CHARGE!!!!

"The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole.

Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile.

To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else. "


Theodore Roosevelt

The Power of Bloggers

Yesterday's post had to do with a subject dear to my heart - how many (usually men) view women in positions of authority and power as being whores and bitches. This disgusts me on many levels, not the least of which is that most of those women had to work three and four times HARDER than any man, to attain the same level of authority.

Today, I am partially pleased.
The offensive card has been removed from the American Greetings "Blue Mountain" website.

Too little, too late, however. I will still boycott their products and have letters in the mail to their advertisers.

The only place you can hit a neocon and have it "hurt" is in the wallet.


723 Days

American Greetings Ridicules Women in Authority

From Left in Aboite

Most folks have focused on the anti-Democrat spin, but I find this also exceptionally disturbing and distasteful in its' disrespect for women in positions of authority - essentially stating that women who have worked their way into a position of power are whores and domineering bitches.

As the folks at American Greetings seem singularly unconcerned about this (per my telephone conversation with their offices), I will be contacting their advertisers (information below) and will do no business with American Greetings.

American Greetings subsidiary trashes Democrats

National greeting card company carrying 'Love Democratic style' card with Pelosi, others in bondage . . .

This Valentine's Day, one of the nation's largest greeting card companies is circulating a satirical online greeting card that depicts "Love Democratic Style" as "throwing family values out the window" and depicts House Speaker Nancy Pelosi dressed as a dominatrix and Sen. Hillary Clinton as a maid. A similar "Love Republican Style" card could not be located at the company's website.

The short eCard from the company plays a jingle for about 30 seconds with a variety of colorful images of Democratic political leaders in compromising situations:

--The eCard first depicts an image of Senator Hillary Clinton dressed in maid garb.

--It then proceeds to show former Governor Howard Dean and Senator John Kerry both wearing dog collars.

--Several Democratic 'newbies' are then shown.

--A photograph of Majority Leader Senator Harry Reid follows with his face beneath a high heel, and the declaration that family values have been thrown "out the window".

--An image of bondage gear is then shown, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi then depicted in a dominatrix outfit while the associated jingle declares that "Love is free with Pelosi".

--The greeting card ends by wishing a "Happy VD".

RAW STORY, the source for this story, is awaiting comment from Democratic offices and American Greetings Interactive, the company that owns Blue Mountain. AGInteractive is owned by American Greetings, which says on its website that it is "one of the world's largest manufacturers of social expression products."

The eCard can be accessed at Blue Mountain's website.

Here is contact information for American Greetings:

Contact American Greetings
American Greetings CorporationOne American Road Cleveland, Ohio 44144-2398
216/252-7300 Fax: 216/252-6778


Corporate contacts
Consumer Relations (Customer Service):
American Greetings 800/777-4891

AmericanGreetings.com / AG Interactive 800/305-6766


Some of their major advertisers:

University of Phoenix

Fashion Bug

Chilis Restaurants (via giftfreebies.com)

giftfreebies.com

Rio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas

e-bay.com

Unlimited Handbags at bagborroworsteal.com
Corporate Contact Information:
Bag Borrow or Steal™
1930 6th Avenue South, Suite 104
Seattle, WA 98134

Albertsons' (supermarkets)
250 Parkcenter Blvd.
Boise, ID 83706 (Map)
Phone: 208-395-6200
Fax: 208-395-6349
Toll Free: 877-932-7948

Netflix:

Netflix public relations has a media buying contact page:
http://www.netflix.com/ContactAlliances
Also an investor relations page with contact info.
http://ir.netflix.com/contactus.cfm


724 Days

Dear John Howard:

Go toss your Fosters Shrimps on the Barbie, and wrestle a Koala, you upside-down crocodile fucking moron - and keep your fucking nose out of American Politics, you grandstanding Aussie Dickhead.

Fuck off.

Thank you very much.

America.

Dismal Day after the Blizzard to you all...

Fitting for the day after a nasty blizzard - for those who hate this "Hallmark Holiday", Today's offering is from Simon and Garfunkel:


A winter's day
In a deep and dark December
I am alone
Gazing from my window
To the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow

I am a rock
I am an island

I've built walls
A fortress deep and mighty
That none may penetrate
I have no need for friendship
Friendship causes pain
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain.

