Post-Presidency

Rather than build a library that amazingly will contain no books, here's an idea for Bush beginning January 21, 2009...and if he and Cheney want to leave early to get to work on it that would be okay too:

In a recent column I speculated on President Bush's post-White House plans. What should he do with himself?

Alice Collins of Oak Lawn has an idea.

"Three hundred and sixty-five days a year, in the wind and snow of winter and the heat and humidity of summer, let him tend to the graves of the almost 4,000 men and women who have given their lives in the debacle of Iraq. They honored their oaths, obeyed their commander-in-chief and sacrificed their lives of promise to a lying, unprincipled warmonger.

"He can begin at the grave of my grandson, Lcpl Jonathan W. Collins, killed in action on 8/8/2004."

Amen.

Marine Lance Cpl. Jonathan Collins of Crystal Lake was killed by enemy fire in the Al Anbar province of Iraq in the summer of 2004. He was 19.

Richard Roeper via Froomkin.

Please responsibly enjoy

This completely NOT safe for work Halloween tale at RH: After Dark.

People become aware of the sad truth...

That it was Larry David who was the actual genius...(in limited doses...a little goes a long way)

...with every horrible, un-funny, and grating "TV junior" or interview or guest appearance, Seinfeld has effectively chipped away at the funny, sharp, entertaining reputation he deservedly earned years ago. He is no longer Jerry Seinfeld, the creator of the exceptional sitcom Seinfeld. He is now Jerry Seinfeld, guy who will only shut up about Bee Movie long enough to launch into a tirade full of lukewarm jokes in defense of his wife's awful cookbook.

In short, Seinfeld is kind of an asshole now—and he's not even a funny asshole like Larry David.

Now, I loved Seinfeld when it was on. But once it left the air I missed it a lot less than I thought I would. I'm not claiming to be a critic of any standard or anything -- but I loved 'Python' when I first saw it, and I still love it as much now as I did then. Jay Leno may get better ratings than Letterman, but from the time he first had his morning show, I'd watch Dave because even with all his verbal ticks, he's still the most fascinating and quickest guy on television. I don't mind the self-loathing one bit. Steve Martin I've always liked no matter how many different twists his career takes.

But Jerry Seinfeld has for some reason or other joined Robin Williams, Adam Sandler and Leno on the list of most annoying comedians on earth -- not even Jim Carrey is on that list. Not pathetic -- that would be reserved for Michael Richards, Drew Carey and Dennis Miller ("cha cha") -- just incredibly annoying.

The Bee Movie ads are as bad as the HeadOn ads, only they aren't supposed to be.

And now back to political snark.

Go Ahead ...

You know you want some.

This is really quite a roll

The GOP has been on. It's like Joe DiMaggio for the ball-gagged set. Now, I'm willing to bet there are more than a few perverts on both sides of the aisle, but only one party has been making its bones claiming purity.

And as in all things, there's noting quite like Hypocrites on Parade for what seems like at least the 10th or 11th straight time (it may be more) it's a Republican that gets caught with his dick in the girdle.

SPOKANE -- State Representative Richard Curtis says he's not gay, but police reports and court records indicate the Republican lawmaker from southwestern Washington dressed up in women's lingerie and met a Medical Lake man in a local erotic video store which led to consensual sex at a downtown hotel and a threat to expose Curtis' activities publicly.

A search warrant unsealed Tuesday morning disclosed that State Representative Richard Curtis (R - La Center) had sex in his room at the Davenport Tower with a man identified as Cody Castagna, 26, of Medical Lake, who he met at the Hollywood Erotic Boutique on October 26th.

But he's "totally straight" and not that "icky" teh gay at all!

Sharing a good laugh

Over the fact Bush is also a "hall-of-fame catcher".


REUTERS/Jason Reed

Well this is hard to believe

Nobody could have guessed:

Roy L. Pearson Jr., the administrative law judge who lost his $54 million lawsuit against a Northeast Washington dry cleaner, lost his job yesterday and was ordered to vacate his office, sources said.

Pearson, 57, who had served as a judge for two years, was up for a 10-year term at the Office of Administrative Hearings, but a judicial committee last week voted against reappointing him...

the committee said it had reviewed Pearson's judicial decisions and audiotapes of proceedings over which he had presided and found he did not demonstrate "appropriate judgment and judicial temperament," according a source who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the case.

Sources said Pearson also was criticized for displaying a "combative" nature with supervisors and colleagues and for failing to comply with policies in drafting opinions.

This guy did about all he could to give every tort-reform asshole in the country fifteen minutes worth of talking points. On behalf of every actual aggrieved and injured person in America, thanks a lot.

Laugh now people

But this week the Minnesota Vikings will be bringing back the Single-Wing, so there!

Someone alert Edward G. Robinson

Oy!

It was at that moment I saw Ari Fleischer in a totally new light: He was a modern day Moses leading his people out of slavery, into freedom. But rather than leading them out of the land of Egypt, he was taking them out of the bondage of the Democratic party.

Where's your God now Ari? --- 24%! That's one Burning Bush.

And if Ari's Moses, that means another 34 years in this fuckin' wilderness.

Moses, Moses, Moses.*


*Mickey Kaus knows where he can get goat's blood by the way.

If I really gave a shit

About my craft, I'd retire because I could never be this unintentional snark, with the real thing:

Blackwater plans to unveil a new Corporate Integrity Department, responding to “a need to defend its corporate name and clear up its public image.” The new head of integrity, Kitty Laver — who has “20 years’ experience in public relations and corporate responsibility” — said that her job is “to put the mercy back in mercenary.”

Fortunately, I'm not a perfectionist.

Well maybe not fortunate for you.

UPDATE: May actually be snark...I'd be confused, except it doesn't really make my post different. If it's actually snark, then I bow to the master -- if it isn't then I bow to a far less talented master, but still the master.

So, Karen Hughes is on a nature walk

Big deal.

Romney supporters find other uses

For non-Sacred Underwear.

Note: Can also be used to revive Marie Osmond.

Original here.

Aiyeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I hate to devote more time to Pammy Atlas, but sometimes you learn stuff and you just have to go with it...via the comments at Sadly, No:

Marilyn [Monroe] was my ideal girl. I adored her, I liked her, I got her - always. Still do. Her vulnerability was her strength, her weakness, ultimately her death sentence. But oh how I locked into that vulnerability. She was the ultimate babe, wildly sexy, smart, funny, and could hang with the boys and drive 'em wild. How cool is that?

The very first piece of art I ever bought...It was/is an incredible peice, mine was huge, all yellow background but Marilyn is in muted khaki green dots. Looks like she's moving. She looks like she wants you to kiss her. She looks like she might drop a tear - pure Marilyn.

I had to have it. So I bought it. I had always worked all through my youth and so I put every last nickel toward that piece and bought the Stern (it was $500-600). I still adore it, and it hangs over my bed, even today.

When you think about the inanity and the insanity of her, uh, performance pieces, and you read the above you realize you don't need mushrooms to have a bad acid trip.

Allow me to summarize through a celebrity spokesperson:

How gauche

A C.R.T. and a 80486?

-- The Blue Screen of Eternal Death


I'm goin' with the ITomb.





via gizmodo.

Iraq in yet another nutshell

Well, what do ya' know.

The largest dam in Iraq is in serious danger of an imminent collapse that could unleash a trillion-gallon wave of water, possibly killing thousands of people and flooding two of the largest cities in the country, according to new assessments by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other U.S. officials.

