October 1, 2003 by s.z.

Rush Sees My Blog, Quits This just in: You Won't Have Rush Limbaugh To Kick Around Anymore on ESPN Anymore  Yes, Rush was called into the office of ESPN President George Bodenheimer, who told him he was fired; causing Rush to say: "Therefore, I have decided to resign. I appreciate the opportunity to be a part of the show and wish all the best to those who make it happen." Bodenheimer indicated that he regretted the "circumstances" (i.e., that Rush made racist comments on his network), but is glad that Rush resigned expeditiously upon getting his pink slip and didn't make things awkward by taking hostages or having Bill O'Reilly's mom come and beat anybody up.  ESPN is considering hiring Ann Coulter to take his place. As for Rush, he said that having finally realized that everybody hates him, he will retire into quiet obscurity, using his free time to build houses for deserving rich people, and maybe trying to learn to read. 10:38:38 PM

TBOGG Proved Right: Rush IS Racist AND Idiot, a Veritable Peanutbutter Cup of Evil Yes, beloved children's entertainer Rush Limbaugh managed a double-play today, becoming Hell's MVP.  First, in his editorial Wilson Benefits from "Sliding Scale of Truth", Rush says that everybody is just making a big deal over nothing (Novak SAID nobody leaked this to him, so no leak happened, you whiny babies), and writes that the real story here is how "full of hate" Wilson is.  Pay no attention to the man in the White House leaking the names of covert CIA employees: He is full of hate, and it should be pointed out. The way this is playing out really causes concern. We need to get to the bottom of this mess before our entire policy in Iraq becomes "a victim of Washington's politics of long knives." Make no mistake about it, there are many that would love to make Bush's Iraq policy turn into a total, abject failure and wouldn't mind that becoming the reality despite the deaths that go with it - all for the sake of their reacquisition of their own political power. That's what you're witnessing, right in front of your very eyes.  So, Rush, you're implying that Wilson went to Niger (as part of some secret CIA plan to sabotage Bush's Iraq policy), falsely claimed that Saddam DIDN'T try to buy uranium from them (he really did--it's hidden on the moon, along with that Nazi gold), and then, um, some stupid nonleak happened, and when CIA referred this non-incident to the DOJ for investigation, Wilson went to the media and claimed to be a "reasonable, disinterested man just trying to do his job and who's super-secret agent wife was nearly killed because someone in the administration hated him."  And he did all this, just to turn Bush's Iraq policy into a "total, abject failure," so that he can reacquire his own political power.  Yes, that IS a much better story than the one I was witnessing.  Thanks.      Now, here's Rush on his radio show (Idiot) remarking on the outrage about his racist comments (the ones about how the media just said that Donovan McNabb was a good player because he's black, since the liberal media wants to further the NFL's "social" agenda of having a black quarterbacks, even though everybody knows that quarterback is a job for white folks) All this has become the tempest that it is because I must have been right about something.  If I wasn't right, there wouldn't be this cacophony of outrage that has sprung up in the sports writer community. Yup, the outrage DOES prove that Rush was right, just like all the non-partisan outrage about the leaking of Plame's CIA affilation proves that Rove was right to do it.  And all that civil war outrage proves that slavery is the only valid solution to our current unemployment woes.  Or something.  Anyway, the paper includes this quote as well: Asked about Limbaugh's comments, Eagles defensive end N.D. Kalu said: "He speaks well, he's well-read, but he's an idiot.''  Well, you got one of the three right, Kalu. 9:07:22 PM

"We Don't Need No Stinkin' Independent Special Counsels," WH Source Tells Knight Ridder               Here are a few paragraphs from Shannon McCaffrey's (Knight Ridder Newspapers) just posted article Lawyers probing leak are veterans of politically sensitive cases : The 12 lawyers who find themselves heading up the first major criminal probe of the Bush White House have been at the center of political firestorms before. They helped send spies Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen to prison. And they worked the sensitive investigation of Chinese-American nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.  John Dion, the career prosecutor who decided to pursue the full-blown White House probe, is a 30-year Justice Department veteran who has twice received one of the department's top awards. The Justice Department's counterespionage section opens 25 to 30 investigations every year into media leaks of classified information, but most never result in criminal charges. In fact, in most cases, the leaker is never identified. In June 2000, then-Attorney General Janet Reno told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that FBI agents have conducted hundreds of interviews focusing on the people who have access to leaked classified information. That typically turns out to be a very large pool of people, she said. "Because of the enormous difficulty of conducting leak investigations, almost all leak investigations are closed without our having identified a suspect," Reno told lawmakers. Nothing much has changed. A senior Justice Department official, who asked not to be identified, described the current number of criminal charges as being "very small." Officials could not provide a specific number or cite a recent case where the criminal charges had been filed because of a classified leak. [snip] Asked if aides would be willing to submit to polygraph tests, McClellan responded: "We will cooperate fully with the investigation and make sure that we preserve the integrity of the investigation." The FBI hunkered down on Wednesday, assembling a team of six or more senior agents to do the legwork. The agents were pulled from in the bureau's Inspections and Counterintelligence Divisions and the Washington Field Office. All had experience in sensitive leak investigations, spokeswoman Susan Whitson said. Okay, let's point out the key points in this portion of Shannon's news article: 1.  