I don't think so ...

I don't often disagree with Jane Hamsher, and never enough to do a blog post about it, but I have to say something here because I don't want him let off the hook. Lardass Matthews came out this week and talked about the pressure put on him by the White House (and others) not to criticize Republicans on his Noballs show. Jane gives him credit for being 'courageous'.

...

I understand the knee-jerk reaction is to say “what took you so long” but the fact of the matter is that it’s going to be awfully difficult to unravel this situation unless journalists start speaking up about the strong-arm tactics that have been used on them, fostering Paul Krugman’s climate of “asymmetrical intimidation” (where no penalty is paid for ridiculing Democrats but you get your ass handed to you for saying anything untoward about the GOP). I also think it took more guts, not less to say it in front of the Pale & Male Club who have been the ones engaging in this charming little game that has landed us in the middle of such a toxic journalistic climate.

Of course there will be times when it looks like people are just trying to catch the next wave, but Matthews actually did speak out at the time and told Joe Wilson that Karl Rove had said his wife was “fair game.” I really do think he should be applauded for speaking out here. Hopefully others will follow suit.

...

If Matthews wants applause from me, he could say this shit on his show, something (for now) people pay attention to. Do you think his comments at this shindig will make it anywhere past the lefty blogs? He could come on and say, "I want to report [whatever] but the White House has put pressure on my boss to silence me." He could have resigned and gone public with the reasons why. He certainly doesn't have to fellate every Rethug who appears. If someone told me to compromise my principles to do my job, I wouldn't have that job.

No, Jane, he gets no credit, no applause from me because he was one of the many who looked the other way when his voice could have made a difference when it counted.

Lessons ...

Barry Bonds and other 'role models' could learn something from Marion Jones. So can children who look up to 'people of celebrity'. What this young woman did yesterday was probably the most difficult thing she ever had to do in her life. She stood up and accepted responsibility for her actions. God bless her and I wish her well. This is a good start on the journey to reclaim her credibility and integrity.

Too bad it took until now ...

I had this same epiphany almost 20 years ago, at the time when being Republican was beginning to mean being 'Christian':

...

Screw them. I got out. They can have their party. I will vote for Democrats and little L libertarians and isolationists until the crazy people aren’t running the GOP. The threat of higher taxes in the short term isn’t enough to keep me from voting out crazy people and voting for sane people with whom I merely disagree regarding policy. Hillarycare doesn’t scare me as much as Frank Gaffney having a line to the person with the nuclear football or Dobson and company crafting domestic policy.

...

Link via Greenwald.

Saturday whorage

Saturday means there's another chapter of Thirty Days at Zeta up at The Practical Press.

As always, whore yourself in comments.

Stupid's hard ...

Cliff Schecter:

...

It seems to be a race to the bottom with these cerebrally ill-clad, Abramoffian imbeciles. After Dan Quayle, for obvious reasons (potato-E) they had to search far and wide for a bigger mumbo-brain. They found one in the persecuted personnage of George W. Bush. A guy who has trouble finding an unlocked door after press conferences or chewing pretzels without the White House taster present.

But finding someone even more mentally handicapped this time around was going to be quite a challenge. They had good 'ole country boy George Allen, if by "country boy" you mean a spoiled-brat, rich-kid from Los Angeles who liked to torture his sister. But he too openly hated black people, instead of hiding it among metaphors and code words like the rest of his klan...er, party.

...

Democratic Presidential Candidate Does The Right Thing! Shocking!

BradBlog

A Democrat does the right thing for a change! What are the odds these days? And will it hold?

Senator and Presidential Candidate Barack Obama (D-IL), had recently (and correctly) called on Bush to send up an "acceptable" nominee to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), instead of the anti-Democracy, anti-voter villain Hans von Spakovsky.

"His record of poor management, divisiveness, and inappropriate partisanship makes him an unacceptable nominee to the FEC," Obama had previously said. "I am particularly concerned with his efforts to undermine voting rights at the Civil Rights Division during his tenure at the Department of Justice."

And for a change, we have a Democrat who has decided to put his money where his mouth is! For now.

It only makes sense for Bush to try and install an FEC head that will try to disenfranchise as many Democratic voters as possible to lessen the margin of the upcoming Repug trounce in '08.

It also makes sense that the Dems try to stop it. It's refreshing that an actual candidate, the one for change, did it.

Good on yer, Senator Obama.

"Look at the poor little sick kid! Hahahahaha!"

Paul Krugman on the 'compassion' of conservatives. Shorter: Not. If you're poor or sick, they think it's funny.

