Violence surges in Iraq's cities

A roadside bomb in Baghdad has killed at least eight people, while violence has broken out in Mosul and Basra.....more

Ann Coulter’s Beautiful Big Money Smear Machine

Ann Coulter was made in the 1990s, as was her right-wing blonde book-end Laura Ingraham, who recently clucked that journalists should get off of their hotel balconies and report the Iraq war; a war that is the deadliest conflict for journalists since WWII.....more

Bill Clinton slams Joe Lieberman

The former president described Lieberman's stand on the war as, "I want to attack Iraq whether or not they have weapons of mass destruction." "His position is the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld position....more

Better Saddam Than Dead

Better dead than Red. During the Cold War, that was the rallying cry of the diehard anti-communists, many of whom never had to face the choice. During those years, hundreds of millions of people—in the Soviet Union, in China and elsewhere—did not adhere to such an extreme slogan. They may not have fancied living in lands without freedoms, but they believed it was preferable to reside under repression than to die trying to topple tyranny.....more

The Bush Administration is acting as the muscle for Coke and Pepsi.

The two soft drink manufacturers are under fire in India after a recent report released by a respected environmental group revealed that the colas marketed in that country contain dangerous pesticides, sometimes at alarmingly high levels. (Coke and Pepsi have hotly disputed the conclusions.).....more

U.S. Torture and Abuse of Detainees

“No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”—The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 5 (1948)

Each day brings more information about the appalling abuses inflicted upon men and women held by the United States in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere around the world. U.S. forces have used interrogation techniques including hooding, stripping detainees naked, subjecting them to extremes of heat, cold, noise and light, and depriving them of sleep—in violation of the Geneva Conventions.....more

Torture Museum

Old Threats, New Fears

Government-induced hysteria thrives on public ignorance, which is why President Bush is so confident of turning the British bomb plot to his partisan purposes. Otherwise, how could he dare claim that his policies have made the nation safer?.....more

Why We Don't Know Our Enemy

Thinking about '08: Playing Pundit for Fun, No Profit

When Al Gore endorsed Howard Dean in 2004 right before Dean's campaign imploded, taking $40 million with it, everyone treated Gore as if he had gone even crazier--what with growing a beard, pointing out that Iraq was a mistake and George W. Bush was a liar. My thought was that Gore was positioning himself for 2008.....more

Republicanisms: War on Terror
1. An unconstitutional never-ending war on an abstract noun
2. Best thing that ever happened to the military-industrial complex
3. Cold War nostagia

From the "Dictionary of Republicanisms"

The new GOP talking point:
"Adapt to win."

Jon Stewart takes a look at the propaganda bug….Stay the course. Or is it?.....more

Fellow Floridians:
This may come as a shock but Bill (The Next Lieberman) Nelson has NOT yet pledged his support for Ned Lamont.

CT-Sen: Bob Geiger is maintaining a list of Senators pledging support
to Ned Lamont. Check it out here, and if your Democratic Senator isn't on that list, give them a call.

http://billnelson.senate.gov/contact/email.cfm

Will the real Democrats please stand up? Other choices in Nov. here

Right Wing attacks the Commander-in-Chief during a time of war

We have a rule in our country that "attacking the Commander-in-Chief during a time of war" helps The Terrorists and emboldens our enemies. Joe Lieberman put it this way: "in matters of war, we undermine presidential credibility at our nation's peril.".....more

Linda Ronstadt defends her politics

Five minutes into the interview and Linda Ronstadt is screaming into the phone, “George Bush stinks!”
“He’s an idiot,” Ronstadt says, adding, “he’s enormously incompetent on both the domestic and international scenes.”.....more

Public Stoning:
Not Just for the Taliban Anymore

"I don't want to capture their (mainstream Americans') system. I want to replace it," fumed North to a cheering audience. North has called for the stoning of gays and nonbelievers (rocks are cheap and plentiful, he has observed). Both friends and foes label him "Scary Gary.".....more

Racial Profiling Gone Wild
No Terror Connection in Michigan Cell Phone Case

On the kids from Texas busted in Michigan Friday and being held by local Michigan prosecutors for terror offenses because they bought too many cell phones at a Wal-Mart.....more

Madonna Headed for Das Big House?

If Madonna doesn't change her ways, she could be going from "Hung Up" to locked up.
German prosecutors have announced plans to monitor the erstwhile Material Girl's Sunday concert in Duesseldorf to see if she goes ahead with the mock-crucifixion routine that has been drawing religious ire since her Confessions tour kicked off in May.....more

War is a Racket
The Anti-War Classic by America's Most Decorated General

Is a short work by former U.S. Marine Major General Smedley Darlington Butler, where Butler discusses how business interests have commercially benefited from warfare. Butler points to a variety of examples, mostly from World War I, where industrialists whose operations were subsidised by public funding were able to generate substantial profits essentially from mass human suffering..... Wikipedia

Read It Here

The Constitution in Crisis; The Downing Street Minutes and Deception,Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Coverups in the Iraq War,and Illegal Domestic Surveillance.....here

Welcome To The Hague

Did Cheney Go Too Far?