The DOJ lawyers in charge of the criminal probe of "SAO LEAK" are really experienced in dealing with high level cases, like the Wen Ho Lee matter (and look how well that went!)  John Dion, head of the unit, has won DOJ awards. 2.  The FBI agents who do leak investigations are really experienced too. 3.  But nobody ever gets prosecuted, because these cases are just too hard. 4.  The White House will cooperate fully with the investigation, but won't answer questions about taking polygraphs. Now, let's review the morals of the story: 1.  No need for a special counsel, because the FBI/DOJ guys are the best. 2.  But don't expect them to catch anybody, because it's impossible in these kinds of cases (even Janet Reno said so, and she worked for Clinton, so you Dems HAVE to believe it).  And when the investigation turns up a lot of interesting material about Wilson, the CIA, and various commie reporters who claimed to have been called by the White House, but nothing about any SOA leakers, don't be surprised. A few personal observations: 1.  John Dion is a competent, intelligent guy, but above all, a DOJ careerist.   If his boss, John Ashcroft, wants to be informed of every bit of information that the investigators uncover, this will happen.  And if Ashcroft wants to brief other people, like, say, Senior Administraion Officials, on this information, nobody is going to stop him. 2.  Speaking of the Aldrich Ames case, the week after it broke, the FBI was testifying to Congress, using stuff it had uncovered while investigating that case, as well as info it had collected previously from the mandated crimes referrals that the CIA sends to the Bureau, to take over CIA territory and budget.  Due to the CIA's code of "Secrecy is Job One," and their reluctance to tell Congress ANYTHING, even instances of FBI bungling, they didn't retaliate after the Hanssen case broke.  But my point is, the FBI is very able at using information developed in the course of investigations to help the Bureau (a lesson J. Edgar taught them well).  So, if some White House skeletons are uncovered in the course of this investigation, expect the FBI to profit from them.  And if the FBI can pin this on the CIA, so much the better (they can take over the Weapons Proliferation account AND get some black-project funding from a grateful White House.) 3.  While leak cases are never prosecuted, oftentimes the culprits ARE identified.  But since nobody wants the unfortunate publicity of a trial, the culprit is just moved to another section in the State Department where he won't see NSA material anymore.  But even more frequently, once the leak is traced to the office of a Senior Official (often, but not always Administration), no further action is deemed necessary.  Truly. 4.  While some of the agents in the FBI's CI squad are good, CI was traditionally a dumping ground for the unbest and the unbrightest, and so the REALLY experienced agent is not the one you want on the job, because anybody who has spent 20 years in the CI sqaud is, by (FBI) definition, a guy who just wasn't smart enough to make it in the exciting world of REAL crime.  The agents assigned to do "leak" cases were the unbestest of all, since everybody knew that the cases weren't going to go anywhere anyway, so why bother to assign somebody good to investigate them.  The FBI would do better in forgoing some leak experience for some investigative competence. 5.  No aides are gonna get polygraphed.  Ain't gonna happen.  Because it would be really embarrassing when none of them passed.  (Even if the relevant question was "Did you leak Valerie Plame's name and CIA affiliation to reporters," and the aide hadn't done that, all the other things he or she had leaked would come to mind, causing a positive reaction.) 6.  Nobody is going to get prosecuted for this leak.  If it looks like the FBI has developed conclusive evidence of the guilt, then magically the culprit will come forward, say that his love of America and hatred of terrorists got the better of him and he's really sorry and the Prez had nothing to do with this, and he's resigning.  To take a highly paid job in some government consulting firm. 7.  If there isn't conclusive evidence, this case will never go to trial, (John Dion won't try a case that he isn't positive he can win), and this whole thing will just kind of fade away, hopefully to be overtaken by a new sex scandal involving a Democrat. 8.  No independent special counsel will be appointed.  Ashcroft would never appoint one, even if he wasn't buddies with the Prez, because he would never give up power that way.  The best we can hope for, IMHO, is that the FBI does get phone records showing that, Dick Cheney called a bunch of reporters at a certain day and time, and then Dick resigns due to health concerns and reports to work at Halliburton the next day. 7:41:48 PM

