Category — politics

Repubs Paid Programmers To Create “Vote Switching” Software: “

Texas to Florida: White House-linked clandestine operation paid for ‘vote switching’ software
By Wayne Madsen for the Online Journal.

According to a notarized affidavit signed by Clint Curtis, while he was employed by the NASA Kennedy Space Center contractor, Yang Enterprises, Inc., during 2000, Feeney solicited him to write a program to ‘control the vote.’ At the time, Curtis was of the opinion that the program was to be used for preventing fraud in the in the 2002 election in Palm Beach County, Florida. His mind was changed, however, when the true intentions of Feeney became clear: the computer program was going to be used to suppress the Democratic vote in counties with large Democratic registrations.

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(Via On Lisa Rein’s Radar.)

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isn’t vote tampering a crime, a very very serious crime?

this is horrible. to disrespect the democracy like this. i would say it is traitorous, it is basically conspiring to commit a coup or very much parallel

FT.com / Arts & Weekend – Dock of the bay: “As this magazine was going to press, a Guantánamo public affairs officer said the combatant status review tribunals were continuing at the camp despite the judge’s ruling. ‘In the meantime, some legal issues are being argued in Federal Court which may or may not ultimately affect this process,’ he added.”

(Via .)

ummm, doesn’t anyone have the power to intervene in these kangaroo courts?

Our Leaders: “~If Our Leaders have been saved, are reborn through the grace of God, is it blasphemy to point-out, to report, their wrong-doings, their misdeeds?…”

(Via Spitting Image.)

great picture.

Democrats United:

Who’s in?

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(Via Michael Bérubé Online.)

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can’t we just buy a nice middle american country and move there and make our own utopia? it would be cheaper and easier…..

bush secrecy

(Via .)

this outlines the secrecy measures that the current administration is implementing to stop citizens from knowing what the government is doing….. in a representative democracy or republic, government needs to be accountable to its citizens and to do that, it must be transparent.

U.S. Forces Using Chemical Weapons On Civilians In Fallujah: “

‘Unusual Weapons’ Used in Fallujah
By Dahr Jamail for Common Dreams.

The U.S. military has used poison gas and other non-conventional weapons against civilians in Fallujah, eyewitnesses report..

”Poisonous gases have been used in Fallujah,” 35-year-old trader from Fallujah Abu Hammad told IPS. ”They used everything — tanks, artillery, infantry, poison gas. Fallujah has been bombed to the ground.”

Hammad is from the Julan district of Fallujah where some of the heaviest fighting occurred. Other residents of that area report the use of illegal weapons.

”They used these weird bombs that put up smoke like a mushroom cloud,” Abu Sabah, another Fallujah refugee from the Julan area told IPS. ”Then small pieces fall from the air with long tails of smoke behind them.”

He said pieces of these bombs exploded into large fires that burnt the skin even when water was thrown on the burns. Phosphorous weapons as well as napalm are known to cause such effects. ”People suffered so much from these,” he said.

Macabre accounts of killing of civilians are emerging through the cordon U.S. forces are still maintaining around Fallujah.

”Doctors in Fallujah are reporting to me that there are patients in the hospital there who were forced out by the Americans,” said Mehdi Abdulla, a 33-year-old ambulance driver at a hospital in Baghdad. ”Some doctors there told me they had a major operation going, but the soldiers took the doctors away and left the patient to die.”

Kassem Mohammed Ahmed who escaped from Fallujah a little over a week ago told IPS he witnessed many atrocities committed by U.S. soldiers in the city.

”I watched them roll over wounded people in the street with tanks,” he said. ”This happened so many times.”…

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(Via On Lisa Rein’s Radar.)

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now… there is probably a bit of excess in this reporting, but…. even if some is true…. then we have a real problem.

The Village Voice: Cartoons: Mark Fiore: Thanks-for-Nothing Turkey by Mark Fiore: “”

(Via .)

Website Reveals the Most Republican Corporations: “

It strikes me as reasonable to consider the politics of a corporation’s management before patronizing that corporation. A website offers data that makes this easier, by noting which companies gave heavily to the Republicans.

N.b. The website promotes a red state/blue state dichotomy, but I do not share that vision of the country.

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(Via Blogs at CIS – Anupam Chander.)

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this is information that people should act on, but they won’t because there is no politics in purchasing or using services anymore, except in rare circumstances. however, boycotts and similar techniques have been powerful means of politics in the past…. remember south africa.

The Path to The Handmaid’s Tale: “

While Planned Parenthood is sounding the alarm about an imminent frontal assault on Roe v. Wade from the Bush Administration, today we see instead how it’s going to play out — the end of choice via small and sly nibbles. Flexing post-election muscle, the Senate Republican leadership has just inserted into a must-pass $388 billion omnibus spending bill, an anti-abortion provision that could have broad reach…allowing hospitals and other healthcare providers to duck a responsibility to provide abortion services across the country. This won’t stop people with money from getting abortions; this will only affect those women least able to expand their families.

If you think abortion rights are someone else’s concern; think again. Do you have sexual relations? Do you believe the decision on whether or not to procreate rests with you and your partner? Do you think that the U.S. Attorney General should have final control of your body, your fertility? This is how it is about to be. These are small steps that lead straight down the path to The Handmaid’s Tale.

You have grown up in a society where women’s physical autonomy has been a given. I did not. I am only a couple decades older than you. I remember the terror of a missed period. The shame of a girlfriend who was banished from high school. A college couple’s frantic gathering of money for a drive into the night. You don’t want to have to live like that. Believe me.

Eight female Senators objected to the provision, including Republican Olympia Snowe of Maine and Democrat Barbara Boxer of California who has vowed to stand in the way of the bill. Support California Senator Barbara Boxer and maintain vigilance for the other indirect tactics that will surely follow.

-RH

addendum:

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi had this to say today on the floor:

“Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the Weldon amendment, an extraordinary sneak attack on women’s rights and a disgraceful display of ideology over health.“
“This language is a radical change in policy that the House has not debated on the floor, and the Senate has never considered, debated, or voted on. Republicans simply slipped it into the appropriations bill when they thought no one was looking.
“If a hospital, health insurance company, or doctor opposes Roe v. Wade, they could simply ignore it. Ignore it. This is the law of the land. A Constitutional right could simply be ignored.”

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(Via Girl In the Locker Room!.)

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i think this is one of the most cogent points made on this topic of late. just how long will it be until the ability to bear children is so heavily legislated that we end up in the handsmaid tale?

Dead Of Night: “

Freedom is on the march.

Last night, behind everyone’s back, the Republicans tried to slip a paragraph into the middle of a rushed, 3000-page spending bill. The paragraph would have allowed the (Republican) leadership and anyone they deputized — but no one else — to read anyone’s tax return for any purpose whatsoever. Extortion, political embarrassment, selective prosecution — anything the Republicans liked.

For example, the Republicans could check the tax returns of people applying for government jobs (or seeking tenure at a state university) to see if they gave money to the ACLU or didn’t support a Christian church.

Fortunately, someone noticed. My initial impression is that the United States just came within a few hours of becoming a one-party dictatorship.

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(Via Mark Bernstein.)

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i think that i agree. this is just getting a bit stupid. people need to start thinking recall.