kansas taliban

what is going on in kansas?

did its citizens go to sleep in america and wake up in fundamentalist-oz? or is the entire state under the control of wild-eyed right-wing zealots?

the state's attorney general, phill kline, recently declared war on women who have had abortions. apparently it's not enough that these women must live with a heartbreaking decision: they also must worry that the state's top cop might get his sweaty hands on them.

having been branded with the scarlet A, they must live in fear of a government witch-burning.

kline is demanding patient records for more than 90 kansas women. these files contain personal details including how the women became pregnant, sexual history, birth control practices, drug use, psychological profiles, fetal abnormalities and more.

the premise for this government intrusion into the private agony of kansans is to "go after child rapists and predators." it assumes that any underage girl who is pregnant was raped. the flaws in this logic are profound, and the precedent this investigation sets is dangerous.

there are valid legal and ethical reasons why patient records and the doctor-patient relationship is beyond the reach of fanatical law enforcement. if that protection is stripped away, the health and safety of the most vulnerable will be sacrificed. this applies not only to pregnant teens and adults but to AIDS patients, people in abusive relationships, and thousands of other compromising situations. instead of seeking help, people will cower and suffer and die.

there are already good laws on the books requiring physicians to report any suspected cases of child rape or other abuse. kline's bludgeoning of the rights of kansas women is in itself abusive. and it's a poorly disguised cloak for his aggressive anti-abortion agenda.

abortion is not a pleasant topic. no one in their right mind is a cheerleader for this cheerless circumstance. but like underage pregnancy, it is a reality that some women endure--and all must have the right to choose.

phill kline, in his self-righteous dudgeon, is pursuing a vindictive kind of "justice." his prosecution of kansas law is looking like a persecution of innocents.

a physician's first duty is to do no harm. in the case of abortion, that scenario is murky at best. there is no question, however, that the kansas attorney general is intent on harm. he's piling legal insult atop the injury already suffered by many women in his state.

he should not be allowed to do more damage.

without fanfare

transcendental floss, now available in three columns. read all the old posts. notice how they subtly changed meaning! no, i kid.

BTW, what's with the doctor's recommendation, is somebody anti-dentite?! it is transcendental floss after all. again, i kid.

really, though, i am just a kid. i may be double the age of a low-aged adult, but still...

coding makes me delirious

outlaw regime II

did you hear that? it sounded distinctly like the other shoe hitting the floor.

my recent comments on the u.s. government locking up its own people without charges, trial or other niceties of due process were followed today by a fairly important clarification. the prisoner in question, Ahmed Abu Ali, today was charged in a plot to assassinate george bush.

ali had for 20 months been detained and tortured in saudi arabia at the behest of the u.s. government.

A federal indictment, setting forth charges that could lead to decades of imprisonment upon conviction, described the defendant as eager to be a partner in terrorism with Al Qaeda.

apparently ali's friends and family in the courtroom laughed out loud as the charges were read.

if true, the charges won't be followed by hilarity. with recent history as our guide, ali will go into a deep dark hole from which he probably won't return.

but regardless of the verity of these accusations--what took so long? the man has been in custody for nearly two years. is it coincidental that charges are finally brought the day after the washington post ran an editorial denouncing the justice department's role in this case?

if ali is guilty he deserves his fate.

and we deserve better than the jackbooted marching of this justice department over the rights of american citizens.

the outlaw regime

which country locks up its own citizens without charges, without trial, without due process?

(hint: don't say china, iran, or north freaking korea. those are too obvious.)

time's up! it's the united states of america.

the details are here. i'm too disgusted to enumerate them for you. read them yourself. after you've had a chance to shower off, think of what this means.

the u.s government is now a rogue state. the precedent has been set, and any of us could be next.

