Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

Are modern pirates still bucklers of swashes?

Why didn’t I get a pony for my 16th birthday?

En lieu of the recent posts on the main blog about the FISA ordeal, I thought I should share this little story I came across when I logged on to Yahoor today.

(Link)

Senate delays eavesdropping vote
By PAMELA HESS, Associated Press Writer2 hours, 39 minutes ago

The Senate on Thursday signaled support for granting legal immunity to telecommunications companies that helped the government conduct warrantless eavesdropping, a sign that the contentious provision may be headed for approval next week.

On a strong 60-36 vote, senators rejected an amendment that would have killed the immunity provision and strengthened the powers of a secret court to oversee the surveillance of phone calls and e-mails that involve people inside the United States.

Further action on the legislation was delayed until Monday, pushing Congress closer to a Feb. 1 deadline for enacting a new law. If a new law is not signed by the president by then, some eavesdropping practices that are now legal would be prohibited.

The Bush administration is insisting that any new law also protect from potentially crippling civil lawsuits those telecommunications companies that helped the government eavesdrop on Americans after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, R-Nev., blamed Republicans for the delay, saying they were trying to block a series of amendments majority Democrats sought to offer.

“It appears the president and Republicans want failure. They don’t want a bill,” Reid said.

The draft bill, written by the Senate Intelligence Committee, would update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The law, first enacted in 1978, dictates when federal agents must obtain court permission before tapping phone and computer lines inside the United States to gather intelligence on foreign threats. Agents may tap lines outside the country without court oversight.

It was the second time in six weeks the Senate had taken up the FISA modernization bill, only to see action stymied. Reid abruptly closed down debate in December when it became clear the Senate couldn’t finish work before the holiday break.

Most vexing to the intelligence agencies, without an extension of the law the government would return to needing individual court orders to listen in on any communication that passes through U.S. telecommunications switches and computer servers — even those that are between people who are outside the country. This is not required by FISA, according to legal experts, but became the practice over time to provide firms with legal protections.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., on Thursday proposed extending the existing law for 30 days to buy the Senate additional time to produce a bill. The House completed its version of the bill last fall.

In a move to resolve the immunity issue, the key impasse on the legislation, the White House ended months of resistance Thursday and agreed to give House members access to secret documents about its warrantless wiretapping program.

The Bush administration is trying to persuade the House to agree to retroactively shield from liability those companies that helped the government eavesdrop on Americans without the approval of the FISA court. About 40 such civil lawsuits are pending against telecommunications firms, and the administration says if the cases go forward they could reveal information that would compromise national security. It also contends that the companies could be bankrupted if the lawsuits are successful.

The companies were helping the administration carry out the so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program, a still-classified effort that intercepted communications on U.S. soil without oversight from the FISA court from Sept. 11, 2001, to Jan. 17, 2007.

Reyes and Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House intelligence panel, requested access to the White House documents in May. House Democrats say they will not support telecom immunity without seeing them first. Some senators were given access to the documents last fall.

The documents include the president’s authorization of warrantless wiretapping, Justice Department legal opinions going back to 2001, and the requests sent to the telecommunications companies asking for their assistance.

I’m trying really hard to be surprised these days…really hard…

I’m still lazy, so here’s another comic;

I should make a big noteworthy post, being the first one after the record ice storm came through my town, but I’d rather post a comic:

A follow-up to the story of the Saudi government punishing a rape victem located here.

News Article

Saudis defend punishment for rape victim
Wed Nov 21, 9:19 AM ET

The Saudi judiciary on Tuesday defended a court verdict that sentenced a 19-year-old victim of a gang rape to six months in jail and 200 lashes because she was with an unrelated male when they were attacked.

The Shiite Muslim woman had initially been sentenced to 90 lashes after being convicted of violating Saudi Arabia’s rigid Islamic law requiring segregation of the sexes.

But in considering her appeal of the verdict, the Saudi General Court increased the punishment. It also roughly doubled prison sentences for the seven men convicted of raping the woman, Saudi news media said last week.

The reports triggered an international outcry over the Saudis punishing the victim of a terrible crime.

But the Ministry of Justice stood by the verdict Tuesday, saying that “charges were proven” against the woman for having been in a car with a man who was not her relative.

