How About That?



Way to go, big man. Do the tears of Chris Rix taste as salty-sweet as expected?

How Do They Sleep At Night?

The Washington Post continues it's journey down the long road of irrelevance.

The Washington Post's executive editor says his paper should have told readers up front that it had helped arrange a Republican debate-watching party it covered, paid for food and carried a photograph that was not as spontaneous as the story suggested.

"That particular event does not live up to standards," Leonard Downie Jr. said Friday.

The story also notes that the Post had sought out and found Democrats to host a debate party. The issue here isn't that the Post arranged a Republican party per se, it's that the Post arranged any kind of party, and then reported on it without informing readers of that fact.

It isn't particularly sinister, it's just stupid.

You'll Miss Their Misconduct When It's Gone

And just what kind of a name is Bunny Greenhouse anyway?

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' top contracting official on Friday called the government's grant of multi-billion dollar contracts to oil services giant Halliburton the worst case of contracting abuse she has ever seen.

"It was misconduct, and part of that misconduct was blatant," said Bunny Greenhouse, in an interview on NBC's Nightly News program.

Greenhouse has already demanded an investigation into the contracts that last year were granted to Halliburton, the energy services firm run by Vice President Dick Cheney from 1995-2000. According to her attorney, the FBI has since asked her for an interview on the matter.

...

"It was the worst abuse of the procurement and contracting system that I have seen," Greenhouse told NBC.

On The Hunt

Kerry responds to the OBL tape.

In response to this tape from Osama bin Laden, let me make it clear, crystal clear. As Americans, we are absolutely united in our determination to hunt down and destroy Osama bin Laden and the terrorists. They are barbarians. And I will stop at absolutely nothing to hunt down, capture or kill the terrorists wherever they are, whatever it takes. Period.

Boom!

Aaron Brown interviewed former head US weapons inspector David Kay this evening on "News Night." The missing explosives issues is settled.

AARON BROWN: I don't know how better to do this than to show you some pictures, have you explain to me what they are or are not, OK? First, I'll just call it the seal and tell me if this is an IAEA seal on that bunker at that munitions dump.

DAVID KAY: Aaron, as about as certain as I can be looking at a picture, not physically holding it, which obviously I would have preferred to have been there, that's an IAEA seal. I've never seen anything else in Iraq in about 15 years of being in Iraq and around Iraq that was other than an IAEA seal of that shape.

BROWN: And was there anything else at the facility that would have been under IAEA seal?

KAY: Absolutely nothing. It was he HMX, RDX, the two high explosives.

BROWN: OK. Now, I want to take a look at the barrels here for a second and you can tell me what they tell you. They obviously to us just show us a bunch of barrels. You'll see it somewhat differently.

KAY: Well, it's interesting. There were three foreign suppliers to Iraq of this explosive in the 1980s. One of them used barrels like this and inside the barrel is a bag. HMX is in powdered form because you actually use it to shape a spherical lens that is used to create the triggering device for nuclear weapons.And, particularly on the videotape, which is actually better than the still photos, as the soldier dips into it that's either HMX or RDX. I don't know of anything else in al Qa Qaa that was in that form.

BROWN: Let me ask you then, David, the question I asked Jamie. In regard to the dispute about whether that stuff was there when the Americans arrived, is it game, set, match? Is that part of the argument now over?

KAY: Well, at least with regard to this one bunker and the film shows one seal, one bunker, one group of soldiers going through and there were others there that were sealed, with this one, I think it is game, set and match. There was HMX, RDX in there. The seal was broken and quite frankly to me the most frightening thing is not only is the seal broken and the lock broken but the soldiers left after opening it up. I mean to rephrase the so-called Pottery Barn rule if you open an arms bunker, you own it. You have to provide security.

BROWN: That raises a number of questions. Let me throw out one. It suggests that maybe they just didn't know what they had.

KAY: I think quite likely they didn't know they had HMX, which speaks to the lack of intelligence given troops moving through that area but they certainly knew they had explosives. And to put this in context, I think it's important this loss of 360 tons but Iraq is awash with tens of thousands of tons of explosives right now in the hands of insurgents because we did not provide the security when we took over the country.

BROWN: Could you -- I'm trying to stay out of the realm of politics.KAY: So am I. BROWN: I'm not sure you can necessarily. I know. It's a little tricky here but is there any reason not to have anticipated the fact that there would be bunkers like this, explosives like this and a need to secure them?

