Who would have thought it?

Wherein Agitprop explains that Bush is not only The Decider, but also The Understander.

Violence and antisocial behavior in sports--the American way

A pro baseball manager hurls a chair after a game. A pro baseball player waves a bat menacingly in an umpire's face. A number of cyclists, including the world's top cyclists, are banned from the world's biggest race because of doping.

A pro football player is arrested for failing to stop at stop signs, playing very loud music, and hauling marijuana (and a gun, but that may have been legal) around in his car. A pro baseball coach calls a sports writer a "fag."

And a very significant number of players (from many countries) in the World Cup punch, kick, trip, tear the shirts of their opponents, and fake injuries in order to turn the fate of the game around.

These are some sports news items from the month of June, many of them from the last few days. In a nation where a man convicted of rape and multiple vicious assauts is still idolized by sports fans, it is no wonder that some days, you have to look carefully to distinguish the sports page from the crime section of the newspaper.

Multiple reports of both college and pro ballplayers sexually assaulting women, abusing substances and punching and/or threatening other players and fans are everywhere. Again--no surprise. America is a violent country. We love guns, fights, war, punishment, and hitting children. We tolerate violence against women. We torture millions of animals a day at labs and factory farms. We say that a man who loves peace is missing his testicles and that having testicles somehow equals courage.

A man who can run very fast or hit a ball hard or use a gun against an enemy is a "hero," but a man or woman who negotiates peace or produces breathtaking art or tells the truth about governmental shams is either not a household name or is a "traitor."

Sports are part of our lives. We like to play them, watch them and follow them. For many of us, the athletes we enjoy watching are probably not people with whom we would want to have a serious conversation (I know that's true in my case), but we also should not consider it acceptable when they are violent, threatening and lawless.

You can't leak something that's already overflowing

If anyone tells you that certain leftist newspapers like the Wall Street Journal (though they will probably say the New York Times, which is about as "leftist" as the WSJ) committed treason by leaking intelligence about the U.S.'s secret searches within a vast global database of confidential financial transactions--tell them to go to a "burning hot" place.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Friday cat blogging--rescue edition

This lovely tabby kitten will go up for adoption

A feral tortoiseshell relaxes before she goes for her surgery

These siblings--two orange brothers and their gray tabby sister, were glad to be reunited. They will go up for adoption.


This feral tabby tries to figure out what's going on. In the next cage, there is another feral tabby who is almost identical to this one.

Number of ATP players who have offered Venus Williams support for equal pay at Wimbledon

0.

An inconvenient truth

During the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore never once uttered the "e" word.

U.S. Supreme Court strikes down military tribunal plans

In a 5-3 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court today stuck down George W. Bush's plant to conduct military tribunals for foreign terror suspects at Guantamamo Bay, Cuba.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Coalition of eleven insurgent groups tries to make a deal with the U.S.

The Associated Press has reported that eleven Sunni insurgent groups have offered an immediate halt on all attacks in Iraq if the United States will agree to withdraw foreign forces from the country within two years. These groups, which operate north of Baghdad, are know not for attacking Iraqi civilians, but for attacking U.S.-led coalition forces.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Greek professor denied entry into the U.S.

His visa was good but his politics were not.

A tall tale

I believe that it is a sin to be tall because my life manual tells me it is. But I'm not like those rigid people down the road who think you chose to be tall out of some perverse whim, that other tall people seduced you into stretching until you became that way, or that there are people whom you can pay to make you short. No, I love the sinner, and I accept you as tall-- as long as you do not act on your tallness.

That means no rising above others in crowds, no taking things effortlessly off of high shelves, no buying the "tall" size pants from L.L. Bean, and by all means--no basketball. Even though you are tall, by not acting tall, you save yourself from the consequences of sin. I actually know some tall people (though not very well--after all, we don't have much in common), and they are polite, mow their lawns, and mind their own business. But too many tall people flaunt their height, even in front of my family, and it pains me to know that they are all going to hell.

I guess I believe you when you say you cannot be short. I suppose that is your bad fortune, but it gives you no right to be proud of your tallness. Even though you are tall, you can still contribute to society, and we will all pray for you, but when you pass me on the street, I ask that you stoop to my level.

They voted for it before they voted against it

It seemed too good to be true when the delegates to the Episcopal Church's national convention voted to dismiss Anglican leaders' request that they temporarity stop ordaining "openly" gay bishops. And it was. In a later vote, they went along with the resolution that doesn't use the word "moratorium," but clearly implies it.

