Bobo's WINGNUTTIA World

The voices that people listen to in "Bobo's World".

They represent a wide-body of experience:

From Watergate Criminal...


to an Oxycontin Addict...


From Unloved, Unmemorable, Adopted Son...


to a Guy who enjoys a good Dildo up his ass...

(O'Reilly pic from here)

But even with such sterling moral paragons, there is one thing that we have been unable to accuse them of ... yet:

Outright Murder

But an aspiring and ambitious radio-bloviator is now really making a name for himself.

I give you, James Keown

A Missouri radio talk show host was arrested on murder charges Monday for allegedly poisoning his wife by spiking her Gatorade with a chemical found in antifreeze.

Prosecutors said James Keown, 31, began poisoning his wife when the couple moved to Massachusetts in January 2004, after he lied to her about being accepted to Harvard Business School.

Here, while you can, is his Bloggy Blog.

Contemplation...

Sam Bodman is stunned, along with the rest of the country, to discover he is the Secretary of Energy.

Nine more dead in Eye-Rack!

Oh, it is to laugh!

(Jim Young/Reuters)

Falafel Follies

From MSNBC (which enjoyed putting this up, I'm sure):

The complaint contends that Joe Chillemi, a Fox vice president who supervised its advertising and promotions departments, sexually harassed and subjected Weiler and other women to a hostile work environment, routinely using obscenities and vulgarities to describe women or their body parts...

...“In addition, at a department discussion about a segment on sexism in the workplace, Chillemi said that in choosing who to hire, ’If it came down between a man or a women, of course I’d pick the man. The woman would most likely get pregnant and leave,”’ the complaint says.

The lawsuit also claims a supervisor in the advertising and promotions departments, which Chillemi oversees, referred to women in those departments in a derogatory way as his “Promo Girls.”

Though he wasn't named, I believe it is a good time to point out who likely inspired Mr. Chillemi:

(pic from here)

Oh, how the mighty have fallen...

Now Bush is just the catcher 24/7.

"We Do Not Torture"

But we reserve the right to torture.

I guess that makes sense in Chimpy-Land.

You have to remember at the time he wrote those pro-torture memos, Candlewax Al Gonzales was frustrated at his inability to progress beyond the "pornstache".

Mr. Dick

The world is falling down around crashcart and all the progressosphere is relishing that fact. And who can really be surprised:

"Those who have known him over the years remain astounded by what they describe as his almost autistic indifference to the thoughts and feelings of others. "He has the least interest in human beings of anyone I have ever met," says John Perry Barlow, his former supporter. Cheney's freshman-year roommate, Steve Billings, agrees: "If I could ask Dick one question, I'd ask him how he could be so unempathetic."

Hard to believe isn't it, I mean...

Oh, well, I guess I can see that.

Taking Western Civilization down Yet another Notch

It's the spinoff of this marginally successful blog...

RISING HEGEMON -- AFTERDARK!!

Fortunately, the decrepit nature of Atta J. Turk is will be offset by the far more vivacious and talented Watertiger (or as she will now also be known, Water J. Tiger).

As ever, for my part, again let me say that I am very sorry.

God Dammit!!!

We started out today with a bad enough figure.

We lost 7, 8 9 more American soldiers so far today.

That's 2,053 total, 2,054, 2,055.

Could someone please do this for the sake of the country, since being a "War Criminal" Doesn't seem to cut it?


From Make Them Accountable.

Any volunteers?


It will be the bravest thing he has ever done!

October 7, 2002 - Cincinnati, Ohio

Here is a picture of your President lying to you. He is saying that his administration had learned that 'Iraq has trained Al-Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases'.

This was a lie -- as they knew the source of that knowledge was lying. Lying to stop being tortured.

I would like to know why Senator Tom Coburn was unable to diagnose this from Bush's body language?

Cheney has GOT to go!

Is this jackass being kept around because he is the "real" President?

Is it because he knows Bush is pounding the Gin & Tonics?

Or is it because he's the kind of insurance against impeachment that Spiro Agnew was?

Over the last several days, several bloggers, including DeDurkheim in a fine post yesterday, commented on various articles regarding torture and the obtaining of false evidence -- evidence the Administration knew to be false -- that helped sell the Iraqi Invasion snow job.

This followed on the heels of information that the United States is running its own version of the Gulag Archipelago.

Now the Washington Post adds yet more information that the man most in favor of torture is one Richard Cheney:

Over the past year, Vice President Cheney has waged an intense and largely unpublicized campaign to stop Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department from imposing more restrictive rules on the handling of terrorist suspects, according to defense, state, intelligence and congressional officials.

Last winter, when Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, began pushing to have the full committee briefed on the CIA's interrogation practices, Cheney called him to the White House to urge that he drop the matter, said three U.S. officials.

In recent months, Cheney has been the force against adding safeguards to the Defense Department's rules on treatment of military prisoners, putting him at odds with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and acting Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon R. England. On a trip to Canada last month, Rice interrupted a packed itinerary to hold a secure video-teleconference with Cheney on detainee policy to make sure no decisions were made without her input.

This depraved fucker must go, he must go now.

"Ooooooooh, French Vanilla!"

Senator George Allen.

John Aravosis has more firsthand information.

Medicare Disaster

Following up on the post praising (frightening?) Paul Krugman's analysis of the far less than it's cracked up to be American Health Care System:

But a bit farther down came a warning that if deBottari gives the new Medicare program, called Part D, a try, "your Boeing prescription drug coverage is part of your Boeing retiree medical plan. If you cancel your Boeing prescription drug coverage, your Boeing medical coverage also will be canceled."

Many other retirees fortunate enough to already have drug coverage are receiving similar warnings from their former employers as the new Medicare drug benefit approaches.

Sweet huh?

Good plan.

Getting what they Deserve

I used to like and admire Tony Blair. In any case, he is far more articulate and seemingly rational than the Chimperor Disgustus.

But then he joined forces with Bush to sell this war, and with his position on the political spectrum pretty much guaranteed that war opponents would have no chance to politically oppose this war (of course the Democrats in Congress didn't help any either).

Some modicum of justice may be neigh for both of them:

TONY BLAIR is set to face an unprecedented parliamentary inquiry into his conduct in the run-up to the Iraq war.

A coalition of Tory and Labour MPs is to table a motion to set up a Commons committee to examine “the conduct of ministers” both before and after the war. They believe they need the support of about 30 Labour rebels to succeed.

The committee, comprising seven privy counsellors, would have the power to see all sensitive documents and call any British witnesses, including intelligence chiefs.

The failure to plan for the aftermath is likely to be at the heart of the committee’s inquiries now that Iraq is in the grip of a violent insurgency, says the Tory MP Douglas Hogg, one of the inquiry’s architects and who is canvassing support for the move. The coalition already has backing from the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish and Welsh Nationalists.

If Blair (or a handful of Democrates) had stood up to the United States, it would have given opponents a chance to defeat Bush on Iraq. But as usual, when the war drums beat, the wuss comes out in too many people. Nobody wants to be called a passivist...why that's worse than being a fucking psychopath anymore.

Sing it Kruggy

Do you think he'll mind if I call him Kruggie?

Would he mind if asked him to sign my chest if he comes to the next EschaCon?

...Do you think he'll still come to the next EschaCon now?

On our nation's shitty health care system...and yes, it is a shitty system:

The funny thing is that the solution - national health insurance, available to everyone - is obvious. But to see the obvious we'll have to overcome pride - the unwarranted belief that America has nothing to learn from other countries - and prejudice - the equally unwarranted belief, driven by ideology, that private insurance is more efficient than public insurance.

Let's start with the fact that America's health care system spends more, for worse results, than that of any other advanced country.

In 2002 the United States spent $5,267 per person on health care. Canada spent $2,931; Germany spent $2,817; Britain spent only $2,160. Yet the United States has lower life expectancy and higher infant mortality than any of these countries.

But don't people in other countries sometimes find it hard to get medical treatment? Yes, sometimes - but so do Americans. No, Virginia, many Americans can't count on ready access to high-quality medical care.

