Enough about you...

((cautiously re-entering tribe))

MyBodyIsATemple — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 22:24:54 GMT

I hate facebook. I just can't take it anymore. So I'm back. Maybe. We'll see how it goes. Looking forward to the new launch of Tribe.

I'm off tribe

MyBodyIsATemple — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 05:48:44 GMT

Not making a big statement, but between my low interest level and tribe's utter lack of reliability, I'm pretty much not on tribe any more. I'll check in every once in a while for messages. Have fun without me.

I just can't keep a secret...

MyBodyIsATemple — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 23:29:01 GMT

J-Cush and I are having a baby. Due NYE. We are mucho happy. Until we find out the gender and can come up with a real name, we are referring to her/him as Limon.

ACK!

MyBodyIsATemple — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 19:32:27 GMT

DIY Kitchen remodel (new cabinets, floor, appliances) Landscaping back yard Dealing with some work politics Planning a wedding Refinishing patio furniture Installing French doors Overseeing contractors for various projects Lots of project stuff at work Family Business trip to NY Business trip to Las Vegas Buying new bedroom furniture Making a baby Having a social life Being obnoxiously in love All of these things I need to fit in before my wedding on May 3. Somehow. My head is going to explode.

where is your star?

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 03:48:21 GMT

join the exclusive star club

$5 to keep Tribe Alive

MyBodyIsATemple — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 20:12:08 GMT

I love Tribe. It has been so many things to me over the years. A way to entertain myself at work A way to find people in my social real life network A source for event news in my community A conduit for all things related to Burning Man A place to me to debate politics so I leave my friends alone It's been a larger and bigger part of my life at different times, but I can't imagine my life without it, and losing it would leave a hole. Do it - don't think about it because it does not make sense - and pay the $5 to keep tribe alive.

feeling sad for my baby

MyBodyIsATemple — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 05:02:08 GMT

I took Lilly to the vet today - her eye was kind of red and inflamed. She has a tear on her cornea. Then they convinced me to clean her teeth, which resulted in them pulling three teeth. $900 dollars later (Merry Christmas to me!) I brought her home. She's a mess. Her mouth is leaking bloody spittle and she's in so much pain and disoriented that she actually wet her own bed, which is something dogs do not do. She will be OK but I'm feeling really agitated and sad. Pain sucks, but pain when you are a little 12 lb critter with no understanding of what is causing the pain it has to be worse.

A little holiday spirit from Bear Force 1

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 23:36:13 GMT

Mario & Jon - this is for you http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGwludVZ4jo

Dennis Kucinich has balls

MyBodyIsATemple — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 17:40:17 GMT

This man should be president. Calling for impeachment of Cheney: "The Vice President's deception upon the citizens and Congress of the United States that enabled the failed United States invasion of Iraq forcibly altered the rules of diplomacy such that the Vice President's recent belligerent actions towards Iran are destabilizing and counterproductive to the national security of the United States. In all of this, Vice President Richard B. Cheney has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as Vice President, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore Richard B. Cheney, by such conduct, warrants impeachment and trial, and removal from office." Read the actual articles of impeachment here: http://kucinich.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=78044 and his wife is a total FLILF. I'm pretty sick of looking at Laura Bush's smarmy ugly mug.

the poorest country in the world? USA!

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 23:00:36 GMT

We are ranked below Haiti, Rawanda, and Burkina Faso (a country I had not even heard of). And this is official - it's information from our own CIA. Do you feel safer now? https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2187rank.html

Do you know your credit score?

MyBodyIsATemple — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 18:27:08 GMT

Take control of your credit. I'm amazed at how many of us - myself included - are out of touch with this basic, and it determines so much about you. You are entitled to a FREE government mandated report once a year. Take advantage of this! "In the United States, once every 12 months, each person is entitled to one free credit report from each of the three nationwide consumer credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. The three companies provide this free report jointly, through a website which asks for a social security number and other identifying information and then walks the user through the three companies' systems, so that the three free reports may be printed out. The site is http://www.annualcreditreport.com, easily confused with many for-profit companies that try to get business by masquerading as this mandated-by-law service." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_history

