The WAWG Blog

In this twenty-four survey of the web, The WAWG Index monthly average was down by 6.1 percent from September 2007. Of the fourteen categories tracked, 8 were down and 6 were up. The largest decrease for October, 29 percent, was for using scapegoats as a unifying cause. The largest increase was for avid militarism at 9 percent.

Through October, the 12 month group moving average for all fourteen categories remained negative at -5.4 percent. It was -7.3 percent last month. Of the fourteen categories tracked, all but one, media control, are negative.

Fear mongering, along with “noble lies,” addressed elsewhere in this blog, are major components in the authoritarian’s tyrannical toolbox.

Ever since we were attacked in 2001, we have been manipulated with the fear card. Any time the Administration wants us to give up a right, manipulate Congress or redact our constitution, they leak or outright announce some imminent terrorist threat.

It’s all wrong!!!

Let me try ease your fears.

First of all, lets put some numbers to our losses caused by those most evil of the evil, the terrorists. Using numbers is cold and our losses are uncalled for, but it might help protect us from the fear mongers.

There are two numbers we can derive for our losses. One is for the attack in September of 2001. The other is for the loss of our children in Iraq.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the United States was close to 284,709,000 in September 2001. On a per capita basis, that attack cost us 1 out of every 95,765 citizens. This loss can also be stated as 104 out of every 10,000,000 citizens.

According to Nation Master, the per capita losses in Iraq since the war started is 83.994 out of every 10,000,000 citizens as of March 2006. Using U. S. Census Bureau population for July 2006, 299,398,484, and the total 2006 fatality count from iCasualties.org, 822 troops, the rate drops to 27.5 fatalities per 10,000,000 citizens. Now using the average fatalities for 2004, 2005 and 2006, 818 troops, against the mid 2005 population, 296,507,061, the rate is 27.6 fatalities per 10,000,000 citizens.

To put those numbers in perspective, here are statistics of other losses we suffer each year. They are from the FBI. These numbers are for both 2001 and 2006 and show the rate for every 10,000,000 citizens.

Since the World Trade Center fatalities were on a single day, the 2001 column is adjusted to a daily rate for the year. Those in the 2006 column are for the entire year.

I have merged the losses from terrorist activities into the table for comparison.

As you can see, we here at home are more likely to have our car stolen than be killed by a terrorist and that assumes we were attacked every day of the year for an average daily fatality rate of 104 for every 10,000,000 citizens.

Now look at the 2006 column again and realize what the last entry for our troops means. Since I’m using the population of the United States and not the population of Iraq nor total US troops in Iraq, they would, both numerically and intuitively, be safer fighting terrorists “here” rather than “there.”

Now imagine you were living in the 1850s in the middle of the old, unsettled, wild west. You are living in a small town inside a fort full of courageous cavalry. When are you and they safest? When all the troops are out searching for the bad guys over the horizon or when they are back at the fort with their loved ones?

In spite of the fear mongering, it’s time to stop cowering each time the fear card is played and bring the troops home so we can all be safer.

More fear mongering exposed …

Attorney General Nominee Isn’t Sure if Waterboarding Should be Considered Torture – President Bush’s nominee for attorney general, Michael B. Mukasey, declined Thursday to say if he considered harsh interrogation techniques like waterboarding, which simulates drowning, to constitute torture or to be illegal if used on terrorism suspects. During questioning by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) yesterday, Mukasey said he wasn’t quite sure if waterboarding should be considered torture. Mukasey said the president’s authority as commander in chief might allow him to supersede laws written by Congress.

Joe Scarborough Says ‘90% of Americans’ Would Approve Waterboarding – MSNBC host Joe Scarborough says that the controversial interrogation tactic known as waterboarding — a method of simulated drowning used by interrogators to extract information from subjects — is an effective practice that most Americans would overwhelmingly approve of if asked. Maybe Joe’s got that confused with snowboarding.

Cheney’s Hand Seen Behind Leaks of Misleading Stories About Syria – Allegations that a Syrian envoy admitted during a United Nations meeting Oct. 17 that an Israeli air strike hit a nuclear facility in September are inaccurate and have raised the ire of some in the US intelligence community, who see the Vice President’s hand as allegedly being behind the disinformation. A United Nations press release discussing the General Assembly’s Disarmament Committee meeting mistranslated comments ascribed to an unnamed Syrian diplomat as saying that Israel had on various occasions “taken action against nuclear facilities, including the 6 July attack in Syria.” The UN has since gone through the tape recordings of the meeting and found that there was no mention of the word “nuclear” at all.

