The Wall Street Journal had a piece on Friday about how Alice Cooper and his band rented a mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut in the early 1970s. Greenwich was known as one of the richest, most exclusive cities in the nation at that time. Cooper and his hell-raising cohorts did not blend in seamlessly. That article […]
Archive | August, 2013
Foreign Aid Breeds Hatred in Egypt
On the bright side, at least Egyptians know the name of the U.S. Ambassador (Anne Patterson). Maybe if we doubled our foreign aid, they would take down at least one of those signs. I have been railing against foreign aid since… hell…. since way back when my beard was red. Here’s a 2011 piece […]
Nixon’s Resignation & the Era of Lawless Presidents
This is the anniversary of President Richard Nixon’s resignation in 1974. Nixon knew that his defense was doomed and chose to throw in the towel without a Senate trial. But President Gerald Ford compounded the damage from Nixon’s presidency when he issued a sweeping pardon of Nixon that practically condemned future generations of Americans to […]
Obama, NSA, Gulf of Tonkin, & Governing as Lying
This is the 49th anniversary of Congress’s passage of the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, by which the Lyndon Johnson administration lied the nation into the Vietnam War. The resolution was spurred by false assertions of multiple North Vietnamese attacks on U.S. ships. At a National Security Council meeting on the evening that the first report came […]
Me? Nihilist? Another NSA Slander
Former National Security Agency boss Michael Hayden denounced defenders of Edward Snowden as “nihilists, anarchists, activists, Lulzsec, Anonymous, twentysomethings who haven’t talked to the opposite sex in five or six years.” Hey, I’m no nihilist! And, though I am still a shy country boy, it’s been a long time since I was accused of being […]
Best Thumbnail Explanation of NSA Spying Scandal
The Onion has the best explanation I have yet seen on how the National Security Agency surveils average Americans. But to be honest, I’m not sure if “Step 9” is accurate. From The Onion: Step 1: NSA goes to Gmail, guesses “puppy64” as the password for all usernames, and successfully gains access to over 5 […]
Great Colbert Riff on Bradley Manning Verdict
Stephen Colbert deserves an Emmy Award for this 4 minute segment on the Bradley Manning case and trial verdict. And he beautifully ties in the NSA at the end of the riff. http://youtu.be/_TJDZax426I?t=18s
Jim Bovard
Thanks very much, Ron! Ping pong balls can provi
Ron Redrift
'[T]he American Federation of Government Empl