Constitution Day

Sunday, September 17 is Constitution Day. All public schools must address this amazing document in curriculum, as of last year. Perhaps we can send Bush, Cheney, Gonzalez, Myers, et al to the DC public schools this week to review the Constitution they clearly skipped in school themselves.

Here are some great educational sites:

C-SPAN has a 16 minute video accessible from their home page.
The National Archives has an "interactive" Constitution page.
National Constitution Center has a number of resources, including lesson plans for teachers and one online exhibit that caught my eye --

What is the difference between "separation of powers" and "popular sovereignty"? Visit Basic Governing Principles and learn about the central governing theories that form the basis of the U.S. Constitution

Justice Learning for analysis and discussion.
Hug your Constitution today -- we must protect it at all costs.

Weekend Videos

Videos on a Saturday night -- sounds good to me! Pop up the popcorn, and dig in. First, a big hat tip to Connecticut's own Amazing Spazeboy, who covered the College Democrats meeting at the University of Hartford this afternoon -- he's got full speeches by Joe Courtney (CT-2nd) and Chris Murphy (CT-5th)Democratic state office holders were there, too.

For all you baseball fans, be sure to check out Ned's new ad

And, finally, NOW from PBS aired a program on political blogging last night; you can see it online with Web extras here

More on the new voting machines

I'm following up on the new Diebold (pronounced "DEE-bald" not "DIE-bold", although I do continue to pronounce it that way because I'm a phonetic dogmatist) optical scan technology which is to be implemented in 25 Connececticut towns and cities (link for list) for the November election, and throughout the state in 2007.

I've been going through Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz's press releases about the new technology, and there is something a little odd about them. I'll admit that I haven't perused each and every one of them, but the five or six I've read didn't mention the name "Diebold" even once. She refers to LHS Associates, the company that is selling the optical scanning machines, and IVS LLC which sells the machine for people with disabilities.

But nowhere is any mention made of Diebold.

Sure, there are links to the company websites at the very end of SOME press releases, and if you go to them they have detailed information on the Diebold machines easily available. But it's an unnecessary extra step that shouldn't be required to find out the manufacturer of the machines.

I'm not sure how the State normally deals with dispensing information about how their contracts are awarded, but wouldn't it be considered "press release-worthy" information to mention the name of the manufacturer of a single machine type that is essentially the entire budget of a $15 million state contract?

I'm also going to pursue information about the security testing of the system at the UConn Computer Sciences department. I found details of the study via TrueVoteCT, which is a non-partisian group of Connecticut voters dedicated to bringing accessible and verifiable voting to Connecticut. I'll try to contact the people running the testing and see what sort of results they're getting.

BlackBoxVoting.Org has a detailed report on the hackability of these machines, with step-by-step illustrated instructions on how to open the machines and replace/hack/copy the memory cards without breaking the official security seal on the unit.

More to come next week. This is an ongoing story.

Article 3

Since the Bush administration, Gonzales, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the rest believe that Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions is hopelessly confusing, I thought I would post it so you folks can help us come up with a way to explain it to them.

Article 3

In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

(b) Taking of hostages;

(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;

(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

2. The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.

The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.

What is so confusing????? What's Joe's latest take on this? And, what did he think about this before this evening? Who's he aligning with -- McCain or Bush? Decisions, decisions....

Joe and the big F.U.

"F.U." stands for "Fairfield University".

But in Joe Lieberman's case, it might also be what he is saying to the handicapped by parking in a clearly marked handicapped parking space this morning.

Apparently Joe has caught a case of George Bush's "Above-the-law-itis".

Dear God, Senator, have you no shame? (photo from LamontBlog.)

UPDATE: Of course, those evil lefty photoshoppers are getting in on the act. Here's a photo on DailyKos's comments.

"Liar, Liar..."

...and you know the rest.

This is an exclusive image of Dan Gerstain's pants after he made a public statement about Ned Lamont. Sources say that his pants sponteneously combusted due to the explosive pressure of his outrageous lies.

Watch and see. (h/t to Scarce)

New Rasmussen poll?

