street.

In fact, EVERYONE'S April Fools Day thing is at The American Street.

.

A Culture of Life™

via Vision Circle

Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science Opens
Applications Being Accepted

In fall 2005, the University will open the Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science [(MS)2], a public charter school committed to academic excellence with a specific focus on mathematics and science. The school is the first component of the University s planned Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Center.

We plan to enroll 120 sixth grade students for the 2005-06 academic year, and only D.C. residents are eligible to apply.

Applications are being accepted during the month of March. They are available online at www.howard.edu/ms2, or may be picked up from the Howard University Community Association, located at 2731 Georgia Avenue, NW. Any applications received after March 31st will be added to the school s waiting list.

A faulty intelligence report

IT WAS classic irony that Terri Schiavo died the same day the presidential commission on intelligence failure was released. For the brain-damaged Schiavo, the allegedly life-loving Republican Congress and White House engineered a historic and histrionic Palm Sunday vote to support Schiavo's parents, who wanted her feeding tube reinserted over the wishes of Schiavo's husband.

Deep divide seen on fate of incapacitated

WASHINGTON -- Once again, the collision of law, politics, and a tortured family saga has jolted America into a discussion of a complex social concern -- in this case, who should decide whether to remove sustenance from an incapacitated person.

The status quo is fine. There are outlier cases, and legal mechanisms to resolve disputes...a different requirement than "make everyone happy." Everyone understands there is a point beyond which active biology can no longer be called human life. Everyone knows what they want for themselves, and everyone knows actually following through if the situation arises will be a real bitch.

You know how they say history is written by the victors? This is how it's done.

Panel faults spy agencies for claims of Iraqi weapons

WASHINGTON -- A presidential commission blamed the intelligence community yesterday for prewar assertions that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and concluded that no one in the Bush administration had pressured analysts to reach any conclusions about Iraq's weapons programs.

Oh, you thought I was talking about the winner in Iraq?

You read this and say, "Oh, what a surprise," and move on like any sane person would. We've been over Iraq. We've moved beyond the invasion, we've had to...we all have a stake in what comes next.

EU Will Seek to Impose Sanctions on U.S.
By RAF CASERT
The Associated Press
Thursday, March 31, 2005; 9:28 AM

BRUSSELS, Belgium - The European Union head office said Thursday it will seek to impose additional sanctions of up to 15 percent on U.S. products to punish Washington for failing to repeal an antidumping law ruled illegal by the World Trade Organization.

The European Commission said its action would be joined soon by seven other nations, including Japan, South Korea and Brazil, which had all requested the WTO authorize retaliation.

The EU's move would slap additional duties of up to 15 percent as of May 1 on such U.S. products as paper, textiles, machinery and farm produce. The European Commission's proposal still needs to be approved by the EU member states.

Look at this shit. Steal $100 million, get caught and pay $6 million in fines. That's $94 million olloars theys bastards get to keep.

Debt-Relief Firms To Pay $6 Million In FTC Settlement
Agency Cites Lies About Fees, Services
By Caroline E. Mayer
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 31, 2005; Page E06

The Federal Trade Commission announced yesterday that three consumer debt-service companies have settled charges that they cheated financially strapped customers out of more than $100 million.

The agency said National Consumer Council Inc., of California, Debt Management Foundation Services, of Florida, and Better Budget Financial Services, of Massachusetts, agreed to pay more than $6 million in consumer refunds for falsely promising easy debt relief that left many consumers deeper in debt and sometimes forced them to file for bankruptcy protection.

Ted Koppel to Leave 'Nightline' and ABC News
By JACQUES STEINBERG
Published: March 31, 2005

Ted Koppel, who during a quarter century as the host of "Nightline" on ABC provided a hard-news alternative to the monologues and light banter of Johnny Carson, Jay Leno and David Letterman, will leave the network when his contract expires in early December, ABC News announced today.

Mr. Koppel said in an interview that he had informed ABC of his decision earlier this week and did not yet know what he might do next. It was not immediately clear how ABC intends to replace him.

ABC News executives said today that they expected that "Nightline" would endure in the same time slot after Mr. Koppel's departure, but the network has yet to resolve how it would rework the program or even whether it would continue to broadcast from Washington.

Here we go again...

Shut the fuck up, go home and let those people get over it.

Columbia Panel Reports No Proof of Anti-Semitism
By KAREN W. ARENSON

An ad hoc faculty committee charged with investigating complaints that pro-Israel Jewish students were harassed by pro-Palestinian professors at Columbia University said it had found one instance in which a professor "exceeded commonly accepted bounds" of behavior when he became angry at a student who he believed was defending Israel's conduct toward Palestinians.

But the report, obtained by The New York Times and scheduled for release today, said it had found "no evidence of any statements made by the faculty that could reasonably be construed as anti-Semitic."

