Israel has acknowledged for the first time that it attacked Hezbollah targets during the second Lebanon war with phosphorus shells. White phosphorus causes very painful and often lethal chemical burns to those hit by it, and until recently Israel maintained that it only uses such bombs to mark targets or territory...

You can see what phosphorous burns, from this war, look like here. CAUTION: VERY GRAPHIC FILM. No longer available.

The website is written in Spanish and contains more pictures of the wounded from Iraq, including some that are incredibly gruesome.  I don't share this for shock value, I share this because I want more people to see what happens to the soldiers that aren't killed in action.

All of us are blessed to have these soldiers defending our country.  It's too bad President Bush (appearing is some of the pictures) doesn't give a shit.

...When our world is shaken, we seek safety. And who better to protect us than the big, strong, tough-talking leader who has been in charge all along. The competence or morality of our leader becomes less relevant. We are afraid. Change might make things worse. As Vice President Dick Cheney has so eloquently claimed, we'd better not vote for John Kerry or we may be hit again by terrorists, this time even worse. Never mind that Cheney's former company is a big benefactor from the hit that occurred on his watch...

The Pentagon said yesterday it was investigating cockpit video footage that shows American pilots attacking and killing a group of apparently unarmed Iraqi civilians.

The 30-second clip shows the pilot targeting the group of people in a street in the city of Fallujah and asking his mission controllers whether he should "take them out". He is told to do so and, shortly afterwards, the footage shows a huge explosion where the people were. A second voice can be heard on the clip saying: "Oh, dude."

A California Republican congressman introduced a constitutional amendment Wednesday that would allow Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to run for president. But he insisted the candidate he really wants to see is a 76-year-old House Democrat from Hungary.

"There are those here Wednesday who will interpret this constitutional proposal permitting naturalized citizens to serve as president as a political ploy," Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, an early supporter of Schwarzenegger's gubernatorial bid, said in remarks prepared for the House floor.

Yikes.

Crossposted.

..."I must say I was appalled at the complete lack of respect Senator Kerry showed for this man of courage, when he rushed to hold a press conference and attack the prime minister, a man America must stand beside to defeat the terrorists," Cheney told several thousand supporters.

"John Kerry is trying to tear down all the good that has been accomplished, and his words are destructive to our effort in Iraq and in the global war on terror," Cheney said. "As Prime Minister Allawi said in his speech, and I quote, 'When political leaders sound the siren of defeatism in the face of terrorism, it only encourages more violence.' End quote."...

(But it does seem that Allawi has picked up the idea of 'talking points' rather well.)

After going to over 70 homes and apartments the Bush & Kerry supporters were about even with voters being undecided.  There was no one home at about two-thirds of the houses we visited (or they didn't want to talk to us.)  Holly and I looked pretty intimidating with our clip boards.

Observations after the jump...

The accompanying caption from the AP:

A member of the audience pulls a demonstrator's hair as he forces her out of an auditorium where President Bush was addressing a crowd of supporters at Byers Choice in Colmar, Pa. Thursday Sept. 9, 2004.

Imagine I have a pretty good idea for what this sign would say but wanted to have a contest at Kos to see if there are better ideas out there.

The winner, as chosen by my arbitrary means, would get...

<jump>

...Suppose that some of the electors -- the people who under our constitutional system conduct the real presidential election some weeks after voters go to the polls -- aren't actually selected by the voters.

Impossible? Not if you give a close reading to the Supreme Court's decision in the case of Bush v. Gore, which finally settled the presidential election of 2000, if not to everyone's satisfaction. Under that decision, there is no guarantee that the electors who are decisive in choosing the next president of the United States will themselves be selected by the people of the United States. That's because the justices ruled in that case that state legislatures have unlimited authority to determine whether citizens in their respective states shall be allowed to vote for president at all.

"The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States," the court said, "unless and until the state legislature chooses a statewide election as the means to implement its power to appoint members of the Electoral College..."

I found out some very interesting information today while giving blood.  First, let me share the percentage breakdown of blood types in the United States:

O Positive  38%
A Positive  34%
B Positive    9%
O Negative  7%
A Negative  6%
AB Positive  3%
B Negative   2%
AB Negative 1%

I found out my blood type, O Positive, (still with me Ashcroft?) can be administered to anyone with a "Positive" blood type. In addition if you have an O Negative blood type your blood can be administered to anyone.  Apparently Type O is the universal blood type but I didn't realize how universal it was.

My point? Give blood!

It reminds me of the movie Broadcast News with William Hurt when he has the script piped in from his producer.

Thinking of the Supreme Commander GWB, I am reminded of an incident last Saturday when he was praising French President Chirac. I was watching CNN when all of a sudden, I heard another voice speaking Bush's pre-scripted lines before he did. That's right---the other voice would be heard BEFORE Bush's voice. What was that?

I thought at the time that that may have been done to give translators a head start on the President's words. Later, I had a call from a reader in Germany who told me she heard the same thing on CNN International including that same voice telling Bush what journalists to call on before he did. We have never heard that before. She asked: "Is someone controlling the president like a ventriloquist"?

...It is possible that Bush is consulting (James E.) Sharp only out of an excess of caution - despite the fact that he knows nothing of the leak, or of any possible coverup of the leak. But that's not likely.

"The Americans brought electricity to my ass before they brought it to my house!"

Dark humor seems somewhat apropos for the quaqmire we've immersed ourselves in.

...On Friday, Stahl reported that senior intelligence officials stress the information Ahmad Chalibi is alleged to have passed on to Iran is of such a seriously sensitive nature, the result of full disclosure could be highly damaging to U.S. security. The information involves secrets that were held by only a handful of very senior U.S. officials, says Stahl...