Freedom, part II

Holes dug, plants planted, and now for some more fun from the Republican Presidential Debates:

Crooks and Liars: “gimme a T, O, R, T, U, R, E“. Of course that old fuddy-duddy McCain said “we don’t torture”.

How Factual Were These Guys?

FactCheck.org weighs in:

Summary
Claims, facts and figures flew at the second GOP presidential debate of 2008. Not all were true. For example:

* Mitt Romney claimed he didn’t raise taxes when he was governor of Massachusetts, failing to note that he increased government fees by hundreds of millions of dollars and shifted some of the state tax burden to the local level.
* Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado claimed scientific reports on whether humans are responsible for global warming are split 50-50, which isn’t close to being true.
* Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee praised a “fair tax” but failed to note that it would ease the burden on the richest Americans while imposing a stiff retail sales tax of perhaps 34 percent.
* Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani used more statistical dexterity to manipulate statistics, claiming adoptions increased 133 percent when he was mayor. Actually, they peaked and started a continuing decline.

Nice analysis at the site.

Hillary Clinton

Fluff, but she shows a sense of humor.

Joe Biden talks about the Feingold-Reid amendment.

Bicyling
No spandex for Iranian women who want to ride bikes!

Iran is to start manufacturing “Islamic bicycles” for women that conceals their figure, the government newspaper Iran reported on Thursday.

“This bike has a cabin which conceals half of the cyclist’s body,” the newspaper said. Elaheh Sofali, an architect of the project, told Iran it would encourage women’s sports in the Islamic republic.

Faezeh Hashemi, a daughter of former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was instrumental in encouraging women to take to the saddle in the 1990s when she was in charge of women’s participation in the Olympics.

Freedom!

My class duties for the semester are over; now I can get to work on some research.

Of course I have duties to do; my wife wants me to plant some flowers; she can’t get away from the office so I won’t be seeing….well see the bottom of this post.

Tidbits

Is President Bush an idiot?

No, we are. Note: many people (especially Republicans) thought that Truman (e. g., “to err is Truman“) and Carter were dumb; that counters what the wingnut talking head just said. Of course, Carter is, in fact, very smart.

Intolerance

We need to be tolerant of the intolerant, or so says Colbert.

Science:
A surprising diversity of life found in hostile antartic waters:

Scientists have found more than 700 new species of marine creatures in seas once thought too hostile to sustain such rich biodiversity.

Groups of carnivorous sponges, free-swimming worms, crustaceans and molluscs were collected.

The findings, published in the journal Nature, could provide insights into the evolution of ocean life in this area.

Dr Katrin Linse, an author of the paper and a marine biologist from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), said: “What was once thought to be a featureless abyss is in fact a dynamic, variable and biologically rich environment.

“Finding this extraordinary treasure trove of marine life is our first step to understanding the complex relationships between the deep ocean and distribution of marine life.”

New to science

The research formed part of the Andeep (Antarctic benthic deep-sea biodiversity) project, which is the first comprehensive study of Antarctic marine life.

It is designed to fill the “knowledge vacuum” that surrounds the fauna that inhabit the deeper parts of the Southern Ocean.
Map of Andeep studies. The first sampling expedition (Andeep 1) took place in 2002. Andeep 2 took also took place in 2002. Andeep 3 took place in 2005.

Wingnuts
Look at what Senator Brownback (who is a Creationist!) is saying:

Dear NewsMax Reader,

Did you see the debate Tuesday night?

The battle is raging for the very heart and soul of the Republican Party.

And the stakes are higher than ever!

Is the Republican Party going to continue to stand for life?

Is the Republican Party going to continue to stand for traditional marriage?
Is the Republican Party going to continue to stand for lower taxes and smaller government?

I know where I stand.

From the first day I served in Congress all the way to the present I’ve been a consistent and faithful proponent for life, for marriage, for lower taxes, and for smaller government.

My record is clear.

Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has called me “unrivaled as an advocate for the family and for life in Washington.”

The Club for Growth released an analysis of my record in the House and Senate and said I had “a stellar record on tax policy”. Club President Pat Toomey was also quoted praising my “bold, specific plans, that are terrific.”

Others may talk the talk from time to time.

But I’ve walked the walk for 10 years in the Senate and two in the House.

And I’ve got the record to prove it.

Now I want to ask YOU a question.

My friend, imagine if the Republican Party nominates a presidential candidate who is NOT honestly and faithfully pro-life.