It should be unthinkable that the courts would resolve this matter without hearing from both sides on key legal questions. It should have been unthinkable for the government to propose such a step.

surprise! for this administration it's more than thinkable; it's easily do-able.

we have met the enemy, and it is us.

bush dishonors american POWs

take a good look at this man. he's everything the bush administration is not.



because this man, U.S. Marine Lt. Col. Clifford Acree, actually fought and bled for his country. he was shot down over iraq in the first gulf war, and was tortured in captivity.

acree and 16 other u.s POWs were awarded nearly a billion dollars of iraqi money by a federal judge, as compensation for their ordeal.

now the bush administration is fighting these veterans, trying to prevent them from collecting the damages they earned.

important note: president bush went awol from the national guard during the viet nam war. dick cheney "had other priorities" at that time. other administration chicken hawks have similar histories of non-service.

other important note: this administration endorses and facilitates torture.

according to the l.a. times:

The case tests a key provision of the Geneva Conventions. The United States and other signers pledged never to "absolve" a state of "any liability" for the torture of POWs.

Former military lawyers and a bipartisan group of legislators have been among those who have urged the Supreme Court to take up the case and to strengthen the law against torturers and tyrannical regimes.

important questions:

why does bush hate the geneva conventions so much?

why does bush hate americans so much?

why is the bush administration filled with so many abysmal examples of humanity?

things we don't care about

americans have become a flabby, complacent bunch.

that's mentally, as well as physically.



if you've been paying any attention to current events, it doesn't trouble most people that new york times reporter judith miller and time magazine reporter matthew cooper are headed inexorably toward jail. their crime? refusing to rat out a confidential source in the valerie plame case. even if you don't know the details of said case, it's pretty obvious that if a reporter isn't allowed to have confidential sources, lots of news won't get reported. unless it's by a conservative pundit paid for by the bush administration, and aired on fox news.

that's bad.

most people aren't aware, and wouldn't care anyway, that jim guckert, aka jeff gannon, used a white house press pass to pimp the bush administration since february, 2003. guckert is a gay male escort (not that there's anything wrong with that) and an internet porn figure. how those impressive credentials warrant a press pass to stand a few feet from the president is a topic of considerable discussion. draw your own conclusions.



meanwhile, maureen dowd, an opinion writer of some note at the new york times, was denied a press pass. though why she'd want to be in the same room as the president is anyone's guess.

that's grotesque.

in other news that creationists will deny any knowledge of, it turns out homo sapiens is a lot older than previously thought. new analysis of a couple skulls found in ethiopia showed the bones to be 195,000 years old. that's a good 35,000 years older than they were given credit for. upon hearing the report, one creationist said, "la la la la, i can't hear you."



that figures.



finally, barry bonds prepares to complete his drug-fueled assault on the home-run record held by a legitimate player, henry aaron. most people don't give a rip about steroids, human growth hormone and other designer performance-enhancing drugs, however. so bonds will get the record without an asterisk, and take his place among the all-time greats at cooperstown.

that's a fraud.

but who cares?

not me.

dojo mojo

my son is learning karate.

part of me thinks this is like giving him the opener to the can of whup-ass on dad.

another part of me is sure of it.

but he's only 6 1/2, so i still should be able to take him for a couple more years. after that i'm in trouble.

i'm wary of any training that puts my "man of the house" status in jeopardy (notice i didn't say "head of the house," since that refers to my wife). the rules of the dojo hint at the possibility of patricide; for example, dojo rule #3 instructs students to "Get permission before handling weapons."

quick quiz: is that a good rule, or a bad rule? it's good, i suppose, in that it requires prior consent to handle weapons. but it implies, no it says straight up that handling weapons is perfectly okay.

for the record, i'm extremely ambivalent about rule #3.

rule #12: In order to concentrate completely while training you must be silent. Then when it is time to answer or kiai, respond loudly.

my son runs his mouth like a nuclear generator. the only time he's quiet is when he's asleep. the day he concentrates completely and silently, i'm in trouble.

rule # 15: Be nice to other students. Help new students who seem confused or don't know what to do.

