San Diego GOP chairman co-founded international piracy ring
by Miriam Raftery
Any job applicant knows that background checks are routine – especially for jobs involving authority or oversight of money. So why didn’t the San Diego Republican Party do a simple Google search before naming Tony Krvaric as its chairman?Online research reveals that Krvaric is the co-founder of Fairlight, a band of software crackers which later evolved into an international video and software piracy group that law enforcement authorities say is among the world’s largest such crime rings. After co-founding Fairlight in Sweden, Krvaric established U.S. operations for the organization, including an arm headquartered in Southern California—a major center for the computer and video game industry. |
Obama ‘outraged’ by Wright’s ‘appalling’ comments
by Nick Juliano
Barack Obama said the Jeremiah Wright who’s reinserted himself into the spotlight over the last few days “was not the person that I met 20 years ago,” and he condemned his former pastor’s eagerness to grab headlines with controversial statements in the most forceful language he’s used so far. |
Cheney lawyer claims Congress lacks power to conduct oversight over vice president
by John Byrne
'I trust you will not turn your back' on respecting Congress, Democrat saysIn what appears yet another effort to strengthen his position in the executive branch, the attorney for Vice President Dick Cheney said in a letter released by Congress Thursday that the Congress "lacks the constitutional power" to conduct oversight over his job. |
Ashley Dupre from Spitzer call girl case sues 'Girls Gone Wild' for $10 million over photos, video
by Sun-sentinel.com
The call girl who triggered the downfall of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer sued the founder of the racy ``Girls Gone Wild'' videos Monday for $10 million, claiming her image and name are being exploited.Ashley Alexandra Dupre also contended in the lawsuit that she was only 17 _ too young to sign legally binding contracts _ and drunk on spring break in 2003 when she agreed to be filmed for ``Girls Gone Wild'' in Miami Beach. |
The Pastor Casts a Shadow
by Bob Herbert
The Rev. Jeremiah Wright went to Washington on Monday not to praise Barack Obama, but to bury him.Smiling, cracking corny jokes, mugging it up for the big-time news media — this reverend is never going away. He’s found himself a national platform, and he’s loving it. |
Human Rights Campaign endorses 14 Senators, candidates for '08
by Nick Juliano
After a 2006 election in which it helped get the most viciously anti-gay politician serving in the US Senate booted from office, the Human Rights Campaign says right-wing fear based assaults on equal rights for gays and lesbians are no longer as relevant as they were even a decade ago. |
Why do the Republicans oppose fair pay?
by Mary Shaw
On April 23, Senate Republicans blocked the Fair Pay Restoration Act from moving to an up or down vote.To give credit where due, there were a few exceptions, with Republican senators Collins (ME), Smith (OR), Snowe (ME), and Specter (PA) voting "Yea". But, unfortunately, they are a mere drop in the big greedy white male Republican bucket. |
John McCain's White Supremacist Problem
by Cliff Schecter
One would have to strain to be shocked that a racist ad [1] is finding its way out of the bowels of conservativism in North Carolina. For political observers from the 1980s and 1990s will remember that Senator Jesse Helms was a master of using divisive tactics inject race into just about everything he did outside of brushing his teeth--whenever he wasn't straining through the holes in the sheet he was wearing to see his Jefferson Davis emblazoned toothbrush. |
While we were shrieking
by Ed Naha
"Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it."-- John Lennon.As much as I like presidential primary pie fights, quite a few strange things have been happening of late that have nothing to do with supposed sniper fire, Rev. Wright and filched food preparation. A lot of these items have slipped under the radar. So, while Obama remembers to duck and cover, Clinton remembers Pearl Harbor and McCain remembers to zip up his fly, let's examine our nation as it circles the drain. |
The Petraeus Story: Selling the President's General
by Tom Engelhardt
You simply can't pile up enough adjectives when it comes to the general, who, at a relatively young age, was already a runner-up for Time Magazine's Person of the Year in 2007. His record is stellar. His tactical sense extraordinary. His strategic ability, when it comes to mounting a campaign, beyond compare. |
"Gangsta" Ole Party Strikes Again
by Min. Paul Scott
The NC Carolina GOP has revealed its latest masterpiece...An attack ad attacking Rev. Jeremiah Wright for...No, that's not it...An attack ad attacking Obama for...No, it's actually an attack ad attacking gubernatorial candidates Bev Purdue and Richard Moore for not attacking.... |
Did You Hear What John McCain's Unrepentant Friend, From Whom He Sought Support, Said?