Of course, minimizing and mocking the suffering of others is a natural strategy for political figures who advocate lower taxes on the rich and less help for the poor and unlucky. But I believe that the lack of empathy shown by Mr. Limbaugh, Mr. Kristol, and, yes, Mr. Bush is genuine, not feigned.

What’s happening, presumably, is that modern movement conservatism attracts a certain personality type. If you identify with the downtrodden, even a little, you don’t belong. If you think ridicule is an appropriate response to other peoples’ woes, you fit right in.

And Republican disillusionment with Mr. Bush does not appear to signal any change in that regard. On the contrary, the leading candidates for the Republican nomination have gone out of their way to condemn “socialism,” which is G.O.P.-speak for any attempt to help the less fortunate.

So once again, if you’re poor or you’re sick or you don’t have health insurance, remember this: these people think your problems are funny.

I like Mr. Krugman. He speaks great truths in the most polite way I can imagine. If it was left to the boorish likes of me to describe the Repugs' attitude toward everyone but themselves, it would be more on the order of: they're mean, cruel, heartless, greedy, selfish, elitist, clueless, hooray-for-me-and-fuck-you warmongering dickless motherfuckers and suckers of corporate cock who have deluded themselves into thinking they are morally superior because of their own propaganda. The Repug Masters know it's not true of course, but if they ever admitted their own lies and mistakes their house of rotten cards would collapse even more quickly than it's going to very soon anyway.

The party of 'moral values' ...

Is a moral failure. Swopa:

...

When you fail on this scale, it’s not just incompetence — it’s an ongoing betrayal of trust, the abandonment of one moral responsibility after another.

...

That’s why MoveOn.org’s recent campaign on this theme is such a threat to the Republicans; it plants an idea in people’s minds that maybe the GOP doesn’t deserve that aura of morality that they’re always claiming for themselves. And once people are cued to start looking for proof of the Republicans’ moral failure, they’re likely to find more evidence every day.

I don't know how it wasn't obvious to the majority of the population until recently, but I'll be satisfied that most Americans have their eyes open now. The imperative now is getting congressional Dems to do the same thing.

Update:

Speaking of 'moral values', how surprised are you to find out another Rethug has an affinity for public restrooms? Our pal Scout Prime:

...

Early Thursday Republican Joey DiFatta dropped out of the Louisiana State Senate 1st District race claiming he had been having chest pains and "might have had a minor heart attack in the past few days." Tonight the Times Picayune reports DiFatta, (a former member of the Republican State Central Committee--1996-2004), was twice detained for suspicion of lewd conduct in mall restrooms.

...

Times-Picayune link on her post.

Foot, meet bullet...

Radio Iowa quoting Fred Thompson on Iran:

I'm afraid that the Soviet Union & China are not ever going to do anything that's going to hurt them that badly but we need to ratchet those up if at all possible.

While that statement is literally true, yer gonna have to do a helluva lot more than ratchet up the Soviet Union, Einstein!

I guess we should be thankful that a presidential candidate didn't mention that the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires ain't likely to be much help either.

I am praying that this moron becomes the Repuglicant nominee.

FNG*

Click to make it even worse

*Fuckin' New Guy

Dippin' the Bishop

I read this at Yahoo!News:

Bishop would deny Communion to Giuliani

ST. LOUIS - Roman Catholic Archbishop Raymond Burke, who made headlines last presidential season by saying he'd refuse Holy Communion to John Kerry, has his eye on Rudy Giuliani this year. Giuliani's response: "Archbishops have a right to their opinion."

Burke, the archbishop of St. Louis, was asked if he would deny Communion to Giuliani or any other presidential candidate who supports abortion rights.

It got me to thinkin' (!!!).

First of all, this clown priest is just looking for publicity. If he'da thought this through, he would realize, if he really believes his own Catholic misinformative oppressive crap, that Giuliani is going to go to Hell anyway just for taking communion. If Giuliani is as good a mackerel snapper as he claims he is, he won't even try. If he takes communion just as a photo-op to show how religious he is, he compounds his 'sin'.

I ain't exactly worried about what happens to JulieAnnie's soul. He ain't got one, near as I can figure.

Now, according to Cat'lick occultism ritual dogma, handed down to keep the faithful in line for centuries, in order to properly cannibalize the transubstantiated Lord by means of the most tasteless little cookie ever devised, your soul has to be in a state of grace, i.e. free of sin. You do this by confessing your sins to a priest, out loud, in person, upon completion of which he makes you pay a small fine in the form of a penance, usually some rote prayers. I can't imagine what sins old Italian and Mexican ladies could commit, but I've seen them flat fuckin' melt their rosaries doing this.

There's a lot of funny jokes about penances, like gargling with holy water to pay off for giving a blow job, but I digress...

