Well after all Pickering, I’m an ordinary man.

Who desires nothing more than an ordinary chance to live exactly as he likes and do precisely what he wants.

An average man am I of no eccentric whim, who likes to live his life free of strife, doing whatever he thinks is best for him.

Well… just an ordinary man…

But let a woman in your life and your serenity is through.  She’ll redecorate your home, from the cellar to the dome, and then go on to the enthralling fun of overhauling you!

Let a woman in your life and you’re up against a wall.  Make a plan and you will find that she has something else in mind, and so rather than do either you do something else that neither likes at all!

You want to talk of Keats and Milton, she only wants to talk of love.  You go to see a play or ballet and spend it searching for her glove.

Let a woman in your life and you invite eternal strife.  Let them buy their wedding bands for those anxious little hands.  I’d be equally as willing for a dentist to be drilling than to ever let a woman in my life.

I’m a very gentle man, even tempered and good natured who you never hear complain, who has the milk of human kindness by the quart in every vein.  A patient man am I, down to my fingertips; the sort who never could, ever would, let an insulting remark escape his lips.  A very gentle man.

But let a woman in your life, and patience hasn’t got a chance.  She will beg you for advice, your reply will be concise, and she will listen very nicely, and then go out and do exactly what she wants!!!

You are a man of grace and polish, who never spoke above a hush, all at once you’re using language that would make a sailor blush.  

Let a woman in your life and you’re plunging in a knife!  Let the others of my sex tie the knot around their necks.  I prefer a new edition of the Spanish Inquisition than to ever let a woman in my life!

I’m a quiet living man who prefers to spend the evening in the silence of his room, who likes an atmosphere as restful as an undiscovered tomb.  A pensive man am I, of philosophical joys, who likes to meditate, contemplate, far for humanities mad inhuman noise.  Quiet living man.

But let a woman in your life and your sabbatical is through.  In a line that never ends comes an army of her friends, come to jabber and to chatter and to tell her what the matter is with YOU!  She’ll have a booming boisterous family who will descend on you en mass.  She’ll have a large Wagnarian mother with a voice that shatters glass,

Let a woman in your life?  Let a woman in your life!?

Let a woman in your life- I shall never let a woman in my life.

(Celebrating 10 years since I proposed to my ex-fiance.)

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Today, Thursday, the House of Representatives is scheduled to mourn the passing of Tom Lantos, victim of fascism.

Tomorrow, Friday, the extension of the Protect America Act expires.

Let it.

This will be brief.

What greater tribute could we pay to a survivor of the Holocaust than to stop the rising tide of fascism in our country?

An American by choice was Tom Lantos, secure in the knowledge that this country could not be stampeded into a Kristallnacht by a mere Reichstag Fire.

9/11 is the Reichstag Fire.  A bully beating to put down the Constitutional guarantees of government and if you don’t see it you are as weak as the Weimar Republicans.  This is an endorsement of Gestapo Police State tactics of torture and universal surveillance.

I know no one here prefers temporary safety to essential liberty.  Today is the day to let your Elected Representatives know that you will be satisfied with nothing less.

As Tom knew the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

It is our fate to live in interesting times.

So.  Do you think The New York Times finally gets it about the Protect America Act?

Even by the dismal standards of what passes for a national debate on intelligence and civil liberties, last week was a really bad week.

…

The law then, and now, also requires the attorney general to certify “in writing under oath” that the surveillance is legal under FISA, not some fanciful theory of executive power. He is required to inform Congress 30 days in advance, and then periodically report to the House and Senate intelligence panels.

Congress was certainly not informed, and if Mr. Ashcroft or later Alberto Gonzales certified anything under oath, it’s a mystery to whom and when. The eavesdropping went on for four years and would probably still be going on if The Times had not revealed it.

…

To defend themselves, the companies must be able to show they cooperated and produce that certification. But the White House does not want the public to see the documents, since it seems clear that the legal requirements were not met. It is invoking the state secrets privilege – saying that as a matter of national security, it will not confirm that any company cooperated with the wiretapping or permit the documents to be disclosed in court.

What about our Democratic Congress?  Glenn Greenwald–

… they are now not only capitulating to, but actually leading (in the form of their Intelligence Committee Chair, Jay Rockefeller), the Bush/Cheney crusade to legalize warrantless eavesdropping and institutionalize lawlessness through telecom amnesty.

…

That is the same failed strategy that Democrats have been pursuing with complete futility for the last eight years. In 2002, they became convinced by their vapid, craven “strategists” that if they voted for the war in Iraq, it would take national security off the table and enable the midterm elections to be decided by domestic issues. In 2004, they decided that they would reject a candidate who provided too much of a contrast on national security (Howard Dean) in favor of one who, having supported the war and with a record of combat, would neutralize national security as an election issue.

