One Utah

This post is part three in my series on good and evil.
In The Lucifer Effect Philip Zimbardo explores the way in which situational factors play a role in individual behaviors. 
Zimbardo sums up his argument:
“Bad systems” create “bad situations” create “bad apples” create “bad behaviors” even in good people.
The point of course is simple - I [...]

Seven years later, at least the cable media is beginning to pull their noses out of Bush’s ass and do their job.
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Many scandals ago, with each new one, I would think it couldn’t get any worse. Today I believe we will continue to uncover [...]

Such a sad, pitiful, little man.

Alberto Gonzales might not make it to Utah- or out of Washington alive. But the list of Bush administration flunkees running to Utah to look busy is obvious and somewhat frightening. The Bush “Mod Squad” of Gonzales, Education Secretary Spellings and HHS head and former Utah governor Mike Leavitt, is due to come here Friday [...]

The profound incompetence of the Bush administration, their collective inability to actually do their jobs in anything like an effective way, has extensive implications for the American body politic.  Bill Scher of Liberaloasis had dedicated a great deal of time to pointing out the ways in which the Bush administration has followed the Heritage Foundation’s [...]

For those not absorbed the Prosecutor Purge, America’s New Monica may be a unfamiliar.  The short version:  Monica Goodling, a graduate of Pat Robertson’s Regent University law school and Messiah College (I’m not familiar but I’m guessing it’s a wingnut training ground) has taken the Fifth to prevent implicating herself in illegal activities with regard [...]

Having been a journalist for more than thirty years, I’m used to politicians lying to me: either to make themselves sound better or denegrate their opponent. But Rep. Chris Cannon and Sen. Orrin Hatch have taken falsehood and inaccuracy to a new, pathological level.
Hatch, seen here claiming he discovered Great Salt Lake, either fibbed or [...]

Over at Washington Monthly, they had a post up that I’ve been pondering for days - Meta Screw-Up. Their post is largely a quote from another post:
In the last couple of weeks, even in the minds of the lawmakers tasked with oversight, the administration’s scandals and screw-ups have started to blur together into [...]

Today, there’s so much good stuff out there in the blogosphere I’m linkfarming rather than writing:
Hugo has one of his more interesting posts, “Architects of our own adversity,” that strikes me as one of the wiser things I’ve read lately about personal transformation. It’s long but well worth reading - one of the best [...]

Whatever you do, when you are being swallowed by scandals and corruption, don’t make it worse by making it appear that you are hiding something.  By refusing to allow Karl Rove and Harriet Miers to testify under oath, the Bush Administration is guaranteeing that it looks like they’re hiding something.  Bush has also decided he’ll [...]

94  to 2
The Senate voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to end the Bush administration’s ability to unilaterally fill U.S. attorney vacancies as a backlash to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ firing of eight federal prosecutors.
. . . Essentially, the Senate returned the law regarding the appointments of U.S. attorneys to where it was before Congress passed the Patriot [...]