Even in a country gripped by daily bloodshed, the possibility of a catastrophic failure of the Mosul Dam has alarmed American officials, who have concluded that it could lead to as many as 500,000 civilian deaths by drowning Mosul under 65 feet of water and parts of Baghdad under 15 feet, said Abdulkhalik Thanoon Ayoub, the dam manager. "The Mosul dam is judged to have an unacceptable annual failure probability," in the dry wording of an Army Corps of Engineers draft report.

At the same time, a U.S. reconstruction project to help shore up the dam in northern Iraq has been marred by incompetence and mismanagement, according to Iraqi officials and a report by a U.S. oversight agency to be released Tuesday.

To give the Bush Administration some credit, they didn't build this dam. Okay, I'm done with the credit.

The effort to prevent a failure of the dam has been complicated by behind-the-scenes wrangling between Iraqi and U.S. officials over the severity of the problem and how much money should be allocated to fix it. The Army Corps has recommended building a second dam downstream as a fail-safe measure, but Iraqi officials have rejected the proposal, arguing that it is unnecessary and too expensive.

The debate has taken place largely out of public view because both Iraqi and U.S. Embassy officials have refused to discuss the details of safety studies -- commissioned by the U.S. government for at least $6 million -- so as not to frighten Iraqi citizens.

Because, after all, Iraqi citizens have absolutely nothing to worry about on that score now.

What are the odds that the Iraqi's main problem is less about Dam safety and more about yet another U.S. Contractor getting another fat contract to fuck something up royally? I'm pretty sure KBR (a subsidiary of Halliburton) still does dam work.

Yes, I Do Still Blog Here ...

Hey. Back from a stretch of having to do, you know, actual work at work and a little weekend sojourn. Meanwhile, Miscellaney:

1. File under, "I KNEW IT!" There is a reason that I flirt my a## off every time I am in Trader Joe's. I thought it was that they were wafting pheromones through the HVAC system. But no, it's just an effective HR initiative.

2. Sweet Jesus, I hate the NYT! Is there any fucking reason that wealthy people need more help staying wealthy? No, there is not. There is a reason, however, that the Sulzbergers need to keep running articles designed to whip up their base, a/k/a anxious upper middle class burghers and, especially, those who aspire to such status. How convenient that Guardian America is now available to us all.

3. I'm catching up on magazines and finally got to this Remnick article about Gary Kasparov, who is making a nuisance of himself in Pooty Poot's Russia. (He's also winning the hearts of Wingnuts, but that's another story.) Anyway, my favorite part of the article was when an economist (and former member of Putin's government) described life in contemporary Russia as follows:

“The vast majority of people enjoy the fact that for the first time in Russian history they have lived for fifteen years now without the constant pressure of totalitarianism in every aspect of their lives... For example, you can travel abroad freely. The majority of people can’t yet afford to do this, but the most active and educated can, and this makes a huge difference. The authorities here let you exist so long as you don’t call them into question. In other words, the deal they offer is: You let us steal and we let you live.”

Hey, I can relate to that. The deal BushCo (and Republicans in general) offer is, "You let us steal and we don't call you a terrorist, treasonous, a traitor, or a faggot."

4. There will be a new installment of "The Continuing Adventures of Rudy & Judi" soon. In the meantime, here are Parts I, II, and III.

Dick Cheney's Undisclosed

Avocation.


AP Photo/Florida Keys News Bureau, Andy Newman

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The William Shatner of Morons:



We here at Rising Hegemon enterprises are pleased to enable this desperate cry for attention.

Dammit, I should have known Sadly, No would have this first.

About sums it up

New York Times Editorial:

With a different White House, we might dismiss this as posturing — or bank on sanity to carry the day, or the warnings of exhausted generals or a defense secretary more rational than his predecessor. Not this crowd.

Four years after his pointless invasion of Iraq, President Bush still confuses bullying with grand strategy. He refuses to do the hard work of diplomacy — or even acknowledge the disastrous costs of his actions. The Republican presidential candidates have apparently decided that the real commander in chief test is to see who can out-trash talk the White House on Iran.

I was briefly thinking about various GOP Candidates touchdown celebration dances, i.e. proclamations of who will bomb who and sooner. An emphasis started with the birth of "Commander Codpiece". I have come to realize Giuliani is the Rudy "White Shoes" of such dances. He makes Chad Johnson look shy and demur.

With one big difference. I'm pretty sure Chad Johnson doesn't dance a jig after the Bengals give up a Touchdown (and he has many, many opportunities). Rudy's unending braying about "9/1l" and how he bravely fled from the burning and collapsing towers is the equivalent of Clinton Portis running for President because of his performance yesterday while his team lost to the Patriots 52-7. Well, at least it would if Portis had a mistress and he had boinked her in Joe Gibbs' office.

Oh looky!

That Chalabi magic works its spell:

A suicide bomber on a bicycle killed 28 policemen at their base in the volatile Iraqi province of Diyala on Monday, police said, in one of the deadliest strikes on Iraq's security forces in months.

I hope this doesn't interrupt Colonel Boylan's busy emailing regimen.

Golly, when last we heard from Chalabi

He was being accused of being a crook and an Iranian agent.

Naturally, the Iranian Agent is now being relied upon to save his Chimperial Dumbass's Iraq strategy tout de suite so he can get his bombing of Iran moving.

And how ironic is this?

Chalabi "is an important part of the process," said Col. Steven Boylan, Petraeus' spokesman. "He has a lot of energy."

That Boylan has found himself a kindred spirit.

"Fuck you and your LOLCatz!"

"Try this one two legs, 'Iz on ur face, scratchin' out ur I-balz'"

AFP/Yoshikazu Tsuno

The Uniter

Juan Cole:

George W. Bush's special greatness is that his coddling of Kurdish separatism and terrorism has brought together the Sunni Turks and the Shiite Iranians, traditional enemies. Yes, these are the birth pangs of the New Middle East.

And John Cole, on the suicide of Robin Prosser, a long-time chronic pain sufferer and medical marijuana advocate:

this goes out to anyone, of any political persuasion, anywhere, who had a problem with this woman using marijuana to alleviate her pain (especially the alleged “conservative” federalists who can’t handle the thought of states making their own drug laws):

Go fuck yourself. To death.

I am tired of being patient with you nannies and your stupid self-serving rules and your slippery slopes and your bullshit and your need to be tough on crime and your earnest concerns about society. Mind your own business, get your own house in order, stop fucking interns and little boys and cheating on your wives and on your taxes and being found dead wearing two wetsuits with a dildo shoved up your ass. Just mind your own damned business, and let people do what they must to deal with their own screwed up lives, and let people handle their pain the best way they can.

I am sick of the bullshit. Life is hard for most people out there, and damned near impossible for people in chronic pain. Quit making it worse, you allegedly compassionate sons-of-bitches.

And me, who found reason 1,032,084 to hate George Bush when half my clocks automatically fell-back, only to discover that Chimpy McNutless decreed it be next week.

An academic, a conservative, and an Iowegian all coming together with the rest of the world to unite in our loathing of Bush and his enablers.

Wow...

I guess it isn't just GOP staffers that don't know how email works. This is inexcusable:

...in an email sent out today, the [House Judiciary] committee inadvertently sent the email addresses of all the would-be whistleblowers to everyone who had written in to the tipline. The committee email was sent to tipsters who had used the website form, including presumably whistleblowers themselves, and all of the recipients of the email were accidentally included in the "to:" field -- instead of concealing those addresses with a so-called blind carbon copy or "bcc:".

Only the email addresses were exposed; none of the names or other identifying information of the whistleblowers was revealed. The blunder, however, was noticed by a number of people who had used the website form and received today's email...