Think for a moment of the priest who has to sit, usually on Thursday or Saturday nights, in a small confessional booth, in the dark, and wait for people to come tell him the weirdest shit so he can absolve them. I wonder what politicians confess to? They never tell the truth anyway. Can you imagine listening, to Repugs in particular, tell you about their sins? No wonder these guys are horny for young boys!

The priests know what's going to happen. In preparation, to help avoid the occasion of sin, they should put about forty pounds of ice in the holy water font ahead of time. After they get all worked up listening to the sleazy details of their parishioners' foibles and need a 'cooling-off period', they should take their Standing Bishops and dip them in it.

Come to think of it, the 'weenie shrinker' penance is something the priest and his political parishioner could do together. It would help keep sleazy hypocritical behavior off the streets and in churches and the Capitol where it belongs.

Update:

It's funny how things work sometimes, but I swear I didn't see this article in Time until after I took my my tongue out of my cheek from dashing off the above.

Increasingly, it seems the only thing U.S. Catholics confess these days is that they rarely if ever confess.
...

The fading away of one of Catholicism's best-known traditions has finally gotten alarming enough that bishops have begun turning to modern marketing tools to reverse it.

Any revival effort has a long way to go. Confession has been in steady decline for decades. Reasons range from long-standing doubts about church teachings to the current obsession with public mea culpas that have largely supplanted the confessional booth. [...]

The church's sexual-abuse scandal has also taken its toll. Catholics felt that the bishops--many of them accused of enabling pedophile priests--were arrogantly evading the same kind of penance they demand from their flocks.

I'm glad a big outfit like Time got my point...

...and some priests are even hearing confessions in venues likes shopping malls.

Near Victoria's Secret I hope...

Who says irony is dead? Ha!

National Guard Troops Denied Benefits After Longest Deployment Of Iraq War

WCSH6, Portland, Maine

MINNEAPOLIS, MN (NBC) -- When they came home from Iraq, 2,600 members of the Minnesota National Guard had been deployed longer than any other ground combat unit. The tour lasted 22 months and had been extended as part of President Bush's surge.

1st Lt. Jon Anderson said he never expected to come home to this: A government refusing to pay education benefits he says he should have earned under the GI bill.

"It's pretty much a slap in the face," Anderson said. "I think it was a scheme to save money, personally. I think it was a leadership failure by the senior Washington leadership... once again failing the soldiers."

Anderson's orders, and the orders of 1,161 other Minnesota guard members, were written for 729 days.

Had they been written for 730 days, just one day more, the soldiers would receive those benefits to pay for school.

This is about as chickenshit as it gets. So far. Just when you think the Pentagon has topped out on egregious fucking over of the troops, they never fail to top themselves with a new low.

22 months is a looong overseas deployment for a Regular, let alone for supposedly part time Citizen Soldiers who have left home and career to get participated in the Iraq clusterfuck.

I guess the (Br)asshats feel they need to stiff a couple thousand guys who did their duty out of a few hundred bucks a month so they can pay 'defense' contractors whatever they want. If they bothered to audit Cheneyburton's or Darksmellyliquid's billings, they could come up with the bucks in a New York minute, but nooooo...then there wouldn't be the high-dollar do-nothing jobs for retired Flags.

Minnesota's senators are looking into this. I hope they can do something. All the GIs are being horribly misused by this administration, and we owe them.

"Like fascism, I fear fascism,"

In case you missed it, watch Matthews get his lard ass handed to him:



More commrmtary at Editor & Publisher.

This was worth waiting a decade for.

Heh.

Update:

Kos

Apparently Tweety has a new book about how life is like a political campaign. Stewart committed the ultimate lapse of judgment and read the fucking thing before having Matthews on.

Well the gist of the book, according to Jon (who I tend to trust on such things) is that life is that the way to be successful in life is to be duplicitous and cut-throat, or at least calculating. Instead of playing along with this shit, Jon called him on it.

Tweety was stunned, of course. Visibly shocked that Jon wasn't just glad-handing him. Tweety made a huge tactical mistake and asked him point-blank what he thought of the book. "I thought it was a recipe for sadness."

By the end I think Jon felt badly about it, but he shouldn't. It was great television and great for Tweety to hear.

It didn't hurt me to hear it either. Well, my sides hurt a little bit afterwards.

It wouldn't hurt even a little bit for more of the inside-the-Beltway gasbags to hear more of this stuff, either.

Now I get it ...

Americans are just celebrity whores. TRex made me see the light:

...

Ryan, I am sure you are a very sweet person, but you and your friends need to be a little more discerning about who makes you guys squeal like a bunch of star-struck little girls at a Justin Timberlake concert. Ann Coulter is serving an agenda that’s about as healthy for the gay community as crystal meth.

