Salon.com News | 7 GOP senators key in filibuster fight: "Seven Republican senators will determine the outcome of a showdown this week between the president and Congress — and a minority within it — over who is going to shape the federal courts.

Barring any unforeseen developments, these are the lawmakers in the make-or-break position when it comes to deciding whether to allow a Senate minority to block a president's nominees for the federal bench.

The senators are Susan Collins of Maine, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, John Warner of Virginia, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and John Sununu of New Hampshire.

At issue is an effort by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to ban judicial filibusters. The Senate's Democratic leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, wants the ability to block nominees for the Supreme Court and lower courts whom his party views as outside the legal mainstream."

(Via Salon.)

Old Foes Soften to New Reactors - New York Times: "Several of the nation's most prominent environmentalists have gone public with the message that nuclear power, long taboo among environmental advocates, should be reconsidered as a remedy for global warming.

Their numbers are still small, but they represent growing cracks in what had been a virtually solid wall of opposition to nuclear power among most mainstream environmental groups. In the past few months, articles in publications like Technology Review, published by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Wired magazine have openly espoused nuclear power, angering other environmental advocates"

(Via NY Times.)

AlterNet: War on Iraq: Torture's Dirty Secret: It Works: "I recently caught a glimpse of the effects of torture in action at an event honoring Maher Arar. The Syrian-born Canadian is the world's most famous victim of "rendition," the process by which US officials outsource torture to foreign countries. Arar was switching planes in New York when U.S. interrogators detained him and "rendered" him to Syria, where he was held for ten months in a cell slightly larger than a grave and taken out periodically for beatings."

...

"In a rare public speech, Arar addressed this fear directly. He told the audience that an independent commissioner has been trying to gather evidence of law-enforcement officials breaking the rules when investigating Muslim Canadians. The commissioner has heard dozens of stories of threats, harassment and inappropriate home visits. But, Arar said, 'not a single person made a public complaint. Fear prevented them from doing so.' Fear of being the next Maher Arar.

The fear is even thicker among Muslims in the United States, where the Patriot Act gives police the power to seize the records of any mosque, school, library or community group on mere suspicion of terrorist links. When this intense surveillance is paired with the ever-present threat of torture, the message is clear: You are being watched, your neighbor may be a spy, the government can find out anything about you. If you misstep, you could disappear onto a plane bound for Syria, or into 'the deep dark hole that is Guantánamo Bay,' to borrow a phrase from Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights."

(Via AlterNet.)

'Protocols' Left Bush Out of the Loop: "Do the Democrats need another think tank to help them figure out their future? A coalition of liberals and centrists believes so, but with a twist: It will be a think tank for politics, not for policy.

The New Politics Institute (NPI) will leave it to others to develop a future policy agenda for the party. Simon Rosenberg, founder of the New Democrat Network and the inspiration behind the new institute, said the new group will study what the rise of the conservative movement, anticipated demographic changes in the country and the 'post-broadcasting' world of new media mean for Democrats' hopes of winning elections.

'Until we can really get our act together and win elections, all the policy white papers aren't going to do us a lot of good,' said Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, whose Daily Kos is one of the most popular political blogs on the Internet and who is an adviser to the institute."

(Via The Washington Post.)

Defense Tech: RESEARCHERS SHACK UP IN REALINGMENT: "Several of the Pentagon's most important centers of science and technology development -- including the mad scientists at Darpa, the Office of Naval Research, the Army Research Office, and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research -- are all going to leave their old offices behind, and become roommates at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

The moves will save a bit of money -- $573 million over 20 years, the Defense Department figures. And they'll probably help with security, by taking these groups out of leased office buildings, and onto a military base.

More importantly, being neighbors might help these far-thinking research groups get rid of some overlap as they hand out grants to scientists and engineers. "

...

