Thursday News Bucket

Posted by CabinGirl | Nov 29, 2007 | 16 |

On my income tax 1040 it says ‘Check this box if you are blind.’ I wanted to put a check mark about three inches away.
– Tom Lehrer

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CabinGirl on November 29, 2007 at 7:29 am

Is the CIA up for another South American misadventure? AP/Newsvine

Venezuela threatened Wednesday to expel a U.S. Embassy official for allegedly conspiring to defeat a referendum championed by President Hugo Chavez, accusing the diplomat of plotting to sway public opinion.

The allegation comes ahead of a fiercely contested referendum on reforms that would allow Chavez indefinite re-election and help him establish a socialist state in Venezuela. Sunday’s vote has generated large pro- and anti-Chavez rallies and Chavez kept the rhetoric high on Wednesday by repeating his charge that Washington is plotting to kill him.

In Caracas, Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro showed state television a document that he claimed was written by the unnamed embassy official and was to have been sent to the CIA as part of a plan to help ensure that Venezuelans vote against the proposed constitutional overhaul.

“It’s a script from the CIA to try to generate a block of opinion among Venezuelans that would give a sure victory to the ‘No’ vote,” said Maduro. “We will investigate and if it’s that way, we’ll remove this person from here as a persona non grata.”

Or is it Chavez playing the propaganda game? One thing’s for sure, I have no doubt BushCo would like to see him out of the picture.
- cruz del sur on November 29, 2007 at 9:13 am
  
  Who killed him?
CabinGirl on November 29, 2007 at 7:34 am

in NYC: LATimes

A crippling strike that had shut down most Broadway shows in the heart of the holiday season ended late Wednesday night as striking stagehands finally hammered out a new contract with theater owners and producers.

The strike, which had entered its 19th day and drained millions of dollars in revenue from the theater district, was settled after a 12-hour bargaining session that had begun Wednesday morning between the League of American Theaters and Producers and members of Local 1, representing about 3,000 stagehands.

“We are pleased to announce that we have a tentative agreement with Local 1 ending the Broadway strike,” said Charlotte St. Martin, the league’s executive director. “The agreement is a good compromise that serves our industry. The most important thing is that Broadway’s lights will once again be shining.”

I was wondering how much of the holiday season was going to slip away before they settled.
CabinGirl on November 29, 2007 at 7:46 am

this time, from Colorado

The Colorado Supreme Court cleared the way Tuesday for an anti-abortion group to collect signatures for a ballot measure that would define a fertilized egg as a person.

The court approved the language of the proposal, rejecting a challenge from abortion-rights supporters who argued it was misleading and dealt with more than one subject in violation of the state constitution.

If approved by voters, the measure would give fertilized eggs the state constitutional protections of inalienable rights, justice and due process.

What next? All the embryos in the fertility clinic will bring a class action lawsuit against the doctors for not implanting them? And what about fertilized eggs that don’t implant? Will someone be held responsible for violating their human rights, or committing murder? Will a special lab be set up to examine used sanitary products to ensure the rigts of these fertilized eggs are being protected?
- Alice on November 29, 2007 at 8:35 am
  
  Just wait till these embryos start filing suit because they were given to the wrong parents. During my adolescence I did suspect some kind of distribution error.
  
  An Illinois judge says frozen embryos are people.
  
  I really want to know if freezing is torture or not.
- Nag on November 29, 2007 at 9:10 am
  
  I love to repeat something I read a long while ago on Kos… I do not remember who said it.
  
  OK, greatly paraphrasing:
  If you had the choice of saving 5 embryos or one 2 year old child from a burning building, which would you choose?
  
  Wing nuttyia can still do a lot of damage in what’s left of Dubya’s reign.
  
  By the way, CG, great quote today. I did not know that Jim Lehrer even HAD a sense of humour.
  - ask on November 29, 2007 at 9:32 am
    
    But it was Tom Lehrer – the singer.
    His highly political lyrics were often also hilarious…
    
    Check lyrics here.
ask on November 29, 2007 at 9:25 am

This outcome could have been (and was) predicted in 2000.

Kosovo’s future uncertain as talks collapse

Talks to find agreement on the future of Kosovo ended in failure yesterday with the Serbian and Albanian sides unable to hammer out a compromise. Mediators said the peace of the region was now at stake.

Three days of UN-sponsored talks in the Austrian spa town of Baden – with the European Union, United States and Russia playing referee – failed to break the deadlock. Now Kosovo’s 90 per cent Albanian majority is preparing to declare independence within months. Serbia has said this will lead to chaos.

All involved in the Austrian talks hastened to say a descent into violence was out of the question. “Both sides have made it clear to us they are committed to avoiding violence,” a leading EU negotiator, Wolfgang Ischinger, said. “This commitment to peace must continue.”

Nonetheless, there are fears that the Balkans is in imminent peril. “The peace of the region is very much at stake,” the chief American mediator, Frank Wisner, said. “It is a volatile region. We are going into a very difficult time.”

