torture

For torture.

WASHINGTON - President Bush said Saturday he vetoed legislation that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods such as waterboarding to break suspected terrorists because it would end practices that have prevented attacks.

"The bill Congress sent me would take away one of the most valuable tools in the war on terror," Bush said in his weekly radio address taped for broadcast Saturday. "So today I vetoed it," Bush said. The bill provides guidelines for intelligence activities for the year and includes the interrogation requirement.

Over the past two years, the Art Pope Puppetshow has served as an exceptional lightning rod for galvanizing progressives against the toxic agenda of North Carolina's free-market extremists. With a multi-million dollar budget to oil their influence-buying machine, the Show has clearly had some measure of success in shaping the agenda with small town newspapers in general and with the Raleigh News and Observer, in particular.

The fondness of the N&O's political reporters for all things Pope has been well discussed, as have the water-carrying activities of Rick Martinez, an opinionator at the N&O whose wife Donna works backstage at the Show. And while I'm reluctant to boost his readership by linking to his columns, today's piece in the N&O shows Martinez at his worst.

I've taken a break from reading The One Percent Doctrine to relate an anecdote.

One of the lessons future administrations were supposed to have learned from LBJ and McNamaras' micromanaging of the Vietnam war was the delegation of such decisions to proper military authorities. It seems no one told George W. Bush.

In which we determine if the Republicans and Jesus are as close as some would have you think.

New Jersey lawmakers vote to abolish death penalty

In which we advance some new thinking that could make torture far more environmentally friendly than it is today.

Kay Hagan and Jim Neal are going to be asked all sorts of things by all sorts of people during the course of this campaign, about the substance of issues, as well as on their campaign tactics. In today's news, both are in the spotlight.

(Updated with tags . . . gotta remember to do that)
(UPDATED WITH NEAL COMMENTS)

Politics in America has always been a “them” and “Us” sort of event. We have so many different outlooks and avenues of expression and thought. Political philosophy, social engagement, citizen responsibility to government, as opposed to government obligation to its citizens, political correctness and how it effects our societal morays and values is today, as always, wonderfully debated and the list goes on; yet somehow those differences have helped to make us the great people we are, which has in turn forged the social Democratic miracle America still is today.

Opposing thought and spectrums, with a shared love of county, liberty, freedom and rule of law have been the hallmark of American political discourse. We all love this county and our opposing thoughts, with few exceptions, have never really challenged that principle.

Mike McIntyre voted for the Military Commissions Act of 2006...authorizing torture and the suspension of Habeas Corpus for "detainees" captured in Iraq and elsewhere. We all also know of at least one Canadian Citizen that was whisked away in an "extraordinary rendition" and held and tortured. Mike helped made this possible and legal. Now he's trying to hide from the facts rather than apologize. Read part of his letter below the fold.

Leslie H said it all today in her rant about Iraq and I'm not gonna go there. If I got started I'd never shut up. But, I'd like to tell you about a letter I got from my Congressman. I went ballistic! Please follow me below the fold for an example of how stupid these people think we are.