Hundreds boo former Bush chief of staff at University of Massachusetts commencement ceremony

In video, booing is at 1:52 remaining in the video

Andrew Card, President George W. Bush’s former Chief of Staff, was showered with a chorus of boos and catcalls from students and faculty of the University of Massachusetts while receiving an honorary degree Friday. Protesters, who caught the embarrassing scene on video, attached anti-Card signs to their robes and drowned out Provost Charlena Seymour’s remarks about Card’s “public service.” Even faculty sitting on stage joined in on the action, screaming their disapproval while holding signs that read “Card: No Honor, No Degree.”

Card, obviously shaken by the commotion, managed a slight grin while Seymour spoke. He later raised his hand in recognition but sat down without speaking at any length.

After the ceremony, he refused to acknowledge the protests, only saying, “It was a great honor and a privilege to be here.”

The university community was upset with the school’s decision to award Card an honorary degree, given his involvement in spinning intelligence in the lead up to the war in Iraq. Even before the ceremony began, 100 faculty members and students sang anti-war songs, handed out leaflets and waved signs outside the arena where commencement was held.

A graduate of the University of South Carolina, Card was a supporter of UMass in his days as a Massachusetts lawmaker. He served as Bush’s chief of staff from the president’s first inauguration through 2006.

The video below was created by the protesters.

It’s a relief when we see that students and faculty are able to stand up to a decision at a major University and not suffer any punishment. However, the fact that Andrew Card was still given the degree is a bit sick.

Is there any way that he could walk away feeling good about that honorary degree? I would have refused it! The students and faculty made it clear that they did not want him to have that degree, and they are the meat of any University not the administration who make these boneheaded decisions.

One more semi-victory for the good guys.

Source: Raw Story 

Giuliani to Paul: ‘Take back’ 9/11 comments

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Why did terrorists attack the U.S. on 9/11?

According to Texas Congressman Ron Paul, “They attack us because we’ve been over there. We’ve been bombing Iraq for 10 years. We’ve been in the Middle East.”

Restrained, but clearly angry, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani jumped in, calling Paul’s statement “extraordinary.”

“As someone who lived through the attack of September 11 — that we invited the attack because we were attacking Iraq — I don’t think I’ve ever heard that before, and I’ve heard some pretty absurd explanations for September 11th,” he said.

Giuliani’s fiery response prompted applause and the following demand from the former mayor: “I would ask the congressman to withdraw that comment and tell us that he didn’t really mean that.”

In response, Paul stood by his comments and said that “if we think that we can do what we want around the world and not incite hatred, then we have a problem … They come and they attack us because we’re over there.”

Giuliani isn’t grounded in reality.

Source: CNN 

The Ron Paul Effect

Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, who barely registers in public opinion polls of the Republican presidential field, won last Thursday night’s debate.

That was the unmistakable conclusion of the online poll posted by debate sponsor MSNBC, which registered Paul with higher positive ratings and lower negative numbers than any of the other nine candidates on the stage.

ABC’s post-debate Internet survey showed an even clearer victory for Paul, with the congressman taking more than 9,400 of 11,000 votes as of 12:30 p.m. Monday. (Rudy Giuliani is the next ranked candidate, with barely 150 votes.)

So are the polls missing a Paul boomlet? Is the famously contrarian ob-gyn — a libertarian nicknamed “Dr. No” because of his propensity to vote against anything he believes contradicts the Constitution’s original intent — poised to surge into contention in the GOP field?

Not likely. What’s more likely, based on Web traffic over the past week, is that Paul supporters have mastered the art of “viral marketing,” using Internet savvy and blog postings to create at least the perception of momentum for his long-shot presidential bid.

The Ron Paul Effect

Since online polls aren’t scientific — people choose to take them, and many people vote multiple times — doing well in them doesn’t necessarily mean a campaign is on the move.

But Internet buzz can have a carry-over effect, said Peter Greenberger, an online strategist at New Media Strategies and a former Democratic political operative.

“It’s evidence of something — either passionate supporters, active supporters, or just one very savvy supporter who’s able to vote several thousand times,” Greenberger said. “If it leads to one or two stories in the mainstream media, that could lead to a bounce online, and could lead to some fundraising successes.”

With strong support among libertarians who are unhappy with the top-tier Republican contenders, Paul has a robust online presence.

His MySpace profile boasts nearly 12,000 “friends.” Today, his name ranks in the Top 10 among blog search terms at Technorati.com, behind Paris Hilton but ahead of Mario Lopez.

