President Bush today vetoed the legislation to widen research on stem cells,  a move many are reporting as a notable event simply because Bush hasn't vetoed anything before.  He may not have exercised his veto before, but his action today is anything but new.  It's perfectly consistent with his personal dislike of science, his personal desire to keep the Christian right happy, and his attempt to appear principled among the ruins of the least principled administration of my lifetime.

Politics sure is weird, isn't it?  Passionate speeches on the floor, asking everybody and their brother for money, smiling all the time (unless you're one of the "attack dog" office holders), reading polls, taking polls, reading polls, taking polls....changing your passionate position.

The Washington Post is carrying an AP story that Alberto Gonzalez has told Arlen Specter's Committee that it was George Bush himself who prevented the DOJ's Office of Preofessional Responsibility (OPR) from continuing their investigation into what role DOJ lawyers might have played in played in the domestic eavesdropping program.

Unity at last according to the AP: Faiths in Jerusalem United Over Gay March.

There have been plenty of stories about U.S. troops suffering psychological problems in Iraq, which puts public pressure on the military to either do something about it, claim they are doing something about it, or be so confusing that no one knows what they're doing about it.

Who would vote against a "most important law [that] protects the most fundamental right of every American?"  Thirty-three Republicans, according to RNC head Ken Mehlman.

If you've served in the military, worked for the military, or watched any black comedies about the military you know that acronyms are a way of military life.  But shouldn't there be a limit?

Lebanon-born Khaled al-Masri, a German citizen, claims to have been abducted/seized in Macedonia in December of 2003, then taken by the CIA to an Afghanistan detention center, where for five months he was interrogated and abused.  In fact, al-Masri has filed a civil lawsuit against the CIA.

Bloomberg News offers the following intro to a story on the upcoming Fed Reserve announcement:

Bernanke May Give Republican Lawmakers Bad Election-Year News
July 17 (Bloomberg) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke may deliver his fellow Republicans a message they'd rather not hear when he gives Congress his monetary-policy report this week: The economy is slowing and inflation remains a risk.

Ahh, what part of reason, and of decency, is killed,

When such a monster they toil and toil to build.

For some reasons, Republicans are rarely bothered by their party's absurd claims of treason, sympathizing with terrorists, and the rest of the Rovian trash heap called politics in the 21st century.  When the absurd smears are directed at Democrats, that is.

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