I can't sleep and it's all Obama's fault... and no, I'm not a concern troll or suffering from insomnia.

I can't sleep because I had a very busy week and I am way behind on finishing up some very important work that I've got to have finished by 9:00am tomorrow morning.

I know you're probably wondering what could possibly be so important that it would keep me up until 5:00am when I've got to be up so early the next day and how could it possibly in any way have anything to do with Senator Obama?

The answer is simple:

Parades.

I only ask, because I've read a lot of pissing and moaning on this site lately and pissing and moaning accomplishes exactly only one thing... It makes you feel better.

That's it. That's all it's ever done and that's all it'll ever  do.

I don't know about you, but I'm mad... I'm fucking pissed off and I'm WAY past the point where crying, screaming, depression or even throwing a goddamned beautiful hissy fit  - the caliber of which the world has never known; is going to make me feel better.

I left "mad" back in the dust about 50 miles ago and am well into vengeance territory now.

We lost this one and we lost it bigtime... So now what are we going to do about it? We can't change history. This one is already over with... It's done and there's no going back.  

A line has been crossed for me and no amount of "Whoops, my bad!" out of any of the cravenly Dems that vote in favor of this piece of shit today is going to cut it with me.

They've crossed the line and now they're going to have to pay.  

Now we need to think about what where we're going to go from here and what we're going to do to prepare for the future.

I think something is fishy about the Spitzer investigation.

The NYT is reporting that the Spitzer/hooker revelations came about not because of an initial investigation into the prostitution ring, but the other way around...

The prostitution ring was apparently uncovered because of a Spitzer investigation that was triggered by a bank employee reporting "suspicious activity."

To my mind, that "suspicious activity" was more than likely a CRT (cash transaction report) and a CRT is triggered every time a person makes $10,000 or more in cash transactions during a single 24 hour period... There are tens of thousands of CRT's filed every single day though and they don't always trigger full-out federal investigations with wiretaps and everything... Especially not for a guy known to be one of the richest people on earth.

I want to know, where's this "leadership" our two Democratic Presidential candidates keep telling us about?

One would think that two such individuals that are brimming over with leadership (two veritable founts of leadership to hear them tell it, really) would be able to manage to at least lead the members of their own damned party into not caving to bush.

We keep hearing about how they're going to "reach across the aisle" and "get things done."

UPDATE::

I just wanted to add this update to let anyone reading it know that Senator Dick Durbin has called on the Attorney General to start a criminal investigation.

You might remember that during his testimony last week, Attorney General Mukasey said that he had not ordered investigations based on idle speculation, because no one knew for sure what techniques were used or even if they were used at all since those techniques have never been divulged...

So I am extremely happy to see that Senator Durbin has rightly pointed out that the administration has now divulged that at minimum, waterboarding was used and so Mukasey should now get cracking on a a criminal investigation.

It also now appears that the bush mafia has decided to go on an all-out PR blitz to try and reform the bad rap waterboarding has gotten, because they're worried that Congress might outlaw waterboarding and they aren't sure that they're quite done torturing people by waterboarding yet, so they want to keep their options open.

Will you set the fucking table already, Speaker Pelosi???

Right off the bat I will put your mind at ease by telling you that these kids aren't in any physical danger or starving or anything.

(Although I do like to tell my niece Alex that she looks like I can buy her for 70 cents a day when she throws a fit about brushing her hair, then she yells back "I'm not 70 cents a day!" and relents to having her hair brushed.)

However, they are in danger of having their little hearts broken if Dan Scripps isn't their next State Representative and I don't want to see their fragile little hearts get broken!

What we've been waiting for. They're actually debating the FISA cloture vote...

   

DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS DIARY.  RECOMMEND THE Mothership

Wanna watch the fireworks live?  C-Span 2

It's never too late to call. smintheus posted Dodd's speech and phone numbers earlier.

UPDATE:  The FISA debate has wrapped up for today and will resume on Monday. Cloture vote will be Monday 1/28 at 4:30pm.

