northnotes

too good, too important to pass up

2006-09-24T19:16:00.000-08:00

matthewyglesias.com

Torture as Investigation

Vladimir Bukovsky:

Investigation is a subtle process, requiring patience and fine analytical ability, as well as a skill in cultivating one's sources. When torture is condoned, these rare talented people leave the service, having been outstripped by less gifted colleagues with their quick-fix methods, and the service itself degenerates into a playground for sadists. Thus, in its heyday, Joseph Stalin's notorious NKVD (the Soviet secret police) became nothing more than an army of butchers terrorizing the whole country but incapable of solving the simplest of crimes. And once the NKVD went into high gear, not even Stalin could stop it at will. He finally succeeded only by turning the fury of the NKVD against itself; he ordered his chief NKVD henchman, Nikolai Yezhov (Beria's predecessor), to be arrested together with his closest aides.
It goes on, including tales of Bukovsky's own experiences as a victim of Soviet torture and deserves to be read in its entirety. But this here is essentially the key point at hand. While you can obviously imagine or gerrymander or stipulate a situation in which torture might yield useful information, in practice the systematic authorization of torture creates an army of butchers, not a crack investigative team. Bush, Cheney, and those around them remind me of Nietzsche's line about staring too long into the abyss. They've become transfixed, hypnotized almost, by the evils they believe themselves to be fighting. Obsessed to the point where they've clearly developed an admiration for the brutal methods, ruthless dishonesty, and utter secrecy with which the enemies of liberalism conduct themselves.

But these things they're so eager -- determined, really -- to cast aside aren't frivolous luxury to be abandonned in times of peril. They're the very essence of what makes our system of government work. They're what makes it worth preserving, as a matter of ethics, but also as a matter of practice vital to the preservation of our way of life. Liberal democracy isn't a fluke occurrence that just so happens to have survived despite its drawbacks. It's actually a superior method of organizing a state. The idea that the country is being run by people who don't understand that is sad and frightening. The idea that the very same people claim to be embarked upon a grand mission to spread our system of government around the world is like a horrible tawdry joke, but doubly frightening in its own way.

9/23/06 3:04PMdel.icio.us thisincoming links

spot on.

2006-08-22T12:55:00.000-08:00

Published on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
Memo to House Democrats
by Robert B. Reich

Democrats: Odds are, come November 7, you will gain the 15 seats you need to take back the House (the odds are much lower in the Senate). So it’s not too early to start thinking about what you should do during the two years leading up to the 2008 presidential election.

You’ll be sorely tempted to showcase the Bush administration in all its lurid awfulness. Imagine an endless parade of witnesses offering shocking details of Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, torture camps, payoffs to Halliburton, Defense Department usurpations, Iraq’s descent into civil war, and other cover-ups, deceptions, data manipulations, suppressions of science, crass incompetencies, and outright corruptions. Out of all of these hearings would come a bill of particulars so damning that every 2008 Democratic candidate running for everything from Indianapolis City Council to president will be swept into office on a riptide of public outrage.

After all, didn’t House Republicans during the Clinton years wreak all the damage they could even when there wasn’t much to complain about? Recall Dan Burton, the Indiana Republican who, while chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, issued truck loads of White House subpoenas along with a sulphurous geyser of unsupported accusations. Why shouldn’t Henry Waxman, who will fill the same shoes, give as good as the Clinton White House got? Imagine how John Dingell, who will run the House Energy and Commerce Committee, could expose the intimacies between the Bushies and Big Oil; what John Conyers, in command of the House Judiciary Committee, could reveal about Bush’s trouncing of Americans’ civil liberties; or the job Barney Frank, at Financial Services, could do on the administration’s nefarious links to Wall Street. Hell, why not try to impeach Bush?

Warning: Resist all such temptation.

You won’t be credible. The public would see the investigations and hearings as partisan wrangling. They might even cause the public to question what it already knows, allowing Republicans to argue it was all conjured up by partisan zealots from the start.

You won’t get any new information anyway. Your subpoena power would have no effect on this White House. You’d end up fighting in federal courts for the whole two years. Besides, there’s enough dirt out there already to sink any administration. Although cowed at the start of the administration, the mainstream media have done a fairly good job since.

Moreover, Bush is the wrong target. His popularity could hardly be lower than it is already, which means 2008 Republican candidates in all but the reddest of red states will distance themselves from this White House. John McCain, should he be the Republican nominee, won’t be tarnished by Bush at all because in the public’s mind McCain is a maverick and independent. He’ll remain above the partisan mud throwing while you’d just mire Democrats in it.

Finally, you and your colleagues have spent the last six years whining and complaining. That was understandable. There was ample reason, and you didn’t have the power to do otherwise. But do that when you do have some power, and you’ll confirm the Republican message that Democrats are pessimistic Eeyores, obsessed with what’s wrong with America and clueless about what to do or how to fix it.

Here’s a better way to go. Use the two years instead to lay the groundwork for a new Democratic agenda. Bring in expert witnesses. Put new ideas on the table. Frame the central issues boldly. Don’t get caught up in arid policy-wonkdom.

For example, instead of framing basic economic questions as whether to roll back Bush’s tax cuts, make it about how to recreate good jobs at good wages and rebuild the middle class. Consider ideas for doing this through trade policy, industrial policy, antitrust, publicly financed research and development, and stronger trade unions.

Instead of framing the central foreign-policy question as whether we should have invaded Iraq, make it how to partition Iraq into Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish zones while America gets out. Focus the national-security debate on how to control loose nukes and fissile material, and secure American ports. Encourage direct negotiations with North Korea and Iran. On energy and the environment, offer ideas for developing new non–fossil-based energy industries in America, and how to ratify a realistic Kyoto accord.

Help the public understand how these are all related -- why, for example, we’ll never have a sane foreign policy unless we reduce our dependence on oil. And most important, be positive. Bush’s shameful record is plain. Start the new Democratic record. Help America dream again.

###

josh takes his gloves off with joe the hoe.

2006-08-09T13:38:00.000-08:00

I found this clip on Atrios's site from this morning's Today Show ...

LAUER: Senator, is there any phone call you could receive? Is there anyone in the Democratic Party who could call you today and ask you to drop out that you would listen to?
LIEBERMAN: Respectfully, no. I am committed to this campaign, to a different kind of politics, to bringing the Democratic Party back from Ned Lamont, Maxine Waters to the mainstream, and for doing something for the people of Connecticut. That's what this is all about: which one of us, Lamont or me, can do more for the future of our people here in Connecticut. And on that basis, I'm going forward with confidence, purpose and some real optimism.

Maxine Waters isn't really my kind of Democrat. But then, if I understand what's happened in the last 36 hours, Joe Lieberman isn't a Democrat at all anymore.

But more to the point. This isn't just inaccurate, it's pathetic. I'ts a like a mini-version of the Iraq War or the War on Terror. You're either with Joe or you're with the extremists. Apparently half of Connecticut Democrats are outside the mainstream.

This is really the attitude that got poor Joe into this bind.

The mainstream is Joe Lieberman, along with possibly Sean Hannity and Bill Kristol. If you disagree with Joe Lieberman, a disagreement about policy is the least of it. It's a major existential crisis for the Democratic party which risks conquest by unreconstructed leftists, extremists and miscellaneous other freaks.

The idea that Ned Lamont is 'outside the mainstream' on any issue I'm aware of is laughable.

As a matter of civics, if Joe Lieberman wants to run as an independent, good for him. If 51% of Connecticut voters want to vote for him, that's democracy. As a Democrat, he should get out of the race now. And every Democrat should tell him to.

If he wants to run as an independent he should and could go to Connecticut voters and say, "A lot of people in my own party disagree with me on this or that issue. But I've served all of Connecticut's citizens for 18 years. And I still think I can be the best senator. So vote for me."

I wouldn't agree with that. But I could respect it.

But he's not. It's all about him and stabbing his own party in the back while he disingenuously pleads that he's trying to save it. He can't admit or realize or get his head around the idea that his denial about Iraq and his obliviousness to his own constituents got him into this mess.

In the end, he just won't come clean. Forget about being a Democrat. Just be a man. It's time.

-- Josh Marshall

what could have been. via dailykos

2006-08-08T22:01:00.000-08:00

The Road Not Taken: Obsessed with Invading Iraq, Bush Ignored an Arab Peace Initiative in 2002
by Paul Rosenberg

Mon Aug 07, 2006 at 07:14:41 PM PDT

From Random Lengths News By Paul Rosenberg, Senior Editor

On June 25, an Israeli soldier was captured, apparently by a combination of three fringe Palestinian groups, one an offshoot of the military wing of Hamas. Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) re-entered Gaza three days latter, on a mission to find him. Two weeks later, another Islamic resistance group, Hezbollah, captured two more IDF soldiers, and IDF forces retaliated quickly, launching an ever-widening aerial bombardment, hitting the Beirut airport, and other key infrastructures in northern Lebanon, as well as numerous targets in Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon, while Hezbollah launched missiles into Israel's interior.

Israel's massive response--meant to destroy Hezbollah--appears on the brink of massive failure, since Hezbollah's mere survival is enough to severely undermine the aura of Israeli invincibility built up over the decades. Like America's invasion of Iraq, the attacks seem to have been launched without any thought about what comes next, or having a "plan B" in case things didn't work out as hoped for.

Paul Rosenberg's diary :: ::
But there's a deeper connection to the US invasion of Iraq.

On March 28, 2002, 22 members of the Arab League unanimously approved a Saudi-crafted peace initiative at a summit in Beirut. The "Beirut Declaration" as it came to be known had the appearance of a dramatic gesture, promising to explicitly recognize Israel's right to exist, in exchange for a return of the Occupied Territories.

Had it been pursued, the carnage and chaos now unfolding in Lebanon could have been rendered impossible. What's more, such a peace agreement would have deprived al Qaeda of a major grievance to exploit, and made it much easier to strengthen moderate voices throughout the Arab world and among Muslims generally. Instead, the Bush Administration remained focused on invading Iraq, under the false assumption that this would benefit Israel as well.

"They totally ignored it," Mideast expert Steven Zunes told Random Lengths. "It was a major breakthrough offering pretty much what Israel had been wanting all these years--land for peace."

Zunes is the author of Tinderbox: U.S. Middle East Policy and the Roots of Terrorism.

Ironically--or predictably, depending on your perspective--the current hostilities have disrupted yet another Arab peace effort that most Americans have never heard of. The original kidnapping derailed a promising agreement between Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, and Gaza's Hamas government. It called for a political initiative, explicitly endorsing a two-state solution, recognizing Israel's right to exist, and calling for the creation of a Palestinian government of national unity--just the sort of entity that could credibly negotiate such a solution.

Furthermore, the kidnappings were just a pretext on both sides. Both Hezbollah, and the IDF had long been planning their attacks, simply waiting for the right moment, the right excuse to launch them.

The Beirut Declaration came at a dire moment, much like the present situation, with Arafat physically under Israeli attack, and General Anthony Zinni--the American mediator hand-picked by Secretary of State Colin Powell--working furiously for a cease-fire. But the Beirut Declaration went far beyond responding to the immediate crisis. Two weeks later, Powell had a two-hour working meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah and other top Saudi officials, sharply focused on the Beirut Declaration. Despite Powell's hopeful press conference afterwards, the US never showed further interest.

Although not known at the time, Bush had already decided to invade Iraq, and thus put the Israeli/Palestinian conflict on the back burner. The decision had put the British government in a bind, as British reporter Michael Smith wrote in The Telegraph on September 18, 2004: "A Secret UK Eyes Only briefing paper was warning that there was no legal justification for war. So Mr. Blair was advised that a strategy would have to be put in place which would provide a legal basis for war."

This mid-March 2002 paper was part of a trail leading directly to the July 23 "Downing Street Memo," in which Richard Dearlove, head of British foreign intelligence service MI6, reported that in Washington "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" of going to war against Iraq.

The Arab Summit had also passed a resolution unanimously opposing that invasion. The Bush Administration ignored both resolutions. Yet, it was necessary to appear engaged and peace-seeking in June 2002. Bush gave a major speech about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, but failed to even mention the Beirut Declaration.

"He was trying to appear more even-handed to assuage the anger in the Arab world," Zunes explained. "But the failure to even refer to the increasing urgent Arab peace initiative indicates he wasn't all that serious about it."

Since then, the Beirut Declaration has virtually disappeared from memory in the US. "Its indicative of yet another manifestation of the rewriting of the history of the conflict, that wants to make the US seem like the only hope for peace," Zunes said. This creates a "rationale for the contradictory role that the US plays of the chief mediater and chief backer of the more powerful party in the conflict."

By never discussing Arab peace initiatives the fantasy is maintained that only Israel and the US are interested in peace. And this, in turn, is used to justify their resort to war. Similar contradictions plague supposed US support for democracy, as seen in the fact that Israel is attacking two Arab democracies--Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority--and that its actions have been condemned by a third: our own creation, the new Iraqi government.

The situation directly clashes with the alleged neo-con "idealism" about democratizing the Middle East. Zunes saw two possible interpretations of what was happening with the neo-con's "democracy" agenda. "The more cynical one [interpretation] is it was a desperate rationale, given the lack of weapons of mass destruction and the lack of a connection to al Qaeda," after the invasion of Iraq--around the time when the neo-cons dramatically stepped up their talk about democracy.

and free-market capitalist," Zunes explained, then added, "Its no accident that half the neocons are former Trotskyites. They have the same ideological blindness." (Irving Kristol, considered the founder of American neo-conservatism, was only the most prominent of the neo-cons to have been a member of the Fourth International--the worldwide organization of anti-Stalinst communists--during the late 1930s and 1940s. Over time, the neo-con's enduring anti-Stalinism lead them to form alliances with the CIA and the American defense establishment, pulling them first to the right of the Democratic Party, then into the Republican Party.)

General Zinni, the Middle East envoy when the Beirut Declaration was announced, soon became one of the earliest critics of the coming war. On August 24, 2002, the Tampa Tribune reported on his speech to Economic Club of Florida in Tallahassee:

"Zinni said a war to bring down Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein would have numerous undesirable side effects and should be low on the nation's list of foreign policy objectives."

In the speech, Zinni said, "The Middle East peace process, in my mind, has to be a higher priority. Winning the war on terrorism has to be a higher priority. More directly, the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Central Asia need to be resolved, making sure Al Qaeda can't rise again from the ashes that are destroyed. Taliban cannot come back--that the warlords can't regain power over Kabul and Karzai, and destroy everything that has happened so far.

"Our relationships in the region are in major disrepair, not to the point where we can't fix them, but we need to quit making enemies we don't need to make enemies out of. And we need to fix those relationships. There's a deep chasm growing between that part of the world and our part of the world. And it's strange, about a month after 9/11, they were sympathetic and compassionate toward us. How did it happen over the last year? And we need to look at that -- that is a higher priority."

Bush didn't listen. And the Mideast is again engulfed in flames.

only a great country could allow this psychopathological protest. too sick. too sad.

2006-08-07T17:38:00.000-08:00

Family, friends honor Cpl. Baucus
By GWEN FLORIO
Tribune Capitol Bureau

WOLF CREEK — By the time the Chinook helicopter with the huge American flag streaming beneath it passed slowly over the ranch here, the protesters and their vile signs were gone, leaving Marine Cpl. Phillip E. Baucus to be put to rest in peace.

A July 29 suicide bombing in Iraq's Al Anbar province killed Baucus, the nephew of U.S. Sen. Max Baucus. He had been married less than a year.

"Every death is a shame, but even more so when one is so young and so intelligent and so vibrant and has so much to offer," said Anthony J. Preite, director of the Montana Department of Commerce, who attended the funeral.

He was among more than 500 people who drove from across Montana and neighboring states to attend the funeral at the sprawling Sieben Ranch, owned by his parents, John and Nina Baucus.

Baucus' status as a nephew of a U.S. senator also drew the attention of the Topeka, Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church, whose members picket military funerals around the country. They believe the troops deserve to die because they fight on behalf of a government that, according to church beliefs, does not adequately condemn homosexuality.

Other groups have started staging silent counter-protests. On Sunday, Tom and Colleen Broeker of Great Falls took part in one here at the turnoff leading to the ranch.

"We are here to support a poor, young kid who had to die too young and whose family deserves a peaceful funeral," said Colleen Broeker.

Across the road, four members of Westboro Baptist — including 20-year-old Megan Phelps-Roper, daughter of its founder, the Rev. Fred Phelps — held up signs at the turnoff leading to the ranch.

"Thank God for dead soldiers," read one. "Soldiers Die, God Laughs," read another.

"They have a constitutional right to be here," sighed Lewis and Clark County Sheriff Cheryl Liedle, whose deputies were out in force Sunday.

"We're out here to make sure that nothing untoward happens to anyone, particularly to members of our community, and to keep the peace and tranquility for an honorable soldier," she said.

A procession of pickup trucks driven by well-dressed people with stony faces kicked up clouds of dust as they sped past.

"That's right. Don't even look at them," yelled Roy Banks, 54, of Helena, a disabled veteran. He was among about 15 people, including other veterans and members of church groups, who gathered to form a peaceful counter-protest to the Westboro Baptist contingent.

The church's actions spurred a measure, signed into law by President Bush on Memorial Day, that prohibits protests at or near national cemeteries. Baucus voted for the Respect for America's Fallen Heroes Act, hence Westboro's presence at his nephew's funeral, according to Westboro attorney Shirley Phelps-Roper. About 26 states have enacted similar laws, she said.

"What he got for his trouble ... is a dead nephew," Phelps-Roper, another of Phelps' daughters, said in a telephone interview.

At 2 p.m. sharp, when the funeral was to begin, the members of Westboro Baptist packed up their signs and left. The helicopter rattled into view a few moments later, the flag fluttering from its belly.

At the protest site, a bearded man holding a flag of his own tilted his head skyward, a tear tracing a path through the dust on his sun-reddened cheek.

Those at the funeral remembered Baucus' more lighthearted moments. Family members who recalled a scatterbrained youngster seemed surprised when Baucus' fellow Marines spoke of a supremely well-organized recruit, according to funeral pool reporter Charles S. Johnson of Lee Newspapers.

"He didn't become a hero when he died. He was a hero before then," said Baucus' older brother, John. He faced his brother's casket and raised his hand to his forehead.

"I'm saluting my brother and my hero. I'll miss you."

And the "free spirit, almost irreverence," of which his uncle, Max, spoke was on display at the end of the funeral. After the other ceremonies — the 21-gun salute; the presentation of the folded flag to his widow, Kathy; the bugled "Taps" and "Amazing Grace" on a bagpipe; the doves released by the Marines — there was one more, a Baucus family tradition that was Phillip's favorite.

There was a loud bang and a lot of smoke. An anvil flew through the air, landing about 30 feet from a car. The Baucuses send anvils flying at family events and on holidays. They used to use one pound of gunpowder to accomplish the feat; Phillip insisted up on two. That's what was used Sunday.

Some two hours after the service began, the pickups began their procession back toward the highway. As they left the ranch, they passed a sign taped to a fencepost. It bore a single word:

"Honor."

Contact Gwen Florio at 406-442-9493, or gflorio@greatfal.gannett.com

Originally published August 7, 2006

annthrax coultergeist, the face of the republican party, loves joe. what an endorsement.

2006-08-07T01:29:00.000-08:00

Conservative columnist Ann Coulter's defending Lieberman, as well, going on at some length during an interview with Fox's Neal Cavuto to explain how much she admires the senator and suggesting that, instead of fighting for the Democratic nomination in Connecticut, Lieberman ought to switch parties. "I think he should come all the way and become a Republican," argues Coulter, who says of Lieberman and the GOP: "at least he'd fit in with the party."

'nuff said.

2006-08-07T00:41:00.000-08:00

In Case We All Forgot, Americans Are Still Dying in Iraq
by Jimmy Breslin

By the way, there are many American soldiers fighting in the Middle East.

In case you haven't noticed, they get killed. A lot of them get killed.

I was watching the endless television coverage of Israel and Hezbollah/Lebanon killing women and children and then picking up the papers to read almost exclusively of the same thing. I found no picture on television and almost no mention in newspapers of Americans dying.

The dead babies of Lebanon and those dismembered by rockets in Israel are considered to be glorious distractions that allow our government to stroll the hallways that appear to have no blood on the floors.

I made a call to the Defense Department: "How are our soldiers doing lately?"

"We've had a bad month," the man responded.

"How bad?"

"Stay there and you'll see."

There now came faxes detailing American soldiers who died in Iraq since July 1. There have been 50 who died since then.

We list below who they are and where they are from, and the statistic that causes all to retch: the age.

We cannot list the entire number of dead in Iraq, for 2,583 Americans have been lost so far. And counting every day.

There also have been 19,270 wounded, with such injuries as legs blown off, young men with shattered backs being placed in wheelchairs for the rest of their lives, genitals lost, brains numbed by flying ball bearings, faces left in half by flames.

The television and newspaper coverage of this has been weak, lazy, fearful. What there is of it, you watch and read with clenched teeth.

Once, on HBO, they showed a young soldier on the table and the whine of a saw sounded as it went through the bone of his leg being amputated. This should be on day and night.

The obligation of reporting is to tell and tell and tell of the deaths and great injuries of young Americans sent to die by old draft dodgers in Washington.

How old was the kid on the table? What could he be? Twenty-two?

He stayed the course in Iraq.

What did it get him? He loses a leg.

Just as he was in his great college appearances, Bush is a cheerleader for any war that can be fought by somebody else's kids.

"I grieve for the children of Beirut."

"My heart truly goes out to the people of Haifa."

The vice president, Dick Cheney, is a serial draft dodger: five deferments, a national record.

The strategy for the Middle East is to keep Israel and Hezbollah/Lebanon fighting. Keep all attention on them. If they ever stop, then everybody would look at Americans dying.

"We didn't know," Erin Tinsley, 37, was saying late Friday. "We didn't know what they were here for. Two military women."

Erin was in the hot 10th-floor hallway of the Alfred E. Smith houses on the downtown East Side. Two doors down from her lived the parents of Haiming Hsia, an Army specialist who died Tuesday in an explosion in in Iraq.

"The father let the military women in and then when they came out, he stood there and seemed fine. I thought that they had brought an award for his son."

Erin said she didn't know how long afterward, an hour, maybe two, before the words of the Army officers exploded inside him. He collapsed, and on Friday, somebody from the family said that his wife, the soldier's mother, was unable to cope.

"President Bush took away my son, my only son," the mother had said.

Just this once, there was no poor, helpless family member saying that they were proud that their son had died in this war.

Don't ever say that the young man had died in vain, because that is the icy truth of Iraq that people often cannot handle.

"I grew up with him," Erin Tinsley was saying on Friday. "We went to PS 126 and IS 131. We used to run up and down the hall. Playing soldier. The last time I saw him was in April. He was home, but he said that he had to go back."

Spc. Hsia joined the Army because he couldn't make enough as a security guard to support a wife and baby. He spent three years in the Middle East and wanted to come home for good, but part of the secret of Iraq is that we don't have enough soldiers. He was ordered back.

This time Hsia was in Iraq for a month. Now he returns to the Alfred E. Smith houses in a box.

He is placed on the list with other U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq since July 1.

CPL. PHILIP E. BAUCUS, 28, Wolf Creek, Mo. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

CPL. NATHANIEL S. BAUGHMAN, 23, Monticello, Ind. With 101st Airborne Division. Died of injuries sustained when his Humvee encountered enemy forces' rocket-propelled grenades during patrol operations in Bayji.

LANCE CPL. ANTHONY E. BUTTERFIELD, 19, Clovis, Calif. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. One of two Marines killed while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SPC. STEPHEN W. CASTNER, 27, Cedarburg, Wis. With Wisconsin Army National Guard. Died of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his Humvee during combat operations in Tallil.

LANCE CPL. GEOFREY R. CAYER, 20, Fitchburg, Mass. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Died in a nonhostile incident in Anbar province. The incident is under investigation.

SGT. ANDRES J. CONTRERAS, 23, Huntington Park, Calif. With 1st Combat Support Brigade. Died of injuries sustained when his vehicle encountered an improvised explosive device in Baghdad.

LANCE CPL. KURT E. DECHEN, 24, of Springfield, Vt. With I Marine Expeditionary Force. Died from wounds received while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

STAFF SGT. MICHAEL A. DICKINSON III, 26, Battle Creek, Mich. With 4th Psychological Operations Group, U.S. Army Special Operations Command. Killed when his dismounted patrol encountered enemy forces' small-arms fire in Ramadi.

STAFF SGT. DUANE J. DREASKY, 31, Novi, Mich. With Michigan Army National Guard. Died at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his Humvee in Habbaniya.

STAFF SGT. JASON M. EVEY, 29, Stockton, Calif. With 2nd Brigade Combat Team. Died of injuries sustained when his Bradley Fighting Vehicle encountered an improvised explosive device during combat operations in Baghdad.

CPL. ADAM J. FARGO, 22, Ruckersville, Va. With 101st Airborne Division. Died of injuries sustained when his convoy encountered enemy forces' small-arms fire in Baghdad.

STAFF SGT. OMAR D. FLORES, 27, Mission, Texas. With 130th Engineer Brigade. One of three soldiers killed when a roadside bomb detonated near their Mine Protected Vehicle during combat operations in Ramadi.

SGT. ALKAILA T. FLOYD, 23, Grand Rapids, Mich. With 130th Engineer Brigade. Died at Landstuhl Medical Center in Landstuhl, Germany, of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his Mine Protected Vehicle in Ramadi.

SGT. JOSHUA A. FORD, 20, Wayne, Neb. With the Army National Guard 485th Corps Support Battalion. Died during combat operations in Al Numaniyah.

SPC. JOSEPH A. GRAVES, 21, Discovery Bay, Calif. With the 89th Military Police Brigade. Killed in action while conducting combat operations north of Baghdad.

PFC. JASON HANSON, 21, Forks, Wash. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SGT. IRVING HERNANDEZ JR., 28, Manhattan. With 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team. Killed when he encountered enemy small-arms fire during combat operations in Mosul.

LANCE CPL. JAMES W. HIGGINS, 22, Frederick, Md. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. Died of wounds received during combat in Anbar province.

SGT. MANUEL J. HOLGUIN, 21, Woodlake, Calif. With 1st Armored Division. Died of injuries sustained when his dismounted patrol encountered enemy small-arms fire and a roadside bomb in Baghdad.

SPC. HAIMING HSIA, 37, Manhattan. With 1st Armored Division. Died Aug. 1 during combat operations in Ramadi.

SGT. RYAN D. JOPEK, 20, Merrill, Wis. With Army National Guard's 127th Infantry Regiment. Died in Tikrit of injuries suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near his convoy.

PETTY OFFICER 2ND CLASS EDWARD A. KOTH, 30, Towson, Md. With Explosive Ordnance Disposal Mobile Unit Eight. Died after ordnance exploded during a disposal operation at Camp Victory.

SGT. DUSTIN D. LAIRD, 23, Martin, Tenn. With the Army National Guard's 46th Engineer Battalion. Died in Al Qaim of injuries sustained when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle during combat operations in Rawah.

PETTY OFFICER 2ND CLASS MARC A. LEE, 28, of Hood River, Ore. Lee was an aviation ordnanceman and a member of a West Coast-based SEAL Team. He was killed during combat operations while on patrol in Ramadi.

SPC. TROY C. LINDEN, 22, Detroit Lakes, Minn. With 130th Engineer Brigade. One of three soldiers killed when a roadside bomb detonated near their Mine Protected Vehicle during combat operations in Ramadi.

PFC. COLLIN T. MASON, 20, Staten Island. With 4th Infantry Division. Killed after encountering direct fire while manning a checkpoint in his vehicle in Taji.

SPC. JOSEPH P. MICKS, 22, Rapid River, Mich. With 130th Engineer Brigade. One of three soldiers killed when a roadside bomb detonated near their Mine Protected Vehicle during combat operations in Ramadi.

SPC. DAMIEN M. MONTOYA, 23, Holbrook, Ariz. With 4th Infantry. Died from a non-combat-related cause in Baghdad.

LANCE CPL. ADAM R. MURRAY, 21, Cordova, Tenn. With 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SGT. JUSTIN L. NOYES, 23, Vinita, Okla. With 3rd Marine Expeditionary Force. Killed while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

STAFF SGT. PAUL S. PABLA, 23, Fort Wayne, Ind. With Indiana Army National Guard. Killed by small arms fire during combat operations in Mosul.

CAPT. CHRISTOPHER T. PATE, 29, Hampstead, N.C. With 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

PFC. DEREK J. PLOWMAN, 20, Everton, Ark. With Arkansas Army National Guard. Died from a gunshot wound in Baghdad.

STAFF SGT. KENNETH I. PUGH, 39, Houston. With 4th Infantry Division. Died of injuries sustained when his M1A1 Abrams tank encountered enemy forces small arms fire in Baghdad.

CPL. JULIAN A. RAMON, 22, Flushing. With 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Died during combat operations in Anbar province.

CPL. TIMOTHY ROOS, 21, Cincinnati. With 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Died of wounds received while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

CAPT. BLAKE H. RUSSELL, 35, Fort Worth, Texas. With 101st Airborne Division. Died of injuries sustained from enemy forces munitions while investigating a possible mortar cache during combat operations in Baghdad.

SPC. DENNIS K. SAMSON JR., 24, Hesperia, Mich. With 101st Airborne Division. Died of injuries sustained when he came under enemy small-arms fire in Taqaddum.

PFC. ENRIQUE C. SANCHEZ, 21, Garner, N.C. With 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SGT. 1ST CLASS SCOTT R. SMITH, 34, Punxsutawney, Pa. With 52nd Ordnance Group. Died of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near a controlled ordnance clearing mission in Iskandariya.

STAFF. SGT. CHRISTOPHER W. SWANSON, 25, Rose Haven, Md. With 1st Armored Division. Died of injuries sustained when his patrol encountered enemy forces using small-arms fire in Ramadi.

PETTY OFFICER 1ST CLASS JERRY A. THARP, 44, Aledo, Ill. With Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 25. Killed when his dismounted patrol was struck by a roadside bomb while operating in Anbar province.

CPL. JOSEPH A. TOMCI, 21, Stow, Ohio. With II Marine Expeditionary Force. Died while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SGT. THOMAS B. TURNER JR., 31, Cottonwood, Calif. With 101st Airborne Division. Died at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Landstuhl, Germany, of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his Bradley Fighting Vehicle in Muqdadiya.

SGT. GEORGE M. ULLOA JR., 23, of Austin, Texas. With II Marine Expeditionary Force. Died from wounds suffered while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

SGT. MARK R. VECCHIONE, 25, Tucson, Ariz. With 1st Armored Division. Died of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his M1A1 Abrams tank in Ramadi.

CPL. MATTHEW P. WALLACE, 22, Lexington Park, Md. With 4th Infantry Division. Died of injuries sustained when a roadside bomb detonated near his Bradley Fighting Vehicle during combat operations in Baghdad.

AIRMAN 1ST CLASS CARL JEROME WARE JR., 22, Glassboro, N.J. With 15th Security Forces Squadron. Died from a non-combat-related cause at Camp Bucca.

CAPT. JASON M. WEST, 28, Pittsburgh. With 1st Armored Division. Killed by enemy forces using small arms fire in Ramadi.

SGT. CHRISTIAN B. WILLIAMS, 27, Winter Haven, Fla. With 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. One of two Marines killed while conducting combat operations in Anbar province.

© 2006 Newsday Inc.

a followup to the previous post.

2006-08-07T00:27:00.000-08:00

Centrism Is for Suckers
By Paul Krugman
The New York Times
Published: August 4, 2006

If you want to understand the state of America today, a good place to start is with the contrast between the political strategies of conservative business advocacy groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and those of more or less liberal advocacy groups like the Sierra Club.

The chamber recently got into trouble because of ads it ran praising Republican members of Congress who, it said, voted for the Medicare prescription drug program. It turned out that one of the congressmen praised in the ads actually voted against the program, while two others weren't even in Congress when the vote took place.

Oops. But the bigger question is, aren't business groups supposed to favor fiscal responsibility and reducing the size of government? So why is the chamber praising a program that substantially increases the size of government and has no visible means of financial support?

The answer is obvious: the Bush administration hopes to win some votes in the midterm elections from older Americans now receiving drug benefits, and the chamber, like many conservative organizations these days, believes that its interests are best served by helping Republicans win elections. If the administration and its allies in Congress want the chamber's support on an issue, they get it, never mind the details.

If you want an even starker example, consider the fact that the National Federation of Independent Business, the small-business lobby, is supporting the bizarre, hybrid wage-and-tax legislation now before the Senate. This legislation would raise the minimum wage while sharply cutting taxes on very large estates.

From a small-business owner's point of view, this deal makes no sense. Many owners of small businesses believe, rightly or wrongly, that they would be hurt by a rise in the minimum wage. Meanwhile, very few are rich enough to pay estate taxes: the Congressional Budget Office reports that if current law had applied in 2000, only 135 small business estates would have paid any tax at all, which means that small-business owners subject to the estate tax are substantially harder to find than people who have been struck by lightning.

It's possible that the federation's leadership has been misled by Heritage Foundation propaganda. But it's more likely that, like the chamber, the federation believes that its interests are best served by acting as a loyal servant of the Republican electoral effort. And both organizations are probably right.

Now compare this with the behavior of advocacy groups like the Sierra Club, the environmental organization, and Naral, the abortion-rights group, both of which have endorsed Senator Lincoln Chafee, Republican of Rhode Island, for re-election. The Sierra Club's executive director defended the Chafee endorsement by saying, "We choose people, not parties." And it's true that Mr. Chafee has usually voted with environmental groups.

But while this principle might once have made sense, it's just naïve today. Given both the radicalism of the majority party's leadership and the ruthlessness with which it exercises its control of the Senate, Mr. Chafee's personal environmentalism is nearly irrelevant when it comes to actual policy outcomes; the only thing that really matters for the issues the Sierra Club cares about is the "R" after his name.

Put it this way: If the Democrats gain only five rather than six Senate seats this November, Senator James Inhofe, who says that global warming is "the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people," will remain in his current position as chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. And if that happens, the Sierra Club may well bear some of the responsibility.

The point is that those who cling to the belief that politics can be conducted in terms of people rather than parties -- a group that also includes would-be centrist Democrats like Joe Lieberman and many members of the punditocracy -- are kidding themselves.

The fact is that in 1994, the year when radical Republicans took control both of Congress and of their own party, things fell apart, and the center did not hold. Now we're living in an age of one-letter politics, in which a politician's partisan affiliation is almost always far more important than his or her personal beliefs. And those who refuse to recognize this reality end up being useful idiots for those, like President Bush, who have been consistently ruthless in their partisanship.

lieberman: bipartisan or capitulator? digby nails it.

2006-08-06T17:39:00.000-08:00

Date Rape

by digby

David Gergen says:

Yes, I am biased in favor of my friend, but I also fear that if Joe Lieberman - a man, let's remember, who was the vice presidential nominee of his party only six years ago - is purged from national leadership, that would send a message rippling through both parties: that in our new politics, working too closely with leaders across the aisle can be political suicide. It's hard to believe that, despite all their frustration, that's what Connecticut Democrats really want to say.

I'm just curious what message the Republicans have sent rippling through both parties for the last six years of strong arm, thuggish political rhetoric and legislative tactics?

Here's a mild example of what the Democrats have been putting up with, from Gergen's brother in arms, David Broder:

Since 1995, when Republicans took control of both sides of the Capitol, the negotiating sessions often have been limited to GOP senators and representatives, with the Democrats locked out along with the press.

That arrangement has been reinforced by the "Hastert doctrine," the policy enunciated by House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert that he will bring to the floor only bills that are supported by the majority of the Republican caucus. Because of that policy, bipartisan coalitions have become rarities in the House. The emphasis now is entirely on shaping bills in conference that most House Republicans can embrace.

No judgment there about whether it's good for the country to kill bipartisanship in a time of war. Just business as usual. IOKIYAR, I guess.

This stuff was going on throughout the first term, despite the disputed election of 2000 --- a unique historical circumstance that one would have thought called for excessive bipartisanship --- as you can see by this article:

Republicans, meanwhile, defended their handling of negotiations, saying too many voices — particularly those of lawmakers who do not support their policy goals — would yield cacophony, not compromise.

"You want to try to negotiate agreements with people who are going to vote for it and negotiate in good faith," said John Feehery, spokesman for House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. "You need to be able to reach agreement, and you can't have 6,000 people negotiating."

In both the cases of Medicare (HR 1) and energy (HR 6), the Republicans have been largely negotiating without the participation of Democrats, who have been complaining for weeks about the process. But in recent days the conflict has escalated.

Getting rid of bipartisanship was a conscious governing philosophy. A great book has been written about it called "Off-Center: the Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy" Somebody should send Gergen and his pals a copy.

