] Florida Gov. Jeb Bush ignored advice to throw out a
] flawed felon voter list before it went out to county
] election offices despite warnings from state officials

Screwing up who can and can't vote once is probably an error. Do it twice, and you're probably trying to screw someone. This is a nice dovetail to the Nevada reports.

Yahoo! News - Report: Jeb Bush Ignored Felon List Advice

STEWART: You know, the interesting thing I have is, you have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably.

CARLSON: You need to get a job at a journalism school, I think.

STEWART: You need to go to one. The thing that I want to say is, when you have people on for just knee-jerk, reactionary talk...

CARLSON: Wait. I thought you were going to be funny. Come on. Be funny.

STEWART: No. No. I'm not going to be your monkey.

(LAUGHTER)

BEGALA: Go ahead. Go ahead.

STEWART: I watch your show every day. And it kills me.

CARLSON: I can tell you love it.

STEWART: It's so -- oh, it's so painful to watch.

(LAUGHTER)

STEWART: You know, because we need what you do. This is such a great opportunity you have here to actually get politicians off of their marketing and strategy.

CARLSON: Is this really Jon Stewart? What is this, anyway?

[ This is absolutely fucking must-see. Stewart completely flays Begala and Carlson. Jon is one of our finest public figures. -k]

IFILM: John Stewart vs. CNN Crossfire

] "Let history be witness I am a criminal."

This story is interesting on a number of levels.
Outwardly, you've got the small town library fighting to protect it's patron list.

Secondly, you've got the FBI not using the Patriot act to collect that list. Its informative on that level. They likely didn't use the patriot act because the conservatives are fond of defending the ability to collect library records by saying that its never been used. On the other hand, because they didn't use the patriot act the library is screaming to high heaven about the inquiry. If they had reason to suspect that an Islamic terrorist did actually read this book that guy has lots and lots of notice that the feds are on to him. In a way, by running screaming to the press the library is demonstrating why the feds need gag orders on libraries. (My defense here of gag orders should not be misconstrued as a defense of the collection of this data without a court order.)

The third level is the interest in the first place. Why get a grand jury involved just because someone scribbled a quote in the margins of a book? Is this a Bin Lauden quote? Googling the quote only returns references to this story. One blogger from the area claims to have seen another quotation in a TV news report about the incident. I wonder if the quotation is entirely different then these two and one which hasn't been made public... Something only someone connected to the base would know...

(Turns out the correct quote is "Let history be witness that I am a criminal." Google it.)

komo 4 news | Small Town Library Takes On The Feds

] A nasty flyer has turned up in Tennesse politics which
] depicts a handicapped athlete running on a track with
] George Bush's face pasted on.
]
]
] The text reads:
]
]
] Voting for Bush is Like Running in the Special Olympics
] -- Even if You Win, You're Still Retarded.
]
]
] The Traditional Values Coalition and other right wing
] operations in the South jumped on this fast alleging that
] Tennessee Democrat Craig Fitzhugh's office, which shares
] space with the Kerry/Edwards Campaign, was distributing
] this flyer.

[ And for those of you who think it's untenable to accuse the GOP of acting in this way, I urge you to look back in my memestream to yesterday. Read Green's piece in the Atlantic Monthly, re: Karl Rove, who utilized this exact tactic in an Alabama Supreme Court race.

It's entirely possible that some silly kid is behind it... This one seems a little amateurish for a Rove maneuver, but it's not out of the question that this activity is more than a prank. -k]

The Washington Note Archives

] President Bush's New England campaign
] chairman stepped down Friday after the Democrats accused
] him of taking part in the jamming of their telephone
] lines on Election Day 2002.

[ For the record, these accusations from the democrats aren't exactly out of thin air. Tobin was implicated in the plea agreement documents of two men who've already pleaded guilty to the fraud : http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2004_08_08.php#003270

This is still not the worst of the worst. The current Sproul & Associates shenanigans in Nevada, and possibly elsewhere, are far more relevant. -k]

Yahoo! News - Bush's New England Campaign Chief Resigns

] Yesterday, Rock the Vote received a very startling letter
] from Ed Gillespie, Chairman of the Republican National
] Committee. He demanded that we stop talking about the
] issue of the military draft.
]
]
] The letter leaked out on the Internet and a lot of people
] wondered whether it was even real. Yes, it is real.
]
]
] The letter from Chairman Gillespie is here. Our response
] is here and below.

[ Pretty unbelievable. Gillespe acts like the draft issue is some kind of demeaning whisper campaign without a shred of merit. Thanks, Ed, but really, that's a Rove tactic, not Rock the Vote's. Really, it's not so much that Gillespe is dismissive of the draft issue, but the way in which he does so.... From the RTV response :

"I am stunned that you would say that the issue of the military draft is an "urban myth"that has been "thoroughly debunked by no less than the President of the United States."

I have some news for you. Just because President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Secretary Rumsfeld, and for that matter Senator Kerry, say that there is not going to be a draft does not make it so. Just because Congress holds a transparently phony vote against the draft does not mean there isn't going to be one. Anyone who thinks that the youth of America are going to take a politician's word on this topic is living on another planet.

By your logic, there should be no debate about anything that you disagree with. There's a place for that kind of sentiment (and your threats), but its not here in our country. "

Hear fucking hear. The rest of the letter is equally cogent. Few would argue that RTV is likely to benefit Bush over Kerry, but truly, getting people to the polls is fundamental, and the fear of a draft is unquestionably a motivating factor for young people. I remember distinctly the day I signed my Selective Service registration card, and thinking about what I would do if it ever came to be used, and how I better start paying attention to the world and voting if I wanted to prevent it. It's no urban myth. -k]

Rock the Vote : Republican Party Chairman Tells Us To Stop Talking About The Draft

] A new means of propelling spacecraft being developed at
] the University of Washington could dramatically cut the
] time needed for astronauts to travel to and from Mars and
] could make humans a permanent fixture in space.
]
]
] In fact, with magnetized-beam plasma propulsion, or
] mag-beam, quick trips to distant parts of the solar
] system could become routine, said Robert Winglee, a UW
] Earth and space sciences professor who is leading the
] project.

[ Interesting concept... -k]

uwnews.org - News and Information from the University of Washington

] "We're talking about dozens of sites being dismantled," a
] diplomat said on condition of anonymity. "Large numbers
] of buildings taken down, warehouses were emptied and
] removed. This would require heavy machinery, demolition
] equipment. This is not something that you'd do
] overnight."
]
] Diplomats in Vienna say the IAEA is worried that these
] facilities, which belonged to Saddam's pre-1991 covert
] nuclear weapons program, could have been packed up and
] sold to a country or militants interested in nuclear
] weapons.

How many of us will die a firey death because of our mistakes in Iraq?

[ Be fair. It'll probly be more of a "coughing, sputtering, radiation sickness death" from the dirty bombs. -k]

CNN.com - Iraqi N-sites 'stripped carefully' - Oct 14, 2004

] "Bush talks and thinks like Milosevic. He will lose, but
] the most disheartening thing is the prospect of his
] religio-nationalist reality-deniers clinging fiercely to
] the sacred glory of their Lost Cause for the next hundred
] years. We live under the Confederacy. We're a podunk
] bunch of swaggering pious hicks."
]
]
] --Bruce Sterling, via email

[ Damn, bruce. -k]

William Gibson is blogging again...

] 9:36 p.m. Bush says that we aren't using "high
] technology" in health care, and that we're "in the buggy
] and horse days." That would explain my Amish HMO.

[ heh. not exactly the peak of political comentary, but funny. -k]

MTV.com - Choose or Lose - Headlines