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"Free Speech"
Former Surgeon General Richard Carmona appeared Tuesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, charging that top Bush administration officials silenced him in his public health reports. According to Carmona, during his four-year term (2002-2006) he was not allowed to speak or issue reports regarding stem cells, emergency contraception, sex education, or prison, mental, and global health issues.
Regarding the politicization of his office, Carmona added that some other former Surgeon Generals told him, “We have never seen it as partisan, as malicious, as vindictive, as mean-spirited as it [...]
Full Story... →This morning, RABid is pimping Ken Blackwell’s latest column on TownHall. The entire column is a fabrication – a lie – and plainly claims a bill does something it explicitly does not. Let’s take a closer look, shall we?
Blackwell says:
A bill making it illegal for people of various faiths to freely hold and profess their respective religion’s teaching on sexual morality is working its way through Congress.
The bill says:
Nothing in this Act, or the amendments made by this Act, shall be construed to prohibit any expressive conduct protected from legal prohibition by, or [...]
Full Story... →This post is a Matty Special, just for our friends at RABid.
It turns out that Dr. Laura’s son, who is currently deployed in Afghanistan, had a MySpace page. And what a page it was.
The soldier son of talk radio relationship counselor Laura Schlessinger is under investigation for a graphic personal Web page that one Army official has called “repulsive.”
The MySpace page, publicly available until Friday when it disappeared from the Internet, included cartoon depictions of rape, murder, torture and child molestation; photographs of soldiers with guns in their mouths; a photograph of a bound and blindfolded [...]
Full Story... →Retired General John Batiste had his consulting arrangement with CBS terminated due to his participation in a recent VoteVets ad. Think Progress notes the numerous excuses and backtracking that followed the announcement. They either can’t get their story straight or they never had one.
Keith Olbermann discussed this recently with the general and it seems clear that the Republicans are out to eat their own in their orgy of a power scramble. Not only can you not be anti-war. You can’t even be pro-war to a different tune than the administration. It’s laughable and an indication that [...]
Full Story... →Update: Some of this post references Scott’s post here (and my comment there) – meant to link it but didn’t.
OK, funny ha-ha time over. I’m on record as giggling my ass off over the thought of strippers at my old office. I’m also on record as not a big strip club fan. However, the issue doesn’t really stop at the 6 feet rule or hours of operation. I’ve been thinking about this alot and was on my way to writing why this is, indeed, important – and even a “progressive cause”. As happens sometimes, someone else ends up [...]
Full Story... →It’s been seven long years, but over the weekend Rage Against The Machine played the Coachella festival out in California. They’ve got a few other planned dates… but might they be encouraged to write new music?
I hope so.
Bonus bootleg footage after the jump.
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Montgomery County BOE reconsiders allowing pollworkers to wear “right to life” shirts
When I finally got close to the front of the line at my polling place in 2004, a pollworker told me to cover my T-shirt. It had the words “Vote Explosion” on it.
Seeing as I had nothing to cover it with and had just spent 3 hours in line, I politely pointed out that there was no partisanship expressed by the shirt. Vote Explosion was just a loose group of friends registering folks to vote at rock shows. She replied that they were trying to avoid even the slightest possible implication of impropriety.
OK, fair enough. Polling places are supposed to be inner sanctums of nonpartisanhip. Neither voters nor pollworkers may wear political shirts, stickers, or buttons within a 100 foot radius. Although the words “Vote Explosion” aren’t explicitly partisan, neither are the words “Eagle Forum” or “MoveOn.” I think it was a wise move to err on the side of overzealousness, and simply prohibit T-shirts bearing all of the above.
The guy behind me in line loaned me his sweatshirt, and I was able to step forth to express my partisanship in the privacy of the voting booth. As an ongoing tribute of thanks to sweatshirt guy, ever since that day I’ve stowed an extra large, plain T-shirt in my purse whenever I go to vote – just in case a fellow voter is asked to cover up.
Until I read Monday’s Columbus Dispatch, it had never occurred to me that I might someday want to offer my spare shirt to a pollworker.
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