"Maybe some of that duplication can be squeezed out, under the new plan. Darpa's been criticized, recently, for straying from its mandate to fund way-out, "blue sky" research. Having agencies nearby that are funding the here-and-now might help Darpa return to its mission."

(Via a DefenseTech.)

News via the Washington Post: "Two weeks ago, before the British elections, in the Times, a document showed up that seems to indicate that George Bush made quite clear to the Brits, in the summer of 2002, that he intended to go to war against Iraq, no matter what.

Today the Washington Post published a story on that document. Nothing that hasn't been said before in British newspapers or the blogosphere. No mention that 89 members of the US Congress sent Bush a letter asking for an explanation. The article does note that the release of the document triggered criticism of Tony Blair, some new news beyond what the Times published on 1 May."

(Via WhirledView.)

Salon.com News | After the oil is gone:
"Does the Iraq war presage the kind of resource wars that you see in the future?

The Iraq war is not hard to understand. It wasn't an attempt to steal Iraq's oil. If that was the case, it would have been a stupid venture because we've spent hundreds of billions of dollars occupying the place, not to mention the lives lost. It was not a matter of stealing the oil; it was a matter of retaining access to it. It was an attempt to stabilize the region of the world that holds two-thirds of the remaining oil, namely, the Middle East.

We opened a police station in the Middle East, and Iraq just happened to be the best candidate for it. They had a troublesome dictator. They were geographically located between Iran and Saudi Arabia. So we went to Iraq to moderate and influence the behavior of the two countries --Iran and Saudi Arabia -- that are so important to us. We desperately wanted the oil supplies to continue coming out of them in a reliable way. So the Iraq venture was all about stabilizing the Middle East. It raises the obvious question: How long can the U.S. hope to occupy unfriendly nations? The answer is, not forever."

...

"If there is such a massive threat to the American way of life, why are our government and civic institutions unable to foresee it and make any changes to address it?

You will now be enlightened: The dirty secret of the American economy for more than a decade now is that it is largely based on the continued creation of suburban sprawl and all its accessories and furnishings. And if you remove that from our economy there isn't a whole lot left besides hair cutting, Colonel Sanders' chicken, and open-heart surgery."

(Via Salon.)

Soviets Planned Nuclear First Strike to Preempt West, Documents Show: "The Soviet-led Warsaw Pact had a long-standing strategy to attack Western Europe that included being the first to use nuclear weapons, according to a new book of previously Secret Warsaw Pact documents published today. Although the aim was apparently to preempt NATO 'aggression,' the Soviets clearly expected that nuclear war was likely and planned specifically to fight and win such a conflict.

The documents show that Moscow's allies went along with these plans but the alliance was weakened by resentment over Soviet domination and the belief that nuclear planning was sometimes highly unrealistic. Just the opposite of Western views at the time, Pact members saw themselves increasingly at a disadvantage compared to the West in the military balance, especially with NATO's ability to incorporate high-technology weaponry and organize more effectively, beginning in the late 1970s."

(Via The National Security Archives.)

Salon.com Technology | Identity crisis: "During the past two weeks, while you weren't looking, Congress turned your driver's license into a national I.D. card. Amended to a 'must pass' spending bill that authorizes $82 billion primarily for the war in Iraq, both the Senate and the House passed the Real I.D. Act, which asks states to issue licenses only to people who can prove they're U.S. citizens or legal immigrants. The law also dictates that licenses be 'machine readable' -- probably through the kind of RFID radio tag that's now on American passports -- so that people seeking your I.D., anyone from cops to a bouncer, can quickly scan the license to obtain your name, address, photograph and other personal information.