I’m appalled that a bunch of grown men in a marginalized population would just drop their principles to fawn over that cracked-out basilisk. I don’t care if her private beliefs are vastly different than the toxic spew she emits on television and in her books.

...

The fact she takes diametrically opposed positions privately and publicly is reason enough to dislike her. I don't know about anyone else, but taking money to preach what you don't believe is disgusting as well as hypocritical.

Off to the shop ...

Yeah, what happened?

From the "How I know the Dems aren't serious" Department:

...

Oh, they can hold a vote condemning Moveon's exercise of it's free speech rights (and get it to the floor in record time). That's easy. But actually schedule a vote on contempt of Congress by Bush administration officials whose actions have deliberately obstructed a congressional investigation into the improper and potentially unlawful firing of US Attorneys by the Bush administration, the suborning of the Department of Justice into just another arm of the Republican Party's voter suppression efforts by forcing US Attorneys' to bring phony charges of voter fraud against Democrats, and allegations of potential White House meddling in prosecutions of corruption by Republican lobbyists and lawmakers in an election year? That's an "uphill struggle." Then again, getting the Democrats to use their political capital to actually oppose Congressional Republicans and/or the White House on anything seems like an uphill struggle most days.

...

And the question Steven D asks is one of mine as well:

... Explain to me why I voted for these clowns in 2006. Better yet, tell me again why I should vote for these clowns in 2008? ...

Because they give the Chimp whatever he wants, just like the Rethugs did in the last Congress. The time for talk is over. Shut up and do what we sent you there to do.

Loved by my people ...

Today, my birthday, is a national holiday in Germany. I would like to thank Herr Kohl, Frau Merkel, and the members of the Bundesrat and Bundestag for bestowing such an honor ...

Quote of the Day - Zwei

August:

So just for the record, the "compassionate conservative" has vetoed only four bills in his entire reign as President. Two of them would have helped advance research into life-saving medical procedures. Another would have started bringing troops home from Iraq. This morning, he vetoed a bill that would have given millions of children health coverage.

There is something very disturbing about Bush having such a high standard for vetoing a bill, and that standard being that it might let people live longer and happier lives.

...

Double-secret probation for you, guvnah ...

Seems the Brits are no longer our best friends (2nd Digby link of the day, BTW. I think C&L is the only other with that honor.):

...

The Daily Telegraph reports today that a senior White House official has revoked Britain’s status of being “the closest Bush ally“:

...

The administration isn't getting the kind of doglike devotion they are accustomed to from the British PM so have turned to ... France and Germany.

...

I thought the French sucked?

"...nursing the boils on his ass."

From Digby (a 'recommended read') on the whole Rush deal on 'phony soldiers', a response from Brian McGough on being called a 'suicide bomber':

So, Rush Limbaugh called me a "suicide bomber." More slander from the high and mighty sitting in his chair nursing the boils on his ass. I can assure you that I am no suicide bomber and that I can think for myself.

Rush, your phony soldier comments pissed me off. The audacity of someone like you who never had the courage to stand and fight for what you believe in makes my head spin. That is what made me stand up and state my convictions in front of a camera. I wanted to point out that you are wrong. I am not a phony soldier. I believe that we are not doing the right thing for national security by staying in Iraq. We are putting too much strain on our military by extending tours and not giving people enough time at home to rest. We have taken our eye off of the real Al-Qaeda and let them regroup to their pre-9/11 strength. We have not developed a political system in Iraq that would enable the country to stand on its own.

I stood in the sand, snow, dirt, mud and dust of both Afghanistan and Iraq. I spent over a week on a side of a mountain in Afghanistan during Operation Anaconda. I received The Bronze Star medal for my actions during that battle. I crossed the border into Iraq with the first wave of the 101st Airborne. I sustained an open head injury on the streets of Mosul after a vehicle borne IED exploded next to the vehicle I was riding in. I have seen the aftermath of a real suicide bomber. I had loved ones who died in the 9/11 attacks. I have friends and colleagues who returned from the war in body bags.

How dare you call someone like me a phony soldier and a suicide bomber? In the commercial I just taped, I told you unless you had the guts to say something to my face, stop telling lies about my service. Well you haven’t had the guts to say it to my face, but I am waiting and the offer is still on the table.

Don't hold yer breath, Brian. Limpbaugh ain't got the balls to say it to your face. If he was to get doped up enough to do it, he'd never even feel it when you beat him bloody. I'd love to see it, though.