The non-binding resolution calls on church authorities "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate (for bishop) whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion."

Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, said that "The wider Communion will therefore need to reflect carefully on the significance of what has been decided before we respond more fully."

In case you're wondering what that means, Frank Griswold, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church of the U.S., explained it on "Fresh Air" today. Griswold said that American Episcopalians need to be in a personal dialogue with Anglicans in other parts of the world so that they can form relationships with members of the U.S. church, and therefore be more open to new ideas. That sounds good on the face of it, but how many people from deeply conservative cultures are ever really going to accept the ordination of gay bishops? And how much effort will the church make to activate this dialogue?

Also, the Episcopal Church of the U.S. does not recognize gay marriage and does not officially endorse the blessing of gay partnerships. So, in review, American Episcopal churches need to stop ordaining gay bishops whose partnerships they haven't blessed.

There was also a lot of talk about respecting the dignity and contributions of gay church members, which made me think of how the Baptist (and other) churches bend over backwards to explain that women are to be "respected," even though they cannot be ordained or can never be the heads of their households.

Note to ESPN

The Wimbledon tournament has this beautiful tennis towel for sale. You have a big budget. Perhaps you could buy one--and stuff it in Pam Shriver's mouth.

Thank you.

Homelessness a threat to veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan

The government estimates that, on any given night, hundreds of military veterans returning from Iraq or Afghanistan are homeless. Some cannot adjust after being in a war zone, some cannot navigate federal red tape, and some simply do not have the money to afford a place to live. The problem is the worst in New York City because of the high cost of housing.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Got cruelty and hormones?

Monica Seles did it. Serena Williams did it. Chris Evert did it. And now, sadly, Lindsay Davenport has done it--made a Got Milk? ad for the American dairy industry. It isn't pretty, the way milk gets to the supermarket. Calves are snatched from their mothers, who cry for them. The males are placed in veal crates, where they can't even turn around, and they are bloated until they are weak and diseased, then slaughtered when they are a few months old. The females are also used as dairy cows, and when their production goes down, they, too, are slaughtered. Dairy cows do not get to graze freely, but are confined their entire lives.

Then there's the matter of the growth hormones that are injected into the cows, and the repeated artificial inseminations that create disease, which means chronic use of antibiotics. That is what people are drinking in this "wholesome" drink.

If you drink organic milk, you are drinking a much healthier beverage, but the cruelty is only slightly less, in that, at some organic dairies, cows are allowed to graze freely.

Davenport's native California "happy cows" are anything but that.

I will never understand why anyone would promote cruelty instead of fighting against it. But animal rights issues aside, it baffles me that athletes, of all people, are promoting a product that is anything but healthy.

If my head hasn't exploded by now, I guess it never will

From feministe (via feministing) comes the news about a severely disabled woman who was sexually assaulted by a 15-year-old male at a Colorado Springs High School. The school district has refused to mediate a civil lawsuit because, its "expert" says--take a deep breath and hang on to the arms of your chair--the event was "pleasurable" for the woman and "ignited her female desires."

The family has filed a federal lawsuit against the school district.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell, just spy

The Pentagon has been conducting surveillance of groups who protest the U.S. military's ridiculous Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy, which has done nothing but make it as difficult as usual for gay soldiers to remain in the military. This revelation came out in a Freedom of Information request made by the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Just when you think you've seen the most obscene vehicle decorations possible...

This afternoon I was behind a truck loaded for hunting trips. At the rear, on top of the trailer pull, was a big bobble-head dear with antlers. Under the pull, dangling from the hitch, was a pair of what appeared to be silver testicles. My suspicion is that this attachment is actually some utilitarian bauble unknown to non-truck and non-hunting types, but believe me, it looked for all the world like a pair of silver testicles.

And whether the combination was purposeful or unconscious really didn't matter. The resulting image pretty much said it all.

Who doesn't like a bit of irony from time to time?

MSNBC New Orleans headlines, in their order, on my home page:

The City On The Road To Recovery

Teen's Body Found In Lake Ponchartrain

Deputies Investigate Fatal Shooting In Harvey

A day to think about torture

Today is International Day in Support of Survivors and Victims of Torture, the culmination of Torture Awareness Month. Unfortunately, the institutionalized torture of women and girls through genital mutilation is, once again, not a focus of this movement against torture.