2,225 Minors in US Serve Life Sentences– Too young to drive, but old enough for life locked up; breaks UN Child Rights.

Comcast Impersonates Users’ Computers to Block Internet File Sharing – Comcast subscribers have been complaining since last summer that the country’s second-largest Internet service provider is deliberately cutting off peer-to-peer file sharing. Now a study by the Associated Press has confirmed those reports. Peer-to-peer networks can be used for unauthorized distribution of copyrighted materials but also have many legitimate uses. File-sharing is now estimated to account for as much as 90% of Internet traffic, and many ISP’s attempt to preserve bandwidth by slowing it down. Comcast is using an even more drastic method, which can prevent file-sharing almost entirely by sending fake messages to both computers involved in a peer-to-peer transaction, telling them to drop the connection.

Bush/Cheney Administration Trying to Dismantle Vital Protections for our National Forests and Grasslands – A proposal introduced by the Bush/Cheney Administration would dismantle vital protections for our National Forests and grasslands and eliminate key federal protections for all wildlife in those areas… including the still-struggling grizzly bear. The 2007 proposed revisions of the National Forest Management Act regulations would eliminate current protections for all wildlife inhabiting every national forest and grassland. Eliminating these protections, which have protected forest wildlife for more than 20 years, would threaten wolves, wolverines, elk, salmon and many other species. The proposal would foreclose citizen participation in the planning process, water down standards for timber harvesting, de-emphasize the role of scientists in the planning process, and exempt all forest plans from meaningful environmental review.

Bush Administration Trying to Open the Fragile Teshekpuk Lake Area to Oil and Gas Leasing – The Bush Administration is trying to open the fragile Teshekpuk Lake area to oil and gas leasing – even though it’s one of the most ecologically important wetland areas in the Arctic region. One of the most important wetlands in the Arctic, the Teshekpuk Lake region provides habitat for a million birds, including threatened species like the Spectacled Eider, as well as the 45,000-member Teshekpuk Lake Caribou Herd. The draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement issued by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) could lead to the opening of this ecologically important wetland habitat to lease sales. The region’s Native residents have expressed strong opposition to the plan. So have sportsmen’s groups, scientists, conservationists and the public at large.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Secretly Pushing for a Vote to Relax Media Ownership Rules by Dec. 18 – Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin is secretly pushing for a vote to relax media ownership rules by Dec. 18. The FCC is reviewing longstanding regulations that forbid a company to own both a newspaper and a television or radio station in the same city. “We are gravely concerned that Chairman Martin would try to secretly move on such a critical issue with such a short timetable,” said Josh Silver, executive director of Free Press, which coordinates the StopBigMedia Coalition. “The public is being shut out of the process so that Martin can move forward with his Big Media giveaway.” Chairman Martin’s secret plans were uncovered during a Commerce Committee hearing yesterday by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), one of the most vocal critics of media consolidation. Sen. Dorgan has co-authored a letter with Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) to the FCC calling for a more transparent and open public review of the media ownership rules.

Regards,

Jim

Fred Thompson Proposes to Cut Social Security Benefits by 25 Percent – Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson proposed to curb the cost of Social Security by cutting projected benefits by as much as 25 percent over the next 33 years, according to the estimate of one conservative think tank. The presidential candidate broached his proposal for limiting the cost of Social Security at a Republican presidential debate in Dearborn, Mich., earlier this month.

Proposed FCC Rule Would Allow One Company to Own a Newspaper and Broadcast Station in the Same market – The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission is proposing a plan that would wrap up by the end of the year the long-running debate over how many media properties a company should be allowed to own in a single market. Among the rules that are potentially on the chopping block is a ban on one company owning a newspaper and broadcast station in the same market. The rule is of particular interest to Tribune Co., which is the subject of a pending buyout led by real estate magnate Sam Zell. Minorities have been shut out from owning television stations — the nation’s most influential form of media. 96.74% of TV stations are white-owned.

