Kudos on the elections in Iraq

Okay, so not everyone voted, and they weren't perfect, but you have to give credit to the Bush administration and especially our troops and the Iraqi voters for making that happen.

Hopefully things will start to get better now, but just having the election is an historic moment.

Bush wins the Catholic vote

Even though John Kerry is Catholic, he lost the Catholic vote to George Bush in the last election. I am not really surprised by that, given the Kerry is for abortion remaining legal and for gay marriage, while I think its safe to say that most Catholics would side with Bush being against both. The partial birth abortion thing I think also contributed, not sure why anyone would be a supporter of that procedure.

You can read about it here"
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=3&u=/ap/20050203/ap_on_re_us/religion_poll

Censorship?

The consitutution (the bill of rights actually) includes the following as amendment I:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances

But, according to some of the actions of the FCC as of late, you wonder if the part of the FCC being supreme ruler of the universe was mistakenly omitted from our copy of the bill of rights. Between the great american tragedy of Boobgate (yes, many of us were traumatized by Janet Jackson's breast, and there were rumors of the religious wrong lobbying for a bill to ban breasts altogether), Howard Stern and any number of other allegedly obscene things on tv and/or radio, there has been a rush toward censorship. Now truthfully I can understand people being riled about the Jackson thing, although I thought the fines were pretty ridiculous, I was personally more offended by the bare ass guy that ran onto the field wearing only a jock strap prior to a kickoff in the second half of the same Super Bowl. But when people are complaining about the violence in Saving Private Ryan when it aired the past couple of times, that is just nuts. If you don't like it (and if you were surprised by the violence at that point after it had been publicized for years you must be living in a cave somewhere) then don't watch it. At long last we had a movie with a realistic depiction of the violence of war, and people have an issue with that. Now Congress wants to raise fines even more. Hell, how about passing an amendment that we only allow on TV what the gov't wants us to see. Oh wait, that was already tried, they called it communism and it pretty much was a failure. To you puritans out there, start thinking with your brain, and not the brainwashed part of it for a change.

Check out this story from the NYTimes (thanks to my brother for emailing me the story):
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/06/arts/06rich.html?ex=1108098000&en=e555d7e03cb0c4e8&ei=5070

and also this one from Yahoo:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=512&ncid=716&e=7&u=/ap/20050203/ap_on_go_co/congress_indecency

Thanks to the national archives for the 1st amendment text, check it out here if you want to:
http://www.archives.gov/

Website of the week, Feb. week 1

Here is another site for you, actually I will give you two since I missed a week or two:

The first is a site where you can circulate or sign petitions, you can find it here:
http://www.petitiononline.com/

The second you can read or leave feedback on all sorts of companies, some of the letters are pretty interesting. If you are registered (which is free), you can leave feedback or comment on others feedback. It does not rate companies, it just provides feedback for them. You can check it out here:
http://www.planetfeedback.com

Too bad we forgot about this

Check out this story on Yahoo (from AP) about scenarios of possible terror attacks that were thought up in the 1970's after the attack on the Isreali athletes in Munich. Too bad we forgot about them, some of them showed remarkable foresight as it turned out.

Read it here:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20050124/ap_on_go_ot/nixon_terrorism

More bad press for Wally World

Following on the heels of Walmart's recent offensive against mounting criticism and backlash of its policies, here is more bad news about the "evil empire". Walmart often talks about it offering health benefits to its employees realtively cheaply, but this story contradicts some of that. Some of what is mentioned, such as having to wait six months for insurance if full time is not necessarily that different than other companies, they may be getting picked on a little bit there. But some of it might be legit as well. The article deals with how much some states have to pay to foot the bill for workers who cannot afford health care through wal mart. That by itself can be misleading since Wal mart employs more than anyone and there are no comparisons to other companies, but still the numbers are big.

Check out the story here:
http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/1884/

More on the Puritans

There are so many of these stories, I am considering starting a series mocking the Girls Gone Wild series called Puritans Gone Wild. The series would feature religious zealots pushing their beliefs onto others and trying to be the moral thought police for the world, thinking they know what is best.