I am a rock
I am an island

Don't talk of love
Well, I've heard the word before
It's sleeping in my memory
I won't disturb the slumber
Of feelings that have died
If I'd never loved,
I never would have cried

I am a rock
I am an island

I have my books
And my poetry to protect me
I am shielded in my armor
Hiding in my room
Safe within my womb
I touch no-one and no-one touches me

I am a rock
I am an island
And the rock feels no pain
And an island never cries

725 Days

The AntiRomance Anthem:

Of course, Disco Sucks - but despite the genre, Gloria Gaynor sang the ultimate anthem for the romance-disillusioned:

First I was afraid
I was petrified
Kept thinking I could never live
without you by my side
But I spent so many nights
thinking how you did me wrong
I grew strong
I learned how to carry on
and so you're back
from outer space
I just walked in to find you here
with that sad look upon your face
I should have changed my stupid lock
I should have made you leave your key
If I had known for just one second
you'd be back to bother me

Go on now go walk out the door
just turn around now
'cause you're not welcome anymore
weren't you the one who tried to hurt me with goodbye
you think I'd crumble
you think I'd lay down and die
Oh no, not I
I will survive
as long as i know how to love
I know I will stay alive
I've got all my life to live
I've got all my love to give
and I'll survive
I will survive

It took all the strength I had
not to fall apart
kept trying hard to mend
the pieces of my broken heart
and I spent oh so many nights
just feeling sorry for myself
I used to cry
Now I hold my head up high
and you see me
somebody new
I'm not that chained up little person
still in love with you
and so you felt like dropping in
and just expect me to be free
now I'm saving all my loving
for someone who's loving me



726 days - we will survive....

This week's feature: Anti-Valentine's Day

I hate this "holiday" - it's stupid, it reeks. Always has, always will. I hate to see anyone who doesn't get flowers or a card - I hate to see people flaunting their "love" with inappropriate PDA's (Public Displays of Affection).

So, In dishonor of the holiday, this week we shall feature lyrics to songs that really SHOULD be played this week:

Lead off song is by the J. Giles Band:

You love her but she loves him
And he loves somebody else
You just can't win

And so it goes
Til the day you die
This thing they call love
It's gonna make you cry

I've had the blues
The reds, and the pinks
One thing for sure (love stinks)

Love stinks, yeah, yeah (love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah (love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah (love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah

Two by two and side by side
Love's gonna find you, yes, it is
You just can't hide

You'll hear it call
Your heart will fall
Then love will fly
It's gonna soar

I don't care
What any casanove thinks
All I can say is love stinks
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah

I've been through diamonds
I've been through minks
I've been through it all

(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah

(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah
(Love stinks)
Love stinks, yeah, yeah......


727 Days

Ding, Dong, the Bimbo's Dead

Why exactly do we care that Anna Nichole Smith is dead? Another bimbo who was only famous for being famous and having big hooters. She had a face only a mother could love - a cross between a horse and Steven Tyler (himself a cross between a human and a wide-mouth frog).

I mean, really - she was just another cheap, trashy, white-trash Texas cheerleader with big hair and bigger bazoombas. And like her fellow "Texan", GWB - an IQ to match her wrist measurement.

So the Miami Herald says she won't be a "punch line anymore". Wanna bet? *snicker*

I do feel sorry for her little girl, however. Probably already a drug-addict from in-utero, and now the centerpiece of paternity suits (A laughable thing in itself - 3 guys are vying for paternity, as opposed to the usual paternity suit where 1 guy is desperately squirming to try and NOT be named the father.) There's her lawyer, her ex-lover... and Zsa Zsa Gabor's husband. This just gets funnier and funnier.

Seems the Bimbo Brigade has forged new frontier.... *chortle*

730 Days

This is good!

Emphasis in red mine.

FT. LEWIS, WASH. — A military judge abruptly declared a mistrial Wednesday in the court-martial of an Army lieutenant who refused orders to go to Iraq, a ruling that handed a temporary reprieve to the elated officer and left military prosecutors visibly stunned.

