As useful as a site of this kind can possibly be, Speaker Pelosi’s blog ‘The Gavel‘ (which I have linked to under ‘Politics’) utilizes YouTube a great deal by posting clips of CSPAN in a very short amount of time, and is organized brilliantly. I was viewing clips of the hearing on GSA oversight without realizing I was actually on a government site, and upon finding out that it was run by Pelosi, it dawned on me that a new day has truly arrived. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 1:41 PM MDT
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by Mark Benjamin - Salon.com - Soldiers on crutches and canes were sent to a main desert camp used for Iraq training. Military experts say the Army was pumping up manpower statistics to show a brigade was battle ready…Salon recently uncovered another troubling development in the Army’s efforts to shore up troop levels, reporting earlier this month that soldiers from the 3rd Brigade had serious health problems that the soldiers claimed were summarily downgraded by military doctors at Fort Benning in February, apparently so that the Army could send them to Iraq. Some of those soldiers were among the group sent to Fort Irwin to train in January.
As an aside - This exact same thing happened to me in 1998-99 when my unit was put on alert for deployment to Kosovo. We’d have been the first Army unit in, and naturally, officers were dazzled by visions of promotions and medals. Anyone can look it up if they’d like to, as the unit was 2/2 Infantry, 1st ID (Vilseck, Germany) and the battalion commander at the time was Lieutenant Colonel Burch. The order from him to the battalion doctor was to deny any request for treatment that could result in someone becoming non-deployable.
My four broken ribs sustained during a riot-control training exercise were just the kind of thing that fell into that category. And so, I was denied an x-ray for over a month, given Ibuprofen and told they were bruised. I’d have been exposed to Article-15 punishment if I sought medical attention outside of my unit (as I was told), and the only thing that worked for me was to head to sick call at a support unit one day when the battalion doctor wasn’t in. This was going on 4-5 weeks.
Three weeks into this, I decided it was worth the risk and got someone to drive me over to the base clinic in Graffenwohr on a Saturday. Horrible luck, as my battalion’s doctor was on duty and he got agitated immediately, told me I was disobeying a direct order, sent me on my way. The thing to keep in mind here is that not only was I denied an x-ray and treatment, but more importantly I wasn’t given a “profile”. A profile is a piece of paper from a doctor that means when you’re told to do something physically (lift a certain amount, do pushups, situps, running, etc), if it is not allowed based on the doctor’s signature on that profile, the Army can’t technically force you to do it.
I was without a profile during this time. And if anyone has been in the Army, they’d know that when your unit is put on alert, it’s a 6-7 day a week hustle, with a lot of time spent up at the motor pool performing manual labor. Eventually my platoon commander realized what was going on and stopped making me participate in PT each day. All that was temporary as I perceived it though, as the real fear was that we’d get the order and a couple days later I’d be fighting a war with broken ribs. It could have happened. Luckily it was decided that we wouldn’t launch a ground assault, but hold off for a number of months.
So for what it’s worth, this shit can and will happen in the Army as long as there are commanders like LTC Burch and officers above him whose own careers are paramount to the needs of anyone under their command. Unreported is how this dynamic, the career path of an officer, is so often put before everything and anything standing in its way. From my experience I can say for certain that the mental injuries suffered by soldiers in this position are far worse than the pain of a physical injury. You realize exactly what you are in moments like these, and believe me, it’s far less than the fireworks on 4th of July would have you think.
I always thought that Kurt Vonnegut Jr. put it best in Chapter 7 of Player Piano.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Al Swearengen, Military at 2:14 AM MDT
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Charles Nordhoff (1830-1901) wrote this essay for Harpers Magazine, and below the fold you will find the complete text, along with the source. Highlighted below is one paragraph that I especially liked, but the entire piece is a great read, now over 135 years later. Keep in mind though that I’m not advocating his position, but found his essay interesting on a number of levels.
