Year: 2007

Edwards to Bush: Fire Karl Rove

Trish

John Edwards will use the first national presidential debate tonight to call for Karl Rove’s job.

According to a campaign email, Edwards feels Rover has crossed a line.

New evidence shows that Rove has been methodically working to twist even the most impartial branches of the federal government—including the Justice Department—to serve the Republican Party at the expense of the American people.

Enough is enough. Impartial justice must be protected. Integrity in government must be defended. Karl Rove must be fired.

Tomorrow, John Edwards is going on national television to take part in the first presidential debate. And that night, he’s going to call on George Bush to fire Karl Rove.

The Edwards camp is asking that we sign a petition calling for Rover’s ousting, so he can say, “X number of Americans want this.”

Will Bush listen? Not to John alone. Not to you or me alone. But if thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of us speak out together to demand accountability for Karl Rove and end their era of cynical, destructive, partisan government—we cannot be ignored.

Wanna bet?

But hey, I certainly agree with what he’s saying so I signed the petition. It’s easy and you don’t even have to give your address, so go for it. It’s better than just wishing.

Update: According to the counter on the site, there are 42,000 signatures so far. I know there are more of you out there who want to see Rove go. Imagine if Bush had to think things up all by himself. The laughs alone are worth signing the petition!

American Family Association Defaming Hate-Crime Legislation

Buck Banks

Disturbing distortions: I suppose it would be way too much to ask Donald Wildmon, head of the arch-conservative, hyper-religious American Family Association, not to lie. When it comes to pushing his homophobic agenda, facts become irrelevant in his efforts to stir up his constituents about hot-button issues.

If this Thought Crimes law passes, your right to share politically incorrect parts of your Christian faith could, in fact, become a federal crime.
— Donald “Wildman” Wildmon

His latest target is H.R. 1592, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007, which has been introduced in the House of Representatives and is headed toward a vote. Wildmon wants his legions of religious zealots to believe that, “If this Thought Crimes law passes, your right to share politically incorrect parts of your Christian faith could, in fact, become a federal crime,” he wrote on the AFA’s Web site and included in an e-mail alert today.

According to Wildmon’s view, “‘hate crimes’ laws inevitably leading to ‘hate speech’ laws targeted specifically at Christians and other faith groups who hold traditional beliefs on homosexuality.” Yeah, and smoking pot inevitably leads to mainlining heroin and following Islam inevitably leads to a life of terrorism. While Wildmon would like to have his followers believe that embedded in this bill is some poison pill that will undermine the entire Judeo-Christian underpinnings of our society, it is instead a bill that provides funds to local law enforcement to prosecute hate crimes.

The only catch is the $5 million annual alottment is held by the U.S. Attorney General, who provides the dough in the form of grants when communities apply for it. But hopefully by the time the bill is made into law we will have a new, competent AG. The bill effectively gives smaller and rural communities access to funds to pursue hate crime investigations and prosecutions that they might otherwise not be able to afford.

And these crimes are not merely calling someone names. Crimes covered under the statute are serious, violent, often involving guns or weapons, and always resulting in serious bodily injury or death.

What I think really galls Wildmon is the bill’s provision that adds gender, sexual identification and gender identity to the list of real or perceived attributes — including race, color, religion and national origin — that constitute the basis of hate crimes. He blames Democrats and gay activists for this assault on the family and the church, but his arguments, based as they are on lies and distortions, only serve to deceive his already deeply misguided followers.

One of Wildmon’s more blatant lies is calling the legislation a Democratic Party bill that he says the Dems are passing to make good on unspecified campaign promises to gay activists. While indeed the bill is sponsored by John Conyers, D-Detroit, it has 112 co-sponsors, among them such Republican stalwarts as Christogpher Shays of Connecticut, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, Mark Kirk of Illinois and others.

So get on board with H.R. 1592. It’s a good law, and one that we hope will help deter hate crimes.