Or if the Republican Party nominates a presidential candidate who is NOT ready and willing to do whatever it takes to protect traditional marriage.

Ask yourself this, would it still be YOUR Republican Party?

Would you have a candidate to vote for in 2008 that you felt good about?

Or would you simply be holding your nose while you voted for the candidate not named Hillary Rodham Clinton?

If you want to make a difference in this battle for the heart and soul of the Republican Party I’m telling you today that it’s not too late.

Note: he is taking shots at Guiliani (and perhaps at McCain and Romney?) and assuming that Hillary Clinton will win the Democratic nomination.

Garden Work…what I am missing because I have to do it alone…

Below are links to photos of what I like to see when I work in the garden; here is a cartoon hint:

And a video one

The Photo Links…you’ve been warned!

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Just Didn’t feel like much

Workout notes Rather apathetic, even though it was a sunny, crisp day. I did swim 2000 yards; 1000 warm up (500 fist drills, 500 drill/swim), 20 x 50 on the :50 (made ‘em all easily). Then yoga, then 3 miles of easy walking on my own. I did 6 last night (3 on my own, 3 with the group). I walked over the Michael Bridge; the view was lovely.

Still, mentally, I just wasn’t there today.

Various topics

John Edwards
Many times I’ve said that it was a good thing for rich people to actually care about poor people. Now a more famous blogger is also saying it out loud:

Sometimes I find myself writing the most obvious things. It’s because the dunderheads in the mainstream media go along with the most ridiculous Republican spin on such a consistent basis. So, now I feel obliged to tell you something that is so plainly obvious that any three year old could understand it:

It is not hypocritical for rich people to help the poor. It is kind and generous.

John Edwards is constantly attacked by the rightwing for fighting poverty while at the same time … wait for it … being rich! How dare he?!

So, what is he supposed to do? Hide his money and keep it from everyone else like a good greedy, conservative? It wouldn’t be hypocritical to be greedy with your money if you’re rich, but it would be hypocritical if you tried to help others? How dumb do you have to be to think that Republican talking point makes any sense?

FDR was rich and he tried to help the poor anyway. What a hypocrite! Same with the Kennedy’s. Limousine liberals! So, would it be okay if you had a limousine but decided to keep all your money for yourself and run the poor over with your limo? Then, I guess you wouldn’t a hypocrite, you’d just be an asshole.

Conservatives have made fun of liberals for trying to help the poor for so long now. Yeah, that’s real funny, make fun of people trying to be helpful and glorify the selfish instead. Very Christian of you. What drives me crazy is how credulous the press is in covering this spin as if it made any sense at all.
[...]
Look, I’m not a big Edwards fan [...] I am always left a little uneasy with John Edwards’ sincerity when he says things like that (justifying his joining a hedge fund).

But what you can’t question is his devotion to fighting poverty. I don’t care why you think he’s doing it, at least he’s doing it. What are the Republican candidates doing to fight poverty? [...]

Yet this level of enormous indifference to the struggling families in this country is greeted as perfectly normal and acceptable.

Feingold-Reid vote results

The Feingold-Reid bill

authored by the gutsy Russ Feingold (D-WI) and rapidly championed by Reid, stipulates that George W. Bush must begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq within 120 days of the bill’s passage and that “no funds appropriated or otherwise made available under any provision of law may be obligated or expended to continue the deployment in Iraq of members of the United States Armed Forces after March 31, 2008.”

“I am pleased to cosponsor Senator Feingold’s important legislation,” Reid said when the bill was introduced early last month. “I believe it is consistent with the language included in the supplemental appropriations bill passed by a bipartisan majority of the Senate. If the President vetoes the supplemental appropriations bill and continues to resist changing course in Iraq, I will work to ensure this legislation receives a vote in the Senate in the next work period.”

The vote on Feingold’s legislation will provide the biggest gut-check of the year for all Senators and give Democrats in particular the opportunity to show just how much they side with the troops and the American people in ending the Iraq quagmire.

But the bill didn’t pass; as mcjoan writes in the Daily Kos

The Feingold-Reid Amendment failed this morning, 29-67. Twenty-nine of our Democratic Senators does comprise a majority of the majority party, and is a significant bump from the 11 senators who are actual cosponsors of the bill. It also sent the strong message that many Dems, including the presidential contenders, endorse the idea of cutting funding in principle.

But the result means that we still have a lot of work to do.

