From Holden: U.S. Marines are killing themselves at an unprecedented rate. The suicide rate for U.S. Marines rose a dramatic 29 percent in the past year, most likely because military operations are coming at too fast a pace, says the Corps’ top dog. Gen. Michael W. Hagee, the Marine Corps commandant, told The Washington Post 31 Marines, all enlisted men, killed themselves in 2004, the highest percentage of suicides in 10 years. Of those who committed suicide, most were under 25 and took their lives by shooting themselves. Eighty-three other Marines attempted suicide, said the Post. In 2003 there were … Continue reading Uncounted Casualties

From Holden: Chimpy’s latest job approval rating from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press document his continuing slide in the court of public opinion. Approve – 46% Disapprove – 47% Continue reading Your Increasingly Unpopular President

From Holden: “Today, same-sex couples are marrying under the law in Massachusetts. Some are actually having children born to them. It’s not right on paper. It’s not right in fact. Every child has the right to have a mother and a father.” Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who is considering a presidential run in 2008, in a speech to South Carolina Republicans (Boston Herald, Feb. 22) Link. Continue reading Massachusetts’ Best and Brightest

From Holden: Geeze, how could I miss yesterday’s new jobless numbers? In the week ending Feb. 19, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 312,000, an increase of 9,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 303,000. The 4-week moving average was 308,750, a decrease of 3,250 from the previous week’s revised average of 312,000. Continue reading Overlooking My Bush Boom

A. Continue reading Friday Ferretblogging

Stolen wholesale from the letters section of Romenesko: 2/24/2005 4:08:38 PM From JEROME WEEKS, Dallas Morning News: Given the recent back-and-forth in these letters about insider access and political manipulation — including William E. Jackson, Jr’s posting about the Judith Miller/Ahmad Chalabi resurrection — interested reporters should pick up the March 10 issue of The New York Review of Books — for the letters page (not available online). Mark Danner, journalism prof at Bard and Berkeley,writes about ‘How Bush Really Won’ and notes what happened with the coverage of Bush’s first campaign ads, which stirred up a furor over the … Continue reading ‘They’re Laughing At Us’

You lucky rubber duck, you happen to be our 500,000th visitor! A. Continue reading Psst! You! You there! Yeah, you!

From Holden: Continue reading Plant It Right There, Big Guy

From Holden: That’s your president. Today he held a joint press conference with Vladimir Putin. First, can somebody please explain to me what this means? Is this a Gannon reference? Our mil-to-mil exchanges are very positive, and I appreciate that. You and I talked about that a couple years ago. I think they’re coming to fruition, which is a very important to make sure we understand each other better. We agreed upon new efforts to fight the war on terror, to combat MANPADS and improvised explosive devices. Now, on to the question and answer period. Good question/rock-stupid answer, Part I: … Continue reading An International Embarrassment

From Holden: Goddammit, doesn’t this woman have work to do? Seriously, what the hell are we paying this bimbo for anyway? Does Laura suspect nothing? Continue reading Where’s Waldo?

From Holden: State legislators pan one of Chimpy’s favorite “achievements”. Concluding a yearlong study on the effectiveness of President Bush’s sweeping education law, No Child Left Behind, a bipartisan panel of lawmakers drawn from many states yesterday pronounced it a flawed, convoluted and unconstitutional education reform initiative that had usurped state and local control of public schools. [snip] The National Conference, which has criticized the federal law in the past, represents the nation’s 50 state legislatures, with a membership that includes 3,657 Republicans and 3,656 Democrats, as well as a few dozen elected from smaller parties, as independents or without … Continue reading Leaving NCLB Behind

From Holden: Note to all you bankers and convenience store owners: take down your video surveilace cameras. Videotape of a crime as it is being committed is no longer considered to be evidence. A US marine, captured on film killing a wounded Iraqi at point blank range during November’s assault on Fallujah, will not be formally charged because of a lack of evidence, CBS News reported yesterday. The November 13 shooting occurred during a search of a mosque in a widely broadcast incident that sparked worldwide outrage. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it showed “utter contempt for … Continue reading A New Motto for the U.S. Marines: “Utter Contempt for Humanity”

