Are you checking A Winding Road? Here's Common Ills community member Folding Star (of A Winding Road) on the Condi vote:
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
13 Senators Stand Tall
85-13. That was the vote. I believe Senator Boxer noted this morning in her remarks that the most ever to vote against a Secretary of State Nominee was 7 Senators against Henry Kissinger, so we've made history today, though we now will have to endure Rice as our top Diplomat (!). The cosmos sure has a wry sense of humor.
A very quick post asking that you all send thank you emails or calls to the following 13 Senators who voted against the confirmation of Condoleezza Rice. 12 Democrats and 1 Independent member of the Senate stood tall today. Some of the names on the list surprised me, others did not. We all knew Rice would be confirmed. But with each vote lately, some Democrats seem to be gaining more backbone in standing up for what's right.
I'll just add how much Senator Lieberman turns my stomach. To hear him prattle on about how we all believe in the war in Iraq now that we're there, it's such crap! The only way to support our troops is to bring them home NOW. 31 more are dead this morning in a helicopter crash. That's 31 more families shattered over an illegal, pointless war.
Lieberman was quickly praised for his comments by his Republican colleagues, big surprise there.
Oh, and a special boo to Senator McCain who jumped on the bandwagon at suggesting that Democrats were playing partisan politics by fulfilling their Constitutional duty! I know some would love to believe that McCain is above partisan politics himself, but he's not. Any respect a liberal might have (mistakenly!) harbored for this particular Senator's independence and integrity should have evaporated when he supported Bush in 2004, after all the rotten dirty tricks Bush pulled against him in the 2000 primaries. McCain likes to paint himself as a Maverick, and on a couple of issues, he may even be one, but overall, he's very much a Republican.
At any rate, I watched the vote live and jotted down the Senators who voted No as I heard them. Here were today's stalwart 13, standing against all that Rice represents: the lies that took us into an illegal war and continue to keep us there.
Senator Boxer
Senator Byrd
Senator Kerry
Senator Reed (of Rhode Island, NOT Harry Reid of Nevada)
Senator Durbin
Senator Jeffords
Senator Kennedy
Senator Levin
Senator Dayton
Senator Akaka
Senator Bayh
Senator Lautenberg
Senator Harkin
Please drop an email or take the time to phone these 13 Senators with your thanks and let them know they should continue to stand strong.
On the vote, I'll note what Gina's e-mailed, "We are seeing more stick their necks out and in many ways it is amazing. On the other hand, it seems that the same group may be used repeatedly to show the spine while others do nothing. I'm getting really disappointed in Hillary Clinton."
Have you read A Winding Road today?
Senator Kennedy Calls for Troop Withdrawal
How odd. Just yesterday, Senator Lieberman was proclaiming on the Senate floor that no matter the debate on how we got into the war, the members of the United States Senate all believe in the mission now that we're there. No one, I seem to recall him saying, wants to 'cut and run'.
Click the higlighted title above the paragraph for more.
Are you checking community member Rebecca's Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude?
[If you're at a work computer, consider yourself warned if your company has a policy on "appropriate" language.] Here she is weighing in on Andrew Sullivan's "review" (that Luke was asking for input on earlier this week) and on the New York Times' decision to review a bio on Sean Penn [language edits are done by this site, not Rebecca, and are indicated with "*"s]:
so then i open the increasingly useless new york times and see andy sullivan trying to prop up his boy donnie rummy with his 'by gosh it all, the military was looking into this!' white wash. the times feels sully's so g**damn important that they let him go on and on. considering that he understands brevity -- those personal ads seeking bareback sex for instance -- it's shocking that they turn over so much space to so questionable a writer.
but just when you're done with granny sully telling you there really is a santa clause, you have to take on the prat that is manohla dargis.
apparently manohla's never read one of those star biographies. you know that this self-proclaimed lover of valley of the dolls has read everyone she could get her hands on.
manohla eats up space in the times book review section by weighing in on a star gazer tome aimed at sean penn.
and apparenlty manohla's new to these type of books. (they often sell well but they rarely grace a best seller list).
manohla's shocked, just shocked, that a writer would write such a glossy treatment of penn. as someone who's flipped through books "about" sharon stone, goldie hawn, cher, johnny depp, river phoenix, warren beatty and countless others, i know when i pick up one of those books that we're looking at a subject without warts. kitty kelley's 1 of the few who's ever felt the need to show warts. and 1 of the few who's sold a book that explored the warts.
. . .
. . . the only 1s buying them are fans of the star.
you don't make any money with a warts and all portrayal.
and no one even tries. which is why a biography on sharon stone works overtime to reassure us of all how she's one of the strongest critical thinkers of our time. yeah, there's sartre and then there's stone.
either manohla is ignorant of the book genre or she's so eager to trash sean penn that she plays dumb.
either way, the book isn't worthy of a review in the times and her "review" isn't worth printing.
. . .
it's not enough that she smear penn himself, she also goes after his dead father leo penn:"he had been blacklisted, though he wasn't sure anyone had actually named his name. (in fact, he may have hit a wall as a screen actor. either way, the blacklist would become an important part of the penn family story.)"
would that be the same new york times family story manhola?
