Internal Monologue

Calling Bush a War Criminal is often denounced as a bit of rhetorical excess from the loony left. But a sober look at the recent Supreme Court case reveals that it might be a rather pedestrian and obvious conclusion. Rosa Brooks has an op-ed in the LA Times (which unlike a certain other “Times” doesn’t charge people to read its columnists on the web) showing how straightforward it is (HT: Taylor Marsh ): But the real blockbuster in the Hamdan decision is the court's holding that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention applies to the conflict with Al Qaeda — a holding that makes high-ranking Bush administration officials potentially subject to prosecution under the federal War Crimes Act. And then later, she connects the dots to US Federal criminal law: But here's where the rubber really hits the road. Under federal criminal law, anyone who "commits a war crime … shall be fined … or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, sh...

Digby’s most recent post contains a rousing defense of secularism in politics: Those who cherish secular values have too often allowed conservatives to frame public policy debates as conflicts between "value-free" secularists and religious representatives of supposedly unchanging moral principles. But secularists are not value-free; their values are simply grounded in earthly concerns rather than in anticipation of heavenly rewards or fear of infernal punishments. No one in public life today upholds secularism and humanism in the uncompromising terms used by Ingersoll more than 125 years ago. "Secularism teaches us to be good here and now. I know nothing better than goodness. Secularism teaches us to be just here and now. It is impossible to be juster than just. Secularism has no 'castles in Spain.' It has no glorified fog. It depends upon realities, upon demonstrations; and its end is to make this world better every day -- to do away with poverty and crime, and...

(One of the advantages of being the blogmaster is that you can “front page” something instead of being relegated to the comments sections. This a reply to App Crit, but I felt it was important (and lengthy) enough that it should have its own post.) Hey App Crit, sorry you feel you have to say “Adieu” . (“Goodbye” has equally theistic origins, and I’m fine with the relics of religion sprinkled throughout our language). In any case, even if you’re going, I’ll reply to some of the things in your farewell comment, for my own edification and that of my other readers (Site meter tells me there’s at least one or two). I didn’t know that Catholics could get their outside marriages blessed within the church, and that is a pleasing concession to reality. But in a way it just reinforces the notion that the institution of the Church controls what is and is not a marriage. And I believe that what transpires between two people, their families, and society (i.e. what happens in the world) is what det...

Wow! I was worried that conservatives were taking over the country. But I don’t have to, because apparently, Liberal judges are more powerful than God! Now, you might be skeptical of this statement, coming from an atheist like myself. And for an atheist to say it doesn’t really mean much: of course a Liberal judge (who exists) is more powerful than God (who doesn’t). But it isn’t me who’s saying it. It’s the king of wingnut theism himself, James Dobson, on CNN.com (HT: Sullivan ): If the battle to protect marriage takes even five more years, liberal judges and activists will have destroyed this 5,000-year-old institution, which was designed by the Creator, Himself. Even now, they are close to achieving that coveted objective. Wow. So if I understand this correctly, unless the American Constitution is amended to exclude marriage for homosexuals within five years, marriage as an institution will be destroyed . It will be destroyed by liberal judges and activists (and bloggers? Can I be ...

Will the court save us from King George? Sullivan thinks it might . Will King George even listen? He seems to be fine ignoring Congress. Let’s hope the other branch has a little more luck. You can read more about it here . Scalia, Thomas, and Alito dissented, backing the president’s unchecked power. No surprises there. Let’s see if they give Democratic executives the same deference. Chief justice Roberts was sidelined because it was one of his rulings (when he was a lower court judge) that was being decided. His ruling was overturned. UPDATE: Digby shares Atrios' skepticism (and my skepticism) that the Bush administration will actually pay attention to this ruling, and shows how the wingers are already spinning this. Greenwald has a very lengthy analysis.

There’s lots of discussion in the comments sections of the posts about mocking supernatural beliefs , Roman Catholic marriage rules , and the Cruise-Kidman (non-)marriage . Sullivan’s still talking about it , too: If the church is utterly indifferent to marriages conducted by other churches or the state, then why has it devoted so much effort to demonizing civil marriages for gay couples? Shouldn't they be as irrelevant to the Vatican as, say, civil divorce or re-marriages in other churches? The double standards abound. This is my main exasperation with the Roman Catholic Church. Their twisted logic would be all fine and good if they kept it within their bizarre cult of Christian Voodoo (“Recite this incantation, and your sins will go away!”). But this is an organization that seeks to alter the laws of my country to suit its notions of morality. They don’t get to hide their weirdness behind the shield of “You have to respect our religion!” while at the same time denying communion t...

