You are currently browsing the Down with Absolutes! weblog archives for October, 2005.
It’s going to be a slow week of posting. As I’m working 7-3 all week at the cafe, it means I’ll have no time between those hours to update the page. It’ll be slim pickens this week most likely.
Happy Halloween to all you crazy nuts who read this page and post replies. I think I’m getting sloshed tonight.
Be sure to tune into The Dott Spott tonight at 10:30 on Comcast 73 for a Halloween edition!
Be safe.
Posted by Mike Matthews in General at 4:20 PM PST
Just when Democrats and liberals seems to be scoring a couple points against this disgusting administration it seems some of us just can’t keep quiet.
Sen. Harry Reid , D-Nev., today called upon Karl Rove to resign. Sen. Reid: Please shut the hell up. Keep your mouth closed and allow the administration to continue its awesome job of self-implosion. Watching Bush fuck up everything from Supreme Court nominations to the War in Iraq is fun. Don’t add your obscene two cents.
Just sit back and smile like the rest of us. The rest will come soon enough.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Rove, Libby, Miller et. al. at 8:41 PM PST
Be back tomorrow with freshness. I’m gone for the day. If you’d like, consider this post like a Daily Kos open thread. Discuss whatever you’d like. But play nice.
Posted by Mike Matthews in General at 9:27 AM PDT
Scooter Libby has been indicted
It is a beautiful day.
Also: The “liberal” New York Times says they fucked up in telling the American people that Judy Miller’s WMD reporting was pure bullshit:
New York Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. said Friday that the newspaper was far too slow in correcting its reports indicating Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but the blame did not lie entirely with Judith Miller, the author of many of the stories.
Not that the Bush Administration needed The New York Times as its cheerleader, but supporting “facts” provided by the one of the highest-circulated dailies in the country certainly didn’t hurt. As dramatic as it sounds, The Times’ complicit ass-fucking into submission by the administration means it has blood on its hands. It certainly helped in advancing the misinformed public opinion that this war was based on “Saddam’s involvement in 9/11″ or “extensive WMD.”
Let’s hope Rove is next. I don’t think Fitzgerald’s got the balls, but I believe this even goes as far as Cheney. We all know he’s a pitbull. Unfortunately, I don’t think Fitzgerald will take it that far.
Folks fighting the good fight: Agitprop, Daily Pepper…more to follow.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Rove, Libby, Miller et. al. at 2:18 PM PDT
#5285- Courtesy of National Journal.
Vice President Cheney and his chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, overruling advice from some White House political staffers and lawyers, decided to withhold crucial documents from the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2004 when the panel was investigating the use of pre-war intelligence that erroneously concluded Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, according to Bush administration and congressional sources.
Treason, I tell ya! Treason. When will Ann Coulter write a book?
Thanks to Agitprop for tipping me off to this.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Filth at 9:38 PM PDT
Some fresh news today regarding Peter Jackson’s highly-anticipated King Kong remake. Looks like it’s gonna hit the three-hour mark. Needless to say I can’t wait!
We all going on a field trip to the theatre this December?
Posted by Mike Matthews in Movies at 5:08 PM PDT
Bill Frist, in a precarious position because of questionable stock sales, is going all liberal on us. He’s ordered a congressional hearing to debate raging energy prices. And I thought liberals were the only ones who were demanding some accountability from the likes of the disgustingly decadent oil industry? Just look at Exxon-Mobil’s windfall profits, with earnings surging 75 percent during the third quarter.
I’m all for capitalism, but some of this shit’s gone too far. Gouging was definitely at play. This had nothing to do with Katrina. Oil executives saw an in to take the stupid American public for all it was worth. And they did a bang-up job.
Exxon-Mobil has said it may have to take a charge in the fourth quarter due to a 4.7 percent production loss because of Katrina. But we all know they’re making more money than they’ve ever made before.
Good for Frist. Maybe this investigation will paint him as something other than the crook and liar he is. Fight the good fight, Bill!
Posted by Mike Matthews in Common Sense at 4:56 PM PDT
Downstate right-wing radio reactionary Dan Gaffney has something to say to dumb little teenagers who write salacious things on peer-networking sites like MySpace.com: Shut the hell up!
To the right: What is Dan smoking this week?
If you haven’t followed this saga you’re all the better. All I can fathom is that it must have been a slow news day down south. There was nothing about our president Gaffney could praise, seeing as how there’s nothing noteworthy the president’s done these past couple weeks. So Gaffney goes on a journey to expose some Cape Henlopen High School students who’ve posted raunchy thoughts and suggestive photos on their myspace.com profiles. For all the sordid details, two Delaware blogs have followed the story more closely.
