Author Archives: Stephen VanDyke

Why the change of heart my dear American compatriots? Has the government finally seen the light that torture and abuse is wicked and evil and is not excusable, even under the pretense of war?

No. We simply couldn’t get the required nine out of fifteen required votes from the U.N. Security Council to extend the exemption for U.S. soldiers from international prosecution. Reuters reports in “U.S. Withdraws UN Measure on Immunity for Soldiers”:

The United States has rarely faced such opposition in the council, with the notable exception of its attempt to get U.N. endorsement for the invasion of Iraq last year. Since then, the council has backed Washington on its plans in Iraq, with far less acrimony than before the war.

But this year specter of U.S. abuse of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan made it difficult for members to extend the resolution for the third time, even though analysts say the scandal would not come before the new tribunal.

No, really? You mean our reputation has been damaged? Shocking.

U.S. Withdraws UN Measure on Immunity for Soldiers [Reuters]

You know, there’s some sex tapes out there that everyone actually wants to see. Move over, Paris Hilton, the Democrats are frothing for some raunchy, Republican Senate candidate Jack Ryan, sexcapades.

Wait… scratch that. No one wants to see (or hear) about some pasty middle-aged Republican jacking off with his wife, even if he’s running for Senate. Well, maybe they do.

If you want to hear about the dirty details of the moral depravity of Jack Ryan, there’s plenty to be found. The scandal-seeking Wonkette asserts in “Illinois Senate Race: Well, Someone Is Sure Getting Whipped Now”:

Ryan’s divorce papers have been plaguing him the entire campaign and the latest revelations are Starr report-level steamy: In them, Ryan’s ex-wife (Jeri Ryan, former alien hottie, later cast in the equally improbable role of a Boston public school teacher) accuses him of taking her to several sex clubs and says he asked her to get jiggy with him in front of other couples. Bright side for the family values folks: She insists he didn’t cheat on her.

But it’s funny because he did it in Paris; Everyone tries to do the nasty in Paris. Political Wire seems to think that the GOP is starting to bail on his (whipped) ass in “In Illinois, Ryan Cancels Key Fundraiser”:

NBC5-TV reports Hastert’s office says he has been called to a “leadership conference at the White House” and would be unable to attend the Ryan event.

That’s Republican code for “oh snap! If we don’t bail on this guy, we’re total hypocrites.” This guy is sooooo not getting elected, bet money on it.

Illinois Senate Race: Well, Someone Is Sure Getting Whipped Now [Wonkette]
In Illinois, Ryan Cancels Key Fundraiser [Political Wire]
Hastert Spokesman: ‘Iraq Trumps Jack Ryan’ [NBC5-TV]

Via Slashdot comes and interesting story by Wired New: “More False Information From TSA”:

Delta, Continental, America West, JetBlue and Frontier Airlines secretly turned over sensitive passenger data to Transportation Security Administration contractors in the spring and summer of 2002, according to the sworn statement of acting TSA chief David Stone. In addition, two of the four largest airline reservation centers, Galileo International and Sabre, also gave sensitive passenger information, including home phone numbers, credit card numbers and health data, without disclosing the transfers to travelers or asking their permission. {emphasis added}

[...]

In November 2003, the senators also asked Stone’s predecessor, retired Adm. James Loy, whether “any contractors working on CAPPS II used any real-world data for testing purposes.” Loy led the TSA from July 2002 until he was promoted to the second-highest position in the Department of Homeland Security in October 2003.

Loy’s sworn written response was, “No. TSA has not used any (passenger) data to test any of the functions of CAPPS II.”

Two TSA spokesmen also made false statements to Wired News about the extent of the transfers.

One of the best summations of the problem with news like this was said by one of the readers at Slashdot:

Nobody’s going to get fired over this, nobody’s going to go to jail over this, nobody’s going to even care about this.

If you do, you’re un-American. Welcome to McCarthyism, population: you.

