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December 24, 2004
Voice of Reality 2004: Richard Clarke
For being one of only a few insiders to stand in defiance of the White House disinformation juggernaut; for being the only high level government official to acknowledge mistakes leading to 9/11 (though he was the lone West Wing voice screaming for action to thwart the plot); and for apologizing to 9/11 families and the nation for those mistakes.
For standing his ground in opposition to the administration neocons' pathological Iraq obsession; for writing a book which held fast to the truth and spared no detail, no matter how wonky; and for providing a grand example of strength and honor when those virtues were in desperately short supply, Reality Based Nation names former counter-terrorism czar, Richard A. Clarke our Voice of Reality for 2004.
03:05 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
The Ghost of Christmas Future
Christmas Eve, 12/24/2004
Begin Dispatch.
A Letter to Future Generations,
To Whomever Can Still Read,
Please forgive us for what has happened. We can only imagine how difficult your life has become, sadly. Please understand that many of us tried to fight the darkness that overtook our democracy in our 224th year of existence. But the larger forces of human greed, hatred, bigotry and fear conspired together to create an insurmountable foe. A foe that used its power to control every aspect of our lives. Reducing us to nothing more than prisoners. What was once the greatest experiment in human self-government was co-opted by extremists who despised what that experiment represented: an egalitarian and free society. Fearful of others, fearful of change and fearful of freedom, those extremists methodically and systematically took control of our government, dismantled it piece by piece and threw it into the fire - destroying forever what we all thought was strong enough to withstand the worst marauding advances - simply, America.
We had been taught (to the point of apathy, perhaps) that the extremes of human history would never blow onto our shores. In hindsight, we were looking in the wrong direction, because they didn't arrive on our shores. They bubbled up from within; from wellsprings of hate and cowardice hiding behind veils of goodness and love. Many thought it was fleeting, the overlords ascendance to power, that it would pass. Many could just not see the course set sail by these horrible men. Sadly, however, many agreed with their leadership; many agreed with their lies.
In our 227th year, the evil forces began a crusade to rid the world of our perceived enemies. The reasons stated for war turned out to be lies. Many disagreed. Many fought against the half-truths. And many died needlessly, on both sides. Perhaps this was the beginning of our end when human life became meaningless and an afterthought. Perhaps we were headed down that road long before. We do not know. What we do know is that our leaders lied to us and our leaders stole from us, on all things and everything.
There were those of us who wanted a society of freedom and dignity for all. There were those of us who believed that our democracy would endure the ravages of these evil men. But we poorly miscalculated their ruthlessness and hatred of our democracy. The result is, unfortunately, your present.
End Dispatch.
03:03 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Jim Biederman
Dem leadership debates abortion
The Democratic leaderhsip is in the midst of an internal battle over abortion. Indiana Congressman Tim Roemer and Howard Dean are the frontrunners to lead the DNC. Roemer, a pro-lifer, just recently emerged as a candidate and appears to have the support of Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. Howard Dean, on the other hand, is urging a Democratic move towards its progressive base and a continued pro-choice posture.
This is why they lose. Rather than standing by its core convictions, while modernizing its tactics (which Dean would do), the Democrats appear to be capitulating to Republican platform ideology and the impassioned mandates of the right-wing punditry to join them or die.
Moving to the right is tantamount to conceding to the whims of an empty shirt GOP. And ANY concessions would confirm the weakling stereotype endowed upon the Democrats by every wingnut with a microphone and the ears of the nation. Get a modern progressive in the top spot and let's go already!
It's not abortion, gay rights, or stem cells that ruin the Democrats in the red states, it's indecision over those issues combined with major flaws in modern campaign strategy.
09:19 AM | Comments (3) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Top 10 Most Outrageous Statements '04
Compiled by Media Matters:
Rush Limbaugh on the Abu Ghraib photos: "I'm talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You ever heard of need to blow some steam off?"
Ann Coulter: "[Senator John] Kerry will improve the economy in the emergency services and body bag industry."
Tony Blankley called philanthropist George Soros "a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust."
Michael Savage: "When you hear 'human rights,' think gays. ... [T]hink only one thing: someone who wants to rape your son."
Oliver North: "Every terrorist out there is hoping John Kerry is the next president of the United States."
Pat Robertson on gays and lesbians: "[S]elf-absorbed hedonists ... that want to impose their particular sexuality on the rest of America."
Pat Buchanan: "[H]omosexuality is an affliction, like alcoholism."
Bill O'Reilly to Jewish caller: "[I]f you are really offended, you gotta go to Israel."
