As recently as a few days ago, the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has been considering an appeal from CBS over a $550,000 fine with from the Federal Communications Commission after Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction” during the Super Bowl a couple of years ago. CBS has a relatively compelling argument: that the FCC has generally […]
First up from the God machine is a story that combines two of my favorite subjects: religion news and science fiction. Last week, two self-proclaimed Jedi Knights appealed to the United Nations to recognize their faith as an official religion and accordingly rename the International Day for Tolerance to Interstellar Day of Tolerance. The petition […]
Guest Post by Morbo Like intestinal flu, head colds and raging sore throats, offensive netlore just keeps making the rounds. Someone sent me an e-mail recently that I assume was cooked up by some fundamentalist Christian somewhere who thinks he’s clever. It concerns sending Christmas cards to the American Civil Liberties Union. Let’s take a […]
Andrew Sullivan captured the dynamic perfectly: “The task of American democracy tackling the kind of issues that were once the province of South American countries has now begun. The authorization of war crimes, torture, and illegal wire-tapping by this administration needs to be thoroughly investigated in order to hold more than a few scapegoat grunts […]
Under Republican rule, lobbyists for corporate and industry interests had it relatively easy. Sure, the “K Street Project” forced them to hire an exclusively Republican staff, but the lobbyists and their firms knew that they could get the job done for their clients. Indeed, thanks to the GOP rule, they could simply buy access — […]
Particularly after 9/11, when government whistleblowers were lauded for having the courage to expose misjudgment and mismanagement in key federal agencies, the message went out to government employees: if you see a national security problem, don’t just keep it to yourself. Unfortunately, the message failed to mention that whistleblowers wouldn’t get any protection at all. […]
Iraq is unraveling… A barrage of car bombs, mortar attacks and missiles battered the Shiite Muslim slum of Sadr City on Thursday afternoon, killing around 200 people and injuring as many more in the single deadliest assault on Iraqi civilians since the start of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003. The highly orchestrated attacks on […]
Given that control of Congress does not hang in the balance, and certain assumptions that elections in Florida are supposed to be embarrassing failures, not nearly enough attention is being given to the recently-decided House race in Florida’s 13th congressional district. Whether you believe some of the general discussion about Republicans trying to “steal” elections […]
The fact that Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) is not well isn’t groundbreaking news. Neither, for that matter, is the fact that Tancredo is aggressively opposed to the president’s immigration policy. I didn’t know, however, just how far over the edge Tancredo was willing to go. President Bush believes America should be more of an idea […]
I can understand Republicans in DC being upset with the timing of Bush’s dismissal of Donald Rumsfeld. By waiting until the day after the election, the president seemed to have the political calculations backwards. That said, Bob Novak wrote a scathing column yesterday on how Bush handled the Rumsfeld problem, but from an entirely different […]