Hello, Official Secrets Act

The Bush Administration is reportedly trying to come up with its own little Official Secrets Act. Given that they have said that the President can classify and declassify items at will, then hell, what can't they charge the press with?

THE MSM IS ALREADY YOUR STINKING LAPDOG, YOU BELTWAY SCUM. WHAT THE HELL ELSE DO YOU WANT? Oh, right, complete immunity to do whatever the hell you please, laws, Constitution, and liberty be damned.

In Leak Cases, New Pressure on Journalists
By ADAM LIPTAK
The New York Times
Published: April 30, 2006

Earlier administrations have fired and prosecuted government officials who provided classified information to the press. They have also tried to force reporters to identify their sources.

But the Bush administration is exploring a more radical measure to protect information it says is vital to national security: the criminal prosecution of reporters under the espionage laws.

[...]

One example of the administration's new approach is the F.B.I.'s recent effort to reclaim classified documents in the files of the late columnist Jack Anderson, a move that legal experts say was surprising if not unheard of.

"Under the law," Bill Carter, a spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said earlier this month, "no private person may possess classified documents that were illegally provided to them."

[...]

"Once you make the press the defendant rather than the leaker," said David Rudenstine, the dean of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York and a First Amendment scholar, "you really shut down the flow of information because the government will always know who the defendant is."

why i hate windows media player

Why do I hate Windows Media Player? I think it's because if you set it up as an administrative user, that doesn't set it up for other users. No wait; it's that if you set it up as a non-administrative user (which you can do) that you can't change its setup settings and prevent it from taking over every filetype in the world - you have to log back in as administrator and change it there, then go back to the regular user and set it up. No wait; it's that this DOESN'T FUCKING WORK and setup defaults to taking over all filetypes anyway and doesn't let you override it. No wait; it's that if you turn off the visualiser, which you hate, in regular mode, it turns it back on when you try to make the stupid thing smaller. No wait; it's that you CAN'T turn off the visualiser when you make the stupid thing smaller, so the "small" mode is still large, and, incidentally, shaped kind of like a club you could potentially use to fiercely bludgeon whoever designed it. No wait; I think it's how to get to the window controls, you have to move the pointer off the visible player and over whatever's behind it that's in the range of the real but invisible rectangular window; you have to move away from the player, but not too far, to get to its window controls. That's "cool," for all values of "cool" meaning "unbelievably stupid." No wait; it's that adjusting one slider on the equaliser also adjusts every other slider on the equaliser because apparently some frakking genius thought it would be funny to make it into a fucking spline. It's like a game, a game called fuck you and your stupid fucking sound settings.

THAT'S it. That's why I hate it.

Today's Cultural Warfare Update

Navy Chaplain violates orders and wears a uniform during a political event with "10 Commandments" judge Roy Moore of Alabama; he's claiming that he's really targeted for saying a prayer in the name of Jesus and that was a religious event, not a political one; Focus on the Family takes his side;

Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM to support the Federal ban on marriage also claiming gay and lesbian people don't actually even want to get married, ignoring what has been pointed out by others in earlier CWUs - that the percentage of LGBT people getting married each year is higher than the heterosexual rate; the total appears paltry, but that's in part from the option being new; if this bears up, this argument will have to be going away soon - not that they let reality stop them;

Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM to support the Federal ban on marriage, quotes former Sen. Danforth (R-Missouri) calling the idea of a Federal amendment "silly";

Focus on the Family Newsbrief covering the lawsuit against the Lexington (MA) school district over the children's book King and King;

FotF Newsbrief on Presbyterian question of whether to allow gay priests, calling it "moral decline";

Faith and Freedom Network ACTION ITEM to get more signatures gathered to override the GLBT civil rights bill in Washington State; they're saying they're quite a bit behind where they wanted to be at this point; good;

"Christian Examiner," linked to by Concerned Women for America, runs an article on the California bill requiring public school lesson plans not be anti-gay and requires that GBLT historical figures and such be included; it talks about how "opponents" say it "will turn schools into sexual indoctrination centers"; I think the latter is micromanaging but the reaction against it is really telling, because it's not a reaction against micromanagement, it's a reaction against not helping keep queers invisible;

The English-language Seoul Times runs a piece against stem-cell research; talks about how it's "professional suicide" to "expose the myth of science serving man"; "Those who see science as an end in itself will stop at nothing to achieve their ends. Nothing.";

AP story on outside groups pouring money into Ohio's gubernatorial race; in particular, fundamentalist groups are pushing hard for social conservatives; Concerned Women for America linked to it;

Family Research Council pushes The Party of Death, an attack book on the Democratic party's support of abortion rights;

American Family Association: "Catholics Demand Answers" from "Pro-Homosexual Bishop";

AFA runs a very friendly article about the Exodus Mandate effort to pass a resolution in the Southern Baptist Convention calling upon families to pull their children en masse from public schools over evolutionary theory, GBLT-student support, and other theological issues; they quote the founder calling it a "Call to Holiness";

AFA supportive article about the Lexington (Mass) lawsuit over the children's book King and King;

AFA promote the "Answers in Genesis" young-earth Creationist "Creation Museum" near Cincinnati International Airport, located in Florence, Kentucky; one of the big features they call out is "a big sculpture of St. George and the Dragon";

AFA talks up a non-SBC Baptist schism in progress in the southwest over the American Baptist Churches USA not being anti-gay enough for some of its membership; they also promote the Focus on the Family postcard ACTION ITEM supporting an anti-marriage Federal amendment;

Traditional Values Coalition slams new Hawai'i abortion bill;

TVC runs their version of the story supporting the student wearing the anti-gay T-shirt at school - the administration told him to remove it and not wear it anymore but did not punish him; he sued; see previous CWUs for discussions;

TVC links to LifeSite's coverage of anti-gay testimony before the Massachusetts legislature;

They then link to the other of their star anti-gay witnesses, also testifying before the Massachusetts legislature; I was pretty brutally abused, can I go testify that all heterosexual women and men are evil asshats who shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a child?;

Charlotte anti-gay Christian groups to hold celebration rally over the successful drive to harass the local Gay Pride parade out of existence this year; they're holding it on the usual day of the parade and rally;

Ooh, I missed this before; the Canada Family Action Coalition links to a serious American anti-gay "diseased fags" site, and says that what's described there is "no different than what is taking place in Canadian public schools."

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