By insinuating that the sizeable majority of American voters who oppose the war in Iraq are aiding and abetting the enemy, Vice President Cheney on Wednesday may have crossed the line that separates legitimate political discourse from hysteria.....more

'They've run this play one too many times','The American people simply do not recognize any validity in what they're saying.'...... Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Lou Dobbs Wakes Up to 9/11 Lies

South Koreans tried and punished by online vigilantes

"By the time I found out the source of this outrage, it was too late. My name, address, photographs, telephone numbers were all over the Internet," . "Tens of thousands of people were busy sharing my identity and discussing how to punish me.....more

Internet rules the news in South Korea

An indigenous revolution brings hope to Bolivia

The challenges in Bolivia are formidable but so is the energy and spirit of the people. For more than 500 years they have waited for this moment and now it is theirs.....more

Fear and Smear

An evil symbiosis does exist between Muslim terrorists and American politicians, but it is not the one Republicans describe. The jihadists need George W. Bush to sustain their cause. His bloody crusade in the Middle East bolsters their accusation that America is out to destroy Islam. The president has unwittingly made himself the lead recruiter of willing young martyrs.....more

Criminal Administration

A few months from now, after midterm elections, if Democrats regain a majority in Congress—or if Democrats regain the Executive office in three years—almost the entire Bush administration could be standing trial....more

Dean Defends Lamont, Slams Lieberman

Today on NBC’s Meet the Press, David Gregory asked DNC Chairman Howard Dean, about his support for Ned Lamont vs. Joe Lieberman.....more

Meet: Marc A. Murolo

After Reading On "The State Of Sunshine" About The Tribute To The Victim's Of 911 By This Website
2,996: A Tribute to the Victims of 9/11
Bloggers honor the innocent victims of that awful day...

I was Honored To Be Assigned Marc A. Murolo.

Other Local Tribute's
Out In Left Field
Fire On The Poop Deck
In Theory

Free Republic: The Castro images are fake

Not fake in the sense that that isn’t Castro, but they were not taken at the time they are stated to have been taken....more

Hemingway felines in Key West spark USDA catfight

For more than 40 years, they have lounged on Ernest Hemingway's bed, lolled in his garden and sipped water from the urinal he dragged home from his favorite saloon (Sloppy Joe's), delighting tourists from around the world.....more

Floridians think war has been handled badly

A St. Petersburg Times poll found that more than half of Floridians think President Bush has done a poor job handling the war in Iraq, an opinion that could spill over into this fall’s elections.....more

Bush Seeks Political Gains from Foiled Plot

US President George W. Bush seized on a foiled London airline bomb plot to hammer unnamed critics he accused of having all but forgotten the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
Weighed down by the unpopular war in Iraq, Bush and his aides have tried to shift the national political debate from that conflict to the broader and more popular global war on terrorism ahead of November 7 congressional elections.....more

'Retaliation monstrous and disproportionate'

Lebanon's social affairs minister is appalled by what she sees as the "monstrous and disproportionate retaliation" of the Israeli military against her country.....more

Braves give the boot to conservative group at "Faith Day"

Several gay rights groups on the Web bristled with speculation that Focus on the Family was given the boot for promoting its belief that homosexuality is a social problem comparable to alcoholism, gambling or depression.....more

Commie Book Ban

"Angelina Jolie has a tattoo of Che Guevara ... like Mike Tyson," said Emilio Izquierdo as he shook his head in mild bewilderment.....more

Vamos a Cuba

Bush staff wanted bomb-detect cash moved

While the British terror suspects were hatching their plot, the Bush administration was quietly seeking permission to divert $6 million that was supposed to be spent this year developing new homeland explosives detection technology.....more

Beyond Chutzpah: Cheney Implies Terrorists Are Happy Lieberman Lost

Here's the bottom line: Ned Lamont ran against the war in Iraq, a war that Joe Lieberman vehemently supported -- and still supports. A war that 60 percent of Americans are against. A war that is the defining foreign policy initiative of the Bush administration -- an initiative that has been an abject failure on every level. A war that has put the GOP's back against the electoral wall. So it's firing back with it's favorite weapon -- fear -- trying to make the case that being against the war somehow makes Lamont soft on national security.....more

"I just think that this Bush administration confuses a comprehensive attack on the terrorists with the invasion of Iraq,"......Ned Lamont