The journal Health Affairs recently published the results of a survey of the medical experience of "sicker adults" in six countries, including Canada, Britain, Germany and the United States. The responses don't support claims about superior service from the U.S. system. It's true that Americans generally have shorter waits for elective surgery than Canadians or Britons, although German waits are even shorter. But Americans do worse by some important measures: we find it harder than citizens of other advanced countries to see a doctor when we need one, and our system is more, not less, rife with medical errors.

5,000 posts of suckitude

Earlier today, the combined forces of the middling triumvirate passed 5,000 posts over the last not quite 20 months.

We apologize.

But do they leave a Stain on Red Dress?

This may be the beginning of the impeachment. Yes, yea, oh yeah we have called and cried and screamed at all who would listen that the Bush regime used shenanigans to get elected not once but twice and many more times. But would anyone listen? No, no they would not.

Now comes word that super sensational charisma-man John "man of few words" Kerry has told acquaintances over the past year that he suspects the election was stolen in 2004 but that he lacked the hard proof to challenge the official results. But one effect of Kerry's avoidance of a public battle may be the despair among millions of Americans who feel that their democratic birthright was taken along with the last two presidential elections.

Now to add fuel to our call for impeachment proceedings against Bush and the other wingnuts, the New York Times is arguing that the Bushies knew a source was lying to them about Iraq's connection to Al Qaeda before the war...and they used the info to sell the war anyway. Hmmmm... does this beat a stain on a red dress? Does this beat the bullshit lies about Vince Foster? The whole Clinton Chronicles right-wing fuck job with the truth?

But, let's be honest for a moment, folks... just a moment that is all we ask... but the far right and its nut job and religious fanatic base has never stopped lying, distorting, and manipulating facts, slandering people's reputations (see Bill Clinton and Joe Wilson for examples, eh?), and just forcing their imperial "we-rule-the-world" mentality.

Take a peek at the allegations in the NYT article:

A top member of Al Qaeda in American custody was identified as a likely fabricator months before the Bush administration began to use his statements as the foundation for its claims that Iraq trained Al Qaeda members to use biological and chemical weapons, according to newly declassified portions of a Defense Intelligence Agency document.

Without mentioning him by name, President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Colin L. Powell, then secretary of state, and other administration officials repeatedly cited Mr. Libi’s information as “credible’’ evidence that Iraq was training Al 8Qaeda members in the use of explosives and illicit weapons.

What are the odds that we are seeing the beginning of an understanding that Bush should be impeached by more than those of us who have been following the facts and sussing out the lies?

Among the first and most prominent assertions was one by Mr. Bush, who said in a major speech in Cincinnati in October 2002 that “we’ve learned that Iraq has trained Al Qaeda members in bomb making and poisons and gases.’’

This report could destroy Bush and his crony-raked presidency if -- and IF -- people take it seriously and begin demanding answers. That is right, friends we really ARE seeing that. The recent ABC poll which said that 55% think that Bush and his debacle of an Administration mislead us into an ill advised war that has only improved terrorism around the middle east and made money for big companies like Haliburton combined with the Zogby poll that found that 53% believe he should be impeached IF he did mislead (and we KNOW that he did)...those numbers were never anywhere near that for Clinton during the right wing machinations of false impeachment.

Add to that that now only 33% think favorably of Bush, that is way below Clinton's low point. Well, I think Bush & Cheney are in near fatal trouble. And it is about damn time!

Just think about this quote from the NYT article:

Mr. Libi was not alone among intelligence sources later determined to have been fabricating accounts. Among others, an Iraqi exile whose code name was Curveball was the primary source for what proved to be false information about Iraq and mobile biological weapons labs. And American military officials cultivated ties with Ahmad Chalabi, the head of the Iraqi National Congress, an exile group, who has been accused of feeding the Pentagon misleading information in urging war.

One has to wonder how this will affect the republican party not just now but into the near future? The religious zealots are not unthinkingly behind their guy anymore after Miers... the Democrats are beginning to grow them some backbones (to a limited extentm yes), the world hates Bush for how he has helped -- yeah, damn right... helped extremism and terrorism grow around the world, Rove may yet be indicted, Libby is going to have to answer some difficult questions about white house shenanigans... and now we have proof... damn it all... real proof that they lied their asses off (if they had any to begin with) to take us to war!

How can all of this not seriously unravel the party? Perhaps the war that they created will ultimately devour them. I, for one, hope that it will. Someone should have to pay for all of the death and destruction these monsters caused.

So, as you read the report, it becomes clear that the Bushies had not one, not two, but three separate false leads? "Curveball", Al Libi, and Chalabi? And all of them lied and/or the information was misused. Wow, what more do we need for a special prosecutor? But of course, for the nutpublicans... does it all leave a stain on a red dress?

And if you think that Colin "Mr. Credability" Powell would not mislead us... remember to things.

One. He was involved in the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam.

And Two... Mr. Powell relied heavily on accounts provided by Mr. Libi for his speech to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, saying that he was tracing “the story of a senior terrorist operative telling how Iraq provided training in these weapons to Al Qaeda.’’

And what's more: Al Libi was TORTURED into this...he lied under torture!!!

Impeach Bush, investigate his cronies, restore democracy. Now.

Cheney loves Torture

DICK CHENEY, liar, torture lover

In a speech to Republican la la makers, Cheney defended the use of torture by U.S. Soldiers, law enforcers, dentists, teachers, and baseball players in the United States. "Hell, Lynn doesn't mind it one little bit when I torture her with electric current from my pacemakers!" When questioned about what his number two said, Mr. Bush while continuing his popular victory tour of South America, loudly proclaimed in defense of Cheney... "heh heh, he said hell! Heh heh..."

The Perils of Oral Gratification

From the Guardian:

According to the New York Observer and sources with knowledge of the negotiations, [Judith] Miller is demanding the right to reply to her critics in an opinion piece and a non-disparagement agreement as condition of her departure. Otherwise she has threatened to return to work.

Sure Pinch, it felt good at the time, but look at the price you are paying. A moment on the lips, a lifetime on your conscience.

Libertarian = Low Tax Wingnut

It has really amazed me over the last five plus years since 9/11 how many folks that are actually uber right-wing consistently use the term "Libertarian".

They use it so much that it has essentially become code talk for, "I'm pretty much a full blown crank job righty that doesn't go to Church every Sunday."

It is also always a convenient label when some proto-fascist starts whining that the GOP is not cruel enough to the poor and tries to absolve themself of any responsibility for deficit spending by saying, "well I'm a libertarian" -- this is quickly followed by a declaration of, "but Gore or Kerry would have been worse."

Pay attention some time, if you can bear it, to Limbaugh or Hannity or whatever variety of right-wingnut you have locally and they will play this canard.

One of the other favorite arguments I always here from these faux Libertarians is "well, tell me one way the Patriot Act" has affected anybody". As if the very essense of a governmental monitoring system of such scale has no effects at all upon their Libertarian philosophy.

Well, self-proclaimed Libertarian, you're as much of an intellectual poseur as ever:

The Connecticut case affords a rare glimpse of an exponentially growing practice of domestic surveillance under the USA Patriot Act, which marked its fourth anniversary on Oct. 26. "National security letters," created in the 1970s for espionage and terrorism investigations, originated as narrow exceptions in consumer privacy law, enabling the FBI to review in secret the customer records of suspected foreign agents. The Patriot Act, and Bush administration guidelines for its use, transformed those letters by permitting clandestine scrutiny of U.S. residents and visitors who are not alleged to be terrorists or spies.

The FBI now issues more than 30,000 national security letters a year, according to government sources, a hundredfold increase over historic norms. The letters -- one of which can be used to sweep up the records of many people -- are extending the bureau's reach as never before into the telephone calls, correspondence and financial lives of ordinary Americans.