Hundreds of immigration rights and civil-liberties groups have criticized the bill. They argue that the national I.D. card will allow cops and corporations to spy on citizens and worry that new databases of personal information will aid identity thieves. Opponents also point out that the new bill could create even longer lines at your local DMV, where clerks will scrutinize everybody who applies for and renews a license. The legislation now awaits President Bush's signature, and despite the criticism, he's certain to sign it. But one aspect of the Real I.D. Act should give Bush pause: According to security experts, the new I.D. cards won't make the country any safer and will likely make terrorists harder to catch."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com News | A real monkey trial: "Martin is a member of Kansas' Board of Education and part of a 6-4 majority that appears dead set on changing state standards so the creationist theory of intelligent design, and perhaps other religious ideas, can be taught in science classes along with evolution. Martin and her creationist colleagues are ready to override a report recently issued by scientists and educators on Kansas' curriculum committee, which wants to keep the state's solid science standards intact."

...

"Krebs, like others around the country who have stood up for evolution in recent years, regards the current creationist fixation on intelligent design as a wedge, intended to open the door to the introduction of a wide range of creationist ideas in science classrooms. For that matter, he also views the entire struggle over evolution as merely a wedge in the religious right's efforts to tear down the constitutional wall between church and state. 'This is all part of a bigger political struggle,' says Krebs, matter-of-factly. And some creationists agree. 'If you believe God created [a] baby, it makes it a whole lot harder to get rid of that baby,' Terry Fox, pastor of the Southern Baptist Ministry in Wichita, told a Washington Post reporter this spring. 'If you can cause enough doubt on evolution, liberalism will die.'"

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com News | Ethiopia: al-Qaida operating in Somalia: "Ethiopia's prime minister warned on Thursday of the danger posed by a ‘very active al-Qaida cell’ in Somalia's capital and said a stable government is the best way to eliminate the terrorist threat in the chaotic Horn of Africa country.

Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, in an interview with The Associated Press days ahead of an election in which he is seeking a third consecutive term, said his government supported the Somali transitional government formed in neighboring Kenya last year and would do everything possible to help it take power and eliminate the terrorist threat.

‘Wherever there is distress, wherever there is acute poverty, social dislocation, the potential for a terrorist state exists,’ Meles said. ‘We have a very active terrorist cell in Mogadishu, which has been involved in terrorist activities in Kenya.’

Kenya has been hit twice in recent years by major terrorist attacks that killed hundreds. In 1998, the U.S. Embassy was destroyed by a car bomb, and another exploded outside a tourist hotel on Kenya's Indian Ocean coast in 2002."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com News | U.S. judge rejects Neb. gay-marriage ban: "Nebraska's ban on gay marriage was struck down by a federal judge who ruled the measure interferes with the rights of gay couples and people in a host of other living arrangements, including foster parents and adopted children. The constitutional amendment, which defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman, was passed overwhelmingly by the voters in November 2000.

U.S. District Judge Joseph Bataillon ruled Thursday the ban 'imposes significant burdens on both the expressive and intimate associational rights' of gays 'and creates a significant barrier to the plaintiffs' right to petition or to participate in the political process.'

Bataillon said the ban 'goes far beyond merely defining marriage as between a man and a woman.'

State Attorney General Jon Bruning said he would appeal the ruling."

(Via Salon.)

Toyota Develops High Pressure Hydrogen Storage Alloy Tank for Fuel Cell Vehicles -- Tech-On!: "Toyota Motor Corp. and Toyota Industrial Corp. has jointly developed a high pressure hydrogen storage alloy tank for fuel cell-powered vehicles. The new tank will solve one of the fuel cell vehicle's knotty problems of short travelling range to increase beyond 700 km. Toyota gave the presentation at an academic conference, based on the facts that the company has already made public at academic conferences in the past, added by results from safety tests and simulations the company has done."

(Via Tech-On!.)

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: The Uses and Abuses of Race: "Today, the pendulum swings back. Fox News commentator Michelle Malkin's recent book, In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror, calls on Us to lock up the Other. Malkin claims that mass ethnic detentions are a prudent response to espionage and terror plots, as if securing a haystack automatically serves to pinpoint a needle. Her guilty-until-proven-innocent approach equates color with criminality and obstructs effective law enforcement. Only in the movies does badass bullying expose conspiracies rather than recruit new conspirators to the cause. Dragnets can't substitute for field operatives and translators.

Most importantly, Malkin's sleazy tract shows how readily our laws and law officials become instruments of evil. The 'black codes' and segregation laws of yesteryear were not the freak consequences of unenlightened times--they were the ordinary outcomes of those in power protecting their self-interest through division and despotism. If we dismiss these laws as rogue jurisprudence with no contemporary relevance, we are the rogues, oblivious to our complicity in racism."

(Via AlterNet.)

Secrecy News for 05/11/05: "The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday affirmed that the Vice President's Energy Task Force was within its rights to meet behind closed doors with industry participation since the industry participants were not, strictly speaking, members of the Task Force."

(Via Secrecy News.)

Secrecy News for 05/11/05: "Dr. Thomas C. Butler, the distinguished physician and specialist in infectious disease who was sentenced to prison last year for improperly transporting medical samples, is the subject of an extraordinary profile in the latest issue of the medical journal Clinical Infectious Disease.

'Thomas Campbell Butler, at 63 years of age, is completing the first year of a 2-year sentence in federal prison, following an investigation and trial that was initiated after he voluntarily reported that he believed vials containing Yersinia pestis were missing from his laboratory at Texas Tech University,' the article begins. 'We take this opportunity to remind the infectious diseases community of the plight of our esteemed colleague, whose career and family have, as a result of his efforts to protect us from infection by this organism, paid a price from which they will never recover.'

Dr. Butler is credited with having saved literally millions of lives in developing countries through his pioneering work on oral hydration as a treatment for diarrheal diseases."

(Via Secrecy News.)

MARINES' BODY ARMOR RECALL: "'The Marine Corps issued to nearly 10,000 troops body armor that Army ballistic experts urged the Marines to reject after tests revealed life-threatening flaws in the vests, an eight-month investigation by Marine Corps Times has found.' In all, the Marines bought about 19,000 Interceptor outer tactical vests from Point Blank Body Armor that failed government tests due to 'multiple complete penetrations' of 9 mm pistol rounds and other ballistic or quality-assurance tests"

(Via Defense Tech.)

WorldNetDaily: Was World War II worth it?: "Bush told the awful truth about what really triumphed in World War II east of the Elbe. And it was not freedom. It was Stalin, the most odious tyrant of the century. Where Hitler killed his millions, Stalin, Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Pol Pot and Castro murdered their tens of millions."

So, Hitler=Not so bad? Btw: author of above is Pat Buchanan

(Via Martini Republic.)

The Onion | What Do You Think?: "Last week, the Texas House of Representatives approved a bill banning 'overtly sexually suggestive' high-school cheerleading routines. What do you think?"

...

"'See?! See what happens when you bring it on, Kirsten Dunst?!'"

(Via The Onion.)

AlterNet: EnviroHealth: What Dow Knows (But Won't Tell): "At this week's annual stockholder meeting, Dow Chemical will surely tout the fact that its stock has outperformed the S&P 500 for the better part of the last five years. But can a company as environmentally burdened as Dow keep it up? Dow is being sued in the U.S. and overseas for environmental damages that stem from both its core products and from the toxic chemicals that are byproducts of its big manufacturing processes.

Take Dow's dioxin liabilities. Dioxins, which are a byproduct of production of some Dow chemicals, are known to cause cancer, immune suppression, reproductive, developmental and liver damage. A class action lawsuit by Michigan residents is seeking compensation for the contamination. Residents in the region are asserting approximately $100 million in property damages and seeking medical monitoring. The medical monitoring claim is now before the Michigan Supreme Court."

Note: remember the last news mention of dioxin?

(Via AlterNet.)

