–Signed prints are available again after some technical difficulties. I’ve upgraded printers and can now offer archival quality. Link’s to your left, below the ad for Bob’s book (scroll down). Remember, Christmas cutoff is 12-7.
–Had a little mishap earlier today, and as a result got a finger in a splint. Won’t affect cartooning (it’s on the left hand) but typing’s a real bitch, so I probably won’t be a real strong presence around here for a few days. (co-bloggers should feel free to take things over… )
Why am I a cranky blogger? Because this has happened 1-2 times a week for the last five years :
Democrats : We’re going to do something about that horrible thing the Republicans are doing
Me : Yay! Give ‘em hell!
Democrats : Nevermind. We didn’t have enough votes.
Of course for these wimpy Dems, this criticism is just seen as the ranting of a vitriolic blogger who’s looking for something to complain about, but one would hope that they could be honest enough with themselves to notice that the disappointment is based on criteria that they set up for themselves. If you keep promising to do something that you’re unable or unwilling to do, then you’re going to keep looking like a failure.
Today kicks off IslamoHorowitzism Awareness Week, during which myself and other speakers from the Jon Schwarz Freedom Center will be speaking at college campuses to heighten awareness of the terrible dangers posed by IslamoHorowitzism.
I LOVE THE 80S: If you look closely, Horowitz seems to have a tin of chewing tobacco in his front pocket to go along with the boots and tshirt tucked into his jeans.
Everyone’s always said we’d eventually live in a nightmarish world of privatized corporate armies. But who will do the necessary management consulting in our hideous dystopia? Laura Rozen has the answer, here.
The name of the company is particularly hilarious. These are funny, funny people.
Scott Horton of Harper’s takes a look at recent events, including the rise in oil prices, pushback from the military, and shifting Israeli analysis, and concludes the Cheney roll-out on Iran may be sputtering.
I always knew there was something terrifying about shopping malls:
In 1987, a film crew was shooting in the basement of the Galerias Pacifico, one of Buenos Aires’ plushest downtown malls, and to their horror they stumbled on an abandoned torture center. It turned out that during the dictatorship, the First Army Corp hid some of its disappeared in the bowels of the mall; the dungeon walls still bore the desperate markings made by its long-dead prisoners: names, dates, pleas for help.
Today, Galerias Pacifico is the crown jewel of Buenos Aires’ shopping district, evidence of its arrival as a globalized consumer capital. Vaulted ceilings and lushly painted frescoes frame the vast array of brand-name stores, from Christian Dior to Ralph Lauren to Nike…
For Argentines who know their history, the mall stands as a chilling reminder that just as an older form of capitalist conquest was built on the mass graves of the country’s indigenous peoples, the Chicago School Project in Latin America was quite literally built on the secret torture camps where thousands of people who believed in a different country disappeared.
The Galerias Pacifico website is here. Who wants to be in charge of adding this to its wikipedia page?
Usually I like to mix a little analysis in with my crude abuse. But in this case I’ll just say: good job, moron.
Democrat Barack Obama said Sunday he will push for higher Social Security taxes if elected, viewing it as the best option for improving the retirement program’s finances…during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Obama said taxing more of a person’s income was the option he would push for if elected president. He objected to benefit cuts or a higher retirement age.
“I think the best way to approach this is to adjust the cap on the payroll tax so that people like myself are paying a little bit more and people who are in need are protected,” the Illinois senator said.
“That is the option that I will be pushing forward.”
Obama has tried to draw contrasts between himself and front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton on Social Security, saying on the stump and in TV ads that she has dodged tough questions about its finances.
Obama said some tough decisions will be in order because Social Security is the most important social program in the country.
“It’s not sufficient for us to just finesse the issue because we’re worried that, well, we might be attacked for the various options we present,” he said.
I’m happy to explain the numerous different ways Obama is being a moron here, if anyone isn’t familiar with them already. For now, however, I’ll just make this point: wow, he’s a moron.
According to Gareth Porter, the intelligence agencies and Dick Cheney’s office have wrestled to a tie on Iran:
The US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran has been held up for more than a year in an effort to force the intelligence community to remove dissenting judgments on the Iranian nuclear program. The aim is to make the document more supportive of Vice President Dick Cheney’s militarily aggressive policy toward Iran, according to accounts provided by participants in the NIE process to two former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officers.
But this pressure on intelligence analysts, obviously instigated by Cheney himself, has not produced a draft estimate without those dissenting views, these sources say. The White House has now apparently decided to release the “unsatisfactory” draft NIE, but without making its key findings public.
For your enjoyment, here are the conclusions of the two government “investigations” of whether the Bush administration pressured the intelligence agencies on Iraq. First, the Senate Intelligence Committee:
The Committee did not find any evidence that Administration officials attempted to coerce, influence or pressure analysts to change their judgments related to Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction capabilities.
One of the top stories on right wing talk radio yesterday (with mentions on NPR and in the New York Times) was the fact that Hillary Clinton did not leave a tip at a restaraunt. I suspect that this has now been enshrined into conventional wisdom on the right, and will be one of those anecdotes which the candidate will never, ever be rid of.
Well, big effing surprise: like pretty much everything else you might hear on right wing talk radio, it was not only untrue, it was demonstrably untrue.
It’s a strange age we live in. To paraphrase Mark Twain, in the time it takes the truth to boot up a browser for a Google search, a lie can circle the globe several times over.
Antiwar Illinois high school students to be expelled?
Arthur Silber has been following the case of several dozen high school students in Berwyn, Illinois who’ve been threatened with expulsion for participating in an anti-war protest on school grounds. His first post is here. A follow up explains the five lessons the students are being taught by the adults in charge.
A Chicago Tribune story runs down the story basics, and reports that yesterday’s scheduled school board vote on whether to approve the expulsions has been postponed. They’re likely feeling the pressure of public attention. You can endorse a petition in support of the students, now with over 6,000 signatures, here.