Issued by FBI field supervisors, national security letters do not need the imprimatur of a prosecutor, grand jury or judge. They receive no review after the fact by the Justice Department or Congress. The executive branch maintains only statistics, which are incomplete and confined to classified reports. The Bush administration defeated legislation and a lawsuit to require a public accounting, and has offered no example in which the use of a national security letter helped disrupt a terrorist plot.

The burgeoning use of national security letters coincides with an unannounced decision to deposit all the information they yield into government data banks -- and to share those private records widely, in the federal government and beyond. In late 2003, the Bush administration reversed a long-standing policy requiring agents to destroy their files on innocent American citizens, companies and residents when investigations closed. Late last month, President Bush signed Executive Order 13388, expanding access to those files for "state, local and tribal" governments and for "appropriate private sector entities," which are not defined.

...

The House and Senate have voted to make noncompliance with a national security letter a criminal offense.

...

Career investigators and Bush administration officials emphasized, in congressional testimony and interviews for this story, that national security letters are for hunting terrorists, not fishing through the private lives of the innocent. The distinction is not as clear in practice.

Under the old legal test, the FBI had to have "specific and articulable" reasons to believe the records it gathered in secret belonged to a terrorist or a spy. Now the bureau needs only to certify that the records are "sought for" or "relevant to" an investigation "to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities."

That standard enables investigators to look for conspirators by sifting the records of nearly anyone who crosses a suspect's path.

"If you have a list of, say, 20 telephone numbers that have come up . . . on a bad guy's telephone," said Valerie E. Caproni, the FBI's general counsel, "you want to find out who he's in contact with." Investigators will say, " 'Okay, phone company, give us subscriber information and toll records on these 20 telephone numbers,' and that can easily be 100."

Bush administration officials compare national security letters to grand jury subpoenas, which are also based on "relevance" to an inquiry. There are differences. Grand juries tend to have a narrower focus because they investigate past conduct, not the speculative threat of unknown future attacks. Recipients of grand jury subpoenas are generally free to discuss the subpoenas publicly. And there are strict limits on sharing grand jury information with government agencies.

...

As the Justice Department prepared congressional testimony this year, FBI headquarters searched for examples that would show how expanded surveillance powers made a difference. Michael Mason, who runs the Washington field office and has the rank of assistant FBI director, found no ready answer.

This is per se an intrusion into the personal lives of thousands of innocent civilians. The violation is in the intrusion itself. There is no way that the government should have such ready, unimpeaded access to your personal information. Yet, few self-described, and proclaimed "Libertarians" seem to give a shit.

After all, they are white, relatively prosperous, self-satisfied pricks who just want to pay no taxes whatsoever, so how does this really affect them?

Proof that there is no Justice

Mike Love sues Brian Wilson. No, really.

Would someone please take Mike Love out for me? The world would be such a better and more harmonious place. What an astounding pariah in popular music. Of course, hypothetically speaking one could organize a "hit" on Mike Love, but then he'd probably sue for using his likeness. Actually, I'm thinking of suing Brian Wilson myself, since he stole all of my ideas in another lifetime before I was born in my present form.

And this just in from Reuters - "Mike Love sues God, claims he actually did invent summer weather first and that the supreme creators use of trademarked images constitutes an infringment on commodities owned by Mr. Love".

Love filed the lawsuit in federal court Thursday accusing Wilson of promoting his 2004 album, "Smile," in a manner that "shamelessly misappropriated Mike Love's songs, likeness and the Beach Boys trademark, as well as the 'Smile' album itself."

Love's lawyer says it's nothing personal.

"Mike has a lot of affection for Brian and they have a good relationship and cordial relations," said Phil Stillman, who has represented Love since 1992. "There's obviously some problem with the way Brian's (associates) have promoted the albums."

Stillman added: "They remain family and the co-founders of a very important band in rock 'n' roll history."

The Beach Boys never completed "Smile," and it was regarded as a lost classic until Wilson opted to finish it himself. The album earned international acclaim and marked a dramatic return for the 63-year-old singer-songwriter, who had kept a low profile for years.

Love objected to a promotion in which 2.6 million copies of a Beach Boys compilation CD were given away to readers of Britain's The Daily Mail on Sunday newspaper. The lawsuit said the giveaway undercut the band's sales.

The lawsuit seeks damages, including "millions of dollars in illicit profits," and seeks at least $1 million for international advertising "to correct the effects of ... unfair competition and infringing uses."

And in case you are looking for justice in this world, it might interest you to know that Mike Love has the exclusive legal right to tour under the Beach Boys name. Brian Wilson, the musical genius behind the Beach Boys cannot tour under that name. Al Jardine, another ex-Beach Boy, tours under the label of the Endless Summer Band Starring Al Jardine. Maybe justice is deaf as well as blind.

"Why yes, Mrs. Bush"

"In a pinch, we can always sneak your husband out of Argentina in one of Evita's old dresses."

(AP Photo/David Mercado,pool)


El Chimperero gets a giggle after giving Pickles what he calls the "Dirty Cameron Diaz"

(REUTERS/Larry Downing)

"Cammy, it smells like when I lived in your knickers"

(REUTERS/Frankie Frost/Pool)

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....

That's goooooooood meth!

The Duchess of Cornwall explores America's greatest resource, rural drug labs.

(REUTERS/Kimberly White)

Condi Keeps a Lookout

As Bush demonstrates just how far he can push a pen into his head.

((Pilar Olivares/Reuters)

Bush gets frustrated

That he cannot do that Vulcan mild meld trick he learned from Condi, on himself.

(Carlos Barria/Reuters)

And the Jokes Still Write Themselves...

Good thing they finally got around to this.

From the Washington Post:

President Bush has ordered White House staff to attend mandatory briefings beginning next week on ethical behavior and the handling of classified material after the indictment last week of a senior administration official in the CIA leak probe.

According to a memo sent to aides yesterday, Bush expects all White House staff to adhere to the "spirit as well as the letter" of all ethics laws and rules. As a result, "the White House counsel's office will conduct a series of presentations next week that will provide refresher lectures on general ethics rules, including the rules of governing the protection of classified information," according to the memo, a copy of which was provided to The Washington Post by a senior White House aide.

...

...counsel Harriet Miers. Miers's office will conduct the ethics briefings.

Cool! Awesome! Neat!

At the conclusion of the presentation, Ms. Meirs' materials will feature this

"Hang in There"

Will Rove burst into flames?

Remember...

Don't be fooled by cute Republicans.

Explanation

This article from Jonathan Chait in yesterday's Los Angeles Times is I think the best overall summation of the lead up in the Iraq War and what it is all about now. With the added bonus of referring to how stupid Bobo Brooks is.

The last portion is really the key:

...It isn't that complicated. The Bush administration, like almost everybody else, made some honest mistakes. Unlike everybody else, it also made some dishonest mistakes. The Clintonites warned against Hussein's weapons, but they didn't bully intelligence analysts into suppressing contrary information, and they didn't pass on information they knew was false. That's what the investigation is about. Everybody got it?

Bingo. Keep up the pressure -- and make sure the media keeps digging. Most Americans are, to some extent, understanding this distinction. But right-wing sops like Brooks and a majority of the punditry are either too deep in the pocket of the right-wing or too cynical to even try.

Speaking of Pittsburgh

We've now launched so many self-described "major operations" in Iraq that they are starting to really scrape around for names.

"Operation Steel Curtain"

Soon to be followed by "Operation Purple People Eaters"; "Operation Doomsday Defense"; and finally "Operation Crazy Legs Hirsch".

Meanwhile, the death count has increased to 2,045.

Pittsburgh -- Get an insignia on the other side of the helmet!

Goddamn Steelers, beat my beloved Vikings in Super Bowl IX (and while we're at it, up yours Kansas City; Miami; and Oakland).

At least I'm not bitter.

But anyway, I've been informed that today should be "Pittsburgh Bloggers Appreciation Day". At least by one person -- so I'm just going to declare all these bloggers Pittsburghians -- whether they are or not and add them to the blogroll.

Eli at Multi-Medium - has unnatural thoughts of Franco Harris's beard.