AlterNet: The Bolton Endgame: Regardless of the outcome, the Bolton nomination has changed the political battlefield in Washington. While Bush stands to lose big if Bolton's nomination is not approved by the Senate Foreign Relations committee Thursday, Democrats have already made considerable gains. Observers say Bolton opponents scored a public and important victory in achieving such a penetrating and public investigation so far, one that revealed a startling glimpse not only into Bolton's appalling and at times almost cartoonish operating style, but a detailed look at the larger context of a Bush administration so divided on the most pressing national security matters that it was often consumed with working against itself.

'It showed the Democrats there was a constituency out there for resisting inappropriate or controversial nominees,' said Chris Nelson of Samuels International, a longtime acute observer of the Washington foreign policy scene in his Nelson Report. 'Democrats have helped themselves by managing to sound uncharacteristically reasonable, while the Republicans have managed to sound so extreme, victims of this kind of Caligula force. It reminds the Republicans that there is a price for this kind of stuff.'"

(Via AlterNet.)

AlterNet: Nationalism's Psychotic Side: "Despite the terrible backdrop of the war, ethnic tension on the pier and back in our neighborhoods was not particularly pronounced. This followed the national pattern. German Americans at the time constituted the largest immigrant group in the U.S., firmly assimilated into the dominant culture. The patriotism of relatively few German or Italian Americans was questioned. Meanwhile, the Japanese Americans of the West Coast were being rounded up and shipped off to grim desert internment camps while I was being indoctrinated by comic books to see the Japanese as bucktoothed savages.

But there wasn't much time to think about all this because U.S. involvement in the war was quite short. Forgotten in President Bush's legitimate criticism of postwar Soviet behavior last week was our own nation's reluctance to enter the war while Hitler's armies conquered France and marched deep into the Soviet Union."

(Via AlterNet.)

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: National Insecurity Cards: "The REAL ID Act -- a bill that brings the country steps closer to imposing a national ID system -- was sent to the president's desk on Tuesday when the Senate voted to approve the measure, which was attached to the $82 billion war funding bill. As the author explains below, these ID cards are not just a violation of our privacy rights and a covert attack on immigrants. They will also be entirely ineffective in fighting terrorism."

(Via AlterNet.)

Panel Sends Bolton Nomination to Senate Without Recommendation - New York Times: " John R. Bolton suffered a setback in his quest to become ambassador to the United Nations today when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee declined to recommend him even as it voted to send the nomination to the full Senate for consideration.

The 10-to-8 vote to send Mr. Bolton's name to the chamber, but absent an endorsement, means he will get a 'yes or no' vote by the Senate. And since Republicans have 55 seats, Mr. Bolton has a good chance to be confirmed, provided there is no more erosion of support among Republicans.

The lack of a committee endorsement became inevitable after a key Republican member, Senator George V. Voinovich of Ohio, said he would vote against the nomination because the United States 'can do better.' Mr. Bolton's critics have complained of his hard-driving personal style as an under secretary of state. Some critics have accused him of pressuring intelligence analysts to tweak their findings to suit his biases."

(Via NY Times.)

Luis Posada Carriles: The Declassified Record: "Declassified CIA and FBI records posted today on the Web by the National Security Archive at George Washington University identify Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles, who is apparently in Florida seeking asylum, as a former CIA agent and as one of the 'engineer[s]' of the 1976 terrorist bombing of Cubana Airlines flight 455 that killed 73 passengers.

The documents include a November 1976 FBI report on the bombing cited in yesterday's New York Times article 'Case of Cuban Exile Could Test the U.S. Definition of Terrorist,' CIA trace reports covering the Agency's recruitment of Posada in the 1960s, as well as the FBI intelligence reporting on the downing of the plane. The Archive also posted a second FBI report, dated one day after the bombing, in which a confidential source 'all but admitted that Posada and [Orlando] Bosch had engineered the bombing of the airline.' In addition, the posting includes several documents relating to Bosch and his suspected role in the downing of the jetliner on October 6, 1976."

(Via The National Security Archives.)