This just in, and I can't verify it's accuracy, but I'm putting it up anyway, (h/t to *xyz) from a post over at DailyKos:

Rasmussen has just come out with a new poll behind the subscription wall, but since these polls are put out there i figure it`s ok to give the results.

Rasmussen has this race a dead heat

LIEBERMAN 45
LAMONT 43

Now all other polls show Lieberman with a double digit lead so it`s a question who to believe. I think Rasmussen has a pretty good record with state polls.

Joe's "war of words"

Joe Lieberman is flailing about like a landed flounder, desperately trying to find anything that will stick to Ned's campaign.

It just looks sad.

In the same week that Joe says Ned is going "negative", Lieberman's campaign has launched personal attacks against Ned's wife, Ned's personal finances, and Ned's experience as a volunteer teacher.

In the same time period, Ned Lamont has outlined his national security policy, put forward an educational proposal (pdf), and pointed out Sen. Lieberman's miserable voting record.

He hasn't gone after his opponent's personal finances, or his family, or his volunteer experience (wait, does he have any?). (h/t to LamontBlog)

Not to mention Dan Gerstain's incessant use of mocking names like "The Nedster", "The Full Lamonty" and "Lamonsters" when referring to Ned and his campaign. It's unseemly for a sitting US Senator to allow that sort of language on his official website.

Joe is starting to look pathetic. Which begs the question:

"What kind of legacy is Lieberman going to leave behind when he's gone?"

As a senator of 18 years who led a somewhat distinguished career?

Or as an obsolete hack who overstayed his usefulness, and whose final appearance on the national stage was that of a self-serving career politico who just couldn't let it go?

Is that how you want the nation to remember you, Joe?

Where IS Joe Lieberman?

Jimmy, I only wish I knew.

I can tell you where Joe Lieberman AIN'T most of the time.

He AIN'T in the Senate during critical votes about the war in Iraq.

OK, well, he IS there occasionally. But since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, he AIN'T been there over HALF THE TIME!

Out of 61 bills related to the conduct of the war, Joe hasn't been able to bring himself into the Senate chambers to cast his VOTE on 31 of them.

Think about that for a minute. Our nation is involved in the single most costly foreign policy situation in our history, and Joe can't even make it into work half the time!

Well, Joe doesn't vote often, but YOU can vote just one time and make a difference.

November 7th.

Make THAT vote count!

(graphic updated and properly Photoshopped by imajoebob)

Nancy Johnson feeds the Fear Machine

The Republican Fear Machine is grinding out more untruths.

This morning while watching the Channel 8 news, a Nancy Johnson commercial appeared. I watched it with disbelief...how stupid does she think people are? Apparently she's trying to tap into that vast reservoir of "low-information voters" that former Lieberman campaign operative Sean Smith was referring to.

Here's the text of the ad:

A call is placed from New York to a known terrorist in Pakistan. A terrorist plot may be unfolding. Should the government intercept that call, or wait until the paperwork is filed? Nancy Johnson says act immediately, lives may be at stake.

Fair enough. Of course we should act immediately. We don't want this guy to get away. So far I'm following you, Nancy.

Liberal Chris Murphy says No, apply for a court warrant even if valuable time is lost.

Here is where Nancy misleads the people. The FISA law clearly states that the government can tap communications between a person in the United States and a foreign nation for up to 72 hours before applying for an order to continue surveillance.

In the entire time the law has been in effect, there have been only FOUR instances of the order being denied, out of THOUSANDS. If you show up with a tape that has a known terrorist in Pakistan on it, your application WILL be approved.

Immediately.

Everybody needs to remember that the REASON the Bush administration DOESN'T want any oversight on surveillance is so they can watch ANYONE they want! Something tells me it ain't just the big bad terrists they're keeping an eye on!

Smarten up, Nancy....stop with the LIES.

Support Chris Murphy for Congress, Democrat in the 5th District.

UPDATE: The anti-Nancy blog No More Nancy has an even MORE detailed deconstruction of the ad. It's "Must See TV!".

And you can watch Nancy Johnson's vile ad in it's entirety right here.