Quote of the Day

From a review of the song Gypsy Biker on Bruce Springsteen's new album Magic, with a little lead in:

[...] 'Gypsy Biker' is a lament for a friend killed in war, and there's no reason to say it isn't in Iraq--the friend has been sent "over the hill" with the cry "victory for the righteous", and the benefit going to "profiteers" and speculators"--but the wailing rock guitars, and the emotion in Springsteen's wailing voice, reach back 35 years or more. The biker culture that is invoked as the dead man's friends "pulled your cycle up out of the garage and polished up the chrome" (itself a line echoing from an Eighties Springsteen song about a Vietnam vet, 'Shut Out the Light') then burn it in the desert is emblematic of the Vietnam era, though that culture persists to this day. The evocation of domestic turmoil about the war ("This whole town's been rousted / Which side are you on?") is, unfortunately, more redolent of 1970 than 2007.

'Redolent' means 'it smells'. Got that one right. '70 or '07, it fuckin' stinks.

In short, the beloved Gypsy Biker may have been killed in Vietnam, or in Iraq. Being a fictional character, indeed, he may have died in both wars.

Here's the quote:

Either way, "To them that threw you away, you ain't nothing but gone."

Amen.

The Mercenary-Evangelical Complex

MoDo

“He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster,” Nietzsche said. “And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.”

We’re gazing into the abyss all right, and Blackwater is gazing back.

President Bush continues to preach that we must defeat the “dark ideology” of extremists with “a more hopeful vision.”

But the compromises W. makes to slog on in Iraq, be it with warlords, dictators or out-of-control contractors, are spreading a dark stain on America’s image.

One more stain on the blue dress of Bush's reign.

Americans have been antimercenary since the British sent 30,000 German Hessians after George Washington in the Revolutionary War.

But W. outsourced his presidency to Cheney and Rummy, and Cheney and Rummy went to war on the cheap and outsourced large chunks of the Iraq occupation to Halliburton and Blackwater. The American taxpayer got gouged, and so did the American reputation.

The mercenaries inflame Iraqis even as Gen. David Petraeus tries to win their trust.

How's that goin', General? Better than here, I hope. You fer damn sure have lost our trust.

Once there was the military-industrial complex. Now we have the mercenary-evangelical complex.

Oh fucking swell. Just what we need.

FOX Honkies Rehearse for Harlem Minstrel Show

Tim Hollis, "News from a lunatic-infested dirt clod":

I'll probably get strangled for this, but I just had to crash the final rehearsals this week and they were nothing short of jaw dropping. Commanding the Apollo stage was GOP hack and author of Who's Loofing Out For You? Bill Bleachedwheat O'Reilly belting out all of America's Jim Crow favorites; My White Heaven, Alabamy Bound and I'm Going South, just to name a few. Don Imus was plucked from the audience to be serenaded with Baby Face. Later teaming up with Anne Coulter for a skit entitled ‘Imus ‘N' Annie' (my em) Don was one nappy headed ho.

And folks, you aint heard nothin' yet. Harkening back to a bygone error when racism was all the vogue, FOX pundits pulled out the stops on You Made Me Love You from Honeymoon Express, and in a tribute to Ronald Reagan, Massah's in de Col' Col' Groun' (There IS a God! - G). ‘Aunt Jemima' Rice was swooned by Colin Powell with Condonia (What Make Yo Big Head So Hard).

Just go read the rest...

Interesting Blackwater/Bush Facts

Just Another Blog (From L.A.)

Turns out Joseph Schmitz, COO & general counsel of the Prince Group, Blackwater's parent company, is married to one Lucila Garnica Gallo, Colomba Bush's sister (Jeb Bush's wife). Next on the list: What sort of family are the Garnica Gallos? Well, not the (literally) criminal lawyers George W. likes to help. Señor Garnica appears to have been a migrant worker.

Hit the links. Interesting stuff.

All these Blackwater execs are old line John Birchers, the forerunners of the neocons. The Schmitz guy in particular is apparently a Bush brother-in-law. The whole deal reads like a Bush family neocon daisy chain.

A few sex scandals (family values, you know) and an infamous sister-in-law as well. Have fun.

Big men ...

Chickenshits more like it. While we're on the subject of mastubatory war fantasies today, Glenn Greenwald looks at some of the reasons why, if the whole world were on fire, these clowns still wouldn't be satisfied:

...

Bombing and killing Muslims is the only path for avoiding the humiliating scenarios which our nation's war cheerleaders carry around obsessively in their heads, and which are currently filling my inbox. They're not going to be the ones on their knees, begging. They're not going to be the "faggots." Instead, they are going to send others off to fight and bomb and occupy and kill and thereby show who is strong and tough and feel protected.

...