Sen. Reid released this statement regarding the Iraq votes:

Regardless of the outcome of today’s votes, I want everyone listening to know that if my Republican friends choose to stick with a failed policy, congressional Democrats will take this fight up again at the first available opportunity. Our troops and their families deserve no less.”

On one hand, I am pleased that Obama, Durbin, Biden and Clinton voted for it. On the other hand, I can see why some voted no, including two people that I trust on this issue: James Webb (D-Virginia) and Chuck Hagle (R-Nebraska).

As Webb as said in the past (hat tip to fleetadmiral at the Daily Kos)

Lets see what Webb says about Iraq:

What we really need to do is to get into the arena where we can talk about a strategy, talk about the pluses and the minuses of the Baker-Hamilton Commission and work toward a solution that, on the one hand, will allow us to remove our combat troops, but on the other, will increase the stability of the region, allow us to continue to fight against international terrorism and allow us, as a nation, to address our strategic interests around the world. And this is — this is one of the drawbacks that we’ve had with so many troops having been put into this constant rotational basis inside one country when we have a war against international terrorism that’s global.

When asked about cutting funds, he said:

I — you know, I lived through Vietnam. I lived through it as a Marine and I know that those sorts of approaches, while they seem attractive on one level are really not that realistic.

In all, his position is rather similar to Tester: try to force a change in strategy that will lead to troops coming home, but they’re not holding a “bring them home now. period.” position.

So in the end, people are bashing Tester and Webb for some sort of betrayal of trust or going back on their words when they voted exactly as they said they would.

Webb is certainly no war-monger:

May 1, 2007 – The following is a statement from Senator Jim Webb in response to the President’s veto of the Iraq War funding bill:

“Congress exercised its constitutional responsibility this week by appropriating more than $100 billion to fully support our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, the President chose not to cash that check. It is up to him to explain to the American people why.

“We won this war four years ago. The question is when we end the occupation. This bill called for a much-needed shift in our approach to Iraq. The United States military is not going to change the societal makeup of Iraq. And the Malaki government is not going to bring peace among Iraq’s competing factions without the strong, overt, diplomatic cooperation of other countries in this region. And this bill called for just an approach.

“I have always said that we need to support the troops through leadership that is equal to the sacrifices we are asking them to make. It is time for a new approach in Iraq, one that displays smart diplomatic leadership in the region. We must bring this occupation to a proper conclusion that will increase our ability to focus on international terrorism, increase the stability in the region and allow us to focus on our strategic interests elsewhere in the world.”

I’d have no trouble allowing him (and Chuck Hagle) to take the lead on this issue and to help us come to a realistic, workable solution.

Ron Paul: sometimes he makes sense.

Jerome Doolittle writes in the Smirking Chimp:

A few minutes later (during the Republican Presidential Candidate debate) an odd thing happened. Some guy that nobody ever even heard of grabbed a mike and committed common sense, right up there on the stage with women and innocent children watching.

It came as a mild but not unpleasant shock, like pulling up the lid and finding a rose in the toilet …

The perpetrator was named Ron Paul, who turned out upon investigation to be an obstetrician with libertarian leanings, an Air Force vet and an obscure Texas congressman who once represented Tom DeLay’s old district. Here’s some of what he said:

We’ve started with — we’ve just — the Republicans put in the Department of Homeland — it’s a monstrous type of bureaucracy. It was supposed to be streamlining our security and it’s unmanageable. I mean, just think of the efficiency of FEMA in its efforts to take care of the floods and the hurricanes…

We were spending $40 billion on security prior to 9/11, and they had all the information they needed there to deal with the threat, and it was inefficiency. So what do we do? We add a gigantic bureaucracy, which they’re still working on trying to put it together, and a tremendous amount of increase in funds…

There’s a strong tradition of being anti-war in the Republican party. It is the constitutional position. It is the advice of the Founders to follow a non-interventionist foreign policy, stay out of entangling alliances, be friends with countries, negotiate and talk with them and trade with them.

Q: Congressman, you don’t think that changed with the 9/11 attacks, sir?

>No. Non-intervention was a major contributing factor. Have you ever read the reasons they attacked us? They attack us because we’ve been over there; we’ve been bombing Iraq for 10 years …

We don’t understand the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics. So right now we’re building an embassy in Iraq that’s bigger than the Vatican. We’re building 14 permanent bases. What would we say here if China was doing this in our country or in the Gulf of Mexico? We would be objecting. We need to look at what we do from the perspective of what would happen if somebody else did it to us. (Applause.)

