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Oh, let’s all hail Rick (the P is silent) Santorum for his primary wins in Alabama and Mississippi, proving I suppose, that really hateful and reactionary rhetoric sincerely expressed is still appreciated in some circles of hell parts of the US of A. Hateful and reactionary policy, however, whether directed at reporters or whistle-blowers of any kind, or of course, the usual suspects (those poor bastards at GTMO) … well, those ill-feelings are wonderfully bi-partisan. I realize I’m a broken record. No one is listening– or wants to. The country’s attentions will now turn to “March Madness,” as even what...

Haven’t had too much chance to blog… but how ’bout that Eric Holder and the new “Liquidate enemies of the state? Trust us.” Honestly– it’s the logical next step after being able to throw anyone we want into a dungeon without any semblance of legal or constitutional rights (and btw, this is “citizens or anyone else”)… why NOT target assassinations? Greenwald rightly decries Democrats for their ominous partisan silence on this– even as Republicans have the intellectual honesty to laud Obama for embracing policies they like. Yes… that’s where we are. Another third world dictatorship, only with better drones (and...

And so we come to a once-quadrennial event, February 29th. I spent the early part of it convalescing in a big city emergency room, following up on an ailment that has plagued me much of this month; to my immense relief (and that of TD-Mom, who stayed with me, Mrs. TD and the Pup, and the rest of TD Famiglia… and hopefully, but not necessarily, TD World), I’m told that things are improving, and neither a multi-day hospital stay (as happened a fortnight or so ago) nor surgery is required. At least for now. And so, as I approach my...

Thousands braved the Russian winter to protest the inevitable election of Vladimir Putin back to the presidency of Russia in Moscow, forming a near human chain along that city’s Garden Ring road. Where was the pepper spray, the sonic weaponry or the tear gas and flash grenades? It’s about confidence, in some sense… the Russian people are confident that their government won’t open fire on them, and Mr. Putin is reasonably confident, he’ll win his election even without [the inevitable] fraud. In the US of A, by contrast, the status quo senses its grip beginning to slip, and hence, it...

That’s pretty much the only thing you can say about insistence by the Germans European financial authorities that already depression-ridden Greece lower its minimum wage some more and other pointlessly draconian austerity measures in order to secure yet another bailout (of mega-banks, of course). Of course, there are those who contend that this is about actual sado-masochism— German popular insistence that other (swarthier) people suffer as a price of German taxpayer bailout while Greece itself (its elites, anyway) enjoy the pain of still being in the euro, when pulling out and just defaulting would, in the end, result in far...

Sorry to be my usual downer self… Hey, I’m as pleased as any New Yawker to see the scrappy N.Y. Giants triumph over the more arrogant (though still brilliant) N.E. Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI (the last place we still use Roman #’S!) as anyone… but I do note that the route of the inevitable ticker-tape (sort of) parade scheduled for tomorrow goes, as usual, right by my office building, which means it also goes right past the Occupy!-free Zuccotti Park (which I assume will be extra clean for the occasion!) The D.C. Occupy! is under some extra “tent cleaning”...

Alrightie then: this from WaPo’s Judy Greg Miller, in which the Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper, Jr. suggested in prepared testimony that Iran is planning on terrrrrrrrorist strikes within our precious bodily fluids the Amurkan homeland, in retaliation for proposed unilateral American aggression in service of the Likud party possible military strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities. Well, our uniformed personnel are out of Iraq now (though, of course, an American taxpayer funded mercenary force will remain)… we can only bog down so many of them in Afghanistan… so… time for another war… somewhere! Of course, the only real...

Honestly, the Grey Lady, in juxtaposing two articles, one in which it evidently decries former Republican National Committee Chairman and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour’s remarkably generous granting of pardons on his way out the door, and Republican Presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and his longstanding financial ties to Goldman Sachs, invites the immediate comparison of “which one is more troubling?”, It is necessary to observe that , at least in the 2008 election cycle, three of Barack Obama’s ten largest contributors were Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase and Citigroup, and that since Barack Obama took office, virtually...

And so it continues. The war on whistleblowers. Famously, of course, Bradley Manning (recently recommended for court-martial…). Now, CIA agent John Kiriakou. Six such prosecutions in all… more than all prior American administrations combined. Kiriakou, allegedly, disclosed some of the horrific tortures associated with the abuse of Abu Zubaydah, KSM and others. Note that the actual torture is of no concern to this Administration– the disclosure of the waterboarding and other egregious torture, however… that is the highest crime of all. Because… The “crime,” of course… is embarassing the Empire. This is reminiscent of the Abu Ghraib perps: that they...

World War III edition? Let’s see… plans for Israeli/USA false flag attacks on Iran? Check. Do we have our “war on” with Iran? Er, check. Is the Grey Lady out there with its Judy Miller-style propaganda, making sure the USA public will be well-behind the coming mega-war? Checkarino. And of course, is all this really about propping up Israeli-domestic-political and internal-American-political-diversion (not to mention generating uber-profits for the usual suspects), because what would actually work to bring down the Iranian regime would be dialing down the World War rhetoric thereby letting oil prices crash and hence bankrupting the Iranian regime?...