Salon.com Wire Story: "Thirty-eight Nobel Prize laureates asked state educators to reject proposed science standards that treat evolution as a seriously questionable theory, calling it instead the 'indispensable' foundation of biology.

The group, led by the writer Elie Wiesel, said it wanted to defend science and combat 'efforts by the proponents of so-called intelligent design to politicize scientific inquiry.'

The proposed standards, which could come up for final Board of Education approval later this year, are designed to expose students to more criticism of evolution but state in an introduction that they do not endorse intelligent design."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com | Blame God, not me: "The administration's multipronged strategy to repair the damage wrought to cherished areas of the president's reputation was on full display at the National Prayer Service, which Bush called to remember victims of the hurricane. Bused-in evacuees from New Orleans? Check. Promotion of faith-based organizations? Check. Shifting blame to others? Check. This time, however, after weeks of laying blame at the doorsteps of Louisiana state officials and the mayor of New Orleans and even some of the victims themselves, Bush chose a bigger target: He blamed God."

(Via Salon.)

Jesus' General: "Someone sent me a link to your article in the Daily Tar Heel, and surprisingly enough, I understood it (thank God for that--I can't afford to burn my computer). Unlike most columnists, you don't dance around your hated of swarthy people. You come right out and write things like this:

I want all Arabs to be stripped naked and cavity-searched if they get within 100 yards of an airport."

(Via Jesus' General.)

Crooks and Liars: "Morris:..he believes that they should fight wars and that was the first term, and they believe they should recover from disasters and that's the second term. Man, is this guy fortunate.

Stunned Hannity: Fortunate to have a disaster?

He does try to recovers, but he had a little too much glee in his eyes. Politically speaking, Morris thinks it's just so great that Bush has all these disasters to attend to so he can look like a hero trying to fix them. "

(Via Crooks and Liars.)

Salon.com Wire Story: "The only real question left about Supreme Court nominee John Roberts is how many Democrats will vote for him to become the nation's 17th chief justice.

This week's grueling four-day Senate confirmation hearings only confirmed for most of the Senate's majority Republicans their contention that President Bush's pick to succeed William H. Rehnquist is the perfect choice.

Since Democrats don't plan to filibuster, they must decide if it's worth casting a symbolic vote against the 50-year-old Roberts, knowing they can't stop his confirmation and that Bush will soon choose another conservative to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a swing vote on the court."

Fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck.

(Via Salon.)

The Counterterrorism Blog: More Frustration on Viktor Bout: "Seems Congressional folks on both sides of the aisle are growing increasingly frustrated with the unwillingness or inability of the Pentagon and State Department to answer questions about Viktor Bout. One set of concerns centers on Bout's ongoing and potentially illegal contracts with the U.S. military and KBR in Iraq and Afghanistan. The other is the State Deparment's inability to get companies and individuals in Bout's network, designated by Treasury Department's OFAC office as bad guys with their assets frozen, onto the broader U.N. sanctions list, which would make the measures applicable worldwide. It has been five months since the OFAC designations, yet State refuses to take what is largely an administrative step and push the already-completed paperwork on up to the United Nations"

Information on the arms trafficker Viktor Bout is available in this article.

(Via The Counterterrorism Blog.)

Martini Republic - Lead, follow, or have a drink.: "The New York Democrat's bid to establish the panel — which would have also made recommendations on how to improve the government's disaster response apparatus — failed to win the two-thirds majority needed to overcome procedural hurdles. Clinton got only 44 votes, all from Democrats and independent Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont. Fifty-four Republicans all voted no."

(Via Martini Republic.)

Salon.com Wire Story: "The judge said the pledge's reference to one nation 'under God' violates school children's right to be 'free from a coercive requirement to affirm God.'"

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com Wire Story: "The military has said the hunger strike began on Aug. 8 with 76 detainees refusing meals. The military said the number rose to 128 before three dropped out, lowering the figure to 125.

