Monthly Archive for June, 2007

Gore-El Warning

al gore

Al Gore has an op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times.

Our home — Earth — is in danger. What is at risk of being destroyed is not the planet itself, but the conditions that have made it hospitable for human beings.

Without realizing the consequences of our actions, we have begun to put so much carbon dioxide into the thin shell of air surrounding our world that we have literally changed the heat balance between Earth and the Sun. If we don’t stop doing this pretty quickly, the average temperature will increase to levels humans have never known and put an end to the favorable climate balance on which our civilization depends.

In the last 150 years, in an accelerating frenzy, we have been removing increasing quantities of carbon from the ground — mainly in the form of coal and oil — and burning it in ways that dump 70 million tons of CO2 every 24 hours into the Earth’s atmosphere.

The concentrations of CO2 — having never risen above 300 parts per million for at least a million years — have been driven from 280 parts per million at the beginning of the coal boom to 383 parts per million this year.

As a direct result, many scientists are now warning that we are moving closer to several “tipping points” that could — within 10 years — make it impossible for us to avoid irretrievable damage to the planet’s habitability for human civilization.

Here’s hoping that the science-based warnings of "Gore-El" are not ignored like those of Jor-El, who was also disastrously right about a planetary emergency.

Hillary Clinton 1, Fred Thompson 0

How dumb is Hollywood actor Fred Thompson to connect the one bloc of Hispanics who vote Republican with terrorists?

Taking a swipe at a potential GOP presidential rival, Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday criticized Fred Thompson for suggesting illegal Cuban immigrants pose a terrorist threat.

"I was appalled when one of the people running for or about to run for the Republican nomination talked about Cuban refugees as potential terrorists," Clinton told Hispanic elected officials. "Apparently he doesn’t have a lot of experience in Florida or anywhere else, and doesn’t know a lot of Cuban-Americans."

But Will The Democrats Listen?

America is practically at consensus on Iraq.

More Americans than ever before, 77 percent, say the war is going badly, up from 66 percent just two months ago. Nearly half, 47 percent, say it’s going very badly.

While the springtime surge in U.S. troops to Iraq is now complete, more Americans than ever are calling for U.S. forces to withdraw. Sixty-six percent say the number of U.S. troops in Iraq should be decreased, including 40 percent who want all U.S. troops removed. That’s a 7-point increase since April.

The war continues because the Democrats are not standing up to Bush. They had a choice earlier this year, and they blinked and spit in the public’s face. The war can end if the Democrats do the right thing, Bush and the Republicans are a lost cause.

Send them a bill with a timeline to end the war. If he vetoes it, send it back.
Send them a bill with a timeline to end the war. If he vetoes it, send it back.
Send them a bill with a timeline to end the war. If he vetoes it, send it back.
Send them a bill with a timeline to end the war. If he vetoes it, send it back.

Borrowed Time

When I see attacks like the one in Glasgow today, I can’t help but to think we’re living on borrowed time here. These acts are not hard to commit, require little to no sophistication and there are more than enough willing terrorists out there. So why the relative silence? I can only guess that Al Qaeda and their sympathizers see more value in a huge attack on the scale of 9/11 than a relatively small one. But we’re on borrowed time and we aren’t remotely ready for it.

Kim Kardashian At The Premiere Of Michael Moore’s “Sicko”

Political documentary and beautiful women. Worlds collide! They collide so much that me posting this is almost not gratuitous. I live to serve. It’s that hard hitting approach to the news that ranks OliverWillis.com among the top sites on Google for “kim kardashian butt“.

Kim Kardashian At The Premiere Of Michael Moore's Sicko

Continue reading ‘Kim Kardashian At The Premiere Of Michael Moore’s “Sicko”’

Fred Thompson Flops In New Hampshire

Who knew Hollywood actor Fred Thompson would be so quick to fall on his face?

“I plan on seeing a whole lot more of you,” Thompson told about 200 New Hampshire Republicans who paid $50 each to hear him — and to benefit state Republican legislators.

He’d better, because many present came away decidedly under-whelmed.

“It was short,” said Richard Heitmiller of Nashua. “He’s got a nice voice. But there was nothing there. He’s for apple pie and motherhood. He’s going to have to say what he’s for.”

Heitmiller said he hadn’t made up his mind about whom to support — way too early — and had come to learn more about this man he’d heard about but never seen.

“People want to get to know him. He hasn’t been here, and he gives a nine-minute speech,” he said dismissively. As Thompson exited, people started making their way to the doors midway through a reception.

“I told my wife we’d get home by 8. We’ll get home a lot earlier than that,” Heitmiller said.

“He looks good onstage, but I don’t know if he has the gravitas,” said Kathleen Williamson, a conservative Roman Catholic from North Weare. “It seems like he’s trying to win over conservatives, but I’m still not sure he has the credentials. I’m worried he’s trying to get by on his celebrity.”

