Random News & Views Roundup

- Drudge reports a lie about CNN reporter Michael Ware. Powerline repeats it. Ware fights back with video. Power Line has to add a corrective update. Other right-wing blogs try to cover their sorry asses. It doesn't work. Just another day in the right-wing blogosphere. (Update: McCain is still living in Neverland.)

- The Supreme Court rules against the Bush administration in a global warming case. Senator Inhofe's head explodes and the Weather Channel's ratings go through the roof.

- What CNN didn't tell you earlier today: the missing American man in Kish, Iran is a former FBI agent. No one knows what happened to him. Was it smart for the State Department to reveal that information? I don't think so.

- US authorities snooping in your Canadian bank accounts? No problem. We all trust the Bush administration, don't we?

- More horror:

Baghdad - A truck bomber carrying food supplies killed eight Iraqi schoolgirls and a baby in the northern oil city of Kirkuk on Monday as suspected Sunni militants executed 21 Shiite workers north of Baghdad.

- Truth:

Terry Jones
Saturday March 31, 2007
The Guardian

I share the outrage expressed in the British press over the treatment of our naval personnel accused by Iran of illegally entering their waters. It is a disgrace. We would never dream of treating captives like this - allowing them to smoke cigarettes, for example, even though it has been proven that smoking kills. And as for compelling poor servicewoman Faye Turney to wear a black headscarf, and then allowing the picture to be posted around the world - have the Iranians no concept of civilised behaviour? For God's sake, what's wrong with putting a bag over her head? That's what we do with the Muslims we capture: we put bags over their heads, so it's hard to breathe. Then it's perfectly acceptable to take photographs of them and circulate them to the press because the captives can't be recognised and humiliated in the way these unfortunate British service people are.


It is also unacceptable that these British captives should be made to talk on television and say things that they may regret later. If the Iranians put duct tape over their mouths, like we do to our captives, they wouldn't be able to talk at all. Of course they'd probably find it even harder to breathe - especially with a bag over their head - but at least they wouldn't be humiliated.

And what's all this about allowing the captives to write letters home saying they are all right? It's time the Iranians fell into line with the rest of the civilised world: they should allow their captives the privacy of solitary confinement. That's one of the many privileges the US grants to its captives in Guantánamo Bay.

The true mark of a civilised country is that it doesn't rush into charging people whom it has arbitrarily arrested in places it's just invaded. The inmates of Guantánamo, for example, have been enjoying all the privacy they want for almost five years, and the first inmate has only just been charged. What a contrast to the disgraceful Iranian rush to parade their captives before the cameras!

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Quote du Jour: Give Bush the Gold Medal for Hypocrisy

Oh that rebel, Hugo!

"You've got to give the U.S. president the gold medal for hypocrisy, because he's said now he's worried about poverty in Latin America," Chavez told reporters soon after landing in Buenos Aires.

"Now he's discovering ... after so many years that there's poverty in Latin America, precisely when the U.S. empire is the principal culprit," said Chavez, who routinely insults Bush.

As does most of the world's population...along with hordes of Brazilian protesters...
 

The Parade of the Conservative Hypocrites

Dennis Prager on CNN's Larry King Live show on Monday attacking Ed Schultz while defending Ann Coulter:

We all have a moral obligation to elevate our discourse.

Dennis Prager on Rep Keith Ellison using the Koran during his private swearing in ceremony:

Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the first Muslim elected to the United States Congress, has announced that he will not take his oath of office on the Bible, but on the bible of Islam, the Koran.

He should not be allowed to do so -- not because of any American hostility to the Koran, but because the act undermines American civilization.

First, it is an act of hubris that perfectly exemplifies multiculturalist activism -- my culture trumps America's culture. What Ellison and his Muslim and leftist supporters are saying is that it is of no consequence what America holds as its holiest book; all that matters is what any individual holds to be his holiest book.

Forgive me, but America should not give a hoot what Keith Ellison's favorite book is. Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress. In your personal life, we will fight for your right to prefer any other book. We will even fight for your right to publish cartoons mocking our Bible. But, Mr. Ellison, America, not you, decides on what book its public servants take their oath.
[...]
...these naive people do not appreciate that America will not change the attitude of a single American-hating Muslim by allowing Ellison to substitute the Koran for the Bible. In fact, the opposite is more likely: Ellison's doing so will embolden Islamic extremists and make new ones, as Islamists, rightly or wrongly, see the first sign of the realization of their greatest goal -- the Islamicization of America.

I guess that's what Prager considers to be an example of elevated discourse.

And, just in case you missed them, check up my updates to my previous Coulter post. The hypocrisy continues...
 

Coulter: You bought her, you own her

Many right-wing bloggers are busy doing damage control following Ann Coulter's despicable remarks about John Edwards at CPAC this week. As Editor & Publisher points out, some major media outlets are busy ignoring what Coulter said.

The sentiment in the right-wing blogosphere today is basically, 'well, I never really liked her anyway'. Then why do so many of them run ads for her books, endorse some of her behaviour and even defend her when it's convenient? And, if she truly has no credibility in conservative circles, why was she even invited to speak at CPAC? It seems to me that those right-wing bloggers who are now disowning and trying so hard to distance themselves from Coulter should have arranged an attempt to have her blacklisted from their conference - especially when she pulled the same kind of stunt at CPAC in 2006 by using the word "raghead" - grabbing headlines for herself at their expense then too.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. You know exactly what you're going to get when you invite Coulter to speak anywhere: a woman who grandstands with the most vile comments just to get people to pay attention to her.

So, you can't have it both ways, right-wing bloggers. Either boycott Coulter completely - and that includes not buying or selling her books for her - or just accept the fact that you're complicit in her behaviour.

Update: Blowback against Coulter from the right-wing bloggers which might actually seem sincere if it didn't endorse equally vile Rush Limbaugh and throw in this dig against the left:

At CPAC 2007 Coulter decided to turn up the volume by referring to John Edwards, a former U.S. Senator and current Presidential candidate, as a “faggot.” Such offensive language–and the cavalier attitude that lies behind it–is intolerable to us. It may be tolerated on liberal websites but not at the nation’s premier conservative gathering.

They just can't help themselves, can they? Some of the bloggers and their commenters signing onto that letter have used the most racist, bigotted language you'll find anywhere on the internet. It's not enough for them, apparently, to take ownership of denouncing Coulter. They just have to attack the left while they're at it in a weak attempt to look superior. Talk about mixed messages. They may not like some of the words she uses, but they sure like her tactics.

Yet another update: Editor & Publisher notes:

Ann Coulter, fresh from implying that John Edwards is a "faggot," now has a statement on her Web site saying Edwards campaign manager David Bonior "is fronting for Arab terrorists."
[...]
A copy of Bonior's letter was posted on Coulter's Web site, with this note underneath: "It's always good to divert Bonior from his principal pastime which is fronting for Arab terrorists."

I guess she thinks she's on a roll now.