Apophenia

"A bill protecting cocks passed through the House Judiciary Committee...Both cockfighting and domestic violence are currently misdemeanor crimes, punishable by 30 days in jail. If the bill passes, cockfighting will become a felony, punishable by five years in jail. Domestic violence crimes will remain a misdemeanor.

...Rep. Altman spoke about domestic violence, "There ought not to be a second offense. The woman ought to not be around the man. I mean you women want it one way and not another.

But new demands [such as hundreds of billions being spent in Iraq?], including $870 million to administer the new Medicare prescription-drug program, forced cuts in scores of programs. The bill also provides money for two big priorities of the conservative movement: faith-based community outreach and abstinence education.

But a budget squeeze forced the termination of 57 programs and froze or reduced funding to many others.

The top American military commander in the Persian Gulf disputed a contention by Vice President Dick Cheney that the Iraqi insurgency was in its “last throes” and told Congress on Thursday that its strength was basically undiminished from six months ago...“The fact is that the insurgency has not weakened,” Levin said. “Our men and women in uniform are serving with great honor. They deserve an objective assessment of the situation in Iraq. They deserve a clear layout of the next steps there. They’re not getting either from the administration.”

— via antiwar

The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." ... "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

"Karl Rove didn't get George W. Bush this far just by luck. Rove has a brilliant and so far unbeatable strategy when it comes to political warfare: He doesn't defend his candidate's weaknesses, he attacks his opponent's strengths. Unapologetically.

Consider the 2004 campaign, when Rove was faced with a Vietnam problem. A war hero was running against his boss, who had opted to stay well out of harm's way. Rather than defend, Rove attacked -- and put John Kerry on the defensive.

Today, Democrats are uniting against the war and the public is increasingly worried and critical about Bush's leadership. So what's Rove doing? Rather than defend against their criticisms, Rove has decided to go for the jugular.

The most compelling anti-war arguments are that the war in Iraq was a diversion from the war on terror and that American troops are dying daily for no good reason. So Rove's response is to liken war critics to al Qaeda sympathizers intent on subverting the American military."