Clogging the intarweb tubes
Send a message in a bottle, online.

Keepin' us safer
Road map of the highway to hell -

"[Israeli]Defense officials told the JPost last week that they were receiving indications from the United States that the US would be interested in seeing Israel attack Syria."

PSM
The giant dead eel tossing contest has been cancelled.

Makin' progress!
Gunmen wearing Iraqi security forces uniforms kidnap 25 people at a Baghdad company, and 4 more US Marines are killed as violence continues to rage across Iraq.

The "Iraqi Interior Ministry may be replaced because things are so bad. Everything is falling apart in Iraq. Bush would call this an opportunity." - John at AmericaBlog.

Bush, Bush supporters, and the judgment of history
Incompetent, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.

And the worst part: We twice allowed this incompetent, boorish ("Yo! Blair!") national embarassment into the position of power from which he now subverts our ideals and endangers world stability.

If there's a Bush supporter out there who can name one useful thing he's done, foreign or domestic -- one positive effect he's had, or is ever likely to have, or that will not backfire on us with the impact of an Israeli air strike -- I long to hear it. Because it is starkly clear that history will judge this ill-bred, malignant narcissist to be not just the worst American president, but a force for evil in the world unseen since the glory days of fascism and Communism. And judge those who voted for him to be entirely responsible for the worldwide calamity known as George W. Bush.

- Steve Horowitz.

Dayum!

Excuse me, Mr. Lieberman?
You egotistical Bushhumping sack of shit?

Michael Schiavo righteously rips into the pompous repuke-enabling panderer.

Kiss of death
Bad enough he crossed the aisle to tongue-kiss an incompetent preznit. Kissing up to a failed war preznit's "unmitigated fiasco of the highest order" is even worse. He must pay...

The Democratic electorate is obligated to send a message to its leadership. The war in Iraq was a colossal mistake, it continues to be a colossal mistake, and it will and should cost any and all congressional supporters their jobs if they continue to support this harebrained and thickheaded emasculation of American democracy.

That starts with one Joseph Lieberman. {...}

Things are looking so bad that he has vowed to mount an independent bid in November if he loses to [challenger Ned] Lamont. Doesn't that sound oh-so-statesmanlike?

- the Chicago Sun-Times.

Wehhhhhh! You can have my Senate seat when you pry my cold dead fingers off Bush's shriveled little weener!

Known unknowns, and known assholes
Darth Rumsfeld, space cadet -

"If I were running against conservatives, I would make up a campaign commercial almost entirely of Donald Rumsfeld’s press conferences, because the man is looking - I mean, it’s not just that he seems like a bad Secretary of Defense. He seems literally in a parallel universe and slightly deranged. If you listen to what he said last week about Iraq, he’s living in a different world, not a different country."

-Newsweek editor Fareed Zakaria.

Keepin' us safer
US risking major backlash in Mideast

"We are FUCKED [T]his will just drive up anti-Americanism to new heights." - Richard Haass, Bush's former State Department policy director.

Haass laughed at the president's public optimism. "An opportunity?" Haass said with an incredulous tone. "Lord, spare me. I don't laugh a lot. That's the funniest thing I've heard in a long time. If this is an opportunity, what's Iraq? A once-in-a-lifetime chance?"

PSM
I remember... the Alamo: "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure" will be on today at noon EDT on TVLand.

Yet another Republican under investigation for yet another stupid, possibly criminal action
Florida rethug candidate for governor in hot water over ethics lapse. Gee.

There is probable cause to believe that gubernatorial candidate Tom Gallagher violated ethics laws by owning stock in two insurance companies while he regulated the industry, the state ethics commission determined Friday.

Rove blasts journalists' role in politics
This is rich - professional smear merchant, enabler of rightwing hate radio and founding father of the swift boaters attacks journalists for their "corrosive role" in politics and government. I wonder which journalists he's {not} talking about.



In a related story...

Sliding into fascism

"The time is coming for us to pull back from the brink again. This must happen before the government gets so strong that it can completely demonize opposition, gain complete control of the media, and develop dossiers on all its citizens. By then it will be too late, and we'll have ourselves to blame."

- from a StarTrib editorial.


But... but... 9/11!
******

Whoa!
"It’s true that Mr. Lieberman has fallen in love with his image as the nation’s moral compass. But if pomposity were a disqualification, the Senate would never be able to call a quorum."

In a beautiful bitchslapping editorial, the NY Times tells "the Republicans' enabler" to go to hell:

[Quisling Joe Loserman, whiny-ass titty-baby] has shown no interest in prodding his Republican friends into investigating how the administration misled the nation about Iraq’s weapons. There is no use having a senator famous for getting along with Republicans if he never challenges them on issues of profound importance.

If Mr. Lieberman had once stood up and taken the lead in saying that there were some places a president had no right to take his country even during a time of war, neither he nor this page would be where we are today. But by suggesting that there is no principled space for that kind of opposition, he has forfeited his role as a conscience of his party, and has forfeited our support.

[T]his primary is not about Mr. Lieberman’s legislative record. Instead it has become a referendum on his warped version of bipartisanship, in which the never-ending war on terror becomes an excuse for silence and inaction. We endorse Ned Lamont in the Democratic primary for Senate in Connecticut.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

Yay
Bob Geiger has the Saturday toons up.

Awesome
Bill Clinton explains the facts of life to harpy skank mAnn Coulter:

W ould Jesus have called someone "sugar tits"?
The passion of the drunken, bigoted a-hole

A blitzed Mel Gibson launched into an obscenity-laced tirade when he was busted on suspicion of drunken driving early yesterday, threatening an officer and making anti-Semitic and sexually abusive remarks, according to a police report.

"My life is f----d," Gibson repeatedly told LA Deputy James Mee, then he embarked on a belligerent, anti-Semitic outburst when he realized he had been busted.

"F-----g Jews. The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world," Mee's report quotes him as saying.

"Are you a Jew?" Gibson asked the deputy, according to the report.

The actor also berated the deputy, threatening, "You motherf----r. I'm going to f--- you," according to Mee's report.

The actor also told the cop he "owns Malibu" and would spend all his money "to get even with me," Mee said in his report.

Gibson noticed a female sergeant on the scene and yelled at her, "What do you think you're looking at, sugar t--s?"

Deputy Mee then wrote an eight-page report detailing of the incident, but higher-ups in the sheriff's department felt it was too inflammatory to release and would merely serve to incite "Jewish hatred."

Saddam look-alike Mel "gznphtb!" Gibson.
*****

Wtf?!
It's a pretty sad state of affairs when you can read something like this and actually believe that it's true:

The widening crisis in the Middle East took on graver proportions today when President George W. Bush indicated that if the hostilities continue, they could threaten his traditional August vacation at his Crawford, Texas, ranch...

No, YOU are!
"For that little twerp to claim I didn't recognize death and suffering -- he can just bite me, for all I care." - Michael "heckuva job" Brown, in an interview for Playboy.

"Brown is an incompetent fool, and everyone in South Mississippi knows it." - Mississippi Rep. Gene Taylor, in reply.

Look, shiny...
Supine whore media responsible for the end of civilization -

"[O]ur media has collapsed. They’ve questioned no one. One of the reasons Bush and Cheney are so daring is that they know there’s nobody to stop them. Nobody is going to write a story that says this is not a war, only Congress can declare war... Nothing makes any sense, and the people are getting very confused. The people are not stupid, but they are totally misinformed."

- Gore Vidal, in the new issue of Duh! magazine.

No probable cause? No problem!
Federal court okays warrantless searches of laptops at US borders - rules searches and seizures are allowed "under the border search doctrine."

"Al Gore -- total fag"
Syphilitic attention whore gets carte blanche to spew her bigoted comments on air, with moist, blowfish-like host applauding and creaming his underpants.

Last night on Hardball, pandering moron Chris Matthews asked hateful harpy skank mAnn Coulter, "How do you know that Bill Clinton is gay?"

Coulter responded, "I don't know if he's gay. But Al Gore -- total fag."



And you -- total cunt.

F*ck you guys, I'm going home
Yeah, whatever: SecState Rice to return to the Middle East "when it is right." She's doin' a heckuva job.

Bush's 'regular guy' mode can backfire
... but not with us!!!, the USA Todayhole gushes.

Amid tensions in Iraq and the Middle East, President Bush meets Friday with a special delegation: Taylor Hicks and the American Idol finalists.

Visiting with the most recent stars of the Fox TV show is the latest example of Bush being a regular guy, exuding a down-home style that has been both a blessing and curse to the greatest president evar.

Well, somebody's exuding something.

Boob
America's attorney general: moronic mouthbreather with a crush on the president, or goosestepping fascist? Uhhhhhhhhh, yes.

Alberto Gonzales is achieving something remarkable, even miraculous, as attorney general: He is making John Ashcroft look good.

There is no polite way to put this: Gonzales doesn't seem to have an adequate grasp of what's happening in his own department or much influence in setting administration policy. [T]he most disturbing aspect of Gonzales's tenure: his lack of independence from the president.

- Ruth Marcus, the WaPo.

Simmering rage within the GOP
They're mad as hell, and they're going to keep taking it up the ass.

Everything the White House does seems to be aimed at pleasing only one section of the Republican coalition -- the religious right. {...}

I first became aware of the spreading discontent on the right in visiting with people in the church social hall after the funeral this spring for Lyn Nofziger, Ronald Reagan's longtime press spokesman and adviser. The comments about the Bush White House people -- who were notable by their absence at the service -- startled me.

But since then I have heard the refrain over and over: They never reached out to us. They never thought they needed our help. Now they're in trouble. To hell with them.

Whether or not the complaints are justified, they are epidemic.

- David Broder.

Remember: vote republican. Because your best chance of staying alive in these troubled times is to keep a bunch of ineffective, incompetent, uncaring hypocritical assclowns in office. 9/11!

Keepin' us safer
"The Bush administration, in its quest to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, approves giving nuclear technology to a country that has not signed the non-proliferation treaty."

North Korea, the Taliban, the economy...
"'Middle East troubles derail Bush comeback.' Comeback? Apparently they thought Americans forgot about the dismal response to Katrina, rising gasoline prices, the Social Security initiative, the criminal investigations and the Iraqi war." - headline on the intarweb.

But... but... Bill Clinton! Ted Kennedy! Jimmy Carter!

Maybe even better than Skittles 'n' beer
Mmmmmmmm, marijuana-filled gumballs.....

Shiny happy world
Army shitcans gay Arabic language specialist. What the hell, right? Because we already have more than enough Arabic translators.

Marching on Lord Lieberman’s castle
Why do blogofascists hate America?

