Freedom is merely privilege extended, unless enjoyed by one and all.

Here’s the best video I could find for Billy Bragg’s version of the Internationale, a stirring tune. Pete Seeger pressed Bragg to write new lyrics to it because he felt there wasn’t a good version in English. (In case you were wondering, this is offered in the spirit of democracy and human rights; I’m not an anarchist nor a commie, although I sometimes joke about being a commie with my conservative friends and family to make them laugh. Come to think of it, at least one conservative family member likes Seeger, too.)
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Willie Nelson, Diana Krall and Elvis Costello - “Crazy”

Willie just turned 75 yesterday, so one of his most famous songs seemed like a good choice. Happy Birthday, Willie!

Funny… Something about this reminds me of Lori Klausutis, the aide to then U.S. Representative Joe Scarborough. You remember the story, don’t you? Found in Joe’s office, killed by an apparent blunt object to the head… but no one saw or knew a thing… AND… the investigation was a total joke… AND… we didn’t get to hear too much about it at the time because the media decided it was much more important to hound the democrat with the missing mistress.

Shouldn’t we have known then that republicans had the media wrapped around their fingers?

‘DC Madam’ Hanged Herself, Police Say

Deborah Jeane Palfrey, the so-called “D.C. Madam” who was convicted last month of running an escort service that catered to Washington’s political elite, killed herself near her mother’s home in Florida, police officials said Thursday. Palfrey, here in September 2007, faced a lengthy prison term, and was scheduled to be sentenced in July.

This is my nothing to do with politics post of the day, because I LOVE all things water……and air. Shipwrecks fascinate me. Every time I read of one being discovered I go on to fascinate about sailing on the high seas and what it must have been like. They suppose this ship is from around 1400-1500. I’m guessing there was nothing glamorous about it. One of my favorite movies is the Mel Fisher story.

The ship was laden with tons of copper ingots, elephant tusks, gold coins - and cannons to fend off pirates.

But it had nothing to protect it from the fierce weather off a particularly bleak stretch of inhospitable African coast, and it sank 500 years ago.

Now it has been found, stumbled upon by De Beers geologists prospecting for diamonds off Namibia.
“If you’re mining on the coast, sooner or later you’ll find a wreck,” archaeologist Dieter Noli said in an interview Thursday.

Namdeb Diamond Corp., a joint venture of the government of Namibia and De Beers, first reported the April 1 find in a statement Wednesday, and planned a news conference in the Namibian capital next week.

The company had cleared and drained a stretch of seabed, building an earthen wall to keep the water out so geologists could work. Noli said one of the geologists saw a few ingots, but had no idea what they were. Then the team found what looked like cannon barrels.

The geologists stopped the brutal earth-moving work of searching for diamonds and sent photos to Noli, who had done research in the Namibian desert since the mid-1980s and has advised De Beers since 1996 on the archaeological impact of its operations in Namibia.

The find “was what I’d been waiting for, for 20 years,” Noli said. “Understandably, I was pretty excited. I still am.”

Noli’s original specialty was the desert, but because of Namdeb’s offshore explorations, he had been preparing for the possibility of a wreck, even learning to dive.

After the discovery, he brought in Bruno Werz, an expert in the field, to help research the wreck. Noli has studied maritime artifacts with Werz, who was one of his instructors at the University of Cape Town.

Judging from the notables depicted on the hoard of Spanish and Portuguese coins, and the type of cannons and navigational equipment, the ship went down in the late 1400s or early 1500s, around the time Vasco de Gama and Columbus were plying the waters of the New World.

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Need more proof of this administration’s incompetence? Well here you go:

Mandela Is on US Terrorist Watch Lists

(May 1) - Nobel Peace Prize winner and international symbol of freedom Nelson Mandela is flagged on U.S. terrorist watch lists and needs special permission to visit the USA. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice calls the situation “embarrassing,” and some members of Congress vow to fix it. [...]

“This is a country with which we now have excellent relations, South Africa, but it’s frankly a rather embarrassing matter that I still have to waive in my own counterpart, the foreign minister of South Africa, not to mention the great leader Nelson Mandela,” Rice said.

These companies KNEW they were doing something illegal, as did the Bush administration. NO IMMUNITY!! Of course, Steney Hoyer may well see that they DO get immunity. And by the by…..this article calls this a “secret POST 9/11 surveillance program.” Am I wrong or did they start doing this PRE 9/11?

The Bush administration is refusing to disclose internal e-mails, letters and notes showing contacts with major telecommunications companies over how to persuade Congress to back a controversial surveillance bill, according to recently disclosed court documents.

The existence of these documents surfaced only in recent days as a result of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by a privacy group called the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The foundation (alerted to the issue in part by a NEWSWEEK story last fall) is seeking information about communications among administration officials, Congress and a battery of politically well-connected lawyers and lobbyists hired by such big telecom carriers as AT&T and Verizon. Court papers recently filed by government lawyers in the case confirm for the first time that since last fall unnamed representatives of the telecoms phoned and e-mailed administration officials to talk about ways to block more than 40 civil suits accusing the companies of privacy violations because of their participation in a secret post-9/11 surveillance program ordered by the White House.

More at Newsweek

Here’s a roundup of “Mission Accomplished“……. 5 years later. H/T Dear Kitty for the photo.

JUAN COLE: 5 Years after Mission Accomplished; April US Troop Toll 50 Killed;
1,073 Iraqis Killed this Month. Memorable phrases from Bush’s speech 5 years ago.

DAILY KOS: Another mission NOT accomplished

HUFFINGTON POST: Mission Accomplished banner reminder of U.S. misjudgements and mistakes in Iraq war.

SOUTHERN BEALE: If this is winning, I’d hate to see what losing looks like!

SHADOWED FOREST OF WORLD POLITICS: Neocon Mission in Iraq Accomplished?? YOU BET!

Blue Girl, Red State: Mission NOT accomplished: The top reconstruction project in Iraq is a $277 million failure

BOOMAN TRIBUNE: Reminds of us the MSM’s love for Bush on Mission Accomplished day five years ago. (get puke bucket)

Just a side note. While looking around at some of my favorite blogs to compile a roundup, I have found that Fade at The House of the Rising Sons is calling it a day, and so is Ken Anderson at Anything They Say.
They will be missed!

That’s what you would have to have to make the following statement:

Counters JOHN A. BOEHNER spokesman MICHAEL STEEL: “Liberals’ sad obsession with scape-goating President Bush, and their conspiracy theories regarding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, will not bring us any closer to our goal: bringing our troops home with success.”

Read what he’s referring to HERE.