There are, of course, a million examples of power crazed, partisan actions on the part of the GOP congressional majority over the years (not the least of which was an impeachment.) And it's not like they have been quiet about it. Here's Tom Delay all the way back in 1991:

We have a small faction, and they are a minority, who believe they are there to govern. Then there is the majority of us who believe that indeed we are there to govern but more importantly we are there to be an opposition to the Democratic philosophy and the only way to do that is through confrontation.

It's a real shame about bipartisanship going the way of the buggy whip, but blaming Democrats for it is laughable. If anything they hung on long after it was obvious that the Republicans were punking them over and over again. Rank and file Democrats have finally had it up to here and are sending a message to their party that they aren't going to sit by and let it happen anymore. The country is in deep trouble and somebody has to step up and put a stop to this.

Naturally, now that the crooked Republicans have shown themselves to be miserable failures at every aspect of governing, which they have consciously done without Democratic input, the mandarins who have been conspicuously silent about the excessive GOP partisanship of the last six years (and the previous decade as well) are calling for comity. If Democrats win in November, I have no doubt we are going to read sanctimonious op-ed after sanctimonious speech about how the Democrats need to put all this unpleasantness behind them and run the congress in a bipartisan spirit to heal the country's wounds.

It's always the same old nonsense with these people. The Republicans run the country into the ground, treat the Democrats like enemies of the state and when they are finally done screwing things up (and exhausted from counting all the money they've stolen from the taxpayers)the Dems have to clean up their mess. And they're supposed to be generous and kind and not embarrass anyone when they do it.

I have no doubt that's what will happen again. But I'm not ready to make nice, not by a long shot. The internet is a powerful tool that keeps a record of every rotten thing these people have ever done and said and I will never let them forget it.

Update: McJoan over at kos today has a great quote:

"Bipartisanship only works when the other side compromises, too. Otherwise it's just capitulation."

That seems like an obvious point. Perhaps David Gergen can give us all an example of anything Joe Lieberman has been able to get the Republicans to compromise on in the last six years. In fact, I'd be interested in hearing about any Republican compromises with Democrats in the last six years. I'm sure there must be a few.

Update II: Joe Gandelman of The Moderate Voice, examines various lessons people might take from the race if Lamont wins on Tuesday. One of them is this:

Bipartisanship Has Limits: If Karl Rove’s strategy has been to paint the United States’ security in danger if Democrats win control, and accuse Democrats who raise questions about the war as wanting to “cut and run” (event it is conceivable that someone supported the war but has very serious questions about its conduct), then it doomed Lieberman’s brand of bipartisanship. Rather than cultivate cooperation, Bush’s “your either with us or against us” has been applied to domestic politics and it sabotaged Lieberman’s cooperation with Bush would be perceived by many in his party.

That would be my take.

.
digby 8/06/2006 11:44:00 AM Comments (37) | Trackback (0)

lieberman has been a wanker on a lot more than the war.

2006-08-03T19:10:00.000-08:00

Greenfield: It's more than just Iraq
Lieberman has long been on the outs with his party's base

By Jeff Greenfield
CNN Senior Analyst

Thursday, August 3, 2006; Posted: 10:13 p.m. EDT (02:13 GMT)

Sen. Joseph Lieberman differs with his party's base not only on Iraq but also on vouchers and affirmative action.

NEW YORK (CNN) -- If the latest Quinnipiac University Poll is right, three-term Sen. Joseph Lieberman is headed for defeat Tuesday in Connecticut's Democratic primary, and Iraq -- more specifically, his steadfast support for that war -- is the big reason.

But it's not the only reason, which is something those looking for broader lessons from this primary campaign might keep in mind.

Yes, of course rival Ned Lamont would never have mounted so daunting a challenge to Lieberman without the Iraq issue, but take a look back to the key "use of force" resolution passed by Congress in October 2002.

Of the Democratic presidential wannabees who were in the Senate back then, just about all of them -- Sens. John Kerry, John Edwards, Hillary Clinton, Evan Bayh, Chris Dodd -- also voted for the resolution empowering the president to use force against Iraq. Among presidential aspirants, only Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold voted "no."

But Lieberman's backing was different: It lasted far longer and was far more full-throated. As late as last November, with conditions in Iraq producing a massive dose of second thoughts from one-time war-backers, he wrote an op-ed piece for The Wall Street Journal hailing "visible and practical" progress, and celebrating the spread of satellite TV and cell phone use.

President Bush often quoted Lieberman as evidence of bipartisan support of his policies. Most memorably, at the 2005 State of the Union speech, Bush embraced Lieberman -- a moment known scornfully as "the kiss" to the senator's foes.

But it's important to remember that Lieberman's problems with Democratic constituencies go back further. He has often taken positions at odds with his party's base. For instance, he supported vouchers for public school students so they might attend other schools -- a position public school teachers' unions strongly oppose. This year, both Connecticut teachers' unions have endorsed Lamont.

In the past, Lieberman has questioned the value of affirmative action. Ten years ago, he said: "Affirmative action is dividing us in ways its creators could never have intended."

It's not exactly a coincidence that prominent African-American politician Rep. Maxine Waters of California and the Rev. Al Sharpton are supporting Lamont.

And last year, he supported federal intervention in the case of Terri Schiavo, a brain-damaged woman at the center of a long legal battle over whether she could be taken off life support, thus aligning himself on that issue with religious conservatives. Schiavo's husband is campaigning for Lamont, and those Democrats generally unhappy with the power of the "Religious Right" gained another reason to oppose the incumbent.

Then there's lingering unhappiness over Lieberman's decision in 2000 to run both for vice president and his Senate seat. Had Al Gore won the White House, Lieberman's replacement would have been chosen by a Republican governor -- costing Democrats control of the Senate and fueling the idea among some that Lieberman cared more about his career than his party.

And his promise to run as an independent if he loses the primary might complicate Democratic efforts to take two or three House seats in his state from vulnerable GOP incumbents.

So though a Lieberman loss will be interpreted as a signal that the party's base will demand an anti-Iraq presidential candidate, don't forget the special circumstances that Lieberman is facing.

One more question: Although polls suggest Lieberman could win in November running as an independent, wouldn't that course be a lot harder for him to follow if he loses the primary in a landslide?

maybe the heat wave is caused by the burning of flags.

2006-08-02T16:47:00.000-08:00

Baby, it's hot outside ...
Joshua Holland (2:44PM) link

It's 101 degrees here in our nation's capitol. Neither I, nor my loyal but hirsute canine companion, the talented Red Dog, are digging it.

It's the same heatwave that killed 164 people in California recently. That's nothing; a similar blast in Europe killed 11,000 in France alone in the summer of 2003.

Earlier this summer, we had the deluge. Rain swamped roads, knocked out power, stranded people on their roofs and caused 200,000 Pennsylvanians to flee their homes (joining tens of thousands who remain refugees a year after Katrina). The Boston Globe called it "The worst flooding in the eastern United States for decades."

It was "triggered by days of torrential downpours." In the Dakotas, farmers (and everyone else) would give their left nut (or left boob) for just one of those days. They've seen a return of the dustbowl:

Fields of wheat, durum, and barley in the Dakotas this dry summer will never end up as pasta, bread, or beer. What is left of the stifled crops has been salvaged to feed livestock struggling on pastures where hot winds blow clouds of dirt from dried-out ponds.
Some ranchers have been forced to sell their entire herds, and others are either moving their cattle to greener pastures or buying more already-costly feed.
Farm ponds and other small bodies of water have dried out from the heat, leaving the residual alkali dust to be whipped up by the wind. The blowing, dirt-and-salt mixture is a phenomenon that hasn't been seen in south central North Dakota since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s…
Mark Svoboda, a climatologist for the National Drought Mitigation Center, told the Globe that more than 60 percent of the country is in a drought, extending from Georgia to Arizona and across the north through the Dakotas, Minnesota, Montana, and Wisconsin.

And while George W. Bush trusts a Sci-fi writer who says it's not due to man-made causes, George Monbiot writes, "the consensus among climatologists is that temperatures will rise in the 21st century by between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees centigrade; by up to 10 times, in other words, the increase we have suffered so far."

Conservatives argue that we can't prove that the increase in extreme weather over the past few years is a product of greenhouse gasses, even if it's consistent with the scientific models, and as far as I understand it they're right. What they don't say is that definitive proof will come far too late to do anything about it. It's a gamble with the whole planet at stake.

Ultimately, it's not the science that makes me gloomy, but the politics. In his excellent book, Collapse, anthropologist Jared Diamond looked at around a dozen societies that changed their environment in ways that threatened their very existence. Some fell apart and disappeared, others overcame their issues and continue to thrive today. Diamond identified five or six factors that made the difference (I don't remember exactly how many), but the one that stood out for me was political leadership; some societies had leaders who were sufficiently aware of their surroundings and bold enough to change the status quo, and they came up with survival strategies. Others whistled by the graveyard, and their people now lie in the proverbial dustbin of history.

So I think about the folks "leading" us, five or so miles from where I sit. They're debating the estate taxe and the minimum wage. They take time talking about amending the Constitution to criminalize flag-burning. And they've declared a rhetorical "war" on a problem that pales in comparison with the potential disaster of catastrophic climate change. We know which type of leaders we have -- we're faced with a narrowly-delineated political culture with sharp limitations on what's possible to even discuss.

The difference between the problems faced by the societies Diamond studied and the issue of climate change is that those other societies' problems were localized. Iceland's soil erosion didn't impact Papua New Guinea. But our rump political culture has the potential to impact all of humanity. We're five percent of the population and we're responsible for over five times that amount of the world's greenhouse gasses.

Sorry to be depressing. But sooner or later, we're going to have to face up to these issues. We can only hope it'll be soon enough.

Copyright © Joshua Holland. Material presented on The Gadflyer is the opinion of the respective author and not that of The Gadflyer, the web host or any other entity.

a lesson from the brilliant juan cole.

2006-07-31T18:23:00.000-08:00

What is Hizbullah?

Western and Israeli pundits keep comparing Hizbullah to al-Qaeda. It is a huge conceptual error. There is a crucial difference between an international terrorist network like al-Qaeda, which can be disrupted by good old policing techniques (such as inserting an agent in the Western Union office in Karachi), and a sub-nationalist movement.

Al-Qaeda is some 5,000 multinational volunteers organized in tiny cells.

Hizbullah is a mass expression of subnationalism that has the loyalty of some 1.3 million highly connected and politically mobilized peasants and slum dwellers. Over a relatively compact area.

I take sub-nationalism as a concept from Anthony D. Smith. It would be most familiar to Western readers under the rubric of the Irish Catholics of North Ireland, or even the Scots of the UK. Subnationalism, like the larger, over-arching nationalism, is a mass movement.

Thus, a very large number of the Pushtuns in Afghanistan are sub-nationalists with a commitment to Pushtun dominance. They deeply resent the victory of the Northern Alliance (i.e. Tajiks, Hazara Shiites, and Uzbeks) in 2001-2002. A lot of what our press calls resurgent "Taliban" activity is just Pushtun irredentism. There are approximately 14 million Pushtuns in Afghanistan and another 14 million or so in Pakistan.

The Shiites of southern Lebanon are compact enough to likewise offer a subnationalism. Note that this is a new phenomenon. The Shiite masses were not socially and politically mobilized until at least the 1970s, and probably it is more accurate to say the 1980s. The main factor in causing these peasant sharecroppers to become politically aware and mobilized was the Arab Israeli conflict. The Israelis stole some of their land in 1948 and expelled 100,000 Palestinians north into south Lebanon, where they competed for resources with local Lebanese Shiites. In the late 1960s and early 1970s the Palestinians became politically and militarily organized by the PLO. The Shiites' conflict with the PLO in the southern camps in the 1970s was probably a key beginning, but from 1982 it was primarily their conflict with the Israeli Occupation army that spurred them on. Processes of integration into the world market and increased mechanization of south Lebanon agriculture, as well as urbanization (Tyre, south Beirut) provided a *social* mobilization substrate that enabled but did not cause their *political mobilization* (see Dick Norton's book on early AMAL). The rise of a Shiite wealthy class, especially as a result of commerce with the Oil Gulf, added to the community's organizational capacity and resources. Still, the Shiites of south Lebanon are generally poor and a lot of them are still rural.

The Sunni Arabs of central, west and north Iraq are now also creating a subnationalism and organizing extensive paramilitary cells with highly significant asymmetrical warfare capabilities. The entire might of the formidable US military machine has made no headway against these 5 million persons.

Where subnationalisms are organized by party-militias willing to use carbombings and other asymmetrical forms of warfare, they are extremely difficult, if not impossible to defeat militarily. It would take a World War II style crushing military defeat of these populations, with the willingness of the conqueror to suffer tens of thousands dead in troop casualties. Israel is not even in a position to risk such a thing, given its small population.

Hizbullah is not like al-Qaeda in any way, sociologically speaking, and making such an analogy is a sure way for a general or politician to trick himself into entering the fires of hell.

What the Israelis set out to do, if they intended to "destroy" or even substantially attrite Hizbullah, was completely impractical. What they have done is to convince even Lebanese formerly on the fence about the issue that Hizbullah's leaders were correct in predicting that Lebanon would again be attacked in the most brutal and horrible way by the Israelis and that an even more powerful deterrent is needed. I.e more silkworms, not fewer. . The days when the Israelis could lord it over disconnected unmobilized Arab peasant villagers with their high tech army are coming to a close. The Arabs are still very weak, but are throwing up powerful asymmetrical challenges (e.g. party-militias with silkworm missiles!). Israeli alarm about the new connectedness of their foe explains the orgy of destruction aimed at bridges, roads, television and radio facilities and internet servers. But it is too late to disconnect the south Lebanese, who can easily and quickly rebuild all those connectors.

One hope the Israeli hawks appear to entertain is that they can permanently depopulate strips Lebanon south of the Litani river. Since most Shiites vote Hizbullah and offer political support and cover to it, fewer people means fewer assets for the party-militia. This project would require the total destruction of large numbers of villages and the permanent displacement of their inhabitants north to Beirut.

That is why the massacre at Qana occurred. The Israelis had bombed Qana 80 times. They were destroying all of its buildings. Therefore, of course, they destroyed the building where dozens of children and families were hiding. This tactic is both collective punishment and ethnic cleansing all at once. It is not only a matter, as the Israelis claim, of hitting Hizbullah rocket launchers. They are destroying all of the buildings.

The Israeli demographic project of thinning out the population of the far south of Lebanon will fail. They do not control that territory, and cannot stop people from coming back and rebuilding. The Israelis have an Orientalist myth that the Arabs are Bedouin and not attached to their ancestral villages. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Palestinian refugees in Lebanon still around their camps in accordance with the geography of their former villages. The Lebanese Shiites will mostly come back.

The Israelis cannot win this struggle against a sophisticated, highly organized and well armed subnationalism.

The only practical thing to do when you can't easily beat people into submission is to find a compromise with them that both sides can live with. It will be a hard lesson for both the Lebanese Shiites and the Israelis. But they will learn it or will go on living with a lot of death and destruction.
posted by Juan @ 7/31/2006 06:21:00 AM 0 comments

where'd my retirement go?

2006-07-25T18:55:00.000-08:00

(ed. note-----save this article. you can refer back to it a year or to down the road when you are looking for a job and wondering what happened to all the promises and guarantees about your retirement. at least you'll have social security. or will you? there's a new push on to loot that as well. lots of retirement programs have already been looted. why not? the national treasury has been looted. once they got that they figure they may as well go ahead and get it all. oh well, you've worked this long you can go ahead and just get another job. only now you will be competing with forced chinese labor. hope you are going to get a lot of untaxed inheritance. or maybe you have a bunch of untaxed high dividend stocks in your portfolio. if not you can just get your bowl and start knocking on your neighbors' back doors. ) harpo

The Suicide of Capitalism
by Molly Ivins

In case you haven’t got anything else to worry about—like war in the Middle East, nuclear showdowns, global warming or Apocalypse Now—how about the suicide of capitalism?

Late last month, the U.S. Court of Appeals struck down a new rule by the Securities and Exchange Commission requiring mandatory registration with the SEC for most hedge funds. This may not strike you as the end of the world, but that’s because you’ve either forgotten what a hedge fund is or how much trouble they can get us into.

These investment pools for rich folks are now a $1.2 trillion industry (known to insiders, I am pleased to report, as “the hedge fund community"). Hedge funds are now beginning to be used by average investors and pension investors. Back in 1998, there was this little-bitty old hedge fund called Long Term Capital Management. Because hedge funds make high-risk bets, Long Term Capital got itself in so much trouble its collapse actually threatened to wreck world markets, and regulators had to step in to negotiate a $3.6 billion bailout. A similar fiasco at this point probably would break world markets.

The Securities and Exchange Commission under William Donaldson (appointed after the Enron mess) had tried to regulate hedge funds. But Christopher Cox, current SEC chairman and no friend of regulation, said he would consult other members of the administration about whether to appeal the ruling, which “came on the same day as disclosures,” reports The Washington Post, that the feds “are investigating Pequot Capital Management, Inc., a $7 billion hedge fund, for possible insider trading.” Nice timing, judges.

This is the third time in less than a year the appeals court has blocked the SEC from acting beyond its authority. According to The Washington Post, “Former SEC member Harvey J. Goldschmid, who voted to approve the plan, yesterday urged regulators to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, members of Congress or both. In the Pequot case, a former SEC lawyer who worked on the Pequot investigation before being fired by the agency has written a letter to key members of the Senate banking and finance committees alleging that the SEC dropped the probe because of political pressure.” The lawyer said he was prevented by political pressure from interviewing a top Wall Street executive: Sources said the executive was John J. Mack, once chairman of Pequot and now chief executive of Morgan Stanley—and a major fundraiser for President Bush’s campaigns. I’d say the guy’s wired.

So what we have here is yet another case of ideological decision-making ("all government regulation is bad") being applied despite the most obvious promptings of common sense. Come to think of it, that’s exactly the same pattern this administration has followed with war in the Middle East, nuclear showdowns, global warming and Apocalypse Now.

Well, if the administration won’t do something, how about Congress? Reps. Barney Frank, Michael Capuano and Paul Kanjorski are co-sponsoring a bill to reverse the court decision—and to gather more information about how hedge funds affect the economy. This would seem a peppy response, except Congress seems quite determined to do nothing at all these days, having already beaten the record of the “do-nothing Congress” of the Truman era. As near as can be figured out, the Republican “game plan” is to do absolutely nothing between now and November. This doesn’t improve anyone’s opinion of the Republican Congress, but has the happy effect of dragging the Democrats down with them.

too sad.

2006-07-23T10:27:00.000-08:00

The Damned
Posted by James Wolcott
The war crimes of the United States compound by the minute, the hour, the day. I predict that George Bush, upon leaving office, will be the most despised president in American history. He will have his core support, the clotted, stunted brains that collect at sites like Lucianne.com and Powerline, but he will enjoy no Reaganesque orange sunset afterglow (or Nixonian self-rehabilitation), so deep, lasting, and tragic is the damage he's done, a damage abetted by a craven, corrupt political class and a press that even now, as the full dimensions of the disaster unfold before us, is unable to sound alarm, so accustomed as they've become to their role as sponges and clever snots. History will not forgive Bush or the United States, nor should it, for raising and destroying the hopes of the Iraqi people, and presiding over the dissolution of their nation into a failed state. Robert Dreyfuss at TomPaine.com:

"Iraq is engaged in a full-fledged civil war. For those remaining defenders of the U.S. occupation of Iraq, who argue that the United States needs to stay put in order to prevent civil war, it’s too late. It’s here, in all of its brutality and ugliness.

"The violence is not only engulfing Baghdad—home to approximately one-fifth of Iraq’s population—but Basra, Iraq’s second city and its only port. In the north, there is violence in Kirkuk, in what has been, until now, the relatively unscathed heartland of the Shiite south, as well.

"What is unfolding in Iraq is a staggering tragedy. An entire nation is dying, right in front of us. And the worst part of it is: It may be too late to do anything to stop it."

"The blame for this carnage must be laid squarely at the feet of George W. Bush. The U.S. invasion of Iraq was ordered against the advice of the CIA, the State Department and most U.S. military officers, and in defiance of the United Nations, America’s allies, and the Arab world. The United States attacked and destroyed a nation that had never attacked the United States, which had no weapons of mass destruction and which had no connection to al-Qaida."

As Dreyfuss observes, the death spiral will continue because the Bush administration is in self-hypnotic denial and, I would add, there is no peace movement or political opposition with any upward force. Compare Iraq with Vietnam, and the sense of resignation and futility is apparent. I will never forgive Joe Lieberman for undercutting John Murtha and muffling the urgency of Murtha's warnings about how rapidly Iraq was unraveling by issuing one of his classic mushmouthed pieties. He immediately gave the White House and the War Party bipartisan cover, helping ensure the policies that weren't working would continue not working as the death-toll tabulator rose and rose.

But it is not enough to blame Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Blair, Lieberman, the neocons, the liberal hawks, and other useless idiots. By our actions in Iraq, and our complicity and collaboration with the Israeli assault on Lebanon, American citizens are culpable for letting 9/11 turn them/us into passive accomplices. "The complicity of the American public in these heinous crimes will damn America for all time in history," Paul Craig Roberts rages at Antiwar.

The scope of those heinous crimes won't be known until the air raids end and the smoke clears, but Robert Fisk escorts the reader on a scenic introductory tour of ravaged Beirut:

"I lived here through 15 years of civil war that took 150,000 lives, and two Israeli invasions and years of Israeli bombardments that cost the lives of a further 20,000 of its people. I have seen them armless, legless, headless, knifed, bombed and splashed across the walls of houses. Yet they are a fine, educated, moral people whose generosity amazes every foreigner, whose gentleness puts any Westerner to shame, and whose suffering we almost always ignore.

"They look like us, the people of Beirut. They have light-coloured skin and speak beautiful English and French. They travel the world. Their women are gorgeous and their food exquisite. But what are we saying of their fate today as the Israelis - in some of their cruellest attacks on this city and the surrounding countryside - tear them from their homes, bomb them on river bridges, cut them off from food and water and electricity? We say that they started this latest war, and we compare their appalling casualties - 240 in all of Lebanon by last night - with Israel's 24 dead, as if the figures are the same.

"And then, most disgraceful of all, we leave the Lebanese to their fate like a diseased people and spend our time evacuating our precious foreigners while tut-tutting about Israel's 'disproportionate' response to the capture of its soldiers by Hizbollah.

"I walked through the deserted city centre of Beirut yesterday and it reminded more than ever of a film lot, a place of dreams too beautiful to last, a phoenix from the ashes of civil war whose plumage was so brightly coloured that it blinded its own people. This part of the city - once a Dresden of ruins - was rebuilt by Rafiq Hariri, the prime minister who was murdered scarcely a mile away on 14 February last year.

[snip]

"At the empty Etoile restaurant - best snails and cappuccino in Beirut, where Hariri once dined Jacques Chirac - I sat on the pavement and watched the parliamentary guard still patrolling the façade of the French-built emporium that houses what is left of Lebanon's democracy. So many of these streets were built by Parisians under the French mandate and they have been exquisitely restored, their mock Arabian doorways bejewelled with marble Roman columns dug from the ancient Via Maxima a few metres away.

"Hariri loved this place and, taking Chirac for a beer one day, he caught sight of me sitting at a table. 'Ah Robert, come over here,' he roared and then turned to Chirac like a cat that was about to eat a canary. 'I want to introduce you, Jacques, to the reporter who said I couldn't rebuild Beirut!'

"And now it is being un-built. The Martyr Rafiq Hariri International Airport has been attacked three times by the Israelis, its glistening halls and shopping malls vibrating to the missiles that thunder into the runways and fuel depots. Hariri's wonderful transnational highway viaduct has been broken by Israeli bombers. Most of his motorway bridges have been destroyed. The Roman-style lighthouse has been smashed by a missile from an Apache helicopter. Only this small jewel of a restaurant in the centre of Beirut has been spared. So far.

"It is the slums of Haret Hreik and Ghobeiri and Shiyah that have been levelled and 'rubble-ised' and pounded to dust, sending a quarter of a million Shia Muslims to seek sanctuary in schools and abandoned parks across the city. Here, indeed, was the headquarters of Hizbollah, another of those 'centres of world terror' which the West keeps discovering in Muslim lands. Here lived Sayed Hassan Nasrallah, the Party of God's leader, a ruthless, caustic, calculating man; and Sayad Mohamed Fadlallah, among the wisest and most eloquent of clerics; and many of Hizbollah's top military planners - including, no doubt, the men who planned over many months the capture of the two Israeli soldiers last Wednesday.

"But did the tens of thousands of poor who live here deserve this act of mass punishment? For a country that boasts of its pin-point accuracy - a doubtful notion in any case, but that's not the issue - what does this act of destruction tell us about Israel? Or about ourselves?"

I think we know what it tells us. And yet I feel confident that if U.S. support for the Israeli campaign results in violent blowback, our politicians, pundits, and editorialists will once again don the American bridal veil of innocence, and profess bewilderment that anyone would want to harm us. Larry C. Johnson at No Quarter spells out the shock that may be in store:

"During the next two weeks we are likely to see combat in southern Lebanon intensify. Most of the action will be on the ground rather than in the air. Both sides will suffer significant casualties. If the United States is perceived (emphasis on perceived) as encouraging or directing the Israeli response [we're already beyond that point, given the NY Times front page story this morning about the US rushing precision-guided bombs to Israel], the odds increase that Hezbollah will ratchet things up another notch by playing the terrorist card.

"We should not confuse Hezbollah with Al Qaeda. Unlike Al Qaeda, Hezbollah has a real and substantial international network. Unlike Al Qaeda, Hezbollah has a real and substantial international political and financial network. They have personnel and supporters scattered in countries around the world who have the training and resources to mount attacks. Hezbollah has no qualms about using terrorist attacks as part of a broader strategy to achieve its objectives. The last major Hezbollah attack against the United States was the June 1996 attack on the U.S. military apartment complex in Dharan, Saudi Arabia. Hezbollah also organized the attacks on the Israeli Embassy in Argentina in 1992 and Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires in 1994. But they also have exercised restraint when they felt they could achieve their objectives through political means. The ten year hiatus in major mass casualty attacks could come to a shattering end in the coming months, and American citizens are likely to pay some of that price with their own blood."

you are a democrat running for office and you need some talking points? here you go.

2006-07-18T18:21:00.000-08:00

(ed.note-----right now we are spending 11 million$ per day in iraq. with that money we could hire, at $200.00 dollars per day, 1100 schoolteachers for each and every state in the union. do your own arithmetic. what else could we do. think if we rolled back the tax cuts for the wealthiest americans in addition to this $11 million per day. what could we do. balance the budget? have a surplus? health care for all americans? food for those 1 out of 5 american children who go to bed hungry at night? what do you think?)

March of Folly
By Paul Krugman
The New York Times
Published: July 17, 2006

Since those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it — and since the cast of characters making pronouncements on the crisis in the Middle East is very much the same as it was three or four years ago — it seems like a good idea to travel down memory lane. Here's what they said and when they said it:

"The greatest thing to come out of [invading Iraq] for the world economy ... would be $20 a barrel for oil." Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corporation (which owns Fox News), February 2003

"Oil Touches Record $78 on Mideast Conflict." Headline on www.foxnews.com, July 14, 2006

"The administration's top budget official estimated today that the cost of a war with Iraq could be in the range of $50 billion to $60 billion," saying that "earlier estimates of $100 billion to $200 billion in Iraq war costs by Lawrence B. Lindsey, Mr. Bush's former chief economic adviser, were too high." The New York Times, Dec. 31, 2002

"According to C.B.O.'s estimates, from the time U.S. forces invaded Iraq in March 2003, $290 billion has been allocated for activities in Iraq. ... Additional costs over the 2007-2016 period would total an estimated $202 billion under the first [optimistic] scenario, and $406 billion under the second one." Congressional Budget Office, July 13, 2006

"Peacekeeping requirements in Iraq might be much lower than historical experience in the Balkans suggests. There's been none of the record in Iraq of ethnic militias fighting one another that produced so much bloodshed and permanent scars in Bosnia." Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense and now president of the World Bank, Feb. 27, 2003

"West Baghdad is no stranger to bombings and killings, but in the past few days all restraint has vanished in an orgy of 'ethnic cleansing.' Shia gunmen are seeking to drive out the once-dominant Sunni minority and the Sunnis are forming neighborhood posses to retaliate. Mosques are being attacked. Scores of innocent civilians have been killed, their bodies left lying in the streets." The Times of London, July 14, 2006

"Earlier this week, I traveled to Baghdad to visit the capital of a free and democratic Iraq." President Bush, June 17, 2006

"People are doing the same as [in] Saddam's time and worse. ... These were the precise reasons that we fought Saddam and now we are seeing the same things." Ayad Allawi, Mr. Bush's choice as Iraq's first post-Saddam prime minister, November 2005

"Iraq's new government has another able leader in Speaker Mashhadani. ... He rejects the use of violence for political ends. And by agreeing to serve in a prominent role in this new unity government, he's demonstrating leadership and courage." President Bush, May 22, 2006

"Some people say 'we saw you beheading, kidnappings and killing. In the end we even started kidnapping women who are our honor.' These acts are not the work of Iraqis. I am sure that he who does this is a Jew and the son of a Jew." Mahmoud Mashhadani, speaker of the Iraqi Parliament, July 13, 2006

"My fellow citizens, not only can we win the war in Iraq, we are winning the war in Iraq." President Bush, Dec. 18, 2005

"I think I would answer that by telling you I don't think we're losing." Gen. Peter Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff, when asked whether we're winning in Iraq, July 14, 2006

"Regime change in Iraq would bring about a number of benefits for the region. ...Extremists in the region would have to rethink their strategy of jihad. Moderates throughout the region would take heart, and our ability to advance the Israeli-Palestinian peace process would be enhanced." Vice President Dick Cheney, Aug. 26, 2002

"Bush — The world is coming unglued before his eyes. His naïve dreams are a Wilsonian disaster." Newsweek Conventional Wisdom Watch, July 24, 2006 edition

"It's time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be the commander in chief for three more critical years, and that in matters of war, we undermine presidential credibility at our nation's peril." Senator Joseph Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, Dec. 6, 2005

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now." Representative Tom DeLay, Republican of Texas, on the campaign against Slobodan Milosevic, April 28, 1999

had enough yet?

2006-07-13T20:09:00.000-08:00

(ed.note=====landay indicates to me that he knows what many of us have suspected and that this program has been used to spy on people for whatever reasons this administration wanted. we are a nation of laws so that trust is a moot question. i don't trust this administration to not spy for political reasons. shit. get real. but trust is not part of the equation. the law says you can't do it and the law must be adhered to. time to get real and hold these criminals to accountability.
understand landay's third paragraph concerning explosive disclosures. time to get real.) harpo

Posted on Thu, Jul. 13, 2006

Bush agrees to have domestic eavesdropping program reviewed

By Jonathan S. Landay
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - In a policy reversal, President Bush has agreed to sign legislation allowing a secret federal court to assess the constitutionality of his warrantless domestic eavesdropping program, a senior Republican senator announced Thursday.

By having the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court conduct the review instead of a regular federal court, the Bush administration would ensure the secrecy of details of the highly classified program. The administration has argued that making details of the program public would compromise national security.

However, such details could include politically explosive disclosures that the government has kept tabs on people it shouldn't have been monitoring.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., who's questioned the program's legality, said the legislation he's sponsoring strikes a balance between the president's inherent constitutional authority to protect the country and citizens' right to privacy.

"It is a weighing of the interests in security to fight terrorism with the privacy interests which are involved," Specter said. "You have here a recognition by the president that he doesn't have a blank check."

Specter said the FISA court wouldn't have to make it findings public.

Bush agreed to sign the bill only if it passed Congress without major changes, Specter said.

The bill was the result of weeks of negotiations between Specter and the White House.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales welcomed the measure, saying it "recognizes the president's constitutional authority to gather up information."

Civil liberties groups called the measure a ruse designed to keep Congress and the public in the dark about the full extent of what they condemned as an illegal program run by the National Security Agency, which conducts electronic eavesdropping.

"Senator Specter's proposal would set up a sham judicial review," charged Kate Martin, the director of the Center for National Security Studies. "It gives them a blank check and legal cover for what they have been doing."

Lee Tien, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group that's suing AT&T over its cooperation with the NSA program, called the bill "terrible" in part because it provides no opportunity for outside attorneys to contest the program's legality before FISA court.

"This bill says nothing about how any outsider or the folks that we represent would have any kind of a voice in this," he said. "It's almost alien to the concept of judicial review in this country."

The NSA has been monitoring overseas telephone and Internet communications of Americans suspected of supporting or belonging to al-Qaida or other terrorist groups without court orders since just after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Bush confirmed the existence of the Terrorist Surveillance Program after its disclosure by The New York Times in November. He said the revelation had seriously damaged national security, and he rejected charges that the program was illegal.

Democrats and civil liberties advocates contended that Bush violated the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. The act requires federal officials to obtain warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to monitor overseas communications of U.S. citizens.

Some Republicans, including Specter, also expressed concerns that the program violated FISA.

The administration said Bush could authorize warrantless wiretaps under his constitutional authority to protect the nation's security and a congressional resolution empowering him to use force against al-Qaida.

The bill would allow the secret court to determine the constitutionality of foreign intelligence surveillance operations, but wouldn't make such reviews mandatory.

Specter said Bush insisted on that language "because the president does not want to bind presidents in the future" to having to seek the court's permission to conduct warrantless eavesdropping programs.

The bill also:

-Would make changes to FISA that are sought by the administration. They include extending the period in which federal officials could conduct emergency surveillance programs before asking the secret court to approve a warrant from three days to a week.

-Require the attorney general to certify that the information gathered through surveillance was being used for national security purposes and that the information couldn't be obtained through "normal investigative techniques."

He also would have to explain how the program conformed to the Constitution and what steps were being taken to ensure the destruction of information mistakenly gathered on Americans with no connections to terrorism.

If the FISA court found the program unconstitutional, the attorney general could make modifications and resubmit them for approval.

-Would also allow the attorney general to seek the transfer of all regular federal court challenges to federal surveillance programs to the FISA court for adjudication. If the FISA court found problems, the cases would be sent back to the original court.

There are about 100 such cases pending.

Sending all the legal challenges to the FISA court would vastly reduce the number of judicial authorities weighing in on their legality, said Tien, the civil liberties group attorney.

McClatchy correspondents Stephen Henderson and Marisa Taylor contributed to this report.

© 2006 McClatchy Washington Bureau and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.realcities.com

had enough yet?

2006-07-13T19:19:00.000-08:00

(ed. note.--- this is some legislation that has been left over from tom delay (the bugman). since tom left the house in disgrace he has decided not to go back into the bug extermination business as he would be
risking additional indictments including fratricide.) harpo

Published on Thursday, July 13, 2006 by the San Francisco Chronicle
House Eyes National Toxics Law
GOP lawmakers would forbid states from passing tougher pesticide bills
by Zachary Coile

House Republicans are pushing new legislation that could wipe out the ability of California and other states to ban or strictly limit the use of pesticides and toxic industrial chemicals that can jeopardize human health.

The measure, approved by a House committee Wednesday on a mostly party line vote, is the latest effort by the Republican-led Congress to block states from enacting environmental, public health or consumer protections that are more stringent than federal standards.

The bill could override a new California law to ban the use of brominated fire retardants, which are believed to have some of the same neurotoxic effects as PCBs and have been found in high concentrations in fish in the San Francisco Bay.

The measure could also thwart new restrictions passed last month by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to restrict the use of certain chemicals in plastic baby bottles, pacifiers and toys, after studies showed they could pose a health risk.

California officials say the bill is part of a broader push by Republicans to aid their allies in industry with weaker national standards on issues from food labeling to fuel efficiency to consumer financial privacy -- although some of the efforts have been blocked in the Senate.

Sponsors of the new bill say it is aimed at implementing the Stockholm Convention, an international treaty signed by 127 nations to ban some of the world's most dangerous chemicals -- called persistent organic pollutants, or POPs for short.

The treaty was first negotiated by President Bill Clinton and signed by President Bush in 2001, but it has yet to be ratified by Congress.

The treaty also is known as the "Dirty Dozen treaty" because it requires all signing countries to outlaw or severely restrict a dozen toxic chemicals -- such as DDT, dioxins, PCBs and the pesticide chlordane -- that can accumulate up the food chain and are linked to health effects including allergies, cancer, birth defects and damage to the immune and reproductive systems of humans and other species.

Bush endorsed the treaty at a Rose Garden ceremony in April 2001, saying, "We must work to eliminate or at least to severely restrict the release of these toxins without delay."