Torture surrounds us on every level. The torture of women is institutionalized, as is the torture of non-humans. Is it any surprise, then, that people of all nations do not rise up against political torture?

Much of the out-and-out American support of political torture is based on unclear thinking:

We need the information any way we can get it. Perhaps, but if you were being tortured, don't you think you'd say anything to get your torturers to stop?

They are the enemy. Actually, many of them are not; they have been caught up in a "homeland security" net that picks up a number of innocent people as well as legitimate suspects.

If we bring the activity down just a notch, we can call it something besides "torture." Fine--would you be willing to have the down-a-notch activity done to you?

We have a right to do anything our government deems necessary in order to win the "war on terror." Well, now that our government has widely increased terrorist sentiment against us, it may seem that way. But international law says we do not have that right. And common sense says that the more we torture others, the more others will torture us.

One final thought...a significant number of Americans who support torture (of political prisoners--almost all Americans appear to support torture in some other ways) identify as Christian. It is really, really difficult for me to imagine Jesus advocating torture, but what do I know?

Equal prize money at Wimbledon?

Venus Williams lays it on the line.

For those still too heartless to care about the cruelty of factory farming...

Tip them off about the EPA's total disregard for human life.

Factory farm may soon have to get permits from the so-callled Environmental Protection Agency when farm animal waste winds up in local rivers, streams and lakes. And guess who the EPA has put in charge of determining what pollution is? If you guessed "the farmers," you win a prize!

A federal appeals court ordered the EPA to also consider formulating new standards for disease-causing bacteria, viruses and parasites in factory farm run-off, but the agency has decided not to do so.

Clitoridectomy--an American tradition

I have been re-reading Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions (second edition), the incredible collection of Gloria Steinem's best essays. Many of the essays I have read several times because I read them in their first incarnation, before they became part of the first edition of the book.

There is a chapter (co-authored by Robin Morgan) on clitoridectomy and its variations, which are too horrible to describe. One of the things Steinem makes very clear is that it wasn't until the 1990s that even the most "progressive" human rights organizations included female genital mutilation in their campaigns or in their funding. It just wasn't seen as an important issue, and when someone brought it up, it was referred to as a "cultural difference."

Clitoridectomy was sometimes performed in the United States, as this essay desribes, in the 19th Century, as a means of "curing" masturbation (it worked) in women, and men who were known to masturbate were also subjected to terrible tortures, such as having acid poured on their penises. The essay goes on to to say that the advent of the 20th Century brought about an end to the use of clitoridectomy in the U.S. Steinem refutes this assertion, however, by referring to clitoridectomies performed in the U.S. in the 1950s to--you guessed it--stop female masturbation, "melancholia," "promiscuity," and to "cure" lesbianism (because everyone knows that "mature," i.e., heterosexual, women have "vaginal" orgasms).

Some of you may remember the "love surgery" procedure from the 1970s, in which the clitoris was moved to a different location (in our current political climate, those in charge would probably like to move it to somewhere in Old Europe). This little bit of "progress" in the medical community finally acknowledged two things: that women receive sexual pleasure via the clitoris, and that women were entitled to receive such pleasure. But instead of encouraging men to "find" the clitoris (how did they lose it?!) and learn to stimulate it, the medical community's answer was to just move the damned thing so the penis could get to it more easily during intercourse. Aside from being incredibly male-centric and misogynistic, this "solution" was also a product of ignorance, for not all women can receive successful clitoral stimulation from intercourse.

In 1979, one American doctor was completely reconstucting women's vaginas so that the penis could have "better access."

Last year, when Eve Ensler appeared on Real Time, she made the rest of the (male) panel visibly uncomfortable when she said that though behaviors may differ, attitudes toward women and girls are the same in this country as they are everywhere else in the world. A short history of clitoridectomy in America shows us that sometimes, even behaviors are the same.

White skirts, strawberries, begin...

Sam Stosur prepares to serve at the Family Circle Cup

Justine Henin-Hardenne practices in Charleston

Monday marks the first day of the 2006 Championships at Wimbledon. The Grand Slam on grass, always made more interesting by rain interruptions, is the favorite of many tennis fans (not this fan, though it is the one that got me started--I was in London when the great Evonne Goolagong won her first Wimbledon). The Brits do not award equal prize money to men and women; in fact, they don't even give equal per diem money to men and women. However, they did bother to give the officials new Ralph Lauren uniforms.

