dick cheney

Leave it to these Republicans. They preach and preach how evil gay marriage is, but as soon as one of their own children comes out to them as being gay, they quickly change positions. The latest is Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH). Here is an interview he gave CNN to discus it:

In the interview, Portman even admits that his decision was based solely on his own child:

"I've come to the conclusion that for me, personally, I think this is something that we should allow people to do, to get married, and to have the joy and stability of marriage that I've had for over 26 years. That I want all of my children to have, including our son, who is gay," said Portman

That is a rather callous statement to make. Portman admits he never believed any other gay couple should have had the "joy and stability" of marriage, until it could have been his son.

David Zurawik , the media critic for the Baltimore Sun, has published a post at Daily Download, in which he declares that MSNBC is now worse than Fox News in ideology. The reason? Well he says it in the first paragraph:

MSNBC has long been as bad as Fox News when it comes to ideological bias. But with the hiring of longtime Team Obama loyalists David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, it’s official: MSNBC is worse.

Apparently Mr. Zurawik is media dumb. Allow me to try and inform him of Fox's past hires.

• Karl Rove - Senior adviser to George Bush. Leaves White House and joins Fox News.
• Dana Perino - Former press secretary for George Bush. Leaves White House and joins Fox News.

Then we have one that went in reverse, where the White House decided to pull it's talent from Fox News.

• Tony Snow - Fox News personality, leaves the network to become Bush press secretary.

Then we have some other notables:

• Liz Cheney - daughter of former vice-President, Dick Cheney. Worked in Bush's State Department. Leaves and joins Fox News.
• Jenna Bush - Daughter of George Bush. Now Fox News Contributor.

But apparently David Zurawik has no idea who these people are, since he fails to mention any of them in his post. That, or maybe he is just another partisan hack, ignoring facts to promote his own agenda. Which ever it is, the article has gone uncorrected for over 12 hours, so we do know that he is incompetent. That's pretty bad for someone who makes a living criticizing others.

The nomination of Chuck Hagel by President Obama to become our next Secretary of Defense has really started a firestorm. One of the most interesting reasons Republicans oppose him has to be this:

They've also lambasted positions Hagel took as a GOP senator, including his opposition to unilateral sanctions against Iran, as well as votes opposing the labeling of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization.

But what about Dick Cheney? Dick Cheney not only opposed sanctions against Iran, but Halliburton, under Cheney's control. actually circumvented previous sanctions. But yet nothing was ever said by the right when it came to this.

Chuck Hagel isn't a typical Republican we are used to today. Instead he follows along the lines of more old-school Republicans, the kind I actually like. He doesn't believe that all of our answers lie within the military. He quickly became an opponent of the Iraq War after seeing how disastrously it was being fought. That right there is enough to piss off Republicans, despite their trying everything to distance themselves from the highly unpopular war.

When it comes to trying and scare the hell out of constituents the Republicans never let us down. The latest chapter of "OMG you will all die" fear mongering comes from the state that bought us one of the greatest fear mongers of all time, Dick Cheney:

State representatives on Friday advanced legislation to launch a study into what Wyoming should do in the event of a complete economic or political collapse in the United States.

House Bill 85 passed on first reading by a voice vote. It would create a state-run government continuity task force, which would study and prepare Wyoming for potential catastrophes, from disruptions in food and energy supplies to a complete meltdown of the federal government.

The task force would look at the feasibility of Wyoming issuing its own alternative currency, if needed. And House members approved an amendment Friday by state Rep. Kermit Brown, R-Laramie, to have the task force also examine conditions under which Wyoming would need to implement its own military draft, raise a standing army, and acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier.

Of course Wyoming needs all the protection they can get, hence the aircraft carrier. Remember when the Bush administration was doling out homeland security money and Wyoming received over double what New York did per capita?

This is the craziness that has taken over the Republican party over the past several years. Even scarier is the number of American's who buy into this thinking. My hopes for our country's future are really diminishing with each passing day.