Out of One, Many        Another David Limbaugh-lover item before I go to bed: if you happened to catch Phil Brennan's NewsMax article Limbaugh Shows How Intolerant 'Liberals' Wage War on Christianity, then you learned that "Even if you were reading Persecution: How Liberals are Waging War Against Christianity in a freezer with the temperature way below zero, your blood would still boil."  It's that annoyingly stupid of a book.  Well, I guess Phil liked it, since he admiringly retells David's blood-boiling story of how Felix fussily corrected Oscar, "It's not spaghetti, it's linguini," and so Oscar threw it against the wall and said, "Now it's garbage!'  Only the way David tells it, it was a Bible.  Or something.  And per Phil, the book allegedly includes other stories like that. But this is the point I wanted to talk about today: apparently the Bill of Rights only prevents the FEDERAL government from establishing a state religion, but it's okay for each individual state to have an official one (yes, this is THE hot, new Constitutional interpretation that all the right-wing lawyer-pundits are hip with).  Here's that portion from Phil's article (I don't know if he is plagiarizing David, of if this is his own work): Thanks to the issues raised by Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, for the first time many Americans were startled to learn that the famous slogan of "separation of church and state" they’ve been told bans government at all levels from allowing religious expression within public facilities or by official bodies is nowhere to be found in the Constitution of the United States. It is a largely a judicial fiction based on a deliberate misreading of the Establishment Clause "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" and the Free Exercise Clause, which follows: "or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." It was not until 1947 that any other meaning than that which forbade Congress (but not the states) from setting up a state-sponsored religion was found. So, since we're getting back to what the Founding Fathers wanted (and not what the evil Supremes have forced on us), I assume we are going to let each state set up its own state-sponsored religion, like they apparently did prior to 1947.  Some states will have large rocks in their public buildings; some will require school children to hold hands and mis-recite rhyming prayers over their graham crackers, and some will make it mandatory to mail religious comic books to soldiers serving in countries with competing religions.  This promises lots of fun for everyone! And, as other legal scholars (Alan Keyes, Ann Coulter, Anna Nicole Smith) have pointed out, if you don't like your state's religion, you can just move to one that suits your preferences.  See, that's the beauty of America: we have states to suit every religious preference, and no need to respect all of them when we can just move to a place where ours is the only one allowed. But since most people don't want to buy a house, get the yard looking nice, and only THEN learn that their state's religion is "Professional Wrestling," I think we should start announcing what each state's official religion is now, to give everybody a chance to move, if they want, before the Official Religion clause of the First Amendment becomes binding on everybody.  In order to get the ball rolling, I set something up (subject to minor adjustments, once everybody's had a chance to look things over).  My methodology was: I got a list of the states, ranked in order of population.  And then I went to U.S. Composite Demographics, and got a ranked listing of the most popular U.S. religions (it was taken from polls where people identified themselves with a particular religion or lack thereof).  This list include demographic groupings other than religions, but more about that later. Then I took the most populous state: California, and matched it with the religion that the most people said they belonged to: Christianity.  And so on, through the various states and religions.  Except that about 3/4 of the way through, I realized I was going to run out of religions, and so I assigned a few states another demographics grouping that were equal in numbers to the religion that would have come next on the list (I didn't want to have any states with no one living in them; and besides, I figured that maybe the gays and lesbians, etc. would like their own state).  And when I got to the least populous states, I just got creative and assigned them a fun demographic group to try out, or a major world religion that I thought might be nice to have represented  in America.  Oh, and I assigned the same religion twice near the middle of the list, and didn't notice this until I was done, so I gave that state their choice of a couple of interesting faiths.  Let me know if you think this is going to be a problem. Anyway, look it over, decide if you can live with your official state religion (keeping in mind it might involve hot dishes, bingo, and/or virgin sacrifices), and if not, start calling real estate agents in a state with a religion or other demographic grouping that you find more interesting.  And if you have a better idea, then let me or David know. Official State Religions 1.  California:                    Christian   2.  Texas:                          Protestant             3.  New York:                   "Born again" or "evangelical"  4,  Florida:                        Catholic  5.  