Issues

The Chicago Tribune says the health insurance industry has a plan.

[America's Health Insurance Plans] called on the federal government to spend an additional $300 billion over 10 years to expand public health programs for poor Americans, offer subsidies to working families to buy medical coverage, and support state health reform efforts. But there are no specifics on how the proposals would be financed or provisions for taming rapidly escalating costs.

Sounds more like a plea than a plan, doesn’t it? I have what I think is a better idea, which I’ve already sent to my congressman. What do you think?

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In an op-ed published in the LA Times, Jonah Goldberg attacks Democrats for hypocrisy for moral outrage over recently "retired" Republican Mark Foley's predatory sexual cyber-stalking and possible statutory rape of Congressional Pages. Using a recently coined term, Ephebophile, to flaunt his supposed intellectual superiority to describe Foley's predilections instead of the "casually" used term pedophile. In light of this semantic hair splitting I think a vocabulary lesson is in order. So class, it's time to sharpen your pencils.

While not technically a pedophile, Foley's Pederasty is not what one could say is acceptable behaviour in most modern societies, let alone George Bush's Amerika... more

CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA SEPTEMBER 30, 2006

David Swanson 1, David Swanson 2

Summer Lipford 1, Summer Lipford 2

Ahmad Daniels 1, Ahmad Daniels 2

Tim Pluta

Bill Glass

Morning headlines brought to you by Carolyn Kay MakeThemAccountable.com The World

Lebanon fighting rages as UN struggles for ceasefire BEIRUT (AFP) - Hezbollah fighters and Israeli ground troops were battling in south Lebanon as diplomats bickered at the United Nations over moves to end four weeks of bloodshed and destruction.

Lebanese PM rejects Bush's cease-fire plan Lebanon's government rejected a U.N. cease-fire plan backed by President Bush on Monday, demanding Israel immediately withdraw even before a peacekeeping force arrives and promising to send 15,000 troops to take control of the Hezbollah stronghold along the border.

I don’t usually read Parade, because it’s so right wing. But today’s Intelligence Report (which won’t be available online until Wednesday) had this to say:

The Daughter Factor

How a male in the House of Representatives votes on bills concerning women’s safety and reproductive rights may depend on how many daughters he has. Ebonya Washington, a Yale economist, found that legislators who have just girls—or more girls than boys—take more liberal positions on issues such as abortion and access to birth control. This held for Republicans as well as Democrats.

UPDATE: Make that July 23, not April, of 2005, that Bush signed flags at Beaver Aerospace and Defense in Livonia, Michigan

From Americablog:

Did George Bush deface American flags in Vienna, Austria today?
by John in DC - 6/21/2006 11:04:00 AM

A US embassy staffer in Vienna writes AMERICAblog and says he did. Reportedly, a slew of conservative Republican Bush supporters wanted to get Bush's autograph on US flags. And Bush signed them. Right on the flags. Kind of ironic right before Senate Republicans force us to debate "flag burning," again, simply because they have no more ideas left.

We never know whether these announcements are true or not, but true or not this is a great opportunity for Democrats. We can now insist that we declare victory in Iraq and bring our troops home. From the Associated Press:

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi killed in air raid Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida's leader in Iraq who led a bloody campaign of suicide bombings and kidnappings, has been killed in an air strike, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday, adding that his identity was confirmed by fingerprints and a look at his face.