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POPSACLU: SODOMY Committed by Prison Guards on POW until death! Fuc@ 'em over until death after beating, burning, dousing with cold water in freezing weather. A quick beheading on TV might appear civilized in comparison!? Expect these men to return home and play happy families without some awful consequences for the children, wives and community? Ye, when you have machines, but not thinking persons doing the torturing and killing for the military. Meanwhile the vets will fill your prisons, mental hospitals and what used be your vets hospitals.
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POPSMyths about Multilingual Societies Myth: If everyone agreed to speak only one language, we wouldn't have so much war and interethnic conflict. Reality: Of course people need a common language to understand one another. But that doesn't require eliminating minority languages; it only requires bilingualism. Switzerland has four official languages and has never had a war. Finland has three (Finnish, Swedish, and Lapp). Hawai'i has had two co-official state languages since 1978 -- English and Hawaiian -- and no civil strife has resulted. On the other hand, much of the conflict in the world has erupted in places where there is only one language. For example, in the U.S.'s own Civil War, both sides spoke English. Khmer-speaking Cambodians under Pol Pot killed millions of other Khmer-speaking Cambodians. Thus language is not the "glue" that binds us together. What really binds us as a nation is a common belief in freedom, including the freedom to speak any language we please.
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POPSFACING RUDENESS I thought this would be a good time to post a clip like this. Just look what is happening on clipmarks. Clips are put up for everyone to comment on. But when a person making a comment is insulted on a clip by another comment maker on someone elses clip, well' that is just rude.
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POPSBecause It's Always Been About Him . . . weight - at the hands of Democrats It's the Blue Dog Democrats in the House who wince at skyrocketing health-reform costs just weeks after having swallowed hemlock for 0bama on a ruinous cap-and-trade carbon tax. He seized on Republican Sen. Jim DeMint's comment that stopping 0bama on health care would break his presidency to protest, with perfect disingenuousness, that "this isn't about me. This isn't about politics. "It's all about him. Health care is his signature reform. He knows that if he produces nothing, he forfeits the mystique that both propelled him to the presidency and has sustained him through a difficult first six months. Which is why 0bama's red lines are constantly shifting. Universal coverage? Maybe not. No middle-class tax hit? Well, perhaps, but only if they don't "primarily" bear the burden. Because it's about him , 0bama is quite prepared to sign anything as long as it is titled "health care reform."
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POPS Born Alive Abortion Victim Thrown In Rubbish Can Renelique gave Williams laminaria, a drug that dilates the cervix, and prescribed three other medications, according to the administrative complaint filed by the Health Department. She was told to go to yet another clinic, A Gyn Diagnostic Center in Hialeah, where the procedure would be performed the next day, on July 20, 2006. Williams arrived in the morning and was given more medication. The Department of Health account continues as follows: Just before noon she began to feel ill. The clinic contacted Renelique. Two hours later, he still hadn't shown up. Williams went into labor and delivered the baby. "She came face to face with a human being," Pennekamp said. "And that changed everything." The complaint says one of the clinic owners, Belkis Gonzalez came in and cut the umbilical cord with scissors, then placed the baby in a plastic bag, and the bag in a trash can.
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POPS"Capital Malpractice" In addition to a number of news articles, Congressional correspondence and expert testimonies, the report also cites a June study produced by the Lewin Group, which is owned by UnitedHealth Group. Republicans have launched a multi-front war against proposed Democratic health care bills and have vowed to continue the fight into the August recess. “Rather than forcing government-run health care on the American people, Washington should be looking to the states which pioneered welfare reform in the 1990s and are serving as laboratories for health care reform today,” Boehner said in a joint news release. “The Congressional Democrats’ flawed attempt at health care reform won’t solve the health care cost crisis facing our nation and, as this report shows, would actually add to the financial burden of states and families,” Pawlenty said in the release.
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POPSLowering health care costs not tied to tort reform More: the second travesty is that the $17.7 million — which he could surely use over the many remaining years of his life — was cut by more than half by Texas law. The award included $6.72 million in economic damages and $11 million for pain and suffering. But the $11 million immediately was reduced to $250,000. Because that’s all Texas law says he can have. Did I mention that health care costs in Texas keep going up, anyway? At age 53, Mr. Fitzgerald can expect another 21 years of life . $250,000 divided by 21 years equals a little less than $12,000 a year. Anyone want to volunteer to have BOTH arms and BOTH legs amputated as the result of somebody else's carelessness and incompentence, in exchange for $12,000 a year? Anyone consider that a reasonable trade-off? Didn't think so...
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POPSThe Bad Medicine of the Republican Doctors Then there's Oklahoma Senator and unexpected Obama confidante Tom Coburn. As a Senate candidate in 2004, Dr. Coburn famously warned that "lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they'll only let one girl go to the bathroom." Upon his arrival in the Senate, the former obstetrician was elevated to the Judiciary Committee despite having advocated the death penalty for doctors who perform abortions. More recently, Coburn the C Street marriage counselor to John Ensign and Mark Sanford turned Deather:
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POPSNYT Malpractice - Like it Wasn't Clear at the Time! Why can't this stuff be exposed in real time??!? ------------------------ _<"“The New York Times keeps going over the line in every single campaign and last year was the worst, easily,” said Mal Kline of the American Journalism Center. “They would ignore real questions worth examining about Obama, the questions about Bill Ayers or about how he got his house. Then on the other side they would try to manufacture scandals.” “If this is true, it would not surprise me at all. The New York Times is a liberal newspaper. It is dedicated to furthering the Democratic Party,” said Dr. Paul Kengor, professor of Political Science at Grove City College. “People think The New York Times is an objective news source and it is not. It would not surprise me that if they had a news story that would have swayed the election into McCain’s favor they would not have used it.”