Thers at Meta-Comments - Has yet to wash the hand once slapped away by Mean Joe Green.

Spork at "Spork in the Drawer" was once the recipient of a restraining order from Mel Blount.

They are all fine and deserving bloggers, in spite of their unhealthy obsessions.

A Monster

There is simply no other way to put it, Richard Cheney, Vice-President of the United States and by implication the President of the United States George Walker Bush (aka the Chimperor Disgustus) are war criminals.

Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's Chief of Staff, was on NPR according to Political Wire and asserted:

Vice President Dick Cheney's office was responsible for issuing the directives which led to U.S. soldiers to abuse prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a NPR interview with Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Wilkerson says he traced a trail of memos authorizing the questionable practices through Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's office directly to Cheney's vice presidential staff.

Wilkerson paraphrased the directions given to U.S. soldiers: "We're not getting enough good intelligence and you need to get that evidence, and, oh, by the way, here's some ways you probably can get it. And even some of the ways that they detailed were not in accordance with the spirit of the Geneva Conventions and the law of war."

Such actions, authorizing torture are illegal under the domestic laws of the United States as well as International Treaties to which the United States is a member.

Cheney, with a long career in high level office was no doubt aware of, and advised of this. Certainly the President of the United States was informed as well.

Nevertheless, they broke the most basic of human rights, the right to not be tortured.

The have, by their actions made the United States a criminal nation -- running a series of "gulags" throughout the world where these acts occur.

If this is true they will go down as greater monsters than any American Political Leader. Greater than Bilbo; greater than Jefferson Davis.

Monsters.

According to Zogby if it is demonstrated that George Bush & Cheney misled the country into war in Iraq the majority of the public believes they should be impeached.

According to ABC, the majority of the People feel they were misled the country about the War.

The clock is ticking.

Bush is a cornered animal. He may not finish his term.

You didn't see it here first.

Bush Demonstrates

The veracity of new studies showing that lying in connected to stomach discomfort.


At least the people love me and American foreign policy.


Yes, at least America's T-Shirt industry.


Now, I've had bad dates, but nothing quite like this.

Friday Miscellaneous Lifeform Blogging

Too offset Bullshit Moose's Marshall Whitman, I present the real article.

"The majestik møøse"



[Møøse Trained by YUTTE HERMSGERVØRDENBRØTBØRDA]

[Special Møøse Effects OLAF PROT]
[Møøse Costumes SIGGI CHURCHILL]

[Møøse choreographed by HORST PROT III]
[Miss Taylor's Møøses by HENGST DOUGLAS-HOME]
[Møøse trained to mis concrete and
sign complicated insurance forms by JURGEN WIGG]

[Møøses noses wiped by BJØRN IRKESTØM-SLATER WALKER]
[Large møøse on the left hand side
of the screen in the third scene from the
end, given a thorough grounding in Latin,
French and 'O' Level Geography by BO BENN]
[Suggestive poses for the møøse
suggested by VIC ROTTER]
[Antler-care by LIV THATCHER]

If Teddy Roosevelt was Channelling Bull(shit) Moose

Marshall Whitmann, proprietor of "Bullshit Moose" had quite a doozey yesterday. In addition to a propensity for referring to himself in the third person, Bullshit is also showing himself to be a pretty poor self-proclaimed representative of Theodore Roosevelt. If Roosevelt had Bullshit writing his speaches we'd have these quotes to chew over:

Speak ineffectually and cowtow to a big prick; you will lose elections.

Character, in the long run, is an overrated factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike.

It is hard to fail, but it is better to have never to tried to succeed.

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed. When this happens they become a blogger claiming my legacy

The best thing is soft hitting. Do not hit at all if it can be avoided; but always hit softly.

And of course, best he re-write his most enduring speech...

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually avoids the arena, whose face is not all icky with dust and sweat and blood; who lies valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, then lies about all the lack of effort, error and shortcomings; but who does not actually strive to do deeds; who manipulates the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who lies unashamedly about what seems a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of stealing an election or two, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while lying greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and turgid souls who died so he can lie about defeat.

Despite the fact that the majority of the American public believes that the Bush Administration purposefully misled us in selling the Iraq Invasion, Bullshit has one simple strategy...

Don't mention the War!!!

Oh, there's some wisdom.

With Hugo Chavez as Che Guevera

(To "Don't Cry for Me Argentina")


Don't jeer at me Argentina

Hey, fact is, I've never heard of you

You're close to Brazil

And that one place, with all the Nazis


I won't won't invade you
Cause your short a Chavez,

But mind your own Business!

Literary Geniuses

I'm sure Holden will not stand for this, but as I get up at a time when only insane people do, I'll take a first swipe at it.

John J. Miller, who has the dubious distinction of being a lesser light at "Moron Junction", actually put this forward:

CATCHER IN THE RYE [John J. Miller]
One of the most overrated books of our time.
Posted at 05:58 PM

Because Mr. Miller is a literary giant. Why look at some of his classic works:

Our Oldest Enemy : A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France

Yes, that fucker Lafayette!

Sometimes, I tell you, ya' just laugh so hard it becomes painful.

Another Hero

I occasionally listen to Thom Hartmann, he's better than Springer. How can they even think of eliminating Maron, while keeping Springer's "Jomemtum" like show -- which attracts "phone trolls" like nothing I've ever seen?

Anyhoo, Crooks & Liars has this fantastic portion of the very -- very short interview of Dick "I Luvs the Toe-Jam" Morris on Hartmann's show yesterday. Here is the transcript:

Hartmann: Sandy Berger told me personally Dick that he told Condi Rice when she came into office-that his words to her were look out for Osama Bin Laden. He's coming to get you. You need to be paying attention. This has to be your number one priority and she said, "OK thank you very much for that information," and did then nothing.

Morris: Did he, did he take the documents out of his socks when he told you that?

Hartmann: Come on Dick, do you want me to talk about hookers with you? Come on Dick.

Morris: Okay, well thanks very much for the interview. Bye-bye. (hangs up)

Oh man, that's beautiful.

Maybe he's moving permanently to South America?

He'd have some friends down there. Sure they're a little old now, but you make the world what you can.

"He understands the problems of people like you"

Yes: 34
No: 66


"He is a strong leader"

Ja: 47
Nein:53


"He is honest and trustworthy"
Creates own truth: 40
Lying Sack of Crap:58


"Please tell me how much confidence you, yourself, have in the Bush Administration: a great deal, quite a lot, some, or very little?"

Yes, Rapture (Great Deal): 15
Well, I'm white, so I'll be okay (A Lot): 14
Some: 22
Very Little: 41
Shoot Me Now: 8


"Would you say your confidence in the Bush Administration lately has been increasing, decreasing or has it remained the same?" Options rotated
Woody getting bigger: 2
Decreasing: 49
Same: 48

"How would you rate Bush's handling of ethics in government: excellent, good, only fair or poor?"

Excellent: 7
Good: 25
Fair:29
Poor: 38

Hmmmm

From the AP:

A group of scientists are turning to people's stomachs to find out if they are telling the truth. A new study by the University of Texas measured electrical impulses in the stomachs of 16 volunteers that were only associated with the act of lying.

"The heart rate went up for both lying and truth, but the gastric electric activity only changed with lying," said Pankaj Pasricha, a researcher with the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston.

Sheds a whole new light on this incident from a few days ago after Harry Reid moved for a Closed Session:

"Republicans are outraged," Sen. Christopher Bond, R-Mo., reported. "I just ate lunch, and it's upset my stomach."

Attention Catholic Wingnuts

All you Cardinals Belong to Us.

Granted, I still find the church's position on sexual orientation, birth control, and other things illogical and self-defeating, but by and large they are not what they used to be in regards to science. In fact, by and large, the Church outside of America has actually tried to be science friendly. Sadly, in this country, the evangelical streak is strong -- as is the desire for simple answers and simple people (almost always white men) to lead.

And you cannot get simpler answers from simpler men than our current Chimp.