The ministry implied the victim’s sentence was increased because she spoke out to the press. “For whoever has an objection on verdicts issued, the system allows an appeal without resorting to the media,” said the statement, which was carried on the official Saudi Press Agency.

The attack occurred in 2006. The victim says she was in a car with a male student she used to know trying to retrieve a picture of her. She says two men got into the car and drove them to a secluded area where she was raped by seven men. Her friend also was assaulted.

Justice in Saudi Arabia is administered by a system of religious courts according to the kingdom’s strict interpretation of Islamic law.

Judges have wide discretion in punishing criminals, rules of evidence are vague and sometimes no defense lawyer is present. The result, critics say, are sentences left to the whim of judges. A rapist, for instance, could receive anywhere from a light sentence to death.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack avoided directly criticizing the Saudi judiciary over the case, but said the verdict “causes a fair degree of surprise and astonishment.”

“It is within the power of the Saudi government to take a look at the verdict and change it,” McCormack said.

Canada’s minister for women’s issues, Jose Verger, has called the sentence “barbaric.”

The New York-based Human Rights Watch said the verdict “not only sends victims of sexual violence the message that they should not press charges, but in effect offers protection and impunity to the perpetrators.”

I’m sorry, but you can try to make any excuse you want to explain away this type of behavior but I can’t view this sort of thing as anything less than the most outrageous, disgusting, immoral perversion of justice that I’ve seen in a very, very long time.

Every so often I’ll see something that can fill me with such disgust and outrage it becomes difficult to express my feelings. This is one of those times.

And to anyone who claims that the members and writers of Irregular Times give Islam a free ride while harping on Christianity, I’m about to prove you wong.

Female rape victim gets 200 lashes and jail
From correspondents in Riyadh
November 16, 2007 07:15am

A COURT in the ultra-conservative Islamic kingdom of Saudi Arabia is punishing a female victim of gang rape with 200 lashes and six months in jail.
The 19-year-old woman - whose six armed attackers have been sentenced to jail terms - was initially ordered to undergo 90 lashes for “being in the car of an unrelated male at the time of the rape,” the Arab News reported.

But in a new verdict issued after Saudi Arabia’s Higher Judicial Council ordered a retrial, the court in the eastern town of Al-Qatif more than doubled the number of lashes to 200.

A court source told the English-language Arab News that the judges had decided to punish the woman further for “her attempt to aggravate and influence the judiciary through the media.”

Saudi Arabia enforces a strict Islamic doctrine known as Wahhabism and forbids unrelated men and women from associating with each other, bans women from driving and forces them to cover head-to-toe in public.

Last year, the court sentenced six Saudi men to between one and five years in jail for the rape as well as ordering lashes for the victim, a member of the minority Shi’ite community.

But the woman’s lawyer Abdul Rahman al-Lahem appealed, arguing that the punishments were too lenient in a country where the offence can carry the death penalty.

In the new verdict issued on Wednesday, the Al-Qatif court also toughened the sentences against the six men to between two and nine years in prison.

The case has angered members of Saudi Arabia’s Shi’ite community. The convicted men are Sunni Muslims, the dominant community in the oil-rich Gulf state.

Mr Lahem, also a human rights activist, said yesterday the court had banned him from handling the rape case and withdrew his licence to practise law because he challenged the verdict.

He said he has also been summoned by the ministry of justice to appear before a disciplinary committee in December.

Mr Lahem said the move might be due to his criticism of some judicial institutions, and “contradicts King Abdullah’s quest to introduce reform, especially in the justice system.”

King Abdullah last month approved a new body of laws regulating the judicial system in Saudi Arabia, which rules on the basis of sharia, or Islamic law.

This is the kind of people who the USA supports. We’re allies with Saudi Arabia even though the majority of the terrorists who hijacked the planes on 9/11 were from there and we’re even sending them military equipment.

When I first read this, I admit, I found I could easily renounce an anti-violence ideal if it meant I could deal some Old Testament type punishment on the people involved with this story, but right now it’s making me feel sick to my stomach.

Religion of peace my achin’ ass.

