According to Rolling Stone, our very own James F. Sensenbrenner is the second worst congressperson in the US, closing in quickly on Denny Hastert. This is particularly embarrassing, as in one of my past lives Hastert was my representative.

No politician better embodies the zealotry of the 109th Congress than Sensenbrenner, chairman of the powerful House Judiciary Committee. His solution to hot-button issues is always the same: Lock 'em up.

This article is a sidebar to the primary article about the current Do-Nothing Congress. Read both articles - it'll make you want to vote more than you already do.

I'm beginning to find it a little disheartening that Rolling Stone is becoming one of the better investigative journalism sources in the US. Where the hell is everyone else?

David Elliot represents the National Coalition Against the Death Penalty

Wisconsin voters this November will be asked their opinion on whether the death penalty should be reinstated. Bringing back capitol punishment after a 153-year hiatus makes about as much sense as driving down I-94 in reverse.You see, even as Wisconsin is considering a nonbinding referendum on the issue, states around the country are backing away from the death penalty. The number of executions is down, public support is down and the number of death sentences sought by prosecutors and handed down by juries has dropped sharply over the past decade.In recent years, a number of states have debated placing a moratorium on executions or doing away with the death penalty altogether. These states include “blue” states like New York and New Jersey as well as “red” states like Montana and North Carolina.

The truth, as both Democrats and Republicans are coming to realize, is that capital punishment is a failed social experiment. It has not made us more safe. It makes egregious errors. And its cost is increasingly more than we can bear.

What with the reports coming in from all over the place that NBC is refusing to run ads for the new movie Shut Up and Sing, I thought I'd do what I could to get some of the ads seen - this isn't the one NBC is refusing, it's a longer version. NBC won't run the ad because it is "disparaging to President Bush". Personally, I think President Bush's press conferences are disparaging to President Bush, but I don't see them trying to keep them off the air --

Oh by the way - some ABC stations are running the ads.

This won't be a regular event - I think people are free to listen to the Dixie Chicks or not, but it worries me that the media are now so easily cowed that they won't even take money for ads if they think they might not be popular. The growing consolidation of the media and the growing conservative control of them is really the issue here.

Anyway - going to see this movie is now an approved Uppity Event.