I'm not sure if this is real. See the thread for details. If it is real, its basically everything the left told you to worry about, but fortunately this view is at least marginalized enough that the organization Wonkette touts as having gone out in support of this idea has done an extensive job of destroying every shred of evidence that they were ever associated with it or it's author. Whether this is because they are horrified by this idea and any thought that they might be associated with it, or if its because you're not supposed to talk about fight club, is really impossible to know. In fact, without more information its impossible to know if this really happened. That question in itself makes this interesting.

If President Bush copied Julius Caesar by ordering his army to empty Iraq of Arabs and repopulate the country with Americans, he would achieve immediate results: popularity with his military; enrichment of America by converting an Arabian Iraq into an American Iraq (therefore turning it from a liability to an asset); and boost American prestiege while terrifying American enemies.

He could then follow Caesar’s example and use his newfound popularity with the military to wield military power to become the first permanent president of America, and end the civil chaos caused by the continually squabbling Congress and the out-of-control Supreme Court.

U.S. Conservative calls for military coup of U.S. Government

As the United States and Iran are locked in a battle for power and influence across the Middle East—with the fear of an Iranian nuclear weapon looming in the background—FRONTLINE gains unprecedented access to Iranian hard-liners shaping government policy, including parliament leader Hamid Reza Hajibabaei, National Security Council member Mohammad Jafari and state newspaper editor Hossein Shariatmadari.

Frontline continues to be worth the hour. This report paints a damning picture of defeat snatched from the jaws of victory in US/Iranian relations mostly due to incompetence. Watch it online.

FRONTLINE: showdown with iran | PBS

Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio, 236 U.S. 230 (1915), was a court case decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1915, in which, in a 9-0 vote, the Court ruled that the free speech protection of the Ohio Constitution — which was substantially similar to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution — did not extend to motion pictures.

And this stood for nearly half a century.

Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A very interesting series of articles by Columbia Law Professor Tim Wu about zones in the American legal system where laws are not enforced... Where otherwise illegal activities are legal. There are multiple sections, but I'm linking the second, which is about drug use:

The current program of drug legalization in the United States is closely and explicitly tied to the strange economics of the U.S. health-care industry. The consequence is that how people get their dopamine or other brain chemicals is ever more explicitly, like the rest of medicine, tied to questions of class.

Antidepressants and anxiety treatments aren't cheap: A fancy drug like Wellbutrin can cost anywhere from $1,000 to $2,400 a year. These drugs also require access to a sympathetic doctor who will issue a prescription. That's why, generally speaking, the new legalization program is for better-off Americans. As the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University reports, rich people tend to abuse prescription drugs, while poorer Americans tend to self-medicate with old-fashioned illegal drugs or just get drunk.

The image painted here is of a society whose psychology is largely chemically modified, and has been largely chemically modified for a long time. Wherein low tech drugs like cocaine and cigarettes, which are taken regularly in small doses in other societies, have been replaced with high tech drugs that have the exact same effects in both low and high doses, but which are also extremely expensive due to patents.

I'd argue that the act of getting high for the thrill of it is far more innocent than maintaining a regular drug regiment in order to feel normal... to feel happy about one's life. Now, there is such a thing as mental illness... some people really do need drugs in order to "feel normal." But one wonders how much of our health care budget goes to substance abusers maintaining addictions... putting an artificial sheen on life. There is no way to systematically tell the difference.

American lawbreaking: How laws die. - By Tim Wu - Slate Magazine

Though short on details, Clinton's broadband policy as announced in a statement would create tax incentives to encourage build-out to "underserved areas." She also said that she would "support" state and local broadband initiatives

Clinton pointed to an initiative called ConnectKentucky as an example of a successful public private partnership. She said that the partnership had stimulated significant investment and had expanded the coverage rate to more than 90%.

Has someone informed Mrs. Clinton that the people who get excited about things like broadband are the same people who play Grand Theft Auto?

Hillary on Broadband

Thomas and her attorney, Brian Toder, said Monday they would appeal the $222,000 verdict a Duluth, Minnesota federal jury awarded last week to the RIAA after finding Thomas purloined 24 copyrighted recordings.

Nah man, our legal system is just fine. No problem at all.

EFF to Weigh in on First RIAA Downloading Trial Appeal on Threat Level

Rattle wrote:

President Bush would like to see some form of universal health coverage for all Americans before leaving office next year, a Cabinet official said Monday.

But, Mr. Leavitt said, the president would "like to see the larger debate begin" regarding health care - an emerging issue in the next election.

"The very best opportunity we have may well be in the next 15 months," he said.

Mr. Bush's intentions come on the heels of a universal health care plan offered Monday by Democratic presidential contender Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York.

Are they completely delusional at the White House? If universal health care is something the Bush administration truly cares about, they missed the ball. There is zero chance of them making it a reality in 15 months.

