Prayers for Khalid

River.

A sorry replacement

Pacific Views takes a look at that putz, Sen Norm Coleman (R-Suckboy), who filled Paul Wellstone's seat.

Hat tip: Avedon Carol

Free Haiti

I have been delinquent and remiss in not pointing you here earlier; CN Todd has been posting an excellent series on our doings in Haiti.

[. . .]

But why should we care? Because H.R. 611 would send millions of dollars in taxpayer money into the pocket of the regime of Gerard Latortue, the man who assumed the title of "Interim President" after Bush helped orchestrate the kidnapping and removal of Aristide in February 2004. And even now, Latortue's police force is carrying out a reign of terror in many of Haiti's poorest neighborhoods, working to eliminate many of Aristide's most loyal supporters.

No doubt, American's will want to know that their Congressmen want to send their tax dollars to help prop up this guy.

[. . .]

Role models

From USAToady via the Operation Yellow Elephant blog:

[. . .]

There's one more option that might make a difference, particularly among middle and upper-income Americans: Strong and sustained calls to service from the nation's political leaders, up to and including the commander-in-chief.

Last fall, Charles Moskos of Northwestern University, a prominent expert on military manpower, asked a group of recruiters what would most help them: tripling bonuses or enlisting presidential daughter Jenna Bush.

The recruiters' choice was unanimous: Jenna Bush.

[. . .]

If the First Fluffers aren't soldier material, why doesn't Chimpy at least have them working for the USO?

Commentary

My weekly commentary is up at Pourquoi Pas.

Go fuck yourselves

That's basically what the Department of Homeland Security told all of us who live in big cities yesterday. You're granted an audience with the King.

Reason #1

Reason #1 to destroy Karl Rove.

Diplomacy in action

Via Pudentilla blogging at Skippy's:

BEIJING, Friday, July 15 - China should use nuclear weapons against the United States if the American military intervenes in any conflict over Taiwan, a senior Chinese military official said Thursday.

"If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons," the official, Maj. Gen. Zhu Chenghu, said at an official briefing.

[. . .]

Good thing Condi went over there, huh? Idiots. The Chinese don't have to threaten us with nukes, they can just cash in all the paper they're holding.

Update: 14:50:

My man Dave Johnson is on this today too.

Buggery for renouncing "Southern Strategy"?

This is indeed getting better and better. TeeHee!

From Media Matters:

Limbaugh blasted Mehlman's renunciation of GOP racial tactics: "Republicans are going to go bend over and grab the ankles"

To which Mehlman, no stranger to bending over and grabbing his ankles, no doubt replied, while glancing back over his shoulder, "And your point is...?"

They're eating their own, and I think they're past the appetizer. Eat hearty, me buckos.

Just to be clear

. . . When Rove confirmed it or commented in any way, he broke the law.

[. . .]

That is the only talking point we need.

Plame Gets the "Gate"

From Editor & Publisher:

Today, July 15, 2005, may go down in history as the day when what has previously been known as the "Plame Affair" or "the CIA leak scandal" or even, lately "Miller/Cooper/Rove," finally gets that most coveted of scandal slugs: Plamegate.

And with the blockbuster reports today from The New York Times, the Associated Press, and the Washington Post detailing Karl Rove's conversation with Robert Novak, six days before he wrote his fateful outing column, we are suddenly into "what-did-the-president-know-and-when-did-he-know-it" territory.

Plamegate. It's about time. Think about it: We had a Liddy then and a Libby now. Though we should be happy that in 1972 Democratic headquarters was not located in a different, nearby, Washington, D.C. complex. Then we might have to call it PlameHoJo.

Who knows, we may even be ready for a re-make of one old early 1970s hit under a new title: "The Night They Rove Old Dubya Down."

Then there's this amusing (if plausible) comment by Congressional Quarterly's Craig Crawford today: "So, now we have leakers leaking the leak investigation. Fitzgerald might have to put the whole press corps in jail before it's over with...."

I posted some of the funny parts to make ya want to go read it, so go read it. This is just getting better and better!

$8M from RNC for Vote Fraud

From the Baltimore Chronicle:

Team Bush Paid Millions to Nathan Sproul - and Tried to Hide It

All the payments by the RNC to Sproul add up to a whopping $8,359,161. Where did all that money come from? Why did the RNC suppress their real expenditures? And what exactly did Sproul do for all that pay?

And that's just money paid to one outfit in pursuit of re-stealing the White House. Makes Nixon's little burglary to the same ends seem kinda quaint, huh?

Rove Two-fer

Two articles on the same page at Truthout. Read 'em both.

Daniel Schorr:

Let me remind you that the underlying issue in the Karl Rove controversy is not a leak, but a war and how America was misled into that war.

The role of Rove and associates added up to a small incident in a very large scandal - the effort to delude America into thinking it faced a threat dire enough to justify a war.

An editorial tying Rove to my other favorite sleazebag:

"It's widely known that Karl Rove has been pulling strings all over Washington for years, obviously not just in the case of the Plame leak," said Peter L. Kelley, manager of the Campaign for a Cleaner Congress.

"What is not widely known, however, is his close connection with Jack Abramoff, who is at the center of the lobbying scandal in which Washington is now embroiled. Rove let archconservative operatives like Grover Norquist call shots at the White House. And just this week, a Texas judge ruled that a former Rove lieutenant must face felony charges of money laundering for Tom DeLay's political operation.