As Gambling Grows, States Depend on Their Cut
By FOX BUTTERFIELD

DOVER, Del. - Gambling revenues, once a mere trickle, have become a critical stream of income in a number of states, in some cases surpassing traditional sources like the corporate income tax and helping states lower personal income or property taxes.

The sums are so alluring that some officials are concerned that their states are becoming as addicted as problem gamblers. "We're drunk on gambling revenue," said Representative Wayne A. Smith, the Republican who is House majority leader in the Delaware Legislature. "Gambling revenues are like free money."

What did I tell you?

Quote of note:

It was also unclear if the Vatican had plans to replace the nasal feeding tube, normally a temporary device, with the more comfortable, efficient and long-term type of artificial feeding conduit that is placed directly through the abdominal wall.

This latter mechanism, called a PEG, is the type that has kept Terri Schiavo alive for the last 12 years. Although it is put in place under local anesthesia, the procedure would presumably require a brief return to the hospital. Also, it represents a more permanent commitment to aggressive end-of-life care, and it is not clear whether the pope would choose that route.

This is the only case whose impact could overshadow the media noise generated around Terri Schiavo's case. I know the Church allows you or your legal guardian to forgo heroic measures to preserve life...for the record, I have no beef with that. But if it's possible to live and you make a conscious choice not to, that's close enough to suicide as to make no difference.

I wouldn't wish life with Parkinson's Disease on my worst enemy, but it is rarely the actual cause of death...steps can be taken now to extend John Paul II's life, to protect against those complications. Of course the neural cell death would continue until his ability to interact is gone. But he'd be alive...the vessel of God's will.

How can The Pope choose not to live? How can the Cardinals choose not to let him?

They can because beyond a point it becomes monstrous.

Of course none of that decision making will take place on the record. But that doesn't matter. The fact that no current religion compels you to take those extraordinary measures to preserve life means every current religion recognizes there is a point at which the biological activity is not human life.

Pope Is Being Fed With a Tube
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL

You know, sometimes I think we've already blown it.

Quote of note:

Walter Reid, director of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, said over the past 50 years humans had changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than any comparable period in human history.

"These changes have resulted in a substantial and largely irreversible loss to the biological diversity of the planet," Reid said.

U.N. Study: Earth's Health Deteriorating
- By CATHERINE McALOON, Associated Press Writer
Thursday, March 31, 2005
(03-31) 02:48 PST LONDON, United Kingdom (AP) --

I mean, since Democrats have made suggestions that would actually achieve solvency Bush can't possibly be talking about them, right?

Anyway...

Bush Invites Critics to Show, Tell
The president warns there may be political repercussions for lawmakers who don't address Social Security's solvency problems.
By Warren Vieth
Times Staff Writer
March 31, 2005

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa   President Bush tried Wednesday to persuade congressional skeptics to back his approach to Social Security restructuring and invited critics to join him at the negotiating table.

Bush took his Social Security campaign to the home state of Republican Senate Finance Chairman Charles E. Grassley, who has expressed doubts about the prospects of passing restructuring legislation this year.

Court Broadens Scope of Age-Discrimination Protections
By DAVID STOUT

WASHINGTON, March 30 - The Supreme Court ruled today that older workers can, in some circumstances, recover damages from their employers for harm caused by age discrimination even if the harm was not deliberate.

The court, ruling 5 to 3 in a case closely watched by business interests, held that the 1967 Age Discrimination in Employment Act does allow such lawsuits. But the court also made clear that the estimated 75 million people covered by the law - workers over age 40 - must clear a high threshold of evidence to prevail.

Justice John Paul Stevens and the four other justices who joined him in the main thrust of today's ruling alluded to earlier Supreme Court findings that good faith by employers "does not redeem employment procedures or testing mechanisms that operate as 'built-in headwinds' for minority groups and are unrelated to measuring job capability."

Justice Stevens, using the technical language that has accompanied years of court arguments over interpretation of the law, said the act does allow recovery of damages in "disparate impact" cases - that is, in instances in which the effect on older workers is unintentional - as well as "disparate treatment" cases, when the effect is clearly deliberate.

This is seriously curious for a couple of reasons. First of all, the "disparate impact" argument has been rejected where racial discrimination is concerned.

Nor have I been so impress with the US nowadays that I want it attached to my domain names.

Anyway...

Dear Valued Go Daddy Customer,

Today I have the unfortunate responsibility of informing you that there has been a decision made by bureaucrats of a Federal agency that takes away your right to privacy as guaranteed by the United States Constitution.

This decision was unilaterally made by the National Telecommunications and Information Association ("NTIA") -- http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ -- without hearings that would determine the impact on those affected, and delivered without notice -- in short, the NTIA decision was made without due process of any kind. This is exactly how our government is not supposed to work.

Since CNN is shilling for the Religious Right nowadays I thought I'd give my honest, swear-ta-God opinion of an idea they're floating.