the entire class is composed of six and seven-year olds. they're all confused, none of them know what to do. but at least they’re nice about it.

in all there are 18 rules the kids must follow while learning the ancient art. near as i can tell, they don’t follow any of them. not that they don't mean well. it's just that their collective concentration span is about as long as this sentence. more often than not their little eyeballs are focused in 18 random directions--forcing sensei o'donnell to bark a loud "kiotsuke! (come to attention!)" suddenly all those eyes go wide, and they're all looking at the big guy in the white robe.

the sensei is brilliant with children. he's funny and engaging and you can tell he really likes working with kids. he's also big and broad and chiseled from years of training. when he barks, everybody in the room snaps to...including the parents, who were busy reading or chatting or dozing just a second ago.

in the moments that follow, actual learning occurs. the next move and corresponding japanese-language phrase are parroted with surprising precision. the sensei rewards the group with a nod and a compliment. in turn, nine children go all ninja turtle on him.

he smiles briefly, lets it go on for a bit, then snaps them back to attention. it seems to be an effective routine. my son is learning. already he can deflect any of my attempts to smack him upside the head.

kidding.

i can still smack him upside the head. but it's not as easy as it once was. the time will come. and when it does, i'm in trouble.

the anti-american

who's tired of me railing against the president? besides me, i mean.

every single day, it's something new. and I’m worn out from reacting viscerally to his spectacular list of screw-ups. i'm like a punch-drunk fighter who's not smart enough to do anything else, getting back up to absorb more punishment.

the latest eye-roller and whiplash-inducer is the 2006 federal "budget."

to sum up, lots of money for war and terrorism, big cuts for the most vulnerable americans.

put another way, more money for the elective war, more tax cuts for the rich, a wrecking ball for social security. and the poor? pfft, they get a texas-sized serving of contempt.

"...we're asking for Congress to cut and/or reduce 150 different programs. The important question that needs to be asked for all constituencies is whether or not the programs achieve a certain result. Have you set goals, and are those goals being met? And the poor and disadvantaged absolutely ought to be asking that question, too. In other words, what is the goal of a particular program? And if that goal isn't being met, the question ought to be asked, why isn't the goal being met?"

got that? the poor and disadvantaged, the people who are struggling to keep themselves and their children off the street, they're the ones who should be taking to task the programs put in place to help them.

it's a joke of a response from this joke of a president who still tries to pass himself off as a "compassionate conservative."

random question: why does bush like iraqis so much more than americans?

he's got hundreds of billions of dollars (strangely unaccounted for in his "budget," mind you) for the downtrodden in other countries, but manages to stiff u.s. education, the environment and health care for children. veterans, the people charged with fighting bush's elective war, get their benefits cut, too. they'll be paying a bunch more for drugs, which they'll desperately need in lieu of the programs their president is yanking out from under them.

it’s remarkable how far from “traditional conservative values” this administration has strayed. once the party of fiscal restraint, the right is now the bastion of big government, big deficits, and big, transparent lies. all at an astronomical cost to average americans.

if approved, this “budget”

“…would lead to the first reduction since the Reagan administration in programs…like local law enforcement projects, the national park system and preschool literacy projects.

"The proposal also calls for substantial reductions in programs like Medicaid and food stamps where spending levels are largely determined by eligibility criteria."

no one believes the president's "budget" will survive in its present form. on both sides of the aisle wagons are being circled, flares are going up, and lines in the sand are being drawn. many, many components of the president's latest assault on americans are considered "dead on arrival" in congress.

but if we are to assume that this is the "budget" bush and his miscreants really want, then it's a stunning demonstration of the low regard the administration has for most people in this country.

another day, another body blow by the anti-american president. frankly, i could use some more rest between rounds, because it looks like it's gonna be a long fight.

a day in a dog's life

our family includes two big dogs. golden retrievers, to be exact. (all of us are, in turn, owned by two cats, but that's another story.)