The debate started about 10:30am ET.
 

  1. Mothership #1, by lgcap

  2. gchaucer2

  3. greenchiledem

  4. Remembering Jello

  5. RichM

  6. TheMomCat

  7. Moody Loner
  8. jrooth

  9. Robroser

 10. kimoconnor

This diary was originally meant to be a comment left in AndyS In Colorado's diary, but then I started to ramble and it got really long... So I decided I'd rather make it a diary, instead of being guilty of writing another mile long comment hogging up the comment space in someone else's diary.

I am hopeful that my ramblings do not offend anyone in the LGTB community, but I realize that because I am not a member of the LGTB community I may be misunderstanding of some things, or my intent may be misunderstood. So I'd just like to take this opportunity to apologize in advance if I've offended anyone and assure you that giving offense was not my intent. If I have misunderstood anything, please set me right in the comments section. I am human and thus have been known to be wrong on occasion. I take no offense at being told I am wrong, because it's usually a pretty common occurrence for we humans to find ourselves in.  

So anyway, here goes...

My little 95 pounds of love, Fergus J. McSquisher is a sturdy lad and would make a fine President.

His biological momma is a greyhound and his biological father is a rottweiler. He is still in contact with his birth-mother and is very close to her, as she lives with my brother, his Uncle. He has no contact with his biological father and neither his biological Mother (her name is Maggie) nor I, his adopted Mother have seen a dime of child support out of the deadbeat.

However, Fergus hasn't let the lack of relationship with his biological Father keep him down. He has persevered through his rough childhood and is a better pup for his struggles.

Please excuse my ramblings, I just wanted to get these concerns off my chest.

I've had some disagreements lately with people I usually never disagree with, mainly my Mother, my Grams, and my Aunties. It's really been bothering me, so I've decided I'd write this diary to try to make some sense out of it all.

I come from a family full of pretty amazing no nonsense women. I remember canvassing for Geraldine Ferraro with my Mother, Grandmothers, and Aunties when I was 6 years old... and even if I didn't remember it, there's pictures to remind me. It was a big deal, a woman running for Vice-President... They still talk about how having had a woman run for Vice-President had meant the world had changed.

I remember it clearly, after all these years. Both the women I knew and the women out there with us that I didn't know; all of them telling me that I should remember this. That this was history and it meant I could do anything I wanted to do and I could be anything I wanted to be when I grew up; even become President of the United States if that's what I wanted.

And yet it's been 24 years, the majority of my entire life... and we still haven't had a female President or Vice-President. So how much of their high hopes have really come to fruition?

I've decided that since everyone and their cousin's Uncle's brother's Step-Nephew has weighed in on the primary flap... Why not join in?

There seems to have been a big to-do over yesterday's frontpaged pieces that said Senator Obama slammed Vice-President Gore and Senator Kerry with the following remarks*:

"I don't want to go into the next election starting off with half the country already not wanting to vote for Democrats -- we've done that in 2004, 2000,"

"I don't want to go into the next election starting off with half the country already not wanting to vote for Democrats. We've done that in 2004 and 2000. 47 percent of the country on one side, 47 percent of the country on the other . . . We don't need another one of those elections."

Since I don't get a meaningful primary vote this election and I have no idea who I'd vote for even if I did; I just couldn't help but join the fray... Basically because I'm just an argumentative sort... and I think pretty much all sides of this argument are wrong.

Harry Reid called for a cloture vote today and introduced the Senate Intelligence Committee version of the FISA bill that includes immunity for the telecoms.

Senator Dodd has promised a filibuster. Ted Kennedy and Russ Feingold have promised to help in this effort so far.

CALL YOUR SENATORS now to ask them to support Dodd, and vote for the Senate Judiciary version that does not include immunity.

This is not an official live blog.....but please no pictures.
Be nice to your fellow Kossacks on dial up

Please do not recommend this diary, please recommend the LiveBlog Mothership here.