Most Fake Bombs Missed by Airport Screeners – Security screeners at two of the nation’s busiest airports failed to find fake bombs hidden on undercover agents posing as passengers in more than 60% of tests last year. Screeners at Los Angeles International Airport missed about 75% of simulated explosives and bomb parts that Transportation Security Administration testers hid under their clothes or in carry-on bags at checkpoints, the TSA report shows. At Chicago O’Hare International Airport, screeners missed about 60% of hidden bomb materials that were packed in everyday carry-ons — including toiletry kits, briefcases and CD players. San Francisco International Airport screeners, who work for a private company instead of the TSA, missed about 20% of the bombs, the report shows. The TSA ran about 70 tests at Los Angeles, 75 at Chicago and 145 at San Francisco.

Senate Caves-In to Bush on Telecom immunity – The Senate sealed an expected deal this week with President Bush to grant major telecommunications companies — including Verizon, Comcast and AT&T — immunity from prosecution for their role in the President’s warrantless eavesdropping program if they can “demonstrate to a court that they acted pursuant to a legal directive in helping the government with surveillance in the United States.” News reports have fingered phone companies AT&T and Verizon as major players. Both firms are entangled in several class action lawsuits for handling over millions of customer files. Verizon recently admitted that it had honored requests for information at least 720 times without a court order.

Investigation Reveals White House Revolving Door on Iraq Public Relations – Political operatives who have promoted President Bush’s Iraq war agenda and their role in spreading “good news” about Iraq, are in a public relations revolving door among the Republican Party, the White House and the private sector. A series of connections exists between the Bush administration and two subsidiaries of the PR giant Burson-Marsteller, particularly BM’s own “grassroots” firm, Direct Impact. For example, Burson-Marsteller, which had hired former National Republican Congressional Committee communications director Craig Veith to oversee their Media Relations Practice, appointed him CEO of Direct Impact in late 2002.

As head of Media Relations, Veith and Prince Bandar, then Saudi ambassador to the US, had signed an agreement for Burson-Marsteller to work on repairing Saudi Arabia’s image in the wake of 9/11 – just three days after the attacks.

Veith was joined at Direct Impact in 2003 by a prominent GOP campaign strategist, Steve Schmidt, who had held Veith’s former job of communications director for the NRCC since 2001. Schmidt left Direct Impact a year later to become a top strategist in the Bush-Cheney ’04 campaign, where he ran the rapid response operation. He then joined the White House staff as a Senior Adviser to the President and a Counselor to the Vice President.

In April 2005, former Bush-Cheney ’04 Midwest regional political director Dave DenHerder joined Direct Impact. DenHerder would become Direct Impact’s COO in September after Veith, who had been both CEO and COO, departed to found his own firm.

The most recent news buzz about Burson-Marsteller has been about their contract with the embattled security contractor Blackwater USA

Regards,

Jim

Mitt Romney’s New National Security Adviser Said He’d Torture “In A Heartbeat” – Retired General James “Spider” Marks, who has just been named a new national security adviser to Mitt Romney’s campaign, asserted in a 2005 interview that he would readily torture prisoners to save a soldier’s life or stop a terror bomb, saying: “I’d stick a knife in somebody’s thigh in a heartbeat.”

How Ironic: Bush taps birth control critic to head family planning programming – President Bush’s choice for heading family planning programming within the Department of Health and Human Services is a critic of birth control. Susan Orr, most recently an associate commissioner in the Administration for Children and Families, was appointed Monday to be acting deputy assistant secretary for population affairs,” reports the Washington Post. “She will oversee $283 million in annual grants to provide low-income families and others with contraceptive services, counseling and preventive screenings.”

More Irony: Bush Exhorts Congress to Work Harder – President Bush on Wednesday accused Congress of dragging its feet on key pieces of legislation, urging quick action on budget and children’s health measures.

Yeah, that’s right, Bush says Congress isn’t working hard enough. His proof? That they haven’t passed legislation on children’s health care…except, of course, they have, with bipartisan support, and he vetoed it, so now Congress has to waste valuable time trying to override his veto of very popular legislation wanted by almost everyone outside the GOP’s base.

Speaking of work: Bush on Track to Become the #1 Vacation President of All Times – The current presidential vacation-time record holder is the late Ronald Reagan, who tallied 436 days in his two terms. But, at 418 days, and with 17 months to go in his presidency, Bush is going to beat that easily. Hey, did I just read that Bush said Congress should work harder? Hello Pot, meet Kettle!

