Month: October 2005

Bush’s decision to name Harriet Miers, his White House counsel and longtime Texas pal, to the Supreme Court seat now held by retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor should raise Constitutional concerns.

Miers, who nobody really knows her stance on certain issues, has left very few clues in her previous public posts, which include service on the Dallas city council and as Bush’s lottery commissioner when he was governor of Texas.

But her nomination to the Supreme Court comes as no surprised to many of us Texans who are Bush watchers since Bush had already established this type of precedents when – as governor in 1998 – he appointed Alberto Gonzales to the Texas Supreme Court.

However, two weeks ago, GW Bush did open Pandora’s Box when he told reporters his reasoning for nominating Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court. Which, now, the White House is actively playing down.

Read More

Years ago while I was visiting friends of mine who had two daughters ages 7 and 9, or thereabouts, their mom got up from the kitchen table, opened up the girls’ door and asked them to pipe down because they were laughing hysterically. Mom sat back down at the table and dad looked at the now closed bedroom door, raised his finger and said snidely, “Ya! Stop having fun!!”. I laughed, of course. Mom wasn’t too impressed with him though.

Over at the orange place, they’re having a big, serious discussion about the appropriateness of celebrating Fitzmas with SnoodGuy leading the way in his “Kill the Fitzmas Talk”  diary. To that I say, “Ya! Stop having fun!!”.

Geez.
 

Read More

Firstly… I only engage Booman on this out of respect.  From my point of view we are using the classical philosophical/scientific/intellectual dialogue method. When Einstein said, “God Doesn’t Play Dice” in criticism of Niels Bohr’s theory, it was out of respect… he didn’t debunk the nutty theories of just anyone. When Bohr said “don’t tell God what to do”… the debate was very clarifying. The issues are still not really resolved, but the dispute is a part of the argument, helping to illuminate the dispute still.

Well… we’re not Einstein and Bohr, but my point is… I take contrast with Booman because I think it’s worth it. Booman’s position is relevant, it’s clear, it’s intentional… it’s well thought out (but mistaken), all good things in a position used to contrast its anti-pode.

Framing is about ideas, the ideas are everywhere, they are the engines behind what we say… to say “don’t frame, just do” is to say “don’t have an engine in your car… just go”… frames are the programs of the mind. To say, “don’t frame” is to say, “don’t run a word processing program… just word process”.

You cannot speak without framing.

The simplest perspective to have on framing is to understand that frames are made of the metaphor we think with, from which we draw conclusions.

Asking progressive to frame is asking us to think about which metaphors we use, to know why we use them, to create new metaphors and refine those we use, and to never use metaphors rigged against us. That last one is important, the advice is to recognize rigged, dishonest metaphors, when we see them.

Booman is actually quite good at this! So I have sought out the frames in his good work at dkos debunking the “defense” of the WH by the WSJ.

Read More

I recently did an interview with Liz Janes, a musician and singer, who lamented the Bush administration’s use of God in all things political. She made this interesting point: “Oh man, just the whole “God Bless America” thing is so awful. Do you remember all the billboards that came up after 9/11? God Bless America at the Holiday Inn, egg breakfast for $2.99. I just think with the combination of terrorism and the Bush administration, state religion has flourished in a scary way that’s not good for the church at large.”

You can read the rest–it’s a long interview–at my site www.econoculture.com

Read More

Italy’s la Republica has provided a partial chronology of events related to the forged Niger documents and blogger de Gondi at Booman Tribune’s sister site European Tribune has a translated summary.

In their first installment, the reporters trace the origins of the documents “up to the autumn of 2001 when Nicolò Pollari passed the false SISMI dossier to Rome CIA station chief, Jeff Castelli.” According to de Gondi’s account: “Castelli wrote a report and forwarded it to the Greg Thielmann’s Bureau of Intelligence which eventually dismissed this first report as unfounded.” As we all know, it didn’t end there.

Much more on the flipside…

Read More