Airlines Gave More Data Than Previously Disclosed [Slashdot]
More False Information From TSA [Wired News]
Comment: It’s legal when you make the laws [Slashdot]

Give me a break with the Clinton book coverage already. We know! He wrote a book! And the right-wingers are already scrambling onto the OMG-no-one-is-buying-the-book bandwagon. Here’s a snapshot of Drudge Report right now… 22 goddamn links to cities that are non-plussed or ecstatic about the book sales. But the créme du la créme has to be when they interview Jeb Bush. I mean, it’s obvious to any political news junky that he’s not going to read any book about Clinton. I mean, BIG FUCKING SURPRISE! No? The best part of the interview has to be where he talks about his short attention span, “I briefly read a great novel about the Alamo after watching the movie.” (emphasis added). Because you know, books are like, long and shit.

Frankly, no one cares… which means no one cares about the kajillion stories that the press is trying to fob off on us about nobody caring. Get over it already.

Props to Angry Finger for letting me know about the Jeb story via AIM.

Florida governor doesn’t plan to read Clinton’s autobiography [Naples Daily News]

I gotta hand it to Roger Ebert, he reviews Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 and slams it due to the blatant inaccuracies caresses it gently like a soft kitten because he is aware of Moore’s integrity and adherence to the truth. Speaking of Moore’s earlier film — Bowling for Columbine — Eber said “some of his ‘facts’ were wrong, false or fudged”, he goes on to agree with Moore’s politics, but can’t get past the part where Moore is prevaricating in order to push his agenda. “But I cannot ignore flaws simply because I agree with the filmmaker. In hurting his cause, he wounds mine.” But he sums it up nicely saying that he agrees that there are some things that are wrong and “I agree with Moore that the presidency of George W. Bush has been a disaster for America.”

It would have been nice if Moore hadn’t let his hatred blind him, and unfortunately he is quickly becoming the liberal counter-part of the vitriol spewing pundits like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. These are men who are willing to lie in order to push their agenda, and none of them can be trusted, I wish people would wake up to the truth of it.

’9/11′: Just the facts? [Chicago Sun-Times]

Note: this article contains dead links, the url is still in the hover/alt text. Keep the web working, curate content well!

I know, never going to happen. But it’s fun to throw that out there, because Hunter S. Thompson is one of the few great American writers who has always had his fist wrapped around the throat of the corrupt political pig-dogs. The real news is that John Kerry met with Thompson in a secret meeting while visiting Aspen yesterday. The New York Times had the news in it’s coverage piece “The Longest Day”:

Half the group headed to Aspen, in two smaller planes, for a fundraiser and a visit with the writer Hunter S. Thompson, while the other half spent its eighth, ninth, 10th, 11th and 12th hours of the day without hearing a word from Mr. Kerry.

That must have been a hell of a long meeting.

I snagged this nice bit of information from American Dynamics’ “hunter and jfk”, but I have to disagree with his assertion that HST is the “god of the angry left.” No man with that many guns and a fanaticism for explosives would call himself a liberal.

Since it was a secret, my best “real” guess is to agree with Blaze thickeye (that’s twice I’ve attributed wrong) that Hunter gave some political strategy insight to Kerry, which he will never follow. It would be really smart for libertarian Michael Badnarik to go talk to Hunter S. Thompson, if he knows what’s good for his campaign. Selah.

The Longest Day [NYT]
hunter and jfk [American Dynamics]
Michael Badnarik Blog

Slate is reporting early reviews of former president Bill Clinton’s book — My Life. Some good quotes from across the board in the snippet “My [Boring] Life“:

New York Times in “The Pastiche of a Presidency, Imitating a Life, in 957 Pages”:

“a hodgepodge of jottings” that’s “sloppy, self-indulgent and often eye-crossingly dull.”

The review ran as a front page item, which is rare for a book review. Are the editors at the Times trying to make a statement here or give a review?

Newsweek in “Bill’s Self-Portrait”:

In truth, it is hardly an edge-of-your-seat experience. Throughout its leisurely 957 pages, however, every facet of Clinton’s complex, nuanced and sometimes maddening personality is on display. He is by turns introspective and willfully obtuse, expansive and curt. One moment, he forces the reader on a joyless march through an arid policy debate.