Illinois:                         Baptist 6. Pennsylvania:               Non-religious 7. Ohio:                             Evangelical (theologically) 8. Michigan:                      Methodist 9. New Jersey:                 Southern Baptist 10.Georgia:                      Lutheran 11. North Carolina:         United Methodist Church 12. Virginia:                    Presbyterian 13. Massachusetts:        Pentecostal 14. Indiana:                    Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) 15. Washington:             Evangelical Lutheran Church in America 16. Tennessee:              gay/lesbian 17. Missouri:                  Episcopalian 18. Wisconsin:               Judaism 19. Maryland:                 Eastern Orthodox 20. Arizona                    Satanism (or Juche--they can have their pick) 21. Minnesota:                 Buddhist 22. Louisiana:                  Non-denominational 23. Alabama:                   French speakers 24. Colorado:                  Megachurch attendance 25. Kentucky:                  Jehovah's Witnesses 26. South Carolina           United Church of Christ 27. Oklahoma:                 Mennonite Church USA 28 Oregon:                      agnostic 29. Connecticut               Churches of Christ 30. Iowa:                         Hindu 31. Mississippi:               atheists 32. Kansas:                    Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) 33. Arkansas:                 Unitarian Universalist 34. Utah:                        Seventh-day Adventists 35. Nevada:                    Neo-pagan (incl. Wiccans) 36. New Mexico              Church of the Nazarene 37. West Virginia            Reformed Church in America (RCA) 38. Nebraska:                Libertarian party members 39. Idaho:                      Baha'i 40. Maine:                      Native American Religionist 41. New Hampshire:       Sikhism 42. Hawaii:                     Deism 43. Rhode Island:           Weight Watchers 44. Montana:                  Dittoheads 45. Delaware:                 Jedi 46. South Dakota:           Zoroastrianism 47. North Dakota:           Zombies 48. Alaska:                      Ingayats 49. Vermont:                   Ba'al 50. District of Columbia:  primal-indigenous 51. Wyoming:                  Rastafarianism Again, let me know if you want a different religion for your state, or have another plan for assigning State Religions.  Because the thing is: the Constitution says we either have to do this, or we have to read David's book. 2:32:49 AM

STUPIDITY, EH?        Like I said yesterday, David Limbaugh is driving me crazy with his carefully manipulated accounts of well-known (in Christian evangelical circles) anecdotes about Christians are being persecuted in this country.  These stories are from his book Persecution.  Actually, if they would just stay in the book, I wouldn't mind them -- those Christians who want to believe that they are martyrs can read David's book and feel good about being hated and reviled, and the rest of Christianity (and everybody else) could just go about their business.  But David and his far-right columnist cohorts are using as the old, dredged-up stories as the foundations of numerous articles this week, all of them lauding David for his "courageous" stand in defending this weak and defenseless minority, and praising his book for its "searing indictment of anti-Christian intolerance"-- while dumping on the rest of America for being so secular, anti-Christian, and "elitist" that they don't CARE that little Kayla is no longer allowed to compel her classmates to hold  hands and pray with her in their kindergarten class.  (Disclaimer here: I am a faithful Christian, but of a denomination that feels that holding hands to pray is a weird, heathen practice, and we're glad, GLAD that little Kayla isn't allowed to inflict her religious practices on our kids.) The latest (as far as I know--these things are popping out everywhere) columist singing the prases of David and using his tired anecdotes to prove that Christians are being repressed in America is TownHall columnist Michelle Malkin.  She starts her piece Christian Soldier, Muslim Soldier thusly: There's something terribly wrong when an American soldier overseas can't receive Scriptures in the mail, but a Muslim chaplain can preach freely among al Qaeda and Taliban enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay. Yeah, what's wrong is STUPIDITY, in that you didn't do any fact checking and your whole premise is flawed from the get-go.  But let's give you a bit more rope before we hang you with it: This is a story of two soldiers, one Christian, one Muslim. It's a cautionary tale that suggests how religious double standards and politically driven hypersensitivity threaten not only our troops, but us all. Six months ago, Jack Moody tried to send his son, Daniel, a care package containing a Bible study and other Christian religious materials.  Daniel is a 21-year-old Army National Guardsman serving in the Middle East. He had written home requesting spiritual support while he risked his life abroad. The literature his dad packed included Christian comic books.  But when Daniel's dad approached the post office in the family's hometown of Lenoir, North Carolina, he was told he would not be allowed to send the items. [snip] "My son is in the military, and he's overseas fighting to free this country from tyranny, and to protect our rights and our freedoms, and here our government has a rule on the books that's limited his freedom. I just couldn't believe it," Moody told the Voice of America news service. Even more unbelievable was the apathetic reaction of Moody's elected representatives. According to John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute, a staunch defender of religious liberty, Sen. Elizabeth Dole's staff brushed Moody off. So did Dan Gurley, GOP Congressman Cass Ballenger's chief of staff. According to Moody, Ballenger refused to get involved, insisting that the matter should be left to the courts. And there's where Moody's case -- which is included in the devastating new book "Persecution," best-selling author David Limbaugh's searing indictment of anti-Christian intolerance -- remains today. Um, yeah.  