The decision by the judge, Lt. Col. John Head, turned on the contentious issue of whether factual stipulations agreed to earlier by the prosecutors and the defense team amounted to a confession of guilt by 1st Lt. Ehren Watada, 28, on the Army's charges of failure to deploy.

Prosecutors argued, in effect, that Watada did confess to refusing direct orders to fly to Iraq with his unit last summer, and that his reasons were irrelevant.

Watada said he had admitted to the fact that he deliberately missed his flight, but that he did so because he considered the war illegal — and wanted to explain his reasoning at the trial.

Watada's touchstone case has made him a cult hero among antiwar protesters, but a coward and a traitor to many in the military.

Under the military code, there is a heavy burden of proof on the refuser to justify disobeying the chain of command, because the chain is considered vital to the effective functioning of military forces.

With the defense set to begin its case Wednesday morning, the judge clearly surprised both sides by raising concerns about the stipulations, which he implied would cause him difficulties with the instructions he would give the jury on how to weigh the evidence.

With the seven-member military jury out of the courtroom, the judge said he could not proceed if Watada did not concede he was admitting guilt or if prosecutors did not abandon key lines of their argument.

"There is an inconsistency in the stipulation of fact," Head said. "I don't know how I can accept this … as we stand here now."

He said he could not allow the court-martial to proceed without dismissing part of the stipulations, which would have been a major tactical advance for Watada.

"We've got the immovable object hitting the irresistible force," the judge said at one point, even as prosecutors and defense lawyers both said they wanted the court-martial to continue. Nevertheless, the prosecutors moved for a mistrial.

Though Watada will probably face another trial, the judge's ruling amounted to a temporary moral victory for the lieutenant in a case that many legal observers had considered a virtual slam-dunk for the Army.

Watada's lawyer, Eric Seitz, said Watada's intent in refusing deployment orders was at the heart of his defense, and that it was ridiculous for prosecutors to suggest that he had no right to explain why he did what he did.

"The government has created a major mess here, and that's clearly why they had to move for a mistrial," Seitz said. "Any time the government tries to suppress a defendant's attempt to explain his actions, that's not a good thing for our legal system."

Antiwar forces wasted no time in declaring the mistrial a victory, with banners saying as much at a rally just outside the base here, several miles south of Tacoma.

"The legal mess we saw here today reflects the major mess the Bush administration has made with the war in Iraq," said Ann Wright, a retired Army colonel and diplomat who resigned a State Department post in March 2003 in protest of the war, which began that month.

But Army officials said the ruling showed how the military system bent over backward to be fair to a defendant.

"Throughout the military justice system, the Army steadfastly protects the rights of the accused," said Lt. Col. Robert Resnick, a legal advisor in the Army's staff judge advocate's office at Ft. Lewis. "The judge's ruling today in this case provides further evidence of that."

Eugene R. Fidell, a military lawyer and president of the nonprofit National Institute of Military Justice in Washington, D.C., said he was puzzled by the judge's decision "to pull the plug on the whole case."

Fidell said the attorneys and the judge could have renegotiated the agreement in the courtroom.

"Now they have to start from square one," he said. With a second trial impending, he said, Watada's case will continue to make news and probably provide more momentum for the antiwar movement.

Watada smiled and hugged his mother, Carolyn Ho, after the judge declared the mistrial. But he left public comments to Seitz, who said Watada was happy but also exhausted, suffering from a cold and disappointed that he was not able to present his defense to the jury.

Watada may not see his second court-martial start until March 19, though the judge indicated it could be postponed beyond that.

His lawyer said it might never come to trial because of government errors.

Seitz rejected any assertion that the stipulations were tantamount to an admission of guilt.

"No. Absolutely no way," he said. "Lt. Watada's a smart guy. He knew exactly what he was agreeing to."


Bring on the surge in the Anti-War movement. Bring it on!!

Quick Change Artist?

I love reading the Yahoo "odd news" items.

This one just tickled my funnybone.

That is either one VERY slow chair lift, or that guy can strip, masturbate and redress faster than Superman in a phone booth.

*laughing*

Takes all kinds, I guess. I wonder if they have agents combing the slopes under the ski lift to see if they can find DNA evidence? And this is a FELONY???? FELONY NAKED SKI-LIFT MASTURBATING????

Oh good greif.

731 days