There are more than 150 recipient addresses revealed in the email. Some of the email addresses appear to be transparently fake, but there's also, much more troubling, a vice_president@whitehouse.gov carbon copied on the email, which is the public email address for Vice President Dick Cheney. In other words, an email containing the email addresses of all the whistleblowers who had written in to the committee tipline was sent to public email address of Vice President Cheney.

So Cheney knows the email addresses of whistleblowers.

Heckuva job fellas!

Dear Rummy...

How's your trip to France going?




Original picture from here.

Hi Def

Those Nigerian E-Mails finally paid off and I was able to fulfill the single-middle aged man's goal in life. Superfluous buying!

I bought myself a big-ass HDTV. I needed it for research (a sociological study on the effects of large screen high-definition televisions on killing off what remains of the desire to "get a life" -- this used to accomplished by becoming a "drunk").

Golly, I hope that means I can write it off?

But this post isn't about me, it's about me and how much my cable provider sucks.

I won't name names (but it starts with "Media" and ends with "Com"), but if all cable companies are run like this one, I have no idea how they will have any customers remaining except morons like me who live where they don't have a viewing angle on the right satellite.

Thus endeth the rant.

Spine!

How about the Democrats, elected for the purpose of putting an end to this, find one for these kids:

"When we first got here, all the shops were open. There were women and children walking out on the street," Alarcon said this week. "The women were in Western clothing. It was our favorite street to go down because of all the hot chicks."

That was 14 long months ago, when the soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division, arrived in southwestern Baghdad. It was before their partners in the Iraqi National Police became their enemies and before Shiite militiamen, aligned with the police, attempted to exterminate a neighborhood of middle-class Sunni families.

Next month, the U.S. soldiers will complete their tour in Iraq. Their experience in Sadiyah has left many of them deeply discouraged, by both the unabated hatred between rival sectarian fighters and the questionable will of the Iraqi government to work toward peaceful solutions.

Asked if the American endeavor here was worth their sacrifice -- 20 soldiers from the battalion have been killed in Baghdad -- Alarcon said no: "I don't think this place is worth another soldier's life."

While top U.S. commanders say the statistics of violence have registered a steep drop in Baghdad and elsewhere, the soldiers' experience in Sadiyah shows that numbers alone do not describe the sense of aborted normalcy -- the fear, the disrupted lives -- that still hangs over the city.

Long excerpt becomes longer:

Over time, the neighborhood became a battleground that residents fled by the thousands. Hundreds of shops shut down, schools closed, and access to basic services such as electricity, fuel and food deteriorated. "The end state was people left. They felt unsafe," said Timmerman, the operations officer.

"We were so committed to them as a partner we couldn't see it for what it was. In retrospect, I've got to think it was a coordinated effort," Timmerman said. "To this day, I don't think we truly understand how infiltrated or complicit the national police are" with the militias.

Lt. Col. George A. Glaze, the battalion commander, says his soldiers are playing the role of a bouncer caught between brawling customers. Alone, they can restrain the fighters, keep them off balance, but they cannot stop the melee until the house lights come on -- that is, until the Iraqi government steps in.

"They're either going to turn the lights on or we're all going to realize they've moved the switch," he said.

Death's up, death's down -- the fact that we are only being tricked into allowing (or closing our eyes and allowing it while our Generals proclaim great success) the completion of ethnic cleansing of Baghdad and Iraq itself...to the tune of hundreds of thousands of deaths, trillions of dollars, and a stain that will long linger on our national reputation and conscience.

Saddest Media Headline Ever

I swear CNN's web people will remember this as the ultimate in human interest headlines:

Pit bulls kill boy's Make-a-Wish horse

I feel bad for the boy -- and, of course, the pony -- but criminy.

Hmmmm....

According to Poll Watch the mean George Bush Approval rating is 34.2%

Meanwhile...

Put Conrad, a homemaker from Hampton, Va., firmly in the camp of the 34 percent of people who say they believe in ghosts, according to a pre-Halloween poll by The Associated Press and Ipsos.

Exxon gets a chubby

How could this NOT happen?

A U.S. military strike against Iran would have dire consequences in petroleum markets, say a variety of oil industry experts, many of whom think the prospect of pandemonium in those markets makes U.S. military action unlikely despite escalating economic sanctions imposed by the Bush administration.

If only there was an appropriate sexual metaphor available to describe how this excites the boardrooms of Exxon, Shell & BP ...

Latest Column

In which Joe Klein demonstrates he's good at swallowing whatever PowerPoint the Department of Defense hands him.

What actually happened.

Uh-Oh!

Cheney's going hunting this weekend...

"Just don't hold me down by the Tiara"

Rudy Giuliani on 'Waterboarding':

Ms. Gustitus said: “He said he didn’t know if waterboarding is torture.”

Mr. Giuliani said: “Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the circumstances. It depends on who does it.

Looks like Judy is into the Water Sports.

While noticing

The spinelessness of Democratic Leadership, and the Will to Power of Rudy Mussolini let us not lose site of other lesser lights running for President who would be more comfortable in lesser roles:

Democrats knew they were embracing the touchy subject of immigration when they planned an afternoon press conference with three college students whose parents came to the United States illegally.

But they were stunned when Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), a presidential candidate who has made a name for himself as a hard-liner on immigration, called for the three students — all of whom have been in the United States for over a decade — to be arrested.

Tancredo surely was born in the wrong place and at the wrong time because the dude is so well-qualified to be a Nazi Capo. Rudy might be the one allowing it, but Tancredo is the guy who would have cackled while shoving a broom-handle up an immigrant's sphincter.

Not just the Nazi's of course, for you can find Tancredo-like characters just about anywhere. He would be the guy who sends his neighbor to Siberia or Lubyanka under Stalin; the Chinese school-child having his teacher arrested during the "Cultural Revolution"; a well-qualified Khmer Rouge Education Camp Administrator.

Nice to know we've advanced so far that both a Capo & the Duce can run as Republicans.

BEHOLD!

The Power of Candy, Mr. Pibb and OCD!

Honestly, do these people have nothing but rakes lying down in their yards and driveways?

Meanwhile:

Behold the Power of Merlot!

Fucknuttier

NY Times Editorial:

Mr. Bush is threatening to veto most of the 12 domestic spending bills now before Congress because Democrats want to provide $22 billion more than the $933 billion he has requested. His argument? Something about the president’s responsibility to rein in lawmakers’ “temptation to overspend.”

This from a leader who turns federal surpluses into deficits, believes that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars can be financed on a separate set of books with borrowed money, and keeps having to go back to Congress for “emergency funding” because he cannot or will not tell the truth about what it is costing to fight these wars.

Mr. Bush’s latest emergency request is for $46 billion. That would bring the 2008 price tag for Iraq and Afghanistan to $196.4 billion. Starting at Sept. 11, 2001, war-fighting expenses total a staggering $800 billion or more. The nonpartisan Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments says that by the end of the year spending on Iraq will probably surpass that on the Vietnam War.

And all of it OFF BUDGET.

Yet we can't let uninsured AMERICAN kids be covered with health care.

Meanwhile, the C.B.O. now states the George Bush Ultimate Adventure Tour (for others) will ring up a tab of more than $2 Trillion. That's so big, I can barely type it as numerals...$2,000,000,000,000. It's a much bigger number than the expense of Vietnam, in fact, it is nearly the adjusted for inflation price of American expense in World War II!

Not that the Republicans give a shit...no we can't spend $20 plus billion a year on insurance for kids.

Well, good luck with that....

Because you won't win an election:

Mr. Giuliani has taken an aggressive position on Iran’s efforts to build a nuclear program, saying last month it was a “promise” that as president he would take military action to keep the Iranians from developing a nuclear weapon.

Warnings like that one and his reliance on advisers like Mr. Podhoretz, who wrote an article in June for Commentary magazine called “The Case for Bombing Iran,” have raised concerns among some Democrats.

