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06-20-09 again

• Seeing the Matrix Clearly - Bush III Is Running the Oval Office:
• McClatchy Newspapers: In stark legal turnaround, Obama now resembles Bush (mcclatchydc) "President Barack Obama is morphing into George W. Bush, as administration attorneys repeatedly adopt the executive-authority and national-security rationales that their Republican predecessors preferred."
• Bill Maher Follows Up Last Week's Obama Slam: 'Democrats are the New Republicans' (bradblog with video)
• So Far to Go As a Species And So Little Time - Perhaps Human Extinction By Global Broiling Will Be a Blessing for This Abused Planet:
• No Matter Who Is President of Iran, They Would Stone Me (commondreams)
• Steal That Election:
• With 'Friends' Like This: Another Guilty Plea in Clay County, KY, Election Fraud Conspiracy Case (bradblog) "Man charged with lying to officials about sending threatening photo showing gun to head of witnesses 'friended' on MySpace..."
• Obama's Betrayal of Gays - The Fallout Continues:
• Anderson Cooper, Richard Socarides & Dustin Lance Black On Obama's Same-Sex Cop-Out (americablog)
• Bankrupt MSM:
• Life After Guantanamo: Why the Media's Happy-Ending Narrative Is Totally Bankrupt (alternet)
• What MSM Won't Show Us: New Film Chronicles Civilian Slaughter in Afghanistan (alternet) "See how these attacks have been devastating to U.S. credibility."
• Wingnutology Watch:
• 9 Conservative Myths About Right-Wing Domestic Terrorism (alternet) "This is terrorism we're dealing with. We can't afford to let ourselves be distracted by spin. It's time to set the record straight with the facts."
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• Galaxy Group HCG 87 (apod)
  

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06-19-09

• White Privilege In a Predominantly Non-White World:
• Keynote: Tim Wise - On White Privilege (freespeech)
• Obama's DoJ As Repressive And Ugly As Bush's:
• Supreme Court denies due process to prisoners, Obama sides with Bush & court's conservative majority (americablog - nytimes) "We are also puzzled and disturbed by the Obama administration’s decision to side with Alaska in this case — continuing the Bush administration’s opposition to recognizing a right to access physical evidence for post-conviction DNA testing. Thursday’s ruling will inevitably allow some innocent people to languish in prison without having the chance to definitively prove their innocence and with the state never being completely certain of their guilt."
• Obama's DOJ: We Can't Release Cheney Records Because Of Late Night Comedy (huffingtonpost) -- These guys must have been taking stupidity lessons from Sarah Palin to come up with such ludicrous crap. They out to be fired outright. First year law students could do better.
• Obama's Betrayal of Gays - The Fallout Continues:
• Obama admin refused to work with gay lawyers to solve supposed DOMA health benefits problem (theplumline - americablog)
• Obama admin rebuffed gay legal groups on DOMA, Part II (americablog) -- DoJ claims the Plum Line story is wrong. The only problem with that is: the story's not wrong.
• Justice Dept. will meet next week with gay rights groups on DOMA (thinkprogress)
• A meeting, a conference call - finally, but ". . . if you want the attention of the Obama White House, you have to play hard ball. For the LGBT community, among other things, that means shutting down the Gay ATM." (americablog)
• Obama's Gay Rights Clusterfuck, Ctd (andrewsullivan) -- Is Obama's LGBT goal to drive gays away?
• Angry Gay Democrats Pull Support For DNC (cbsnews) -- More Gay Donors Drop Out of DNC Fundraiser, Protesting Justice Department Brief (abcnews)
• More Fallout Over the Obama Admin's Pro-DOMA Brief (newsweek)
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• Star Forming Region LH 95 (apod)
  

