Breaking: Univ. of Colo. student arrested for remarks about VA Tech shooter
Wed Apr 18, 2007 at 06:26:21 PM PDT
I apologize for writing a "breaking" diary, but I haven't seen this addressed yet here, and it evoked the kind of "holy @#$%, is this really happening in America?" reaction that we've all experienced far too frequently over the last six years.
The AP headline reads Student Arrested Over Va. Tech Remarks. Now, I understand that those tasked with ensuring security on college campuses are justifiably on edge right now, but this went beyond any reasonable bounds of decency.
Science Saturday: An adult stem cell research "advance" that isn't
Sat Aug 20, 2005 at 10:12:59 AM PDT
Apologies to Page, who rocks in every way imaginable, for piggybacking on her "Science Friday" series.
So I was browsing RedState this morning and noticed this RedHot item titled "Advance made in stem cell research". Since I'm a grad student in immunology and scan the primary literature fairly regularly, I'm usually up on these things, so I was surprised to have missed this one. The first alarm bells started going off when I moused over the link and found it was to the Washington Times. Hmmm, a major advance in stem cell research that could render ES cells unnecessary, reported by the Washington Times and no other outlet.
Blatant liberal media bias, or the right-wing press twisting the science to suit their purposes? Read on...
Paul Harvey hearts genocide
Fri Jun 24, 2005 at 06:40:57 PM PDT
So, Mr. Rove, you want to take a few quotes out of context from Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, and Moveon.org and use them to claim that liberals "offered understanding and therapy to our attackers"? Maybe you should check the integrity of your own house first before you start throwing stones -- that glass isn't as shatterproof as you think.
Paul Harvey is broadcast six days a week on over 1200 radio stations. His "News and Comment" and "The Rest of the Story" segments are staples on AM radio. Imagine an elderly Limbaugh, and you've got Paul Harvey.
Fast-forward to 12:20 and listen to what he has to say about our actions post-9/11 (transcript below the flip for the audio-impaired).
John Cole smacks down Durbin-bashers on RedState
Mon Jun 20, 2005 at 06:20:23 PM PDT
John Cole is one of the few right-wing pundits I read regularly. Sure, he's a conservative, but his positions are consistent and his military experiences give him a perspective sorely lacking on the right side of the blogosphere.
Today, Cole waded into RedState and -- on their own front page -- delivered a brilliant, articulate, dead-on smackdown of the hysterical Durbin-bashers.
Update [2005-6-20 23:8:57 by Buck Fush]: Trevino concurs.
NYT: Frist to appear in telecast with Dobson, Colson
Thu Apr 14, 2005 at 08:09:20 PM PDT
CHALABI a candidate for new Iraqi PM?
Wed Feb 16, 2005 at 10:42:33 AM PDT
My profuse apologies if this has already been diaried.
Just read this in the NY Times (via AP). WHAT THE FUCK?
Leaders of the Shiite political alliance that won Iraq's election failed to agree on a single nominee for prime minister Wednesday, with the two candidates insisting on a vote by the alliance's 140 parliamentarians, officials said...
After meeting for hours with Shiite cleric and politician Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, members of the United Iraqi Alliance agreed to hold a secret ballot to choose between two former exiles, Ibrahim al-Jaafari and Ahmad Chalabi, said Ali Hashim al-Youshaa, an alliance leader who attended the meetings. The vote is expected Friday.
RNC poll #s on SS -- WTF?
Fri Feb 11, 2005 at 05:27:36 PM PDT
As a result of a particularly nasty prank played by a colleague shortly before the election, I, Buck Fush, am a GOP Team Leader. This, of course, means that I get all their juicy oppo research, which I can immediately share with y'all. (It also means I get the occasional autographed picture of George, Laura, and the twins -- they make great dartboards.)
The topic of today's e-mail: Social Security. Apparently the troops have had a few setbacks lately, and are in need of some rallying...
Some funky poll numbers and more below the jump.
Ernst Mayr, architect of modern evolutionary theory, dies
Fri Feb 04, 2005 at 05:07:52 PM PDT
Apparently losing Max Schmeling and Ossie Davis in the course of one day wasn't bad enough. Ernst Mayr, the evolutionary biologist who first linked Darwinian natural selection with Mendelian genetics and in doing so laid the foundation of modern evolutionary theory, has died. He was 100.
Link here (registration required), and excerpts and reflection below the jump.
MO: Who should challenge Talent in '06?
Mon Nov 22, 2004 at 07:28:45 PM PDT
With all the recent excellent diaries analyzing which PA Dem should take on Senator Man-on-Dog in '06, I thought I'd do a similar analysis of another vulnerable Republican-held Senate seat here in Missouri.
Jim Talent is beatable. He got elected to the Senate under a highly unusual set of circumstances unlikely ever to be repeated again (details in the extended box). He's not particularly charismatic; he sort of gives off a bespectacled, college-professor vibe. He hasn't done much of note in two years in the Senate (you can bet he'll get a plum appointment to try and change that). He lacks Bond's gift for bringing home pork. Most significantly, he's from the St. Louis metro area, which is a serious handicap if you're running statewide in Missouri. Resentment outstate runs deep, and cuts across party lines. (It's not just cultural - rural voters are still upset about their tax dollars going to desegregate the St. Louis schools in the 70s, and the new Cardinals stadium won't help things.)
More, and thoughts on potential challengers, below the jump.
Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) may take post in Bush cabinet
Wed Nov 17, 2004 at 07:42:05 PM PDT
Well, it seems Dubya has finally followed through on his post-election promise to reach out to Democrats .. by raiding Democratic senators in red states with Republican governors.