But anyway, back to the topic at hand:

Poupard and others at the news conference were asked about the religion-science debate raging in the United States over evolution and "intelligent design."

Intelligent design's supporters argue that natural selection, an element of evolutionary theory, cannot fully explain the origin of life or the emergence of highly complex life forms.

Monsignor Gianfranco Basti, director of the Vatican project STOQ, or Science, Theology and Ontological Quest, reaffirmed John Paul's 1996 statement that evolution was "more than just a hypothesis."

"A hypothesis asks whether something is true or false," he said. "(Evolution) is more than a hypothesis because there is proof."

He was asked about comments made in July by Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, who dismissed in a New York Times article the 1996 statement by John Paul as "rather vague and unimportant" and seemed to back intelligent design.

Basti concurred that John Paul's 1996 letter "is not a very clear expression from a definition point of view," but he said evolution was assuming ever more authority as scientific proof develops.

We put up a lot of polls showing the Chimp to be graduating from disdained to loathed, but there are other disturbing polls. Those polls show consistently that most people in this country are woefully ignorant.

One small, but important, victory at a time.

By the way, there is not a better site on these issues than Pharyngula.

Finally, a place for Jerry Falwell to take a piss in Poland

Copernicus' Grave Found in Polish Church

Wingnutty

Santorum Exposed via Atrios . I had the patience to listen to the whole thing and let me tell you--you know these muthafuckers have gone off the deep end when they say Chalabi is more trustworthy than the CIA. Fucking nuts.

Bob Woodward, Fatuous Fuck

We are all now realizing just how deeply Bob Woodward is deep throating Bush -- right down to the short hairs, all while vigorously massaging the taint.

But in case you need a refresher (and one that is perhaps slightly less disgusting) C & L reminded me of something.

As recently as this Summer, Woodward was insisting that Cheney was going to run in 2008, just insisting that this was the master plan.

"He would be 67 if he ran and was elected. Reagan was 69. Republicans always like the old warhorse. ... Nixon was 68," said Woodward, best known for exposing the Watergate scandal that led to Richard Nixon's resignation in 1974. "Both parties like to nominate vice presidents. ... Cheney would do it, and I think it's highly likely, so stay tuned."

Doesn't sound so good now does it Bob?

Vice President Cheney has never been as popular as the president, but his favorable rating is down nine points this year to just 19 percent.

Hope you can get a good "ebay bid" on those kneepads.

Bernstein is laughing at you.

Might makes right

I had some fun with the Podhoretz analysis below.

He's probably right, however, the source is most likely McClellan who got hung out to dry by Rove, who flat out lied to him and made McSpokesman look like a fool -- and one that gets beaten up everyday.

Mark Kleiman has an excellent post on this.

But Podhoretz goes on to say that, if an at-best-moderately-competent McClellan can't get along with a political genius like Rove, it's obviously McClellan who ought to go. That's the assertion that strikes me as morally idiotic.

McClellan is angry at Rove because Rove flat-out lied to McClellan and sent him out to retail that lie, with his personal credibility behind it, to the White House press corps and, through them, the American people. Rove had no obligation to tell McClellan the truth about what he must have suspected might be felonious activity, but he could have said, "Scott, I don't know about you, but I've got more important things to talk about than who did or didn't leak the name of someone whose employment might or might not have been classified." Rove chose, instead, to lie, and to do McClellan enormous professional damage in the process.

So to discuss the quarrel between Rove and McClellan as if it were merely a personal spat, to be resolved by dumping whichever of the disputants is less valuable to the organization, is to leave out entirely the difference between right and wrong.

Podhoretz in other words is just about pure "power politics" not about what is right and what is wrong.

McClellan is in the position he is in because Rove fucked him. Rove is clearly morally bankrupt and made McClellan's life even more hellish than it needed to be. Although, I think Scotty would probably have managed to fuck up an announcement on V-E Day.

However, I'd go one step further.

If I were McClellan (and of course I'm not -- I'm far less sweaty for one thing) I'd resign.

And then I'd go out and fuck with Karl big time.

I'd give interview after interview about how Rove lied to me; how he lied to Bush; and the various scummy things he has done over the years.

...of course, first I'd ring up Mr. Fitzgerald to see if he wants to know anything in particular.

So there's your best option Scotty, you might want to think about it.

Headline of the Day

Scientists find Fossils in Sexual Union

That seems a tad cruel.

Pull out the Shivs...

'Cause there is a GOP knife-fight going on.

In the wake of the WaPo article implying that White House folks want Rove to go (i.e. Scottie McClellan), John Podhoretz, who makes a most grizzly bears look like Jeff Gannon, shoves his knife into McClellan's back:

Look, let's talk turkey. McClellan isn't a very good press secretary, to put it mildly. He looks as though at any moment he is going to bolt from the podium and go running into the bathroom to throw up. Karl Rove is the most effective White House strategist in our lifetimes.

Absent more bad news for Rove, if there were a choice about which of the two of them ought to exit, the answer would unambiguously be: Keep Rove and let McClellan walk. Unless, that is, you're the Democratic Party. Or Scott McClellan. Oh, and as for the story's detail about how Rove may still be in trouble with the special prosecutor because Fitzgerald had a conversation with Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper's lawyer this week, give me a break. We know, because Fitzgerald said so, that he's tying up loose ends and finishing his investigation. Rove spent four hours before the Fitzgerald grand jury nearly three weeks ago and that's the testimony Fitzgerald is surely doublechecking.

Podhoretz is one of the most vociferous of those proclaiming that NOTHING would develop from the Plame Matter.

Just in case you wish to still check his veracity, after wondering how long it takes to skim out his pool.

Hey, everyone how's it go... *THWACK* ...

He doesn't just fall off bikes or segways.






*It's actually Bush 41, but works well enough for me.

The Hits just keep Coming

About a month ago, Brownie was before Congress talking about how hard he worked and how he had been slandered. He then blamed everybody but the precious Bush Administration.

Here is just a snippet of Brownie at work, a few days after the hurricane:

In another e-mail Sept. 4, a FEMA official tells Brown:

"Please roll up the sleeves of your shirt . . . all shirts. Even the president rolled his sleeves to just below the elbow. In this crisis and on TV you need to look more hard-working. ROLL UP THE SLEEVES!"

It's all about image.

There is so much disgusting and vain shit in these emails it is unbelievable.

Ungracious Blob

Guess what K-Lo, when you are buried (in the freight car they'll call a casket)...nobody will be there.

Nobody.

IS THERE NO LEARNING CURVE IN POLITICS? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
I'm catching a little more of the Rosa Parks funeral on CSPAN right now while I am supposed to be meeting deadlines. I'm trying to get beyond Louis Farakhan prominently in the audience, sitting next to Al Sharpton (his name always should be followed by "Remember Freddie's Fashion Mart?"). I'm trying to get beyond Nancy Pelosi. Hillary Clinton. John Kerry. But then I hear John Kerry do a commercial for affirmative action, tying a current unjust public policy to her quite just bus action. A veiled reference to women having underclass issues here. A veiled reference to blacks who were shut out from voting (OR I MIGHT BE PRESIDENT!--I'm adding this) there. Bill Clinton had to cut out early to make sure New Yorkers get health care....maybe I need to watch the whole thing, but what I have seen has felt a little....Wellstone funeral-like.
Posted at 07:08 PM

Again, let me emphasize (because if you don't want to be humorous, why not be starkly accurate & cruel).

Nobody.

You're still a douchebag!

Richard Cohen connects "A" but apparently still cannot see "B" leading to "C":

Just about everything Washington said was happening (weapons of mass destruction) and would happen (an easy occupation) has turned out to be utterly false.

One could almost forgive President Bush for waging war under false or mistaken pretenses had a better, more democratic Middle East come out of it. But just as the 1991 Persian Gulf War introduced an element of instability in the region -- the rise of al Qaeda in response to the stationing of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia -- so might this one do something similar. A Shiite arc is forming, Iraq is infested with terrorists and coming apart, Syria might be going from bad to worse, and Saudi Arabia is complaining loudly that the war's only winners are the Shiites and Iran. From here, it looks like a war that is already going badly for America could go even worse for much of the Middle East.