That is a major reason why -- despite the endless debates and overwhelming public sentiment -- we stay in Iraq (because to leave would be to "lose," to suffer a "humiliating defeat" at the hands of a laughing Al Qaeda), and it is why war with Iran is so appetizing for so many -- we need to show the world who is boss. It is warped psychology masquerading as political belief. And that is why nothing triggers hysteria of the sort in the above-excerpted post more than challenging the notion that it may not actually be necessary to wage Permanent and Endless War on Muslims. Arguing that is virtually tantamount to advocating that our nation's vicarious war cheerleaders be deprived of food, water and oxygen.

...

And I hope all of you realize that once they get done killing all the Muslims, they're gonna look for someone else to eradicate. You see, it's impossible to blame themselves for their own failings and shortcomings, actual or perceived. They will always have the need for someone to blame.

Good thing I didn't compare them to Nazis, eh? (Muslim, Jew, either would work in a pinch, right?) Wouldn't want anyone to think I was trivializing anything.

What's a dead Iraqi worth?

The Rude One, offered without comment except for "read the whole thing":

...

Just imagine: you tell some alcoholic pistol-fellating badass wannabes that they'll get paid a thou a day to drive around Baghdad in Hummers with submachine guns and not only do they not have to follow military code, they can't even be prosecuted for "misfires." Why, they might go batshit crazy with power.

Without getting too much into the shit you can discover by reading Jeremy Scahill's book on Blackwater, its website is filled with tough guy t-shirt bullshit: "When failure is not an option and hope is not enough." It's enough to make your crazy uncle living outside Reno jack off in anticipation of killing some brown people. You may have never gotten to be that Navy SEAL, but Blackwater can make your paramilitary fantasies come true.

...

Figures ...

[A big Brain welcome to Shakes' and Blue Girl's readers.]

Maru found this at that nitwit Drudge:

Mon Oct 01 2007 -- Mr. Kingston submitted the following resolution honoring all Americans serving in the Armed Forces of the United States and commending broadcaster Rush Limbaugh for his relentless efforts to build and maintain troop morale through worldwide radio broadcasts and personal visits to conflict regions. [my em]

...

Please, please, please, let me wake up tomorrow and it will be 2000 and Al Gore won in a landslide ...

Fuck that apartment in Paris ...

I want this!

Thanks to Nicole for the link.

Fun At Auschwitz

Go see this narrated slide show of recently unearthed photos from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and then read Dr. J's Commentary.

That is the basis of the horrors that we observe in the behavior of the German guards at Auschwitz, of Southern townspeople, of American guards at Abu Ghraib, at Japanese soldiers during the Nanking Massacre of 1937: a particular group of humans aren't; they are sub-human and thus can be treated like animals (that is if one is into brutalizing animals). When one government engages in systematic dehumanization of one or more groups of either its own citizens or the citizens of a country with which it has gone to war, "fun at Auschwitz" and "fun at the lynching in the center of town" can happen, all too easily.

But it couldn't happen here again, could it? Nah. Couldn't possibly. We're just too advanced. No one could get away with labeling all of their political opponents as "traitors," as "godless," as "just not like us," as "not Christian and thus not qualified to govern" (and yes, none other than John McCain said that in so many words just the other day [The Progress Report, "Blackout and Brownout," Oct. 1, 2007]), and thus quite possibly somehow less than human. Couldn't happen here, could it. Could it?

It has, and could again. Much too easily.

Support Our Troop

I'm sorta screwin' around so far today. Go see "The Loneliest Icelander".

About This Video

Iceland just had one "troop" on the ground in Iraq, (actually a press aide, not a soldier--Iceland has no standing army), but that didn't stop Bush from counting them as an equal member of his disappearing "coalition."

We aren't hating on you, Icelanders. We're jealous of what you enjoy--a lack of military entanglements, a terrific standard of living, and a genetic predisposition for high cheekbones.

Welcome home.

Hey Rush, STFU

Cold War, anyone?

Haven't heard about one of these in a while. Back when I was in, the Russians (Soviets) used to test our security all the time:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Russian warplanes staged at least seven exercises outside U.S. airspace near Alaska this summer, and each time U.S. or Canadian fighter jets were dispatched to escort them, U.S. military officials said Monday.

...

At least five exercises by the Russian Tu-95 Bear heavy bombers have taken place off Alaska's Aleutian Islands and other historic Cold War outposts, such as Cape Lisburne and St. Lawrence Island, according to NORAD records.

All occurred beyond the 12-mile boundary that constitutes U.S. airspace and have involved two to six aircraft. Each time, Russia alerted the U.S. through reports in Russian news agencies, Herritage said.

...

When I was in, we used to make 'pickups and deliveries' of Agency folks working behind the Iron Curtain. We bumped uglies with the Soviets a few times, one particular stand-off between the pilot of the Pave Low II I was in and the guy in a Russian Mi-24 still puckers my ass when I think about it 25 years after the fact and not a shot was fired.