Mr. Podhoretz said in an interview published Wednesday in The New York Observer that he recently met with Mr. Giuliani to discuss his new book, in which he advocates bombing Iran as part of a larger struggle against “Islamofascism,” and “there is very little difference in how he sees the war and I see it.”

Asked in a recent interview if he agreed with Mr. Podhoretz that the time to bomb Iran has already come, Mr. Giuliani said: “From the information I do have available, which is all public source material, I would say that that is not correct, we are not at that stage at this point. Can we get to that stage? Yes. And is that stage closer than some of the Democrats believe? I believe it is.”

Thankfully, a newspaper finally gets Rudy on the record...he wants another war...a world war.

Oh, and a uniform, and a balcony to strut upon.

The Hell?

Larry King in "Scanners II: This time it's Enjoyable"

Why Snark...

When you can just quote the real thing?

Touting his accomplishments as mayor Tuesday while on the campaign trail in New Hampshire, Giuliani crowed, "I took a city that was known for pornography and licked it* to a large extent, so I have my own set of qualifications."

*In Rudy's defense, it was very polite and kept the pages from sticking together.

Tragic Irony

Trent Lott's toupee farm is located just north of San Diego.

Let's hope FEMA can help him build a new and better toupee farm.

Only conformist crazy people allowed

This is damn funny, in an incredibly pathetic way, RedState is a self-perpetuating inadvertent parody blog:

Effective immediately, new users may *not* shill for Ron Paul in any way shape, form or fashion. Not in comments, not in diaries, nada. If your account is less than 6 months old, you can talk about something else, you can participate in the other threads and be your zany libertarian self all you want, but you cannot pimp Ron Paul. Those with accounts more than six months old may proceed as normal.

Looks like Ron Paul's supporters are the WRONG kind of sociopaths.

"Suck on this..."

Tommy Friedman, still sitting in his family estate and pontificating on matters he managed to enable:

It still feels to me as if we’ve made Iraq just safe enough for its politicians to be obstinate, corrupt or reckless on our dime. Even the moderate Kurds must have developed some kind of death wish, allowing their radicals to simultaneously provoke both Turkey and Iran and risking the island of real decency the Kurds have built in the north.

March 23, 2003:

Indeed, the French argue that only bad things will come from this war -- more terrorism, a dangerous precedent for preventive war, civilian casualties. The Bush team argues that this war will be a game-changer -- that it will spark reform throughout the Arab world and intimidate other tyrants who support terrorists.

Can this war produce more of what the Bush team expects than the Europeans predict? Yes, it can.

"Biggest Evacuation" since the Civil War

NBC news keeps saying this about the Southern California fires. First, they kept throwing out the figure of about 1 million...while others say 500,000.

In any case, while there's no doubt there were civilian evacuations during the American Civil War, I can't think of any evacuation that came close to 500,000 people over a short-period of time (if it's longer I'd call it a "migration"), let alone 1 million during the American Civil War [proportionally "maybe" as there were only about 30 million or so people in the country).

Can anyone else?

Silly Kucinich

You can never have encounters with intergalactic aliens and be taken seriously in America.

You can only claim GOD talked to you personally -- THAT'S how a pro does it!

Mike Huckabee's Great Moments in 'Murican Historee'

It's funny 'cause he thinks it is true:


Washington posts the '95 Declarations of Independences'


Washington parts the Delaware


Jefferson subs for Don Cornelius on 'Soul Train'.

"But, But, OIL FOR FOOD, OIL FOR FOOD!!!"

I remember once the W.M.D.'s weren't there and the they "shipped to Syria" story was not working out so well, some of our nation's most self-proclaimed "straight talkers" reached out for new excuses, er, reasons:

John McCain: "It's (the Oil-for-food program) an argument, maybe a small one, but maybe an argument that justifies our actions in Iraq"

Meanwhile, the latest story of another billion or more down the 'thunder bucket' oozes out of "Freedom's Septic Tank":

The U.S. State Department is unable to account for most of $1.2 billion in funding that it gave to DynCorp International to train Iraqi police, a government report said Tuesday.

"The bottom line is that State can't account for where it went," said Glenn D. Furbish, who was involved in putting together the 20-page report for the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction (SIGIR).

This is, oh, I dunno, about the 100th story of fraud and corruption coming out of Iraq that involves $100 million or more.

There is only one solution.

It's a good thing we invaded so we could show the Iraqis how "professionals engage in corruption".

Stay safe San Diego

I have a relatives, friends, bloggers, and comedians I like who live in the area. My brother for one (so far still at his place in Le Mesa); TBogg (also unaffected so far) as all of you know is from there, and even people who make me laugh, like Mike Nelson (formerly of MST3k now here and evacuated) who are in the area.

Best of luck to all of them.

All of whom should also be allowed a free kick at what passes for Glenn Beck's nutsack.

WTF?!!!

Jiminy Jeebus, you have got to be shittin' me?


This is the CIA's Terrorist Buster Logo.

Yes, international terrorism...for kids (some assembly required).

Don't hold your breath Juan

Yet another former mouthpiece to the clusterfuck comes clean...years too late:

Feisal Istrabadi, former deputy ambassador of the Shiite government of Iraq to the United Nations, has resigned because of the corruption and inefficiency of the Iraqi government...and all during our righteous all victorious surge!

Why the nerve!

A principal architect of Iraq’s interim constitution, who resigned in August as one of the country’s top diplomats, has laid out a devastating critique of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the U.S. occupation, telling NBC News that, functionally, “there is no Iraqi government.”...

Istrabadi made it clear in an exclusive interview with NBC News that he was dismayed by al-Maliki’s government and the U.S. occupation, saying the government was stocked with incompetent administrators who had helped bring about “chaos and instability.”

The Iraqi government is an illusion, said Istrabadi, who is now a visiting professor at the Indiana University Law School. “You’ve got patently incompetent men appointed to important positions.”...

Istrabadi traced what he called the country’s “chaos and instability” in part to the U.S. insistence on holding elections in 2005, before Iraq had developed robust democratic institutions to buffer the influence of religious leaders...

Istrabadi acknowledged that he harbored those doubts at the time but was powerless to speak out because he represented the government. “I publicly defended them because that was the government’s policy,” he said.

Free of that burden now, Istrabadi was eager to speak out.

Juan Cole notes that this is yet another guy who admits he lied about how good things were going in Clusterfuck Utopia when it really mattered:

I debated Istrabadi more than once, as at the Lehrer Newshour, and also on radio shows such as Warren Olney's To the Point and have to wonder whether, despite our surface disagreements (with me playing the critic and pessimist), he actually agreed privately with much of what I was saying. Another issue is that far Rightwing and mostly very dishonest blogs such as Powerline used the testimony of Iraqis such as Istrabadi to bring sharply into question my own analyses. They used to charge that Cole was way off base since our generals and the Iraqi officials agreed with Bush about the 'improving' situation in Iraq. And all these brain dead Rightists are now crowing about the reduced casualty counts in Iraq, as though they weren't artificially achieved, as though they could possibly be sustained, and as though they meant anything in the absence of genuine political progress. Now that Sanchez and Istrabadi are revealing that they actually privately agreed with critics such as myself even at that time and all along, will the Rightwing blogs now apologize to those they smeared?

Yeah, right.

Besides, this time ... we're winning all over again.

"It's the 'I love Jesus WAY more than Hillary does Hoedown' "

AP Photo/Reinhold Matay

And the excitement is palpable:

REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Rudy spies

An honorarium.

REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Fred Finds Out

He's got to do a half-hour of interviews before he can change his adult undergarments pants.

