Any of you who lives in a competitive district knows that the GOP is pushing immigration as a major issue for November.  While the more viruently anti-immigrant elements of the GOP claim that they are not racist or anti-Hispanic, this ad from the National Republican Congressional Committee shows plain well to what sick impulses they are trying to appeal.  

The ad is against Tammy Duckworth in the Illinois 6th District and has been running for about a week in the Chicago market:

http://youtube.com/...

Seems like the standard arguments, that Democrat X supports "amnesty" and that that will cost the US billions for social services (like social security, which many illegal immigrants pay large sums of money into without getting anything in return, but that's beside the point).

While the footage of Mexicans being caught at the border is distasteful to say the least, perhaps the NRCC bigwigs would have a point that they are not racist because they are showing illegal aliens.  Fine, let's give them that point.

However, the vile, racist nature of this ad comes out at second 15, with the following graphic:

FoxNews.com has just posted an article entitled "Is the Daily Kos About to Implode?"

I haven't read it all, but it seems rather bogus.  Here's the link

http://www.foxnews.com/...

It's written by Noel Sheppard of realclearpolitics.com

I'll pad this diary a bit below the jump more after reading the article, but I'd like to get it out there for y'all first.

If you go to the Drudge report right now ( http://www.drudgereport.com/ ) you will see that one of the links on the site says "Latino gangs claim their turf in Iraq...".

That link takes you to this article from the Chicago Sun-Times:

http://www.suntimes.com/...

Which has the following first two paragraphs:

The Gangster Disciples, Latin Kings and Vice Lords were born decades ago in Chicago's most violent neighborhoods. Now, their gang graffiti is showing up 6,400 miles away in one of the world's most dangerous neighborhoods -- Iraq.

Armored vehicles, concrete barricades and bathroom walls all have served as canvasses for their spray-painted gang art. At Camp Cedar II, about 185 miles southeast of Baghdad, a guard shack was recently defaced with "GDN" for Gangster Disciple Nation, along with the gang's six-pointed star and the word "Chitown," a soldier who photographed it said.

I don't know about you, but I really don't have a problem with the status quo on illegal immigration.  For me, it seems like it is the least worst option.  I don't support sealing the border and punishing people who help illegal immigrants because I believe in liberty and I certainly don't support making being an illegal immigrant a felony, because wanting to work is not a felony and we are spending enough on Federal Prisons.  I also don't really support allowing undocumented immigrants currently here a chance to become citizens, as it would be a slap in the face to people who come here legally.

So why can't we just leave well enough alone?

Yesterday, Tuesday February 21, four University of Chicago students were arrested for protesting Marine Recruiters who were on campus.  The four students are Jeremy Cohan, Ben Fink, Tom Discepola, and Brian Stapleton.  They have been charged with misdemeanor disorderly conduct.  You can read about what transpired and see some cell phone pics of the events at the website of undergraduate student Jarrett Belle-Isle ( http://www.jbelleisle.com/ ), from which I quote the story below the jump.

So this is expected to be a tough race.  12-year incumbent John Stroger (http://www.co.cook.il.us/...) is being challenged by County Commissioner Forrest Claypool (http://www.co.cook.il.us/...).  

I ask you in poll form, Cook County Kossacks, for whom will you be voting?

I'll be voting for Claypool.  He showed at the Park District that he can clean out corruption and patronage and deliver quality government services without raising taxes which is exactly what the county needs.  Stroger's a good guy, but the corruption and horrible delivery of county services has been just too much.

Last night, a Kossack named A Patriot put up a post and a poll asking who do you despise more, George Bush or Osama Bin Laden.  The results were as follows

http://www.dailykos.com/...

OBL  57%
Bush 41%
392 total votes

Check out below the jump what Katherine Jean Lopez and the crew at the Corner on National Review online have to say about us by going to http://corner.nationalreview.com/ and searching the page for " kos ".

Below the jump is Governor Rod Blagojevich's 2006 Illinois State of the State address, delivered this morning.  Do comment!

Have any of you seen this quote from Time Magazine?  It is an articles by Matt Cooper about the Bush-Delay relationship.  Check out this little quotation:

http://www.time.com/...

Well, I was checking out the News Blog a couple minutes ago and the "Simple Sambo" picture is no more.

http://stevegilliard.blogspot.com/...

I guess it was a Washington Post-owned picture that was "touched up" to get the blackface effect and said newspaper took exception to Steve Gilliard's use of their photo.  As such, as of the last few hours or so, when you click on the above link, you will no longer have Simple Sambo greeting you.

I suppose that Gilliard's picture did go a bit beyond fair use.  I wasn't really a fan of it, but in light of Mr. Gilliard's being black I had no problem with his using it.  I also fully understand Tim Kaine's decision to pull his ad from the site because, really, there is no upside to being associated with a picture like that if you don't have to.  Oh well, the uproar was fun while it lasted.