Verizon provided data to Feds 720 times without court order or determining its legality – Verizon has provided data to federal authorities on an emergency basis without a court order — and without determining the requests’ legality — 720 times between January 2005 and September of this year.

Republican Smears Sick Toddler’s Parents – Mark Hemingway at the National Review says the parents of a sick toddler are irresponsible for having a child when they can’t afford health insurance. So he is pro-life only if you have money.

Fox News Uses Not-So-Expert-on Global-Warming Expert to Try to Discredit Al Gore – Dr. William Gray, who argues that humans are not responsible for the warming of the earth, and says that salinity determines the temperature of the oceans’ waters, was cited on the Fox and Friends show as proof that Al Gore is all wrong. However, The Washington Post reports:

Gray’s crusade against global warming “hysteria” began in the early 1990s, when he saw enormous sums of federal research money going toward computer modeling rather than his kind of science, the old-fashioned stuff based on direct observation. Gray often cites the ascendancy of Gore to the vice presidency as the start of his own problems with federal funding. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) stopped giving him research grants. So did NASA. All the money was going to computer models. The field was going off on this wild tangent.

Someone like Bill Gray seems to be a fully credentialed authority figure. But when you press him on his theory of how thermohaline circulation has caused recent warming of the planet and will soon cause cooling, he concedes that he hasn’t published the idea in any peer-reviewed journal. He’s working on it, he says.

The Web site Real Climate run by a loose group of climate scientists, recently published a detailed refutation of Gray’s theory, saying his claims about the ocean circulation lack evidence. The Web site criticized Gray for not adapting to the modern era of meteorology, “which demands hypotheses soundly grounded in quantitative and consistent physical formulations, not seat-of-the-pants flying.”

The field has fully embraced numerical modeling, and Gray is increasingly on the fringe. His cranky skepticism has become a tired act among younger scientists. “It’s sad,” says Emanuel,(Kerry Emanuel, an atmospheric scientist at MIT).

Former Telcom CEO Says Bush’s Illegal Spying Began Months Before 9/11 Attacks – A former Qwest Communications International executive, appealing a conviction for insider trading, has alleged that the government withdrew opportunities for contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars after Qwest refused to participate in an unidentified National Security Agency program that the company thought might be illegal. Former chief executive Joseph P. Nacchio, convicted in April of 19 counts of insider trading, said the NSA approached Qwest more than six months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, according to court documents unsealed in Denver this week.

Hard-Line Anti-Illegal Immigrant Mayor Hires Two Illegal Immigrants – Bogota, New Jersey Mayor Steve Lonegan, whose hard line against illegal immigration has at times attracted national attention, this week hired two workers whom police later found to be undocumented immigrants. Lonegan, perhaps best known for taking McDonald’s to task for placing a Spanish-language billboard in town, said he enlisted the men to help assemble political signs in the garage of a vacant home he owns in the borough.

Bush Administration to Slash Protected Habitat for Endangered Peninsular Bighorn Sheep – On October 10, 2007, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in line with the Bush administration’s status quo for species non-protection, proposed severely restricting critical habitat for the Peninsular Ranges desert bighorn sheep. The new critical habitat proposal would reduce by nearly 55 percent the area that the agency determined in 2001 was crucial for the survival and recovery of this highly endangered animal. Joan Taylor of the Coachella Valley Sierra Club put it this way: “Nothing is different about bighorn biology since the original critical habitat determination, but the politics have changed. What the administration has basically done is to cave to special development interests, and the bighorn have taken the shaft in the process.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service is accepting public comments on the new proposal until December 10, 2007. You can submit your comments regarding the severe restriction of Peninsular Ranges bighorn sheep critical habitat by sending an email to fw8cfwocomments@fws.gov.

Regards,

Jim

Below is a message I sent to Congressman Nick Lampson and it includes a message I sent to Congressman Ron Paul:

I’m surrounded by your district, but I contributed to your run against the worst Congressman ever and have attended many of your local constituent meetings.

I’m on you email distribution list and enjoy responding to your surveys. However, today’s survey on SCHIP would not respond to my clicking of the Submit button.

I support the expansion of the SCHIP program and think we need to go even further.

I’m near retirement and despite my ‘significant’ resources, I’m concerned that maintaining our health could easily put us in the poor house. National healthcare for all is the right thing to do. If passing this SCHIP over the “Shrub’s” veto can be done to start us down that slippery slop, then let’s do it.