If I was casting a movie about a gruff conservative president with a bit part, I might cast Fred Thompson, but even in an age as superficial as ours you need more than a role on Law & Order to be president. Even Ronald Reagan brought more to the table than his IMDB credits.

John McCain’s Desperate E-Mail

The McCain campaign sent out the following e-mail Saturday morning. In big letters it says “John McCain is the only candidate who can defeat Hillary Clinton” !!!!!! You always know the cons are desperate and trying to raise cash when they raise the specter of Sen. Clinton, their #1 boogeyman.

Mccainhrcemail

Mitt Romney’s Dog Abuse Problem

When this story came out, I said to my friend – this is not a policy issue of any substance but the story has legs. Why? America loves pets. America looooves pets. As a pet owner myself, I know how people think about their animals, and the idea that someone of public prominence is mean to a pet – even a long time ago – makes them look like a total ass.

Romney Accused of Mistreating Family Dog

An example of Mitt Romney’s crisis management skills has turned into something of a political problem for the Republican presidential contender.

Romney placed his family dog, an Irish setter named Seamus, into a kennel lashed to the top of his station wagon for a 12-hour family trip from Boston to Ontario in 1983. Despite being shielded by a wind screen the former Massachusetts governor erected, Seamus expressed his discomfort with a diarrhea attack.

Now the story, recounted this week in a Boston Globe profile of Romney, has touched off howls of outrage from bloggers and animal rights activists even though it was presented in the story as an example of Romney’s coolness under trying circumstances.

Listening…

This is good… Now, if the Democratic party would just follow the rest of my directions they would rule the world…

PBS Democratic Debate 2

– Dems on Katrina: could this question possibly be any easier? Remotely?
– Outsourcing is bad. We need American jobs. Water is wet. Friction, damn it. Dodd, use that giant hair and hammer someone with it.
– If there’s a winner so far it’s HRC. But its kind of like Martyball – you hold the ball when you have the lead and don’t make any sudden moves.

– And that’s it. Game over. I’ll look around and see if there’s anything interesting up here.

– I’m a couple steps away from spin alley. I will never understand why any journalist would go to “spin alley” in search of a story. They might as well call it Spoonfed Drive.

– Up close, Chris Dodd’s hair is as pretty as you think it is.

– I’m always amazed by guys like Bill Richardson — because they look just like how they look on tv.

– If there’s ever a movie of Jesse Jackson Jr.’s life, Cuba Gooding will play him. For some reason I’ve now seen both of them in real life (I saw Cuba buying dog food when I lived in L.A.).

– It should be noted for the record that Dennis Kucinich is the only candidate who came by the bloggers to press the flesh, along with his wife Elizabeth who positively towers over him.

– To be honest I did have a moment where I went OMG IT’S CLARENCE PAGE!!!!

– The handlers Mike Gravel had around him were just the kind of guys you would think would follow Mike Gravel around. A little… off.

– I also saw David Axelrod (Obama’s campaign manager), who was talking to Matthew Sheffield from Newsbusters, so if a phony story about Axelrod comes out I will have witnessed its beginnings

– Oddly enough I talked religion with Lashawn Barber. She doesn’t have fangs or anything, but she’s totally wrong on everything. She likes Tancredo though, and I can get behind that!

Pam and Liza have images and video

PBS Democratic Debate

– Made it here just under the wire. Met a couple black conservatives (including LaShawn Barber). They do exist!

– Other coverage is here.

– Tom Joyner gets a big pop from the crowd. Apparently black media is powerful.

– You should be aware that Tavis Smiley made some incorrect statements about Media Matters today.

– The media room isn’t in the actual room the debate is happening in, but the Blackburn Center where the media is assembled.

– Tavis Smiley discusses the Covenant book, which I’m pretty sure most Americans have never heard of because it exists in one of those subcultures the MSM won’t cover other than as a curiosity.

– Deval Patrick (yay!) comes out to talk about Democratic superiority and warns about the dangers of compacency.

Question: Is Race Most Intractable Issue in US Today?

– HRC talks about the fact that race is still important, hits the rollback of Brown decision and Katrina. The question was almost a soft pitch over the middle.

– Biden talks about the importance of blocking Roberts, and importance of judges. Finally someone hits it. Now, frontrunners?

– Richardson is getting existential on the issue. Talking about the abstraction of race versus more granular stuff like HRC and Biden did. I don’t get it.

– Edwards discusses the “Two Americas”, makes sense and the first mid-speech clap. Easy one on voting integrity.

– Obama nods to legacy of Howard and racial fight (Thurgood Marshall). Talks about how racial equality makes united America, but progress to go.