Bill Cunningham (Clear Channel radio host who appeared as a guest on The Sean Hannity Show): The election is over because "Elizabeth Edwards has now sung."
Jerry Falwell: "And we're going to invite PETA [to "wild game night"] as our special guest, P-E-T-A -- People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. We want you to come, we're going to give you a top seat there, so you can sit there and suffer. This is one of my special groups, another one's the ACLU, another is the NOW -- the National Order of Witches [sic]. We've got -- I've got a lot of special groups."
09:05 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Fox News changes AP wording
U.S.: Mosul Bomber Wore Iraqi Uniform lead as reported by Rawya Rageh, Associated Press Writer:
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The suicide bomber believed to have blown himself up in a U.S. military dining tent near Mosul this week...
The exact same AP story lead as it appears on Fox News:
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The homicide bomber believed to have blown himself up in a U.S. military dining tent near Mosul this week...
See "Outfoxed" for more on this. Tip by way of dKos.
01:22 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
December 23, 2004
Of Mice and Orange Revolutions
We're less than a month away from Bush's second inauguration and nowhere near where we need to be in terms of adequate protest and nonviolent resistance. Protests throughout the last four years, as well as protests in Ohio, have floundered and very little has been achieved -- which is, let's face it, pathetic considering how Bush was somehow re-elected despite a massive opposition effort and a litany of mistakes on which we simply didn't capitalize.
There's a series of actions set for the January 20 inauguration and reports are already coming down that -- imagine what Gandhi would say to this -- permits are being denied to activist groups and planners are placing grandstands at locations where permits were issued. Permits? So far, our cause is plagued by poor strategy, casual leadership, and lackluster execution.
What's the disconnect?
In the Ukraine, our government has transparently used the Albert Einstein Institution for Peace and its founder Gene Sharp, a Boston political scientist and Gandhi-proxy for the modern nonviolent action movement, to help rally the supporters of regime change and opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko. The students, the mass protests, the orange ribbons. All from Sharp's theories and all prime illustrations of how to do it right.
It's not like this is classified information. Sharp's opus "The Politics of Nonviolent Action" has been around for 30 years. Clearly, his methods work. Ask Slobodan Milosevic, who fell due to nonviolent action inspired by Sharp. The "Rose Revolution" in Georgia was textbook Sharp.
Anti-Bush protest organizers can no longer rely on weekend warrior actions in which expression is abundant, but winning is rare. How do the orange flags in the Ukraine gain worldwide attention and OUR protests in Ohio are laughed off with tinfoil hat jokes? It’s not simply because Americans are cynical. It's because we’re just not doing it right.
We need to begin with Sharp's 198 Methods of Nonviolent Action.
If our opposition forces can't make significant headway against this current administration -- hell, they hand us great material almost hourly -- then clearly there's some major problems with our methods.
There's an old Quaker axiom: "Shit or get off the pot." If we're going to stumble our way through the next four years using the same ham-fisted routines, we might as well give up now.
Ukraine: Part Homegrown Uprising, Part Imported Production?
Albert Einstein Institution for Peace
Common Dreams: A Letter to the US Peace Movement
09:36 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Bush to world's poor: let them eat cake!
From today's NY Times:
"...the latest available figures show that the percentage of United States income going to poor countries remains near rock bottom: 0.14 percent. Britain is at 0.34 percent, and France at 0.41 percent. (Norway and Sweden, to no one's surprise, are already exceeding the goal, at 0.92 percent and 0.79 percent.)"
Read it here.
05:32 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Jim Biederman
Extremist Judges, the Sequel
Bush continues his war against our democracy by re-nominating extremist, bigoted, and intellectually-challenged judges for U.S. District Court positions.
05:15 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Jim Biederman
Kerry joins Ohio suit against Triad
Baby steps out the door. Baby steps into the recount. Clearly Christine Gregoire and Viktor Yushchenko have provided some shred of inspiration for Senator John Kerry. Breaking news from Truthout:
Specifically, Kerry will be filing a request for expedited discovery regarding Triad Systems voting machines, as well as a motion for a preservation order to protect any and all discovery and preserve any evidence on this matter.
In case you missed it -- and it's not difficult to miss news from Ohio's recount since the media is ignoring it entirely -- a Triad Systems employee was caught in Hocking County, Ohio allegedly tampering with a vote counting machine which could taint the recount totals there.
01:04 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
"Many of these trees were my friends!"
