Random News Stories Summarized

More stuff that is happening in our little corner of the world...

In my recent post on King President Bush's growing abuses of executive power, I noted that Attorney General Gonzales and the FBI Director are pressuring "telecommunications officials to record their customers' Internet activities" and retain the information. USA Today elaborates on this in a new story. The article states that "Top law enforcement officials have asked leading Internet companies to keep histories of the activities of Web users for up to two years to assist in criminal investigations of child pornography and terrorism, the Justice Department said Wednesday", but adds that "Justice is not asking the companies to keep the content of e-mails, spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said. It wants records such as lists of e-mail traffic and Web searches, he said."

Meanwhile, the AP reports that the request "has prompted alarm from some executives and privacy advocates".

Moving on, as the aftermath of the Haditha massacre unfolds, things go from bad worse. Amid news of further civilian killings by U.S. forces, the Iraqi Prime Minister has made strong accusations against our armed forces that cannot be dismissed in terms of their significance. From the NY Times (via AmericaBlog), Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki "said violence against civilians had become a 'daily phenomenon' by troops in the American-led coalition who 'do not respect the Iraqi people.'". Does it even need to be said that when the Prime Minister- whom we helped select because Bush and crew didn't like the old one- is accusing the U.S. of systematic war crimes, that we have entered a whole new level of disaster in Iraq? The word 'quagmire' doesn't really cover it anymore.

No surprise that Iraqi war veterans are concerned they will face the same level of scorn and/or indifference when returning home that Vietnam vets faced. I imagine the psychological scars that destroyed many veterans' lives after Vietnam will also be a factor now.

As for Afghanistan... it's only looking slightly less horrific these days.

In other news, hurricane season has begun and things aren't looking much better now than last Fall on the Gulf Coast. [*insert heckuva job reference here*] Meanwhile, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers officially takes reponsibility for the flooding of New Orleans based on their failures in building the levees. They said they can hope the tragedy has given them the lessons needed to create better flood protection. In related news, radar maps show that New Orleans is sinking.

In a rare occurence, politicians from both parties are angry over the same issue. Homeland Security's decision to cut anti-terror funding to New York and Washington DC (while increasing it in smaller, heartland areas) has been met with anger by both conservative and liberal outlets. The story gets odder as ABC News reveals that a Homeland Security form used to figure out the new funding stated that New York has no national monuments or icons. As ABC notes in response, "The formula did not consider as landmarks or icons: The Empire State Building, The United Nations, The Statue of Liberty and others found on several terror target hit lists. It also left off notable landmarks, such as the New York Public Library, Times Square, City Hall and at least three of the nation's most renowned museums: The Guggenheim, The Metropolitan and The Museum of Natural History." Mayor Bloomberg summed it up by stating that "I think the facts are clear. What they've really done is taken what was supposed to be threat-based and just started to distribute it as normal pork." Politically motivated mistakes like this is exactly what the 9/11 Commission warned us about.

In other news... massive deficit and debt? Must be time to cut more taxes!

Finally, in humorous right-wing immigration 'crisis' land, two stories of interest. Michelle Malkin wants to tell you how much she supports the shit out of Dunkin Donuts because they don't hire illegal immigrants. "National security never tasted so good", she states. No, honey, that's a munchkin. Moving on to the insane rather than amusing, a new report states that "VeriChip Corporation has proposed implanting the company's RFID tracking tags in immigrant and guest workers." Let's pray that Congress wasn't listening.