But environmentalists and public health advocates argue the new bill pushed by GOP lawmakers and backed by the White House is actually an effort to undermine the treaty by creating new loopholes that would allow the chemical industry to keep producing and selling potentially toxic agents.

The legislation would require the Environmental Protection Agency to use a cost-benefit standard when determining whether to ban chemicals in pesticides or industrial products. Critics claim the provision could delay the phasing out of toxins by forcing the agency to conduct economic analysis on whether new regulations are too onerous on the industry.

"These new criteria will expand the number of analyses required, delay regulatory action and provide many new opportunities to judicially challenge any EPA regulation of a future listed (toxic) chemical," said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., the ranking member on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

On a party line vote Wednesday, the committee defeated an effort to replace the cost-benefit standard with a standard that focused solely on human health risks.

Democrats complained the new legislation was aimed at blocking state and local governments from enacting their own tough standards to ban or restrict the use of toxic chemicals. The bill is opposed by a dozen state attorneys general, including California's Bill Lockyer, as well as the American Nurses Association and more than 60 environmental and public health groups.

The bill's sponsor, Rep. Paul Gillmor, R-Ohio, insisted that state and local governments would still have some authority under existing law to ban toxic chemicals or to petition the EPA to implement tougher restrictions.

But the bill's language makes clear the United States can only have a single national standard on new pollutants to meet the treaty's requirements, not a series of state standards.

Critics also complained the new legislation has no clear timetable to force EPA to act to regulate a new pollutant once it's been added to the treaty's list of banned substances.

"There's no requirement that EPA do anything after an international decision has been made to add a new (chemical) ... and no citizen participation process to challenge the EPA," said Rep. Lois Capps, D-Santa Barbara.

But Republicans on the panel said the measure was carefully written to avoid giving too much power to environmental officials at the United Nations and foreign countries over regulations in the United States.

"Simply put, (the bill) protects U.S. sovereignty," said Rep. John Sullivan, R-Okla.

The bill passed, 28-15, but it still faces several hurdles.

The House and Senate Agriculture committees must also approve bills to implement the treaty because it regulates pesticides. The Senate Energy and Public Works Committee has yet to take up any legislation related to the treaty.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee also sparred over a proposal to require manufacturers of antifreeze to use denatonium benzoate -- an extremely bitter substance that makes antifreeze unpalatable to drink. About 1,400 children and 10,000 animals are poisoned each year after drinking ethylene glycol, a toxic substance in antifreeze that has a sweet taste and smell that can be attractive to kids and pets.

But some Democrats argued the bill, despite its good intentions, may have unintended consequences. Denatonium benzoate does not biodegrade easily and some water agencies fear it could contaminate groundwater.

Critics said it would be irresponsible to pass the requirement and give broad legal immunity to antifreeze makers who use it without more research on the chemical's effects on human health.

But the bill's sponsors said the concerns were overblown, since the substance has been in widespread use in products since the 1960s. California, New Mexico and Oregon have passed laws requiring that a bittering agent be used in antifreeze, and other states are considering them. The bill passed by a 30-15 vote.

©2006 San Francisco Chronicle

###

brownback is a screwy, scary, dipshit jerk.

2006-06-19T18:33:00.000-08:00

The Da Vinci Senator
By Bob Geiger, AlterNet
Posted on June 19, 2006, Printed on June 19, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/37668/

The United States Senate is often called "the greatest deliberative body in the world," which usually raises the bar on the tenor and intellectual content of speeches given on the floor, if not for the official record.

Not so for Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., who took to the Senate floor last week to deliver a strident push for the bigoted "Marriage Protection Amendment." Alongside the typical massive distortions of the issue was an argument that was based almost solely on the opinion of a little-known conservative think tank affiliated with the Roman Catholic organization Opus Dei.

"The problem we have in front of us is the institution of marriage has been weakened, and the effort to redefine it on this vast social experiment that we have going on, redefining marriage differently than it has ever been defined before," the Kansas senator grimly intoned last week. "This effort of this vast social experiment, the early data that we see from other places, harms the institution of the family, the raising of the next generation. And it is harmful to the future of the republic."

Brownback then went on to give figures for how various states have shown their hatred of gay people with their own prohibitions on same-sex marriage and used that as his rationale for a similar amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

But Brownback really hit his stride when he described a paper called "Ten Principles on Marriage and the Public Good," published by a fairly new and extremely conservative group at Princeton University. According to Brownback, the paper is an "important statement of principles from top American scholars [to] be considered carefully by my colleagues." He then added that the sentiments expressed in the nonscientific treatise were so vital to our national dialog that they should "… help guide our debate on this issue."

The paper, sponsored by the Witherspoon Institute at Princeton, makes a case for banning same-sex marriage altogether. What's extraordinary is the idea of a United States senator attempting to sway opinion on an amendment that would have altered our Constitution (had it not been defeated last Wednesday) by using a paper from an organization linked to Opus Dei, a strict religious group that some former members have described as a cult.

Brownback spent a good part of his lengthy Senate speech last week citing the study and attributing it to "this Princeton group of scholars," while never mentioning that all of the findings were based on the ultraconservative Witherspoon Institute bolstered by the involvement -- directly or indirectly -- of a nonprofit, tax-exempt religious organization in Opus Dei.

So what exactly is the Witherspoon Institute, whose paper formed the foundation of Brownback's anti-gay argument?

The institute, which has only been around since 2003, has close ties to Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council, but is also tightly aligned with Opus Dei. Indeed, Luis Tellez, the president of the Witherspoon Institute is also the director and lead cleric of Opus Dei in Princeton.

Since its founding in 1928, Opus Dei has been known for its traditionalist values and right-wing political stances. And critics in academia -- which include former members who sometimes go through "deprogramming" upon exiting Opus Dei -- charge that organizations like the Witherspoon Institute are just veiled attempts by Opus Dei to spread its influence in top-tier academic circles.

So why then, is a U.S. senator offering to Congress "research" linked to Opus Dei on something as vital as amending the Constitution? It turns out that Brownback, who was formerly an evangelical Protestant, converted to Catholicism by way of Opus Dei in 2002 and was sponsored in that conversion by Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Penn., a vocal Opus Dei advocate.

Tellez, the leader of Opus Dei in Princeton, is a "numerary," considered the most conservative of the sect's members -- they are unmarried, celibate, devote every aspect of their lives to their spiritual beliefs and turn over their salaries from secular jobs to Opus Dei.

Again, it bears repeating that Tellez is also the head of the Witherspoon Institute, the group Brownback cited at great length as his primary argument against gay marriage.

And remember, it is Brownback, as an Opus Dei convert, who also leads the charge on Capitol Hill against abortion and stem cell research and who, along with Santorum, is seen by the Religious Right as a point man on "culture war" issues.

The other central figure in the Witherspoon orbit is Dr. Robert George, a Princeton professor and a board member in the institute who, not coincidentally, helped draft the federal gay-marriage ban that was just defeated in the Senate. George chaired a meeting of religious leaders in late 2005 that included Dr. James Dobson and other members of the extreme Religious Right. In fact, in addition to his pivotal role in the Witherspoon Institute, George is also a board member at Perkins' Family Research Council, a group known for its bigoted positions on the gay community.

And, via Brownback, all of this is ultimately finding its way into the halls of Congress.

While it may not be technically illegal for Brownback to be so clearly mixing hard-right religious ideology -- and faux-academic papers promoted by religious organizations like Opus Dei -- with debate on the Senate floor, it should certainly raise some eyebrows. In a country where strict separation of church and state is mandated, it seems Brownback is freely blending the two, attempting to use religious dogma to influence public policy -- all the while not disclosing to his Senate colleagues the background sources of the research he is citing.

But this should not be surprising coming from Brownback.

In a January 2006 Rolling Stone article, "God's Senator," Brownback is described as a religious zealot with a view for America's future that could almost be described as medieval.

"In his dream, America, the one he believes both the Bible and the Constitution promise, the state will simply wither away. In its place will be a country so suffused with God and the free market that the social fabric of the last hundred years -- schools, Social Security, welfare -- will be privatized or simply done away with," reads the article. "There will be no abortions; sex will be confined to heterosexual marriage. Men will lead families, mothers will tend children, and big business and the church will take care of all."

After all, it was Brownback, who came to Congress in 1994 and refused to sign Newt Gingrich's "Contract With America" because he felt it wasn't conservative enough. Even then, as a newcomer to the House of Representatives, Brownback believed that the vast majority of what he saw as Big Government should simply be eliminated, including the departments of education, energy and commerce.

And, yes, it was also Brownback who was so outraged at the split-second glimpse of Janet Jackson's nipple during the 2004 Super Bowl, that he introduced the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act, which substantially raised fines for such simple on-air displays of nudity.

Finally, in addition to being brought into Catholicism by the likes of Opus Dei and using laundered research by an affiliated group on the Senate floor, Brownback chairs a meeting every Tuesday night with the "Values Action Team," consisting of religious leaders like Dobson who help the senator formulate his thoughts on public policy issues.

According to Time magazine, Opus Dei has assets in the neighborhood of $2.8 billion and, with John McCain unlikely to significantly rouse the Religious Right in 2008, look for Brownback to be the guy that Opus Dei, Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council turn to as their presidential candidate.

And make no mistake about it: Brownback wants to run. So if you think his views for a new America, as viewed from the Senate floor, are scary, think of what he'll be like sitting at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

In his mind, it may already be ordained.

© 2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/37668/

freedom on the march --------- from juancole.com

2006-06-04T20:56:00.000-08:00

Sunday, June 04, 2006

Nearly 30 Dead in Basra Bombing, 62 Wounded

Political violence in the Iraqi Civil War left 44 dead on Saturday in an arc that stretched from the far south to the northeast of the country.

In Basra, guerrillas used a car bomb to kill 28 persons (according to late reports) and wound 62. The bomber set it off at a market in the south of the city, late afternoon on Saturday. Basra security has deteriorated dramatically this year. It is unclear who the perpetrator is. Some Arabic sources are speculating that it is an answer to Zarqawi's call to redouble the fight against Shiites. Al-Hayat speculates that it might have been a response to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's call to curb the oil-smuggling gangs in the city.

Courtesy KarbalaNews.net.

In the northeast, guerrillas launched a sophisticated attack on a police checkpoint near Baqubah. They threw grenades and used RPGs against police, killing 7 of them and wounding 10 other persons.

Also near Baqubah, heads of 8 persons were sent to the police, including 7 cousins and a Sunni mosque preacher, in empty banana cartons (-al-Hayat]. The preacher, according to a note found with the head, stood accused of having arranged for the assassination of 4 Shiite physicians in the area.

In Baghdad, a Russian diplomat and one other person were killed by guerrillas, who kidnapped 3 other Russian embassy personnel.

A spokesman for the Iraqi prime minister's office on Saturday rejected a US military appraisal that troops at Ishaqi in mid-March did nothing wrong. They attacked a safe house from which they maintain they took fire, and appear to have shot dead 11 civilians, including 4 children and 5 women. They then demolished the house and reported only 4 civilian deaths in such a way as to imply that they had died in the collapse of the building. A videotape was leaked to the BBC last week that clearly showed the bodies had died of gunshot wounds. The Iraqi government says it will do its own probe of Ishaqi.

Salafi Jihadi militiamen wearing black dominate some Sunni Arab neighborhoods in once-modern Western Baghdad, and they terrorize unveiled women.

A "British Brigade" of 150 young radical Muslim Britons has gone off to Iraq to fight for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his Salafi Jihadi movement. The illegal Iraq War and Anglo-American occupation of Iraq has radicalized many British Muslims, including the cell that blew up the London subway on 7/7 last year, and which was probably run by Ayman al-Zawahiri. Of the 150, those who survive will learn deadly skills that they can apply to future terror operations in the West.

Meanwhile, 23 Yemenis went on trial Saturday for forming an armed unit and planning to go fight the Americans in Iraq. Yes, you can hear the purling waters of Bush's Arab Spring just everywhere.

The networks in their evening news segments have given less and less attention to Iraq. It is hard and expensive to cover, reporters risk their lives, and they often get pressure in the aftermath for not having been "balanced".
posted by Juan @ 6/04/2006 06:30:00 AM 10 comments

bad timing laura? or just fucking stupid?

2006-06-04T20:37:00.000-08:00

Under fire in Iraq, at home
Tim Rutten
Regarding Media

June 3, 2006

WHEN two CBS journalists were killed and a third was critically wounded this week, the war in Iraq officially became the deadliest ever for combat correspondents.

The car bomb that took the lives of cameraman Paul Douglas and soundman James Brolan and badly injured reporter Kimberly Dozier pushed this conflict's journalistic death toll to 71. Twenty-six members of the news media's support staff also have been killed. By comparison, 69 journalists were killed during World War II, 63 in Vietnam and 17 in Korea. The majority of those killed in this conflict were Iraqis working with American or other Western news organizations.

As this toll has mounted, it's been curious to watch the change in attitude toward the press by the war's die-hard supporters. Initially, we were informed, the embedding process was going to produce a better sort of war correspondent — more Ernie Pyle, less David Halberstam. The eminent military historian Sir John Keegan, now a military analyst for Britain's Daily Telegraph and a great admirer of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, informed us that the embeds' experience of training and serving alongside fighting troops would create a new generation of journalists, free of the skeptical and adversarial taint that has poisoned combat correspondence since the Vietnam War. Keegan's American confrères more or less agreed.

As the war ground on — and so much of the news became so inconveniently bad — the tenor of this commentary changed. More recently, there has been a drumbeat of criticism alleging that the press corps in Iraq is misleading the American people because it is either too cowardly to leave the relative safety of the Green Zone, or too culturally biased to recognize what they see when they do.

The right-wing radio personality Laura Ingraham went on the "Today" show and charged the Baghdad press corps with simply "reporting from hotel balconies about the latest IEDs going off."

If Dozier ever recovers the full use of her legs, maybe she and Laura could go for a walk and talk the whole thing over.

In the New York Post, Ralph Peters excoriated Iraq correspondents for staying "safe in their enclaves protected by hired guns, complaining that it's too dangerous out on the streets. They're only in Baghdad for the byline …"

One suspects he meant "dateline," but perhaps he can explain that to Douglas' widow, when he pays a condolence call.

Best of all, though, were the comments by President Bush's new chief domestic policy advisor, Karl Zinsmeister. As a magazine editor, he made a trip to Iraq and wrote in the National Review that "many of the journalists observable in this war theater are bursting with knee-jerk suspicions and antagonisms for the warriors all around them. A significant number are whiny and appallingly soft … and show their discomfort clearly as they hide together in the press tents, fantasizing about expensive restaurants at home and plush hotels in Kuwait City, fondling keyboards and satellite phones with pale fingers, clinging to their world of offices and tattle and chatter where they feel less ineffective, less testosterone deficient …"

If Zinsmeister's busy schedule permits, maybe he could call on Brolan's 17-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter and explain how real men behave. On the other hand, maybe he should stay in the White House and mislead the president. He doesn't seem to mind.

Criticized for reporting

THIS week, moreover, many of the right-wing's most ardent press critics did a 180 and denounced correspondents for reporting too much out of Iraq. The stories they find so objectionable concern allegations that U.S. Marines executed as many as 24 civilians, including women and children, in the village of Haditha and, earlier, another civilian in Hamandiya. As The Times' Tony Perry reported Friday, the Corps shortly will file charges, including murder, in the latter incident. The events in Haditha are being investigated, but appear to involve not just the enlisted men who allegedly did the killing, but some officers who overlooked or covered up the misconduct. The military's probe of the incident began four months after the killings occurred and two months after reporters from Time Magazine first inquired about it.

Thursday, the BBC obtained videotape that appeared to corroborate a report filed March 19 by Knight Ridder's Matthew Schofield that U.S. soldiers may have executed as many as 11 Iraqi civilians in the town of Ishaqi. The victims included a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old infant. (The Pentagon on Friday issued a report exonerating the U.S. soldiers.)

This time, critics say, the problem is that the press is saying too much. In fact, some online commentators insist that any reporting on these incidents or the investigations into them is an act of disloyalty and an attack on the morale of our soldiers and Marines.

More typical was the blogger who wrote: "The accelerating media feeding frenzy over the alleged killings of 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha by U.S. Marines last November is about to overwhelm American politics. Propelled by their most irresponsible war critics, the left will try to use Haditha as it used My Lai 30 years ago: as a political tool to take apart America's support for the law and to shatter the legitimacy of our cause and the morale of our troops." Another alleged that "the media frenzy around the actions of a handful of Marines … will be used to advance agendas unrelated to the allegations, agendas which trade on the slander of the American military … "

Truth, of course, is an absolute defense against slander charges. Silence is truth's enemy.

Meanwhile, when Dozier awoke Thursday in a military hospital after a series of operations, according to The Times' Matea Gold, the first question she scribbled onto a piece of paper was, what happened to her crew? When Dozier has the strength to look around, she'll see a Purple Heart. The young American soldier to whom it was awarded gave it to Dozier's brother Michael, and said he wanted the correspondent to have it.

Whatever the ideologues may argue, Americans — whether in or out of uniform — are neither a fearful nor a fragile people. They are not indifferent to facts, even unpleasant ones about themselves. They do not want their journalists to behave like ancient bards, contriving cheap mythology from the sanitized feats of warrior heroes. They do not want a press that cuts and pastes to serve a party line.

Military service is one of the most onerous responsibilities free men and women discharge in the service of their community's common good. The correspondents who go to Iraq to report on the lives — and deaths — of our servicemen and -women are not only fulfilling the duty of witness that a self-governing people requires of its free press; they also are expressing, through their very presence, a profound solidarity with fellow Americans put in harm's way by decisions taken in all our names.

The President's advisors may choose to ignore that, as may their eager acolytes in the commenting class. The American soldier who sent his own Purple Heart to acknowledge his bond with Dozier clearly feels otherwise.

Like the honorable majority of our soldiers and Marines, he's not the sort inclined to look away.

i promise some answers

2006-05-23T01:01:00.000-08:00

In Washington people are always dealing in information, money, and secrets. Sometimes you need to peddle information to get a seat at the table or to help write bills for your lobbying clients. Other times you need to throw money around, ingratiate yourself with the locals and take them out to a skybox and watch Gilbert Arenas score 40 points. Throw a fund raiser for your favorite legislator (i.e.: the guy who's vote you need to switch). How else are you going to stop that bill that would help millions of people but hurt your client? Usually you tout these accomplishments and get patted on the back. But sometimes, you do something that you don't want anyone to know about and you need to hide your information, or your money, somewhere. Anywhere. Where do you hide it? Well, we gathered up a group of Washington insiders with first hand experience in hiding stuff and asked them how they would go about hiding money or information in Washington

robert scheer speaks to all teachers.

2006-04-28T17:09:00.000-08:00

RS: Empowering people is an overworked term, but I still believe in it. One reason I teach is because it's an exercise in humility. If you don't empower your students, you lose them. You can't propagandize or sloganeer them, or their eyes glaze over, and they're out the door.

I've been doing this a long time, and if you want to reach people, you have to be ruthlessly honest about what you don't know, what you do know, and where you're coming from. We need to let people know there are real issues to think about, and that they're interesting and exciting. They affect your life.

integrity vs. corruption via the great juancole.com

2006-04-26T07:49:00.000-08:00

logger David versus WSJ Goliath

This is day three since John Fund of the Wall Street Journal did a nationally-read hatchet job on me in which he made up quotes and falsely attributed them to me. He has still not retracted, and has not apologized. Neither has The Wall Street Journal. Hint: I wouldn't want my business news or investment advice from a newspaper that just makes things up. I have complained directly to the Opinion Journal. But still nothing. The lies are still out there, online, damaging my reputation. Those readers who wish to help might write (politely to OpJournal.help@dowjones.com. )

Fund's lies and smears are typical of the far right, which controls so much of corporate media. Much of corporate-owned "news" is increasingly just bubbly entertainment, put on in a ceaseless search for at least 15% profits (on news!). As Tom Fenton has argued, corporate news dropped the ball in the 1990s on covering al-Qaeda (props to the hardy few like Peter Berger and John Miller, among a handful who did the hard work), and therefore bears significant responsibility for allowing America to be blindsided on September 11.

Now it has largely gone back to business as usual. They almost never report on Afghanistan or the regrouping of the Taliban. Do Americans even know that we have 18,000 troops in that country. Do citizens of the US even know that brave Canadian troops are risking their lives against the neo-Taliban and al-Qaeda in Qandahar, and that some were recently killed? No. Because it mostly isn't being covered in the mass media inside the US. It would not generate 15% profits. Nothing will, but sensationalism and lies.

The lies have even corrupted our political process. Indeed, Senator John Kerry could never have been swiftboated during his presidential bid unless corporate media jumped aboard and gave all the falsehoods enormous play. They threw the election, folks. Those editors and journalists knew that the swiftboaters had no case. The media caesars put them on anyway, to play lions to Kerry's Christian. Even Kerry was unable to get his message out. A humble college history teacher has as much chance of winning against the billionaire smear machine as a union organizer has of keeping her job in a Walmart.

(When I complain about Faux "news" often being mere propaganda, Fund accuses me of "intolerance"!) If it weren't for this little blog, I wouldn't even have had a way of challenging Fund's and the WSJ's falsehoods. (And, if the media corporations can take "net neutrality" away from us, they'll remove that avenue of reply, too.)

If it were just a matter of ruining my reputation with false quotes, the issue would not be world-shaking, though it is a sad day for America when giant corporations can just crush red-blooded Americans at will. But the paid-for lies of the John Funds of the world have profoundly endangered the security of the United States by plunging it into a quagmire in Iraq.

Iraqi Shiites protest against United States and against Terrorism, March, 2006.

And, the accelerating threat of global warming cannot be addressed because people like Fund shout the evidence down with their cable- and satellite-provided megaphones-- provided by Rupert Murdoch and General Electric.

Not only was Fund wrong about the "weapons of mass destruction" threat in Iraq, a mistake that has cost the US nearly 2400 lives and 14,000 severely wounded, but he is wrong about the threat of global warming. I found that on January 25, 2003, he managed to be wrong about both things all at once! Here he is on Hardball in late January, 2003, urging on the Bush administration Titanic toward twin glaciers!

' MSNBC
SHOW: HARDBALL 21:00
January 31, 2003 Friday

MATTHEWS: John Fund, do you know what turned him [Colin Powell] around from a man who is perceived by the public to be dovish to a man who is the hard line fellow, very much like his fellow Cabinet members, Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney?

JOHN FUND, "THE WALL STREET JOURNAL": Complete frustration Chris. He basically decided that Saddam Hussein was never going to come clean, that the process was completely flawed.

You know the same people who believe that global warming is absolutely proven and they're not going to listen to anything else are the same people who will accept absolutely no evidence that Saddam Hussein is hiding something and including weapons of mass destruction. Colin Powell basically finally threw up his hands and said we have to act because the alternative is to let Saddam Hussein win the game, set and match, and the world cannot be blackmailed that way. '

Actually, Iraq let the UN inspectors in. The inspected 100 of 600 sites designated as suspicious by the CIA. They found nothing. As Fund was talking, Iraq had complied with Bush's demand. Fund wanted to go to war anyway.

He castigated those, like myself, who refused to believe that Iraq formed a danger to the US, as being like people who believe in global warming!!

Why be wrong once when you can be wrong twice? Or, if you throw his manufactured quotes attributed to me into the kitty, three times. Indeed, you begin to wonder if Fund ever gets anything right.

In fact the melting of the ice caps both at the arctic and the antarctic has accelerated beyond scientists' expectations.

Mr. Fund should explain to the people of New Orleans about how warming seas are a myth.

A humble college history teacher is like a canary in the mine. If he starts being strangled for air, it is a sign that we all are in grave danger. People like John Fund are taking our country, and our world, down into the deadly methane of propaganda and falsehood.

posted by Juan @ 4/26/2006 06:05:00 AM 4 comments

when ideology trumps pragmatism, trumps empiricism, trumps basic common sense, we have a failed foreign policy.

2006-04-21T20:01:00.000-08:00

TALKING TO IRAN....What should we do about Iran? I have a suggestion, but first I need to relate a story that's gotten suprisingly little attention from the press. Perhaps they're too bored to pick up on it.

It started on May 6, 2003, shortly after George Bush declared "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq. On that day the Associated Press reported without elaboration that Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman had confirmed that "Iran has exchanged messages with U.S. officials about Iraq through the Swiss Embassy, which represents U.S. interests in Tehran. He declined to give details."

What was that all about? Last January, Flynt Leverett, who worked for Condoleezza Rice on the National Security Council, provided some initial clues:

In the spring of 2003, shortly before I left government, the Iranian Foreign Ministry sent Washington a detailed proposal for comprehensive negotiations to resolve bilateral differences. The document acknowledged that Iran would have to address concerns about its weapons programs and support for anti-Israeli terrorist organizations. It was presented as having support from all major players in Iran's power structure, including the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. A conversation I had shortly after leaving the government with a senior conservative Iranian official strongly suggested that this was the case. Unfortunately, the administration's response was to complain that the Swiss diplomats who passed the document from Tehran to Washington were out of line.

In February, Newsday picked up the story:

The fax was one of a series of informal soundings that emanated from Tehran in the months after the United States invasion of Iraq. Iran's envoys to Sweden and Britain also began sending signals that the regime was ready to negotiate a deal, according to a former Western diplomat closely familiar with the messages. Iran was sending messages through other back-channels as well, according to Paul Pillar, who served as the CIA's national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia from 2000 to 2005.

...."No one at a senior level was willing to push Iran on diplomacy," said Leverett. "Was there at least a chance that we could have gotten something going? Yes, there was a chance."

Three weeks ago, Gareth Porter added some more details:

Realists, led by Powell and his Deputy Richard Armitage, were inclined to respond positively to the Iranian offer. Nevertheless, within a few days of its receipt, the State Department had rebuked the Swiss ambassador for having passed on the offer.

Exactly how the decision was made is not known. "As with many of these issues of national security decision-making, there are no fingerprints," [Lawrence] Wilkerson told IPS. "But I would guess Dick Cheney with the blessing of George W. Bush."

As Wilkerson observes, however, the mysterious death of what became known among Iran specialists as Iran's "grand bargain" initiative was a result of the administration's inability to agree on a policy toward Tehran.

A draft National Security Policy Directive (NSPD) on Iran calling for diplomatic engagement had been in the process of interagency coordination for more than a year, according to a source who asks to remain unidentified.

But it was impossible to get formal agreement on the NSPD, the source recalls, because officials in Cheney's office and in Undersecretary of Defence for Policy Douglas Feith's Office of Special Plans wanted a policy of regime change and kept trying to amend it.

With that as background, here's my suggestion: quit letting Cheney's crackpots run foreign policy and talk to Iran. After all, the administration's ideologues killed an opportunity to ratchet down tensions three years ago, and since then things have only gotten worse: Iran has elected a wingnut president, they've made progress on nuclear enrichment, gained considerable influence in Iraq, and increased their global economic leverage as oil supplies have gotten tighter. So why blow another chance? If the talks fail, then they fail. But what possible reason can there be to refuse to even discuss things with Iran — unless you're trying to leave no alternative to war?

That may well be the Bush administration's strategy, but ordinary horse sense suggests it shouldn't be anyone else's.

beating a dead dog by preaching to the choir --not to mention mixed metaphors

2006-04-20T16:46:00.000-08:00

Why We Went To War in Iraq
by Armando
Thu Apr 20, 2006 at 08:53:50 AM PDT

Larry Lindsey on the "benefits" of "regime change" in Iraq:

As for the impact of a war with Iraq, "It depends how the war goes." But he quickly adds that that "Under every plausible scenario, the negative effect will be quite small relative to the economic benefits that would come from a successful prosecution of the war."
"The key issue is oil, and a regime change in Iraq would facilitate an increase in world oil," which would drive down oil prices, giving the U.S. economy an added boost.

Price of oil today:

Oil prices leapt above $72 a barrel Wednesday, settling at a record high for the third straight day after a government report showed shrinking U.S. gasoline supplies and traders fretted about nuclear tensions between Iran and the international community.
You were saying Mr. Lindsey?

in case you were wondering

2006-04-20T07:39:00.000-08:00

In reality, though, conservatism hasn't really changed all that much. The Christian right has certainly infused it with moralism and anti-Darwin mumbo-jumbo, but what's more striking about the GOP over the past 100 years or so is its continuity. The party's main, almost sole, purpose has been to ensure that as much money as possible goes to those who need it least and that as little as possible goes to those who need it most. In a party of moneybags, Theodore Roosevelt was the exception, not the rule. Whether Bush manages to extricate the United States from Iraq or not, his avalanche of tax cuts has already justified the main reason that Republican pooh-bahs selected him to become their candidate for president.

nice summary from kevin drum--washingtonmonthly.com

2006-04-19T11:11:00.000-08:00

I know I'm not the first — or even the thousandth — to make this point, but consider a few wonkish numbers from the past 20 years:

*

Per capita GDP in the United States has increased about 52% over the past two decades. This economic growth is due mostly to increased productivity, which in turn is largely due to technological progress. It's not due to any magical increase in the quality of CEOs, managers, or factory floor workers.

*

Median personal income 20 years ago was about $18,000. If everybody's income had grown 52% since then, median income would be about $27,000 today.

*

It's not. It's only $23,000. If you add in health benefits it changes the numbers only slightly.

The reason for this is obvious: our economy has grown 52%, but that doesn't mean everyone's income has grown 52%. It means that the incomes of the super-rich have grown 100% while the incomes of average schmoes have grown only 25%. And average schmoe incomes haven't risen a penny since George Bush took office.

In other words, the rich are taking most of the money and leaving little behind for anyone else. And then, to add insult to injury, they whine about having to pay taxes on that vastly increased income.

And you, my lovely little schmoes, have to listen to that whining every day on Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and in the pages of National Review. Your income ought to be about $4,000 higher than it is, but instead of getting that income you get bought off with a $200 tax cut from the Republican Party. Meanwhile, the lucky duckies at the top get a 100% pay increase and a 30% tax cut. It's a good time to be super-rich in America.
—Kevin Drum 2:20 PM Permalink | Trackbacks | Comments (23)

why are we going to invade iraq mr. cheney? " Because it's dooable."

2006-04-17T08:48:00.000-08:00

** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
** Visit the Dahr Jamail Iraq website http://dahrjamailiraq.com **
** Website by http://jeffpflueger.com **

Baghdad Morgue Overflowing Daily

Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail and Arkan Hamed

*BAGHDAD, Apr 14 (IPS) - As sectarian killings continue to rise in Iraq,
the central morgue in Baghdad is unable to keep up with the daily influx
of bodies. *

The morgue is receiving a minimum of 60 bodies a day and sometimes more
than 100, a morgue employee told IPS on condition of anonymity.

"The average is probably over 85," said the employee on the morning of
April 12, as scores of family members waited outside the building to see
if their loved ones were among the dead.

The family of a man named Ashraf who had been taken away by the Iraqi
police Feb. 16 anxiously searched through digital photographs inside the
morgue. He then found what he was looking for.

"His two sons were killed when Ashraf was taken," said his uncle,
50-year-old Aziz. "Ashraf was a bricklayer who was simply trying to do
his job, and now we see what has become of him in our new democracy."

Aziz found that the body of Ashraf was brought to the morgue Feb. 18 by
the Iraqi police two days after he was abducted. The photographs of the
body showed gunshot wounds in the head and bludgeon marks across the
face. Both arms were apparently broken, and so many holes had been
drilled into his chest that it appeared shredded..

A report Oct. 29, 2004 in the British medical journal The Lancet had
said that "by conservative assumptions, we think about 100,000 excess
deaths or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq."

In an update, Les Roberts, lead author of the report said Feb. 8 this
year that there may have been 300,000 Iraqi civilian deaths since the
invasion.

Such findings seem in line with information IPS obtained at the Baghdad
morgue.

Morgue official said bodies unclaimed after 15 days are transferred to
the cemetery administration to be catalogued, and then taken for burial
at a cemetery in Najaf. As he spoke, three Iraqi police pick-up trucks
loaded with about 10 bodies each arrived at the morgue.

At the cemetery administration, an official told IPS: "From February 1
to March 31, we've logged and buried 2,576 bodies from Baghdad."

Requests by IPS to meet with administration officials at the Baghdad
morgue were turned down for "security reasons."

Several surveys have pointed to large numbers of civilian deaths as a
result of the U.S.-led occupation.

Iraqiyun, a humanitarian group affiliated with the political party of
interim president Ghazi al-Yawir reported Jul. 12 last year that there
had been 128,000 violent deaths since the invasion. The group said it
had only counted deaths confirmed by relatives, and that it had omitted
the large numbers of people who simply disappeared without trace..

Another group, the People's Kifah, involved hundreds of academics and
volunteers in a survey conducted in coordination with "grave-diggers
across Iraq." The group said it also "obtained information from
hospitals and spoke to thousands of witnesses who saw incidents in which
Iraqi civilians were killed by U.S. fire."

The project was abandoned after one of the researchers was captured by
Kurdish militiamen and handed over to U.S. forces. He was never seen
again. But in less than two months' work, the group documented about
37,000 violent civilian deaths up to October 2003.

The Baghdad central morgue alone accounts for roughly 30,000 bodies
annually. That is besides the large number of bodies taken to morgues in
cities such as Basra, Mosul, Ramadi, Kirkuk, Irbil, Najaf and Karbala.

_______________________________________________

quote of the day from t.j.--our t.j.? no, the other t.j.

2006-04-16T18:19:00.000-08:00

"… But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. … Reason and free enquiry are the only effectual agents against error. Give a loose to them, they will support the true religion, by bringing every false one to their tribunal, to the test of their investigation." - Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia - Query XVII

well said, charles.

2006-04-16T17:19:00.000-08:00

Help wanted

When I began my book Five Days in Philadelphia, my main motive was to restore Wendell Willkie to the place in history that he deserved by demonstrating his crucial role as the Republican presidential nominee who gave a Democratic president the courage to make politically dangerous decisions in an election year—decisions that were vital to the survival of democracy. As I was writing the book, however, I realized there were differences between the country in 1940 and the way it is today that I wanted to explain so that young people would understand that we can do better, a lot better than we're doing now.

But I have failed. Although the book was generously reviewed, and I have received far more enthusiastic phone calls, letters, and emails from readers than for any of my seven other books, I've had to face the fact that except for a handful from younger Monthly alumni, these messages came from no one recognizably under 35.

So I ask for your help and advice in figuring out how to reach these young people and urge you to write me with your advice, care of the Monthly. The points I want to emphasize most are that we can have leaders like Franklin Roosevelt and Wendell Willkie, and we can be willing to sacrifice by drafting ourselves into military service and paying higher taxes. We can have a dominant Christianity that supports liberal programs, and we can have a country where too many people are not trying to demonstrate that they are richer, smarter, and have better taste than the next guys, but where instead, they're trying to find common ground with their fellow citizens. It can happen because it did happen.

We can not only do better, we can also be better. Not that we won't still be recognizably human, with our share of failings. Even FDR and Willkie had their weaknesses. But they and we were able to rise to behavior characterized by considerably more idealism and generosity than is evident today.

Charles Peters is the founding editor of The Washington Monthly and president of Understanding Government.

the truth has to be in this administration because it has never come out of it.

2006-04-16T11:57:00.000-08:00

Speaking of facts, But here is an example of Rummy's "facts": via dailykos

Yesterday on PBS' Newshour, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld said no administration official made any predictions about the length or cost of the war in Iraq:
I was very careful. I never predicted any number of deaths or the cost or the length because I've looked at a lot of wars, and anyone who tries to do that is going to find themselves wrong, flat wrong…I don't know anybody who had any reasonable expectations about the number or the length of the war or the cost of the war. I just don't — no one I know went out and said these are how those three metrics ought to be considered. And you can take it to the bank.
The truth is, Rumsfeld and other top administration officials made predictions on all three metrics. You can take that to the bank – Length:
Rumsfeld, 2/7/03: "It could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months." Cheney, 3/16/03: "I think it will go relatively quickly, . . . (in) weeks rather than months"
Cost:
Daniels, 12/30/02: "The administration's top budget [Mitch Daniels] official estimated today that the cost of a war with Iraq could be in the range of $50 billion to $60 billion … Mr. Daniels declined to explain how budget officials had reached the $50 billion to $60 billion range for war costs…" [New York Times, 12/31/02]
Casualties:
Q: If your analysis is not correct, and we're not treated as liberators, but as conquerors, and the Iraqis begin to resist, particularly in Baghdad, do you think the American people are prepared for a long, costly, and bloody battle with significant American casualties? Cheney: Well, I don't think it's likely to unfold that way, Tim, because I really do believe that we will be greeted as liberators. [Meet the Press, 3/16/03]
An angrier leftie might call Rummy and a liar.

i agree with atrios on this one.