I’ve been browsing through some fundamentalist religious quotes on Fundies Say The Darndest Things and from what I can tell most of those quotes can be broken up into five basic categories:

-Anti-Evolution
-Anti-Homosexuality
-Anti-Abortion
-Anti-other religions
-Miscellaneous

Now, while I could go and tackle each and every one of those points and their reasons behind them, I want to focus on the Anti-Homo part of it during this entry.

I’ve heard many justifications for this type of bigotry and they’ve come in many forms from calm explanations to near hysterical SHOUTING IN ALL CAPS-LOCK!!!1!111!!

But whatever form it takes on it always seems to come back to one thing: “Its an abomination against God” and to support this stance and their own bigotry they’ll site Leviticus 18:22. However most of these same people, when you point anything else out they’ll say that the New Testament did away with the Old Testament and therefore the Old Testament is now invalid. Except, just now to confirm what I was already pretty sure of, I looked up the book of Leviticus, and guess what I found?

Leviticus is a part of the Old Testament.

Now, rather than use the point of eating shell-fish to counter their argument and show them as hypocrites, I’m just going to start pointing out what they already believe; that Jesus’ sacrifice rendered the Old Testament obsolete (seeing as they seem so intent on ignoring Matthew 5:18-19 and Luke 16:17 when it suits them) and that therefore Homosexuality must be just fine so long as those damn homos except Jesus as their savior. After all, the Old Testament is invalid according to them, right?

Now, if they somehow claim that homosexuality is a sin and yet the Old Testament is still void, I feel I’d be well justified in pointing out their hypocrisy.

Tonight I was researching various topics on paganism and ancient revivalism when I came across a Wikipedia article about a group of pagans in Greece who were trying to gain equal rights in the eyes of the Greek government. It seems that prior to 2006, all religions except Christianity, Judaism and Islam had been banned. An Athenian court seems to have overruled that.

The story regarding this can be found here (I may post a separate diary entry about this later).

When I read about their desire to be allowed to worship in the Parthenon, I looked it up on Wikipedia for clarification. The article listed pollution hazards and I found myself curious enough to read on. It seems that acid rain from the growth of Athens and the exhaust from cars has caused irreparable damage to the sculptures in the Parthenon.

Pollution is a bad thing, not only for the harm it does to ourselves and our environment but for the harm it does to our history. When historical landmarks and wonders of the ancient world are threatened by our pollution, isn’t it time to do something?

I see this and then I see conservatives calling for less restraints put on pollution control and I find it hard to believe that they could be so caviler and arrogant not to see the harm that is already happening. Is there nothing at all more important than grabbing for that extra dollar?

‘lo and behold, what do I find when I wake up and log into Yahoo this morning?

(link)

Bush vetoes water projects bill
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer 22 minutes ago

An increasingly confrontational President Bush on Friday vetoed a bill authorizing hundreds of popular water projects even though lawmakers can count enough votes to override him.

Bush brushed aside significant objections from Capitol Hill, even from Republicans, in thwarting legislation that provides money for projects like repairing hurricane damage, restoring wetlands and preventing flooding in communities across the nation.

This level of opposition virtually assured that Bush would have a veto overridden for the first time in his presidency. He has used the veto very sparingly for most of the time he has been in office, but has made more use of it recently.

“When we override this irresponsible veto, perhaps the president will finally recognize that Congress is an equal branch of government and reconsider his many other reckless veto threats,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

“More than two years after failing to respond to the devastation and destruction of Hurricane Katrina, he is refusing to fund important projects guided by the Army Corps of Engineers that are essential to protecting the people of the Gulf Coast region.”

The $23 billion water bill passed in both chambers of Congress by well more than the two-thirds majority needed to vacate a veto and make the bill law.

Bush objected to the $9 billion in projects added during negotiations between the House and Senate. He hoped that his action, even though it is sure not to hold, would cast him as a friend to conservatives who demand a tighter rein on federal spending.

But Bush never vetoed spending bills under the Republican Congress, despite budgetary increases then, too. Attempting to demonstrate fiscal toughness now, in the seventh year of his presidency, carried the risk being criticized for doing too little, too late or as waging a transparently partisan attack against the Democrats who now run Capitol Hill.

The president took the gamble, making it part of a broader effort to more pointedly and frequently take on Democratic leaders.