After Thursday night’s debate, the comment sections of several major news organizations — including ABC’s — were inundated with pro-Paul messages.

Viewers raved about Paul’s commitment to abolishing the IRS, his steadfast opposition to a national ID card, and a forthright tone that bloggers said set him apart from the other candidates onstage.

The Paul campaign did not immediately respond to a phone call and e-mail message seeking comment.

ABC and other major news sources are downplaying the effect that congressmen Ron Paul’s victory might have. They constantly say “He can’t win”, and that the polls are a fluke.

Is the news media that far into  someones pocket that they need to toss in their opinions on politics in order to prevent Ron Paul from even having a chance? This is a sick and disgusting practice that needs to be turned around because it crushes the spirit of democracy.

I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next few weeks, but something is going to have the change in the way the news media presents these candidates…. declaring “HE CAN’T WIN” this early because he hasn’t been in the national spot light yet isn’t conjecture…. it’s  just ignorance.

Source: ABCNews 

Is there a better reason to declare that Imus should still me on the air?

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the highest-ranking black woman in government history, said the racist, sexist comments that got radio shock jock Don Imus fired were “disgusting.”In her first public remarks on the controversy, Rice said Friday that Imus had insulted not only female athletes but all young black women by referring to the Rutgers women’s basketball team as “nappy headed hos.”

“They’re 18- and 19-year-old women,” she said. “And what were they doing except showing that they’re really fine athletes, playing under extraordinary pressure in which for them was a dream season.

“And it gets ruined by this disgusting — and I’ll use the word ‘disgusting’ — comment which doesn’t belong in any polite company and certainly doesn’t belong on any radio station that I would listen to,” Rice told talk show host Michael Medved.

“I just thought that it was an attack on women’s sports, first of all, and secondly an attack on very accomplished young black women in a way that was really offensive,” she said, according to a transcript of the interview released by the State Department.

Rice declined to offer an opinion on Imus’s firing but said she was “very glad that there was, in fact, a consequence” for the remarks.

Imus was fired by CBS radio on Thursday as the controversy over his remarks last week grew and advertisers began to pull support for his show, “Imus in the Morning,” which regularly featured Washington insiders.

Rice, according to her spokesman Sean McCormack, never appeared on the program.

So the stuck up, conservative governors believe that Imus losing his job was a good thing…. of course Imus rarely mentioned George Bush’s name without adding “War Criminal” to it. Is Rice an objective observer?

Well as a Black, female, conservative who wouldn’t listen to a radio station if they used the word “Hoe”… you decide.

Source: CNN 

Stem cell vote set for Congress this week

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Stem cells will be at the top of the agenda for the U.S. Senate when it returns on Tuesday with supporters of the research hoping they can change the president’s mind on the issue and opponents hoping to have a say about their stand.

The Senate will consider two bills, one virtually identical to a bill vetoed by President George W. Bush last year that would have expanded and encouraged federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research.

The other is a compromise measure worked out by Republicans Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia and Norm Coleman of Minnesota. It would encourage stem cell research on embryos that have naturally lost the ability to develop into fetuses, such as those that have died “naturally” during fertility treatments.

The compromise bill also would support the creation of a bank of stem cells taken from amniotic fluid and placentas — two recently discovered potential sources.

This bill replaces last year’s alternative sponsored by Kansas Republican Sam Brownback, which would ban human embryonic stem cell research and encourage research using other types of stem cells.

The House of Representatives passed a bill in January that would expand federal funding of stem cell research, which is now restricted by Bush to batches available as of August 2001. But the bill does not have enough supporters to override a second presidential veto.

Even when the Democrates are in power and some of this stuff has a chance to pass we still are doomed to fail thanks to Bush having the power to veto congress. I never liked that factor of our government, why one man should have the power to overrule the decision of a hundred.

But with every step we get closer, and maybe someday soon we will be able to  research and get the full benefit from the use of Stem Cells. Until then… we just have to hope that the next president will have a basic understanding of science that doesn’t come from the bible.

Source: Reuters

Bill Maher Interviews Ron Paul

Bill Maher thinks he is a Libertarian… HA

Ron Paul deals with some good issues, he allows Maher to play with him by answering the question about the Civil War; which he did very well; and made great points on how the VA heath care system and all government run heath care doesn’t work. Talking about health care from the point of view of a doctor and not a politician he is able to actually make a case… unlike other members of congress who enjoy screaming about the heath care system.

