Four stories worth mentioning.
1) Looks like, “Mission Accomplished, Part II,” is on it’s way. With the recent announcement to scale back the U.S. troop presence in Iraq, my fears of Bush and his crew saying, “Okay, everything looks fine here. We can go now,” have only increased. McCain, who no, I wouldn’t vote for, put it best: "To announce withdrawals when the number of attacks and deaths of American military are going up is not reasonable or logical," Mr. McCain said in an interview. "If the American military can't do it, then certainly half-trained Iraqis cannot." Of course they can’t. But that isn’t really the point now, is it? The U.S. could pull out all it’s personnel tomorrow and 100 Iraqi policeman could get shot a day, but it wouldn’t matter to people in this country.
B) Roy Moore, “the ten commandments judge” was removed from the bench today by a special ethics commission. All I can say is that it’s about time and that he should not only be removed, but also disbarred and held in criminal contempt. The removal is all I think I’ll get though, so I’ll take it.
One asshole had this to say: "They're undoing a democratic process here," said Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition. "It smacks of third-world countries. It smacks of dictatorship."
I seem to remember a similar line of defense used in Alabama and other Southern states not so long ago…what was that over again???? Damn my racist memory…. NO! Lazy memory. That’s what I meant to say! That and democracy rules, especially when it applies to mob democracy suppressing the rights of minorities!
Pi) Jean Chretien is ending his tenure his ten year tenure as Canadian Prime Minister. All in all, he’s been a capable politician and an admirable man. Best quote in the article I have linked, on the reaction he expected from Bush over the decision not to send Canadian troops to Iraq: “‘Of course he was not happy,’ he said, recalling President Bush's obvious displeasure. ‘I did not expect him to send me flowers.’” Almost as good as Pierre Trudeau’s response to Nixon calling Trudeau, “a goddamned bastard.” The Canadian PM replied, “I simply told President Nixon that I had been called worse things by better people.” Now Trudeau, there was a class act.
Zs@!k) And finally, I heard on NPR this morning that as Senate Republicans marched down the aisle today to begin their 30 hour “anti-filibuster” (? A Santorum word of course), Iowa Senator Tom Harkin aided by some other Democrats raised a banner that read “I’ll be home watching The Bachelor.” Why? “Because,” as Harkin explained, “that way I’ll be watching something that’s almost as stupid as this.” Harkin gets double points for ripping obnoxious Senate theatrics AND for making a clumsy cultural reference to a show that’s no longer on the air….the best kind of cultural reference. I wouldn’t respect the gesture as much if the sign referred to something current.
Roy Moore is an idiot. The Roy who got mauled by a tiger would make a better judge.
Posted by mike at November 14, 2003 01:23 AM