Treebeard wept as Bush continued his "War on the Environment" yesterday by authorizing new rules which will allow the raping of our 192 million acres of national forests. The Washington Post:
"The end result of all this is there will be more logging and less conservation of wildlife," said Mike Leahy, natural resources counsel for Defenders of Wildlife. "They're not going to provide enough land for these species to hang on."
The rules give "economic activity" increased importance; reductions in mandated studies on the impact on endangered species; and regulations on logging have been relaxed. Studies on forest species of fish and wildlife will no longer be required before stripping.
One-quarter of U.S. species at risk of extinction -- including more than 25 species of trout and salmon -- live in national forests, according to the conservation group NatureServe. Large animals such as grizzly bears, wolves and elk depend on the forests' large, undisturbed swaths of land for habitat.
Over-all, this is an environmental policy roll-back to the '70s, erasing rules put in place by Reagan, Bush 41, and Clinton. There aren't words to describe how heinous this action is. It's a shameful day for America and a tragic era for our planet.
11:42 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Frivolous Lawsuits
Jerry Falwell:
"Imagine God raising up an army of attorneys, far more than the ACLU has, to stand up for religious freedom in America. This is a positive thing. It's an encouraging thing. Why do we always have to be on the defense? We have declared war on the left, and we're going to sue the hide off of everybody, everybody, who tries to inhibit the liberties of our children and our families from worshipping and honoring the Lord, as we in America are constitutionally allowed to do."
I wonder if this falls into Bush's frivolous lawsuit category?
01:39 AM | Comments (1) | Posted By Jim Biederman
O'Reilly is "Misinformer of the Year"
Media Matters has determined that Bill O'Reilly is the 2004 "Misinformer of the Year" with a total of 70 documented instances of passing off lies as "spin-free" truth.
Connect the splotches:
Among O'Reilly's most egregiously false and misleading claims were false assertions that President Bush did not oppose the 911 Commission; repeated declarations of an Iraq-Al Qaeda link; and one instance where O'Reilly fabricated a Paris newspaper to support his claim of a successful French boycott. In other instances, O'Reilly promoted falsehoods about the tax structure, economy, and the American electorate.
And he's the most popular prime time pundit. Thank goodness American TV viewers don't repeat what they hear on -- oh crap.
12:21 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
December 22, 2004
Gregoire up by 10 votes
The Washington gubernatorial recount seems locked up for Democrat Christine Gregoire... by 10 votes. Earlier results this evening showed an eight vote lead over Republican Dino Rossi, but that number has since been revised.
The heated recount process has been on-going since November 2 and NPR reported tonight that the GOP will be appealing for a re-vote in the gubernatorial race.
A bit of perspective on the GOP's duplicity regarding appealing and contesting the election... On Fox News last week, Sean Hannity told Ohio presidential recount attorney Cliff Arnebeck, "You guys are sore losers, and I have three words for both of you: get over it. Two more: you lost." Keep talking, man-child.
11:19 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Bush talking into his neck tie... for real
By way of Crooks & Liars and James Poling... This clip enters the "George W. Bush Hall of Public Weirdness". Dateline: The December 20 Press Conference. What the hell is he mumbling into his tie? Is he telling an advisor to slow down the lines being fed into his ear piece? Is he sending messages to "Tony" the little boy who lives in his mouth?
WATCH THE VIDEO (Windows Media - better quality)
WATCH THE VIDEO (Real Player - Go to 16:47:00)
UPDATE: It sounds like, "Get over it." Huh?
09:15 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Sheen for America
In the latest issue of Rolling Stone, Michael Moore called for the Democrats to choose their own Arnold in time for the 2008 election. In other words, we need a big name to lead our party in ways Harry Reid and Evan Bayh simply can't. So what's the short list of potential celebrity candidates?
Tom Hanks. To date, has he ever shown an interest in running for office? If he ran, he'd be easily elected, but it's unlikely he'd ever thrust his guarded private life into the spotlight. Plus, there's all that old footage from "Bosom Buddies" which Fox News would air around the clock -- even during stories completely unrelated to the race.
Paul Newman. Can you imagine the series of salad dressing analogies coming from the Republicans? "Is this the honey mustard Newman or the Bacon Ranch Newman?" or "Too much oil, not enough vinegar, Mr. Newman!" (Not sure what either actually mean, but leave it to brainiacs like Ann Coulter -- they'll say it anyway.)
Warren Beatty. Maybe. The movie "Bulworth" was a good template to imagine him in office, but the crazier scenes would be run in TV ads and most of the red states would think they're watching real-life footage of Beatty.
Now the best, most plausible possibility...
