| Bill's Blog 2005 |
The Holidays Are Upon Us Have yourself a happy holiday! November 2005 Iraqi Leaders Call for Withdrawal
Timetable The Iraqi representatives went even further, taking a jab at the Bush administration by asserting that “resistance is a legitimate right for all people” and acknowledging that there’s a difference between insurgents who are fighting to drive foreign forces out of the country and terrorists who indiscriminately attack civilians. Ouch. I can’t say I blame the Iraqis for feeling the way they do. Think about it, how would you feel if some other country decided to use your country as the battlefield for their war? That’s how Bush has portrayed the ongoing Iraq conflict. He has repeatedly called Iraq the central front in his war on terror and said that he’s fighting terrorists over there so he doesn’t have to fight them here, in the US. Imagine how that sounds to the people who live “over there.” It sounds like an arrogant leader has decided to fight his war on their land, destroying much of their country, ruining their economy and infrastructure, and killing many of their family members and friends in the process. I can understand why many Iraqis would tell Bush to get out of their country and go fight his war somewhere else. And don’t get me started on that nonsensical argument about “fighting them over there so we don’t have to fight them here.” That makes sense only if you assume that “the terrorists” can only fight in one place at a time, an assumption which has been repeatedly shown to be false by the many significant terrorist attacks that have occurred around the world since the Iraq war began. And Bush making illogical statements which so obviously underestimate the capabilities of our enemies is supposed to make us safer … how? This whole withdrawal timetable situation will serve as yet another test of George Bush’s honesty and integrity. When the new Iraqi government was first formed Bush said that the new government was sovereign, the Iraqis were in charge, and American troops were in Iraq at their request. On several occasions he made a point of stressing that US troops were in Iraq because the Iraqi government wanted them there, that it was their decision. The question now is, when Bush said those things was he telling the truth or was he just BS-ing in an effort to divert blame for the continued occupation fiasco and shift responsibility for the ongoing mess from himself to the new Iraqi government? The withdrawal situation will also provide further insight into the Bush administration’s real Middle Eastern agenda. Was the Iraq invasion really about Saddam Hussein and WMDs as they claimed, or was it about global domination and conquest of strategic resources (oil), an agenda the neocons in his administration advocated for years before Bush seized power in 2000? Bush’s response to the Iraqi request for a withdrawal timetable will help to answer these questions for us. As noted, Bush has adamantly opposed a withdrawal timetable and said flatly that there will not be one. But now the Iraqi government has requested one and said that US-led forces should be able to leave Iraq by the end of 2006. If the invasion of Iraq really was all about Saddam Hussein, WMDs, and liberating the Iraqi people as Bush has said, and if Bush really meant what he said about Iraq being sovereign and US troops being there at the request of the Iraqi government, then he will drop his opposition to a withdrawal timetable and agree to their request to develop a timeline for getting our troops out of their country. If Bush doesn’t agree to the Iraqi’s request it will be further evidence that the Bush administration is more interested in controlling major Middle Eastern oil reserves and establishing a stronger military presence in the area than they are in giving the Iraqi people their sovereignty and right to self-determination. It will also reveal that once again Bush has lied to us, he doesn’t really regard Iraq as sovereign, and US troops aren’t in Iraq because the Iraqi government wants them there, they’re in Iraq because George W. Bush and his neocon cohorts want them there. Bush and Cheney Push Pro-Torture Agenda For those of you who live in the US of A, doesn’t this just make you so proud to be an American right now? Don’t you feel good knowing that the leaders of our once-great nation want to use the same kinds of cruel and inhumane techniques as dictators like Saddam Hussein? Doesn’t it make you happy to know that while our sons and daughters are fighting and dying to supposedly eliminate regimes that use torture, their commander in chief is arguing for the right to torture people? As John McCain said, “This means that America is the only country in the world that asserts a legal right to engage in cruel and inhumane treatment.” How can anyone claim that George W. Bush truly “supports our troops” when he’s actively fighting for the very evils that he sent our troops to fight against? That’s not support, that’s betrayal. What prompted Bush and Cheney to come out in support of torture was an amendment that John McCain introduced in the Senate which would ban the “cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment or punishment” of prisoners. The ban was attached to a military spending bill and George “Waterboard” Bush threatened to veto the bill if it included the amendment. According to the New York Times “The White House has also threatened a veto if any bill arrives on President Bush’s desk with the provision.” Keep in mind that to date president George “Thumbscrews” Bush hasn’t yet vetoed a single bill, for any reason. Apparently the right to torture people is the only thing that’s so important to him that he would use his veto power to preserve it. And, after all of Bush’s platitudes about “supporting the troops” he’s threatening to veto a military spending bill, which would take much-needed money away from those same troops, all in the name of trying to give himself the ability to be cruel and inhumane whenever he pleases. Bush’s actions are morally reprehensible and thoroughly disgusting. According to news reports Dick Cheney has been especially active in pushing the administration’s pro-torture position, including pressuring members of Congress not to investigate CIA interrogation practices and actively lobbying McCain to exempt the CIA from the proposed torture ban. The Washington Post reported “Over the past year, Vice President Dick 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.” The Post also stated that Cheney made “an impassioned plea” to Republican senators to reject McCain’s amendment, and he “pushed hard to have the amendment defeated.” The Los Angeles Times also reported that “White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Vice President Dick Cheney was representing the views of President Bush in lobbying lawmakers to exempt the CIA from legislation that would ban the inhumane treatment of suspected terrorists and other detainees.” They went on to say that “McClellan said existing laws were adequate to prevent torture of the prisoners, including those who are held at what are reported to be secret CIA-operated facilities in Eastern Europe.” So the White House believes existing laws are adequate, huh? I guess that all depends on how you define “adequate.” If you consider the disgusting pictures and stories of abuse that have come out of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay it sure doesn’t look like existing laws are adequate. Those laws did a heck of a job of preventing all that abuse, didn’t they? I guess we have to keep in mind that this is coming from an administration that believes it’s “adequate” to put a former horse show manager in charge of FEMA and leave thousands of people to suffer and drown in the wake of a major hurricane. The former FEMA head was apparently adequate in their opinion too, Bush even said he was doing “a heck of a job.” When your definition of “adequate” includes total incompetence and complete ineffectiveness, then sure, existing laws are certainly adequate. And a cup of water is adequate for fighting a raging forest fire too. Once again Bush has had the gall (and the dishonesty) to say one thing when the TV cameras are on him, proclaiming that “we don’t torture”, and then he does the opposite when the cameras are gone, he fights for the right to torture. Given Bush and Cheney’s recent efforts to defeat McCain’s torture ban there is now no doubt, no uncertainty, and no ambiguity about their true position. They support the use of torture, and if you support them then you support torture too. If you’re an American and you support Bush you should be ashamed of yourself. As I watch the actions of this corrupt regime I have but one source of solace. Well, two actually. The first is that we only have three more years of King George to endure. The second is that if there is a God, and if there is a judgment of each individual upon death as many Christians believe, then Bush will be spending eternity in a place where he won’t need a jacket. He and Dick might even get to enjoy some of that torture that they love so much. The Iraq Deception
- How U.S. Fell Under the Spell of Curveball Five senior German intelligence officials who worked with Curveball for six years have come forward and described how they warned the Bush administration that Curveball was unreliable and his information was likely untrue. They have also noted that Bush exaggerated and mischaracterized the information provided by Curveball in an effort to overstate the threat from Saddam Hussein and push for the invasion of Iraq. (I’m shocked to hear that! Shocked I tell you!!!) Here are some excerpts from the LA Times article: The German intelligence officials responsible for one of the most important informants on Saddam Hussein's suspected weapons of mass destruction say that the Bush administration and the CIA repeatedly exaggerated his claims during the run-up to the war in Iraq. According to the Germans, President Bush mischaracterized Curveball's information when he warned before the war that Iraq had at least seven mobile factories brewing biological poisons. Curveball was the chief source of inaccurate prewar U.S. accusations that Baghdad had biological weapons, a commission appointed by Bush reported this year. The White House, for example, ignored evidence gathered by United Nations weapons inspectors shortly before the war that disproved Curveball's account. At the Central Intelligence Agency, officials embraced Curveball's account even though they could not confirm it or interview him until a year after the invasion. They ignored multiple warnings about his reliability before the war, punished in-house critics who provided proof that he had lied and refused to admit error until May 2004, 14 months after the invasion. There is much, much more detail in the article so give it a read at http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-curveball20nov20,0,2053900,full.story?coll=la-home-headlines. Right to a trial or
no right to a trial? - More Bush Hypocrisy The Bush administration was in all-too-typical form recently when the great Mis-Leaders Bush and Cheney commented on the resignation of Cheney’s former chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter – New American Century Neocon” Libby. After spending the past couple years fighting all the way to the Supreme Court for the ability to strip US citizens of their legal rights, ship them to an offshore island, hold them forever with no charges, no right to a trial, no right to legal representation, no right to even know why they are being held, no right to see the evidence against them and no right to respond to it, Bush actually had the gall to say, and I quote: “In our system, each individual is presumed innocent and entitled to due process and a fair trial.” Go ahead and pause for a minute and take deep breaths until your brain stops spinning. You may want to sit down until the intense cognitive dissonance clears. Yes, it was THAT George W. Bush who actually said that. I’m not making it up. I don’t know what kind of toothpaste Bush uses but it must be mighty powerful to get rid of the stench of the BS that comes out of his mouth. (There’s a Saturday Night Live, or maybe Mad TV, skit in there somewhere. “Brush with new Stench-Away!”) The complete contradiction between the administration’s actions with respect to detainee rights and executive power and Bush’s comments concerning the charges against Lewis Libby is yet another example of how Bush says one thing when the cameras are on him and the media is taking notes, and then does the opposite when it comes to policy decisions and his “behind the scenes” agenda. It all depends on what suits his needs at the moment, he’ll say whatever is best for protecting his administration and his image, even if it’s completely contradicted by the facts and his own well-documented actions. Cheney added his own BS to the pile with this equally absurd line: “In our system of government an accused person is presumed innocent until a contrary finding is made by a jury after an opportunity to answer the charges and a full airing of the facts.” Right, Dick. Let’s check in on the Bush administration’s adherence to their alleged belief that everyone is presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial by looking back at some of their actions relating to Guantanamo Bay, compliments of Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_bay): … the U.S. government argued unsuccessfully that people detained at Guantanamo were legally outside of the U.S. and did not have the Constitutional rights that they would have if they were held on U.S. territory (see Cuban American Bar Ass'n, Inc. v. Christopher, 43 F.3d 1412 (11th Cir. 1995)). In 2004, the Supreme Court rejected this argument in the case Rasul v. Bush brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights, with the majority decision and ruled that prisoners in Guantanamo have access to American courts … On November 8, 2004 U.S. District Court Judge James Robertson ruled in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld that the Bush Administration could not try such prisoners as enemy combatants in a military tribunal and could not deny them access to the evidence used against them. Prisoners held at Camp Delta and Camp Echo have been labeled "illegal" or "unlawful enemy combatants", but a number of observers such as the Center for Constitutional Rights and Human Rights Watch maintain that the United States has not held the Article 5 tribunals specified by the Geneva Conventions. The International Committee of the Red Cross has stated that, "Every person in enemy hands must have some status under international law: he is either a prisoner of war and, as such, covered by the Third Convention, a civilian covered by the Fourth Convention, [or] a member of the medical personnel of the armed forces who is covered by the First Convention. There is no intermediate status; nobody in enemy hands can fall outside the law." Yessiree, sounds like everyone is certainly presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial in Bushland! And if you doubt the insincerity of the Bush/Cheney/Republican crew’s claims about the right to due process and a fair trial, consider this from a November 13, 2005 article in The Observer: Human rights campaigners are calling it the 'November surprise' - a last-minute amendment smuggled into a Pentagon finance bill in the US Senate last Thursday. Its effects are likely to be devastating: the permanent removal of almost all legal rights from 'war on terror' detainees at Guantanamo Bay and every other similar US facility on foreign or American soil. If the amendment passes the House of Representatives unmodified, one of its immediate effects is that Stafford Smith and all the other lawyers who act for Guantanamo prisoners will again be denied access, as they were for more than two years after Camp X-Ray opened in 2002. The amendment was tabled by Lindsay Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and passed by 49 votes to 42. It reverses the Supreme Court's decision in June last year which affirmed the right of detainees to bring habeas corpus petitions in American federal courts. The article also has this to say about the detainees at Guantanamo Bay: None of them were given any kind of hearing when they were consigned to Guantanamo. Instead, the Americans unilaterally declared they were unlawful 'enemy combatants', mostly on the basis of assessments by junior military intelligence personnel, who were often reliant on interpreters whose skills internal Pentagon reports have criticised. (sic) Nice, huh? First they stand in front of the cameras and say “each individual is presumed innocent and entitled to due process and a fair trial,” and then we find out about how they’ve “smuggled … the permanent removal of almost all legal rights” from anyone they choose into a finance bill. Where I grew up we called that lying and being deceitful. Unfortunately it’s just another day at the office for Bush and company. Just for fun, why don’t we all throw our support behind the Bush administration’s legal efforts and lobby for “the permanent removal of almost all legal rights” from Scooter Libby? Let’s start by denying him the right to use the nickname “Scooter.” I mean come on, when you’re the chief of staff (ex-chief of staff now) to the vice president and a co-architect of the grand scheme of Middle Eastern oil conquest that led to the Iraq debacle, shouldn’t you have a better nickname than Scooter? How about something more appropriate like Lewis “Shock and Awe” Libby, Lewis “The Conquer” Libby, Lewis “American Imperialist” Libby, or Lewis “Global Dominator” Libby? It's Cartoon Time Again! Bless You Rosa Parks
– May We Finish What You Started For some Americans the discrimination they face today is just as real and as unjust as the discrimination Rosa Parks faced so many years ago. Today, like then, the discrimination arises from people who want to oppress others who are not like them, those who are different in some way. As in the past, ignorance and fear are the root causes of this intolerance. Back then it came from certain white Americans who didn’t want black Americans to have the same rights they had. Today some of the worst discrimination in America comes from some members of the heterosexual community who don’t want homosexuals to have the same rights they have. Whether it’s the right to sit where you choose on the bus, or the right to marry the person of your choice, unfortunately discrimination is still very much alive in America. In the case of same-sex marriage, certain groups are willing to abandon the principle of “equal protection under the law” and deny other groups the right to the same legal protections that they themselves receive when they marry. The thing that is incredibly ironic about this is that many of the groups who are so eager to give up the standard of equal legal protection are religious groups. What they don’t seem to realize is that the standard either applies to everyone, or it doesn’t. Things are either equal or they’re not. You can’t have “partly equal” or “equal for some groups but not for others.” If some religious groups want to throw out “equal protection” and say that it’s okay to discriminate against a particular group based on some characteristic of their choosing, such as sexual orientation, then they have to be willing to say that it’s also okay for other groups do the same thing and discriminate against them based on some characteristic of their choosing, such as religious beliefs. That is the irony, and the hypocrisy, of this sort of discrimination. I can guarantee that if someone were to discriminate against one of these religious groups that are so eager to eliminate equal protection for others, and deny that group rights because of their religious beliefs, they would condemn that discrimination as religious persecution. They would complain loudly about how unjust and un-American, and perhaps even how immoral, it was. And yet they do exactly the same thing to others and seem to believe that it is perfectly fine and fully justified. Yes, we have made good progress in some ways in eliminating discrimination in American, but it seems that for as long as there are differences between people, and for as long as ignorance and fear are prevalent, there will continue to be discrimination against one group by another. I hope that I live to see the day when we, as a country, finish the work that Rosa Parks started so long ago. The day when we make equal rights and equal protection under the law more than just an abstract legal concept, the day when we make it a reality for all Americans. October 2005October is Gone? Huh? With the approach of winter there are plenty of things to be done around the “estate” and I’ve got a few other irons in the fire, as they say, including working on a bunch of new song ideas (the muse has been especially generous of late), doing pre-production work for another long-distance recording project, and working on a movie idea that I’m co-developing with an associate. It hasn’t left me with a lot of time to write commentary, which is a real shame because so much has been going on recently. Rosa Park sI say “God Bless You” to Rosa Parks, a true American hero, role model, and inspiration to everyone who wonders if a single person can make a difference. Rosa, you have inspired me to stand up on my web server and shout (or type) the message of truth and justice to the world. Plame, Iraq, and
More For years we’ve known about the oil pipeline that the Bush administration wanted to build through Afghanistan and Pakistan. Now we know about the administration’s meetings in mid-2001 (months before the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center) with the Taliban and members of Pakistan’s ISI (Pakistan’s secret service) where the Taliban were told that if they didn’t allow the pipeline to be built through Afghanistan, bombs would fall on them before the snow, by mid-October at the latest. Bush made good on that threat, invading Afghanistan on October 7. We also know about how neocons in the Bush administration were disappointed that Saddam Hussein was left in power at the end of the 1991 Gulf War and have continuously pressed to remove him, by military means if necessary. We know about how they pushed for the US to use force to secure strategic natural resources, like Middle Eastern oil. We know that Dick Cheney and representatives from major oil companies (the “Cheney energy task force”) met in March of 2001 (six months before the 9/11 attacks) and reviewed maps of Iraq’s oil fields and a list of potential buyers of Iraqi oil. We know about how Donald Rumsfeld and other neocons created the Office of Special Plans in the Pentagon to generate intelligence to support their plan for invading Iraq, intelligence which turned out to be false. The list goes on, and on, and on. I have barely scratched the surface. The American people deserve to know the truth, and justice should be done. I hope it is. Supreme
Court Nomination This opinion by Alito shows that he views women to be inferior citizens, not equal to their husbands, who can be required to seek the permission of their spouse before doing certain things. That is a dangerous attitude, a threat to the civil rights of women, and it should concern every woman in America. Tom DeLay Arrest Warrant Issued How the Bush
