Absquatulando

Outsiders? Liberators! The Iraqi prime minister today reacted angrily to warnings that the country risked losing US support unless it shunned sectarianism in its new government. Ibrahim al-Jaafari spoke out after Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador to Iraq, said Iraqi leaders could lose support unless they established a government in which the police and army were beyond the control...

Who would die a martyr to sense in a country where the religion is folly? William Congreve.

Inscrutable Dems? Or Just Plain Old Spineless Dems? Rockefeller (following Libby's indictment & resignation, quoted by Josh Marshall):"We must send a strong message to all the patriotic Americans in our intelligence agencies who continue to serve their country at great personal risk. Our government and our judicial system will not tolerate those who leak classified information and...

The Tough on Crime Guys From Firedoglake & elsewhere Bill Frist (R-TN): To not remove President Clinton for grand jury perjury lowers uniquely the Constitution's removal standard, and thus requires less of the man who appoints all federal judges than we require of those judges themselves. I will have no part in the creation of a constitutional double-standard to benefit the President. He...

9-23-04 Poor, Black, and Left Behind By Mike Davis The evacuation of New Orleans in the face of Hurricane Ivan looked sinisterly like Strom Thurmond's version of the Rapture. Affluent white people fled the Big Easy in their SUVs, while the old and car-less -- mainly Black -- were left behind in their below-sea-level shotgun shacks and aging tenements to face the watery wrath. New...

No Cake at the Superdome -- Let them eat shit. We need to understand that the capability has been there from the start to drive water and food right up to the convention center, as those roads have been clear -- it's how the National Guard drove into the city. Let me say this again: The government is intentionally not allowing food or water in....

Giving Okay, pony up, but where to put the bucks? I consulted my brother who's got a much more eleemosynary spirit than I -- he volunteers at the Salvation Army, does good in many ways. I tell him it's a toss up between the Red Cross and the Sally. He tells me that the international head of the Sally gets $310 a week, a car and a house, just like every other officer in the Salvation Army....