Who's the most beloved president of our era? President Bartlet himself: Martin Sheen. MORE...
Most of America could easily envision him as the president, and my guess is he'd be a lot like the character he plays on "The West Wing". He could even hire John Spencer to be his chief of staff and Aaron Sorkin as his speech writer and political advisor. He's played JFK, RFK, and an advisor to President Michael Douglas in "The American President".
He's a self-proclaimed devout Catholic which could diffuse criticism of his 60 arrests on civil disobedience charges as well as his serious drug and alcohol problem before, through, and including the filming of "Apocalypse Now". But drug issues didn't hurt Arnold.
Though he always denied political aspirations (he was asked to run with Nader in 1996), he's certainly been active in campaigns. Watch a speech he gave for Howard Dean here -- fast forward to about 13 minutes in. Note his ability to deliver a hell of a speech.
There's the issue, however, of Sheen being "too liberal". So what. So is Arnold, depending on who you ask.
And the clincher? According to Gallup, Martin Sheen's approval rating is 55% -- a full six points higher than our current actual president.
President Martin Sheen in 2008. "Sheen for America!"
Meanwhile, I'll make a bold prediction here. The Democratic nominee in 2008 will NOT be Hillary Clinton. The Republican nominee will NOT be Bill Frist. Prediction: the race will be John Kerry vs. Condi Rice. Unless Sheen runs.
03:10 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Christmas Under Siege: 3 days left
With three days to go, it's anyone's guess whether Christmas will, in fact, occur this year. The future of three-days-from-now hangs in the balance as the gathering threat of total cancellation looms. Will an estimated 159 million Christian households in America wake up to gifts, church, feasting, and songs being sung by a choir -- or will they just simply... not wake up? Sadly, it doesn't look good.
Reached for comment, a spokesperson for the Baby Jesus said, "While we appreciate O'Reilly, Hannity, and Buchanan bravely coming to our rescue, it's looking like a 'too little too late' scenario. We've been in touch with the estate of Burl Ives and an emergency strategy summit is scheduled for tonight at O'Reilly's ginger bread bunker hidden in an undisclosed location."
Meanwhile, there's been no update on the impending sieges on television, professional football, dancing, and "water as a beverage choice". We'll keep you posted as news becomes available.
(Complete "War on Christmas" coverage here.)
01:36 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Halliburton delayed sturdier mess hall
From USA Today, today, regarding the Mosul base mess tent:
A sturdier structure designed to replace the mess is being built at the base, but the work has been plagued by delays. Hastings said workers from KBR [Kellogg, Brown & Root], a subsidiary of Halliburton, were supposed to have completed it by Christmas.
Two questions: Who the hell is running the show over there? And how many more have to die for the cause of gross incompetence?
01:17 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
CNN juxtaposes Iraq and Vietnam
This morning, CNN finally stepped up to the reality plate.
Between 10am and 10:30am EST, CNN cablecasted live footage of wounded soldiers from yesterday's attack in Mosul arriving in snow-swept Germany. What was more unusual was that they aired live split-screen footage of the annual dedication at the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, DC, during which messages were read aloud to fallen soldiers and memorialized on a ceremonial Christmas tree.
Finally, a mainstream media outlet spends a little time covering the war as they should've been all along. The two events happened at the same time, but rather than to run one or the other as a taped item later, they chose to set them side-by-side.
12:45 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
December 21, 2004
Scarborough compares Iraq to WWII
Is Joe Scarborough really this naive and ill-informed? Towards the end of his "blog" today on MSNBC:
Circle January 30th our D-day, because our enemies know as Hitler did in 1944, that a U.S. victory on that date means the beginning of the end for the forces of evil.
Where to begin...
Our WWII European enemy. A well-defined military regime which invaded and conquered an entire continent and exterminated six million people, with its sights expressly set on the world.
Our Iraq enemy. A vague, ill-defined, decentralized force which can melt into the citizenry at the drop of a hat, preventing our military from identifying them as friend or foe. Their only aim is to wreck havoc without remorse (or honor) on the next nearest human being, regardless of their affiliation. It's a guerrilla army which, as history has shown again and again, can exist in perpetuity. New, faceless, nameless members of this force are joining every day from all points of the Middle East region.
The definition of victory in WWII Europe. Defeat the Nazi regime by destroying it's well-defined, uniformed military; conquering its capital; and capturing or killing its commanders and politicians.
The definition of victory in Iraq. We don't know for sure. Scarborough, the GOP, and the Bush administration are wishfully thinking that elections will somehow scare the guerrilla enemy into submission. If the largest military force the world has ever known hasn't scared them, how could a ramshackled, facade of an election possibly deter their efforts? That is, if the election happens in the first place.