Administration Helped Bring Disaster to New Orleans Unfortunately in the case of Bush’s FEMA appointments, it has also cost many Americans their lives. (Have you noticed how so many of Bush’s actions result in more dead Americans? How can any American support this? It makes me wonder just whose side they’re on.) First Bush appointed Joe Allbaugh as head of FEMA. Did Allbaugh have any relevant experience that qualified him for the job? No, of course not, but that doesn’t matter in the Bush administration. Allbaugh had no experience in disaster management but he was one of Bush’s buddies from Texas, so he got the job. When Allbaugh decided to leave FEMA in 2002 Bush put his deputy, Michael Brown, in charge of the agency. Surely Brown had relevant experience, right? Wrong. Like Allbaugh, Brown had no disaster management experience. Before working at FEMA Brown had been the head of the International Arabian Horse Association. Let’s see, putting on horse shows and managing national disasters, they’re basically the same, right? I guess in George Bush’s mind they are. For him it’s all a show. To illustrate just how absurd (and wrong) this practice is, imagine if Bush appointed airline pilots or surgeons. How would you feel getting on a plane piloted by someone who was there because they had raised over $200,000 for Bush, even though they had never flown a plane before? Would you feel safe? Would you get on the plane? And how would you feel “going under the knife” of a surgeon who got his position because he had helped Bush with his campaign, even though he had no medical experience and had never operated on anyone before? Would you agree to let that person operate on you? And what about the person who made those appointments, would you support them? Would you support a person who endangered your life by putting someone with no flying experience in the pilot’s seat of your airplane? Would you support a person who endangered your life by appointing someone with no medical or surgical experience to operate on you? Not if you’re sane you wouldn’t. And yet for some reason, some people continue to support Bush even though he does exactly this sort of thing with his political appointments. The neglect of the New Orleans levee system due to Bush’s budget cuts and the flooding that resulted also illustrates a second danger of the Bush administration - their continued disregard of the needs of average Americans, especially the poor, in favor of the rich and large corporations. Bush and the Republicans in Congress have repeatedly cut or eliminated programs that millions of Americans depend on for their health, safety, and survival while handing big business and the wealthy huge giveaways. They have also taken more and more power and authority away from the agencies and organizations that protect average Americans and given more and more power and authority to big business and their wealthy supporters. As a result many of the support systems and safety nets that millions of Americans rely on to save them when misfortune strikes have been eroded to the point where they are no longer effective. This has seriously compromised the safety of millions of Americans and left them dangerously vulnerable. The Bush administration’s neglect of the American public’s safety has been particularly evident in the case of New Orleans. Just two months before hurricane Katrina caused the city’s levees to fail Bush slashed a record $71.2 million from the budget of the New Orleans branch of the Army Corp of Engineers. (The Corp is responsible for maintaining the levees.) The New Orleans branch of the Corp has suffered a 44.2% reduction in their funding since Bush took office in 2001. As a result work on the city’s levees stopped for the first time in 37 years, major hurricane and flood protection projects did not go forward, and a study to determine ways to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane was shelved. About the only way that Bush could have done more to endanger New Orleans would have been if he had gone there with a shovel to dig holes in the levees himself. The combination of these two Bush administration practices, the appointment of unqualified personnel to government positions as a reward for their political support and the continued redirection of resources away from critical support systems and toward wealthy Republican supporters and big business, has jeopardized the health, safety, and security of millions of Americans. This trend is not something that just recently developed, Bush has been doing these things since the very beginning of his presidency, it just took a large disaster like hurricane Katrina to make the consequences apparent to most Americans. I sincerely hope that my fellow Americans, especially those who have supported Bush or other Republican leaders, learn something from the New Orleans disaster. I hope they’re able to realize that this catastrophe didn’t have to be as bad as it was, the damage didn’t have to be so extensive and the loss of life so great. The money needed to maintain and improve the levees that protected New Orleans didn’t have to be cut from the federal budget so that tax cuts could be given to the wealthy, an unnecessary war could be funded, and giant corporations could make record profits. All it would have taken to save most (perhaps all) of New Orleans was a president and a ruling party that put the safety of the American people first, ahead of their own greed and desire for power. All it would have taken was a president and a ruling party that worked for the good of the American people instead of the good of special-interest lobbyists, big business, and their wealthy supporters. I hate to see bad things happen to my country and I hate to see my fellow citizens suffer, so please, people, when the next election comes around take the time to learn about the candidates before you vote. If you just blindly vote for the candidate from your chosen party every election then you’re not well-suited to a democracy. A democracy requires an educated and well-informed public that makes intelligent choices in order to succeed. If you don’t want to take the time to educate yourself about the issues and think about the effects of your choices, I suggest you move to a country where you don’t have to make that effort. There are plenty of places in the world where those choices are made for you, where you don’t have the burden of learning and thinking, and they’d be happy to have another person who blindly supports “the party.” But if you plan to stay in America and vote, take the time to research candidates’ backgrounds and learn what their priorities are, who they work for and who they neglect. Look at what they’ve done and the consequences of their actions. Don’t be fooled by their BS talking points and misleading campaign advertisements. Take the time to find out the truth. Look at what they do, not what they say, and think for yourself. Your life, as well as mine, may depend on it. Compromising FEMA, Endangering New Orleans September 2005 Tom DeLay Indicted for Criminal Conspiracy,
Steps Down as Majority Leader Stop the Presses:
Bush Says the R-Word – Responsibility George W. Bush (yes, THAT George W. Bush, the bonehead) actually stood at a podium, in public, with cameras rolling, and while commenting on the lame federal response to hurricane Katrina said “… to the extent that the federal government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility.” That’s right, go ahead, read it again, pinch yourself, you’re not dreaming. George Bush actually said the R-word and took responsibility for one small part of his administration’s incompetence. I imagine that as the words “I take responsibility” left his lips somewhere in the universe galaxies collided, stars exploded and black holes collapsed, tearing the very fabric of space-time asunder. For a second I thought that perhaps we had somehow swapped places with a mirror-image universe where everything was the opposite of our universe, where George W. Bush was a man of integrity and character. I was wrong, however. He’s still an idiot. From the video it was clear that it wasn’t easy for Bush to make that statement, it looked like he really had to struggle to get the words out. It reminded me of his appearance on Earth Day earlier this year, where it looked like it actually caused him physical pain to say something good about protecting the environment. I’m sure Bush didn’t want to take responsibility for his administration’s failures in responding to hurricane Katrina, but with his approval ratings the lowest of his presidency I’m sure Karl Rove is desperate to try anything, even trying to make Bush appear to be a man of integrity who takes responsibility for his mistakes. At least Rove knew that he would have the element of surprise with that tactic, no one was expecting anything like that from Bush. I can just see Bush arguing with Rove about it, like a child whose mother has told him that he has to go apologize for something he’s done wrong. “You’ve got to say it George” Rove would insist. “But I don’t waaannnt to!” Bush would whine. “George, listen to me,” Rove would say. “No! No! NO NO NO!” Bush would yell while stomping his feet, “You can’t make me!” “George, I’ve already made you,” Rove would calmly reply, “Your political career would be nothing without me.” “But I don’t wanna say it!!” Bush would insist, “I wanna start another war! Give me another war! I’m a war president!” “Now George, what did I tell you about that?” Rove would ask, “You can’t start another war until the finish the ones you’ve already started.” “Whhhhaaaa!!!” I can just imagine Bush spending an hour or so whining, pouting, stomping his feet, pounding his fists, and holding his breath before he finally gave in to Rove and agreed to read what had been written for him like a good little president. I still can’t believe he said it. It’s not like he meant it or anything, but it’s still amazing that he managed to get the words out of his mouth. New Music - Bryan Lee Foster (aka The
Phoenix) A Note to George Bush About Hurricane
Katrina In a recent speech you repeated a statement that you have made several times before, saying “We will confront emerging threats before they fully materialize.” Well guess what George, global warming is a serious threat to America and the whole world, and it has just materialized all over Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. It has already caused hundreds of billions of dollars in damage and claimed tens of thousands of lives, and it will only get worse. I ask you George, do you really mean what you say about “confronting threats before they fully materialize” or is that just more of your BS? Your words may lie but your actions will reveal the truth. You have an important choice to make George. Are you going to do the right thing and stand up for America and the American people? Are you going to address this threat that we face and do your best to protect us from it? Or are you going to continue selling us out and being a whore for the energy industry, performing obscene acts of greed and betrayal in exchange for their money? I’m sure you’ll take issue with my use of words like whore and obscene, George, but they are accurate. One definition of a whore is a person “who is regarded as willing to set aside principles or personal integrity in order to obtain something, usually for selfish motives.” There’s no way that you can truthfully argue with that characterization George, it describes you to a tee. Your actions throughout your professional and political career have shown us that. Likewise, one definition of obscene is “disgusting and morally offensive, especially through an apparent total disregard for others' rights or natural justice.” They sure nailed you with that one. I’m surprised your picture isn’t in the dictionary next to it. You say that you’ve refused to sign the Kyoto treaty, take meaningful steps to reduce US greenhouse gas emissions, or otherwise address global warming because it would hurt the US economy. Well George, can you look me in the eye, can you look the American people in the eye, and tell us truthfully that disasters like hurricane Katrina don’t hurt the US economy? That the economy is somehow better off with a major city destroyed and submerged? That all those hurricanes that hit Florida last year didn’t hurt the economy? That all of the more frequent, more deadly, and more destructive storms that are coming in the years ahead won’t hurt the economy? What you don’t seem to understand, George, is that one way or another we’re going to have to pay the price for global warming, we cannot avoid it and we cannot escape it. Tax cuts won’t make it go away, talking points won’t prevent it, and you can’t fight it over there so we won’t get warm here. We can pay now in the form of tougher environmental regulations that take a modest amount of money out of our pockets (and reward us with longer, healthier lives and lower medical expenses), or we (and our children and grandchildren) can pay a hell of a lot more later in the form of deadly heat waves, destructive storms, flooded cities, destroyed homes, devastated lives, and dead bodies. What’s it going to be, George? Which future do you want for America? Are you going to stand on the side of the American people and do what’s right, or sell us out again for campaign contributions from the energy industry? Are you going to “mean what you say” and address this threat, or once again be a liar? Are you going to promote a “culture of life” by protecting the environment that sustains all life, or promote a culture of suffering and death by continuing to take the side of polluters who poison that environment? Are you going to be a patriot and a leader and do what’s right for your country, or are you going to continue being an oil industry whore? I know it’s a tough choice for you, George, the people or the almighty dollar. You’ve got three more years of your term to show us what your choice is, and we’ll be watching. The Gloves Are
Off As of today, the gloves are off. I am calling a spade a spade, a traitor a traitor, and bullshit, well, I’m calling it exactly what it is, male bovine feces. I hope sensitive readers will excuse my language because at times I may utilize the full dynamic range of the English lexicon, and it’s likely to get colorful. The straw that broke this blogger’s back was watching the Hurricane Katrina disaster, watching the Bush administration’s reaction, and thinking about the things that Bush had done to make the disaster worse, like slashing funding for New Orleans hurricane and flooding protection and ignoring global warming. Over the past five years I have spent many months researching and studying Bush and the neocons he rode to Washington on. I have read many tens of thousands of pages documenting their actions and the effects they have had. I’m not talking about the deceptive and misleading “talking points” they repeat ad nauseam or any of the things they say from a podium when the TV cameras are on them, I’m talking about what they do when the cameras are off and reporters weren’t around taking notes. (And 99% of the time it’s the opposite of what they said from the podium.) All of those months of research have led me to this conclusion: George W. Bush and his cohorts are doing serious harm to America, and anyone who supports them is either willfully ignorant, in denial, a traitor, or all of the above. As a patriotic US citizen I believe it is my duty to do what I can to defend America against all threats, foreign and domestic, and today the Bush administration is one of the greatest domestic threats that America faces. If you disagree with that statement then you don’t know much about the Bush administration and you don’t understand how their policies have negatively affected almost every aspect of life as an American. George Bush is much like the captain of the Titanic. He believes things that aren’t true (“the ship is unsinkable”) and when people who are more intelligent and better informed than he is try to alert him to reality (impending disaster) he discredits them and refuses to believe them. His response is to blindly and unthinkingly repeat his mantra that we need to “stay the course” – right toward the iceberg. Well people, Captain Bush has sailed America into the iceberg and we’re taking on water fast, literally. In response, Bush and his administration are hurriedly arranging dinner parties, masquerade balls, and other activities in a desperate attempt to distract us from the seriousness of the problem. Any member of his crew that tries to reveal the truth and tell the passengers that the ship is sinking is promptly attacked and thrown overboard. In the end Bush and his friends will escape unscathed, made even wealthier by the ordeal, while we the passengers are abandoned and left to drown as the ship goes down, our bodies floating in the aftermath like those poor souls in New Orleans I have had enough. The time for being polite is long past. This is, literally, a matter of life and death. For the hundreds of thousands of poor women and children around the world who have died because Bush eliminated funding for the programs that provided critical medical care for them. For the poor elderly Americans who had their heat shut off and froze to death in their homes during the winter of 2003 because Bush refused to release the funds for the program that helped them pay their heating bills. For the 6,000-9,000 Americans who die every year because of Bush’s cutbacks in pollution protection. For the thousands of babies who are born with birth defects and neurological disorders each year because of the additional chemicals that Bush has allowed to be spewed into our environment. For the hundreds of thousands of people in Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and other states whose lives have been devastated by storms made increasingly frequent and violent by the global warming that Bush ignorantly refuses to address. For the more than 35,000 Europeans who died in the killer heat wave of 2003 that was fueled by that same warming. For the more than 100,000 innocent civilians and thousands of soldiers who have been killed in Bush’s wars for oil in Afghanistan and Iraq, wars based on neocon delusions of grandeur, greed, lies, and deceit. And for the thousands more who will be killed or irreparably harmed if George Bush and his cadre of crooks are allowed to continue pursuing their heartless, self-serving agenda at the expense of America and the American people. I must speak out for those who can no longer speak for themselves because their lives have been ended and their voices silenced by Bush’s cruel and inhumane actions. Their deaths should not be forgotten, and they should not be in vain. And to those who think my opposition to the Bush administration is extreme, unpatriotic, or wrong, I must ask, what if it was discovered that Al Qaeda or some other terrorist organization was taking actions that were causing hundreds of billions of dollars in damage to the US and killing thousands of Americans every year? Would you be outraged? Would you demand that we use all our resources to defend our country and stop them? Would you demand that they be brought to justice? So how do you respond to the fact that the Bush administration’s actions are causing hundreds of billions of dollars in damage to the US and killing thousands of Americans every year? Not just in Iraq but right here in America as a result of Bush’s environmental and domestic policies. Do you think that it’s fine because it’s our own government doing it to us instead of some other organization? That it’s fine because the perpetrators belong to the same political party as you do? Does that somehow make it OK? Does that make it any less of a crime? Does that make it any less of an assault on the American people? Does that mean that we shouldn’t take action, defend our country, and try to stop them? Does that mean that we shouldn’t demand they be brought to justice? No, it does not. It’s not OK, it’s still a crime, it’s still an assault on the American people, and we should do everything we can to defend our country, try to stop them, and demand they be brought to justice. I understand that it’s very easy to pretend everything will be fine, to change the channel, turn off the news, tune out, not pay attention, go on with your life and refuse to believe how bad it really is. I understand that we all want to believe that our government is good and they’re doing good in our names, that they have our best interests at heart. I understand how reassuring it is to believe soothing sound-bite talking points that make the frightening complexities of a dangerous world seem so simple and easily solved. I understand the comforting lure of the “ignorance is bliss” approach and I know how hard it is to admit that as a nation we have made a colossal mistake in electing George Bush president. It is a mistake that has cost hundreds of thousands of people their lives, cost us (and our children and grandchildren) trillions of dollars, and cost America its reputation as a noble and just nation. It may be difficult and it may be uncomfortable, but the time has come for all of us to take a hard, honest look at the actions of the Bush administration, call them what they are, and hold them accountable. If America is to ever be respected again as a country that values truth, integrity, justice and knowledge over lies, deceit, ignorance and blind dogma, it must be done. Crimes are still crimes regardless of whether they’re committed by people with light skin or dark skin, Christians or Muslims, our own government or foreign insurgents. It doesn’t matter whether they’re paid for with our tax dollars or by terrorist supporters, either way the misdeeds are just as despicable and the victims are just as dead. It has been said that all that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing. Are you a good person? Are you doing something? Are you speaking out, writing letters to the editor, signing petitions, contacting your representatives, donating to organizations that oppose the Bush administration? At a time like this apathy and inaction are akin to treason. Yes, that is a strong statement, but it is not an exaggeration. To sit by and do nothing to stop the Bush/neocon agenda is to betray your country and your fellow citizens. The stakes are too high to continue denying the truth any longer. The time has come for each of us to decide where our loyalty lies. Are you for America and the American people, or against them? Will you do your part to stop the destructive Bush/neocon agenda, or will you be complicit in their crimes? Will you stand up for what is good, and right, and just, or will you allow treachery to prevail? Will you be a patriot who defends your country, or a traitor who allows it to be raped, pillaged and plundered by the highest bidder? I have made my choice. Have you made yours? Our Hearts Go Out to All Victims of Hurricane
Katrina August 2005 God
Bless Cindy Sheehan The Bible also says that the world is filled with good and evil. If you believe that, then which side do the peace makers fall on and which side do the war makers fall on? If the peace makers are blessed by God as the Bible says then they must be good, because God would not bless evil. That means that war makers are the opposite of good, or evil. So what does this say about Cindy Sheehan and George Bush? Which one is the peace maker and which one is the war maker? Which one is blessed and which one is damned? Which one is good and which one is evil? If you claim to believe the Bible and believe what is says, then there is only one rational conclusion that you can reach. It is an irrefutable fact that Cindy Sheehan is a peace maker and George Bush is a war maker. Bush made his position clear when he proclaimed “I’m a war president.” Therefore Cindy Sheehan is blessed and George Bush is damned. Cindy Sheehan is good and George Bush is evil. To some of you that’s probably a startling conclusion, but it’s very simple and straightforward. There’s no convoluted rhetoric, no doubletalk, and no misleading talking points. If you’re having trouble accepting it go back and read that passage from Matthew again. It doesn’t say “Blessed are the peace makers unless they stand along the road with signs,” or “Blessed are the peace makers unless they want to talk to the president,” or “Blessed are the peace makers unless they disagree with US foreign policy.” It says "Blessed are the peace makers, for they will be called sons of God” – period, end of sentence, full stop. No qualifiers, no conditions, no fine print, no exceptions. God Bless you, Cindy Sheehan. And as for George Bush, let’s just say I’m confident that he will pay for his crimes, if not in this world or this lifetime, in another one. Cow Manure Eyed as Alternate Fuel Source The article says researchers (what are they called, bullshitologists?) are experimenting to find the best mix of manure to yield the most useable energy and heat. I think there’s also an opportunity to maximize the energy output by modifying what the cows eat. I know a taqueria that makes a bean burrito that’ll give those cow pies a real kick, and a Texas five-alarm chili joint that’s sure to result in high-octane bovine droppings. The only potential problem, of course, is that the resulting cow flatulence would be a fire hazard (Please, no open flames around the longhorns!) but technology does exist to mitigate that danger. *Note: All calculations were performed using a little-known variation on Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity (E=mc2) known as Einstein’s Conjecture of Bovine Relativity, E=cm2, where Energy = cow manure2. Did you know that if you were to send a cow into space and accelerate it to near the speed of light, time would pass much more slowly for it than for the cows back on Earth? And did you know that the farmer would be really pissed at you for sending his cow into space? Read the San Jose Mercury News article at http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/12445125.htm. The End Must Be Near Why