Q:Are you suggesting we invited the 9/11 attack, sir?

I’m suggesting that we listen to the people who attacked us and the reason they did it, and they are delighted that we’re over there because Osama bin Laden has said, “I am glad you’re over on our sand because we can target you so much easier.” They have already now since that time — have killed 3,400 of our men, and I don’t think it was necessary.

MR. GIULIANI: Wendell, may I comment on that? That’s really an extraordinary statement. That’s an extraordinary statement, as someone who lived through the attack of September 11, that we invited the attack because we were attacking Iraq. I don’t think I’ve heard that before, and I’ve heard some pretty absurd explanations for September 11th. (Applause, cheers.)

And I would ask the congressman to withdraw that comment and tell us that he didn’t really mean that. (Applause.)

Q:Congressman?

I believe very sincerely that the CIA is correct when they teach and talk about blowback. When we went into Iran in 1953 and installed the shah, yes, there was blowback. A reaction to that was the taking of our hostages and that persists. And if we ignore that, we ignore that at our own risk. If we think that we can do what we want around the world and not incite hatred, then we have a problem.

They don’t come here to attack us because we’re rich and we’re free. They come and they attack us because we’re over there. I mean, what would we think if we were — if other foreign countries were doing that to us?

This is the first time I can remember that any candidate for the presidency, of either party, has taken on the question that Osama bin Laden once suggested that we ask ourselves: Why didn’t his men attack Stockholm? The misnamed “War on Terror” can only be won once we react to that question like grownups, not like Rudolph Giuliani and the fools who cheered him so wildly last night.

Reactions to Falwell’s death

Princess Sparkle Pony’s photo. Get it?

Christopher Hitchens weighs in (yep, the very one that parted ways with The Nation after he backed the Iraq war)

Religion

Religion gone bad: attempts made to convert wounded Jewish Navy veteran to Christianity:
(in the Navy Times via Radio Free Chimp)

Navy veteran David Miller said that when he checked into the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Iowa City, he didn’t realize he would get a hard sell for Christian fundamentalism along with treatment for his kidney stones.

Miller, 46, an Orthodox Jew, said he was repeatedly proselytized by hospital chaplains and staff in attempts to convert him to Christianity during three hospitalizations over the past two years.

He said he went hungry each time because the hospital wouldn’t serve him kosher food, and the staff refused to contact his rabbi, who could have brought him something to eat.

Miller, an Iowa City resident and former petty officer third class who spent four years in the Navy, outlined his complaints at a news conference in Des Moines on Thursday. The event was sponsored by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, an activist group based in Albuquerque, N.M.

He described the Iowa City facility as an institution permeated by government sponsorship of fundamentalist Christianity and unconstitutional discrimination against Jews.

Miller has been classified as 100 percent disabled because of chronic painful problems with kidney stones, and he has repeatedly visited the center as a patient and outpatient.

The hospital’s chaplains and staff, Miller said, have the attitude that you either accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior and you are saved, or you are damned.

He said he has tried to resolve the problems with the hospital’s administration without success.

“I am not trying to get rid of the chaplain corps,” Miller said. “When I was in the Navy, I was a religious program specialist. I worked with Christian chaplains, and I believe in the value of the chaplain corps, but not using it to bludgeon people, for heaven’s sake.”

There are atheists in foxholes after all
You’ve heard it said that “there are no atheists in foxholes”. Yes, my dad (who was NOT a believer, though he believed in some “spirit in the sky” sort of thing) tell me that, while being rocketed, he did hear some very non-pious people begging god to spare them. But Kurt Vonnegut wasn’t exactly a believer (he was a POW during World War II). And there have been many stories of soliders who turned into atheists after facing the horrors of war.

Here is one (which is not the centeral part of the larger article); hat tip to O’Brien for alerting us to it (from U. S. News and World Report):

Four days before his death, Army Staff Sgt. Darrell Ray Griffin Jr., an infantry squad leader in Baghdad, sent an E-mail to his wife, Diana. “Spartan women of Greece used to tell their husbands, before they went into battle, to come back with their shields or laying on them, dying honorably in battle. But if they did not return with their shield, this showed that they ran away from the battle. Cowardice was not a Spartan virtue … Tell me that you love me the same by me coming back with my shield or on it.”

A few days later, Diana replied. “Are you ok??? I haven’t heard from you since Sunday and it is now Wednesday … I know you said you were going on a dangerous mission … I get so nervous when I don’t hear from you … phone call or e-mail … I just hope and pray your ok honey … “

It was an E-mail Griffin would never read.