AlterNet: They Lied to Us: "Since I believe one of our greatest strengths as Americans is shrewd practicality, I thought it was time we moved past the now unhelpful, 'How did we get into his mess?' to the more utilitarian, 'What the hell do we do now?'

However, I cannot let this astounding Downing Street memo go unmentioned.

On May 1, the Sunday Times of London printed a secret memo that went to the defense secretary, foreign secretary, attorney general and other high officials. It is the minutes of their meeting on Iraq with Tony Blair. The memo was written by Matthew Rycroft, a Downing Street foreign policy aide. It has been confirmed as legitimate and is dated July 23, 2002. I suppose the correct cliché is 'smoking gun.'"

(Via AlterNet.)

Theology, Not Politics by Rep. Ron Paul: "I’m happy to witness so many politicians honoring a great man of God and peace. The problem, however, is that so few of them honored him during his lifetime by their actions as legislators. In fact, most members of Congress support policies that are totally at odds with Catholic teachings.

Just two years ago conservatives were busy scolding the Pope for his refusal to back our invasion of Iraq. One conservative media favorite even made the sickening suggestion that the Pope was the enemy of the United States because he would not support our aggression in the Middle East. The Pontiff would not ignore the inherent contradiction in being pro-life and pro-war, nor distort just war doctrine to endorse attacking a nation that clearly posed no threat to America – and conservatives resented it. September 11th did not change everything, and the Pope understood that killing is still killing. "

(Via Lew Rockwell.)

AlterNet: Bush's New Social Security Tactic: "As a result of George, Dick Cheney, and a plague of other big-shot Bushites going on this cross-country flim-flam tour, more Americans now oppose Bush's scheme than before the White House crew ventured out of Washington. So Bush & Company are now trying a new tactic: Class war.

George W. has come out for an arcane proposal he calls 'progressive price indexing' as a new way for the government to calculate the amount of your Social Security check when you retire. Striking a populist pose, which is awkward for this elitist, rich son-of-a-Bush, George asserts that his accounting gimmick will fix most of the long-term financing gap in Social Security by cutting the benefits of the rich and increasing those of the poor.

But Mr. George Jennings Bryan is a fraud. The poor would get no increase in benefits under his indexing, and a millionaire's reduction would amount to only one percent, which is insignificant to the rich, since they don't depend on Social Security for their retirement."

(Via AlterNet.)

AlterNet: EnviroHealth: Brazil to U.S.: Keep Your Money: "Brazil has rejected $40 million in U.S. funds for fighting AIDS because of demands that it condemn prostitution, a key participant in its flagship AIDS program. The move is seen by some observers as a rejection of Washington's head-in-the-sand linkage of neo-con morality and foreign aid.

''Biblical principles [are] their guide, not science,' Pedro Chequer, director of Brazil's AIDS program told media outlets on Wednesday. 'This premise is inadequate because it hurts our autonomous national policy.'

Acting in accordance with a 2003 federal law, U.S. Congress demanded that Brazil publicly condemn prostitution before accepting the funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID. Prostitution is a legal industry in Brazil and a key civic player in fighting the spread of HIV/AIDS."

(Via AlterNet.)

PressEsc - PETA kills animals: "The animal rights group PETA has killed thousands of animals over a fifteen-year period, a consumer rights group claimed today.

...

'PETA raked in nearly $29 million last year,' said Center for Consumer Freedom research director David Martosko, 'and much of it was from pet owners who thought their donations actually helped animals. Instead, PETA killed them -- while spending millions on programs equating meat eaters with Nazis, scaring young children away from drinking milk, recruiting kids into a radical animal-rights lifestyle, and even defending arsonists and other violent extremists.'

The consumer rights group claimed that other animal protection agencies near PETA's Virginia headquarters 'put down' a much smaller percentage of the animals entrusted to them. In 2003 the Norfolk SPCA found adoptive homes for 73 percent of its animals. The Virginia Beach SPCA adopted out 66 percent. PETA could only manage 14 percent."