FL-22: Another Republican runs away from Bush

A strong challenge by Democratic state Sen. Ron Klein is giving 13-term Republican Rep. E. Clay Shaw Jr. what appears the toughest challenge of his House career. And Shaw, as he seeks to hang on in south Florida's politically competitive 22nd District, is using his TV advertising to preemptively -- if selectively -- distance himself from President Bush.....more

Be Prepared For Republicans To Close Gap

Right now, both Democrats and the progressive movement are flying high. Our fifty-state strategy has yielded record candidate recruitment. With a 43% Democratic turnout in Connecticut, evidence continues to mount that Democrats are turning out at higher rates than Republicans (possibly significantly higher rates)....more

Cheney on Lamont: Can't Resist the Low Blow

Mayhem in Iraq. Global warming on the warpath. National debt to the moon. There's much to moan about. But it's the little things that sometimes can tick one off the most....more

Half of Americans Still Believe In WMDs - They Saw Them on TV

A recent Harris Poll reports found that while “the U.S. and other countries have not found any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, surprisingly more U.S. adults (50%) think that Iraq had such weapons when the U.S. invaded Iraq.....more

The neocons' next war
By secretly providing NSA intelligence to Israel and undermining the hapless Condi Rice, hardliners in the Bush administration are trying to widen the Middle East conflict to Iran and Syria, not stop it....more

A Clean Break:A New Strategy for Securing the Realm

The Nexus of Politics and Terror

In the last three years there had been about 13 similar coincidences - a political downturn for the administration, followed by a “terror event” - a change in alert status, an arrest, a warning....more

Watch it Here

Dean on Republican Post-Primary Spin

"Republicans can try to spin their propaganda, but the truth is Republicans are out of touch with America and the November elections will be a referendum on George Bush's failed policies".....more

Yesterday....
Neo-Conservatives' "Favorite Democrat" Falls

Today....
Bush says plot a 'stark reminder'

"hmmm"?

Q&A: Liquid explosives

An alleged plot to blow up planes from the UK mid-flight and cause "mass murder on an unimaginable scale" has been disrupted, Scotland Yard has said....more

Penguins in Texas highway crash

Texas highway patrol officers carried out one of their strangest rescues after a truck carrying 25 penguins, an octopus and exotic fish overturned....more

Let's Speak Rumsfeldian!

It's the new language that's sweeping the globe!....more

Neo-Conservatives' "Favorite Democrat" Falls

Tuesday's defeat in Connecticut's primary election of President George W. Bush's "favourite Democrat", Sen. Joe Lieberman, by a little-known anti-war candidate marks a major setback to neo-conservative hopes of maintaining bipartisan support for the administration's aggressive foreign policies, particularly in the Middle East.....more

Smith lets Big Sugar do the dirty work

How nice that U.S. Sugar, which has done so much for - sorry, I meant to - the state of Florida, now is telling people how to vote in the governor's race.....more

Lamont's Victory -- A Media Defeat
Jeff Cohen

Lieberman is not just the favorite Democrat of the White House and corporate interests; he’s also a favorite of conservative pundits and Fox News and Sean Hannity, who proposed “Conservatives for Lieberman” and has volunteered to campaign and fundraise for Joe in Connecticut.....more

The Unmaking of a Senator: How Bloggers Pulled It Off

With Lieberman's primary loss, the netroots movement has established itself as a power center among Democrats. But will its influence haunt the party in November?.....more

"MoveOn is not fringe. They're the heart of the party.".....Mary Matalin

Dean on Yesterday's Strong Turnout in Democratic Primaries Across the Country

"In Connecticut, Democratic voters exercised their most fundamental right as Americans, choosing Ned Lamont as the Democratic nominee. We congratulate Mr. Lamont and look forward to working with him both to ensure his victory in November and as a United States Senator....more

Mr. Lamont Goes to Washington



The Morning After....
Posted by Kirby noon Eastern

We follow people who care about their fellow man and supporting this amazing experiment called the United States and getting it back in line with the Constitution our framers brilliantly constructed so as to remain our guiding principle here, 200+ years later......more

C'mon kids, let's go to Army World!

The Army is considering a proposal to allow a private developer to build a military-themed park that would include Cobra Gunship rides and bars including a "1st Division Lounge.".....more

Ned, Did it!
Antiwar challengers across US get a vote of confidence

In October 2002, lawmakers in Congress were presented with a preelection test about where they stood on Iraq, and most answered it by siding with President Bush, voting to authorize his use of force against Saddam Hussein and promising an anxious electorate that they would be protected against a potential threat from Iraq.....more

America Struggles With Its Own Evangelical Taliban

At this late stage of the Bush rapture, American evangelism is a lot like the Exxon Valdez: Massive, sloshing with oily energy and not a little drunk on its power as it steers through hazards of its own designs. The moment evangelicals began tearing down the church-state wall, the rubble became their shoals.....more