I'm just trying to be a better person

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 16:22:30 GMT

I'm back on the veggie wagon as of midnight last night. I went to Turf Club last night with Spike, Lust, Bean, Dr Evil, Apple Jack and Cush to have my last steak. Oh, steak, I will miss you. I was a vegetarian for six years but did it in a pretty stupid way, being a teenager and college student from the midwest with no real concept of nutrition, no ability to cook, and limited awareness of and access to decent vegetarian food. I'm ready to commit to doing it in a healthy and smart way. I have lots of reasons: 1) I want to be healthier and live longer. Vegetarians have lower risk for certain cancers, diabetes and heart problems. 2) I've put on some weight recently and I'm tired of being a fat ass. 3) A meat based diet has a very bad environmental impact. 4) I don't want to subject animals to a lifetime of suffering on a factory farm. 5) Our meat based diet is just so gluttonous and selfish, from many standpoints. But at the end of the day, I just can't look into my dogs' eyes after eating another animal. Wish me luck.

I think

MyBodyIsATemple — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 21:29:24 GMT

someone fucked my washing machine!

Thank you, Don Imus.

MyBodyIsATemple — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 22:57:04 GMT

Thank you, Don Imus. You’ve given us (black people) an excuse to avoid our real problem. You’ve given Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson another opportunity to pretend that the old fight, which is now the safe and lucrative fight, is still the most important fight in our push for true economic and social equality. You’ve given Vivian Stringer and Rutgers the chance to hold a nationally televised recruiting celebration expertly disguised as a news conference to respond to your poor attempt at humor. Thank you, Don Imus. You extended Black History Month to April, and we can once again wallow in victimhood, protest like it’s 1965 and delude ourselves into believing that fixing your hatred is more necessary than eradicating our self-hatred. The bigots win again. While we’re fixated on a bad joke cracked by an irrelevant, bad shock jock, I’m sure at least one of the marvelous young women on the Rutgers basketball team is somewhere snapping her fingers to the beat of 50 Cent’s or Snoop Dogg’s or Young Jeezy’s latest ode glorifying nappy-headed pimps and hos. I ain’t saying Jesse, Al and Vivian are gold-diggas, but they don’t have the heart to mount a legitimate campaign against the real black-folk killas. It is us. At this time, we are our own worst enemies. We have allowed our youths to buy into a culture (hip hop) that has been perverted, corrupted and overtaken by prison culture. The music, attitude and behavior expressed in this culture is anti-black, anti-education, demeaning, self-destructive, pro-drug dealing and violent. Rather than confront this heinous enemy from within, we sit back and wait for someone like Imus to have a slip of the tongue and make the mistake of repeating the things we say about ourselves. It’s embarrassing. Dave Chappelle was offered $50 million to make racially insensitive jokes about black and white people on TV. He was hailed as a genius. Black comedians routinely crack jokes about white and black people, and we all laugh out loud. I’m no Don Imus apologist. He and his tiny companion Mike Lupica blasted me after I fell out with ESPN. Imus is a hack. But, in my view, he didn’t do anything outside the norm for shock jocks and comedians. He also offered an apology. That should’ve been the end of this whole affair. Instead, it’s only the beginning. It’s an opportunity for Stringer, Jackson and Sharpton to step on victim platforms and elevate themselves and their agenda$. I watched the Rutgers news conference and was ashamed. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke for eight minutes in 1963 at the March on Washington. At the time, black people could be lynched and denied fundamental rights with little thought. With the comments of a talk-show host most of her players had never heard of before last week serving as her excuse, Vivian Stringer rambled on for 30 minutes about the amazing season her team had. Somehow, we’re supposed to believe that the comments of a man with virtually no connection to the sports world ruined Rutgers’ wonderful season. Had a broadcaster with credibility and a platform in the sports world uttered the words Imus did, I could understand a level of outrage. But an hourlong press conference over a man who has already apologized, already been suspended and is already insignificant is just plain intellectually dishonest. This is opportunism. This is a distraction. In the grand scheme, Don Imus is no threat to us in general and no threat to black women in particular. If his words are so powerful and so destructive and must be rebuked so forcefully, then what should we do about the idiot rappers on BET, MTV and every black-owned radio station in the country who use words much more powerful and much more destructive? I don’t listen or watch Imus’ show regularly. Has he at any point glorified selling crack cocaine to black women? Has he celebrated black men shooting each other randomly? Has he suggested in any way that it’s cool to be a baby-daddy rather than a husband and a parent? Does he tell his listeners that they’re suckers for pursuing education and that they’re selling out their race if they do? When Imus does any of that, call me and I’ll get upset. Until then, he is what he is — a washed-up shock jock who is very easy to ignore when you’re not looking to be made a victim. No. We all know where the real battleground is. We know that the gangsta rappers and their followers in the athletic world have far bigger platforms to negatively define us than some old white man with a bad radio show. There’s no money and lots of danger in that battle, so Jesse and Al are going to sit it out. http://www.kansascity.com/182/story/66339.html

