Petraeus Opposes Cheney And Limbaugh On Torture
And Guantánamo

post from DownWithTyranny! on 26 May 2009 10:00:00 AM. © DownWithTyranny!

We all know physical cowards (and draft dodgers) Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh love belittling and denigrating the men and women who have put their lives on the line to defend our country. Their scurrilous attacks on Colin Powell have even been supported by the fringy base of the Republican Party. But what about General David Petraeus? He's been a GOP icon who they're praying will run for president and bring them back to power. Well Limbaugh, Rove and Cheney may all prefer each other over Colin Powell, but General Petraeus is in line with the mainstream of American thought that torture is the wrong approach and that Guantánamo should be shut down.

He was interviewed on Radio Free Europe Sunday and he broke Dick Cheney's ~~heart~~.. whatever contraption he's got in there. Like Colin Powell and most military men Petraeus opposes torture and opposes keeping Guantánamo open.

"I think, on balance, that those moves help [us]," said the chief of U.S. Central Command. "In fact, I have long been on record as having testified and also in helping write doctrine for interrogation techniques that are completely in line with the Geneva Convention. And as a division commander in Iraq in the early days, we put out guidance very early on to make sure that our soldiers, in fact, knew that we needed to stay within those guidelines.

"With respect to Guantánamo," Petraeus added, "I think that the closure in a responsible manner, obviously one that is certainly being worked out now by the Department of Justice-- I talked to the Attorney General the other day [and] they have a very intensive effort ongoing to determine, indeed, what to do with the detainees who are left, how to deal with them in a legal way, and if continued incarceration is necessary-- again, how to take that forward. But doing that in a responsible manner, I think, sends an important message to the world, as does the commitment of the United States to observe the Geneva Convention when it comes to the treatment of detainees."

Of course, Petreus is hardly the only one pointing out how wrong Cheney and Limbaugh are. "Matthew Alexander," a pseudonym for an actual official Air Force interrogator in Iraq, is especially important to listen to-- and his perspective shows what a lying sack Cheney is. Torture cost us thousands of lives and was a major recruiting tool for Al Qaeda. Cheney and Bush need to be put on trial. Take a look:

video details and more

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In the long run, we may have just scored a
victory in California

post from AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth on 26 May 2009 09:58:00 AM. © AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth

Today the California Supreme Court upheld Prop 8, a ballot initiative that made it illegal to marry gay couples. But the court did something else. They let stand the marriages of 18,000 gay couples who tied the knot before Prop 8 became law. I believe that those marriages may, in the long run, make gay marriage inevitable in California.

Sexual orientation already enjoys equal status with gender and race in California discrimination law, and, as the LA Times notes, today's court decision doesn't change that:

Even with the court upholding Proposition 8, a key portion of the court's May 15, 2008, decision remains intact. Sexual orientation will continue to receive the strongest constitutional protection possible when California courts consider cases of alleged discrimination. The California Supreme Court is the only state high court in the nation to have elevated sexual orientation to the status of race and gender in weighing discrimination claims.

The fact that 18,000 gay marriages will remain on the books means that, eventually, another case will go to the California Supreme Court, questioning the constitutionality of laws banning gay marriage, and the court will have to consider why those 18,000 marriages how not destroyed traditional marriage as we know it. In other words, the ongoing existence of these marriages, with no demonstrable harm being caused by their existence, will call into question, if not outright destroy, the bigots' argument for why the state has an interest in banning gays from getting married. In more colloquial terms, no harm no foul.

Yes, the decision is disappointing, but it wasn't unexpected. What is now clear is that those 18,000 gay marriages will remain the law of the land in California. And those 18,000 gay couples should now be able to get California state benefits that straight married couples get. All of that will eventually, I believe, lead California courts to rule that the sky has not fallen - there is no valid reason for not protecting gay couples equally under the law.

And those 18,000 couples will help prove, in states across the land, that the existence of gay marriages do not somehow cause bigots like Tony Perkins and Jim Inhofe to suddenly want to get divorced and shack up with a guy.

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-just-scored.html

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California Facing Huge Budget Deficit --
Verse-Case Scenario by Tony Peyser

post from BuzzFlash.org - Progressive News and Commentary with an Attitude | Fight Ignorance: Read BuzzFlash on 26 May 2009 09:56:47 AM. © BuzzFlash.org - Progressive News and Commentary with an Attitude | Fight Ignorance: Read BuzzFlash

Massive cuts all across the board
Will be causing wide & vast pain
Schwarzenegger even has to lay off
Some consonants in his last name.

VERSE CASE SCENARIO

Tony Peyser provides daily poems and weekly cartoons for BuzzFlash and also writes the BuzzFlash column, "Blue State Jukebox." He was a daily cartoonist for the L.A. Times from 1994 to 1997. You can e-mail Tony at tonypeyser@yahoo.com.

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Tuesday Open Thread

post from My Left Wing - Front Page on 26 May 2009 09:56:05 AM. © My Left Wing - Front Page

"Photography takes an instant out of time,
altering life by holding it still."
-- Dorothea Lange
Born May 26, 1895

The most famous photograph Lange ever took,
of a Depression-era woman and her children...

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Prop. 8 Decision Coming Today

post from Moue Magazine on 26 May 2009 09:50:21 AM. © Moue Magazine

California’s state Supreme Court will decide today whether Proposition 8 was constitutional. There are no clear indications which way the decision will go but the recent gains (and the New Hampshire setback) have increased the importance of[...]

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http://www.mouemagazine.com/blog/2009/05/prop-8-decision-coming-today/

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Hmmm

post from Talking Points Memo on 26 May 2009 09:49:00 AM. © Talking Points Memo

The Politico says that Republicans are in the difficult position of perhaps needing to hold their fire because of the political dangers of attacking a "Latina single mother." But the Post says Sotomayor, who was married briefly when she was younger, has[...]

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Sotomayor for Supreme Court

post from OutrageNation on 26 May 2009 09:46:00 AM. © OutrageNation

After weeks of speculation, President Obama is today announcing his Supreme Court selection - Judge Sonia Sotomayor.

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Market Update: Bank of America (BAC) and General
Motors (GM)

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Supreme Court Announcement At 10:15ET

And the AP thinks it's Sotomayor...Tags: Supreme Court (all tags) [...]

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