2006-04-15T11:49:00.000-08:00

Supporting the Ego

I really do wonder what it takes to support your own unwarranted arrogance when it confronts a reality completely at odds with it. I doubt I'm alone in having occasional nontrivial anxiety bouts over some fairly screwup early in life which had relatively trivial consequences for me or those around me. I honestly can't imagine living with the responsibility for what goes on in Iraq day after day without either having some severe psychotic break or simply curling up under the bed in the fetal position.

These people are wired up differently than me.

-Atrios 12:51 PM

gingrich is a sniveling chickenshit.

2006-04-12T19:08:00.000-08:00

I Don’t Think So
By Jane Hamsher ------firedoglake.com

I love Arianna and as I said yesterday, I’m sympathetic with her and others who want to embrace all converts to the "this war is a bad idea" camp. But I am intrinsically, tempermentally and constitutionally opposed to allowing Newt Gingrich and other architects of war to evade responsibility for their actions and give themselves political cover by handing them a "free pass" for their zealous efforts to land us in the middle of this quagmire.

Newt Gingrich does not equal Hillary Clinton. He does not equal John Kerry and he sure as hell doesn’t equal Jack Murtha. Glenn Greenwald has an excellent piece up at Alternet today about Newt’s history in branding anyone who opposed the Bush Administration and/or the war as traitors giving aid and comfort to the enemy:

These same would-be Bush critics have spent the last four years creating a paradigm where this type of criticism of the Commander is not permitted because such criticism constitutes aid to Al Qaeda and is therefore tantamount to treason. Compare the criticisms made by Gingrich of the President’s illegal eavesdropping and his Iraq policies to this truly disgusting declaration made by him just a few months ago on Hannity & Colmes:

I think it’s quite clear as you point out, Sean, that from this tape, that bin Laden and his lieutenants are monitoring the American news media, they’re monitoring public opinion polling, and I suspect they take a great deal of comfort when they see people attacking United States policies.

There are few people left willing to defend the President on much of anything, including the NSA scandal. Several days ago, House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner publicly upbraided Alberto Gonzales for "stonewalling" — i.e. engaging in a cover-up — for concealing virtually all relevant information sought by the Committee as it pretends to investigate the Administration’s eavesdropping conduct.

There is clearly a sea change going on. The self-interested rats who propped up this Administration with blind loyalty for the last five years are now jumping ship as it sinks, desperately trying to save themselves by showing some extremely belated autonomy and independence. But where were Gingrich, Conway and Sensenbrenner for the last five years while "the most politically and substantively inept (administration) that the nation has had in over a quarter of a century" inflicted unquantifiable, arguably irreversible damage on our nation? They were accusing Administration critics of lacking patriotism and being on the side of terrorists, and they cannot be allowed to distance themselves now from the Administration to which they tied themselves.

Newt didn’t just support the war. In addition to sitting on the Defense Policy Board and being one of its more enthusiastic cheerleaders, he created a climate where it became impossible to question the war, the rationals given for it or any of the disastrous decisions made by George W. Bush by branding people who did so as anti-American turncoats. As Glenn says:

The greatest evil of the last five years isn’t that our government pursued disastrous and illegal policies, it’s that the administration and its supporters attempted to immunize themselves from criticism for those actions, thus depriving our democracy of its greatest strength. To watch the people responsible for that dissent-quashing now stand up and voice the very criticisms they’ve long equated with treason is far too infuriating to celebrate. It is important to ensure that the people responsible for the indescribable mess our country is in on so many levels not be allowed to extricate themselves from responsibility. There has been one political faction which has run every part of our country for the last five years and they are responsible for everything that has happened. We know who they are and it is critically important that they not be permitted to play-act as a legitimate opposition.

So we should embrace Newt’s apostasy? I don’t think so. He’s admitted no culpability, taken no responsibility for his role in all of this. As Bill Sher argues, he’s probably just dancing around trying to find a new neocon frame for the whole mess that will wash with an increasingly disillusioned public. One that, I suspect, will include the wisdom of going to war with Iran ("you see, the war we really wanted was…")

I guess I’m just not the "forgiving" type when it comes to the likes of Newt. Don’t expect me to joining any kind of applause chorus any time soon.

goddam' we showed 'em! via eschaton

2006-04-12T18:50:00.000-08:00

Why Are We In Iraq?

Apparently Evan Thomas of Newsweek thinks he knows. On Hardball:

Thomas: I don't think the Wmd... I've never thought the WMD was the reason we went to war. They went to war for othe reasons. It was an excuse to go to war, it was a convenient excuse - they sorta believed it - but it really wasn't the reason they did it.

[drunk hitchens and tweety babbling]

Thomas: After 9/11 they felt they had to teach "The Arabs" a lesson. It was a demonstration of American force. We wanted to show the world - particularly the Arabs - how tough we were. I think that's why we went to war.

Tweety: It had to be a big bang in response to 9/11.

Thomas: Afghanistan was not a big enough bang.

Well, there you go.

-Atrios 8:00 PM

must read from maxspeak.org

2006-04-07T13:26:00.000-08:00

April 07, 2006

GOODS OVER PEOPLE?
By Josh Bivens

Immigration has recently joined international trade as one of the most controversial topics in American politics. For an economist, this isn’t surprising. Economic theory predicts that the impacts of immigration and trade on the American economy are analytically equivalent: both increase total national income while causing redistribution that typically harms less-skilled natives. Whether we're importing immigrant janitors and landscapers or importing manufacturing labor from developing nations embodied in DVD players and t-shirts, the net effect is the same: less demand for Americans (generally less-skilled) who compete with this labor, and, cheaper stuff for those Americans who don't. Reshuffling income around always makes for knotty politics.

I’m a professional worrier about the impact of trade on the American income distribution. The optimal response to my worries is to strike grand bargains that compensate American workers for the harm done to them by globalization. The corporate class gets NAFTA, American workers should have gotten universal health care. The corporate class gets membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO), American workers should have gotten labor law reform to help willing workers more easily form unions.

Given that the stakes for striking these bargains have by now been largely frittered away (with blame to go around to both political parties), this optimum looks more remote all the time. All students of the issue agree that economic theory predicts globalization will exacerbate American inequality, where I part company from the professional mainstream is only my willingness to make a political point: absent these grand bargains, there’s nothing in globalization-as-currently practiced for American workers, and they have every right to impede its progress. This is where too many economists cry “protectionism” and serious debate ends.

The first-best response to potential economic problems caused by immigration is the same: a reconstructed social contract that provides all workers (native or foreign-born) with labor protections and a baseline level of economic security, including guaranteed health and pension coverage. A number of prominent economists and writers have recently been willing to say that, absent (or even present) this first-best response, they believe that immigration flows of less-skilled workers should be stemmed. No cry of "protectionism" ensued, but let's leave the sociology of the economics profession aside for a moment, as that way lies madness.

Unlike trade, I'm personally not willing to call for immigration restrictions, even in the absence of the optimal response. Why not, if I'm willing to risk professional approbation in the trade debate? First, it's just a fact that embargoing people at national borders is an inherently uglier business than embargoing goods. Second, immigration offers truly enormous economic benefits to the immigrants themselves. Some argue that tariff-free access to the US market offers huge benefits to workers in developing nations. They're wrong: the gains (to developing country workers) from immigration dwarf the gains from market access.

Given all of this, I have been wondering of late why elite opinion has been vociferous about keeping US borders open for goods, but, has been recently queasy about keeping it open for poor people. Tom Friedman , uber-globalist, has written that we need a "big wall" on the US/Mexico border, yet not only supports free trade, but, the all-but-divine right of multinational companies to buy whatever company they want whenever they want it - see Dubai Ports and Friedman's fury on behalf of their failed bid to manage US maritime terminals. Robert Samuelson similarly calls for a wall, while cheerleading for trade liberalization regularly in his economics column. Even Paul Krugman, a lodestar of progressive economists (me included) and surely no nativist, has so far expressed concern for the impact of trade without repudiating its expansion, but, has made a clear-cut argument for slowing the flow of poor immigrants in the name of cushioning American wages. But, again, importing immigrant labor has the same impact on American wages as importing foreign-made textiles; concern over the plight of low-wage workers just doesn't strike me as providing enough traction to make this distinction.

To take this further, if one is concerned about the economic prospects of low-wage workers, why not respond to potential distributional problems caused by immigration with trade tariffs? How serious am I about this? Not very. There's still an ideal response to both - using broader tools to bolster economic security for all Americans. But, the odd deference given to the movement of goods over the movement of people in the global economy remains pretty jarring to me.

Posted by max at April 7, 2006 03:06 PM

first i've heard of this. via gadflyer,com

2006-04-07T08:27:00.000-08:00

The Real Boomers Retirement Crisis
Jonathan Weiler

Atrios recently flagged the administration for missing its April 1 deadline for producing the annual social security trustees report. As Atrios puts it, "maybe Saddam smuggled it into Syria." Or maybe, Atrios suggests, continued increases in productivity are stretching out social security's ability to pay all scheduled benefits that much farther into the future. And, as Atrios comments, "we can't have that."

The President's campaign last year to try to "reform" social security was always a big, fat fraud. The program is projected to be fully solvent for decades, has built-in adjustments for the increasing age of the population and is fully able to accommodate the retiring baby boomers until the youngest boomers are between 77 and 88 years old, according to the most recent, actually published, official reports on the subject. Furthermore, whatever fiscal adjustments might have become necessary after 2041 or 2052 were eminently manageable within the current parameters of the program. Anyone following the debate in 2005 knew this to be true, despite both willful misrepresentations by the President and his allies, and the laziness of much of the MSM in turning the reform debate into a he-said/she said affair.

There is, potentially, a serious financial problem attending the coming retirement of the baby boomers. It just happens to be the inverse of what the President has claimed it to be. It's not social security's solvency that is at issue. The real problem is the impact of the boomers' retirement on Wall street-based interests, when a potential massive withdrawal of funds from the market could negatively affect stock prices. In his illuminating book, Understanding Globalization, Robert Schaeffer notes that Wall Street investors have long complained that social security diverted money that might otherwise have been invested in stocks and bonds and this was the source of their opposition to FDR's proposed social security program in the first place. With a large retirement bubble looming, Schaeffer says of Wall Street interests:

"They want the government to redirect pension revenue because when baby-boomers retire in coming years, they will begin withdrawing money from their retirement accounts to pay for their retirement. Large-scale withdrawals could force stock prices down. To prevent this, Wall Street needs a new infusion of cash."

Enter the Bush plan – divert social security money into private accounts that would be invested in the market. Black is white, up is down. A potential crisis for equity markets is inverted into a solvency "crisis" for social security. Kevin Phillips has written of the unholy trinity of oil, religious extremism and the "debt-driven financial sector," the true constituents of the contemporary Republican Party in general and the Bush family in particular. It's the latter of that alliance that may be in for rough sledding beginning in about a decade. The President's solution: raid America's most successful social program to save a core constituency – a "reckless credit-feeding financial complex" in Phillips' words.

In this light, one could argue that it's not the market that is needed to save Americans from retirement insecurity. Instead, the motive behind social security reform is to sacrifice Americans' retirement security to save the market.

Copyright © Jonathan Weiler. Material presented on The Gadflyer is the opinion of the respective author and not that of The Gadflyer, the web host or any other entity.

we have to watch and work hard and not let these creepy dipshits take this away from us.

2006-04-06T22:22:00.000-08:00

Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

liar in chief.

2006-04-06T10:58:00.000-08:00

"I don't know of anybody in my administration who leaked classified information. If somebody did leak classified information, I'd like to know it, and we'll take the appropriate action." [Bush Remarks: Chicago, Illinois, 9/30/03]

"The President has set high standards, the highest of standards for people
in his administration. He's made it very clear to people in his administration that he expects them to adhere to the highest standards of conduct. If anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration." [White House Briefing, 9/29/03]

why the '06 elections are so vital for our democracy.

2006-04-05T16:53:00.000-08:00

Bush's Unprecedented Arrogance
By John Dean
FindLaw.com

Wednesday 05 April 2006

President George Bush continues to openly and defiantly ignore the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) - the 1978 statute prohibiting electronic inspection of Americans' telephone and email communications with people outside the United States without a court-authorized warrant. (According to U.S. News & World Report, the President may also have authorized warrantless break-ins and other physical surveillance, such as opening regular mail, in violation of the Fourth Amendment.)

Bush's position is that he does not need Congressional approval for his measures. Even he does not claim that Congress gave him express power to undertake them, but he does claim that Congress indirectly approved such measures when it authorized the use of force to go after those involved in the 9/11 terror attacks on the United States. He also argues that, in any event, approval was not necessary - for he argues that he has such authority under Article II of the Constitution, as the chief executive, and Commander in Chief, charged with faithfully executing the laws of the land and protecting the Constitution.

These arguments are hauntingly familiar to this observer.

The Nixon Precedent

No one can question President Bush's goal: Protecting Americans from further terror attacks. But every American should question his means: Openly defying a longstanding statute that prohibits the very actions he insists on undertaking, when done in the very manner he insists upon doing them. In some two hundred and seventeen years of the American presidency, there has been only one President who provides a precedent for Bush's stunning, in-your-face, conduct: Richard Nixon. Like Bush, Nixon claimed he was acting to protect the nation's security. Like Bush, Nixon broke the law - authorizing, among other things, illegal wiretaps.

Ironically, a stronger case might be made for Nixon's warrantless wiretaps, than for Bush's. Nixon's were installed to track leaks of national security information relating to the war in Vietnam. (He never found the leaker.) He pursued domestic intelligence by illegal means because he believed - based on information from President Lyndon Johnson - that communists had infiltrated the anti-war movement. (No such evidence was ever found.) In addition, he believed that extreme measures were necessary to deal with domestic terrorists, who were responsible for hundreds of deadly bombings. (This is the same argument Bush makes today.)

Nixon also claimed he was only doing what his predecessors had done. That was not untrue - but what had, in the past, been the exception to the rule became standard operating procedure under Nixon. Bush, however, can only claim one predecessor for his actions: Nixon. And, of course, he has not made this claim - for Nixon was forced from office because of his defiance of the law.

Prior Presidents Have Always Gone to Congress

Bush has admitted he is ignoring FISA. His Attorney General has offered lame and loose legal justifications that he ought not to dare attempt in any court of law. Only blind partisan followers buy the president's bogus legal arguments. The U.S. Supreme Court's prescient discussion of presidential powers reveals how weak these arguments really are.

In May 1952, President Truman directed his Secretary of Commerce, Charles Sawyer, to take charge of the nation's steel mills, rather than permit a strike by steelworkers - and intransigent management - from hampering national security. The nation was at war in Korea, and without steel, the war effort would be in jeopardy. Truman informed Congress of his actions, but rather than asked for emergency legislation, he proceeded by executive order.

The owners of the steel mills immediately sought an injunction, which was granted by a federal district court judge, and the government appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court. In a 6-3 ruling, the Court, in Youngstown Co. v. Sawyer, held that Truman's attempted takeover of the steel mills was unconstitutional. Truman then asked Congress for emergency legislation, but Congress turned him down too.

As the strong dissent in Youngstown notes, the "diversity of views expressed in the six opinions of the majority, the lack of reference to authoritative precedent, the repeated reliance upon prior dissenting opinions, the complete disregard of the uncontroverted facts showing the gravity of the emergency and the temporary nature of the taking all serve to demonstrate how far afield one must go to" deny Truman this power. It seems Bush believes he can ride on that dissent. But in the end, the dissent not only is not the law; it is not persuasive.

Truman's actions were not unprecedented: President Lincoln had seized rail and telegraph lines during the Civil War; President Theodore Roosevelt was ready to seize Pennsylvania coal mines if a strike created shortages; President Wilson seized industrial plants and railroads during World War I; and six months before Peal Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt seized a California aviation plant when a strike occurred. These presidents, however, went to Congress - as Truman also eventually did. Only Bush (like Nixon) refuses to do so.

As Donald McCoy's study of the Truman presidency (for the University Press of Kansas) points out, "Truman had sought not only to resolve the steel crisis but also substantially to expand the president's power in a single action that matched his sense of gravity of the emergency that was confronting the nation. He had gambled badly, and he had lost badly." The same could be said of Nixon, who lost even worse because he - like Bush, and unlike Truman - was acting secretly.

Bush, once it was learned what he was doing, could have asked Congress to grant him the authority that he believed he needed. Instead, he has taken the Nixon approach, and wants to do what he wants to do - the Congress be damned. Will he succeed? What if he does? What if he doesn't?

Bush's Gambling With Presidential Powers

Like Nixon, Bush has wrapped himself in the American flag, national security, his high office, and a claim to be the defender of America - the man who can show terrorists not to mess with the U.S.A. His critics are attacked as being soft on fighting terrorism, or being knee-jerk partisans, when all they want is for their president to stay within the law.

If the issue stays out of court - and continues to be debated by many as if it were purely a policy issue, and FISA does not exist - Bush may prevail; it will be up to the voters in this Fall's election to judge him, and to decide whether to sweep out of office those legislators who are preventing a full investigation of this matter. But if this issue goes to court, Bush should worry. Even Republican-appointed judges would have to comprise their judicial integrity to rule in his favor. One reason it may stay out of court, though, is the difficulty of finding a plaintiff with proper standing: someone who has been illegally harmed by reason of Bush's surveillance. The ACLU has looked for such plaintiffs and then filed a lawsuit but its chances are not strong.

Another reason it might stay out of court is if legislation moots the issue. Senators Dewine, Graham, Hagel and Snowe have sponsored legislation, S. 2455, that would retroactively (as well as prospectively) legalize the president's refusal to seek FISA warrants. The bill provides for nominal oversight by the Senate and House Select Intelligence Committees. And this approach, which has in the past, usually been requested by presidents, rather than simply granted by Congress, has been a satisfactory remedy.

But Bush does not want this retroactive approval by Congress. Instead, he wants to keep on breaking the law to try to set a precedent - enlarging his presidential powers (and those of subsequent presidents) permanently, to the detriment of Congress. Another possible solution, and probably the most thoughtful and intelligent to be offered, is the legislation proposed by Senator Arlen Specter, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Specter - who was once considered by Nixon for a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, even before he had been elected to the Senate - is now one of the Senate's best legal minds. But I suspect the Bush White House will fight Senator Specter's proposal because under it, they may lose.

Senator Specter's Proposed "National Security Surveillance Act of 2006"

On March 16, Senator Specter introduced his proposed legislation, following hearings in which his Judiciary Committee quizzed Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for seven hours about the legality of the president's action. Neither Gonzales nor anyone on the panel of legal experts that followed, made anything approaching a compelling case that this was legal activity, although several were highly persuasive that it was transparently illegal.

Implicit in Chairman Specter's proposal, S. 2453, is the fact that the president's actions are, indeed, not legal. Although Specter does not so state, his bill would appropriately place the question of the legality of Bush's actions before the FISA Court, where that court could judge it. No doubt he knows how, in fact, they would judge the matter: They would likely find that the President's bypassing their statutorily-granted authority was, and continues to be, illegal.

Specter recognizes the seriousness of the dilemma here: We are a nation at war, yet also a nation that believes in the rule of law. To have it both ways, he has drawn from a recommendation made decades ago by former Attorney General Edward Levi - a staunch defender of the executive powers: Turn the matter over the FISA Court, where it can, if the Administration presents a solid case (of need balanced against the invasion of civil liberties), rule in the President's favor, but can also reject the President's actions if the balance cuts the other way.

Specter's is a great solution. It preserves secrecy: The FISA Court has shown itself capable of keeping secrets, and while the bill requires bi-annual reports to Congress, they would not reveal secrets. Most importantly, whereas the President claims he is protecting liberties by reviewing the program every forty-five days, Specter's bill imposes a similar requirement.

No doubt the Bush Administration will fight Specter's bill - for the simple reason that it does not want to be tested by a court, for it wants neither checks nor balances, but simple the unilateral exercise of executive power. And even if Specter can get the bill through the Senate, Bush's soldiers in the monocratic House will kill it.

Feingold's Motion for Censure

While Specter's bill may be the best idea yet as to how to deal with Bush's behavior, the approach that has received the most media attention is Senator Russ Feingold's resolution calling for censure of President Bush. The resolution condemns Bush's actions in authorizing the illegal wiretapping program of Americans as part of his war on terror, and then misleading the country about the existence and legality of the program.

Even though nearly half of Americans favor censure, it too is a long shot. Yet is probably the most damning of the documents before Congress. Feingold's preamble points out that Bush openly lied to Americans about his secret wiretapping, on repeated occasions: On April 20, 2004, Bush said, "When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so.''; on July 14, 2004, he claimed that "the government can't move on wiretaps or roving wiretaps without getting a court order"; and on June 9, 2005, he said, "Law enforcement officers need a federal judge's permission to wiretap a foreign terrorist's phone, a federal judge's permission to track his calls, or a federal judge's permission to search his property. Officers must meet strict standards to use any of these tools."

All this was untrue. Bush had authorized these very law enforcement officials to bypass federal judges, and proceed without warrants. Why he engaged in such bald-faced lies, in circumstances where it was not necessary, is unclear. Senator Feingold's proposal has no chance of being adopted in a GOP-controlled Senate - one that includes, as well, more than a few spineless Democrats. Still, he has made his point. As Feingold told the New York Observer, "What [the Republicans had] succeeded in doing, [since this issue has arisen] was to sweep the illegality under the rug." Feingold added, "I decided it was time to include that on the record and came up with the censure proposal, to bring accountability back into the discussion. And I succeeded in doing that. That's been achieved."

Election 2006 Is the Key

In the end, this issue is going to be resolved by the 2006 midterm election. If Republicans lose control of either the House or Senate, the investigations of the Bush/Cheney White House will begin. It won't be pretty. It will make dealing with lying about sex look like High School hazing. It will even make Richard Nixon look like a piker when it comes to staying within the law.

If the early polls are half correct, independent swing voters have had it with Bush. Democrats want no part of him. Moderate Republicans are keeping their distance; they are no longer willing to hold their noses and vote for him. The big question is whether there will be an "October Surprise" - a dramatic event that will bump up Bush's currently dismal polling numbers, and help his party. Right now, Republican friends tell me they are doing all they can to keep the mid-terms from being a referendum on Bush. They know they have a better chance if they focus on local races - absent an October Surprise. If you have any knowledge of how White Houses operate, you can be sure they are working night and day to pull off such a surprise.

If they do it, Bush will get away with his lawlessness. If not, he and Cheney are in for two very bad years. They have earned them.

why dividend tax cuts must expire. via washingtonmonthly

2006-04-05T11:23:00.000-08:00

SUPER RICH IN AMERICA....Back in 2003, here's how the Bush administration explained its proposed dividend tax cut:

Everyone who invests in the stock market and receives dividend income—especially seniors—will benefit from elimination of the double taxation on dividends. About half of all dividend income goes to America’s seniors, who often rely on those checks for a steady source of retirement income.

That's a heartwarming portrait, isn't it? All those seniors relying on Bush's dividend tax cut to help pay the rent and keep their pantries stocked with something better than Alpo.

Fast forward to 2006 and you will be unsurprised to learn that an analysis by the New York Times demonstrates that the reality turned out to be a wee bit different:

Americans with annual incomes of $1 million or more, about one-tenth of 1 percent all taxpayers, reaped 43 percent of all the savings on investment taxes in 2003....The analyses show that more than 70 percent of the tax savings on investment income went to the top 2 percent, about 2.6 million taxpayers.

By contrast, few taxpayers with modest incomes benefited because most of them who own stocks held them in retirement accounts, which are not eligible for the investment income tax cuts. Money in these accounts is not taxed until withdrawal, when the higher rates on wages apply.

Sure, half of all dividend income goes to America's seniors — America's super-wealthy seniors, that is. By contrast, the kind of middle class senior that puts money into a retirement account doesn't benefit at all from dividend and capital gains tax cuts.

It's a good time to be super rich in America. A very good time.

—Kevin Drum 2:08 AM Permalink | Trackbacks | Comments (104)

just what we need: a closer relationship between guv'mt and religion. just like the taliban. the radical islamists. the inquisition. et.al.

2006-04-03T21:31:00.000-08:00

Monday, Apr. 03, 2006
Tom DeLay Says He Will Give Up His Seat
The embattled former Republican leader tells TIME that he will leave Congress and not seek reelection
By MIKE ALLEN/SUGAR LAND, TEXAS

Rep. Tom DeLay, whose iron hold on the House Republicans melted as a lobbying corruption scandal engulfed the Capitol, told TIME that he will not seek reelection and will leave Congress within months. Taking defiant swipes at "the left" and the press, he said he feels "liberated" and vowed to pursue an aggressive speaking and organizing campaign aimed at promoting foster care, Republican candidates and a closer connection between religion and government.

"I'm going to announce tomorrow that I'm not running for reelection and that I'm going to leave Congress," DeLay, who turns 59 on Saturday, said during a 90-minute interview on Monday. "I'm very much at peace with it." He notified President Bush in the afternoon. DeLay and his wife, Christine, said they had been prepared to fight, but that he decided last Wednesday, after months of prayer and contemplation, to spare his suburban Houston district the mudfest to come. "This had become a referendum on me," he said. "So it's better for me to step aside and let it be a referendum on ideas, Republican values and what's important for this district."

DeLay's fall has been stunningly swift, one of the most brutal and decisive in American history. He had to give up his title of Majority Leader, the No. 2 spot in the House Republican leadership, in September when a Texas grand jury indicted him on charges of trying to evade the state's election law. So he moved out of his palatial suite in the Capitol, where he once brandished a "No Whining" mug during feisty weekly sessions with reporters, and moved across the street to the Cannon House Office Building, home of many freshmen.

The surprise decision was based on the sort of ruthless calculation that had once given him unchallenged dominance of House Republicans and their wealthy friends in Washington's lobbying community: he realized he might lose in this November's election. DeLay got a scare in a Republican primary last month, and a recent poll taken by his campaign gave him a roughly 50-50 shot of winning, in an election season when Republicans need every seat they can hang onto to avoid a Democratic takeover of the House.

"I'm a realist. I've been around awhile. I can evaluate political situations," DeLay told TIME at his kitchen table in Sugar Land, a former sugar plantation in suburban Houston. Bluebonnets are blooming along the highways. "I feel that I could have won the race. I just felt like I didn't want to risk the seat and that I can do more on the outside of the House than I can on the inside right now. I want to continue to fight for the conservative cause. I want to continue to work for a Republican majority."

Asked if he had done anything illegal or immoral in public office, DeLay replied curtly, "No." Asked if he'd done anything immoral, he said with a laugh, "We're all sinners." Asked what he would do differently, he said, "Nothing." He denied having failed to adequately supervise members of his staff, even though two of his former aides have pleaded guilty to committing crimes while on his staff. "Two people violated my trust over 21 years," he said. "I guarantee you if other offices were under the scrutiny I've been under in the last 10 years, with the Democrat Party announcing that they're going to destroy me, destroy my reputation, and that's how they're going to get rid of me, I guarantee you you're going to find, out of hundreds of people, somebody that's probably done something wrong."

DeLay brushed off the torrent of investigative news articles questioning the funding behind the golf, private planes and resort hotels that marked his travel at home and abroad. He even accepted a plane from R.J. Reynolds Tobacco to go to his arraignment. "There's nothing wrong with it," he said. "They had a plane available. My schedule was such that I couldn't do it commercially — that I had to get up there and then get back and do my job. And that's the only plane that was available at the time."

"You can't prove to me one thing that I have done for my own personal gain," he added. "Yes, I play golf. I'm very proud of the fact that I play golf. It's the only thing that I do for myself. And when you go to a country and you're there for seven days and you take an afternoon off to play golf, what does the national media write? All about the golf, not about the meeting that went to. I'm not ashamed of anything I've done. I've never done anything in my political career for my own personal gain. You can look at my bank account and my house to understand that."

"I don't care what history writes, " he continued. "What I care about, what's important to me is who I am, what I've done and what I can accomplish in the future. What I care about it what I believe in and how I conduct myself in fighting for what I believe in."

Appearing relaxed despite three cups of coffee, DeLay played with his petite dogs and led a leisurely tour of his home. Upstairs, he offered a frame-by-frame description of the photos reflecting his past political clout, such as a private session on the Truman Balcony with the President and First Lady Laura Bush. The first frame marks the beginning of his arc from pest-control entrepreneur to a feared and ingenious power broker. It's the front page from a local paper, the Herald-Coaster, from 1978, proclaiming, "DeLay Is House Winner." That was the Texas House; voters sent him to Washington six years later, starting him on a 21-year congressional career. During the tour, he gave an indication of his early deftness at the political game when he showed off a picture of his wife, Christine, and their daughter, Danielle, with President Ronald Reagan. "I had to withhold my vote," he said, "to get my daughter's picture with Ronald Reagan as a freshman." His wife, a formidable daily force in his office with a voice in nearly all scheduling and media decisions, pointed to a photo of former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, and noted, "That's when we thought she was going to be conservative."

Putting the best face on the poll taken by his campaign, DeLay said it gave him "a little bit better than a 50/50 chance of winning reelection." Asked if that didn't mean that he could lose, he replied, "Could have. There's no reason to risk a seat. This is a very strong Republican district. It's obvious to me that anybody but me running here will overwhelmingly win the seat."

DeLay said he is likely to leave by the end of May, depending on the Congressional schedule and finishing his work on a couple of issues. He said he will change his legal residence to his condominium in Alexandria, Va., from his modest two-story home on a golf course here in the 22nd District of Texas. "I become ineligible to run for election if I'm not a resident of the state of Texas," he said, turning election law to his purposes for perhaps on last time. State Republican officials will then be able to name another Republican candidate to face Democrat Nick Lampson, a former House members who lost his seat in a redistricting engineered by DeLay.

Lampson has made a major issue of the lobbying scandal, and his campaign home page has a petition headed, "Tell Tom DeLay to Return the Dirty Money!," referring to contributions from he and his political action committees have received from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a one-time DeLay ally who pleaded guilty in January to three felonies, including conspiring to defraud clients and bribe public officials.

DeLay's decision means that he no longer has to fear any further sanctions from the House ethics committee, which admonished him three times in 1994 for official conduct deemed inappropriate by members, but has been paralyzed for more than a year and has taken no action in the more recent scandal. Sources close to DeLay said he remains under investigation by the Justice Department prosecutors, who now have Abramoff's cooperation, but the lawmaker said he has nothing to fear from the feds. "I paid lawyers to investigate me as if they were prosecuting me," he said. "They found nothing. There is absolutely nothing — no connection with Jack Abramoff that is illegal, dishonest, unethical or against the House rules."

Richard Cullen, a former U.S. attorney who is DeLay's Washington lawyer, told TIME that in December, the lawmaker's legal team turned over to the Justice Department about 1,000 e-mails from his office computers. "This was to show we had nothing to hide," Cullen said. "They were everything we felt related to the Abramoff investigation. None are from DeLay. They're from staffers, showing their give and take with Abramoff. There was nothing that I said to myself or DeLay, wow, this is really bad for him. Prosecutors are looking to see whether anyone on the government payroll, whether a congressman or a staffer, performed official acts in return for a bribe or gratuity."

A Texas district attorney, Ronnie Earle of Travis County, indicted DeLay last year on money-laundering charges for transactions involving Texans for a Republican Majority (TRMPAC), a political action committee DeLay founded. Earle is a Democrat and DeLay has attacked the charges as "a political hit job." He says he did not personally carry out the transactions and that, in any case, they are standard practice for parties around the country. Regardless, DeLay was forced to vacate his post as majority leader because of a House Republican rule (known as "the DeLay rule," because it was enacted amid concern about his legal situation) that requires a leader under indictment to step down.

DeLay, a Baptist born in the border city of Laredo, said he "spent a lot of time" praying about his decision and that his personal relationship with Jesus drives his day-to-day actions. "My faith is who I am," he said. When DeLay was booked on the Texas charges, he wore his Congressional I.D. pin and flashed a broad smile designed to thwart Democrats who had hoped to make wide use of an image of a glowering DeLay. "I said a little prayer before I actually did the fingerprint thing, and the picture," he said. "My prayer was basically: 'Let people see Christ through me. And let me smile.' Now, when they took the shot, from my side, I thought it was fakiest smile I'd ever given. But through the camera, it was glowing. I mean, it had the right impact. Poor old left couldn't use it at all."

Recently, he said, he has been hearing from many people who want his help on projects outside Congress. He said his decision was cemented by the thunderous response at a conference in Washington last Wednesday decrying the "War on Christianity."

"You talk to a lot of people, give a lot of people opportunities to give you message," DeLay said. "If it's the wrong decision, doors don't open — they're closed to you, and you don't feel good about it, and you have doubts. Doors are opening already." He said he has no plans to write a book. "I'm not a very good writer, " he said. In what must be a relief to his many lawyers, he said he has not kept a diary.

Copyright © 2006 Time Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited. Privacy Policy

is twisted dick cheney a sadist? did shooting his friend give him a woodie?

2006-03-29T10:10:00.000-09:00

Article Launched: 3/26/2006 12:06 AM
'Unit's' military expert has fighting words for Bush
By David Kronke, TV Critic
U-Entertainment
Eric Haney, a retired command sergeant major of the U.S. Army, was a founding member of Delta Force, the military's elite covert counter-terrorist unit. He culled his experiences for "Inside Delta Force" (Delta; $14), a memoir rich with harrowing stories, though in an interview, Haney declines with a shrug to estimate the number of times he was almost killed. (Perhaps the most high-profile incident that almost claimed his life was the 1980 failed rescue of the hostages in Iran.) Today, he's doing nothing nearly as dangerous: He serves as an executive producer and technical adviser for "The Unit," CBS' new hit drama based on his book, developed by playwright David Mamet. Even up against "American Idol," "The Unit" shows muscle, drawing 18 million viewers in its first two airings.
Since he has devoted his life to protecting his country in some of the world's most dangerous hot spots, you might assume Haney is sympathetic to the Bush administration's current plight in Iraq (the laudatory cover blurb on his book comes from none other than Fox's News' Bill O'Reilly). But he's also someone with close ties to the Pentagon, so he's privy to information denied the rest of us.

We recently spoke to Haney, an amiable, soft-spoken Southern gentleman, on the set of "The Unit."

Q: What's your assessment of the war in Iraq?

A: Utter debacle. But it had to be from the very first. The reasons were wrong. The reasons of this administration for taking this nation to war were not what they stated. (Army Gen.) Tommy Franks was brow-beaten and ... pursued warfare that he knew strategically was wrong in the long term. That's why he retired immediately afterward. His own staff could tell him what was going to happen afterward.

We have fomented civil war in Iraq. We have probably fomented internecine war in the Muslim world between the Shias and the Sunnis, and I think Bush may well have started the third world war, all for their own personal policies.

Q: What is the cost to our country?

A: For the first thing, our credibility is utterly zero. So we destroyed whatever credibility we had. ... And I say "we," because the American public went along with this. They voted for a second Bush administration out of fear, so fear is what they're going to have from now on.

Our military is completely consumed, so were there a real threat - thankfully, there is no real threat to the U.S. in the world, but were there one, we couldn't confront it. Right now, that may not be a bad thing, because that keeps Bush from trying something with Iran or with Venezuela.

The harm that has been done is irreparable. There are more than 2,000 American kids that have been killed. Tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis have been killed ñ which no one in the U.S. really cares about those people, do they? I never hear anybody lament that fact. It has been a horror, and this administration has worked overtime to divert the American public's attention from it. Their lies are coming home to roost now, and it's gonna fall apart. But somebody's gonna have to clear up the aftermath and the harm that it's done just to what America stands for. It may be two or three generations in repairing.

Q: What do you make of the torture debate? Cheney ...

A: (Interrupting) That's Cheney's pursuit. The only reason anyone tortures is because they like to do it. It's about vengeance, it's about revenge, or it's about cover-up. You don't gain intelligence that way. Everyone in the world knows that. It's worse than small-minded, and look what it does.

I've argued this on Bill O'Reilly and other Fox News shows. I ask, who would you want to pay to be a torturer? Do you want someone that the American public pays to torture? He's an employee of yours. It's worse than ridiculous. It's criminal; it's utterly criminal. This administration has been masters of diverting attention away from real issues and debating the silly. Debating what constitutes torture: Mistreatment of helpless people in your power is torture, period. And (I'm saying this as) a man who has been involved in the most pointed of our activities. I know it, and all of my mates know it. You don't do it. It's an act of cowardice. I hear apologists for torture say, "Well, they do it to us." Which is a ludicrous argument. ... The Saddam Husseins of the world are not our teachers. Christ almighty, we wrote a Constitution saying what's legal and what we believed in. Now we're going to throw it away.