DelaWired’s said quite a bit about it here, here, here, here, and here.
See also PolitaKid’s post warning parents about the “evils” of the internets.
When I was a kid we didn’t have outlets like myspace.com. No, we made our “evil” comments and suicide threats by writing in slam books and passing notes in history class. It’s all the same, it’s just the media through which kids today act out this stupidity has changed.
Gaffney’s reactionary response –even giving it a response– is nothing more than a right-winger out to impart his own moral code on the rest of society. He thinks it’s “dirty,” so let’s do something about it! Could potential employers possibly find this garbage, thus harming the students’ prospects in the future? Of course. But it’s their own damn fault. What happened to that “personal responsibility” righties are always touting? Something tells me these dumb little brats know what they’re doing. Gaffney’s meandering mumbo-jumbo only further emboldens their cause.
Update I: I don’t know whether to believe it, but it seems one of the parents of a targeted myspace.com student has responded to Gaffney’s looniness. Here’s an abridgement of what she says:
This message is for Dan Gaffney and I’m sure you’ll see it. I’m sure, also, that you think you are helping people by “exposing” what teenagers are doing and saying on Myspace. There is a vague possibility that some good may come out of this, but I’m certain more harm has been done than you will ever know. What was once a way for kids to communicate with each other has now been turned around as a way to misjudge and scare them with threats of investigations and wrongful accusations. You scare me, Dan. You have the ability because of your vocation to say anything you want and not give anyone the opportunity to speak the truth. You read every other line and add up two and two and get five. What’s really scary is that, because of your blundering effort to do good, you have hurt a lot of innocent people. Did you stop to think for a second that if my son was really that down on life and likely to hurt himself, that this wouldn’t put him over the edge? Because of your actions, and the threat of someone taking his words the wrong way and twisting the truth, we are having to take this form of communication away from him. You don’t know my son and you don’t understand the way the kids talk to each other. They know what they’re talking about because their communication is meant for each other, not you. Can you imagine what people would think if they heard or read the comments you make to your friends? In effect, you have eavesdropped on his conversations. I really don’t want to hear back from you. You’ve done your civic duty and alerted parents to the dangers their kids may be exposing themselves to. Now, please just drop the whole thing. And I think it would be great if you didn’t make any more comments on the air about my son or my parenting skills. We’re okay, Dan. Don’t worry about us and please don’t talk about us.
This message is for the police investigating my son. I know you have to do your job, but this is really sad and frustrating because you are spending your valuable time looking at the wrong kid. His friends, in their defense of Ryan, said a lot of stupid things about Dan Gaffney. They don’t realize that they are making things worse for themselves and for Ryan. They just know their friend isn’t the kind of person who would ever do anything to hurt anyone and they expressed it the only way they knew how. I’m afraid to say anything else for fear of you or someone else misinterpreting my comments and using them against us. If anyone has been hurt, it’s my family because of what people are saying about Ryan when he didn’t do anything illegal. The school testified to that. I’m sorry for your time and energy being wasted on a fruitless investigation. Any complaints against my son have been proven unfounded and he has been cleared of any accusations of wrongdoing.
You can check out the rest of this melodrama over at WGMD’s “Local Concerns” forum.
Posted by Mike Matthews in First State Filth at 3:34 PM PDT
I always said a good Republican is a dead Republican (Except of course the ones who post here as well as my family and friends. And I kind of like John McCain)
House Republicans voted to cut student loan subsidies, child support enforcement and aid to firms hurt by unfair trade practices as various committees scrambled to piece together $50 billion in budget cuts.
I’m thinking I’ll go impregnate some chick and run off, content with the knowledge that funds have been cut to search for my lackey ass. I should
I’m just having “visceral reactions” to the fact that student aid loan subsidies and child support enforcement aid is to be cut. We do have a war and trillion-dollar tax cuts to pay for, though, so I suppose some of this unnecessary “pork” had to be trimmed.
PS…to those of you who think I’m serious about my “dead Republican” comment…I don’t even think I need to respond to your paranoia. I only said it to see what lengthy diatribe of a response would be produced by Mynym (wink, wink!).
Posted by Mike Matthews in Conservatism at 8:58 PM PDT
It’s been pouring on and off in Delaware these past couple of days. Let’s be thankful we’re not in West Virginia, as Dave from Ramblings of a College Freshman is experiencing an early winter.