Irving Stolberg, former speaker of the Connecticut House and a longtime Lieberman ally, recently endorsed [challenger Ned] Lamont in the Hartford Courant. He wrote that Lieberman’s “blind support of the Iraq war, begun illegally and a continuing catastrophe, is monstrous.” Stolberg added that Lieberman’s “defense of an incompetent president, a vice president who fits the dictionary definition of fascism and an extremist administration that has perpetrated torture, illegal eavesdropping and a general shredding of the Constitution is insulting to the people who elected him in the first place.”

Word.

No sex, please - we're republicans
Won't somebody think of the children?

Cops catch Norm Coleman Sr., the agile 81-year-old father of Minnesota's Senator Coleman, playing escaped convict and the French nanny.

A police report said officers were called to Savoy Inn at 7:40 p.m. to investigate a report that two people were having sex in a car. The police report stated a woman, Patrizia Marie Schrag, 38, also was cited for lewd and disorderly conduct.

Sen. Coleman issued a statement after learning of the citation against his father: "I love my father dearly. I do not condone his actions or behavior, and I am deeply disturbed by what I have learned."

"He clearly has some issues that need to be dealt with," the senator said through a mouth pursed up like an inflamed anus. "And I'm personally going to see that he gets all the help he needs, from his new nursing home in Barrow, Alaska."

"We don't talk to bad people"
Maybe if we ignore them, they'll go away?

The Bush misadministration became "so preoccupied with Iraq that it has no credibility whatsoever with the Arab people,'' said Mehdi Noorbaksh, an international affairs professor at Harrisburg University of Science and Technology.

"This president has a very firm world view that is not about to be changed by facts or realities." And that's a good thing how exactly?

Stick a fork in her
"In only three months, U.S. Senate candidate Katherine Harris has lost almost half of the Republicans who planned to vote for her, according to a new poll."

So what?
Syphilitic attention whore whoring for more attention.

Harpy skank mAnn Coulter says former President Bill Clinton's behavior shows "some level of latent homosexuality." Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I wonder if she gives any thought to how she appears? Ahhh, probably not. C*nt.

Vote us in to keep us out - of jail!
Found this at RimJob's this morning - it's from a Moonie Times editorial. There's no link since I would've had to register first:

If congressional Democrats acquire subpoena power by capturing a majority in either the House or the Senate in this fall's elections, the last two years of the Bush administration will be a nightmare for the White House.

Yeah... mwwwaahahahahaha! If they don't pussy up, anyway.

Today we look at the House, where Democrats must gain 15 seats in November. That would enable them to install Nancy Pelosi as speaker; Alcee Hastings as chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence; Henry Waxman as chairman of the Government Reform Committee; and John Conyers, who is running for re-election on an "impeach the president" platform, as chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

The horror of having the House in the control of these crooks and incompetants is a sure way for this country to fail.

And we know what that's like, believe me.

Citizen diplomacy
Please don't hate us 'cause our president is a dumbass!

With anti-American sentiment at unprecedented levels around the world - a trend that has accelerated sharply under the 'unilateralist and arrogant' reign of King Gropie McStupid - Americans worried about their country's low standing are pushing a grassroots campaign to change foreign perceptions of the United States "one handshake at a time."

"Hey, lookit this! If ah shake this thing hard enough, it makes noise!"
*****

Resolutenitude
"That's what is so frustrating about watching him deal - or not deal - with Iraq and Lebanon. There's almost nothing to watch. It's not even like watching paint dry, since that, too, is a passage from one state to another. It's like watching dry paint." - Maureen Dowd, July 26.


I'm eating lead paint!
*****

Hmmm, OK, let's try THIS one
Bush's new, new plan to help end Iraq violence -

We're makin' progress, but it's hard work. Terrists hate democracy. We got to stay the course. We got to fight 'em over there. An' obviously the violence in Baghdad is still terrible, and therefore there needs to be more troops. Ah'm the decider, you see. Ah've decided. An' we're makin' progress.

Might as well pack it in now
It's all over for Joe Lieberman.
/slight sarcasm

Heckuva job
First you're called a "political imbecile" - then you find out you're being sued for "bungling the evacuation" of US nationals from Lebanon.

{No, not him. One of the other imbecilic bunglers.}

{No, the other one.}

Olbermann to O'Reilly boss: ORLY?
Keith Olbermann responds to humorless asshole Roger Ailes:

"'Over the line?' Where was Roger when O'Reilly defended the Nazi SS stormtroopers from Malmedy in World War II? The SS shot 84 American POW's there in 1944, and three different times in the last year, Bill called has called those dead Americans war criminals. I guess there is no line at Fox News."

Link goes to newsbusters, another site for mouthbreathers. Yuck.

Keeping it in the family

The Bush administration is moving to eliminate the jobs of nearly half of the lawyers at the Internal Revenue Service who audit the tax returns of some of the wealthiest Americans.

IRS deputy commissioner Kevin Brown said that he had ordered the cuts because far fewer people were obliged to pay estate taxes under Bush's legislation.

But six lawyers whose jobs are likely to be eliminated said during interviews that the cuts were just the latest moves to shield people.

Sharyn Phillips, an IRS estate tax lawyer in New York, called the cuts a "backdoor way for the Bush administration to achieve what it cannot get from Congress, which is repeal of the estate tax."

"Now watch this drive."
*****

Biggest baby in the world
No, the other one.

Fox News' humorless CEO Roger Ailes called Keith Olbermann's pranking of crybaby Bill O'Reilly at the Television Critics Association meeting last weekend "over the line." The Dem-bashing Ailes said Olbermann, a "notorious smear merchant," picks on the sweet, helpless O'Reilly just to boost his ratings. What a meanie. Really, what nerve. Someone should just turn off his mike.

Fun fact: Fox News will mark its 10th anniversary with a "Thank You America" tour this fall. Live shows hosted by O'Reilly, Shepard Smith, Sean Hannity, Alan Corpse, and Neil Cavuto will be broadcast from 10 cities around the country. Line up your Hannidate and get your tickets now!

Syphilitic skank shitcanned from second paper

The Augusta Chronicle has become the second newspaper to drop mAnn Coulter's column this month, explaining that her "stridency" had crossed the line.

"We're a conservative editorial page," editor Michael Ryan said, but the vile harpy was "becoming kind of a broken record". "[B]iting commentary is one thing. A personal attack is another -- such as when she slammed 9-11 widows for backing Democrats and allegedly milking the tragedy for political purposes. That charge alone isn't necessarily unfair, but to suggest they were 'enjoying' their husbands' deaths and calling them 'witches' -- well, that's where stridency crosses a line."

The Gazette of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, also dropped Coulter this month. And the Times of Shreveport, La., is considering dropping her column as well.

Nice try, Loserman
Joe Lieberman, hoping Bill Clinton's charismatic manlitude would hypnotize the masses, invited him to appear at a rally last night to "defend" the quisling's "Democratic credentials."


"Hey, remember when you tore me a new butthole over that Monica thing?"
"Yeah... haha... good times..."
"Well, I'm about to stick this cigar up your ass, you droopy-balled mother#ucker."
******

To Bush’s favorite Democrat
Shorter Irving Stolberg: Fuck you, twerp. I've voting Lamont."

I'm eating paste!
White House officials say Stupie McGropiehands is setting up a bike play-date with Floyd Landis opposed to an immediate cease-fire in the Middle East, despite personal pleas from his good buddies in Saudi Arabia. Seems he'd rather see the violence and carnage continue, hoping that the situation will "degrade Hezbollah and further isolate its enablers in Syria and Iran." He's even rushing precision-guided bombs to Israel to help them out.


Bombs are cool! Now watch this wheelie!
******

Heckuva job, Bushies!

Lebanon war rages on

Blast hits US-led forces vehicle in Afghanistan

Baghdad attacks up 40%. "We have not witnessed the reduction in violence one would have hoped for," says general

Slide towards civil war in Iraq continues as car bombs kill dozens

Pakistan in large-scale nuclear expansion

Over 60 killed as Iraq violence escalates

Hundreds of Taliban fighters assault police post

Group accuses Jordan of torturing for U.S

Misadministration involvement in Iraq "the work of butchers"

U.S. gas prices hit all-time high

ABA blasts Bush for repeatedly violating the Constitution

Hmmm. And why should people vote republican this fall again?

Duuuurrrrrrr!!
"SecState Rice makes unannounced vist to LEBANON! Breaking on Fox now. This could be HUGH!" - post at RimJob's Circlejerk Central.


Ah dun thought her name wuz Condo!
******

Well, the rain finally stopped. Now I get to finish vacuuming up the water that flooded the family room. How's your day going?

Whoa
Some kick-ass cartoons at Bob Geiger's blog.

Yeah, 'cause they've done such a great job SO far
Yesterday, Vice President Dick "dick" Cheney used the latest Middle East carnage as a reason to vote rethuglican this fall. AmericaBlog asks -

What other great issues should the Republicans run on this fall?

- Losing New Orleans
- Ignoring North Korea
- Botching Iraq
- Doing nothing about high gas prices
- Trying to privatize social security
- Screwing Alzheimers and Parkinsons patients by vetoing stem cell research
- Polluting the environment
- Breaking the budget

My favorite still has to be Bunnypants saying "OK, you covered your ass" when presented with the Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the US PDB in August of 2001.

Oh holy shit...
Four US soldiers accused of murdering suspected insurgents during a raid in Iraq said they were under orders to "kill all military age males" whether they were innocent or guilty, according to sworn statements.

Makin' progress
Stayin' the cour "Iraq is finished... We are extremely worried."

A senior unidentified official from the Iraqi government said Friday that "Iraq as a political project is finished," and that Baghdad might be divided between east and west, Raw Story reports.

I couldn't find any images I liked for 'clusterfuck,' so here's one of a fiasco:

Ow! Wack mofo cracker ...
Touchy-feely president's reign of terror increasing. First it was rubbing bald men's heads. Then holding hands with oil buddies. Then it escalated - to kissing senators, to massaging heads of state, and now this...

Caption: President George W. Bush playfully slaps U.S. Congressman Al Green (D-TX) as he greets delegates following his remarks at the annual convention at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in Washington July 20, 2006.

"Okay, let's just take a step back here. You show up for the FIRST FUCKING TIME of your presidency at the NAACP's annual meeting, and what do you do? You slap a black man in the face." - watertiger.

Classy.
******

Yeah, 'cause they've done such a great job SO far
Unbelievable -

Vice President Dick "dick" Cheney on Friday pointed to the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah as fresh evidence of the ongoing battle against terrorism that underscores the need to keep [Gropie McStupid]'s republiboob allies in control of Congress.