Q: As someone who repeatedly put your life on the line, did some of the most hair-raising things to protect your country, and to see your country behave this way, that must be ...

A: It's pretty galling. But ultimately I believe in the good and the decency of the American people, and they're starting to see what's happening and the lies that have been told. We're seeing this current house of cards start to flutter away. The American people come around. They always do.

THE UNIT

What: Action-adventure about special-ops unit.
Where: CBS (Channel 2).
When: 9 p.m. Tuesdays.

---
David Kronke (818) 713-3638 david.kronke@dailynews.com

finally some good news: a kirkuk dr. confessed.

2006-03-28T19:45:00.000-09:00

As Many as 90 Killed ---via juancole.com
Badr Demands Khalilzad's Expulsion

A suicide bomber struck an army recruiting station near Tal Afar in northern Iraq, killing 40 and wounding 20. President Bush recently lauded the situation in Tal Afar and environs as a US success story.

About 29 corpses corpses showed up in the streets of Baghdad, most of them strangled and tortured.

A rocket attack on a building resulted in several casualties. The building housed political offices for the Fadhila (Virtue) and Dawa Parties. Both are Shiite religious parties.

A young physician in Kirkuk confessed on Kurdistan television Monday to having been an serial killer on behalf of the guerrillas, giving lethal injections to more than 40 Iraqi soldiers and police or denying them oxygen. At the same time, he was secretly treating wounded members of the guerrilla movement.

Guerrillas abducted 16 employees of an Iraqi trading company on Monday, according to the Iraqi Interior Ministry.

The governor of Baghdad province, Hussein al-Tahan, announced Monday “Today we decided to stop all political and service cooperation with the US forces until a legal committee is formed to investigate this incident.” [i.e. the US/Iraqi attack on the Mustafa Husayniyah in the Ur district on Sunday, which left some 20 persons dead).

it's bush et.al. vs. the constitution

2006-03-26T21:36:00.000-09:00

The Founders Never Imagined a Bush Administration

By Joyce Appleby and Gary Hart

Joyce Appleby is professor emerita of history at UCLA and co-director of the History New Service. Gary Hart is a former U.S. senator and Wirth Chair in the Graduate School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado, Denver.

George W. Bush and his most trusted advisers, Richard B. Cheney and Donald H. Rumsfeld, entered office determined to restore the authority of the presidency. Five years and many decisions later, they've pushed the expansion of presidential power so far that we now confront a constitutional crisis.

Relying on legal opinions from Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and Professor John Yoo, then working in the White House, Bush has insisted that there can be no limits to the power of the commander-in-chief in time of war. More recently the president has claimed that laws relating to domestic spying and the torture of detainees do not apply to him. His interpretation has produced a devilish conundrum.

President Bush has given Commander-in-Chief Bush unlimited wartime authority. But the "war on terror" is more a metaphor than a fact. Terrorism is a method, not an ideology; terrorists are criminals, not warriors. No peace treaty can possibly bring an end to the fight against far-flung terrorists. The emergency powers of the president during this "war" can now extend indefinitely, at the pleasure of the president and at great threat to the liberties and rights guaranteed us under the Constitution.

When President Nixon covertly subverted checks and balances 30 years ago during the Vietnam War, Congress passed laws making clear that presidents were not to engage in unconstitutional behavior in the interest of "national security." Then Congress was reacting to violation of Fourth Amendment protections against searches and seizures without judicial warrants establishing "probable cause," attempts to assassinate foreign leaders and surveillance of American citizens.

Now the Iraq war is being used to justify similar abuses. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, providing constitutional means to carry out surveillance, and the Intelligence Identification Protection Act, protecting the identity of undercover intelligence agents, have both been violated by an administration seeking to restore "the legitimate authority of the presidency," as Cheney puts it.

The presidency possesses no power not granted to it under the Constitution. The powers the current administration seeks in its "war on terror" are not granted under the Constitution. Indeed, they are explicitly prohibited by acts of Congress.

The Founding Fathers, who always come to mind when the Constitution is in danger, anticipated just such a possibility. Writing in the Federalist Papers, James Madison defined tyranny as the concentration of powers in one branch of the government.

"The great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department," Madison wrote in Federalist 51, "consists in giving to those who administer each department, the necessary constitutional means, and personal motives, to resist encroachments of the others."

Warming to his subject, Madison continued, "Ambition must be made to counteract ambition;" the interest of the office holders must "be connected with the constitutional rights of the place."

Recognizing that he was making an appeal to interest over ideals, he concluded that it "may be a reflection of human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government." "But what," Madison asked, "is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary."

Madison's solution to the concentration of powers that lead to tyranny relied upon either Congress or the Supreme Court to check the overreaching of a president. In our present crisis, Congress has been supine in the face of the president's grab for unconstitutional, unlimited power, and no case is working its way towards a Supreme Court judgment.

If Madison's reliance on the ambition of other office holders has failed us, we need to look elsewhere. Can what Thomas Jefferson called the "common sense and good judgment of the American people" help us now? In the past, they have been a critical last resort when our leaders endangered the constitutional checks and balances that have made us the world's oldest democracy. But first the public must wake up to this constitutional crisis.

This piece was distributed for non-exclusive use by the History News Service, an informal syndicate of professional historians who seek to improve the public's understanding of current events by setting these events in their historical contexts. The article may be republished as long as both the author and the History News Service are clearly credited.

thoughtful patriotism

2006-03-25T15:30:00.000-09:00

Published on Saturday, March 25, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
A Call to All Good Americans
by Ralph Nader

Attention please, good people! Adjust your routines and come to the aid of your country, and your children with your thoughtful patriotism. Don't just hope for impeachment, demand the resignation now of the mad hatters in the White House - George W. Bush and Richard Cheney.

Already, a large majority of you do not consider this shifty duo trustworthy. By more than two to one you disapprove of Bush's war in Iraq. Similar majorities believe this is also a President whose administrative incompetence - note the post-Katrina debacles compared to his promises last September in that devastated New Orleans - nearly matches his penchant for daily fabrications.

The precipitous drop in Bush's polls (Cheney's are even lower) is not coming from liberals who long ago registered negative in these national surveys. The drop is coming from millions of erstwhile Bush supporters, Bush voters, Bush-loving conservatives.

Why? Just look at or read the news every day. There goes Bush and Cheney insisting that conditions in Iraq are getting better and better, when they are getting worse and worse. And Americans also know this because hundreds of thousands of soldiers and other personnel are rotating from Iraq back into every state and community and telling millions of people the truth.

Repeated reports from diverse official, media and eyewitness accounts say that there is less electricity, more disease, less drinkable water, less housing, far less street security, less health care, less gasoline, fewer jobs and far more violence against civilians after the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld invasion in March 2003 than before the sanctioned, tottering, besieged dictator, Saddam Hussein, was toppled.

With Bush's own ambassador to Iraq warning of a possible civil war and Bush's handpicked interim Iraqi prime minister, Ayad Allawi saying "We are in a terrible civil conflict now," the serial delusionists, Bush and Cheney, having lied five ways into their war, go around daily as smarmy pollyannas spouting what Bush calls "a strategy that will lead to victory in Iraq".

Why, didn't you know about all the progress in Iraq? If only the media would report it, they both say again and again. Really! What about all the corruption by the many contractors, all the brutal militias that now often do their work wearing Iraqi soldier or police uniforms, all the bogus reconstruction, paid with billions of American taxpayer money? What about the spreading chaos that Bush has no intention of confronting, as international law requires invading occupiers to remedy. Remember Colin Powell's tight phrase, "We broke it, we own it," that sums up the global law on this subject.

Massive separation from reality frequently involves ordinary personalities with psychotherapy. Read the words of the The Washington Post's respected columnist, Eugene Robinson:

The people running this country sound convinced that reality is whatever they say it is. And if they've actually strayed into the realm of genuine self-delusion - if they actually believe the fantasies they're spinning about the bloody mess they made in Iraq over the past three years - then things are even worse than I thought.

He described Bush as "divorced from reality".

Worse still is the delusion that claims the Bush-Cheney War is not generating more terrorists. Mr. Bush doesn't listen to intelligence, military and diplomatic officials, or even to his CIA Director Porter Goss. Mr. Goss has testified that the U.S. occupation is a magnet and a training ground for even more terrorists from outside and inside Iraq. Thereby, setting up a boomerang against our national security in the future.

One area, however, in Iraq is proceeding on schedule - the building of four massive, permanent super-bases, complete with American suburban amenities such as Pizza Hut, Burger King, miniature golf courses, theaters, swimming pools and even a football field. There is almost a news blackout about Balad Air Base, al-Asad Airbase and others, thought not quite the blockage that the two White House draft-dodgers have placed on reporters trying to cover the return of the fallen soldiers to Dover, Delaware.

Senator Joe Biden (D-Delaware) spoke about the growing opposition by both Republican and Democratic Senators, to what can deliberately be called disinformation coming out of the Bush administration. Not to mention the refusal to respond at all to serious inquiries by members of Congress.

Unlike the Presidential ordering of military invasions that violate our domestic laws, our Constitution and international treaties to which the U.S. is a signatory, massive delusion in the White House is not an impeachable offense. But it should be a cause for resignation driven by popular bipartisan demand. Bush and Cheney have arrayed their no-fault power, their political egos against the interests of our country. They are obsessively-compulsed.

Bush recently traveled to West Virginia and did not speak to the poverty among some of the hardest workers in America. He went to Ohio on Air Force One and ignored the huge loss of manufacturing jobs there to Mexico, China and other authoritarian nations. No, instead, he brings his gigantic sign, "Plan for Victory", stands in front of it and, as befits the Mayor of Baghdad, talks about his delusions in that oil-rich, devastated country.

Reality, good citizens, can fairly describe the dictatorial Bush and Cheney as psychiatrically challenged. Send them to the unemployment lines, where Halliburton and Exxon will certainly pick them up.

###

remember when capability trumped ideology?

2006-03-24T16:07:00.000-09:00

Good versus evil isn't a strategy
Bush's worldview fails to see that in the Middle East, power politics is the key.
By Madeleine Albright in the la times.

March 24, 2006

THE BUSH administration's newly unveiled National Security Strategy might well be subtitled "The Irony of Iran." Three years after the invasion of Iraq and the invention of the phrase "axis of evil," the administration now highlights the threat posed by Iran — whose radical government has been vastly strengthened by the invasion of Iraq. This is more tragedy than strategy, and it reflects the Manichean approach this administration has taken to the world.

It is sometimes convenient, for purposes of rhetorical effect, for national leaders to talk of a globe neatly divided into good and bad. It is quite another, however, to base the policies of the world's most powerful nation upon that fiction. The administration's penchant for painting its perceived adversaries with the same sweeping brush has led to a series of unintended consequences.

For years, the president has acted as if Al Qaeda, Saddam Hussein's followers and Iran's mullahs were parts of the same problem. Yet, in the 1980s, Hussein's Iraq and Iran fought a brutal war. In the 1990s, Al Qaeda's allies murdered a group of Iranian diplomats. For years, Osama bin Laden ridiculed Hussein, who persecuted Sunni and Shiite religious leaders alike. When Al Qaeda struck the U.S. on 9/11, Iran condemned the attacks and later participated constructively in talks on Afghanistan. The top leaders in the new Iraq — chosen in elections that George W. Bush called "a magic moment in the history of liberty" — are friends of Iran. When the U.S. invaded Iraq, Bush may have thought he was striking a blow for good over evil, but the forces unleashed were considerably more complex.

The administration is now divided between those who understand this complexity and those who do not. On one side, there are ideologues, such as the vice president, who apparently see Iraq as a useful precedent for Iran. Meanwhile, officials on the front lines in Iraq know they cannot succeed in assembling a workable government in that country without the tacit blessing of Iran; hence, last week's long-overdue announcement of plans for a U.S.-Iranian dialogue on Iraq — a dialogue that if properly executed might also lead to progress on other issues.

Although this is not an administration known for taking advice, I offer three suggestions. The first is to understand that although we all want to "end tyranny in this world," that is a fantasy unless we begin to solve hard problems. Iraq is increasingly a gang war that can be solved in one of two ways: by one side imposing its will or by all the legitimate players having a piece of the power. The U.S. is no longer able to control events in Iraq, but it can be useful as a referee.

Second, the Bush administration should disavow any plan for regime change in Iran — not because the regime should not be changed but because U.S. endorsement of that goal only makes it less likely. In today's warped political environment, nothing strengthens a radical government more than Washington's overt antagonism. It also is common sense to presume that Iran will be less willing to cooperate in Iraq and to compromise on nuclear issues if it is being threatened with destruction. As for Iran's choleric and anti-Semitic new president, he will be swallowed up by internal rivals if he is not unwittingly propped up by external foes.

Third, the administration must stop playing solitaire while Middle East and Persian Gulf leaders play poker. Bush's "march of freedom" is not the big story in the Muslim world, where Shiite Muslims suddenly have more power than they have had in 1,000 years; it is not the big story in Lebanon, where Iran is filling the vacuum left by Syria; it is not the story among Palestinians, who voted — in Western eyes — freely, and wrongly; it is not even the big story in Iraq, where the top three factions in the recent elections were all supported by decidedly undemocratic militias.

In the long term, the future of the Middle East may well be determined by those in the region dedicated to the hard work of building democracy. I certainly hope so. But hope is not a policy. In the short term, we must recognize that the region will be shaped primarily by fairly ruthless power politics in which the clash between good and evil will be swamped by differences between Sunni and Shiite, Arab and Persian, Arab and Kurd, Kurd and Turk, Hashemite and Saudi, secular and religious and, of course, Arab and Jew. This is the world, the president pledges in his National Security Strategy, that "America must continue to lead." Actually, it is the world he must begin to address — before it is too late.

MADELEINE ALBRIGHT, secretary of State from 1997 to 2001, is the author of "The Mighty and the Almighty -- Reflections on America, God, and World Affairs," to be published by Harper Collins in May. This essay appears by special arrangement with the Financial Times.

another sleazy pol. from the gadflyer.

2006-03-24T08:09:00.000-09:00

3.24.06

Straight Talk on Mr. Straight Talk
Elbert Ventura
In his March 21 Media Notes column, Howard Kurtz notes the emerging strain of anti-McCain sentiment in the media and among liberals. Pointing out that McCain has never presented himself as anything other than a "rock-ribbed conservative," Kurtz ascribes the mounting anti-McCain mood to the Arizona senator's emergence as the front-runner for the GOP nomination. "I suspect this is only the beginning," he adds, excerpting recent critiques by Paul Krugman and Mark Schmitt.

Certainly McCain's rise as the man to beat in November '08 merits attention and scrutiny. But it's what McCain has done to put himself in that position that has drawn the ire of the left--deservedly.

McCain's honeymoon period of 1999-2001 saw him establish and burnish his credentials as a noble straight-talker, above the fray and beholden to no one. But in the last couple of years, another McCain has shown his face: calculating, opportunistic, and compromised. This McCain backed George W. Bush in '04, despite the Bush campaign's vicious attacks on him in '00; continued to peddle the administration line on Iraq even as the rationale for war collapsed; began to mend fences with his traditional enemies on the right; picked a fight with Barack Obama, a threat to his media-darling throne; and, most egregiously, punted on lobbying reform as his own fundraising needs came into view.

The result? A "maverick" who has made himself a viable GOP primary winner in 2008, thanks to unscrupulous political maneuvering. Yes, it's no different than what a lot of other politicians do--which is why it's high time McCain should be treated like other politicians, instead of a principled idealist who can do no wrong.

Old habits die hard. In a February episode of Hardball, Chris Matthews could not stop gushing about McCain the maverick, praising in particular his takedown of Obama. A self-satisfied McCain replied, "It was a little straight talk, Chris," sounding like a man who has let his media-made myth go to his head.

Liberals are sounding the alarm on McCain not because he's leading the GOP pack, but because he's revealed himself to be far less than the shoot-from-the-hip reformer he's been made out to be. For years, the media has been buying John McCain, overinflating the Straight Talk stock. What we are seeing now is the correction, long overdue. Let's hope it's only the beginning.

Copyright © Elbert Ventura. Material presented on The Gadflyer is the opinion of the respective author and not that of The Gadflyer, the web host or any other entity.

you want apocalypse? YOU CAN'T HANDLE APOCALYPSE!

2006-03-23T15:47:00.000-09:00

"Worse than a Fool"
Posted by James Wolcott.com
Among the many peculiarities of this president is his utter refusal to listen to those within his own orbit in the oil realm. It's understandable, if unacceptable, that Bush would ignore the warnings of environmentalists regarding Peak Oil and global warming, but why would he tune out the words of his gummy ally Tony Blair, Matthew Simmons, the expert oil analyst and author of Twilight in the Desert who has briefed Bush personally, and Richard Rainwater?

"Richard Rainwater doesn't want to sound like a kook," began a profile of the super investor in Fortune magazine (the italics below are mine). "But he's about as worried as a happily married guy with more than $2 billion and a home in Pebble Beach can get. Americans are 'in the kind of trouble people shouldn't find themselves in,' he says. He's just wary about being the one to sound the alarm.

"Rainwater is something of a behind-the-scenes type--at least as far as alpha-male billionaires go. He counts President Bush as a personal friend but dislikes politics, and frankly, when he gets worked up, he says some pretty far-out things that could easily be taken out of context. Such as: An economic tsunami is about to hit the global economy as the world runs out of oil. Or a coalition of communist and Islamic states may decide to stop selling their precious crude to Americans any day now. Or food shortages may soon hit the U.S. Or he read on a blog last night that there's this one gargantuan chunk of ice sitting on a precipice in Antarctica that, if it falls off, will raise sea levels worldwide by two feet--and it's getting closer to the edge.... And then he'll interrupt himself: 'Look, I'm not predicting anything,' he'll say. 'That's when you get a little kooky-sounding.'

"Rainwater is no crackpot. But you don't get to be a multibillionaire investor--one who's more than doubled his net worth in a decade--through incremental gains on little stock trades. You have to push way past conventional thinking, test the boundaries of chaos, see events in a bigger context. You have to look at all the scenarios, from 'A to friggin' Z, as he says, and not be afraid to focus on Z. Only when you've vacuumed up as much information as possible and you know the world is at a major inflection point do you put a hell of a lot of money behind your conviction.

"Such insights have allowed Rainwater to turn moments of cataclysm into gigantic paydays before. In the mid-1990s he saw panic selling in Houston real estate and bought some 15 million square feet; now the properties are selling for three times his purchase price. In the late '90s, when oil seemed plentiful and its price had fallen to the low teens, he bet hundreds of millions--by investing in oil stocks and futures--that it would rise. A billion dollars later, that move is still paying off. 'Most people invest and then sit around worrying what the next blowup will be," he says. "I do the opposite. I wait for the blowup, then invest.'

"The next blowup, however, looms so large that it scares and confuses him. For the past few months he's been holed up in hard-core research mode--reading books, academic studies, and, yes, blogs. Every morning he rises before dawn at one of his houses in Texas or South Carolina or California (he actually owns a piece of Pebble Beach Resorts) and spends four or five hours reading sites like LifeAftertheOilCrash.net or DieOff.org, obsessively following links and sifting through data. How worried is he? He has some $500 million of his $2.5 billion fortune in cash, more than ever before. 'I'm long oil and I'm liquid,' he says. 'I've put myself in a position that if the end of the world came tomorrow I'd kind of be prepared.' He's also ready to move fast if he spots an opening.

"His instincts tell him that another enormous moneymaking opportunity is about to present itself, what he calls a 'slow pitch down the middle.' But, at 61, wealthier and happier than ever before, Rainwater finds himself reacting differently this time. He's focused more on staying rich than on getting richer. But there's something else too: a sort of billionaire-style civic duty he feels to get a conversation started. Why couldn't energy prices skyrocket, with grave repercussions, not just economic but political? As industry analysts debate whether the world's oil production is destined to decline, the prospect makes him itchy.

"'This is a nonrecurring event," he says. 'The 100-year flood in Houston real estate was one, the ability to buy oil and gas really cheap was another, and now there's the opportunity to do something based on a shortage of natural resources. Can you make money? Well, yeah. One way is to just stay long domestic oil. But there may be something more important than making money. This is the first scenario I've seen where I question the survivability of mankind. I don't want the world to wake up one day and say, 'How come some doofus billionaire in Texas made all this money by being aware of this, and why didn't someone tell us?'"

The only explanation, apart from Bush's cognitive disability in facing reality, is that he sociopathically doesn't care about the coming calamity endangering the planet because he and his cronies will be financially prepared even as most Americans lose their standard of living.

There are so many reasons that Bush's name should be dragged through the dust of his post-presidency for the harm and disgrace his administration has inflicted, and so impeachable offenses for which he would prosecuted today if we had a Congress worthy of the Founders. His malign indifference to Peak Oil and global warming may be the greatest of his crimes, because it will lead to the misery and deaths of untold millions of people, animals, and natural resources.

Richard Heinberg, author of The Party's Over and Powerdown, methodically lays out the prosecution argument for the impeachment of George W. Bush.

"While it would be difficult to create an airtight legal case for impeaching George W. Bush based on his ignoring the very real threat posed by Peak Oil, nevertheless I believe that his actions—and inaction—in this regard constitute dereliction of duty on an unprecedented scale.

It is part of the job of leaders to foresee problems and either steer around them or prepare for them. A head of state is analogous to the captain of a ship, who is responsible not only for keeping his vessel on course but also for avoiding hazards such as storms and icebergs. Some problems are not foreseeable; others are. A ship’s captain who loses his vessel to a freak 'perfect storm' may be blameless, but one who steers his passenger liner directly into a foggy ice field, having no sonar or radar, is worse than a fool: he is criminally negligent.

"The argument I will make, in brief, is this:

"Peak Oil is foreseeable.

"The consequences are also foreseeable and are likely to be ruinous.

"The Bush administration has been repeatedly warned.

"Actions could be taken to reduce the impact, but the longer those actions are delayed, the worse the impact will be.

"The administration, rather than taking steps to mitigate these looming catastrophic impacts, has instead done things that can only worsen them.

"Let us go through these points one by one."

Which he proceeds to do, convincingly, devastatingly.

gutless democrats just don't get it.--- STAND FOR SOMETHING

2006-03-22T18:18:00.000-09:00

Here Beginneth the Lesson
What does Russ Feingold have in common with Jack Abramoff? Not much. And that’s exactly the Democrats’ problem.
By Charles P. Pierce

Just so everyone knows, I have several Personal people in my life, not including those in my immediate family, which includes my Personal Wife and all three of my Personal Children. Elsewhere, I have a Personal Agent, a Personal Mechanic, a Personal Yard Guy (twice a year), several Personal Editors, and my Personal Fencing Coach, a jovial Egyptian who weekly tries in vain to teach me a beat-Four attack with an epee and then retires outside to smoke a cigarette and wonder why the Pharaohs blew town and left him with the likes of me.

I do not have a Personal Lord and Savior. Despite the attempts of television preachers, think-tank apostles, and several professional athletes to convince me otherwise, I do not want a Personal Lord and Savior, not even the most popular one ever to come out of the Nazarene artisans' community. While I have no problem with Whoever’s eye is on every sparrow, and while I have indeed considered the lilies of the field -- and so has my Personal Yard Man, who believes them to be flowering weeds -- I’d just as soon not have a Lord and Savior who has my cell-phone number. I don’t want one I can call by His first name, as though he were making me some bookcases. “Mr. ben-Yosef” is fine by me, thanks, and he should worry about Africa, and not about my beat-Four problem. When it comes to Lords-and-Saviors, I’m perfectly willing to be part of a large and impersonal client base.

I have no problem with all those people who disagree. Most of them I simply ignore, which is something that my fellow liberals seem to have lost the ability to do. We aren’t any good at ignoring people any more. We’ve lost the essential ability to Not Pay Attention. Wiser pundits than I have argued that this is a problem of insecurity: that liberals -- and their Democratic meat-puppets -- are so unsure of that for which they stand that they’re afraid to ignore anybody, even the theocratic carny-barkers who draw their public rituals from the Book Of Common Buncombe. I am not sure about that. I think the problem is one of timing.

The most important thing is not knowing who to ignore, but of knowing when to ignore them. Consider two cases now prominent in the news of the day -- those of Jack Abramoff and of Russell Feingold. Now, let us never forget that, in the annals of American corruption, the former is the capo di tutti bagmen. Compared to Jackie The Hat, the Daley mob were Campfire Girls and Boss Tweed was Jane Addams. For centuries, American politicians sought in vain for the Unifying Theory Of Political Sleaze. Brilliant men failed in the attempt. Abramoff managed to succeed in less than a decade.

Of course, he had help. Everywhere he looked, there was a Republican politician to sublet. There were GOP superstars appearing at his door with both hands out, each of which held a bushel basket. As near as we can tell by the available evidence, over the course of the past decade, the Old Course at St. Andrews hosted more Republican hacks than Bob Jones University ever did. Of course, the whiskey’s better there. He helped fund think tanks. He helped find people jobs. He helped run phony moralist crusades. He became the most famous white person to swindle Indians since Peter Minuit. The only question regarding his oeuvre seemed to be whether scoring tickets to watch the Washington Wizards in any real sense constituted a bribe.

And now?

Nobody knows the guy.

Tom DeLay may have heard his name on an airplane. The president may have bumped into him while clearing brush. Denny Hastert thinks he might have been a guy he wrestled against in high school. Bill Frist thinks he put a stent in him once 20 years ago, but maybe not. Could have been someone else. Grover Norquist apparently believes him to be a figment of someone’s imagination. Every other (so far) unindicted Republican thinks he or she may have bought a newspaper from him one morning, and isn’t he the guy in the scalley cap who runs the newsstand at Union Station?

See the point, though? The Republicans didn’t start ignoring Jack Abramoff until they’d ALREADY GOT THE GOODIES! They’d financed their political machines, won their elections, played their 18 holes. They didn’t start ignoring Jack Abramoff until he’d done them all the good he could do for them. That is how you ignore people. You don’t start ignoring someone until a federal prosecutor makes it easy for you to do so. Compare that to how the Democratic party has chosen to ignore Russ Feingold. A couple of weeks back, Feingold got up in the Senate and proposed that the legislature inform the president in no uncertain terms that he sort of, maybe, ought to obey the law. This gave many influential Democrats the public vapors. (Note to Evan Bayh -- IKEA called. Your spine came in.) It was hard to figure out why.

The president’s approval ratings are in the low thirties. The vice president’s approval ratings are in a Level Four biohazard facility at the CDC. The administration’s primary domestic policies are lying in the road waiting for the Department of Public Works to scrape them up with a shovel. Its primary foreign policy initiative is most popular these days in Teheran. The generic congressional polling numbers seem to favor the Democratic candidates. Now, I’m no Bob Shrum, certainly, but this seems to me a good time to roll up the Constitution and give these incumbent lads a good whack across the nose while they’re down.

Instead, the most prominent Democratic politicians -- to wit, everyone in the party who looks in the mirror and hears “Hail To The Chief,” which is most of them, God knows – have embarked on a strategy of Ignoring Russ Feingold.

“Who? Where’s he from? Wisconsin? Is that a state? Oh, where the Packers play? I know that place. Harumph. Ahem. When am I on with Imus again?”

Ladies and gents, what you do is sign on, milk it for all the advantages during the upcoming elections that the polls say you can, and THEN, afterwards, that’s when you ignore Russ Feingold, probably when he decides to run for president. As a great man once said, if I can’t drink their whiskey, screw their women, and then vote against them anyway, what’s the point of being in politics? All principled politics are essentially exercises in ingratitude.

Charles P. Pierce is a staff writer at The Boston Globe Magazine and a contributing writer for Esquire. He also is heard regularly on National Public Radio.

© 2006 by The American Prospect, Inc.

showin' some fiscal discipline. from dailykos

2006-03-19T21:52:00.000-09:00

That Good Ol' Compassionate Conservatism in Action
by mcjoan
Sun Mar 19, 2006 at 10:48:54 PM PDT

Bob Herbert is too infrequently linked these days, particularly since that blasted firewall. Herbert has an amazing talent for finding that small, absolutely critical story, presented clearly, simply and with devastating acuity. Tomorrow's column is emblematic of that skill.

The federal government has a national breast and cervical cancer early detection program, run by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It provides screening and other important services to low-income women who do not have health insurance, or are underinsured.
There is agreement across the board that the program is a success. It saves lives and it saves money. Its biggest problem is that it doesn't reach enough women. At the moment there is only enough funding to screen one in five eligible women.

A sensible policy position for the Bush administration would be to expand funding for the program so that it reached everyone who was eligible. It terms of overall federal spending, the result would be a net decrease. Preventing cancer, or treating it early, is a lot less expensive than treating advanced cancer.

So what did this president do? He proposed a cut in the program of $1.4 million (a minuscule amount when you're talking about the national budget), which would mean that 4,000 fewer women would have access to early detection.

Four thousand women, 4,000 families, written off. For a measly $1.4 million. Women who generally are working, make too much to qualify for Medicaid and whose employers don't provide health insurance. This program offers free early detection services--mammograms, Pap smears--and for those with a cancer diagnosis, hooks them up with a companion program that provides medical insurance.

The truly insane thing about this particular target is that the screening catches these cancers early on, when they are still relatively easy and inexpensive to treat. As one doctor participating in the program explains

"It won't save money," he said. "You don't save money by not diagnosing cancer early. You end up spending more money because anyone who develops cancer will get into the health care system and they will be treated. And the cost at that point will be a lot more. The logic here is very simple: the later you diagnose cancer of the breast or cervix, the more expensive it is to the country."
Katrina went a long way toward proving the lie of Bush's compassionate conservatism. The conclusion of Herbert's column pretty much seals the deal.

This is just one program in a range of cancer services that rely on support from the federal government. As if immune to the extent of human suffering involved, President Bush has proposed a barrage of cuts for these programs.
"What's really amazing," said Mr. Smith, "is that the president cut every cancer program. He cut the colorectal cancer program. He cut research at the National Cancer Institute. He cut literally every one of our cancer-specific programs. It's incomprehensible."

no paris hilton left behind budget.

2006-03-17T17:07:00.000-09:00

Debt Be Not Proud
Very quietly, Congress will once again raise the debt ceiling.
By Robert B. Reich
Web Exclusive: 03.16.06

You may hear it called the ‘debt limit’ or ‘debt ceiling’ or ‘debt cap,’ but usually you don’t hear about it at all because most people in Washington don’t like to talk about it. It’s the maximum amount of money the United States can borrow. And that maximum is set by Congress.

Until Congress votes another rise, that maximum is set at $8.184 trillion. The White House wants to raise the limit to $8.961 trillion. Are you still reading? These are numbers so big they defy imagination. On seeing them, the mind stops. Eyes glaze over. We’re talking about a sum of money that’s almost 90 percent of America’s entire gross domestic product this year.

The White House wants Congress to raise the limit because the nation is going deeper into debt. We’re going deeper into debt because the government continues to spend more than it’s receiving back in taxes. If Congress doesn’t raise the debt limit, the United States can’t borrow more money, the Treasury can’t auction off the next batch of ten-year notes, and the U.S. would default on its obligations. This would not be a pretty picture. A default by the United States would be the end of financial civilization as we know it.

So of course Congress will raise the debt limit. But it’s embarrassing to members of Congress. They like to talk about being fiscally responsible yet the budget is so obviously out of control. It would be especially embarrassing if they had to record their votes. A mid-term election is coming up in seven months, and who wants to be on record in favor of raising the national debt?

There’s also the inconvenient historic fact that a little more than a decade ago, when a Democrat was in the White House, Republican congressional leaders refused to raise the debt limit until they got an iron-clad promise that the budget would be balanced. And it was. But this time nobody expects the budget to get anywhere near balance for years to come, if ever.

It’s another Washington song and dance. Sing the song of fiscal responsibility. Dance in the other direction.

The irony is that a larger national debt would not be bad if the extra money we borrowed was spent on making Americans more productive. If we were healthier and better educated and better prepared, in future years we could repay the debt and also enjoy a higher standard of living.

The real tragedy is the extra borrowing isn’t for any of this. In fact, the federal government is cutting back on education and skimping on child health.

The extra money is for a bloated military budget, a badly-thought out Medicare drug benefit, an engorged subsidy to big agriculture, and a slag heap of pork and corporate welfare such as was doled out in last summer’s energy and highway bills.

And on top of all this, the White House wants to extend forever those 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, mainly for the wealthy, that still haven’t boosted investment or trickled downward, and never will.

The debt limit will be raised as quietly as possible because almost no one in Washington wants to talk about how much we as a nation owe, how badly we’re spending what we’re borrowing, and how much of our future we’re squandering as a result.

Robert B. Reich is co-founder of The American Prospect. A version of this column originally appeared on Marketplace.

© 2006 by The American Prospect, Inc.

sooo prescient. from fair.org

2006-03-16T03:47:00.000-09:00

"The Final Word Is Hooray!"
Remembering the Iraq War's Pollyanna pundits

3/15/06

Weeks after the invasion of Iraq began, Fox News Channel host Brit Hume delivered a scathing speech critiquing the media's supposedly pessimistic assessment of the Iraq War.

"The majority of the American media who were in a position to comment upon the progress of the war in the early going, and even after that, got it wrong," Hume complained in the April 2003 speech (Richmond Times Dispatch, 4/25/04). "They didn't get it just a little wrong. They got it completely wrong."

Hume was perhaps correct--but almost entirely in the opposite sense. Days or weeks into the war, commentators and reporters made premature declarations of victory, offered predictions about lasting political effects and called on the critics of the war to apologize. Three years later, the Iraq War grinds on at the cost of at least tens of thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars.

Around the same time as Hume's speech, syndicated columnist Cal Thomas declared (4/16/03): "All of the printed and voiced prophecies should be saved in an archive. When these false prophets again appear, they can be reminded of the error of their previous ways and at least be offered an opportunity to recant and repent. Otherwise, they will return to us in another situation where their expertise will be acknowledged, or taken for granted, but their credibility will be lacking."

Gathered here are some of the most notable media comments from the early days of the Iraq War.

Declaring Victory

"Iraq Is All but Won; Now What?"
(Los Angeles Times headline, 4/10/03)

"Now that the combat phase of the war in Iraq is officially over, what begins is a debate throughout the entire U.S. government over America's unrivaled power and how best to use it."
(CBS reporter Joie Chen, 5/4/03)

"Congress returns to Washington this week to a world very different from the one members left two weeks ago. The war in Iraq is essentially over and domestic issues are regaining attention."
(NPR's Bob Edwards, 4/28/03)

"Tommy Franks and the coalition forces have demonstrated the old axiom that boldness on the battlefield produces swift and relatively bloodless victory. The three-week swing through Iraq has utterly shattered skeptics' complaints."
(Fox News Channel's Tony Snow, 4/27/03)

"The only people who think this wasn't a victory are Upper Westside liberals, and a few people here in Washington."
(Charles Krauthammer, Inside Washington, WUSA-TV, 4/19/03)

"We had controversial wars that divided the country. This war united the country and brought the military back."
(Newsweek's Howard Fineman--MSNBC, 5/7/03)

"We're all neo-cons now."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 4/9/03)

"The war was the hard part. The hard part was putting together a coalition, getting 300,000 troops over there and all their equipment and winning. And it gets easier. I mean, setting up a democracy is hard, but it is not as hard as winning a war."
(Fox News Channel's Fred Barnes, 4/10/03)

"Oh, it was breathtaking. I mean I was almost starting to think that we had become inured to everything that we'd seen of this war over the past three weeks; all this sort of saturation. And finally, when we saw that it was such a just true, genuine expression. It was reminiscent, I think, of the fall of the Berlin Wall. And just sort of that pure emotional expression, not choreographed, not stage-managed, the way so many things these days seem to be. Really breathtaking."
(Washington Post reporter Ceci Connolly, appearing on Fox News Channel on 4/9/03, discussing the pulling down of a Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad, an event later revealed to have been a U.S. military PSYOPS operation [stunt]--Los Angeles Times, 7/3/04)

Mission Accomplished?