The ace up his sleeve

NEW YORK (CNN) -- This past weekend, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the influential chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, seemed to throw cold water on President Bush's hopes for major Social Security change. And recent polls have shown that the public is also cool to the idea of private accounts, arguably the central element of President Bush's Social Security plan.

But as the Social Security debate continues to unfold, do not underestimate President Bush's ability to still get his ideas enacted. Indeed, even without broad Congressional or public support, President Bush just may have an ace up his sleeve. How might he enact his private accounts idea without such support, you may ask? By executive order.

...When President Clinton failed to get his health care plan passed in the mid-1990s, he experimented with portions of his program via executive order.

Similarly, if President Bush ultimately fails to persuade Congress (especially centrist Senators) to back his private account plan, he may sign an executive order for a smaller version of his plan,

Critics of executive orders note that Congress and the courts rarely overturn such directives, thereby raising the specter of unchecked, un-reviewed and potentially even presidential abuse of power. Indeed, the Supreme Court has only overturned an executive order twice and Congress a mere four times in the past century.

Ladies and gentlemen, if Bush does this in the face of the overwhelming rejection of his push for privatization it will represent the biggest "Fuck all you little people" ever committed in American politics.

I haven't had the time to sort out all the ideas I have whose roots lay in something I learned from Harold Cruse's Plural but Equal and The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual...though I can tell you right off the top that Crisis showed me I not only can start my analyses without assuming everyone else's assumptions, but that is must.

If you haven't read these books you should. Or at least get The Essential Harold Cruse: A Reader. I haven't read it but I own the other two books so... but if I had read it, I'd have know the introduction to the book, written by Jelani Cobb, is online at his site. PTCruiser knew though, and told me. Now I pass it to the rest of you. It's a long read but worthy...not a straight lionization of Cruse at all (though I wouldn't have complained).

Mississippi Eases Hair Braiding Rules

Date: Tuesday, March 29, 2005
By: Associated Press

JACKSON, Miss. -- Mississippi lawmakers approved a bill Tuesday that would lift licensing requirements for people who take money to braid hair.

Supporters said braiding is a part of African-American heritage that should be free of the state bureaucracy. Opponents of the bill said the practice needs regulation to prevent the spread of scalp diseases.

Current Mississippi law says a braider must hold either a cosmetology license, requiring 1,500 hours of education, or a wig specialist license, requiring 300 hours of training.

The compromise bill sent to Gov. Haley Barbour only requires hair braiders to pay an annual $25 fee to register with the state and take a self-test. They would also receive a brochure on sanitation.

Read what I wrote here.

Read what ex-senator Bill Bradley wrote here.

While you do that, I'll look for an online course on writing more verbosely.

Latam-Spain Leaders Vow Cooperation But Not Anti-US
Reuters
Tuesday, March 29, 2005; 9:55 PM

By Silene Ramirez

CIUDAD GUAYANA, Venezuela (Reuters) - The leaders of Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia and Spain agreed on Tuesday to join forces to fight terrorism, drug-trafficking and poverty in Latin America, but they said their alliance was not intended to confront the United States.

The one-day summit was hosted by leftist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a fierce critic of Washington's global policies, at Ciudad Guayana on the banks of the Orinoco river.

Despite Chavez's stance, Venezuela, the world's No. 5 oil exporter, remains a major supplier to the United States.

Quote of note:

Protesters often stand out because the crowds are packed with Bush supporters, who have been invited by a local GOP House member or organization. Those onstage at most of the town hall meetings are carefully screened people from the area who agree with the president's Social Security proposal. The participants typically rehearse what they will say with members of the president's advance team and rarely, if ever, say anything critical about his plan for private accounts.

Three Were Told to Leave Bush Town Meeting
By Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 30, 2005; Page A04

Anne Applebaum says in the Washington Post:

Yet, although we see video images of death all the time -- movie shootouts, scenes of faraway warfare -- we don't much like dwelling on the medicalized environments in which most people in our society actually pass away, and we don't like thinking about the murky ethical dilemmas that their deaths often present. In some sense the Schiavo case has attracted so much attention precisely because it brings, almost for the first time, a very common, very painful, but usually very private dilemma into the public sphere.

Can we just not politicize this any further?

The fact that this has drawn so much public attention doesn't mean the general issue is now a public one.

Doubts Raised On Schiavo Memo
Web Critics Question Authenticity Of 'Talking Points' Aimed at GOP

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 30, 2005; Page C01

Bloggers are swarming around a new target: the Terri Schiavo "talking points."

Fresh from declaring victory over CBS News and its discredited National Guard memos about President Bush, some of the same bloggers are raising questions about a strategy memo, first reported by ABC News and The Washington Post, that cast the Schiavo right-to-die case as a partisan opportunity for Republicans to stick it to Democrats.

"Fake but Accurate Again?" says the Weekly Standard headline on an article by John Hinderaker, an attorney and conservative blogger who had challenged the CBS documents.

