The Weekly Rewind

It's Friday... we all know what that means. Time for The Weekly Rewind.

Applaud: to people who are starting to pay attention to the man behind the curtain. Former Christian Coalition head, and tool, Ralph Reed suffered a humiliating defeat in his Georgia Lt. Governor’s campaign earlier this week. After leaving the coalition, Reed later worked as a lobbyist with “close associate” Jack Abramoff, a job that seemingly derailed his campaign before it even had a real chance to start. (This brings a smile to my face as Reed is one of the most manipulative and creepy people in the GOP today. He’s like a male version of Katherine Harris…)

Heckle: to Halliburton. Usually just on general principles alone, but this week it’s for earning a second-quarter profitof $591 million, a 51 percent increase over the same period last year. Nice to see them making a nifty amount off people’s suffering.

Applaud:to more people seemingly seeing the light for the first time. A bill thats aim was to allow the Bush Administration more freedom in its warrantless surveillance program (they need more freedom??) was met with indifferance and resistance in the Senate this week. (Hmmm, I wonder why? It would have allowed the administration to submit the NSA's warrantless surveillance program to a secret intelligence court for review of its legality and some senators had problems with that??? Gee, I have no idea why... As I've said before, it's hard to express sarcasm in the written form...

Heckle: to the entire Bush-appearance at the NAACP’s annual convention. First, it has to be seen for what it was; a (piss-poor) attempt to mend the rift that was created by him jilting the organization the last five years. Second, for Bush’s audacity at saying that his party has ignored African-Americans. His party? How about himself???? Third, for his White House trying to scam the American public by ‘failing’ to include in the official transcripts the short dialog between Bush and NAACP Chairman Julian Bond in response to some hecklers. The White House later repented and labeled the disruption as “applause.” Yes, that right… applause. . give me a friggin’ break…

Applaud: to telling it like it is. One of the top scientists at NASA, James Hansen, gave an explanation as to his reasoning for not attending a recent House committee hearing on global warming. His reasoning; “I would get out of my sickbed to testify to Congress on global warming, if they were ready to deal responsibly with the matter. But obviously they are still in denial, inviting contrarians to ‘balance’ the science of global warming.” (Very well said mr. Hansen. Which everyone had your convictions about global warming…)

Heckle: to Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) for calling White House Press Corps icon Helen Thomas a “left-wing, socialist, wacko, communist” when speaking at an intern seminar. Sorry Pat, Helen knows more about politics than you ever will. And be warned; when you attack Helen, the entire press corps comes back at you, even from conservative media outlets. You may want to watch your back…

Applaud: to a federal judge who didn't buy the Bush Administration’s argument that a lawsuit challenging the NSA domestic wiretapping program would endanger national security. U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that he did not see any “reasonable danger” towards national security and that the court had a constitutional duty to decide matters brought before it. Brilliant, absolutely brilliant.

Heckle: to the bloodshed in the Middle East between Israel and Hezbollah . (We’re not taking sides, only to say this; knock it the hell off…).

Applaud: to republican politicians who are starting to see the light. Sen. John Thune (R-SD) said recently that if he was running a reelection campaign this year, he would not “embrace the president and his agenda.” Saying that he would have to acknowledge that mistakes were made before he could continue.

Heckle: to flip-flops… and I don’t mean the footwear... or Sen. John Kerry... This one is to describe Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH). Sen. Voinovich refused to back John Bolton as U.N. Ambassador last year. This year? Different story… and he’s giving the standard “undermine our policies and agenda” claptrap… as well as saying that not doing so would jeopardize the US influence in the United Nations. (Sure… we all know the US has no influence at the UN anymore, not after BushCo’s crying of wolf in Iraq that has been deemed; untrue. Bolton is a crony, and like all of Bush’s other cronies, he’ll get a free pass to re-approval. Scary… )

Heckle: to Margaret Spellings the head of the U.S. Department of Education. She visited Capitol Hill earlier this week to push a voucher program. No surprise there, right. Well, it turns out that her department had published a report earlier that found little difference between students performances in public versus private schools. (Nice. She's the head of the US Dept of Ed, and she can't read a report that, I don't know, sounds pretty damn important. Just another example of Bush's cronyism shining bright...)

Heckle: to the House for passing a bill earlier this week that will “bar federal courts from ruling on the constitutional validity” of the Pledge of Allegiance. (Well… I think it’s safe to say the First Amendment is now on life support in this country… and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) agrees with me, stating after the vote that “We (Congress) are making an all-out assault on the Constitution of the United States…” She thinks the measure will fail. Me, I’m not so sure. )

Heckle: Usually we like to heckle Dubya just for the pure joy, and general principles, o of it all. This week, we have a legitimate heckle. Ignoring the majority of Americans (wow, I guess he was right, it's not just the African-Americans that Bush can ignore... it's everyone), Dubya, despite the Senate voting to lift restrictions on federally funded human embryonic stem cell research, shot the bill down. (As I said this past Wednesday in the random thoughts, this veto was a sad and pathetic act by a sad and pathetic man who thinks he's doing the noble thing. The facts are this; the majority of American citizens, Liberal and conservative, wanted this bill passed, and yet the administration did what it does best; ignored them. Many pundits are saying this will hurt the GOP’s chances in November more than anything else… let’s hope they’re right)

Heckle: to Democratic presidential nominee front-runner (Why God?? Why?> Good God, noooooooooo!!!!!) Hillary Clinton (D-NY) is apparently losing her freakin' mind. In a speech to the Kaiser Family Foundation earlier this week, Mrs. Clinton started mouthing off about the evil that faces America. No, not terrorism. No, not nuclear weapons. No, not even flag burning. Her target? The evil of video games (that's right, you heard me...) At one point during the speech, she stated:

“At the rate that technology is advancing, people will be implanting chips in our children to advertise directly into their brains and tell them what kind of products to buy.”

You're... you're kidding me... right? This is a skit from SNL, isn't it?? Sigh... I think if she gets the nomination in 2008, we as a country are once again gonna get screwed with our pants on...


Wow... a LOT more heckles this week... I wonder if that means anything?

Take 'em as you will...