in a failed attempt to keep the big dogs from trashing our back yard, i take them to a nearby park, twice a day every day. it's a couple-acre arrangement, fenced all the way around. and though the signs say leashes are required, it's rare to see a leash on a dog there. the people are pretty unleashed as well.

twice a day, every day, for the last seven months. you get to know the dogs first, and sometimes their owners. i still know more of the dogs' names than their owners' names. i don't know what that says about us all, but it does say something.

hoover is a sharpei-golden retriever cross. it's an unlikely mix, but she is a beautiful dog with an endearing face. her owner, john, is somewhat physically disabled. he has trouble speaking, and is ungainly in his walk, but his mind is as sharp as anyone's. it took awhile to become attuned to his speech patterns, but once i did it became clear that john has a great sense of humor. he calls hoover his babe magnet, for one thing. he's a liberal democrat for another, and has offered up many a gently scolding comment on the current administration.

right now john is recovering from a broken rib, courtesy of his four-legged friend. apparently hoover, usually the most mild mannered of dogs, got it in her head to chase after a golden lab puppy. unfortunately she, john and the leash had not yet parted ways, and john was yanked off his feet. so he is now at his mom's house in bellingham, on the mend.

a 30-something gal with two labs, (one golden one black), visits the park most afternoons. she and the dogs are slightly plump, but very cheerful, and we all get along nicely. one day the gal wore a "culinary arts institute" sweatshirt, and i cleverly asked her if she were a graduate.

"no," she said, "my ex-fiance is. i put him through school, and then he decided to move out."

ah, geez. my casual conversation starter had taken a turn for the awkward. "well," i recovered brightly. "at least you got a sweatshirt out of the deal."

"that's about all i got. he's at our apartment right now moving out his stuff."

oh, damn. the dog poop was really hitting the fan. "i am so sorry," i said. ("you're going to make her cry, right here at the park, idiot," i thought.) "couldn't you have, i don't know, sabotaged his souffle or something?"

"no, it's okay. i'm at the park with my dogs, it's a sunny day, and it's all good."

clearly it was not all good, but as i mentioned, she's a cheerful sort. she kindly let me off the conversational hook that i had firmly set in my rear, and the dogs played on.

another woman, attached to a scottish terrier, comes around semi-regularly. she's a substitute teacher in the seattle public school system, but would like a full-time gig. she'd heard there was a demand for teachers in seattle schools, but instead found there is a surplus of applications for every opening. so she subs, and surfs the net for teacher shortages in other parts of the country.

we talked about the relative merits of las vegas, new orleans, and hilton head, south carolina. i felt eminently qualified to comment as i've visited each town at least once in the last 20 years. quality of life, whether the people are friendly, housing costs. i don't know anything about these subjects as they apply to any of these towns, but i know there's a casino in downtown new orleans. i've lost money there. there are casinos in las vegas too, as it turns out, but you don't have to actually go in any of them. there are no casinos in hilton head, but they have some big damn gators living there. freaking dinosaurs, as a matter of fact.

she got a call this week for an interview in new orleans. they may have gators there, i don't know. but they do have crawfish. lots of crawfish.


(to be continued...)

no, buffs...

it's been...oh, a few years since i attended the university of colorado. during my time there the football program was atrocious and binge drinking was a serious concern.

kind of like now.

the social climate has changed a bit since then, however. for one thing, the first amendment doesn't seem to have the cache it once did.

and these days a tenured CU professor is on the brink of losing his job because some people don't like his politics.

in 2001 the professor, ward churchill, wrote a scathing assessment of the 9/11 attacks in an online essay. he opined that the attacks on the world trade towers and the pentagon were an understandable, predictable response to u.s. policies in the middle east and elsewhere.

while i disagree with most of the rantings in his essay, i think he had an interesting point of view. i can see how some would find his analysis persuasive.

suddenly, however, professor churchill has been targeted by the colorado state legislature for his opinions, and a firestorm has ensued.

the rocky mountain news says:

From the governor's office to the floors of the House and Senate, lawmakers of both political stripes fumed over what they said were the University of Colorado teacher's "anti-American, pro-terrorist" remarks that "justify" attacks on the U.S.

the denver post says:

The Colorado state Senate today joined the House in passing a resolution denouncing a University of Colorado professor who likened some victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks to a notorious Nazi.

