Have you forgotten?

Friday to Friday creeps in its petty pace ....

Ways to avoid being eaten by mosquitoes.

What climate change means to polar bears.  And to bring back to life ancient pathogens which may or may not be virulent.

Building a sailboat and the love of woodcraft.

The opposite of hoarding... being too clean?

A necessary and informative timeline from the New York Times (takes us only to April 2015) to show how long it took to get the Iran nuclear agreement and why it is a big effing deal.  And why Cheney wants Iran to be all Obama's fault.

How to catch liars.

A designer for Silicon Valley.  She's over 90.

A scientist's doubts over GMOs.  French court finds Monsanto guilty of chemical poisoning.

Harvard linguist points out the 58 most commonly misused words and phrases

Dealing with depression.

9/11 conspiracies list.

This should be front page news.

Bush and Cheney lied us into war.  But we knew that.  Even back then.

What Digby said.

And life goes on

Weird things asked of librarians.

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not Eureka! (I found it!) but rather, 'hmm... that's funny...'"
- Isaac Asimov

How to deal with narcissists.

The gender bias of toys.

Getting the 1%.

Regulations for pissing on Dick Cheney's grave.

Police:  Explaining attitudes to Josh Marshall, explaining actions to a citizen of Nashville, getting an explanation of what Bill de Blasio talked about

Tuesday's Traumas

Fun with guns.

Dick Cheney.

The Koch machine.

What the poor must do every day.

Mary Poppin's creator was cantankerous and grumpy.  And didn't like Disney's take on her book. 

Failure and how to deal with it.

Republican's to do list.

One way to honor the children of Sandy Hook without bothering the community.

We were close to war with Iran during President Cheney's reign

But I didn't realize how close.  If this is true, it was going to happen.

Susie Madrak introduces us: This is Gwyneth Todd, former member of President Clinton’s National Security Council and top Middle East advisor. (articles date from 2012.)

Military command of this invasion, to be done without consultation of congress or the United Nations was left to Vice Admiral Kevin J. Cosgriff and Admiral Will J. Fallon, both career opportunists with extremist political views, willing to do anything for promotion and the curry favor from the powerful criminal figures in US government. 

Their “cover story” was to sale a frigate up the Shatt al Arab, a disputed waterway between Iraq and Iran, hoping to stimulate a “response” from Iran. 

Their real plan was to create the response themselves, as was done by the Navy during the Tonkin Gulf Incident in 1964 when America “invented” an attack by North Vietnam as a prelude to a 10 year war America eventually lost. 

Their plans were to create phony radio traffic simulating an Iranian attack in order to push America into authorizing hostilities that they, themselves, had perpetrated in as part of a conspiracy.

Apparently there were attempts to follow Gwyneth Todd to Australia.  Juan Cole discusses events.

Christianists to Pick Up Artists

Conservatives cite ‘neutrality’ memo as proof of military’s hostility to Christianity

A conservative group claims the United States Air Force violated religious freedom by advising officials not to discriminate against subordinates based on their religion. 

The Family Research Council on Tuesday released a report on religious freedom in the United States Armed Forces, which concluded the Obama administration was cracking down on Christianity. 

The report stated that high-level officers within the Air Force were cooperating with “anti-Christian activists” like attorney Michael Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. As evidence, the report compiled a list of incidence which purportedly showed religious freedoms being violated.

Tasers kill. The police know this and keep on using them.  So I guess they're just letting the lawsuits pile up?

Edward Snowden: US officials are preventing me claiming asylum

Arizona being Arizona... APS seeks higher bills for new solar customers

The Cheney presidency was where the NSA spying started.  Before 9/11.  No surprise there...

We are not Trayvon Martin.

Republican pick up lines to woo women voters....

Well, we're certainly NOT.

George W. Bush: 'I'm Comfortable With What I Did'

Duh, deo and doo doo

Solar panels could destroy U.S. utilities, according to U.S. utilities

Discussion of funny videos on Reddit.

Dangerous deodorant

Falling frozen vultures.

The way you walk may make you a victim.

Deep doo doo from the man who knows all about shit.