This year, for the first time, Web viewers can buy either an all-access pass or day passes to watch streaming video of matches.

Neither Lindsay Daveport nor Mary Pierce will be there; both are sidelined with injury. This is especially sad for Davenport and her fans. In 2004, she was leading in her semifinal against Maria Sharapova. There was a rain delay, and during that time out, Davenport underwent an emotional slump, suddenly feeling all the fatigue and stress of her long time on the road. Her husband rallied her to go on, but when she returned after the lengthy delay, Sharapova took over and won the match. She also went on to win the tournament.

Last year, Davenport made it to the final and lost in a thrilling, high-quality, heartbreaking match against Venus Williams. It was the longest women's final in Wimbledon history, and Williams took it, 4-6, 7-6, 9-7. I was depressed for days. To make matters worse, Davenport had somewhat of a physical breakdown during the 2005 Australian Open final, and in the 2004 U.S. Open, she became injured while playing (and losing) her semifinal against Svetlana Kuznetsova, who went on to win the tournament. She has come so close to winning another Grand Slam during the past few years, but nothing has gone her way.

Players to watch:

Eleni Daniilidou
The Greek player is as streaky as you can get, but on grass, she shines, and her serve-and-volley game can be dangerous. She just reached the semifinals at Ordina, and last year, she took out Justine Henin-Hardenne in the first round of Wimbledon.

Mara Santangelo
Santangelo is another serve-and-volley player whose game should be at its best at Wimbledon. I'm not sure why Santangelo hasn't done better in grass tournaments.

Katarina Srebotnik
Another player who can volley like mad and could do some real damage to players seeded higher.

Samantha Stosur
"Slammin' Sam," number one in the world in doubles, has a wonderful serve, is a great volleyer and is a lot of fun to watch. But, as people have pointed out, Stosur is at her best when she is defending, and given a chance to take control of a match, she tends to flub. Here's hoping that won't happen next week; Stosur is one of the biggest delights on the tour.

Players to seriously watch:

Amelie Mauresmo
World number one Mauresmo had her usual crash-out at the French Open, and she was knocked out of the second round at Eastbourne this week. But never mind that. Her biggest nemesis at Wimbledon, where she has reached the semifinals the last few years, has been Serena Williams (their 2004 match was one of the best women's matches I've seen this decade), and Williams won't be there this year. Though she is an all-surface player, grass is Mauresmo's best surface by far.

Maria Sharapova
Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004, became a household name, and hasn't won a Slam since. But grass is her surface, and she is surely very hungry to win again. Last year, she lost her semifinal against eventual winner Venus Williams (the mutual screaming was more than I could take). Sharapova has a great second serve and is mentally tough. Like Serena Williams, she can find amazing shots when she needs them.

Justine Henin-Hardenne
She may be the Clay Court Queen, and Wimbledon may be the only Grand Slam she hasn't won (she was a the finalist in 2001), but she is to be feared on any surface. When Henin-Hardenne is on, she's very difficult to beat, though it can be done. Some think that her post-virus physical fragility will prevent her from playing her best after her full two weeks' work at the French Open, but I think differently.

Kim Clijsters
Clijsters has been complaining of never feeling physically right anymore, and clay season was really hard on her body. A grass court gives her muscles a rest, however, and since she is one of the speediest women on the tour, the fast pace of grass suits her game well. Clijsters does have meltdowns from time to time, but if she is up, she is a threat to take the tournament.

Martina Hingis
Because her game is still the best one to watch on the women's tour. And if--and only if--she doesn't have to use that joke of a second serve, she is a contender.

Venus Williams
The defending champion and three-time Wimbledon winner. Say no more.

Friday cat blogging--sister slumber edition

Going after the "real" terrorists

Once again, Greenpeace activists are the target of law enforcement gone mad. A peaceful protest by members of Greenpeace resulted in the arrests of several people who were attempting to depict a whale "graveyard" with 863 cardboard "tails."

The French were not present, so at least the Greenpeace ship wasn't bombed.

The Supreme Court does a very good thing

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court made it much easier to hold an employer liable when that employer retaliates against an employee for making a charge of discrimination against the company. The unanimous ruling upheld a lower court decision on behalf of a forklift operator who said her company had retaliated against her when she made a charge of sex discrimination.