Thank you for your service and hope to see you again for lunch.

One other thing ….

Here is a copy of my message to my Congressman Ron Paul. This is an example of what really disappoints me about Congress. It’s bad enough that we have a lame duck in the White House, but to have a lame duck Congress that can only come together on such as this is very sad:

“Congressman,

I am very disappointed in your vote on MoveOn.org. We not only have a lame duck president, we have a lame duck Congress. But worse yet, Congress has as much disrespect for the Constitution as the President does. Bush took away habeas corpus and both Congress and the Administration only want free speech for the extreme right like Ann Coulter or Fox “Noise.”

There is something very wrong with those who work inside the beltway!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Left Gets Blasted While the Extreme Right Gets Free Speech

If you just overlook all the hype over the headline of the add and read the other view of the ‘success’ of the surge, you will find it to be true. General Petraeus could not use this information because his boss would not have allowed it. The general understands his chain-of-command.”

Add to this the despicable attacks on children supporting SCHIP that are initiated by “right-wing authoritarians” in Congress and the media and I just can’t believe how low this country has sunk from what The Greatest Generation defended during WWII. The only think that I’m glad for at this time is that my mother, now 92, doesn’t realize what has happened to the country she served between 1942 and 1944.

Keep up the fight for what is right for the citizens of this country.

The Man Behind the UK Court Attack on Al Gore’s Film is a Fuel and Mining Magnate – The school governor who challenged the screening of Al Gore’s climate change documentary in secondary schools was funded by a Scottish quarrying magnate who established a controversial lobbying group to attack environmentalists’ claims about global warming. Stewart Dimmock’s high-profile fight to ban the film being shown in schools was depicted as a David and Goliath battle, with the Kent school governor taking on the state by arguing that the government was ‘brainwashing’ pupils. Dimmock’s case was supported by a powerful network of business interests with close links to the fuel and mining lobbies. He was also supported by a Conservative councillor in Hampshire, Derek Tipp.

Conservatives Ignore UK Court’s Finding That Al Gore’s Film is Very Well Supported by Scientific Research – Those who use the nine errors and exaggerations the judge found in the film to slam Gore have a responsibility to be fair and say what the judge found before he cited the nine instances.
From the judgement:

“17 ii) As Mr Chamberlain persuasively sets out at paragraph 11 of his skeleton:
‘The Film advances four main scientific hypotheses, each of which is very well supported by research published in respected, peer-reviewed journals and accords with the latest conclusions of the IPCC:
(1) global average temperatures have been rising significantly over the past half century and are likely to continue to rise (“climate change”);
(2) climate change is mainly attributable to man-made emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide (“greenhouse gases”);
(3) climate change will, if unchecked, have significant adverse effects on the world and its populations; and
(4) there are measures which individuals and governments can take which will help to reduce climate change or mitigate its effects.’
These propositions, Mr Chamberlain submits (and I accept), are supported by a vast quantity of research published in peer-reviewed journals worldwide and by the great majority of the world’s climate scientists.”

Attack on Al Gore’s Electricity Usage is from a Right-Wing Group That Misrepresents Itself as “Non-Partisan” – The attack originated from the Tennessee Center For Policy Research. TCPR claims “to be non-partisan, but only link(s) to far-right and conservative groups so regardless of what their status is with the IRS, this is a conservative, strongly-leaning Republican organization.” The “non-partisan” TCPR web site links only to right-wing groups such as the Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation and American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Tennessee Center’s President Drew Johnson comes straight out of the right’s network, coming from Exxon-funded American Enterprise Institute and the right-wing-funded National Taxpayers Foundation. The Tennessee Center For Policy Research is part of the right’s State Policy Network. “SPN is a national network of state-based right-wing organizations in 37 states as well as prominent nationwide right-wing organizations. Through its network SPN advances the public policy ideas of the expansive right-wing political movement on the state and local level.”