is George Afraid of Cindy? It’s a general pattern of spinelessness that I’m surprised the media hasn’t noticed and pointed out. OK, scratch that, the mainstream media seems thoroughly incapable of meaningful analysis or insight these days, so I guess the lack of exposure is par for the sordid course. But back to cowardly George. This is a topic that could easily be a full article (and if I get the time it may be) but in brief, if you look at Bush’s career what you see is an ongoing pattern of spinelessness and avoidance of any conflict that he would have to personally face. Look at his military “career.” He used family connections to get in the “champagne unit” where he’d be safe and sound with all the other little rich boys. He never had to face any real conflict, but he even skipped out on that, not showing up to complete his service. Look at all the hundreds of campaign appearances and “town hall” meetings Bush has held where the audience members were thoroughly screened and hand-selected to ensure that there wouldn’t be a single person in attendance who disagreed with him. God forbid poor Georgie should have to face someone who asked him a tough question, he doesn’t have the mettle for that. Look at how Bush “flip-flopped” his position on the Israeli withdrawal from occupied Palestinian territories to suit whichever side had just pressed their case to him. The lines between Israel and Palestine have shifted over the years, and a point of contention has been whether Israel should withdraw to the armistice lines of 1949 or those of 1967. First, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon met with Bush and argued for the 1967 lines, and afterward Bush endorsed Sharon’s position, saying it was unrealistic to expect a return to the 1949 lines. Then Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas met with Bush and argued for the 1949 lines, and afterward Bush endorsed Abbas’ position, saying that any changes to the 1949 lines would have to be mutually agreed to by both sides. Thankfully we were spared the spectacle of revolving door visits by Sharon and Abbas, with Bush changing his position back and forth depending on who had spoken to him most recently. Bush apparently couldn’t muster the nerve to take a firm position and defend his decision to the opposing side. Look at the administration neocons and the Iraq war. It’s been well documented that the neoconservatives in the Bush administration have wanted to invade Iraq since the end of the first Gulf war, which they felt was “unfinished.” People like Paul Wolfowitz were especially vocal about it in published papers as far back as 1992. Wolfowitz, Cheney, and Rumsfeld became hawks of a feather on this issue, and when Bush-Cheney took power in 2000 Cheney brought a whole flock of neocons with him to the administration (Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Bolton, Feith, Perle, Libby, and many more). This motley crew pressured Bush to carry out their wishes to invade Iraq, overthrow Saddam, and privatize Iraq’s oil industry (Cheney’s pet project), and of course Bush caved in and went along with it. It’s an amazing irony that the invasion of Iraq, which Bush’s supporters cite as a prime example of his toughness, is actually a prime example of his weakness, of his inability to stand up to the neocons in his administration and say no to their delusional visions of global conquest. Bush didn’t go along with the Iraq invasion because he’s tough, he went along with the Iraq invasion because he was afraid to face the neocons around him and tell them no. He’s not equipped to deal with that kind of personal, one-on-one confrontation. And look at the literally hundreds of times throughout Bush’s presidential career when he’s given in to pressure from lobbyists, big-money donors, and special interests, and given them whatever they’ve wanted. It’s like he (along with many members of the Republican “leadership”) are their paid servants, dutifully doing their master’s bidding, rewriting legislation and giving away more and more of America to big, wealthy interests so they can pillage and plunder it at will in the name of the almighty dollar. I’m convinced that’s why Bush’s handlers so carefully control who gains access to him. Only those who are willing to spend the most money to pay off the gatekeepers are allowed to enter the castle and have an audience with King George the Spineless, who promptly consents to their demands and grants their wishes. It doesn’t matter how badly their requests (which usually involve harming others in the name of making more money) hurt America or the American people, all it takes is a little pressure and Bush folds like a house of cards and gives them whatever they want. When Bush needs to act strong he can certainly put on a decent show. He’s fairly good at following Rove’s instructions and posturing properly at the podium, saying the right words to sound tough, putting on a costume and strutting around on an aircraft carrier, and generally giving the impression that he has some strength and conviction under his designer suit, but his actions reveal that it’s all an elaborately choreographed charade. The reality is that time and time again when Bush was faced with the prospect of personally facing conflict, looking someone in the eye and defending his position, he has wimped out. So George, I challenge you to overcome your fear of facing the opposition, find yourself a spine (borrow one from Cheney if you need to, he seems to have plenty), and go talk to Cindy Sheehan. Are you man enough to do that? Are you brave enough to do that? Or will you take the easy, cowardly way out and avoid her? What you do in this situation, George, will tell us far more about your true character than all of your well-rehearsed speeches. It’s been reported that as Bush’s motorcade drove past Cindy Sheehan on the way to a $2 million fundraiser for the Republican National Committee, she stood holding a sign which asked “Why do you make time for donors and not for me?” I can answer that question for you Cindy. It’s an answer that is both simple and sad. It’s because Bush’s donors are rich and powerful, and you’re not. It’s because they can give him lots of money while you can only give him your son, and Bush values their dollars far more than he values your son’s life. And it’s because Bush, an AWOL chickenhawk who started a war based on lies and sent your son and hundreds of thousands of other American sons and daughters half way around the world to face bullets and bombs in the sweltering Iraqi heat, doesn’t have the guts to face an angry mother on a back road in Texas. Send Bush an email and tell him to meet with Cindy at president@whitehouse.gov. Bill
O’Reilly Goes O’Crazy Bill’s
Brain to Robert Novak: Keep On Walking! Bush Appoints Bolton: It’s Payback Time Bush and the White House had been stalling the Bolton vote for weeks, refusing the Senate’s requests for documents from Bolton’s past that could reveal just how ill-suited he is for the job. This stonewalling was actually a smart strategy on the part of Bush and White House, as it allowed them to keep incriminating evidence about Bolton’s past secret, and it also allowed them to stall the vote on Bolton (which very well could have resulted in him being rejected) until the Congressional recess, thereby allowing Bush to appoint him during the recess. In the end Bolton’s skeletons stayed in his closet, Bush didn’t have to risk a politically damaging Senate rejection of Bolton, and Bush got his way. It was a win-win-lose situation for Bush, Bolton, and the American people. Why was Bush so determined to appoint Bolton? In the Bush administration it’s all about loyalty and payback. It doesn’t matter whether the person is competent, or if they’re qualified for the position, or if it’s bad for America. If they’ve been loyal to Bush and his agenda, Bush will pay them back, often with a cushy appointment. Bolton has been very loyal to Bush and his agenda, so Bush was determined to give him this appointment as his reward. It also fits in nicely with Bush’s general dislike of the United Nations. Let’s take a quick look at what Bolton has done to earn his reward: 2000 Election *AEI stands for American Enterprise Institute. As reported in Wikipedia, the AEI “has emerged as one of the leading architects of the Bush administration's public policy; more than two dozen AEI alumni have served either in a Bush administration policy post or on one of the government's many panels and commissions.” Avoiding Prosecution New American Century Office of Special Plans Yellow Cake Lies Distorting Intelligence It has been said that Bolton repeatedly “cherry picked” bits of intelligence that supported the neocons’ agenda while rejecting intelligence that didn’t. Greg Thielman, of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), was assigned as Bolton’s intelligence liaison and met with him daily to discuss the INR’s latest findings, at least for a while. Thielman describes why the meetings ended: "Bolton seemed troubled because INR was not telling him what he wanted to hear ... I was intercepted at the door of his office and told, 'The Undersecretary doesn't need you to attend this meeting anymore.'" Bolton was getting all of the “intelligence” he needed to support the Iraq invasion from the neocons’ Office of Special Plans, he didn’t need any real intelligence getting in the way. It has also been reported that Bolton withheld information that contradicted the administration’s WMD claims from Secretary of State Colin Powell on several occasions, and from his successor, Condoleezza Rice, at least once. Eliminating Opponents In the run up to the invasion, when the Bush administration was making accusations about Saddam Hussein’s chemical and biological weapons, Bustani was working to send chemical weapons inspectors to Iraq to verify the administration’s claims. Of course there were no chemical weapons, so the inspectors represented a threat to the administration’s planned invasion. They couldn’t allow their WMD claims to be exposed as lies, and so Bustani came to be viewed as one of the “foremost obstacles to war.” Bolton decided that Bustani had to go, so he flew to Europe to demand Bustani’s resignation, and orchestrated his removal at a special session of the OPCW. Bolton’s actions were later condemned by the United Nation’s highest administrative tribunal as an "unacceptable violation" of the principles that protect international civil servants. Abuse of Power After the Iraq invasion Bolton continued to target officials who questioned or criticized the Bush administration’s erroneous WMD intelligence. Both Mohamed ElBaradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and Hans Blix, head of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, were targeted by Bolton after they criticized the invasion of Iraq as unjustified. Bolton reportedly got the CIA and the NSA to spy on both of them in an effort to find something he could use against them to remove them from their positions. (Nice guy, huh? No spitefulness or vindictiveness there. Just the kind of guy I want representing the US to the international community. NOT!) Anti-United Nations Bolton has made no secret of his anti-UN feelings, including his infamous statement about the UN headquarters Secretariat building: "The Secretariat building in New York has 38 stories. If it lost ten stories, it wouldn't make a bit of difference." Indeed, it seems that the only use Bolton sees for the UN is as a tool of the US. In a paper he wrote on US participation in the UN, Bolton stated "the United Nations can be a useful instrument in the conduct of American foreign policy." Pro-Gun Agenda Spreading Biological Weapons We Like Nukes No Longer Invited to the Party Lying to Congress As these sordid examples show, Bolton has been a loyal Bush supporter, faithfully pushing the neocons’ New American Century Iraq invasion oil conquest agenda, and his UN appointment is his reward. Having an anti-UN ambassador will also help further the PNAC goal of marginalizing the United Nations. The Bolton appointment illustrates a pattern that is not only disturbing but also harmful to America, one that Bush has repeated over and over again. Rewards and promotions in the Bush administration are not based on competence or success in doing things that benefit the country or the American people, they’re based on loyalty to Bush and his agenda and are given as payback for services rendered to Bush and the party. Time and time again Bush’s buddies are the winners, and the American people are the losers. Based on his actions it seems obvious that Bush doesn’t really care about what Congress thinks, or what the American people think, or even if Bolton is qualified for the job. The Bolton appointment is a continuation of Bush’s policy of paying back those who have helped him, and yet another opportunity for him to demonstrate his contempt for the UN. If there’s any consolation to be had, it comes from the fact that because Bolton’s appointment was a recess appointment he will only serve as ambassador until the next session of Congress, in January 2007. Still, a loose canon neocon ideologue like Bolton can do a lot of damage in 18 months. We must remain vigilant and speak out, loudly, whenever he acts in ways that threaten America’s security and prosperity. July 2005 Bush
Administration Lobbies for Cruel, Inhumane and Degrading Treatment But wonder of wonders, guess who has come out on the side of cruel tyrants and “evildoers” everywhere by opposing McCain’s measure. That’s right, you guessed it, the Bush administration. Think about that for a while, roll it around in your head, and let it sink in. By opposing this legislation Bush and his cohorts have now officially spoken out in favor of "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" of prisoners. If their support of Alberto Gonzales, with his collection of memos justifying the use of torture, wasn’t a clear enough signal as to just how morally bankrupt (and dare I say, evil?) this administration is, it should now be painfully clear to everyone, especially anyone unlucky enough to be in US custody during the reign of the Bush regime. To anyone who still holds traditional American values it’s disgusting, completely disgusting. The effort that the White House put forth to block McCain’s legislation is nothing short of amazing considering their history of doing nothing more than posturing and showing up for photo ops when it’s politically advantageous, then sitting on the sidelines when real work needs to be done. They put far more effort into blocking this legislation than they have for doing things like decreasing America’s dependence on fossil fuels and foreign oil, securing our borders, or doing anything that would help the American people (anyone who’s not one of their wealthy supporters). It’s important to note that McCain and several supporters in the Senate were attempting to add the anti-torture legislation as an amendment to a $491 billion defense spending bill which included $50 billion for operations in Iraq. Not only did the White House threaten to veto the defense spending bill if the anti-torture legislation was included (it would have been the first Bush veto in his presidential career), but Dick Cheney even met personally with members of the Senate twice in an effort to block it. That should give you an idea of just how important this was, I mean who else has Cheney proactively met with, other than the oil companies that he was going to let divvy up Iraq’s oil fields after the war (remember the secret Cheney energy task force?). And of course Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (Republican, of course) was also working his tookus off, twisting arms and lobbying and trying to prevent the McCain amendment from being added to the defense bill. In the end, however, Frist, Cheney and the White House weren’t able to convince enough Senators to forsake their values and support torture. They couldn’t get enough votes to block the legislation, it was successfully added to the defense spending bill and it looked very likely that the bill would pass with the anti-torture amendment. So what did they do? In an amazing display of chutzpah, Frist pulled the bill from consideration in order to prevent a vote on it and stop it from passing. That’s right, they nixed a bill which would have provided $50 billion for our troops in Iraq because it was going to limit their ability to torture people. Think about that. If any of you were unsure about the Bush administration’s values or priorities there’s no longer any excuse for ignorance, this latest charade makes it totally clear. Allow me to paraphrase the administration’s position: “To hell with the troops, we want to torture people, damn it! Preserving the ability to torture prisoners is more important than giving our troops what they need. I mean come on, if we can’t torture anyone anymore then what are we fighting for? What good is ‘spreading freedom’ if we’re not free to be cruel and inhumane?” One White House official actually said that the McCain legislation would “usurp the president’s authority.” Yep, that crazy old George Bush, he really enjoys having the authority to beat the shit out of people and put jumper cables on their testicles. He always was a real fun-loving guy. And such a good Christian too. (Question for George: Did God tell you that you have the authority to torture people? Have you asked Him about it? You might want to. I’ve heard He’s against it. I think He has a special place for people who do things like that.) The White House official also said that McCain’s legislation would interfere with Bush’s ability “to protect Americans effectively from terrorist attack.” OK, let’s see if we can follow the twisted logic on this one. The Bush administration says that in order to effectively protect Americans from terrorist attack they need to be able to torture prisoners, an act which thoroughly enrages those who oppose the US, reinforces the radical belief that America is the evil “Great Satan,” and inspires more terrorists to hate us and want to kill us, all of which puts us in even greater danger of a terrorist attack. Once again the Bush administration says they’re doing one thing when in reality they’re doing the opposite, and the American people pay the price. Another question for George: Does anyone in your administration posses the ability to think logically and clearly, and if so, why don’t they? And what will happen the next time that a US solder or someone else is captured by insurgents in Iraq and subjected to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment? Will Bush and company say it’s all fine and good because the insurgents are just doing the same things that the White House says it should be able to do? I don’t think that Bush and his ethically-challenged minions grasp the fact that by speaking out in support of the right to mistreat prisoners they’re actually increasing the chances that our own soldiers will be mistreated if they happen to be captured. Way to “support the troops” there George. Not only are you denying them money that could provide life-saving armor by blocking the defense bill, you’re also increasing the chances that they could suffer a horrific fate if they’re captured. Note to John McCain: Bush Says He Will Fire Himself If Bush really did mean what he said, then he’d be getting rid of everyone who was involved in producing those propaganda videos that his administration tried to pass of as “news.” The General Accounting Office (GAO) investigated them and determined that they violated not one, but two federal laws. As reported in the Washington Post, “The 16-page legal opinion says that Health and Human Service’s "video news releases" violated a statute that forbids the use of federal money for propaganda, as well as the Antideficiency Act, which covers the unauthorized use of federal funds.” That means that the people who produced and distributed the videos committed a crime so Bush is showing them the door, just like he said, right? (No.) And then of course we have Bush’s own crimes, and what whoppers they are. Let’s start with one that hasn’t received much attention in the press and therefore most people probably don’t know about it. It has to do with the Iraq war resolution passed by Congress, the one that Bush claims gave him the authority to invade Iraq, Public Law 107-243. It required Bush to meet two conditions, and to submit a formal presidential determination to Congress showing that he had met those two conditions, in order to gain approval to invade. He didn’t do it. In essence, what Bush did was to take the language in the Congressional resolution, which lists the conditions that he was required to find true in order to use force against Iraq, copied it, pasted it into his “presidential determination,” and gave it back to Congress saying “Congress has found all of the following to be true.” As John W. Dean says in his book “Worse Than Watergate,” it was a case of “male bovine droppings” which “totally fails to comply with the requirements of the Iraq war resolution.” Congress had not found any of the conditions to be true, Congress was requiring Bush to find those items to be true in order to justify the invasion, but Bush didn’t do it. Thus, according to the conditions of Public Law 107-243 Bush did not have Congressional approval to invade Iraq, and his invasion was illegal. Pack up your desk Georgie-boy, because you can no longer work in your administration, right? That’s what you said, right? And then of course there’s lying to Congress, which not only a crime but also an impeachable offense. Thanks to the English “Deep Throat” who has leaked the Downing Street Memos and other secret British government documents, we now know that Bush had made up his mind to attack Iraq and was moving ahead with war planning, all the while telling Congress that he wasn’t. Note to Bush: Lying to Congress is a crime Georgie-boy, so I guess you’re looking for a job now? You said it yourself: “If someone committed a crime, they will no longer work in my administration.” So are you leaving the administration or are you just planning on not doing any work? Technically you could just stop working and it would satisfy the conditions of your statement. And it’s not like anyone would notice, I mean you’ve spent 40% of your presidency on vacation and most of the rest of the time out to lunch, either literally or figuratively. It would actually be a lot better for the country if you did stop working because every time you do something it makes life worse for most Americans and a lot of other people around the world. And just on the remote, slight, highly unlikely chance that you really do “mean what you say” (hey, maybe pigs will fly?) I’ll pay for your ticket back to Crawford. When I look at how much your debt is costing me, a plane ticket is a helluva lot cheaper. So what’s it gonna be George, are you going to be a man of your word and leave the administration, or were you just spreading BS as usual? House Energy