The Associate Press was even more acidic in “Clinton’s ‘Life’ both too much, not enough”:

None of them comes alive, not even the main characters of this badly conceived, flatly written, poorly edited book. Not Hillary Rodham Clinton, who comes off as a cardboard saint who is said to be smart and tough and good. Not special prosecutor Kenneth Starr, the book’s villain, who comes off as pure evil – not really a human being at all, more of an incubus.

And not even Bill Clinton himself. Here is one of the most fascinating figures of his time, a charismatic and brilliant man – a fatherless boy who rose from humble beginnings to live, in his own words, “an improbable life” – and he has produced a book that lacks anything more than the most rudimentary insights. This master politician does not even offer a single good discussion of the art of politics.

My [Boring] Life [Slate]
The Pastiche of a Presidency, Imitating a Life, in 957 Pages [NY Times]
Bill’s Self-Portrait [Newsweek]
Clinton’s ‘Life’ both too much, not enough [AP]

Christopher Hitchens over at Slate has a truly scathing review of Michael Moore’s new movie Fahrenheit 9/11 Here’s some choice qoutes from his article, “Unfairenheit 9/11: The lies of Michael Moore”:

Invasion of Iraq:

Watching the clips Moore uses, and recalling them well, I can recognize various Saddam palaces and military and police centers getting the treatment. But these sites are not identified as such. In fact, I don’t think Al Jazeera would, on a bad day, have transmitted anything so utterly propagandistic.

9/11 attacks:

Indeed, Moore’s affected and ostentatious concern for black America is one of the most suspect ingredients of his pitch package. In a recent interview, he yelled that if the hijacked civilians of 9/11 had been black, they would have fought back, unlike the stupid and presumably cowardly white men and women (and children). Never mind for now how many black passengers were on those planes–we happen to know what Moore does not care to mention: that Todd Beamer and a few of his co-passengers, shouting “Let’s roll,” rammed the hijackers with a trolley, fought them tooth and nail, and helped bring down a United Airlines plane, in Pennsylvania, that was speeding toward either the White House or the Capitol. There are no words for real, impromptu bravery like that, which helped save our republic from worse than actually befell.

[...]

To him, easy applause, in front of credulous audiences, is everything.

“Unfairenheit 9/11: The lies of Michael Moore” [Slate]

Normally I don’t like to post an entire show to the Internet, but um… well fuck it, I’m just posting a torrent link. Anyways, Bob gave me the heads up on last night’s show, so I figure I’d pass it along. The Daily Show on 6/21/2004 bittorrent link (92.8 MB)

[Video clip of Dick Cheney interview with CNBC Capital Report]
Interviewer: You have said in the past that it was, quote, “pretty well confirmed…”
Cheney: No I never said that.
Interviewer: Okay…
Cheney: Never said that.
Interviewer: I think that is…
Cheney: Absolutely not…

[Daily Show studio]
{laughter}
Jon Stewart: He absolutely never said that. {strokes chin} Hmmmmmm.

[Video clip of Cheney on Meet the Press, dated December 9, 2001]
Cheney: …it’s been pretty well confirmed, that he did go to Prague and he did meet with um, senior officials of the Iraq intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April.

[Daily Show studio]
Stewart: {stops stroking chin} Mr. Vice President, I… have to inform you… your pants are on fire.

The Daily Show on 6/21/2004 bittorrent link [Hammer of Truth]
BitTorrent download
The Daily Show with John Stewart [Comedy Central]

My exclusive feature article for WatchBlog is finally done and posted, so go check it out. I interviewed all of the libertarian candidates and a libertarian pundit and analyzed the dynamic between third party candidates and the media. Spread it around if you can, this is an *** EXCLUSIVE *** article and all that jazz, so you’re not going to find it in the media.

Hopefully it’s interesting and not dry and crappy or anything like that. I’ll be posting it here in full on Wednesday so that I have a copy of it on the blog.