Two Months In and Still Foundering
Iraqi Assembly Again Fails to Elect Speaker or Fill Other Key Positions

By Caryle Murphy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 30, 2005; Page A08

BAGHDAD, March 29 -- Iraq's new National Assembly had just convened for its second session Tuesday when a wide-girthed Shiite Muslim cleric, Hussein Sadr, appealed to his fellow deputies to quickly elect a speaker.

"Public opinion on the street is now waiting for some action by us. What can we answer?" he said. "What shall we say to history?"

A female delegate clad head-to-toe in black also jumped up to demand answers. "There are 17 Sunni personalities inside this assembly, and to choose one of them is not difficult," she shouted, referring to the vote for speaker. "Please clarify this."

Tell me your opinion of this.

Quote of note:

Executives of Response Unlimited declined to comment. Gary McCullough, director of the Christian Communication Network and a spokesman for Ms. Schiavo's parents, confirmed that Mr. Schindler had agreed to let Response Unlimited rent out the list as part of a deal for the firm to send an e-mail solicitation raising money on the family's behalf.

List of Schiavo Donors Will Be Sold by Direct-Marketing Firm
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and JOHN SCHWARTZ

WASHINGTON, March 28 - The parents of Terri Schiavo have authorized a conservative direct-mailing firm to sell a list of their financial supporters, making it likely that thousands of strangers moved by her plight will receive a steady stream of solicitations from anti-abortion and conservative groups.

I am. MAJOR dental work yesterday.

How major? We put those yellow cones on my forehead and routed street traffic around my head for several hours. I considered leaving my jaw there overnight, pick it up later after the swelling goes down.

Justices: Whistleblowers Can Sue for Retaliation
From Associated Press
9:40 AM PST, March 29, 2005

WASHINGTON   The Supreme Court expanded the scope of the landmark gender equity law Title IX, ruling today that it shields whistleblowers who accuse academic institutions of discrimination based on sex.

The 5-4 decision in favor of Alabama high school girls basketball coach Roderick Jackson is a victory for women's advocates who say the legal protection will prompt reports of bias that would otherwise go unsaid or unheeded.

The ruling means Jackson can pursue a lawsuit claiming he was fired for complaining that the boys team received better treatment. Congress intended such lawsuits when it passed the Title IX law, justices said.

Harold Cruse has died.

You have no idea the impact this man has had on my views. Not just  The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual, but another major work of his, Plural but Equal.

Qusan points to a pretty amazing admission made by the anti-intellectual forces in Dover, PA., the guys trying to eliminate the teaching of evolution in schools.

"Christians are a lot more bold under Bush's leadership, he speaks what a lot of us believe," said Mummert.

"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture," he said, adding that the school board's declaration is just a first step.

"We" are not in the intelligent, educated segment of the culture. "We," in fact, feel singularly threatened by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture and the constant flow of new things it forces "us" to react to.

The autopsy can handle the Schindler's accusations.

Schiavo's Husband and Parents Now Battling Over Autopsy Plan
By Manuel Roig-Franzia and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, March 29, 2005; Page A03

PINELLAS PARK, Fla., March 28 -- The war over Terri Schiavo, once tightly focused on whether she would live or die, shifted at times Monday to arguments over how her body will be examined.

Her husband, Michael Schiavo, wants an autopsy in hopes of proving the severity of her brain damage. Her parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, want a medical examination to answer questions about their suspicions that Michael Schiavo may have broken her bones in what they say may have been an attack that caused her brain injury, an allegation that was previously made.

Michael Schiavo and his attorneys have vehemently denied the accusation, saying doctors believe Schiavo's brain injury was caused by a lack of oxygen after a heart attack.

The dueling plans for examining Terri Schiavo's body were announced Monday as protesters carried crucifixes into Lafayette Square across from the White House, then visited three congressional offices to pressure lawmakers to intervene again in the case.

You know how folks have to warn you when something isn't work-safe? Well, make sure there are no fundies around when you follow this link.

Don't forget to read the comments.

Alma Mater As Big Brother
By Katherine Haley Will
Tuesday, March 29, 2005; Page A15

A proposal by the Education Department would force every college and university in America to report all their students' Social Security numbers and other information about each individual -- including credits earned, degree plan, race and ethnicity, and grants and loans received -- to a national databank. The government will record every student, regardless of whether he or she receives federal aid, in the databank.

The government's plan is to track students individually and in full detail as they complete their post-secondary education. The threat to our students' privacy is of grave concern, and the government has not satisfactorily explained why it wants to collect individual information.

Ex-Diplomats to Urge Rejection of Bolton as U.N. Ambassador
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 29, 2005

WASHINGTON, March 28 (AP) - A group of former American diplomats plan to send a letter to urge the Senate to reject John R. Bolton's nomination to be the next United States ambassador to the United Nations.