The number differed from one given in an Aug. 31 report from the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, which claimed 210 prisoners were refusing meals.

The center said the prisoners are angry because the military allegedly reneged on promises to bring the prison into compliance with the Geneva Conventions if prisoners agreed to end a hunger strike that began in June."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com News | Timeline to disaster: "Salon's hour-by-hour account of the worst natural disaster in U.S. history -- and how our government failed."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com Wire Story: "Two associates of U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay were indicted Tuesday on additional felony charges of violating Texas election law and criminal conspiracy to violate election law for their role in the 2002 legislative races.

The indictment was the latest from a grand jury investigating the use of corporate money in the campaigns that gave Republicans control of the Texas House.

In Texas, state law prohibits using corporate contributions to advocate the election or defeat of state candidates."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com - War Room: "That's right, Sen. Cornyn. It's wrong to 'appropriate a national tragedy' to 'further a political interest,' and that's something your party would never do. It's not like the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee once offered photos of George W. Bush on 9/11 in exchange for campaign contributions. It's not like the Republican National Committee decided to hold its 2004 convention later than usual and in New York to capitalize on a 9/11 anniversary. It's not like the Bush-Cheney campaign ran a campaign ad featuring footage of the destroyed World Trade Center or firefighters carrying a flag-covered body. And it's not like the president invokes the memories of 9/11 again and again and again to sell his war on Iraq, to obscure the effects of his tax cuts, to get himself reelected and to gussy up his administration's response to Katrina."

(Via Salon.)

Salon.com Wire Story: "John Roberts kissed his wife and then, like clockwork, his Supreme Court confirmation hearing was gaveled to order at 9:30 a.m. sharp on Tuesday. By 9:40, he already had dodged the particulars of Roe v. Wade four times.

'I feel the need to stay away from a discussion of specific cases,' he said.

'I think I should stay away from discussion of specific issues,' he demurred.

'I do feel compelled to point that I should not ... agree or disagree with particular decisions,' he persisted.

'That's something that I'm going to have to draw the line in the sand,' he offered.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., had wasted no time in grilling Roberts on one of the big issues of the day -- abortion -- and Roberts wasted no time in displaying his skills at the artful dodge."

(Via Salon.)

Congress to Debate "Fixed" Pre-War Intelligence | AfterDowningStreet.org: "House Panel Will Vote on Lee Resolution on the 'Downing Street Memo'

Who/What: The House International Relations Committee will debate and vote on H.Res. 375, a Resolution of Inquiry introduced by Representative Barbara Lee (D-CA). The Resolution, which has bipartisan support and 70 cosponsors, calls upon the Bush administration to give Congress all information relating to communication with officials of the United Kingdom relating to U.S. policy in Iraq between January 1, 2002 and October 16, 2002, the date Congressional authority to use force in Iraq became law. The measure is a privileged resolution, meaning if it is not taken up by the International Relations Committee in a defined period of time, Representative Lee would be entitled to request that it be brought to the House floor for a vote.

Where: 2172 Rayburn House Office Bldg.

When: Wednesday, September 14th, 10:30 AM EDT"

(Via AfterDowningStreet.org.)

The Counterterrorism Blog: Disillusion and Frustration in Intelligence Community: "There is no question the CIA needed to be remade in the wake of 9-11, but several retired officers who now work around the agency feel the full-scale bloodletting in recent years has left the CIA on the brink of becoming unable to produce the intelligence and analysis required of it. I have had my quarrels with the agency over time, but I know there are many good people trying very hard to do their jobs. While youth and fresh ideas are needed, they need to be blended with the experience of people who have been in the field. Some old hands are being hired back on contracts to try to help, but that is a limited and short-term fix to a structural problem that will be difficult to overcome in the near term."

(Via The Counterterrorism Blog.)

