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Tuesday Open Thread

By Jeralyn, Section Blog Related
Posted on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 12:00:35 AM EST
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Today is moving day for me. I'll be losing my tv, telephone and high speed internet connection until Wednesday....and that's assuming Comcast and Qwest perform as agreed.

A huge thanks to TChris who will be posting here and perhaps Big Tent Democrat and Last Night in Little Rock. I'll be on WWAN every few hours to push your comments through, so I hope you'll check in.

The site move to Scoop is progressing, ScoopHost says they'll have a test site up by Thursday. I'm hoping that will solve the commenting problem and by next week TalkLeft will be faster and easier for commenters than ever.

In the meantime, feel free to chat here. I'll be back as soon as I get a working computer and online access at my new home.

And for those of you with a residence move in your future, don't forget to leave a few items of silverware and a towel or two out on your last night. I ate my take-out dinner with a 1/4 teaspoon I found left in a drawer and while I remembered to put a change of clothes, shampoo and some makeup aside, I forgot all about a towel for the shower. I had to go to the new house and bring one back.

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    • Tuesday Open Thread | 16 comments (16 topical)
    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#1)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 01:44:18 AM EST
    assuming Comcast and Qwest perform as agreed If things get frustrating today, remember, there's always Murphy's Law to fall back on. Or down in. ;-) Hope all goes well!

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 06:51:39 AM EST
    Why isn't the real war on terror being fought against real people who kill Americans? Halliburton to Wounded Employee: You'll Get a Medal -- If You Don't Sue By Justin Rood - September 18, 2006, 2:10 PM
    Halliburton will help its combat-zone employees get the honors and recognition they deserve -- if they promise not to sue the company. That's according to new documents released today by Senate Democrats. Ray Stannard was a truck driver in Iraq for Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root. In 2003, he was part of a fuel convoy that was ambushed by insurgents. Seven Americans died in the attack and 26 were injured, including Stanner. He is suing the company. His company knew the convoy's route was dangerous and unprotected, he says, but sent the convoy through anyway. "What they did was murder," Stannard told CBS News recently. "And I stick by that."
    ---edger

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#7)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 10:00:45 AM EST
    USATODAY/Gallup released a new poll and this recent polling data tells me that voters have a clear perspective on the war in Iraq...perhaps more cogent than either Party. They feel it is being handled poorly, they know what a civil war looks like, they believe Congress has failed to do its part in guiding and overseeing the executive branch, and they realize that the notion of exporting democracy to the Middle East is a Bush Doctrine that fails to recognize the realities in the region. Finally, they believe that Middle East stability is important and that a withdrawal that leaves Iraq in chaos may well be detrimental to the United States. That, my friends, is one spot on analysis and suggests that voters have discerned fact from fiction with an impressive demonstration of acuity. Perhaps both parties will someday learn that the truth is, in the final analysis, the most powerful campaign strategy available. Don't hold your breath. Read more here: www.thoughttheater.com

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#8)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 10:58:00 AM EST
    All this worry about the power Control group and then Billman posts this on Lovelock.
    "While the political and/or economic topics discussed herein could be very important, it's also possible that they don't matter jack squat because the world as you and I know it is about to be parboiled."
    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#10)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 11:04:41 AM EST
    TL: I can't remember if I ever stated this in posts past, but THANK YOU! Yours is probably the classiest blog I've frequented. Truly a class act. While I find we differ on quite a few issues, you take a principled stand on virtually everything you post and I greatly appreciate that. Furthermore, your blog is a great "jumping off point" for other great blogs. However, you're still number one. Keep fighting the good fight. Just curious: who among the Dems do you predict breaking out of the pack (Hillary NOT included)?

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#12)
    by jimakaPPJ on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 01:29:04 PM EST
    edger - Now I know nothing about the facts of the case, as neither do you. But I would expect that no one is going to give someone a weapon to bolster the other sides claim in a lawsuit. So beat'em up over facts. But when you always play the edge, edger, you loose.

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#2)
    by Johnny on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    Qwest sucks... I ran over there line with my lawnmower one afternoon, and they charged me 180 bucks to fix the line! How in hades is it my responsibility to watch out for a line that should be buried?

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#3)
    by Edger on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    Why isn't the real war on terror being fought against real people who kill Americans? Halliburton to Wounded Employee: You'll Get a Medal -- If You Don't Sue By Justin Rood - September 18, 2006, 2:10 PM
    Halliburton will help its combat-zone employees get the honors and recognition they deserve -- if they promise not to sue the company. That's according to new documents released today by Senate Democrats. Ray Stannard was a truck driver in Iraq for Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root. In 2003, he was part of a fuel convoy that was ambushed by insurgents. Seven Americans died in the attack and 26 were injured, including Stanner. He is suing the company. His company knew the convoy's route was dangerous and unprotected, he says, but sent the convoy through anyway. "What they did was murder," Stannard told CBS News recently. "And I stick by that."