The Tennessee Dept. of Revenue has actually termed the TCPR as “not a legitimate organization.” The Tennessee Center for Policy Research claimed to have gotten its figures for Gore’s electic usage from Nashville Electric Service. But company spokeswoman Laurie Parker said the utility never got a request from the policy center and never gave it any information.”
Gore’s family has taken numerous steps to reduce the carbon footprint of their private residence, including signing up for 100 percent green power through Green Power Switch installing solar panels, and using compact fluorescent bulbs and other energy saving technology. Gore has had a consistent position of purchasing carbon offsets to offset the family’s carbon footprint. Keith Olbermann at MSNBC reported that the Gore home includes offices for both Gore and his wife and ‘special security measures’ making it unrepresentative of what the average US home consumes. Additionally, the green power purchased by the Gores increased the cost of their electricity by “$5,893, more than 50 percent, in order to minimize carbon pollution. Zoning rules in Al Gore’s upscale neighborhood kept the former vice president and environmental activist from installing solar panels on his roof. The rules were changed in April. The Gore family is “in the midst of installing solar panels on their home, which will enable them to use less power.” They also use compact fluorescent bulbs and other energy efficiency measures and then they purchase offsets for their carbon emissions to bring their carbon footprint down to zero.

NTUF

State Policy Network

Tennesee Valley Authority

Community Television Weakened by the FCC – Congress didn’t act on legislation that would have severely weakened or eliminated local video franchising for telephone companies and put community television in danger — but the FCC did.

Dow Jones Drops Paid-for CNBC Ads From Web Sites in Favor of Fox Links – On the day they had contracted to run advertisements placed by CNBC, two Web sites owned by Dow Jones & Company instead ran ads for that cable business channel’s new competitor, the Fox Business Network. Both MarketWatch and The Wall Street Journal’s Web site, WSJ.com, filled up the exact spaces CNBC had purchased with rotating ads that included some for Fox Business Network. These were accompanied by links to foxbusiness.com, the Web site of the Fox Business Network. The ads for Fox started running soon after midnight. CNBC, which is owned by NBC Universal (both are units of General Electric), had concluded a deal with Dow Jones more than a month ago to secure those locations for ads supporting CNBC. CNBC paid about $87,000 for the ads.

Regards,

Jim

1. One to deny that the light bulb needs to be changed

2. One to attack the patriotism of anyone who says the light bulb needs to be changed.

3. One to blame Clinton for burning out the light bulb.

4. One to tell the nations of the world that they are either for changing the light bulb or they are for darkness.

5. One to give a billion dollar no-bid/cost-plus contract to Halliburton for the new light bulb.

6. One to arrange a photograph of Bush, dressed as a janitor, standing on a stepladder under the banner: “Light Bulb Change Accomplished.”

7. One administration insider to resign and write a book documenting in detail how Bush was literally in the dark.

8. One to viciously smear #7.

9. One surrogate to campaign on TV and at rallies on how George Bush has had a strong light bulb changing policy all along.

10. One to represent the “Light Bulb Twisters for Truth and Justice” in their claim that Thomas Edison was actually out of the country when the light bulb was invented, and that he was in fact a cowardly traitor, incapable of twisting, let alone inventing a light bulb.

11. One to create new tax breaks for the manufacturer of the light bulb to move its factories overseas.

12. One to suggest that layed-off American light bulb makers train their foreign replacements.

13. One to change the name of “ light bulb” to “Devine-Light Bulb From Above”.

14. One to create a Constitutional Amendment banning “gays” from screwing bulbs.

15. One to promote the “trickle down light” theory, where poor people get scraps of light from bulbs exclusively screwed by the rich.

16. One to say, “We would not comment on, confirm, or deny, any elements of our light bulb changing procedures in the interest of maintaining the operational security and integrity of said procedures, if in fact those procedures exist.”

17. One to pray for the soul of the dead light bulb and to remind us that we must choose a Christian light bulb as a replacement.

18. One to make the right-wing pundit panel TV talk show rounds with the claim that the light bulb did not burn out on its own, but was in fact sabotaged by Al Gore in an attempt to slow global warming – a clear act of terrorism in league with Al Qaeda and Iran.

19. One to say, “We cannot answer the question because of there is an on going investigation into why the light bulb is out.”

20. One to look at a videotape of the old light bulb, and say, “I’m an electrician, and I can tell that the light bulb is not out. The light bulb is still on, and glowing.”

21. One to convene a special emergency session of Congress to intervene on behalf of the still-in-socket light bulb, in order to get the courts involved with preventing anyone from removing the light bulb from its electricity supply.