Chair Attempts to Intimidate Climate Scientists Rove and Plame: The Great Diversion Consider the facts: In the preceding weeks the infamous Downing Street Memos had been causing a stir and were beginning to gather more media attention. As more British documents were leaked and the evidence of Bush’s pre-war lies and deception mounted there was more and more talk of impeachment. (Lying to Congress is an impeachable offense.) There were even discussions of the fact that if the memos’ allegations were true, Bush and his co-conspirators could be prosecuted for war crimes for what they had done. If there’s one thing that Bush and his neocon cohorts are afraid of it’s being hauled off to the Hague and charged with war crimes. It’s clear that Bush wants to avoid appearing before the International Criminal Court (ICC) as “the defendant,” it’s one of the few messes that daddy’s money and daddy’s connections can’t get him out of. That’s why he pulled the US out of the ICC before he invaded Iraq. That’s why he has refused to allow the ICC to handle the Darfur genocide case. That’s why he has repeatedly insisted that the ICC doesn’t have jurisdiction over him or members of his administration, and it’s why he has consistently worked to undermine the ICC’s authority. All of the talk about the Downing Street Memos, impeachment, and war crimes was understandably making the Bush administration nervous. Their biggest crime had been exposed and it was beginning to attract the attention of the mainstream media. There was a very real danger that if the press (and the American people) maintained their focus on the Memo scandal and persisted in digging, asking tough questions and insisting on answers, it could all turn out very badly for Bush and his neocon crew. They might actually be held responsible for their actions (that would be a first), removed from power, and worst-case, end up in jail. They had to do something to divert attention away from the Memos and their increasingly obvious Iraq war lies. They had to do something big, something they knew would dominate the news for weeks or months to come, something that would push the Downing Street Memos off the front pages and out of the headlines. Luckily for them, the Valerie Plame leak investigation was beginning to garner significant press attention, and they saw a way to use it to their advantage. The Plame investigation presented the Bush administration with the opportunity to create a grand diversion. I believe that a decision was made to sacrifice Rove, to have him make the call to Matthew Cooper, in order to create that diversion and take the heat off the rest of the administration. They knew that if Rove was identified as the source of the leak it would be such a big story and generate such a media feeding frenzy that the Downing Street Memos and the talk of impeachment and war crimes would disappear from the headlines, hopefully forever. It came down to a choice between potentially losing one advisor (Rove), or potentially losing the whole administration, and so Rove stepped forward. And from what I’ve seen thus far, their diversion is working just as they’d hoped. Once again the media has been played by the Bush administration. The mainstream press is doing exactly what the administration wants them to do, they’re ignoring the Downing Street Memos and swarming all over the Rove-Plame story. The sad irony of the situation is that just when the press thinks they’re getting tough with the Bush administration by pelting (White House press secretary) Scott McClellan with questions about Rove’s involvement in the Plame case and making it their featured story, the reality is that they’re once again allowing themselves to be used by the administration. Once again they’re allowing the Bush administration to determine which stories get the headlines, and thus the public’s attention. So, to all members of the media I say: If you really want to do your job as an independent press and get tough with the administration, stop letting them lead you around and go back to asking questions about the Downing Street Memos. Ask Bush why he told Congress that he would use force only as a last resort in dealing with Saddam Hussein, when in fact US and British planes had begun secretly bombing Iraq months earlier. Ask him if he realizes that lying to Congress is an impeachable offense. Ask him if he knows what the word “impeachable” means. Ask him exactly what “the plan” was that the memos refer to, what intelligence was being “fixed” to it, and if it came from the special Pentagon office the neocons created to “gather” their own intelligence to support the invasion, free of oversight by the CIA or any other established intelligence organization. Ask him why, even though Saddam Hussein had complied with his demands and allowed unannounced weapons inspections anywhere in Iraq, he still ordered the inspectors out of the country and invaded. Ask him why, even though his administration claimed to know where Saddam’s alleged WMDs were, each and every time that the inspectors went where the administration told them to go they found nothing. And while you’re at it, ask Cheney why, at his secret energy task force meeting with representatives from the major oil companies, held two years before the Iraq war, he presented maps of Iraq’s oil fields and documents with titles like “Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts.” And ask them both to explain how all of this relates to the right-wing think tank Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the PNAC’s papers advocating world domination (starting with – surprise – the “unresolved conflict” with Iraq) and control of strategic resources (like Iraqi oil), and the fact that no less than 16 members of the Bush administration are also members of the PNAC. There are plenty more questions to ask, but that’s enough to get you started. Go to it. Rove Leaks to
Novak – It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again Rove fired from Bush Sr's '92 campaign over leak to Novak. - Karl Rove was fired from the 1992 re-election campaign of Bush Sr. for allegedly leaking a negative story about Bush loyalist/fundraiser Robert Mosbacher to Novak. Novak's piece described a meeting organized by then-Senator Phil Gramm at which Mosbacher was relieved of his duties as state campaign manager because "the president's re-election effort in Texas has been a bust." Rove was fired after Mosbacher fingered him as Novak's source.
Rove was the "only one with a motive to leak": Mosbacher says: "I said Rove is the only one with a motive to leak this. We let him go." The motive in question? Mosbacher had given Rove only a quarter of the $1 million spent on direct mail contracts for the 92 campaign; Rove, who in 1988 had the entire direct mail contract, therefore had an axe to grind with Mosbacher. Novak's column stated: "Also attending the session was political consultant Karl Rove, who had been shoved aside by Mosbacher."
Mosbacher still says Rove did it: Although Novak and Rove continue to deny Rove was the source of the leak, Mosbacher recently stated "I still believe he did it."
(Sources: "Karl and Bob: a leaky history," Houston Chronicle, Nov. 7, 2003, ; "Genius," Texas Monthly, March 2003, p. 82; "Why Are These Men Laughing," Esquire, January 2003)
The current Bush scourge of the nation, George W. Bush, is on record as saying that whoever leaked Plame’s name will be fired: When asked at a post G-8 Summit News Conference on June 10, 2004 if he stood by his statement that he would fire whoever was responsible for the leak, Bush said, "Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts." Even tap dancer extraordinaire Scott McClellan said that the leaker will be shown the door. From one of his press conferences: “No one wants to get to the bottom of this matter more than the President of the United States. If someone leaked classified information, the President wants to know. If someone in this administration leaked classified information, they will no longer be a part of this administration, because that's not the way this White House operates." I think this is going to get interesting, folks. Scott McClellan Refuses to
Stand By Rove Statements Q Do you stand by your statement from the fall of 2003 when you were asked specifically about Karl and Elliott Abrams and Scooter Libby, and you said, "I've gone to each of those gentlemen, and they have told me they are not involved in this" -- do you stand by that statement?
MR. McCLELLAN: And if you will recall, I said that as part of helping the investigators move forward on the investigation we're not going to get into commenting on it. That was something I stated back near that time, as well.
Q Scott, I mean, just -- I mean, this is ridiculous. The notion that you're going to stand before us after having commented with that level of detail and tell people watching this that somehow you decided not to talk. You've got a public record out there. Do you stand by your remarks from that podium, or not?
MR. McCLELLAN: And again, David, I'm well aware, like you, of what was previously said, and I will be glad to talk about it at the appropriate time. The appropriate time is when the investigation –
Q Why are you choosing when it's appropriate and when it's inappropriate?
MR. McCLELLAN: If you'll let me finish –
Q No, you're not finishing -- you're not saying anything. You stood at that podium and said that Karl Rove was not involved. And now we find out that he spoke out about Joseph Wilson's wife. So don't you owe the American public a fuller explanation? Was he involved, or was he not? Because, contrary to what you told the American people, he did, indeed, talk about his wife, didn't he?
MR. McCLELLAN: David, there will be a time to talk about this, but now is not the time to talk about it.
Q Do you think people will accept that, what you're saying today?
MR. McCLELLAN: Again, I've responded to the question. Wow. Did the White House press core finally get a spine? If so, can you guys please ask more questions about the Downing Street Memos? Here’s the full transcript of the press conference, with a link to the video: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/07/20050711-3.html Election 2004 Page Updated London Falling
– 7-7-05 I sincerely hope that your leaders will honor the memory of those who have fallen by finding the criminals responsible and bringing them to justice, and not disgrace you and your country by using the tragedy to further their own unrelated agenda, as our leaders have done with 9/11. (And I’m sad to say it, but I’m sure that our leaders will also try to use your tragedy to continue furthering their destructive agenda.) One very painful lesson that we in America have learned is that in these times of turmoil you must be vigilant - don’t let your government take advantage of your pain and anger. It is all too easy in emotional moments like this to march unquestioningly to the drums of war. Visions of revenge (dressed up in the costume of “justice”) can easily blind you to the motives of those who are beating the drums and leading the march. Don’t allow yourselves to be led astray as we were. Don’t allow yourselves to become that which you hate. May those responsible for these tragedies be brought to justice, and may peace be with you, my British friends. Former Republican Committee Co-Chair to Head Corp for
Public Broadcasting Is it just me, or is anyone else tired of listening to the whining about “liberal bias” in the media? I consider myself to be liberal and most of my friends are also fairly liberal. Based on all the liberals I know I’d say that liberals are intelligent, well-educated and well-informed. They’re able to think rationally and logically, and understand complex concepts. They’re open to new ideas and continually seek out new knowledge. They value truth and honesty. They believe in the integrity and importance of science. They care about other people and want to improve all of society, not just a privileged few. They despise people who lie to them, try to deceive them, or take advantage of them. They’re not bigoted or prejudiced and they don’t try to repress those who are different from themselves. Based on these characteristics, is there really a “liberal bias” in public broadcasting? Well, let’s see, many of the programs are intelligent and educate the viewer. That’s liberal. They communicate in a rational and logical manner. That’s also liberal. They provide viewers with new information and expose them to new ideas. That’s liberal too. The programs tell the truth and frequently contain facts that are supported by evidence. That’s very liberal. There are excellent programs about science. More liberalism. I myself have seen several shows that dealt with making the world a better place, especially for those who are less fortunate. Definitely liberal. OK, so there really is rampant liberalism in public broadcasting. The programs are just too intelligent, rational, open-minded, truthful, and scientific. But is this a problem? Should public broadcasting (not to mention much of the rest of the media) be made dumber, more irrational, more bigoted, more dishonest, and more dogmatic so that it doesn’t challenge the impaired world view of right-wing conservatives? Does the world really need less Nova and more Ann Coulter? Would that really serve the public good? I think not. But back to the whole Corporation for Public Broadcasting thing. Now that a former RNC co-chair will be running the CPB I can only imagine the changes that we might see in the coming months. If the appointment of Ms. Harrison really is part of an effort to bring “conservative programs” to public broadcasting, don’t be surprised if they quietly change the name of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to the Corporation for Public Brainwashing. And if they follow the Karl Rove strategy they’ll do it at 5:00 PM on a Friday before a holiday weekend, hoping no one will notice. I’m sure that a conservative-controlled CPB could offer some interesting new shows for their target audience. Bill’s Brain has pondered the programming possibilities and offers these ideas for new shows that you may soon see on public broadcasting: Bend Over and Spread
‘Em: How Republicans are Helping You Lies are Truth, War
is Peace, Poverty is Wealth Shut the F*** Up! Portrait of the New
Messiah: Karl Rove George W. Bush:
Leading America Into the 20th Century Global Warming Means
You Won’t Need a Sweater Talking Points Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost Trees: The Silent
Killers New American Century Overcrowded Earth Conservative Values
Series, Part 1: Lying Conservative Values
Series, Part 2: Greed Conservative Values
Series, Part 3: Bigotry Conservative Values
Series, Part 4: Torture 9/11! 9/11! 9/11!
9/11! Too Much is Never
Enough Every Sperm is
Sacred The Buck Stops
Somewhere Else The Downing Street Memo and other similar British government documents have shown beyond a doubt that president Bush was determined to attack Iraq from the beginning of his presidency, that he was determined to manipulate intelligence to make his case for war, and that he lied to Congress, the UN, the American people, and the rest of the world about his intentions. Bill's Brain would like to send a big THANK YOU to the British “Deep Throat” (or Deep Bloke?) for leaking these documents, the American people and the rest of the world deserve to know the truth. A terrible crime has been committed, a crime that makes Watergate look trivial in comparison, and those who committed this crime must be held responsible. Just how important are the Downing Street Memo and the other British government documents that have recently been exposed? Important enough that they should trigger a full investigation and if the documents’ allegations are true, it should lead to the impeachment of George W. Bush. The Washington Post wrote “The memo, which dates back to 2002, conveys a British intelligence official's conclusion that President Bush was manipulating intelligence to build support for war with Iraq -- and that he was already set on invasion long before acknowledging as much in public. The Sunday Times of London first published a leaked version on May 1.” One of the most incriminating sections is the paragraph that reads “Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.” Here’s a collection of other comments on the memo: Senator Ted Kennedy "In addition, the Downing Street Minutes also confirm what has long been obvious – that the timing of the war was linked to the 2002 Congressional elections, and that the Administration’s planning for post-war Iraq was incompetent in all its aspects. The current continuing crisis is a direct result of that incompetence. We know the Administration had been planning to invade Iraq for many months before the invasion actually began. We know the Administration twisted the intelligence to make the facts fit their plan. We know that the Administration never really intended to give the U.N. weapons inspectors a reasonable chance to succeed. The Downing Street Minutes demonstrate that the Administration knew their case for war was paper thin, and that in order to go into war with the support of our allies, we had to demonstrate some willingness to go along with the UN inspection process. But the Administration continued to misuse its intelligence, distort the facts and pay only lip-service to the UN’s role in disarming Iraq. "We never should have gone to war for ideological reasons driven by politics and based on manipulated intelligence. The Downing Street Minutes provide even more proof that this is exactly what happened on Iraq. The Administration’s dishonesty, lack of candor, and lack of planning have brought us to where we are today, with American soldiers dying, Iraqi civilians living in constant fear, and with no clearer picture of our strategy for victory in Iraq than when we started.” SF Chronicle
Editorial If he is right, it is a sad commentary on the state of American democracy and values. In the most disturbing passage of the minutes, the head of Britain's MI6 intelligence service, reporting on his recent trip to Washington, told the group that "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" of a war to remove Saddam Hussein from power. Bush was finally asked about the memo directly this week, during a media availability with Blair. Bush tried to discredit the memo because of the timing of its disclosure -- just days before Blair's re-election. But it is important to note that no one has challenged the authenticity of the memo nor the accuracy of its account of the meeting. There should be no statute of limitations -- or shortness of public attention span -- on an issue that cuts to the core of this government's integrity and credibility. Congress must fully investigate the actions in Washington that led the highest officials in Great Britain to be convinced that the Bush administration was hell-bent on war and working to concoct a rationalization for it. The Times (London) The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier. The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair's inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was "necessary to create the conditions" which would make it legal. This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action. The suggestions that the allies use the UN to justify war contradicts claims by Blair and Bush, repeated during their Washington summit last week, that they turned to the UN in order to avoid having to go to war. The attack on Iraq finally began in March 2003. Washington Post The eight-page memo, written in advance of a July 23, 2002, Downing Street meeting on Iraq, provides new insights into how senior British officials saw a Bush administration decision to go to war as inevitable, and realized more clearly than their American counterparts the potential for the post-invasion instability that continues to plague Iraq. In its introduction, the memo "Iraq: Conditions for Military Action" notes that U.S. "military planning for action against Iraq is proceeding apace," but adds that "little thought" has been given to, among other things, “the aftermath and how to shape it." Saying that "we need to be sure that the outcome of the military action would match our objective," the memo’s authors point out, "A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise." The authors add, "As already made clear, the U.S. military plans are virtually silent on this point. Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden." Times Herald-Record
(Rep. Maurice Hinchey) That might have been a hypothetical question a month ago; it might not be hypothetical anymore. In fact, Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-Hurley, says the answer to the question could lead to the impeachment of President Bush. "Attacking Iraq was something the administration focused on from the very beginning," Hinchey said. "Bush made the policy, then altered, twisted and distorted the facts to fit the policy." "If the president intentionally twisted the facts about the Sept. 11 attacks and the Iraq war, and lied to Congress about it, and then elicited authorization from Congress to launch a war that's caused the deaths of 1,700 U.S. men and women along with tens of thousands of others, that is definitely an impeachable offense," Hinchey said. SFGate.com Prepared for Blair and his closest advisers, this newly discovered document clearly states that "since regime change was illegal, it was 'necessary to create the conditions' which would make it legal." The Times' news story, written by defense reporter Michael Smith, about the newly discovered, secret briefing paper noted that it had confirmed that Blair "had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W. Bush three months earlier." In his news article, Smith explained that fabricating conditions for going to war "was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal U.S. action." Toronto Sun “But don't just blame Bush and Blair. [Vice President Dick] Cheney, CIA boss George Tenet (a.k.a. 'Dr. Yes'), Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and other senior administration officials who promoted falsehoods over Iraq and war fever were just as guilty of deceiving and misleading the American people and Congress." NBC News Just last week, both President George W. Bush and Blair vigorously denied that war was inevitable. But now, war critics have come up with seven more memos, verified by NBC News. One, also from July 2002, says U.S. military planners had given "little thought" to postwar Iraq. “The memos are startlingly clear that the British saw that there was inadequate planning, little planning for the aftermath,” says Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee. And there's more. To prepare Blair for a meeting at the president's ranch in April 2002, a year before the war, other British memos raised more questions. After a dinner with Bush’s then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Blair's former national security adviser David Manning, now Britain's ambassador to the U.S., wondered, “What happens on the morning after” the war? The Huffington Post
(Paul Loeb) Earlier this month, Jeremy Scahill wrote a powerful piece on The Nation’s website, describing a huge air assault in September 2002, “Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace,” Scahill writes. “At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist.”
Why aren’t we talking about this? As Scahill points out, this was a month before the Congressional vote, and two before the UN resolution. Supposedly part of enforcing “no fly zones,” the bombings were actually systematic assaults on Iraq’s capacity to defend itself. The US had never declared war. Bush had no authorization, not even a fig leaf. He was simply attacking another nation because he’d decided to do so. This preemptive war preempted our own Congress, as well as international law.
The Sunday Times
(London) The advice was first provided to senior ministers in March 2002. Two months later RAF and USAF jets began “spikes of activity” designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war. The Foreign Office advice shows military action to pressurise the regime was “not consistent with” UN law, despite American claims that it was. The decision to provoke the Iraqis emerged in leaked minutes of a meeting between Tony Blair and his most senior advisers — the so-called Downing Street memo published by The Sunday Times shortly before the general election. The increased attacks on Iraqi installations, which senior US officers admitted were designed to “degrade” Iraqi air defences, began six months before the UN passed resolution 1441, which the allies claim authorised military action. The war finally started in March 2003. The Guardian (UK) He tells the Guardian: "I'd read the intelligence on WMD for four and a half years, and there's no way that it could sustain the case that the government was presenting. All of my colleagues knew that, too." James
Sensenbrenner - Asshole Extraordinaire I should note that earlier in the week Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, scheduled hearings on the renewal of the Patriot Act but he neglected to schedule a hearing on one of the most controversial parts of the Act, Section 215, which gives the FBI access to library records and allows racial profiling. And, the only witness that Sensenbrenner allowed at those hearings was James Comey, the US Deputy Attorney General, who supports renewal of the Act. Sensenbrenner failed to address the most disturbing parts of the Act and Democrats were not allowed to call even a single witness to testify. Not exactly a “fair and balanced” set of hearings by any stretch of the imagination. So, Democrats on the Judiciary Committee invoked Rule 11 of the House Rules and requested their own hearing so that Section 215 of the Act could be discussed and so that the committee could hear from witnesses on both sides of the issue. Sensenbrenner, being the nice guy that he is (yea, right), scheduled the additional hearing the day after the House adjourned, when most House members had returned home to their districts. Like I said, he’s a really nice guy. Those committee members who stayed in Washington on what was supposed to be their day off and attended the hearing were treated to an impressive (and repressive) display of arrogance from “The Mighty Sphincterbrenner, Asshole Extraordinaire.” Here’s a sampling of the things Sensenbrenner did during the hearing:
It was quite a performance. Take a look at this video clip of The Mighty Sphincterbrenner giving his final comments and closing the hearing without calling for a vote to adjourn (a violation of House rules) and then walking out with the gavel while ignoring the Democratic members of the committee who were asking to be recognized: http://216.55.181.228/videos/061005a.wmv More of the discussion that occurred after Sensenbrenner left the hearing: http://216.55.181.228/videos/061005b.wmv Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s press release describing Sensenbrenner’s actions, with a link to the full hearing video (it’s almost two hours long, but she notes where the most interesting parts are so you can skip ahead to them): http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/fl20_schultz/judgavelledoff.html House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi’s comments on the incident: http://press.arrivenet.com/pol/article.php/651798.html Washington Post story on the hearing: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/10/AR2005061002110.html Welcome
to Downing Street Mr. Bush Now several more secret British government documents have surfaced which provide additional evidence that the Bush administration was determined to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam from day one of their reign, long before 9/11, and long before any talk of a “war on terror.” As I’ve noted elsewhere, their plot was conceived and driven primarily by the self-described neoconservatives in the administration including Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Perle, and several others. As far back as 1992 Wolfowitz and Cheney were pushing an agenda of world domination, an agenda which became the basis for the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a radical right-wing think tank whose membership includes Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Elliott Abrams, Lewis Libby, and even Jeb Bush. In the late 1990’s the PNAC developed more detailed plans for asserting US military might over the planet, including a plan to take control of strategic natural resources such as Middle Eastern oil. It was this agenda which evolved into the plot to attack Iraq, overthrow Saddam Hussein, privatize Iraq’s oil industry, and build a dozen or more US military bases on their soil. All of these plans were in place before Bush was elected (or selected) in 2000. When Bush took office in January 2001 he brought his neocon supporters with him, and they immediately went to work carrying out their plan. I have described some of this in the “Truth About the Iraq War” section of this site, but as of this writing the information there is still preliminary. The problem I have is that after spending more than three years researching Bush’s neocon crew I have found an enormous amount of incriminating evidence. All together it is many hundreds of pages and I have written at least 30-40 pages in an attempt to tie all the information together and summarize it. It is not something that can be done in just a few web pages, it would take a full-length book to lay out all the evidence and show how it all ties together into a coordinated plot that led to the invasion of Iraq. One day I may write that book, but for now I will try to put together a brief summary and post it on the Truth About the Iraq War page. Knowing what I know about Bush and the neocons who now control our country, it has been very frustrating to watch them continue to deceive the public, win (or as I believe, steal) the 2004 election, and continue making a complete mess out of the Iraq occupation. The cost to the American people, in lives and dollars, is immense. Recent estimates say that the Iraq war will cost US taxpayers at least a half trillion dollars before it’s all over. Given the level of violence it’s also reasonable to estimate that more than 2,000 US soldiers will be killed and tens of thousands will be seriously wounded. Well over 100,000 and perhaps as many as 200,000 or more innocent Iraqi civilians, many of them women and children, will also die from a combination of violence, disease, and starvation caused by the war. And it’s all based on lies. The result of deadly delusions of grandeur, an evil scheme dreamt up by a radical group bent on military conquest and justified every step of the way by lies, lies, and more lies. For the past few years the mainstream media has ignored all the evidence and I thought that Bush and his neocon co-conspirators were destined to get away with their crimes, but now I have hope. With the release of the Downing Street Memo and the other British government documents, and with the media’s coverage of them, I have hope that justice may prevail. Hope that Bush and his motley crew will be held accountable for what they have done. Representative John Conyers of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, recently held a forum with several other Congressmen (and women) to gather information on the Downing Street Memo allegations and call for an investigation. It was encouraging to me to see that several members of Congress were taking the situation seriously, with some even talking about impeachment. According to comments made during the discussions, the meeting had to be held in a small room in a basement because the Republicans had booked all the meeting rooms in order to prevent Conyers from having one. One Congresswoman also noted that the Republican “leadership” had scheduled an unprecedented 11 Congressional votes at the same time as the forum. Normally there might be at most two or three votes in that same time period, but the Republicans wanted to make sure that any Democrats who participated in the forum would miss as many votes as possible. And I’ll go on the record as predicting that in the next election you’ll see the Republicans use those missed votes against the Democrats in any way they can. I can just see it now, a TV ad saying some misleading crap like “he didn’t vote to support our troops.” That’s because he was working to protect the American people from scumbags like you, asshole! Frickin’ bastards. Slimy, frickin’ bastards. (Deep cleansing breaths … deep cleansing breaths ...) After the forum Representative Conyers delivered petitions to the White House with 560,000 signatures demanding an investigation into the allegations of the Downing Street Memo and the Bush administration’s use (or rather, misuse) of intelligence. Conyers has also written a letter to the White House calling for an investigation, and at the time of the forum it had been signed by 122 members of Congress. It appears that this issue is finally getting some attention. If you care about the truth, if you care about justice, if you care about America, and you if you care about the men, women, and children who have died in the Iraq war, then take a few minutes and do your part to help ensure that this matter is investigated in a thorough, complete, and non-partisan manner. Send an email to Congress urging an investigation at http://www.democrats.com/peoplesemailnetwork/39. Sign the MoveOn.org “Tell the Truth About Iraq” petition at http://www.moveonpac.org/tellthetruth/. Contact your representatives in Congress directly and tell them that the Downing Street Memo and the Bush administration’s misuse of Iraq intelligence must be investigated. House representatives can be contacted at http://www.house.gov/ and Senate representatives can be contacted at http://www.senate.gov/. Visit Representative John Conyers’ web site at http://www.house.gov/conyers/. There you can read the Downing Street Memo and Conyers’ letter to president Bush. Get more details at the AfterDowningStreet.org web site http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/. Vote to impeach Bush at http://www.votetoimpeach.org/. More information on impeachment at http://www.impeachbush.tv/. Contact president Bush at http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ and tell him you want a full investigation. And while you’re at it tell him he’s an idiot. More cartoons! Bill’s
Brain Quiz: Which is More Important, People or Profits? So, 45 million Americans are addicted to tobacco because they were deceived by companies that manipulated the facts and lied to them, and as a result thousands are dead. The full impact is staggering, 400,000 deaths and $75 billion in medical expenses each year. If the government wanted to protect the American people from further harm they would go after the tobacco industry and make them pay for the devastating effect that their deceit has had on millions of lives, but not the Bush administration. Since Bush’s 2000 presidential campaign the tobacco industry has contributed over $16 million to Republicans, and that kind of money buys a lot of favors in the Bush regime. When his administration has to choose between helping the American people or helping their big-money supporters, big money wins out and the American people get screwed every time. And so it goes yet again. Senior Justice Department officials have decided not to ask for the full $130 billion that is needed to help the 45 million addicted smokers, instead they are requesting a mere $10 billion “to pay only for smoking cessation programs for an unspecified number of future smokers who may become addicted to cigarettes in the first year after the trial concludes.” So if you’re one of the 45 million Americans who became addicted to tobacco as a result of the industry’s lies and deception you now know just how much your life is worth to the Bush administration. Not a damn thing. It doesn’t surprise me at all that the Bush administration is once again screwing the American people so that their rich big-business supporters can make more money, they do that all the time. What’s notable about this case is that there is much more at stake than just money. The actions of the tobacco industry in promoting cigarettes are remarkably similar to the actions of the Bush administration in promoting the Iraq war, and the results are also similar. The Bush administration may be evil but they’re not stupid (Bush is an idiot but Rove, Cheney and the other folks who are actually running the show aren’t dumb), so I believe that they realize the significance of this case and that’s one of the reasons why they’re going easy on the tobacco industry. They don’t want to set a precedent that could come back later to haunt them in a big way. Consider the facts: The tobacco industry had a self-serving hidden agenda (getting people addicted to cigarettes) that brought significant harm to the American people and to the country. The Bush administration had a self-serving hidden agenda (overthrowing Saddam Hussein, privatizing Iraq’s oil industry, and establishing a military presence in the Gulf) that brought significant harm to the American people and to the country. The tobacco industry “fixed” the intelligence about tobacco’s addictive properties, manipulated the evidence, and lied about their actions. The Bush administration “fixed” the intelligence about Iraq’s WMDs, manipulated the evidence, and lied about their actions. As a result of the tobacco industry’s deception the American public is burdened with paying for hundreds of billions of dollars in additional healthcare costs and thousands of people have died. As a result of the Bush administration’s deception the American public is burdened with paying for hundreds of billions of dollars in additional war costs and thousands of people have died. The tobacco case and Bush’s bogus WMD case both involve organizations that deliberately deceived the public in an effort to advance their illegal agenda, and both have caused great economic harm and loss of life. It’s easy to understand why the Bush administration wants to avoid promoting the idea that organizations which commit deceptive and destructive acts should be held responsible and made to pay for the consequences of their actions. They certainly don’t want that standard of justice to be applied to themselves, if it were they’d be facing impeachment and prosecution for war crimes. So, they’re going to go easy in the tobacco case, downplay its significance, let the tobacco industry avoid responsibility, and ultimately let them off with just a light slap on the wrist. This fear of being held accountable is also the likely motivation behind the Bush administration’s response to the horrific slaughter of thousands in the Sudan. There has been an international effort to bring those responsible for the mass killing before the International Criminal Court (ICC) and charge them with genocide. The Bush administration, however, has vigorously opposed those efforts and insisted that the matter be handled in regional courts. Why? Because the ICC is where war criminals are tried and convicted and it therefore makes Bush and his cohorts understandably nervous. Bush pulled the US out of the ICC shortly after he became president (more evidence that he was determined to invade Iraq from the very beginning) and his administration is being careful not to do anything that would acknowledge the authority of the ICC. I also can’t help but note the glaring contradiction between Bush’s claims about “defending life” and his Justice Department’s actions in the tobacco case. According to his own administration’s data more than 45 million Americans are addicted to tobacco and as a result over 400,000 of them will die this year. Yet the Justice Department is now asking that if the tobacco industry is found guilty of deliberately deceiving the public about the risks of smoking they should pay $0, nothing at all, to help those 45 million people. Way to go defending those lives George! I’m sure that the almost 1,100 smokers who die every day and the millions who struggle to pay for that $75 billion a year in medical expenses will be very grateful for the whopping $0 of assistance that your Justice Department got for them. But hey, all the rich folks got big tax breaks so it’s all fine, right? A Plea to the Media I’m writing to say thank you Aaron for your reports on global warming and the Downing Street memo. I’m very glad that you’re reporting on these serious issues. It makes me sick to see how most of the media obsesses over things like runaway brides and celebrity trials, I can’t watch it anymore. Especially while we have an administration that ignores threats like global warming and has still not been honest about the Iraq war. The media should also be reporting on things like the death of Raymond Lemme and the ongoing attempt to cover up manipulation of the 2004 election. Mr. Lemme, from the Florida Inspector General's office, was investigating charges that a Republican representative had requested vote-rigging software for electronic voting machines. He reportedly found evidence of corruption that went "all the way to the top," but never got a chance to present that evidence. He was found dead in a hotel bathtub 80 miles from his home just days before he was going to go public with his charges. There is ample evidence of a cover-up: After investigating police claimed that all photos of the crime scene had been lost because the memory card in their camera failed, but those “non-existent” photos were later leaked and appeared on the internet. Programmer Clint Curtis has submitted a sworn affidavit saying he created the vote-rigging software at the request of Republican representative Tom Feeney of Florida, and he has also passed a lie detector test. This is a story that needs to be investigated and reported and I hope I can count on you and CNN to report it. Not all threats to our democracy come from outside our borders and the press has a responsibility, a duty, to America and the American people to report on those threats and expose them. The media plays a crucial role in ensuring the integrity of our democracy by counteracting political “spin” and informing the public about the activities of their government, both good and bad. Without full and accurate knowledge of the government’s actions and their consequences it is impossible for citizens to cast intelligent, informed ballots. Without intelligent and informed ballots, which are accurately counted and reported, our country will not have a government which truly reflects the will of the people. The press is therefore critical to ensuring the integrity of our democratic process and ensuring that our government is at all times working for the good of the people they serve. The press should be the American public’s greatest ally in the effort to keep our government open and honest. Please, Aaron, and everyone else at CNN, don’t let the American people down. We need you. We need you to tell the stories that really matter, the stories that really affect our lives, our future, and our children’s future. The fact is that our country and our planet are facing some very difficult problems and those problems aren’t going to go away if we all spend our time talking about runaway brides and celebrity trials. The problems will only get worse and their consequences more severe. Everyone who ignores them and fails to do anything about them only helps to bring those consequences down upon themselves, their follow Americans, and everyone else that we share this planet with. There’s no such thing as sitting on the sidelines in this game. If you don’t participate you allow the problems to get worse, so doing nothing means you’re still doing something. Inaction is complicity. Ultimately it comes down to a fundamental decision: Do you want to be part of the problem, or part of the solution? If you want to be part of the solution then you need to act accordingly. Don’t be part of the problem. We need you to tell us the stories that really matter. We need you to tell us the truth, now more than ever. Please don’t let us down. May 2005 Memorial Day ThoughtsWhile people all across America are enjoying their cookouts and Memorial Day sales they should take a moment to think about the meaning of this holiday and the millions of men and women that it’s dedicated to. Especially the ones who aren’t here to enjoy the cookout or the big sale. The ones who answered their country’s call and made the greatest sacrifice that a person can make. It is often said that they gave their lives for their country, but I agree with Andy Rooney’s comments last night on 60 Minutes. Andy said that they didn’t give their lives, their lives were taken from them. He’s right. We should never forget that, and we should be forever grateful. I worry that too many younger people today don’t understand and don’t appreciate the sacrifice that millions of American soldiers have made. They didn’t watch their friends get drafted, go off to war, and come home in a box. To many people war is just something they play in a video game or see on TV, it’s not something they’ve had to live through. They don’t know the real horror of war, and they take the freedom that they have for granted. Millions of Americans paid for that freedom with their blood and their lives. Millions lost a son or daughter, a husband or wife, a father or mother, a brother or sister. We should never forget that, and we should be forever grateful. On this Memorial Day and every day Bill’s Brain gives sincere and heartfelt thanks to all of America's veterans. Thank you, and may God bless you. Amnesty International Calls for Investigation of Bush