The legislation originally approved by the Senate would have cost $14 billion and the House version would have totaled $15 billion. Bush and a few Republicans complained that the final version was larded with unneeded pet projects pushed by individual lawmakers — sending the overall cost of the bill much higher.

“Only in Washington could the House take a $14 billion bill into a conference with the Senate’s $15 billion bill and emerge with a compromise that costs taxpayers over $23 billion,” said White House press secretary Dana Perino.

She also said Bush vetoed the bill because it is “fiscally irresponsible” and falls outside the scope of the Army Corps’ mission.

Critics noted that the bill piles more work on the Army Corps of Engineers, which already has a backlog of $58 billion worth of projects and an annual budget of only about $2 billion to address them.

If Bush is overridden, the measure would give a green light to projects in virtually every state. It only authorizes the projects; the actual funding must be approved separately.

The authorizations include:

_$3.6 billion for major wetlands and other coastal restoration, flood control and dredging projects for Louisiana, a state where coastal erosion and storms have resulted in the disappearance of huge areas of land;

_nearly $2 billion for the restoration of the Florida Everglades;

_nearly $2 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers to build seven new locks on the upper Mississippi and Illinois rivers;

_$7 billion for various projects related to hurricane mitigation in Mississippi and Louisiana, including assuring 100-year levee protection in New Orleans;

_hundreds of smaller dredging, wetlands restoration and flood control projects across the country.

The Congressional Budget office says the bill includes projects that, if fully funded, would cost $11.2 billion over the next four years and $12 billion in the decade after that. The bill also calls for increased oversight of the Corps, requiring an outside review of water construction projects.

The veto was Bush’s fifth. Four of those have come since Democrats took over Congress in January, but this one was unusual because it also pits the president against a sizable number of lawmakers from his own party. Previous Bush vetoes include two of bills allowing expanded federal research using embryonic stem cells, and a spending bill that would have required troop withdrawals from Iraq.

Last month, Bush vetoed a major expansion of a children’s health insurance program, also over objections from some Republicans. But he has far more partisan unity on that issue than on the water projects bill. It was the first time Bush went into a veto knowing it was a futile effort. This turns the tables somewhat on him, as he has been criticizing Democrats almost daily for wasting time by passing legislation they knew he would not accept.

Isn’t it funny that now that there’s a Democratic majority in Congress Bush is finally taking the packaging off his veto pen? Ain’t it also funny that Bush considers things that will cost around 14 billion over the next 14 years to help fix some badly needed things is “fiscally irresponsible” and yet I just found an article that report economists are speculating that the war in Iraq could balloon to over $1 TRILLION dollars. Whether that is true or not that same article is reporting that the daily cost is over $200 million a day.

Which is fiscally irresponsible? Adding in things to help protect American citizens from natural disasters and restore the environment for $14 billion, or continue an occupation of a foreign nation that serves as nothing but a black hole for the economy and is turning this into the most expensive military campaign in American history?

You want to be fiscally responsible? Pull troops out of Iraq and STOP GIVING TAX BREAKS TO COMPANIES FOR OUTSOURCING AMERICAN JOBS!

I fear the title of this entry may be misleading but this is something that’s interested me for the last minute and a half.

A while back a article was written on the main page about British claiming territory in Antarctica (link) and was subsequently followed up in a diary by Iroquois (link) but a short while ago I found myself reflecting on the amusement I had partaken in that little gambit.

One of the things I got to thinking about was, what if I really did have a nation in Antarctica as well as everyone else who claimed territory there in the original posting? Granted my own nation wouldn’t end up taking up half the continent, but that’s beside the point.

Now I’m going to sit back and think about what kind of government I would found and what kind of policies would be set up and I’m going to try and be as thorough as I can (including little selfish items I’d like to have).

Now, I and a group of people along with myself arrive on Antarctica with one old ship, possibly a surplus World War 2 era U.S. cruiser, which I’ll call the Avalon and two very large wooden square-rigged merchant ships full of supplies which we’ll call the Achilles and the Soyuz (if any of you have a problem with this so far, eat me, this is MY story). We crack through a narrow area in the ice and arrive on land. I go ashore and plant my flag, my new nation has just been founded.