22. One to announce that the ladder used to screw in the light bulb is now called the “freedom ladder”.

23. One to proclaim that we’re changing light bulbs over there so we don’t have to change them here.

24. One to say, “I do not recall a light bulb.”

And there’s these quotes about the light-bulb situation:
George Bush: “That information is covered under Executive Privilege.”
Dick Cheney: “We will be welcomed as light-bulb liberators.”
Rudy Guilliani: “I changed a light bulb on 9/11.”
John McCain: “My entire campaign staff has either quit or been fired, so I sit in the dark a lot.”
Mitt Romney: “I was pro-change before I was pro-light, but then I changed my mind.”
Larry Craig: “My wide stance won’t allow me to stand on that stool to change the bulb.”

But regardless of the number of Republicans that get involved, the excuses mount, and the light bulb never gets changed. They’re just waiting for someone else to take over and change it for them.

Based on: HOW MANY REPUBLICANS– EVEN WITH HELP FROM THEIR STOOGES, LIKE LIEBERMAN– DOES IT TAKE TO SCREW IN A LIGHT BULB?

Regards,

Jim

Ann Coulter says Jews need “to be perfected” and the nation would be better off if it were all-Christian – Appearing on “The Big Idea” with host Donny Deutsch on Monday, Ann Coulter said Christians were tolerant of racial diversity but that it “would be a lot easier” for Jews if they were to become Christians. Deutsch, who described himself as a practicing Jew on the show, was clearly dismayed by the remarks, which he called “hateful” and “anti-Semitic.” In her defense, Coulter apologized for the remarks and said they were misinterpreted. “I don’t think you should take it that way (as offensive), but that is what Christians consider themselves: perfected Jews. We believe the Old Testament,” she said.

CIA Chief Ordered Probe of Inspector General – The work of the CIA’s in-house investigator who found fault with the agency’s handling of the Sept. 11 attacks is being subjected to an internal review, published reports say. The move, which is highly unusual, has raised concerns that CIA Director Michael Hayden is trying to squelch the investigations of Inspector General John Helgerson.

Is the Department of Homeland Security Using Robot Insects to Spy on Protesters? – Vanessa Alarcon saw them while working at an antiwar rally in Lafayette Square last month. “I heard someone say, ‘Oh my god, look at those,’ ” the college senior from New York recalled. “I look up and I’m like, ‘What the hell is that?’ They looked kind of like dragonflies or little helicopters. But I mean, those are not insects.” Out in the crowd, Bernard Crane saw them, too. “I’d never seen anything like it in my life,” the Washington lawyer said. “They were large for dragonflies. I thought, ‘Is that mechanical, or is that alive?’ ” That is just one of the questions hovering over a handful of similar sightings at political events in Washington and New York. Some suspect the insect-like drones are high-tech surveillance tools, perhaps deployed by the Department of Homeland Security.

Income Inequality Worst Since 1920s – The superrich are gobbling up an ever larger piece of the economic pie, and the poor are seeing their share of earnings shrink: new IRS data shows the top 1 percent of Americans are claiming a larger share of national income than at any time since before the Great Depression. The top percentile of wealthy Americans earned 21.2 percent of all income in 2005, up from 19 percent in 2004, according to new Internal Revenue Service data published in the Wall Street Journal Friday. Americans in the bottom 50 percent of wage earners saw their share of income shrink to 12.8 percent in 2005, down from 13.4 percent.

Rush Limbaugh: War is Peace, Black is White, and Up is Down – As for the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Al Gore, Rush Limbaugh had a suggestion: “I call on Albert Arnold ‘Algore’ to redirect his Nobel Peace Prize to genuine agents of peace.” And who might that be? Army Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. troops in Iraq. “If there has ever been an engine of peace, it’s the United States military,” Limbaugh said.

Regards,

Jim

Two Iraqi Women Killed by Security Contractors – Two Iraqi women were killed when guards from the Australian-run private security firm, RTI International, working for the U. S. State Department, fired at the women’s white Oldsmobile. As many as 40 bullets struck the car, killing the driver and the woman in the front seat on the passenger side. A woman and a boy in the back seat survived, according to witnesses and local police officials in the Karada neighborhood, where the shooting took place on a boulevard lined with appliance stores, tea shops and money changers.

Bush and the Phone Companies: Partners in Crime – The phone companies’ lobbyists have teamed with Bush to strong arm Congress into granting full immunity for a disturbing array of illegal and unconstitutional acts.

Aetna charges 20 cents to do what Medicare does for a nickel and federal law guarantees their right to go right on doing it

Regards,

Jim