KAY: Absolutely not. For example, al Qa Qaa was a site of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) super gun project. It was a team of mine that discovered the HMX originally in 1991. That was one of the most well documented explosive sites in all of Iraq. The other 80 or so major ammunition storage points were also well documented.Iraq had, and it's a frightening number, two-thirds of the total conventional explosives that the U.S. has in its entire inventory. The country was an armed camp.

BROWN: David, as quickly as you can because this just came up in the last hour, as dangerous as this stuff is, this would not be described as a WMD, correct?

KAY: Oh, absolutely not.

BROWN: Thank you.

KAY: And, in fact, the loss of it is not a proliferation issue.

BROWN: OK. It's just dangerous and it's out there and by your thinking it should have been secured.

KAY: Well, look, it was used to bring the Pan Am flight down. It's a very dangerous explosive, particularly in the hands of terrorists.

I Love It When They Call Me Big Papi



Awesome.

Blogger Sucks

Blogger had some issues yesterday. I don't know if last night's posts ever showed or not, but they should be up now.

I Like Butter On My Milquetoast

This could be no truer.

Today, I would like to join my online brethren over at Slate in endorsing John Kerry, as distasteful as that particular chore is. Sadly, one doesn't have much choice considering what we have to deal with. I only wish that the nominees could be more like, well... me. But that would be too much to ask so I will hold my aristocratic nose and vote for the lesser of two losers. Again.

You see, I am a beltway "independent" which allows me to criticize everyone and take responsibility for nothing at all. I would never actually vote for a Republican mind you --- how could I align myself with all that tacky Nascar and gay bashing business? But, neither can I associate myself with the Democratic party what with its stubborn insistence on not being exactly like me in every way.

As a beltway independent, then, I can safely vote against the Republicans without ever having to compromise even one of my pet issues in order that anything actually gets accomplished. And, there's no need to sully my clean hands with those tawdry fights against the opposition. Whatever I don't like I blame on Democratic weakness and perfidy, thereby proving to the Republicans that I am independent enough to agree with them on a least that one issue if nothing else.

John Kerry, sadly, does certain things with which I disagree and I find that unacceptable in a politician. And even worse, instead of being as dazzlingly exciting as say...me, he is serious and plodding as are so many of these lowly politicians who cater to the unwashed hoi polloi. Frankly, it's just a bit stomach churning to see a brahmin behaving as if he cares about what they want and need when we know that he couldn't possibly.

Still, what choice to we really have? George W. Bush has made a hash out everything so even someone uninspiring and thick will just have to do.

Vote for John Kerry. He's slightly better than that cretin George W. Bush but not nearly as perfect as I am.

That covers Chris Matthews, Little Russ, Hideous Maureen Dowd, The Washington Post Editorial Board and all the rest of the milquetoast democrats. We're sorry John Kerry isn't the living emodiment of every ideal you cherish, but really: be down or lay down; we're tired of your half-assed endorsements.

Oh No! I Think They're Getting Gay Married!

From Atrios, this may the greatest quote ever.

The rally was a love-fest in the conservative, rural Florida community. Three busloads of schoolchildren from the Heritage Christian School waited for an hour and a half to see Cheney and clap for the man they said speaks to the issues important to their lives.

Asked to name the country's biggest problem, 12-year-old Vivian Resto said, "Homosexuals. I think it's kind of gross, and my mom and I believe it should be a man and a woman." (emphasis added)

Mrs. Resto should be proud.

Really? Part Deux

Hey hey hey, this evening is just full of surprises. I mean, who could imagine that Republicans would be trying to surpress the black vote in Florida?

Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign's national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called "caging list".

It lists 1,886 names and addresses of voters in predominantly black and traditionally Democrat areas of Jacksonville, Florida.

An elections supervisor in Tallahassee, when shown the list, told Newsnight: "The only possible reason why they would keep such a thing is to challenge voters on election day."

Understatement Of The Century

This falls into the "really?" category.

The head of the BBC's news operations accused U.S. media organizations on Tuesday night of being overly patriotic in their coverage of the lead-up to the Iraq war.

"Before Iraq, it seemed to me that some U.S. news broadcasters wrapped themselves in the flag and, as a consequence, did not perform the role the public expects of them," said Richard Sambrook, director of the BBC's global news division.

"Our natural instinct is to support our country. But the responsibility of the news media is to ask the difficult questions, to press, to verify," Sambrook said, according to an advance copy of his speech to the Columbia Journalism School in New York.

Why ask difficult questions when it's so much easier to just point the camera and record staged events?

