I'm satisfied so far with the selection of Sonia Sotomayor to be the next justice on the court, but why is that Republicans can unabashedly nominate and confirm extreme right wingers to the Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito) and then go out of their way to say they'd nominate more like them given the chance, yet Democrats have to pussy-foot around and try to confirm their nominees in as stealth liberals. God forbid any Democrat come out and say they would like to see a far-left judge on the Supreme Court. Just once I'd like to hear the Democrats say with pride, "If elected, I will nominate to the Supreme Court judges in the fine liberal tradition of William O. Douglas and Thurgood Marshall.

I'm satisfied so far with the selection of Sonia Sotomayor to be the next justice on the court, but why is that Republicans can unabashedly nominate and confirm extreme right wingers to the Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito) and then go out of their way to say they'd nominate more like them given the chance, yet Democrats have to pussy-foot around and try to confirm their nominees in as stealth liberals. God forbid any Democrat come out and say they would like to see a far-left judge on the Supreme Court. Just once I'd like to hear the Democrats say with pride, "If elected, I will nominate to the Supreme Court judges in the fine liberal tradition of William O. Douglas and Thurgood Marshall.

I'm satisfied so far with the selection of Sonia Sotomayor to be the next justice on the court, but why is that Republicans can unabashedly nominate and confirm extreme right wingers to the Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito) and then go out of their way to say they'd nominate more like them given the chance, yet Democrats have to pussy-foot around and try to confirm their nominees in as stealth liberals. God forbid any Democrat come out and say they would like to see a far-left judge on the Supreme Court. Just once I'd like to hear the Democrats say with pride, "If elected, I will nominate to the Supreme Court judges in the fine liberal tradition of William O. Douglas and Thurgood Marshall.

I'm satisfied so far with the selection of Sonia Sotomayor to be the next justice on the court, but why is that Republicans can unabashedly nominate and confirm extreme right wingers to the Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito) and then go out of their way to say they'd nominate more like them given the chance, yet Democrats have to pussy-foot around and try to confirm their nominees in as stealth liberals. God forbid any Democrat come out and say they would like to see a far-left judge on the Supreme Court. Just once I'd like to hear the Democrats say with pride, "If elected, I will nominate to the Supreme Court judges in the fine liberal tradition of William O. Douglas and Thurgood Marshall.

What kind of scheme is the little drama queen, McCain, cooking up now. He's just getting started.

Youhave to wonder what kind of scheme the little drama queen, McCain, is cooking up now, because you know he's just getting starting.

THE DIXIE DICKS:

In 2003, the right-wing brought out all the heavy artillery to give it to the Dixie Chicks when Natalie Maines spoke up against George Bush soon before the start of the Iraq war. Many radio dj's around the country urged people to stop buying and playing their music. Many radio stations stopped playing their music - Cox Radio and Cumulus Broadcasting, two large owners of country music stations, instructed their outlets to drop the Dixie Chicks’ music. Their records (cd's) were destroyed in public demonstrations. And not be left out of the fun, #1 frenzy-fuck, right wing attack-asshole himself, Sean Hannity, blasted them for weeks. SO, what was the big deal? They criticized America and George Bush while on foreign soil. "How DARE they," they said, "be critical of the U.S. on foreign soil." 'What happens in America, stays in America,' was the gist of it

Now we have George Bush who took the American elections to Israel and injected political jabs at Obama into a speech given to the Israeli Knesset meant to celebrate Israel's 60 anniversary. To top that, he compared Obama's willingness to have a dialogue with our enemies to Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler in his ceding half of Czechoslovakia in 1938 to Hitler. What a piece of shit we have for a president.

Unfortunately, there's not much to do to Bush since we stopped buying his bullshit a while back. The real appeasers here, and the main reason I'm supporting Obama over Hillary, are the media and the vast majority of Democrats. The press, in the way they gave away any pretense of objectivity in acting as the set-up people for the war in Iraq (and then served as it's biggest cheerleaders), and in its failure to expose the attempts to destroy the Bill of Rights, in exchange for access and invitations to the annual White House Christmas party. And the Democrats who failed to fall on their swords prevent an unnecessary and illegal war when they could have made a difference and - all in exchange for the security of their own Congressional seats.

At least the Dixie Chicks went on to win some Grammy's for their following (anti-war) album. Bush will not as well.

A letter sent today to New York Times Public Editor, Clark Hoyt.


HOW MANY TIMES DOES IT NEED TO BE EXPLAINED?

Dear Mr. Hoyt,

I was struck by the language in Benjamin Weiser's piece in today's paper, "Police in Gun Searches Face Disbelief in Court." In discussing the issue of searches made by police, he writes: "The Fourth Amendment sets limits on the conditions that permit a search; if they are not met, judges must exclude the evidence, even if that means allowing a guilty person to go free."

How many times does the point need to be made, that the status of guilt is one determined by a court of law, NOT a New York Times reporter, nor anyone else, before a highly paid Times reporter begins to get it right? As we all know, one item that sets our criminal justice system apart from many others in the world is that the accused
are "innocent until proven guilty." It is not Mr. Weiser's place to provide a summary judgment on any accused person and he should refrain from throwing around this right wing boilerplate talking-point. If we can't count on the 'neutral' New York Times to get it right, than who can we count on? It should be struck
from the record, or 'the paper of record.'

Sincerely,
Edward Keating

WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE?

DISHONEST, DISINGENUOUS and DISHEARTENING:
Motherfuckers, every last one of them. Michael Chertoff tells us last week that he has a "gut feeling" we're going to be attacked this summer by al Qaida. Now, the National Intelligence Estimate has it that terrorist groups, including al Qaida, pose a "persistent and evolving threat" to our country, or the "homeland" (a term favored by the Nazis). I'm curious to know whether his "gut feeling" has anything to do with the unreleased, classified portions of the NIE report and if this is just one more example of these people in such vital and important positions dealing from the bottom of the deck.

LEGACY:

President George W. Johnson.. or George W. Bush-Baines Johnson. Call him what you want, but this disastrous war is going to be Bush's legacy.

That and the two extreme right-wingers he got onto the Supreme Court.