Grumpasaurus.com

You sure should now

A collision with a semi-trailer truck seven years ago left 52-year-old Deborah Shank permanently brain-damaged and in a wheelchair. Her husband, Jim, and three sons found a small source of solace: a $700,000 accident settlement from the trucking company involved. After legal fees and other expenses, the remaining $417,000 was put in a special trust. It was to be used for Mrs. Shanks care.

Instead, all of it is now slated to go to Mrs. Shanks former employer, Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

Two years ago, the retail giants health plan sued the Shanks for the $470,000 it had spent on her medical care. A federal judge ruled last year in Wal-Marts favor, backed by an appeals-court decision in August. Now, her family has to rely on Medicaid and Mrs. Shanks social-security payments to keep up her round-the-clock care.

Oh wait, it gets better

In August last year, U.S. district judge Lewis Blanton sided with Wal-Mart, ruling that when Mrs. Shank signed on to Wal-Mart’s health plan she was obligated to abide by its terms.

The ruling came six days before the Shanks’ 18-year-old son, Jeremy, was killed in September last year in Iraq shortly after he arrived in the U.S. Army’s 25th Infantry Division.

If ever there was an entity that deserved strychnine in its reservoir, Wal-Mart would be the one.

Olberman has more

Now implement some goddamn national health insurance for fuck’s sake.

Jose Padilla sentenced to 17 years in prison

Jose Padilla, once accused of plotting with al Qaeda to blow up a radioactive “dirty bomb,” was sentenced Tuesday to 17 years and four months on terrorism conspiracy charges that don’t mention those initial allegations.

Padilla, an American citizen, was taken on U.S. soil (with Ashcroft holding a press conference to announce the grab of the dirty bomber), held without charges for 3.5 years,¹ in solitary confinement, denied access to an attorney, and tortured.² I’ve mentioned this before.

Without even going to the elements of what appears on the surface to be a Thought Crime more than an actual crime, there is no conceivable way by which this trial could be imagined to have been fair or Padilla’s civil rights upheld. Any one of the elements above would be sufficient in a system still beholden to the rule of law to create a mistrial; taken together the are a nightmare of coercion, duress, and authoritarianism.

This verdict is a black eye on the Department of Justice, the prosecuting attorneys who did not resign rather than try this case, the judge, the judicial system, the media, the Bush administration, and America.

Just fucking embarrassing.

I’m sure my shame and anger will comfort the now-physically and mentally broken Padilla while he’s in solitary confinement and on suicide watch for the next 17 years.

The Bush administration and the DoJ forwarded an argument in this case, and one that has apparently stood, that the President has the power to declare anyone – even a United States citizen – to be an enemy combatant and outside the jurisdiction of our system of laws. Again, I’ve talked about this before. Gentle reader, from the results of this case, you too could be deemed an enemy combatant. At any time. In any place.

I hope you like Uzbekistan. Or at least windowless rooms in hot climates. I also hope you aren’t too attached to your fingernails, skull, or skin.

Note: unlike John Cole, I don’t think this sentence is a rebuke to the Bush government. To reach that stage, you first have to accept the Bush-DoJ interpretation of enemy combatant and that this was a fair trial. A real rebuke would have dismissed the case. This is just mealy halfassed reasonableness by the judge.

Wow, what a coincidence! It just so happens that the missing emails (related deletions discussed previously) from the records the White House turned over to Congress aren’t complete. Golly gee willickers! Whouda thunk that the emails turned over by the OVP would be missing 16 days worth of emails?

House Oversight Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) revealed that the White House failed to preserve emails for at least 473 separate days. Waxman’s report said “Vice President Cheney’s office showed no electronic messages on 16 occasions from September 2003 to May 2005.” Among the sixteen days for which email are missing from Vice President Cheney’s office “is Sept. 30, 2003, the same day the day the Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced they were investigating who outed former CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson.”

INT. office – night

We revolve around a classic, quality desk largely cleared of papers. It’s dark wood exudes power and solidity. A single lamp spotlights the desktop and the two liver-spotted hands lightly touching at the fingertips. CHENEY, the man behind the hands, is in shadow. He may or may not be undead. Thunder BOOMS outside and rain DRUMS on the windows. The phone RINGS.

cheney

The data we provided to Congress is incomplete you say? And the missing days just happen to align with my Energy Task Force and the Plame records?

(beat)

My, that is unfortunate.

(beat)

How could that have ever happened?

CUT TO:

Close up of a severe, old, possibly dead man’s eyes. Which are behind glasses. We slowly pan back until we can see all of CHENEY’S face. A corner of one side of his mouth curls up. CHENEY winks. The lamp CLICKS off.