"Could party leaders' abrupt about-face on the Plame case have anything to do with the other ethics scandals that have been grabbing headlines for months now?" said Kelley. "It seems there are more than a few bad apples in this barrel, and they don't like it that the public is starting to find out."

I got a little miffed at the last sentence. I'm certainly not starting to find out anything except details of the depth of their sleaze. Then I realized the writer wasn't talking about me. When all the people who bought their crap (see title of previous post), or from whom they thought they had hidden it, realize what fools the power people think they are, they're gonna be pissed. I've been on a perma-pissoff for years. I'm used to it. The awakening masses aren't. They're liable to react in a way that will not be be pleasing to the pols and their accomplices. Whee!

We can rule you just fine as long as your head's in the sand...

Now that the Catholic Church has come out against evolution, Frisco Jon has a few words on the subject of "faith".

You'd think, what with the whole sun-going-around-the-Earth thing, the church might be content to leave the details to the experts. But the idea of experts is outmoded. The scientific method is outdated. The new paradigm: Start from the conclusions and work backward. This is the age of faith or, as we called it last time, the Dark Ages (my emphasis).

Like many people, I am astonished by how the Bush administration can get away with this much incompetence for this long. I am surprised that it can continue to be callously indifferent to the needless deaths of soldiers and civilians in Iraq. I am surprised that it can blow the cover of a CIA secret operative and escape the consequences. I have this eerie alternative-universe feeling. I hear the "Twilight Zone" music. Didn't actions used to have consequences? When lies were exposed, didn't something happen?

Not in a little year we like to call -- 721.

Let's look at the upside for a minute. There will be plenty of cool new illuminated manuscripts; there will be exciting advances in distilled beverages; we will all get to own our own sheep. Plus, if there's a crusade, we'll be able to travel to foreign lands. The motto du jour: Our crazy people can beat their crazy people. We have faith.

I really don't care what god or gods people worship. It's the realm of the mysterious and the supernatural; go nuts. The list of great thinkers who were also great believers is long; there is nothing incompatible between the two. That is, until someone announces that all truths are known and all behaviors are judged and you are going to Paradise and you aren't.

Once upon a time, there were two American institutions I believed in: the Supreme Court and the voting process. Now I have serious questions about both because people of faith seem to be taking them over. Faith-based elections: First the results, then the counting. Faith-based judicial decisions: First the verdict, then the facts.

There seems to be a lovely little tea party going on down the block. There's a guy in a big hat, and a rabbit, and please, pay no attention to what the dormouse says. We have enough hallucinations already.

Gee, maybe if we have to re-invent the wheel, it'll have a more efficient shape this time.

The stench of hypocrisy 10

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-Clueless) 11 Dec 1998, at the beginning of the Clinton Impeachment hearings. WaPo:

[. . .]

Should he be impeached? Very quickly; the hardest decision I think I will ever make. Learning that the president lied to the grand jury about sex, I still believe that every president of the United States, regardless of the matter they called to testify about before a grand jury should testify truthfully and if they don't they should be subject to losing their job.

I believe that about Bill Clinton and I'll believe that about the next president. If it had been a Republican, I would have still believed that and I would hope that if a Republican person had done all this that some of us would've went (sic) over and told him, You need to leave office. I understand that the dilemma that all of us are in about that. His fate is in his own hands. [my emphases]

[. . .]

So, when ya makin' that trip up to 1600, you hypocritical piece of shit? Yeah, thought so.

[Hat tip: Digby]

Friday Cattle Dog Blogging

I hate that camera, dad!!!

Rove's America

[. . .]

What Mr. Rove understood, long before the rest of us, is that we're not living in the America of the past, where even partisans sometimes changed their views when faced with the facts. Instead, we're living in a country in which there is no longer such a thing as nonpolitical truth. In particular, there are now few, if any, limits to what conservative politicians can get away with: the faithful will follow the twists and turns of the party line with a loyalty that would have pleased the Comintern.

I first realized that we were living in Karl Rove's America during the 2000 presidential campaign, when George W. Bush began saying things about Social Security privatization and tax cuts that were simply false. At first, I thought the Bush campaign was making a big mistake - that these blatant falsehoods would be condemned by prominent Republican politicians and Republican economists, especially those who had spent years building reputations as advocates of fiscal responsibility. In fact, with hardly any exceptions they lined up to praise Mr. Bush's proposals.

But the real demonstration that Mr. Rove understands American politics better than any pundit came after 9/11.

Every time I read a lament for the post-9/11 era of national unity, I wonder what people are talking about. On the issues I was watching, the Republicans' exploitation of the atrocity began while ground zero was still smoldering. [NYT]

[. . .]

I love Krugman because he doesn't care. He doesn't care what his bosses at the NYT think of him, nor anybody else. He calls 'em the way he sees 'em and lets the chips fall where they may.

Pic from Asia Times via Glen.

Where are they now?

T. Rex checks up on all those people you don't hear much about anymore.

Repub economics

From Roger Ailes the Good:

That sound coming from Las Vegas is the high-pitched whine of the Cash-Strapped Nevada Chickenhawk:

[. . .]

A microcosm of the nation's leadership.

You may be a redneck . . .

I was just out in the yard with the Monster and I noticed something. Looking at my vehicles, you'd think I was a Republican: