LowerCaseRepublican

He does have a basis correct. There is a huge relationship between the Bush family and the bin Ladens going back to when Bush was a head member of Harken. (not to mention Carlyle Group) Unger's book "House of Bush House of Saud" has much more detail into the relationship between the House of Saud and Bush family. Moore is lax in fact checking but his wider swipe at Bush for being a whore for Bandar and the house of Saud is provable, as can be seen from the testimony of FBI agents in "House of Bush House of Saud". Even Faux News wasn't this harsh. They had numerous fact checkers on saying that the distortions were minimal but the wider point of the movie was indeed accurate.

Obama was already kicking his ass 8 ways from Sunday. This is just hilarious that the family values, sanctity of marriage loving guy gets nailed with this. The hypocricy is so goddamned funny.

Yeah, it's a quote from HST. It was after there was a sexual harassment suit filed against him in 1990. The suit was dismissed because there was no evidence of it and all the evidence proved that the woman who brought the charges lied. It's in his book "Kingdom of Fear". Then he formed the 4th Amendment Foundation to protect people from illegal searches because they tore apart his place looking for evidence and found nothing for 26 hours. He's also gotten involved in a case of a woman in CO that's been in prison because her boyfriend was stopped by a cop, then the boyfriend pulls a gun and blows the cop's brains out, then shoots himself. She had no prior knowledge and they charged her with being a felony for killing the cop due to state statutes. His stuff is really good. I'm reading "Generation of Swine" right now and just finished "The Rum Diary". All really kick ass stuff. As for the VP question, Kerry needs Dean or Edwards as his choice.

Kap, the Bible also states that marriage is to be between "one man and one or more women." Why is bigamy illegal? It's in the Bible. (Gen. 29:17-28 and II Samuel 3:2-5) Marriage shall not impede a man's right to take concubines in addition to wife or wives (II Sam. 5:13, I Kings 11:3, II Chron. 11:21) A marriage is only valid if the wife is a virgin. If not, she is to be executed. (Deut. 22:13-21) Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden (Gen. 24:3, Numbers 25:1-9, Ezra 9:12, Nehemiah 10:30, II Corinth. 6:14) Since marriage is for life, there is no divorce (Deut. 22:19, Mark 10:9-12) Not meant as a slap at you Kap...just if we're gonna have an old fashioned OT gay rights stomping party then we should go full force with everything the Bible says about marriage. It's just food for thought for the fundamentalists.

Powell helped to cover up My Lai. He's also, as Steff pointed out, the guy who fathered the head of the Uber-Nanny Association, the FCC. Also, Powell was quoted as saying on Feb. 5 when he was to read the UN speech condemning Iraq that "I'm not reading this. This is bulls***." and yet he read it anyway. A corrupt piece of trash. Thanks. We've already had enough of those in power from both parties.

I know a few people that have ED's. They are crippling to people that have them. That really sucks that Mary Kate has it. When they had a recent photo of the two on BBC, she looked really unhealthily thin.

I think the kid learned a valuable lesson: Don't Get Caught. And this dad seems pretty stupid too if he's consistently getting taken advantage of by a 13 year old.

I'm holding the nose and voting for Kerry because he cannot be as bad as the 4 years of Bush. 1) The National Debt has increased under Bush Jr. so drastically that the average American's share of the debt will be $24,000 compared to $500 when W first took office. 2) Under Bush Jr. we've gone from 41 million without health care to 43 million. 3) He cut health care benefits for veterans and increase co-payments and waiting time for VA hospitals. 4) Youth Opportunity Grants have been done away with. This was a program providing job training to America's youth and despite 13% unemployment of people aged 16-24, he gutted the program. 5) Cut funding for 375,000 low income college students and reduced Pell grant amounts to such a severe degree that it effectively caused 84,000 students to no longer be eligible for Pell grants. Pell grants have been overall reduced for 1.5 million students. 6) Our withdrawal from the International Criminal Court. 7) His refusal to punish or reprimand Lt. General Jerry Boykin for his comments about how the Christian God would kick Allah's ass. (not an exact quote...Google it) 8) First president to have a criminal record. 9) Decreased funding for the Violence Against Women Act. 10) Appointed Charles Pickering, a noted segregationist from MS, as a federal judge....on MLK Jr. Day. 11) Under the Clear Skies Initiative, power plants are allowed to emit 3x the amount of highly toxic mercury into the environment. 12) He's on pace to be the President with the most vacation time taken. Before 9/11, 42% of his presidency was "vacation time". 13) Failure to protect 3 million acres of the Tongass Nat'l Forest from logging. The Tongass has the highest concentration of bald eagles on Earth and already lost 700 sq. miles to logging with 33 more logging permits pending. 14) Pat Robertson has endorsed him. The same Pat Robertson quoted as stating that we should "nuke the State Department" and that 9/11 was caused by gays, lesbians, feminists, the ACLU, People for the American Way and other non-Christians. 15) His decline to fully fund the AIDS initiative that he promised to fund fully. 16) His denial of equal rights to the LGBT community.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/06/21/moon/index.html For those that don't want to watch the commercial to get the free day pass, here's the article. Hail to the Moon king The deeply weird coronation of Rev. Sun Myung Moon in a Senate office building -- crown, robes, the works -- is no longer one of Washington's best-kept secrets. - - - - - - - - - - - By John Gorenfeld You probably imagine your congressman hard at work in the Capitol debating legislation, making laws -- you know, governing. But your newspaper probably didn't tell you that one night in March, members of Congress hosted a crowning ritual for an ex-convict and multibillionaire who dressed up in maroon robes and declared himself the Second Coming. On March 23, the Dirksen Senate Office Building was the scene of a coronation ceremony for Rev. Sun Myung Moon, owner of the conservative Washington Times newspaper and UPI wire service, who was given a bejeweled crown by Rep. Danny K. Davis, D-Ill. Afterward, Moon told his bipartisan audience of Washington power players he would save everyone on Earth as he had saved the souls of Hitler and Stalin -- the murderous dictators had been born again through him, he said. In a vision, Moon said the reformed Hitler and Stalin vouched for him, calling him "none other than humanity's Savior, Messiah, Returning Lord and True Parent." To many observers, this bizarre scene would have looked like the apocalypse as depicted in "Left Behind" novels. Moon, 84, the benefactor of conservative foundations like the American Family Coalition -- who served time in the 1980s for tax fraud and conspiracy to obstruct justice -- has views somewhere to the right of the Taliban's Mullah Omar. Moon preaches that gays are "dung-eating dogs," Jews brought on the Holocaust by betraying Jesus, and the U.S. Constitution should be scrapped in favor of a system he calls "Godism" -- with him in charge. The man crowned "King of Peace" by congressmen once said, according to sermons reprinted in his church's Unification News: "Suppose I were to hit you with the baseball bat to stop you, bloodying your ear and breaking a bone or two, yet still you insisted on doing more work for Father." What, exactly, drew at least a dozen members of Congress to Moon's coronation? (By the Unification Church's estimate, 81 congressmen attended, although that number is probably high.) The event was the grand finale of Moon's coast-to-coast "tear down the cross" Moonification tour, intended to remove Christian crosses from almost 300 churches in poor neighborhoods -- the idea being that the cross was an obstacle to uniting religions under Moon. Yet the Dirksen ceremony was sold as a celebration of world peace. According to a cheery promotional video released by Moon's International and Interreligious Federation for World Peace, the ceremony marked the dawn of "the era of the Eternal Peace Kingdom, one global family under God." Moon's coronation also cured God's pain, the announcer explains. By all accounts, most of the congressmen in attendance didn't expect a coronation. Instead, they thought they were heading to an awards dinner honoring activists from their home states as "Ambassadors for Peace." A flier for the event claimed an impressive who's-who of organizers, including Republicans Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Rep. Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland and Charlie Black, a top Republican strategist. Democrats were named, too, like Rep. Harold Ford of Tennessee, who, incidentally, claims to have not even heard of the event. And then there was Rep. Danny K. Davis, D-Ill., the only congressman who has publicly expressed pride in the crowning ceremony, who praised Moon for bringing religious leaders together in his Ambassadors for Peace tours to Jerusalem and beyond. Davis, it was revealed this week in the Chicago Reader, took money from Moon-organized fundraisers, who also gave to a charity of his choice. Davis told an Anglican magazine that Moon's remarks were "similar to a baseball team owner telling team members that 'we are the greatest team on earth'" to get them fired up. At the time, the surreal event went uncovered by the Washington press corps, save for Moon's own Washington Times, which ran a brief description of the festivities. The story is getting some traction only now, after it was recently reported in the online magazine The Gadflyer. But what transpired at Dirksen two months ago remains a mystery to most Americans -- and those constituents of congressmen who attended Moon's crowning. The crowning ritual indeed began as a somewhat normal awards ceremony. Ribbons that looked like Olympic gold medals were given to Rep. Bartlett and others. But then it took an odd turn. Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., whose office maintained he did not attend the event until I provided photographs of him there -- spoke beside a photograph of himself pinning an American flag on Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy, back when President Bush was praising him for abandoning WMD programs and before he was suspected of trying to kill the leader of Saudi Arabia. Then, after Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., gave a speech praising one of Moon's Ambassadors for Peace, the civil rights veteran Rev. Walter Fauntroy, an unnamed Lubovitch rabbi took the stage declaring: "I have never seen this miracle where Jews, Christians and Muslims come together for peace!" Then Moon's cleric Chung Kwak took the mic. Before his days as the commander of the UPI wire service, Kwak, Moon said in a 1997 speech, was authorized to whomp on Unification Church members who slacked off. "Particularly those who are sleeping and hiding, Reverend Kwak's baseball bat will fall upon you at any time," Moon said. Now Kwak was standing in a Senate office building declaring Moon the king of the "second and third Israel." It might almost make sense for conservative congressmen to honor Moon in this way. After all, a writer in Moon's magazine Insight wrote in February that it's long past time for Republicans to thank the billionaire Korean preacher for his gifts. "[T]he continued refusal of Beltway conservatives publicly to acknowledge their steadfast patron is, of course, scandalous," wrote contributor Paul Gottfried. Moon has sunk an estimated $2-$4 billion into the money-losing Times, and countless other causes -- like Jerry Falwell's Liberty University. Moon has also made inroads in the Bush administration, as Salon reported last September, with plum appointments for former or present Moon VIPs, and almost half a million dollars in abstinence-only grants supporting Moon's anti-sex crusade. To teach teens that "free sex" is revolting, they're asked by Moon's followers to drink other people's spit out of a cup, and then consider how much more vigilant you must be when sharing other body fluids. While Moon once focused his energies on anti-Communism, making him popular among Republicans in the Reagan era -- his organization gave the first $100,000 to Oliver North's Nicaraguan Freedom Fund -- he has now shifted gears, aiming left. He's planning a "Peace United Nations" entwining religions instead of countries and is trying to make friends in the Congressional Black Caucus, like Rep. Davis. No congressman, on the right or left, has publicly denounced Moon for his momentous speeches describing his "peace kingdom" as a place where "gays will be eliminated" in a "purge on God's orders" he says will be like Stalin's. And many are surprisingly comfortable around a guy known for over-the-top speeches about the holy "love organ of life" and its various fluids. In a 1994 speech, he asked: "Do you like the smell of your husband's semen? Answer to Father. Does it smell good or bad? You may not like the smell of your wife's stool, but do you smell your own? Why don't you smell your own but you smell your wife's? Because you are not totally one." But if Moon pulled off his greatest trick on Mar. 23, fooling some unsuspecting congressmen into attending his coronation, it's not as if his stunt was new -- for more than 25 years, Moon has sought to surround himself with powerful people to gain credibility and legitimacy, including presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush. If the congressmen had simply run "Ambassadors for Peace" through the Google search engine, they would have discovered the group was tied to Moon and his grand plans for the future of Christianity -- plans to "reconcile" religions by tearing the Christian cross off church walls and persuading Jews to sign apologies for giving Jesus over to the Romans. Weldon, for one, had a long time to do that Google search. As far back as June 19, 2003, he's listed in a speech by Rep. Danny K. Davis on the floor of the House of Representatives honoring Moon: "Many of my colleagues will join me and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon), co-chair, in giving tribute to some of the outstanding Americans from our districts," said Davis. "We are grateful to the founders of Ambassadors for Peace, the Reverend and Mrs. Sun Myung [Moon], for promoting the vision of world peace, and we commend them for their work." As for Moon's vision of world peace, there are widespread reports, even acknowledged within Moon's church, of allegations that in 1989 he allowed brutal inquisitions to take place. The inquisitor, a man Moon apparently believed was the reincarnation of his son, was allegedly encouraged to tie people to radiators and beat them. As a result, Moon's trusted lieutenant, Bo Hi Pak, was said to have suffered minor brain damage. Wrote his daughter-in-law, Nansook Hong, in her tell-all book: "Sun Myung Moon seemed to take pleasure in the reports that filtered back to East Garden of the beatings being administered by the Black Heung Jin. He would laugh raucously if someone out of favor had been dealt an especially hard blow." Members of Congress may want to do their homework before they crown their next King of Peace.

Hahaha, I saw this on Fark a while ago. The photos of what he sent the guy are hilarious.

I personally think they should have a SWAT team rush the guy's house and do what they normally do for a criminal. Sure, the cops rough up the guy who steals $30 and a woman's purse but this guy steals millions and the cops are treating him with kid gloves. I love the Chapelle Show sketch where he shows the difference when he makes fun of Law and Order with the corporate goon being taken down with a SWAT team and he gets the kid gloves and no punishment.

CK, the 9/11 commission stated (I watch a lot of CSPAN) that Iraq did not work with Al Qaeda or harbor them. AQ tried to inquire a lot of times but the government of Iraq categorically denied them every time. You couldn't responsibly ignore [the possibility that] a tyrant had these stocks," Clinton said. -- Um...that begs the question of why are we not invading N. Korea and all the other nuclear nations that are relatively unstable? From the Guardian Unlimited: A senior US intelligence official is about to publish a bitter condemnation of America's counter-terrorism policy, arguing that the west is losing the war against al-Qaida and that an "avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked" war in Iraq has played into Osama bin Laden's hands. His book describes the Iraq invasion as "an avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat but whose defeat did offer economic advantage." Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, due out next month, dismisses two of the most frequent boasts of the Bush administration: that Bin Laden and al-Qaida are "on the run" and that the Iraq invasion has made America safer. In an interview with the Guardian the official, who writes as "Anonymous", described al-Qaida as a much more proficient and focused organisation than it was in 2001, and predicted that it would "inevitably" acquire weapons of mass destruction and try to use them. "For my money, the game was over at Tora Bora," Anonymous said, speaking of the area where we had Osama cornered, but Bush pulled back so he could go after Saddam's oil fields. And hey, let's not forget that AQ made an official statement endorsing Bush for President...No, I'm not making this up. The terrorist group stated that it wished Bush to win because it was not possible to find a leader, "more foolish than you, who deals with matters by force rather than with wisdom." http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;j...97&pageNumber=0

There was one hit by Aramis Ramirez in the 2-1 Loss to the A's where he was like "long fly ball belted way back" and it was like 5 steps in front of the track in CF. It was a routine fly f***ing ball and he about creamed in his pants. Stoney, please just strangle him.

f***ing f***y f*** f*** f***. Goddamned Bradford couldn't hit the broadside of a barn with a strike.

Speaking of the beheadings, I was looking up a little bit of stuff on the Berg killing. On the film, the lead guy says he is al-Zarqawi. However, a few months ago (before the film and the prison stuff even broke), there was an MSNBC story saying that this man had been killed in a bombing campaign.

IIRC, real wages have steadily been decreasing since the 1970s. And the CEO of Manpower, I might be wrong but isn't Manpower the #1 temp agency in the world? I think if a company hires temp workers they could afford to take on more workers/pay more $$ because they do not necessarily have to provide benefits/health care to temp workers. I dunno if that's THE explanation, just one I developed after closely reading the article posted by SS2K4. And Nuke, that's the reason the Bush administration is taking such heat for the idea of making fast food workers "manufacturing" jobs because it's inaccurate and deceptive.

I do believe there was a somewhat buried story a few months ago that they were re-naming fast food jobs manufacturing jobs in order to inflate numbers of manufacturing jobs. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/20/...ain601336.shtml Google search for a lot of articles about it. It's a fairly deceptive way to make it seem like there are less manufacturing jobs being lost. And regarding this move, the Chairman of the report was sent a letter by John Dingell (D-MI) stating some of the following: "I am sure the 163,000 factory workers who have lost their jobs in Michigan will find it heartening to know that a world of opportunity awaits them in high growth manufacturing careers like spatula operation, napkin restocking, and lunch tray removal...Will federal student loans and Trade Adjustment Assistance grants be applied to tuition costs at Burger College?...Will special sauce now be counted as a durable good?" And kapkomet, you are correct. There are a lot of loopholes (i.e. putting corporate HQ in a PO box in the Cayman Islands so all the funds are tax free while getting all the benefits of the US without having to pay for them) And the loopholes isn't a one party thing either. Both parties are up to their necks in this s***.