Scarborough seems to think this war is a lot like World War II, and that an election on January 30, 2005 is tantamount to the D-Day Invasion and the fall of Berlin. Other than the fortitude, bravery, and blood of our soldiers, I can't think of anything else about this false, frivolous Iraq War that even closely resembles the last honorable war this nation and its allies fought.
10:22 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Mosul, Iraq: 12/21/04
05:01 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Hue, South Vietnam: 02/02/68
04:50 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Repeat after me...
As expected the press is only half-reporting the latest allegations that the White House, and specifically Public Enemy Number 1: George W. Bush, explicity approved various forms of torture on detainees in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay. And also, as expected, the White House is promising a whitewash, err, umm, an investigation into those abuses.
04:49 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Jim Biederman
Plant a demon seed, raise a flower of fire
01:42 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
A presidential directive on detainees
Since the release of the FBI e-mail mentioning an Executive Order in which the president authorized use of torture on detainees in Iraq, just about every federal department has issued denials of such and order. Of course they're denying it. This is the Bush era in which black is white.
"No such executive order exists or has ever existed," an NSC spokesman told Knight-Ridder. No "order", but perhaps a "directive"?
The White House website contains the full text of a June 22, 2004 press briefing with counsel Al Gonzales and several counsels from the Department of Defense at the height of the Abu Ghraib scandal. In that briefing, Gonzales released a document to the press: not an Executive Order, but rather a Presidential Directive signed by the president on February 7, 2002. Gonzales claimed in that briefing that this is the only document regarding detainees signed by the president.
The order (found after much digging around Google - download pdf) details the president's views on the Geneva Convention and how they apply to al Qaeda and the Taliban. Those "views" waffle between page one and two, but the up-shot is that even though he directs that detainees have no right to be protected by Article 3 of the Geneva Convention, they should be treated humanely. Maybe. MORE...
I also accept the legal conclusion of the Department of Justice and determine that common Article 3 of Geneva does not apply to either al Qaeda or Taliban detainees, because, among other reasons, the relevant conflicts are international in scope and common Article 3 applies only to "armed conflict not of an international character."
Of course there's nothing in the directive that defines "al Qaeda" and given the rhetoric of the Iraq War, Bush's definition of al Qaeda could mean just about anyone.
Meanwhile, the document gets really fuzzy when, even though he's repeated several times how Geneva doesn't apply, the president states:
The United States Armed Forces shall continue to treat detainees humanely and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of Geneva.
The language is vague, no? Principles? What is "military necessity"? It sounds like, "Use Geneva as a rule of thumb until it becomes inconvenient." Could torture be seen as a "necessity" when attempting to ascertain important information from men and women suspected of wanting to kill the military's forces?
If, however unlikely, the FBI e-mail was mistakenly referring to this as the "Executive Order", it's possible that the vague language of the directive allowed for some of what happened at Abu Ghraib, since 1) those detainees weren't necessarily al Qaeda, 2) there were civilian interrogators (contractors and federal agents) in the facility, and 3) with Rumsfeld's, Justice's, and other memos, the combination could lead to an affirmation that some of the torture techniques were permissible according to the president.
Then again, it's very likely that there is another presidential memorandum, directive, or order which updated the language to include the war in Iraq and the detainees in prisons there.
One other thing. The FBI e-mail directly connects specific torture techniques with the president. The directive does not mention the use of any techniques. But watch. If the administration is pressed, they might try to pass off the directive as the order so as to further diffuse the issue. It won't work if media attention, Congressional inquiries, and further investigation by the ACLU serve to further clarify what we all suspect.
Meanwhile, the torture buck still appears to stop at the desks of Donald Rumsfeld, Al Gonzales, and Mr. Bush. I found this document in about 15 minutes on the internet (it was, after all, released to the public), where-as the man who wrote that e-mail is an official employed by the FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATIONS, with access to far greater information and resources than Google and too much coffee.
12:51 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
December 20, 2004
Bad News Bush: 49% approval rating
So the news gets worse for our torturer-in-chief. In addition to a dismal press conference, and new FBI documents indicating that he authorized some of the abuses at Abu Ghraib, a new USA Today/Gallup/CNN poll is reporting that Bush's approval rating has dropped six points since November.
49 percent of respondents said they approved of the job the president is doing. That number is down from his November approval rating of 55 percent. Bush is the first incumbent president to have an approval rating below 50 percent one month after winning re-election.