His film career had just begun when Penn was blacklisted after attending a pro-union meeting with other actors. That the group was actively supporting the first blacklistees, the Hollywood Ten, only worsened matters.http://movies2.nytimes.com/gst/movies/filmography.html?p_id=106025&mod=bio
yeah, manohla tile, that's your own damn paper. you might want to consider researching a little before you spew your venum. you're exactly the sort of 'critic' that kat was talking in thursday's kat's korner -- you mistake criticism for an appearence on crossfire!
maybe manohla tile is unaware of this too:
When he was called before the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee, and asked to expose Hollywood Communists, Leo Penn refused to name names.http://writ.news.findlaw.com/hilden/20050118.html
or maybe the dumb ass just doesn't grasp how the blacklist worked, maybe she's historically ignorant as well as a bad writer?
you sure are quick to absolve the blacklisters and question the documented claims of a victim, manohla tile.
Are you checking out the community members that are running The Third Estate Sunday Review? Each Sunday they provide new content. We've highlighted their editorial on the Times in Monday's post here so let's note they've done another interview with a college student.
"Mike" was placed in rehab when he was a teenager. To find out about his experience in the rehab he went to read the interview. Here's a sample:
There were people with serious addictions to things like cocaine and heroin and alcohol or meth or whatever. And I don't think any of those kids learned anything in treatment. This one guy who was on my team, I've stayed in contact with him through e-mail. He went right back into treatment a month after he got discharged but this time he went to a real treatment center and learned some things. He's still off and on with his recovery but he learned the tools to work his recovery if he wants to do that.
I think places like the one I was at just take people's money. They do a nice con job on your parents or guardians and then you're basically in day care the whole time you're there. They aren't giving you any tools. Like, I was in there for new year's eve, okay? Now an addict on new year's eve trying to work their recovery must be a hard thing. But they didn't use that opportunity. I mean, they didn't stage a clean and sober new year's eve so you could experience at least one where you were interacting with your peers without the use of drugs. They just treated it like any other night that you had to be in bed by nine-thirty. But when it was Superbowl time, they wheeled in the TV and you were expected to stay in this room watching the Superbowl until it was over. Then you broke back up into teams and went back to your living areas.
Most of the kids were stoners who couldn't care less about sports. I doubt many of them have watched a Superbowl since. I don't think that had anything to do with treatment. It was just that the Bible thumper family running the camp, and I call it a camp and not a treatment center, were big into football. New Year's Eve effects everyone. Whether you're alone or at a party with friends, you know it's New Year's Eve. They blew a big opportunity to educate by ignoring it but I guess it wasn't as important to them as the Superbowl.
And don't miss Ron's work on the mysterious "Ricky" who seems to post everywhere and often as a "Democrat" at Why Are We Back In Iraq?:
5 AM in the morning Update. Ricky's "New Democrat" blog has been removed from blogspot. I'm assuming that was Ricky's move because of the work Tas and I (and Jesse) have done. So Max, looks like you might get to keep your blog title, unless Simon Rosenberg comes knocking.
Ricky, this isn't over yet. Some Americans don't take kindly to foreigners interfering in our presidential elections.
Update: Ricky Ain't American!. Check out the latest article by Tas at Loaded Mouth (you too, Ricky, unless you've already made your way from there to here) to find out what other country the "new democrat" blogs from.
Why did so many big time Republican bloggers hand out links to a foreigner in a bid to influence our Presidential election? They have f**king site trackers just like most of us bloggers, so they knew damn well where Ricky Vandal originated from. Instapundit, L.G.F., Protein Wisdom, Andrew Sullivan, and every other right wing blogger that linked to the anti-Kerry websites are looking about as unpatriotic as you can get, in my never-humble opinion.
I just found another Ricky page on the Internet devoted to smearing John Kerry's war record that was posted on October 11, 2004.. This page is basically a reprint of the hores**t on Ricky's New Soldier blog (which attracted 300,000 visitors before the election...not all arriving from right wing blogs). It's called "Is Kerry a traitor?" It's a page on the American Computer Science Associate Website, (ACSA.Net) and it claims to represent the views of ACSA, a "NON-PROFIT CHARITY, A PRIVATE FOUNDATION UNDER USC 501(c)3."
[Note, as with Rebecca's excerpt, we've edited language here -- indicated with "*"s -- to do our best to be work place friendly.]
"Ricky" new to you? Read the series at Why Are We Back In Iraq? and learn more about what's going on there.
Lastly, Luke is a regular visitor here and he blogs out of Australia at wotisitgood4 so please check out his site. Here's one example (from January 22nd) of the type of commentary you can find at Luke's site (and the usual WARNING before you visit in case you are on a work computer and there is a strict policy on "appropriate" langauge at your job):
* nyt obviously felt compelled to report on the boxer/rice nom thing. apparently the key issue is that boxer has the loudest voice, she hasnt lost her voice, she is full-throated, is outspoken, and has an aggressive posture. further down we learn that the CA repugs 'have been unable to defeat her despite her liberal voting record and her prominent role as a legislative leader on protecting abortion rights'. In para 9, we learn that the nomination is to be debated on the senate floor.http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/20/politics/20boxer.html?oref=login
[Note: My apologies if anyone caught the curse word in the post above that I didn't use "*"s on.
I do try to catch them. I am sorry. Reading over it right now, I saw it and immediately moved to correct it. But again, I'm sorry.]