The general conviction that, as Quetelet[2] puts it, “it is society which prepares the crime, the criminal being only the instrument which executes it,” has become so deep that society has in modern times conscientiously imposed upon governments the task of not merely confining but of trying to reform its crim ina ls. With Society organized as at present—that is to say, very rudely, imperfectly, and selfishly—we know that, given a certain density of population, and we shall find a certain definite and predictable number of thefts, of robberies, of burglaries, and murders. The diffusion of intelligence, the decrease of intemperance, and other circumstances affect this result, but they are themselves affected by density of population, and it remains true that the statistician can foretell with startling correctness how many thieves, burglars, robbers, and assassins there will be in any Christian community whose numbers per square mile he knows. Society being constituted as it now is, a certain proportion will be criminals, just as a certain other proportion will be dyspeptics, or will have weak eyes, and another proportion will be virtuous, self-denying, conscientious, and irritable. The burglar is as much the natural and legitimate product of society as Jim Fisk[3] was the inevitable result of the indecent scramble for wealth, and the semi-barbarous love of ostentatious living which distinguishes New York.
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Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 12:48 AM MDT
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‘How Specialist Town Lost His Benefits‘ - by Joshua Kors - Sample:
They say the military is purposely misdiagnosing soldiers like Town and that it’s doing so for one reason: to cheat them out of a lifetime of disability and medical benefits, thereby saving billions in expenses.
‘Rumsfeld‘ - Chapter 1 - by Andrew Cockburn (h/t Andrew Sullivan) - Here you have an account of what Rumsfeld was doing on 9/11, as the planes were hitting.
‘When Will Fredo Get Whacked‘ - by Frank Rich - Sample:
“I’m not going to resign,” Mr. Gonzales asserted last week as he played the minority card, rounding up Hispanic supporters to cheer his protestations of innocence. “I’m going to stay focused on protecting our kids.” Actually, he’s going to stay focused on protecting the president. Once he can no longer be useful in that role, it’s a sure thing that like Scooter before him, Fredo will be tossed overboard.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 12:10 AM MDT
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The story about Georgia designating April for ‘Confederacy History and Heritage Month’ must have really got under my skin, because I’ve been jousting over at Control Congress exclusively these past few days, with a number of posts and comments that have surely led to signs of life underground in various southern spots, like wherever they buried the bones of Strom Thurman…that said, in the past few years I’ve embraced the fact that online in a political debate, I’m probably the most tenacious prick you’ll ever run into, and it works like a charm since my family has lived in this house for well over a year now and the neighbors never have to deal with that side of me. It’s my own private CSPAN I suppose, and unlike most other venues I’ve stirred up some shit at in the past, it’s been months now and I haven’t been banned. I point this out only because this past week may have inched me closer to just that, but we’ll see.
Those unfamiliar with Control Congress, let me say up front that for me it is a venue that boasts a variety of personalities and beliefs, and therefore constitutes a sort of comfort zone that i s hard to find elsewhere in the political cyber-arena. Too often with most political blogs it’s one way or the other with nothing in between (great for reading, but not writing/debating from), and while the radio show that accompanies the blog is performed by a couple of Republicans, since anyone can post whatever they want, their influence is often tiny. In fact, the top dog over there (John Konop) generally pulls a story out of the newscycle, applies a stupid subject to it and asks a leading question before posting the article’s contents in blockquote below. When the right-wing jitters are fierce and he doesn’t have the stomach for reality, he’ll simply restate old opinions, accuse readers of not caring enough about something as he does…when the war becomes a topic, he cuts and pastes something he wrote six months ago or more, and in general will avoid the meat and potatos, choosing instead to focus on the silverware.