Just in case you forgot Sullivan was a conservative, he comes out with this : “I'm fine with Porkbusters, but it needs to be said again and again that pork is not our real problem. Middle-class entitlements are.” He’s right that entitlement programs form an enormous portion of Federal Spending, and dwarf even the egregious amounts of pork these Republicans have feasted on, but I wouldn’t call entitlements “our real problem”. I would say our real problems from a fiscal point of view are our broken system of paying for health care (which will cause Medicare costs to skyrocket) and Republican eagerness for tax give-aways to those who suffer from having enormous amounts of money. Republican propaganda has turned this country into a bunch of revenue-sissies who want government to do a bunch of stuff but don’t want to actually pay for it. Sorry folks, stuff costs money (especially wars). No amount of Club for Growth talking point recital is going to change that. That being said, I don’t ...

I just want to add my wee little voice to the defense of the New York Times against the furystorm the right-wing machine has unleashed against it. As usual, Glen Greenwald is a principled and reasoned voice on this matter . Just a few things I’d like to highlight: The information allegedly “given away to terrorists” (like the existence of the SWIFT program) has been in the public domain already . Some of it was apparently even announced by the Bush administration itself, in its endless touting of how its keeping us safe. The LA Times and the Wall Street Journal published this story, too . And yet talking heads aren’t calling for their editors to be thrown in jail. Could it be because their editorial pages are more friendly to the current administration? UPDATE: Sullivan weighs in , and concludes that it's pretty obvious that this whole NYT thing is just Rove's propaganda theme of the week.

It’s about frickin’ time: According to Kos , The DNC rules committee is moving to shake-up the order of the presidential primaries and caucuses. What’s so special about Iowa and New Hampshire that presidential candidates should have to pander to them so much? It’s ridiculous. This is a most welcome beginning.

Digby goes all soft and nice on astrology of all things. Apparently, Jerome Armstrong (co-author of Crashing the Gate—see sidebar for link) believes in astrology, and some conservatives are using this to mock him. How do I feel about this? Well, in some sense, I agree with those mocking him: I think astrology, which I understand to be a system of divination predicated on the assumption that the position of various celestial bodies has an influence on events in our lives and on our personalities, and that by studying these positions we can gain useful information that would otherwise be unavailable to us, is total bunk. As on many subjects, one of Shakespeare’s characters has some choice words on the subject (Edmund in King Lear I.ii ): This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; ...

I didn’t quite realize how silly the rules were either. App Crit makes a few points in a comment on my Kidman-Cruise post , but I remain convinced that these rules are ridiculous. Andrew Sullivan points out that it is pretty funny that an institution pushing for a “sanctity of marriage” amendment routinely grants annulments. I guess with their reality-altering magic power they can make things un-happen or something. A quote from his post: "There is nothing that has a greater hold on the minds of people than ignorance fraught with technicalities."

If Bush/Iraq War/Torture supporters are seriously quoting War Nerd to back up their positions, they need to get a clue .

Celebrity gossip hasn’t been Internal Monologue’s specialty, but when there’s an opportunity to trackback to Sullivan and make fun of the ridiculous rules of the Roman Catholic church at the same time, how can I resist? Now, I was always skeptical of the Cruise-Kidman marriage. I’m skeptical of all Hollywood marriages. I think they’re publicity stunts. Or at any rate there’s an enormous incentive to turn them into publicity stunts. You get magazine covers when you get engaged, magazine covers when you marry, magazine covers when you have kids, magazine covers when you divorce, magazine covers devoted to who you and your former spouse are seeing now. You can’t buy that kind of publicity. Well, you probably could, but it’s much cheaper just to get hitched. And publicity is the currency of celebrity. How could they not take advantage? Now maybe some of those celebrity marriages are real, but given the incentives that exist (to say nothing of the celebrity divorce rate) my skepticism meter...