Let me start off with the basics.
- New Atlantis (in lieu of a better name)
- Government type: Representative Democratic Socialism
- Capitol Location: 63°14′5.02″S 57°15′25.15″W
- Draft a Constitution

Okay, we’ve got that out of the way, what’s first on the agenda? Well, we’re in Antarctica, and its cold. There’s very little (near nothing) by way of materials for construction and industry (unless we live in igloos) and we’ve gotta build a shelter of some sort. What are my options and what do we have at our disposal?

The ships are jam packed with cold weather gear, food, and various tools. However, the only materials we have to build with are the ships themselves. One of the first things I’d order would be one of the ships be dismantled and the wood used to construct living facilities. any piece of wood that can’t be used in constructing will be set aside for firewood.

- Dismantle the Soyuz, construct five communal living quarters and smaller storage sheds.

The sails from the ship will be stripped and used for extra blankets. For now, the Avalon will be used as a Capitol building.

Second on the agenda, food is looking good so far, but without being resupplied we will soon run out and be forced into cannibalism. I’d have to open contact with other nations and ask for help until we can become self sustaining. One of the first things to be purchased from a neighboring nation would have to be greenhouse equipment and plant seeds.

- Open contact with a close-by nation and request supplies.

Third on the agenda, crops are growing nicely and we even have some surplus. So, we trade them to a small nation for extra building supplies and solar generators. With the supplies we get we’ll construct further living quarters and greenhouse facilities.

- Secure further building materials and power-sources.

Now, some of my citizens will be growing restless at this time, so the next thing to do would be to send the Achilles along the coast and send a few people inland to scout possible sites for mining various ores that can be traded or sold. we can only last on the dependency of others for so long, so one of the top priorities of mine would be to find a way to make my nation economically stable. Because Antarctica is a vast frozen tract of nothingness, the only way to be able to do that would be to dig.

- Locate possible minerals for extracting.

Its been a while now and the Achilles has since returned as well as a number of the scouting parties. There are a few sites that can provide limited mining, but on the whole little else. After a time, enough revenue can be acquired from these mineral deposits to allow for the construction of larger living facilities as well as a general store with the next supply shipment to arrive on the Achilles from its last journey from Chile.

- Construct general store and further living facilities, try to allow more room for the citizens to expect some measure of privacy.

Soon I find a piece of mail on my desk aboard the Avalon from the French government requesting to set up a long-term research outpost in my nation. Apparently the conditions they’re looking to study are localized within my borders. With this comes an idea, I’ll rent them the land and make available to them my facilities at a low price. With this comes the added revenue of whatever the researches buy at my general store.

- Rent land to foreign nation for research purposes.

Now I have a steady income and I can afford another building, this time well stocked with research equipment. And because of the location of my nation and my capitol on the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, I am in a position which places New Atlantis at a near highway for researchers traveling to various outposts in Antarctica and I’m starting to see an economic growth as scientists and researchers stop off to reequip themselves and spend a few nights in a warm bed in one of my new hotels. With this influx of visitors I’m finding more immigrants arriving and my capitol is starting to expand.

- Begin building more commercial areas, start laying down a concrete road system.
- Construct a solar and wind generated power plant.

Next thing I find is that I am being advised to start collecting official taxes and begin providing public services.

- Found the first official police department, fire department, hospital, educational system and set up a tax collectors office.

As more ships arrive on a regular basis and with the Avalon now firmly iced in I have to find a way to keep the waterways clear. After contacting a foreign nation to purchase a surplus icebreaker, I’ll have to consult with my city engineers about building a port to properly receive new ships.

- Build a harbor to allow easier loading and unloading of supplies, equipment, and personnel as well as an airport.

Now as my capitol grows, settlers are migrating outwards along the coat and founding new cities and finally I am faced with the growing need to build a military force to counter the acts of piracy that we’ve been experiencing along the trade routs. Currently my only form of defense is the Avalon but it is still being used as the administrative facility for my government. Beside the port I commission the construction of a drydock as well as the design and construction of three medium sized destroyers and two new cruisers.

- Found a Navy

The new cruisers are given the names USNA Vostok and USNA Lafayette while the destroyers are given the names USNA Tesla, USNA Cousteau, and USNA Scotia. As the Vostok, Cousteau, and Tesla are patrolling the shipping lanes and the Lafayette and the Scotia are anchored outside the harbor, I decide its best to put the drydock to further use and commission the construction of two large research vessels named the NAR Discovery and the NAR Endeavour and send them to conduct research at the behest of my scientific advisers.