Mission accomplished?

Yes, item "A", the war was based on false information (sometimes termed "LIES") both before the war, and by an entire series of lies afterwards.

But Cohen, only in the last month has been prattling on and on about how Fitzgerald's investigation into the outing of a CIA covert agent is the kind of thing that shouldn't be investigated, Item "B". Even though her outing is part & parcel with the lies that led to the war.

Which, of course, leads to the sum of the equation, "Item C" that the Bush Administration started an illegal war and punished those who might possibly oppose it no matter what, leading to their ultimate pattern, that the Bush Administration has got to go.

But this equation is too opaque to Richard Cohen, self-styled intrepid columnists and guest at all the best Washington parties. Give him the Champagne & the finest in Puff Pastries. Behold the size of those cocktail shrimp, why they are virtually Prawns. And that salmon is fantastic!

Cohen couldn't possibly give up this comfortable existence by thinking of those 298 million other non-D.C.-afied proles that inhabit this purported Democratic Republic.

Getting things straight

I know this conundrum can be difficult to distinguish, but here goes:

'
This is Bush and the mythical beast that is the embodiment of him as President, Sasquatch.



This is Bush with the all too real Beast dispatched on a mythical mission of improving our relations with the Islamic World (certainly a job for a Texas Presbyterian with a known penchant for lying her ass off right?)... Snatchsquatch.


(thanks, again to Ice Weasel for the second picture)

President Empty Suit

Yes, all hail bold leader finally noticing that the United States (thanks to him) is woefully behind Europe on the Bird Flu. So he goes out and proposes $7.1 Billion in spending upon the project and acts (with the medias cooperation) as if he just invented the jelly doughnut.

Problem is:

The president's request is similar to a $7.9 billion supplemental appropriation for flu pandemic planning assembled by Democratic leaders and passed last week by the Senate.

Is it any wonder he is at 35% approval -- hey media, the citizenry is ahead of you again.

Something for Cliff May to consider

Or Jonah (as Atrios notes) or Lowry, or even Ernest T. Bass, Esq. from the guy that actually founded their magazine:

When in 1951 I was inducted into the CIA as a deep cover agent, the procedures for disguising my affiliation and my work were unsmilingly comprehensive. It was three months before I was formally permitted to inform my wife what the real reason was for going to Mexico City to live. If, a year later, I had been apprehended, dosed with sodium pentothal, and forced to give out the names of everyone I knew in the CIA, I could have come up with exactly one name, that of my immediate boss (E. Howard Hunt, as it happened). In the passage of time one can indulge in idle talk on spook life. In 1980 I found myself seated next to the former president of Mexico at a ski-area restaurant. What, he asked amiably, had I done when I lived in Mexico? "I tried to undermine your regime, Mr. President." He thought this amusing, and that is all that it was, under the aspect of the heavens.

We have noticed that Valerie Plame Wilson has lived in Washington since 1997. Where she was before that is not disclosed by research facilities at my disposal. But even if she was safe in Washington when the identity of her employer was given out, it does not mean that her outing was without consequence. We do not know what dealings she might have been engaging in which are now interrupted or even made impossible. We do not know whether the countries in which she worked before 1997 could accost her, if she were to visit any of them, confronting her with signed papers that gave untruthful reasons for her previous stay — that she was there only as tourist, or working for a fictitious U.S. company. In my case, it was 15 years after reentry into the secular world before my secret career in Mexico was blown, harming no one except perhaps some who might have been put off by my deception.

The great question here is Robert Novak. It was he who published, in his column, that Mrs. Joseph Wilson was a secret agent of the CIA. I am too close a friend to pursue the matter with Novak, and his loyalty is a postulate. What was going on? If there are mysteries in town, that surely is one of them, the role of Novak.

The importance of the law against revealing the true professional identity of an agent is advertised by the draconian punishment, under the federal code, for violating it. In the swirl of the Libby affair, one loses sight of the real offense, and it becomes almost inapprehensible what it is that Cheney/Libby/Rove got themselves into. But the sacredness of the law against betraying a clandestine soldier of the republic cannot be slighted.

Interesting little bit of "fuck you stupid douchebags" isn't it? Not that Buckley, race-baiter and McCarthy enabler is exactly worthy of being praised as a hero (plus his cloak & dagger period wasn't exactly a lengthy pursuit -- more of a lark).

Any mention of this yet at "The Corner" (aka "Moron Junction")? I'll be monitoring when their site is up again (as I always do -- it's material people).

Rovey-Pooh

While we are awaiting for to see whether a man who will forever be known as the “Mark Hanna” for the worst President in American History, will be indicted, could we do away with sourcing foolishness like this:

Sources close to Rove said they do not believe the strategist is in the clear, but are confident the prosecutor will determine Rove did nothing illegal.

“Sources close to Rove” is so clearly Robert “Please don’t assume I’m related to Donald” Luskin.

Stop pretending.

Oh, look Karl, you are earning your own mythical doppleganger!

(pic, thanks to the Ice Weasel)

Substantive Debate

Bush & Windsor stumped over who has the worst gene pool.

The Ineffable Quality of Conservative Entertainment

Warren Bell, conservative & producer of high brow sitcoms like "The World According to Jim" and "Ellen" before it got all gay-ee is pimped by his biggest fan (in this case literally):

GOOD TV TIMES [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
Coach, which our bud Warren Bell worked on, is on UPN in NYC right now.

Coach seems not to be on DVD. Wassup with that, Warren?
Posted at 11:38 AM

Okay, let's see how many items there are to make fun of in those three short sentences.

1. K-Lo has such a "full life" that she is watching a local affiliates slate of pathetic re-runs before noon?

...Wow, consider putting the oven on "Clean" and exploring Kathryn.


2. Who the fuck ever watched "Coach" to begin with? That show was on forever, it seemed, but does anyone know anyone that ever watched it?

3. I'm guessing "Coach" isn't on DVD because, who the hell would buy it? Even Craig T. Nelson wouldn't watch that piece of shit show again.

...Can you imagine anything worse than a "Commentary" track for that show, with Craig & Warren Bell.

"Remember this scene Craig? Man the work Jerry Van Dyke did here...he's such a good actor, Dick must be soooooo jealous."

"Um, yeah, sure, Warren."


4. "Wassup"

...Wassup?

Oh man, I tell you folks, she tries to be down with what's happening in the street. But she's watching "Coach" at 11:30 in the morning for chrissake.

The Perfect Replacement for Rove

In a reality-based world, as opposed to the one with Two Suns, and Two Sons, that the modern GOP inhabits, Ahmed Chalabi would be arrested the moment he set foot on the Dulles tarmac.

But, of course, he will not be.

Politically savvy and a sharp dresser with a perpetual grin, Ahmad Chalabi has gone from Washington insider, to alleged Iranian spy, to someone the Bush administration cannot afford to ignore — all in the space of two years.

Chalabi, a deputy prime minister, plans to travel this month to Washington to refurbish a reputation tainted by the since-discredited claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. At home, Chalabi has quit a Shiite political alliance criticized for its strong ties to Iran.

All this points to one thing: Chalabi is maneuvering to become Iraq's next prime minister after elections in less than two months.

So the Richard Perle "fun tour" is coming back again.

Great.

Smirk on the Run

Dick Cheney leaves his Capitol Hill office before Harry Reid comes and kicks his ass.



In an effort to prepare for the Bird Flu, Bush announced plans to continue to stay away from Vietnam and eat less suet.

"Freedom is on the Mar...shut your Sovereign Yap"

From Juan Cole:

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Tuesday before the United Nations: "I categorically refuse the use of Iraqi soil to launch a military strike against Syria or any other Arab country . . . "But at the end of the day my ability to confront the US military is limited and I cannot impose on them my will."