"This conflict is a long way from over," Cheney said at a fundraising appearance for a GOP congressional candidate. "It's going to be a battle that will last for a very long time. It is absolutely essential that we stay the course."

Clicky.
****

Bush plans to build Arab "umbrella," WWI model airplane
Catapulting the propaganda

Although some conservatives have been fretting that Lebanese rocket fire and Israeli warplanes are making [Stupie McGameboy] look even MORE like a fucking candy-assed bonehead helpless, administration officials revealed to Time today that they have plans to harness the chaos as a "leadership moment" for Bush that could wind up helping his flagging goal of transforming the Middle East.

"Leadership moment." "Leadership moment." What an absolute pile of reeking bullshit. In other words, he's just sitting there watching Nickelodeon with a blank look on his face while his handlers are running around in a panic, scrambling to find some kind of solution. I'm sorry, but I just keep picturing him asking "why are Lesbians firing rockets at Jews?" with that just-struck-by-lightning look on his stupid chimpy phiz. Then slouching off somewhere to try and light his farts.

Where's our banner??
This blog is pissing me off today. Is anybody else not seeing our usual banner at the top? Or having problems with the comments? Is anyone even reading this?!

From the intarweb tubes
"One of the most popular clips on the Web."

In a related story... German, American scientists to decode Neanderthal genome.

Friday cat blogging
OK, it's somebody else's cat, but it's kinda cute -

Neighborhood cat planning world domination, one gardening glove at a time

Cat burgler: Willy, with a display of several pairs of garden gloves that he took from unknown yards in his neighborhood in Pelham, N.Y. Willy has brought home nine pairs of gloves and five singles over several weeks laying them on his owners' front or back porches. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

Eggcellent!
Jon Stewart compares asshole Sen. Brownback to a vagina -

Columnists don't buy Novak's Plame explanation
Cranky, incontinent traitor Bob Novak a lying Bushdiver, say pundits

"To maintain credibility with readers, columnists have to write honest columns. It's not our job to be an errand boy for politicians seeking vengeance against enemies. It used to be that confidential sources sought to blow the whistle against abuses of power. Now, at least in this instance, they're used to abuse power and to allow those in power to assault enemies without leaving evidence."

"A failed attempt to restore whatever credibility he had before the episode began. He seeks to have it both ways -- to appear to be a champion of a free press and to appear to have cooperated with authorities. I'm not buying it."

Novak's whole convoluted explanation of his behavior is another page out of the 'Eddie Haskell Sucking Up to Authority for Access and Self-Exoneration' handbook. To be fair to Novak, I'm sure he has said just exactly what he was told to say."

"It's funny how it's OK for Bob Novak to tell secrets, but not the New York Times. The First Amendment applies to everybody, or it applies to nobody."

Novak "plays it both ways -- shoe-leather reporter and de facto GOP operative."

"Ever since his column named Plame, he has gone through a convoluted process of behind-the-scenes legal maneuvers and public posturing calculated to take care of number one while aiding the Rove operation as much as possible under the circumstances. This guy wasn't exactly Captain Courageous for journalistic principle when he talked to the prosecutor and then the grand jury."

"What - a - douchebag."

Whazzup today?



Keepin' us safer
Steely, resolute war pres Gropie McGameboy and his conservative, do-nothing cronies fucking everything up -

US facing widening rift with South Korea over how best to deal with Kim Jong Il.

Curfew extended as Baghdad violence mounts.

Bombings and shootings soared by 40 percent in the Baghdad area in the past week, the US military said Thursday.

Israel preparing Lebanon ground offensive as casualties mount, thousands flee.

"The current deepening crisis in the Middle East and Bush’s veto yesterday of a stem cell bill passed by Congress belie an integrated, if frighteningly insane, internal mental map."

Quickies
A rift that opened along a fault line in the Afar desert in Ethiopia after an earthquake last September could be the beginning of a new ocean.

Yellow-green glass scarab worn by King Tut was created by a meteorite fireball.

The music of sand dunes.

So unoffensive they're offensive: the 111 wussiest songs of all time, according to AOLmusic.

Charles Barkley on current politics in America: "I was a Republican - until they lost their minds."

Corrupt scumbag Tom DeLay's fundraising PAC gets hit with one of the largest fines in FEC history.

Heh
White House spokes-tool Tony Snow has no security clearance and no access to intelligence.

Snowflake children snowjob
Bush uses former frozen blastocyst-Americans, or blasticicles, as political props - but says they are not ‘spare parts.’

"[O]ne of the most obscenely crass political displays of the Bush presidency, and that is saying a lot." - Jon, at the Pensito Review.

Air-kisses


Pic by the General.

DeWine blunder adds fuel to controversial Sept. 11 ad
Republican blatantly exploiting the sacrifices of 9/11 for political gain.

The video of the burning World Trade Center towers in a television campaign ad for Ohio Sen. Mike DeWine is doctored, U.S. News has learned.

The ad is "shameful," says Joanna Kuebler, Democrat challenger Rep. Sherrod Brown's communication director. "Instead of being honest and engaged in discussion with voters and the media ... [DeWine's] exploiting an American tragedy and now we find out that even that's a distortion."

Instead of pulling the ads, he's gong to take out the fake stuff - and substitute it with actual footage of the Twin Towers burning. What a classy guy.

Keepin' us safer
Good. #ucking. Christ. From Blah3:

The reason that the evacuation of American citizens from Beirut is taking so long is... because the White House doesn't want all that bombing and destruction to look as bad as it is, and the 'visuals' would remind people of the fall of Saigon.

Shit on toast. People are dying and he's thinking about how it's going to look? Jebus wept.

"Massive waste, fraud and abuse"
Lack of leadership - in this administration?? :: snort ::

"Due to a lack of leadership,” employees of the Homeland Security Department racked up $68,500 worth of unused dog booties, hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of computers that "somehow disappeared," iPods, and a $227 beer brewing kit.

In other words, employees of the Bushies stole hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayers’ money. I bet you can imagine the outrage if this had happened during Clinton's time in office.

Makin' progress!
Thousands flee as Iraq violence deepens

Sunni leaders accuse Shi'ite militia death squads, some with links to government parties and operating inside the police, of a form of Balkan-style "ethnic cleansing." Tens of thousands of Iraqis have fled their homes in fear of sectarian violence that has worsened since formation of a US-backed national unity government two months ago, official data showed on Thursday.

A day after the United States issued a stern warning to both Shi'ite and minority Sunni leaders to match talk with action on reining in "death squads" and "terrorists" from their respective communities, the Migration Ministry said more than 30,000 people had registered as refugees this month alone.

"We consider this to be a dangerous sign," ministry spokesman Sattar Nowruz said.

Meanwhile, GOP lawmakers are cutting and running away from optimism on Iraq:

Faced with almost daily reports of sectarian carnage in Iraq, congressional Republicans are shifting their message on the war from speaking optimistically of progress to acknowledging the difficulty of the mission and pointing up mistakes in planning and execution. Rep. Gil Gutknecht of Minn. now says that conditions in Baghdad are far worse "than we'd been led to believe" and is even urging that troop withdrawals begin immediately. Said Gutknecht: "Essentially what the White House is saying is 'Stay the course, stay the course.' I don't think that course is politically sustainable."

Holy cow - this morning I spotted my first luna moth in like fifteen years, resting on a brick wall at work. What a beauty!

Luna moths are common throughout the eastern US, but their night flying habits and short life span as an adult moth - only about 1 week - combine to make them a rare find. Most adults fly from early June to early July. In New Jersey larvae eat hickory, walnut, and sweetgum leaves. Adult luna moths don't eat; in fact, they don't even have a mouth. Their only purpose is to mate.

Nedmentum!
Lamont pulls even with incumbent Quisling McKissyface in latest poll.

Democratic challenger Ned Lamont has pulled into a dead heat in his US Senate race with egotistical Bushkissing vichycrat Joe Lieberman, according to a new Quinnipiac poll. The poll shows Lamont ahead 51-47 percent among likely voters in the Aug. 8 Democratic primary. That compares to a 55-40 percent lead for Lieberman in a similar poll in June.

Uhhh, never heard of him
John Thune, who was a Republican hero two years ago for ousting then Senate Democratic leader Patsy McDaschle, said Wednesday that if he were running this year, he'd distance himself from President Shitforbrains and his craptacular agenda, the AP reports.

Everybody panic!
With everything else that's going on in the world today...

"CNN doesn't recognize Nazareth as 'Holy City'!"

Stupie McStupidstein at RimJob's Stupidville Central has way too much time on his hands. Along with too little brains and probably not much of a dick, either:

"Anyone notice this morning that while both FoxNews and even MSNBC are refering to the attacks on Nazareth as on the 'Holy City of Nazareth', CNN Does NOT?! Coincidence? I don't think so. Isn't it time CNN heard from Christians all over the world protesting their pro-islamic anti-Christian bias????

Oh for the love of criminey. He goes on:

"Liberals are 'Godless.' I just finished reading Ann Coulter's book."

Jebus. OK then. Good gravy.

Take this job and shove it
Katherine Harris's speechwriter Jennifer Hickey posts her resignation letter:

Value of "George Harris Legacy Loan" to Senate campaign: $10 million

Value of "refurbishments" to Capitol Hill residence: $100,000

Value of Handing in my Resignation Letter: Priceless

"I do not have a job lined up,'' she wrote. "But I have my dignity and a smidgen of the sanity I had when I came to work here."

Corrupt hypocrite concedes defeat
Good: being called "The Right Hand of God" by Time magazine.
Bad: doing business with indicted criminal Jack Abramoff.
Worse: being accused of fraud and racketeering by a Texas Indian tribe.

Karma: losing the Georgia primary race for lt governor.

Duh: there's something seriously wrong with almost half of Georgia's registered voters.

Conservative anger grows over Bush's lack of foreign policy, brains
Steely war president facing a new and swiftly building backlash on the right over his handling of foreign affairs.

Once creaming in their pants at the preznit's manly resolutenitude, conservative leaders and pundits are just now realizing what so many of us have known since 1999 - the man's a complete fucking bonehead.

Conservative intellectuals {Huh? - Ed.} and commentators who once lauded Bush said that they perceive timidity and confusion about long-standing problems including Iran and North Korea, as well as urgent new ones such as the latest crisis between Israel and Hezbollah.

"It is Topic A of every single conversation," said Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute. "I don't have a friend in the administration, on Capitol Hill or any part of the conservative foreign policy establishment who is not beside themselves with fury at the administration."

Cry me a fucking river.

Fanning the flames
Way to win hearts and minds, dumbass: Bush rewards Abu Ghraib military lawyer with federal judgeship.

