That's way out of line. Can you imagine the outcry from "Focus on the Family" if a pro-choice candidate sent NOW a thank you letter for their support after winning a seat on the bench?

Excellent...

Just another reason to support Ciro...

Keith Olbermann produced a great segment on this sham. He interviewed Ernie Banks to get his reaction as well. See the video here.

Your conservative media.

(via Think Progress)

(AP)
Here's the video of this breaking story. Hat tip David Edwards. FEMA Brown is telling everyone that this is the "BIG ONE!" Bush says in the video that he's "fully prepared." He sure didn't act like he was now did he? Bush is busted for lying about the fact that nobody knew the levee's would possibly have been breached.

See the Video Here

Federal officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief of possible devastation just before Hurricane Katrina struck. Six days of video footage from briefings and transcripts were obtained by The Associated Press. The warnings were that the storm could breach levees, risk lives in the New Orleans Superdome and overwhelm rescuers.A-P reports Bush didn't ask any questions during the final government-wide briefing the day before Katrina struck on August 29th....read on"

AmericaBlog has more...

DarkSyde has more: The video shows both FEMA Director Mike "Heckuva job" Brownie saying he had a gut feeling this would be the "big one" and storm meteorologist Max Mayfield standing in front of a radar image indicating a breach in the levees, specifically from Lake Pontchartrain driven by high winds, was a concern:

"I don't think any model can tell you with any confidence right now whether the levees will be topped or not but that is obviously a very, very grave concern," Mayfield told the briefing."

FireDogLake:

"Hoping to counteract the damage of the story, the White House leaked Newsweek transcripts from daily noon FEMA conference calls during and after Katrina to show how engaged and concerned Dubya was. Trouble is, these are transcripts that they had initially refused to provide to congressional investigators...read on

The Moderate Voice has more...

This is a really horrifying exchange especially after this new story just broke.
Download | play -WMP Download | play -QT

ABC World News:

VARGAS: When you look back on those days immediately following when Katrina struck, what moment do you think was the moment that you realized that the government was failing, especially the people of New Orleans?

BUSH: When I saw TV reporters interviewing people who were screaming for help. It looked - the scenes looked chaotic and desperate. And I realized that our government was-could have done a better job of comforting people.

Froomkin:

In "How Bush Blew It," his Newsweek story last September, Evan Thomas wrote: "The reality, say several aides who did not wish to be quoted because it might displease the president, did not really sink in until Thursday night. Some White House staffers were watching the evening news and thought the president needed to see the horrific reports coming out of New Orleans. Counselor Bartlett made up a DVD of the newscasts so Bush could see them in their entirety as he flew down to the Gulf Coast the next morning on Air Force One."

So that would be Friday morning, Sept. 2, that Bush saw people screaming for help....read on"

BREAKING: Video shows Bush, Chertoff warned before Katrina

This is huge.

Federal officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief of possible devastation just before Hurricane Katrina struck. Six days of video footage from briefings and transcripts were obtained by The Associated Press. The warnings were that the storm could breach levees, risk lives in the New Orleans Superdome and overwhelm rescuers.A-P reports Bush didn't ask any questions during the final government-wide briefing the day before Katrina struck on August 29th....read on"

William Vitka:

"In order to throw a wrench into the machine, or at least, as Burroughs said, to educate the mark, I'm proud to present Frank Zappa's Congressional testimony. It's easy to draw parallels between the legal threats music faced over twenty years ago and what lawmakers are trying to do to video games now. Though this testimony is long, you would be doing yourself a disservice if you didn't read it in full...read on

Rich Hersh of Boca Raton, Florida, a 59 year-old wheelchair bound, disabled American is fed up. So fed up is he with local high school military recruitment (legalized by the "No Child Left Behind bill") that he sets up his own info table right alongside handsome, camo-garbed U.S. army recruiters at a local high school. He wants to advise impressionable high schoolers to look before they leap into an abyss called Iraq.

With sagging army recruitment numbers and ever increasing American death rates in Iraq, the Bush administration does not take kindly on any operation that interferes with their need for new bodies in

their never ending War on Terror.

Despite numerous glares and stares from the "competition," Hersh does not buckle. But now he looks over his shoulder. More than once a day. Hersh is concerned. Concerned about being wiretapped, eavesdropped, surveilled, and intimidated...by his own government. Rich Hersh is a board member of the Truth Project, Inc. a non-profit educational organization (www.truthproject.info) based in Palm Beach County,Florida.

The Truth Project gained national attention Dec. 13,2005 when NBC News reported that a Pentagon agency {902 Military Intelligence Group out of Ft. Mead, Md.} had monitored and infiltrated the group when about eight of its board members met in November 2004 in a Quaker meeting house in Lake Worth, Florida. (see photo)The 400-page document obtained by NBC described the group as both a "threat" and "credible."

