===He looks HAMMERED! I mean SMASHED!===

I watched this live and was shocked at what I herd, ThinkProgress picked up on it as well, and spells it out. (click the link to watch the video yourself)

His Lawyer must have shit himself.

From Think Progess

Criminally indicted former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay yesterday laid out a strong case

Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay

I person by the name of Hunter on DailyKOS wrote a very well written synopsis of the Republican Party, I will post it here

Well the Bush Administration has pulled out every trick in the book to stop the release of more Abu Ghraib torture pics, and tapes, but they have lost, and now the we are going to be able to see what was done in our name by this administration.

What next? Screw the judges?

From the AP via Yahoo

NEW YORK - Saying the United States “does not surrender to

blackmail,” a judge ruled Thursday that pictures of detainee abuse at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison must be released over government claims that they could damage America’s image.

U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein ordered the release of certain pictures in a 50-page decision that said terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan have proven they “do not need pretexts for their barbarism.”

The ACLU has sought the release of 87 photographs and four videotapes taken at the prison as part of an October 2003 lawsuit demanding information on the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody and the transfer of prisoners to countries known to use torture. The ACLU contends that prisoner abuse is systemic.

The judge said: “Our nation does not surrender to blackmail, and fear of blackmail is not a legally sufficient argument to prevent us from performing a statutory command. Indeed, the freedoms that we champion are as important to our success in Iraq and Afghanistan as the guns and missiles with which our troops are armed.”

Just a quick tech matter. I installed the latest vs of b2Evolution, so if you find an issue let me know please.

Note to SPAMMERS - All of the Public Stats are GONE, so pinging them will not raise your google rating. Also ALL comments have a nofollow so comment spam is usless.

For those that have no clue what I am talking about, real quick. Spammers use blogs to raise there search position in google. The more sites that link to yours the higher you are on the list, so they go to the way back of this blog, last Fed and so on, and post “Come and play online poker at http://I am a dumbass.tard. They do this because the google spider will follow the link, and add one to there record.

It sucks, and is an on going fight. I HATE SPAMMERS, ALMOST LOWER THAN THIS ADMINISTRATION.

The Washington Post has posted.

New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released from jail late yesterday and is scheduled to testify this morning before a federal grand jury investigating whether any government officials illegally leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame to the media, according to lawyers involved in the case.

Miller, 57, has been jailed for contempt of court since July 6 for refusing to testify about conversations with news sources. She was released from the Alexandria Detention Center shortly after 4 p.m. yesterday after her attorney, Robert S. Bennett, reached an agreement on her testimony with special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald, according to two lawyers familiar with the case.

Miller had refused to testify about information she received from confidential sources. But she said she changed her mind after I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, chief of staff for Vice President Cheney, assured her in a telephone call last week that a waiver he gave prosecutors authorizing them to question reporters about their conversations with him was not coerced.

This is going to get good.

According to the Washington Post, FEMA signed a NO-BID contract with Carnival Cruise lines to house some of the people left homeless in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The contract was for $236 Million in Taxpayer money for the month deal.

To critics, the price is exorbitant. If the ships were at capacity, with 7,116 evacuees, for six months, the price per evacuee would total $1,275 a week, according to calculations by aides to Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.). A seven-day western Caribbean cruise out of Galveston can be had for $599 a person — and that would include entertainment and the cost of actually making the ship move.

“When the federal government would actually save millions of dollars by forgoing the status quo and actually sending evacuees on a luxurious six-month cruise it is time to rethink how we are conducting oversight. A short-term temporary solution has turned into a long-term, grossly overpriced sweetheart deal for a cruise line,” said Coburn and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) in a joint statement yesterday calling for a chief financial officer to oversee Katrina spending.

To make sure that not a single dollar goes unspent, Also from the Washington Post

As fiscal hawks surrendered, would-be government contractors were meeting in the Hart Senate Office Building to figure out how to get a share of the money. A “Katrina Reconstruction Summit,” hosted by Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) and sponsored by Halliburton, among others, brought some 200 lobbyists, corporate representatives and government staffers to a room overlooking the Capitol for a five-hour conference that included time for a “networking break” and advice on “opportunities for private sector involvement.”

This graphic comes from the FEMA website, you can see it here, and it shows that FEMA was on the mark when it came to its handling of Hurricane Katrina.

As you can see, there is a disaster, then FEMA acts, they respond, recover and so on, after they do all of the things they do, as the graphic shows, it is a disaster.

So we should not really blame FEMA, they are supposed to be in the business of making disasters, it is right here in full color.

Bill Bennett, former Reagan administration Secretary of Education, and current right-wing shill said on his morning program,

This is based on 2 things I have read, one is a post from Timbuk3 at the DailyKOS, they other is the Oct 3 TIME that asks “How Many More Mike Browns Are Out There?”

