ProgressOhio

From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE...

What Do They Have On You, Dems?

I figure it must be some sick perverted sex thing. Involving sheep or chickens. Maybe horses.

Sure, it could be some money scandal or shady land sale or quid pro quo campaign-contributions-for-favors deal. But I doubt it.

I suspect the gutless and the gullible Democrats in Congress gather at one of their apartments every night, strip down, grease up, and have orgies with hookers, barn animals, toys of every shape and size, and each other. And if they don’t keep doing what Republicans tell them to do inside Congress, their "little secret" will be leaked to the press and that'll be that: rehab for everyone.

As you may have heard (it was on the teevee), Congress is at eleven percent approval. Eleven percent---hockey sticks. That's less than half the approval of the worst president in U.S. history, who stands at a mind-blowing 24 percent (as bad as Nixon's numbers got during the darkest days of Watergate). But eleven percent? That's even worse than the last congress, in which the GOP literally banged their gavel and then called Bingo for a whopping 23 days out of the year. How hard could it be to top that??

There must be something pretty twisted going on behind closed doors, because raising their approval rating is as easy as getting off their trapezes, removing their fur-lined handcuffs and spiked collars, sending Bessie the "wonder mule" back to the stable and doing something as simple as saying the magic word: "No."

Retroactive immunity for the telcos? "No." War funding for anything other than the redeployment of our troops out of Iraq? "No." Continuing to deny Habeas Corpus rights? "No." Illegal wiretapping? "No, no, no."

And how about doing something about all those witnesses---like Karl Rove and Harriet Miers---who gave you the middle finger by not showing up for congressional hearings?

But no. They just follow the Yellow Brick Road until they get to the GOP poppy field and pass out. Republicans must have something pretty scandalous on their "friends and colleagues across the aisle." I figure it's gotta be sex, because that's the only thing politicians are capable of being embarrassed about these days (the ultra-flamboyant Larry Craig excepted). Rove must've dug up some really kinky dirt when he worked at the White House. I'm thinking scuba gear and branding irons.

I hate to talk this way about our leaders in Congress. But when they get so many chances for easy lay-ups on critical constitutional issues, yet never seem to get the ball in the damn hoop, all I can think is: sex sex sex sex sex.

I'd love to know what Republicans have on you, Nancy and Harry and all you button-down blue dogs. Next time I'm in D.C. I intend to interview all the livestock within a twenty mile radius. One of 'em will talk, I'm sure...if properly motivated.

Cheers and Jeers starts in There's Moreville... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]

Cheers and Jeers is a weekday feature of Daily Kos

Jury awards $6 million in World Harvest day-care spanking

A jury has awarded nearly $6 million to a Canal Winchester couple, holding World Harvest Church and a substitute teacher there liable for a spanking incident at its day care last year.

Added without comment.  Your thoughts? 

Poll: Bullshit Is Most Important Issue For 2008 Voters

Who do you find to be the biggest bullsh*tter of the current campaign?

The House FISA bill is dead in the water.

The Senate FISA bill will have retroactive immunity for the people who sold you out:

Senators this week began reviewing classified documents related to the participation of the telephone carriers in the security agency program and came away from that early review convinced that the companies had "acted in good faith" in cooperating with what they believed was a legal and presidentially authorized program and that they should not be punished through civil litigation for their roles, the official said.

Only here's the thing: on what planet did the telecom companies here act in "good faith?" There's every indication that those who agreed to go along with the spying scheme were rewarded with free passes on regulatory issues like mergers and acquisitions, while the one company that actually asked questions and insisted on listening to their lawyers got shut out of the booming mergers market, and found their CEO sentenced to six years in prison.

And check this:

It will include full immunity for those companies that can demonstrate to a court that they acted pursuant to a legal directive in helping the government with surveillance in the United States.

Such a demonstration, which the bill says could be made in secret, would wipe out a series of pending lawsuits alleging violations of privacy rights by telecommunications companies that provided telephone records, summaries of e-mail traffic and other information to the government after Sept. 11, 2001, without receiving court warrants.

Immunity for companies that can demonstrate they acted "pursuant to a legal directive."

What kind of "legal directive" are we talking about? Well, consider that this immunity is intended to be retroactive, to cover the activities these companies have already engaged in. There haven't been any court orders issued that authorize such activity. If there had been, the companies wouldn't need this bill. So we must be talking about some other kind of "legal directive." The kind that gets written in the executive branch. The kind that the executive branch keeps secret. The kind the executive branch tells Congress they're not entitle to see.

These "legal directives" are really just "legal opinions" drafted by the "administration." They're untested in any court, because they won't allow any court to see them, and any case that tries to test them gets blocked, usually when the "government" invokes the "state secrets" doctrine, or some other claim that national security or executive privilege would somehow be compromised.

So what we're saying here is that secret memos can now be drafted (retroactively and be backdated if necessary?) that purport to be "legal directives" upon which the telecom companies can claim to have relied in "good faith." Or worse, they may even be able to say they received nothing but oral assurances that their activities were "legal." And if you want to see these "legal directives," it just so happens that since they've been prepared by the Office of Legal Counsel or some other close advisors to the president, executive privilege may just prevent you from doing so.

Or "national security."

Or "I just don't feel like it, and you can't make me."

And that's the real problem here. How is anyone to tell the difference between law that meets the commonly accepted definition we all work with every day on the one hand, and "whatever the hell the president says" on the other?

What is "law," anyway? Is it the stuff that Congress passes in public and that you can read in order to be able to obey it? Or is it just anything that can in practice frighten you into obeying? If you can be sent to jail, or immunized from suit, or whatever, based on a secret showing that you relied in "good faith" on a memo an "administration" official gives you (and literally nothing more -- and perhaps even a lot less), you really have to ask yourself that question. What. Is. Law?

And if nobody knows what "law" is, one might just as well ask what the point of being in Congress is. After all, it's purported in our Constitution that Congress has the prerogative to make the laws. But now it's making laws that say things other than what it passes can substitute for law -- specifically anything the White House puts on in a memo, or whispers to you in a meeting.

That's a gut punch directly to the very foundation of western civilization. And we worry whether talking about it will jeopardize our chances in the next election.

HT: Kos 

The Politico reports that the Republicans' Washington leadership is hard at work on a long-overdue "Issues Agenda" for their 2008 candidates.

Newshoggers has received an advance copy of a late-stage draft from a source within the RNC communications shop, which we are proud to present here for your consideration."8 Solutions for '08: Republicans Address America's Issues in a Change Election"

Issues:
1. IRAQ!!
2. War on Terror
3. HOMOS!!!
4. Iran
5. Health Care
6. IMMIGRANTS!!!!
7. Education
8. TAXES!!!!!

Read the Full Talking Points at NewsHoggers