President Bush's visit to Argentina has been met with a violent response. Now, many of us here understand why so many across the globe, and currently nearly 60% of Americans in every major poll, feel that Dubya is so dangerous to human rights and to the progress of human freedom and dignity.

But, for those 35% or so that will never leave Dubya, even in the darkest hours, they should take a look on the front page of Yahoo! right now.

Summit Protests Turn Violent in Argentina - Thousands of demonstrators flooded the streets of this seaside resort Friday chanting "Get out Bush" as the U.S. president sought to promote free trade at a divided Summit of the Americas. Protests turned violent with about 1,000 people shattering shopfronts with clubs and pelting riot police with stones... Demonstrators took to the streets hours before the summit started, shouting insults about President Bush and chanting "Fascist Bush! You are the terrorist!"

The remaining Bush faithful (at this point I'm going to call them dead-enders... thanks Rummy!) are shocked and dismayed with such statements and opposition. Why, George is just a good-old boy! He's one of us. He's making the world safe for freedom. We're freedom lovers. You're with us or against us. The conservative dead-enders are asking, how come these people hate America so much?

Maybe because they're also reading the story directly below, too!

You remember "shoe bomber" Richard Reid, right? There's no way you've forgotten him... he was kind of the softer side of terrorism, what with his wildly unmanaged hair and googly crazy eyes and the fact that he was caught squirming around in his seat trying to light his fucking shoes on fire. Hilarious! We all knew it was. You laughed. Admit it.

We all knew, that is, except for the "terrorism experts" at our local airports, who started (and in some locations I imagine have not stopped) having us take our shoes off. It's as if Richard Reid hit the scene, and Federal security personnel looked at each other and said, "Oh my God! Did you know that? Did you realize that they can put bombs in shoes now?? They're going to put bombs in everyone's shoes now, because they did it once! Take off your shooooooes!!!"

Yeah. Idiots. We call that "reacting," not "acting." We call that "fumbling around with a sack over our heads asking why the lights went off," not "actually protecting Americans from terror."

Meanwhile, as Senator Patty Murray has pointed out over and over and over and over and over and over again, our ports are totally and completely insecure and they are right smack in the middle of huge population centers and they are a perfect target because there is No. Cargo. Inspection. At all.

As all of you are I am sure aware, London was attacked by a series of bombings not long ago. It seems that the death toll may remain mercifully low, but who knows.

One frightening realization that strikes me is that we may now be entering a new era of small, disruptive and civilian-focused terrorist attacks. We do not have any more time in which to figure out how to really defeat terrorism.

If you have friends and family in London, Better Donkey wishes them God speed and good luck. I just got off the phone with my friends over there and found that the international operators are swamped, so be patient.

As if on cue really but it seems our version of 007's Q would like to use plutonium to power future spy gadgets.

Plutonium.

Spy Gadgets.

Exploding Watches..nah..238 doesn't really pack the punch...

Camera's with a half life of 88 years? Maybe...

Whatever the cause though it's important to remember that we are asking Iran to not develop the technology to produce plutonium because it is hazardous and has the potential for abuse. Yet here we are using uranium tipped weapons and hooking our super agents up with plutonium jet packs (I can dream can't I?) to fly to their posh hotel.

We also have to consider that we can't keep nuclear secrets very well and that our gadgets often inspire same/similar gadgets on an international scale.

Mum's the word eh? Well fuck mum.

So I've been following this story about the arrest warrants issued for 13 US CIA Agents whose successful efforts to kidnap a fundamentalist Muslim priest were well documented by the Italian government.

It's hilarious.

First we have all these Diner's Club receipts for first class hotels, fine dining, and celebratory vacations after assaulting the priest, spraying a debilitating chemical in his face, then tossing the 42 year old Osama Nasr Mostafa Hassan into a van where he could be beaten at a more leisurely pace later.

Wouldn't it be great if the law enforcement could issue subpoena without those pesky judges? Well at least one senator (Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan) thinks it would be a great idea. At least that’s what it looks like from the new legislation he wrote.

If passed, the new law would renew the Patriot Act and expand government powers in the name of fighting terrorism, including allowing the FBI to subpoena records without permission from a judge or grand jury.

USA Today is reporting that,

The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level, Ridge now says.

Ridge, who resigned Feb. 1, said Tuesday that he often disagreed with administration officials who wanted to elevate the threat level to orange, or "high" risk of terrorist attack, but was overruled.

This revelation comes just after Julius blog conducted an analysis of Bush’s popularity and terror alerts.

Notice the nice spike after each alert.

George Bush, for a stronger America

Hello all,

Now comes the time where we must discuss PFC Lynndie England. Of course, we all know who she is; it’s all over the news. I will talk further about the case at Abu Ghraib, but for right now I want to focus on her. In an effort to not be redundant, I will assume that all of you know about the case and her pleadings. Now, the judge threw out her guilty plea because he thinks she might not have known her actions were wrong at the time. Her lawyers stated that she had severe learning disabilities and mental health problems. What does all of this mean? What it points to is a flaw within our military’s recruiting process, that a person with mental problems and learning disabilities can not only become a soldier, but also have some type of authority over prisoners in a jail.

If it is found out that the defense is correct, that PFC England is all of the things that they claim, you have to assume how many people in the military are just like her. I remember my process of joining the military, you are tested again and again; first the ASVAB, which determines what kind of job you are suitable for in the military. Then, during your basic training you take practical application tests, written tests about first aid, the UCMJ, and other various nuggets of military knowledge. So how is it possible that a person with a severe learning disability slipped through the cracks? How is it possible that this person could not figure out that putting a leash around someone’s neck might not be a good thing if it’s not consensual? I’m sorry, but it doesn’t hold water with me. I think she knew full well what she was doing, and didn’t care about the consequences. Either way, it makes the army look incredibly stupid.

I guess if you can’t stop terrorism, you might as well stop people from talking about it.

The Knight Ridder Newspapers agency is reporting that, the State Department abruptly pulled the plug on its an annual report on international terrorism after the government's top terrorism center concluded that there were more terrorist attacks in 2004 than in any year since the reports inception in 1985.

According to Larry C. Johnson, a former CIA analyst and State Department terrorism expert who first disclosed the decision to eliminate the report on his blog The Counterterrorism Blog

For example, in 2003 there were about 172 significant attacks. The numbers for 2004 have jumped to at least 655. At least 300 of those incidents occurred in India in the Kashmir region. NCTC, I'm told, is still tweaking the numbers. For Secretary of State Rice these numbers are a disaster. It is tough to argue we are winning the war on terrorism when the numbers in the official Government report will show the largest number of incidents ever recorded since the State Department started reporting on terrorist incidents.

Check out this clip from the Daily Show. I guess CIA director Porter Goss doesn’t believe Bush's when he says "We spend everyday gathering information to locate Osama bin Laden.."