So let's get this straight. The president of Iraq elected six months after the US "turned over sovereignty" on June 28, 2004 is saying before the United Nations that George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld decide whether his country can be used as a base to attack other countries, and he is unable to influence such decisions-- even though he categorically rejects any such action.

I imagine Bush & Rummy told him to pay attention to the schools that were painted last year. "Jalal, we invaded your country and said you were sovereign. Now shut up and enjoy the Jonquil Yellow"

More fuckin' Depravity

I realize that sometimes the juxtaposition of my rants with my snark must give people whiplash, but at this moment I am just one pissed off blogger. Soon I'll put up some snark and it will seem horribly out of position to some of my other posts.

But the disgusting statements just keep rolling. Only Bush, Cheney, Rummy & the gang could make one feel sorry for religious extremists, but they manage it somehow -- about their only real success to my eyes. Rummy on those on hunger strikes at GITMO:

Asked about the motivation of the hunger strikers, Rumsfeld said: "Well, I suppose that what they're trying to do is to capture press attention, obviously, and they've succeeded.

"There are a number of people who go on a diet where they don't eat for a period and then go off of it at some point. And then they rotate and other people do that,"" he added.

US District Court Judge Gladys Kessler last week ordered the government to provide medical records on Guantanamo prisoners who are being force-fed and to notify their lawyers about forced feedings.

The judge said detainees' lawyers had presented "deeply troubling" allegations of US personnel violently shoving feeding tubes as thick as a finger through the men's noses and into their stomachs without anaesthesia or sedatives, with detainees vomiting blood as US personnel mocked them.

Yes, Rummy, they're just on the Southbeach Diet.

Asshole.

The World Implodes

Remember the Cold War? All of that propaganda we had (with the benefit of substantial truth) about the Soviet penal system. We've seen evidence come out on this in bits and drabs, but today the full extent of the matter is laid out.

Remember "The Gulag Archipelago?"

Well, the Bush Administration has recreated it.

And any person who has not fully sold their soul to be a Bush Cheerleader should be sickened and fully, totally, and righteously pissed off.

Well, thanks the the Bush Administration, we've bought a controlling interest in the Gulag system, we even got some of the worksites:

The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement.

The secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand, Afghanistan and several democracies in Eastern Europe, as well as a small center at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, according to current and former intelligence officials and diplomats from three continents.

...

The CIA and the White House, citing national security concerns and the value of the program, have dissuaded Congress from demanding that the agency answer questions in open testimony about the conditions under which captives are held. Virtually nothing is known about who is kept in the facilities, what interrogation methods are employed with them, or how decisions are made about whether they should be detained or for how long.

How does the above make the Bush Administration different, in the four-corners of the paragraph above, from Stalin?

While the Defense Department has produced volumes of public reports and testimony about its detention practices and rules after the abuse scandals at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and at Guantanamo Bay, the CIA has not even acknowledged the existence of its black sites. To do so, say officials familiar with the program, could open the U.S. government to legal challenges, particularly in foreign courts, and increase the risk of political condemnation at home and abroad.

I cry for the loss of "the City on the Hill".

And it gets worse...

Host countries have signed the U.N. Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, as has the United States. Yet CIA interrogators in the overseas sites are permitted to use the CIA's approved "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques," some of which are prohibited by the U.N. convention and by U.S. military law. They include tactics such as "waterboarding," in which a prisoner is made to believe he or she is drowning.

So we continue to violate the the very treaties we belong to and have signed. But what of "Our word is as good as Gold" Condi?

This action is BLATENTLY ILLEGAL. The programs were set up overseas because they violate domestic law. But as the United States has signed the "Convention against Torture" it is not made legal because it is done somewhere else...only more difficult to expose. Not only is Bush a liar when he states he is opposed to torture, he has explicitly violated every human rights law in the United States Code by authorizing and continuing this practice. This is Nixon authorizing the bombing of Cambodia, on a more methodical, systematic scale. He is shaming each and everyone of us, and the GOP controlled Congress (with some Democrat help no doubt) has enabled and perpetuated this crime.

And it is a crime. There is no legal authority for the President of the United States to authorize this, zero -- NONE.

Further, it is an impeachable crime, the very embodiment of a High Crime & Misdemeanor. Of course, a HUGE and self-funded swath of the citizenry actually get their lizard-minded jollies out of such depravity (see the post below). "Why should we lift a finger to help out these swarthies?" It's not like Bush has lied about something really serious like receiving the "oral sex". No, all Bush has done is create a legacy of the United States being just another imperialistic asshole of a nation, where might makes right. Bully for us -- we've become what we have always been able to fool ourselves into believing we could never be.

And if you think that "Bush must have to learn something with all his troubles", he has.

"MORE OF THE SAME"
Take Cheney's replacement for Scooter, David Addington:

Mr. Addington has done his best to crown King Cheney. As Dana Milbank wrote in The Washington Post, Mr. Addington pushed an obscure philosophy called the unitary executive theory that "favors an extraordinarily powerful president." He would go "through every page of the federal budget in search of riders that could restrict executive authority."

"He was a principal author of the White House memo justifying torture of terrorism suspects," Mr. Milbank wrote. "He was a prime advocate of arguments supporting the holding of terrorism suspects without access to courts. Addington also led the fight with Congress and environmentalists over access to information about corporations that advised the White House on energy policy." And he helped stonewall the 9/11 commission.

Every new day, brings another reason to call for the exposure, shaming, and casting out of these bastards.

An Important Public Service

Tbogg reminds us, once again, that Little LuLu is just Ann Coulter sans testicles.

The General provided a review of her latest work...

Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild

I'm guessing the book had the working title of "Cut & Paste: What My Husband Put together for Me, after all Scaife will bulk buy anything". Nevertheless, the General stated:

I want to like Mrs. Malkin's book, but I'm really struggling to get through it. Every ten pages or so, I'm overcome with the urge to get out my big bag of M&Ms and segregate out all of the brown ones. I then take these "unter-kandies" and lock them away in a baby food jar where I taunt them while touching myself inappropriately.

Ah, humor

First of all, hundreds of progressive bloggers have by now given their huzzahs to Harry Reid, so I'll quickly joing the crowd.

But I also noticed this question out of the gaggle that Holden tracks so well. It is too beautiful for my not to highlight it. It's from "Paula":

Q Okay. Is it accurate to say, then, that anyone working within the Executive Office of the President is welcome to stay aboard if, one, they're not arrested, as was the case with the Office of Federal Procurement Policy Director; and, secondly, if they're not indicted, as was the case of the Chief of Staff of the Vice President; or, thirdly, if they're not convicted, even --

Scotty is in for a bumpy ride.

Time to Wage the "War on tERROR"

I know those currently on their knees to the Chimperor Disgustus will just say *squawk* "Clinton Appointees!"...

America's badly damaged image in the Muslim world could take more than a generation to set right. And Bush's mounting political woes at home have undermined the chance for any bold U.S. initiatives to address the grim social realities that feed Islamic radicalism, they say.

"It's been fairly disastrous," said Benjamin, who worked as a director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council from 1994 to 1999.

"We have had some very important successes getting individual terrorists. But I think the broader story is really quite awful. We have done a lot to fuel the fires, and we have done a lot to encourage people to hate us," he added in an interview.

But one has to look at the fact that they are hardly isolated or alone:

Benjamin and Simon's criticism of the Bush administration in Iraq follows a path similar to those of other critics, including former U.S. national security adviser Brent Scowcroft and former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke.

"We may be attacked by terrorists who receive their training in Iraq, or attacked by terrorists who were inspired, organized and trained by people who were in Iraq," said Simon, a Rand Corp. analyst who teaches at Georgetown University.

"(Bush) has given them an excellent American target in Iraq but in the process has energized the jihad and given militants the kind of urban warfare experience that will raise the future threat to the United States exponentially."

For Benjamin and Simon, the war on terrorism has cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars and failed to counter a deadly global movement responsible for attacks in London, Madrid, Bali, Indonesia, and Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.

And not even al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, they say, could have dreamed the United States would stumble so badly in the court of Muslim public opinion.