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POPSCourts Rule for Rationality A positive ruling by the NJ Supreme Court upholding the right for people to form their own idea of when life begins instead of kowtowing to right-wing ideology.
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POPS GOP Set to Propose Its Own Health Bill Republicans have talked about a variety of alternatives to Democratic efforts on health care, but decided to put out their own bill after seeing details of the legislation unveiled by Democrats last Thursday. GOP leaders hope to offer the measure as an alternative during debate on the Democratic bill, and a spokesman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) said Republicans would be allowed to do so. In the Senate, where Democratic leaders are pushing a proposal to create a new government-run insurance plan, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the Connecticut independent, made clear again Sunday that he opposed the idea. The senator said he wouldn't try to block debate on the bill, but signaled he would support any Republican efforts to block a vote on it. by Greg Hitt at wsj.com
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POPS "Media Malpractice" John Ziegler's Movie Kudos to Kevin Ferris for having the mettle to write about Media Malpractice. It takes a certain strength of character to step back and examine the actions of the media during the past election cycle. Even more so when it is your chosen profession. Perhaps Kevin should hand out copies of ‘Better‘ along with this article to his fellow journalists at the Inquirer. They need all the help they can get! I found a great video of John Zeigler talking about the media’s reaction to his film. He jokes about having enough material from the reception his film received to make a Media Malpractice 2 - only I don’t believe he was joking. Witness The Death Of Journalism http://www.howobamagotelected.com/
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POPS A Stimulus You Can Believe In The total cost to the economy from excessive litigation is an estimated $900 billion a year. These include unbounded noneconomic damages; a broader use of punitive damages; contingent fees of a percentage of recovery; the lack of loser-pays system; extraordinarily broad discovery; class-action litigation; and the use of speculative and nonscientific expert testimony in some state courts. Yet, despite these increased costs, there is no evidence that the United States tort system provides benefits superior to those of other nations. For example, New Zealand does not even offer the availability of private medical malpractice litigation, yet no one thinks that medical care in New Zealand is of substandard quality because of that absence. If anything, it is quite likely that the arbitrary nature of the American legal system has distorting effects that make it perform worse than other nations’ systems.
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POPSJake Tapper's ACORN Posts at his ABC Political Punch Blog ABC's Charles Gibson --- "Unaware" of Five Day-Old ACORN Controversy, Senate Vote to De-Fund ACORN Gibson, as John Stephenson and P.J. Gladnick of NewsBusters noted in September of last year, as a result of his interview with GOP vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, twisted her words, with the help of selective editing, to portray her as some kind of out of touch, excessively religious, militaristic rube. With the above interview, no editing is required. Who’s out of touch now, Charlie? Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org. _______________________________________ UPDATE: Rush and some NB commenters are speculating that Gibson may have said “I haven’t heard about it” because the only other alternative would be to say a completely damning “We didn’t think it was important.” Gibson’s laugh at the beginning of his response does seem to be a bit nervous.
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POPSA Tale of Two Protection Rackets: ACORN’s — and The Media’s
This is the network that surreptitiously rigged GM pickup trucks in staged crash tests in 1993 to show that the vehicles were unsafe " and failed to inform viewers that the simulations used incendiary devices to ignite the explosions. This is the network that sent out an intrepid NBC News reporter in a canoe to cover treacherous New Jersey flooding in 2005 " only to be shown up by passers-by who sloshed in front of the camera and demonstrated that the water was only a few inches deep. This is the network that tried to arrange Islamophobia stings at NASCAR events in 2006 to try and “expose” racism among Southerners. The network worked with a Muslim activist who sent a recruitment notice across the Internet: They are looking for some Muslim male candidates for their show who would be willing to go to non-Muslim gatherings and see if they attract any discriminatory comments or actions while being filmed…NBC is willing to fly in someone and cover their weekend expenses.
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POPS"Architects of Ruin" throw out common sense and decades of experience in order to make loans that were almost certain to go unpaid. The effort was launched during the Carter administration but really gained momentum and a head of steam during the Clinton years. (GOPers shouldn't feel too smug as the Bush administration continued and even expanded the practice). "Architects of Ruin" can be advance-ordered now on Amazon.com. No doubt, it will generate a flood of negative reviews from liberals in the mainstream media and their allies in the political and academic worlds in part because of sensational tidbits like the fact White House Chief of Staff was paid "more than $46,000 an hour as a board member for Freddie Mac ." What caught my eye today, though, concerns a little known fact about a long-forgotten class-action lawsuit filed in 1994 by three young trial lawyers, one of whom just happens to be sitting in the Oval Office today as president.
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POPSDr blogs own malpractice trial, loses Pediatrician Robert Lindeman started an anonymous blog, "drfleablog", where he talked about pediatrics issues. He was sued for failing to diagnose diabetes in a little boy who eventually died from it. In his blog, he would talk about the malpractice suit and make fun of the plaintiffs and the jury. Since he knew that malpractice cases hinge on what juries think of the doctor's moral character, the revelation that he was the author of the blog meant that his asshole nature would be exposed to the jury and his case would be sunk.
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POPSThe Torture Memo When lawyers in private practice mess up, they face serious jeopardy. They can be fired, sued for malpractice, disbarred or prosecuted. Yoo and Bybee face no such risks. The President won't protest. He got what he wanted. And while a state disciplinary body can investigate, that is unlikely without Justice Department help.
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