One indication of how pervasive the right-wing bias is in corporate-owned media can be found in the burying of Gannongate. Let’s review the situation.

- A man posing as a reporter gained access to the White House on numerous occasions under an inaccurate name.

- The organization he worked for was a front for the Texas GOP.

- This person was given preferential treatment at Bush’s press conferences in return for softball questions which primarily served to glorify Bush and vilify the opposition party rather than obtaining information for the public about the Bush regime and its policies.

- There are allegations that Guckert/Gannon received classified information about the identity of a CIA agent whose husband offended the Bush regime.

- There is no indication that a proper vetting was done on Gannon before giving him access inside the White House, a serious security breach.

- The Gannongate scandal happened at the same general time that the Bush Administration got caught paying off fundamentalist propagandists Armstrong Williams and Maggie Gallagher with government funds.

If something like this happened during a Democratic administration, every major news outlet would flog the story to death. Republicans would start impeachment proceedings, and they would be quite correct in doing so.

Gannon seems to be starting a pity campaign to get queers to ignore the story. But, it’s tough for me to have any sympathy for him when he has been completely disloyal to the lgbt community. Gannon has propagandized for Bush, a fanatical and dangerous homophobe and has been active in the homo-hating Free Republic crowd. He actually attacked a politician for being pro-gay (in this case John Kerry). Loyalty is a two-way street, something Gannon/Guckert/whatever has yet to realize.

The irony is that only sheer laziness by the Bush regime allowed Gannon to become the high profile player he temporarily became. If they knew he was queer, much less involved in porno/prostitution Web sites, the wouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near Bush’s press conferences.

Alternet has an excellent article on the subject by Michael Dietz, “Becoming Jeff Gannon”

Democrats.com is calling for a Special Prosecutor to investigate the scandal.

MoveOn is promoting a Flash animation that offers a solution to a relatively minor long term problem with Social Security during the middle of this century: eliminating the salary cap on Social Security taxation. As the animation points out, CEO’s pay a much lower percentage of their income to Social Security than police officers do.

Check it out

There’s a fairly recent trend in spam: fundamentalist Christian junk emailers. One of the most prolific is from Christian Debt Removers. Christian Mortgage USA gets its licks in too. Even though I’m an atheist, I get emails for the “Christian Dish,” with the “best in Christian programming.” Talk about an oxymoron. I could even meet Talibanists for dating from “Christian Singles.”

I love how fundamentalist Christians, who love to condemn everyone else as “immoral,” have little or no standards of ethical behavior.

I can’t wait for emails selling “Christian” Viagra.

The media tend to be more interested in covering Democrats when they criticize Bush and the GOP than covering Democratic policy proposals. It’s good to try to balance things out a bit.

Boxer And Woolsey Introduce Legislation To Permanently Protect The Sonoma Coast

It's important to defend America from the Republican Party's Talibanist agenda, but it also is important for liberals to present positive ideas. Being the lesser of two evils isn't enough.

I'm an apparently intelligent, liberal, not-too-generous, not-too-selfish, relatively well adjusted human being!
See how compatible you are with me!
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey

During ceremonies commemorating the victory against Nazi Germany, Bush actually said the following:

"We are fighting this battle together. The struggle for peace connects us all."

The most notorious war-monger in the world today actually said he is struggling for peace. With Bush and his regime, truth is stranger than fiction. Article

Rolling Stone has an excellent piece on Operation Iraqi Quagmire. The author saves the most interesting part for last:

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In fact, it may already be too late to prevent Iraq from exploding. Iraq's new government is stuck in a fatal Catch-22: To have any credibility among Iraqis it must break with the U.S. and oppose the occupation, but it couldn't last a week without the protection of American troops. The Bush administration is also stuck. Its failure to stabilize Iraq, and the continuing casualties there, have led to a steady slide in the president's popularity: Polls show that a majority of Americans no longer think that the war in Iraq was worth fighting in the first place. Yet withdrawing from Iraq would only lead to more chaos, and the rest of the world has exhibited little interest in cleaning up America's mess. Of the two dozen or so countries that sent troops to Iraq, fewer and fewer remain: Spain, Portugal, Hungary and New Zealand have already quit, and the Netherlands, Bulgaria, Ukraine and Italy have announced they are getting out. Even if the United Nations agreed to step in, there is little or no chance that the administration will internationalize control over Iraq. In the face of a full-scale civil war in Iraq, says a source close to the U.S. military, Bush intends to go it alone.

"Our policy is to make Iraq a colony," he says. "We won't let go."


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Article

Looks like that annoying show is going to finally bite the dust, torturing people only in syndication. I could never get through more than 5 minutes of it without wretching. If I were Italian-American, I would be boycotting CBS over the negative portrayals of that ethnic group.

The program does show something about the state of network television these days. The militant fundamentalists at hate-groups like the so-called “Parents Television Council” have succeeded at censoring network tv to the point that only sanitized snores have a future on broadcast tv.

Two anti-Raymond links:

From Robotjohnny.com

From Downtownchickchat.com

MoveOn.org is fighting the Bush regime's efforts to wipe out Social Security:

https://www.moveon.org/donatec4/socialsecurity.html

Ex-Capitol leader in sex scandal
Spokane Mayor Jim West accused of molesting two boys

http://159.54.227.3/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050506/NEWS/505060305

And, the Religious Right says that liberal homos are the pedophiles.

It's going to be a bumpy ride.

Why did I start this web log?

I always thought I'd do something like this. Now, I have a cold, can't sleep, and don't feel like doing anything strenuous or productive.