Libertarians: Whispering from the Rafters [WatchBlog]

This is just a completely ridiculous story. Here’s the backstory: This past January, CBS decided it would be a great idea to deny MoveOn.org from displaying ads based on a policy that would disallow any “advocacy advertising” that would have an “undue influence on “controversial issues of public importance.” Now, they are flipping their own rule on it’s ear and will be airing an “anti-Clinton ad” — paid for by the advocacy group Citizens United — during former President Bill Clinton’s interview on 60 Minutes. Media Matters has the full story (and backstory) in “CBS to air new ‘anti-Clinton ad’?”:

The Citizens United ad claims that Clinton is “responsible” for “leaving us vulnerable to terrorists.”

[...]

CBS’s airing of the Citizens United ad would be noteworthy because the network refused to run ads from MoveOn.org and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) during this year’s Super Bowl.

[...]

However, the network’s claim that it does not broadcast “advocacy” advertising or ads about “controversial issues of public importance” rang hollow at the outset. In January, Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) noted in a floor speech that CBS has recently aired other advocacy ads, including controversial ads sponsored by the White House Drug Control Policy Agency.

CBS needs to get rid of this arbitrarily enforced policy. They should just show all the ads and let the public decide: if there’s misrepresentation in the ads, we’ll learn about it (behold, the blogosphere) and the effected parties can sue for libel and slander; If there’s truth in the ads, we’ll be better of because of them. This is an arrogant policy that is going to backfire in their faces unless they quickly change their tune.

CBS to air new ‘anti-Clinton ad’? [Media Matters]
PRESS RELEASE: CITIZENS UNITED AD MAY RUN DURING 60 MINUTES; AD SEEMS TO VIOLATE CBS’ S POLICY AGAINST “ADVOCACY ADVERTISING” [Media Matters]

I want to welcome the following sites to the Recommended Sites list in the right-hand column:

• Andrew Sullivan – A professed “conservative” who has consistently upheld reason and logic in his arguments instead of emotion. A welcome addition who is already a big player in the blogosphere.
• Political Wire – A rather unbiased political analysis blog with breaking news and overviews.
• Winning Argument – A very new website (first post on June 8th) that compares political arguments — based on fact and evidence alone — and determines the winner. Definitely an up-and-comer, though I would suggest upgrading to a top-level domain and having it point at Blogspot.

An al-Qaida group said Friday it killed American hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr, posting an Internet message that showed three photographs of a severed head that appeared to be his. AP/Yahoo has the details in “U.S. Hostage Beheaded, Terror Group Says”

see more…

This is extremely amusing. Jack Shafer has posted a rather scathing piece where he tracks Perle’s promise to sue Sy Hersh for libel in an English court over Hersh’s investigative profile, then the subsequent chickening out (March 12, 2004) and promise to try his case in the court of public opinion — through a release 80 to 90 pages of transcripts that would “make it absolutely clear that his reporting in his article is false,” Slate has the scoop in “The Perle-Hersh Transcript Watch”:

As a scholar of journalism and a distinguished fellow in Perlean studies, I would very much like to see those transcripts. Christ knows I could squeeze another Perle column of them. So where are they? It can’t possibly take three months to rent some server space and upload 90 pages of text to a Web site.

Maybe Perle’s stumbling block is technological. If that’s the case, Perle can messenger or e-mail the transcripts to me, and I’ll get them posted on the Web overnight. I’ll even send the URL for the transcript pages to David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, so he can weigh whether a correction is in order.

This is a great article to spread around. Perle is being a weasel and hoping that this fades from memory, but it won’t.

The Perle-Hersh Transcript Watch [Slate]

You know the New York Times is sorta finally on the ball (after how many weeks?) when they finally realize that the Abu Ghraib picture of a hooded detainee standing on a box with wires snaking out is the prominant pop cultural reference to the scandal. The less than stellar report is available in “Torture Incarnate, and Propped on a Pedestal”:

The image appears in mock advertisements in New York, in paintings in San Francisco, on murals in Tehran and on mannequins in Baghdad. It shows no dogs, no dead, no leash, no face, no nakedness, no pileup, no thumbs-up. It is the picture of a hooded prisoner standing on a box, electrodes attached to his outstretched arms.