He is also correct about the CIA, why do we need to have an intelligence agency working independently  “for the good of the nation”? It seems crazy to me.

White House official defends censorship of “Climate Change” papers.

A former White House official accused of improperly editing reports on global warming defended his editorial changes Monday as reflecting views expressed in a 2001 report by the National Academy of Sciences.House Democrats said the 181 changes made in three climate reports reflected a consistent attempt to emphasize uncertainties surrounding the science of climate change and undercut the broad conclusions that manmade emissions are warming the earth.Philip Cooney, former chief of staff at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, acknowledged at a House hearing that some of the changes he made were “to align these communications with the administration’s stated policy” on climate change.

The extent of Cooney’s editing of government climate reports first surfaced in 2005. Shortly thereafter, Cooney, a former oil industry lobbyist, left the White House to work at Exxon Mobil Corp.

So the government is so deeply into the pockets of big business that they will go to any length to silence scientists trying to warn us about Global Warming.

Doesn’t surprise me one bit.

Waxman’s committee also heard from James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and one of the country’s leading climate scientists, who said the White House repeatedly tried to control what government scientists say to the public and media about climate change.

“Interference with communications of science to the public has been greater during the current administration than at any time in my career,” said Hansen, who was one of the first to raise the problem of climate change in the 1980s.

Hansen’s battles with NASA and White House public affairs officials are not new and resulted in an easing of NASA’s policies toward scientists talking to the media about their work.

But that was not always the case.

Hansen said that in 2005 he was told by a 24-year-old NASA public affairs official he could take no part in an interview with National Public Radio on orders from senior NASA public affairs officials. Instead, three other NASA officials were offered for the interview.

The young press officer, George Deutsch, now 26, sat next to Hansen at the witness table Monday and told the committee he had simply been “relaying” the views of higher-ups at NASA that Hansen was not to participate in the interview.

Republican Rep. Darrell Issa suggested that Hansen was not being muzzled at all, and there is nothing wrong with government scientists being subject to some limits in what they say.

A Republican Representative says that censoring scientists is ok because they work for the government? How do you put limits on a person who’s job is to uncover facts?

Source: Huffington Post

The entire idea of government controlled research has seen much better days, this event will hopefully be a huge step toward taking the scientists away from the government.

Religious right launches rival to ‘un-American’ Wikipedia

DINOSAURS. They may not exist, but they’re just launched their own online encyclopaedia. Conservapedia claims to be ‘a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American.’ Rather than having anything as mundane as posting rules, Conservapedia has Commandments. The first Commandment is ‘ Everything you post must be true and verifiable.’ Strange that, I always thought it was ‘Thou shalt have no other gods before me.’ But Conservapedia is ‘the encyclopedia you can trust’ – apart from knowing how to spell ‘encyclopaedia’, obviously – so I must be mistaken. Oooh, hang on, Commandment Five says that American spelling of words must be used. And as everyone knows, both Jesus and his dad were born in the USA.

Coming back to Conservapedia’s First Commandment, it will be interesting to see exactly how any reference to the Bible will be verified as fact. Obviously, as a new site, many subjects have yet to appear, or are in need of expansion. This is the full article on Iraq, for example:

A Middle-Eastern country, currently occupied by U.S. Troops.

We feel sure that all God-fearing INQUIRER readers will step up to the plate and fill in a few of these gaps for them. If you don’t, the turrists will have won.

Somehow, “we all expected it” just doesn’t make this sit well in my mind. The Conservatives have declared that, if they find it offensive they will counter it with something that their children can look at and gather unbiased, truth.

Let’s take a look at some of Conservapedia’s unbiased and honest encyclopedia , as we compare it to Wikipedia.

From Wikipedia on abortion, we’ll review the first paragraph of each article:

“An abortion is the removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus from the uterus, resulting in or caused by its death. This can occur spontaneously as a miscarriage, or be artificially induced by chemical, surgical or other means. Commonly, “abortion” refers to an induced procedure at any point during pregnancy; medically, it is defined as miscarriage or induced termination before twenty weeks’ gestation, which is considered nonviable.”

And from Conservapedia:

“Abortion is the induced termination of a pregnancy. The father of medicine, Hippocrates, expressly prohibited abortion in his ethical Oath long before Christianity. Today abortion is a billion-dollar industry in the United States and Western Europe except for Ireland, Malta, Poland and Portugal, where it is generally illegal.”

