Texass 2-(Mis)Step

From Alex Pareene at Salon:

Even though they have the exact same style of speaking and propensity to execute innocent people, current Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Texas Gov. George W. Bush are very different politicians. And they don’t like each other, according to the New York Times. Or rather their staffs and “camps” don’t like each other.

Rick Perry was Bush’s lieutenant governor. Whether the two men personally like each other is totally unknown (politicians don’t like other humans anyway; that is why they go into politics), but Perry is “signaling” that he is very different from Bush because Bush was a terrible president who left office hated by everyone and Rick Perry would maybe like to be the next president (or he is at least surrounded by people who think he could be the next president).

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Kans-asses

From THE TOPEKA CAPITAL-JOURNAL:

The Kansas Democratic Party injected the Kansas gubernatorial campaign Monday with questions about the relationship between Republican nominee Sam Brownback and a provocative evangelist who dreamed the Kansas senator would be elected president.

Kenny Johnston, executive director of the state Democratic Party, said conduct of preacher Lou Engle and the degree of the U.S. senator’s acceptance of the Christian activist’s theological ideas about homosexuality and abortion were legitimate issues to consider as Kansas voters approach the Nov. 2 election. Brownback is on the ballot with Democratic state Sen. Tom Holland and the Reform and Libertarian party nominees.

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If torture doesn’t stink, why does Mike McConnell have to hold his nose?

LONDON (AP) — One of the United States’ top judges said in an interview broadcast in Britain on Tuesday that interrogators can inflict pain to obtain critical information about an imminent terrorist threat.

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said that aggressive interrogation could be appropriate to learn where a bomb was hidden shortly before it was set to explode or to discover the plans or whereabouts of a terrorist group.

“It seems to me you have to say, as unlikely as that is, it would be absurd to say you couldn’t, I don’t know, stick something under the fingernail, smack him in the face. It would be absurd to say you couldn’t do that,” Scalia told British Broadcasting Radio Corp.

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Well?

From the Guardian Unlimited:

Without clear frontrunners in the US primaries, pressure is mounting on New York mayor Mike Bloomberg to make a decision on launching an independent bid for the presidency.

He has talked with potential running mates; he has criticised candidates on policy; he has been flattered and encouraged by cover stories in Time and Newsweek; and he has paid for polling in every state to gauge potential support.

But officially, at least, the self-made multi-billionaire is sticking to his coy position: denying interest in a possible White House bid while his political team continues to lay the groundwork and infrastructure for one.

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