Hope you make it through down there, Dave! Don’t send any of that weather up here.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Friends at 3:11 PM PDT
Ginger at Daily Pepper is celebrating a new holiday…the forthcoming Fitzmas! She’s crafted a witty little rhyme that hopefully will put Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Karl Rove and Judy Miller to sleep real quick!
Here’s a tasty morsel. Click the link above to read the complete lyrics.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Fitzmas
Soon the trials will start
And to watch the Bushies squirm
Through the reins of their second term
Is sure to warm your heart
I’m feeling warm and toasty already. Where’s my mistletoe?
See also: Agitprop is soliciting YOUR Fitzmas greetings!
Update I: I’ve written my own Fitzmas lyrics:
I’m dreaming of a dark Fitzmas
Filled with indictments and jail terms
Where the West Wing listens
to jury convictions
For all these treasonous worms.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Rove, Libby, Miller et. al. at 11:21 AM PDT
On December 1, 1955, the history of the United States changed forever. The sad news of Rosa Parks’s passing yesterday has brought many to opine on just how important those actions were nearly 50 years ago.
It’s hard for me to put into words just how important this woman was in the course of American history. I suppose it’s better that I not attempt to speak of her great accomplishments. I would do a grave injustice to Parks in any attempt to dissect her greatness and service to this country.
What I do know is that the word “hero” is often carelessly thrown about in this country. Everyone’s a “hero,” be it your favorite sports star or musician. But the contributions of a sports star are trivial compared to the work of a great hero. A real hero. Rosa Parks.
Here’s what others are saying.
PolitaKid says he’s thankful for Parks because his generation doesn’t have to tolerate a segregated society:
Rosa Parks, the black Montgomery, Alabama woman who famously refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white person, has died at the age of 92. Parks’ courage helped spark the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Thanks to her, my generation does not have to deal with a segregated world. For that, PolitaKid salutes Rosa Parks.
Jill at Feministe holds the same opinion as me. Words are hard to describe what Parks did:
At 92, Rosa Parks has passed away. There’s probably nothing I can say about her that will do justice to what a remarkable human being she was, and that will fully capture her contribution to the world we live in today. I know many people take issue with Jesse Jackson, but I thought his reaction was appropriate: “She sat down in order that we might stand up. Paradoxically, her imprisonment opened the doors for our long journey to freedom.”
Pam says it doesn’t take numbers to bring about change in the world:
Let none of us ever forget that sometimes all it takes to change the world is for one brave person to stand up and demand that it change.
La Shawn Barber offers some history for those of my younger readers who may not understand the brevity of Parks’s actions :
December 1, 1955, was also the beginning of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted for a year. Blacks refused to ride the buses in Montgomery, Alabama, until November 13, 1956, when the U.S. Supreme Court declared segregation on buses unconstitutional. Despite its embarrassing and often pathetic history, America is still, by far, the greatest country in the world, no matter what color you happen to be.
The history of any country is often dark and rife with apathy. Fortunately, we were blessed with a ray of light named Rosa Parks. May she rest in eternal peace.
Update I: For further reading, check out Oblogatory Anecdotes, Don Surber, Outside the Beltway, Tel-Chai Nation and the great guys at Colossus of Rhodey.
If anyone else has a link they’d like me to cite, feel free to trackback and I’ll include you.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Heroes at 9:10 AM PDT
Actor Alec Baldwin’s got something to say. And he makes a hell of a lot of sense:
My question for today is: Why are contemporary Republicans so full of shit? And a follow-up…How did the party of Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and General Eisenhower get taken over by such lying, thieving, self-serving scoundrels?
I agree with him. More importantly, I wish he would have asked: Why are contemporary Democrats so fucking spineless? What happened to the party of Kennedy, FDR and Harry Truman. A party that STOOD for the middle and lower-class as opposed to this obscene corporate-ruled culture. Democrats are just as beholden to that corporate, pay-for-play “payola” bullshit as the Republicans.
I’ve taken Baldwin’s post out-of-context. He’s really writing about that tragig bullshitter, Rep. Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas.
Click “more” to check out his full post below the jump.
Posted by Mike Matthews in General at 8:08 AM PDT
Is anyone else as excited as I am that, after 12 years, Kate Bush finally has a new album due for release in early November? And a double-CD at that!
A big welcome back to the original mystical musical mama.
In celebration, here’s her first single, King of the Mountain. (Right Click, Save Target As)
Posted by Mike Matthews in Music at 7:52 PM PDT
Hello. I’m sending in my RSVP for the blog shindig at Klondike Kate’s on Nov. 9. Is the rest of this happy fun bunch going to join me for drinks and “light fare?” (Light fare?? Pssshaw! I’ll probably order my own dinner. Klondike Kate’s has awesome burgers).