I heard a report about it on NPR, and a spokesperson for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was disappointed and said something to the effect of "Oh well, we'll just have to train people not to retaliate." You have to train people not to retaliate against their employees? I guess you do. His statement pretty said it all.

Terry Gross interviews Joseph Margulies

If you didn't get to hear the "Fresh Air" featuring Joseph Margulies, here it is. Margulies was on to talk about his new book, Guantanamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power. The stories he tells about our government are harrowing.

Group of Republicans stalls renewal of Voting Rights Act

A spokesperson for House Speaker Dennis Hastert says that the Republican leadership "is committed to passing the Voting Rights Act legislation as soon as possible."

Maybe not. Today, just as the vote to renew the Voting Rights Act was about to take place, some members of the Republican Party met behind closed doors and decided to stall the vote. Their reason? That some of the requirements of the act were no longer relevant to key southern states that historically have tried to prevent African Americans from voting. Two Congressmen from Georgia, Lynn Westmoreland and Jack Kingston, led the movement to delay the vote, and they were joined by 78 other Republicans.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

This is how stupid a lot of people are...

Everywhere I go on the Web, conservatives accuse non-conservatives of "getting your news from CNN." Hello! CNN=Fox, except that the anchors on Fox are more tolerable to watch.

What if we hadn't invaded Iraq?

I think about this during idle moments. Would our government still be applauding itself for having "rid" Afghanistan of the Taliban? Would there be any serious efforts to stop the ongoing oppression, especially of women and girls, there? How would Bush's campaign debts to big oil have been paid? Would any real money have been allotted to help America's first responders and to protect cargo holds and containers?

Your thoughts...

The book banners are at it again

The ACLU has asked a federal judge to stop the Miami-Dade County school district from removing some children's books from its libraries. The books include Vamos a Cuba and A Visit to Cuba, and were removed because school officials say they contain inaccuracies about life in a Communist country. Both the county schools chief and two advisory committees recommended that the books stay on the shelves, but the county board voted to remove them.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

ROFLMAO, or something like that

"Telling the truth is one of the better things people who have changed our history have done."

Lynne Cheney, speaking to a group of children at the Civil Rights Institute in Birmingham

Women sue state trooper and member of Santorum's promotional team

Remember, back in August, when the Delaware State Police supported one of its members strong-arming of some women who came to protest Rick Santorum at his Barnes & Noble book-signing? The trooper was on private guard duty but wearing his official uniform. He arrested two of the women and threatened all of them with prison.

That trooper, Sgt. Mark DiJiacomo, has been sued by four of the women and one minor, and there is also a suit against an unidentified member of Santorum's team. The women have filed the suit because of the deprivation of the First and Fourth Amendment rights, and for distress caused by false arrest and threats.

If you are going to argue against anti-cruelty campaigns, at least have a clue what you're talking about

Just in case you are one of the totally ignorant people who continues to distribute ridiculous falsehoods all over the Web, for the one thousandth time...

PETA did not smash up any lab buildings. PETA has never destroyed any property. PETA is subversive, not lawless.

Yes, there is something wrong with Beyonce, the Williams sisters, or anyone wearing fur. We may not agree that it is wrong to kill an innocent creature because you want to look chic in a Miami club (and yes, I think there is something frightening about your not agreeing), but how can we not agree that it is wrong to torture that creature before it dies? Leghold traps, lifelong confinement in a tiny space, and anal electrocution are examples of extreme cruelty.

Yes, animals kill and eat each other in "nature." They also urinate and defecate wherever they happen to be, have sex with whoever is in heat wherever they happen to be, and physically attack whoever frightens them. So...are we "civilized" about some things and not about others? That's convenient. And anyway, other animals do not torture their prey before killing and eating it.

Telling animal rights group to "work for legislation" instead of participating in activist activites is, frankly, a ridiculous suggestion. They do work for legislation, of course. But waiting for legislative bodies to stop oppression has never worked because those bodies are made up of the oppressors, and of people who are afraid to act. There would be no black civil rights movement if there had been no sit-ins, marches and riots. There would be no gay rights movement without Stonewall. There would be no women's rights movement (such as it is) if the suffragists had not chained themselves to public buildings.

Humans are not superior to "animals." Humans are animals. If having a lesser-functioning brain means that you can be trapped, confined, tossed live into boiling water, dragged behind a truck, force-fed, and anally electrocuted, then I should be wearing Sean Hannity-skin shoes and carrying a Michelle Malkin-skin handbag.