William Haynes II, the Pentagon’s general counsel, has been closely involved in shaping some of the Bush administration’s most legally and morally objectionable policies, notably on the use of torture. The last thing he is suited to be is a federal judge, but that is just what President Bush wants to make him.

Twenty retired military officers, including a retired Army colonel who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, wrote to the Senate to express their concern that the policies Mr. Haynes helped develop “compromised military values, ignored federal and international law and damaged America’s reputation and world leadership.” The officers expressed their “deep concern” about his fitness for the court.

It is disturbing that while low-level soldiers have been convicted for their actions at the Iraqi prison, Mr. Haynes has been rewarded with a coveted judicial nomination.

Senate votes to kill tiny helpless proto-humans
/freetard

Senate defies veto threat, sends stem cell bill to Bush illustrated with little hand-drawn, smiley-face cartoon cancer patients

White House spokes-tool Tony Snow said Bush would issue a veto because "it's inappropriate for the federal government to finance something that many people consider murder," conveniently forgetting about the war in Iraq.

"People will look back in wonderment at how there could be any doubt about using these stem cells to save lives," said Sen. Arlen Specter, a cancer survivor, comparing Bush's position to those who opposed Columbus, locked up Galileo, and rejected anesthesia, electricity, vaccines and rail travel. Such attitudes "in retrospect look foolish, look absolutely ridiculous," said Specter.

The House will try today to get 290 votes to override the blockhead.

F*cking nuts
Senator Brownback loses his mind during debate on cell research

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Fundie) is leading the opposition to the H.R. 011, the Every Sperm is Sacred Anti-Masturbation Act. Yesterday, during debate on the bill, he held up a picture of an sperm cell drawn by James Dobson. Relaying a conversation with Dobson’s mother, Brownback said the sperm was asking the Senate, “Are you going to kill me?”

What??? Oh, sorry -

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Naturally) is leading the opposition to the H.R. 810, the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act. Yesterday, during debate on the bill, he held up a picture of an embryo drawn by a 7-year-old girl. Relaying a conversation with the girl’s mother, Brownback said the embryo was asking the Senate, “Are you going to kill me?”

- Think Progress has the video.

Weird headline of the day
Police say naked man flailed car with stolen pigeon.

Bonus: Government orders 12 new Nimrods. :: giggle ::

It's just a goddamn piece of paper!
Rule of law! Rule of law!

Obstruction of justice: US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said Tuesday that the Dictator-tot personally blocked a Justice Department probe of his illegal domestic warrantless eavesdropping program.

Isn't that a felony?

US charging evacuees to get out of Lebanon
Really.

I'll take Fellate the Preznit for 200, Alex
Ooooh, please let me suck your manly cowboy wang a bit longer, Mister President! It would be my pleasure! Numnumnumnumnums! Mission accomplished!

IOKIYAR

George W.'s heartfelt outburst yesterday at the G-8 summit, describing the Hezbollah attack on Israel (and by implication the terrorists themselves) as barnyard excrement, is stout-hearted and reassuring. This president gets it. You might think the television networks, which more or less invented the vulgarity that has submerged the culture in slime, would know better than to be shocked (shocked!) by the president's word selection, which the TV correspondents invariably described as "cursing," which of course it was not.

- some hot-yogurt-spurting cumhole embarrassing himself at the Moonie Times.


"I've got the flag tattooed on my tiny, shriveled dick!"
*****

Please welcome
Disgusted in St. Louis!

Where I found this neat Rush Dittohead Pez Dispenser -

For Democrats, a wave is building
If history is any guide, we're heading into a major political shit storm. In a good way.

The Democrats' hopes rest on intense public unhappiness with Bush and the GOP -- and enough districts in play to allow them to pick up the 15 seats they need to become the majority party. Over the past year, the Cook Political Report has increased the number of Republican seats it considers highly vulnerable from two to 10, and those it considers somewhat vulnerable from 16 to 25. Eighteen others are potentially vulnerable. That's double the number of a year ago. [Another] factor is the Republican decision to pursue a risky strategy: turn their greatest liability -- the war in Iraq -- into an asset by linking it to the broader fight against terrorism. The risk is that this will reinforce the public's association of the GOP with an unpopular war.

We can only hope. From an opinion piece in the WaPo.

Meanwhile, Dick "dick" Cheney is urging republitards to use "security" as their top campaign issue going into the midterm elections.

In a related story, the entire fucking world is on the verge of blowing itself up. Security my ass.

Homegrown terrorist
mAnn Coulter "jokes" that she sent that envelope of white powder to the New York Times.

The syphilitic skankho, who once said that the Times should have been blown up by Timothy McVeigh and that editor Bill Keller should be executed, was suspect numero uno when the paper received an envelope with powder inside.

"This thing makes all of Ann Coulter's comments a little less funny," said the Times source. "I wonder if she considers herself at all responsible when lunatics read her columns and she says that we should be killed."

So [the World Nut Daily's] Memo Pad went and asked her, sending an e-mail to her AOL account. And guess what? She not only responded, but claimed to be the sender of the mysterious powder.

"So glad to hear that the New York Times got my letter and that your friend at the Times thinks I'm funny," she wrote back. "Good luck in journalism and please send me your home address so we can stay in touch, too.

Fucking crazy bitch. I don't care if she's joking or not. Doesn't that make her a terrorist? Shouldn't she be investigated or something? Bah.

Inappropriate touching
Frat-boy groper Drinky McDumbass massages German Chancellor Angela Merkel - who seems to be thinking Gahhhhh! Get this crazy motherfucker off me!


"He's touching me! Yuck! Chimp cooties!"
******

Oh goody!
It'll be like Christmas - only with lots and lots of dead people!

Spongy, impotent druggie Rush Limbaugh: the escalating hostilities in the MidEast are a gift to the world because this is "finally" our chance to go after Iran.

Nuclear winter! Slay bells!

Today's music video
I'm not a wabbit...

Blah blah blah...*
With the war in Iraq over, the Middle East at peace, the borders secure and gas prices back to normal... huh? Oh yeah.

Undeterred by a decisive defeat in the Senate, House Republicans are moving ahead with a vote on a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, forcing lawmakers to take a stand just months before the election.

The vote, scheduled for Tuesday, will occur in a week devoted to several priorities of social conservatives - what House GOP leaders call their "American values agenda." Also on tap are a pledge protection bill and several Republican-backed stem cell bills.

Rep. Tammy Baldwin, a gay Democrat from Wisconsin, said the marriage amendment "certainly is a tool that the right wing is using, but I think it has lost the impact it had in 2004."

Baldwin said voters are more concerned about the war in Iraq, health care costs and gas prices and to a greater extent "are recognizing this time that these measures are politically motivated."

"We're heading into an election where the Republicans are in deep trouble," said Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay rights group. "The outcome is not really a significant factor in all of this," he said of the House vote. "It's a move to appease a rapidly dwindling base."

*with apologies to Blah3.

Illegal surveillance lawsuit may be headed for secret court
Oh good -

A lawsuit in San Francisco federal court accusing ATnT of illegally collaborating with the Bush administration's electronic surveillance of US citizens would be transferred to a secret court accessible only to the government under new legislation backed by the White House.

A provision of the bill introduced Thursday by rethug Sen. Arlen Specter would allow the government to move the ATnT case and all other lawsuits involving the surveillance program to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review in Washington.

The three-judge court meets behind closed doors and hears arguments only from the Justice Department.

"It is the Supreme Court's role to find out what the law of the land is, not some secret court in Washington, DC," said Kevin Bankston, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco.

The real agenda
Well, duh.

It is only now, nearly five years after Sept. 11, that the full picture of the Bush administration’s response to the terror attacks is becoming clear. Much of it, we can see now, had far less to do with fighting Osama bin Laden than with expanding presidential power.

Over and over again, the same pattern emerges: Given a choice between following the rules or carving out some unprecedented executive power, the White House always shrugged off the legal constraints.

- Ya think, NY Times? :: major #ucking bitchslap :: Welcome to Planet Earth.

Sealed with a kiss
With Dems like these...

Kisses mock Mr. Lieberman, the incumbent Democrat, all over Connecticut - on signs, on buttons, even on giant parade floats. They commemorate the one President Bush appeared to plant on his cheek after last year’s State of the Union address, a symbol, in the eyes of Mr. Lieberman’s liberal critics, of an unforgivable alliance in support of the Iraq war.

“It’s a ‘Godfather’ kiss - one of those kisses that says, ‘I own you,’ ” said Edward Anderson, a supporter of Mr. Lieberman’s Democratic primary opponent, Ned Lamont.

Said Ari Melber, a former staff member for Senator John Kerry who writes regularly for the Huffington Post: “When prominent Democrats regularly capitulate to Republicans, they undermine the rationale for an opposition party. Lieberman is seen as the serial offender.”

Give 'em Zell, Joe
The General helpfully posts another campaign ad for Joe Loserman.

Still too dumb to be President

[I]t is now increasingly clear that Bush's status as non-rocket scientist is a serious problem. The problem is not his habit - savored by late-night comedians - of stumbling over multisyllabic words. It is his shocking lack of intellectual curiosity...

It matters that the president values his gut reaction and disdains book learnin'. It's not just a question of cultural style. The president's narrow intellectual horizons have real consequences, sometimes cataclysmic ones.

- Jonathan Chait.

Unclean
As the world goes up in flames around him, Bush jokes about his roast pig dinner. We got a lot of mail about this story -

As Israeli warplanes were preparing an attack on Lebanon Thursday afternoon, and a Lebanese militia was aiming a rocket at the ancient Israeli city of Safed, President Bush was bantering with reporters in Germany about a pig.

Bush kept bringing up the roast wild boar he was about to dine on at a banquet that night, even when asked about the swelling crisis in the Middle East, where pig meat is forbidden to religious Jews and Muslims.

"Does it concern you that the Beirut airport has been bombed?" a reporter asked. "And do you see a risk of triggering a wider war?"

"I thought you were going to ask me about the pig," Bush replied blithely. Then he brought the pig up again -- for the fifth time -- before giving a long answer that ended with his saying Israel needed to protect itself.

"He was asked a serious question," said Ian Lustick, a Middle East expert, and his answer "epitomized his disengagement in the Middle East."

- from a BuzzFlash email, via the internet tubes.

Bush explodes, drops s-bomb
Won't somebody think of the children??

Top story: Classy McDumbass, frustrated with the crisis in the Middle East, talks with his mouth full, swears -

"See, the irony is that what they need to do is to get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit and it's over."

"Irony"??

Crooks and Liars has the video.

Snakes on a Plame
“For me destroying people is like a sorbet. A trifle - an amuse bouche, if you will. I have my eggs, my coffee, I destroy someone, and then it’s off to jazzercize.” - Jon Stewart channeling incontinent traitor Boob Novak.