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06-18-09

• Barack Obama, brilliant as he is said to be, is just too inexperienced for the job he now wakes up to each morning - maybe he would be ready in another 10 years or so, but not at this callow point in his life. What we voted into office is a master orator who hasn't yet been forced to develop the moral courage of his own self-proclaimed convictions--more and more seen merely as a dishonest and cynical rhetorical device only for winning votes. Many of us who voted for him did so, not because we trusted his claims, but to end the monstrous death grip the Republicans had on this country, continually tightening their coils and squeezing the breath out of democracy. We are not surprised that what we elected is a good teleprompter reader who happens to have a brilliant speech writer. But we still expect President Obama to keep his promises. What we see instead are backpedaling, betrayal, broken promises, lies and the spectacle of Obama actually out-Bushing George W. Bush himself. If it weren't so tragic for the U.S. and the world, it could make for good comedy.
• Continued Gay Outrage Over Obama's Insults, Lies And Almost Non-Existent Support:
• Gays furious at Obama, DOJ (bayareareporter)
• Andrew Sullivan declares war on the DNC (americablog with video Aravosis interview - andrewsullivan)
• Of Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin, and old wineskin (americablog)
• Outcry on Federal Same-Sex Benefits (nytimes)
• Gay tsunami slams Obama (wockner)
• CBS News reports on Obama's temporary crumbs tossed to gays (cbs)
• S.O.S. (indegayforum) -- Obama's grandiose generosity benefits the 3% that are homosexual of the 2% of Americans who are federal employees and excludes the benefit that makes the biggest difference in peoples lives--health insurance.
• Obama's mini-me benefits memo a very small step in the right direction (nytimes)
• The least he could do (volokh)
• Bushies Still in Power to Sabotage Progressive Effort:
• Bush political appointees serving in Obama administration appoint GOP cronies to senior civil service jobs (onlinejournal) ". . . in the politicization of HHS, it appears as if Obama was aiding and abetting in the establishment of a cadre of GOP civil servants at HHS who will ensure that the president’s much-touted universal health care proposal is 'dead on arrival.'"
• Military-Industrial Profiteers:
• Former Cheney Assassination Team Leader Now Obama's Top Man in Afghanistan - Will Not Kill Less Afghan Civilians, But Will Blame Those Deaths on Taliban Instead - OR - Why Change Your Tactics When You Can Merely Change Your Propaganda? (ips)
• Scahill: How About a New FB/Twitter App for Victims of US War Crimes? (rebelreports)
• Steal That Vote - GOP Continually Screams About ACORN, That Did Nothing Wrong, While Their Own Are Guilty As Sin - Typical Behavior:
• Head of California GOP Voter Registration Firm Pleads Guilty to Voter Registration Fraud (bradblog) -- Complicit media fail to mention that he was "hired by the California Republican Party to head up their voter registration efforts in the state."
• Biden suddenly finds his voice about stolen elections now that it's Iran whose election has been stolen (onlinejournal) -- 2000 and 2004 Bushie election thefts - Biden silent.
• Watch the excellent video 'Free For All!' about the 2000 and 2004 stolen elections (video.google 1hr 36min) -- The Republican Party should be outlawed because of this alone.
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• NGC 6240: Merging Galaxies (apod)
  

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06-17-09

• The Greatest Theft of All Time:
• Obama’s Financial Overhaul — More Like a Tune-Up (firedoglake) "Obama’s plans didn’t even come close" to an overhaul.
• Angry, Courageous Iranians Protest Their George W. Bush Election:
• Cartoon of the Day (mattbors)
• Spineless Man of Little Substance, Just Pretty Rhetoric That Is Written For Him - Obama's Tokenism And Lies When Gays Threaten to Shut Off their DNC ATM:
• They're lying about DOMA too (americablog - americablog label "gay")
• Certain Gay "Leaders" Give Obama Cover in Latest Outrage (americablog)
• Gay Rep. Barney Frank now spouting WH talking points and says he's comfortable with the DOMA brief's language that compares gay relationships to incest and sex with underage children. (americablog) "Never ever underestimate the ability or willingness of a member of Congress of either party to screw his people for a better offer. HRC attends the White House ceremony, Barney Frank lauds a brief comparing us to pedophilia and incest."
• Obama, the War President - Democrats, the Party of War:
• Scahill: Shame: The 'Anti-War' Democrats Who Sold Out (alternet) "In a historic vote, only 30 of 256 Democrats stood against $100 billion for more war."
• Obama - Man of Many Shams - Gay Temporary Benefit Crumbs Memorandum Is a Mere Smokescreen To Try To Obscure His Blatant Bigotry, Cowardice And Broken Promises to Gays - It's So Much More Important To Keep His RW Homophobes Happy - Who Are the Next Group To Be Tossed Under His Bus of Political Expediency? - What Will You Do When It's Your Turn?
• Aravosis at Salon on President Shame on You (salon)
• Gibbs: President stands behind incest/pedophilia brief (americablog) "Yes, God forbid [that] our president [would] distance himself from a brief that argues that gay and lesbian marriages are akin to incest and pedophilia. I ask again, who is advising these people?"
• More on Obama's gay crumbs scam: Obama giving federal agencies a right they already have? (americablog) "The answer, "yes." So what's new about tonight? Obama is going to 'tell' the agencies to give the benefits - as if any agency in the Obama administration would dare tell a gay employee no to a request for time off to attend their partner's funeral?"
• White House admits Obama "benefits" speech simply political ploy, plan still being created after it was already announced (americablog)
• Obama admin's (lame) fed partner benefits plan designed to stop DNC fundraiser disaster (pamshouseblend)
• Obama Reaches For Low-Hanging Fruit (dansavage) "Don't fall for it."
• Some Federal Employees Are More Equal Than Others (dansavage) "This is worse than insulting. This is outrageous—a fresh outrage on top of the DOMA betrayal last week. Fuck the Obama administration. That DNC fundraiser next week has to be shut down."
• Democrats To Gay Americans: Fuck You. Now Write Us a Check (dansavage)
• Are You For Real, President Obama? (signorile)
• Obama won't issue executive order, won't include health benefits (americablog - americablog label "gay") -- Obama is tossing out a few meager crumbs, hoping angry gays will be taken in by it.
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• M13: A Great Globular Cluster of Stars (apod)
  