Rush Limbaugh smuggling unprescribed Viagra in from the Dominican Republic? A virtuous character like him would never do something as comical and dumb as that, would he? Well, he did admit to being addicted to pain killers, and has been arrested before on drug-related charges. Taylor Marsh points to this story and asks: “What does that do to his plea deal?” Commenters say it invalidates the deal . Of course, he could have brought the Viagra with him into the Dominican Republic, and only got caught bringing it back into the US. Taylor also asks, “Oh, and one more thing, what the hell was Rush doing in the Dominican Republic? My sex trade investigation nose is twitching, Samantha.” Is it bad that I am enjoying the misfortune of another human being? Yes it is bad. Bad Liberal! <smack>. But I’m still smiling, so I must be a very, very bad boy. Tell you what, Rush, you join the Drug Policy Alliance and rail against the stupidity of the drug war on your radio show, and I’ll forgive...

This is a great diary from The Rockridge Institute (of which George Lakoff is a member). It has actually changed my thinking on this issue. Its central thesis: Bush is not incompetent: the “failures” of his administration (Katrina, Iraq, massive budget deficits) are in fact successful implementations of conservative philosophy. It is conservatism itself that is wrong. The political angle is this: if we call Bush incompetent, that does nothing to damage the political philosophy he represents. People might think that the next Republican will do better, and vote for him (unless it’s Rice, in which case it will be her). We must instead show that it is conservative governing principles themselves that are at the root of our problems.   And yes, many “conservatives” criticize Bush for not being a “real conservative”, but Bushism is conservatism as it currently exists and is practiced in this country. There may be some philosophically pure “conservatism” out there in the ether that...

Slacktivist has an interesting explanation of a phenomenon that has always puzzled us atheists enormously: Why aren’t American Christian Evangelicals more…Christian? We atheists can read, too. And we read the Gospels and the words of Christ we think, “Wow, those Christians must be awfully moral. All that stuff about turning the other cheek and shunning wealth, I sure don’t have spiritual strength for all of that. They may have completely wack metaphysics, but there’s no denying their goodness and moral strength.” But then we atheists look at “Christian” mega-churches obviously flush with cash, and hear their vicious attacks on homosexuals, see the support for wars of aggression and their wholehearted leap into the Republican party, and we wonder what’s going on. Instead of being all ascetic and non-violent and humble, we find them to be opulent, arrogant, war-mongers. What about all that stuff the alleged Son of God actually said ? What gives? Well, it turns out that under some versio...

Could he be coming around? On his blog he points to his column for the Sunday Times (the UK Sunday Times, not the New York Times, so you can actually link to it ), Sullivan does his usual repeating of the Dems are wimps meme, but then concludes: The president’s PR brilliance [brilliance? C’mon.] of the week, after the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, will fade if the results aren’t there in the autumn. And then the wimps might seem prescient, or even courageous.

David Brooks provides a wonderful illustration of this maxim in action. When he writes about what he knows, like in Bobos in Paradise , he’s hysterically funny and accurate. However, when he writes about blogs, blogging, and bloggers, like in today’s Sunday Times (click on that link to get a nice little message about how the NYT expects you to pay for opinion content online. Hah!), it’s obvious he really doesn’t get it: The Keyboard Kingpin, a k a Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, sits at his computer, fires up his website, Daily Kos [with what? Propane?], and commands his followers, who come across like squadrons of rabid lambs, to unleash their venom on those who stand in the way. And in this way the Kingpin had made himself a mighty force in his own mind, and every knee shall bow. Where to begin? The major misunderstanding that Brooks and just about everyone else makes when talking about the progosphere is treating Zúniga like some sort of lefty Karl Rove who’s pulling all these strings and...

Newt Gingrich on Iraq : "It was an enormous mistake for us to try to occupy that country after June of 2003," Gingrich said during a question-and-answer session at the school. "We have to pull back, and we have to recognize it." Obviously a defeatist cut-and-run Liberal. When will the rest of the Republicans wake up? I think there may finally be a sea-change going on here. The fact that the Iraqi government itself is contradicting Bush’s talking points might cause some of the denial to unravel. [I was at a D&D minis tournament today, so that’s why there was little activity. I got whupped: record was 2-5.]