Mandate. Political capital. Will of the people. Pathetic.
09:01 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
ACLU: Bush ordered Abu Ghraib abuses
A new set of documents obtained by the ACLU via the Freedom of Information Act seems to indicate that Bush himself authorized the use of certain forms of torture via an Executive Order.
An e-mail (download pdf) sent from a redacted "On Scene Commander--Baghdad" to a number of FBI agents references "techniques authorized by Executive Order" which included "stress positions", "use of military working dogs", "prisoners with hoods on their heads", and "sleep deprivation".
Some of the wording indicates that agents were instructed, either before or after the Abu Ghraib story broke, not to employ the illegal techniques seen in the Abu Ghraib photos, as well as the "legal" ones (authorized by Bush) also seen in the photos. MORE...
This is the first evidence we've seen of the torture practices being authorized by Bush himself. Previously, any abuse allegations only reached as high as White House counsel Al Gonzales, and most recently Donald Rumsfeld. Up to this point, there's been no official mention of any Executive Order regarding prisoner abuse.
But what has Bush had to say this year about a prison of which he could barely pronounce the name at first? Let's go to the videotape...
"[U.S. soldiers who did this] will be brought to justice. The people in the Middle East must understand that this was horrible." George W. Bush, May 5, 2004
"I talked to the secretary of defense this morning. I said: Find the truth, and then tell the Iraqi people and the world the truth. We have nothing to hide." George W. Bush, May 5, 2004
"The U.S. remains steadfastly committed to upholding the Geneva Conventions. These acts were wrong. They were inconsistent with our policies and our values as a nation. I have directed a full accounting for the abuse of the Abu Ghraib detainees, and investigations are under way to review detention operations in Iraq and elsewhere." George W. Bush, June 26, 2004
"We will not compromise the rule of law or the values and principles that make us strong. Torture is wrong no matter where it occurs, and the United States will continue to lead the fight to eliminate it everywhere." George W. Bush, June 26, 2004
"Under the dictator [Hussein], prisons like Abu Gar -- reb -- were symbols of death and torture. That same prison became a symbol of disgraceful conduct by a few American troops who dishonored our country and disregardered [sic] our values. America will fund the construction of a modern, maximum security prison. When that prison is completed, detainees at Abu Garub will be relocated. Then, with the approval of the Iraqi government, we will demolish the Abu Garab prison, as a fitting symbol of Iraq's new beginning." George W. Bush, May 24, 2004
And he signed an Executive Order allowing many of the abuses seen in the photos. Unless Bush is like Colonel Blake from M*A*S*H and signs things indiscriminately, he's spent the last seven months lying to the world. Which is no surprise.
05:57 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Bush's job is to tell us about his job
Bush conducted a piss-poor 55-minute press conference this morning peppered with the usual disorganized, rambling non-sentences interspersed with brain-fart pauses, pulpit-thumping, and disrespectful staccato chuckling while staggering his way through life-and-death issues. In other words, exactly like every extemporaneous performance of his career in the White House.
But what did we learn? Civics. Second-grade-level social studies. We learned that Bush has a pathological need to instruct us about "his job", "the American people's job", and "Congress's job".
What are Bush's requisites for choosing a Director of National Intelligence?
Clearly, the president's job is to, "pick someone who knows something about intelligence," Bush said. Why, great! The DNI's job is to know about intelligence. We would hope the newly created position of Overlord for the nation's intelligence services will know something about intelligence.
What are the lessons Bush learned from the Bernard Kerik fiasco?
"The lessons learned is, continue to vet," Bush said. That's the lesson. See, what happened with Kerik is that they vetted him, and in the future they’re going to continue vetting. Here's a piece of news from the president: the White House has vetted a lot of people. Stop the presses.
If his priority is to reduce the deficit, why did he sign every spending bill that crossed his desk last term? Because it's Congress’s job to work with the president while he does his job in order to come up with spending that makes sense for the American people whose job it is to understand what the president’s job… is.
Social Security was especially weird. Congress's job is to write the laws that the president proposes to them. But don't make the president negotiate with himself in front of the press, as in this exchange:
Q Thank you, sir. Mr. President, on that point, there is already a lot of opposition to the idea of personal accounts, some of it fairly entrenched among the Democrats. I wonder what your strategy is to try to convince them to your view? And, specifically, they say that personal accounts would destroy Social Security. You argue that it would help save the system. Can you explain how?
THE PRESIDENT: I will try to explain how without negotiating with myself. It's a very tricky way to get me to play my cards.
Several questions later...