And don't we feel outraged!  But if you'd only spent 5-minutes checking on this instead of relying on David's book, you would have found (along numerous other facts that rain on Moody's Persecution Parade) this article from Concerned Women for America (Concerned Women Not That Concerned About This), a conservative Christian group whose credentials and bona fides will surely be considered above reproach by David (if he ever bothers to do any checking either): It's a matter of Customs.  But the religious freedom attorneys may have fired at the wrong target. The postal restrictions are from the U.S. Customs Service and stem from the host country's customs regulations. “The customs prohibition was put in place by the host country to keep bulk quantities of material of that nature out of the country,” U.S. Customs spokesman Mark Saunders told WNCT-TV. “Each country has [its] own restrictions, because of the level of security risk involved.”  “Why did the parents make an issue of it in the first place?” Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, asked The Culture & Family Report. “I am not aware that the Postal Service opens packages addressed to individual service members.” On a family support site for the Army’s 3rd Infantry. . .a note dated April 11 addressed the issues of Bibles directly.  Q: Does this [regulation] mean I can’t mail a Bible? A: No. The intent of this customs prohibition was the host country's concern about distributing these materials to its citizens.  Mailing a Bible or other individual religious item as long as it is solely for the personal use of the service member should not be an issue. The controversy has led the Postal Service to clarify its restriction. "If you're mailing to an individual soldier, it should not be an issue," Mark Saunders, a Postal Service spokesman in Washington, told CNS News. The updated guidance for mailings now reads: "Although religious materials contrary to the Islamic faith are prohibited in bulk quantities, items for the personal use of the addressee are permissible," Saunders noted. [snip] “If the actions of the Post Office are based on the needs of the military, I doubt that the court will agree with the plaintiffs." Donnelly noted that many restrictions placed on troops stationed in predominantly Islamic countries were for the benefit of the military as a whole, such as the military's need to maintain troop strength in nations with religious concerns over the presence of non-Islamic personnel and practices.   So, Moody could have mailed his stuff.  He still can.  Michelle could even send those scriptures she was so worried about in her opening paragraph (here's a link to the U.S. Postal Service's info, if you don't trust the Concerned Women (Operaton Iraqi Freedom Mailing Tips). And if Moody wants to send his son 1000 of those religious comic books, and TELLS the clerk that's what he plans to do, and the postal clerk tells him that regulations prohibit it, then he (and the Rutherford Foundation, which has apparently decided its mission is to put Christianity into practice by picking on Islam) shouldn't sue the postal service or the U.S. government, but instead the Muslim nations who don't want bulk quanities of religious items (that might be used to proselytize their people) being mailed into their countries.  Yeah, sue the Iraqis--that'll teach the bastards not to be Christian! But now we get to Michelle's Muslim soldier, included in this piece so Michelle can point out that IT'S JUST NOT FAIR!  Christianity doesn't get to mail comic books to soldiers in Iraq, while Islam gets away with having spies (and gets to stay up later and not do the dishes or ANYTHING!): [Muslim Chaplain] Yee brought the detainees prayer beads and religious books, facilitated prayer services, and assisted them with Muslim food preparation. And he received lavish, fawning profiles in the "diversity-" and "tolerance-" obsessed mainstream press. Now, he has been charged with sedition, aiding the enemy, spying, espionage and failure to obey a general order. Treason charges may be added. Islamist Fifth Columnists are benefiting from the very guarantees of religious freedom being denied to devout Christian soldiers such as Daniel Moody who are risking their lives for the War on Terror overseas. It all goes to show: diversity and tolerance are EVIL!  I blame political correctness for this whole Gitmo spy mess.  No, wait, Mona Cheren already did.  Then I blame the U.S. postal service!  Bottom line: David's book is Christianity's Greatest Urban Legends of Persecution.  Anybody on the right with an iota of integrity should check out his stories before they use them in their own articles.  And Michelle, if you seriously believe that the Muslims have it so good in this country, what with being allowed to mail THEIR religious materials to the Middle East, and getting to have their own chaplains while THEY are being held in prisons in Cuba, then maybe you ought to convert for a day--you know, wear a head scarf in Georgia, see how you get preferential treatment, sing Ramadan carols in the public schools, etc.  Seriously, try it out and see if it's really as grand as you imagine.  But if you are just mad because you don't get to expose the people working for our nation against the forces of terrorism, and don't get to betray classified information to our foes, then just find work at the White House: I hear they're looking for a few more moral, upstanding people to join their crew.