Ben Nelson is reportedly at the top of the short list to replace Ann Veneman as secretary of agriculture. If he leaves, Republican Mike Johanns would appoint a Republican to replace him, bringing the GOP one vote closer to the magic 60. Nelson is up for re-election in 2006, and his anticipated opponent is Johanns (term-limited). It would be a very tough race, but Nelson (himself a former governor) has pulled it off before. Still, I could see why he'd take the job.
Link and more info here.
The "we need a Southerner" meme: Geography alone isn't enough
Sat Nov 06, 2004 at 05:37:57 PM PDT
I started writing this as a comment in one of the "we need a Southerner" diaries, but it started getting longer and longer until I said "fuck it" and started my own diary.
Much like the media's focus on the Swift Boaters' lies obscured the real reason their ads resonated (genuine national ambivalence about the legacy of the 60s and the lessons of Vietnam), focusing on the geographical origins of our candidates obscures the real reason this is an issue in the first place: many rural (especially Southern, especially evangelical) voters were never convinced that John Kerry gave a flying fuck about their concerns.
Yes, Kerry's Northeastern origins played a role in this, but that's not the whole story. More after the jump.
Who are our rising stars?
Fri Nov 05, 2004 at 06:49:07 PM PDT
In the 1980s and early-mid 90s, while the old guard Republicans (Reagan, Bush I, Dole) held the leadership positions in the party, the GOP quietly built up a farm team of politically gifted, young, conservative governors -- John Ashcroft in Missouri, Mark Racicot in Montana, and of course Dubya in Texas. When the old guard passed from the scene, they took over the reins of power and led the party to dominance.
We need to do the same. This past election will be the last in which we nominate an old-guard, establishment Democrat. Our loss this time around coupled with the rising grassroots make that a certainty.
So who are our rising stars -- the people we will be talking about as national candidates in the near future? I'm not thinking so much about 2008 as 2012, 2016, etc. My thoughts below the jump.
Tom Friedman (implicitly) endorses Kerry
Sun Oct 31, 2004 at 07:51:08 AM PDT
(Apologies if this has already been diaried -- it's not in the last 50, and I was away from Kos all day yesterday canvassing/phonebanking.)
I don't know what to think about Tom Friedman. On one hand, his occasional shilling for the neocon agenda pisses me off to no end (much more than, say, Safire, who has his head up his ass -- Friedman really should know better). On the other, the man can write, and he occasionally comes up with a real winner. Today's column is an example. On the surface, the column is an endorsement of Bush Sr. for president (echoing Lincoln Chafee). But if you read all the way through, it's pretty clear who he's really endorsing.
Highlights and more below the jump.
ABC early voter polling B-51 K-47 (don't panic)
Tue Oct 26, 2004 at 02:54:40 PM PDT
The Freepers are having orgasms over this nugget of information contained in the latest ABC News tracking poll report (the overall result was K-49, B-48):
Nine percent of "likely" voters in the ABC News tracking poll say they've voted for president, either by absentee ballot or early voting, a number that's jumped in the last week. Fifty-one percent say they went for George W. Bush, 47 percent for John Kerry.
Full link here. Why not to panic after the jump.
HAHAHA: The lamest Bush campaign attack yet
Mon Oct 25, 2004 at 12:26:02 PM PDT
Apparently the Bush/Cheney campaign is running out of nasty things to say about Big Bad John Kerry and his enemy-empowering, treasonous attacks on Our Dear Leader.
The latest: According to Ken Mehlman, Kerry has stooped so low that he is now ripping his attacks from the headlines!
Apparently the facts really do have a liberal bias. More below the jump.
Need Inspiration? Watch This Obama Ad
Wed Oct 20, 2004 at 12:16:48 PM PDT
Here it is (high bandwidth warning).
Via ArchPundit, and as he says, it just isn't fair that Obama's ads are this good.
Sorry for the short diary, but this gave me a much-needed pick-me-up just as I was about to hit my midday circadian lull.
Right-Wing 527 Ad Blitz Coming: Be Prepared
Tue Oct 19, 2004 at 08:40:41 AM PDT
Get ready to hear a whole lot about Ashley's story.
Apparently this has been circulating in right-wing corners of the Internet for a while, but I first found out about it via their banner ad on the front page of the NYT Web site. At a campaign rally in Ohio last May, Bush got the photo-op of a lifetime: with the cameras rolling, he hugged 16 year old Ashley Faulkner, whose mother died on 9/11. This is now being turned into a 30-second ad by a 527 group, the Progress for America Voter Fund, which states its goal as "to promote President Bush's record on key issues and expose the real John Kerry's ultra-liberal agenda, as well as the record of other liberal candidates". They are spending $14.2 million on this ad buy, which makes it the biggest single ad buy of the campaign by any group, including the campaigns and party committees. In addition to the TV ad, the blitz includes e-mails, automated phone calls, 2.3 million voter brochures, and a Web site.
Article from USA Today here and their analysis of the ad here. I'm not going to help their Google rankings by linking, but if you want to watch this piece of manipulative tripe, you can click on the NY Times ad, which takes you to the web site.
New NY Times poll: 46-46 RV
Mon Oct 18, 2004 at 09:04:17 PM PDT
With leaners, it's Kerry 47, Bush 46.
Among likely voters (and who knows what the fuck that means), it's Bush 47, Kerry 46.
Bush's approval is at 44 percent. If his approval rating is this low on Election Day, he's going down for certain.
Article here (NY Times, registration required). Click on the "Interactive" link on the right for the internals (it's a 42 page PDF file).