Jesus Walked the Dinosaur!

MyBodyIsATemple — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 21:36:28 GMT

Jesus lived with dinosaurs http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2001/dinos_on_ark.asp crazy freaking Xtians

goddamn internet fascists!

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 18:38:44 GMT

My company has a web blocker and it just started (today) blocking certain tribe pages. What's a crack addicted manic tribe poster to do? Is this the end of an era? The kicker is, I'd already voluntarily reduced my tribe time to a few hours a week, and little of it at work.

An Inconvenient Truth - Feb 13 6 PM - Hillcrest Whole Foods

MyBodyIsATemple — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 00:25:00 GMT

Free viewing of "An Inconvenient Truth" Feb 13 6 PM Whole Foods - Hillcrest (San Diego) Post movie discussion moderated by one of San Diego's renewable energy experts (otherwise known as my boyfriend J-Cush)

My LUST will make me a better friend

MyBodyIsATemple — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 06:17:34 GMT

I have phone issues. I admit it. I'm sorry to everyone whose call I didn't return or whose text message I never read. I'm great with e-mail, good at tribe, but just a big ole phone retard. But I am going to reform - I just didn't know how. I just needed technology to catch up me! And now it has. I just discovered the iPhone. Now I have a reason for living. No price is too high if it makes me a better person. Better friendships and relationships through technology. Ugh. Now I have to wait until April.

Summing Up 2006

MyBodyIsATemple — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 18:00:54 GMT

The Bill of Wrongs The 10 most outrageous civil liberties violations of 2006. 10. Attempt to Get Death Penalty for Zacarias Moussaoui Long after it was clear the hapless Frenchman was neither the "20th hijacker" nor a key plotter in the attacks of 9/11, the government pressed to execute him as a "conspirator" in those attacks. Moussaoui's alleged participation? By failing to confess to what he may have known about the plot, which may have led the government to disrupt it, Moussaoui directly caused the deaths of thousands of people. This massive overreading of the federal conspiracy laws would be laughable were the stakes not so high. Thankfully, a jury rejected the notion that Moussaoui could be executed for the crime of merely wishing there had been a real connection between himself and 9/11. 9. Guantanamo Bay It takes a licking but it keeps on ticking. After the Supreme Court struck down the military tribunals planned to try hundreds of detainees moldering on the base, and after the president agreed that it might be a good idea to close it down, the worst public relations fiasco since the Japanese internment camps lives on. Prisoners once deemed "among the most dangerous, best-trained, vicious killers on the face of the earth" are either quietly released (and usually set free) or still awaiting trial. The lucky 75 to be tried there will be cheered to hear that the Pentagon has just unveiled plans to build a $125 million legal complex for the hearings. The government has now officially put more thought into the design of Guantanamo's court bathrooms than the charges against its prisoners. Click Here! 8. Slagging the Media Whether the Bush administration is reclassifying previously declassified documents, sidestepping the FOIA, threatening journalists for leaks on dubious legal grounds, or, most recently, using its subpoena power to try to wring secret documents from the ACLU, the administration has continued its "secrets at any price" campaign. Is this a constitutional crisis? Probably not. Annoying as hell? Definitely. 7. Slagging the Courts It starts with the president's complaints about "activist judges," and evolves to Congressional threats to appoint an inspector general to oversee federal judges. As public distrust of the bench is fueled, the stripping of courts' authority to hear whole classes of cases—most recently any habeas corpus claims from Guantanamo detainees—almost seems reasonable. Each tiny incursion into the independence of the judiciary seems justified. Until you realize that the courts are often the only places that will defend our shrinking civil liberties. This leads to ... 6. The State-Secrets Doctrine The Bush administration's insane argument in court is that judges should dismiss entire lawsuits over many of the outrages detailed on this very list. Why? Because the outrageously illegal things are themselves matters of top-secret national security. The administration has raised this claim in relation to its adventures in secret wiretapping and its fun with extraordinary rendition. A government privilege once used to sidestep civil claims has mushroomed into sweeping immunity for the administration's sometimes criminal behavior. 5. Government Snooping Take your pick. There's the NSA warrantless eavesdropping program wherein the president breezily authorized spying on the phone calls of innocent citizens, in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The FBI's TALON database shows the government has been spying on nonterrorist groups, including Quakers, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and Veterans for Peace. The Patriot Act lives on. And that's just the stuff we know about. 4. Extraordinary Rendition So, when does it start to become ordinary rendition? This government program has us FedEx-ing unindicted terror suspects abroad for interrogation/torture. Khalid El-Masri, a German citizen, was shipped off to Afghanistan for such treatment and then released without charges, based on some government confusion about his name. Heh heh. Canadian citizen Maher Arar claims he was tortured in Syria for a year, released without charges, and cleared by a Canadian commission. Attempts to vindicate the rights of such men? You'd need to circle back to the state-secrets doctrine, above. 3. Abuse of Jose Padilla First, he was, according to then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, "exploring a plan to build and explode a radiological dispersion device, or 'dirty bomb,' in the United States." Then, he was planning to blow up apartments. Then he was just part of a vague terror conspiracy to commit jihad in Bosnia and Chechnya. Always, he was a U.S. citizen. After three and a half years, in which he was denied the most basic legal rights, it has now emerged that Padilla was either outright tortured or near-tortured. According to a recent motion, during Padilla's years of almost complete isolation, he was treated by the U.S. government to sensory and sleep deprivation, extreme cold, stress positions, threats of execution, and drugging with truth serum. Experts say he is too mentally damaged to stand trial. The Bush administration supported his motion for a mental competency assessment, in hopes that will help prevent his torture claims from ever coming to trial, or, as Yale Law School's inimitable Jack Balkin put it: "You can't believe Padilla when he says we tortured him because he's crazy from all the things we did to him." 2. The Military Commissions Act of 2006 This was the so-called compromise legislation that gave President Bush even more power than he initially had to detain and try so-called enemy combatants. He was generously handed the authority to define for himself the parameters of interrogation and torture and the responsibility to report upon it, since he'd been so good at that. What we allegedly did to Jose Padilla was once a dirty national secret. The MCA made it the law. 1. Hubris Whenever the courts push back against the administration's unsupportable constitutional ideas—ideas about "inherent powers" and a "unitary executive" or the silliness of the Geneva Conventions or the limitless sweep of presidential powers during wartime—the Bush response is to repeat the same chorus louder: Every detainee is the worst of the worst; every action taken is legal, necessary, and secret. No mistakes, no apologies. No nuance, no regrets. This legal and intellectual intractability can create the illusion that we are standing on the same constitutional ground we stood upon in 2001, even as that ground is sliding away under our feet. http://www.slate.com/id/2156397/

Slutz!

MyBodyIsATemple — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 02:24:08 GMT

What are we teaching our children? I'm a fan of revealing clothing, and love make up and getting prettied up. But I'm a grown up. These things are aimed at 8-12 year old GIRLS. Why are we pushing our little girls to grow up? And what kind of values are we teaching our girls? "she's a little tiny baby slut" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HerDz9tVWw

I went to a party last saturday night

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 04:23:29 GMT

I did get laid, but I didn't get in a fight uh huh it ain't no big thing My tiny little get together wound up being a full on house party - didn't know I jam this many people into my modest little bungalow. I had circus freaks, broken furniture, a wardrobe malfunction and kitchen disasters. I also invented my new trademark shot - it's kind of a variation on a lemon drop. Vodka chased with a lime coated with brown sugar. Something that would only sound good to a slightly tipsy hostess. Guaranteed to cure you of drinking. I had a great night dancing to J-Cush's sounds - we wore him out. Luckily Philly B was on hand to close the party out. PHOTOS http://mybodyisatemple.tribe.net/photos And someone left a cane behind. I can donate it to one of the birthday girls - Sadie and Erika - but despite now being a year older they are still a bit away from needing a cane.