Why this image above all the rest? It is far from the most violent, but easily the most graphic. You need less than a second’s glance to know exactly what it is. The triangle of the hood silhouettes sharply against the hot pink or chartreuse background of a fake iPod ad. Andy Warhol himself could not have done better.

I’ve been covering this pop-culture adaptation of the torture and abuse pictures coming out of Abu Ghraib, but it’s good to see that the mainstream media isn’t completely out of the loop.

Of course, the Politburo Diktat reveals the more appropriate places for putting the picture in “Forget the Swoosh”.

Torture Incarnate, and Propped on a Pedestal [New York Times]
Forget the Swoosh [Politburo Diktat]

see more…

Or maybe it’s something else dribbling from the corners of his mouth… Who am I to say? Slate is slamming the famous New York Times’ columnist for banging the drum of the MohammedAtta/Iraq link in their roundup “Hell, No, They Won’t Let Go”:

The commission also tried to kill the never-say-no theory that Mohammed Atta met an Iraqi spy in Prague. As the staff reports note, a few days before the supposed meeting, Atta was caught on a security camera in the U.S., and his cell phone was used in the U.S. right before, during, and after it. For those keeping score, this is the same meeting Times columnist Bill Safire once termed, “an undisputed fact.”

But don’t stop there, Slate, because Safire keeps on getting it wrong, such as in the article November 2003 article — Missing Links Found — which is, well, full of lies (and more dubious Atta links).

But hey, it’s not like Safire has a history of prevaricating or anything.

Hell, No, They Won’t Let Go [Slate]
Essay; Prague Connection [New York Times]
Missing Links Found [New York Times]
Abolish Tenure at the New York Times (Safire is lying again edition) [Explananda]

Boing Boing has a great link to a mix of the Enron tapes with Snap!’s The Power in their post “Enron/I Got the Power mashup”. Tuba Frenzy created them, saying in his post “I’ve Got The Power”:

Ever since the big Enron bankruptcy and subsequent accounting scandal broke a couple of years ago, I’ve gotten a perverse pleasure from laughing at all things Enron-related. I still enjoy hunting for Enron memorabilia on eBay….funny stuff like the “Enron Code of Ethics” (unused, of course!!) or Enron schwag peppered with ironic quotes like “Ask Why” or MLK’s “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” But I digress….I got such a kick out of these Enron trader conversations that I decided to take portions of the audio clips and incorporate them into a remix of a song that seemed pretty topical: Snap!’s big 1990 hit “The Power”.

As for mashup fate of future Enron tapes? Tim at Tuba City says “…, someone with superior digital audio skills should try a remix of the Electric Slide (aka “Electric Boogie” by Marcia Griffiths) or maybe Eddy Grant’s “Electric Avenue”. And then we’ll take it higher…”

Enron/Snap! The Power MP3 (5.1MB) [Tuba City]
Enron/I Got the Power mashup [Boing Boing]
I’ve Got The Power [Tuba City]

see more…

The DNC released a list of “trustees,” fundraisers who bring in $250,000 or more for the party and its presidential nominee, and “Patriots,” who raise at least $100,000. The Washington Post has an editorial on it in “Patriot Names” (haha, get it? Like Patriot Games? Okay, lame). Anyways, that editorial isn’t all that interesting, but it’s a good idea to release the list.

The really interesting thing was American Dynamics’ digging to actually find the list. He couldn’t, and explained his aggravation in “Name That Trustee”:

A search directly on the DNC site for “trustee” their name for $250,000 plus donors turns up nothing relevant. Google likewise has failed me. Wonder if perhaps they’d rather the “release” be kept off the internet and inside the beltway…

I tried searching as well, to no avail. So I called the DNC headquarters to determine just where the list was, and was told that it was supposed to be put up yesterday. When asked if it was accesible from the front page and how to find it, I was told to ask the tech department. Multiple calls to the tech department was equally frustrating as it continuously went to voicemail. I tried asking other people, and no one was aware of where the document was on the website.