They were the shots seen 'round the world: newspaper photographs and TV images of jubilant Iraqis toppling a giant statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad on April 9, 2003, shortly after the U.S. military chased him out of town. Now, after months of rumors, the U.S. military has confirmed that the entire stunt was conceived by the U.S. military and enacted with the help of a fast-thinking Army psychological operation (PSYOP).

Hi! My Name Is...

My opinion of Eminem varies -- I enjoy some of his stuff, but there's plenty of it I could leave behind -- however, this song and it's accompanying video are incredibly powerful.

It's ends with Eminem leading an ominous mob down the street to storm a building...

So that they can register to vote Bush out of office.

Danger Zone

This is so totally awesome that it almost makes me want to vote for Bush. Almost.

President Bush turned his Marine One chopper into a campaign prop Saturday and used it to drop in on huge crowds at three stadiums around Florida, at a time of concern in his campaign about his failure to gain a decisive lead in the most crucial battlegrounds.

...

The commander in chief landed at the ballparks to the strains of the "Top Gun" theme, his most dramatic use of a military asset since he rode a fighter jet onto an aircraft carrier 17 months ago to declare the end of major combat operations in Iraq.

...

The other chopper rallies were in Lakeland and Melbourne. Bush's finale was a rally for 25,000 or more at Alltel Stadium, home of the National Football League's Jacksonville Jaguars and site of next February's Super Bowl. Bush spoke from a lectern on the 50-yard line. He arrived amid rock-concert-style smoke and departed to fireworks.


"You're everyone's problem, Bush. That's because every time you go up in the air, you're unsafe. I don't like you because you're dangerous."


"That's right! Ice... man. I am dangerous."

Walking The Line
with Dr. Victor Von Doom

"A Renoir. I have three myself. I had four, but ordered one burned . . . It displeased me."

So Doom returns to the standard bearer of his reign as the greatest sports prognosticator in the history of all mankind: the 2-1 record. It was gospel that Doom would return to winning after a brief one-week mishap; some may feel Doom is now satisfied. Doom says thee nay. Doom settles for naught but perfection. The week, the quest continues.

JACKSONVILLE (-9) @ INDIANAPOLIS
Doom has a broken device entitled "The Rainmaker" that controls the weather. Fondly, Doom recalls a day when his treasured creation was not broken. In a stroke of genius, Doom used the device to strike the accursed Human Torch with lightning. Standing over the fool's smoldering body, Doom asked "how's the weather" then pressed a button on "The Rainmaker" as to deliver a final, deadly strike of lightning to the helpless Human Torch. Or so Doom thought. Instead, the errant bolt struck Doom, frying both the device and Doom's brain. Lightning, it seems, never strikes twice. The Colts may very well defeat the Jaguars again, but it will not be by as wide a margin as the last time; Jacksonville with the points.

NEW ORLEANS (-3) @ OAKLAND
Saints head coach Jim Haslett is fighting for his job like so many a disloyal employee or foe of Doom has fought for their respective life. Backed into this kind of a corner, man often reacts more like beast. And while Doom is certain to destroy that beast-man using a room in which the floor retracts into the walls and beneath it is a pit full of hungry cheetahs and angry scorpions, so is it certain that Raiders head coach Norv Turner is no Doom. Beast-man Haslett and his Saints win this game.

NY JETS (-6.5) @ NEW ENGLAND
While Doom approved of the rioting in Boston after the Red Sox victory -- make no doubt, Doom continues to wish a pox on all citizens of the United States but endorses large-scale mayhem in general -- he does not approve of this spread. Doom says that if the Patriots win, it will be by a field goal: Jets with the points.

Awful

An act like this requires military-style strength, planning and execution; which means the Iraqi insurgency is beginning to organize as a militia. Fantastic.

The bodies of 37 Iraqi soldiers shot dead northeast of Baghdad were found Saturday and 12 more corpses discovered on Sunday, police and officials said.

"They were all executed, we found them executed," Interior Ministry spokesman Adnan Abdul-Rahman said.

The attack was another blow to the efforts of the interim government to develop Iraq's fledgling security forces to tackle a raging insurgency that U.S.-led forces have failed to quell. The soldiers, based at Kirkush, 55 miles northeast of Baghdad, had been in civilian clothes, heading for home leave in three minibuses when they were ambushed.

Police said insurgents appeared to have forced them to lie on the road before shooting them. The minibuses were burned.

...


"It appears that they were ambushed by a large, well-organized force with good intelligence," the source said.