I get on his case sometimes like an attack dog in Guantanamo, but never has it been as fun or good writing practice as these past couple of days. And with that in mind, I’ll link to a couple threads from over there where he basically toes the party line 
and characterizes the House war supplemental passed on Friday as a pork-fest, but unlike the folks at FoxNews, he won’t touch anything pertaining to the actual war with a ten foot pole besides pasting that thing he wrote a while back that every reader on the site has seen 100 times already. Some of these are g reat, but to save space I’ll post the links and if anyone is interested in learning about how to debate a right-winger, here’s a crash course:
School prevents me from doing much more than this, but hopefully someone will find their way over there, because it’s all good for the mind. Like a game of chess I suppose. No lights or cameras, but enough ideas to help anyone looking to bring the fight to some right-wingers elsewhere.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 10:48 PM MDT
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There was a hearing today on this - no video posted on CSPAN yet, but the House site has something up here. The number of auditors on staff to handle the highest wage bracket has been cut, with a news-worthy layoff last year that came and went without a critical word from the Republican-controlled Congress. From the NYTimes:
“We must have ten case apiece closed by 3-7-2007,” Mr. Kates wrote. “You must keep me informed and make me aware immediately if you will have any problems meeting this goal. The goal translates into two cases per week.”All of the agents interviewed said they believed that the controlling factor in determining whether their superiors qualified for cash bonuses and promotions was their success at closing cases. “How the managers get paid; that’s the real policy,” one auditor in Texas said. A Feb. 1 e-mail message from Kenneth L. Kates of the audit quality assurance operation orders nine subordinates to complete their reviews of audits without mentioning quality. One veteran agent of the largest corporate audits compared the I.R.S. to a crew that walks through an orchard instead of working from ladders. “You can grab all the low-hanging fruit in a few highly productive hours, while leaving most of the harvest untouched,” he said.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 11:27 PM MDT
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Hope I didn’t catch you dozing on me…the demands of life in general aren’t the kind of devil grease splatters one can simply pour water over or ignore, so the ‘blog’ takes a backseat to the slumber-sucking reality of this bullshit life of treadmill achievement on a day to day basis, with this feeling like a dolphin snapping up tiny fish from the hand of some lithium-head ordering up all these tricks, never enough for a smile, until I once again realize the one thing that’s been missing in my life lately is right down the street. Why not? As for school, I tend to keep attention easier after a couple swigs, and ever since I was an Army private it’s been routine to down 2-3 glasses of water before heading up to bed. The next morning I focus on the teeth, bowl, boys, diapers, breakfast AND THEN it comes time for the coffee and sip sip reminds me I’m in the midst of minds twice the speed of my own and at least ten times as powerful. Like my stupid hands typing on this keyboard, Max and Sam can bust up on Swearengen without words even. A paid listener would call that paranoia, but I’m not taking advice in March from anyone unless they’ve got something more powerfull than a .22 pointing at my head.
As for the boys, my game centers around this constant dialog, with questions and statements, most they’ve heard a thousand times already, but to me it means something deeper, because the simplicity of this head I’m using is so boring to these guys already that the most enjoyable game is to bust on the whole scene, crack on papa and not care if he knows it or not. I understand everything, and play right into their hands by letting them know, which can lead to a roll of the eyes or something like “yeaaaa…yeaaaa”, though Sam in particular has a certain talent for rubbing it in, a different way each day. Taking it all in stride, I embrace my geek days in school, head booted a few times and a Nike swoosh imprinted on my cheek for a couple days…in a way it’s my way of laughing at all those fools and at God and at the stupid country in general and at my bowl of corn pops, because here is a situation where these sons of mine 
exist with cranky old Al in this fishbowl every day and when they realize I’m full of shit or are just sick of my voice, they let me know and it makes me laugh, with this warm feeling inside like an endless mug of hot cocoa.
They’ve got a sense of humor. I’m the butt of every joke, but because I encourage it, we’re all in this state of discovery. Momma comes home and the game continues, in a different way…when there’s someone else around I suddenly feel self-conscious, but once she’s laughing about it as well, there’s this calm that comes over me, like for the first time in my life there are people everywhere who understand me…and understand that part of my being who I am is the charity they’re enjoying, which constitutes a small portion of the laughter taking place in this house everyday, as for most of the years I’ve been on this earth, the number one thing I longed for most was the freedom to be stupid and appreciated for it. I think that Max and Sam can be stupid and funny without feeling bad or self-conscious, and that will help ‘yall to fare better when they take over the world.
I’m doing this for mankind, and enjoying myself through them enjoying myself.
F Jackie!
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 1:35 AM MDT
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Is John Rocker considering a run for office in Georgia? After being quoted years ago saying, “I’m not a very big fan of foreigners…how the hell did they get into this country(?)”, his baseball career took a bad turn. Clearly he was too heavy a racist to play baseball for Ted Turner, but I have a feeling that he’d fit right in with the Georgia state legislature. A story that flew under the national radar this week featured Republican lawmakers from Georgia considering whether or not they should follow the lead of Virginia and Missouri in formally apologizing for their role in slavery. That Georgia decided against doing so isn’t surprising, but to add insult to injury they decided to hammer the point home by designating the month of April as Confederate History and Heritage Month.