Mmmmmmmmmm....squishy

REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Getting Back to Basics

How refreshing to have a celebrity moron arrested for doing EXACTLY what you'd expect the moron to be involved in:

Waffle House brawl lands Kid Rock in jail

YESSSSSSSSSS! The perfect vapid celebrity news story.

Looks like somebody got caught with his pants around his ankles...again

"I'm out"

I Showed Up Late [Jonah Goldberg]

The Goldberg household thought the debate started at nine. It pains me greatly that I was watching the Valerie Plame piece on 60 Minutes when I could have been watching the debate.

...and then his wife walked in and there was much unspoken awkwardness.

So, just another ordinary day.

Next time, he'll limit his pants adventures to Willard Romney exclusively.

Sunday Art Blogging

Sharon Core

"Cakes" -- 2003

C-Print , 60" x 72"

(Bigger image here.)

The Continuing Adventures of Rudy & Judi (Third in a Series)

Tonight, somewhere in South Carolina...

JUDI: "Rudy, this settles it. You're gonna have to knock me up."

RUDY: "Knock you what?!"

JUDI: "Look at this shit, Rudy. Do you think I'm gonna let some geezer's trophy wife steal the Motherhood of the Year Award out from under me? We need a kid, Rudy. A little girl like this, in patent leather Mary Janes and some schmata that looks like it was made by half-blind Amish."

RUDY: "But Judy, you're ... well, never mind. Don't we already have enough problems with kids?"

JUDI: "Okay, okay. I hear you. But then I want 14-karat gold fingernails."

RUDY: "Fourteen-karat gold what?"

JUDY: "Fingernails, you guinea schmuck. Look: Harold Robbins bought his second wife a set of 14-karat gold fingernails!"

RUDY: "Harold Robbins? Who the hell even remembers Harold Robbins?"

JUDY: "Are you kidding? I still have my copy of The Carpetbaggers with all the fuck scenes highlighted and if you had a brain in your head and balls in your pants you'd study those scenes quick. Because I'm bored, Rudy. I'm very, very bored."

RUDY: (sighs) "Judy..."

JUDI: "I don't wanna hear it, Rudy. If I can't have a four-year-old in calico Gunne Sax I want those fingernails. Think of what I could do to that low-rent whore Jeri Thompson with those things!"

Read Part I.

Read Part II.

"Moooooooooooooo"

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

When he was a chronological child, Babs bought George a discount "See & Say"

Bush eventually frustrated over not getting his Tootsie-Pop theory confirmed.

MATLOCK!!!

David Broder, is apparently eating quail with others behind Karl Rove's back:

For most of the American public, Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt is best defined by his role defending President Bush's controversial veto of the State Children's Health Insurance Program.

Leavitt, along with the president, has argued that the bipartisan bill is too ambitious and too expensive, encroaching on the private insurance market. For his pains, he has been characterized as an ogre, standing in the way of better treatment for millions of youngsters in cash-strapped families.

That is not the man I got to know and admire in his years as governor of Utah and a leader in the National Governors Association.

You know, political punditry, aging, and homoeroticism all have their places but I think most of us would prefer "avoidance" as a strategy on the subject of combining all three.

"Cocktail Circuit" Update

How proud the rest of us our for the quality of 'Beltway' Nobility:

Dredge your overstuffed furniture. Scrape the bottom of your purse. Shatter your kid's piggy bank. Do what ever it takes to find $500 for a ticket to the Churchill Centre's Oct. 25 fund-raising dinner at the Willard so you can witness the presentation of the Emery Reves Award to Chris Matthews for lifetime achievement in journalism...

...the award honors "excellence in writing or speaking about Churchill's life and times, or for applying his precepts and values to contemporary issues among the English-Speaking Peoples," according to the affair's invitation.

[blogger takes two-minute break to reattach lower jaw to head]

Matthews was on Maher's show last night and when being introduced Tweety kept making his fake guffaw in the same Tourette's Syndrome loop which Olbermann subtly parodies each night during his "Oddball" segment.

It managed to be the most irritating moment of the show...really saying something when the live show was interrupted by two or three "9/11 Truthers" (the only bunch in the country to condense as much annoyance in a small group of people as a National Review Holiday Party - how about we hate George W. Bush for his actual crimes and stupidities?).

Christ on a Graham Cracker!

Are you shittin' me?


For just over $1,000, GlamGuns will sell you this super-custom Hello Kitty AK-47 assault rifle. Comes with hand-crocheted shoulder-stock muffler.


Why don't we pass these out in Iraq?

At least it will add to the tragic absurdity.

Your Rights, Bought & Sold

Jay Rockefeller, can apparently be purchased as easily as a Republican.

Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-West Virginia) is reportedly steering the secretive Senate Intelligence Committee to give retroactive immunity to telecoms that helped the government secretly spy on Americans.

He has also recently benefited from some interesting political contributions.

Read this, prepare to be disgusted.

"Jesus Christ..."

"Who wrote this piece of shit?"


Photo by Karl Walter/Getty


(Oh how I hope nobody has done this rather obvious caption before)

"I Wanted Ellen's doggy"

You can't always get what you want.

D'uh!

Scientist believe Neanderthal's Could Speak.

Just not very well.

Yes Clifford...

He wants to refer to Hillary Clinton a "Vaginal American".

Seems really inappropriate and over-the-line because, well, it is.

But you have to remember, Cliff May is universally reknowned as a "Gigantic Prick" so...

Good job in picking your "respected friends" Wolf.


FT to Sukabi

"Oh Look, it's Karma"

"Coming to eternally kick your Texas Ass."

REUTERS/Larry Downing


Watertiger has a different take on a similar picture.

News of Denny Hastert's spending more time at the 'Bob Evans'

Sets off a panic.

REUTERS/Chaiwat Subprasom

Looks like I picked the wrong decade to stop swallowing bullshit

WaPo:

Senate Democrats and Republicans reached agreement with the Bush administration yesterday on the terms of new legislation to control the federal government's domestic surveillance program, which includes a highly controversial grant of legal immunity to telecommunications companies that have assisted the program, according to congressional sources.

Awwwwwwwww.....that's insipid

Country star Martina McBride sang a song consoling Rick Santorum's eight-year old daughter over her tears when Daddy lost big-time in his bid for re-election.

“I’d been looking for a song that talks about these times we live in, and addresses issues that really bother me. I wanted lyrics that express how I truly feel, and these are perfect.”

Yes, poor little girl Santorum's daddy lost an election -- and her tears caused this song:

In these times in which we live
Where the worst of what we live
Is laid out for all the world on the front page
And the sound of someone’s heartbreak
Is a sound bite at the news break
With a close shot of the tears rollin’ down their face
Blessed be the child who turns a loving eye
And stops to pray
For these times in which we live

Telling that Martina McBride apparently moved by the tears of a defeated politician's daughter ... a man who happily enabled scenes like the one befalling this young girl, probably a tad younger:


A child covered in her parent's blood cries after they were killed in their car in Tal Afar, Iraq for not stopping at a checkpoint.

Whose prayers was she not in Martina?

"Ah miss mah codpiece"

AFP/File/Mandel Ngan

Lucy Baines Johnson

Pleads for jumper cables.

AP Photo/Chris Carson

And we still see John Edwards Haircut Stories

High on the hog:

Giuliani's spending was elevated at least in part because he traveled in style. He often stayed in luxury hotels, spending $2,010 at the Greenbrier in West Virginia, $4,034 at La Costa Resort and Spa in Carlsbad, Calif., and $5,370 at the Fairmont in San Francisco. He also spent more than $565,000 reimbursing various corporate supporters for private jet travel and an additional $800,000 on charter jet travel.

