Month: February 2008

“I believe that it is torture, very exquisite torture.”
– John McCainAfter John McCain became the undisputed frontrunner for the GOP nomination when he swept the board in the Potomac primaries on Tuesday, it took just two days for him to sell out his principles on torture in order to get the endorsements of blood-thirsty rightwingers among the House Republicans, as well as the previous all-time champion flipflopper, Mitt Romney.

First, here’s a trip down memory lane recalling the so-called straight-talking Maverick’s previous position against the use of torture techniques like waterboarding.

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Oxnard, Calif., is a mostly working class town near Ventura, about an hour north of Los Angeles. In a junior high classroom there Tuesday morning, Brandon McInerney, 14, shot a classmate, Lawrence King, also 14, in the head. Police now say the killing was premeditated and that Mcinerney shot Larry because he’d recently come out as gay:

classmates of the slain boy, Lawrence King, said he recently had started to wear makeup and jewelry and had proclaimed himself gay. Several students said King and a group of boys, including the defendant, had a verbal confrontation concerning King’s sexual orientation a day before the killing.

King, 15, was declared brain-dead and was expected to be taken off a ventilator late Thursday so organs could be removed for donation, said Craig Stevens, senior county deputy medical examiner.

King was shot in the head early Tuesday in a classroom full of students at E.O. Green Junior High School. Police said the suspect fled and was apprehended a few blocks away.

Larry King was a foster child living in Casa Pacifica, a shelter for abused and troubled children in nearby Camarillo.

“He never felt like he had a family, but he told me when he got to Casa Pacifica that he had one there,” a classmate and friend told the Los Angeles Times.

Brandon McInerney’s father has a police record that includes several run-ins with the law, including disturbing the peace, drunk driving and one count of domestic abuse.

Jay Smith, executive director of Ventura County Rainbow Alliance, a gay rights organization, told reporters that “[in] the 15-year history of this organization, this is the first time we’ve seen the district attorney act this swiftly and clearly to say ‘This will not be tolerated’ … We are very eager to see the district attorney follow through”

On Wednesday, the day after the shooting, about three-quarters of the students were back in school:

“We had extra counselors in,” said Superintendent Jerry Dannenberg. “They’ve been meeting with students all day long. They’re reporting a very healthy response.”

After the last bell rang, students stopped at the memorial on their way out, reading the messages. One boy knelt and prayed.

“We love you Larry,” a student had written on a paper note, “1993-2008.”

Brandon McInerney is being held in Juvenile Hall, where he is being held in lieu of $770,000 bail. He could face 50 years to life, if convicted.

California voters gave prosecutors the option of charging children 14 and older as adults with the passage of Proposition 21 in 2002.

Send this special Valentine to friends and loved ones, from Americans United.

Politico:

The House has approved criminal and civil contempt resolutions against White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former White House counsel Harriet Miers for failing to respond to subpoenas from the House Judiciary Committee. The vote was 223-32, as Republicans walked out of the chamber to protest the vote and the Democrats’ failure to take up the Senate-passed revision to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

If “fascism” is defined as corporate control of government, then there has never been a more brazen display of American fascism than the one put on by Republicans in Washington today.

First, George Bush threatened to postpone his trip to Africa tomorrow because the House version of the new FISA bill does not give immunity to giant telecom corporations who conspired with him hundreds of times to violate federal wiretap laws and eavesdrop on Americans without warrants:

“If we have to delay (the trip), we’ll delay,” Bush said.

Bush is backing the Senate-passed bill, which includes retroactive protection from lawsuits that telecommunications companies are facing because they cooperated with government eavesdropping following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The House has not passed that measure, and the law expires at midnight Saturday. The House bill also does not provide immunity from lawsuits for the telecommunications companies.

Then congressional Republicans staged a walk-out to protest the fact that their corporate masters could be held accountable for crimes they knowingly committed:

It’s political gamesmanship of the highest order.

House Republicans have just staged a walkout from the chamber to protest the decision of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic leadership to let an act that expands the government’s surveillance powers expire.

Republican leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) is giving a press conference on the Capitol steps right now, saying that the decision of the House to debate a contempt resolution involving former White House officials instead of taking up the Protect America Act jeopardizes national security. He said the House Republicans would stay in Washington as long as necessary to finish the bill.

Pelosi and the Democratic leadership believe there isn’t enough time to reconcile the differences between the Senate and House versions of the act, which would make adjustments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act permanent, giving the government more power to monitor phone calls and emails without a court order in certain circumstances. The Democrats want a second extension of the current out to work out the differences.

So far, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is standing firm.

This item was apparently “dumped” into late Friday news cycle last week, although it’s unclear who was trying to downplay it, James Dobson, the leader of the tax-exempt anti-gay group, Focus on the Family (FOTF), or Mike Huckabee, the no-shot Republican presidential candidate:
Ironically, evangelical Christian couples have a higher divorce rate that normal couples, and yet their leaders are too obsessed with their hatred of gay people to act against this this scourge within the church family.

James Dobson, one of the nation’s most prominent evangelical Christian leaders, backed Mike Huckabee’s presidential bid Thursday night, giving the former Arkansas governor a long-sought endorsement as the Republican field narrowed to a two-man race.

In a statement first obtained by The Associated Press, Dobson reiterated his declaration on Super Tuesday that he could not in good conscience vote for John McCain, the front-runner, because of concerns over the Arizona senator’s conservative credentials.

Dobson and his confederates promote FOTF as an advocacy group for “moral values.” However, it apparently does not concern them that Huckabee has two advisers who are notorious adulterers: Dick Morris, the professional Clinton-hater who consorted with prostitutes while married, and Rev. Tim Hutchinson, the former Arkansas senator who was conducting an extramarital affair in 1998 when he voted to convict Pres. Clinton for lying about having an affair with a staffer.

(Similarly, Pat Robertson, the TV preacher who also raises millions by promoting homophobia, endorsed Rudolph Giuliani, a serial adulterer, whose second wife learned he was leaving her for another woman when he announced it at a news conference.)

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