This will be the dominating news story for the next week:

The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan has been summoned to Washington to explain his controversial comments about colleagues in a recent interview, an Obama administration official said Tuesday.

The official says Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who has since issued an apology for his comments, has been directed to attend the monthly White House meeting on Afghanistan and Pakistan in person Wednesday rather than over a secure video teleconference, so he can discuss his comments with President Barack Obama and top Pentagon officials.

An article in this week's Rolling Stone magazine depicts McChrystal as a lone wolf on the outs with many important figures in the Obama administration and unable to persuade even some of his own soldiers that his strategy can win the war.

The Rolling Stone article isn’t out yet, but already it is drawing a lot of conversation. Here’s Marc Ambinder’s take on it:

What in the heck was Gen. Stanley McChrystal thinking? I mean, I know what he was thinking: he was tired of being the victim of what he believes is a concerted effort on behalf of Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry and others to undermine everything he was given 18 months to do. He was tired of being perceived in the press as a neoconservative killer, Dick Cheney's hired assassin, or disloyal to President Obama and his staff. He was angry at being blamed for leaking the draft of his report to the President to Bob Woodward. (He did NOT leak the document). He was miffed that a large number of mid-ranking soldiers and battalion commanders and enlisted guys didn't support his strategy.

The Republicans have been working hard to try and blame Obama for the oil spill. As I pointed out yesterday, Obama does deserve a little blame for not having booms on hand, but that blame also needs to be shared with Bush and Clinton, since none of them prepared to follow a 1994 plan on dealing with spills put out by the government.

But now we are getting more evidence that points directly to Dr. Evil himself, Dick Cheney. First the investigation into the cause of the fire is starting to zero in on Halliburton and the cementing process they had just completed. Interesting enough this same process caused a fire and spill last year in Australia and was also completed by Halliburton. That investigation is too zeroing in on the cementing process by Halliburton.

Even more interesting is the safety requirements that Cheney fought to get rid of. The problem with the oil spill has been the inability to shut the leak off. The blowout preventer has failed and there was no secondary device. Here’s an explanation by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.;

From ABC:

Federal air marshals subdued a man who authorities say attempted to "light his shoes on fire" on a United flight from Washington Reagan to Denver Wednesday night, federal law enforcement officials told ABC News.

Authorities say an explosive team is on the way to the airport, and that while the presence of explosives has not yet been confirmed, they believe it was an attempted "shoe bomb."

The suspect was identified by authorities as a diplomat in the Qatar embassy in Washington, Mohammed al Modadi. The FBI said the man had full diplomat immunity as the 3rd secretary and vice-consul.

Authorities said two jet fighters were scrambled from Buckley Air Force Base to accompany United flight 663, a Boeing 757, as it flew the final 40 miles to Denver where it landed safely.

Authorities said the man, identified as from Qatar, was restrained by the air marshals who were on the flight.

Coming up tomorrow – nonstop interviews with Dick Cheney.

UPDATE (10:40):

Per Pete Williams on MSNBC there is no shoe bomb. Apparently the suspect spent an extra long time in the bathroom. When he finally came out an air marshal said he smelled smoke and asked the suspect what he was doing. The suspect responded “trying to light my shoes on fire”. They now believe he was smoking a cigarette in the bathroom.

When you ignore Afghanistan for 7 years then you never get stories like this:

The Taliban’s top military commander was captured several days ago in Karachi, Pakistan, in a secret joint operation by Pakistani and American intelligence forces, according to American government officials.

The commander, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, is an Afghan described by American officials as the most significant Taliban figure to be detained since the American-led war in Afghanistan started more than eight years ago. He ranks second in influence only to Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban’s founder and a close associate of Osama bin Laden before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Mullah Baradar has been in Pakistani custody for several days, with American and Pakistani intelligence officials both taking part in interrogations, according to the officials.

This is a great accomplishment for the military and administration, but for some reason I feel Dick Cheney will consider it a major failure.