Meerkat Attack!

MyBodyIsATemple — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 03:46:59 GMT

Animals fascinate me. Specifically, their social habits fascinate me. I like to watch dogs meet one another at the dog park. So I just got hooked on a new show that is an animal soap opera. These guys have families and social structures as complex as our own. It's a window into the innocence and cruelty of animals. It makes me wonder what the world would be like if humans were not the dominant species. http://animal.discovery.com/fansites/meerkat/meerkat.html

The Male Privilege Checklist

MyBodyIsATemple — Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:55:11 GMT

The Male Privilege Checklist 1. My odds of being hired for a job, when competing against female applicants, are probably skewed in my favor. The more prestigious the job, the larger the odds are skewed. 2. I can be confident that my co-workers won't think I got my job because of my sex - even though that might be true. 3. If I am never promoted, it's not because of my sex. 4. If I fail in my job or career, I can feel sure this won't be seen as a black mark against my entire sex's capabilities. 5. The odds of my encountering sexual harassment on the job are so low as to be negligible. 6. If I do the same task as a woman, and if the measurement is at all subjective, chances are people will think I did a better job. 7. If I'm a teen or adult, and if I can stay out of prison, my odds of being raped are so low as to be negligible. 8. I am not taught to fear walking alone after dark in average public spaces. 9. If I choose not to have children, my masculinity will not be called into question. 10. If I have children but do not provide primary care for them, my masculinity will not be called into question. 11. If I have children and provide primary care for them, I'll be praised for extraordinary parenting if I'm even marginally competent. 12. If I have children and pursue a career, no one will think I'm selfish for not staying at home. 13. If I seek political office, my relationship with my children, or who I hire to take care of them, will probably not be scrutinized by the press. 14. Chances are my elected representatives are mostly people of my own sex. The more prestigious and powerful the elected position, the more likely this is to be true. 15. I can be somewhat sure that if I ask to see "the person in charge," I will face a person of my own sex. The higher-up in the organization the person is, the surer I can be. 16. As a child, chances are I was encouraged to be more active and outgoing than my sisters. 17. As a child, I could choose from an almost infinite variety of children's media featuring positive, active, non-stereotyped heroes of my own sex. I never had to look for it; male heroes were the default. 18. As a child, chances are I got more teacher attention than girls who raised their hands just as often. 19. If my day, week or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether or not it has sexist overtones. 20. I can turn on the television or glance at the front page of the newspaper and see people of my own sex widely represented, every day, without exception. 21. If I'm careless with my financial affairs it won't be attributed to my sex. 22. If I'm careless with my driving it won't be attributed to my sex. 23. I can speak in public to a large group without putting my sex on trial. 24. If I have sex with a lot of people, it won't make me an object of contempt or derision. 25. There are value-neutral clothing choices available to me; it is possible for me to choose clothing that doesn't send any particular message to the world. 26. My wardrobe and grooming are relatively cheap and consume little time. 27. If I buy a new car, chances are I'll be offered a better price than a woman buying the same car. 28. If I'm not conventionally attractive, the disadvantages are relatively small and easy to ignore. 29. I can be loud with no fear of being called a shrew. I can be aggressive with no fear of being called a bitch. 30. I can ask for legal protection from violence that happens mostly to men without being seen as a selfish special interest, since that kind of violence is called "crime" and is a general social concern. (Violence that happens mostly to women is usually called "domestic violence" or "acquaintance rape," and is seen as a special interest issue.) 31. I can be confident that the ordinary language of day-to-day existence will always include my sex. "All men are created equal…," mailman, chairman, freshman, he. 32. My ability to make important decisions and my capability in general will never be questioned depending on what time of the month it is. 33. I will never be expected to change my name upon marriage or questioned if i don't change my name. 34. The decision to hire me will never be based on assumptions about whether or not I might choose to have a family sometime soon. 35. Every major religion in the world is led primarily by people of my own sex. Even God, in most major religions, is usually pictured as being male. 36. Most major religions argue that I should be the head of my household, while my wife and children should be subservient to me. 37. If I have a wife or girlfriend, chances are we'll divide up household chores so that she does most of the labor, and in particular the most repetitive and unrewarding tasks. 38. If I have children with a wife or girlfriend, chances are she'll do most of the childrearing, and in particular the most dirty, repetitive and unrewarding parts of childrearing. 39. If I have children with a wife or girlfriend, and it turns out that one of us needs to make career sacrifices to raise the kids, chances are we'll both assume the career sacrificed should be hers. 40. Magazines, billboards, television, movies, pornography, and virtually all of media is filled with images of scantily-clad women intended to appeal to me sexually. Such images of men exist, but are much rarer. 41. I am not expected to spend my entire life 20-40 pounds underweight. 42. If I am heterosexual, it's incredibly unlikely that I'll ever be beaten up by a spouse or lover. 43. I have the privilege of being unaware of my male privilege. http://colours.mahost.org/org/maleprivilege.html

