Flicker Fusion

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Quite possibly my favorite song from one of my favorite local, no scratch that, just fave, bands, the Long Winters. It never even occurred to me that there’d be a video – I thought videos were for Kanye. Anyway, this is great, watch it, and thanks, Merlin, you’re aces. But you knew that.

Terrorists should not be treated like common criminals in federal court. These detainees are enemies of the state, and should be treated as such by being held and brought to justice right where they are — in Guantanamo Bay.

Terrorists should not be treated like common criminals in federal court. These detainees are enemies of the state, and should be treated as such by being held and brought to justice right where they are — in Guantanamo Bay.

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Representative Jerry Lewis (R-CA), criticizing a Democratic play to transfer suspected enemy combatants from Guantanamo to the United States to stand trial.

It occurs to me that this kind of thinking is exactly backwards – nothing would be more humiliating to a terrorist than to be treated like a common criminal. We need to stop treating these people as if they’re some kind of team of super-villains ready to sow havoc on the U.S. at a moment’s notice. It’s not Lex Luthor or an evil genius Bond villain that we’re up against here – these people are barely literate, delusional and fueled by a misappropriation of religion and blind hatred of a worldview too complicated for them to understand. If that sounds familiar to people like Representative Lewis, it’s probably because it’s also an apt description of the extreme of his own party.

To suggest that an Army officer, who has received a medical education at the expense of the government and then seeks to avoid deployment based upon speculation that the President is not a natural born citizen, is equivalent to a young child, who is forced to attend an inferior segregated school based solely on the color of her skin, demonstrates an appalling lack of knowledge of the history of this Country and the importance of the civil rights movement. Counsel’s attempt to align herself with Justice Marshall appears to be an act of desperation rather than one of admiration. For if counsel truly admired Justice Marshall’s achievements, she would not seek to cheapen them with such inapt comparisons.

To suggest that an Army officer, who has received a medical education at the expense of the government and then seeks to avoid deployment based upon speculation that the President is not a natural born citizen, is equivalent to a young child, who is forced to attend an inferior segregated school based solely on the color of her skin, demonstrates an appalling lack of knowledge of the history of this Country and the importance of the civil rights movement. Counsel’s attempt to align herself with Justice Marshall appears to be an act of desperation rather than one of admiration. For if counsel truly admired Justice Marshall’s achievements, she would not seek to cheapen them with such inapt comparisons.

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U.S. District Judge Clay D. Land, referring to birther lawyer/dentist Orly Taitz and her ridiculous quest to prove that Barack Obama is not a U.S. citizen. Land has imposed a $20,000 fine on Taitz for her repeated, merit-less lawsuits.

In this particular passage, Land is admonishing the birther-in-chief for having the gall to compare herself to Thurgood Marshall when he argued the historic Brown v. Board of Education case.