The following quote is posted not for the status of its source (modest), but for its pithy timeliness:

It is more than investigation of possible counterterrorism oversight that [the Bush administration is] resisting. They are resisting the erosion of the dissent-free culture of political orthodoxy that has dominated this nation's for the last eight months -- and it comes not a moment too soon.

The President who couldn't even name the leader of Pakistan has embarked on a foreign-policy nightmare. America has allied itself with a number of flagrantly undemocratic nations, from Uzbekistan to Malaysia. Evidence emerges almost daily of our probable role in an aborted coup in Venezuela, while our support of a brutal civil war in Columbia resembles the early years of Vietnam. One and a half million troops are massed at the India-Pakistan border, ready to plunge the Indian subcontinent into chaos. War with Iraq looms. The situation in Israel and Palestine threatens to destabilize the entire region, and our policies in the Holy Land risk birthing a new generation of anti-American terrorists.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration has revived talk of using nuclear weapons on a first-strike basis, overturned the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, declined to sign a biological weapons treaty, hid our own production of biological weapons, refused to recognize International Criminal Court, held up the World Council on Children, and -- after rejecting the Kyoto Accords -- replaced the head of the International Panel on Climate Change. Domestically, we have an energy policy written by the same people responsible for staging an energy 'crisis' that cost the state of California $30 billion. The denial of public inquiry into the matter was justified with an invocation of, more or less, the divine right of kings -- fitting, perhaps, given the administration's disregard of the Constitution in the name of fighting terrorism.

To top it all off, contrary to Bush's campaign promises, our budget deficit is at least $121 billion -- and, according to a note from Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill in our government's 2001 financial report, it may actually run to half a trillion dollars.

The time has come to lift the star-spangled shroud of silence that has hidden the affairs of our nation.

"Finally victims will be rehabilitated -- even if many are already dead," said a campaigner friday, aparently with no irony, after Germany's parliament passed legislation allowing around 50,000 gay men prosecuted by the Nazis because of their sexuality to be pardoned, 57 years after the end of the Nazi regime.

Silence earlier meant concentration camp, sometimes death, and after the war, very often continued imprisonment, for the victims of heterosexism.

Anti-gay measures passed in 1935 formed part of a Nazi philosophy that deemed homosexuals alien to the state's aim to create a "super-race."

"The new state ... must firmly counter all unnatural sexual urges," the preamble to the 1935 law said, singling out gay men.

If found guilty, victims faced up to 10 years in prison or concentration camps, where thousands died. Other gay men were forcibly sterilized or subjected to medical experiments.

The legislation remained unchanged on Germany's statute books until 1969.

It's not easy for Americans to grasp complex political concepts, especially in this wonderful age of concensus, but Richard Goldstein offers to help us to understand a man who definitely did not fit into our simple categories.

The anxiety that still surrounds homosexuality in this culture is what makes our gay right so brittle, and so set against any queer who doesn't meet the standard of respectability. But the saga of Pim Fortuyn shows what can happen in a society where the energies of gay people are unleashed. The potential for leadership asserts itself, and if the result isn't always pretty, call it an unintended consequence of success. The goal of the gay movement is to liberate gay people. What they do with their freedom is something else again.

Dan Rather is ashamed that he, and the American media generally, has not taken on the Bush administration over the war on terrorism, because of misguided ideas about patriotism, and of course, out of shear fear!

"It starts with a feeling of patriotism within oneself. It carries through with a certain knowledge that the country as a whole - and for all the right reasons - felt and continues to feel this surge of patriotism within themselves. And one finds oneself saying: 'I know the right question, but you know what? This is not exactly the right time to ask it.'"

"It is an obscene comparison - you know I am not sure I like it - but you know there was a time in South Africa that people would put flaming tires around people's necks if they dissented. And in some ways the fear is that you will be necklaced here, you will have a flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your neck," he said. "Now it is that fear that keeps journalists from asking the toughest of the tough questions."

Are we waking-up now? But even if we are, is it too late?

Just a thought. But there are more and more stories, and more and more corroborations, of an alleged connection between oil and gas industry profits and "The War on Terror." Since the Bushie administration is essentially an oil and gas administration, will be be surprised to find that our present nightmare is really part of a horrrible, cynical game being played out of sight?

In the aftermath of September 11th, we were told the terror was brought upon us by people who hate our freedom and resent our way of life. In point of fact, however, it appears the attacks came as part of a broader game. The Bush administration willingly entered parley with the Taliban, despite their care and feeding of wanted killer Osama bin Laden, so as to further the goals on an American petroleum interest. In the process, they watered down American anti-terrorism measures to such a degree that a Deputy Director was compelled to quit in protest, and another has since filed suit against the agency.

This very provocative essay is logged here in order to get it out into the open, where it can be defended or dismissed as more information comes forward.

Bushie's only response to the growing uproar over his administration's foreknowledge of a terrorist attack, foreknowledge kept secret until now, is to ask God for wisdom. Well, we know we won't get it from Bushie or his handlers, especially if they're really looking for it to come from an Imaginary Playmate.

Bush made no immediate comment on the situation.

He attended a National Hispanic Prayer Breakfast in Washington and said prayer has helped Americans of faith to get through the last eight months.

"The last eight months have showed the world the American character is incredibly strong and confident. Yet, prayer reminds us that a great people must be humble before God, searching for wisdom -- constantly searching for wisdom from the Almighty," he said.

Hugh Hicks never met a lightbulb he didn't like, so he collected them all.

He was not above what might be termed stealing, and he proudly displayed stolen bulbs in a group he called 10 Hot Types. In the Paris Metro in 1964, he noticed a series of 1920's-era tungsten bulbs along the wall. He did not know that the bulbs were wired so that if one was removed, all would go out.

He surreptitiously removed a bulb, and the tunnel was suddenly pitch dark. With people screaming, he scrambled to replace the bulb.

"But I couldn't get it back," Dr. Hicks said in an interview in The Baltimore Sun. "So, you know me, I grabbed two more and took off."

Still two countries, Georgie!

Would it be better to believe the Unelected One was simply under a misapprehension, or just generally stupid? Here are his exact words, as heard in news broadcasts, and as printed in the NYTimes today:

"Today, I'm pleased to announce that the United States and Russia has [sic] agreed to a treaty which will substantially reduce our nuclear arsenals to the agreed-upon range of 1700 to 2200 warheads."

The "sic" is my own, and was not present in the Times text, unfortunately.

The headline of the day, or even more, from Reuters:

New NATO-Russia Partnership Ends Cold War Again

For a non-hysterical discussion of gay sexuality in the Catholic priesthood, read the interview the NYTimes published May 11.
The interviewee tries to distinguish pedophilia from an attraction to sexually-mature teenagers, but messes-up in his conclusion.

But as I understand it, pedophilia is a specific clinical description of a person who is attracted to prepubescent children, and in that there is no particular connection to homosexuality. Where the issue gets murky for everybody is where you're talking about 16- or 17-year-olds, who may regard themselves as sexually mature. How do we talk about priests who have relations with such people? Can someone who has homosexual desires be sexually attracted to 17-year-olds? Yes, some gay men are. Some straight men are attracted to 17-year-old girls. So do we regard that as a pathology, or do we regard it as an attraction that shouldn't be acted on for moral reasons? Either way, it's wrong, but not wrong in the same way.

The last two sentences would be defensible only if they actually read, "So do we regard that as a pathology, or do we regard it as an attraction that perhaps shouldn't be acted on because of socially-constructed prohibitions? If it is wrong, it is therefore wrong for very different reasons."