AlterNet: Hurricane Katrina: Overkill in New Orleans: "Heavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for its work in Iraq, are openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans. Some of the mercenaries say they have been 'deputized' by the Louisiana governor; indeed some are wearing gold Louisiana state law enforcement badges on their chests and Blackwater photo identification cards on their arms. They say they are on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and have been given the authority to use lethal force. "

...

"Blackwater mercenaries are some of the most feared professional killers in the world and they are accustomed to operating without worry of legal consequences. Their presence on the streets of New Orleans should be a cause for serious concern for the remaining residents of the city and raises alarming questions about why the government would allow men trained to kill with impunity in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to operate here."

(Via AlterNet.)

Baghdad Burning: September 11, 2005...: "Al-Qaeda was just a vague name back then. Iraqis were concerned with their own problems and fears. We were coping with the sanctions and the fact that life seemed to stand still every few years for an American air raid. We didn’t have the problem of Muslim fundamentalists- that was a concern for neighbors like Saudi Arabia and Iran.

I remember almost immediately, Western media began conjecturing on which Islamic group it could have been. I remember hoping it wasn’t Muslims or Arabs. I remember feeling that way not just because of the thousands of victims, but because I sensed that we’d suffer in Iraq. We’d be made to suffer for something we weren’t responsible for.

E. looked at me wide-eyed that day and asked the inevitable question, ‘How long do you think before they bomb us?’

‘But it wasn’t us. It can’t be us…’ I rationalized.

‘It doesn’t matter. It’s all they need.’

And it was true. It began with Afghanistan and then it was Iraq. We began preparing for it almost immediately. The price of the dollar rose as people began stocking up on flour, rice, sugar and other commodities. "

(Via Baghdad Burning.)

AlterNet: Hurricane Katrina: Eight Big Lies About Katrina: "Big Media has given ample space for administration officials and conservatives to spread falsehoods about relief efforts.

In the past week, Bush administration officials and conservative commentators have repeatedly used the national media to spread misinformation about the federal government's widely criticized response to the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina."

(Via AlterNet.)

AlterNet: Soul Freedom: "At the Central Baptist Church in Marshall, Texas, where I was baptized in the faith, we believed in a free church in a free state. I still do. My spiritual forbears did not take kindly to living under theocrats who embraced religious liberty for themselves but denied it to others.

'Forced worship stinks in God's nostrils,' thundered the dissenter Roger Williams as he was banished from Massachusetts for denying Puritan authority over his conscience."

(Via Salon.)

Schneier on Security: Katrina and Security: "Leaving aside the political posturing and the finger-pointing, how did our nation mishandle Katrina so badly? After spending tens of billions of dollars on homeland security (hundreds of billions, if you include the war in Iraq) in the four years after 9/11, what did we do wrong? Why were there so many failures at the local, state and federal levels? These are reasonable questions. Katrina was a natural disaster and not a terrorist attack, but that only matters before the event. Large-scale terrorist attacks and natural disasters differ in cause, but they're very similar in aftermath. And one can easily imagine a Katrina-like aftermath to a terrorist attack, especially one involving nuclear, biological or chemical weapons."

...

"Our nation needs to spend its homeland security dollars on two things: intelligence-gathering and emergency response. These two things will help us regardless of what the terrorists are plotting, and the second helps both against terrorist attacks and national disasters."

(Via Schneier on Security.)

Salon.com | The bitter lessons of four years: "In a strange way, Sept. 11 -- despite all the instantaneous proclamations that things would never be the same -- represented a final moment of innocence.

Now catastrophe has befallen another American city, with horrors and losses that may surpass the toppling of the twin towers. And while many people in New Orleans have shown themselves to be brave, generous and decent, this season's disaster has instilled more dread than pride, more anger than unity. Why is the mood so different now? At every level, the vacuum of leadership was appalling, but especially among the national leaders to whom all Americans look at a time of catastrophic peril. As rising waters sank the city, summer vacations in Texas and Wyoming, and shoe-shopping on Madison Avenue, appeared to take priority over the suffering on the Gulf Coast."

(Via Salon.)