You should see what Judy spends on the "tiara-Cut" and poodle-gassing.

Whew!

Good thing I decided not to jump on the Randi Rhodes "was attacked" version and decided to wait and see what happened.

Yep, I'd hate to see this blog's reputation for good taste and restrained banter sullied by a rush to judgment.

Stay Classy me, stay classy.



P.S. Best wishes to Randi.

Isn't it tragic

For all concerned that Michelle Malkin is not Canadian?

First of all, it would mean she would be writing diatribes in a distant and exotic foreign land and complaining about two-line passes and how everyone gets free medical care, even liberal children and french speakers.

Second, most of her Spring could be spent reveling in the glories of pounding Jesse baby seals with a nail-tipped wooden club (if she lived in the U.S. she'd call it a "bat").

Third, she could re-write that terrible national anthem that actually tells a lucid story and everyone can actually sing, eh (and who needs a national anthem like that?)

Fourth, it would give me the perfect -- okay -- an excuse to post this -- the man Canadian Michelle Malkin would've married:

Poor Mexico...

So far from God, so close to the Chalupa Supreme Value Meal.

12 Angry Phony Soldiers

Just thought I'd get the Rush Limbaugh skit out of the way before he does...

Today marks five years since the authorization of military force in Iraq, setting Operation Iraqi Freedom in motion. Five years on, the Iraq war is as undermanned and under-resourced as it was from the start. And, five years on, Iraq is in shambles.

As Army captains who served in Baghdad and beyond, we've seen the corruption and the sectarian division. We understand what it's like to be stretched too thin. And we know when it's time to get out...

U.S. forces, responsible for too many objectives and too much "battle space," are vulnerable targets. The sad inevitability of a protracted draw-down is further escalation of attacks -- on U.S. troops, civilian leaders and advisory teams. They would also no doubt get caught in the crossfire of the imminent Iraqi civil war.

Iraqi security forces would not be able to salvage the situation. Even if all the Iraqi military and police were properly trained, equipped and truly committed, their 346,000 personnel would be too few. As it is, Iraqi soldiers quit at will. The police are effectively controlled by militias. And, again, corruption is debilitating. U.S. tax dollars enrich self-serving generals and support the very elements that will battle each other after we're gone.

This is Operation Iraqi Freedom and the reality we experienced. This is what we tried to communicate up the chain of command. This is either what did not get passed on to our civilian leadership or what our civilian leaders chose to ignore. While our generals pursue a strategy dependent on peace breaking out, the Iraqis prepare for their war -- and our servicemen and women, and their families, continue to suffer.

There is one way we might be able to succeed in Iraq. To continue an operation of this intensity and duration, we would have to abandon our volunteer military for compulsory service. Short of that, our best option is to leave Iraq immediately. A scaled withdrawal will not prevent a civil war, and it will spend more blood and treasure on a losing proposition.

America, it has been five years. It's time to make a choice.

What could these dozen know that Rush "from Oxy10 to Oxycontin" Limbaugh doesn't about War? Rush saw "The Green Berets" for goodness sake.

Oh, I'm sure Rudy will be a model of ethics

Memory Foam mattresses in the Lincoln Bedroom ... made out of the finest baby seals will be just a start:

Giuliani's spending was elevated at least in part because he traveled in style. He often stayed in luxury hotels, spending $2,010 at the Greenbrier in West Virginia, $4,034 at La Costa Resort and Spa in Carlsbad, Calif., and $5,370 at the Fairmont in San Francisco. He also spent more than $565,000 reimbursing various corporate supporters for private jet travel and an additional $800,000 on charter jet travel.

Jeff Gerth better get to work...oh, he's still busy? Nevermind.

Decisions. Decisions.

What to read first?

Perrotta's The Abstinence Teacher ? Have read the entire Perrotta ouvre. Even own a hardbound copy of Bad Haircut: Stories of the Seventies. Love them all.

Richard Russo's Bridge of Sighs ? Still like The Risk Pool best of all.

or

Roth's Exit Ghost ? I like a lot of Roth. The Human Stain is a recent fave.

I'm going to read them all. Just not sure of order yet.

Headlines you can't read too quickly

From TPM:

Craig: Romney "Threw Me Under His Campaign Bus"

Euphemistically Yours...

A bit of friendly advice

In the name even of humor, DO NOT look up "goat fucking" under images in either Yahoo or Google.

Just...don't...do it.

Fight Larry fight

Look, I'm no fan of hypocrites, though I am entertained by stupid ones, and there would be no bigger example of this than Larry Craig. Or at least he would be until you consider those who totally bashed and ran away from the guy as if he was Stalin's Handjob Boy because a misdemeanor. As laughable as Craig was, and hypocritical as his anti-gay voting behavior was...he sure seemed a hell of a lot better than the vast majority of his Republican colleagues who were far worse in reacting to him...while giving David Vitter a standing ovation.

And Craig noticed to. And in the ultimate irony of ironies, Craig decided if his colleagues were going to treat him like he was gay and the worst thing on earth then he was going to fuck 'em.

So you go you stupid hypocrite, I'll be rooting for ya'.

Yeah that's about right

All you need to know about modern politics in two areas:

Saturday evening and Sunday morning somehow began with right-wing gloating about how the surge was working (again?). Cap'n Ed let out a might Nelson=like "Ha Ha", which is sort of a strange utterance from anyone over Operation Clusterfuck -- but there you are.

Naturally, this could only mean one thing...reality would assert itself:

BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed four people in Baghdad's Kadhimiya district, police said. The district is home to the shrine of a revered Shi'ite imam.

NEAR RAMADI - Police major Waheed Dulaimi and four members of his family were killed in a suicide car bomb attack on his house in the town of Baghdadi northwest of Ramadi in western Anbar province, police said. Eight other people were wounded.

BAQUBA - The Iraqi army found 10 bodies in a village northwest of Baquba. Dr Ahmed Faoud at Baquba hospital said the bodies all appeared to have been shot and were decomposed.

BAGHDAD - Police found the bodies of three people across Baghdad on Saturday, a police source said.

And just after the chest-thumping:

A wave of violence across Iraq, including the bombing of a minibus filled with Shiite worshippers and a suicide truck bomb attack on a police station, has killed 32 people, officials said Sunday.

Couple this with what Krugman accurately points out today over the right-wings screaming about Gore winning the Nobel Peace Prize:

The worst thing about Mr. Gore, from the conservative point of view, is that he keeps being right. In 1992, George H. W. Bush mocked him as the “ozone man,” but three years later the scientists who discovered the threat to the ozone layer won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In 2002 he warned that if we invaded Iraq, “the resulting chaos could easily pose a far greater danger to the United States than we presently face from Saddam.” And so it has proved...

So dealing with climate change not only requires new taxes or their equivalent; it also requires international negotiations in which the United States will have to give as well as get.

Everything I’ve just said should be uncontroversial — but imagine the reception a Republican candidate for president would receive if he acknowledged these truths at the next debate. Today, being a good Republican means believing that taxes should always be cut, never raised. It also means believing that we should bomb and bully foreigners, not negotiate with them.

So if science says that we have a big problem that can’t be solved with tax cuts or bombs — well, the science must be rejected, and the scientists must be slimed. For example, Investor’s Business Daily recently declared that the prominence of James Hansen, the NASA researcher who first made climate change a national issue two decades ago, is actually due to the nefarious schemes of — who else? — George Soros.

Which brings us to the biggest reason the right hates Mr. Gore: in his case the smear campaign has failed. He’s taken everything they could throw at him, and emerged more respected, and more credible, than ever. And it drives them crazy.