As the Baghdad security plan draws thousands more troops into densely populated parts of the Iraqi capital, the danger from roadside bombs and small-arms fire grows exponentially. The city has now surpassed Anbar province as the deadliest region for U.S. troops. Since the war began, more than 3,370 American soldiers and marines have been killed and more than 25,000 wounded in Iraq, and, in terms of American casualties, the past six months have been the costliest of the war. American commanders say they expect casualties to increase in the next three months.

One of those casualties was Darrell Griffin, felled by a sniper’s bullet on March 21, 2007, while patrolling in Sadr City. He was fatally shot while standing in the hatch of a Stryker armored vehicle. I interviewed him on March 3, 10 days before his 36th birthday, at a forward operating base near the town of Iskandariyah, 35 miles south of the city where he was killed. The desert sun was bright, and he wore a pair of dark glasses, which covered his eyes but couldn’t conceal a spasmodic muscle tic in his face. He was quite self-conscious about the tic, he confessed, but shrugged it off. “That’s what happens after two combat tours in Iraq.” We talked about a recent battle and about his collection of digital photographs chronicling his two tours in Iraq. He’d seen things, he said, that he could never tell his wife or family on the phone. [...]

He often wrote about God in his E-mails home. He’d been a part-time pastor at a California Baptist church once, giving sermons on Wednesday nights. He’d knocked on the door of a church shortly after he met his wife in 1992. “I’d like to be saved,” he’d said. In January, he asked his wife to send him a copy of the Koran, because he wanted to read about the Muslim faith. But in early March of this year, he told me that he’d stopped attending church. “I started studying philosophy and became an atheist,” he said. “I’m still trying to contemplate God, but it is kind of hard here.” Ten days later, on his birthday, he called home. “He was remarkably calm,” recalled his father. “The things he has seen in war and the fact that he read so deeply in philosophical and theological issues led him to be often conflicted internally about God. He said that he reconciled his conflicts and that he was ready anytime God called him. Not the statement of an atheist.”

See the conflict here? He said he had become an atheist; his father didn’t seem to accept that. Perhaps he really wasn’t and had indeed changed back. But you can see how non-black-and-white this is.

Quiz at Belief.net

I took a quiz at Belief.net; if nothing else it was fun. This is the “belief-o-matic” quiz results which shows spiritual type; the percentage is how closely my beliefs match those of others who took this quiz. Those who know me wouldn’t be surprised.

1. Secular Humanism (100%)
2. Unitarian Universalism (95%)
3. Liberal Quakers (83%)
4. Neo-Pagan (76%)
5. Theravada Buddhism (74%)
6. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (71%)
7. Nontheist (68%)
8. New Age (60%)
9. Taoism (54%)
10. Reform Judaism (54%)
11. Mahayana Buddhism (53%)
12. Orthodox Quaker (52%)
13. Bahá’í Faith (45%)
14. Scientology (42%)
15. Jainism (41%)
16. Sikhism (41%)
17. New Thought (38%)
18. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (35%)
19. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (34%)
20. Hinduism (29%)
21. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (27%)
22. Seventh Day Adventist (27%)
23. Islam (24%)
24. Orthodox Judaism (24%)
25. Jehovah’s Witness (18%)
26. Eastern Orthodox (17%)
27. Roman Catholic (17%)

I took a second quiz and the results are below. I couldn’t answer some of the questions as none of the choices fit; for example, there was a question as to how I respond to reading about natural disasters. I couldn’t say that it was “part of God’s plan” because I don’t believe that, I couldn’t say that “it gives me doubt” or “tests my faith” or even it “disporoves the existence of a god”. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the quiz.

Quiz: What’s Your Spiritual Type?

You scored 38, on a scale of 25 to 100.

Here’s how to interpret your score:
25 – 29
Hardcore Skeptic — but interested or you wouldn’t be here!
30 – 39
Spiritual Dabbler — Open to spiritual matters but far from impressed
40 – 49
Active Spiritual Seeker – Spiritual but turned off by organized religion
50 – 59
Spiritual Straddler – One foot in traditional religion, one foot in free-form spirituality
60 – 69
Old-fashioned Seeker — Happy with my religion but searching for the right expression of it
70 – 79
Questioning Believer – You have doubts about the particulars but not the Big Stuff
80 – 89
Confident Believer – You have little doubt you’ve found the right path
90 – 100
Candidate for Clergy