Be sure to send your RSVP to Katherine Ward at DelawarePress@aol.com or 302.655.2175.
I hope to see you all. Here’s wishing Grump and Mynym will show up as well. Especially the elusive Grump!
Posted by Mike Matthews in Personal at 4:44 PM PDT
I’m beginning to think that blowing all the Muslims up isn’t such a bad idea.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Craziness at 4:23 PM PDT
This is some creepy shit in reference to this milblogger (military-blogger for those who don’t know nerd slang).
No matter where you stand on the military, you must agree that silencing dissenters from within (not just silencing, but forcing them to RETRACT previous statements) is filthy and disgusting.
Thanks to Lauren at Feministe for bringing this one to my attention.
The day we EVER get an army that marches lock-step to the drums of a leader without questioning their mission is the day fascism becomes the order of the day. Dissent is necessary, even in a military where soldiers have signed away their lives to a mission with which they may not agree. It seems the military is protecting our “freedoms.” It’s unfortunate some in the military aren’t included in that collective “our.”
Posted by Mike Matthews in Craziness at 11:01 PM PDT
Four US Contractors Killed in Iraq. [Via Yahoo!]
This is why we shouldn’t have invaded. Invaded because of bald-faced lies:
The Telegraph reported the contractors killed and wounded were employees of the Halliburton Co. subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root, the biggest U.S. military contractor in Iraq. But Goldenberg could not confirm that.
The [Daily] Telegraph reported that two of the contractors not killed in the initial attack were dragged alive from their vehicle, which had been badly shot up. They were forced to kneel in the road before being killed.
“Killing one of the men with a rifle round fired into the back of his head, they doused the other with petrol and set him alight,” the paper reported.
“Barefoot children, yelping in delight, piled straw on to the screaming man’s body to stoke the flames.”
So much for chocolates and roses. Yup, these Iraqi neanderthals really want us there. Screw you, Judith Miller!
Posted by Mike Matthews in Rove, Libby, Miller et. al. at 4:21 PM PDT
Updates throughout post.
An absolutely fascinating New York Times piece, to be published tomorrow.
In the end, I just want to know if Judy Miller was fucking Scooter Libby. That’s it. That’s all I want confirmed. Because that’ll close the case quicker than it started. If he was fucking her, let’s hope he gave it to her good. Because she fucked our country real good.
Update I: It gets even deeper in this report by New York Times ombudsman Byron Calame. How conservatives can continue to defend this bullshit is beyond me. Judith Miller should be locked up again.
Most damning:
One ethical problem emerged when Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor, asked Ms. Miller if she had pursued an article about Valerie Plame, the C.I.A. operative, or her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV. Ms. Miller said in an interview for the retrospective that she “made a strong recommendation to my editor” that a story be pursued. “I was told no.”
But Jill Abramson, now a managing editor and the Washington bureau chief in 2003, would have known about such a request. Ms. Abramson, to whom Ms. Miller reported, strongly asserted to me that Ms. Miller never asked to pursue an article about the operative. Ms. Abramson said that she did not recall Ms. Miller ever mentioning the confidential conversations she had with I. Lewis Libby, the vice president’s chief of staff, who appears to be in the middle of the leak investigation. When I asked her, Ms. Miller declined to identify the editor she dealt with.
If Ms. Abramson is to be believed, and I do believe her, this raises clear issues of trust and credibility. It also means that because Ms. Miller didn’t let an editor know what she knew, Times readers were deprived of a potentially exclusive look into an apparent administration effort to undercut Mr. Wilson and other critics of the Iraq war.
I would venture to say this case is no longer much about the outing of Valerie Plame, but rather part and parcel to a grandiose conspiracy to distract the country about the real facts about the war and to discredit those who would dare come out against it. Jesus if people aren’t indicted and sent to jail because of this I will have no faith in the judicial processes of this great nation.
I wonder if Michelle Malkin or Glenn Reynolds will be covering this?
This is a classic Dowdism:
Judy admitted in the story that she “got it totally wrong” about WMD “If your sources are wrong,” she said, “you are wrong.” But investigative reporting is not stenography.
Update III: Oliver Willis isn’t buying the Times’ mea culpa. He wants more. And I’m inclined to agree with him.
Eschaton offers some speculation as well regarding the relation ship between “Journalist” Miller and Source Libby.
Oddly, the big time right-wing bloggers have remained a bit silent on this topic. Aside from bashing Maureen Dowd and questioning Chris Matthews’s sanity, their silence has been quite deafening. I wonder why? Perhaps because they can’t go off on some loony tirade about how the Times is a “left-wing rag,” seeing as how their whole case for war was built on lies by this trollop Judy Miller. To my credit, I’ve been challenged by conservatives in the past to comment on topics liberal bloggers typically avoided. I suppose I’m now asking the same of the conservatives. What say you on this issue?
Update IV: The Queen chimes in:
Now the Times has clearly turned on its modern day Rosa Parks. Ridding the Times of Judy is a good start, but the Times’ problems are bigger than Ms. Run Amok. In the same way that however hard the White House tries (and as Josh Marshall points out, it’s trying very, very hard) to turn Libby into Mr. Run Amok, it will not succeed in pinning it all on Scooter. The crisis at the New York Times is about much more than Judy Miller, and the crisis at the White House is about much more than Scooter Libby.
Update V: I wrote last night that the CIA leak case was no longer much about Plamegate. The NY Times seems to put forth the same idea. This whole fiasco was about selling a war based on lies and then later discrediting those who would dare challenge the neo-con bullshit.
Update VI (Monday 7:20 pm): Ryan at Jokers to the Right says he’s not surprised about Plamegate. He believes history shows second-term presidencies tend to be rife with scandal:
Watergate, Iran-Contra, Monica.
The last several two-term presidents have had a scandal of varying degree break during their second term. If “Plamegate” is the worst, then it really isn’t too bad (unless it goes to the top, but there is no idication of that as of yet). Reagan successfully navigated Iran-Contra, and we’ll see if the Democrats decide to attack Bush or be productive and try to gain some seats in Congress.
I tend to agree with that conclusion.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Rove, Libby, Miller et. al. at 8:14 PM PDT
Michelle Malkin is a pretty good blogger. She gets her shit right about 95% of the time, even though I mostly disagree with her.
But she needs to check herself.
She cites an LGF post claiming that anti-war activists are holding “parties” to mark the 2000th dead soldier killed in Iraq, to happen any day now. Malkin doesn’t interpret “parties” to mean a “gathering of people.” The way she writes, she’s interpreting “parties” to mean a bunch of drunken, boozed up idiots destroying the memories of our troops.
I was affiliated a while back with one of the groups that will be hosting a “party” in the near future. In fact, I received my invitation to this “party” in the mail today. The group hosting the Wilmington “party” is featured on the website of “event locations” that LGF cited in its post.
For those of you interested, below is the postcard I received in the mail this morning.
Michelle’s better than this. She knows what these gatherings are. I suppose she has to succumb to a bit of hardcore spin every now and again. She’s only human.
Left-wingers Agitprop are a little harder on Michelle, though their point is well taken.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Conservatism at 3:58 PM PDT
I don’t know what I’m doing up so late. Living dangerously at 23! It’s now time for bed.
For all you crazy-ass night owls, here’s a mindwrackingly fun game for you to play. It’s called the Crimson Room. Can you find your way out?
Those of you who find yourselves utterly frustrated can check the cheat solution here.
Posted by Mike Matthews in Dumb stuff at 1:11 AM PDT
Check out the guys at Delawired for a new perspective on “Delaware issues, national issues, non-issues, sports, entertainment and anything that strikes [their] fancy.”
For future viewing, I’ve added the link to the list of “Delaware Blogs” to the right.
Welcome, guys!
Posted by Mike Matthews in First State Filth at 12:48 AM PDT
I like Mynym over at Into Good and Evil. He kindly replies to quite a few of my own posts here at this respectable (?!?!?) blog. However, I’ve felt the need recently to go a little deeper in respect to some comments made about some content on this here blog. In particular, check out this post from October 18, where Mynym compares the thoughts and writing styles of several Delaware bloggers. Below is what he wrote about my site in general and a commenter in particular:
At Down with Absolutes, there’s a writer whose pattern of thought seems to match the eugenics movement. It seems they generally focus on having opinions about things, and some lil’ feelings too. It doesn’t matter if the opinion is wrong or ignorant, as long as they feel that they have an opinion it seems to make them happy. Having a correct opinion would probably be imposing, and hurt their feelings by shaping and molding them. So they seem to stick with incorrect opinions and murmur about their right to be wrong instead.
To be fair, Mynym wasn’t speaking of me, but of a commenter who advocated sterilizations. But we got into it in the comments section. I just want to share what I think of the whole situation. Click the link to see more.
Posted by Mike Matthews in First State Filth at 12:36 AM PDT