Mark Casey Online

Jamie Leigh Jones came forward this month to claim that she’d been gang-raped by Halliburton/KBR employees, then locked in a room for 24 hours so a rape kit could not be administered.

An army rape kit proved that she had been raped vaginally and anally–then promptly disappeared.

For her part, Jones was told not to tell. Sound familiar? It’s not that there’s a conspiracy among Halliburton or Blackwater or The Administration to commit these evil acts and then cover them up. It never is–it’s just the opposite. These evil acts occur in an unsupervised, hostile, stressful and undisciplined environment. Then the companies cover them up like a scared 13-year-old who accidentally set a fire in his parents garage. Like the boy’s parents, it’s up to the media, and the public, to discover and punish these events.

There’s no option for the companies themselves–either get in trouble, or don’t. If there were millions at stake, what would you do?

Merry Christmas, faithful readers. There’s a lot to be hopeful for this year.

And remember, Saturn is the reason for the season.

(No matter what your prominent Right Wing ideologue says.)

Less than a week after senator Dodd spent hours filibustering the debate on the new FISA bill–which would have given immunity to the telecom companies who illegally turned over our private information to the government–the Democratic-led senate is doing it again.

Instead of going into the traditional holiday recess and allowing President Bush to appoint whatever judges and cabinet positions he wants without confirmation, a few worthy senators have opened session for a minute or so every day. They’re cheap tricks, but so are what they’re stopping–and they’re working.

Yesterday, the board of housing development in New Orleans confirmed their decision to tear down four lower-income housing developments–consisting of over 4,000 homes–to make way for spanking new developments of “mixed income” (read: upper middle class) housing. Mayor Ray Nagin said that the decision is “moving forward” for New Orleans.

Of course, Nagin is half right. Building new homes, across the income spectrum, is crucial for the development of New Orleans. But tearing down four thousand homes and building four thousand more is the opposite of moving forward, or backward: it’s just stagnation.

And as always, those who have nothing will end up losing the most.

Most of us realize that violent crimes tend to be crimes of passion, despite what “FBI Files” on the Discovery Channel tells us about the preponderance of cold, calculating wife killers and insurance scammers.  And the thing about crimes of passion is, there’s usually no punishment that can act as a deterrent.  Most murderers  aren’t thinking, “Wait, if I kill this person, I will be executed myself.”  Most murderers are thinking, “This guy just beat me up, I’m going to stab him,” or “This guy just slept with my wife, I’m going to point a gun at him and see what happens.”

Of course, no one is justifying the choice to respond to any situation with irrational violence, but it’s been proven in study after study that irrational violence isn’t deterred by rational thoughts of consequences.  Unfortunately, lawmakers and governors don’t really care about whether or not a program which costs their taxpayers millions of dollars is effective or moral.  They just care about making their taxpayers feel safe, even if they have to lie to them about what actually makes them safe.

Until now, it seems.  Most people have heard about the recent New Jersey ban on executions, and it seems that similar thoughts have been on the minds of other states.  Executions dropped 57 percent last year, as evidence has been mounting that the system isn’t always accurate about who’s guilty (big surprise), and that the “humane” method of killing someone–by lethal injection–is apparently much more cruel and unusual than some (not me) thought.

Remember Mark Foley, the guy who was in charge of a senate committee on prosecuting sexual predators and pedophiles, who was embroiled in his own scandal last year for soliciting sexual conversation with his teenage staffers?  He claimed that his problem was “alcoholism,” promptly resigned and disappeared into rehab.

Well, Newsweek reports that one year later he’s openly gay and living happily in a Florida mansion with his longtime partner.  He’s said to be considering a new career in real estate.  It’s a suitably happy ending, but it’s still such a shame that he was hounded his entire time in office.

Since he first ran, he was badgered constantly about whether or not he was gay–since he was–and he called the questions “Revolting and unforgivable.”  It’s not the being gay that was a  problem, it’s that he felt he had to repress his identity and lifestyle.  It’s easy to blame the fact that he was a Republican, but the Dems who ran against him were also big fans of the flames against him.   I’m glad he’s happy now, and I hope he’s decided to stick to men his own age.

Click here for a newspaper clip of this article.

By now, there aren’t many people who haven’t heard of Mike Huckabee’s swift (and possibly temporary) rise to the top of this year’s Republican candidates. And similarly, there aren’t many who haven’t heard of Oprah’s recent stint campaigning with Democratic hopeful Barack Obama.

What you may not know, however, is that Obama’s endorsement from the iconic Oprah Winfrey pretty much fizzled, without any increase in public support, even as Huckabee’s success was immediately preceded by a high-profile celebrity endorsement of his own.

So why such a difference between the campaign strategies? Two words: Chuck Norris.

Read more…

Mitt Romney stood up in front of a bunch of presumably rich and presumably white Texans today for the sole purpose of defending himself as a Mormon.

And while I certainly think that followers of any religion should be willing and able to intelligently defend their beliefs daily (as too few believe too much while thinking too little), the point remains that this is a free country, and a man is allowed to believe what he wishes. The only thing more strong than our constitutional conviction of this is our rock-solid belief that elected officials should not be elected or tested for their religion, or lack thereof.

Still, enough people out there care about their president’s religion, and believe that Christianity is the only means by which a person may behave justly and morally, that this poor man, like Kennedy, has to convince them that his “unChristian” beliefs won’t effect his morality.

What a country.

Read the speech here: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=23830

Read my full column about it here: http://markcaseyonline.com/?p=31