Maybe it’s a fluke, but this could be something bigger.

Patriot Names [Washington Post]
Name That Trustee [American Dynamics]
Search Results [DNC]

I know, I’m being pretty slack today, but that’s because I’ve been talking to a lot of different people for the exclusive article for Watchblog. I’ll see if I can link some news in here today.

I also want to ask people to suggest links for me to post. You’ll get thanks and kudos in the form of a linkback to your own site from the entry, and that’s not too bad, because we could all use some more exposure. I do have a ton of RSS feeds that I go through every day in determining what to run (if I was able to do this full time, I’d have 20 entries a day), and I do get emails and AIM messages from friends with links. Just think, you could help swing the hammer of truth. Use the suggest a site feature at the top of the column on the right.

Lisa Rein has put up some more Daily Show clips, and thankfully she put up the one where the State Department’s Global Terror Report is just ripped to shreds. Jon Stewart says it best concerning the 8 pages of corrections: “The first page or two: honest errors. Third page? Uhhhhh… perhaps a questionable half-truth. By page six? You’re fuckin’ lying. {laughter}”

[click to view video (requires Quicktime)]

New Daily Show Clips Up [On Lisa Rein's Radar]
State Dept. Global Terror Report: Double Plus Good [Hammer of Truth]

Thanks to Bob Sawyer for pointing these CNN screenshots of the 9/11 commission saying there’s no link, while Bush keeps saying there is in “Lies, Damn Lies, and CNN”:

[click for larger image]

[click for larger image]

This is just too surreal. Flying in the face of truth, Bush and the gang just won’t stop repeating the Al Qaida/Saddam link.

Lies, Damn Lies, and CNN [Bob Sawyer]
9/11 staff: No al Qaeda cooperation with Iraq [CNN]
Bush stands by al Qaeda, Saddam link [CNN]

It seems that there are more people getting sloshed these days (myself included). Reuters has the full story in “More Americans Abuse Alcohol, Study Finds”:

They found that the number of American adults who abuse alcohol or are alcohol dependent rose to 17.6 million or 8.46 percent of the population in 2001-2002 from 13.8 million or 7.41 percent of the population in 1991-1992.

The researchers cannot say why heavy drinking is up.

I know, you’re probably thinking: “how is this political?” Well, go find all the political drinking games. There’s the multiple State of the Union drinking games, the Reagan State Funeral Drinking Game, The Democratic Debate Drinking Game, the Political Hearings Drinking Games, it goes on ad nauseum. It’s no wonder that we’re all becoming lushes, we’re trying to trick our brains into thinking that things are somehow good, when in fact everything that we’re told is utter trash.

Drink on!

More Americans Abuse Alcohol, Study Finds [Yahoo/Reuters]
2004 State of the Union drinking game
2003 State of the Union drinking game
2002 State of the Union drinking game
Reagan State Funeral Drinking Game [theStranger.com via Wonkette]
The Democratic Debate Drinking Game [Slate]
Political Hearings Drinking Game [Flutterby]

An interesting, if misguided, plan was proposed in place of a general draft. Thought Crimes lays out the details in “The Allen Plan”:

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could deploy 35-50,000 trained soldiers to Iraq in say, three to six months? Ideally, these would be folks who want to be in Iraq and are already familiar with and acclimated to the environment. Even better, these folks would already have their own weapons and gear and actually be close to the “theatre of operation” as the folks in the military like to say.

A pipe dream you say? Ladies and gentlemen, I give you all the civilian contractors currently in Iraq.

Now, I say misguided, because continuous conscription is something that has always been an unbalanced process that favors military expedition instead of national sovereignty. Also, it is unfair to ask for Americans to sacrifice to the country, when we are already doing that for the sum of our lives. That’s called taxation. I would have no problem trading taxation for a term of service, however I don’t agree with letting them have their cake and eating it too.

The Allen Plan [Thought Crimes]

see more…