"The war winds down, politics heats up.... Picture perfect. Part Spider-Man, part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan. The president seizes the moment on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."
(PBS's Gwen Ifill, 5/2/03, on George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech)

"We're proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical, who's not a complicated guy like Clinton or even like Dukakis or Mondale, all those guys, McGovern. They want a guy who's president. Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It's simple. We're not like the Brits."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 5/1/03)

"He looked like an alternatively commander in chief, rock star, movie star, and one of the guys."
(CNN's Lou Dobbs, on Bush's 'Mission Accomplished' speech, 5/1/03)

Neutralizing the Opposition

"Why don't the damn Democrats give the president his day? He won today. He did well today."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 4/9/03)

"What's he going to talk about a year from now, the fact that the war went too well and it's over? I mean, don't these things sort of lose their--Isn't there a fresh date on some of these debate points?"
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, speaking about Howard Dean--4/9/03)

"If image is everything, how can the Democratic presidential hopefuls compete with a president fresh from a war victory?"
(CNN's Judy Woodruff, 5/5/03)

"It is amazing how thorough the victory in Iraq really was in the broadest context..... And the silence, I think, is that it's clear that nobody can do anything about it. There isn't anybody who can stop him. The Democrats can't oppose--cannot oppose him politically."
(Washington Post reporter Jeff Birnbaum-- Fox News Channel, 5/2/03)

Nagging the "Naysayers"

"Now that the war in Iraq is all but over, should the people in Hollywood who opposed the president admit they were wrong?"
(Fox News Channel's Alan Colmes, 4/25/03)

"I doubt that the journalists at the New York Times and NPR or at ABC or at CNN are going to ever admit just how wrong their negative pronouncements were over the past four weeks."
(MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, 4/9/03)

"I'm waiting to hear the words 'I was wrong' from some of the world's most elite journalists, politicians and Hollywood types.... I just wonder, who's going to be the first elitist to show the character to say: 'Hey, America, guess what? I was wrong'? Maybe the White House will get an apology, first, from the New York Times' Maureen Dowd. Now, Ms. Dowd mocked the morality of this war....

"Do you all remember Scott Ritter, you know, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector who played chief stooge for Saddam Hussein? Well, Mr. Ritter actually told a French radio network that -- quote, "The United States is going to leave Baghdad with its tail between its legs, defeated." Sorry, Scott. I think you've been chasing the wrong tail, again.

"Maybe disgraced commentators and politicians alike, like Daschle, Jimmy Carter, Dennis Kucinich, and all those others, will step forward tonight and show the content of their character by simply admitting what we know already: that their wartime predictions were arrogant, they were misguided and they were dead wrong. Maybe, just maybe, these self-anointed critics will learn from their mistakes. But I doubt it. After all, we don't call them 'elitists' for nothing."
(MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, 4/10/03)

"Over the next couple of weeks when we find the chemical weapons this guy was amassing, the fact that this war was attacked by the left and so the right was so vindicated, I think, really means that the left is going to have to hang its head for three or four more years."
(Fox News Channel's Dick Morris, 4/9/03)

"This has been a tough war for commentators on the American left. To hope for defeat meant cheering for Saddam Hussein. To hope for victory meant cheering for President Bush. The toppling of Mr. Hussein, or at least a statue of him, has made their arguments even harder to defend. Liberal writers for ideologically driven magazines like The Nation and for less overtly political ones like The New Yorker did not predict a defeat, but the terrible consequences many warned of have not happened. Now liberal commentators must address the victory at hand and confront an ascendant conservative juggernaut that asserts United States might can set the world right."
(New York Times reporter David Carr, 4/16/03)

"Well, the hot story of the week is victory.... The Tommy Franks-Don Rumsfeld battle plan, war plan, worked brilliantly, a three-week war with mercifully few American deaths or Iraqi civilian deaths.... There is a lot of work yet to do, but all the naysayers have been humiliated so far.... The final word on this is, hooray."
(Fox News Channel's Morton Kondracke, 4/12/03)

"Shouldn't the [Canadian] prime minister and all of us who thought the war was hasty and dangerous and wrongheaded admit that we were wrong? I mean, with the pictures of those Iraqis dancing in the streets, hauling down statues of Saddam Hussein and gushing their thanks to the Americans, isn't it clear that President Bush and Britain's Tony Blair were right all along? If we believe it's a good thing that Hussein's regime has been dismantled, aren't we hypocritical not to acknowledge Bush's superior judgment?... Why can't those of us who thought the war was a bad idea (or, at any rate, a premature one) let it go now and just join in celebrating the victory wrought by our magnificent military forces?"
(Washington Post's William Raspberry, 4/14/03)

"Some journalists, in my judgment, just can't stand success, especially a few liberal columnists and newspapers and a few Arab reporters."
(CNN's Lou Dobbs, 4/14/03)

"Sean Penn is at it again. The Hollywood star takes out a full-page ad out in the New York Times bashing George Bush. Apparently he still hasn't figured out we won the war."
(MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, 5/30/03)

Cakewalk?

"This will be no war -- there will be a fairly brief and ruthless military intervention.... The president will give an order. [The attack] will be rapid, accurate and dazzling.... It will be greeted by the majority of the Iraqi people as an emancipation. And I say, bring it on."
(Christopher Hitchens, in a 1/28/03 debate-- cited in the Observer, 3/30/03)

"I will bet you the best dinner in the gaslight district of San Diego that military action will not last more than a week. Are you willing to take that wager?"
(Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly, 1/29/03)

"It won't take weeks. You know that, professor. Our military machine will crush Iraq in a matter of days and there's no question that it will."
(Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly, 2/10/03)

"There's no way. There's absolutely no way. They may bomb for a matter of weeks, try to soften them up as they did in Afghanistan. But once the United States and Britain unleash, it's maybe hours. They're going to fold like that."
(Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly, 2/10/03)

"He [Saddam Hussein] actually thought that he could stop us and win the debate worldwide. But he didn't--he didn't bargain on a two- or three week war. I actually thought it would be less than two weeks."
(NBC reporter Fred Francis, Chris Matthews Show, 4/13/03)

Weapons of Mass Destruction

NPR's Mara Liasson: Where there was a debate about whether or not Iraq had these weapons of mass destruction and whether we can find it...

Brit Hume: No, there wasn't. Nobody seriously argued that he didn't have them beforehand. Nobody.
(Fox News Channel, April 6, 2003)

"Speaking to the U.N. Security Council last week, Secretary of State Colin Powell made so strong a case that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein is in material breach of U.N. resolutions that only the duped, the dumb and the desperate could ignore it."
(Cal Thomas, syndicated column, 2/12/03)

"Saddam could decide to take Baghdad with him. One Arab intelligence officer interviewed by Newsweek spoke of "the green mushroom" over Baghdad--the modern-day caliph bidding a grotesque bio-chem farewell to the land of the living alongside thousands of his subjects as well as his enemies. Saddam wants to be remembered. He has the means and the demonic imagination. It is up to U.S. armed forces to stop him before he can achieve notoriety for all time."
(Newsweek, 3/17/03)

"Chris, more than anything else, real vindication for the administration. One, credible evidence of weapons of mass destruction. Two, you know what? There were a lot of terrorists here, really bad guys. I saw them."
(MSNBC reporter Bob Arnot, 4/9/03)

"Even in the flush of triumph, doubts will be raised. Where are the supplies of germs and poison gas and plans for nukes to justify pre-emption? (Freed scientists will lead us to caches no inspectors could find.) What about remaining danger from Baathist torturers and war criminals forming pockets of resistance and plotting vengeance? (Their death wish is our command.)"
(New York Times' William Safire, 4/10/03)

so much fun.

2006-03-12T18:17:00.000-09:00

via digbysblog.blogspot.com

Our Two Bobbies

By Lucian Truscott IV

The steno-pads in the Washington press corps have covered the Dubai Port deal the way they cover everything else, like a herd of hamsters scurrying for space on the airless, cramped exercise wheel that serves as our national capital. The conventional wisdom has focused exclusively on only one aspect of the story, national security, conveniently overlooking the fact that the Bush White House owns the goddamned national security issue. It's the one thing they can spin freely at Rovian whim, because they happen to have noticed that the inhabitants of Redneck Nation responded so warmly to Ronnie "working" at his "ranch" in his cowboy boots and western shirt and rolled up sleeves that Redneck Nation has collectively seized on the idea that anybody who spends lots of time "clearing brush" on his "ranch" in cowboy boots and western shirts with rolled up sleeves can be trusted not only with the Office of the President, but with our "security."

As a sergeant from Tennessee of my acquaintance in the Army used to say every time the Captain would pass down some wisdom from on-high about what was necessary to become a combat-ready rootin' tootin' blood-thirsty warrior: whhuuuut th' fuuuuuuk?

Here is a glimpse of what the Washington press corps steno-pads are failing to copy down:

Ask yourself why Bush suddenly found his Veto Stick and brandished it wildly at any legislation intended to stop the Dubai port deal. Ask yourself why he's out there on the plank facing growing opposition within his own party to the deal. Was it because he believes canceling the deal would send the wrong message to all of our "friends" in the world-- all three of them? Or maybe because he really believes it would be "unfair" to all those sheiks and emirs swathed in gold-embroidered robes having their toes sucked by Imported Blonde Virgins while they tap at their Blackberries, checking their stock portfolios for teeny little hundred-million dollar variances in their multi-billion dollar balances. I've got it! Bush is all upset with Republican Party congressional "leaders" because he's absolutely convinced that Dubai Ports World Inc. -- a national company wholly owned by the Emirate of Dubai -- has been thoroughly and expertly vetted by some "interagency committee" neither he, Rumsfeld, Snow, Chertoff or anyone else ever heard of before last week.

There are a few problems with this interagency committee vetting thing, beginning with the fact that the Deputy Secretary of the Treasury who chaired the interagency committee that vetted Dubai Ports World is the same guy who vetted Dan Quayle as well qualified to be Vice President for Bush's daddy when he was running for President in 1988. You read that right. His name is Robert M. Kimmitt, and believe-you-me, this man has a history of doing a hell of a job when it comes to being Bush Family Deputy-Expert Vetter. This is no doubt because he studied the fine art of vetting at the feet of Bush Family Master Fixer, Expert Vetter and Chief Water Carrier: James A. Baker III.

The Dubai Ports deal stinks to high heaven of tall Texan and master-fixer Baker. Robert M. Kimmitt, chair of the interagency committee that took something like 20 minutes to certify Dubai Ports as a worthy partner in running our ports -- without even taking a vote -- is a familiar name to me. He and I graduated in the same West Point class in June of 1969. Kimmitt, after serving in Vietnam, during which he was awarded three Bronze Stars, a Purple Heart, and an Air Medal, Kimmitt went to Georgetown Law School on the Army's dime and after graduating in 1977, plunged himself immediately into finding his way along Washington's corridors of power. As it happens, Kimmitt had some help reading the Power Map. His father was the man chosen by then Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson to replace Bobby Baker as the quietly powerful Secretary to Senate after Bobby Baker was discovered inflagrante in the bathroom of a gay porno theater. If anyone had the Power Map to the maze of corridors in our nation's capital, it was Kimmitt's daddy.

Kimmitt had also benefited from the careful guidance and ministrations of a powerful mentor with a big-time DC Power Job while he was still a cadet at West Point -- loooong story...WAY too long for this brief screed -- and now that he had in hand his Vietnam medals and Georgetown diploma and letters of recommendation from his DC Circuit Court of Appeals judge, whatdayaknow, but our boy Bobby immediately landed a job across town on the National Security Council at the White House. No stopping off to spend a couple of years rooting as an associate, around in a dusty law firm library for this boy! Nosiree! Robert M. Kimmitt knew there was one hell of a lot of vetting in his future, and where better to learn the fine art of vetting, but in the offices of the National Security Advisor to the President of the United States? There just wasn't any better place, that's what! So Kimmitt sets up shop on the staff of the NSC in 1978 and holds his breath and guts it out until that commie pinko peacenik Naval Academy grad and former nuclear submariner Jimmie Carter was ousted by cowboy boot and western shirt wearin', brush clearin' President Ronald Reagan, and he rolled up his sleeves and got busy. Busy doing what, you may ask? Easy! Bob Kimmitt got busy studying at the feet of his new mentor on the NSC -- James A. Baker III, who was installed on the NSC as the Bush Family Master Fixer, Expert Vetter and Chief Water Carrier!

Now you may be thinking, what a lucky guy, this Bob Kimmitt. It's 1978, he's not even 30 years old, and he's held only one real job in his life -- junior officer in the Army -- and there he is with his nose pressed not against the glass trying to get a glimpse of the Asshole of Power in Washington D.C., but on the other side of the glass, inside, really, really, really close to the Asshole of Power in Washington D.C., the one place where those words which ring in such dulcet political tones....national security...are not merely an aspect of policy, or a sideshow to the Real Deal, but the Real Deal Itself! Wow! National Security is right there in the title of the office where Bobby had his desk! And his phone! And his White House Pass! And his parking spot! Say it out loud! Listen!

National Security Council!

Double wow! Triple wow! No...whoopee! He's made it! Across town, mentors and daddies are celebrating! They're pouring tall tumblers of the Good Stuff out there on their patios! A Republican in the White House wearing cowboy boots and western shirts and clearin' brush during those loooooong weekends out there at the Western White House -- don't ya love the sound of it? Western White House! And our boy Bob right in there with him, watching out for our security! Whew! Isn't it great that we can relax out there on the back nine...swing that club a little looser...get that ball a little closer to the pin, maybe...now that Bob is in the White House making sure we're safe?

It was a great time for golfers, those years when Bob Kimmitt was looking out for the safety and security of their country clubs and the skies through which they passed in their Lears and Gulfstreams. Kimmitt spent the years 1978 to 1983 as an NSC staffer, and then he was promoted, and the golf courses turned greener and the Gulfstreams flew faster! Yep! Jim Baker promoted Bob to be his Executive Secretary, and then he made Bob the General Counsel to the NSC! Quadruple wow! But...wait. There was a problem. Some guys down there in the bowels of the NSC, guys flew so close to the Asshole of Power that their noses got singed, guys like North and Poindexter and McFarlane, guys who were messing around with arms for hostages and Contras and so forth. Not only did their noses get singed, some of 'em even got convicted of some crimes! But not our Bobby. No sir. That whole Iran-Contra thing...that was a Reagan deal all the way. Well...sort of. There was one little hiccup, something about Bob and a license that was needed to ship some missiles or rockets or something or another, and Bob was interviewed by the Tower Commission, but he sailed through safely, and in 1985, our Bobby followed the Bush Family Master Fixer, Expert Vetter and Chief Water Carrier over to the Department of Treasury, where he was installed as General Counsel to the Department under Secretary Baker. Now that the golf courses were safe and the Gulfstreams were up there flying through our secure skies, it was time to Watch the Money, and where better to watch it than the place where it was printed and distributed.

Kimmitt remained at Treasury under Secretary of Money Watching Baker until 1988 when he followed Baker into Bush Campaign I, where he distinguished himself by being deputized by Expert Vetter Baker to check out the qualifications of Dan Quayle. But hell. Anybody can make a mistake when it comes to one of those loons from Capitol Hill, and besides, Quayle didn't work out so badly. He turned into a kind of Agnew The Lesser, and baited the Dems and did what he was told, and down the road, he sure as hell wasn't a threat to any of the Bush Boys when one of them decided to run for President!

With Bush I elected in '88, Kimmitt followed the Master Fixer over to the Department of State, where he was made Under Secretary of State for Political and Military Affairs! Our boy Bob, who had toiled so long as a little-known player in the back rooms and basements of various government departments, was now up there on a High Floor at Foggy Bottom! And those golf courses and Gulfstreams and all that Republican money? Why, having Insured Security and Watched the Money for years, now Bob would move off-shore and do the same thing all over the world -- making the International Skies safe for the Gulfstreams and Watching the Money as it moved back and forth between friendly companies and banks in the States to foreign countries and friends who could be trusted, because if they stepped out of line, Bob was there to see to it that their Gulfstreams wouldn't be welcome in our skies, and their tacky golf shoes would not sully the groomed greens of our golf courses until they straightened-up and did the Right Thing with Our Money, which of course was to turn the Small Piles into Large Piles, and the Large Piles into Huge, Monciferous Piles of Crinkly-Smacking-Green Cash!

In 1991, Secretary of International Money Watching and Security Insuring Baker put in the fix so Bob was appointed Ambassador to Germany. He stayed in this post until Baker's boss lost in '92, and the Clinton people removed him in '93.

Sigh. Bob was on the street...in a Republican sort of way, you understand. He held a series of big-time, big-bucks corporate jobs during the politically Lean Years of the Clinton Administration, and took a long-awaited and well-deserved vacation in a top job at Time Warner AOL during Bush II's first administration. But recently jaws dropped on the E-ring of the Pentagon when word got around that Kimmitt was offered Secretary of the Navy, and to everyone's surprise, turned down that plum for Deputy Secretary of the Treasury. Now, why would a Power Guy like Kimmitt turn down a job where you could hop in your own personal Navy Lear Jet and take off to "visit the fleet" in Honolulu for the weekend, and instead take a slot as a deputy to a Bush lapdog who's still wandering the halls of the big building on 14th Street looking for his water bowl? There are probably some cynics who would call Kimmitt a footman riding the back bumper of the Bush Family Power Carriage, but I think of him simply as a wholly-owned subsidiary of James A. Baker III, Inc. Subsidiaries do what they're told to do, and when a former Treasury Secretary drops a hint that there are Things to Do and Money To Be Watched over in a Deputy Secretary's office at Treasury, why, what would you expect a good little Bobby to do, but listen to Duh Man.

When it comes to the Middle East -- specifically, to the Oil Business in the Middle East -- Baker is most assuredly Duh Man. Baker's powerful Houston law firm, Baker & Botts, represents the oil interests of the Saudi Royal family and has a big satellite office in Dubai which does business, among other things, in pipelines, energy and trade. You will recall that in 2003, Bush Family Master Fixer Baker was appointed by Bush as the Special Envoy who "negotiated" Iraq's huge debt, largely held by other Middle East oil-producing nations, including the UAE. Iraqi debt was reduced across the board. Does anyone think that the UAE just wrote off Iraq's debt? Not on your life. They are getting paid off in other ways...such as having the US approve a deal to have the UAE's Dubai company run six US ports, which will doubtlessly turn out to be hugely profitable to them, or else why would they be in the port business in a time when maritime trade is growing by leaps and bounds, and shipyards around the world can't turn out container ships and tankers fast enough. And that doesn't even get into Baker's connections to the Carlyle Group, or Bechtel, which built the port of Dubai, or any of that boring stuff.

Even leaving the Carlyle and Bechtel Boys aside, it gets better. Another "protege" of Baker's appears on the scene: Robert Zoellick, currently Deputy Secretary of State, but from 2001 to 2005, this country's Trade Representative in charge, largely, of setting up free trade agreements such as CAFTA around the world. I guess it was little noticed in 2004 when Zoellick signed a TIFA -- Trade and Investment Framework Agreement -- with the UAE, a first step in the negotiations with the Sheiks of Dubai toward a FTA, a Free Trade Agreement, negotiations for which are ongoing. In a speech in Jordan that year, Zoellick described the UAE as a "very positive partner for free trade in the region. The impending FTA with the UAE follows on the heels of FTA's already negotiated with Jordan, Egypt and Morocco. Trade ministers in the Middle East have described the free trade march of the US across the Middle East as picking off suckers one by one and an attempt to mollify Arab and Muslim nations with the carrot of trade while the stick of war is pounding Iraq. In fact, the several FTA's already signed are the beginnings of a plan for an overall MEFTA -- Middle East Free Trade Agreement -- intended to cover up to 20 nations in the region which is planned for completion by 2013.

And who is Zoellick to James A. Baker III? Why, he was the guy walking behind Baker carrying the briefcase containing Baker's Roman numerals, that's who! His technical job title was Counselor to Treasury Secretary Baker in 1985, and then Deputy Treasury Secretary under Baker until 1988. Then he took a cab down the Mall to Foggy Bottom where he was stood guard as Counselor to the State Department, and then moved into a tidy office down the hall where he went about the business of American Business as Undersecretary of State for Economic and Agricultural Affairs.

You think our two Bobbys ran into each other in the Corridors of Power when they were working for Duh Man? Does "duh" work for you as an answer? You think that the Deputy Secretary of the Treasury and the U.S. Trade Representative might have, uh, talked about stuff over a couple of lunches or sixteen or thirty-three? You think they might have played a round of golf or anything like that? You think that the interests of Bobby The Kimmitt and Bobby The Zoellick might not only coincide, but resemble each other so much they would appear as twins?

Consider their mutual interests in the UAE: The UAE is our 3rd largest trading partner in the Middle East, behind only Israel and Saudi Arabia. The Port of Dubai is the 3rd busiest in the world and is Home Away From Home for US warships, not to mention airfields in the UAE serving the same function for US Air Force warplanes. Consider that the Bush Administration's plans for a Free Trade Agreement with UAE are not just a foot but an entire leg in the door of an overall Middle East FTA slated for only 7 years down the road. You think there might be far more at stake with the Dubai Ports deal than our reputation with our "friends" in the world, or maybe even our "national security?" You think with two Money Watchers running things when it comes to Big Business and the UAE, that Bush might consider puttin' on his boots and western shirt and rollin' up his sleeves and brandishin' his Veto Stick if those goofballs on Capitol Hill mess around with his deal? Huh? Ya think?

As usual with the Bush Family -- with this Bush administration and the administration of Bush I -- if you turn over a rock, you won't find Weapons of Mass Destruction or Terrorist Connections or Osama bin Laden, but you will find a gigantic pile of Crinkly Greenbacks being overseen by our two Bobbies, dutifully carrying out their duties as Money Watchers, and buried in there amongst the grass-cuttings from the fresh-mown greens and a faint odor of kerosene dripped from topped-off wing tanks of the Gulfstreams...right down there next to the Veritable Bunghole of Power you will find evidence of fresh spittle from Bush Family Master Fixer, Expert Vetter and Chief Water Carrier James A. Baker III.

Most of you probably already know the name Lucian Truscott IV from the op-ed pages of the New York Times, stories in the Village Voice, novels like Dress Gray and Dress Blue or perhaps even the Sally Hemmings controversy in which Truscott, a Jefferson heir, insisted that Hemmings' family be included in the yearly family reunions. Now he has reached the pinnacle of his career by appearing on Hullabaloo.

By the way, even though he has been publishing op-eds in the New York Times since they started the page, for some reason they weren't interested in (the sedate NY Times version) of this essay. So he blogged it. Hah. ---- digby

i wanna' live in vermont

2006-03-07T19:18:00.001-09:00

ARTICLE 29
We the voters of Newfane would like Town Meeting, March 2006, to consider the following resolution:
Whereas George W. Bush has:

1. Misled the nation about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction;

2. Misled the nation about ties between Iraq and Al Quaeda;

3. Used these falsehoods to lead our nation into war unsupported by international law;

4. Not told the truth about American policy with respect to the use of torture; and

5. Has directed the government to engage in domestic spying, in direct contravention of U.S. law.

Therefore, the voters of the town of Newfane ask that our representative to the U.S. House of Representatives file articles of impeachment to remove him from office.

dubai ports deal---via dailykos

2006-02-28T14:17:00.000-09:00

Joseph King, who headed the customs agency's anti-terrorism efforts under the Treasury Department and the new Department of Homeland Security, said national security fears are well grounded.

He said a company the size of Dubai Ports World would be able to get hundreds of visas to relocate managers and other employees to the United States. Using appeals to Muslim solidarity or threats of violence, al-Qaeda operatives could force low-level managers to provide some of those visas to al-Qaeda sympathizers, said King, who for years tracked similar efforts by organized crime to infiltrate ports in New York and New Jersey. Those sympathizers could obtain legitimate driver's licenses, work permits and mortgages that could then be used by terrorist operatives.

Dubai Ports World could also offer a simple conduit for wire transfers to terrorist operatives in the Middle East. Large wire transfers from individuals would quickly attract federal scrutiny, but such transfers, buried in the dozens of wire transfers a day from Dubai Ports World's operations in the United States to the Middle East would go undetected, King said.

lest we forget.

2006-02-26T19:05:00.000-09:00

republicans wish you a merry christmas
December 25, 2005

A Chilling Departure From the Capitol One of the shabbiest shell games of the year was played out in the closing hours of Congress in its now-you-see-it, now-you-don't offering of some badly needed winter heating aid to the nation's working poor. The climactic moment occurred when Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, huckstering his most treasured goal, tried to sell oil drilling in his state's pristine wildlife preserve by promising it would help finance a long list of shoppers' bonuses for his colleagues: extra money for flu vaccine, hurricane reconstruction, first-responder radios and - if you vote yes right away - $2 billion in extra heating aid for the poor this cold winter.

Mr. Stevens's cunning warning was that all those extras would die on the vine unless Alaska drilling was approved. His cynical flimflammery was deservedly rebuffed as enough opponents stood firm against the oil drilling. And soon enough the word went round that things like flu vaccine and hurricane aid were not endangered after all.

Not so the extra fuel aid for low-income families. There was a heating supplement tied to the Alaska proposal, as Mr. Stevens promised. But there was also a separate $2 billion appropriated for the same purpose elsewhere in the legislation - unconnected to the Alaska floor machinations - that somehow was struck from the final bill as lawmakers rushed to recess. Malice? Who can say? Obviously the poor can't afford a campaign donation PAC to catch Congress's attention for an answer.

The government's home heating supplement now stands at a half or less of what the poor will need if predictions of a harsh winter pan out and fuel bills increase 25 percent. Various studies have established that, in a pinch, the poor scrimp on food purchases in order to meet heating bills. Yet Congress's stinginess is being compounded by the administration's recent decision to reject a request from New York and several other states to increase food stamp outlays to the poor as fuel bills mount.

Lawmakers insist that the $2 billion supplement technically had to be cut - but may be restored yet again next month. Believe that and we have an oil derrick to sell you in Alaska.

generally not getting involved

2006-02-26T18:54:00.000-09:00

Baghdad Burning

... I'll meet you 'round the bend my friend, where hearts can heal and souls can mend...
Monday, February 27, 2006

Volatile Days...
The last few days have been unsettlingly violent in spite of the curfew. We’ve been at home simply waiting it out and hoping for the best. The phone wasn’t working and the electrical situation hasn’t improved. We are at a point, however, where things like electricity, telephones and fuel seem like minor worries. Even complaining about them is a luxury Iraqis can’t afford these days.

The sounds of shooting and explosions usually begin at dawn, at least that’s when I first sense them, and they don’t really subside until well into the night. There was a small gunfight on the main road near our area the day before yesterday, but with the exception of the local mosque being fired upon, and a corpse found at dawn three streets down, things have been relatively quiet.

Some of the neighbors have been discussing the possibility of the men setting up a neighborhood watch. We did this during the war and during the chaos immediately after the war. The problem this time is that the Iraqi security forces are as much to fear as the black-clad and hooded men attacking mosques, houses and each other.

It does not feel like civil war because Sunnis and Shia have been showing solidarity these last few days in a big way. I don’t mean the clerics or the religious zealots or the politicians- but the average person. Our neighborhood is mixed and Sunnis and Shia alike have been outraged with the attacks on mosques and shrines. The telephones have been down, but we’ve agreed upon a very primitive communication arrangement. Should any house in the area come under siege, someone would fire in the air three times. If firing in the air isn’t an option, then someone inside the house would have to try to communicate trouble from the rooftop.

The mosques also have a code when they’re in trouble, i.e. under attack, the man who does the call for prayer calls out “Allahu Akbar” three times until people from the area can come help protect the mosque or someone gets involved.

Yesterday they were showing Sunni and Shia clerics praying together in a mosque and while it looked encouraging, I couldn’t help but feel angry. Why don’t they simply tell their militias to step down- to stop attacking mosques and husseiniyas- to stop terrorizing people? It’s so deceptive and empty on television- like a peaceful vision from another land. The Iraqi government is pretending dismay, but it's doing nothing to curb the violence and the bloodshed beyond a curfew. And where are the Americans in all of this? They are sitting back and letting things happen- sometimes flying a helicopter here or there- but generally not getting involved.

I’m reading, and hearing, about the possibility of civil war. The possibility. Yet I’m sitting here wondering if this is actually what civil war is like. Has it become a reality? Will we look back at this in one year, two years… ten… and say, “It began in February 2006…”? It is like a nightmare in that you don’t realise it’s a nightmare while having it- only later, after waking up with your heart throbbing, and your eyes searching the dark for a pinpoint of light, do you realise it was a nightmare…

- posted by river @ 2:27 AM

what do we do now, howard?

2006-02-25T18:38:00.000-09:00

Whose judgment on the Iraq War is entitled to respect?

It is becoming increasingly apparent even to loyal Bush followers that our occupation in Iraq has turned into a full-blown, irreversible disaster. Conservative hero William Buckley, writing in the pages of National Review yesterday, emphatically proclaimed American defeat in that war.

The United States has a tragic and disastrous situation on its hands, and there are no good choices. Having invaded the country, shattered its infrastructure, removed its government and promised to stay until the country was re-built, stabilized, and democratic, there is something self-evidently unseemly and extremely irresponsible about simply leaving the mess in the Iraqi’s lap by withdrawing our military presence the minute it looks as though a civil was is about to break out.

But, as Jack Murtha pointed out (months before Buckley did so), there is no point in staying if our military occupation is not improving the situation, let alone if it is making the situation worse (an observation which caused Murtha to be promptly accused by the White House of wanting to "surrender to the terrorists").

During the build-up to the war in 2002 and early 2003, most prominent Democrats were bullied and intimidated into supporting the invasion of Iraq by a combination of Bush’s sky-high popularity and accusations of subversiveness which were launched at anyone who opposed the Leader’s war. One of the few nationally prominent Democrats to emphatically oppose the war was Howard Dean, and it is truly staggering just how right he was in virtually every statement he made about the war.

This is worth noting not because this is a time for recriminations or because of the satisfaction which one can derive from a celebratory "I-told-you-so" moment. It is critical to focus on who was right about this war because this country, right now, has extremely difficult choices to make with regard to the disaster it has created in Iraq – and the first choice is whose judgment and foreign policy wisdom ought to be listened to and accorded respect.

Karl Rove has declared that Republicans intend to make national security the principal issue leading up to the 2006 elections, but how could that possibly benefit anyone other than Democrats? With regard to what we should do about the war, following the advice of Bush and the neonconservative geniuses who led us into this disaster is a bit like wanting to build a ship and hiring the naval architect of the Titanic to build it and the Titanic’s captain to navigate it. Put simply, Bush supporters were wrong -- fundamentally and tragically wrong -- with regard to every facet of this war.

By stark contrast, when one reviews the pre-war arguments made by Howard Dean as to why the war was ill-advised, it is glaringly self-evident just how right he was -- at a time when few others recognized it -- about virtually everything. Here are excerpts from a speech Dean gave on February 17, 2003 -- just over a month before we invaded -- at Drake University which reflects the prescient warnings he was making back then:

I believe it is my patriotic duty to urge a different path to protecting America's security: To focus on al Qaeda, which is an imminent threat, and to use our resources to improve and strengthen the security and safety of our home front and our people while working with the other nations of the world to contain Saddam Hussein. . . .

Had I been a member of the Senate, I would have voted against the resolution that authorized the President to use unilateral force against Iraq - unlike others in that body now seeking the presidency.

That the President was given open-ended authority to go to war in Iraq resulted from a failure of too many in my party in Washington who were worried about political positioning for the presidential election.

The stakes are so high, this is not a time for holding back or sheepishly going along with the herd.

To this day, the President has not made a case that war against Iraq, now, is necessary to defend American territory, our citizens, our allies, or our essential interests.

The Administration has not explained how a lasting peace, and lasting security, will be achieved in Iraq once Saddam Hussein is toppled.

I, for one, am not ready to abandon the search for better answers.

As a doctor, I was trained to treat illness, and to examine a variety of options before deciding which to prescribe. I worried about side effects and took the time to see what else might work before proceeding to high-risk measures. . . .

We have been told over and over again what the risks will be if we do not go to war.

We have been told little about what the risks will be if we do go to war.
If we go to war, I certainly hope the Administration's assumptions are realized, and the conflict is swift, successful and clean. I certainly hope our armed forces will be welcomed like heroes and liberators in the streets of Baghdad.

I certainly hope Iraq emerges from the war stable, united and democratic.

I certainly hope terrorists around the world conclude it is a mistake to defy America and cease, thereafter, to be terrorists.

It is possible, however, that events could go differently, . . . .

Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.

Anti-American feelings will surely be inflamed among the misguided who choose to see an assault on Iraq as an attack on Islam, or as a means of controlling Iraqi oil.

And last week's tape by Osama bin Laden tells us that our enemies will seek relentlessly to transform a war into a tool for inspiring and recruiting more terrorists.

There are other risks. Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.

Using the standard rhetorical tactic of Bush followers, Dean was caricatured and falsely accused by Republicans, some Democrats, and an easily manipulated media as being some sort of radical pacifist subversive who should be mocked rather than listened to. That was achieved only by distorting his views. As Dean made repeatedly clear, he favors fighting wars which are truly necessary to defend the United States from imminent threats, but he believed there was no persuasive evidence demonstrating that Saddam constituted a threat which justified the war.

And those who claim that there was nobody before the war who doubted that Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs which compelled our invasion ought to read this passage from Dean's speech:

Now, I am not among those who say that America should never use its armed forces unilaterally. In some circumstances, we have no choice. In Iraq, I would be prepared to go ahead without further Security Council backing if it were clear the threat posed to us by Saddam Hussein was imminent, and could neither be contained nor deterred.

However, that case has not been made, and I believe we should continue the hard work of diplomacy and inspection. . . .

Secretary Powell's recent presentation at the UN showed the extent to which we have Iraq under an audio and visual microscope. Given that, I was impressed not by the vastness of evidence presented by the Secretary, but rather by its sketchiness. . .

Can anyone dispute that Dean was right about virtually every prediction and claim he made, every warning that he issued about why invading Iraq was ill-advised and counter-productive? Compare this outright prescience from Dean to the war supporters’ declarations of cakewalks, predictions of glorious victory celebrations, promises that the war would pay for itself, Purple Finger celebrations where they insisted that democracy was upon us, errors regarding the number of troops needed, inexcusable failure to anticipate or plan the insurgency, and shrill fear-mongering about Saddam’s non-existent weapons.

Americans long ago abandoned Bush’s war once they realized that the premises on which the war was justified were false. But while this war was George Bush’s from start to finish - and he will live with it forever ignominiously tagged to him in history – it is now America’s war as well. And as the country decides what course of action we ought to take to extricate ourselves from this disaster, it is worth remembering whose judgment was so accurate and wise and whose judgment was so horribly wrong in every respect.

Democrats ought to be eager to make national security a critical issue for this year's elections. After all, Bush and his followers are responsible for the single worst strategic error made by the United States during our lifetimes, perhaps in the country's history.

--posted by Glenn Greenwald

funny quips from bartcop.