From Holden: Note to all you bankers and convenience store owners: take down your video surveilace cameras. Videotape of a crime as it is being committed is no longer considered to be evidence. A US marine, captured on film killing a wounded Iraqi at point blank range during November’s assault on Fallujah, will not be formally charged because of a lack of evidence, CBS News reported yesterday. The November 13 shooting occurred during a search of a mosque in a widely broadcast incident that sparked worldwide outrage. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it showed “utter contempt for … Continue reading A New Motto for the U.S. Marines: ”Utter Contempt for Humanity”

From Holden: One of my lovely U.S. senators, the embarrassingly homophobic John Cornyn, held a forum in Sherman, Texas, yesterday to promote Chimpy’s plan to demolish Social Security. Surprisingly, Senator Turtlelove praised progressive income taxes while explaining his support for an increase in the payroll tax cap. But what caught my eye was this question from a local college student that for convenience sake we’ll call “Jeff”. One of the college students present said to the senator, “What is interesting to me is that there are several prominent Democrats, such as President Clinton and the current Senate minority leader, Harry … Continue reading Gannonosity

Today’s Action Comes from the NRDC.� Visit their webpage at http://www.nrdc.org and click on: “Stop Global Mercury Pollution� The U.S. should lead the way,” to send an email to the State Department asking them to adopt meaningful goals for reducing mercury pollution.� Or, copy and send the sample letter below. ************************************************************* February 24, 2005 Claudia A. McMurray Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Environment U.S. Department of State 2201 C Street NW Washington, DC 20520 The Bush administration has frequently pointed to the fact that much of our mercury pollution in the United States comes from abroad. The upcoming United Nations … Continue reading Action Alert – Thursday, February 24

From Holden: After peaking during the last year of the Clinton administration the participation rate falls to its lowest level since 1988. The share of the working-age population working or actively seeking a job — known as the participation rate — fell to 65.8 percent in January, the lowest reading in 17 years, according to numbers collected by the Labor Department. [snip] Mark Zandi, an economist at Economy.com, who has done some of his own research, found “participation rates have declined the most in parts of the country where manufacturing is important and has just been pummeled,” such as the … Continue reading Have You Seen My Bush Boom?

From Holden: Newsweek Howie recalls a Kodak moment from the boy they called Georgie. As a boy in Maine, he was the oldest of many cousins, and would set the rules for summer games at the family compound. “If he was losing he’d change the rules—or take the ball and leave,” one cousin told me. Howie then applies this tale to an episode from the Wead tapes. Were Forbes to win the GOP nomination by attacking him too hard, Bush told Wead, he could forget any support from the Bush family, including from his brother Jeb, the governor of Florida. … Continue reading This Comes as No Surprise

From Holden: For another round of that sweet presidential manlove. Don’t let the jaunty beret and fur coat fool ya’. Continue reading Joe Lieberman Flies to Bratislava

From Holden: Canada nixes participation in the invisible space shield. After declining to take part in the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Canada is just saying no again to its powerful southern neighbor, this time on the issue of taking part in a controversial anti-missile shield program. After weighing the highly unpopular idea for more than a year, Prime Minister Paul Martin was expected to announce the decision as soon as today, Canadian news reports said. Well aware that the move will cool U.S.-Canadian relations, which had started to warm somewhat after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Martin advised President Bush … Continue reading Canada to Bush: Suck It, Pretzel-Boy

Senator Durbin, you rock. A. Continue reading Happy Democrat Photo: You Don’t Know Dick Edition

From Holden: Tapped points us to The Gawker, who noticed something in last week’s NYTimes article on PBS president Pat Mitchell: She also said she had not been personally pressured to change programming by Republicans at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provides federal money to the system. But she said her programmers had worked with their counterparts at the corporation, which is led by White House appointees, in developing several new shows, including a talk show for the conservative commentator Tucker Carlson. Continue reading Bush’s Bow-Tied Bitch