The nonbinding resolution was identical to one passed Wednesday by the House, calling Ward Churchill's comments "evil and inflammatory."

Gov. Bill Owens has asked the university to fire Churchill, saying the school had legal grounds to dismiss him even though he is protected by tenure.

churchill has received a pile of hate mail in recent days, and some clever vandal spray-painted swastikas on his truck.

all of these folks, apparently, vehemently disagree with professor churchill.

quick poll: who's the better american, churchill or the people now trying to shut him up?

never mind, we'll come back to that question.

first, a refresher: the first amendment to the constitution of the united states declares that "congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech."

as a result, americans have the right to:

Desecrate the national flag as a symbol of protest.
Burn the cross as an expression of racial bigotry and hatred.
Espouse the violent overthrow of the government as long as it is mere abstract advocacy and not an immediate incitement to violence.
Traffic in sexually explicit erotica as long as it does not meet a rigorous definition of "hard core" obscenity.
Defame public officials and public figures with falsehoods provided they are not published with knowledge of their falsity or reckless disregard for the truth.
Disseminate information invading personal privacy if the revelation is deemed "newsworthy."
Engage in countless other forms of expression that would be outlawed in many nations but are regarded as constitutionally protected here.

as public officials, wouldn't you think the governor and legislature of colorado would be aware of first amendment protections? they're elected officials, after all, and as such are charged with defending the constitution.

they don't have the latitude to defend the parts of the constitution they like, or defending it when they find it personally gratifying or politically expedient. they should know this, right? unless each and every one of them missed "getting to know the constitution" during their post-election orientation day.

the CU faculty, bless them, has issued a statement defending academic freedom and reminding folks that freedom of expression is a fairly important tenet of american liberty.

Today, the University of Colorado has been challenged again to defend the principles of academic freedom to a public that may not appreciate fully the essential requirements and benefits of debate and differing views in an institution of higher education. Professor Ward Churchill's writings contravene accepted thinking and community sentiment. Reasonable people may consider them controversial, offensive, and odious in some of the examples used; indeed, many faculty are themselves offended. The widespread release of these writings through the media has brought calls for censure and punishment of Professor Churchill.

The University, through its Regents and administration, must resist these pressures. If we stand for the dissemination of knowledge, of the freedom to question, and of freedom of expression, then we must protect all, including Professor Churchill and others, expressing the most unpopular sentiments. Anything less than an affirmation of academic freedom for all the University's faculty is an admission that we are not truly committed to the University's mission and philosophy.

at a meeting today of the university of colorado board of regents, lots of interested people were on hand to see what would happen next. some students were hauled off and arrested, and one of the regents, republican tom lucero, said:

"...he will propose a thorough review of all of CU's core curriculum and have departments defend their programs. He also said he will propose a way to terminate tenured professors through an administrative process rather than only through a faculty review." (Boulder Daily Camera)

Four Republican lawmakers went further, saying they will try to cut CU's budget by $100,000 to reimburse taxpayers for Churchill's salary. (Rocky Mtn. News)

let's get back to my question. this is america we're talking about. and, as americans, we've been told all our lives that we have certain inalienable rights and liberties (stop me if i'm straying from fact here).

you might say that as americans, we have a responsibility to help perpetuate and sustain those rights and liberties (unless of course the existence of the country as we know it has been based on a faulty premise all these generations).

so i ask you once again: in this little drama, who is the better representative of the american ideal, professor churchill or the people screaming for him to shut the hell up?