And the biggest claim against Gore continues to be this...for the sin of being consistently right ... even conservatives that occasionally have an ounce of introspection live Andrew Sullivan still say this...

But he's also insufferable. And can you imagine how more pompous he's going to be now?

The right-wing has been in power and free to unleash one fucking disaster and half-baked idea after another. Their opponents have been called traitors, weasels, immoral, moonbats, cowards, defeatests, and crazy.

So everything has pretty much been "projection".

And they haven't learned one goddamned thing...fortunately, most Americans have.

Sunday Art Blogging

Caravaggio (b. 1571, Milan - Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio)

Detail: "Judith Beheading Holfernes"
1599

Full image here.

Read all about him.

Pussy Galore

Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, what?

Has Cat Fancy purchased the New York Times?

Look, I know Maureen Dowd is about to claim the title of neighborhood "Cat Lady" but still.

Digby Tristero noticed too but she uses more of them fancy words than I do.

News to me...

News to everybody:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice played down expectations for breakthroughs as she opened a critical round of Mideast shuttle diplomacy Sunday

On what possible basis did we have expectations? When has Rice ever had a diplomatic success? How could she possibly have one, given the Administration's policies?

Sorry, but I don't consider "Mangoes for Nukes" to be a rousing accomplishment. Somehow the Nobel committee overlooked that one again.

There's only one tangible success that Rice can realistically have (and it's no minor one):

"Dear Diary, we didn't bomb Iran today like Dick Cheney wanted."

That's almost a passable column

From the Mustache of Understanding Marital Assets in comparing Gore to Bush ... almost:

Indeed, Mr. Bush, rather than taking all that unity and using it to rebuild America for the 21st century, took all that unity and used it to push the narrow agenda of his “base.” He used all that unity to take a far-right agenda on taxes and social issues that was going nowhere on 9/10 and drive it into a 9/12 world.

Never has so much national unity — which could have been used to develop a real energy policy, reverse our coming Social Security deficit, assemble a lasting coalition to deal with Afghanistan and Iraq, maybe even get a national health care program — been used to build so little. That is what historians will note most about Mr. Bush’s tenure — the sheer wasted opportunity of it all.

Suck on what now?

It's almost like Friedman didn't play any manner of cheerleading or enabling role in that at all.

Hmmmm....

This should get some notice at The Atlantic:

James Fallows:

I am old enough to remember, from my school years, the disdainful reaction in my home town to the news that Martin Luther King had won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964...the stated form of the objection concerned not King's race but his obnoxiousness as a man. He was a windbag. He was pompous and self-dramatizing, He was holier than thou.

Andrew Sullivan:

Gore...But he's also insufferable. And can you imagine how more pompous he's going to be now?

Please Kill Me

NYT: I loathe you with the heat of 1,000 suns ....

I Know What He Means

About Van's "Mystic" ... and this:

Remember his name doesn't rhyme with Betrayus

AND he's Hispanic, so Lou Dobbs and the Right-Wing can unleash all manner of treasonous allegations about Ricardo (rhymes with "Retardo") Sanchez (rhymes with ah..."Traitor" [close enough for them]):

"I'm too old for this shit"
REUTERS/Anja Niedringhaus/Pool/Files

Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, who led U.S. forces in Iraq for a year after the March 2003 invasion, accused the Bush administration yesterday of going to war with a "catastrophically flawed" plan and said the United States is "living a nightmare with no end in sight."

Sanchez also bluntly criticized the current troop increase in Iraq, describing it as "a desperate attempt by the administration that has not accepted the political and economic realities of this war."

"The administration, Congress and the entire interagency, especially the State Department, must shoulder the responsibility for this catastrophic failure, and the American people must hold them accountable,"...

Oh, don't worry General, I'm sure Michelle Malkin has breatheless reports of you suckling a caviar & cocaine dipped Graeme Frost upon your teat in the back of your "Traitor-Mobile" this very moment -- while Ernest T. Bass is posting a heh-indeedy here and a heh-indeed there until it becomes almost as good as if it actually happened.

Anything else?

He also assailed war policies over the past four years, which he said had stripped senior military officers of responsibility and thus thrust the armed services into an "intractable position" in Iraq.

"The best we can do with this flawed approach is stave off defeat," Sanchez said in a speech to the Military Reporters and Editors' annual conference in Crystal City. "Without bipartisan cooperation, we are destined to fail. There is nothing going on in Washington that would give us hope."

He faulted the administration for failing to "communicate effectively that reality to the American people."

Well, that's it. Not only does this three-star criticize Washington Jesus AND Iraqi Jesus, he sounds like Harry Reid -- who's a losing-loving poopyhead.

This will not stand evildoer.

To move out of the realm of sarcasm, Sanchez has his own errors and problems during his tenure while the military chief in Iraq. No doubt, much of this is an attempt at rehabilitation from the knocks he received from the media, towards whom his speech is very negative -- ironically while ultimately buttressing the narrative that has been produced (Iraq=disaster). Sanchez certainly came in for criticism, now that he is gone, the Administration and others have had no trouble dumping on him. He and Bremer have pointed fingers at each other, and Abu Ghraib happened under his watch [though he was cleared of any responsibility for it]. But Bremer got a 'Medal of Freeance' and Sanchez didn't even get a 4th Star. In Bush World it is almost always the guy that gets the short-end of the stick that is the most reliable and screwed up the least. So my money's on Sanchez in spite of his own self-denial of responsibility (self-denial starts from the head down in the Bush Administration).

Just look out for Lou Dobbs General.

This will not be pretty

HBO tonight:

This Friday at 11 pm, Bill Maher welcomes TV host Joy Behar, economist Paul Krugman, talk show host Tucker Carlson.

Paul Krugman versus Tucker Carlson -- yeah, there's an even match, betcha Tucker outwhines 'im though.

The Continuing Adventures of Rudi & Judi (Second in a Series)

Tonight at the Giuliani-Nathans:

JUDI: "Why don't you have a Nobel Peace Prize?

RUDY: "What do I need with a ..."

JUDI: "Listen to this fucking guy. 'What do I need with a Nobel Peace Prize?' You stupid shit. I'm not going to go down to D.C. and stand there with my thumb up my ass while Miss Parents Music Resource Center displays that thing on her fucking mantel when all I've got is the souvenir seeds from your prostate operation!"

RUDY: "Judi, what do you want from me?"

JUDI: "What do I want from you? I want a bigger house in the Hamptons -- on Gin Fucking Lane, Rudy, not some three-bedroom post-war shitbox on a fucking side street north of Montauk Highway. I want a custom-made gold-leaf iPod sleeve designed by Donatella Versace. And I want goddamned Nobel Peace Prize, Rudy. I NEED IT if I'm gonna be first lady!"

(Read Part I in the series.)

Ann Coulter in History

You know she wishes she could have been there:



I'd like to say this is her "Imus" moment, but it won't be. This is, in fact, her nature.

O'Reilly, Malkin, Limbaugh, Coulter, they don't have career killing moments -- no, thanks to the hard work of Rupert & Aisles, and Scaife, these folks get to say whatever asinine and hurtful thing they can. And then when criticized they scream FIRST AMENDMENT and decry the "Politically Correct" police that are after them.

But, of course, it isn't about the First Amendment at all, it's about the power of shame, and the fact that they have none of it and it is considered somehow both admirable and profitable.

"Stupit Gore"

REUTERS/Jim Young

Remember that Post Yesterday

When I predicted who would likely NOT win the Nobel Peace Prize? (i.e. who is the Nostradumbass now?)

No?

Good.

As, I always said, Al Gore's work and that of others on Global Warming will likely win them this year's Nobel Peace Prize. Congratulations.