    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#5)
    by kdog on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    Should be interesting at the UN today. It's a long shot, but maybe the UN will work as intended and some of the impending wars some of the world leader's have a hard-on for can be avoided.

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#6)
    by scribe on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    On August 5, 2006, the Washington Post reported (at page A20) German prosecutors were investigating Custer Battles for money laundering to avoid the civil fraud judgment recently entered in federal court. Battles' wife, Jacqueline, is a German national and lives in the Darmstadt area. Today, AP reports Jacqueline Battles has been arrested, and in excess of $1 million seized from bank accounts she recently opened under her maiden name. It has also been reported, apparently via AP, that the whereabouts of both Custer and Battles themselves are currently unknown.

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#9)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    Peaches checking in above

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#11)
    by wagonjak on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    I spent the last night with my brother in a house we had lived in for 22 years. We had only our sleeping bags, enough logs for one last fire and some booze...which we had too much of and fell asleep in our sleeping bags. In the morning we awoke to hangovers and a horn beeping loudly out on the street. We staggered to the door and opened it. It was the new owner, telling us to get out. I restrained my brother from attacking the man, and we grumpily left with our sleeping bags.

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#13)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Sep 19, 2006 at 05:34:42 PM EST
    My first post today was put in a moderator pile for later. The second went through, no problem. That suggests that having a cookie already set allows posts since I've cleared my cookies since last posting days ago, and had a cookie set for the second post today. Anyone else notice this? If so, it could be a matter of the site knowing what to do when a cookie is not set.

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#16)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Wed Sep 20, 2006 at 01:49:14 AM EST
    It seems the rethugs are having their last orgy of looting the treasury before the doors are locked in November. FBI forced to triple fraud probe squads to keep up BY JAMES GORDON MEEK DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
    WASHINGTON - There is so much political corruption on Capitol Hill that the FBI has had to triple the number of squads investigating lobbyists, lawmakers and influence peddlers, the Daily News has learned. For decades, only one squad in Washington handled corruption cases because the crimes were seen as local offenses handled by FBI field offices in lawmakers' home districts. But in recent years, the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and other abuses of power and privilege have prompted the FBI to assign 37 agents full-time to three new squads in an office near Capitol Hill. ... FBI Assistant Director Chip Burrus told The News yesterday that he wants to detail even more agents to the Washington field office for a fourth corruption squad because so much wrongdoing is being uncovered.
    ---edger

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#17)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Wed Sep 20, 2006 at 01:51:33 AM EST
    And in the naked light I saw
    Ten thousand people, maybe more.
    People talking without speaking,
    People hearing without listening,
    People writing songs that voices never share
    And no one dare
    Disturb the sound of silence.

    Fools said I, you do not know
    Silence like a cancer grows.

    --Sounds of Silence ---edger

    Re: Tuesday Open Thread (none / 0) (#15)
    by Sumner on Wed Sep 20, 2006 at 06:57:30 PM EST
    Today was quite the VNR news day, blasting child porn. US Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales testified for Senator Shelby's Senate Banking Committee, where once again, the chairman promised to throw virtually unlimited funds at him. Fox News had former US prosecutor Wendy Murphy on Bill O'Reilly's town hall meeting, where they discussed the pending sentence of a man (who pled out) in a child porn possession case. Wendy Murphy said that if it was up to her, she would "whack him", (in the Organized Crime sense of the word). O'Reilly said he would burn down the man's house. Such incitements from Rupert Murdoch's channels are hardly uncommon. Last week, the exaggerations about the size of the "industry" were put at $20 billion. Today, Wendy Murphy repeatedly asserted the "industry" is at $40 billion annually. (Utterly preposterous!) The Center for Missing and Exploited Children's Ernie Allen, testified today that they are well on their way in stamping out the "problem" and are on track with "complete elimination of commercial child porn by 2008". The other characters in the histrionics today, claimed that the "problem" is still exploding exponentially. I have often referred to this as the "Charles Keating Syndrome", where officials rail against "morals offenses", as misdirection, all the while they are looting, pillaging and plundering, either by themselves, or with others. And as I have long observed, no matter how over-the-top these laws keep going, no matter how much fraud and lies are behind them, they keep passing more and more such legislation. As they build such enormous Police State infrastructure to this end, once there is no more "child porn", they must reclassify bathing suit pictures, etc., as a crime. Today they made clear that "adult porn" is every bit as big a problem as "child porn" and it must also be included in future prosecutions. Numerous other channels around the dial ran lurid stories on this theme today, "accommodatingly".

    Tuesday Open Thread | 16 comments (16 topical)