What will happen if the Democrats control Congress!

MyBodyIsATemple — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 16:36:42 GMT

Beware Hillary! http://www.thepoorman.net/2006/11/02/keyboard-kommando-komics-presents-8

'Beginning of the End of America'

MyBodyIsATemple — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 19:52:56 GMT

'Beginning of the End of America' Olbermann Addresses the Military Commissions Act in a Special Comment by Keith Olbermann We have lived as if in a trance. We have lived as people in fear. And now—our rights and our freedoms in peril—we slowly awake to learn that we have been afraid of the wrong thing. Therefore, tonight have we truly become the inheritors of our American legacy. For, on this first full day that the Military Commissions Act is in force, we now face what our ancestors faced, at other times of exaggerated crisis and melodramatic fear-mongering: A government more dangerous to our liberty, than is the enemy it claims to protect us from. We have been here before—and we have been here before led here—by men better and wiser and nobler than George W. Bush. We have been here when President John Adams insisted that the Alien and Sedition Acts were necessary to save American lives, only to watch him use those acts to jail newspaper editors. American newspaper editors, in American jails, for things they wrote about America. We have been here when President Woodrow Wilson insisted that the Espionage Act was necessary to save American lives, only to watch him use that Act to prosecute 2,000 Americans, especially those he disparaged as “Hyphenated Americans,” most of whom were guilty only of advocating peace in a time of war. American public speakers, in American jails, for things they said about America. And we have been here when President Franklin D. Roosevelt insisted that Executive Order 9066 was necessary to save American lives, only to watch him use that order to imprison and pauperize 110,000 Americans while his man in charge, General DeWitt, told Congress: “It makes no difference whether he is an American citizen—he is still a Japanese.” American citizens, in American camps, for something they neither wrote nor said nor did, but for the choices they or their ancestors had made about coming to America. Each of these actions was undertaken for the most vital, the most urgent, the most inescapable of reasons. And each was a betrayal of that for which the president who advocated them claimed to be fighting. Adams and his party were swept from office, and the Alien and Sedition Acts erased. Many of the very people Wilson silenced survived him, and one of them even ran to succeed him, and got 900,000 votes, though his presidential campaign was conducted entirely from his jail cell. And Roosevelt’s internment of the Japanese was not merely the worst blight on his record, but it would necessitate a formal apology from the government of the United States to the citizens of the United States whose lives it ruined. The most vital, the most urgent, the most inescapable of reasons. In times of fright, we have been only human. We have let Roosevelt’s “fear of fear itself” overtake us. We have listened to the little voice inside that has said, “the wolf is at the door; this will be temporary; this will be precise; this too shall pass.” We have accepted that the only way to stop the terrorists is to let the government become just a little bit like the terrorists. Just the way we once accepted that the only way to stop the Soviets was to let the government become just a little bit like the Soviets. Or substitute the Japanese. Or the Germans. Or the Socialists. Or the Anarchists. Or the Immigrants. Or the British. Or the Aliens. The most vital, the most urgent, the most inescapable of reasons. And, always, always wrong. “With the distance of history, the questions will be narrowed and few: Did this generation of Americans take the threat seriously, and did we do what it takes to defeat that threat?” Wise words. And ironic ones, Mr. Bush. Your own, of course, yesterday, in signing the Military Commissions Act. You spoke so much more than you know, Sir. Sadly—of course—the distance of history will recognize that the threat this generation of Americans needed to take seriously was you. We have a long and painful history of ignoring the prophecy attributed to Benjamin Franklin that “those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” But even within this history we have not before