From Holden: They’re out. Not Jeff Gannon out, or even Ken Mehlman out. Shit, just click the link. And congratulations to all the talented bloggers, whether or not you won an award. There’s so much talent on the left it’s a bit scary. Continue reading Koufax Award Winners

From Holden: Extracts of Philippe Sands new book, Lawless World,published in today’s Guardian, show that Britain’s attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, warned days prior to the Attack on Iraq that the invations could be ruled illegal. Yet, in violation of British law, his legal opinion was not shared with the cabinet who were instead told that the invasion was legitimate. Lord Goldsmith warned Tony Blair in a document on March 7 2003 that the use of force against Iraq could be illegal. It would be safer to have a second UN resolution explicitly sanctioning military action. “So concerned was the government … Continue reading The Illegal War

More scalp collecting, this time in (gasp! clutchpearls!) DC: Beginning in January 2004, Washington Post journalists David Nakamura, Carol D. Leonnig, D’Vera Cohn, Craig Timberg, Monte Reel, Sarah Cohen and Jo Becker began reporting and publishing more than 200 articles alerting local residents to dangerously high levels of lead in tap water. Their continuing investigation ultimately resulted in the firing of James Buford, director of the District of Columbia Department of Public Health, and revealed that water agencies across the country have manipulated or withheld test results that disclose high levels of lead content. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency along … Continue reading Scalp Collecting: Our Naition’s Capital Edition

From Holden: Why would Australian PM John Howard reneg on an election year pledge in order to assist an old enemy? Prime Minister John Howard refused to apologize Wednesday for breaking an election pledge by doubling Australia’s troop commitment to Iraq, arguing it was justified by the need to maintain an important regional alliance with Japan. Howard acknowledged he broke his two-year policy not to substantially increase Australian troop numbers in Iraq when he announced Tuesday that 450 additional soldiers will be sent to southern Iraq to protect Japanese military engineers who are repairing roads and schools there. He also … Continue reading The Subcontracts of the Coalition of the Billing

From Holden: To post images of this doll posed with this one (via Tbogg)? Continue reading Who Will Be the First?

From Holden: I’ve been predicting for the past couple of weeks that the White House press corps would ask no further questions about James D. “J.D.” “Jeff Gannon” Guckert until and unless the ball is moved significantly downfield (ie: direct monetary ties between “Gannon” and the White House, or serious allegations of a sexual relationship between and senior administration officials). The White House press corps is simply uninterested in shining a spotlight on “Gannon”, and thus themselves. The Nashua Advocate provides further support for this line of thinking by revelaing that the media had many of the facts of Gannongate … Continue reading Gannongate: A Press Failure

From Holden: Catching up with Riverbend. It’s not about a Sunni government or a Shia government- it’s about the possibility of an Iranian-modeled Iraq. Many Shia are also appalled with the results of the elections. There’s talk of Sunnis being marginalized by the elections but that isn’t the situation. It’s not just Sunnis- it’s moderate Shia and secular people in general who have been marginalized. The list is frightening- Da’awa, SCIRI, Chalabi, Hussein Shahristani and a whole collection of pro-Iran political figures and clerics. They are going to have a primary role in writing the new constitution. There’s talk of … Continue reading “There was hope of a secular Iraq, even after the occupation.”

From Holden: Catching up with Riverbend. It’s not about a Sunni government or a Shia government- it’s about the possibility of an Iranian-modeled Iraq. Many Shia are also appalled with the results of the elections. There’s talk of Sunnis being marginalized by the elections but that isn’t the situation. It’s not just Sunnis- it’s moderate Shia and secular people in general who have been marginalized. The list is frightening- Da’awa, SCIRI, Chalabi, Hussein Shahristani and a whole collection of pro-Iran political figures and clerics. They are going to have a primary role in writing the new constitution. There’s talk of … Continue reading ”There was hope of a secular Iraq, even after the occupation.”