"Everyone says there's a war of ideas out there, and I agree. The sad fact is that we're on the wrong side," said Benjamin, now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

U.S. fortunes could improve, the authors say, if Washington took a number of politically challenging steps, like bolstering public diplomacy with trade pacts aimed at expanding middle-class influence in countries such as Pakistan.

Washington also needs to do more to ease regional tensions that feed Muslim grievances across the globe, from Thailand and the Philippines to Chechnya and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In a Muslim world of 1.2 billion people, as many as three-in-four hold negative views of the United States.

But, the wingnuts say, IT'S SO MUCH MORE FUN TO BLOW SHIT UP!

Such is our country's sad state.

The Bush Administration BIRD FLU Alert System

Out of Pocket

All week I'm out trying to make a living so can't be doing much here but I'll check in from time-to-time. Over at Kos I see they went over 20 kajillion blah blah blah. Seriously, they do great work over there. Congratulations.

We may just break a million over here by the end of the year. Congratulations to the angry middling triumvirate. Great work Attaturk. Thanks for giving me the space.

Oh yeah, almost forgot why I checked in while I don't have time to do so: Alito sucks. Bush sucks. Cheney sucks. Rove sucks. Libby's gonna sing.

The Unbearable Stupidity of Being Cliff May

Project Much Clifford?

WILSON ON CNN [Cliff May]
Did anyone else watch Wolf Blitzer interview Joe Wilson? It was astonishing. The guy claimed the Vanity Fair photo was an attempt at humor and irony – and that having her picture in that and other publications did not harm her prospects for future employment as a covert agent.

And he was smearing all his critics.

And he was so smug and prickly.
Posted at 05:40 PM

Still waiting for you to admit your assertion that it was "common knowledge that Plame was CIA" was a lie.

Good thing I've got other things to do in life.

Another thing to take action over

I like politics (though it makes me despair), but I love comedy.

Some people don't think enough politics is talked about on Air America's Morning Sedition.

But come on, its not fucking IMUS -- unlike that show, Morning Sedition makes you want to go on living, not wishing for the sweet release of death.

In the morning, I like the funny (hell I always like "the funny").

And this show is funny and quite often brilliant.

For example...check out any "Rapture Watch","Future Mark", "Lawton Smalls" or "Radio Theatre" and you'll see why this show is a precious commodity.

If you agree, send off a message to keep Marc Maron around.

Here is a petition as well

It's nice I can see this, but, OH FUCK!

The fact that a glacier isn't over this is frankly, frightening.


Mount Kilimanjaro

And Now we can Tie Bush to Vietnam too!

In the post below I linked to a story in the San Francisco Chronicle about the Tonkin Gulf Resolution which led to an escalation of the American presence in Vietnam. The release of documents confirmed what had long been assumed, that we became involved based on a lie.

The National Security Agency has kept secret since 2001 a finding by an agency historian that NSA officers deliberately distorted critical intelligence during the Tonkin Gulf episode that helped precipitate the Vietnam War, according to two people familiar with the historian's work.

...deliberately distorted critical intelligence...

Gee, no similarities to modern times there.

And what is this with the NSA keeping this document secret since 2001, it is almost as if they didn't want this confirmation around, when, say, there was a dispute about intelligence during the build up to another war.

Why would one think that?

You know national media, once again, I'd like to point out I'm just a dope from Iowa; often portrayed as a hick, a hayseed. I'm supposed to be naive and simple; a "bumkin" if you will. I was ed-ju-ma-cated at "State Schools". So how come I can notice stuff like this, yet you cannot be bothered?

Of course, us bumkins have always just fought and died in your wars, we've never been good at starting them -- that's been the job the elites always claim.

UPDATE: Tom Legg had similar thoughts.

From "American Conservative"?

You mean there are still "real" conservatives, as opposed to members of "team Bush"?

Well apparently there are a few. Something backing up Josh Marshall:

In February 2002, Pollari and Berlusconi resubmitted their report to Washington with some embellishments, resulting in Joe Wilson’s trip to Niger. Wilson visited Niamey in February 2002 and subsequently reported to the CIA that the information could not be confirmed.

Enter Michael Ledeen, the Office of Special Plans’ man in Rome. Ledeen was paid $30,000 by the Italian Ministry of the Interior in 1978 for a report on terrorism and was well known to senior SISMI officials. Italian sources indicate that Pollari was eager to engage with the Pentagon hardliners, knowing they were at odds with the CIA and the State Department officials who had slighted him. He turned to Ledeen, who quickly established himself as the liaison between SISMI and Feith’s OSP, where he was a consultant. Ledeen, who had personal access to the National Security Council’s Condoleezza Rice and Stephen Hadley and was also a confidant of Vice President Cheney, was well placed to circumvent the obstruction coming from the CIA and State.

The timing, August 2002, was also propitious as the administration was intensifying its efforts to make the case for war. In the same month, the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) was set up to market the war by providing information to friends in the media. It has subsequently been alleged that false information generated by Ahmad Chalabi’s Iraqi National Congress was given to Judith Miller and other journalists through WHIG.

On Sept. 9, 2002, Ledeen set up a secret meeting between Pollari and Deputy National Security Adviser Hadley. Two weeks before the meeting, a group of documents had been offered to journalist Elisabetta Burba of the Italian magazine Panorama for $10,000, but the demand for money was soon dropped and the papers were handed over. The man offering the documents was Rocco Martino, a former SISMI officer who delivered the first WMD dossier to London in October 2002. That Martino quickly dropped his request for money suggests that the approach was a set-up primarily intended to surface the documents.

Panorama, perhaps not coincidentally, is owned by Prime Minister Berlusconi. On Oct. 9, the documents were taken from the magazine to the U.S. Embassy, where they were apparently expected. Instead of going to the CIA Station, which would have been the normal procedure, they were sent straight to Washington where they bypassed the agency’s analysts and went directly to the NSC and the Vice President’s Office.

On Jan. 28, 2003, over the objections of the CIA and State, the famous 16 words about Niger’s uranium were used in President Bush’s State of the Union address justifying an attack on Iraq: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” Both the British and American governments had actually obtained the report from the Italians, who had asked that they not be identified as the source. The UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency also looked at the documents shortly after Bush spoke and pronounced them crude forgeries.

President Bush soon stopped referring to the Niger uranium, but Vice President Cheney continued to insist that Iraq was seeking nuclear weapons.

Once again, many of the enablers are treating Fitzgerald's indictment as the "end" of this matter. But it will not be.

The new Gallup poll shows that 53% of the country thinks that Bush "misled" the nation into war and 55% of the country judges his presidency a failure; a majority of the country wants to get the fuck out of Iraq -- and Bush refuses to leave, or make plans for leaving.

It gets progressively worse on this matter. It is not going away. History is going to judge Bush and his minions "War Criminals" -- I'd suggest conservatives might want to get on board before their legacy gets permenantly entwined (mostly too late for that). As it happened -- and has now been confirmed -- against the Johnson Administration, illegal wars - especially the illegal wars you do not win (see James K. Polk for what Bush was hoping for) have a tendency to really count against you in history's judgment.

Sadly, the senseless deaths are not going to end; which added seven Americans and dozens of Iraqi civilians yesterday. And will inevitably add thousands more in the coming months. Bush has staked his legacy on his illegal war. See the paragraph above.

After World War I, former general (and war hero) and progressive Smedley Butler called war a "Racket". Well, the Second World War came and to an extent it seemed the exception to the rule perhaps -- but can anyone really dispell Butler's claim to this war? Sold on deceipt and resulting in gigantic profits for Halliburton and Oil Companies?



*Butler was a marine major general and a double Medal of Honor winner. It is frankly shocking, but indicative of how a "progressive" is treated by history that he is largely forgotten -- though the fact is that much of World War I is forgotten in the shadow of its sequel.

Somebody better call "Batman"

The headline says it all...

Bush to Unveil Super-Flu Strategy

Ladies & Gentlemen, we're fucked.