According to this article in the Telegraph (HT: DarkSyde on Kos), the Iraqi government (the one that we fought to have democratically elected) is going to “offer a timetable for American troop withdrawal, stop US operations targeting insurgents, and clamp down on violations of human rights abuses, according to a 28-page deal reported by the Times.” Well. I guess the Iraqi government that we expended so much blood, effort, and money to set up didn’t get its talking point list from Rove this week. Don’t they know that a timetable “ wouldn’t do any good ”? They must be a bunch of defeatists! If this breach between Republican delusion and Iraqi reality doesn’t become a major shitstorm in the mainstream American media, I’ll officially sign up for the blogger revolution (but I guess maybe I already have). Let’s see what tomorrows New York Times will bring. But wait! There’s more! The Iraqi government is also planning to offer amnesty to Sunni insurgents who are willing to lay down their ar...

…with the blogospheric revolution. Especially not this person (HT blogometer ): Blog: The word "blog" is literally shorthand for "boring;" a vulgar, overused word that strikes your ear with the dull thud of a cudgel to the soft spot of a child. It's an abbreviation used by journalism drop outs to give legitimacy to their shallow opinions and amateur photography that seems to be permanently stuck in first draft hell. Looking in the archives of the blogs, one would expect someone who has been at it for years to slowly hone their craft and improve their writing and photographs, since it's usually safe to assume that if someone does something long enough, he or she will eventually not suck at it. Even with lowered expectations, you'll get a shotgun blast of disappointment in your face. It's an unspoken rule that every blog must use the same layout as every other blog: long, slender columns of annoyingly condensed text, thousands of links to other blogs,...

Foreign Affairs has a good discussion of possible US alternatives going forward in Iraq (HT Andrew , as usual). It’s good to get beyond the “stay the course” vs. “get the hell out” level of discussion. Of course, the whole discussion is useless if the Bush administration won’t take good ideas and use them. One idea that was brought up is some sort of partition of Iraq into separate regions. One might cynically call this the “ethnic cleansing with a human face” option. The idea is that before withdrawing, the US should supervise and protect large movements of refugees to make Iraq’s regions more ethnically homogeneous. That way, when US forces withdrew, some of the worst neighbor-vs.-neighbor genocide might be averted. But many of Iraq’s large cities are very mixed and not easily untangled ethnically. So in practice this solution may be unworkable. The panelists all seem to agree that present policy will not work, and that any solutions will be extremely difficult at best.

Most people seem to be able distinguish Ann from Adolf , but can you tell American victims of a Nazi massacre from the SS soldiers who perpetrated that massacre? Easy, one would think. But apparently not for Bill O’Reilly . He gets an infamous atrocity committed by SS soldiers during the Battle of the Bulge (Dec. 1944) backwards, and attributes it to American soldiers, who were in fact the victims. He does this while interviewing General Wesley Clark, of all people. And he did it TWICE. And he altered the transcript of the event to cover it up. Video of Keith Olbermann delivering a smackdown can be found here .

It has been far too long since Internal Monologue engaged in some gratuitous titillation thinly disguised with a veneer of social criticism. But upon finding this article on the phenomenon of “spotlight lesbianism” (my term! I invented it! I hereby claim it for my own!) via this analysis on Pandagon I knew that this prurience drought would end: She and a friend were drinking at a party, and some guys dared them to kiss ... so they did. "It was like, look, I'm the center of attention! Everyone's looking at me and cheering me on. It felt good being in the spotlight [emphasis added]," she says. Then she adds, "And the kissing itself didn't really bug me. From then on it became a normal thing to do." Now the thin veneer of social criticism: Is this phenomenon as widespread as breathless columnists portray it? Is it on the increase? Is it demeaning or empowering? The Pandagon article talks about this “craze”, and compares it to the whole “blowjob blowup” th...

Atrios asks a great question: Why don’t Republicans Want the War to End ? Maybe it’s because it’s a great excuse to push their agenda, or at least distracts/rallies people enough so they can get away with pushing their agenda. For some sad reason, Atrios no longer has trackbacks on his blog. So of course I’ll be linking to him less. For anyone who’s looked at my Site Meter statistics referrals section knows, most of my traffic comes from me putting trackbacks on infinitely more popular sites. Indeed, I could rename Internal Monologue “Mooching off Andrew Sullivan” and I wouldn’t be that far off. So if you want me to link to you, enable trackbacks. I should get around to doing trackbacks on my site, too, so people can then mooch off of me. Andrew Sullivan’s site is great, because he doesn’t have comments. So if people want to know how others have responded to his posts, they have to click on the trackbacks.