"He is the wrong man for this position," the group of 59 former diplomats say in the letter, addressed to Senator Richard G. Lugar, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Mr. Lugar, Republican of Indiana, has scheduled hearings for April 7 on Mr. Bolton's nomination.

Did Bush listen to the economists? No.

Did Bush listen to Union of Concerned Scientists? No.

The other day I noted pharmacists that refuse to do their jobs are part of the same Religious Right movement that set up antiabortion organizations designed to confuse women who want abortions. Today, Paul Krugman notes the pattern

Yesterday The Washington Post reported on the growing number of pharmacists who, on religious grounds, refuse to fill prescriptions for birth control or morning-after pills. These pharmacists talk of personal belief; but the effect is to undermine laws that make these drugs available. And let me make a prediction: soon, wherever the religious right is strong, many pharmacists will be pressured into denying women legal drugs.

And it won't stop there. There is a nationwide trend toward "conscience" or "refusal" legislation. Laws in Illinois and Mississippi already allow doctors and other health providers to deny virtually any procedure to any patient. Again, think of how such laws expose doctors to pressure and intimidation.

...and that it's much wider than that.

This is at the National Press Club.

Blogger? Journalist?

Now that anyone with a computer and an Internet connection can set up shop on the Web, the days when you could tell who was a reporter by looking for a press card stuck in a fedora are long gone. Both journalists and bloggers will debate whether there's a difference between them, on Fri., Apr. 8, at 9:30 a.m. The panel includes Jeff Gannon, whose question at a presidential press conference focused attention on the issue; Ana Marie Cox, editor of Wonkette.com, and Congress Daily's John Stanton. Reserve at 662-7501.

I spotted this issue at Steve Gilliard's News Blog.

Ireland Enacts Law Banning English on Maps
Ireland Enacts Law Banning English on Road Signs, Official Maps on Much of Nation's West Coast
By SHAWN POGATCHNIK

The Associated Press

Mar. 28, 2005 - Tourists, beware: Your guide book may tell you the way to Dingle in County Kerry, but all the road signs will be pointing you toward An Daingean in Contae an Ciarrai instead.

In an age where many people bemoan English's growing global influence, advocates of local languages scored a small victory Monday when Ireland enacted a law outlawing English in road signs and official maps on much of the nation's western coast, where many people speak Gaelic.

Locals concede the switch will confuse foreigners in an area that depends heavily on tourism, but they say it's the price of patriotism.

Oliver says:

It's now becoming a serious question whether Republicans are on "the other side" or not.

It's LONG been a serious question...and here's the serious answer.

Right-Wing Terror Movements Omitted from DHS Terrorist List
By Justin Rood, CQ Staff

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not list right-wing domestic terrorists and terrorist groups on a document that appears to be an internal list of threats to the nation s security.

According to the list   part of a draft planning document obtained by CQ Homeland Security   between now and 2011 DHS expects to contend primarily with adversaries such as al Qaeda and other foreign entities affiliated with the Islamic Jihad movement, as well as domestic radical Islamist groups.

That headline oughta catch your interest.

I try clever, literate lead-ins sometimes, but I've read a lot and quoting all the requisite set-up stuff would be annoying so I'll just list the stuff that got me thinking about this.

First was The Unbranding by Jeffrey Goldberg, in The New Yorkershugavery, one of the members here, brought it to my attention with this quote.

He has come to realize, he said, that many Democrats still haven’t grasped the political importance of September 11th, and again he recalled how he had urged Kerry to keep his campaign message focussed on terrorism. Kerry, Biden said, would tell voters that he would “fight terror as hard as Bush,” but then he would add, “and I’ll help you economically.” “What is Bush saying?” Biden said. “Terror, terror, terror, terror, terror. I would say to John, ‘Let me put it to you this way. The Lord Almighty, or Allah, whoever, if he came to every kitchen table in America and said, “Look, I have a Faustian bargain for you, you choose. I will guarantee to you that I will end all terror threats against the United States within the year, but in return for that there will be no help for education, no help for Social Security, no help for health care.” What do you do?’

“My answer,” Biden said, “is that seventy-five per cent of the American people would buy that bargain.”

Then, while on tour, I ran across Jude of Iddybud, writing at The American Street, responding to a post by Chris Bowers at MyDD that flipped on a statement about Goldberg's article in an article in which Matt Taibi basically rips National Security Democrats a new orifice. Chris focuses on this quote.

Court Declines to Review Abortion Law
Supreme Court Rejects Appeal to Reinstate Law Requiring Girls Under Age 18 to Get Consent for Abortions
By HOPE YEN
The Associated Press

Mar. 28, 2005 - The Supreme Court rejected an appeal Monday to reinstate a state law requiring girls under age 18 to get parental consent for abortions except under the most dire of medical emergencies.

Without comment, justices let stand a lower court ruling that struck down the Idaho law because its provisions on emergency abortions were too strict.

The Supreme Court in its landmark 1973 case, Roe v. Wade, ruled that a woman has a constitutional right to abortion before the fetus is viable and to terminate her pregnancy if it poses a risk to her health.