Hypocritude
Insensitive, disrespectful, and disturbing

AmericaBlog reports that the Democrats' new ad is one of "the most tasteless gestures" ever seen in poli... what? Oh, sorry. After screaming in outrage that Dems were using coffins of US troops in campaign ads, Repuke Senator DeWine (R-Asshole) has gone one better: using images of the burning Twin Towers and the 9/11 hijackers to charge Democratic challenger Sherrod Brown as being weak on terror.

They're heeeeeere
The first cicadas of the season.

They appear around sunset, males slightly preceding females. Males form chorusing centers of great aggregations. Singing peaks around 10:00 AM. Adults feed on a wide range of woody plants during the day; such feeding is apparently restricted to the females since the male digestive tract is rudimentary. Oviposition begins about 2 weeks after emergence.

The three species of cicadas have unique calls - which vary from a high-pitched hollow whistle to a series of clicks and buzzes to the sound of a rotary sprinkler head - so that only females of their own kind are attracted. Responsive females make a sound by flicking their wings, which is similar to flipping through a deck of cards.

[D]ead bug corpses will decay in the heat of summer and begin to smell like ripe Limburger cheese. The odor will last for about two weeks.

Mmmmmmm, bug cheese...


Clicky.
*****

Lieberman PWN3D by Colbert
Stephen Colbert: “Well folks, if a ‘jihad’ like this can happen to Joe Lieberman, it can happen like this to any Democrat. Who tongued a president."

Makin' progress
The head of Iraq's Olympic committee and at least 30 employees have been kidnapped by gunmen riding in government vehicles and wearing police uniforms.

'Iraq’s civil war spins out of US and Iraqi government control.'

In a related story, Russian President Vladimir Putin has rejected a suggestion from Preznit Snippy McDipshit that his country should emulate democracy in Iraq.

Big baby
Miniature human confuses, terrifies Bush -

Oh please
GOP upset that Dems are threatening their monopoly on photo ops involving elements of national tragedy.

Republicans say Democrats ought to be ashamed of themselves for using the flag-draped coffins of US troops who died in Iraq for political gain. The coffins are among the images featured in a new political ad produced by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, a group that raises funds to elect Democrats to Congress.

"It makes my stomach turn to see National Democrats so blatantly exploit the sacrifices made by the men and women of our armed forces," National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman/asshole Tom Reynolds said in a press release.

Oh really.

Crooks and Liars has the video. Of Republicans. Blatantly exploiting the sacrifices made by the men and women of our armed forces for political gain.

Friday cat blogging


Nummins! Pink paw pads!
*****

It's just a goddamn piece of paper!
Josh Marshall fears that the White House has been using their illegal wiretapping program to monitor political opponents -

By having the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court conduct the review instead of a regular federal court, the Bush administration would ensure the secrecy of details of the highly classified program. The administration has argued that making details of the program public would compromise national security.

However, such details could include politically explosive disclosures that the government has kept tabs on people it shouldn't have been monitoring.

Story of 'Joe's dead intern' began Harris' slide, insiders say
Katherine Harris to Republican donors: Joe Scarborough killed one of his interns.

Katherine Harris' floundering US Senate campaign lost its high-level staff again this week and is groping for a message -- which doesn't surprise Republican insiders who trace the seeds of her trouble to the story of "Joe's dead intern."

This wasn't any old Joe. It was Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC's Scarborough Country and a former Pensacola Republican congressman who was courted last summer by national Republicans to run against Harris. But before he could announce he wouldn't, Harris called major donors and suggested Scarborough would have to answer questions about the strange death of a former staff member in 2001, according to two former high-level Harris staff members, a GOP donor and Scarborough.

"That was the first clue that something wasn't right with Katherine Harris," Scarborough said.

Friday cat blogging


Egon hogging the computer.
*****

Makin' progress
Times of London: "Baghdad starts to collapse as its people flee a life of death"

WWJD?
While the world prays for a peaceful end to the current violence in the Middle East, an American 'Christian' Fundamentaloon says "The only thing that works with Islam is blowing them to kingdom come. It's time to go in with force."

Tony Snow: preznental porthole
The President who took us into Iraq, fucked up with Katrina, ignored the PDB before 9/11, choked on pretzel and fell off a Segway credited with "a chess player's ability to think several moves ahead."

Convicted felon, corrupt scumbag to be honored
The US Capitol Historical Society will hold a reception next week to honor, among others, former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham for his "hard work, service, time and the sacrifices made in upholding the office with which [he was] entrusted."

He won't be able to make it because he’s currently serving a prison term of eight years and four months after being found guilty of conspiracy to commit bribery, mail fraud, wire fraud, and tax evasion.

Another honoree is disgraced former Rep. Tom DeLay, who resigned from Congress on June 9, 2006 after his own series of criminal indictments.

:: Sniff :: It promises to be a very dignified, touching ceremony. I'd watch it, but I'm going to be cleaning out the litterboxes that night.

Poll: most Americans hate America
Plan to vote Democratic this fall.

Republicans are in jeopardy of losing their grip on Congress in November. With less than four months to the midterm elections, the latest Associated Press-Ipsos poll found that Americans by an almost 3-to-1 margin hold the GOP-controlled Congress in low regard and profess a desire to see Democrats wrest control after a dozen years of Republican rule.

Overall, only 27 percent approved of the way the Republican-controlled Congress is doing its job.

[A] Democratic takeover of either the House or Senate would be disastrous for the president, leaving both his agenda for the last two years in office and the chairmanship of investigative committees in the hands of the opposition party.

Mwwwwaaaa. Yeah.

Fun fact: even Fox News viewers prefer Dems.

Happy Friday! It's gonna be a scorcher today. And at 0700 this morning the humidity was already 87%.


Judge: Dems can depose Gillespie, top White House and GOP officials in phone jamming case
NH Dems to retrieve White House phone records of Ken Mehlman, others; Judge denies GOP motion to postpone trial

A New Hampshire Superior Court judge has granted the request of the New Hampshire Democratic Party to seek discovery against the White House and top DC Republican operatives in the civil suit arising from the 2002 phone jamming scandal.

Those named in the motion include former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie, former White House political director (and current RNC Chairman) Ken Mehlman, and Terry Nelson, a top strategist in the political operation of Sen. John McCain.

The next step will be serving subpoenas on the various individuals and entities involved.

The motion also sought records from the White House and from the US Chamber of Commerce. Specifically, the NHDP is seeking the White House phone records of former political director Ken Mehlman, as well as other White House numbers frequently called by officials of the NH Republican Party.

Judge Mangones also today denied the Republicans’ motion to postpone the New Hampshire Democrats’ civil suit trial. The trial is currently scheduled to commence on November 27, 2006.

Integritude.


"Ow!"
*****

Repub Congressman: Bush should be removed from office
Yeah, and?

Yesterday Republican Texas Congressman Ron Paul said the following:

"I would have trouble arguing that he's been a Constitutional President, and once you violate the Constitution and be proven to do that I think these people should be removed from office."

Paul also said the United States had entered a period of "soft fascism."

But does he want to do anything about it? Nein.

Feeling safer yet?
Ripe for a terrist attack: what our DHS taxpayer money is protecting -

Old MacDonald’s petting zoo
Bean Fest
Nix’s Check Cashing
Amer. Society of Young Musicians
Trees of Mystery
Car Dealerships
Kennel Club and Poker Room
4 Cs Fuel and Lube
DPW Landfill
Kangaroo Conservation Center
Assyrian American Association
Association for the Jewish Blind
[university] Insect Zoo
Bourbon Festival
Jay’s Sporting Goods
Nestle Purina Pet food Plant
Auto Shop
Veterinary Clinic
Groundhog Zoo
Sweetwater Flea Market
High Stakes Bingo
Petting Zoo
Frontier Fun Park
Mule Day Parade
Amish Country Popcorn
Order of Elks National Memorial
Ice Cream Parlor
Bakery & Cookie Shop
Sears Auto Center
Casket Company
Bass Pro Shop
Muzzle Shoot Enterprise
Several Wal-Marts
Apple and Pork Festival
Yacht Repair Business
Anti-Cruelty Society
Tackle Shop
Elevator Company
UPS Store
Heritage Groups
Parcel Shop
YMCA Center
Brewery
Mail Boxes Etc

-a partial list posted by Ed at Attytood.

Scary
When I first read this, I thought it was a joke. It's not.

This just in
July 13, 2006 - Valerie Plame Wilson, Ambassador Joseph Wilson and their counsel, Christopher Wolf, will hold a news conference at 10 AM EDT on Friday, July 14 at the National Press Club, Washington, DC, to announce the filing of a civil lawsuit against Lewis "Scooter " Libby, Vice-President Dick "Dick" Cheney and Karl "Slimy Asshat" Rove.

F*cking dumbasses
First Geraldo, now this guy.

After revealing detailed information about the movement of Israeli troops, a Fox News crew gets shot at on live television. Raw Story has the video.

A laurel and hearty handshake...
To our friends at skippy the bush kangaroo, on their blogiversary!

Wall Street Journal huuuuuge White House whore
Even more so than the NY Times.

[O]ne could say that Bush owes his continued occupancy of the White House to the Gray Lady of American journalism. Above and beyond Judith Miller's and Howell Raines's front-page amplifications of administration lies about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, the Times's timely self-censorship proved essential to Bush's re-election campaign. Had the "paper of record" recorded the existence of the National Security Agency's warrantless (and unconstitutional) wiretapping program before the 2004 election -- instead of sitting on the story for more than a year -- we could very well be debating President John Kerry's equivocations on Iraq, rather than President Bush's incessant blather about staying the course.

But there are worse things than a pseudo-liberal newspaper's cooperating with malevolent power in Washington. For example, there is the Wall Street Journal's alarmingly mendacious suck-up response to the Bushwhacking of the Times.

That the hysterical reactionaries of the WSJ think that we require less information about the government in wartime speaks more to the newspaper's unconscious wish for a president who would be king than it does to the WSJ's concern for the safety of ordinary Americans.

- John R. MacArthur, publisher of Harper's Magazine.

New Middle East violence rankles Bush
"Preznentin' is hard work!"

That darn Middle East, how dare they gang up on poor Preznit Poopypants!

The Middle East was another headache for Bush, along with rising violence in Iraq and Afghanistan and continuing tensions with Iran and North Korea.

And to make matters even worse, former BFF Pooty-poot turning into a real smartass!