by Steve Young
Last month, replicating what's been tossed incessantly across the media, MSNBC political analyst Steve Adubato wrote [1] about Jeremiah Wright's comments and Barack Obama's reaction to them. "...it's not simply about race, but about judgment and the courage to stand up and confront a longtime friend and supporter who is prominent and influential, and who has also been divisive and dangerous. Wright may have done good things for many poor people in Chicago, but this in no way excuses or explains what I and every other person in the media, as well as every interested American, saw on tape from his disgraceful sermons. It's inexcusable. It's unacceptable. While Obama isn't responsible for those comments, his feigning ignorance that he wasn't in the pew listening to Wright on a particular day, or that he didn't know how bad Rev. Wright's hateful rhetoric was makes him look very un-presidential." |
Military Propaganda Pushed Me Off TV
by Jeff Cohen
In the fall of 2002, week after week, I argued vigorously against invading Iraq in debates televised on MSNBC. I used every possible argument that might sway mainstream viewers — no real threat, cost, instability. But as the war neared, my debates were terminated. |
Burger King Exec Uses Daughter’s Online ID To Chide Immokalee Coalition
by Amy Bennett Williams
As the Coalition of Immokalee Workers prepares to deliver more than 60,000 petitions to Burger King headquarters in Miami today, the daughter of Burger King’s vice-president Stephen Grover confirmed her father is responsible for online postings vilifying the coalition. |
Mill Hill Populism
by Bob Moser
It's a bright, mellow, short-sleeve April evening in the troubled pinelands of south central North Carolina. Except for the waspish drone of lawnmowers and the occasional whoosh of a car sliding along Highway 220, this town of 1,700 is almost eerily quiet--partly because, with gas costing what it does, people can't afford to do much driving around. But it's mostly because of the big yawning silence at the center of Biscoe, where the mill used to be. |
Cuba to hold 1st Communist congress since '97
by AP
President Raul Castro announced Monday that Cuba will convene its first Communist Party congress since 1997 — a gathering that could chart the island's political future long after he and his older brother Fidel are gone.Castro also said the government within weeks will commute death sentences for several inmates. The prisoners are likely to include two Central Americans sentenced for planting bombs, one of which killed an Italian tourist, in Havana tourist locales a decade ago. Capital punishment will remain on the books in Cuba. |
Is Barack Obama too smart to be President?
by CapitolHillBlue.com
Is Barack Obama too smart to be President of the United States? Are Americans afraid to elect a leader who might actually know what he (or she) is doing?George W. Bush certainly doesn't qualify for membership in Mensa. His predecessor, a native-born Southern governor from a red neck state, had a beer belly, a fondness for beer and Big Macs and put chasing White House interns ahead of others affairs of state. |
Mindy McCready weeps as she confirms affair with Roger Clemens
by Teri Thompson
Barricaded behind tightly drawn blinds at her Nashville home Monday, country singer Mindy McCready confirmed a long-term affair with embattled pitcher Roger Clemens."I cannot refute anything in the story," a tearful but resolute McCready told the Daily News, which broke the story at midnight Sunday. |
Exercise-heart study casts doubt on 'fit but fat' theory
by Lindsey Tanner
New research challenges the notion that you can be fat and fit, finding that being active can lower but not eliminate heart risks faced by heavy women. "It doesn't take away the risk entirely. Weight still matters," said Dr. Martha Gulati, a heart specialist at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. |
Pump prices lift Shell and BP to record $7.2 billion
by AP
BP and Royal Dutch Shell have reported massive increases in profits for the first three months of this year on the back of rocketing petrol prices, which are expected to hit £5 a gallon today.BP's pre-tax profits rose 48 per cent in the first quarter to $6.6 billion (£3.3 billion) while Shell increased its profits 12 per cent to a record $7.8 billion (£3.9 billion). |