Court Won't Step Into Newspaper Lawsuit
Top Court Won't Step Into Lawsuit Against Paper That Reported on Accusations Among Politicians
By PETE YOST
The Associated Press

Mar. 28, 2005 - The Supreme Court refused Monday to step into a lawsuit against a newspaper, leaving the media in Pennsylvania legally vulnerable when they report defamatory comments by public figures.

The case could chill news coverage of political campaigns where charges and countercharges are commonplace, First Amendment advocates say.

The justices' decision not to consider the case was a victory for the former mayor and current council president of Parkesburg, Pa., who sued when the Daily Local News in West Chester, Pa., reported that a council member claimed they were homosexuals. The newspaper reported the councilman also had issued a statement strongly implying that he considered the two officials to be "queers and child molesters."

I missed it because I don't tech blog like I used to. But at the beginning of the month, during the quarterly "where da wimmin at" discussion, Dare Obasanjo (a VERY competent Microsoft developer and blogger I became familiar with during the Atom vs. RSS wars) commented on it and asked:

I wonder when the NAACP or Jesse Jackson are going to get in on the act and hold a blaggercon conference for black bloggers. Speaking of which, it's my turn to ask "Quick   name me five black bloggers". Post your answers in the comments.

"blaggercon" is not a typo, by the way.

Quote of note:

Currently, the system taxes only the first $90,000 of income, while a growing number of Americans earn more. In 2001, for example, 15 percent of Social Security contributors made more than the taxable earnings maximum, up from 10 percent in 1983. That trend has happened despite the year-by-year increase in the taxable maximum. That translates into lost funding for Social Security. In 1983, the sum amounted to $305 billion, notes an Economic Policy Institute study. By 2001, that had grown to $775 billion. (To adjust for inflation, both figures are reported in 2004 dollars.)

"More than half of the currently projected shortfall over the 75-year planning horizon is attributable to upward redistribution of wage income since 1983," notes Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a Washington think tank.

How Social Security could narrow rich-poor gap
By David R. Francis

Sorry, that slipped.

Quote of note:

It's commonly argued that Americans don't want the jobs illegals take. But a workforce of perhaps 7 million undocumented workers depresses wages. Those wages would readjust upward, and be attractive to Americans and legal immigrants, if the stream of illegals significantly abated. Promise of work in the US encourages illegal (and dangerous) border crossing. That's why the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 provided for sanctions against businesses that hire the undocumented.

Joke on America: Hiring Illegals

Ha ha ha. That's a good one. Wal-Mart, a company with $285 billion in sales, gets fined a mere $11 million earlier this month for having hundreds of illegal immigrants clean its stores.

The federal government boasts it's the largest fine of its kind. But for Wal-Mart, it amounts to a rounding error - and no admittance of wrongdoing since it claims it didn't know its contractors hired the illegals.

Quote of note:

In that she is not alone. As of 2001, a federal analysis of households with at least one worker from age 21 to 64 concluded that 28 million -- more than one-third of the total -- did not have a retirement savings account of any kind. The study, released in 2003, relied on Census Bureau and Federal Reserve data.

Saving for the Future
By Annys Shin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 28, 2005; Page E01

Pamela Ginsberg was once invited to a bar mitzvah by one of her customers and danced the hora in the family circle. At the grocery store where she works as a butcher, she has blanketed part of a wall behind the deli counter with photos and hand-scrawled notes from the children she has treated to slices of turkey. When she serves customers, she stands beneath a flying wooden cow and pig -- gifts from a man who could not get enough of her corned beef.

Quote of note:

Drug makers consider the governor's plan far more preferable than the Health Access and Frommer approaches. Their plans would cover more people than Schwarzenegger's, requiring discounts for anyone earning less than four times the federal poverty level ($38,200 for an individual or $77,400 for a family of four). People with incomes above that who spend a disproportionate amount on medical expenses also would be eligible.

Most disturbing to the industry is that under the Health Access and Frommer proposals, drug companies that do not consent to the discounts could be shut out of a prized market: the state's huge Medi-Cal program, which annually buys $3 billion worth of drugs for the poor.

"The prescription drug companies have admitted with their initiative that their drug prices are too high," said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access. "The question is, should the state use its leverage to bargain for better prices, or should it just rely on the goodwill of the industry?"

Industry Aims to Defeat Discount Drug Initiatives
By Jordan Rau
Times Staff Writer
March 28, 2005

SACRAMENTO   Facing pressure from many states to provide cheaper prescription drugs, the pharmaceutical industry has launched its most aggressive counterattack in California, where the issue is threatening to explode on the ballot as early as this fall.

Is No One Accountable?

By BOB HERBERT

The Bush administration is desperately trying to keep the full story from emerging. But there is no longer any doubt that prisoners seized by the U.S. in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere have been killed, tortured, sexually humiliated and otherwise grotesquely abused.