The link at the bottom is about a juice bar, featuring nude dancing , that the gov't is trying to close. In many such cases, when they find out the laws on the books don't prohibit it, they try passing new laws or even using other things like denying licenses, to try and get such businesses to close. Now for you puritans, I am not saying strip clubs should be everywhere, but truthfully if people want to see nude dancing, and no one is getting hurt, and it takes place in a private place, how exactly is it any of your damn business? Where in the constitution does it say that you have the right to make that decision for me or anyone else? Bottom line, if they are bothering anyone not in the club, if it bothers you then don't go there. They act like these strip clubs have naked women walking around outside for the world to see. I am not saying I would want to live next to one, or any bar for that matter, but if you don't like then don't go. This is one story that I hope there are some comments on, I would love the chance to debate any of the zealots on this one.

Here is the story:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=718&e=10&u=/ap/20050202/ap_on_re_us/nude_juice_bar

Landlord tenant horror stories

Check out this link to a good article in the Cedar Rapid gazette about landlord abuse, including some big time landlords with pretty shady practices. I can relate to these stories, spent some time in landlord hell when I was transferred a few years ago. I had to threaten legal action before it was finally resolved.

Here is the link:
http://www.gazetteonline.com/article.aspx?art_id=93119&cat_id=2

Chuck, take any money from Citibank?

Check out this article from the Des Moines Register discussing Senator Chuck Grassley's support of legislation to overhaul fedearal bankruptch laws. Yeah, the laws almost certainly need some tweaking, but the credit cards companies that are pushing this bill (with tons of money in contributions, what are the odds that Grassley got some of that money?) have to take some of the blame for many bankrupcies. They offer credit very liberally, and then if anyone is late on their bill with any creditor, they will often raise the rate is high as 28% as a penalty. Now if you are someone struggling to make ends meet, why bother making payments when you know you will never get out from under without bankruptcy. How about this Chuck- add a rider to the bill prohibiting credit card companies from charging more than 10% above prime for any reason. I am a grassley fan, especially of his war on pentagon waste, but I disagree on this one.

The credit card companies have been trying to get this past for years now because they want to have their cake and eat it too.

You can read the article here:
http://www.dmregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050122/NEWS08/501220336/1001&lead=1

Enemy combatants

In a recent court decision, the gov't plan of detaining enemy combatants indefinitely without charges was dealt a blow when a federal judge ruled that terror suspects can petition for their release. This whole issue will be tied up in court for years. One of my biggest criticisms of the Bush administration is that they always knew it was a possibility that a court or the supreme court could rule that the gov't could not hold prisoners indefinitely without a trial or charges, but yet there was literally no contingency plan to fall back on if there was such a ruling (and there has been such a ruling). If a CEO made such a decision he would be out on his rear and sued a billion times in a heartbeat. But you don't hear that anyone lost their job for this remarkable oversight.

Read the story here:
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/10792030.htm?1c

We should be doing more of this stuff

Check out this story about Iran basically claiming we are waging a psychological war with them, especially in regard to talks about Iran's nuclear program. In my opinion, especially in Iraq, we should be conducting far more Psy Ops opertions. In Iraq most of the news they get is slanted against the United States, so why not fire back with some stuff of our own. It can be a great tool when used correctly.

Here is the story:
http://www.albawaba.com/en/news/179196

Saw this one coming

When I first heard about the deal to sell IBM's computer unit to a Chinese company, I thought two things 1.) Who would buy a computer from a company called Lenovo and 2.) Would regulators torpedo the deal because of security concerns? No one knows the answer to the first question yet, although its probably a lock that IBM (or Lenovo) will lose a ton of market share in the process) but reglulators are eyeing the deal right now for those security concerns.

Part of the concern is due to a research facility that would be sold as part of the deal and that facility is involved with some military research, raising concerns that the Chinese could steal security secrets that way.

Here is a link to the story:
http://triangle.bizjournals.com/triangle/stories/2005/01/24/daily4.html

What? NO WMD's?

You might want to check out this article about WMD's from TomPaine.com, its pretty interesting. Yes, its from a liberal source, and one that is not by any means non partisan, but still worth reading.

I am actually not against the war, but I think the WMD thing was a disaster. We lost a ton of credibility with the rest of the world by using this as the precursor to war and then not finding them. I think we all know that was not the reason that we went to war, and maybe we would have been better off just admitting that from the start. There are two main reasons we went to war: 1.) Oil and 2.) Regime change.

