The picture you see to the left is that of a beautiful child named Brisenia Flores. She beams an awkward little smile for the photographer that is common in chidren of that age, and she reminds me very much of my own five year old daughter (whose last name, by sheer coincidence, is also Flores). But unlike my daughter, Brisenia will never again flash that beautiful smile to a photographer or anyone else for that matter. That is because on March 30 of this year Brisenia, who was nine at the time, was murdered by members of a Right-wing terrorist, anti-immigrant, paramilitary group called the Minutemen American Defense, a group with ties to the larger Minutemen paramilitary vigilante organization that patrols the U.S. border on a self proclaimed mission to halt illegal immigration into this nation. This is how the blog Crooks and Liars describes the 9/11 tape of the call that Brisenia’s mother placed on the night of the shooting:

She explains that the killers walked up cold-bloodedly to her daughter, 9-year-old Brisenia Flores, as she cowered and cried, and shot her two or three times anyway.

Stinquers will forgive me for relying on that blog’s description, but I have not been able to bring myself to listen to the tape. As I said, I have a daughter who is probably the same age as Brisenia was when the above picture was taken and I don’t think I could bear to live her mother’s experience even voeyeuristically.

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Disgraced GOP Senator John Ensign’s career of adulterous evil is only just coming to light, with not one but now two Republican strumpets emerging from out of his damp, quivering past and putting the lie to his lavish posturing and condemnations of his political contemporaries’ morals.

First, this sleazy rancid hypocritical fuck admits to hosing a staffer’s wife, Cynthia ‘Cindy’ Hampton [below] who came forward this week and admitted to pestorking the bejesus out of Sen. Ensign, no doubt fishing for an agent to represent her tell-all tale of cackling GOP lechery and savage debauchery. Hilarity ensued as the media remembered all of Ensign’s elaborate condemnations of Bill Clinton and Sen. Larry Craig for getting extra-marital blow-jobs – that he apparently believed only he deserved – and demanding their resignatons.

Now, the Associated Press reports that Ensign and his wayward schlong have been involved in yet another illicit tryst:

The disclosure resurrected questions about a two-week period in 2002, when Ensign abruptly dropped from public view. A person familiar with that episode, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said Tuesday the senator told a close associate the absence followed an earlier affair.

No doubt, the parade of Ensign’s extramarital fuck buddies has just begun. Who knows who or what could appear now that Ensign’s schlong gobblers are leaping from the weeds in increasing numbers.

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Tehran is a half-day ahead of Stinque HQ in San Diego. By the time this is posted Friday morning, it will be late Friday afternoon there. The Supreme Leader will already have spoken. What he will say, and the consequences of what he says, are both unknowable at the time of writing.

So let’s take a look at something that’s been nagging us all week: Tehran is not eleven hours ahead of our time — it’s eleven and-a-half. Why?

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So we’re checking out the homepage of Press TV, Iran’s state-supported English-language satellite service, and we notice the blurb for the second video: “Hate filled commentary on U.S. media outlets growing”.

And then we notice the image they’re running with it.

The story, filed from Washington and posted at 2:05 GMT Friday, highlights Rush, O’Reilly, Beck, Dobbs, and Uncle Pat, with expert commentary from the SPLC and Media Matters, among others. But in the entire 2:37 video, there’s no sight or mention of Stephen Colbert.

As mentioned in a thread earlier today: Richard M. Daley, Mayor — whilst promoting the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid — kited a check.  A really big one.

Faced with losing the 2016 Summer Games to competing cities offering full government guarantees, Mayor Richard Daley made an about-face Wednesday and said the City of Chicago would sign a contract agreeing to take full financial responsibility for the Games.  In a worst-case situation, such as severe cost-overruns or a catastrophic event, the agreement could leave taxpayers on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars or even more, a scenario Chicago’s bid team acknowledges but insists is far-fetched.

Far-fetched my ass.  This is Chicago.  There will be “cost-overruns.”  (These are referred to, in other parts of the world, as “kickbacks.”)  Everybody knows this.  And so the City Council — recently burned on a parking meter privatization deal that Rich pushed through and has since gone horribly, horribly wrong — wants another look. 

Now: the reigning World Champion of Hope is going to Denmark in October when the final vote is taken.  If Chicago wins, it shows Barry’s power and influence.  If the bid fails, then it will be taken as a sign of the bloom coming off his rose.  And, in fact, the outcome could have nothing to do with Barry, and everything to do with purely local politics — pressure on the City to use money for other things (like, oh, I don’t know, schools), anger over sudden increases in taxes and fees at precisely the wrong moment, corruption and graft and patronage and on and on. 

The intricacies of all of this could fill a book.  As could the bullshit.  This is going to be fun.

You know that guy don’t you? You know who I’m talking about. The guy who, no matter what the conversation, finds a way to make it all about him.  You can be all “So I took my car in to the shop for a regular maintenance and the mechanic is telling me I need new pads, rotors and wheel bearings and it’s going to cost me $1200!” And this guy instantly replies “Oh, that’s nothing. Last fall my car was hit by a meteor and erupted into a ball of flame.” Then later your other friend is like “My daughter is so sad because our dog ran away two days ago and he still hasn’t turned up.” And this guy doesn’t bat an eyelid before responding: “That’s nothing, back in ’92 one of my cats was eaten by an alligator.” So no matter what the conversation, he tries to one-up you with an anecdote of his own.

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Pitney:

The numbers at today’s rally are hard to gauge, but our correspondent Saeed Kamali Dehghan, reckons there could be as many as one million people there. …

He said the demonstration is bigger than Monday’s rally. Many are wearing black and carrying photos of those who died. Some are carry placards calling for a new election not a recount. The shops on the route are closed in support of the rally, he added.

More photos of today’s demonstration here.
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