These atrocities have been carried out in an atmosphere in which administration officials have routinely behaved as though they were above the law, and thus accountable to no one. People have been rounded up, stripped, shackled, beaten, incarcerated and in some cases killed, without being offered even the semblance of due process. No charges. No lawyers. No appeals.

Quote of note:

The American Pharmacists Association recently reaffirmed its policy that pharmacists can refuse to fill prescriptions as long as they make sure customers can get their medications some other way.

Really.

...Neil T. Noesen...in 2002 refused to fill a University of Wisconsin student's birth control pill prescription at a Kmart in Menomonie, Wis., or transfer the prescription elsewhere. An administrative judge last month recommended Noesen be required to take ethics classes, alert future employers to his beliefs and pay what could be as much as $20,000 to cover the costs of the legal proceedings. The state pharmacy board will decide whether to impose that penalty next month.

"He's a devout Roman Catholic and believes participating in any action that inhibits or prohibits human life is a sin," said Aden of the Christian Legal Society. "The rights of pharmacists like him should be respected."

He has the right to deny the policy...and the pharmacy board has the right to penalize his ass for it. He's in the wrong fucking business.

This is exactly like the "crisis pregnancy center" fraud

When the U.S. Supreme Court handed down Roe in January 1973, Pearson founded the Pearson Foundation and wrote a manual titled "How to Start and Operate Your Own Pro-Life Outreach Crisis Pregnancy Center." Soon, CPCs were popping up all across the country. Today, there are an estimated 3,200 CPCs nationwide.

Pearson's manual instructs CPC staff to use vague and evasive language so as not to clue women and girls in to the fact that the centers are anti-abortion. He advises centers to list themselves in the phone book "under the headings of abortion, pregnancy, birth control information, clinics, social services, welfare organizations, women's organizations and services, and health services" in order to mislead women. The manual also suggests that CPCs locate themselves in the same buildings as abortion clinics so that "the abortion chamber is paying for advertising to bring that girl to you." (JMJ Life Center, a local CPC, moved directly next door to Planned Parenthood Greater Orlando earlier this month.) Pearson's philosophy deems that CPC staffers should use whatever means necessary to prevent a woman from getting an abortion. In a 1994 speech, he declared: "Obviously, we're fighting Satan ... A killer, who in this case is the girl who wants to kill her baby, has no right to information that will help her [do that]."

Choose Life Inc.
Historically, CPCs have been funded by private donations. But in 1997, Marion County Commissioner Randy Harris formed an anti-abortion organization called Choose Life Inc., and championed a proposal that would create a state-sponsored fund-raising vehicle for CPCs: the unprecedented "Choose Life" license plate.

The first attempt to pass the "Choose Life" tag was vetoed by Gov. Lawton Chiles in 1998. But in 1999, Gov. Jeb Bush -- a staunch abortion opponent -- signed into law a bill creating the plate, making it the first of its kind in the country. (Bush is such a fan of CPCs that he donated part of his $675,000 campaign-fund surplus to them after becoming governor.)

For each $22 tag sold, $20 is returned to the county of purchase, where the board of commissioners distributes the funds to CPCs. (To date, $1.48 million has been raised in Florida from sales of more than 37,000 "Choose Life" tags; it remains one of the top-selling specialty tags.) Effectively, the "Choose Life" plate amounts to the state acting as a fund-raising agent (via tag sales) for predominantly religious, anti-abortion organizations.

Anyway...

Pharmacists' Rights at Front Of New Debate
Because of Beliefs, Some Refuse To Fill Birth Control Prescriptions

By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 28, 2005; Page A01

Some pharmacists across the country are refusing to fill prescriptions for birth control and morning-after pills, saying that dispensing the medications violates their personal moral or religious beliefs.

Quote of note:

Paul L. Francis, the acquisition and sourcing management director for the accountability office, told Congress that the Army was building Future Combat Systems without the data it needed to guide it. "If everything goes as planned, the program will attain the level of knowledge in 2008 that it should have had before it started in 2003," Mr. Francis said in written testimony. "But things are not going as planned."

He warned that Future Combat Systems, in its early stages of research and development, was showing signs typical of multibillion-dollar weapons programs that cost far more than expected and deliver fewer weapons than promised. Future Combat is a network of 53 crucial technologies, he said, and 52 are unproven.

An even better quote of note:

Future Combat soldiers, weapons and robots are to be linked by a $25 billion web, Joint Tactical Radio Systems, known as JTRS (pronounced "jitters"). The network would transmit the battlefield information intended to protect soldiers. It is not included in the Future Combat budget.

If JTRS does not work, Future Combat will fail, General Cartwright said. The Army halted production on the first set of JTRS radios in January, saying they were not progressing as planned.

An Army Program to Build a High-Tech Force Hits Cost Snags
By TIM WEINER

The Army's plan to transform itself into a futuristic high-technology force has become so expensive that some of the military's strongest supporters in Congress are questioning the program's costs and complexity.

