Anyone remember this story where people were ejected from a Bush event for the umper sticker on the car (see photo in link)? NYT
Lawyers for two men charged with illegally ejecting two people from a speech by President Bush in 2005 are arguing that the president’s staff can lawfully remove anyone who expresses points of view different from his.
Gee, how dictatorial…and here I thought we lived in a democracy, with freedom to dissent…what was that thing called that said so…let me think…the, um, Constitution wasn’t it?
Guess George and his pals missed that day in elementary school social studies class. Or maybe they have it confused with a monarchy?
A member of Tony Blair ‘s Cabinet on Monday brought out into the open a quiet shift away from the U.S. view on combatting extremist groups, acknowledging that British officials have stopped using the expression “war on terror ” favored by President Bush .
International Development Secretary Hilary Benn, a rising star of the governing Labour Party, said the phrase strengthens terrorists by making them feel part of a bigger struggle.
Although it does kind of remind me of the way saying we need to leave Iraq supposedly ’emboldens the terrists’…
Thanks for the quote, Cabin. It sent me looking at the amusing Official Ken Kesey Site where I found this:
Show surprise when you are surprised, laugh when its funny,
cry when its sad, we havent done that in years.
Were too cool. Were pragmatic.
State Departments are pragmatic, so are Departments of Defense and CIAs.
But Constitutions are idealistic.
I think Im going to become an idealist again.
To hell with pragmatism that works.
It has no soul.
~Ken Kesey ~
Getting There From Here
Sorry not news, I just wanted to celebrate one of our literary treasures while we can.
Two young humanitarian volunteers cleared of human-smuggling charges have won a human rights award for their work aiding distressed migrants along the Arizona-Mexico border.
Shanti Sellz and Daniel Strauss, along with the humanitarian group No More Deaths, will receive the Oscar Romero Award for Human Rights at a ceremony in Houston on April 22. – linkage
GENEVA (Reuters) – The United Nations’ refugee agency on Tuesday appealed for international aid for nearly 4 million Iraqis driven from their homes by conflict, and for those sheltering them inside and outside Iraq.
About 2 million Iraqis have fled to Syria and Jordan, whose governments are struggling “without any meaningful support from outside,” U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said at the start of a two-day international conference.
Another 1.9 million Iraqis are uprooted within their homeland, racked by insurgency and sectarian violence.
“It is time that the international community responded with genuine solidarity and unstinting aid to displaced Iraqis and to the states housing them,” Guterres said.
His agency, UNHCR, says up to 50,000 Iraqis flee their homes each month in an exodus linked to pervasive violence, poor basic services, loss of jobs and an uncertain future.
Four million – out of a population of 27 million. That’s roughly 15%. Imagine 45 million Americans uprooted…
I wonder how people would respond to a 2 million person diaspora from the US?
Of course, we’ve seen the response to something similar within our own borders, a la the victims of Katrina, so maybe it wouldn’t be much of a response.
PARIS (Reuters) – France’s presidential election looked on Tuesday increasingly like a two-horse race, with frontrunners rightist Nicolas Sarkozy and Socialist Segolene Royal battling for supremacy while other candidates lost ground.
An opinion poll published in le Parisien daily suggested Sarkozy and Royal would cruise past their rivals in the April 22 first round vote and then tie in a run-off ballot on May 6.
Sarkozy, a tough-talking former interior minister, has led Royal in recent weeks and the CSA survey for le Parisien was the first to put the two on level terms since March 21.
Royal, seeking to become France’s first woman president, has had trouble asserting her credibility during the campaign and pollsters had warned that many undecided voters might spurn her in favour of the centrist candidate Francois Bayrou.
However, political analysts said these voters would swing behind Royal, despite persisting doubts over her high-spending manifesto proposals, if they thought she could beat Sarkozy.
Algeria’s Foreign Ministry scolded the US Embassy yesterday, saying its warning a day earlier of possible terror attacks in the capital was “irresponsible,” the official APS news agency reported.
The US warning, repeated on television stations on Saturday, reportedly spread fear among Algerians, still stunned by double suicide bombings Wednesday on the prime minister’s office and a police station.
[snip]
Algerian authorities summoned the No. 2 official at the embassy, Thomas F. Daughton, to advise the US mission of its “obligation to scrupulously respect the sovereignty” of Algeria and of “the principle of noninterference in its internal affairs,” APS reported, citing the Foreign Ministry. – linkage
Anyone remember this story where people were ejected from a Bush event for the umper sticker on the car (see photo in link)? NYT
Gee, how dictatorial…and here I thought we lived in a democracy, with freedom to dissent…what was that thing called that said so…let me think…the, um, Constitution wasn’t it?
Guess George and his pals missed that day in elementary school social studies class. Or maybe they have it confused with a monarchy?
The Brits are going off message: AP/AOL
Although it does kind of remind me of the way saying we need to leave Iraq supposedly ’emboldens the terrists’…
Thanks for the quote, Cabin. It sent me looking at the amusing Official Ken Kesey Site where I found this:
Show surprise when you are surprised, laugh when its funny,
cry when its sad, we havent done that in years.
Were too cool. Were pragmatic.
State Departments are pragmatic, so are Departments of Defense and CIAs.
But Constitutions are idealistic.
I think Im going to become an idealist again.
To hell with pragmatism that works.
It has no soul.
~Ken Kesey ~
Getting There From Here
Sorry not news, I just wanted to celebrate one of our literary treasures while we can.
I like that one too.
I actually met Ken late one night in Ventura back in the 80s…
.
Police have identified the killer as South Korean Cho Seung-Hui,
a 23-Year-old student at Virginia Tech living in one of the dorms.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."U.N. seeks aid for 4 million uprooted Iraqis
Four million – out of a population of 27 million. That’s roughly 15%. Imagine 45 million Americans uprooted…
I wonder how people would respond to a 2 million person diaspora from the US?
Of course, we’ve seen the response to something similar within our own borders, a la the victims of Katrina, so maybe it wouldn’t be much of a response.
French vote shaping up as two-horse race