Watch the action here:
C-Span 2 Realplayer Audio

C-Span 2 Windows Mediaplayer

I have a confession to make; I was busy yesterday and didn't have a chance to catch my Congressman Pete Hoekstra's confession that he was the source of Joe Klein's ridiculous claims about the FISA bill.  

I did have a pretty good excuse for missing the lying Dutchman's confession though; I was busy all day cooking for a fundraising dinner that raised funds for Pete's opponent (and my friend) Scott Killips.

Imagine my surprise to find that Pete's been a busy busy little Dutchman while he's been holed up in his cozy little corner of Dumfukistan.  Not only had Pistol Pete been furiously writing a masterpiece of utter bullshit in the form of an op-ed for the National Journal, but he'd also been sharing his expert advice with Joe Klein.

I find myself wanting the answers to a few questions after reading the Lying Dutchman's op-ed...

While reading Bill Tchakirides' diary "What do people without insurance do?" earlier today; I found myself wanting to ask a question of my own:

Am I the only cancer survivor that is suffering from this crushing survivor's guilt?

I remember feeling so terribly, terribly guilty everyday on the drive to my blood and cancer clinic... I knew if I was told I needed a new drug, or yet another surgery, I'd be treated right then, that day, or the next day at the latest... and I knew that some of my friends wouldn't and there was nothing I could do to change that terrible fact.

I knew I had some of the best insurance money could buy and I wasn't going to have to wait and see whether or not my insurance was going to cover my doctor's recommendations, because I knew I was going to get whatever I needed... Unlike  so many of my fellow patients.

I feel guilty because here I sit, healthy and safe... While my Uncle is dying, without even the benefit of pain meds to help ease his suffering and so many others are dying or already dead.

This wasn't the diary I had planned to write today. I had big plans for the second diary in my series chronicling Pete Hoekstra's dirty deeds and legislative whore-like behavior to be about Pete's cozy relationship with the Telecommunications Industry... However, my plans changed after I received a phone call this morning from my Mother.

I answered the phone this morning and my Mom was crying... Big-heaving-heart-wrenching-tears-can't-catch-your-breath kind of crying. If you knew my Mom, you'd understand just how unusual it is to hear my Mom cry. I can only remember hearing my Mom cry like that one time before in my entire life and that was when she got the call that her daughter was dead... It basically takes a tragedy of unimaginable proportions to make my Mother cry.

***Reposted Diary and cross-posted at Michigan Liberal at the request of LiberalLucy.

I've been asking myself a question for quite awhile, "What drives Pete Hoekstra's desire for eternal war?

Is it possible that the infinite statements from Pete Hoekstra (Lying Dutchman MI-02) like this:

"Our nation faces a serious and ongoing threat from radical, militant jihadists. I fear that some believe that by pushing a date certain for withdrawal

"As the radical Islamists themselves have made clear, it will not, and we need to from Iraq we will somehow make the radical jihadist threat just go away.remain engaged to counter this threat."

Might have something to do with this little fact:

Before the run-up to the Iraq War the lying Dutchman hadn't received campaign contributions from the Defense industry. However, starting in 2003 that all changed.

In fact, Hoekstra's list of campaign contributors changed a LOT...

While reading the comments in Ekaterin's excellent dairy Slain Soldier Feared 'Something Might Happen to Her', I was struck by a comment thread about Afghanistan's heroin trade.

I had read an a few months back about heroin use among US soldiers in Afghanistan. I guess I was a little surprised that with such an active thread, it seemed like no one else had heard about the rumored heroin use in Afghanistan by US soldiers.

There were comments along the lines of how there had to be some heroin use in Afghanistan, since it's the heroin capital of the world. There were comments along the lines of how there couldn't be any heroin use, because if there were the press would have reported about it. The comment thread went back and forth, but no one seemed to know that there actually HAD been stories written about heroin use in Afghanistan and Iraq. I knew there were articles about US Military heroin use, because I'd read at least two of them.  

So off I went to the google, because I had intended to find links to the articles that I had read, and post them in that comment thread... Only I think I may have found something else: