Friday, September 29, 2006

How Bush goes 

I seriously think my country has lost its mind. We're getting the best wakeup call possible with the torture bill. We're getting the warning, if we re-elect the Republican Congress, we deserve what we get.

However, it's not up to me, it's up to the Republicans. That's the basic truth. If you love the Constitution, if you love this country, how can you support what Congress just did. I struggle to find something to say, but then there really is nothing left. If the Republican voters can't figure this one out, we're totally screwed.

I wonder if Bush will leave office at the end of his term. Someone should ask him that question and listen carefully to the answer. An unequivocal "yes" is the only acceptable answer. I don't think he's planning to leave. That's what all this maneuvering is about. The next step will be they'll find some American citizens who are terrorists, and Congress will vote that in time of war the President doesn't need to charge them with anything to imprison them until the war is over. They can already put non-citizens, legal or illegal, in prison, indefinitely without charging them.

What's next? How far is "economic terrorism" from Islamofascists? Not really very far at all. When McCain runs for President the immigration issue will be front and center. Use your imagination if you want to understand what the final solution will be. And you should worry. I don't believe U.S. citizenship is any kind of protection.

We may be in the last moments of free speech in this country, unless we do something about it. It seems we still have a vote. I will vote against the Republicans, take that as a given. But that isn't enough. We need people who voted Republican in past elections to stand with us, to vote them out, now, so we can begin the process of unwinding the mess we're in.

I heard a talk by Joseph Biden earlier today. I think he's got some interesting ideas. Might want to take a look at that, for something positive and constructive we can focus on. And yes, once there's a new Congress, we can begin the impeachment process. That's how Bush goes. We can't wait for him to decide whether he wants to leave or not. It's time for him to go.

An important life lesson 

I should probably do a Flickr illustration for this one.

Four years ago today: "One of the lessons I've learned in 47.4 years: When someone accuses you of a deceit, there's a very good chance the accuser practices that form of deceit, and a reasonable chance that he or she is doing it as they point the finger."

Yahoo opens its identity system 

Jeremy Zawodny links to Yahoo's diminutively named Browser Based Authentication (or BBAuth).

If it's easy to program, and delivers on what it says it does, this is a huge deal. Basically Yahoo is opening up their identity system, and user-data system, so developers can build on Yahoo as a platform. It's a bit further than Amazon was willing to go with S3 (it has an identity system, but it's not the same one that Amazon uses).

The Identity Gang folks are going to be talking about this for a long time to come. Now Google and Microsoft have to speak. I'm pretty sure they're not going to federate with Yahoo. Will they?

Ryan Tate is "confused but interested."

Wes Felter: "Google released the same thing a few months ago."

Wikipedia as a tool for character assassination 

Seth Finkelstein: "For people who are not very prominent, Wikipedia biographies can be an 'attractive nuisance'. It says, to every troll, vandal, and score-settler: 'Here's an article about a person where you can, with no accountability whatsoever, write any libel, defamation, or smear. It won't be a marginal comment with the social status of an inconsequential rant, but rather will be made prominent about the person, and reputation-laundered with the institutional status of an encyclopedia.'"

I don't believe in War On Terror 

I don't believe in "War on Terror." It's a Republican code-phrase which is used to change the US from a republic with a strong foundation for freedom, into a Christian terrorocracy. The irony is of course that the terrorists are the ones who always invoke this idea of "War on Terror." After the latest fiasco in Congress, we're once again dependent on the courts to uphold our basic values. We've lost two branches of government. For now the executive appears to be respecting the courts. Key word there is "appears." I have no idea what they plan next.

Daniel Conover: "Shame on us."