Birmingham Blues

The vote was 69-28. Way to go, you defenders of the Constitution! (That was snark, just in case anyone wondered.)
More than two and a half years after the disclosure of President’s Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program set off a furious national debate, the Senate gave final approval on Wednesday afternoon to broadening the government’s [...]

Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) shows his support:

We spent the night in the Green Zone, in the poolhouse of one of Saddam’s palaces. A little weird, I got to be honest with you. But I felt safe. And so in the morning, I got up early — not that I make this a great habit — [...]

This morning, Del sent me a link to this must-read article from Vanity Fair on the development of the Bush administration’s torture policy. It’s long, and I’m not even going to try to excerpt. Read the whole thing. I’ll warn you that you’re likely to come away nauseated and disgusted. If [...]

…since George W. Bush chose to invade a country that had not attacked us, using phony links to al-Qaeda and fears of non-existent weapons of mass destruction. Five years since Dick Cheney told us our soldiers would be greeted as liberators. Five years since Donald Rumsfeld told us the war would last “six [...]

The US House held a rare closed session last night to discuss the pending FISA bill that would regulate government spying on phone calls and emails. Ironically, according to the Rachel Maddow Show, House members had to wait several hours to start the session so the chamber could be swept for bugs.
George W. Bush, [...]

Lots of stuff going on in the world lately; not a lot of posting here. Chalk that up to crazy busy real life. I have been following the news, as I know you have, and one huge story is the declaration of martial law in Pakistan. It isn’t exactly a huge shock [...]

Okay. So the “Muzzle the Mercenary Dogs of War” bill passed with only 30 Republicans voting against it. So, I thought I would look up how our own Alabama reps had voted, just to shake my head with disgust because (surely!) all the Republicans would have voted No. But…lo and behold all except Mike [...]

Dear Husband and I just turned on the TiVo to watch last night’s broadcast of Ken Burns’ “The War”, and we heard these introductory words: “Corporate funding for The War is provided by…”
DH completed that sentence: Halliburton, Blackwater, and the oil companies.
Oops.  Different war.

This just makes me sad.
CASTOR, La. — On the fourth Sunday in July, John Lee Cockerham was here in his hometown for the baptism of his twin sons…
…Less than 24 hours later Major Cockerham was behind bars, accused of orchestrating the largest single bribery scheme against the military since the start of the Iraq war. [...]

If you watched Bush’s speech tonight, you may be interested in this analysis from the Washington Post. As I have been so frequently of late, I’m simply stunned to see that our Dear Leader didn’t exactly stick to the facts in his “I’m pretending this isn’t more of the same ’stay-the-course’ bullshit that I’ve [...]