2006-02-21T19:33:00.000-09:00

"In terms of required difficulty and skill, think of what these guys were doing as 'hunting' in the same sense that you might go hunting for a donut on the way to work tomorrow morning... It's astonishing that the VP was able to hit something other than one of the hundreds of tame birds released for his shootin' pleasure."
- Kieran Healy -

"Ultimately, I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and fired the round that hit Harry, and you can talk about all of the other conditions that existed at the time, but that's the bottom line. And there's no - it was not Harry's fault. You can't blame anybody else. I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend. And I say that is something I'll never forget."
- Deadeye Dick -

"I'd rather go hunting with Dick Cheney than driving with Ted Kennedy."
- Mary Jo Kopechne -

"I heard one of Cheney's buck shot pellets hit that lawyer in the heart. Do you realize how hard it is to hit a target that small?"
- Horace J. Digby -

"Amidst the swirl of outrage, obfuscation and wisecracking, one fundamental flaw in the White House's Cheney shooting story remains. How can a 28-gauge shotgun fired from supposedly 30 yards away cause pellets to become lodged in someone's heart?
"How can a weapon that has little more power than a kids BB gun fire projectiles that in most cases don't penetrate further than an inch into a bird's breast and yet in this instance tore through a hunting vest, clothes underneath, the chest cavity and into the muscle of Whittington's heart?
"Alex Jones has been bird hunting on countless occasions and considers himself an expert. Alex says that it is simply impossible for such a weak shotgun to cause such damage from 30 yards . Alex has used shotguns that are more powerful than the 28-gauge and seen pellets literally bounce off birds and only stun them. It is common practice for birds to be stunned as a result of the pellets not penetrating and it is usually necessary to have to snap the neck to finish them off.
"The only explanation that fits the nature of Whittington's injuries is that Cheney's gun discharged at extremely close range...
"As others have speculated it is likely that Cheney was drunk and he dropped the weapon, causing it to discharge and pepper Whittington at close range. Cheney refused to talk to local police until the next day and the Secret Service made sure the authorities had no access to him. This tells us that Cheney considers himself to be above the law.
"If any other US citizen shot someone in the face would the police be happy to wait 14 hours before talking to them?"
- Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones: Media Ignores Cheney 'Smoking Gun' -

"He didn't do anything he wasn't supposed to do."
- Mary Matalin: Cheney adviser -

"After being moved out of ICU, the lawyer had a minor heart attack or as Cheney calls it, 'Monday.'"
- Danny Gallagher -

"When gutting a moose, use the serrated spoon attachment on your survival knife to scrape any powder burns off the pelt surrounding the close-range entry wound."
- Kooky Uncle Chucky Heston -

"Cheney needs to start setting a less violent example by switching to target practice and leaving animals and people in peace."
- Ingrid Newkirk: PETA President -

"2. Until Democrats approve Medicare reform, we have to make some tough choices for the elderly."
- David Letterman's Top Ten Cheney Excuses for Shooting 78 year old Harry Whittington -

"I had a friend once who accidentally shot pellets into his dog - and I thought he was an idiot."
- Jim Brady -

"We'd advise him to pursue a less violent form of relaxation and get on with the important business of leading the country."
- Wayne Pacelle: president and chief executive of the Humane Society of the United States -

"The entire Cheney hunting accident story stinks. The delay in announcing it is suspicious, obviously. I'll bet Cheney had a few beers in him, but I'm not sure that is illegal in Texas (drinking and hunting is illegal in most states, but I couldn't find out if that includes Texas). But a few other points that may be worth noting...
"The news reports say that after Whittington had gotten off his shot and went looking for his bird, Cheney and the other hunter went to another spot where they saw a covey of quail. Texas quail might be different from Iowa quail, but in Iowa when a shotgun goes off, every quail within earshot flutters away. The story doesn't make sense.
"None of the stories have commented on the fact that they were 'road hunting,' or hunting from a car. That is just about the lowest kind of low-rent, dishonorable kind of hunting there is (the phrase 'road hunting' is often used synonymously with 'poaching'). When I was growing up in Iowa, I went pheasant or quail hunting on scores of occasions with my Dad and others. We never would have hunted from a vehicle and it was an insult to even suggest that someone might. It was considered dangerous and dÃ©classÃ©, as it was too great an advantage for the hunter to be 'fair.' It most states, including Texas, it is also illegal...
"Ms. Armstrong claims to have been in the car, but to have witnessed the shooting. If so, that would mean the hunters were fairly close, within eyeshot, which makes it even less likely that Whittington had gotten off a shot at a quail and then there were other quail still waiting around for Cheney to find them. It just does not make sense!"
- Direland: QUESTIONS ABOUT THE VEEP WHO COULDN'T SHOOT STRAIGHT: WHAT REALLY HAPPENED IN DICK CHENEY'S HUNTING "ACCIDENT"? -

"He was acting on the best available intelligence at the time."
- Cheney spokesman -

"What is the difference between Dick Cheney and a constipated owl? One hoots but can't shit..."
- the abbreviated spoonster -

"In case you hadn't heard, the Vice President celebrated Darwin's birthday on Sunday by shooting his hunting companion, a 78-year old lawyer. 'Fuck him,' Cheney snarled. 'The dumbass took his eye off me. Survival of the fittest, hombre.'"
- BitchPhD -

"Time to take the shotgun away from grandpa, who's blasted perhaps hundreds of innocent birds into bloody feathers during his life, before he has another senior moment."
- James Wolcott -

"Hey, I'm not going to bust Cheney's chops on shooting that guy at all. I know it's an accident. Because the prey Cheney hunts to eat, he strangles to death with his bare hands. Mmmmm, orphan juice."
- John Rogers -

"None of this would have happened if Bush had only read that PDB titled 'Cheney determined to strike in Texas.'"
- Washington Monthly -

"The local waterfowl will greet us as liberators."
- Paul Wolfowitz -

"A liberal is a conservative who's been shot by a gun nut."
- Tinkerbell -

"Republicans usually don't shoot lawyers for the same reason that sharks won't eat them: professional courtesy."
- Bryan Zepp Jamieson -

"So, what we have is an event shrouded in secrecy for almost 24 hours which, when disclosed, was accompanied by a fawning statement by a Bush apparatchik exonerating Cheney from any and all blame and/or liability. Thus, this appears to be yet another example of the Bush administration attempting to manipulate the press and perhaps hide the truth. What really happened on that ranch yesterday? Who the heck knows? What we do know is that, regardless of what actually happened, the administration spin-doctors immediately jumped in and crafted a story that put Cheney in the best possible light. And the 'traditional media' reported that story without any skepticism whatsoever."
- Political Cortex -

"Hamilton, of course, shot in a duel with Aaron Burr over issues of honor, integrity and political maneuvering. Whittington? Mistaken for a bird."
- Jon Stewart -

"In 2006, Richard Cheney, while on a hunting trip in Texas, became the second vice president to shoot a person while in office."
- Update you're welcome to make at the Wikipedia entry on the Burr-Hamilton duel -

"That's what you think."
- Lyndon Johnson -

"All I can say is what a Harry Whittington."
- Guy Cheney should have shot -

"What it comes down to, I think, is this: While the Vice President is an avid hunter, he may not be particularly up on gun safety. After all, it's not as though he's had any military training."
- Adam Felber: Fanatical Apathy -

Bonus factoid: One of Cheney's hunting companions, Pamela Pitzer Willeford, is ex-chairman of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, which is charged with overseeing all public post-secondary education in Texas. According to the Texas Progress Report, Texas currently spends about $745 per student less than the national average, which places Texas 37th in the nation on education spending. Texas currently ranks 47th nationally in average SAT scores. According to Steve Murdock, official state demographer, if present education performance trends continue, by 2040 Texas will have a 40% increase in the poverty rate, a 50% increase in people on welfare, declining average income for households, a 54.3% increase in prison population, and a 36.8% increase of youth in Texas Youth Commission programs. For her outstanding work, Bush appointed her ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein in 2003.

laffer is a laugher.

2006-02-21T18:22:00.000-09:00

Bush's Policies Don't Promote Growth
By John Irons and Lee Price
Mother Jones

Friday 17 February 2006

The economic evidence is clear: the president's tax changes have not worked to improve the health of the economy.
Business investment, employment, and wages have all underperformed past recoveries. Furthermore, the choices made in the president's budget put at risk the future health of the nation by running massive deficits and by cutting back on important national investments in education, science, and energy.

Tax Policy

Bush's tax policy has created a ballooning federal budget deficit that threatens our future prosperity. Between early 2001 and September 2005, tax changes reduced revenue by $870 billion. The tax cuts that favor the most prosperous cannot be defended on grounds of fairness. But the president has tried to justify them as promoting a stronger, more prosperous economy for everyone. In fact, however, the tax changes since 2001 have failed to spur business investment, jobs, wages, or overall growth.

The rhetoric for the tax cuts was appealing: by taxing income less, businesses would be encouraged to make new investments and people would work harder, knowing that they would keep more of what they earn. It has not worked out that way. Business investment has failed to recover at a normal rate and labor force participation has fallen. Rather than people coming into the workforce at higher rates, the opposite has happened. If the workforce had grown with the population since 2001, there would be 3 million more people between the ages of 20 and 65 in the workforce.

Business Investment

According to proponents of the tax cuts, cutting corporate income taxes and personal income tax rates was supposed to improve the investment incentives of America's businesses. Small business owners, especially, were supposed to respond to lower individual tax rates by investing more and hiring new workers. In addition, more than $200 billion of cuts were specifically tied to business investment, reducing the cost as a way to encourage purchases of equipment, software, structures and machinery.

The cuts were an utter failure. Business investment has always recovered after a recession, but this was the most sluggish recovery in memory. As a result, business investment has grown 65% more slowly since the peak of the business cycle five years ago than the average for similar periods after nine cycle peaks in the last 60 years. (A business cycle includes a recession and the expansion until the next recession. The peak of a business cycle occurs just before a recession.)

In the recession and recovery of 1990-1994, instead of cutting taxes, Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton signed tax increases into law. Yet businesses' investment grew much faster during that recovery than it has during the last four years.

The Bush tax cuts have been a waste precisely because they were targeted at business owners and the wealthiest Americans, rather than the average consumer whose increased demand and consumption would have made it sensible for businesses to invest.

Employment

Business investment didn't take off, and neither did job creation. Even now, after five years of huge tax cuts, one million more people are officially unemployed than when George Bush took office, and millions more have left the labor force.

President Bush has noted that 2 million jobs were created over the course of 2005, and that we have added 4.6 million jobs since the decline in jobs ended in May 2003. This is not evidence that the tax cuts are working.

When the third round of tax cuts passed in 2003, one of the Bush administration's major selling points was the claim that the economy would create 5.5 million jobs from July 2003 through the end of 2004 - almost one and a half million more jobs than would be expected in a normal recovery. Instead, only 2.4 million jobs were created, 1.7 million less than the number we were told to expect with no tax cut.

Job growth remains abnormally slow. Last year's 2 million new jobs represented a gain of only 1.5%. With normal growth, we would have created 4.6 million jobs last year.

Wages and Income

Not surprisingly, since job growth has been so poor, the tax cuts have also failed to create substantial wage and salary growth. Most Americans depend on their wages and salaries for their standard of living. In a healthy economy, wages and salaries should rise along with rising national income and productivity. A record long period of job decline followed by sluggish job growth has created slack in the labor market and pulled down wage growth below inflation growth in the last two years. Last year, middle income wages grew less than inflation (2.4% vs. 3.4%), reducing their buying power.

The Overall Economy

The tax cuts failed to produce the burst of economic activity the president promised. Instead of doing better than in past business cycles, the economy has grown sluggishly, at a rate far slower than in previous cycles The most common measure of economic activity, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), grew only 13.5% since the first round of tax cuts were passed in early 2001, averaging 2.7% per year. The average for similar periods in the past was far better - growing 16.3% or 3.2% per year.

--------

John Irons is Director of Tax and Budget Policy at the Center for American Progress, and Lee Price is Research Director at the Economic Policy Institute.

quote of the day for democrats. from thomas paine via firedoglake

2006-02-17T11:21:00.000-09:00

THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated.

freedom on the march --------- from dailykos

2006-02-16T17:45:00.000-09:00

A War Story in Four Parts
by SusanG
Thu Feb 16, 2006 at 04:52:06 PM PDT

Part I: This Is What "Last Throes" Looks Like

Report: Iraqi insurgency more confident, coordinated
CNN - A few large groups using sophisticated communications increasingly have come to dominate Iraq's insurgency, a report released Wednesday said.

The report from the International Crisis Group, a nongovernmental organization that tries to solve conflicts, noted the insurgency "no longer is a scattered, erratic, chaotic phenomenon."

"Groups are well organized, produce regular publications, react rapidly to political developments and appear surprisingly centralized," the report said.

It noted the insurgency, a predominately Sunni Arab movement, has grown "more confident, better organized, coordinated, information-savvy."

Part II: This Is What the Human Toll on Americans Looks Like

Knight Ridder -- Equipment can be repaired or replaced. But nothing can replace a father or mother who has been killed in this war, or any war. Nothing can compensate for all the lives shattered when a soldier dies in combat.
In Iraq it is estimated that the human toll includes nearly 1,000 spouses who have been left behind, alone, and more than 2,000 children who have lost a parent to the war.

Nor can you repair or replace what has been lost by hundreds of soldiers severely injured by powerful IED blasts and left double or triple amputees, blind or brain damaged, riddled by shrapnel. For them, and those who love them, life suddenly has become an unending struggle.

Remember them.

Part III: This Is What the Human Toll on Iraqis Looks Like

Iraq death toll 'soared post-war'
BBC - Poor planning, air strikes by coalition forces and a "climate of violence" have led to more than 100,000 extra deaths in Iraq, scientists claim.

A study published by the Lancet says the risk of death by violence for civilians in Iraq is now 58 times higher than before the US-led invasion.

[Note: This old news, from October 2004. Either we stopped counting, stopped caring or stopped posting these kinds of studies. If anyone has newer estimates, please post them.]

Part IV: This Is What the Toll for Halliburton Looks Like

Halliburton hikes dividend, splits stock
2-for-1 split would raise outstanding shares to 2 billion
By August Cole, Feb 16, 2006

MarketWatch - Halliburton Co., coming off a banner year in the energy sector and flush with Pentagon contracts abroad, announced Thursday a series of measures to share the spoils with shareholders.

The Houston-based company said its board of directors approved a two-for-one stock split that would double its shares outstanding to 2 billion. Stockholders must still sign off on the split.

The quarterly dividend for Halliburton stock was also raised 20% to 15 cents a share. The higher payout is set for March 23 for shareholders as of March 2.

A $1 billion share buyback is also in the works, the company said.

tooo much fun. had to post this again this year. thank you beast.

2006-02-01T22:39:00.000-09:00

The BEAST - America's Best Fiend...................................................................buffalobeast.com

The BEAST 50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2005

50. Geraldo Rivera

Charges: A mustache only slightly less loathsome than Tom Friedman’s-if only because fewer people take Rivera seriously. Began his career as a seemingly skilled and passionate muckraker, but having been exposed countless times as a shameless, megalomaniacal fraud, he absolutely refuses to get out of our living rooms. Most recently, Geraldo was accused of making a frail, elderly victim of Hurricane Katrina whom he "rescued" do multiple takes of the rescue scene with Rivera for Fox News cameras. Geraldo heroically carried the woman’s dog.

Exhibit A: Claims he defected from CNBC to Fox News for patriotic reasons.

Sentence: Sealed inside Al Capone’s vault with a phalanx of Neo-nazis armed with folding chairs.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

49. Michelle Malkin

Charges: A curious case of racial Stockholm syndrome with a palpable lust for violent ideological oppression and displays of imperial power. Rose to prominence in conservative circles by congratulating white America for its most shameful chapter since slavery, and encouraging a return to form in her book, In Defense of Internment: The Case for "Racial Profiling" in World War II and the War on Terror. Malkin thinks it’s hunky-dory to detain an entire demographic indefinitely if it makes the rest of us feel more comfortable. Her newest, Unhinged, argues that liberals have lost their minds, because they are upset with the direction their country is taking. Her evidence is a carefully collected selection of the dumbest things liberals have ever said, as if she couldn’t have just as easily filled an entire library with the insane ravings of right-wingers. Her accusations of blind hatred and vitriol mimic soul sister Ann Coulter’s classic tactic of psychological projection: whatever Malkin is, she sees in her opponents.

Exhibit A: Internment was so irresponsible that it prompted 40 history professors to sign a letter condemning it.

Sentence: Detained indefinitely without charge and waterboarded hourly for looking at a cop "all slanty-like."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

48. Larry the Cable Guy

Charges: The absolute nadir of the American South’s baffling cultural hegemony. A middle-class Nebraskan, raised in Palm Beach, whose parents sent him to private school, masquerading as an Appalachian mutant and making millions off the nine-toed cyclopes in his audience by calling his material "blue collar," when it’s really just a celebration of proud ignorance. The latest in a long line of "entertainers" propagating the lie that real talent is elitist. The South has risen again—just long enough to grab the rest of the nation by the legs and pull it back down to its Lovecraftian depths. Isn’t even "bad funny." Makes Jeff Foxworthy look like Chris Rock.

Exhibit A: Ostensibly humorous catchphrase translates into "complete the task."

Sentence: Sent back in time for the sole purpose of having Mark Twain’s cigars extinguished on his face.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

47. Martha Stewart

Charges: Only in America could a plutocrat charged with insider trading find sympathy among her social inferiors—people she would have either sterilized or mustard gassed, if the law permitted her. Stewart, a woman so frigid she makes Gila monsters look cuddly, rode this wave of infamy to a resurgence in popularity and a second television show. To the nation’s delight, she then used this public forum to demean the aborigines in her charge with robotic mordancy. Is in obvious discomfort when laughing. Would have drowned the survivors on the Titanic and used their corpses as a human pontoon to walk to dry land.

Exhibit A: Seemed to genuinely enjoy prison.

Sentence: Forced to use own K-Mart products.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

46. Bruce Chapman

Charges: Founder of the misnamed "Discovery Institute." Despite its pioneering title, Chapman’s organization seeks to make one of the world’s oldest, dumbest ideas the prevailing ideology, to "undiscover" evolution and set us back more than a century. Seems to believe a petition signed by 400 PhDs and professors is convincing proof of Intelligent Design’s widespread acceptance, when more scientists named "Steve" endorse Darwin. A lazy dissembler, he blames the lack of actual research and peer-reviewed articles on ID on academic "blackballing." Right, ‘cause Galileo had it easy. Chapman’s sole trailblazing achievement in the field of academic inquiry has been in proving scientists can be even smugger--when driven by theology.

Exhibit A: Held high-level positions under Reagan and Bush, Sr. Is not a scientist.

Sentence: Infested and colonized by scabies mites: eyeless, brainless parasites unique to humans—perfectly evolved to afflict us. Succumbing to the maddening itch, Chapman skins himself alive.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

45. Robert Novak

Charges: The absence of charges, for one. While the Valerie Plame leak scandal has taken down one prominent reporter and tarnished the reputation of several others, Novak—the one who actually printed the leak—remains inexplicably unscathed, unless you count the profane bout of crankiness that got his satanic ass bounced to Fox News, where, after all, he really belongs. Either Novak has secretly revealed his sources, damaging his already dubious journalistic credibility, or he is simply so well ensconced in the Washington power structure that he can’t be removed, like a metastasized tumor.

Exhibit A: The sheer, dreadful, angler-fish ugliness of the man, which can only be explained by the gradual accumulation of several lifetime’s worth of misanthropy, or possibly possession by demonic entity.

Sentence: Finds himself chained to a desk with James Carville; figures out he’s in hell only after several weeks pass without winning a single argument.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

44. George Lucas

Charges: It needs to be said: George Lucas is an awful writer and a shitty, shitty director. His second Star Wars trilogy absolutely sucked from beginning to end, and was in fact the least brave creative endeavor he could possibly have chosen, a guaranteed grand slam. Lucas has grown so accustomed to massive commercial success that he has no idea he’s putting out the worst work of his career, and no one dares to tell him. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because an army of sexless, sedentary thirty-something dweebs with an unhealthy fixation on Princess Leia will insist that his schlock is brilliant as if their lives depend on it, and an absurdly disproportionate media blitz always brings the kids in. But everything that was great about the first trilogy—reasonably decent acting, an engaging storyline and cool model-based special effects—is gone, replaced by detestably unsympathetic characters reciting torturously bad dialogue in a manner so wooden that coaching from Keanu Reeves would have helped, and CGI effects that, while painstakingly crafted down to the nanopixel, somehow looked less real than plastic spaceships and Muppets.

Exhibit A: Already revising the new trilogy for DVD releases.

Sentence: Cast into the gaping maw of Tatooine’s all-powerful Sarlacc and digested alive for a thousand years, along with a talkative Jar Jar Binks.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

43. Rush Limbaugh

Charges: Rather than engage in the admittedly difficult task of justifying GOP policies rationally, the key to Limbaugh’s success is attracting an audience that actually yearns to be lied to. It doesn’t matter how many righteous fact-checkers assail him in print and on the web, because dittoheads don’t care that he’s lying, as long as the lies justify their prejudices. Limbaugh’s program is not just hypocritical; it is a celebration of hypocrisy for ignorant crackers, angry at smart people and strung out on the dwindling sensation that they are better than everyone else by virtue of their race, sex, nationality or level of bluster, because their character and accomplishments don’t warrant such feelings. If political discussion were sex, the Limbaugh audience would be a horde of virgins beating off to deranged rape fantasies.

Exhibit A: Started out in sports radio; hasn’t changed his approach one bit.

Sentence: Starved to death in full view of glazed ham; ACLU mistakenly bestowed entire estate due to barbecue sauce stain on last will and testament.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

42. Nancy Grace

Charges: Revenges herself nightly for the murder of her fiancée on every criminal suspect and defendant; facts be damned. Despite her viscous, Gump-like hyper-drawl, her brain can barely keep pace. Looks like a camel in drag. Her crude vindictiveness is to the myth of the southern belle what Roots was to the myth of the genteel South.

Exhibit A: Repeatedly utters a snarling "You know what?" at guests who question her-not as a rhetorical device, but as a declarative sentence.

Sentence: Wrongly convicted and summarily executed by intrauterine electrocution on national television, so horrifying the nation that capital punishment is thenceforth outlawed.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

41. Charles Krauthammer

Charges: Considered an intellectual authority among neocons, Krauthammer, like his colleagues George Will and Tony Blankley, really only presents a passable facsimile of gravitas, substituting vocabulary for intelligence, mischaracterization for argument, and intolerable haughtiness for authority. The fact that this wanton fascist’s opinions are not only considered fit for mainstream consumption, but among the cream of the conservative crop, is a maddening indictment of both the media and conservative movement.

Exhibit A: Posed a hypothetical scenario involving 9/11 "architect" Kalid Sheikh Mohammed to advocate legalizing torture, when the actual Kalid Sheikh Mohammed was actually tortured without any such legislation.

Sentence: Lockheed-designed bionic exoskeleton he receives from Dick Cheney in exchange for opposing stem cell research goes berserk, ignoring Krauthammer’s excited protestations as it uses its powerful titanium arms to pulverize his loved ones and donate his life savings to Hamas.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

40. Tom Cruise

Charges: Criminal narcissism. After mega-lawyer Bert Fields threatened to sue The BEAST over Cruise’s inclusion in last year’s Loathsome List, we responded by giving him the editorial finger, and bracing ourselves for the legal spanking of our lives. Instead, the episode seemed to trigger a cascading ego crisis, culminating in a rapid and irrecoverable image downgrade from exalted idol to ridiculous buffoon. From his laughable claim of psychological expertise to his worst acting performance ever—as a man in love—Cruise simply cracked up on camera in 2005, and a public hitherto willing to overlook his obsessively inauthentic personality and comical religious affiliation had finally had enough. Cruise is a perfect example of a person who is simultaneously in love with and completely unfamiliar with himself, living in perpetual fear of self-actualization, and asserting a legal right to live free of criticism. A guy who can do whatever the hell he wants, yet chooses to devote his life to maintaining the public perception that he is somebody else.

Exhibit A: "I care man, I care. I care about you. I care about your children. I care about these people here in this room. Every one of you. And I...I mean it. That is not just some words to me. That is a promise." Seriously, can’t even act like a human being.

Sentence: A lifetime of forced, joyless sex with famously beautiful women, only to have his colossal gay porn library posthumously bequeathed to the Smithsonian by bitter, unloved offspring.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

39. Dr. David Hager

Charges: A Bush appointee to the FDA who was the key figure in its rejection of emergency oral contraceptive Plan B as an over the counter drug, which Hager bragged was the second time in fifty years the FDA has ruled against the overwhelming approval of its own advisory committee. The author of books like Stress and the Woman’s Body and As Jesus Cared for Women, Hager repeatedly sodomized his ex-wife for years against her will, alternately apologizing for or denying it when confronted by her, offering excuses like "You asked me to do that" and "Oh, I didn’t mean to have anal sex with you; I can’t feel the difference," she told The Nation. Seems a bit fishy, a supposed authority on women’s health who can’t detect such a significant distinction with his most sensitive instrument.

Exhibit A: "My official comment is that I decline to comment."

Sentence: A three-day group ramming by the multi-dildoed Oregon chapter of NOW, after which Hager will walk with a pronounced limp, never to regain control of his sphincter, and discover himself to be inexplicably pregnant.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

38. Mr. Blackwell

Charges: Has made a career of releasing an annual list judging the most superficial members of society based solely on their most superficial aspects. Richard’s "Worst Dressed" celebrity lists have all the redeeming qualities of syphilis. Is clearly motivated by jealousy towards young, beautiful women, because he knows he can never be one.

Exhibit A: Routinely cited by E!, Entertainment tonight and People Magazine; we’ve got to settle for the Celebrity Justice.

Sentence: Teeth extracted with pliers and used to bedazzle Britney Spears’s jean jacket.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

37. Donovan McNabb

Charges: Played so poorly that his demoralized and alienated teammates yearned for the return of ego-vampire Terrell Owens. A chocolate commodity so inoffensive he makes Hershey bars look militant. Responded indignantly to loopy criticism from the head of the Philly NAACP, but laughed off Rush Limbaugh’s racist broadsides. Choked in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl; this year he enjoyed the worst fourth quarter passer rating in the league. Made over $11,000,000 in 2004.

Exhibit A: Logged only significant playing time this season with his mom in soup commercials.

Sentence: Peon at a Campbell’s Soup cannery in China. Flogged routinely for underperformance.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

36. John Rendon

Charges: The man behind the man behind the curtain. His PR firm created the Iraqi National Congress in 1991 and dubbed Ahmed Chalabi its brave leader. Has been on the CIA’s list of organizations to funnel money to since the key role it played ousting Noriega from Panama for papa Bush. Three weeks after 9/11 the Rendon Group began collecting a $326,000 a month paycheck for disseminating Iraq war propaganda by organizing and funding the INC, amongst other activities such as bribing and coercing foreign journalists to beat the drum for war. The Rendon Group played matchmaker between Ahmed Chalabi, Judith Miller and a well-trained Iraqi defector with wild, polygraph-disproved claims of vast WMD stockpiles. A former McGovern supporter and lifelong Democrat who enjoys his life as the Goebbels of outsourcing.

Exhibit A: This self described "information warrior" produced the now infamous tight shot short film of the falling Saddam Hussein statue with a small, yet enthused cast of INC players he had shipped into town with CIA money and planes.

Sentence: Paid handsomely to saturate the global media with fabricated reports that the cure for cancer is "punching John Rendon in the throat."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

35. Michael Brown

Charges: Second fiddle to Bush’s Nero—except that while New Orleans sank, Michael Brown just fiddled with himself. A man of geological indolence, Brown makes lichens seem dynamic. Despite being woefully unqualified for his job as FEMA director, it was Brown’s lethal callousness that really astounded (and killed) so many Americans. When one of only two FEMA employees Brown had vouchsafed New Orleans wrote two days after Katrina that "the situation is past critical," Brown responded, "Thanks for the update. Anything specific I need to do or tweak?" When he finally arrived in Louisiana, Brown was preoccupied with demanding more time to eat dinner at a Baton Rouge restaurant, instead of sucking down an MRE and getting to work doing his incredibly important job, like a fucking man. Brown reacted to the most important moment in his life like an immature college student who realizes he’s fucking up the semester and stops going to class without telling anyone. No human being can possibly be this ineffective unless he simply doesn’t give a shit if people die.

Exhibit A: In subsequent communications, Brown asked, "Can I quit now? Can I come home?" and complained about trouble finding a dog sitter. With almost comical indifference to those actually suffering, he wrote: "I’m trapped now, please rescue me."

Sentence: What else? Dehydrated, starved, and slowly baked to death on a Ninth Ward rooftop while repeatedly buzzed by news helicopters. Body secretly recovered and incinerated by Blackwater operatives as part of a Cheney-initiated campaign to keep casualty figures artificially low.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

34. Scooter Libby

Charges: Known as "germ boy" within the administration for his obsession with creating panic over biological warfare in order to facilitate huge government vaccine purchases and alter markets to the benefit of big pharmaceutical industry stock holders like Rumsfeld, George Shultz and himself. Sound familiar? A high-level fall guy, responsible for leaking what was in the interest of profit, not leaking what wasn’t, and barking on cue to produce the noise of governance without the drawbacks of actual governance.

Exhibit A: "The Aspens turn in clusters," or something.

Sentence: Raped by bear.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

33. Johnny Damon

Charges: Any baseball player with highlights in his hair should be faced with the same penalty system applied to those using performance-enhancing steroids. It’s ruining the game. And if a ball player is going to grow a beard, it should be a Charlie Manson/Thurman Munson scraggle of bushy whiskers, not a neatly manicured and softly conditioned frame for your pretty face. The only thing that got Damon to step into line and quit hair-farming was a 52 million dollar check from the New York Yankees. Boston prayed for the multi-bladed Gillette that officially made him a Yankee to slip while gliding over his Adam’s apple and spill his lifeblood into the bathroom sink.

Exhibit A: Going from the Red Sox to the Yankees is like fucking the guy that murdered your husband.

Sentence: Killed by barrage of hurled D cell batteries when he takes the field at Fenway next season.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

32. Kenneth Tomlinson

Charges: Hired to infiltrate the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, making way for a GOP takeover of the final outlet for objective, fact-based TV reporting left largely unsullied by corporate manipulation. Why is it that whenever conservatives complain about the "liberal bias" of investigative journalism programs, they seek to “balance” them out with shows that feature wealthy Republicans sitting in chairs and talking? And why is that those who rail against "racial quotas" have no problem with affirmative action when it’s applied to newsroom ideology? Tomlinson’s heavy-handed invasion was so objectionable that he was forced to resign, but he left behind some real gems: new CPB president and CEO Patricia Harrison was co-chair of the RNC, Assistant Secretary of State and oversaw the production of now-notorious fake news segments for the White House; and the new Chairwoman and Vice Chairwoman are both major donors to the RNC. Look forward to a new, more "balanced" era in public broadcasting.

Exhibit A: Next year’s children’s special, "Elmo and Milton Friedman’s Supply Side Christmas Adventure."

Sentence: Life as Bill Moyers’ butler, including sponge baths and diaper service.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

31. Rita Cosby

Charges: Unholy pastiche of fearmongering and celebrity ringworm with the brain of a moth, the integrity of a tapeworm, and the appearance and larynx of a sugar-addicted, glass-eating drag queen.

Exhibit A: Her banter with Joe Scarborough kills children.

Sentence: Kicked in the nuts.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

30. Hillary Clinton

Charges: Let’s face it: one reason the Republicans have done so well in recent elections (aside from touch screen voting machines) is that they are consistent in their views, however nuts they are, while "new Democrats" like Clinton are willing to hump every fence they come across. Hillary’s recent triangulation on issues like flag-burning and naughty video games has no right-wing equivalent in reality, but it would be something like Alaska Senator Ted Stevens launching a campaign against logging. Claims to pray all the time, which even her supporters know is bullshit.

Exhibit A: Will probably cause yet another tragic Republican presidency.

Sentence: Designated cookie-baker for Feminists for Life.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

29. Terri Schiavo

Charges: Sacrificed her grey matter to vanity, only to become the focus of a manufactured media blitz involving the character assassination of her husband, the selective coverage of fifty protestors by 200 reporters, and a disgusting demonstration of congressional overreaching, all in deference to a frightening fringe culture’s farcical take on ethics. If you can’t tell a brain-dead oxygen-waster from a fetus, you’ve got no place debating policy or exploiting a devastated family to further your idiotic agenda or political career.

Exhibit A: As confirmed by a conspicuously underreported autopsy, Schiavo feels the same about her current situation as she did a year ago.

Sentence: To have the circumstances of her death become a bizarre political freakshow; to be worshipped as a religious idol by weak-minded weirdoes who never knew her, stripping her and her family of all dignity as she lies, powerless to stop it, in a hospital bed. Oh, right. Never mind.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

28. Joe Lieberman

Charges: Technically there are 55 Republicans in the Senate, but that’s not counting their favorite shill Joe Lieberman. He’s a Democrat because…well…he’s from Connecticut. And he’s Jewish. But Lieberman has spent his time since "losing" to Bush/Cheney in 2000 spooning the White House and attempting to inoculate their increasingly insane policies from legitimate criticism. Resembles Tex Avery cartoon character Droopy Dog in voice, demeanor, and spinelessness.

Exhibit A: "Freedom of religion doesn’t mean freedom from religion." Apparently, it also doesn’t mean freedom from asinine revisionism.

Sentence: Made into Oval Office footstool.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

27. Ann Coulter

Charges: The fact that Coulter is considered desirable by Republicans betrays their sick and masochistic nature. We saw Coulter in person this year, and she is a revolting skeleton with a boob job and a grotesquely oversized head, who feeds only on the hatred of her target audience, liberals. Sole redeeming quality is that she is impossible to take seriously--she's really more of a shock comic than a political commentator, whether she knows it or not.

Exhibit A: "I’m getting a little fed up with hearing about, oh, civilian casualties."

Sentence: Confined to Mississippi; forever banned from interacting with the lefty intellectuals she lives to antagonize.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

26. Spammers

Charges: Wasting billions of minutes of time and millions of dollars in bandwidth on the thin hope that a few poor saps will be stupid enough to believe that a Nigerian banker actually wants to give them millions of dollars, or that responding to an unsolicited e-mail is the smart way to refinance their mortgage or enlarge their penis. Every day, we must perform the tedious task of combing through our e-mail and deleting the nine tenths of it which consist of the most retarded marketing in history, along with mean-spirited swindles and ads for the vilest pornography imaginable. All because these jack-offs can think of no better way to support themselves than by pestering the entire fucking planet.

Exhibit A: Your inbox.

Sentence: Faces repeatedly smashed into keyboards until dead; bodies made into actual Spam; greedily devoured by Nigerian bankers.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

25. Paris Hilton

Charges: Won’t go away. A head so empty, the rails of coke that sustain her must dissipate in clouds around her ears; this residual high the only explanation anyone would come within five feet of her. Brainless, her spinal cord defies physics, like an Indian rope trick. Her Carl’s Jr. commercial, while an uninspired approximation of eroticism, was still hotter than her actual "sex" tape, in which she only made noise when she wasn’t screwing—that’s not hot. Squints inexplicably for photo ops, suggesting even minimal focus is beyond her. Her continued success as a celebrity famous for nothing, despite the eerie resemblance she bears to the inbred banjoist from Deliverance and a lack of talent so profound that others become duller as they approach her, indicates that something is fundamentally wrong with humanity.

Exhibit A: Somehow, everybody in America knew that this completely pointless person had lost her dog, and we are all diminished by the experience.

Sentence: Locked in a room with a high steel ceiling which lowers a centimeter per hour, until she either solves a Rubik’s cube or is crushed; whichever comes first.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

24. Jim Guckert

Charges: The most hilariously twisted figure of 2005, including Michael Jackson. Guckert, better known as Jeff Gannon, truly lived a life in need of two names: the upright, macho, McCarthyite Clark Kent and the buff, military-fetish prostitute Superfag. Gannon symbolized so many things: the exponential erosion of journalistic standards, the fundamental hypocrisy in the heart of each Republican (further evidenced by their charges of "gay-bashing" when liberals could not conceal their amusement at his outing), unseemly conflicts of interest between the press and the GOP, etc. But what was lost in the sauce was that Gannon was a straight-up plagiarist, actually copying and pasting sections of White House press releases into his articles, and we don’t mean quotations. Now that’s a lazy propagandist. Nobody seemed to find that part of the story particularly interesting, but hey, what’s violating the first rule of journalism next to hotmilitarystuds.com?

Exhibit A: Despite having been publicly exposed to be a clownish impostor and an embarrassment to his party, Gannon refuses to go away, clinging ever more tenaciously to the same self-denying dogma that made him a laughingstock in the first place.

Sentence: Reunited with reality, in the form of ass cancer.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

23. Jennifer Wilbanks

Charges: Wasting the entire nation’s time and attention without actually being abducted and killed. The "Runaway Bride" fiasco marks a new low point in modern news, an episode in which the media devoted more attention to a single fruitcake than the rest of the damned world, discovered her to be simply an inconsiderate flake, and continued their shameless round-the-clock coverage of her unabated for many days afterward, compulsively playing 10 seconds of towel-headed perp walk footage over and over and over again, as world events were left to take care of themselves. This bug-eyed bitch and her doormat fiancée, after all, were important—right?

Exhibit A: Even if she were actually abducted and killed, it wouldn’t have merited 1/1000th the coverage she got in the first day of this speculation orgy.

Sentence: Actually abducted and killed.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

22. Jesse Jackson

Charges: Having parlayed a brief association with and willingness to mimic Martin Luther King Jr. into a lifelong career, Jackson finally cast aside all vestiges of integrity in 2005, diving headlong into rhetorical prostitution appearances in support of three extremely dubious "heroes": transparent pedophile Michael Jackson, all-star wide receiver and raging asshole Terrell Owens, and convicted quadruple-murderer Stanley "Tookie" Williams, who Jackson compared to Nelson Mandela. Providing the post-black pop star with racial cover for what must have been an exorbitant amount of money, and arguing that Tookie’s writing a children’s book makes up for mocking the death-rattles of his victims, Jackson managed to make Al Sharpton look good last year. It’s a long, soul-destroying trek from "I have a dream" to "I have to get a receipt for my expense account."

Exhibit A: Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH coalition organized a five-bus caravan, ostensibly to bring New Orleans residents wiped out by hurricane Katrina back to the Big Easy for guaranteed jobs and housing. Only fourteen of the two hundred passengers were actually from New Orleans. Three quarters of the passengers went right back home. Forty-eight were hired, three of which were from New Orleans.

