bad news for Palmeiro

[from BaltimoreSun.com: Palmeiro learned of failed test in May

'no significant need for the United States.'

the response by Iran's new President, installed today, when asked about future relations with the US.

all hail the king

[from BBC News: Saudis vow loyalty to new monarch]

Maryland's Katherine Harris

Ehrlich picks new secretary of state... wife of Maryland Republican Party Chairman.

ridiculous

these friggin morons... Republicans will do ANYTHING to ensure the use of their Diebold vote fraud machines. Today's Baltimore Sun contains this article... on the Maryland Board of Elections' decision to conduct a 'study' to "help legislators decide whether there should be a paper trail" that would be auditable after the election is over. Maryland's Annotated Code considering, only a moron would think that there shouldn't be... From Maryland's election law:

(c) The State Board may not certify a voting system unless, the State Board determines that: (1) the voting system will:

(i) protect the secrecy of the ballot; (ii) protect the security of the voting process; (iii) count and record all votes accurately; (iv) accommodate any ballot used under this article; (v) protect all other rights of voters and candidates; and (vi) be capable of creating a paper record of all votes cast in order that an audit trail is available in the event of a recount;

[oh, and just in case you were wondering if these machines are infallible, they aren't]

an interesting approach

[from APNews: HHS May Use Mail to Deliver Emergency Meds]

"Terror in the Skies"

Why 9-11 Could Happen Again will be released on 9/11. Half price if you pre-order it now.

memo for the PNAC

the Project for New American Century is deeply offended by yesterday's Washington Post report on the intelligence community's consensus that Iran is 10 YEARS from having a nuclear weapon... And rightly so... I mean, this throws a monkey wrench into Illegal Invasion and Occupation #2. So, Gary Schmitt took it upon himself to send this memo to PNAC's "opinion leaders" (laugh) which contains this 2 sentence irony overload:

Indeed, given how little we know, the intelligence community estimate is just as likely to be wrong as right when it comes to predicting Iran’s program.Remember, US intelligence on Iraq first missed how close Saddam was to having a bomb prior to the first Gulf War before overestimating Iraq’s wmd program in the run up to the second war.

Yeah, they made big mistakes, didn't they guys? How could they be so wildly off-base?

---------------------------------

MEMORANDUM TO: PNAC Opinion Leaders FROM: No One In Particular SUBJECT: Shut yer pie hole. You got it wrong for nearly a decade on Iraq. Stop killing American soldiers for your global circle-jerk. Your Pax-Americana agenda is transparent and you are weakening our Country and endangering our citizens.

---------------------------------

[related - this article appeared yesterday at The American Conservative:

Attack on Iran: Pre-emptive Nuclear War

The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons.

The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney’s office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States. The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. Within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option. As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States. Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly appalled at the implications of what they are doing—that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack—but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections.]

Concerned Women for America: hacks and hypocrites

yeah, I said it...

[from Demogogue: That Was Then] Concerned Women for America (CWA) commends the President's appointment of John Bolton as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. And here is CWA, back in 2000, calling recess appointments a "direct assault on America’s constitutional foundation and, therefore, a direct attack on the freedom of all Americans."

Michael Bloomberg: political novice extraordinaire

[from PoliticalWire.com: Bloomberg Seeks to Revive Liberal Party] New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg (R), "who switched his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican in 2001 to run for mayor, is hoping to revive the state's Liberal Party so that he can run on its currently defunct ballot line in November," the New York Daily News reports. "That would allow Bloomberg to run as a Republican-Liberal -- a fusion that the city's overwhelmingly Democratic majority might find a little easier to support in voting booths this November."

must read from TIA

Eric Martin rips the Bush administration ... and deservedly so, for their horrifically-planned march to war and subsequent quagmire of a strategy for withdrawal.

BigPharma's War on Wellness

[from Newsweek: Selling Sickness to the Well]

A new book looks at how pharmaceutical companies are using aggressive marketing campaigns to turn more people into patients.

bush administration's self-fulfilling prophecy

on the new breed of jihadists entering Iraq, previously not motivated to kill Americans, but now are...

[from Globalterroralert.com, via The Counterterrorism Blog: The Road Through Syria to Jihad in Iraq]

In a new guide published on the Internet, an alleged former resident of the Iraqi-Syrian border region has explained in detail for potential foreign fighter recruits how they can enter Iraq and join in the jihad by traveling through neighboring Syria. According to "Al-Muhajir al-Islami", foreign jihadists should travel to the eastern Syrian city of Dayr al-Zawr: "it is recommended to enter the city using a car and do not carry large sums of money. If anyone asks, say you are here on a vacation and have come to go fishing in the Euphrates—therefore, bring some fishing equipment and another person with you so you won’t look suspicious." Recruits are also advised to avoid consulting government-sponsored Muslim clerics in local mosques and only to "approach the Salafist youths" outside of mosques and beyond the prying eyes of Syrian intelligence.

you mean it's not just here?

[from The Guardian: Bribes, corrupt chiefs and paid-for sex ... corporate Germany is in crisis]

when judges should judge

rather than write hackish books:

Judge Posner's Incorrect Verdict

Sloppy writing like Posner's is enough to erode my trust in American jurisprudence.