On "playing the blame game"

After New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast were devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, both Karl Rove's operatives and the Office of Homeland Security did a splendid job of blaming Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco for all manner of things she did not do. They also attacked her for doing things that were right (such as refusing to let Bush take over the state), and they accused her of not performing tasks she had performed (such as immediately calling for federal troops). New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin also attacked Blanco. This is not to say that Blanco did everything right, just that she was blamed for a great number of things that had nothing to do with her performance as the state's leader. The media ate this stuff up without chewing and spread Rove's lies, as usual. As a result, Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Bobby bumper stickers began appearing in south Louisiana.

Bashing Blanco and Nagin became a national sport on talk shows, message boards, blogs, and in letters to the editor. Then memos of what actually happened were released, and the despicable Brown began spilling the beans and whining. It turned out that Blanco did request everything that she should have, that Bush knew about the crisis early on, that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers knew they were designing levees destined to fail.

The incompetence and gross immorality of these failings is colossal in nature, but when it came time to accuse the Corps of Engineers, Bush, Chertoff, etc., we were told "Don't play the blame game." "Stop playing the blame game." It was okay to accuse Blanco, Nagin, and the citizens of New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast of being incompetent, lazy and ignorant, but to point the finger where most of the finger belongs is "playing the blame game" and is not allowed.

I have found that when people--conservatives, to be exact--are caught in deception and irresponsibility, any attack on them is part of a "blame game" that is "not constructive." I experience the same thing in my psychotherapy practice, on a more personal scale. If your mother beat you or your father molested you, "move on" and don't "blame" them.

I experience it as an animal rights activist, as a feminist, and as an LGBT rights activist. "Culture" and "tradition" are used to justify cruelty and bigotry every day.

I experience it in interpersonal communication. "I didn't mean anything by it." "I was just saying..."

Here is a novel idea: What if the group that is constantly hitting us on the head with the concept of "taking responsibility" took responsibility for destroying New Orleans and much of the Gulf Coast?

When we will leave Iraq?

Richard Armitage says maybe soon, because Iraq will ask us to.

Press secretary does Snow job on Imus

It doesn't take much to get Don Imus to endorse all manner of lies and distortions. White House Press Secretary Tony Snow found it was pretty easy on June 14 when he stated that George W. Bush had never linked Saddam Hussein with the attacks of September 11, 2001.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Once again, the Senate endorses fraud, waste and mismanagement

In another vote on whether to investigate massive waste and fraud in the awarding of Iraq-related contracts, the U.S. Senate voted along party lines (with the exception of Lincoln Chafee) not to do so.

To my surprise, the American Episcopal Church does the right thing

I thought the delegates would cave, but they didn't: A majority of delegates to the General Convention voted against a measure that would have urged dioceses not to consecrate gay bishops.

Schultz-McCarthy returns to tennis, and not all the spin is topspin

Dutch tennis star Brenda Schultz, now Brenda Schultz-McCarthy, used to have the fastest serve in women's tennis--she once clocked a ball at 123 mph. Venus Williams' 127 mph. ball is now the record, and other women have hit the ball at 123, but Schultz-McCarthy did a lot of damage with her serve during her years on the tour, and was in the top 10.

A herniated disc stopped Schultz-McCartney's career in 1999, and she set up a tennis camp in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Last year, however, she coached the Netherlands' Fed Cup team, and when she realized she could play better than her team members, she decided to give the tour another go.

In order to get back into professional tennis, Schultz-McCarthy had to hand over most of her considerable tour winnings to repay her insurance money from the injury. Though she won the DFS Classic in 1992, the tournament declined to give her a wild card, which many of us think was on the mean side. She then entered the Ordina Open, where she has already made it to the round of 16, having beaten both Laura Granville and Poland's talented Marta Domachowska.

Schultz-McCarthy is 35 years old. When Pete Sampras won his last U.S. Open, he was 31. Everyone said what an amazing athlete he was. If Schultz-McCarthy keeps winning, some people will say she is a good athlete, but many will say her success just proves how bad the women's tour is. They are already saying it. What a difference a gender makes.

Flag Protection Amendment is scary, unnecessary, and vague as all get-out

Writing in yesterday's USA Today, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein called for passage of the Flag Protection Amendment. Her rationale, provided by former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White, is that the flag is a "monument," and we would not allow anyone to deface a national monument.