Sentence: Jackson awakes to discover that he really has 'had a dream,' and that he is actually white, dirt poor, unemployed, and a terrible dresser.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

21. Bill Frist

Charges: A physician whose senatorial career has been a protracted renunciation of the Hippocractic oath. First and foremost, Frist does harm. Drew the scrutiny of the SEC and Department of Justice for directing the sale of $6 million worth of stock in his brother’s company, while claiming not to know he even owned it. Diagnosed Terri Schiavo from the senate floor, proclaiming "that is not somebody in a persistent vegetative state," and then denied ever having made such a judgment. His Harvard Medical School classmates reproached him in a letter for having exploited his medical training. Made protecting drug maker Eli Lilly from litigation for putting mercury in vaccines a provision of the Homeland Security bill. Honed his surgical skills on cats he adopted from pet shelters—really.

Exhibit A: Opposed Patients’ Bill of Rights.

Sentence: Brain damage due to botched botox treatment.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

20. Oprah Winfrey

Charges: Winfrey’s entire life is an exercise in self-aggrandizement, from the TV show which tells us what to read and how to live to her eponymous magazine, every issue of which features her smug countenance on its cover. More than just another insufferable Hollywood egotist, Oprah is something more akin to a housewife messiah, providing false hope and faux spirituality for experience-deprived worshippers. Everything she does is strategically designed to draw more praise, more devotees, and of course more money. Recently had celebrated poet Maya Angelou on her program to promote her new poem, which Oprah read for the audience as if she wrote it herself, as she seems to actually believe.

Exhibit A: Dr. Phil.

Sentence: Crushed by self-commissioned 40-story platinum Oprah statue.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

19. James Sensenbrenner

Charges: Hates free speech. Sensenbrenner is every truculent moron who ever shouted you down for informing him or called you a traitor for disagreeing with him. Sensenbrenner wants to apply criminal penalties for broadcast indecency—jail for swearing. Sensenbrenner and his supporters don’t know a damn thing about freedom or democracy; they may not even understand that they are clearly against these concepts. They are terrible, mindless, trained by decades of churchgoing into an unquestioning loyalty and a bitter resentment of dissent. That’s why they didn’t mind when this turgid cock abruptly ended a hearing on the Patriot Act after a single round of questioning because the witnesses were talking about Guantanamo. Sensenbrenner gaveled the hearing to a close over the objections of many, and when it became clear that the Democrats weren’t leaving, this old, worthless bag of shit turned off the microphones and ordered CSPAN to turn its cameras off, clearly enraged by the idea of liberals getting a turn to talk. Specializes in legislative attacks on civil liberties and the separation of powers, such as the Patriot Act and 2005’s REAL ID Act, which made it’s way into law as a rider attached to a military spending bill, and allows the Homeland Security Department to bypass any law or court to erect physical barriers at our borders.

Exhibit A: If Sensenbrenner ran the country, we’d go to jail for writing this.

Sentence: Spine-mounted electrode racks Sensenbrenner’s body with searing pain every time he utters an article, pronoun, or any form of the verbs "to have" and "to be."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

18. Tommy Hilfiger

Charges: Egomaniacal designer of drab, ironically patriot-hued clothing, manufactured by Chinese migrants who overcrowd the equally drab Pacific Rim factories of the United States Commonwealth of Saipan, favorite illegal vacation spot of Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay. Workers slave for pennies, are administered forced abortions, and still can slap a "Made in the USA" sticker on their products.

Exhibit A: Publicly raising a spoiled cunt on MTV’s post-apocalyptic "Rich Girls," and hosting a primetime CBS reality infomercial while peddling overpriced trash made by slaves.

Sentence: Receives gift from Ralph Lauren—a Sicilian necktie.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

17. William A. Donohue

Charges: If Jesus Christ were alive today, Catholic League president Bill Donohue would regularly call him a faggot in casual conversation. Purports to somehow defend Christianity by attacking nearly everybody on the planet in a perpetual frenzy of hateful, red-faced rage. As far as Donohue is concerned, the main focus of Catholicism is to stamp out homosexuality and Hollywood Jews who "like anal sex."

Exhibit A: When a liberal blogger posted an "O’Reilly Factor" parody transcript wherein Donohue launches a campaign against responding to sneezes by saying "gesundheit" instead of "God bless you," many failed to get the joke, because, well, it’s just plain realistic.

Sentence: Actually judged by true Christian god.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

16. R Kelly

Charges: As if videotaping himself urinating on an underage girl wasn’t bad enough, Kelly decided to follow up by inflicting the worst piece of music in American history upon the public consciousness. Kelly claims he is a genius for squeezing out what are so far 12 installments of his “hip hopera,” “Trapped in the Closet” like so many virtually identical turds, with no variation in musical content and a story line so patently terrible that it soon became the subject of a parody-frenzy involving Saturday Night Live, South Park, Mad TV, Jimmy Kimmel, and the Upright Citizens brigade, among many others. Even his good songs all seem to be about fucking underage girls.

Exhibit A: Seriously—pissing on an underage girl.

Sentence: Trapped in a closet. Eventually dies of thirst.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

15. Karl Rove

Charges: A greasy pig whose only distinction in life is his total lack of decency. Rove is decidedly not a genius; he is simply missing the part of his soul that prevents the rest of us from kicking elderly women in the face. His admirers have elevated fanatical, amoral ambition to the status of a virtue, along with lying, cheating, and negligent homicide, all in the name of "values." Quite possibly the worst person in the worst White House in American history.

Exhibit A: "As people do better, they start voting like Republicans - unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing."

Sentence: Lowered head first into oil refinery smokestack.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

14. Elisabeth Bumiller

Charges: The ultimate Bush hagiographer, Bumiller is responsible for unearthing such essential information as Bush’s iPod playlist and how he always makes his bed time. Bumiller’s weekly presidential throat job in the rapidly declining New York Times, the "White House Letter," reads like transparent ad copy for the president. Her unabashedly moist, worshipful tone would seem a little over-the-top at an RNC convention. Bumiller revealed the secret of her success to her alumni magazine at Northwestern: doing the very least that her job description requires. "At every press conference I stand up every time and ask a question," Bumiller said. "No matter what." Wow.

Exhibit A: "You can’t say George Bush is wrong here. There’s no way you can say that in the New York Times…You can’t just say the president is lying. You don’t just say that in the… You can’t say the president is lying—that’s a judgment call… What is wrong with that? What is your problem with that? What? Why do you all object to that?"

Sentence: The Times' reign as the "paper of record" is finally brought to an end when the paper’s headquarters are demolished by readers upon publication of Bumiller’s final dispatch, "Bush’s Taint: Sweet Like Honey."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

13. God

Charges: If your answer to the age-old question of God’s existence is "yes," your next question should be, "Why is he such a dick?" After three major natural disasters, not to mention the eternal constants of famine, war and disease, to believe in God is to believe either that He enjoys fucking with us, or at best has totally lost interest in the whole "people" thing. Never calls anymore.

Exhibit A: Mosquitoes, Ralph Reed.

Sentence: Forever listening to an unending stream of idiotic, mundane prayers uttered by the dumbest, most inarticulate people in His creation.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

12. Barbara Bush

Charges: Her polluted womb nurtured the seed of American decadence. The root of America’s decay; the poison tree from whence the fruit loop George W. Bush sprang. This unfeeling, unthinking patrician hag spawned America’s most notorious welfare child, whose every glaring deficiency has been excused or underwritten by undeserved wealth. Chuckling, she remarked of poor people displaced by Hurricane Katrina, "And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them." Of their plans for permanent relocation, she speculated: "What I’m hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas." A true aristocrat, she sees poor people as another species.

Exhibit A: George H.W., George W., Jeb, Neil, Jenna, Barbara, Noelle, succeeding generations.

Sentence: Hysterectomy on principle. Bound and thrown into Lake Pontchartrain. If she floats, burned at the stake. If she drowns, even better.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

11. Samuel Alito

Charges: The US Supreme Court’s fait accompli. President Bush’s closet case follow-up to the "most qualified" Harriet Miers' disastrous nomination, Alito was defended vociferously as a victim of racism by conservatives for being labeled "Scalito," a nickname clearly signifying his kinship of judicial philosophy with Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and nothing else. Writes autistic opinions, in which language itself is rendered meaningless. For example, he wrote in a decision that the government should not protect plaintiffs from "employers who, although they have not acted with the intent to discriminate, may have treated their employees unfairly." When Alito puts on his Supreme Court robe, America can say "Arrivederci" to a woman’s right to choose.

Exhibit A: In a landmark case, Alito distinguished himself by advocating the most extreme interpretation of law on the conservative Third Circuit; the decision prompted one observer to note, "[F]or the first time since 1973, a Federal court of appeals has directly said that Roe v. Wade is no longer the law of the land."

Sentence: Paper cut while handling the Constitution, left untreated, becomes infected, eventually killing him. Wife cries.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

10. Bill O’Reilly

Charges: Even Limbaugh must bow before O’Reilly’s unparalleled bullying skills and ability to deliver undiluted bullshit with an air of brusque authority. O’Reilly is so comfortable with his astounding hypocrisy that he didn’t skip a beat when he was publicly revealed to be a comically perverse sexual harasser, continuing to sanctimoniously moralize about the corrosive effects of rap music and intellectualism on American society. Main tactic against his critics, whose jobs rank among the easiest in the world, is to accuse them of his own methods: arbitrary smears, selective quotation, partisan motivation, and intellectual cowardice. Infuriatingly claims to be a political "independent" who just happens to parrot virtually every Republican talking point and equate mainstream liberals with Nazis and Stalinists. Claimed his call for abandoning San Francisco to al Qaeda bombing was "satirical," which is itself the funniest thing he’s ever said. An honest to goodness list-making Joe McCarthy wannabe, with the ACLU standing in for the Communist Party.

Exhibit A: O’Reilly’s novel, Those Who Trespass, which reads like an eighth grade writing assignment, is about a blustery news correspondent, demoted from foreign correspondence to less prestigious work (as O’Reilly was when he moved from ABC News to Inside Edition), who murders a string of colleagues he feels have hindered his career. "I kill you on page six," he told Charlie Gibson on Good Morning America.

Sentence: After O'Reilly's influence fundamentally changes the nature of jurisprudence, he is tortured and jailed for life when it is discovered that he once leafed through a copy of the Communist Manifesto as a teen.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9. BTK Killer

Charges: It’s not so much the depraved sexual murder or sociopathic lack of remorse—if we started including every homicidal freak in this list, there'd be no room to display our prodigious political bias. It’s the fact that Dennis Rader turned out to be, in the end, a sad, needy wuss. His jaw-dropping statement at his sentencing, coming after a series of tearful, enraged victims’ statements, revealed the extent of Rader’s detachment from reality—doling out thank-yous to his lawyers, the cops, his prison guards and the gang back at lock-up, like he just won an Oscar, cracking inside jokes and pretending to be 'close' with people who doubtless wished they could beat him dead with his own severed arms.

Exhibit A: "I feel like a star right now."

Sentence: Bound. Tortured. Killed.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

8. Judith Miller

Charges: The human warhead Ahmed Chalabi fired into America's collective ass on behalf of the federal government. A dutiful stenographer, Miller regurgitated all of Chalabi’s erroneous assertions about Iraq’s weapon’s capabilities without skepticism and threw in a few of her own. Essentially started a war with bad reporting, and remained indefatigably self-satisfied throughout the ensuing imbroglio, her mantis-like face fixed in a smile behind oddly insectival sunglasses. Managed to cast herself as a martyr for journalistic principles, despite her role as a conduit for a successful White House propaganda campaign, which is exactly why they’d try to use her to leak a CIA agent’s identity—to break the law again.

Exhibit A: Told a Salon interviewer in May, 2004, while US troops were already dying, "You know what, I was proved fucking right. That’s what happened. People who disagreed with me were saying, 'There she goes again.' But I was proved fucking right," which shows that not only doesn’t Miller really report for the Times, but she also doesn’t read it.

Sentence: After a brief but horrible stint as a chemical weapons test subject for Monsanto, Miller is vivisected without anesthesia and her organs are harvested alive to be preserved as spares for Seymour Hersh.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

7. Thomas Friedman

Charges: The worst of all creatures in the political opinion jungle: a cretin who thinks he’s a genius. Friedman’s intolerable knack for converting irreducibly complex geopolitical/socioeconomic situations into simplistic, tin-eared insta-clichés makes him one of the most dangerous people on the planet, arming people even stupider than him with the illusion of knowledge in the form of a crude vocabulary of badly mixed metaphors and ill-conceived flashcard images, thereby having a negative net effect on the nation’s intellect. India and China are "like a bottle of champagne" which someone has been "shaking for 40 years;" the modern economy dictates that "you need to be at a certain level to be able to claim your share of a global pie that is both expanding and becoming more complex;" and the threat of terrorism is a "bubble" that threatens to "undermine" open society. Friedman’s disorienting literary ineptitude is nearly enough to distract us from the indisputable fact that he has no fucking idea what he’s talking about. For this dolt-friendly parlor trick and a slavish devotion to globalization and technology as abstract, almost mystical tenets, Friedman has achieved iconic status. Exhibits the easy smile and benevolent smugness of an unjustly celebrated man who has never thought very deeply or rigorously about anything at all.

Exhibit A: Despite his constant exaltation of the internet as some kind of global cure-all, Friedman had to actually fly to London to discover that European newspapers were having misgivings about Guantanamo Bay.

Sentence: Column outsourced to Bangalore, where there is some difficulty in finding a peasant ignorant and ineloquent enough to please his audience. Compelled at gunpoint to write a 500-page retraction of his recent best-seller, called No, Actually the World is Round.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

6. Michael Jackson

Charges: Jackson’s second escape from accountability for a well-known lust for little boys was disappointing, but at least his image is forever ruined, causing him to flee the country. Unfortunately, his own imperiled children have not been taken from him. First plan upon acquittal was to build another amusement park, this time in Africa, where apparently it must be easier to buy off parents and/or potential prosecutors. Currently in Bahrain, where he is negotiating a consultant job with a company to help set up—yup—theme parks. Like a spider whose web has been destroyed, Jackson simply relocates and spins a new one. On top of all of this, he hasn’t recorded a decent track since Thriller’s success drove him off the deep end, and has retroactively ruined such now-creepy titles as "PYT (Pretty Young Thing)" and "The Way You Make Me Feel."

Exhibit A: Truly living in a fantasy world of his own creation, Jackson insists with a (figuratively) straight face that he has only had a nose job. Remember when Prince was weird?

Sentence: Forced to actually relive his childhood, including all of the beatings and molestation which transformed him into the inhuman freak he is today.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Tom Delay

Charges: A politician so horrible, his prior career as an exterminator constitutes fratricide. Smiled for his mug shot like it was a campaign poster. Asked three young Katrina evacuees, “Now tell me the truth, boys, is this kind of fun?” One of an elite handful of white Americans still engaged in the time-honored tradition of screwing over Indians. Responding to a request he extinguish his cigar in a restaurant in accordance with federal regulations, Delay replied, “I AM the federal government.” Claimed that there was “no fat left to cut” from the federal budget to offset New Orleans reconstruction costs. So arrogant in abuse of power that he doesn’t even take time to construct plausible lies.

Exhibit A: Explaining his failure to enlist during Vietnam: "So many minority youths had volunteered…that there was literally no room for patriotic folks like myself."

Sentence: Bashed to death with hammer.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

4. You

Charges: Silently enabling and contributing to the irreversible destruction of your planet. Absolving yourself of your responsibility to do anything about it that your immediate neighbors don’t. Assuming that it’s normal behavior to spend several hours each day totally inert and staring into a cathode ray tube. Substituting antidepressants for physical motion. Caring more about the personal relationships of people you will never meet than your own. Shrugging your shoulders at the knowledge that your government is populated by criminal liars intent on fooling you into impoverished, helpless submission. Cheering this process on.

Exhibit A: You don’t even know who your congressman is.

Sentence: Deathbed realization that your entire life was an unending series of stupid mistakes and wasted opportunities, a priceless gift of potential extravagantly squandered, for which you deserve nothing but scorn or, at best, indifference, and a cold, meaningless demise.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

3. George W. Bush

Charges: Simply put, the stupidest man ever to lead this country. Bush’s lobotomized Will Rogers routine is a satirist’s dream, a European intellectual’s caricature of the dipshit cowboy American, all balls and no brains. Often responds to questions by attempting to define the word he finds the most challenging in them. Thinks press reports of his various crimes are responsible for his waning popularity, rather than the deeds themselves. Interprets the constitution like a Unitarian interprets the bible; for maximum convenience and with no regard to the actual text. Foreign policy vision is less serious and more simplistic than an issue of Captain America.

Exhibit A: "I want to thank the President and the CEO of Constellation Energy, Mayo Shattuck. That’s a pretty cool first name, isn’t it? Mayo. Pass the Mayo."

Sentence: Trapped for eternity under shoddily manufactured Diebold voting machine, unable to reach nearby refrigerator full of hot dogs and bourbon.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2. Dick Cheney

Charges: At the forefront of nearly every administration effort to anihillate the constitution. A true psychopath with only one motivating force; insatiable greed. Insists that we can only remain "free" through torture, spying and secrecy. Bears the crooked ugliness of a man whose entire life has been devoted to a senseless pursuit of power, and whose most effective weapon is a total lack of ethics, or even decorum. So cartoonishly evil he defies parody.

Exhibit A: "I think they’re in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency."

Sentence: Strapped to chair; eyes removed with melon baller. Nursed back to health. Lips sewn to a rubber hose connecting him to a 500 gallon nutrition shake. Nursed back to health. Fingers, hands, toes, feet, nose and genitals devoured by hungry pigs. Nursed back to health. Legs and arms ground to stubs with belt sander. Nursed back to health. Fitted with earphones that play only Christina Aguilera songs, and left alone to think about what he has done.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. Pat Robertson

Charges: If Pat Robertson’s local Starbucks caught fire, he would claim that God was punishing them for giving him a caramel latte when he ordered vanilla. Robertson has always been a demonic charlatan with the credibility of Miss Cleo and a lust for Armageddon in his vile, rat-toad heart, but this was really his year to shine. In 2005, Robertson called on God to vacate seats in the Supreme Court (the almighty obliged, killing Rehnquist), advocated assassinating Hugo Chavez, said ‘judicial activists’ were a more serious threat to America than terrorists, called criticism of the war treason, said John Roberts should be thankful for Hurricane Katrina, which he implied was “connected” to Roe v. Wade, attributed Ariel Sharon’s stroke to divine retribution for the Gaza pullout, said “the Antichrist is probably a Jew alive in Israel today,” and implied that God would wipe the residents of Dover, PA off the map for rejecting Creationism. Not to mention raising huge sums of cash from his zombie army, much of which is diverted from his charity operations to his business interests, including African diamond mines. Has long advocated that America simply ignore the Supreme Court. Robertson’s God is an insecure, misogynistic, homicidal fanatic—just like Pat.

Exhibit A: Vehemently opposed to voluntary abortion in America, but okay with forced abortion in China, where his cable investments depend on the good graces of the government.

Sentence: Repeatedly struck by lightning.

© Copyright 2005, The Beast. All rights reserved.

republicans wish you a merry christmas

2005-12-25T11:59:00.000-09:00

December 25, 2005
Editorial the new york times

A Chilling Departure From the Capitol One of the shabbiest shell games of the year was played out in the closing hours of Congress in its now-you-see-it, now-you-don't offering of some badly needed winter heating aid to the nation's working poor. The climactic moment occurred when Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, huckstering his most treasured goal, tried to sell oil drilling in his state's pristine wildlife preserve by promising it would help finance a long list of shoppers' bonuses for his colleagues: extra money for flu vaccine, hurricane reconstruction, first-responder radios and - if you vote yes right away - $2 billion in extra heating aid for the poor this cold winter.

Mr. Stevens's cunning warning was that all those extras would die on the vine unless Alaska drilling was approved. His cynical flimflammery was deservedly rebuffed as enough opponents stood firm against the oil drilling. And soon enough the word went round that things like flu vaccine and hurricane aid were not endangered after all.

Not so the extra fuel aid for low-income families. There was a heating supplement tied to the Alaska proposal, as Mr. Stevens promised. But there was also a separate $2 billion appropriated for the same purpose elsewhere in the legislation - unconnected to the Alaska floor machinations - that somehow was struck from the final bill as lawmakers rushed to recess. Malice? Who can say? Obviously the poor can't afford a campaign donation PAC to catch Congress's attention for an answer.

The government's home heating supplement now stands at a half or less of what the poor will need if predictions of a harsh winter pan out and fuel bills increase 25 percent. Various studies have established that, in a pinch, the poor scrimp on food purchases in order to meet heating bills. Yet Congress's stinginess is being compounded by the administration's recent decision to reject a request from New York and several other states to increase food stamp outlays to the poor as fuel bills mount.

Lawmakers insist that the $2 billion supplement technically had to be cut - but may be restored yet again next month. Believe that and we have an oil derrick to sell you in Alaska.

the definition of a rhetorical question.

2005-12-22T15:22:00.000-09:00

(December 22, 2005 -- 05:56 PM EST

Every so often a reader writes in and asks this question. And it's a pretty good one. So here goes: When was the last time there was a major terror alert? They were something like a regular occurence for the eighteen months or so before the 2004 election. And through 2004 the administration pushed the line that al Qaida was aiming to disrupt the elections themselves. But as near I can tell there hasn't been a single one since election day.

Through 2004, of course, critics of the administration routinely questioned whether the frequency and timing of the various terror alerts were not all or in part for political effect.

How do we explain what appears to be a night and day difference between the year prior to November 2004 and the year since in terms of terror alerts and scares?
-- Josh Marshall

freedom on the march

2005-12-21T05:56:00.000-09:00

RJ Eskow: Voting Confirms: Iraq Is a Red State RJ Eskow
Tue Dec 20, 4:13 PM ET

An election driven by religion. A deeply polarized electorate. Disputed voting results, where the only question is whether the fraud was small-scale or massive. Yes, we have succeeded in exporting American-style democracy to Iraq. The question ofwhether it was worth it has been answered - with a solid "no" - by the American people, but they lack leaders who will speak for them. You get the democracy you pay for.

Thee mission of "exporting democracy" to Iraq had four key goals:

1. To create a US-friendly nation in the region
2. To build a working model of democracy as the neocons conceived it for the Middle East
3. To provide Israel with an ally in the Arab world (which Chalabi had promised to deliver)
4. To isolate Iran from the Arab world

What have we gotten instead, for the massive loss of American and Iraqi life and the hundreds of billions of dollars spent so far?

1. A country where 82% of the population "strongly opposes" our presence and 45% support armed attacks against US troops
2. A highly conservative, religiously-based electorate that's a far cry from the neocon vision of liberal democracy
3. A country that appears to be drawing closer and closer to Israel's enemies
4. A new ally and sister country to Iran, with similar religious and political beliefs

The juxtaposition of "neocon vision" with "liberal democracy" may sound strange to some of you, but one characteristic of the neoconservatives (and I've worked with a few) is a streak of naive idealism. They had the sincere belief, unsupported by research or data, that Middle Easterners would respond in an enlightened way when given the chance to vote - by looking at the big picture, considering the greater good of the country and the region, and recognizing the value of religious freedom.

Why did they believe that Iraqis would use the ballot in a more enlightened way than we do here at home? Voters are human. There - as here - many are influenced by their immediate personal needs and the advice of their clergy. That's what drove many voters in the last couple of US elections, and what seems to be driving them in Iraq. The Iraqis are further driven by their first-hand experience of the suffering of war, which each day hardens their resolve against America.

Democracy is not a tool, and shouldn't be used as one by cynics or naifs - and the neocons are both. Yes, more Iraqis voted this time. The Association of Muslim Scholars and other groups dropped their opposition to Sunni participation. As Juan Cole points out, though, that's analogous to the IRA's dual campaign of combat and electoral politics in Northern Ireland.

Democracy for democracy's sake is a valid goal, but few Americans would have supported this war - with its four objectives - knowing that these would be the four outcomes. The war-friendly Democrats are wrong to say that now that the harm's been done by invasion, we have to stay to fix it. That's a coward's stance. The truth is that harm was done by the invasion, and is made worse with every day we stay.

Yet no American leader, Republican or Democrat, will say what needs to be said: We've given the President his war, and we've seen the results. The Iraqis have elected their Iran-friendly, fundamentalist Muslim leadership, as is their sovereign right. Now let's leave the country to those leaders to run as they see fit.

Copyright © 2005 HuffingtonPost.com.

the cesspool that keeps on seeping.

2005-12-21T04:59:00.000-09:00

The New York Times
December 21, 2005
Lobbyist Is Said to Discuss Plea and Testimony
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT

WASHINGTON, Dec. 20 - Jack Abramoff, the Republican lobbyist under criminal investigation, has been discussing with prosecutors a deal that would grant him a reduced sentence in exchange for testimony against former political and business associates, people with detailed knowledge of the case say.

Mr. Abramoff is believed to have extensive knowledge of what prosecutors suspect is a wider pattern of corruption among lawmakers and Congressional staff members. One participant in the case who insisted on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the negotiations described him as a "unique resource."

Other people involved in the case or who have been officially briefed on it said the talks had reached a tense phase, with each side mindful of the date Jan. 9, when Mr. Abramoff is scheduled to stand trial in Miami in a separate prosecution.

What began as a limited inquiry into $82 million of Indian casino lobbying by Mr. Abramoff and his closest partner, Michael Scanlon, has broadened into a far-reaching corruption investigation of mainly Republican lawmakers and aides suspected of accepting favors in exchange for legislative work.

Prominent party officials, including the former House majority leader, Representative Tom DeLay of Texas, are under scrutiny involving trips and other gifts from Mr. Abramoff and his clients. The case has shaken the Republican establishment, with the threat of testimony from Mr. Abramoff, once a ubiquitous and well-connected Republican star, sowing anxiety throughout the party ranks.

At issue is the complicated structure of the case against Mr. Abramoff. In August, he was indicted by federal prosecutors in Miami on charges of fraud stemming from his purchase of a fleet of casino boats in 2000. He pleaded not guilty in that case, and his lawyers say they are preparing him to stand trial. Mr. Abramoff has also been under investigation here in connection with his lobbying. No charges have been brought against him in that inquiry. The existence of what amounts to two separate but overlapping investigations partly explains why the plea negotiations for Mr. Abramoff have been so protracted and tough, said people with inside knowledge of the case.

With the trial in Miami fast approaching, and coming on the heels of plea agreements from Mr. Scanlon and another close associate of Mr. Abramoff, pressure has mounted to reach his own agreement. Mr. Abramoff has also told associates that he is broke, making the prospect of an extended jury trial even less appealing.

Mr. Abramoff's lead defense lawyer, Abbe D. Lowell, said he would not comment.

Several people involved in various aspects of the case agreed to be interviewed as long as their names and affiliations were not made public. Justice Department officials are prohibited from discussing continuing cases as a matter of course. A spokesman for the department, Bryan Sierra, declined to comment.

Although the Miami case is ostensibly separate from the Washington inquiry, the overlapping elements include occasions when Mr. Abramoff flexed his political muscle to enhance his business deal in Florida.

While he and a partner, Adam Kidan, were angling to buy the SunCruz boat fleet in 2000, Mr. Abramoff had Mr. Scanlon persuade Representative Bob Ney, Republican of Ohio, to insert negative comments about a business rival of Mr. Abramoff into The Congressional Record, under a scheme outlined in documents filed in Mr. Scanlon's criminal case.

The rival, Konstantinos Boulis, was murdered a short time later in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., a twist that heightened the profile of the Miami case.

Florida prosecutors are also investigating corruption in that case, focusing on Mr. Ney and his chief of staff at the time, Neil Volz, according to people involved in the case. Mr. Volz reportedly agreed to put negative remarks about Mr. Boulis in The Congressional Record, even though Mr. Ney had no obvious reason to comment on Mr. Boulis.

Mr. Volz went on to work for Mr. Abramoff as a lobbyist.

Mr. Ney has said he was tricked by Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff into participating, and no charges have been brought against him.

In his financial paperwork in the Miami deal, Mr. Abramoff listed Tony C. Rudy, a deputy chief of staff to Mr. DeLay at the time, as a reference.

He also listed Representative Dana Rohrabacher, Republican of California, who has since defended the decision to support the lobbyist.

Lawyers for Mr. Volz, Mr. Ney and Mr. Rudy did not return calls for comment. A lawyer for Mr. DeLay declined to comment, but spokesmen for Mr. DeLay have repeatedly said he had done nothing improper.

Such ties are only at the periphery of the investigations, according to people briefed on the case. Mr. Scanlon, who worked on public affairs for the SunCruz casinos and is familiar with the inner workings of many of Mr. Abramoff's deals, is cooperating in the Miami case as well as in Washington, his lawyer has said.

Prosecutors are also looking at how some former Congressional staff members landed their lucrative lobbying positions and at the role the wives of several lobbyists and lawmakers may have had in any influence scheme, a piece of the puzzle that investigators have begun referring to privately as the "wives' club."

* Copyright 2005The New York Times Company

if the msm thinks this. think how bad it must really be.

2005-12-18T18:38:00.000-09:00

from the huggingtonpost.com

Kansas City Star: “The Struggle With Foreign Enemies Does Not Simply Give Him A Blank Check”…
Denver Post: Adm. Has Lost “Balance Between Essential Anti-Terrorism Tools And Encroachment On Liberties”…
LA Times: “Stunning,” “One Of The More Egregious Cases Of Governmental Overreach”…
Wash. Post: “The Tools Of Foreign Intelligence Are Not Consistent With A Democratic Society”…
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “Unacceptable Actions Of A Police State”…
St. Petersburg Times: “So Dangerously Ill-Conceived And Contrary To This Nation's Guiding Principles”…
NY Times: Bush “Secretly And Recklessly Expanded The Govt.'s Powers In Dangerous And Unnecessary Ways”…

quote of the day from the federalist papers

2005-12-18T16:24:00.000-09:00

"An ELECTIVE DESPOTISM was not the government we fought for; but one which should not only be founded on free principles, but in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among several bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits, without being effectually checked and restrained by the others."

important post from firedoglake.blogspot.com

2005-12-18T09:09:00.000-09:00

Sunday, December 18, 2005
Intellectual Dishonesty

Hey, Wingnuts. This is your conscience. If you want to defend the Preznit because you value maintaining power over every principle on which this nation was founded, then that is your right. But be intellectually honest about it.

Don't lie to yourself. You are doing it for power and the party and no other reason. And don't try lying to the rest of us -- we aren't buying it.

Glenn Greenwald has a superb post up about a particularly assanine lie that has wormed its way through the wankersphere.
Defenders of the Bush Administration are resorting to outright distortions and deliberate falsehoods about the Foreign Intelligence Security Act (FISA) in order to argue that the Administration's warrantless eavesdropping on U.S. citizens complies with the mandates of that statute. To do so, they are simply lying -- and that term is used advisedly -- about what FISA says by misquoting the statute in order to make it appear that the Administration’s clearly illegal behavior conforms to the statute.

This is a real case study in how total falsehoods are disseminated by a single right-wing blogger who is then linked to and approvingly cited by large, highly partisan bloggers, which then cause the outright falsehoods to be bestowed with credibility and take on the status of a conventionally accepted talking point in defense of the Administration.
This particular right-wing circle jerk needs to be called for what it is: complete bullshit. And if it were an argument being made in a court of law, the lawyer making it could be subject to sanction for doing so, because it is an entirely misleading statement of the law.

But it isn't just the right wing wankosphere that is perpetuating this crap. Atrios posted a particularly ludicrous bit from Dana Rohrbacher, wherein the blowhard representative from California makes an utter ass of himself by arguing that the Preznit should be able to do whatever the hell he pleases, the Constitution be damned. The amusing portion of it for me was that Bob Barr, an equally conservative blowhard, was apoplectic at this assertion.

And herein we find the lesson: it is possible to maintain some level of intellectual honesty in all of this on both sides. Certainly, some spying within the United States on citizens is expected, needed even, in a time of war. There are certainly threats both outside and within our borders.

But by throwing the Constitution out with the rest of the Bill of Rights and all those other inconvenient things we call laws, the Preznit and all of those people who prop him up on this foundation of falsehoods are just as culpible as Bushie himself.

What you have in this life is your own integrity. If you are willing to sell it so cheaply for a fleeting moment of power, that is your choice. But don't come crying to me the next time someone wiretaps your phone, searches your house and business without a warrant while holding you at gunpoint, hauls you off to an undisclosed location without any access to legal representation, applies coercive interrogation methods to get you to confess to a crime you didn't commit in the first place, and holds you for years before letting you go without ever actually charging you with a crime, all because you fit a certain profile based on your ethnic background or political beliefs.

If you think it can't happen in America, think again. We have laws in place for a reason, and when you allow the President to start selectively ignoring them, it sets a precedent for every other law enforcement official in the nation. We fought a revolution in this country to prevent just this sort of behavior -- we are a nation of laws, and not of imperial whim.

The question is whether you have the fortitude to say enough, or whether you are the sort of wanker who says "whatever you want, so long as I get to keep my "influental" piece of the pie. This is the time for true patriots to stand up and show their true colors, so don't lie to yourself about your craven motive of maintaining power above every other consideration. It's unbecoming and intellectually dishonest.

jack cafferty on cnn via crooksandliars.com

2005-12-16T15:02:00.000-09:00

Cafferty: Who cares if the Patriot Act get's renewed. Want to abuse our civil liberties-Just do it! Who cares about the Geneva conventions? Want to torture prisoners-Just do it! Who cares about rules concerning the identity of CIA gents. Want to reveal the name of a covert operative? Just do it!... ..Who cares about whether the intelligence concerning WMD's is accurate. You want to invade Iraq? Just do it....Who cares about needing a court order to eavesdrop on American citizens. Want to wiretap their phones conversations? Just do it.... What a joke. A very cruel, very sad joke.(someone want to write a full transcript?)

from dailykos

2005-12-15T19:51:00.000-09:00

ed.note----this came from dailykos via knight ridder who stands alone among the mainstream media in maintaining the standards of ethical journalism.----harpo

It's Official: Congress Didn't See Same Pre-War Intelligence as Bush
by SusanG
Thu Dec 15, 2005 at 06:16:31 PM PDT

Seems like it was just yesterday, Bush was saying:

Some of the most irresponsible comments - about manipulating intelligence - have come from politicians who saw the same intelligence I saw and then voted to authorize the use of force against Saddam Hussein, These charges are pure politics."

Whoops! It was yesterday! Ha ha ha ha ha!

What a difference a day makes, eh? Because today from Knight Ridder, we have:

WASHINGTON - President Bush and top administration officials have access to a much broader range of intelligence reports than members of Congress do, a nonpartisan congressional research agency said in a report Thursday, raising questions about recent assertions by the president.
...
The Congressional Research Service, by contrast, said: "The president, and a small number of presidentially designated Cabinet-level officials, including the vice president ... have access to a far greater overall volume of intelligence and to more sensitive intelligence information, including information regarding intelligence sources and methods."
...
The CRS report identified nine key U.S. intelligence "products" that aren't generally shared with Congress. These include the President's Daily Brief, a compilation of analyses that's given only to the president and a handful of top aides, and a daily digest on terrorism-related matters.

Surprisingly, the White House refused to comment on the issue.

We can only hope some fightin' Dems come out tomorrow with plen

from the gadflyer.com

2005-12-15T19:24:00.000-09:00

ed. note-----does anybody know anybody or has anyone ever heard of anyone who objects to merry christmas? what a sick, sorry, sad, situation the rovian repugnicans have made of our democracy.---harpo

The War Is Joined
Paul Waldman (2:10PM) link

John Dingell, who just celebrated an incredible 50 years in the House of Representatives, recited this little poem on the House floor last night:

'Twas the week before Christmas and all through the House,
no bills were passed `bout which Fox News could grouse.
Tax cuts for the wealthy were passed with great cheer,
so vacations in St. Barts soon should be near.
Katrina kids were all nestled snug in motel beds,
while visions of school and home danced in their heads.
In Iraq, our soldiers need supplies and a plan,
and nuclear weapons are being built in Iran.
Gas prices shot up, consumer confidence fell.
Americans feared we were in a fast track to ..... well.
Wait, we need a distraction, something divisive and wily,
a fabrication straight from the mouth of O'Reilly.
We will pretend Christmas is under attack,
hold a vote to save it, then pat ourselves on the back.
Silent Night, First Noel, Away in the Manger,
Wake up Congress, they're in no danger.
This time of year, we see Christmas everywhere we go,
From churches to homes to schools and, yes, even Costco.
What we have is an attempt to divide and destroy
when this is the season to unite us with joy.
At Christmastime, we're taught to unite.
We don't need a made-up reason to fight.
So on O'Reilly, on Hannity, on Coulter and those right-wing blogs.
You should sit back and relax, have a few egg nogs.
'Tis the holiday season; enjoy it a pinch.
With all our real problems, do we really need another Grinch?
So to my friends and my colleagues, I say with delight,
a Merry Christmas to all, and to Bill O'Reilly, happy holidays.
Ho, ho, ho. Merry Christmas