Newspaper to syphilitic skank: see ya
Cedar Rapids Gazette drops attention whore mAnn Coulter's insane, hatefilled screeds -

“I think it was the book that began to unwind support among her readers,” opinion page editor Doug Neumann explained. “Liberals have never liked her, and we’ve always gotten complaints [from them]. But the complaints that mattered the most were from the conservative readers, who felt that their views were being misrepresented."

Harpy skank Ms Coulter.
*****

Altar boys' union sees hope
Unintentionally funny headline of the day:

"Spanish govt said Pope gave PM's wife pearl necklace"

Speaking of train wrecks
Katherine Harris's Senate campaign staff has bailed. Again.

Great. More rain.

Big story from Fox - ahem - News
Daily Kos is having a flame war! The grassroots is doomed! Dooooooomed! Mwwaahahahahaha!

Is the Daily Kos about to implode?

Such a civil war within the liberal blogosphere certainly has the potential to further discredit it, while likely making the mainstream media as well as the candidates they revere less apt to associate with this developing train wreck.

Keep dreaming, you brainless a-hole. First of all, it's called a difference of opinion. You rightwingnut sheep wouldn't know about that. Secondly, you're a vapid, twitterpating little jerk-off. Train wreck? What's the world like up your own ass? Idiot.

Pentagon to blow off Dick
The US Army has canceled their multibillion-dollar contract with Dick Cheney's "former" company, Halliburton

"The choice comes after several years of attacks from critics who saw the contract as a symbol of politically connected corporations profiteering on the war."

See also Halliburton+allegations of fraud, Halliburton+expired food rations, Halliburton+alleged accounting irregularities, Halliburton+offshore tax havens, Halliburton+Judicial Watch, Halliburton+no-bid contracts, Halliburton+bribes, Halliburton+illegal business practices, and Halliburton+billing discrepancies.

WSJ news staff to editorial page: go #uck yourselves
Ho ho!

“They’re wrong all the time. They lack credibility to the point that the emperor has no clothes,” said one news reporter.

“To have Paul Gigot as our captain is bullshit,” another staffer said. “It’s not for real.”

Thanks, but no thanks
Winners of the National Design Award declined their invitation to breakfast at the White House. Here's why:

We understand that politics often involves high rhetoric and the shading of language for political ends. However it is our belief that the current administration of George W. Bush has used the mass communication of words and images in ways that have seriously harmed the political discourse in America. We therefore feel it would be inconsistent with those values previously stated to accept an award celebrating language and communication, from a representative of an administration that has engaged in a prolonged assault on meaning.

While we have diverse political beliefs, we are united in our rejection of these policies. Through the wide-scale distortion of words (from "Healthy Forests" to "Mission Accomplished") and both the manipulation of media (the photo op) and its suppression (the hidden war casualties), the Bush administration has demonstrated disdain for the responsible use of mass media, language and the intelligence of the American people.

While it may be an insignificant gesture, we stand against these distortions and for the restoration of a civil political dialogue.

We must therefore ask you to go fuck yourselves.

- from here. Mostly.

Today's music video
Madness takes its toll...

Good shot!
Pootie-poot fires one off at the vice prez --

Cheney, in a May speech in the ex-Soviet republic of Lithuania, accused Russia of cracking down on religious and political rights and of using its energy reserves as “tools of intimidation or blackmail.”

In response, Putin said, “I think the statements of your vice president of this sort are the same as an unsuccessful hunting shot. It’s pretty much the same.”

GFY!
*****

Kalb to Gigot: WSJ "dead wrong" for publishing editorial attacking NY Times
Marvin Kalb gets all over Wall Street Journal editorial page editor Paul Gigot's fat stupid face:

"I think you declared war on another American newspaper without due cause. It is mean. It is mean-spirited."

He also slammed the Journal for being a misadministration asswhore:

KALB: So in other words, I don't know that you have a right, on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal, which was also fed this story by the government --

GIGOT: We were not fed the story. The news side -- the news side was fed it.

KALB (paraphrasing): Ooooooh! It was the news side! Ooooooh! Doesn't matter, a-hole: you do not have the right to accuse the Times of treason. That's terrible. You pompous, chickenshit little fuckwit.

It's official: Rove's stanky fingers all over the Plame leak
Incontinent traitor Bob Novak has confirmed that Karl Rove was his source in identifying covert CIA agent Valerie Plame.

Novak said he is talking now because Patrick Fitzgerald told his lawyer that matters directly relating to Novak has been concluded.

Though 'knowingly disclosing the identity of an undercover intelligence agent can bring a federal prison term of up to 10 years under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act,' Rove remains free, unindicted, and with his security clearance intact.

He's also officially a flaming liar --

Flashback: Luskin, Rove's lawyer, told Newsweek that Rove "never knowingly disclosed classified information" and that "he did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA."

Even the White House denied Karl played any role in the leak:

"If there's a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is," Bush told reporters February 10, 2004. "If the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of."

"And I said it is simply not true. So, I mean, it's public knowledge. I've said that it's not true. And I have spoken with Karl Rove ... He [President Bush]'s aware of what I've said, that there is simply no truth to that suggestion. And I have spoken with Karl about it," then-White House press-tool Scott McClellan said on 9/29/03.

And during the Republican National Convention, Rove told CNN

"I didn't know her name and didn't leak her name. This is at the Justice Department. I'm confident that the US Attorney, the prosecutor who's involved in looking at this is going to do a very thorough job of doing a very substantial and conclusive investigation."

So what happens now?

Bush, June 10, 2004: (responding to a media question which asked "do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have leaked [Valerie Plame's] name?"): "Yes. And that's up to the US Attorney to find the facts."

Zzzzzzzzzzzzz...


Ick.
*****

Iraq to ask UN to end US immunity

Iraq will ask the United Nations to end immunity for US troops, the government said on Monday, as the US military named five soldiers charged in a rape-murder case that has outraged Iraqis.

In an interview a week after Prime Minister al-Maliki demanded a review of foreign troops' immunity, Human Rights Minister Wigdan Michael said work on it was now under way and a request could be ready by next month to go to the UN Security Council.

"We're very serious about this," she said, adding a lack of enforcement of US military law in the past had encouraged soldiers to commit crimes against Iraqi civilians.

Asked to respond to Michael's remarks, White House spokesman Tony Snow dismissed that as a "hypothetical game."

A "game"???? Yeah, tell that to the Iraqi parents whose children were tortured and killed.


Major dork Tony Snow has fun in war-torn Iraq.

Jerk-off. Oh, btw, a Nuremberg chief prosecutor says there is a case for trying Bush for the 'supreme crime against humanity, an illegal war of aggression against a sovereign nation' (thx, BuzzFlash).
******

Yeah really
Dick Armey: "I'm not sure what this Congress has accomplished."

Ack!!
Anyone else heard rumors that Jeb! may run in 2008 as John McCain's VP?!?

Culture of life
With all other problems solved, Bush will use his first veto to reject the stem-cell bill.

"The president is emphatic about this," said sluglike, inhuman phlegmball Karl Rove.

Makin' progress
With the insurgency in its las Sectarian violence continues to spiral out of control in Iraq:

Video released of US corpses
Gunmen ambush bus in Baghdad, kill 10
Car bombs kill 8 in Shiite slum in Baghdad
Gunmen kidnap diplomat

Meanwhile, with Taliban-linked violence increasing in that other hellhole we're managing to fuck up, our hero {} Don Rumsfeld arrives in Afghanistan to discuss the drug problem there.

Cool
First ever 3-D crop circle found in an Oxfordshire field.

Accountabilitude
Shorter Bush White House on North Korea: It's all Bill Clinton's fault!

A kinder, gentler, frothier Rick Santorum
Embattled, unpopular Senator Rick 'Anal Froth' Santorum distributed a brochure this week called "Fifty Things You May Not Know About Rick Santorum." It is filled with what he called 'meat and potatoes,' like his work to expand colon screenings, his stand on man-on-dog sex, and fisting. Well, maybe not the last two.

"I can't tell you the number of people who, after having read it, said, 'Gee, I didn't know any of this stuff,' " Mr. Santorum said in an interview.

Schmoementurd
Another major campaign event blows up in Joe's face, CTBlogger reports.

The spoiled, pudfaced vichycrat had an all-around rough day on Monday as he was met by protesters, hardly any supporters showed up for his event, and his guest of honor Joe Biden never appeared. Oh, and a concerned voter challenged him on his douchebaggery.

'Hearing Lieberman impugn Ned Lamont's "courage and integrity" at the same time as Lieberman is repeating lies about Ned Lamont [and Joe Biden - Ed.] and threatening to ignore the Democratic primary results if he loses (hardly an example of courage and integrity) really got my Irish up... I forget exactly what words I said but I said something like, "Look, if you win the Democratic primary, I'll be supporting you and I wish you would agree to support the winner, too" and he said, "Well, let's make sure I win in August, then!" and waved me away.'

Unbelievable. More here.


Pic via firedoglake (click to enlarge).
*****

Petulant whiny-ass titty-baby files for independent run
The republicans' favorite "democrat" would rather divide voters and see the party crash and burn than lose power.

Desperate to win at any cost, quisling Sore Loserman filed papers Monday to create a new party called Lieberman Connecticut for Lieberman.

"He does this from a position of weakness, where he looks like a desperate career politician attempting to cling to power," Ned Lamont's campaign manager said. "He's going to hurt Democrats. What a fucking douchebag."

Lamont meanwhile aired a commercial in response to Lieberman's negative ads:

The Lamont parody version opens with a narrator grimly intoning over grainy black-and-white footage, "Meet Ned Lamont. He can't make a decent cup of coffee. ... He's a bad karaoke singer. ... And he has a messy desk."

Thanks to Atrios for the link.
*****

Tom Petty: Bush going to Hell
Tom Petty predicts eternal damnation for war preznit/murderer Smirky McLiar

"The war in Iraq is shameful," Petty says in Esquire mag. "Whether you're pro or con Bush, you've got to admit it: The guy lied. And he continues to do so. I can't understand why he's just not run out on a rail. To send somebody's kids off and have them killed for no good reason — he's going to have his day in hell for that. I wouldn't want that karma."

Freetards screaming about 9/11 in 3... 2... 1...


"Poop - my icecream's all melted."
*****

Man arrested for protesting Iraq war
Cops confiscate "Honk if you want Bush out" sign because intersection was becoming too noisy.

Today's music video
The mother#ucking Snakes on a Plane theme song

Rocket scientists
LOL: Dr Fronkenstupe and Eyegor -





Doofus pics courtesy of DU (click to enlarge).
****

Hey, ah've been busy!
Snippy McStupid gets bitchy with reporter regarding N Korea:

Q: Mr. President, if I could follow up, you say diplomacy takes time –

DUMBYA: Yes, it does.