As you can see, Conservapedia offers a much “safer” view on conservative principals. You notice, right away, that the first thing that Conservapedia does is go head right to Opinion, not facts.

Hippocrates says! Conservapedia points out, where the Wikipedia article states complete truth as to what Abortion is.

We have entered a brand new era! Wikiignorence!

Source: The inquirer 

Atheists under attack in America

CNN runs a story on how Atheists are under attack in America, but during the discussion at the end of the show prove their point on a different level by having the panelists ruthlessly and hatefully attack people who lack faith in any higher power.

It is a sickening display and far worse than I’ve seen of any atheist, including myself who and I am admittedly a ruthless bastard, attack Christians or any religious group.

In the aftermath, Debbie Schlussel posts her response to the anger the segment generated on her blog.

It’s a sick look at the mind of a paranoid, heartless person consumed by the ignorance of her faith.

I’m surprised these atheists would be so obedient to a higher power that told them to e-mail me since, after all, the one thing they’re supposed to have in common is a lack of belief in a higher power. Well, no-one ever said atheists are consistent or immune from hypocrisy.

I don’t mind receiving the atheist hate mail, since I know that in a few years, many of these same people will either be Muslim extremists (redundant) or helping the country fall further in its fight against the creep of Islamic imposition on America . . . or both.

Look at famous atheists and what happened to them. Adam Gadahn a/k/a Azzam Al-Amriki–now a top Al-Qaeda video “personality”–was raised by his hippie Jewish father and equally bizarre gentile mother as an atheist. And look how he turned out. Ditto for hippie-spawn John Walker Lindh.

Those two people are enemies of America, and many of those who think like them are of equally weak mind. If you don’t believe in anything, you’ll fall for virtually nothing. That’s why Europe is so quickly turning Islamist–because atheism dominates and Christianity is rapidly dying there. Over there, the number one cause for which atheists are suddenly finding “god” is Islam.

Over here, as I pointed out on CNN, atheists are on the attack against religion and G-d only when Christians and Jews are involved, not when Muslims and Islam are. A Christian prayer at a public school graduation or football game? Send in the ACLU lawyers. A Muslim prayer at a high school football game in Dearbornistan? Suddenly, when the “Religion of Peace” is involved, atheists boast extreme tolerance and display ultimate deference. No lawsuits. Ever. And the Muslim prayers continue.

So to you hate-filled atheists a/k/a future Muslim extremists (redundant), your e-mails have no effect on me. Ditto for your creative obscenities which don’t impress upon me the civility of the atheo-fascisti set

It’s a sad day for this county.

Republican: Scripts need reviewing Raleigh | Cit…

Raleigh | Citing the controversy surrounding the Dakota Fanning film Hounddog, the leader of the state Senate Republicans says he wants the government to review scripts before cameras start rolling in North Carolina.

That system, said state Sen. Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, would apply only to films seeking the state’s lucrative filmmaker incentive, which refunds as much as 15 percent of what productions spend in North Carolina from the state treasury.

“Why should North Carolina taxpayers pay for something they find objectionable?” said Berger, who is having proposed legislation drafted.

It is not known whether Hounddog’s producers have or will apply for the incentive. A call Thursday to the N.C. Department of Revenue, which oversees incentive payments, was not returned.

Sen. Julia Boseman, D-New Hanover, one of the backers of the new law that created the current incentive system, said she couldn’t say much until she saw Berger’s proposal in writing.

“There’s no bill yet to take a look at,” she said. “But I am always willing to consider reasonable ways to improve the program.”

She did say she thought looking at scripts before shooting starts might be meaningless because a script could be changed during production.

“We should consider the end product,” she said, “which is what our current system is designed to do.”

State law denies the incentive to films that are obscene. In state law, obscenity is defined as depicting sexual conduct presented in an offensive way that appeals to prurient interest, lacks any “serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value” and is not free speech protected by the state or federal constitutions.

Berger said the film-incentive ban should be broadened to include material considered objectionable. He said there should be no First Amendment concerns because the producer would be seeking money from the state government. But he did say that if constitutional questions confused the matter, it would be better not to have a film incentive at all.

This is insane, any form of censorship is wrong, although on that same matter why should the people’s tax dollars have to do to pay for a film anyway? It seems that it’s more of a bribe to attempt to get money into the states local economy than anything else. Which plays for public interest on one side, but on the other takes money out of their pockets.

Private investors for private films. Simple as that.

Source: Wilmington Star