…

Notably, the one time they actually allowed a contrast to be created on national security — in the run-up to the 2006 midterm election, when they were perceived to be the anti-war party and the GOP was perceived to be tied to Iraq — they won a decisive victory. When they seek to remove national security as an issue by copying Republicans, they lose.

I don’t get it.  Mike Tabbi–

The story of how the Democrats finally betrayed the voters who handed them both houses of Congress a year ago is a depressing preview of what’s to come if they win the White House. And if we don’t pay attention to this sorry tale now, while there’s still time to change our minds about whom to nominate, we might be stuck with this same bunch of spineless creeps for four more years. With no one but ourselves to blame.

…

Democrats insist that the reason they can’t cut off the money for the war, despite their majority in both houses, is purely political. “George Bush would be on TV every five minutes saying that the Democrats betrayed the troops,” says Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Then he glumly adds another reason. “Also, it just wasn’t going to happen.”

Why it “just wasn’t going to happen” is the controversy. In and around the halls of Congress, the notion that the Democrats made a sincere effort to end the war meets with, at best, derisive laughter. Though few congressional aides would think of saying so on the record, in private many dismiss their party’s lame anti-war effort as an absurd dog-and-pony show, a calculated attempt to score political points without ever being serious about bringing the troops home.

…

But any suggestion that the Democrats had an obligation to fight this good fight infuriates the bund of hedging careerists in charge of the party. In fact, nothing sums up the current Democratic leadership better than its vitriolic criticisms of those recalcitrant party members who insist on interpreting their 2006 mandate as a command to actually end the war. Rep. David Obey, chair of the House Appropriations Committee and a key Pelosi-Reid ally, lambasted anti-war Democrats who “didn’t want to get specks on those white robes of theirs.” Obey even berated a soldier’s mother who begged him to cut off funds for the war, accusing her and her friends of “smoking something illegal.”

…

Even beyond the war, the Democrats have repeatedly gone limp-dick every time the Bush administration so much as raises its voice. Most recently, twelve Democrats crossed the aisle to grant immunity to phone companies who participated in Bush’s notorious wiretapping program. Before that, Democrats caved in and confirmed Mike Mukasey as attorney general after he kept his middle finger extended and refused to condemn waterboarding as torture. Democrats fattened by Wall Street also got cold feet about upsetting the country’s gazillionaires, refusing to close a tax loophole that rewarded hedge-fund managers with a tax rate less than half that paid by ordinary citizens.

Instead they simply pretend to live in fear of the Villagers, a group of ineffective toothless sycophants (Greenwald again).

… there are plenty of people who still insist that people like Chris Wallace and Brit Hume are real journalists, somehow distinguishable from the likes of Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly. Shouldn’t this question from Wallace, by itself, preclude that assessment? Is Wallace’s embarrassingly deferential inquiry really any different than the defining question asked of the Commander-in-Chief which exposed Jeff Gannon:

Senate Democratic leaders have painted a very bleak picture of the U.S. economy. Harry Reid was talking about soup lines. And Hillary Clinton was talking about the economy being on the verge of collapse. Yet in the same breath they say that Social Security is rock solid and there’s no crisis there. How are you going to work — you’ve said you are going to reach out to these people — how are you going to work with people who seem to have divorced themselves from reality?

Both Wallace and Gannon — with the opportunity to question the U.S. President — basically asked: “Mr. President, how do you handle so well the fact that your political opponents are so crazy, malicious and anti-American”? Just compare Gannon’s mentality (“how are you going to work with people who seem to have divorced themselves from reality?”) with Wallace’s (“are you ever puzzled by all of the concern in this country about protecting of rights of people who want to kill us?”). Brezhnev-era Pravda would have been too ashamed to ask such blatantly subservient questions of political leaders. But Chris Wallace is a Very Serious Journalist and Fox is a real news network.

Real journalists?  Yup, just like Tweety and Timmeh and Shuster and Mrs. Greenspan and Wolfie from AIPAC and Candy and Mr. Matlin and the Beckmiester of hate.

Serious.  Respected.

Pfui.

Welcome, New Users, to The Daily Kos.  This Diary is intended to help you orient yourself to the site and ask questions about how to use it.

In the Body you will find some links intended to get you participating more effectively.  Also in the Body this week is a discussion of Traffic Cops and Civility.

After that you can ask me any question you want.  I don’t know all the answers so if you stump me, you do.  I invite those wiser than I to contribute and correct (or raise a ruckus, just don’t scare people).

No permission slips needed, join us at the deep end of the pool for adult swim.

Do you miss Mitt?

Conventional wisdom says perhaps you should, for now the focus will be entirely on the Democratic jackass race that shows no signs of melting down until June if then.