Fools, Fanatics, Faith, and Fungus

NRA Ridicules Congresswoman Whose Husband Was Shot and Killed in Mass Shooting

Dick Cheney, Ahmed Chalabi Contemplated Value Of Iraqi Oil To U.S., David Frum Writes

Depleted uranium, a gift of war that keeps on giving....

MUST WATCH: A Politician Loses It And Restores My Faith In Humanity

White-nose bat fungus. So now we kill off the bats and wonder why we are being inundated with insects.

Prison Profiteers Are Neo-Slaveholders and Solitary Is Their Weapon of Choice

You don't say!

A Brief History Lesson for Justice Antonin ‘Racial Entitlement’ Scalia

Baby elephant hugs.

Writing the Unwritten Handbook: Antifascism and Neighborhood Resistance in Athens

State Department’ Keystone XL Report Actually Written By TransCanada Contractor

Poor Jeb Bush.

Here Are Some Rich New Yorkers Whining About Feeling Poor (The comments are enlightening.)

Howard Fineman: We Are Living in the World Dick Cheney Made

The rich poor divide.

To help you win climate change arguments.

A veteran's remorse: what have we done to Iraq?

Starting the week with a bang... Or maybe a whimper...

Louisiana's coast is feeling the sea-level rise.

While state officials continue to argue over restoration projects to save the state’s sinking, crumbling coast, top researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have concluded that Louisiana is in line for the highest rate of sea-level rise “on the planet.” * Indeed, the water is rising so fast that some coastal restoration projects could be obsolete before they are completed, the officials said.
NOAA’s Tim Osborne, an 18-year veteran of Louisiana coastal surveys, and Steve Gill, senior scientist at the agency’s Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services, spelled out the grim reality in interviews with The Lens. When new data on the rate of coastal subsidence is married with updated projections of sea-level rise, the southeast corner of Louisiana looks likely to be under at least 4.3 feet of gulf water by the end of the century.

The Republicans are getting upset that the Democrats are standing back and letting them fall on their faces. Josh Marshall says it best:

Official Washington is accustomed to having a Democratic safety net — not cash transfers for those who fall through the cracks of the market economy — but that Democrats will come in and solve crises created by GOP government by crisis.

Cheney is afraid of being tried as a war criminal.

No chemicals, no GMO grain, India has record crop:

What if the agricultural revolution has already happened and we didn’t realize it? Essentially, that’s the idea in this report from the Guardian about a group of poverty-stricken Indian rice and potato farmers who harvested confirmed world-record yields of rice and potatoes. Best of all: They did it completely sans-GMOs or even chemicals of any kind

And farmers are demanding control over the seeds:

Vandana Shiva: 'Seeds must be in the hands of farmers',Biodiversity campaigner accuses corporate giants of trying to take over the world's seed supply through genetic engineering,

I have here in my hand... McCarthyism style innuendo doesn't quite work the way it did before YouTube and the internets....

Friday

Are you being persecuted because of your faith?  Because claiming you are persecuted is cool and makes people bond together against the bad guys and give money to churches and stuff.

We knew this when it happened.  It was obvious to those who could watch the news and think for themselves.  Bush and Cheney knew a lot more than they shared with us about Bin Laden and 9/11.  So when's the war crimes tribunal?

Jupiter saves Earth ... again.

If You Plan On Ever Getting Old And/Or Sick, You Need To See This

When the buffaloes roamed the prairies... and then when they didn't.

Should women be criminalized for having abortions?  Are we that close to losing the right to choose?  On the edge.

Scott Walker has a goon squad because 8x11 1/2 signs are a threat.  And being a mayor means you can do what you want.

Elizabeth Warren:



Rachel Maddow:  (sorry for the ads)

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I'll say it now. If Romney becomes president, we will be at war with Iran within two years.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Do we really need to list why we despise Dick Cheney?

Because even those who cheered him on during his reign of terror seem to have woken up.

But if you are interested....

(An aside... I've never been really clear when to use awakened, woke, awake etc.... so this was fun to find.)

Update: Robert Sheer takes a whack at the Cheney ego.

Bullshit

Bush: 'I Was A Dissenting Voice' On Iraq War

We knew this from the very beginning.

From the moment Bush was selected to be president, some of us bet we'd be at war with Iraq in two years. The neocons had been begging Clinton for years to take out Saddam, and now they had the power and ability to do so themselves.