The failure of the talks was no surprise. Serbia has never budged from its fixed stand that Kosovo is, always has been and always will be a province of Serbia, whatever the wishes of the Albanians. But during recent elections in Kosovo, the only issue on which all ethnic Albanian candidates were united was the need for independence, rather than the partial autonomy offered by Serbia.
idredit on November 29, 2007 at 10:26 am

Hillary’s Campaign Over-reaches, Again a Nixon girl all the way

Cooper Anderson disclosed that Hillary’s campaign planted a question in last night repubthugs’ debate:

Anderson Cooper’s Mea Culpa

imho, Hillary wants this president gig real bad and the guerilla war she’s currently engaged in will come back to haunt. She’s violating the old cardinal rule – don’t appear too eager. It’s a real turn off.
- dada on November 29, 2007 at 11:19 am
  
  hillary runs into another questionable fund raiser:
  
  Hillary Clinton Says Bye-Bye to Indicted Trial Lawyer
  
  Bad news for trial lawyers, and bad news for Bill and Hillary, too. Famed Mississippi plaintiff’s lawyer Richard “Dickie” Scruggs, who was slated to host a Clinton fundraiser next month, was indicted yesterday for allegedly trying to bribe a state court judge. The indictment comes a day after the FBI raided his office looking for a document, and two days after Scruggs’ brother-in-law, Trent Lott, announced his resignation from the Senate.
  
  When the FBI first raided Scruggs’ office, Lott said the timing of his resignation was just a coincidence. But you do have to wonder. The indictment is pretty damning, and includes apparently taped conversations between the judge and some of the other lawyers involved in the alleged scheme.
  .
  .
  But his political loyalties have always been a little suspect, and not just because of his in-law status. This year, for instance, he has given nearly $30,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and several thousand dollars to Joe Biden. But he’s also contributed to Republican John McCain. Next month, Bill Clinton was scheduled to headline a fundraiser for his wife at Scruggs’ Oxford home. Not surprisingly, today a Clinton spokesman tells Mother Jones that the event is “not happening.”
  
  mother jones
  
  more on the incictment by max follmer at huffington.
  
  all these beltway insiders sure are an incestuous bunch.
  
  lTMF’sA
  - CabinGirl on November 29, 2007 at 2:22 pm
    
    She really wants to be a moderate Republican (again), doesn’t she?
  - idredit on November 29, 2007 at 4:12 pm
    
    doggone.
    
    I read at Sullivan where her team monitors the Sunday Talk bubblevision to see who’ll be critiquing politics.. ermm her, if so, who do they have on as a balance.
    
    Kid you not.
    
    BUT She’d best be looking over her shoulder, not for Obama but for Mike
    
    from the pages of The Weekly Standard (H/T: The Daily Dish)
    
    On February 7, presumptive nominee Mike Huckabee pledges a campaign of “compassion, comparison, and civility” against presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama. New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg announces the formation of an exploratory committee for an independent presidential
    campaign. Rumored budget: $1.5 billion. The cover of TIME magazine screams: “Tsunami 2008: The Year of the Upset.”
    
    could be why Mike has been prepping on foreign policy issues. Hmmmmm.
dada on November 29, 2007 at 10:53 am

dodd plans to introduce legislation to amend the bankruptcy law:

A New Beginning for American Families: The Dodd Plan for Fair, Practical Bankruptcy Reform

-Once again “allow judges to consider the unique circumstances of individuals and to ensure that families are given adequate resources on which to live.”

-“Ensure that money intended for child support or alimony payments to support children do not become part of the estate and cannot be distributed to creditors at the expense of children.”

-“Amend current bankruptcy law to treat a mortgage like other secured debt, allowing bankruptcy courts to restructure mortgages so that they are affordable for the borrower while helping people keep their homes.”

-“Reform bankruptcy so that all medical debts are dischargeable, so that a medical illness can never result in a family’s financial ruin.

-Allow for private student loans to be dischargeable through bankruptcy, to provide a disincentive against predatory private lenders exploiting students and their families.

h/t leftcoaster

detailed issue statement at chrisdodd.com

this should be interesting as reid and biden both voted for it…presidential hardball. at least some of the candidates are trying to get real issues on the table.

lTMF’sA
dada on November 29, 2007 at 11:40 am

in the wake of howards’ disastrous defeat in oz, the losers far outnumber the winners:

ThinkProgress has compiled a new report, highlighting the fate of world leaders from “coalition of the willing” countries who sent troops to support the invasion. Of 14 major partners in the Coalition, eight leaders were defeated in elections, two stepped down, two were term limited, and two remained in office. Click here to view the full report.

bad things seem to happen to those who go along w/ chimpy, eh.

worst. president. ever.

even chuck hagel agrees:

“I have to say this is one of the most arrogant, incompetent administrations I’ve ever seen or ever read about,” Hagel said, according to our colleague Robert Kaiser, who attended the speech. In case his audience didn’t get the point, Hagel also said: “They have failed the country.”

link

yup

lTMF’sA
Man Eegee on November 29, 2007 at 1:15 pm

Looks like the Endorsement Game rages on…

WASHINGTON – Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton was endorsed for president Thursday by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental activist and scion of one of the nation’s most prominent political families. – linkage

Sorry, Bobby Jr., she’s still not getting my vote.
on November 29, 2007 at 8:00 pm

I am going to quote this verbatum.
“Employees may also be held liable for damages suffered by the company”.

Let’s see if I am really reading this right, yup, that’s what is says.

“Employees may also be held liable for damages suffered by the company”.

Well it’s real, it’s on the company website, all real and official looking. I have a pdf of it on at least two computers now. In addition to the obvious Satan inspired policy changes reading between the lines a trained analyst such as myself can easily extrapolate the proximity and severity of the imminent dystopian future.

I still work here though so providing other details over the world wide web might be a bit questionable. Anyway if the wingers ask you what “rights” you have lost during this war of terra you may cite this example.

Who do you work for?
Are you just a mere “employee”?
You can laugh at me now but I get to publish it after they fire my ass!

http://www.ratical.org/ratvill...
http://www.ericblumrich.com/14...

Thursday News Bucket

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CabinGirl

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