Great post by digby on Rove, Murtha, and the fawning coverage of Bush’s Iraq visit. A good quote: One of the most infuriating things about the triumphal coverage of the Baghdad trip is the fact that the media didn't seem to think it was noteworthy that after all this time the president (or anybody else) still can't make a planned visit because he can't trust anyone and the situation on the ground is so dangerous. Why that's considered "good news" for him is anyone's guess. Rational people are right to conclude that there has pretty much been no progress since Bush dropped in exactly the same way for that stupid Turkey stunt. By this time we should have been able to have a state visit and a parade. What if three years after conquering Japan, MacArthur could only visit Tokyo for a day at a time via surprise visit? That’s pretty much where we are with Iraq.

Grishnash is frickin’ great. Yes, he’s also one of my closest friends. We’ve known each other since first grade. From the comments sections of this very blog: On Ann-Adolf : The rule that got me 13/14 was that the more well-written ones were Hitler. On The Pledge : I wonder if they'll want the Pledge banned if they ever figure out it was written by a Socialist. Dude, that is a meme that so needs to be more widespread. FLAG PLEDGERS ARE COMMIES!!! I had heard this, but had forgotten it. On Iraq-Al Qaeda : Oh, but it's even better than that... That tenuous tie to al-Qaida in Saddam's Iraq? Turns out the worst of them were operating unmolested in the Northern No-Fly Zone. Why didn't Saddam shut them down? Because we would have bombed any forces he sent in there into oblivion. Why didn't we bomb them when we knew where they were? Because we needed there to be terrorists in Iraq when we invaded . If the administration is looking for a good justification for another war,...

Andrew Sullivan: sometimes wonderful, sometimes exasperating. He longs for a savior (McCain) to salvage the war. He’s too smart and good at heart to believe the deceptions and immorality put out by the Bush administration. But he won’t allow himself to believe that Iraq is an impossible quagmire. He sees that the Iraq war is being used for vile political purposes by an administration he despises, but doesn’t favor an end to that war. Here’s his latest : Unable to access intelligence, forced to rely on news reports, blogs and other sources for information, I don't have an alternative master-plan to win either. I would support an increase in troop levels, a clear-and-hold strategy, a more aggressive military commitment to protect the infrastructure, and the kind of outreach to alienated Sunnis that Maliki and Khalilzad are attempting. But as long as Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld are running the show, I cannot say I am optimistic that such a sane strategy will be employed or that it will ...

...our own troops, apparently, according to this Zogby poll from Feb. 2006: An overwhelming majority of 72% of American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should exit the country within the next year, and more than one in four say the troops should leave immediately, a new Le Moyne College/Zogby International survey shows. Of course, this same poll also says: While 85% [of the troops surveyed] said the U.S. mission is mainly “to retaliate for Saddam’s role in the 9-11 attacks,” 77% said they also believe the main or a major reason for the war was “to stop Saddam from protecting al Qaeda in Iraq.” When I read stuff like this, I want to scream in exasperation. 85%?!?! Clearly, they think Saddam had a major role in the 9-11 attacks! My God. (No, that it not a renunciation of my atheism, merely “rhetorical deism”.) This is simply not true , though it seems some 30% of Americans continue to believe it . And the notion of Hussien protecting Al Qaeda is rather far-fetched. “Al-Qaeda was s...

…and take the Quiz ! I got 12 of 14 correct. Andrew Sullivan claims 13 of 14 ! Can you get a perfect score? The challenge is to decide whether each quote about Liberals comes from Ann Coulter or Adolf Hitler! I was able to tell in most cases, but I found myself relying stylistic “tells” rather than substantive ones. Of course the quotes were selected to be similar, and the usual disclaimers about how Ann Coulter isn’t really a Nazi, hasn’t invaded Poland, hasn’t killed millions of people, etc. apply. (Wikipedia has a definition of Godwin’s Law .)