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06-16-09

• How Long Must We Wait for Justice?
• Cheney tied to cash theft and possible murder in Iraq (onlinejournal) -- Maybe 20 years from now, when Darth Vader and Bush are long gone.
• How Much Proof Do We Need That Our Great Black Hope Is a Blatant, Opportunistic Liar?
• Obama blocks list of visitors to White House (msnbc - crew - thinkprogress) -- Same as Bush, even though Obama promised transparency in his administration.
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• Moonrise Over Turkey (apod)
  

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06-15-09

• Anything to Sidestep an Effective Public Healthcare Option:
• Howard Dean: Insurance co-ops won’t solve problem (therawstory)
• Steal That Vote!
• Leaked election results show Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came in third (telegraph/uk) -- George W. Bush must be thinking all high-five's for Iran's theft of their election. He knows a little something about that sort of thing.
• United States: The World's Great White Hope And Example of What Democracy Means:
• Lendman: New UN Report Denounces America's Human Rights Record (sjlendman)
• The Greatest Theft of All Time:
• The Big Bank Bailout Payback Bamboozle (motherjones) -- They paid back $68.3 billion - really owe $229.7 - another public relations sham.
• Chris Hedges: The American Empire Is Bankrupt (truthdig) "Barack Obama, and the criminal class on Wall Street, aided by a corporate media that continues to peddle fatuous gossip and trash talk as news while we endure the greatest economic crisis in our history, may have fooled us, but the rest of the world knows we are bankrupt."
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• Streaming Dark Nebulas near B44 (apod)
  

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06-14-09

• Treason and High Crimes:
• CIA chief Panetta believes Cheney almost wants US attacked (reuters) -- Is Darth Vader longing for the adrenalin rush of his old 9/11 bunker, pushing all the buttons and pulling all the strings to ensure our complete lack of effective U.S. military defense against that coup d'etat?
• One Congress, Bought and Paid For:
• Senators who opposed tobacco bill received top dollar from industry (mcclatchydc) -- Three Republican leaders got the most payola, while a Dem came in for a trailing fourth place.
• Steal That Vote!
• Video of Americans in D.C. Violently Protesting the Stolen 2000 and 2004 U.S. Elections (youtube - washingtonmonthly) -- Oops, my mistake. Americans would never do that. This only happens in countries that care enough about their freedoms to fight for them. We don't suffer enough yet here to risk such angry protest against our government's criminality. Yawn, I think I'll go watch some more reality TV.
• MIC - Obama's War Profiteers Killing Afghan Civilians - They're Only 'Collateral Damage' in an 'Honorable Endeavor':
• Afghan villagers slain as they took cover (timesonline) -- But we made amends. Wow! We paid $2,000 for each death and $1,000 for each injury. How would those payments stand up in unlawful death and injury cases in the United States?
• No, Virginia, Man Is Not the Center of the Universe:
• Stars at the Galactic Center (apod) -- There are so many stars huddled at the galactic center, one would never experience the darkness of nighttime.