Memorial for Ryan Skipper in Atlanta, Sat. April 28

Jon Ponder

Saturday would have been Ryan Skipper’s 26th birthday. His family and friends are holding a memorial in Atlanta:

Saturday, April 28, 2007

1:00pm

First Metropolitan Community Church

1379 Tullie Road NE

Atlanta, GA 30329

404-325-4143

For more information on attending Ryan’s vigil and other ways you can help please contact Melinda Morgan by email or at (404) 327-9898.

Ryan Skipper was viciously murdered on March 14, 2007. Two men, including one who had known Ryan for about six months, were arrested and charged with the murder as a hate crime.

Update: Check the Georgia Equality website for the latest info.

Kucinich Files Articles of Impeachment against Cheney

Jon Ponder

Back in the Clinton era, Rep. Bob Barr filed articles of impeachment against Pres. Clinton in the fall of 1997, fully a year before the momentum was in place to proceed to the actual impeachment. Keep that in mind as you read this:

Rep. Dennis Kucinich, a candidate for president, introduced articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney to the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.

Under the House impeachment process, Kucinich’s articles would be reviewed by the committee, which would decide whether to conduct an impeachment inquiry. The committee would seek authority from the entire House before beginning an inquiry.

The Ohio congressman said Cheney manipulated and fabricated intelligence on weapons of mass destruction to justify the Iraq war.

Kucinich said it was important to introduce the legislation “because the threat of war against Iran is very real.”

“This vice president cannot be permitted to continue to violate both the U.S. Constitution and the U.N. Charter,” he added.

House Authorizes Subpoena, Immunity for Monica Goodling

Jon Ponder

You remember Monica Goodling — she was the highest ranking among the 150 the Christian Nationalist plants inside the Dept. of Justice who said she would take the Fifth instead of testifying before Congress about the firing of eight U.S. attorneys last year. Why? Because, she said, otherwise she would be forced to lie about her contacts with Karl Rove and perhaps even Pres. Bush.

Goodling would have been the first Dept. of Justice employee in the history of the republic to plead the Fifth before congress. Apparently unsure what else to do with her, the Bushies forced her to resign.

Today the House Judiciary Committee voted to issue a subpoena to Goodling, and made her an offer she could not refuse: an offer of immunity from prosecution.

Giuliani’s Vision for the Future — Gulag America

Buck Banks

Shades of 9/11: Lest we forget that “America’s Mayor” was all over the media following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Rudy Giuliani has identified Americans’ abiding fear of terrorists in our midst as an issue on which to base his campaign for prez. He was talking tough yesterday in New Hampshire:

‘The freedoms we have are in conflict with the perverted, maniacal interpretation of their religion.’
— Rudy Giuliani on terrorists

“If any Republican is elected president — and I think obviously I would be the best at this — we will remain on offense and will anticipate what [the terrorists] will do and try to stop them before they do it,” Giuliani said.

The former New York City mayor, currently leading in all national polls for the Republican nomination for president, said Tuesday night that America would ultimately defeat terrorism no matter which party gains the White House.

“But the question is how long will it take and how many casualties will we have?” Giuliani said. “If we are on defense [with a Democratic president], we will have more losses and it will go on longer.”

“I listen a little to the Democrats and if one of them gets elected, we are going on defense,” Giuliani continued. “We will wave the white flag on Iraq. We will cut back on the Patriot Act, electronic surveillance, interrogation and we will be back to our pre-Sept. 11 attitude of defense.”

That seems to indicate that Rudy would approve a broader Patriot Act (don’t go to the library, kids), more electronic surveillance (speak clearly into the receiver) and more interrogation (getcher waterboard ready, boys). Giuliani builds up to a cresendo, we assume from the flaming rhetoric, with flying spit and everything:

“This war ends when they stop coming here to kill us!” Giuliani said in his speech. “Never, ever again will this country ever be on defense waiting for [terrorists] to attack us if I have anything to say about it. And make no mistake, the Democrats want to put us back on defense!”

Giuliani said terrorists “hate us and not because of anything bad we have done; it has nothing to do with Israel and Palestine. They hate us for the freedoms we have and the freedoms we want to share with the world.”