Q Good morning, Mr. President. I'd like to ask you on Social Security, you said that you don't like to come to the table with -- having negotiated with yourself. Yet, you have ruled out tax cuts and no cuts in benefits for the retired and the near retired. I wonder how you square that statement. And also, what do you -- in your mind, what is near retired?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, well, that's going to fall in the negotiating with myself category.
His job is to say he's not going to negotiate with himself, while literally negotiating with himself. The empty shirt of a so-called "steadfast" leader.
How does he feel about the torture allegations stemming from Guantanamo? Well, it's his job to enforce the rule of law and to vet the court ruling about the job of the officials at Guantanamo.
On that note... Rummy?
"The Secretary of Defense is a complex job."
And immigration reform?
The president's job is to make sure "good-hearted" immigrants will be allowed to come here and, "[do] jobs Americans will not do." He repeated this at least three times, "Legalize the process of people doing jobs Americans won't do."
After an hour of job descriptions, it would’ve been great to hear what some of those jobs are. Never-the-less, this statement really stuck out as being one of the most insensitive and potentially disastrous things he’s ever said. Bring in the immigrants (just the nice ones) so they can scoop shit in the park, or trim our hedges, or drain our septic tanks, or hell -- pick our cotton. It's an immigration policy designed for the expressed intent of fashioning a government sanctioned 21st Century indentured servant underclass.
The president has a bizarre pathology. Rather than actually doing his job (naturally exuding the traits required for the presidency), he substitutes telling us what his job is and what his responsibilities are. Rather than having any real ideas, he gives us condescending (yet ham-fisted) overviews of government policy-making with the notion that we’ll somehow be wowed by how crazy and complex Washington is, and thus sympathetic to his plight of trying to reform it. And rather than admitting a mistake, he twists the mistake into the solution (he's going to fix his vetting process by continuing to vet – or fix No Child Left Behind by expanding it to high schools).
One other thing by way of a non sequiter: What’s wrong with his jaw?
01:22 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Bob Cesca
December 19, 2004
We can barely have elections in Ohio...
Are we really deluded enough to believe there will be real elections in Iraq when electoral commission workers are shot and beheaded in broad daylight in the streets of Baghdad?
The AP: "About 30 militants hurling hand grenades and firing machine guns attacked a car carrying five people employed by the [electoral] commission's Baghdad office and tried 'to drag them out.'" Three of the five men were killed in the attack.
Joe Biden on "Meet the Press" today predicted that real elections won't happen in Iraq for another year or so. He's being generous. Of couse, Allawi can always fly in Wally O'Dell and voters can just stay home.
11:30 PM | Comments (1) | Posted By Bob Cesca
The Army of God's General
Lt. Gen. Jerry "You Say Muslim, I Say Devil" Boykin has a new job: figuring out how to screw the CIA out of their job.
You may remember Jerry from earlier this year, when he said the following charming thing about a Somali warlord: "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol."
The Somali's God was, of course, Allah. Not a "real" God, as far as Jerry's concerned. Sorry, you billions of Muslims -- Jerry Boykin's got some bad news for you!
Jerry has big ideas about his own God, though. Check out this quote from last year: "We in the army of God, in the house of God, kingdom of God have been raised for such a time as this."
And here's what he says about America's first born-again President: "He's in the White House because God put him there." And, no, God is not a synonym for Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, or Karl Rove. Jerry is talking about God. That's HIS God, not some Arab's God.
So now, the New York Times tells us, Jerry is spearheading the revamping of the Pentagon's intelligence operation, taking over for the recently Bush-screwed CIA. Top among Jerry's ideas is "commencing combat operations chiefly to obtain intelligence."
Sorry your son's dead, ma'am, but it was worth fighting this battle because we caught us some Arabs and we're gonna torture 'em until they'll say anything we want 'em to say!
I never, ever thought I'd say the CIA was the good option.
10:26 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By John Christian Plummer
And so it begins...
If you choose to live among undesirables, then you must be one too.
Social Security is denying registration cards for hetereosexual couples married in New Paltz, NY, because the city also married gay couples.
The AP has it here.
08:27 PM | Comments (2) | Posted By Jim Biederman
No Child Left Behind prompts cheating
A Dallas Morning News investigation has shown that Texas schools (the administration, not the students) in Dallas, Houston, and other regions have been allegedly cheating their test results in order to pass the accountibility mandates in Bush's ridiculous No Child Left Behind education program.
[The investigation] found, for example, that the fourth-graders at Sanderson Elementary School in the Houston Independent School District scored extremely poorly on the math TAKS test this year, rating the school in the bottom 2 percent of the state.
