ASSOCIATED PRESS: GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) — Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other men charged with coordinating the Sept. 11 attacks say they want to enter guilty pleas, apparently challenging the U.S. government to sentence them to death before President-elect Barack Obama takes office. The Guantanamo detainees said they decided on Nov. 4 — the day Obama was elected — to abandon their defenses in their death-penalty trials. Obama opposes the military war-crimes trials and has pledged to close Guantanamo’s detention center, which holds some 250 men. Mohammed said Monday he will confess to masterminding the attacks that […]
NEWS CLUES: Like A Private Bodyguard Of The Truth
Blackwater Guards Surrender On Manslaughter Charges Five private security guards working for the American firm Blackwater fired machine guns and grenade launchers against unarmed Iraqi civilians, some who had their hands up, US prosecution lawyers said today. The five face 14 counts of manslaughter and 20 counts of attempted manslaughter, lawyers announced, following last year’s shooting which killed 17 Iraqis. They are also charged with using a machine gun to commit a crime of violence, a charge that carries a 30-year minimum sentence. The five guards surrendered today and were due to ask a federal judge for bail. A sixth […]
EXPLAINER: Eagles vs. The Libraries
[Dir. by SCOTT COLAN]
WEEKEND UPDATE: The Good News Flower Hour
The Good News Flower Hour #3 Folks, here’s the third installment of The Good News Flower Hour, wherein I provide the voice for a flower that reads the news. The debut is HERE and the last one is HERE. We are still tweaking the concept and streamlining the production schedule on these — it takes a LONG-ass time to make these little three-minute suckers — but we hope to make this a weekly feature in the very near future. Enjoy.
THE NEW NEW DEAL: Obama Announces Massive Public Works Project To Offset Titanic Econ Downturn
NEW YORK TIMES: WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama committed Saturday to the largest public works construction program since the creation of the interstate highway system a half-century ago as he seeks to put together a plan to resuscitate the reeling economy.With unemployment on the rise and no end to the recession in sight, Mr. Obama began highlighting elements of the economic recovery program he is trying to fashion with Congressional leaders in hopes of being able to enact it shortly after being sworn in on Jan. 20. Mr. Obama’s remarks sought to expand the definition of traditional work programs for […]
WORTH REPEATING: Good Money After Bad
BY ELLIOT SPITZER FOR SLATE The great irony is that our new place in the global economy is a direct consequence of our grand victory over the past 60 years. We have, indeed, converted virtually the entire world into one integrated capitalist economy, and we must now bear the brunt of serious and vigorous competition. In the immediate aftermath of World War II, the United States was essentially the only nation with financial capital, intellectual capital, skilled labor, a growing middle class generating consumer demand, and a rule of law permitting safe investment. Now we are one of many nations […]
LIPSTICK ON A PIG: What Ed Said
INQUIRER: This morning, CNN confirmed that Rendell said of Palin: “Look, she has a right to be here. I think she has great instincts. … She has very good political instincts … cooperate where we can because that’s what the American people want to hear … not bull—-.” PolitickerPA.com, however, reports that the full quote includes, “She’s not a genius, but she has very good political instincts.” The “not a genius” part is so difficult to hear, it’s uncertain if Rendell said it, according to CNN. MORE PREVIOUSLY: Yesterday in Philadelphia, Gov. Ed Rendell made some blunt remarks that could […]
FLEECING CHANGE: Obama Quietly Deletes Promised Windfall Tax On Big Oil From Official Web Site
Make a Donation Today and Get Your Official Obama Fleece This holiday season, celebrate our historic victory with a limited edition Obama fleece jacket. Your donation will support the Democratic National Committee and help recover the enormous resources they committed to this campaign. Make your donation of $50 or more by December 15th and your fleece jacket will be delivered by December 24th. [via OBAMA.COM] HOUSTON CHRONICLE: President-elect Barack Obama has quietly shelved a proposal to slap oil and natural gas companies with a new windfall profits tax. An aide for the transition team acknowledged the policy shift Tuesday, after […]
GAYDAR: My Own Private 9/11
BY AARON STELLA GAYDAR EDITOR Today we set the Wayback Machine to September 11th, 2001, which will forever live in infamy as the day I was expelled from the Alabama School of Fine Arts (ASFA). Freshman year at ASFA, I boarded in the high school dormitories, until the dorm directors permanently banned me for illicit acts of sodomy. By the time my sophomore year rolled around, I had accepted the mantle of ‘delinquent in the making.’ And so, one afternoon, September 10th, 2001 to be exact, I snuck back into the dorm to have one last romp in the sack […]
TRAILER: Che
The new 257-minute Che Guevara biopic is being released in two parts in January 2009, but a special single-picture engagement starts December 12 in New York in LA.
WE SHALL OVERCOME: Folk Icon Odetta Dead At 77
NEW YORK TIMES: Odetta, the singer whose deep voice wove together the strongest songs of American folk music and the civil rights movement, died on Tuesday at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan. She was 77. The cause was heart disease, said her manager, Doug Yeager. He added that she had been hoping to sing at Barack Obama’s inauguration. Odetta sang at coffeehouses and at Carnegie Hall, made highly influential recordings of blues and ballads, and became one of the most widely known folk-music artists of the 1950s and ’60s. She was a formative influence on dozens of artists, including Bob […]
WSJ: The WTF On The Mumbai Attacks
WALL STREET JOURNAL: MUMBAI — India has accused a senior leader of the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba of orchestrating last week’s terror attacks that killed at least 172 people here, and demanded the Pakistani government turn him over and take action against the group. Just two days before hitting the city, the group of 10 terrorists who ravaged India’s financial capital communicated with Yusuf Muzammil and four other Lashkar leaders via a satellite phone that they left behind on a fishing trawler they hijacked to get to Mumbai, a senior Mumbai police official told The Wall Street Journal. The entire […]
OBAMA: ‘Ello Guv’ner!
NEW YORK TIMES: President-elect Barack Obama turned from national security to domestic concerns on Tuesday, telling the country’s governors that his administration would not delay in pushing an economic recovery plan that would bring relief to the states, 41 of which are forecasting budget shortfalls this year or next. Speaking at a conference of the National Governors Association in Philadelphia, Mr. Obama said his background in the Illinois state senate made him particularly sympathetic to the needs of state and local governments. And he declared himself open to good ideas that work, whether they come from Democrats or Republicans. “We […]