Quote of note:

Some of the anti-indecency groups see à la carte services as a way of helping consumers block out programming they consider indecent. "We are at a rare moment when there seems to be bipartisan energy on both sides of the political aisle and both sides of the ideological divide," said L. Brent Bozell, president of the Parents Television Council, a leading advocacy organization that officials say has been responsible for the vast majority of complaints against the broadcasters.

You know what? I don't much care if the choke down on sex, violence and profanity incable programming. It would seriously cut into a major source of income for major Republican donors. And it's not like people don't know where to get their sex, violence and profanity any time they want.

And I personally won't miss any of it. Last porn I bought was the issue of Playboy in which Naomi Campbell was the centerfold...and when I threw it away (after years, admittedly) none of the pages were stuck together.

There are only two down sides to this and they are "bigger picture" issues: the Bushistas will get credit from some circles, and the last time Congress forced a decoupling of cable services all the vendors repriced the parts such that the same features cost much more when a consumer reassembled the package.

Under New Chief, F.C.C. Considers Widening Its Reach
By STEPHEN LABATON

Abiola isa libertarian and so he gets a lot of readers that wouldn't be interested in my perspective. But he's also one of like three libertarians I've seen that hasn't ever said a a stupid thing. So when his readers get upset at something he writes they should really think a bit before flipping on him.

The Distribution of Human Genetic Diversity

My statement in an earlier post that I would pick mostly Africans, if I were thinking about ensuring maximum genetic variation in a small group of settlers, has evidently gotten under the skin of no small number of ignorant racist nutjobs, several of whom have, in a wonderful display of projection, been busy flinging comments on here and elsewhere to the effect that I'm a "racist" for stating what any population geneticists will acknowledge as obvious.

For the edification of such fools (and on the highly doubtful assumption that they are even educable), I hereby present a few papers supporting just this claim:

Today when you see artists like 50 Cent, Nelly, Ludacris, and others painting lyrical pictures of Black men as thugs, drug dealers, and degrading imagery of Black women, they succeed because their 80% non-Black consumer base co-signs it. So far, Ludacris has sold 10 million albums. Fiddy s "Get Rich or Die Trying" moved 11 million. If all the Black music consumers boycotted these two artists, Luda would still have sold around 8 million while 50 s last disc would ve moved a little over 9 million, simply due to the fact that 80% of their audience is not Black.

Angela Winters at Politopics pointed out How Blackness Became  Universal, and it's a goodie. Nevermind that I've said all this stuff before.

Quote of note:

Students who believe their professor is singling them out for  public ridicule  ænbsp; for instance, when professors use the Socratic method to force students to explain their theories in class   would also be given the right to sue.

Some professors say,  Evolution is a fact. I don t want to hear about Intelligent Design (a creationist theory), and if you don t like it, there s the door,   Baxley said, citing one example when he thought a student should sue.

Capitol bill aims to control  leftist  profs
By JAMES VANLANDINGHAM
Alligator Staff Writer

TALLAHASSEE   Republicans on the House Choice and Innovation Committee voted along party lines Tuesday to pass a bill that aims to stamp out  leftist totalitarianism  by  dictator professors  in the classrooms of Florida s universities.

I haven't been that much fun here recently because I'm working some code to work with Amazon.com's affiliate program with Drupal that has me interested. And there's really some other functionality I should build for P6 in the next week or so. And I need to study up on Wordpress because I'll be helping out The American Street with a little tech support (not to mention its API looks interesting).

Still, I think I should like, write something once in a while. It just doesn't always have to be clever. I can point out obvious stuff once in a while, right? Well, it's become obvious to Republicans they have to appeal to at least some Black folks, and they're going to Black churches because that's where they expect to find the candidate Black folk.

On Meet the Press I've heard 'moral foundation" so many times from Reza Aslan, I think we need to recognize our foundation as a nation is economic, and our religious history has always been pluralistic.

I am SO happy to have this PVR.

This was a good roundtable. There was a discussion of the political fallout of the biomass circus. They pointed out it's enabled a political argument the Republicans have no respect for the rules, that when they don't like the rules, they just change them.

This is good. It's true, and it's been done visibly...people will relate to this in a way they don't to screwing with the internal procedures of the House.

I'm going to think about this for a minute. I'm currently in the process of being amazed by the Chris Matthews Show.

On This Week, Stephanopolis is playing DeLay's claim that Terri Schiavo was God's gift to Conservatives! I love it!

Later today I'm going to present DeLay's paranoid statement and transcribe Rep. Weldon's response. It was, as Rep. Franks said, a noble attempt to pull on DeLay's foot without getting dragged down his throat with it.

LATER: I changed my mind. DeLay's noise was played in a bunch of the morning talk shows so I was in no rush.

I think John Paul will be the first Pope to rule from beyond the grave.