a brief history of america..
March 11, 2008 archive
Mar 11 2008
Docudharma Times Tuesday March 11
Why do the heathens rage behind the firehouse
Where Peewee sits upon the wall to preach?
This boy and girl that gather pearls
Of wisdom falling from his mouth
U.N. Alleges Nuclear Work By Iran’s Civilian Scientists
Iranian nuclear engineer Mohsen Fakhrizadeh lectures weekly on physics at Tehran’s Imam Hossein University. Yet for more than a decade, according to documents attracting interest among Western governments, he also ran secret programs aimed at acquiring sensitive nuclear technology for his government.Experts at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have repeatedly invited Fakhrizadeh to tea and a chat about Iran’s nuclear work. But for two years, the government in Tehran has barred any contact with the scientist, who U.S. officials say recently moved to a new lab in a heavily guarded compound also off-limits to U.N. inspectors.
Mar 11 2008
Muse in the Morning
 Muse in the Morning |
The muses are ancient. The inspirations for our stories were said to be born from them. Muses of song and dance, or poetry and prose, of comedy and tragedy, of the inward and the outward. In one version they are Calliope, Euterpe and Terpsichore, Erato and Clio, Thalia and Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Urania.
It has also been traditional to name a tenth muse. Plato declared Sappho to be the tenth muse, the muse of women poets. Others have been suggested throughout the centuries. I don’t have a name for one, but I do think there should be a muse for the graphical arts. And maybe there should be many more.
Please join us inside to celebrate our various muses…
Mar 11 2008
Your Caption Here
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Mar 11 2008
Random Encounter with an Iraqi driver.
Moving through the streets of Portland. Me in the back of a town car, after a short chat about the weather…
Me: You sound like you’re from the Middle East.
Him: Iraq.
Me: Really? How long have you been–
Him: I left after the first Bush war.
Mar 11 2008
The Stars Hollow Gazette
Well, since sex sells.
Here’s why I don’t go to nudie bars.
One night my Republican friend and another friend of ours (don’t know his political affiliation) decided that we (that’s all of us including me) should go out to a local bar where a girl we all knew from having attended several parties with her was “performing”.
It was a horrible place, barely bigger than a walk-in closet and dead empty.
The 400 pound owner was crammed behind the bar his fat factually filling the space between the counter and the bottles. He was screaming obscenities at our mutual acquaintance, calling her a lazy slut who couldn’t make money.
So when we sat down next to the stage with our $5 Budweisers, I took what I had in my wallet and just dumped it out.
I didn’t even drink my beer, just kind of clutched it in both hands and stared at it.
An eternity later, after my “friends” decided I was sufficiently embarrassed we finally left and as we did my non-affiliated bud said to me-
“You know, she makes more in one night than you do in a week.”
Somehow that did not console me.
Mar 11 2008
Democrats in Iowa’s State Legislature Thwart Constitutional Ban on Gay Marriage
An effort by Republicans in the Iowa state legislature to debate a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage failed last week. The amendment will likely not be debated at all this year since it could not advance through the House Judiciary Committee by March 7th, the deadline for getting on the current session’s calendar. The Republicans attempted a seldom-used maneuver to hold a floor vote to move the stalled proposal out of committee, but the Democratic majority in the Iowa House blocked the attempt by a 50-46 party line vote.
Before the vote, the leading Republican in the Iowa congress warned:
“We have to do it now, or this issue is done,” House Minority Leader Christopher Rants, a Sioux City Republican, said Monday. “We’re going to see gay marriages take place in Iowa. Iowa’s going to be sort of the Las Vegas of America, because we have no residency requirement and we’ll have people from all across the country coming to Iowa to get married.”
As Iowans we are used to being the butt of “country hick” jokes and have developed a pretty thick skin. But to be compared to Las Vegas? Mr. Rants was playing Republican hardball with that. But the Democrats in the house weren’t as insulted as Rants hoped they would be.
Mar 11 2008
I Saw the Tabloids Today
I saw tabloids today. In the convenience store. In the drug store. In the supermarket. All about Obama and his terrorist ties and homosexual liaison and god knows what else. And tomorrow? Move over Britney because tomorrow, Eliot Sptizer will get skewered in the great tabloid void.
I have to tell you. I was overcome with sadness. An unbearable sadness at these affronts in full-blown color, all screaming and prominently displayed. How did it come to this? How did we devolve to this?
We finally have a woman and a man of color in serious contention for the presidency of the United States and we’ve managed to make it cheap.
All the while the press plays hand maiden to a war criminal who, along with all the others of his ilk, are responsible for destruction and death on a scale hard to comprehend. It isn’t just Bush and it just isn’t Iraq. It’s Africa. It’s rain forests. It’s the oceans and plankton. It’s whaling and polar bears. And pushing for open season on wolves.
Mar 11 2008
EENR 4 Progress: Let’s Elect Burner & Fallon!
Hey all, welcome to another edition of EENR for Progress. Tonight the bloggers of EENR are endorsing two fightin’ progressives from Iowa and Washington state; Ed Fallon and Darcy Burner! Follow me below the fold to learn more about why we have to help elect these two candidates to Congress in 2008….
Mar 11 2008
Polluted Water for the Troops in Iraq? Thanks KBR!
KBR Inc. may have supplied U.S. troops fighting in Iraq with tainted water according to a Pentagon inspector general’s report that was released today: Audit of Potable and Nonpotable Water in Iraq (PDF). KBR is a private contractor that, at the time they were supplying American bases in Iraq with polluted water, was owned by Halliburton.
According to the AP, Water makes U.S. troops in Iraq sick.
Soldiers experienced skin abscesses, cellulitis, skin infections, diarrhea and other illnesses after using discolored, smelly water for personal hygiene and laundry at five U.S. military sites in Iraq.
Mar 11 2008
Look! It’s a sex scandal!
While the corporate media are dancing on Eliot Spitzer’s political grave, and the supposedly lefty blogs are inventing new and exciting sludge bombs to sling at the Democrat they love to demonize, McClatchy has this:
Eight U.S. service members were killed in two attacks today in Iraq, making it the deadliest day against the military this year, a senior American military official in Baghdad said. At least 11 Iraqis also were killed Monday in a surge of attacks throughout the country.
Five of the Americans died when a suicide bomber walked up to a foot patrol in Baghdad and self-detonated. The others died while on a patrol in Diyala province, the official said. He asked not to be identified as he isn’t an official spokesman.
The rash of attacks against a spectrum of targets raised new questions about whether the U.S. can draw down its presence from the current buildup to levels of about a year ago.