- Begin scientific research into arctic conditions.

As my nation grows further I find more issues start to arise, including establishing an embassy and lobbying for entry into the United Nations. Also I find the need to establish a standing army and a space program.

- Contact Heckler & Koch, purchase 50 G36E assault rifles and 50 H&K416 assault rifles for a 100 man army.
- Construct space facility and reusable space vehicles.

This is just some of what I would do should I found my own Antarctic nation, just talking about some of the ways I would get things started. What would you do with your nation?

I really didn’t think they could be this out of touch with the American people.

GOP Rivals Argue Who’s Most Conservative

GOP rivals argue who’s most conservative
By LIBBY QUAID, Associated Press WriterMon Oct 22, 6:31 PM ET

Republican front-runners Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney defended their conservative credentials in the face of pointed attacks from campaign rivals Sunday night in the most aggressive debate to date of the race for the White House.

“You’ve just spent the last year trying to fool people about your record. I don’t want you to start fooling them about mine,” Arizona Sen. John McCain bluntly told Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts.

Former Sen. Fred Thompson made Giuliani his target, saying the former New York mayor supported federal funding for abortion, gun control and havens for illegal immigrants.

“He sides with Hillary Clinton on each of those issues,” added Thompson, referring to the New York Democrat who leads in the polls for her party’s presidential nomination.

The clashes in the early moments of a 90-minute debate prompted former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee to say he wanted no part of a “demolition derby” with others of his own party. “What I’m interested in is fighting for the American people.”

Whatever their disagreements among one another, the eight rivals agreed on one issue. They took turns criticizing Clinton, the Democratic front-runner.

Asked whether she was fit to be commander in chief, Romney replied, “I’d vote no.”

Giuliani said he agreed with one thing the former first lady said recently. “I have a million ideas. America cannot afford them all,” he quoted her as saying as laughter filled the debate hall. “I’m not making it up.”

McCain said Clinton had recently tried to spend $1 million on a Woodstock Museum, commemorating perhaps the most famous counterculture event of the 1960s.

“Now my friends I wasn’t there. I’m sure it was a cultural and pharmaceutical event,” he said.

“I was tied up at the time,” he deadpanned, and the audience rose to applaud the reference to the five and a half years McCain spent as a prisoner of war during Vietnam.

The debate was the first since Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas dropped out of the race, winnowing the field. The remaining rivals stood on a stage at a resort 10 miles from Walt Disney World, fielding questions at an event broadcast by Fox News Channel.

The leadoff Iowa caucuses are scheduled for Jan. 3, 2008, for Republicans. In their most recent debate, Oct. 9, Giuliani and Romney swapped charges with each other, vying for primacy in the race.

This time they largely ignored each other. Instead, Giuliani’s lead in the nation polls, as well as Romney’s perceived strength in early voting states, made them obvious targets for McCain and Thompson.

The first question went to Giuliani, asked whether he was more conservative than Thompson. “I can’t comment on Fred,” the former mayor said.

He then added that he had brought down crime, cleaned up Times Square, cut taxes and eliminated the city’s deficits. “I think that was a pretty darned good conservative record,” he said.

Giuliani took a more conservative position on gay marriage than he has thus far, saying he would support a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage if states begin to legalize it.

Giuliani lived with an openly gay couple after separating from his second wife, Donna Hanover, and one member of the couple said at the time that Giuliani promised to marry them if gay marriage was ever legalized.

Attacked by the former Tennessee senator moments later, Giuliani fired back at his antagonist. “Fred has problems, too,” he said. He said Thompson was the “single biggest obstacle” in the Senate to legislation limiting the ability of individuals filing lawsuits to recover unlimited damages.

“He stood with the Democrats over and over again” on the issue, Giuliani added.

Thompson said he believed states should decide whether to limit lawsuits in their own states.

Republicans in Congress tried for years to pass legislation that would cap damages in lawsuits, but never succeeded before losing their majority to Democrats in 2006.

Romney was asked about McCain’s earlier claims that he had shifted positions on a number of issues to appeal to conservative Republicans.