Administration Wow, someone actually had the cojones to ask that Bush and his cohorts be held responsible for the things that happened under their command. Even arrested and charged with crimes if investigations show that it’s warranted. Stunning. Heartening, but still stunning. I guess I’ve gotten so used to everyone bending over backwards to kiss the Bush/Rove behind (or bending over forwards to take more of Bush’s “agenda”) that it surprises me when someone stands up and calls a spade a spade. America needs more of that, a hell of a lot more of that, if we’re going to have any hope of dragging ourselves out of the cesspool of lies, deception, and corruption that George Bush has pulled us into. Amnesty International’s call is described in an article by Cox News Service which pretty much says it all, so I’ll let it speak for itself: Amnesty International USA urged foreign governments Wednesday to use international law to investigate Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and other alleged American "architects of torture" at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and other prisons where detainees suspected of ties to terrorist groups have been interrogated. "If those investigations support prosecution, the governments should arrest any official who enters their territory and begin legal proceedings against them," said William Shulz, executive director of the U.S. branch of the international human rights agency. In its annual report on "The State of the World's Human Rights," Amnesty International said the Navy base at Guantanamo Bay Cuba, "has become the gulag of our times" and accused officials of flaunting international law in their treatment of detainees. There is no statute of limitations on crimes such as torture, Shulz said. So for years to come, the director warned, "the apparent high-level architects of torture should think twice before planning their next vacation to places like Acapulco or the French Riviera because they may find themselves under arrest as Augusto Pinochet famously did in London in 1998." Gen. Pinochet, a former dictator of Chile, was arrested on an international warrant issued by a Spanish judge while Pinochet was in England receiving medical treatment. Charged with torturing Spanish citizens in Chile, he was held under house arrest in England for more than a year but eventually returned to his homeland and escaped an international trial. If the United States "continues to shirk its responsibility" of investigating allegations of abuse to the top of the chain of command, Shulz said, foreign governments should uphold their obligations under international law by investigating all senior U.S. officials involved. Now, you just know that in the face of scathing comments like those the Bush administration is going to pull their usual denial routine and respond with totally irrelevant BS, right? Sure enough, White House stooge Scott McClellan hitched the manure spreader to the tractor and put it into high gear, saying that the charges were "unsupported by the facts." Now I’ve seen a lot of pictures of the terrible things that were done at Abu Ghraib (or “Abu Garef” as Bush calls it) and I believe that in order for someone to have taken a picture of it, it had to have actually happened, and that makes it a fact. Of course I also believe that facts have to be true, but the Bush administration doesn’t burden themselves with that requirement. To them a “fact” is whatever they say it is, or is not. So just because president Bush’s former attorney (and now Attorney General) Alberto Gonzales said that it’s okay to torture people, Bush agreed, and then the US tortured a bunch of people in US prisons, that doesn’t mean that Bush or Gonzales are responsible. Heavens no! That would be like saying that because Hitler said the Jews should be eliminated and then the Nazis killed a bunch of Jews in Nazi concentration camps, Hitler was somehow responsible. Of course not! That’s crazy talk, just ask Scott McClellan. In the Amnesty International report Mr. Schulz named the individuals that he considered "high-level torture architects:" In addition to Rumsfeld and Gonzales, they included former CIA Director George Tenet; Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the former commander of U.S. forces in Iraq; Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, commander of the Joint Task Force Guantanamo; and Douglas Feith, the under secretary of defense for policy. Shulz said the Geneva Conventions and the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment legally bind the countries that have signed them to exercise "universal jurisdiction" on people suspected of violations. Certain crimes, including torture, amount to offenses against all of humanity so all countries have a responsibility to investigate and prosecute people responsible for such crimes, he said. For the full Amnesty International report visit www.amnesty.org. All quotes from the Cox News Service article are copyright 2005 Night Ridder. Bush
Threatens to Make Americans Suffer More Bush’s latest attempt to force more suffering onto the American people come in the form of a threat he recently made to veto legislation which would allow embryos discarded by fertility clinics to be used for stem cell research. Just to be clear, we’re talking about embryos that are being discarded here, thrown away. Embryos which will never, ever develop into a human being. Embryos which could be used to develop breakthrough medical treatments that could alleviate the suffering of sick Americans and improve the quality and length of their lives. But Bush doesn’t want that to happen. He’d rather see those embryos be destroyed without serving any good purpose instead of using them to help Americans suffering from life-threatening illnesses. The bastard. How can he sleep at night? I guess ignorance must truly be bliss and Bush is blissed-out to beat the band. This might be a good time to point out that thus far in Bush’s presidency he has not vetoed a single bill. None, nada, zero, zilch. Not the spending bills so obscenely laden with Republican pork that our grandchildren will still be working to pay off the debt. Not the dozens that shifted more and more hardship onto average and lower-income Americans. But when a bill comes along that could dramatically help those Americans who are facing the specter of some of the most devastating and debilitating diseases of our time, not just by providing life-transforming treatments but by literally giving them life and allowing them to live for years longer, Bush threatens to veto it. The heartless frickin’ bastard. Why does he hate the American people so much? To be fair, he doesn’t hate all Americans. He’s shown himself to be quite fond of the wealthy and those who have large financial interests in the oil, gas, mining, drug, lumber and defense industries. Everyone else, however, is fair game. I suppose that in his cold, dark heart Bush doesn’t really hate the American people (after all, he and Rove need us so they can lie to us and manipulate us in order to get our votes), it’s just that he values his misguided ideology more than he values the welfare of his country or his fellow citizens. In threatening to veto the stem cell bill Bush demonstrates a characteristic that both he and fanatics like Osama Bin Laden share, that of putting ideology above compassion for one’s fellow human beings. This is illustrated in a story recounted by Carmen Binladin (sic), the terrorist leader's sister-in-law, in her book “Inside the Kingdom.” In the book Ms. Binladin describes a hot day in the Saudi Arabian desert when Osama Bin Laden’s young son began crying for water. Osama would not allow the baby to be given a water bottle, saying the boy should be fed water with a spoon because of Muslim teachings. Bin Laden could have alleviated his son’s misery by letting him to drink from a bottle of water, but he wouldn’t allow it because his ideology was more important to him than the suffering of his own child. And so it is with George W. Bush. He could alleviate the misery of thousands of Americans by letting scientists use embryos that are being thrown away, but he won’t allow it because his ideology is more important to him than the suffering of American citizens. In describing the incident in the desert Ms. Binladen says of Osama, “It was not as if he didn't care about the child. But to him, the baby's suffering was less important than a principle which he probably imagined stemmed from some seventh-century verse in the Quran.” The similarity to George Bush is undeniable and disturbing. It’s not as if he doesn't care about sick and dying Americans. But to him, their suffering is less important than a principle which he probably imagines stems from some first-century verse in the Bible. Bill’s Brain
is Back! I’ve always admired Parrish’s paintings but now that I’ve seen 80 or so originals and learned about how he painted him, I’m definitely a fan. Parrish painted in a way that’s very different from the way most (maybe all?) other artists painted. When most artists want a particular shade they mix colors together until they get the shade they want, and then they put the mixed paint on the canvas. But Maxfield Parrish never mixed different paint colors together, he only painted with the pure, undiluted colors that came out of each tube of paint. So how did he get the thousands of shades and intense colors in his paintings? Layers. He would paint a layer with one solid color, like blue, and let it dry. Then he would coat it with varnish and paint another layer on top with another solid color. He’d repeat this process over and over until he had built up as many as 40 layers of paint and varnish, producing the final finished painting. He had to wait for each layer to thoroughly dry so it often took him two years, and sometimes longer, to finish a painting. Thanks to the process that he used the colors on Parrish’s paintings are simply stunning. Of course there is his famous deep blue and the rosy sunrise/sunset colors that seem to glow softly, but some of his paintings feature an aqua-green that looks like glowing neon, even 80-100 years after they were painted. If you ever have the opportunity to see a Maxfield Parrish exhibit, do it. Even if you’re not particularly fond of his style, just go and look at the colors. There’s a huge difference between looking at a normal “flat” color that’s just a single layer of mixed paint on canvas, and looking at the shades that are created by looking through 20, 30, or even 40 layers of pure color and varnish. Parish’s layered painting process means that posters or other prints (basically anything other than a high-quality lithograph) do not come close to capturing the colors of his original paintings. In the early part of Parrish’s career lithography was limited to just a few colors but he worked with lithographers to create a 17-color (and therefore 17-layer) process. With 17 layers of color to work with lithographers were able to do a pretty good of capturing the colors in his paintings, but it’s still not the same as the originals. Again, if you ever have the chance to see the original paintings, DO IT. You won’t be disappointed. Oh, and I saw a lot of amazing one-of-a-kind cars at the auto museum and scored big-time on a couple Edison Gold-Molded phonograph cylinders (the black wax type, 1904, very good condition) at an antique store, so all-in-all it was a very good trip indeed. Thoughts on a Bunch of Stuff - Vol. 1 Bush Avoids the
Hague DeLay Armed and
Dangerous Earth in Trouble God Speaks to Bush Giving Away America Radioactive
Republicans John Bolton Injustice Sunday Thankfully the Family Research Council doesn’t have an exclusive right to faith. I too am a person of faith, so it bothers me when these “holier-than-thou” people do asinine (and un-Christian) things like accuse Democrats of “filibustering people of faith.” In reality they are trying to silence the members of the Senate who represent my views, so they are trying to “silence people of faith.” If they somehow believe that gives them the moral high ground, then their morality is seriously defective. And what about conservative Christians comparing their plight to the civil rights movement? I’m afraid that the BS is now so deep in here that I’m going to have to ditch the hip waders and go for a full wet suit and snorkel! Can anyone name even ONE civil right that anyone is trying to prevent conservative Christians from having? No, they can’t, because there aren’t any. No one is trying to deny conservative Christians even a single right that other groups have. The comparison of the conservative Christian agenda that is being pushed by groups like the Family Research Council to the civil rights movement is utter, complete, total, nonsense. It would be laughable if it weren’t so sad, completely backwards, thoroughly wrong, and clearly threatening to the values of freedom and equal rights that the majority of Americans hold dear. The civil rights movement was all about gaining equal rights for those who didn’t have them. The conservative Christian agenda is all about preventing others from having the same rights they have. The former was a movement for equal rights, while the latter is a movement against equal rights. The issue of marriage clearly illustrates this fact. It’s a safe bet that every married conservative Christian at the “rights for us only” rally was free to marry the person of their choice. They had the right to choose their partner in marriage without the US government or any religious group stepping in and trying to stop them or make their marriage illegal or unconstitutional. If conservative Christians were really like those who fought for civil rights they’d be working to ensure that all Americans had that same freedom and that same right. But are they? No. Quite the opposite, they’re working to prevent others (primarily gays and lesbians) from having equal rights and enjoying the same freedoms that they have. Comparing the conservative Christian agenda to the civil rights movement is a bit like comparing the Klu Klux Klan to the civil rights movement. Both groups want to impose their “values” and beliefs on others, oppress groups of people who are not like themselves, prevent those groups from having the same rights they have, and ideally, eliminate the group entirely. To me it’s sad to see what people like Tony Perkins and the Family Research Council say and do in the name of “Christianity.” It reflects badly on a religion that, in spite of its problems and imperfections, has provided inspiration and comfort to millions of people and done a lot of good around the world. Speaking of the KKK, it turns out that Mr. Perkins’ “conservative Christian” agenda may have more in common with the KKK than he cares to admit. In 1996 Perkins paid $82,000 for former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke’s mailing list. At the time, Perkins was the campaign manager for Woody Jenkins, a right-wing Republican candidate for US Senate in Louisiana. The Federal Election Commission fined the campaign $3,000 for trying to hide Perkins’ payment to Duke. Four years ago Perkins also addressed the Louisiana chapter of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC), a group described as the premier white supremacist organization in America. The CCC is the successor to the White Citizens Councils, which fought against integration in the South. So to Mr. Perkins, Family Research Council (or is it White Family Supremacy Council?) members and their supporters, I must ask, do you have extra commandments that the rest of us don’t have? Did your Moses have an extra stone tablet that said things like “thou shall be racially prejudiced” and “thou shall oppress others?” Bush Suggests Not Totally Screwing
the Poor After declaring a Social Security “crisis” because not enough money was coming into the system, Bush proposed to “fix” it with a plan that reduces the amount of money coming into the system. (Go ahead, ponder that for a while. It’s true.) And his “fix” would also create trillions of dollars more debt. This illustrates a part of the “Bush doctrine” that doesn’t seem to get a lot of press: “When you’re in a financial hole, dig faster!” Maybe his theory is that he’ll dig all the way through the Earth and come out in China, and while he’s there he can sell them enough US treasury bonds to keep the government afloat for a while longer. I think it’s safe to say that by now even the slowest among us should be able to understand why Bush’s business ventures failed. He appears wholly incapable of grasping the concept of “positive cash flow,” or the consequences of not having it. I guess when you have daddy and his rich buddies to bail you out you don’t have to worry about things like that. Unfortunately daddy and his rich buddies aren’t going to bail out America and pay off Bush’s national debt. You, I, our children, and probably our grandchildren will have to pay for that. But back to the Social Security boondoggle. Bush’s new Social Security proposal involves a “sliding-scale benefit formula” that would eliminate benefit cuts for the lowest-income retirees. I’m sure it’s also intended to benefit him by preventing his approval rating from sliding off the scale. Interestingly, the proposal comes from Robert Pozen, an investment executive, member of Bush’s 2001 Social Security Commission, and – believe it or not – a Democrat. Some of you might remember the Democrats, they’re the party that doesn’t want to screw you over, force their beliefs onto you, make your medical care decisions for you, take away your rights, hand the country over to special interests, destroy the environment, create record deficits, invade other countries for their oil, and turn America into a nation that is globally despised. You should check them out sometime. Using Pozen’s sliding scale won’t eliminate the entire gap between expected Social Security revenues and benefit payouts, but the White House has estimated it would eliminate 70% of the shortfall. No matter how you slice it, that would make the problem much more manageable, and do it in a way that is much more equitable than the across-the-board benefit cut that Bush originally proposed. It does a much better job of matching benefit reductions to the actual needs of the recipient. Low-income persons (the bottom 30%) will continue to receive benefits as promised under the current system, while those who are more wealthy (and thus don’t need checks from the government to get by) will have their benefits reduced the most. I have to say I’m glad to see the Bush administration, which has been so completely beholden to their big-money special-interest supporters and blind to the needs of the poor, finally do something that puts a little less financial burden onto society’s least fortunate. Mark the date on your calendar, it’s a first. Even stranger, the idea came from a Democrat, which means that they also finally listened to someone from the other party and embraced one of their suggestions as a good idea. Mark that too, it’s another first, and it might never happen again. I support the sliding scale’s larger benefit cuts for the rich, after all they’ve already received far more financial benefit from Bush’s tax cuts than the other 98% of Americans. The wealthy are getting their “benefits” now, in the form of lower taxes, they don’t have to wait until they retire. They can invest their tax cuts in those wonderful “private accounts” (stocks and bonds) that Bush keeps telling us about. And besides, why does a person with millions of dollars need to collect Social Security anyway? It seems like they should be last in line for government checks, far, far behind people like veterans, the disabled, the poor, folks who are struggling with high medical expenses, and a whole host of others who have a genuine, legitimate need. Although I support the sliding scale idea, let’s be clear about one important point: The current proposal will still worsen the financial situation of many lower-income American families. That’s because the benefit cuts will affect anyone who makes more than about $25,000 a year. Granted, I live in one of the more expensive areas of the country, but anyone making $25,000 a year in my neck of the woods is barely getting by. Average rent is over $15,000 a year and typical annual mortgage payments for someone purchasing a house today are more than double the $25,000 figure. Unless they have no children, live in their car, buy their clothes at Goodwill, and have perfect health, anyone making $25,000 a year in my neighborhood is going to have to completely depend on Social Security for their retirement income. So even though the current sliding scale proposal preserves Social Security benefits for the bottom 30% of workers, it will still negatively impact many middle-class families. Over the past several years Bush and his administration have shifted much of the financial burden of running our country and caring for American citizens from the wealthy down to the middle-class, and this will add to that burden. Bush and his crew are creating an American aristocracy, where the elite wealthy ruling class subjugates the poor masses and uses them for their own gain. Although with all of the efforts by Bush and Congressional Republicans to consolidate power and eliminate opposition, along with their pandering to right-wing religious groups, it’s probably more accurate to say they’re pushing America toward a dictatorial aristocratic theocracy. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think that’s what our country’s founders had in mind. The fact that the Republicans weren’t able to come up with an idea like the sliding scale reinforces my suspicion that the current Republican “leadership” may actually be incapable of coming up with ideas that don’t screw over those who are not like them (that is, those who are not heterosexual, rich, and politically well-connected). It’s a bit like Darwinian evolution, if an animal doesn’t use a particular capability for a long time, they lose it. Like animals that have lived in dark caves for thousands of years and lost their ability to see, the current administration has lived in the dark cave of their privileged, self-centered, wealth and power-focused world for so long that they’ve lost the ability to understand, much less feel compassion for, those less fortunate souls who live outside. As we look at them and ponder what strange creatures they have become, perhaps even feeling a twinge of sympathy for their impaired state, they stare back, utterly incapable of comprehending the world that we live in. And as their fiscally-irresponsible actions rack up record national debt in the name of pushing their self-serving agenda, they add insult to injury by working to ensure that they don’t have to pay for their share of that debt. By doing things like trying to make Bush’s tax cuts for the rich permanent, eliminating the estate tax, and refusing to raise the AMT (Alternative Minimum Tax) threshold, they’re working to ensure that they get to keep their wealth while average American middle-class families get stuck with more and more of the burden of their debt. Personally, I’d like to see the requirements of the recently-passed Credit Card Industry Giveaway Bill (a.k.a. “bankruptcy reform”) applied to Bush and his cohorts. They should have to pay off as much of their debt as possible before they walk away and stick the American people with the bill. After all, they’re supposed to work for us, “we the people” and all that, so why can’t we garnish their wages and sell off some of their assets to help pay for the messes they’ve created? Bush’s ranch in Crawford seems nice, we could probably get quite a bit for it if we put it up on eBay. Maybe a Saudi prince would buy it? And if Bush and his free-spending cronies can’t pay for all their debt now, I’d be happy to let them work it off over the next several years. I could use someone to help out around the house, mow the yard, trim the trees, that sort of stuff. He would need to be supervised while using power tools, but I’m sure Bush could handle it. And while he’s at it maybe I could explain to him why tax cuts are not an effective way to stimulate the economy and create jobs. Nah, that would be too complicated. Better just stick to the lawn mowing. April 2005 Republicans Going Nuclear?It’s now painfully obvious that some Republicans in Congress just can’t get enough power, it’s become a vulgar obsession with them. Now they’re threatening to invoke what’s been called the “nuclear option,” changing Senate rules to eliminate the filibuster so they can have total, absolute control over the appointment of judges. It’s not good enough for them that over 95% of Bush’s judicial nominations have been approved (204 out of 214), they want to ram all of Bush’s judicial nominations down the throat of the American people. (Welcome to the foie gras factory, folks! Now open wide!) Remember, Bush’s judges will be interpreting the law for ALL Americans, not just the 21% who voted for him (62 million out of 296 million total Americans). A look at the numbers shows just how extreme these guys are. Bush has re-nominated seven of the judges who were not approved in his first term, which amounts to slightly over 3% of the total of 214, and the Republicans are threatening to “go nuclear” over that, a mere 3%. Anyone who is reasonable, anyone who respects the American system of government and the rights and opinions of the American people, would not have a problem letting 3% of their most “out of the mainstream” judicial nominations be blocked by a group that represents 48% of the people who voted in the last presidential election. Think about how extreme that really is, they don’t want to let the party representing 48% of the voters determine even 3% of the outcome. Nope, not these bastards. They want absolute, total, control. When these guys were young they must have been those annoying little kids who screamed and screamed and screamed and screamed and stomped their feet and threw things and held their breath until they either got what they wanted or passed out, whichever came first. And if they passed out they got right back up when they came to and screamed and stomped some more. You know the ones I’m talking about, you’ve seen them in the store making a God-awful ruckus because they can’t have some stupid little thing that they want. And you’ve probably shot nasty looks at their parents too, I know I have. Let this serve as a warning to all you parents out there, don’t raise spoiled little brats who get everything they want. They just might grow up to be Republican Congresspersons who throw temper tantrums and threaten to throw our government’s system of checks and balances out the window and dishonor 229 years of American democracy because they can’t get a measly 3% of their judges approved. Lord knows we don’t need any more of that crap, there are serious issues that we should be addressing. Tell Corporate
America to "Drop the Hammer" Bill's Brain
presents: Cartoons! Bush
Runs Out of Gas I’ve heard many Bush supporters say that he says what he means and means what he says, so that means that right now he must be busy “jawboning” away on those OPEC folks, right? WRONG!!! A recent Knight Ridder article says that at a recent public appearance “Bush suggested that he’s powerless to stop price increases that pushed the average price of gasoline to a record $2.28 last week.” Bush stated “I wish I could simply wave a magic wand and lower gas prices tomorrow, I’d do that.” Well George, you don’t need a magic wand to release some oil from America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) and ease prices by making more oil available, as other presidents have done in the past. All you have to do is say the word. Oh I forgot, you won’t do that because then your rich oil industry friends would make less money. For many years oil futures have been priced based on the expectation that if the cost of oil got too high the president would release oil from the SPR, and when you announced that you wouldn’t do that the value of oil futures soared, making your rich oil buddies even richer. Plus, while the American people are having more money than ever taken out of their pockets at the gas pump, the oil companies that are your big financial supporters are reporting record profits. I’m sure that they’ll say “thank you” and give Republicans a nice chunk of those profits in the form of campaign donations, and that’s what it’s really all about, isn’t it George? Figuring out more ways to make your rich friends richer and gain even more power for the Party, even if it means fleecing the American public? You also don’t need a magic wand, George, to stop driving down the value of the dollar with your short-sighted, self-serving, irrational economic policies that benefit the few, harm the many, and burden the country with enormous debt. The policies that you and the Republicans in Congress pushed through have significantly driven down the value of the US dollar, and that means you (yes George, YOU) have driven up the cost of oil for the American people. I realize some readers might be wondering why that’s the case. Well, when the government runs a large deficit, as Bush has (he has not yet vetoed a single spending bill, even those that were laden with special-interest pork) it means that the government needs to sell a large amount of bonds to cover their daily expenses. Selling bonds is, in effect, selling US dollars and taking out a loan from the buyer. Currently the government has to “borrow” about $2 billion a day this way just to stay in business. When there are so many dollars (bonds) for sale on the market, the market tends to get flooded (there’s more supply than demand) and the price goes down. That means that the value of the US dollar goes down. But what does this all mean to you, the humble reader? It means that you have to pay a lot more for oil (and consequently, for gas) when you’re buying it with US dollars. Here’s an example of the end result: From February 2002 through February 2004 the price of oil in US dollars increased by 51% (as did US gas prices), but the price of the same oil in Euros only increased by 4%. Big difference huh? Just to put that into perspective, let’s say that before the price increase you were paying $1.50 a gallon for gas (just to pick a round number). A 4% rise would only increase the price to $1.56, which is not bad at all, but a 51% increase pushes the price all the way up to $2.67 a gallon. Every time I fill up it makes me want to say a big “thank you” to everyone who voted for Bush. I’ll just pull some more (and more, and more) money out of my pocket to pay for your inability to make informed, intelligent decisions. (Am I grumpy about it? Oh, a tad.) Here’s an idea for everyone who voted for someone other than Bush: The next time you fill up your tank, try to find a Bush voter at the station who will pay for part of your gas to offset the price increase. After all, they voted for the polices that drove up the cost, you didn’t. You might have a difficult time though. I’ve noticed that when it comes to stepping up to the plate and paying for the consequences of their decision, Bush voters don’t want to put their money where their votes are. “Dead Wrong”
Intelligence, Wrongly Dead Victims This conclusion comes as no surprise to those who closely followed the Bush administration’s activities prior to the Iraq invasion. When Bush took office in 2000 he brought with him a group of self-described “neo-conservatives” (or “neocons”) who were determined to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein as part of their larger agenda of asserting global US military dominance and gaining control of strategic natural resources. This agenda included establishing a significant US military presence in the Gulf region and taking control of Middle Eastern oil reserves. Iraq was just the first country they targeted for “regime change,” and there are several more on their list. The names of this motley neocon crew, many of them members of the right-wing think tank Project for the New American Century, are familiar ones; Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, John Bolton, Douglas Feith, Richard Perle, Lewis Libby, Elliot Abrams, and even the president’s brother, Jeb Bush. From the day that Bush took office and the neocons took control of the Pentagon they began working to carry out their plan. An important part of that plan included establishing their own “intelligence” operations in the Pentagon, creating the “Office of Special Plans” (OSP) under Douglas Feith to develop what I call “neocon-intelligence” or “neo-intel” for short. These operations were completely under their control, and were independent of the CIA and other established intelligence organizations. This neo-intel operation was used to generate much of the bogus (“dead wrong”) “intelligence” that was used to convince the American people and United Nations that Saddam Hussein was a threat and that Iraq therefore needed to be invaded in a preemptive attack. This attack and subsequent occupation would allow the neocons to advance two of their major goals, fortifying the US military presence in the Gulf region by building several US military bases in Iraq (reportedly a dozen or more), and gaining control of Middle Eastern oil by privatizing Iraq’s oil industry and taking the world’s third largest oil reserves out of Saddam’s hands. Because the neocons’ operation worked outside of the government’s “real” intelligence organizations, it was not subject to oversight by those organizations. The bogus neo-intel from the OSP often went straight into Bush’s and Cheney’s speeches without being checked and verified by the CIA or other legitimate intelligence organization. This caused many disputes between the CIA and the White House over accusations that Bush and Cheney made in their speeches in the months before the invasion. In many cases CIA intelligence contradicted the information coming out of the OSP, but it didn’t matter to Bush, Cheney or the other neocons. They were determined to launch a war of conquest in the Middle East and they were willing to say and do anything to make it happen. It is now known that much of the neo-intel about Saddam’s alleged weapons came from the now-discredited Ahmad Chalabi, who reportedly has close ties to Iran and is suspected of sharing US security information with Iranian officials. It is no secret that Iran and Iraq have been enemies for many years, the two countries have fought long and bloody wars. It is also believed that some of the bogus information came from persons working with the Saudi Arabian government. Both Chalabi and the Saudis wanted to see Saddam Hussein overthrown and so they were more than happy to tell the neocons what they wanted to hear, that Saddam had frightful quantities of WMDs, he posed a grave threat, and he should be overthrown immediately. As we now know, it was all lies. Bush and his neocon crew were eager to find any “evidence” or accusation to support their plan of overthrowing Saddam, and Saddam’s enemies were equally eager to feed them false “intelligence” to help achieve that goal. Some have suggested that Bush and the neocons were duped or misled by bad intelligence, but the evidence suggests that’s not the case. There were too many instances where Bush and Cheney were told by the CIA and other intelligence organizations that their accusations against Saddam were questionable or likely wrong, but they continued to repeat them. Bush and the neocons took a “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach to the accuracy and truthfulness of the information that was being fed to the OSP by Chalabi and other sources. As long as it supported their agenda they didn’t question it. And now, three years later, a commission has studied that intelligence and concluded – surprise! – it was “dead wrong.” No kidding. To Bush and the neocons it never mattered whether the intelligence was right or wrong. All that mattered was that they could find sources who would tell them what they wanted to hear, sources who would help them make a case against Saddam Hussein and mislead a majority of the American people (and hopefully the United Nations too) into believing that he was an imminent threat and that a preemptive attack on Iraq was justified. And unfortunately, in spite of all the efforts in recent years to reform and improve US intelligence operations, including the creation of a new National Intelligence Director (NID), there’s a real danger that a similar “intelligence failure” could happen again. Why? Because Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and like-minded Republicans in Congress made certain that the new NID position would have no authority over their neo-intel operations in the Pentagon. When the National Intelligence Director position was first proposed by the 9/11 Commission the idea was that the NID would have oversight over all US intelligence operations, including those in the CIA, FBI, and the Pentagon. Bush and the neocons quickly realized that if the NID had authority over Pentagon intelligence it would threaten their ability to continue using their neo-intel operations inside the Pentagon to create more bogus “intelligence” for use against the other countries that they’ve targeted for regime change. If the NID were given authority over Pentagon intelligence operations it would mean that information from their Pentagon “Office of Special Plans” could no longer find it’s way into presidential and vice presidential speeches without first being scrutinized (and if the past is any indication, frequently discredited and rejected) by the NID. This posed a significant threat to their agenda, so Bush, Rumsfeld and the other neocons refused to support the creation of the NID position until the Director’s authority was scaled back to exclude their “Special” Pentagon neo-intel operations. The reason that was given publicly for excluding Defense Department intelligence operations from NID oversight (even though the Department of Defense controls 80% of the known US intelligence budget) was that it “might deprive troops on the battlefield of vital information.” This of course was a complete smokescreen, but true to form Congressional Republicans invoked the image of “supporting the troops” and then pushed through changes that advanced their own agenda but in fact did nothing to support the troops. In reality the limitations on NID oversight are actually harmful to the troops because they increase the likelihood that they will be injured or killed in yet another military conflict that is justified using “dead wrong” intelligence. So where does all of this leave the United States today? I’m sorry to say that it leaves us in substantially the same position as we were in during the run-up to the Iraq war. The neocons still have their own neo-intel operations in the Pentagon and the new NID has no authority over them. The “intelligence” that they produce, no matter how flawed, faulty, or fraudulent, is still not subject to review or verification by another independent intelligence agency. Information from the OSP can still flow directly into speeches by the president, vice president, or other administration official and be presented as “facts” which are used to justify additional military action to further the neocon agenda. In some ways US intelligence is actually worse off now than it was before the Iraq war. Before the war the major neocon influence was limited to the Pentagon and the executive branch. The CIA was largely independent, and was dedicated to providing real, credible intelligence. Now the CIA has been purged of everyone who wouldn’t march in lock-step with the Bush/neocon agenda and staffed with people more friendly to the neocon mindset. This assures that when the neocons present more “dead wrong” intelligence to support their next misadventure, no one at the CIA will question them. For more information: Bush Clarifies Social Security Plan "Because the - all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculated, for example, is on the table. Whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those - changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be - or closer delivered to what has been promised. Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's a series of things that cause the - like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate - the benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those - if that growth is affected, it will help on the red." Finally, I understand it! Thank you George. And remember, this is coming from the guy who told Al Gore during the 2000 campaign that the way he talked "you'd think Social Security was some kind of government program." And people voted for this guy. Scary, very scary. It's True! Sex Helps Your Brain A chemical called prolactin, which is found in high levels in pregnant women, also appears to promote the growth of new cells in the brain. Said Bartlett, "Prolactin levels also go up during sex as well. So one could think of a number of more entertaining activities than running in order to regulate the production of nerve cells." That sounds like a good way to take care of Bill's Brain to us! I'll bet that Bartlett guy has some interesting pickup lines. "Would you like me to raise your prolactin levels, ma'am?" I wonder if he offers free anti-Alzheimer's and anti-Parkinson's treatments to "preferred" patients? March 2005 Why Did Republicans Get So Involved in the Terri Schiavo Case?Unless you’ve been in a persistent vegetative state you know that a whole hoard of Republicans and right-wing religious folks swarmed all over Terri Schiavo like flies on doo-doo. It seemed as if they just couldn’t stop themselves from inserting their opinions into this poor family’s affairs. They protested and pontificated, and turned this tragedy into an opportunity for them to grandstand in front of TV cameras and make defiant statements about “defending life.” One thing’s for sure, whenever you see the Republisharks circling for a feeding frenzy like this, you can bet that there’s more going on than meets the eye. Was this overblown display of “concern,” with all of its unprecedented legal maneuvering by the Republicans in congress and the president, really all about poor Terri Schiavo, or was there something else on their agenda? It’s no secret that many Republicans and their right-wing religious supporters want to put an end to abortion. Overturning Roe v. Wade and making abortion illegal is high on their priority list. But what does this have to do with Terri Schiavo? Consider the many similarities between Mrs. Schiavo, in her vegetative state, and a fetus. Both have brains that are not fully functional. They cannot make their own decisions or express themselves. They are incapable of surviving on their own and need a caregiver (doctor or mother) to stay alive. They are both nourished through a tube (feeding tube or umbilical cord), and if the tube is removed they will die. In both cases other people have the authority to make decisions about medical procedures that determine their life or death (feeding tube removal or abortion). In many ways Terri Schiavo was like an “adult fetus,” caught in the middle of a dispute over whether she should live or die. The fact is that if Republicans had succeeded in finding a way to give the government the authority to step in and prevent the removal of Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube, it would have put them a big step closer to giving the government the authority to step in and prevent the removal of the “feeding tube” (umbilical cord) from a developing fetus. It would have set a legal precedent that abortion foes could have leveraged and built upon to move forward in their quest to outlaw abortion. I believe that Republican and right-to-life strategists realized this, and that is why they made such a big deal about Terri Schiavo. In their view there was much more at stake than just Terri’s life. I have no doubt that they sympathized with Terri’s family and were genuinely concerned about her well being, but I think there was more to it than that. Decisions to end life support are made every day in America without congress or the president getting involved, and without protesters showing up. Out of all the cases and all the decisions, why did they choose to get so involved in this one? I believe it’s because they saw the Schiavo case as a unique opportunity to rally enough support to set a legal precedent which they could then use to advance their larger agenda of outlawing abortion. UPDATED April 2005 "It is more than just Terri Schiavo. This is a critical issue for people in this position, and it is also a critical issue to fight that fight for life, whether it be euthanasia or abortion. I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, one thing God has brought to us is Terri Schiavo to elevate the visibility of what’s going on in America." Yes, thank God that He's helped bring visibility to how shamless politicians such as yourself will use the suffering and death of helpless people like Terri Schiavo for your own political gain. I can only hope that one day God will give you your just reward. And the Washington Post reported that GOP strategist Jeff Bell said the intensity around Terri Schiavo came from the link between the case and other life issues such as abortion. "Although the form of this issue was assisted suicide it has a lot more relevance for abortion," Bell said. Also reported by the Washington Post: Even chimp-in-chief George Bush got into the act, saying "I urge all those who honor Terri Schiavo to continue to work to build a culture of life where all Americans are welcomed and valued and protected." Unless of course they're gay, or non-Christian, or liberal, or a Democrat, or poor, or ... So I was right. It was all about advancing their political agenda and they were just using poor Terri's suffering and death to further their own cause. Do these people have no shame? Bush Achieves New Heights