We'd hear the fighter guys talk about 'shadowing the Bears' all the time, serious tension. It was a prick-waving contest at 30,000 feet, and our guys would get close enough to read hand-written notes from the Soviet crews they'd put up against the windows. A lot of "Fuck your Mother" and "American Dog" was countered with American middle fingers. Heh ...

The point of this little trip down memory lane was the fact once again, tensions are escalating between us and the Russians. Cookie Jill, from whom I stole the link, thinks it's because of the anti-missile shield tests we're doing. In addition, I get the feeling Putin feels threatened by our operations in the Middle East (other countries need oil besides us) and the more than doubling in size of the EU, many former Eastern Bloc nations joining the economic partnership or attempting to.

We're worrying a lot of people (not that I'm a big fan of Putin), and the Cold War spawned Korea (we still have troops there 50 years later), Vietnam (and everything that brought with it), and a hundred other little skirmishes no one's ever heard about (South America and the Caribbean). It was the reason for our relationship with al-Qaeda and the reason for our fucked up policy toward Cuba. We don't need another Cold War and all the attendant bullshit attached to it. The only people it will benefit will be the defense contractors.

Thanks to the Chimp and his neo-con pals, nations who used to be friendly with us are now holding us at arm's length and our former enemies are beginning to refortify. The United States has taken under this administration has served to increase tensions all over the world. We have become an international pariah.

Repug Rag on Gen. Betraeus

Pensito Review

American Conservative Mag Mocks Petraeus As ‘Sycophant Savoir’ - Will Congress Condemn It Like They Did the Moveon.org Ad?

Beyond the headline, the American Conservative article is harshly critical of the general and the partisan political role he has chosen to play. The writer, Andrew J. Bacevich, describes Petraeus as a “politcal general of the worst kind — one who indulges in the politics of accommodation that is Washington’s bread and butter but has thereby deferred a far more urgent political imperative, namely, bringing our military policies into harmony with our political purposes.”

Bacevich accuses Petraeus of deploying a strategy in Iraq that is designed to succeed politically in Washington, not militarily in Iraq:

Petraeus has chosen a middle course, carefully crafted to cause the least amount of consternation among various Washington constituencies he is eager to accommodate. This is the politics of give and take, of horse trading, of putting lipstick on a pig. Ultimately, it is the politics of avoidance.

Bacevich concludes:

Politically, it qualifies as a brilliant maneuver. The general’s relationships with official Washington remain intact. Yet he has broken faith with the soldiers he commands and the Army to which he has devoted his life. He has failed his country. History will not judge him kindly.

We’ll be waiting (but not holding our breath) to see if anyone drafts a similar measure condemning the American Conservative magazine.

The Repugs will condemn that rag when we're dodging aviating porcine excreta. it would not be politically expedient to fire on one of their own.

Reaching out to minorities

Click to Stuff Shirt even more...

Black Republicans ...

It still seems like two mutually exclusive terms but there are some. I think I saw all 5 of them on CNN this weekend, laying down cover for the Republican frontrunners in the upcoming Presidential election.

Now, far be it for me to speak about the black experience. Totally unqualified. But to see them uncomfortably covering for racists and a racist political party is something to behold. Trust me, I know bigots when I see 'em.

J.C. Watts, who must qualify as one of the dumbest mofos who ever walked the face of the earth, was tongue-tied when asked if the Rethugs were racist by not attending the debates the other night and bowing out of the Univision event.

There's a pretty woman as well, who they put on as a counterpoint to Donna Brazile if Ol' J.C. ain't available. It was something too see her put out the 'these are Presidential candidates and have very busy schedules' talking point. You could see she didn't believe it either. There was also the 'well, blacks usually vote Dem anyway so why bother' meme that was pushed around as well. To me, that says the black (or any other ethnic group's) vote doesn't matter. There's something wrong when politicians turn away votes. Digby has some thoughts on that magic.

I guess you can find self-haters everywhere, look at all the closeted (and not-so-closeted) gay Republicans, but I still have to wonder what can make people defend those who would deprive them of their rights and ignore things important to such a large constituency.

While I would love to see a color blind society emerge in this country, the sad fact is we're a long way from it. Whether it pertains to black or Hispanic issues (or issues important to any other ethnic group) the Republicans have ignored the situation or been outright hostile to it. Until we have a truly color blind society, race issues matter and when a political party openly disregards them, it says they do not care about a large percentage of Americans.

