Thanks to Nate and KO for debunking the claims about political favoritism in which car dealers get closed under the Chrysler and GM bankruptcies. There’s one more important point on this: car dealers are disproportionately the biggest donors from the industry.

Why Do You Kill? is the most important book I’ve read on our occupation of Iraq. Written by Dr. Jürgen Todenhöfer, this book finally provides a voice to the people of Iraq, a voice we never hear in the Western media, a voice our government silences rather than engages.

It is decision day for the gunslingers at the al-Haramain corral. If you recall when we last left this little vignette, exactly one week ago today, Judge Vaughn Walker had just issued a fairly terse ruling giving certain instructions to the parties. Both parties were given one week, until today, May 29th, to produce written responses to the court. al-Haramain’s is in, and it is very interesting.

In what looked– at least from the outside– as one of the most unlikely outcomes of the 2008 election cycle, Democrat Linda Ketner came within two percentage points of beating entrenched Establishment wingnut Henry Brown in a gerrymandered South Carolina district specifically drawn to be an easy win for Republicans. At the same time, Obama only managed 42% in the district. Linda was the only South Carolina Democrat who came close to ousting an incumbent last year. Until near the end of the campaign the DCCC and the punditocracy didn’t have a clue. The fact that Linda is openly gay and openly progressive on social issues– and very outspoken– caused quite a few people to not even give the race a second look.

Carl Levin better watch out for Liz “BabyDick” Cheney and her cries of “libel!” Because he just called her Daddy a liar. But I’m most interested in how the specific denials he gave about the content of the documents Cheney wants fleshes out the information in the May 30, 2005 Bradbury Memo on efficacy.

Sen. Claire McCaskill held a public Q&A in Sedalia last Wednesday, and it’s a great demonstration of how these events can break through the DC bubble. No screened questions, just citizens speaking their minds and asking for their senators and representatives to do the same.

Arrr, mateys! Hoist the Double Standard high! We of the good ship Golden Wingnut must never allow a judge nominated by a Democrat — especially if that judge is a wench with darker skin than ours — to use a tenth of the mannerisms used by our own beloved Antonin Scalia!

This morning, I’m finally putting my spa gift certificate to good use. It’s a pretty sad commentary when you get a “spa day” as a Valentine’s Day present and don’t get around to actually using it until nearly June, but there you are. I recently found a live performance piece of Raglan Road (YouTube), as sung by Loreena McKennitt, which is lovely.

Featuring a new video “Swine Flew” from comedienne musician Mandy Steckelberg, and a new video from Eight Legs.

It is one of the biggest problems of the last eight years (30 years?) in micro-view. Most Americans don’t have a lot of time for parsing and parrying, and so certitude often looks a little like the truth. You’d think our current administration, so very good at message management during the campaign, would know that.