Disqus - Latest Comments for tombetz

Re: Al Franken Reads the 4th Amendment to Justice Department Official

tombetz — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:12:23 -0000

He doesn't need to propose anything new. All he needs to do is co-sponsor the Judicious Use of Surveillance Tools In Counterterrorism Efforts (JUSTICE) Act introduced last week.

http://feingold.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=317927

Re: Obama: I’m a ‘Fierce Advocate’ for Gay and Lesbians

tombetz — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:04:23 -0000

If President Obama feels the need to include anti-gay bigotry in his inaugural, if he must include a representative of those who oppose equal rights for gay people, where is the white supremacist in his inaugural program? The anti-semite? The anti-papist? Surely, he must include them as well.

Or is bigotry against homosexuals the only remaining acceptable bigotry in America today?

Re: More Criticism of Obama over Warren Pick

tombetz — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:01:57 -0000

Re: Holder Confirmation Hearings Slated for Early January

tombetz — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 20:38:50 -0000

I wonder whether anyone will ask Holder about the matter of Kenneth Michael Trentadue and the Trentadonts?

http://www.kmtreward.com/

Leaked memos here tying Holder to a criminal coverup here:

http://freespeech.vo.llnwd.net/o25/pub/pp/image...

It seems that Eric Holder was up to his neck in a murder coverup in the 90's.

To date, he has never answered for it.

Re: Another Year’s Worth Of Gates?

tombetz — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:59:03 -0000

Keeping Gates is a really bad idea.

In "The Professional," Fred Kaplan's extended New York Times Magazine profile of Defense Secretary Robert "I Am Not Now Nor Have I Ever Been Donald Rumsfeld" Gates from February 10, 2008, the editors buried on page 96 what was to me the most revealing anecdote in the story.

From Kaplan's article:

At last summer’s debate on Iraq, Cheney urged the president to resist the Democrats’ call for troop withdrawals and to prolong the surge indefinitely. But the Joint Chiefs argued that they didn’t have the troops to sustain the surge beyond the summer of 2008. Gates made a more political point: that if there were no prospects for gradual but substantial troop withdrawals, popular support for the war would evaporate, and the next president would probably pull out all the troops as quickly as possible, resulting in Iraq’s potential collapse. On the plane from Fort Hood, Gates spelled out his position. "We need bipartisan support for a prolonged presence in Iraq," he said. "But to do that, we need to demonstrate that we’re drawing down to lower levels." He recalled watching one of the early Democratic presidential debates. The moderator asked the candidates if they would promise to withdraw all U.S. troops from Iraq by 2013, the end of the first term. The three candidates with the highest poll ratings all declined to make that pledge. Gates remembered saying to himself, "My work here is done."

(emphasis mine)

Gates' admission that the primary reason George Bush hired him to replace Rumsfeld was to make an extended occupation of Iraq palatable enough to Americans that the Democratic front-runners for the 2008 Presidential nomination would refuse to reject it as Iraq policy should be front page news; but as is typical of the corporate poodle press in America, the importance of this point went right over his head.

Never mind that all the areas in Iraq where violence has declined the most are the areas where the US has the smallest number of troops; never mind that, given the reduction in American troops in Sunni areas, native Iraqi Sunni leaders have themselves begun tracking down and killing Wahabist al Qaeda forces.

Never mind that all the evidence shows that it is precisely the presence of our troops, propping up a corrupt Shia-dominated puppet government, that is preventing the Shia and Sunni and Kurd leaders from coming to their own resolution of their differences.

As long as the the Democratic President-elect can be conned into accepting the inevitability of an extended military occupation of Iraq, Bob Gates will continue to consider his work done. You can bet that if he continues as Secretary of Defense, he will do his best to con President Obama.

Re: The Scoreboard: Tuesday, Sept. 16 - mediabistro.com: TVNewser

tombetz — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 08:05:29 -0000

It's no conspiracy, nor does it hav anything to do with ratings -- a lot of low-rated channels are retained on the lower-cost tiers -- it's a simple profit motive.

Comcast sees how MSNBC is growing its audience, largely composed of younger, smarter people with more disposable income (as opposed to Fox's demographic of decrepit minds and Archie Bunker wannabees), and see moving MSNBC to a tier that costs more as a way to cash in on its growing success.

Re: The Scoreboard: Tuesday, Sept. 16 - mediabistro.com: TVNewser

tombetz — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 18:33:44 -0000

Comcast has been on a tear lately, moving MSNBC to the digital-only tier, meaning that fewer households get it in their basic cable package. On the other hand, Rupert Murdoch pays off cablecos big time to make sure that Fox News always has basic cable carriage.