From Time, (9 pages BTW, good read)

The Bush Administration didn’t invent cronyism; John F. Kennedy turned the Justice Department over to his brother, while Bill Clinton gave his most ambitious domestic policy initiative to his wife. Jimmy Carter made his old friend Bert Lance his budget director, only to see him hauled in front of the Senate to answer questions on his past banking practices in Georgia, and George H.W. Bush deposited so many friends at the Commerce Department that the agency was known internally as “Bush Gardens.” The difference is that this Bush Administration had a plan from day one for remaking the bureaucracy, and has done so with greater success.

As far back as the Florida recount, soon-to-be Vice President Dick Cheney was poring over organizational charts of the government with an eye toward stocking it with people sympathetic to the incoming Administration. Clay Johnson III, Bush’s former Yale roommate and the Administration’s chief architect of personnel, recalls preparing for the inner circle’s first trip from Austin, Texas, to Washington: “We were standing there getting ready to get on a plane, looking at each other like: Can you believe what we’re getting ready to do?”

The Office of Personnel Management’s Plum Book, published at the start of each presidential Administration, shows that there are more than 3,000 positions a President can fill without consideration for civil service rules. And Bush has gone further than most Presidents to put political stalwarts in some of the most important government jobs you’ve never heard of, and to give them genuine power over the bureaucracy. “These folks are really good at using the instruments of government to promote the President’s political agenda,” says Paul Light, a professor of public service at New York University and a well-known expert on the machinery of government. “And I think that takes you well into the gray zone where few Presidents have dared to go in the past. It’s the coordination and centralization that’s important here.”

And from Timbuk3 (much more “in your face”)

Sandra Day O’Connor’s resignation is not effective until her successor has been named and approved by the Senate. There is no urgency to fill her seat on the most important court in the (previously) United States of America.

Now that the House majority speaker (GOP) has been indicted, while we wait for the SEC investigation of the Senate majority leader (GOP), as we wait for Fitzgerald’s grand jury investigation of the treasonous outing of a CIA NOC by a GOP executive branch to wrap up, and as disapproval of the President himself (GOP) reaches into the 40% range (Rasmussen), it’s time to call a halt to the packing of the courts with ultra-right wing conservative activists.

We should not allow the GOP to continue to abuse their remaining, slim hold on power by installing corrupt judges who will see to it that the poor, women, and minorities will be punished for the sin of voting for Democrats. The President’s margin of victory was 117,000 votes in Ohio; votes that no one from either side can verify were counted fairly and correctly. This is not a mandate to overturn years of American tradition by turning our court system into an ideological machine.

The Democrats are often criticized for not taking a stand. Sometimes this accusation is just, and sometimes it isn’t, but there is no greater commitment that could be made at this time in our nation’s history than to take a stand against the self-serving GOP’s giveaway of our nation’s future to the freedom-hating “religious” ultra-right, the criminal corporations that move jobs and profits off-shore to avoid accountability, and the war-making machinery that steals from the middle class and gives to the few who profit from oil and death.

As the decay of our country continues the GOP places intolerant judges ever deeper into the core of the judiciary. Even lower court judges are ticking time bombs, waiting for the proper moment to unleash their deadly payloads of intolerance for the poor and underprivileged, obeisance to their corporate masters, and the defense of the new status quo of torture, pre-emptive war, and massive profits for the biggest supporters of the formerly reasonable Republican party.

Now is the time for the Democratic party to mobilize with ONE VOICE, the voice of their constituents, and ensure that this packing of the courts be suspended until the American people have again had a chance to speak.

No more judges (or controversial representatives) should be approved by the Senate until after the elections of 2006.

I read the following, and I have to agree, I think that all Bush Appointees should be halted until we can get a handle on the danger this administration has placed us in. How many more damn horse judges and defunked lawyers are there right now placed in a position that domestic and national security implication? We already have a failed businessman at the helm, do we need more?

What have we learned from the Bush

Frist

Rep. David Dreier (R-CA) is going to be the Speaker of the House, at least for now. Dreier is a self hating gay that was out

Well it did not take long, looks like the Republicans were just waiting for it. Haster has announced that David Dreier is the new House Majority Leader. Tom DeLay is not longer at the head.

Now, we just need to get Karl and the rest f the gang.

UPDATE: Soon after his name was said, the Republicans back tracked, I guess the Republicans only have room for one gay in leadership positions, Right Ken?

CNN has reported that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay indicted on one count of criminal conspiracy by Texas grand jury, according to Travis County clerk’s office.
As soon as the story is up, I will post some links.

From MSNBC

WASHINGTON - A Texas grand jury on Wednesday charged Rep. Tom DeLay and two political associates with conspiracy in a campaign finance scheme, an indictment that could force him to step down as House majority leader.

Earlier, lawyers for DeLay were at the criminal justice center in Austin on Wednesday, waiting to learn whether a grand jury

Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay

Unless you live in a political bubble, or you have recently awaken from the Bush trance, you know that Tom Delay is on borrowed time. His PAC in Texas has been Indited, Jack Abramoff, Tom