Q: But it was four years ago that you labeled North Korea a member of the "axis of evil." And since then it’s increased its nuclear arsenal, it’s abandoned six-party talks and now these missile launches –

THE PRESIDENT: Let me ask you a question. It’s increased it’s -- that’s an interesting statement: "North Korea has increased its nuclear arsenal." Can you verify that?

Jebus fucking criminey, what a dipshit. I know he doesn't read the papers, but don't his people tell him anything??? And later -

PREZNIT GAMEBOY: Suzanne, these problems didn’t arise overnight, and they don’t get solved overnight. It takes a while. Again, I think if you look at the history of the North Korean weapons program, it started probably in the ’80s. We don’t know — maybe you know more than I do — about increasing the number of nuclear weapons. My view is we ought to treat North Korea as a danger, take them seriously. No question that he has signed agreements and didn’t stick by them. But that was done during — when we had bilateral negotiations with him, and it’s done during the six-party talks.

You’ve asked what we’ve done. We’ve created a framework that will be successful.

An' it's hard work. Resolvitude. We're gonna stay th' course.

Maybe you do know more'n ah do 'bout nooculer weapons, or if they've increased their nooculer arsenal, little Miss Smartypants, but ah'm the preznit! So there! Phthththth!


"Bill Clinton!"
****

It's hard work!
Being an incompetent moron!

At a news conference Friday, President Bush was asked why, given North Korea's increasing nuclear capability, its refusal to talk and its July 4 missile launches, Americans shouldn't conclude that the U.S. policy toward North Korea is a failed one.

"Because it takes time to get things done," Bush replied.

Or not done, as the case may be. Bear in mind that Bush first railed against the "Axis of Evil" - Iran, Iraq, and North Korea - back in January 2002.

- from the Top 10 Conservative Idiots, at DemoUnderground.

Fun fact: Since Bunnypants entered the Oval Office in January 2001, Kim Jong Il's estimated stockpile of plutonium has quintupled.

Yerp, he certainly is keepin' us safer.

After scores killed, Sunni officials say US can't protect Iraqis
'Get the hell out and send us someone competent, please. And hurry.'

Ayad al-Samaraie, a member of the Iraqi Accordance Front, the largest Sunni bloc in parliament, said US-led forces have failed to provide security in the country.

"Occupation forces cannot protect the people and therefore United Nations peacekeepers" should be sent to Iraq, al-Samaraie told reporters.

Game over, man! Game over!

Misadministration censoring news from Iraq

"It’s a lot worse over here than is reported. The administration does a great job of managing the news.

[But] you can only manage the news to a certain degree. It is certainly hard to hide the fact that in the third year of this war, Iraqis are only getting electricity for about 5 to 10 percent of the day. Living conditions have gotten so much worse, violence is at an even higher tempo, and the country is on the verge of civil war. The administration has been successful to the extent that most Americans are not aware of just how dire it is and how little progress has been made. They keep talking about how the Iraqi army is doing much better and taking over responsibilities, but for the most part that’s not true. It is extremely dangerous."

- Rod Nordland, Newsweek.

Makin' progress
While the Commander-in-Chimp continues his 'folksy' redneck comedy tour of the 'heartland,' the situation in Iraq is growing more and more dire.

Not quite getting the concept: Deadly rampage during "Operation Together Forward" - 'one of the biggest massacres of Sunnis' ever.

With the insurgency in its last throes, Baghdad erupts in mob violence: 'Even by recent standards the violence here on Sunday was frightening.'

Bombs blast Shiite area after Baghdad rampage, killing twelve, wounding 62, and destroying a freshly-painted hospital and morgue.

With Dems like these, who needs enemas?
Note to dense mainstream media: We don't hate Joe Lieberman because he's beautiful. :: snort :: We hate him because he's a quisling, rethug-enabling asskisser.

I am constantly amazed by how uninformed people are when their job is to inform others...

Every press article or editorial I've seen on the Lieberman issue completely misses the point. Lieberman knows that these are the same guys who have been unabashedly using 9/11 as a political tool. He knows these are the same guys who linked Iraq and 9/11 when there was absolutely no connection. He knows they campaign against gays, immigrants and anyone else they can focus people's hatred on. He knows they have devolved into a party of misinformation, propaganda, ill-conceived wars and religious zealotry -- and he still loves them.

He isn't just buying Republican talking points, he's selling them.

He talks like them, he walks like them, he is them. It's not the Iraq War vote people care about nearly as much as when he said, "It is time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be commander-in-chief for three more critical years, and that in matters of war we undermine Presidential credibility at our nation's peril."

That's going out of your way to support not just their ideology and their war, but to support their demagoguery. It's ugly and it reeks. We get plenty enough of that from Republicans, we don't need any of that from so-called Democrats.

- Cenk Uygar, the Huffington Post.


Kiss off!
****

Trumpet vine flowers.

Breaking
Karl Rove has not just blown up a building in Manhattan, prefering to wait until it gets closer to the elections.

Awwwwwww!
The General's army has new recruits!

I believe I'll have another beer!
"Here's how you win elections: You win elections by believing something." - Stupie McLiar, July 7, 2006.

And what would that be, you clueless fuckwit?????

Skepticism rising over Karl's "terra plots"

Let's see: Election years 2004 and 2006, full of terror threats but non-election-year 2005, few terror threats. Hmmm...wonder if there is any correlation? Election years: lots of terror threats. Non-election-years: few terror threats. What to make of that?

- the Progressive Daily Beacon.

Karl Rove & Co. are, once again, playing the Fear Card in an election year. Anyone who doubts that simply hasn’t been paying attention for the last five years.

- Rolling Stone.

[T]he Miami and New York cases are inspiring a new round of skepticism from some lawyers who are openly questioning whether the government, in its zeal to win the midterm electio stop terrorism, is forgetting an element central to any case: the actual intent to commit a crime.

- the NY Times.

Chickenhawks target John Murtha
Disgraceful -

Now we have the Bush administration's admirers on a crusade to destroy the reputation of any critics, including a genuine patriot like Murtha.

It's an administration headed by someone who dodged service in Vietnam by pretending to serve in the National Guard, and whose veep had a politically powerful daddy wangle him a deferment. His chief adviser, Karl Rove, also got a deferment, and his chief cheerleader, Rush Limbaugh, also had a politically powerful daddy get him one — based on a big pimple on his fanny.

- columnist Paul Carpenter.

Talk radio host hangs up on Coulter for phoning in late
"I'm tight on time too, and I don't have time for bitches."

What a thing of beauty! Why doesn't this happen more often?!

ADAM CAROLLA: Ann Coulter, who was suppose to be on the show about an hour and a half ago, is now on the phone, as well. Ann?

ANN COULTER: Hello.

CAROLLA: Hi Ann. You’re late, babydoll.

COULTER: Uh, somebody gave me the wrong number.

CAROLLA: Mmm… how did you get the right number? Just dialed randomly — eventually got to our show? (Laughter in background)

COULTER: Um, no. My publicist e-mailed it to me, I guess, after checking with you.

CAROLLA: Ahh, I see.

COULTER: But I am really tight on time right now because I already had a —

CAROLLA: Alright, well, get lost.

** Click! **

Crooks and Liars, of course, has the audio.

Heh



Make your own motivational posters here (thanks, Elayne!).
******

Funnies
Bob Geiger has the Saturday toons.

"I think - tide turning - see, as I remember - I was raised in the desert, but tides kind of - it's easy to see a tide turn - did I say those words?" - Smirky McStupid, June 14, 2006.

"We shouldn't fear a world that is more interacted." - Stupie McStupidhead, June 27, 2006.

CIA officials: there was no serious plot to bomb NYC
Rove planted the story to make the misadministration look better. Raw Story reports:

The alleged bomb plot, sources suggest, may have been to alleviate Bush administration concerns that the Alec Station (the CIA unit responsible for tracking Osama bin Laden) shutdown story would make them appear to be "weak on terror."

“In sum, the plot, if that is what we would call it, was not well conceived, and there was no possibility of flooding Wall Street. There was no connection to a cell in the US. Finally, professional terrorists generally do not discuss targeting on open channels. As it was being monitored from the beginning of the open discussion, there was little chance anything concrete would have developed," said CIA officer Philip Giraldi.

Ahhh! Ahhhh! Ahhhhhh!
Sadly, No!, you monster!

I see your cheesy video and give you...



Feh. Now I really need the eye bleach. But at least I got that stupid Snickers song out of my head.

Garden blogging
The rare It hasn't been eaten by deer yet! daylily -

NY tunnel "terror plot" another Rove lie
Yerp, here we go again. An official now says there was no specific target mentioned, no weapons, no money, and no explosives -

Federal officials indicated that there was a difference of opinion among investigators as to what the actual target was, the official said.

The case has apparently been under investigation for about a year, and authorities believe there were multiple conspirators.

"At this time we have no indication of any imminent threat to the New York transportation system, or anywhere else in the U.S.," Richard Kolko, Washington-based FBI special agent, said in a statement to Associated Press Radio.

One U.S. official called the plot "largely aspirational" and described the Internet conversations as mostly extremists discussing and conceptualizing the plot.

The official said no money had been transferred, nor had other similar operational steps been taken.

Uh-huh.

Garden blogging
Butterfly bush blossom with bug -


*****

Judge rules DeLay stays on ballot
Corrupt scumbag Tom DeLay, under indictment and awaiting trial on money laundering and conspiracy charges, must keep his name on the November Texas ballot, even though he dropped his re-election bid and 'moved to Virginia.'

Lawyers for Texas Democrats argued that DeLay still owns a Houston-area home, where his wife Christine lives and where DeLay spends time. The Democrats also argued that it couldn't be shown conclusively whether DeLay would be an "inhabitant" of Texas on Election Day on Nov. 7.

Gee. Another "terra plot" uncovered.
First we heard that the Feebs uncovered a plot to blow up New York's Holland Tunnel "in an effort to flood the Wall Street financial district."

The New York Daily News, quoting Karl Ro unidentified counterterrorism sources, said the investigation involved what officials considered a "serious plot" to detonate enough explosives inside the landmark tunnel to destroy it and send devastating floodwaters through lower Manhattan.

Well, the story's changed already.

A government official with knowledge of the investigation said while the alleged plot did focus on New York's transportation system, it did not target the Holland Tunnel. It's unlikely that any plan to flood the financial district would work because it is above the level of the Hudson River.

Next we'll find out it was just some homeless drunken retarded guy with pliers.