codified the poisoning of habeas corpus, that wellspring of protection from which all essential liberties flow. You, sir, have now befouled that spring. You, sir, have now given us chaos and called it order. You, sir, have now imposed subjugation and called it freedom. For the most vital, the most urgent, the most inescapable of reasons. And — again, Mr. Bush — all of them, wrong. We have handed a blank check drawn against our freedom to a man who has said it is unacceptable to compare anything this country has ever done to anything the terrorists have ever done. We have handed a blank check drawn against our freedom to a man who has insisted again that “the United States does not torture. It’s against our laws and it’s against our values” and who has said it with a straight face while the pictures from Abu Ghraib Prison and the stories of Waterboarding figuratively fade in and out, around him. We have handed a blank check drawn against our freedom to a man who may now, if he so decides, declare not merely any non-American citizens “unlawful enemy combatants” and ship them somewhere—anywhere -- but may now, if he so decides, declare you an “unlawful enemy combatant” and ship you somewhere - anywhere. And if you think this hyperbole or hysteria, ask the newspaper editors when John Adams was president or the pacifists when Woodrow Wilson was president or the Japanese at Manzanar when Franklin Roosevelt was president. And if you somehow think habeas corpus has not been suspended for American citizens but only for everybody else, ask yourself this: If you are pulled off the street tomorrow, and they call you an alien or an undocumented immigrant or an “unlawful enemy combatant”—exactly how are you going to convince them to give you a court hearing to prove you are not? Do you think this attorney general is going to help you? This President now has his blank check. He lied to get it. He lied as he received it. Is there any reason to even hope he has not lied about how he intends to use it nor who he intends to use it against? “These military commissions will provide a fair trial,” you told us yesterday, Mr. Bush, “in which the accused are presumed innocent, have access to an attorney and can hear all the evidence against them.” "Presumed innocent," Mr. Bush? The very piece of paper you signed as you said that, allows for the detainees to be abused up to the point just before they sustain “serious mental and physical trauma” in the hope of getting them to incriminate themselves, and may no longer even invoke The Geneva Conventions in their own defense. "Access to an attorney," Mr. Bush? Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift said on this program, Sir, and to the Supreme Court, that he was only granted access to his detainee defendant on the promise that the detainee would plead guilty. "Hearing all the evidence," Mr. Bush? The Military Commissions Act specifically permits the introduction of classified evidence not made available to the defense. Your words are lies, Sir. They are lies that imperil us all. “One of the terrorists believed to have planned the 9/11 attacks,” you told us yesterday, “said he hoped the attacks would be the beginning of the end of America.” That terrorist, sir, could only hope. Not his actions, nor the actions of a ceaseless line of terrorists (real or imagined), could measure up to what you have wrought. Habeas corpus? Gone. The Geneva Conventions? Optional. The moral force we shined outwards to the world as an eternal beacon, and inwards at ourselves as an eternal protection? Snuffed out. These things you have done, Mr. Bush, they would be “the beginning of the end of America.” And did it even occur to you once, sir — somewhere in amidst those eight separate, gruesome, intentional, terroristic invocations of the horrors of 9/11 -- that with only a little further shift in this world we now know—just a touch more repudiation of all of that for which our patriots died --- did it ever occur to you once that in just 27 months and two days from now when you leave office, some irresponsible future president and a “competent tribunal” of lackeys would be entitled, by the actions of your own hand, to declare the status of “unlawful enemy combatant” for -- and convene a Military Commission to try -- not John Walker Lindh, but George Walker Bush? For the most vital, the most urgent, the most inescapable of reasons. And doubtless, Sir, all of them—as always—wrong. © 2006 MSNBC Interactive