I'm ecstatic!  They just beat the Angels in game 5 6-3 to take the series 4 games to 1 and go to their first series since 1959!  Here's hoping they make it the first World Series title since 1917.

Sure there were some bad calls, but you can't deny that the Sox did play much better than the Angels this series regardless of the bad umpiring.  Those 4 straight complete games by Buehrle, Garland, Garcia, and Contreras were stellar.

I'm just giddy!

I was perusing http://www.andrewsullivan.com today as I am wont to do in the morning, and in addition to Andrew's justified outrage at Pope Benedict's new policy of banning homosexuals from seminaries, he also takes a jab at Armando for his recent post on Larry Summers ( http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/9/21/101049/138 ) and evidence calling into question his assertion that there may possibly be genetic differences between men and women when it comes to math and science.

Sullivan's post can be found at this link:

http://www.andrewsullivan.com/index.php?dish_inc=archives/2005_09_18_dish_archive.html#1127397188863 04256

More beyond the jump.

Update [2005-9-14 19:15:27 by Armando]: By Armando. Edited for style.

On the heels of other polls putting Bush below 40%, the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll puts Bush's approval at 40%, the lowest for Bush in the history of the NBC/WSJ poll. Some other damning numbers from the Poll:

Iraq:
Approve: 37%
Disapprove: 58%

Troop Level:
Maintain: 36%
Reduce: 55%

Also, 75% say the US is not prepared for a WMD attack, and check out these numbers for how people think the reconstruction after Katrina should be primarily funded:

Reduced Iraq spending: 45%
Repeal tax cuts:   27%
Cut federal spending:  12%
Increase the Deficit:   8%
Raise income taxes:   7%

Poll of 1,103 adults conducted between September 9-12 with a margin of error of +/- 3.1%. Go to the link for more details.

Each and Every Congressional Democrat in this country needs to be calling for George W. Bush's resignation.  And we need to make this all about Katrina and Bush's incompetence.  Bush and Cheney specifically made it clear in 2004 that people should vote for them because they could protect them from terrorist attacks.  Remember when Dick Cheney said that he worried that if Kerry was President, there would be attacks?  Well, they're in charge, there was an attack (albeit not a terrorist one) and they failed.  They failed to do the one basic thing you promised they would do, which was to protect American lives.

I'll admit, I too was wondering why there was not a more expansive busing out program for the poor and I was wondering if perhaps the local officials could have done more.

Then it occurred to me: THE LOCAL OFFICIALS WERE ABLE TO GET OUT 80% OF THE CITY IN ONE DAY!  And on top of that, they were able to get a significant portion of those left behind into the Superdome before the storm hit.  IN ONE DAY!  Do you realize how impressive that was?  They actually got things done when it was in their ability to get things done.

However, after the Hurricane struck and the levees broke, it took the Federal government more than 4 DAMN DAYS of sitting on their damn hands before they even started to get supplies to the dying people who needed them.  In that time people were dying preventable deaths at a time when the Federal government was the only power that could actually get anything done.

(More below the jump)

I don't know about you, but I haven't been putting up tip jar or tip jar-ish comments to my diaries about Hurricane Katrina.  It kind of felt like I was taking advantage of the situation to increase my mojosity, sort of like a light version of the way I felt sick when I heard them discussing on CNBC what stocks to buy to take advantage of the hurricane rebuilding (they recommended construction and mobile homes among other things).  I'm not saying people were wrong if they have been doing this, and in the scheme of things it seems weird to be pondering the place of internet comment ratings when there are lot more fucked up things in this world, but I admit I was thinking about it before I put up my diaries.

Has anyone else had similar feelings?

I regularly post on and read a message board dedicated to a Chicago sports station, http://www.score670.com .  There was a thread about Mayor Nagin's radio interview because one of the shows had mentioned it to describe the dire situation in New Orleans.  Here is a post to this thread made a couple hours ago from someone who I know through the board (he goes by the name "Regular Reader" and is a regular poster and I trust him) who had just gotten out and was a tourist trapped there.

It is below the bump

Since we learned in the aftermath of Katrina that the Federal Government pathetically isn't up to the task of protecting American citizens and won't be as long as this ass clown is in charge, it's time for the states to take action to be sure that America will be ready when the next disaster occurs, whether it be a natural or a terrorist one.

Since most if not all Governors actually understand the threat that catastrophic disasters pose, state leaders need to have some sort of memorandum of understanding that whenever such a disaster hits an area, the Governors of that area will have access to something like a quarter or some fraction of the domestically posted National Guardsmen and women in order to assist in evacuation, rescue survivors, and restore order to anarchy.