• Mukasey: No, I Will Not Investigate Waterboarding
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 11:44AM
• Mukasey: No, I Will Not Investigate Warrantless Wiretapping
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 1:10PM
• Mukasey: The Law Is What The Justice Department Says It Is
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 3:00PM
• Mukasey to Muckraker: Get Press Releases off The Website
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 3:55PM
• Mukasey: No, I Will Not Enforce Citations for Contempt of Congress
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 6:24PM

Your Bonus Muck-

• We Don’t Discuss Interrogation Techniques until We Want to
  
  By Paul Kiel – February 6, 2008, 1:03PM
• White House Insists on Confirmation of Torture Memo Author
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker- February 6, 2008, 4:35PM

  … For more than three years, Steven Bradbury has been the acting head of the Office of Legal Counsel, the crucial Justice Department office that has the power to issue “advance pardons,” as former OLC head Jack Goldsmith put it. But Senate Democrats, because of Bradbury’s role in approving the warrantless wiretapping program and enhanced interrogation techniques that include waterboarding, have opposed White House efforts to have him confirmed and remove his acting status.

• Today’s Must Read
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 9:44AM

  If it’s seemed to you that the administration has blundered its way into its recent pro-waterboarding PR offensive, you’re right.

• GOPer: 99% of Americans Would Support Waterboarding
  
  By Paul Kiel, TPMMuckracker – February 7, 2008, 2:25PM

Bonus coverage from emptywheel–

“Are you the people’s lawyer or the President’s?”

DocuDharma has kept an admirable concentration on the real issues that confront us, centered primarily on the essential lawlessness of the current administration and it’s Congressional and Village Idiot enablers.

Update: Conyers Says He’s on Edge of Starting Impeachment

by David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org

Friday 2008-02-08 04:34

h/t: Tigana

So tomorrow we’re set up for what are likely to be a string of defeats on the Protect America Act extension which we’re all supposed to ignore because we can’t keep our concentration focused on anything except cheap plastic distractions like the Super Bowl (congratulations Obama for your Giants endorsement) and Super Tuesday horse racing (go Sea Biscuit).

Glenn Greenwald–

In the Senate, Democratic and Republican leaders have, according to Congressional Quarterly and others sources, reached an agreement as to how to proceed on the FISA vote this Monday. There are currently numerous amendments pending to the Cheney/Rockefeller Senate Intelligence Committee bill, almost all of them introduced by Democrats (with one co-sponsored by Arlen Specter) and most of them (if not all) unacceptable to the White House and the GOP.

The essence of the new agreement is that most of the amendments will be subject to a simple up-or-down vote — if they get 50 votes, then they pass — while several of the amendments will require 60 votes to pass (allowing, in essence, the Republicans to filibuster those amendments without actually having to go to the Senate floor and engage in a real filibuster).

Senate Democratic leadership sources are trying to claim that this is some sort of victory for Senate Democrats, and echoing that sentiment, even some of the most insightful and knowledgeable around — such as McJoan at Daily Kos — are hailing the agreement as evidence that “Dems didn’t cave” and that “they held tough.” Unless there is something I’m overlooking, I don’t understand that perspective at all.

Update III-

UPDATE III: Dan Froomkin, quoting The Providence Journal’s Scott MacKay, has excerpts from former GOP Sen. Lincoln Chafee’s new book:

The book excoriates Mr. Bush and his GOP allies who repeatedly fanned such wedge issues as changing the U.S. Constitution to ban gay marriage, abortion and flag-burning. But he saves some of his harshest words for Democrats who paved the way for Mr. Bush to use the U.S. military to invade Iraq. . . . “The top Democrats were at their weakest when trying to show how tough they were,” writes Chafee. “They were afraid that Republicans would label them soft in the post-September 11 world, and when they acted in political self-interest, they helped the president send thousands of Americans and uncounted innocent Iraqis to their doom. “Instead of talking tough or meekly raising one’s hand to support the tough talk, it is far more muscular, I think, to find out what is really happening in the world and have a debate about what we really need to accomplish,” writes Chafee. “That is the hard work of governing, but it was swept aside once the fear, the war rhetoric and the political conniving took over.” Chafee writes of his surprise at “how quickly key Democrats crumbled.” Democratic senators, Chafee writes, “went down to the meetings at the White House and the Pentagon and came back to the chamber ready to salute. With wrinkled brows they gravely intoned that Saddam Hussein must be stopped. Stopped from what? They had no conviction or evidence of their own. They were just parroting the administration’s nonsense. They knew it could go terribly wrong; they also knew it could go terribly right. Which did they fear more?”

Chafee was describing the 2002 lead-up to the invasion of Iraq, but the description is just as apt today. And his description of what Democratic Senators did back then after meeting with White House and Pentagon officials sounds a lot like what many of them do today after meeting with White House and NSA officials.

Read it and weep.

Are you clear what’s happening here?

Tomorrow is another day of struggle and all cranky and hung over I expect you back at work.