Here is a link to the article, op ed piece or whatever you want to call it:
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/dreaming_of_wmds.php

Here is a surprise

In a shocker, the AARP is against changing social security, apparently sacrificing needs of future needs for those of its current members (which is not exactly rare these days). This issue may not be settled for years, but it will be interesting to watch. I have not seen any details of Bush's plan so I can't say if I would support it or not, but I think doing nothing is a mistake. I heard one commentator say it won't be techically in trouble until 2042, as if that means we should not try to fix it now. The private account idea certainly has some merits but some pitfalls as well. My biggest concerns right now is that the average person may not have the expertise needed in such a system and may not truly realize that they could lose all or part of their money that way.
This should be one of the most interesting political events of our generation, it should be very interesting to watch as our elected representatives juggle several strong competing influences.

You can read an article about this here:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=676&ncid=716&e=25&u=/usatoday/20050125/ts_usatoday/aarpdeadsetagainstbushssocialsecurityplan

Should the gov't give grants to faith based groups?

One of the Bush administrations faith based grants has been blocked by a federal appeals court. More legal challenges will probably follow this ruling. Until recently faith based groups could not received federal funding. Not sure how I feel about this one. The consitution does say sepertation of church and state, but if you leave out faith based groups, many needy people might not get the help that they need. My main concern would be such groups using the money for political gain.

Click the link to read a story from TV station KOLD in Tucson:
http://www.kold.com/Global/story.asp?S=2814354

Another reason I will never be a democrat

Although part of the reason for this may be technicalities of the law, the fact that a lawsuit against McDonalds for obesity is even allowed to go forward is an example of how messed up our system is today. I am not going to get into the whole tort reform here, this lawsuit is absurd. What's next, a parent suing Sony because their kid played his PS2 ten hours a day and turned into a anti-social lard ass? Another example of PFD in action. If you thought fast food was health food, you are pretty damn dumb. Maybe you should sue your parents for raising a dumbass.

Read the story here (about the lawsuit with McDonalds, not suing your parents for raising a dumbass):
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=568&ncid=749&e=3&u=/nm/20050126/bs_nm/food_mcdonalds_dc

Dissent in the Pentagon?

Check out this story about differences between top military officals and civilians in the Defense Department regarding planning the war in Iraq, including some info from before the war started. The best part is a quote from General Tommy Franks that you will have to read to believe. This has been one of the weak spots of the war planning, the civilians have more pull with Bush than those in the military. And I don't think anyone, not even tubby himself, could defend the planning of this war. But if anyone thinks they can, take your best shot.

You can read the story here:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6814437/

Are US Forces fighting in Iran?

According to a story on Yahoo via Reuters, US Special Forces troops are already operating in some capacity in Iran. The administration does not outright deny it, and truthfully, if we are not at least doing recon missions there, we are not being too smart. If we truly are fighting a war in terror, Iran would have to be a target. In fact, they are truthfully much more of a threat to spread anti US influence than Iraq ever has been due to more Muslim fanatics. Iran is definitely a threat to destabilize Iraq and our relations with Iran have always been poor.

Might be worth keeping an eye on.

You can read the story here:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050116/ts_nm/iran_usa_newyorker_dc

Kudos to the FBI

In another example of government waste and ineptitude, the FBI is apparently pulling the plug on their effort to develop advanced software for managing cases, especially terrorism cases. Its hard to believe that with the money that the spent on the project, approximately half a billion dollars, that they could not get it to work. Makes you wonder if they went to the right company, given the many software companies out there, hard to believe someone else could not have gotten it right.

Great job guys, you just wasted half a billion dollars!

You can read about it here:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/01/13/terror/main666644.shtml

Religious zealots gone wild

Wow, just when you thought the religious right (or is it wrong?) can get no dumber, something like this happens. It looks like the apparently ever homophobic Dr. James Dobson has gone off the deepend again. He apparently is claiming that a video featuring Spongebob, among other cartoon characters, is brainwashing kids. Want to know the best part? A spokesman for Dobson's group, Focus on the Family, admits that they are not sure if Dobson has even seen the video. So if he has not seen it, how can he say it brainwashes kids?

Good job James, this is what I call PFD. That stands for PrettyF***ing Dumb.

Click here to read an article from MSNBC.com:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6852828/