of Hypocrisy in Schiavo Case In 1999, when Bush was governor of Texas, he signed a law which took life support decisions away from patients’ families. The law permitted hospitals to withdraw life support from patients and allow them to die, even when the family objected and wanted to continue life support. Then in 2005, as president of the United States, Bush made a special trip back to Washington DC so that he could sign a bill intended to reinstate life support for Terri Schiavo, a brain-damaged Florida woman. The bill was created and passed in response to requests from the woman’s family. Let me make sure I understand this: Apparently Bush believes that when it comes to removing life support and allowing a person to die, the family's desires don't matter when the patient is in Texas, but when the patient is in Florida the family's desires are so important that they warrant a special trip by the president of the United States. To add irony to this hypocrisy, just five days before Bush rushed back to Washington DC to sign the bill which reinstated Terri Schiavo's life support, the law he signed as governor of Texas was used to remove life support from a 17-pound, six month old baby that had been born with dwarfism. Wanda Hudson's baby died that day, and Bush didn't rush anywhere to sign anything. And while the White House said that Bush wanted to give Schiavo’s parents another chance to save their daughter and that it was a matter of "defending life," the family of Spiro Nikolouzos continued their fight to keep their 68 year old grandfather alive. A Texas hospital wants to use the law that Bush signed as governor to end life support for Mr. Nikolouzos and allow him to die. To the best that we can determine, president Bush has not rushed anywhere or signed anything for Mr. Nikolouzos. I know the sunshine state has a lot going for it, but does Bush believe that life in Florida is worth that much more than life in Texas? How can Bush silently ignore the deaths resulting from the Texas law he signed while making a special (and very public) trip for Terri Schiavo, and then claim that his actions in the Schiavo case were not politically motivated? Perhaps the more appropriate question is how can he do it and expect anyone to take him seriously? Does he expect us to believe that it doesn’t make any difference that Schiavo is in the state where his brother Jeb is governor, and Jeb Bush is contemplating a run for president in 2008? If that’s the case, then why didn’t Bush take action to prevent the death of Wanda Hudson’s baby? In commenting on his signing of the bill for Schiavo, Bush stated that he will "continue to stand on the side of those defending life." Again, how can Bush say this and expect anyone to take him seriously? This is the president who has repeatedly sold out the public and allowed hundreds of thousands of people to die for the sake of corporate profits, irrational ideology, and his desire for political power. He signed the law in Texas that allows healthcare organizations to reduce their costs (and increase their profits) by removing life support and allowing patients to die. He has fought efforts to implement universal health coverage (boosting healthcare providers’ profits) while 18,000 deaths occur every year because of lack of health insurance. He prevented Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices and refused to allow lower-cost medicines to be imported, increasing drug company profits and denying poor Americans access to life-saving medications. He rolled back pollution controls to reduce energy companies' costs (and increase their profits) resulting in the deaths of 6,000-9,000 Americans a year from pollution-caused diseases and increasing the suffering of many thousands more from respiratory and cardiovascular illnesses. His refusal to address global warming and pursue alternative energy sources helps to increase oil companies' profits at the cost of thousands of lives and billions of dollars of destruction from more violent weather (35,000 people died in the record 2003 European heat wave and thousands more have died from more frequent and more violent hurricanes, typhoons, and floods). His support of the neoconservative agenda of preemptive war as a means to take control of Middle Eastern oil has boosted his supporters’ profits (Halliburton and others) while costing over 1,500 American troops and over a hundred thousand Iraqi citizens their lives. He has repeatedly withheld US funding for the UN population fund, denying money that would have prevented the deaths of hundreds of thousands of poor women and children around the world. When he wanted to maintain his hold on power in the 2004 election (and get NRA members’ votes) he broke a promise he made during the previous campaign and allowed the ban on assault weapons expire, putting these deadly guns back on the streets where they can kill and injure more Americans. The list goes on, and on, and on. Over and over again Bush's actions have shown that he values corporate profits, political power, and ideology over the lives of the American people and other people around the world. And then he has the gall to say that he will “continue to stand on the side of those defending life." George, the brazenness of your duplicity is stunning. And does Bush really believe the American people are so ignorant that they won’t see the utter hypocrisy of his actions? Sadly, the mainstream media probably won’t report on the events in Texas, and the average American will continue to remain ignorant about how frequently Bush changes his position to suit whatever political goal he’s trying to achieve at the moment. And why did Bush fly from his ranch in Texas to Washington DC to sign the bill? White House officials have acknowledged that it wasn’t necessary for Bush to return to Washington, the final bill could have easily been flown to Texas for him to sign. I’m not a gambling man, but I’m willing to bet that Bush left Texas because he and his handlers didn’t want him signing a bill attempting to reinstate Terri Schiavo’s life support on the same soil where he signed a bill that allows hospitals to override a family’s wishes and discontinue life support for patients like Terri. Imagine how bad it would have been for Bush if a flock of reporters had come to Texas to cover the bill signing and Wanda Hudson or the Nikolouzos family had managed to get their attention and tell them about the bill governor Bush signed and the effect it has had on their lives. The death of Mrs. Hudson’s baby and the Nikolouzos’ fight to keep their grandfather alive would have certainly made national news, and it would not have looked good for Bush. I’m betting that a decision was made to not draw media attention to Texas, so Bush high-tailed it out of town and headed for Washington. One thing is for sure, with his latest "rush to Washington to defend life" performance Bush has clinched our nomination for the Best Actor in a Continuing Disaster award. Bush’s Secret Plan to
Eliminate Education Funding First, a summary of the facts: NCLB requires that every year a certain percentage of students at each school must pass standardized tests or the school will be labeled as “failing.” Students at a failing school can apply for a transfer to a “passing” school. The percentage of students who must pass the standardized tests increases year to year until it reaches 100% in 2014. If a school fails too many years in a row it will lose Title 1 government funding. Title 1 funding is the largest source of federal funding for US elementary and secondary education. Since the inception of NCLB President Bush has significantly under-funded the program, leaving many schools without the resources needed to meet the program’s requirements. What exactly does Bush hope to accomplish with NCLB? It’s no secret that Bush and many other Republicans want to significantly cut or eliminate government funding for “entitlement” programs like Social Security, assistance for the poor, and education funding. They have repeatedly denied increases or made cuts in these areas, even though it was often unpopular and they’ve taken political hits for it. What if Bush and his cohorts decided that they also wanted to eliminate the largest source of federal funding for our public schools? If they came right out and proposed doing away with this funding there would certainly be a loud outcry from parents, educators, and others. Such a proposal would be very unpopular, and it would not be a smart political move. But what if they could figure out a way to eliminate nearly all Title 1 funding while making it look like they were actually supporting education? What if they could devise a scheme which would eventually lead to the elimination of billions of dollars of federal educational aid and sell it to the American people as a way to “improve” the education system? Bush and his cohorts did figure it out such a scheme, and it’s called No Child Left Behind. In 2014, when NCLB will require 100% of all students at every school to pass standardized tests, the requirements will be so strict that it will be nearly impossible for schools to avoid a “failing” grade. At that point I would not be surprised if 90% or more of the schools in America are classified as failing. Even today, with much less stringent requirements in place, there are many schools which are considered to be failing simply because two or three students were not able to make it to school on the day of testing. (Sorry, make-up exams aren’t allowed.) Imagine how much worse the situation will be when 100% of all students are required to pass the tests. A school with thousands of students could be excelling in every way, a true model of educational excellence, but if just one student happens to be hit by a car and taken to the hospital while they’re on their way to school to take the test, the whole school could be classified as failing and lose government funding. The same thing could happen if just one student missed the test day because their parent had just died, or they were terribly sick, or hospitalized for some reason. Think about it, how often does a school have 100% attendance? Clearly, NCLB creates a situation where failure, not success, will be the norm. When you consider the reality of NCLB in the context of Bush’s desire to eliminate entitlement programs it suggests that there are hidden motives behind the plan, that it was deliberately designed to lead to a massive cut in federal educational funding. If that’s the case I have to give him credit, it certainly is a brilliant scheme, in an evil sort of way. Pretend to be working to improve education while drastically slashing education funding, all in four easy steps: 1. Implement a program with unreasonable requirements which will be impossible for the vast majority of schools to meet. 2. Significantly under-fund the program to ensure that schools don’t have the resources they need to meet requirements. 3. Spread failure by allowing under-performing students from failing schools to transfer to passing schools. This will make it harder and harder for those schools to continue passing and will push them to failure. 4. As school after school repeatedly fails to meet requirements, cut off their Title 1 funding. End result: Mission accomplished! Another "entitlement" has been effectively eliminated, with the largest federal funding program for elementary and secondary education slashed by perhaps 90%, possibly even more. Brilliant, George. Deceptively, deviously, deceitfully brilliant. The
Mysterious Death of Raymond Lemme Curtis discussed the charges with Raymond Lemme of the Florida Inspector General's office, who was investigating allegations of election fraud. Cutis says that in mid-June of 2003 Lemme told him that he "had tracked the corruption 'all the way to the top' and that the story would break in the next few weeks and I would be satisfied with the results." Unfortunately Mr. Lemme never got the chance to break the story and come forward with the evidence. Just two weeks after his conversation with Curtis he was found dead in a bathtub in a hotel room 80 miles from where he lived. His left arm had been slit twice with a razor blade near the left elbow in an “apparent” suicide. In their report police stated that all photos of the scene had been lost because of the failure of the camera’s flash memory card, but now those supposedly “lost” photos have been published on the Internet at bradblog.com. I don’t know about you, but I know when something smells suspicious, and this one reeks. A member of the Florida Inspector General's office investigates a Republican representative’s request to create vote-rigging software, discovers evidence of corruption that goes “all the way to the top,” and then turns up dead in a hotel bathtub a week before he’s set to go public with the evidence. It sure looks like someone didn’t want Mr. Lemme to talk about what he had found, and they were willing to do anything to shut him up. You can bet we’ll be keeping an eye on this story as it develops. You can read a summary of the whole affair at The Brad Blog: http://www.bradblog.com/ClintCurtisSummary.htm 666 - The Number
of the Deficit Bernard Kerik:
“Doin’ It” While NY Burns US Shoots Freed Italian Hostage President Bush has promised a full investigation. I certainly hope it will be more extensive than his investigation into the thousands of voting irregularities and statistical impossibilities in the 2004 election, or his investigation into why he and the neocons in his administration pushed the country into war with Iraq based on unverified WMD “intelligence” supplied by Iraq’s enemies through a special office in the Pentagon which was set up to bypass all of the normal intelligence channels. Based on the Bush administration’s treatment of Donald Rumsfeld and George Tenet, all of the shooters will probably be given medals and told they’re doing a “superb” job. But I don’t think they’re to blame for what happened, the real fault lies elsewhere. At the risk of pointing out the obvious, Iraq is a war zone. People shoot at people there, and people die. American patrols are everywhere and there are hundreds (maybe even thousands) of insurgents shooting at them and trying to blow them up every day. They get understandably nervous when unidentified vehicles speed at them and don’t stop when asked to. Given these facts I hope I can assume (there I go with the A-word again) that American military leaders are smart enough to have communicated clearly and strongly to all governments with security forces working in Iraq that if they’re planning to conduct any operations, say for instance rescuing a hostage and racing her to the airport, they need to let American commanders know where they’ll be driving, when, and what kind of vehicle they’ll be in so that American troops can expect them, recognize them, and not shoot and kill them. I hope that US military leaders are smart enough and proactive enough to have done this. To do anything less subjects our allies to unnecessary risk and borders on negligence. This situation represents a tragic and utterly inexcusable failure to communicate, and we’ll be watching to see where that failure occurred. Congress Supports Religious
Discrimination We’re talking about taxpayer-funded jobs where candidates would be subject to being rejected solely because of their religious beliefs, and right-wing conservative Republicans actually see this as a step in the right direction. (The right direction is backwards, as usual.) I guess if they can successfully re-introduce employment discrimination based on religious belief then they’re a just small step away from bringing back employment discrimination based on other things like race and gender. With a continuation of economic policies that widen the gap between rich and poor and push millions of Americans into poverty, combined with flawed abstinence-only indoctrination that spreads reproductive disinformation and continued cuts in education spending, they’ll soon have us Americans back to the way they like us - dumb, broke, and pregnant. Yee-haw! The White House supports the House bill, saying that "receipt of federal funds should not be conditioned on a faith-based organization's giving up a part of its religious identity and mission." That sounds like a wonderful sentiment, but it’s nothing more than a nice way of saying that organizations shouldn’t have to hire people who aren’t like them. The problem with this sort of thing is stopping it once it gets started. Note that the White House statement referred to faith-based, not religious, organizations. The definition of a “faith-based” organization can be stretched pretty far. The KKK and the Nazi party are certainly faith-based, as would be a group that worships demons of the underworld and practices black magic. At the opposite end of the spectrum, is there a single company in business today that isn’t based on faith? Faith that their products or services will sell, faith that they’ll be able to develop new ones in response to changing market needs, faith that they’ll be able to maintain a decent market share and make an adequate profit, faith that their employees will show up every day and do a good job, and so on and so on. And what will happen when the all-white office is faced with hiring a person of color, or the all-male office discovers that the best person for the job is a woman? Will they be allowed to discriminate against them so that they don’t have to give up part of their racial or gender identity and mission? February 2005 UN Report
Confirms "Bush-style" Democracy in Afghanistan Wow, that sounds amazingly like what the Bush administration has been doing right here in the US! (I can’t help but note that they didn’t mention the now-thriving Afghan opium industry, which is responsible for about 80% of the heroin on the streets of Europe. Maybe that’s considered a positive thing? Is that part of the Bush “drug benefit” I keep hearing about?) Anyway, let's go down that list of Afghan problems and compare it to what the Bush administration has done here in the US: Decreasing our security by pursuing imperialistic foreign policies that create unprecedented hatred toward America - check. Decreasing the average American's welfare by cutting or eliminating programs that help the disadvantaged; refusing to extend benefits for the unemployed; pursuing oil-centric energy policies that drive up American's energy costs; exposing Americans to more pollution causing more suffering, disease, and death; pursuing economic policies that create record deficits, leave Americans with massive debt to repay, and drive down the value of the dollar - check. Reducing American's ability to control their own lives by taking decisions about how to best use public assets, like national forests and wildlife preserves, away from the public and giving them to business interests; insisting that the government has the right to spy on American citizens whenever they want to, or even lock them up forever with no legal rights; working to take away a woman's ability to make her own reproductive decisions; trying to prevent the terminally ill from being able to choose the time and manner of their death; and by trying to control who American citizens can and cannot marry, based solely on their gender - check. That's certainly a lot, but there's more. Leaving millions of Americans without healthcare and reducing the number of Americans who can afford healthcare by allowing healthcare lobbyists to write policies that maximize profits instead of patient benefits; making it illegal for the government to negotiate lower drug prices for Americans; and refusing to address the need for healthcare for all Americans – check. Lowering American education standards by implementing the flawed and shamefully under-funded No Child Left Behind Act and cutting funding for educational assistance - check. Allowing most of the country’s income to be taken by “warlords” with strong political and military connections (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Perle, Libby and all the other neoconservative Project for the New American Century members who pushed the country into an unnecessary war with Iraq), draining $300 billion (and counting) in direct costs and perhaps twice that amount in indirect costs from the American economy - check. Creating a dangerous gap between the rich and poor by lavishing tax cuts on the wealthy and big corporations while cutting assistance to the poor - check. Producing a climate of fear (by repeatedly invoking the specter of terrorist attacks for political reasons, in an attempt to instill fear and manipulate public opinion), intimidation (widespread during the 2004 election thanks to Republican “poll monitors” who tried to intimidate minority voters and other tactics to disenfranchise Democratic voters), terror (witness the dramatic increase in terrorist activity in Iraq and throughout the Middle East after the Bush invasion) and lawlessness (the Bush administration has repeatedly violated Federal law by illegally producing fake “news reports” that were actually administration propaganda, in addition to violating International law by illegally attacking and invading another country without provocation) - check. All while neglecting longer-term threats to the country's security such as the dangerously lax security at our nation’s ports and chemical factories, and not only ignoring, but actually worsening, the greatest threat that America (and the whole world) faces, global warming. I guess if all of that is good for America, it must be good for Afghanistan too! So to the Afghan people we say welcome to “democracy,” Bush-style! Please don’t hate all of us, only half of us voted for him. Maybe we can form a “George Bush F-d Up My Country” support group or something? Bush Objects to Putin's "Consolidation of Power" That's odd, because since 9/11 Bush has tried to consolidate more power in the Executive branch than ever before. He's worked to remove Congressional oversight and even tried to figure out how to structure constitutional amendments so that the Supreme Court wouldn't have the authority to reverse his decisions. He's proclaimed that he has the right to use presidential "war powers" even when America is not at war. (According to the US Constitution only Congress can declare war. Congress has not declared war and Bush has not asked them to. Therefore, we are NOT "at war" no matter how many times the Bush administration propaganda machine says we are in their effort to justify their illegal and unconstitutional activities.) Bush has violated both Federal and International law, and asserted that he is not bound by the World Court or the International Criminal Court. On issue after issue he has worked to make himself "King George of the World," claiming the power to unilaterally do whatever he wants while proclaiming himself exempt from any law on Earth. And after all of that he has the gall to object to Putin's consolidation of power. George, you should look in the mirror and object to your own consolidation of power first. Hypocrites who live in Whitehouses shouldn't throw stones, George. Social Security Smear Campaign Now, to any intelligent person who's well-informed about the reality of "Republican values" that's an extremely nice and complimentary thing to say about the AARP. It's a bit like someone in 1930's Germany saying you're "out of goose step with Nazi values." They may mean it as an insult or criticism, but it's really not. Unfortunately, I have a feeling those USA Next guys are too busy inspecting their own colons to stay well-informed. USA Next has, not surprisingly, a history that they probably don't want you to know about. According to the New York Times the organization was founded in 1991 as the United Seniors Association by Richard Viguerie, a Republican "mastermind of direct mailings who raised millions from older Americans using solicitations that sent alarming messages about Social Security." That's right, they raised millions of dollars by scaring old people into sending them their savings. Doesn't that just make you proud to be an American? Republicans Chant
“Social Security has got to go!” |