The Bush administration was obviously prepping for war while theatrically pretending to be weighing the decision until the last minute. It was so very clear to us what they intended to do but the media just bizarrely ate up each declaration from Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush as the truth and asked no questions. It's what made me give up on the mainstream media in disgust and go hunting for those who actually reported the truth.

I really think the neocons felt they had all bases covered. The churches had been bought off with the 'faith-based initiatives', the allies were ready to get the oil, the military brass got a new shiny war with really big bombs, the media had been seduced with quail eggs and special interviews.... The Bush administration just didn't plan on those pesky bloggers with their damned facts and discomforting questions.

The truth refuses to die even though you thought you put out a hit, Mr. Cheney. And now the facts are slowly working back to the surface. Even though we knew what the truth was, it's nice to prove it.

Newly Declassified Documents Show Bush Administration Looked For Excuse To Start War In Iraq In Nov. 2001

Good.

Have at it.

In a move that will put Britain's relationship with U.S. intelligence agencies under intense and possibly damaging scrutiny, British Prime Minister David Cameron has launched an unprecedented inquiry into whether security services were involved in the torture of terrorism suspects.

Americans don't 'torture', remember? (Nudge nudge wink wink) We just do necessary enhanced interrogations!



Renaming a war crime doesn't change the fact it's a crime, Georgie. Semantics won't save your prezidenting legacy.

When liberals swear

Pearls get clutched and knees buckle, apparently.

When Bush swore?



It was because it was true? Or righteous?

How about when Cheney told Leahy to go fuck himself?

In 2004, then-Vice President Dick Cheney had a “frank exchange of views” with Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) on the Senate floor over Cheney’s ties to Halliburton and President Bush’s judicial nominees. Cheney ended the argument by telling Leahy, “F*ck yourself.” Since then, Cheney has joked about the incident and claimed the Leahy “merited” it because he was “close” to kissing him. On Dennis Miller’s radio show today, Cheney suggested that his Leahy f-bomb was “the best thing” he had ever done...

We knew this all along

US medical staff experimented on terror suspects: report

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Medical personnel apparently experimented on terror detainees during CIA-led torture after the September 11 attacks, aiming to improve interrogation techniques, a human rights group said Monday.

"There is evidence that they were calibrating the harm inflicted by these techniques allegedly and also looking to extend their knowledge about the effects," said Nathaniel Raymond, from Physicians for Human Rights.

The group said it had used public records showing health professionals worked under the supervision of the Central Intelligence Agency during interrogations of "war on terror" detainees after the 2001 attacks.

The doctors and medical staff witnessed waterboarding, forced nudity, sleep deprivation, temperature extremes and prolonged isolation among other techniques.

"What we see is doctors collecting data that is used to draw conclusions related to whether or not the techniques or behaviors that they are observing violate the Department of Justice standard on what constitutes a level of harm, what makes it torture," Raymond told a press conference.

Who are these people? Did we just raise a generation oblivious to the horrors of WWII? Did we just create our very own Dr. Mengeles?

Who on earth could justify any of this?

“Yeah, we waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed,” the former president told a business audience in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “I’d do it again to save lives.”

Oh yeah. Him. And what about Cheney?

To many, Cheney is the dark side of the Bush administration, and this program will only cement that judgment. ``Frontline" chronicles the brutal campaign by two consummate political in-fighters -- Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld -- to decimate the CIA, politically emasculate Secretary of State Colin Powell, and construct a near-limitless concept of executive power during war. While many of these strands are familiar, they have not been assembled as effectively before on television to present a coherent picture of what happened after 9/11.

Cheney didn't trust the CIA after it missed the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Iranian revolution, and Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, so he created through Rumsfeld's Pentagon his own intelligence network to suit his agenda. Powell and former CIA director George Tenet were no match for this pair, who have known each other for three decades. By the time that Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis ``Scooter" Libby, was indicted last fall, Powell and Tenet were long gone and the CIA was in shambles.

My theory is that these guys got off on torture. You don't need to waterboard somebody 183 times to get information. You do it because it makes you feel powerful. Non-military, cowardly, craven blunderers, they thought it made them manly and tough. What it actually did was make everything ten times worse.

And these 'doctors' who were involved in the torture?

We want their names.