It is quite a stretch to call the U.S. flag a monument. The flag is not an erected structure or an original document ecased in glass, but rather, a reproducible symbol. It also does not symbolize a shared belief--conservatives abandoned the Constitution and the foundations of the republic some time ago. Of course, it is wrong to deface a flag that is flying on a government building, a business, or someone's house. That is vandalism, and is already illegal. I believe in harsh penalties for vandalism, but I do not believe that vandalism of a flag is any worse than vandalism of another part of someone else's property.

Feinstein, in an ambiguous statement that I hope is the fault of a bad copy editor at the newspaper, says:

The Flag Protection Amendment would not prohibit flag burning. Rather, the amendment would simply return to Congress the ability to protect the flag as it has been protected throughout most of this nation's history.

Actually, that is good to know, since part of standard flag etiquette, taught to us when we were children, is that the only proper way to dispose of a flag is to burn it. So if the FPA passes, will all proper burning/disposals of the flag have to be done under cover, or will people have to obtain permits to perform them? The amendment defines neither "flag" nor "desecration." If I have an American flag shirt and I cut it up to make rags to clean my car, am I in violation of the amendment? If I stand on my own property and set fire to my own personal American flag, can my neighbors report me to the police?

The Citizens Flag Alliance, which supports the amendment, lists some truly chilling reasons for supporting it:

It is commonly accepted today that the traditional values upon which our nation was founded and which find tangible expression in our respect for our flag are essential to the smooth functioning of a free society. Flag protection highlights and enhances these values and thus helps to preserve freedom and democratic government.

The government has a fundamental interest in protecting the most basic condition of freedom; our bond to one another in our aspiration for national unity. With traditional unifying elements of American language, culture and heritage fraying, the flag remains a single unifying embodiment of our unceasing struggle for liberty and equality and our basic commitment to others. The flag affirms that without some aspiration to national unity, a free people and constitutional government cannot long endure.

Finally, the flag is an important incident of our national sovereignty. The United States--like many other nations--displays the flag to signify national ownership and protection. By pronouncements in the earliest years of the Republic, the Framers of the Constitution made clear that the flag, and its physical requirements, related to the existence and sovereignty of the nation and that insults to the flag were matters of great national concern that warranted strict punitive action.

"Traditional values." "With traditional unifying elements of American language, culture and heritage fraying...." "...insults to the flag were matters of great national concern that warranted strict punitive action." Scare you to death? It ought to.

The FPA is not only unnecessary and hysterical, it is so vague that no one has any idea what it really means and what could be the consequences of its passage.

Pentagon document continues to classify homosexuality as a mental defect

Though the mental health profession stopped labeling homosexuality a mental disorder decades ago, it turns out that the Pentagon did not. An official Pentagon document lists homosexuality along with mental retardation and personality disorders, as a "defect."

The document, found by the Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military, is not in accordance with other Pentagon mental health regulations, and is to be reviewed.

Halliburton contracts up by 600%

A document compiled at the request of Rep. Henry Waxman of California, confirms that federal contracts are now the fastest growing component of federal discretionary spending. The Government Accountability Office and the Defense Contract Audit Agency were two of the agencies whose 500 reports, audits and investigations were used to compile the report.

(Continue reading at MoJo Blog)

Can't they at least be proud bigots?

Some people who signed the petition supporting the Florida Marriage Protection Amendment, are unhappy that their names have been published on the Know Thy Neighbor Florida website. The petition, however, is a public record.

And shouldn't you know that when you sign it?

And shouldn't you be proud to "protect" marriage?

And boo-hoo.

Endorsements and party loyalty

If endorsements do not mean anything, then politicians need to stop making them. For example, the Republican (he "changed" to the Democratic Party two days before his first election, and has governed totally as a Republican--he is a fake if ever there was one) mayor of New Orleans, Ray Nagin, endorsed Bobby Jindal for governor of Louisiana. Jindal is a slick, fast-talking former Bush administration bureaucrat who also happens to be an extreme right-wing nutcase.

During the gubernatorial election, Jindal made it clear that he wanted prayer of every fashion in schools and he wanted the Ten Commandments stuck everywhere imaginable, including, probably, my front yard. He is "pro-family," and also campaigned as being against abortion in all circumstances, including rape, incest, and to save the health or life of the mother.