END

Remember, this is the group that permanently deleted the pre-Iraq email backups. The group (especially Rove) that used RNC mail servers for official government business and then deleted those emails when subpoenaed. All of this is in violation of the Federal Records Act and we’re not even into conspiracy to obstruct justice territory or the substance of the underlying crimes yet.

And Congress apparently still thinks “impeachment” is a new cocktail from Georgia.

Just like the Enron they so resemble and admire (and used to work for), the Bush administration just happened to destroy all records of pre-Iraq war emails. How convenient!

The White House has acknowledged recycling its backup computer tapes of e-mail before October 2003, raising the possibility that many electronic messages — including those pertaining to the CIA leak case — have been taped over and are gone forever.

The disclosure came minutes before midnight Tuesday under a court-ordered deadline that forced the White House to reveal information it has previously refused to provide.

Among the e-mails that could be lost are messages swapped by any White House officials involved in discussions about leaking a CIA officer’s identity to reporters.

Note that this, in addition to, you know, hiding the crimes, is almost certainly in violation of the Federal Records Act. To be in compliance with the FRA, records may only be destroyed under the authority of a records disposition schedule approved by the Archivist of the United States.

NARA issues a General Records Schedule (GRS) that gives record descriptions of records that are common to most Federal agencies and authorizes record disposals for temporary records. The Department is responsible for developing agency record schedules-with the approval of the Archivist of the United States-that are tailored to our own agency-specific records that are not provided for in the GRS.

Record schedules are mandatory instructions of what to do with records (and nonrecord materials) no longer needed for current Government business. The records schedules indicate how long a document must be kept before it is transferred to a Federal Records Center, destroyed or transferred to NARA for permanent preservation.

Now, gentle Congresscritters, who is going to be the first to query the record schedules to see if these documents were on the list? Who is going to be the first to issue a subpoena? Who is going to be the first to mention “criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice”?

I’m going with “no one,” but they should. Not only did Congress let the administration get away with rampant lawbreaking for 7 years… they’re going to let them destroy the evidence while they sit around and have bullshit investigations about fucking steroids in a sport?!? Jesus fuck that makes me want to find the nearest protruding object and run into it full force with my eyeball.

The sad part is, I remember when this behavior by the Busheviks used to surprise me.

Mark Deli Siljander, a former Republican congressperson from Michigan was indicted today as part of a conspiracy to funnel money terrorists who have threatened US troops in Afghanistan.

A former congressman and delegate to the United Nations was indicted Wednesday as part of a terrorist fundraising ring that allegedly sent more than $130,000 to an al-Qaida and Taliban supporter who has threatened U.S. and international troops in Afghanistan.

The former Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, was charged with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about lobbying senators on behalf of an Islamic charity that authorities said was secretly sending funds to terrorists.

Siljander is a true warrior for the true GOP cause – money. It’s not about nationalism, jingoism, saving the troops, saving the unborn, saving christmas… it’s all about the benjamins. With regards to his true orthodoxy, Siljander is surely going to spend eternity with his 72 bags of glittery gold. Or the gold may be from the fronts of his soon-to-be cellmate smiling down at Siljander as Siljander performs his patented 72-lick salad toss. Hard to tell on these things. It’s heaven for one of them!

I give it approximately 30 10 minutes before Faux news “inadvertently” labels the GOP Republican GOP Republican GOP Republican GOP Republican GOP Siljander as “(D-MI)”. Oopsies! How’d that D get in there?

Read the indictment in my newly-opened “unfinished” legal bits section.

Yet another story of hypocrisy, addition, sexual peccadilloes, and abhorrent behavior by the slimiest of the slimy slimesters that have so degraded our nation.

Richard Mellon Scaife, billionaire bankroller of conservative crusades, spent heavily to expose Bill Clinton’s “Troopergate” misbehavior. Now Scaife’s divorce from his second wife, Ritchie, is providing another unsavory saga—adultery! addiction! assault! dognapping!?!—as both parties let loose

Hahahahaaaaa… definitely the best schadenfreude moment o’ the year.

In December of 2005, the private detective proved Ritchie’s fears to have been well founded: he took pictures showing the reclusive 75-year-old billionaire with a woman named Tammy Vasco, a tall, blonde 43-year-old whose criminal history includes two arrests for prostitution. The pair was photographed at Doug’s Motel, a roadside establishment near Pittsburgh, where rooms rent for $49 a night, or $31 for three hours.

Given how the dog whistles have already begun (1, 2, 3, 4) and in preparation from November’s massive hate-n-bigotry fest that’s going to come from the right in November¹, I just wanted to get ahead of the curve on this one.