– I wonder how the GOPers will answer this question – I mean, many of them think the racial issue is settled and not to be discussed. It will also be a lineup of lily white guys doing it.

– Good line from Kucinich – the right tells us to “pull yourself up by the bootstraps… then they steal the boots”

– Gravel goes off on the war on drugs. He’ll destroy the war on drugs. Okay.

– Dodd hits the issue from the education angle, and how its central to racial harmony. Would use tools as president to reverse the nutty SCOTUS decision from today.

– Responses limited to one minute. And it seems like a hard limit because the shut up Biden and that’s a miracle.

– This is the problem with these debates: they all agree on things like early childhood education (the current question), just within degrees. No sparks. Someone needs to grab a steel chair…. Sen. Gravel?

Obama: When you’ve got a bill called no child left behind, you can’t leave the money behind.

– It would be awesome if they gave Mike Gravel an Archie Bunker chair to sit in, because then he would be at home as the resident crazy guy.

– Hillary: It takes a village to raise a child. [AVAILABLE AT STORES NOW IN PAPERBACK!!!]

– Obama discusses homophobia with black America. He’s the only one I think who can be critical of black America’s problems, and I’m glad he’s doing it rather than mindless boosterism.

Casey Latrigue from CATO, who’s right next to me, exemplifies the kind of silly thinking the right supports. Oh, the civil rights act passed we ought to pretend race is solved.

– HRC gets first standing ovation pop for comments saying that if AIDS rate among white women was as bad as it is wiht black women.

– Biden’s line about Barack getting tested for AIDS is INSANE……. and Rev Al’s facial response was GOLD. The media room was rolling at that whole exchange.

– HRC: The economy was working a lot better in the 90s. [WHEN MY HUSBAND WAS PRESIDENT, HINT HINT NUDGE NUDGE]

– I’m trying to figure out if this is the first debate to have the words “crack” and “cocaine” in them. I understand why, but….

CONTINUED…

Ann Coulter, Conservative Leader

So says another conservative leader.

Even A Rigged Fox Poll Comes Out In Favor Of Dems

Fox News: Imagine the Islamofascist hordes are attacking our borders and creating WORLD WAR THREEE – who do you trust, America?

Democrats.

Lame Duck

It’s been true for some time now, but now we’ve got some visual confirmation.

Letter From Donna Edwards

Here in Maryland we’re strongly blue, and as such there’s nothing wrong with an internal fight to get a good Democrat in over a bad one. I met Donna Edwards last week and Maryland will be better off to have her in congress.

CREW Report On Katrina

I wonder how long the right will keep up the pretense that everything went well and still wonder why they’ve lost public confidence and will never get the black vote.

Critically, CREW found that FEMA had created a “Southeast Louisiana Catastrophic Hurricane Plan” (SLCHP), which forecast a range of specific consequences, including:

* New Orleans would be flooded with 14-17 feet of water, the levee system inundated with at least 10 feet of water and the hurricane would move into Mississippi;

* One million people would evacuate, but flooding would trap at least 250-350,000; and

* Each hurricane victim would require a minimum of two Meals Ready to Eat, one gallon of water and eight pounds of ice per day.

The SLCHP included plans to:

* Evacuate residents and position resources pre-hurricane;
* Provide power, water and ice to hurricane victims; and
* Provide short-term shelter and longer-term temporary housing.

Nevertheless, despite the comprehensive SLCHP, post-Katrina FEMA documents demonstrate that the plan was never implemented. On August 28, 2005, the day before Katrina hit, FEMA Deputy Director Patrick Rhode sent an email to Deputy Chief of Staff Brooks Altshuler and Michael Heath, Special Assistant to FEMA Director Michael Brown, with the subject line, “copy of New Orleans cat plan” stating, “I never got one – I think Brown got my copy – did you get one?”

Mitt Romney’s Big Empty Room

The Mitt Romney campaign is promoting this video of a one-day fundraiser they recently held, trying to communicate energy and enthusiasm for the candidate. As the NYT reported yesterday they generated $1.5 million, a far cry from the $6.5 million they brought in a few months ago at a similar event. But what I noticed is that in order to communicate the “bigness” of the occasion they rented out Boston Garden and Fenway Park. But its empty. If you’re going to hold a big free event at a sports venue, I don’t think you communicate momentum by having an empty stadium.

Mittempty1
Mittempty2

Superman Graduation

How did I not come up with this?

Mitt Romney Tied His Dog To His Car Roof

How cracked is that?

The Republican Party Is The Iraq War Party

I said that liberals shouldn’t believe a damn word coming from Republicans suddenly against the war because when push comes to shove, they blink. Dick Lugar is just the latest to shuck and jive. Only Democrats can stop the war. Only they can stand up to Bush.