Here’s a great cartoon for those of us interested in ridding our Republic of ceremonial deism (via Anglico on Kos ).

One thing I think would go a long way to helping our democracy would be the public financing of political campaigns. If our representatives didn’t have to solicit bribes to fund their campaigns, they would be less subject to corruption. It won’t make politicians perfect, but I’d rather politicians pander to voters than to corporate donors. David Sirota has a post on Kos about this, and there’s this group, Just $6 , that is fighting for this issue.

Ah, the tried-and-true tactic of attacking Democrats has run into a little snag on the immigration issue. You see, the position Republicans are attacking (the possibility of a “path to citizenship” for illegal immigrants) is essentially the president’s own position. So the trick: “’… is how to put the Democrats in a box without attacking the president,’ said one aide, speaking on condition of anonymity.” (From this article on My Way news. HT: Sullivan ). I suppose it’s OK for Republicans to criticize Bush’s immigration policy, but it’s not OK for Democrats to criticize his Iraq policy without being branded traitors. I find it rather mind-boggling that Republicans can try to bludgeon their opponents with this whole commander-in-chief-dear-leader-cult-of-personality thing. Yet when the House disagrees with his immigration reform package, they feel free to ignore him, to be embarrassed by him. What about the fact that he’s a born-again Christian who has heart-to-hearts with God? If God t...

Well it’s probably not news to most of my readers, but according to the Pew Global Attitudes Project it seems our country is liked less and less these days (HT: Dan Froomkin ): America's global image has again slipped and support for the war on terrorism has declined even among close U.S. allies like Japan. The war in Iraq is a continuing drag on opinions of the United States, not only in predominantly Muslim countries but in Europe and Asia as well. And despite growing concern over Iran's nuclear ambitions, the U.S. presence in Iraq is cited at least as often as Iran - and in many countries much more often - as a danger to world peace. Emphasis added by yours truly. Yet another reason to get out of there as quickly as possible.

Not only is our president a zombie, he seems to have the ability to transform young Merchant Marine Academy graduates (in this case, one Gabriel Whitney) into zombies. Can you see the zombie love? Perhaps this explains why he thinks we can "stay the course" in Iraq: if we're zombies, there's no way the insurgents could harm us! Sometimes I'm annoyed with the New York Times for lazily sinking into pro-Republican narratives (e.g. Getting caught up in pro-war hysteria, treating the Clintons' sex life as newsworthy, but not the sex life of Republicans, etc.). But clearly, whoever decided to run this Charles Dharapak/Associated Press photo in today's Times wasn't out to flatter the president. As a courtesy to the "paper of record" I'll link to the article , but I suspect you might have to be a TimesSelect subscriber to see it. [Update: more photos from the Zombie Sequence ]

If thinking about our government’s practice of torture has got you down, let’s switch of a more cheerful topic: Republican sexual hypocricy. It turns out that three Republican front-runners for the 2008 presidential nomination are confirmed adulterers ! In some mystical, distant past I might have said, “Ah, but that wouldn’t affect their job performance, so it really shouldn’t be a campaign issue.” But if the New York Times is going to salivate at the prospect of “reporting” on the Clinton’s sex life, I think it’s only fair that Republicans get some scrutiny in this area too. What’s the puritanical crowd going to think of their Republican leaders? Will they hypocritically overlook it, or will they puritanically savage them? I think the Democrats and the Progosphere need to shed some light on these issues, if only to inoculate our side against these kinds of attacks. If it doesn’t matter, that’s fine (and that’s the way it should be), but if it’s going to matter for the Clinton, it matt...

I have nothing but disgust for this administration. If this is true , (torturing a mentally ill Al Qaida lackey and then acting on all of his “confessions”, all to “save face” for the president) they are even immoral and incompetent than I thought, and I had a damn low opinion of them before. Impeach Bush, Cheney, et. al. now. Other folk ( here and here ) seem to agree.