By the way, this one is (tm, me), bitches. Y’all betta reckognize!

Speaking of dog whistles, Barack uses his own in that his cadences, sometimes accent and pronunciation, and some phrase usage are all in the manner of black preachers and evocative of the civil rights movement. So while he doesn’t appeal to race directly, I believe his presentation is meant to do so to those listening for such signals. This is no different than Bush’s longstanding code language for the anti-choice radical right either, I just wanted to note that such language usage exists for multiple purposes.

1. It’s going to be a hatred and bigotry fest no matter who the Dem candidate is, of course. Fear and hatred is the only way the right knows how to operate. The most obvious form is going to be racism, but that’s just one of their legion ways of getting their ragegasm on.

Sears distributing spyware edition

It’s not that Sears fails to notify users it intends to spy on them. Indeed, the email sent to users states that the application “monitors all of the internet behavior that occurs on the computer on which you install the application, including…filling a shopping basket, completing an application form, or checking your…personal financial or health information.”

The rub is that this unusually frank warning comes on page 10 of a 54-page privacy statement that is 2,971 words long. Edelman, who is a frequent critic of spyware companies, said the Sears document fails to meet standards established by the Federal Trade Commission when it settled with Direct Revenue and Zango over the lack of disclosure about the extent of their snoopware.

You might want to check who is writing the entries

The gospel of truth according to fake penis experts and nerds with chips on their shoulders, Wikipedia, has been edited by a Bush friendly member of the US House of Representatives.

Apparently the person was so concerned that people no longer bought the story about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq that he or she took to tampering with the Whackypedia entry.

The entry was edited by someone with a House of Representatives IP address to make the bizarre claim that there was a link between the terrorist organisation al Qaeda and the Iraq government.

Orwell wept. See also, the CIA and Vatican.

A US hacker’s homemade program to pinpoint origins of Wikipedia edits indicates that alterations to the popular online encyclopedia have come from the CIA and the Vatican.

Virgil Griffith’s “Wikiscanner” points to Central Intelligence Agency computers as the sources of nearly 300 edits to subjects including Iran’s president, the Argentine navy, and China’s nuclear arsenal.

Update: Add the US Army at Gitmo to the list.

Sinking ship, rat

Karl Rove, President Bush’s close friend and chief political strategist, announced Monday he will leave the White House at the end of August

That’s ratfucker to you, bub

Cop goes apeshit over upside down flag, assaults citizens

The Buncombe County Sheriff’s Office arrested activists Mark and Deborah Kuhn in West Asheville Wednesday morning after a complaint that the couple was desecrating an American flag. They say a deputy invaded their home and used excessive force.

If you think this is an isolated example of this behavior, I’ve got a nice bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

His brand of substance-free pussified blowhard sociopathy fits right in with the modern GOP. I can’t imagine why he doesn’t have more followers.

The incident: dog excrement found on the roof and windows of the Romney station wagon. How it got there: Romney strapped a dog carrier — with the family dog Seamus, an Irish Setter, in it — to the roof of the family station wagon for a twelve hour drive from Boston to Ontario, which the family apparently completed, despite Seamuss rather visceral protest.

Let me repeat: rather than kennel his animal or make room in the car, he strapped it to the roof for a 12 hour drive. 12. hours.

Too bad this one is that the zombies of America have stuck us with a regressive group of misogynistic sadists on the Supreme Court.

Mr. Bowles, an Ohio inmate, challenged his conviction in federal district court and lost. The court told Mr. Bowles that he had until Feb. 27 to appeal. He filed the appeal on Feb. 26, and was ready to argue why he was wrongly convicted. But it turned out the district court made a mistake. The appeal should have been filed by Feb. 24.

The Supreme Court ruled, 5 to 4, in a majority opinion written by Justice Clarence Thomas, that Mr. Bowles was out of luck, and his appeal was invalid. So much for heeding a federal judge.

A special shout out to the cowardly Dems who were “keeping their powders dry” when they chose not to fight first Roberts then scAlito.

Great work, creator o’ vid!

They’ve been prepping to attack Iran for more than a year. We need to stop this insanity. Now.

The Bush Administration, while publicly advocating diplomacy in order to stop Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon, has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible major air attack. Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium.
…
Some operations, apparently aimed in part at intimidating Iran, are already under way. American Naval tactical aircraft, operating from carriers in the Arabian Sea, have been flying simulated nuclear-weapons delivery missions—rapid ascending maneuvers known as “over the shoulder” bombing—since last summer, the former official said, within range of Iranian coastal radars.

I’m out of words on this one. Attacking Iran will be a disaster on so many levels that the wisdom in keeping it from happening should be self-evident.