So Nagin endorsed him. And I'm sure he endorsed him because of his bureaucratic skills, but that does not erase the fact that Jindal promotes an extreme right-wing agenda. The very good mayor of the town on whose outskirts I live endorsed Jindal, and our very effective parish president endorsed him, too. I appreciate the good work that both of these local Republican leaders have done, especially post-Katrina, but it does not remove the moral stain they now carry for endorsing someone who would rather see a woman die than permit any abortions to take place, and who seeks to destroy the U.S. Constitution.

As for Jindal--during the campaign, he talked about how happy he was that Baton Rouge was his home and how settled he was there with his pro-family family. When he lost the election, he promptly moved to a New Orleans suburb and was elected to Congress.

Thoughts on Torture Awareness Month

For many of us, the concept of torture is so horrific, we find it difficult to believe that it is practiced. Torture is not practical, but sadistic. Those who practice it do so because of a desire to make others suffer. Who is stupid enough to think that people being tortured will not say just about anything to make the torture stop? In America, our government justifies the less horrible types of torture by calling them "abuse." But that is only when the government and military officials' backs are against the wall: Most of the time, they consider such practices normal.

Extraordinary rendition, in which the U.S. has been very active, is the passive aggressive bureaucrat's preferred method of torture. Send the "person of interest" to a country where torture is a fine art, and then wipe your hands clean of the consequences. "Not out problem anymore." How convenient.

The events that took place at Abu Gharib are perfect examples of torture as an exercise in deriving sadistic pleasure. Prisoners were hurt and humiliated because it gave their captors a high to hurt and humiliate them, not because they were providing essential intelligence about a war that, by the way, is being fought for no reason.

There is nothing new about any of this. The way to get soldiers to be amoral and hyper-aggressive is to get them to hate the enemy. Last year in Harper's, there was an interview with a Palestinian soldier who said that he figured the Israeli soldiers were okay people, but it was his job to kill them, so that's what he did, and he did it well. There is nothing extraordinary in this soldier's statement: It is the nature of war. You kill or be killed, you kill because it is your job, or you kill because you have been taught to hate the enemy.

But the concept of torture is not confined to war. Remember, during the 90s, how eager so many thousands of Americans were for the young American prisoner in Singapore to be caned? Look at American prisons: Sadistic torture is often the order of the day. Look at many American homes, where children are beaten, whipped, burned, and routinely humiliated by kneeling on rice, sometimes while holding cans of food.

And finally, consider this: Many of the people who are so appalled by the treatment of prisoners at Abu Gharib and Guantanamo Bay sit down to discuss their indignation over a dinner of factory farm meat. Hogs crowded into gestation crates and hens stuffed into battery cages so small that they cannot turn around, downed animals left to die slow, painful deaths, very young and weak calves dragged behind trucks to slaughter houses, chickens' beaks cut off without anesthesia, chickens thrown up against wall for the "pleasure" of the chicken factory employees, geese with tubes forced down their throats to fatten them, veal calves confined to tiny cages where they, too are force-fed, hogs legs' pulled off, live chickens thrown into scalding water, sores and diseases everywhere, and on and on.

Some people were angry when PETA published its "A Holocaust On Your Plate" campaign, but a sentient being is a sentient being. I own the posters, and it is very, very hard to look at them.

In the end, the real difference between tortured humans and tortured non-humans is that the non-humans are eaten, worn as clothing, and swept away as lab trash.

It is time for Americans to take a look at our attitudes about torture. During wartime (even during fake wartime), we consider humiliation, pain, and rape "normal." Many parents consider the humiliation and pain of children to be "normal" because it reflects how they were treated by their own parents.

And millions of the biggest liberals around think nothing of dining on or wearing the products of daily, mass torture that is arguably the cruelest of all. If we are going to stop torture, we need to stop all of it.

People ask "When will New Orleans be back to normal?"

Well, over the weekend, five teenage boys were shot to death in Mid-City.

Two NOPD officers were recently arrested for shaking down a massage parlor owner.

An NOPD officer recently roughed up and threatened a Jefferson Parish taxi driver who was making a legitimate drop-off in the city.

Mayor Nagin ordered use of new landfill right smack on top of one of New Orleans' largest Vietnamese neighborhoods. Residents are afraid for their health, and also doubt whether the landfill is safe with regard to nearby major wetlands. Right before the election, Nagin stopped the dumping. Right after he got back in office, he resumed it.

Sounds normal to me.

Sometimes, there's nothing to be said

You just have to see it.