The former Massachusetts governor responded that he was proud of his record, particularly since the state had an overwhelmingly Democratic Legislature. “I fought to make sure we kept our taxes down. I fought for pro-growth strategies. I cut taxes,” he said.

Moments later, though, McCain personally turned on Romney.

“Governor Romney, you’ve been spending the last year trying to fool people about your record. I don’t want you to start fooling them about mine,” he said.

Saying he would run on his record as a conservative, McCain added, “I don’t think you can fool the American people. I think the first thing you’d need is their respect.”

Coming up next, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain debate the looming threat of of a domino effect of the Red Menace. Stay tuned!

Kind of scary when you think about it.

Link

70 Punished in Accidental B-52 Flight
By PAULINE JELINEK, Associated Press WriterFri Oct 19, 7:58 PM ET

The Air Force said Friday it would punish 70 airmen involved in the accidental, cross-country flight of a nuclear-armed B-52 bomber following an investigation that found widespread disregard for the rules on handling such munitions.

“There has been an erosion of adherence to weapons-handling standards at Minot Air Force Base and Barksdale Air Force Base,” said Maj. Gen. Richard Newton, the Air Force deputy chief of staff for operations.

Newton was announcing the results of a six-week probe into the Aug. 29-30 incident in which the B-52 was inadvertently armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles and flown from Minot in North Dakota to Barksdale in Louisiana without anyone noticing the mistake for more than a day.

The missiles were supposed to be taken to Louisiana, but the warheads were supposed to have been removed beforehand.

A main reason for the error was that crews had decided not to follow a complex schedule under which the status of the missiles is tracked while they are disarmed, loaded, moved and so on, one official said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

The airmen replaced the schedule with their own “informal” system, he said, though he didn’t say why they did that nor how long they had been doing it their own way.

“This was an unacceptable mistake and a clear deviation from our exacting standards,” Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne said at a Pentagon press conference with Newton. “We hold ourselves accountable to the American people and want to ensure proper corrective action has been taken.”

Newton acknowledged that the Air Force needs to “restore the confidence” lost among the American people after the August incident, which raised questions about the safety of the country’s nuclear arsenal.

“We are making all appropriate changes to ensure this has a minimal chance of ever happening again,” Wynne said.

Newton said the flight in question resulted from an “unprecedented string of procedural errors,” beginning with a failure by airmen to conduct a required inspection of the missiles before they were loaded aboard the B-52 bomber at Minot. The crew flying the plane was unaware nuclear warheads were on its wing, though it wasn’t explained what role they played in the mistake.

Highest among those to be punished are four officers who were relieved this week of their commands, including the 5th Bomb Wing commander at Minot — Col. Bruce Emig, who also has been the base commander since June.

In addition, the wing has been “decertified from its wartime mission,” Newton said.

Some 65 airmen have been decertified from handling nuclear weapons. The certification process looks at a person’s psychological profile, any medications they are taking and other factors in determining a person’s reliability to handle weapons.

After it was loaded with the missiles, the B-52 sat overnight at Minot, flew the next morning to Louisiana, and then sat on a tarmac again for hours before anyone noticed the nuclear warheads.

Newton avoided repeated questions on what extra security would have been required if crews had known the nuclear weapons were on the plane. But another official later said privately that security was increased as soon as the nuclear warheads were discovered.

The Air Combat Command ordered a command-wide stand-down — instituted base by base and completed Sept. 14 — to set aside time for personnel to review procedures, officials said.

The incident was so serious that it required President Bush and Defense Secretary Robert Gates to be quickly informed.

Wynne prefaced his remarks about the B-52 incident by saying that, in publicly confirming that nuclear weapons were involved, he had authorized a one-time exception to U.S. policy, which states that the location of nuclear weapons will never be confirmed publicly. He said he made this exception because of the seriousness of the episode and its importance to the nation.

The weapon involved was the Advanced Cruise Missile, a “stealth” weapon developed in the 1980s with the ability to evade detection by Soviet radar. The Air Force said in March that it had decided to retire the Advanced Cruise Missile fleet soon, and officials said after the breach that the missiles were being flown to Barksdale for decommissioning.

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On the Net:

Air Combat Command: http://www.acc.af.mil

Have we had nuclear weapons for so long our military is becoming caviler in regards to their handling?

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