(Via PressEsc.)

Schneier on Security: REAL ID: "I've already written about national IDs. I've written about the fallacies of identification as a security tool. I'm not going to repeat myself here, and I urge everyone who is interested to read those two essays (and even this older essay). A national ID is a lousy security trade-off, and everyone needs to understand why.

Aside from those generalities, there are specifics about REAL ID that make for bad security.

The REAL ID Act requires driver's licenses to include a 'common machine-readable technology.' This will, of course, make identity theft easier. Assume that this information will be collected by bars and other businesses, and that it will be resold to companies like ChoicePoint and Acxiom. It actually doesn't matter how well the states and federal government protect the data on driver's licenses, as there will be parallel commercial databases with the same information."

(Via Schneier on Security.)

Salon.com Politics: "In the days after the November election, Democrats found themselves in despair on just about every front, but there was little else as alarming as this: The Democratic Party was losing women. Bill Clinton had a 16-point edge over Bob Dole among women; Al Gore had an 11 point edge over George W. Bush among women; but John Kerry beat Bush among women by only 3 percentage points. Combine that trend with a lot of male hostility toward Democrats, and you come up with a pretty red view of the future.

But are things starting to change? Maybe. As we move further and further away from 9/11, as the war in Iraq -- at least sometimes -- takes a backseat to domestic issues like Social Security, health care and the price of gas, there are signs that voters, and women voters in particular, are ready to think again about the Democratic Party."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com News | Pushing PBS to the right: "But the question remains, a perception of political bias by whom -- Republican politicians and conservative activists, or PBS viewers? If most PBS viewers and other Americans don't think the programming is biased -- and two internal polls prove they don't -- then why is the CPB unleashing this campaign?"

(Via Salon.)

Slashdot | Gulf Stream Slowdown in Progress?: "peacefinder writes 'Researchers report that one process which drives the Gulf Stream is slowing down. As that current is part of the global oceanic heat conveyor which keeps parts of Europe and North America warmer than would be expected for their latitudes, such a slowdown might lead to abrupt climate change.'"

(Via /.)

PressEsc - Feature: Holding the Line in Fight against Torture: "‘We thought the absolute prohibition of torture was established, it was taken for granted that there was no more discussion left and now we have to start to explain it all from the beginning,’ Edouard Delaplace, of the Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT), said. He explains that with the strengthening of the normative framework the scope of the fight against torture has increased, however argues that the current threats indicate a reversion in the campaign.

Wendy Pattern US advocacy director for Human Rights Watch describes the current scenario as a ‘very troubling development that threatens to weaken the fundamentals of human rights’. She said that post 11 September, governments are attempting to redefine torture narrowly and justify it in the name of fighting terrorism.

‘Torture was always pervasive but what was more often the case before was that governments would not justify but try to hide it’, she said."

(Via PressEsc.)

'Miserable failure' links to Bush: "Web users entering the words 'miserable failure' into the popular search engine are directed to the biography of the president on the White House website."

(Via BBC News.)

Night Light: torture's #1 fan to visit Afghanistan: "Hey, college guys, remember when the guys at Alpha Sigma Sigma kept us chained naked in a room for 18 days with only water and thin cereal to eat?   Man, those guys were crazy!    Remember when they desecrated our holy book and forced us to say we hate Jesus or Abraham or Moses?  Dude, that was just nuts.   Remember all those times they made us pretend to f**k each other, and broke those glowsticks and poured the chemicals all over us?  When they hid us from Amnesty International and the UN?  Then when they said all serious-like that they were going to rape our parents?  Remember when they kept those vicious dogs barking and snapping at us, then finally let one go and it ripped open my leg and all that blood?  Bro, man, those guys were ... a little harsh, huh.   And remember those guys who died?   Yeah, man.   They just died, just like that.   And right before finals."

(Via Night Light.)