Found on Ornicus' site - an excellent quote from Theodore Roosevelt that should be taught in all American History or political science classes.  A shortened version of this has been floating around for a while now, but this longer excerpt from the essay offers a better view of what he is saying:

"The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else."

"Roosevelt in the Kansas City Star", 149
May 7, 1918

Eschaton links to an article today about a former Gulf War (I) veteran who was apparently beaten up after voicing his opposition to the war in a West Virginia bar.

Before the alleged attack, Brown said, he questioned the wisdom of going to war with Iraq so soon. He said he and other bar patrons called British Prime Minister Tony Blair and President George Bush “idiots.”

Brown said a friend warned him that he would be “jumped” when he left the bar because of what he said. On the way out of the bar, he said a man in “biker gear” confronted him and asked if he “had a problem with America.”

He said when he reached his car, someone hit him from behind with a blunt object, and then two people stood on his arms while another kicked his head. He suffered a broken nose and other facial injuries, and was treated at hospitals in Grafton and Morgantown.

[...]

“When people are being attacked for expressing themselves, we’re in trouble,” he said. “Using violence for patriotism is a very feeble and poor excuse.”

Somehow I fear that this is only the beginning.

Bill and Melinda Gates' medical foundation has awarded a $60 million grant to the International Partnership for Microbicides to help in the development of microbicides - cremes, gels, films, sponges and other topically-applied products - which may be useful in not only helping slow the spread of HIV, but also in giving women a product that they can use to protect themselves from HIV transmission.

Women are at greater risk for HIV infection than men, said Helene Gayle, director of HIV, TB and Reproductive Health for the Gates Foundation.

There are also social and economic reasons, such as whether a man uses a condom and the low availability of female condoms, for finding ways that women can protect themselves, she said.

"The imperative to find something that women can use to protect themselves from HIV is clear and urgent," Gayle said. "The only technology we have is a male-controlled technology -- a condom."

The foundation found little interest among major pharmaceutical companies because of the absence of a clear moneymaking potential for microbial products, she said.

According to the Guardian, the missile that killed more than 60 people at a Baghdad marketplace last week was an American Cruise missile.  Interestingly, the proof came from a Guardian reader who took information reported in the news about the missile and was able to use the Internet to research where the missile was made.

A metal fragment found at the scene by British journalist Robert Fisk carried various markings, including "MFR 96214 09". This, our reader pointed out in an email, is a manufacturer's identification number known as a "cage code".

Cage codes can be looked up on the internet (www.gidm.dlis.dla.mil), and keying in the number 96214 traces the fragment back to a plant in McKinney, Texas, owned by the Raytheon Company.

The article also provides a different viewpoint on the checkpoint killing of 7 women and children by US soldiers, noting that the soldier in charge of the checkpoint blames his troops for the deaths as they did not follow orders to first fire a warning shot.

In a rather interesting, but diplomatically-boneheaded move, the US is now planning to bring in their own weapons inspectors to find the weapons of mass distruction that the UN inspectors never located.  Brian Whitaker, the author of the article, comments: "The US appears unaware that such a project will have little credibility internationally..."  For some reason, that doesn't surprise me in the least.

Paul Krugman writes this week about how the money that is supposed to go towards ensuring "homeland security" appears to be being distributed less on a basis of where it might be needed than one of where it might secure the most electoral votes.  He notes that a review of Department of Homeland Security's spending formula, the government will be spending seven times as much on each resident of Wyoming as it will on each resident in New York. 

How does this relate to the electoral votes?  The formula being used is set up similar to the way the distribution of electoral votes is set up.  There is a portion of the funding that provides an equal grant to every state, regardless of population, and a second portion of the funding that is divided in proportion to each state's population.  Just as the electoral college winds up giving small states a disproportionately "louder" voice than many large states have, the homeland security funding formula gives those same smaller states a larger slice of the pie when viewed on a per capita basis.

Where this becomes problematic is that states with large populations almost invariably are also states with large urban centers - the kind of densly populated areas that terrorists are most likely to target.  While it's true that terrorists can target anywhere, it is far more likely that they will pick a New York City or Los Angeles than Casper, Wyoming.  Yet, with the way the money is being divided between the states, Wyoming can afford far better protection for each one of its citizens than New York or Los Angeles will be able to. 

As Krugman notes, its probably no coincidence that the Department of Homeland Security is granting proportionally more funds to smaller, less urban-oritented states, since those same states are generally Republican strongholds, making it important to Bush, and the Republican party, to keep them very happy.

Unfortunately, keeping them happy, in this case, means leaving the largely Democrat-oriented, urban areas more vulnerable to terrorist attacks. I suppose that's one way to help make your opponants less of a threat come election time....