However, the school's fifth-graders ended up with the highest scale scores on the math TAKS of any school in Texas, with more than 90 percent of the students getting perfect or near-perfect scores.
Massive under-funding of the program aside, this feels like the beginnings of a major, more damaging epidemic. The consolation? The White House gets to joke about No Child in their Barney videos -- which, tragically enough, are designed for kids.
07:33 PM | Comments (2) | Posted By Bob Cesca
AP: 'potential' U.S. invasion of Cuba?
Today, Cuba wrapped up its largest war exercises in 18 years in preparation for what Fidel Castro is calling an impending invasion of Cuba by U.S. forces. The AP:
Thousands of Cubans took to the streets, taking their prearranged places under the doctrine of "The Peoples' War," in which every citizen, young and old, participates in the defense of the country.
"The risks of (U.S.) aggression are real," President Fidel Castro said Sunday on Cuban television.
Since even before the United States launched its unilateral attack on Iraq last year, Cuba has insisted that a similar U.S. strike is possible.
Of course he has every reason to be scared. We're in the era of the Bush Doctrine and no nation is safe, for better or worse. But the headline and wording in the AP story is bizarre. Without getting into deep analysis of semantics, the word "potential" in the headline instead of "hypothetical" is curious. Headlines are vetted by editors and it seems strange that this leading word usage would slip by. Does Castro know something we don't? Or does Vanessa Arrington of the AP know something we don't?
07:15 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Tucker goes to MSNBC
Tucker Carlson, who was smacked down by the truth-talking Jon Stewart, is set to take over the Deborah Norville slot on MSNBC at 9pm weeknights, according the TV Newser. So the news media's parroting of the right continues, especially at NBC networks. Let's take a look.
MSNBC Primetime:
7pm: Hardball
Chris Matthews is a conservative-sounding Democrat who routinely weighs his panels heavily to the right. Yet his Sunday morning "Chris Matthews Show" is more balanced.
8pm: Countdown with Keith Olbermann
Balance of comedy and news, slightly left when covering Ohio voting irregularities. The only voice of reason on the network.
9pm: Tucker Carlson
Totally right-wing bow-tied man-boy who never matured beyond Sunday school naivete.
10pm: Scarborough Country
"Congressman" Joe is insanely right-wing. He's also insane. And with Pat Buchanan filling in for him for the last month, it's been, what Jon Stewart called, "F**k You with Pat Buchanan".
And while we're at it... NBC networks (MSNBC, CNBC, NBC, even Bravo!) gave, on average, around 67% of their political donations to Republicans. Even Fox News gave less to the GOP. That's saying A LOT.
05:25 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Yellow magnets V: Bring them home
Iraq war veteran, Marine Lance Corporal Michael Hoffman in Allentown, PA's Morning Call:
If you have one of those magnetic "support our troops" ribbons on your car, Michael Hoffman suggests you grab a marker and add a few words: "Bring them home now."
"Being against the war is the only way to be for the troops," said Hoffman. "We're doing them no good by sending them over there."
Hoffman is the co-founder of Iraq Veterans Against the War. Read the whole Morning Call item here. On that note, have we heard any statistics about how the rank & file in Iraq voted in November?
Previous Yellow Magnet Rants:
Part IV: Beyond Profitdome
Part III: Yellow magnets: 'Your ad here'
Part II: Crown Sizing
Part I: Yellow magnets and homeless vets
01:43 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
Because they can, that's why!
Pfizer. Inc.'s CEO announced yesterday that the company will not recall the popular arthitis drug Celebrex, despite a massive study showing that the drug increases the chances of heart attack 2 to 1. I guess it's a good news, bad news sort of thing.
Why would a major pharmaceutical company disregard the public's health so blatantly? Because they can.
12:53 PM | Comments (0) | Posted By Jim Biederman
Meanwhile, in Iraq today
While Bush talks baby-talk with Barney (RealPlayer) and basks in his preordained legacy...
Karbala, Najaf car bombs kill 58
Voter registration site attacked
11:18 AM | Comments (3) | Posted By Bob Cesca
TIME picks Bush, lowers standards
"For sticking to his guns (literally and figuratively), for reshaping the rules of politics to fit his ten-gallon-hat leadership style and for persuading a majority of voters that he deserved to be in the White House for another four years, George W. Bush is TIME's 2004 Person of the Year."
In 1938, Adolf Hitler was named TIME's person of the year.
10:51 AM | Comments (0) | Posted By Bob Cesca
