One Utah

This frightening map highlights 8 major Christian denominations, showing where they represent a plurality (and in counties marked with a + at least 50%) of the relevant counties’ population.

This shows that there are quite a few remarkably contiguous religious blocks in the US. That is what Al-Qaeda will call “integrated” neighborhoods when they occupy us. [...]

Someone in the State Senate should make sure he’s on his medication. I mean seriously, he’s an embarrassment - that someone this monumentally stupid keeps getting elected should give pause to the voters in his district.
From today’s Trib:
“I’m for the concept of the bill, but we don’t want outside organizations coming into schools [...]

Waldman as usual has an amazing piece as TAP about the challenge facing the next Democratic president.  He writes:
Today, progressives feel as though they’ve been walking in the desert, and the promised land is at last coming into view. They don’t necessarily need their own Reagan to get there, mostly because progressives simply don’t do [...]

On VetVoice, RockRichard compares the current situation in Afghanistan to Whack-a-Mole. And you thought the US military only played that game in Iraq.

Coalition forces are in engaged in a high-stakes game of Whack-a-Mole. Do some poking around on Wikipedia and you will see what is going on in Helmand province. American, British [...]

I’ve called attention before to Jane Stillwater, a talented writer and one of the world’s most intrepid bloggers. On her own initiative, she obtained press credentials and went to Afghanistan and Iraq (twice) on a shoestring budget. During first visit to Baghdad’s Green Zone in April 2007, Jane outdid CNN, putting Senator John [...]

I haven’t really commented much on this year’s legislative session for one reason - the news I’ve seen hasn’t really painted a picture of the session. Aside from anything having to do with immigration (i.e. brown people) the session seems to have been actually kind of boring. Yesterday, I got to spend some [...]

At least, we do until the state legislature gets involved . . . .
Mayor Ralph Becker and his staff totally rock. This should have happened years ago.
It passed unanimously. We had three members of the City Council who struggled to reach their decision (Jergensen and Christensen and Martin). In the end, they [...]

Today, CIA Director Michael Hayden for the first time divulged specifics about officially-authorized CIA torture sessions in a public Congressional hearing. Via Talking Points Memo:
In the life of the CIA detention program, we have held fewer than 100 people. And actually, fewer than one-third of those people have had any techniques used against them, [...]

America’s manufacturing capacity has struggled to produce enough body armor, up-armored Humvees and MRAPs, and even bullets for the Iraq fiasco. Yet the White House propaganda mill has had no trouble keeping up with the demand for new slogans. [Inspired by HTML Mencken's thorough vivisection of Rich Lowry on Sadly, No!]
“The smoking gun [...]

This is my reply to some other folks on the Moab Area Progressive Network in a dialogue about Barack Obama and electoral politics in Utah:
(1) In respect to initiation of paradigm shifts, John is correct that these are not initiated by INCUMBENT mainstream politicians. They originate in “closets.” According to Peck’s Microtrends, [...]

Wikileaks has released an apparently authentic copy of the Rules of Engagement (ROE) for Multi-National Division - Baghdad. They claim that these ROE were in use as recently as 2005. The document is classified SECRET.
For those unfamiliar with ROE, Wikipedia offers the following definition: “In military or police operations, the rules of engagement [...]