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp...=20040613ARL208 The Texas baseball fan who prompted a public outcry when he knocked aside a 4-year-old to get a foul ball now says he will give the ball to the youngster. Matt Starr has also agreed to send a letter of apology to the family of Nick O'Brien and buy his family tickets to future Texas Rangers games, club official John Blake said Wednesday.

IIRC, I remember seeing on the Royals board that he was thinking about retirement and needed arm surgery but wanted to play through it to the end of the season a month or two ago. Then he continued to suck because of the injury and needs surgery. We don't need Leskanic especially since he's damaged goods.

Just do what Homer suggests in the Simpsons..."Just say you're equally biased against all races."

kkkkjkkkkkk

Beirut...IIRC, I believe Reagan's plan of action was to turn tail and run in order to invade Grenada. Attacking a country that didn't do s*** to us made no sense and showed, according to many Islamic clerics who have made statements, that the US would just shoot and ask questions later. Al Qaeda has actually (I'm not making this up, you can Google the story) endorsed Bush for President cuz he knee jerk military reactionism is making it much easier for AQ to recruit people. Here's the left libertarian in me coming out, this guy seems to give big love taps to Saudi Arabia. The Bush family and the ruling family of Saudi Arabia have an extensively close relationship for years. Ron Paul and others have tried to call this out because giving the country that provided 15 of the 19 hijackers, is the country of origin of Osama's family etc. f***ing love taps is insane. If conservatives are truly worried about Wahhabi fundamentalism and fundamentalist Islam, then look no further than our buddy buddy relationship with Saudi Arabia. Also, re: 1993 WTC bombing, I believe it was the Dec. 15, 1993 Chicago Tribune that stated the FBI had an informant who built the bomb (FBI provided him with the substances to build it), knew when it was going down (he told the FBI), where it was going down (he told the FBI) yet the FBI did nothing to stop the attack that could have been devastatingly destructive. And for all that think Clinton sat back and let this happen, in his defense he did stop Project Bojinka before it could get off the ground. And your statement that the Iraqis are disrespecting the US troops. If you had tanks, troops etc. rolling through your town and arresting you for small violations (traffic tickets etc.) and throwing you in prison until you get interrogated, you just might be pissed too (BBC covered that story) and the Independent in the UK covered the story that 70-90% of the people that the US has imprisoned, according to US intelligence statements released, are mistakes and should be released. You have to wonder why they're so pissed when that is going on and we have our troops and Bremer living in Saddam's old palaces? There are barb wired towns where people cannot move freely and have to clear 3 different checkpoints. We have a government where we closed down newspapers that we didn't like (free press?). A lot of the actions are antithetical to democracy and the Iraqis are just a little pissed being told they are getting democracy when they're not.

Welcome to the bizarro universe, where the movie reviewer at Fox News thinks Fahrenheit 9/11 is "a really brilliant piece of work, and a film that members of all political parties should see without fail". http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_st...,122678,00.html Wow, Fox News Channel giving Michael Moore props for making a movie that does Bush no favors...::faints::

Radio giant Clear Channel and the other big broadcasters have been fighting to prevent local communities from starting low power radio stations across America. These "LPFM" stations are a crucial part of the movement to create better local, independent and diverse media. Recently, Senators John McCain [R-AZ] and Patrick Leahy [D-VT] introduced legislation (Senate bill 2505) that would issue broadcast licenses to thousands of new noncommercial radio stations across the nation. Most Senators want to support LPFM, but — as usual — they are getting hammered by the powerful broadcast lobby. Last year over two million real petitions prompted Congress to attempt to overturn new FCC rules that let Big Media get even bigger. A little background: A few years ago, Clear Channel (which owns more than one out of every ten radio stations) and the National Association of Broadcasters made bogus claims that low-power radio signals would interfere with their own signals, and successfully blocked new LPFM licenses in the nation's 50 biggest markets. A recently-released technical study debunked that claim, and pulled away the last fig leaf hiding their anti-competitive agenda. --- I got this in an Free Press e-mail. I wanted to see what everybody thought about this since media has been a huge discussion topic on ST recently.