Book Review

Bought "I am America (and So Can You!)" by Dr. Stephen Colbert. It's kind of a heavy, technical, similar to "The Wealth of Nations" only with helpful graphics, stickers, and finger-puzzles. It was a little tough for evening reading, which is usually comprised of reviewing the love correspondence of Andrea Mitchell and Alan Greenspan (oh, inflationary pressures of irrational exuberance take me away!).

The book is hard to describe, but seems rather self-centered, if not egomaniacal. Similar in tone to Kim Il Jong's pivotal 70s work "Fear of Flying, Me".

I'll keep you advised if it changes in tone.

Paul Krugman's special message

For John Roberts of CNN

SHRILL

All in all, the Graeme Frost case is a perfect illustration of the modern right-wing political machine at work, and in particular its routine reliance on character assassination in place of honest debate. If service members oppose a Republican war, they’re “phony soldiers”; if Michael J. Fox opposes Bush policy on stem cells, he’s faking his Parkinson’s symptoms; if an injured 12-year-old child makes the case for a government health insurance program, he’s a fraud.

Meanwhile, leading conservative politicians, far from trying to distance themselves from these smears, rush to embrace them. And some people in the news media are still willing to be used as patsies.

10 Reasons Why Charlie Savage is The Shit

Caught Charlie Savage's talk courtesy of the American Constitution Society at Cardozo tonight . (Charlie, if you're reading this, I was the girl in the back row who asked whether those signing statements were difficult to get through because they were dense, Gonzales-penned gibberish, or the rantings of a lunatic.)

Anyway, here are 10 Reasons Why Charlie Savage Rocks and you should check out his book and catch him if he comes to speak at a theater (or law school) near you:

1. Owns the presidential signing statement story the way Josh Marshall owns the U.S. Attorney scandal story.
2. Puts the signing statement story in historical context. If you've ever asked yourself, "How the hell did we get here?" Charlie can explain.
3. Bottom-lines complicated legal issues for the benefit of lawyers and non-lawyers alike.
4. Took one for The Team ("The Team" being you and I) by sifting through the private papers of Dick Cheney at the Gerald Ford Collection in Ann Arbor, Michigan and by thinking deeply about other world-class assholes such as Alberto Gonzales and John Yoo.
5. Knows how to deal with potential speechifying by audience members. (This is NY. Our audiences specialize in speechifying.)
6. Manages to singlehandedly redeem his alma maters, Harvard and Yale, which also awarded our idiot president degrees.
7. Will sign his book, Takeover, for you.
8. Has a soupçon of that utterly charming "Aw shucks" midwestern charm thing going on.
9. Will make you laugh just when you think you're about to cry.
10. Is easy on the eyes.
    

Idiots

I know it's unlikely those who love wars other people fight so they can make bad puns and poetry out of it know much about the Nobels but the award ceremony is held in DECEMBER, well after the awards are announced.

So Drudgy poo and the rest of these cretins on the Al Gore beat can go back to their usual "own meat" beat, he isn't going to spend two months in Oslo.

This speculation about Gore winning the Peace Prize is inanity at its most, well, inane. NOBODY FUCKING KNOWS who is going to win the Award, public nominations aren't made, the judges don't talk. Just this morning we found out the literature winner, and the rumors were it was going to be Philip Roth -- who did not win. Why anybody engages in this shit, when nobody knows fuck all is beyond me.

Here's my prediction, Al Gore who has no way of knowing and who has no say or control over the matter anyway WILL NOT WIN THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE TOMORROW. And when he does not win the award, there will be a HAPPY DANCE from the Right Wing about a man who had no say in the matter not winning the award, like Al Gore got punked.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I like my odds better then those predicting he'll win.

UPDATE:

D'oh!!!

A good cause

Scout Prime has a way to help a family still in need in New Orleans. Read it and help out if you can -- It'll wash the soul-staining residue of Malkin from your soul.

Walk on the God Side (by your G.O.P. & the Fundies)

(To "Walk on the Wild Side")

Gary Aldridge alum of Liberty
Preached against the sodomites in Alabamy

Worked for Bush and worked for Dick
wore two-ply wet suits and died upon rubber prick
He said, hey babe, take a walk on the God side
said, hey honey, take a walk on the God side

Larry flew in from out of State
in the bathroom he was everybody's darling

But in his pants he didn't crap
even when guilty of a kinky tap
He says, hey babe, take a walk on the God side
said, hey babe, take a walk on the God side
and the righty judges go

Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, etc.

Little Joe never once gave it away
everybody had to pay and pay

A bombing here and a bombing there
Iraq, Iran aw hell just any ol' where
they said, hey babe, take a walk on the God side
I Said hey Joe, take a walk on the God side


Klutzo the Clown came while pleasing kids
called out to Jesus and damning yids

Went to birthdays like a made up saint
Until the time he'd show his taint
He said, little boy, take a walk on the God side
I said, hey little dude, take a walk on the God side
all right, huh


Foley is just I.M-ing away
MAF53 always ready to play

And when he quit it was to please

Like Jimmy-Jeff on a five-day leave
He said, hey babe, take a walk on the God side
He said, hey Cheney, take a walk on the God side
and the right-wing bloggers say

Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, etc.

Deliberately NOT Comprehending the Horror

From a CNN article on Jordanian schools accommodating Iraqi refugees:

For the first time since the start of the Iraq war, Jordan is allowing all Iraqi children -- regardless of refugee status -- to enroll in state-funded schools.

Simply, this means that even illegal refugees with no paperwork can send their kids to school with no questions asked.

This sort of thing should be "stroking out" Lou "My Flag Pin Means EVERYTHING" Dobbs, please somebody tell him:

The move is cementing a massive population shift in the Middle East. More than 2.2 million Iraqis have fled the violence in their homeland, most of them seeking refuge in neighboring Jordan and Syria, according to humanitarian officials...About 10 percent of Jordan's population is now made up of Iraqi refugees -- the estimates range from 500,000 to 750,000 of them.

That may be a conservative estimate, 2.2 Million have fled form a country with a pre-invasion population of 27 million. Imagine 25 Million American's fleeing the country in four years -- consider, especially that these refugees were heavily comprised of the nations physicians, business people, professors, and lawyers. What you'd have left would be a shell of what was the United States (though James Dobson would have a good solid session of beating his meat in the shower and scaring children just thinking about it).

And, of course, there are their actual life experiences:

In a nearby neighborhood, in the study room of the Ahmed Toukan School for Boys, a handful of Iraqi kids talk of their experience living far from home. Seated at a rectangular table covered with a red and white tablecloth, the boys tell stories of horror and displacement.

Eighteen-year-old Qutaiba lost five immediate family members before moving to Jordan to try to live a normal life. Matter-of-factly and with a straight-ahead stare, he repeats the number: "Five members."

One thing that we in this country are being willfully determined to ignore are not only the vast number of refugees, but the sheer number of Iraqi dead and wounded, all directly at our hands, or at the hands of forces opposing us -- that wouldn't be if we were not there. Latest estimates 1.2 million. But our media manages to cover their ears and go "LA LA LA oh look Britney Spears and flag pins and Betrayus Ads".

Awwwww

George Will demands his Diamond Encrusted, Platinum-Plated, Real Doll!

Enough, already, with compassion for society's middle and lower orders. There currently is a sympathy deficit regarding the very rich. Or so the rich might argue because they bear the heavy burden of spending enough to keep today's plutonomy humming.

Furthermore, they are getting diminishing psychological returns on their spending now that luxury brands are becoming democratized. When there are 379 Louis Vuitton and 227 Gucci stores, who cares? ...

...it is increasingly expensive to be rich.

THOSE POOR RICH BASTARDS!