Bush: Kenny-Boy Lay was 'a good guy'
"You know, my hope is that his heart was right with the Lord and I feel real sorry for his wife. She's had a rough go and she's now here on earth to bear the burdens of losing her husband, a man she loved," Bunnypants told Larry King. Bush said he planned to write Linda Lay a letter expressing his condolences, and asking if she'd mind contributing to the republitude party with some of the shitloads of money her husband stole.

Preznit Privilege seeks to build standing with public
Bush says he'd rather be right than popular. Well, so far he's 0 for 2.

Spending more time in communities, heartland "news conferences," staying up past his bedtime, stopping at lemonade stands - the flip-flopping Boy King is changing his campaign tactics in order to show his - puke! - "folksier side."

Another Bush boner
Radar Operator: Colonel, you better have a look at this radar.
Colonel: What is it, son?
Radar Operator: I don't know, sir, but it looks like a giant...
Jet Pilot: Dick. Dick, take a look out of starboard.
Co-Pilot: Oh my God, it looks like a huge...
Bird-Watching Woman: Pecker.
Bird-Watching Man: [raising binoculars] Ooh, Where?
Bird-Watching Woman: Over there. What sort of bird is that? Wait, it's not a woodpecker, it looks like someone's...
Army Sergeant: Privates. We have reports of an unidentified flying object. It has a long, smooth shaft, complete with...
Baseball Umpire: Two balls.
[looking up from game]
Baseball Umpire: What is that? It looks just like an enormous...
Chinese Teacher: Wang. Pay attention.
Wang: I was distracted by that giant flying...
Musician: Willie.
Willie Nelson: Yeah?
Musician: What's that?
Willie: [squints] Well, that looks like a huge...
Colonel: Johnson.
Radar Operator: Yes, sir?
Colonel: Get on the horn to British Intelligence and let them know about this.

Basil: Did we get Dr. Evil?
Radar Operator: No, sir, he got away in that big spaceship that looks like a huge...
Teacher: Penis. The male reproductive organ. Also known as tallywhacker, schlong, or...
Dad: Wiener? Any of your kids want another wiener?
Son: Dad, what's that?
Dad: I don't know, son, but it has great big...
Peanut Vendor: Nuts. Hot, salty nuts. Who wants some?...
Peanut Vendor: Lord Almighty!
Woman: That looks just like my husband's...
Circus Barker: ONE-EYED MONSTER. Step right up and see the One-eyed Monster!
Cyclops: Hey, what's that? It looks like a...
Fan: Woody! Woody Harrelson! Could I have your autograph?
Woody: Sure. Oh, my Lord! Look at that thing!
Fan: It's so huge.
Woody: No, I've seen bigger. That's a ...
Squinty McStupid: Dick! Unca Dick! Kin you believe that Kim Jong Il? How'm ah gonna be able to go on vacation?
VP Cheney: Now, now, boy, settle down. Whoa - what's that? It looks like some...
Kim Jong Il, giggling: Taepodong!

It's all about Joe
DINO-crock

"Joe Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, announced that he will run as an independent if he loses his party's primary nomination in August. The three-term senator is billing his decision as a commitment to principle. Mostly, it feels like a commitment to Lieberman."

- Joan Vennochi, Boston Globe columnist.


Pic from firedoglake (click to enlarge).
****

Chump channels chimp in debate
"I believe it was the right thing for us to overthrow Saddam Hussein" - vichycrat Joe Lieberman last night, echoing Smirky McMonkeybrains during his last night's fellatofest with Larry King.

Lieberman actually channeled Bush throughout the debate. He echoed the White House spin on Iraq, arguing the only "choice is between helping the Iraqis achieve a free and independent Iraq or abandoning them and letting the terrorists take over." He trotted out baseless flip-flop charges, accusing Lamont of taking five different positions on the war. And when all else failed, Lieberman deployed the classic Bush-Rove tactic: project your own weakness on to your opponent. So he accused Lamont of the top grievances voters have against Lieberman: voting too often with Republicans, acting out of touch and prioritizing power over principle.

It got so fierce MSNBC's Tom Curry noted that Lieberman was "super-aggressive and sometimes rude," a stark contrast from his mild debate with Dick Cheney in 2000. Several bloggers observed that Liebeman seemed angry and contemptuous at even having to converse with a challenger.

Reuters reports Lieberman "took a hammering."

"Senator Lieberman, if you won't challenge President Bush and his failed agenda, I will," said Lamont. Kissyface McBrown-nose "cheered the President every step of the way when he stood have been asking the tough questions."

Heh: Lamont at one point stopped Lieberman from cutting him off by cracking, "This is
not Fox News, sir"

Crooks and Liars and firedoglake have some debate videos.

It's the Fuckwad-in-Chief's birthday today
Hope he likes our gift basket, containing a game of Clue, the Curious George series, and a big box of pretzals.

Coulter's bosses request report from plagiarism expert
After John Barrie exposed the extent of the plagiarism by hatefilled neonazi skank mAnn Coulter for the New York Post, the Universal Press Syndicate asked him for a copy of his report.

It didn't take long to find evidence of plagiarism, Barrie said, but his staffers stopped before completing the task -- "we gave up after awhile, we'd seen enough," he explained. The many examples added up to "advanced plagiarism," he said, the kind of stuff that would "flunk any English student."

[T]he task proved draining, he said -- on himself, not his technology. "After combing through Ann Coulter for a while, it doesn't take long before you want to call it quits. I want to prove the technology, but I don't want to make my eyes bleed."

Barrie confirmed that Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes Coulter's columns to over 100 newspapers around the country, called him twice yesterday.

Fun fact: the harpy skank, in a venomous snit, lashed back at the tabloid Post, calling them a tabloid.

Fun fact 2: she didn't deny the proof allegations against her.

Bonus: Crooks and Liars has the video of her smackdown by Olbermann.

PSM
firedoglake - which has lots of great pics up of whiny-ass titty-baby Sore Loserman - reminds us that C-span will be covering tonight’s debate between Lieberman and Ned Lamont, beginning at 7:00 pm ET.

Senate colleagues to help quisling Bush asskisser, screw democracy
Who supports Democratic voters? Not these guys -

Joe Biden, Barbara Boxer, and Ken Salazar (of Colorado) plan to campaign in Connecticut for Joe Lieberman between now and the Aug. 8 primary.

The rush of support from his pathetic, tone-deaf Senate colleagues comes two days after Lieberman told Dems "fuck you surprised Democrats by announcing that he would start collecting signatures for an independent campaign if he loses the primary.

Lieberman's move toward an independent bid put national party chickenshits leaders in a bind. Many support Lieberman personally for some goddamn reason, but they also are eager to tap the anti-war sentiments of many liberals in hopes of recapturing Congress this fall.

"I'm not sure, in a year where people are fed up with Washington, having a bunch of Washington politicians travel the state for Joe Lieberman will help at all," said Ned Lamont campaign manager Tom Swan. "It would only reinforce the idea that Joe is more about Washington than Connecticut."

Party before country

If Democrats are divided, as Republicans gleefully note, about what to do in Iraq, Republicans have reacted to last week's Supreme Court decision striking down the administration's military tribunals in a way that makes clear that they themselves are divided about the rule of law in America.

The Democrats are concerned with such quaint and obsolete concepts as the rule of law. None of that for the Republicans; they're too tough and realistic.
And so, when Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi had the temerity to welcome the court's decision, Republican House leader John Boehner responded with a press release that attacked her for advocating "special privileges for terrorists."

Echoing Boehner, the talk-radio thugocracy could speak of little else.

So Republicans have a choice. Working with the Democrats, they could craft a legislative response that incorporates both halves of the court's decision, guaranteeing the legality of the new procedures -- but forfeiting a major opportunity to demagogue against Democrats between now and November. Or, as they do roughly 100 times out of 100, they could simply choose to go for the politics.

- Harold Meyerson.

Rich white guy gets off
Flabby prick Rush Limpbaugh beats another one - will not face criminal charges in the Viagra case, impotent prosecutors said Wednesday. #uck.

Secret terrist probe neither secret or useful
"We're not stupid, you know," says terrorist financier, looking up from his copy of the Wall Street Journal.

The Bush administration has repeatedly bragged about its efforts and self-proclaimed success tracking terrorist financing since the September 11 attacks. The government described its quest to catch financiers in numerous public documents, reports and Capitol Hill testimonies.

"Since the New York Times and other media didn’t tell the public anything the terrorists didn’t already know and since banks already monitor suspicious transactions for the U.S. government, many question the probe’s usefulness. It’s not a cost-effective way to deal with terrorism issues,” said Victor Comras, a former State Department official and diplomat appointed by the UN Security Council to assess global anti-terrorist financing efforts.

Wouldn't surprise me either
White House says North Korean missiles pose no threat to U.S. until we get much closer to election day. - headline via an intarweb tube.

Now watch this drive...
Bush: Iraq timetable would dishonor troops, help terrorists

"We're not gonna cut an' run. We're stayin' the course," the AWOL War Preznit said yesterday. "As they stand up, we'll stand with 'em, then we'll stand down. We're makin' progress bringin' the enemy leaders to justice."

Yerp, progress, as the insurgency is in its last throes:

Bodies flood Baghdad morgue despite Zarqawi's death.

Gunmen have kidnapped Iraq's deputy electricity minister and 19 bodyguards.

Al-Zarqawi's death fails to stop bloodshed.


Sweating chimp, blowing sputum all over birthday cake, almost drops it (click to enlarge).
*****

Ohhhhh.... kayyyyy....
I kept waiting for the punchline. There wasn't one. Though the whole thing was kind of funny in a bizarre sort of way. Like rubbernecking past a horrific highway accident involving clowns -

While America has generally prospered under the steady hand of GW Bush over the past five plus years, our nation continues to pay a steep price for electing Democrats in 1976 and 1992/1996. Specifically, America's 2006 Independence Day celebrations were marred by news that North Korea fired six missiles including a long-range one with capability to reach the United States...

Uhhh, right.

Democrats. The ones who haven't been in power for years. Those Democrats?

Had American military professionals been involved instead of inexperienced chickenhawk draft dodgers, incompetent cronies and a president addicted to jogging, photo-ops, and vacations, Kim Jong Il would have been put out of business years ago.

Moron.

Hillary: asskissing quisling can just suck it
Will not back vichycrat's bid for re-election if he loses the party primary.

"The challenges before us in 2006 call for a strong, united party, in which we all support and work for the candidates who are selected in the Democratic process," Hillary Clinton said in a statement Tuesday. "I want to be clear that I will support the nominee chosen by Connecticut Democrats in their primary. I believe in the Democratic Party, and I believe we must honor the decisions made by Democratic primary voters."

Fun fact: at a July 4th parade in Willimantic, Conn, Lieberman passed out chocolate Kisses to the crowd. :: giggle ::