{For the Record: There have been no indications that the members of the Truth Project were being monitored for any links to terrorism or al-Qaida, or would have been the focus of any of the domestic spying efforts Bush said he has approved on more than 30 occasions
since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.}

The group has filed several Freedom of Information Requests to obtain more information about government monitoring. {Hersh has agreed to forward such documents to Crooksandliars.com for publication
immediately upon receipt}

"We really want to know the extent of the spying that has been going on, and want Congress to do something about the misbehaviors by the executive branch," says Hersh.

Last week, in the spirit of "Mr. Smith Goes To

Washington", Mr. Hersh rolled his wheelchair into a Capital Hill basement meeting room for a hearing chaired by Michigan Congressman John Conyers to investigate domestic spying on American civilians.

I interviewed Mr. Hersh on Monday, January 30th, 2006.
Here's what I learned:

MG: What is "BeNow"?

RH: BeNow, Inc. of Wakefield, Mass. is a data collection firm hired by the DOD to provide them with information on American high
school students. Everything from their social security numbers, their grade point average, what video games they buy, ect. It is paid for by U.S. tax payers.

MG: In order to better recruit them?

RH: Yes.

MG: Your organization, the Truth Project provides documents for students to opt out of being recruited.
Does it work?

RH: Yes, but its up to the individual student to getthem and file them. To go around that the DOD is
simply purchasing the same info through companies like Be Now or other data collection firms.

MG: Lets talk about surveillance. You don't as of yet have the hard evidence as you've filed for that under
FOI. What is the soft evidence?

RH: Well, for instance, when you pick up your phone there is at first, no dial tone, then you say into the phone, "I want to make a call" and the dial tone comes on. In addition, when you are engaged in a telephonecall the audio tone changes throughout the call.

MG: You mentioned your website.

RH: Yes, we have been hacked repeatedly. Out email address books have been stolen. Our emails move far slower now. Our webmaster informs us these are typicalresults from scanning or hacking by an outside source.

MG: How about the physical surveillance?

RH: Strangers show up in our meetings. We are a small elderly group so when a crew cut young muscle man with wraparound shades sits in the back, well you take notice. Then when we pass around the sign up sheets

for people to list their contact info, both he and the
sheets usually disappear at the same time.

MG: You mentioned two homeless guys at a rally?

RH: Yes, two supposedly homeless guys were at our rally pushing shopping carts around with suitcases in them and talking to each other on cell phones. At the end of the rally they and their carts were loaded into the back of trucks and driven away.

MG: What about the black Ford Explorers?

RH: Well they sit there and take pictures through tinted windows. Then they turn around and come back and do it again.

MG: You believe this is part of the so-called "Talon"program.

RH: Yes, from what I understand.

MG: How about the waterways? You mentioned the canals.

RH: We have meetings in a member's backyard which has a canal. A bass fishing boat always shows up with a military-looking guy who never catches anything and won't even wave back to us when we wave at him to say hello. He is just making believe he is fishing.

MG: So how does it feel to be an enemy of the state?

RH: That was never my intention, I can assure you.

MG: Thank you so much for your time.

RH: You bet.

The criminal incompetence, the skewed priorities, the bald cronyism, the relentless dishonesty and hypocrisy, the lawless abuses, the authoritarian tendencies, and the diplomatic arrogance. The outrages are legion and constant.

democracy arsenal: There is increasing evidence that there is more than one NSA program and that the program(s) not yet discussed publicly are far more extensive than the "terrorist surveillance program" described by the President and the Attorney General. (read the comments, too)

, the authoritarian tendencies, and the diplomatic arrogance. The outrages are legion and constant.

democracy arsenal: There is increasing evidence that there is more than one NSA program and that the program(s) not yet discussed publicly are far more extensive than the "terrorist surveillance program" described by the President and the Attorney General. (read the comments, too)

The Heretik: More 'scrubbing' on internet news sites. When they're not scrubbin', they're selling snake oil.

Copeland Institute for Lower Learning: A group of Catholic House Democrats plan to release a document explaining the balance between private faith and public service.

Nieman Watchdog: Former CIA official Paul Pillar, who coordinated U.S. intelligence on the Middle East until last year, criticizes our credulous press and proposes questions reporters should ask -- retrospectively and prospectively -- about the use and abuse of intelligence by policymakers.

DAYS: Start the "Way Back Machine." We've got some improbable history to explore!
The Heretik: More 'scrubbing' on internet news sites. When they're not scrubbin', they're selling snake oil.

Copeland Institute for Lower Learning: A group of Catholic House Democrats plan to release a document explaining the balance between private faith and public service.

Nieman Watchdog: Former CIA official Paul Pillar, who coordinated U.S. intelligence on the Middle East until last year, criticizes our credulous press and proposes questions reporters should ask -- retrospectively and prospectively -- about the use and abuse of intelligence by policymakers.

DAYS: Start the "Way Back Machine." We've got some improbable history to explore!