Just yesterday, Rude Pundit asked the following about what the US government reaction would be if the two captured US troops (Tucker and Menchaca) were tortured (hat tip: Sullivan ): What will our government do? What could it do? Could it condemn the actions as not abiding by the Geneva Conventions? Could it call the actions "torture"? Could it demand accountability? Could it demand that the soldiers be treated as POWs? Could it simply say, "Well, we don't do that shit... anymore "? Tragically, these two troops were found tortured and killed. Here’s the story ( Washington Post via Taylor Marsh ): BAGHDAD, July 20 -- Two U.S. soldiers missing since an attack on a checkpoint last week have been found dead near a power plant in Yusifiyah, south of Baghdad, according to U.S. officials, and Iraqi officials say the soldiers had been tortured. In the past, the United States might have been able to point to this incident and say what an enormous moral gulf exists betw...

For an Iraqi perspective on the death of Zarqawi, here’s Riverbend of Baghdad Burning (hat tip: Pablo , who doesn’t have a blog but should): "A new day for Iraqis" is the current theme of the Iraqi puppet government and the Americans. Like it was "A New Day for Iraqis" on April 9, 2003 . And it was "A New Day for Iraqis" when they killed Oday and Qusay. Another "New Day for Iraqis" when they caught Saddam. More "New Day" when they drafted the constitution… I'm beginning to think it's like one of those questions they give you on IQ tests: If 'New' is equal to 'More' and 'Day' is equal to 'Suffering', what does "New Day for Iraqis" mean? How do I feel? To hell with Zarqawi (or Zayrkawi as Bush calls him). He was an American creation- he came along with them- they don't need him anymore, apparently. His influence was greatly exaggerated but he was the justification for every single fam...

Taylor Marsh covers Hillary’s leftward tack after getting booed by Democrats for saying that setting a firm date for withdrawal would be not in our best interest. I don’t think the “stay the course” arguments are going to be very persuasive come November (to say nothing of 2008). By then, Zarqawi’s death will be a distant memory. I don’t picture Iraq improving much, barring a major strategic shift on our part (and even then, it’s iffy). I’m not sure about Hillary. On the one hand, she is a force to be reckoned with. And she has an ability to work with people and win them over, as her work in the Senate shows. And her husband is one of the great political talents of our time. But her hawkish poses seem to spring from political calculation, rather than conviction (or from any sense of what is actually going on in Iraq). And her support among party activists is very low. (To say nothing of the irrational hatred she inspires among the some of the right.) I haven’t heard her combating the...

Atrios points to this Reuters story . Louisiana enacted a “trigger law” that would ban almost all abortions “even in cases of rape or incest” if Roe vs. Wade is overturned. This saddens me. I think people are going to have to start dying from botched abortions again before some states will come up with a tolerable compromise. Federalism (i.e. different states doing different things) may be the only way to go on this issue, but that means abandoning many to the punishments of the reactionaries. If you’re angry about this, there’s a Planned Parenthood link in the sidebar. Give them some love.

We are now the Progosphere ! I like this abbreviation for “Progressive Blogosphere” better than Progblog. “Progosphere” sounds like “blogosphere”, which is something people are already saying. “Progblog” sounds like one progressive weblog. Progosphere it is! Unfortunately, a Google search reveals that 15 other people have used the term already. So I won’t be able to claim credit for coining it. Still, only 15 Google hits means I’m one of the first. Maybe if I say “progoshpere” enough in this post, I will get a high-ranking search result.

Enough politics! Here's another fun web quiz, via App Crit . This one about your worldview. Here are my results. Not surprising for those of you who are familiar with how I see things. You scored as Materialist . Materialism stresses the essence of fundamental particles. Everything that exists is purely physical matter and there is no special force that holds life together. You believe that anything can be explained by breaking it up into its pieces. i.e. the big picture can be understood by its smaller elements. Materialist 81% Existentialist 69% Cultural Creative 44% Postmodernist 44% Fundamentalist 31% Modernist 31% Idealist 25% Romanticist 6% What is Your World View? (updated) created with QuizFarm.com

Digby links to a June 6 cable sent by the American Embassy and signed by Khalizad to the American Secretary of State outlining the dire conditions under which their employees in Iraq have to work. It paints a very bleak picture: Creeping Taliban-like dress codes (“Indeed, she said, some groups are pushing women to cover even their face, a step not taken in Iran even at its most conservative.”), lack of electricity, paranoia that someone will discover they work at the embassy, threats of kidnapping, and a general sense of anxiety are making life for employees very difficult. [UPDATE: A trios links to this memo as well and comments that it "isn't getting much play". Let's see if our left-wing noise machine can change that. I bet it will.] [UPDATE 2: Sullivan's got it now , too. I think the blogosphere is going to push this into the spotlight.] Of course, for those of us in the reality-based community, this isn’t too shocking. We’ve been hearing this kind of stuff...

