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From metafilter:
One of the more interesting Senate races in 2004 is shaping up in Florida, where everyone but the electorate appears to know that Republican U.S. Rep. Mark Foley is gay. This open secret — which would help explain how a “dream come true” right-wing politician has a strong gay-rights voting record — calls into question whether respecting a person’s right to “stay in the closet” perpetuates the idea that homosexuality is abnormal. (Via Eschaton).
“I begin to feel like I was in the last generation of Americans who took a civics class. I begin to feel like most Americans don’t understand the First Amendment, don’t understand the idea of freedom of speech, and don’t understand that it’s the responsibility of the citizen to speak out….When I write a political column for the Chicago Sun-Times, when liberals disagree with me, they send in long, logical e-mails explaining all my errors. I hardly ever get well-reasoned articles from the right. People just tell me to shut up. That’s the message: ‘Shut up. Don’t write anymore about this. Who do you think you are?'” Roger Ebert chats about dissent, celebrities, the power of film to effect change, and Moore. [metafilter.com]
Oh, God! Under the Bush administration there were a lot of things we had to forget, things like how democratic presidents get elected, how to sell democracy to undemocratic peoples, how to be free, patriotic, etc. Now, it seems, is the time to forget all about this menace to mankind: SCIENCE. [metafilter.com]
The Screen Actors Guild has likened the atmosphere to the McCarthy-era anti-Communist witch-hunts of the 1950s. It issued a statement saying that no performer should be denied work on the basis of his or her political beliefs. “Even a hint of the blacklist must never again be tolerated in this nation,” it said.
Within three hours of that statement being posted, the guild was inundated with the by now familiar deluge of hate mail. Nevertheless, the statement remains steadfastly posted on the guild’s website.
Did the Bush administration pass some law requiring the leaders of political parties to insult at least one minority group during their term in office while I wasn’t looking? [Morons Dot Org]
The New Chosen. After reading about six Congressmen living in unbelievably cheap housing owned by a religious organization called “The Fellowship Foundation” (or “The Fellowship” or “The Foundation”) (via Fark), I became curious about the group. They sponsor the National Prayer Breakfast, but they’d rather you didn’t know that – they go to great pains to give the impression that it’s an official government function. (President Bush’s remarks from 2002, and Rev. Rob Schenck’s take on missing the same breakfast.) In March, Harper’s Magazine ran Jeffrey Sharlet’s first-person account on being a Fellowship neonate, in which he describes the group’s organizational structure (which takes its clues from terrorists, Hitler, and the Mafia). In 2002 the Los Angeles Times published an examination of the Foundation’s political activities (hosted at toobeautiful.org, which recounts an interesting episode in which three Congressmen, all Fellowship members, take the opportunity to proselytize to a foreign head of state while on official government business. [more inside] [metafilter.com]
MSNBC is reporting that the little town of Arcata, California has become the first city in the United States to pass a law outlawing voluntary compliance with the Patriot Act of 2002. Other cities have issued resolutions condemning the Partiot Act, and Hawaii is in the process of passing a statewide resolution, but Arcata stands as the first political body in the United States to legally defy it. [Kuro5hin.org]
Once again, President Bush is folding his hands in his public office and raising his middle finger a bit higher to those of non-Judeo-Christian faith or no faith at all… [Morons Dot Org]
This is what pisses me off about Bush. I believe religion should be kept out of the government. They have no right to tell us that we should pray or what we should believe. I consider myself an atheist & I don’t care much for any religion. I don’t care what anyone else believes as long as they keep it to themselves.
A grant for developing a secure, free operating system was cancelled by DARPA, the U.S. military’s research agency, when a programmer working on the project expressed anti-war sentiments. He wonders if his freedom of speech is in jeopardy. [Wired News]
Howard Dean writes about the Bush doctrine (and more) for Common Dreams.
“I am what is commonly referred to as a social liberal and a fiscal conservative.”
In other words, he’s not only about the war, it’s the economy stupid. [metafilter.com]
Dean is my choice for the next president. After reading this, I’m even more impressed.
Excerpt:
The President who campaigned on a platform of a humble foreign policy has instead begun implementing a foreign policy characterized by dominance, arrogance and intimidation. The tidal wave of support and goodwill that engulfed us after the tragedy of 9/11 has dried up and been replaced by undercurrents of distrust, skepticism and hostility by many who had been among our closest allies.
This unilateral approach to foreign policy is a disaster. All of the challenges facing the United States – from winning the war on terror and containing weapons of mass destruction to building an open world economy and protecting the global environment – can only be met by working with our allies. A renegade, go-it-alone approach will be doomed to failure, because these challenges know no boundaries.
The largest, most sophisticated military in the history of the world cannot eliminate the threat of sleeper terrorist cells. That task requires the highest level of intelligence cooperation with our allies.