Lest anyone think I pulled this scenario from The Onion or something, here is a link. In other words, “not only aren’t we apologizing, we think someone should apologize for taking our slaves away…anything short of that will have to get made up during April of every year when the white people of Georgia commemorate the good ‘ol days.” - - I bust John Konop’s chops occasionally on how the illegal immigration issue takes on an unmistakably racist tone on talk radio and within southern politics. He takes offense and generally turns it around to where I’m the villain for throwing around the ‘r’ word in mixed company. In light of recent developments, perhaps it’s time for Republicans from Georgia who resent being called racists when they bash immigrants to start making a stink about every April from now on being devoted to Confederate History and Heritage. Until I see that happening, the shoe fits as far as I’m concerned.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 2:44 AM MDT
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I’ve never been impressed by Reid, and him being the senate majority leader at this stage has been annoying me for some time now. Dick Durbin is a better fit for that role, but I’d still rather see someone like Chuck Schumer or Barbara Boxer in Reid’s position. Aside from his shady business deals from back home, he’s proven to be ineffective in getting things done on Iraq. Too much time has already been wasted trying to get this Iraq debate on CSPAN, and now that it finally is, I’m nervous about a lot of things like message discipline and whether or not the two houses are close enough to get something that can be even close to veto-proof. Obviously the house is going to be too far one way for the senate, but if that gap isn’t closed with a consistent message of why, one that makes sense to Democrats, I blame Reid for that.
Incoherence defines much of what the house has proposed regarding Iraq, having been properly panned by Jon Stewart, and it is the role of the senate majority leader to smooth this out. You’re talking about a house caucus numbering over 200, and unless the brains of half or more are shut down with fear, ala the GOP under Delay’s leadership, the final product on a bill dealing with something as complex as Iraq will be as confusing as what Nancy Pelosi laid out the other day. The senate on the other hand is not as much of a cluster, and with senators like Chuck Hagel, John Warner, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins saying the things they are saying so often now, it shouldn’t be this difficult for the majority leader to get something done.
If he is unable to get house leaders to back down on certain elements of their legislation, then he’s the wrong person for the job. If he is unable to figure out a way to leverage the most anti-war and election-conscious (Norm Coleman) Republicans to his advantage by now, then he’s the wrong person for the job. The right politician in this situation would be able to get something done. The once-in-a-generation politician in this situation would be able to pass a bill with enough votes to override a veto.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 2:20 PM MDT
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I’d never heard of this woman until today. I think someone should check into this. Perhaps someone like Henry Waxman or Patrick Leahy even. The short version is that this woman speaks several languages, and was working for the FBI before and after 9/11 as a translator. She came across information regarding Turkish businesses and their connections with Dennis Hassert, Richard Pearle and Doug Feith. She went up the chain with what she had, but it was GOP-town back then, so naturally they accused her of something, ransacked her home, made her take a polygraph, and when there wasn’t anything to prove she was doing anything wrong, they fired her. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. I haven’t gotten through even half of what I want to read on this topic, and I’m already hooked. Have at it - her website - an interview she gave, and one piece by someone named Chris Floyd on a site called Empire Burlesque.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 10:56 PM MDT
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The amount of time it takes to read up on everything that’s going on is prohibitive when it comes to relating what I think about all of it here. First is the task of taking it all in and having some time to toss it around upstairs before turning a john the baptist with the keyboard, and what stands out most I’ve found, is the stark difference between obscurity and saturation, mostly in regards to the enormous amount of facts and quotes provided to bulk up each case making headlines. Now that Democrats can decide what the conversation on CSPAN is going to be each week, the open wounds that had been festering for years already, now suddenly become worth everybody’s attention. Whether it’s the Ahab strategy in Iraq, troops under equipped and denied benefits as a business model, lack of law-abiding officials in the federal government in general, let alone the fact that a senator will lean on a US attorney right before an election to ‘get busy embarrassing Democrats before it’s too late’ or to chant ‘free the duke-ster, free the duke-ster’, a foreign person will be arbitrarily chosen by the fates to be deemed suspicious (unlucky) enough for detention in one of Americas -3 star accommodations worldwide, where the ‘death to America’ people are designed, manufactured, tortured, boxed and shipped.
