Monday's news...

• Vice President continues to pressure congress to allow CIA, Dept. of Def. to torture detainees. John McCain, other Senators resist because they know torture is immoral, illegal, and bad for America.

"Just last week, Cheney showed up at a Republican senatorial luncheon to lobby lawmakers for a CIA exemption to an amendment by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) that would ban torture and inhumane treatment of prisoners. The exemption would cover the CIA's covert "black sites" in several Eastern European democracies and other countries where key al Qaeda captives are being kept."

McCain vows to add anti-torture amendment to every bill: "He vowed today that his measure would be 'on every vehicle that goes through this body' until it's enacted into law. 'It's not going away,' he said on the Senate floor. 'This issue is incredibly harmful to the United States of America and our image throughout the world.'" Hooray for John McCain, hooray for American values. Dick "Torquemada" Chaney and his apologists should be ashamed of themselves.

• President Bush says, "We do not torture" terror suspects. Oh, okay. Sure. I believe you. This is gonna be one of those statements that backfires. Remember these gems of eloquence?: "I really do believe that we will be greeted as liberators." "Bring 'em on!" "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended" "The insurgency is in its last throes." The prisoners at Gitmo are "living in the tropics. They're well fed. They've got everything they could possibly want." Bald faced-liars, all of them.
  
• The US is using white phosphorus on Iraqi civilians. This is nasty toxic stuff that virtually desintegrates skin on contact. "Bodies melted away before us." Holy crap. Saddam Hussein "used chemical weapons on his own people" and they call him a tyrant. The US does it and we call ourselves liberators. This is how we win hearts and minds of the Iraqi people?
• Harper's: "A history of the Iraq war, told entirely of lies." The lies used to tell this history are all quotes from senior Bush administration officials.
• "When I Die" will be shown Saturday at the Starz Denver International Film Festival. The hour-long movie depicts the creation of the 15-story tower that was used to blast Hunter S. Thompson's ashes into the sky at a closed memorial service on his Woody Creek property in August." Cool.
• The Family Guy took on the FCC last night. Did anybody watch? i missed it, was watching the Redskins beat the Eagles. Related: T.O. out of Philly. Ok, who wants a belligerent man-baby on their team? Any takers?.......anyone? The sad thing is, somebody's gonna pick him up, and that somebody's gonna regret it very soon after.
• TV tonight: Don't miss the return of Arrested Development on Fox. It's the best show on TV (standard disclaimer: besides The Simpsons). Yay! Thanks to DTS for the heads up on that one.
  

Later!