This IS odd. Leavitt was attributed but not directly quoted. Possibilities:

1. Leavitt did not actually say that.
2. If you are going to veto money for sick children, you better overshadow it with something, or its drop dead easy for people to paint you as a bastard. They aren't serious.
3. Republican negotiators believe that the Democrats will have complete control of the government after '08 and feel the time is now to get this done when they are in a position to veto it rather than in 3 years when they have no influence over the situation.
4. Just like the immigration plan, the Bush administration actually sees this as the right answer, and also thinks it is political suicide in America regardless of which party does it, mostly because Rush Limbaugh has too much influence. Seeing as his popularity is in the hole he is willing to take this bullet too. Better to fix this now than in 6 or more years.

I'm actually leaning toward 4 unless this completely falls off the radar screen. The problem is that much like the immigration issue the people have been so brainwashed with bullshit that they will see this move as completely insane. They won't understand how to fit it into the framework the pundits have constructed for them and their will react very negatively toward it as a result.

The basic problem that our government faces today is that the people with numbers who are actually thinking about how to solve problems have been completely overshadowed in the public mind by people whose primary goal is to be entertaining.

RE: Bush Wants Universal Health Coverage

Watch the cops beat this guy down and then charge him with assault!

After waiting in line throughout the morning for the hearing that was scheduled to start at 12:30pm, Rev. Yearwood was stopped from entering the room, while others behind him were allowed to enter. He told the officers blocking his ability to enter the room, that he was waiting in line with everyone else and had the right to enter as well. When they threatened him with arrest he responded with "I will not be arrested today." According to witnesses, six capitol police, without warning, "football tackled him. He was carried off in a wheel chair by DC Fire and Emergency to George Washington Hospital.

Rev. Yearwood was examined for possible head and leg injuries then transferred to Central Processing. He has been charged with "assaulting a police officer."

He obviously made a sudden move which provoked the police to tackle him. Its not clear why the police decided to order him to the back of the line. Its not clear that it took 6 cops to subdue him. What is clear is that he did not assault a police officer. He was arrested for failing to comply with an order, and he resisted arrest. If this video did not exist he probably would, however, be convicted of assault, because the police would all testify that he had done so, and the counter testimony would all come from a bunch of nutty protesters. The charge is clearly a dishonest attempt to inflict harm on him because he refused to do what he was told to, and the charge is at the heart of why this will be controversial.

The bottom line is that many police officers believe that there is no limit to the level of force that they may employ to obtain compliance from people who refuse to follow their orders, no matter how unreasonable their orders may be or how passive the resistance to them is. Its clear from the video that the police are not at all interested in discussing whether or not their order that he move to the back of the line was or was not reasonable. They were simply focused on the fact that they had issued an order and that order was not complied with. Its not about protecting the hearing from unruly people. Its not about right or wrong. Its about power. They could have let him walk away. They tackled him because they wanted to tackle him. The dishonest charge is the evidence that is impossible to explain another way.

AlterNet: Blogs: Video: Anti-War Minister Is Attacked, Gets Leg Broken for Trying to Enter Petraeus Hearing

Katie Hafner puts Virgil on the front page of the Sunday New York Times.

The site, wikiscanner.virgil.gr, created by a computer science graduate student, cross-references an edited entry on Wikipedia with the owner of the computer network where the change originated, using the Internet protocol address of the editor’s network. The address information was already available on Wikipedia, but the new site makes it much easier to connect those numbers with the names of network owners.

WikiScanner is the work of Virgil Griffith, 24, a cognitive scientist who is a visiting researcher at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico. Mr. Griffith, who spent two weeks this summer writing the software for the site, said he got interested in creating such a tool last year after hearing of members of Congress who were editing their own entries.

Mr. Griffith said he “was expecting a few people to get nailed pretty hard” after his service became public. “The yield, in terms of public relations disasters, is about what I expected.”

Mr. Griffith, who also likes to refer to himself as a “disruptive technologist,” said he was certain any more examples of self-interested editing would come out in the next few weeks, “because the data set is just so huge.”

Seeing Corporate Fingerprints in Wikipedia Edits

In closing arguments, Padilla's lawyers argued he never spoke in code. His voice is heard on only seven of 300,000 taped conversations.

They also tried to rebut a key piece of prosecution evidence -- an al Qaeda terrorist training camp application or "mujahedeen data form."

A covert CIA officer -- who testified in disguise at Padilla's trial -- said he was given the form in Afghanistan, and a fingerprint expert found Padilla's prints on the form, prosecutors said.

But Michael Caruso, Padilla's defense attorney, said the prints on the form were not consistent with someone who filled out the document.

"Jose at some point handled the document, but did not fill out the form," Caruso said.

Per the script, clearly you can convict terrorist suspects in the criminal justice system, even if you have almost no evidence, and the evidence you do have is questionable.

I think perhaps we don't use juries because they are actually a good way of determining whether or not someone is guilty. We use them to distribute responsibility for making the determination, so that no one person can be held personally responsible if it was wrong, or completely baseless, or politically motivated. We don't know how to build a system that makes good decisions, so we've built a system that makes unaccountable ones.

Was that part of a script?

Jury finds Padilla guilty on terror charges - CNN.com