How come we’re not worried about Pakistan? I mean, Iran doesn’t have the bomb yet. Pakistan does. And the whole A. Q. Kahn scandal/pardon fiasco shows that Pakistan has a history of selling this stuff. Taylor Marsh says the only person talking about Pakistan is emptywheel on The Next Hurrah . Here’s a bit of what emptywheel says: Which is why I invite everyone, every time someone raises the "Iran problem" to respond with a question about the "Pakistan problem." By addressing the latter first, we're more likely to succeed. And we'll break the cycle of chasing down one after another "rogue state" crisis. More importantly, by addressing the problem of nuclear proliferation at its source, we might be able to stop invading all these other countries. And while we eliminate that threat everywhere, we can try to establish real relations with Iran before it becomes the problem it is promised to be, five years down the road.

Taylor Marsh has a great site . What do I like about it? It’s graphically a cut or two above most other Lefty blogs. It uses the web as a visual medium, whereas most blogs (including this one) are primarily text-driven, with an occasional picture thrown in. She’s definitely a member of the Liberal blogosphere, but also seems to have a slightly different angle than the “core” Lefty blogs I tend to reference: Eschaton, Hullabaloo, Daily Kos, and Unclaimed Territory. For links, see the sidebar. (Andrew Sullivan, perhaps my most referenced blogger, is a conservative and is often loathed by the right for criticizing the war and torture, and by the left for his derisive comments about Dems and previous enthusiasm for the Bush administration and its reckless fiscal policies.) She deals a lot with military matters, and seems to get her material from a wide variety of sources. If you want some visual polish with your sharp pro-Democrat commentary, you could do worse than to check out her site. ...

We progressives in favor of marriage for all gnash our teeth when Republicans ride the fear and prejudice surrounding homosexuality into elected office. They ride it, and they try to whip it up every election cycle. And they don’t give a damn about the targets of this hatred (at least not the extent that they’ll change their behavior or public posture). A very moving piece of testimony from a former Baptist preacher: Given the fact that Alabama just voted overwhelmingly to reject the right of gays to marry, I found myself feeling like a stranger in a strange land. This state has been my home all of my 41 years. My parents, thank the Lord, are still here. I graduated with a degree in Mathematics from the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. There have been days when I've felt the brush of God's grace through the warm, southern winds. And the sun rose like a thousand diamonds in the sparkle of the trees as I go on my long, crazy drives, praying to God. But now, I feel isolated, ...

From consortiumnews.com via Unclaimed Territory , here’s a lament about one of the missing links in the desperately needed left-wing counter-mobilization: big money Liberal donors taking media infrastructure seriously. Robert Parry’s piece on consortiumnews.com is particularly despondent about Liberal donors not “getting media”. I hope that the building blocks of the much needed vast left-wing conspiracy will come into place soon. I think the progblog (progressive blogosphere) is a very important building block: it provides energy, a factory of ideas, a fast reaction force against lies, and a source of funding. But it needs to get connected to the larger media world of television and newspapers. It needs to be energized by enthusiastic wealthy donors and foundations. And it needs to be supported by think tanks, training programs, and policy institutes. We can’t afford to stumble along on our own anymore. And we can’t wait for the mainstream media to suddenly wake up and start telling ...

Just what I needed! A rant by the notorious Kos diarist Hunter in support of progressives selling out and making money ! I don’t know if I’d defend commercialism as vehemently as he does, but he’s got a point: wingnuts get paid to shill their ideas. Progressives should at least be in the same ballpark. We’re not even close to being there yet, but we are moving up the economic food chain rapidly. Heck, even I’ve made a whopping $8.52 in ad revenue since putting those Google ads on the site! (With my discount at Games of Berkeley , that is EXACTLY the price of one box of D&D minis !) But apparently some people decry our success as “selling out”. I guess they want us to remain “pure” and “ignored”. Hunter will have none of it, and is not shy about saying so.