The Washington Post has a good synopsis of the passage (finally!) of the Matthew Shepherd bill.

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President Obama gave a speech Saturday night, in which he said he would end the long-standing “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. He provided no timetable.

An article by from sailor Joseph Rocha from yesterday’s Washington Post provides a classic example of why this needs to be changed. Now.

Grave of Leonard Matlovich

The London Times is reporting today that there are now acknowledged instances of voter fraud in Iran’s presidential election. The risible part is the explanation given for why this was disclosed.

The emphasis in the article is mine.

Iran admits 50 cities had more votes than voters

Martin Fletcher | The London Times

In 50 Iranian cities the number of votes cast in this month presidential election exceeded the number of eligible voters, the state’s election watchdog admitted today.

The surprising admission by the Guardian Council was, however, designed to undermine the claims of the defeated candidates that the vote was rigged.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s main rival in the hotly-disputed election, and the other two losing candidates have claimed that the vote exceeded eligible voters in as many as 170 districts.

Abbasali Kadkhodai, a spokesman for the council of senior clerics, told the state television channel IRIB: “Our investigation shows that the number of districts they announced is not correct. Based on our preliminary report, 50 districts face this issue.”
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I think we are seeing a sea-change in Iran right now. When the ‘Supreme Leader’ told the vote-protesting Iranians to stop it and accept the published results, I thought to myself, “you’ve opened a can of worms, Ayatollah”.

(An analyst on NPR noted that the Supreme Leader is the “chairman of the board” and the disputed president is the “CEO”)

It sounds like what a certain Utah church would like to have happen: head up a theocracy that pays lip service to democracy (a throwback to Brigham Young in the 1850s).

And yet the Taliban — who are doing the same thing — are feared because of their inherent violence and ties to the 9/11 attacks.

It really is all about control. How fucked up is that?

Here is the CNN article referencing the title of this entry:

‘Neda’ becomes rallying cry for Iranian protests

(CNN) — “RIP NEDA, The World cries seeing your last breath, you didn’t die in vain. We remember you.”

That post on Twitter came from a man who identified himself as an American guitarist in Nashville, Tennessee.

Amid the hundreds of images and videos of Saturday’s brutal crackdown on protesters in Iran that flooded the Internet, it was the graphic video showing the death of a young woman that touched a nerve among those following the events in Tehran for more than a week.
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Apparently yesterday was the 150th anniversary of the reburial of the bones of the victims of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. I guess they are going to do something for every significant event until the end of time.

I can’t wait for the 10th anniversary of the 150th anniversary in 2017.

A photograph accompanied the Salt Lake Tribune article. Is it me, or is there some irony in a 21-gun salute honoring 119 men and women that were essentially killed by walking firing squad?

This is a succinct, well-written article that calls former Vice President Cheney to task for his finger-pointing, security-claiming, torture-advocating behavior.

As John Stewart said on the Daily Show a few weeks ago: “You lost the election. It’s supposed to taste like a shit taco”.

Mr. Cheney, You Did Not Keep Us Safe
by Paul Begala | CNN political commentator

If 3,000 Americans had been killed on your watch, in an attack that could have been prevented, perhaps you’d be a little hesitant to accuse anyone else of endangering America. And if you had advocated torture, and the torture produced false information that you used to mislead America into an unwise, unjust and unwarranted war, you might be a tad sheepish about defending the use of torture.

Not Dick Cheney. Mr. Cheney has stepped up his attack on Pres. Obama’s security strategy, telling CBS’s Bob Schieffer that Obama’s refusal to use waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation techniques” (i.e., torture) endangers American lives.

The truth is the Bush-Cheney policies did not keep us safe, and Mr. Cheney is not a credible spokesman on issues of national security.
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Joining the New York Times, The Salt Lake Tribune has jumped into the fray with its opinion that Jay Bybee should do the right thing and resign from his federal judgeship — or face impeachment.

Bybee’s memo
Judge should resign or be impeached
Tribune Editorial

Salt Lake Tribune

Judges appointed to the federal bench swear to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic” and to “bear true faith and allegiance to the same… .” It is part of the oath of office taken by Jay S. Bybee, after he had given the Bush administration a sickening shred of legal cover to use “harsh interrogation techniques” that, by U.S. and international laws, amount to torture.

For his efforts at redefining torture so the Bush administration could engage in it, Bybee was rewarded by President George W. Bush, who nominated him to a seat on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Bybee was confirmed in 2003, a year before the infamous photos of U.S. soldiers brutalizing Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib prison came to light.
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I’m almost having a hard time with the sheer number of articles and calls for resignation or impeachment being published on the web.

This one from truthout was written by a “29-year US Army Reserves veteran who retired as a colonel”.

Torture: An Author and a Resister
Friday 01 May 2009
by: Ann Wright, t r u t h o u t | Perspective

As a Bush administration political appointee Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel of the Department of Justice, Jay Bybee, a Mormon, wrote one of four torture memos released last month. Bybee’s August 1, 2002, 20-page memorandum laid out in excruciating detail the interrogation techniques he was authorizing the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to use on al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah.

Bybee authorized ten “enhanced interrogation techniques” to encourage Abu Zubaydah to disclose “crucial information regarding terrorist networks in the United States or in Saudi Arabia and information regarding plans to conduct attacks within the United States or against US interests overseas.” The torture techniques authorized were (1) attention grasp, (2) walling, (3) facial hold, (4) facial slap, (5) cramped confinement, (6) wall standing, (7) stress position, (8) sleep deprivation, (9) insects placed in a confinement box and (10) waterboarding.
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So apparently this non-official, under-the-table support of torture by LDS members in key positions in the Bush administration was just an unintended offshoot of Gordon B. Hinckley’s attempt to fit into mainstream Christianity.

You’re in good company.

Survey: Support for terror suspect torture differs among the faithful

742 American adults surveyed on use of torture against suspected terrorists

54 percent of those who go to services at least weekly say it’s often or sometimes OK

In survey, people unaffiliated with any religious group were least likely to back torture

President of National Association of Evangelicals yet to comment on survey

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
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Utah attorney (and LDS member) David Irvine calls it like he sees it.

LDS lawyers, psychologists had a hand in torture policies
By David R. Irvine

Salt Lake Tribune

An overheard conversation among several women at a local deli: “I can’t believe this country elected Obama as president; it must be a sign of the end times when the Constitution will hang by a thread.” The irony of this uniquely Utah political thread about church elders saving the Constitution might have shocked the lunch bunch had they read The Dark Side by Jane Mayer (Doubleday, 2008).
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