Giuliani continued: “The freedoms we have are in conflict with the perverted, maniacal interpretation of their religion.” He said Americans would fight for “freedom for women, the freedom of elections, freedom of religion and the freedom of our economy.”

Addressing the terrorists directly, Giuliani said: “We are not giving that up, and you are not going to take it from us!”

Good show, Rudy. Maybe that hardline act will make your fellow Repugs forget that you have favored a woman’s right to choose an abortion, supported gay rights and, when it comes to the sanctity of marriage, you’ve got the morals of a ferret.

Laura Bush on Iraq: ‘No One Suffers More Than [the] President and I’

Jon Ponder

Double standard: On the Today Show this morning, First Lady Laura Bush was asked what she thought about the damage the war in Iraq was doing to the American people. Her answer, which came without a pause, may have been revelatory:

ANN CURRY: Do you know the American people are suffering… watching [Iraq]?

LAURA BUSH: Oh, I know that very much, and, believe me, no suffers more than their president and I do when we watch this. And certainly the commander-in-chief who has asked our military to go into harm’s way.

AC: What do you think the American people need to know…

LB: Well, I hope they do know the burden of worry that’s on his shoulders every single day for our troops. And I think they do. I think if they don’t, they’re not seeing what the real responsibilities of our president are.

AC: It must be hard for you to watch him in this.

LB: It’s hard. Of course, it’s absolutely hard.

The was an egregious misstatement. The Bushes do not suffer more than the families of the dead and wounded, obviously. It bespeaks an aristocratic ennui — “If only the little people knew how much we royals suffer.”

Last week, when Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid accused the president, Sec. of State Condoleeza Rice and other top Bush aides of knowing the war in Iraq is lost, just as Nixon and Sec. of State Henry Kissinger knew that Vietnam was lost but continued to send men there to die, the media and the GOP reported a much shorter version: “Sen Reid said the war is lost.”

Republicans have been having a field day with this misquote for over a week. The majority leader has demoralized our troops, they say, without providing any evidence that this is so. As late as yesterday, Vice Pres. Cheney called Sen. Reid a “defeatist.”

Compared with the treatment Reid continues to receive, the media and even the Democrats will give the first lady a pass, even though if a similar statement were made by a Democratic first lady, the media and the Republicans would tear her to shreds.

Finally, the interviewer, Ann Curry, did not ask Mrs. Bush about rumors that she and her husband were living apart because he had resumed drinking. I doubt Curry would have passed on the opportunity 10 years ago to ask First Lady Hillary Clinton if tabloid rumors were true.

New Mexico U.S. Attorney Fired for Being a Vet

Trish

Only in the George Bush years could something like this happen.

The Office of Special Counsel, charged with enforcing both the Civil Service Act and the Hatch Act, is looking into the firing of New Mexico federal attorney and Navy Reserve Capt. David Iglesias. If you recall, Iglesias was fired after Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) called him at home and blasted him for not speeding up fraud prosecutions of Democrats before the 2006 elections.

The Office of Special Counsel is also responsible for protecting the job rights of National Guard and Reserve members who are called away for military duty. In that capacity, [Agency Director Scott] Bloch is looking into whether David Iglesias, one of eight U.S. attorneys dismissed earlier this year, was punished for missing work to serve in the Navy Reserve.

Iglesias, who was the U.S. attorney for New Mexico until he was replaced in February, was cited as an “absentee landlord” in a Justice Department document laying out reasons for his termination. William Moschella, the No. 3 official at Justice, told a House subcommittee in March that Iglesias was fired because he delegated too much responsibility to his deputy.

Good lord. How low can these people go?

Fly the Flags at Half Staff for Slain Students – Why Not for Soldiers?

Jon Ponder

I got an interesting note from my friend Judy today:

We made the correct decision to fly our flags at half mast when the students were murdered last week. What is the difference between their promising young lives of the students and the daily deaths of young soldiers in a wasted war? Shouldn’t our flags fly at half mast until there are no soldiers being killed in the Bush/Cheney war?

I can’t think of a better symbol for the antiwar movement than a Old Glory at half-staff.