Scandals are piling up, and the connection within all of them is turdblossom. His chubby fingerprints are all over the justice department mess, and he was in on the effort to out Wilson’s wife. This government has seen more talent run out the door these past few years than we can even imagine. The sanctity of oaths taken to oneself, God, the job that requires it - all go undervalued in this Republican universe, as above such piddly nonsense is always the #1 deity here on earth, the Party! Lawyers, doctors, scientists, soldiers - all of what makes these people relevant and a testament to our country’s greatness, happens outside of the blue and red arena. These people keep us legitimate even when we look like clowns on the world stage, but when they’re under pressure to ignore their oath and call it all the boss’s way, all they really become are bodies bearing college degrees, aspirations and zero capacity for shame. They’ve circumvented reality to the point where telling the truth is somehow unpatriotic.
And for the record…Newt Gingrich admitting that he was having an affair while at the same time busting on Clinton for the same thing, is a bit of everything if you ever need help describing the Republican mindset at this point in our history. He wasn’t wrong back then because of a technical explanation that has to be 100% separate from the logic used today in the case of arguing for why Scooter Libby deserves a pardon. They both deal with the same crimes and questions of character, but forget about all that. Gingrich is the quintessential Republican of this era simply because he knows full well that he’s dirty and needs to repent, but he’s going to act ‘as if’ and count on the ‘gimme - gimme - gimme’ nature of his party’s base, conform to specific pockets of delusion, and insist that up is down to a high enough degree that it manages to work as well as it did in the 90s. He won’t change, just like the Dobson evangelicals won’t change, and the fantasy Republican voter’s stomach for hypocrisy won’t change.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 7:15 PM MDT
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From the same issue of the Washington Post, you’ll find that our President is on top of his game. It feels like 2005 all over again:
Progress in the ‘war on terror’ can be explained in many different ways, but for me it would have mostly to do with the actual number of times some scriptured-up scumbag walks into the market and detonates.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 2:32 PM MDT
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Hey - we were embarrased about all the foreign people our government arbitrarily detains and kicks around, but to think that even powerful Americans can get wraped up over nothing by that same government…in fact, was there even a trial? I don’t think there was. Really, the terrorists have a better justice system provided to them in terms of absolute fairness than Scooter Libby unfortunately had here.
Obstruction of Justice, Perjury, both seemingly ridiculous concepts at first glance, as they could easily be mistaken for a Grisham novel and diet pills, it is absolutely shocking that in this day and age in the US we’re still burdened as a society with over stuffed prisons, yet still attached to such crybaby laws as these. So here is one instance where I agree with Sean Hannity, and have to give him a pat on the back for being brave enough to stand up and say it, that both Perjury and Obstruction of Justice need to be removed from the criminal statutes in every state immediately.
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 10:03 PM MST
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What fun is being able to say you’re in charge of something important if you can’t obstruct a little justice now and then?
Posted by Al Swearengen as Words at 3:20 AM MST
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I encourage everyone to read this entire piece by John Conroy in the Chicago Reader. Here is an Army interrogator telling us about everything. It is the first full account from an actual soldier that I have come across that hasn’t been edited into clips or published in quotes attributed to anonymous sources. Here are some samples:
We were getting prisoners from the navy SEALs who were using a lot of the same techniques we were using, except they were a little more harsh. They would actually have the detainee stripped nude, laying on the floor, pouring ice water over his body. They were taking his temperature with a rectal thermometer. We had one guy who had been burned by the navy SEALs. He looked like he had a lighter held up to his legs. One guy’s feet were like huge and black and blue, his toes were obviously all broken, he couldn’t walk.
It was bad, in particular the First Recon—they’re sort of like marine special forces, an elite unit [attached to the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, known as 24th MEU]. Every time they went on a raid it didn’t matter who they were bringing back, they would just fuck these guys up. Old men, 15-year-old kids, they all came with bruises and broken bones. One guy came with a blister on the back of his leg. It was big, it was horrible, a burn blister. They’d made him sit on the exhaust pipe of a running truck.
(HT - Andrew Sullivan)
Posted by Al Swearengen as Military at 2:11 PM MST
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