Now, I give a damn what anybody believes or who they vote for, but were my concerns ignored by my affiliated party (hello, Dems? Iraq? Corruption?), and a majority of the members are openly hostile to me, I'm going to go somewhere else to have my needs addressed. I left the Republican Party 20 years ago, when the Jesus freaks began their takeover because that's another one of their things. There is little tolerance for anyone not 'Christian' and it's quite plain the Republicans don't want to know about folks who have no 'faith' or ascribe to the 'wrong' one.

So, I'm back to my original question. What can make people defend those who would oppress them (in the worst case) and ignore them (in the best)? What can make people defend the usurpation of civil rights when they will be the first to lose theirs? What can make people defend the corruption when their people have been ripped off more than the rest of us? What can make someone defend a war where their people make up the highest percentage of casualties? What can make people defend a political party whose base is made up of people who think theirs should 'know their place'?

I just don't get it.

Quote of the Day

MoDo

Without nepotism, Hillary would be running for the president of Vassar. But then, without nepotism, W. would be pumping gas in Midland — and not out of the ground.

Phony Soldiers

Army Of Dude responds to Limpbaugh and posts photos of some of the phonies he served with in Iraq.

[...] As the war kept on, so did I. I waited for a little over a year to get my results back: I would finally be able to join despite the surgery I had two years prior. As Rush found after dropping out of his first year of college at Southeast Missouri State University in 1969-1970, he found himself on draft status. Nothing that a claim of an old football injury or a boil on the ass can take care of, though! The medical deferment he was referring to was a pilonidal cyst, which apparently is a clump of severely ingrown hairs. That barred him from enlistment, and I'm sure he was ecstatic. After all, there was a war on. Here's a first hand account of the surgery that was done to correct it. She claims that in eight weeks, it was perfectly healed. Rush is willing to sacrifice the lives of Americans in Iraq but not his own ass (literally) in a simple surgery. I waited a year to get in, and he didn't try. Boy, do I really give an effort at being a phony soldier!

Speaking of phony soldiers, I wanted to show Rush a few that I know:

Go see. I particularly liked the one of the guy tugging on the wire to lead him to an IED! Grunts ain't no smarter today than they used to be...

Note to Rush (good name for a doper, huh?): You got out of service during Vietnam because of an easily repairable pimple on your ass. Fitting, indeed, because you ain't a pimple on the ass of a 17-year-old recruit stepping off the bus at boot camp today, let alone the Vets you call phony soldiers, you yellow son of a bitch.

I don't blame anybody who didn't want to go to Vietnam or doesn't want to go to Iraq, but it's the height of hypocrisy and arrogance to find a cheap-ass phony way out of the one and then forty years later call serving soldiers 'phonies' for not agreeing with you when you're wrong.

Oh no!

Dad's got the camera ...



Shayna's annoyed because I'll be starting (as if I don't have enough shit on my plate) the remodel of the Living Room/Dining Room soon. She's used to construction but always manages to get something dropped on her or get paint (or some other substance) on her anyway.

Update:

Where we hide the bodies ...

Saturday whorage

The first couple chapters of my novel Thirty Days at Zeta are up at The Practical Press.

As always, pimp your own in comments.

Nature's gentle reminder...

Click to embiggen

Got plenty of nuts stored up?

And what did you wake up to this morning?

Blackwater caused many Marine casualties

Hammerin' Hank's Committee on Oversight and Government Reform faults Blackwater for the Fallujah ambush that left four mercs as hangin' crispy critters and ultimately caused the deaths and woundings of many Marines in the first and second battles of Fallujah in '04.

The details of the events leading to the incident are disturbing, revealing an unprepared and disorderly organization operating in a hostile environment. Mistake apparently compounded mistake. [...]

And from Left I on the News:

Blackwater USA triggered a major battle in the Iraq war in 2004 by sending an unprepared team of guards into an insurgent stronghold, a move that led to their horrific deaths and a violent response by U.S. forces, says a congressional investigation released Thursday.

Not only are these un-oversighted mercs trigger-happy and not accountable for their actions, they're also incompetent. I believe in the magic of superior firepower as much as any Marine, but planning is basic and necessary to try to minimize casualties.

Recently I read No True Glory by Bing West, that detailed the two battles for Fallujah that were precipitated by the dumb-ass mercs. I highly recommend this book. The Marines had just about cleaned the city out when they were called off by Baghdad and Washington for political reasons, which let the insurgents re-arm and solidify so that the Jarheads had to go back in a few months later and do it all over again.

I don't give a shit if the mercs get their asses in a crack and get them blown off. They know the score and they get a lot of money to do what they do. They're making a pile by making a failed policy fail even more. Fuck them.

What I do give a shit about is that regular ol' underpaid actual soldiers and Marines had to go in and get their asses blown away in response to the stupid mercs' actions.

Why didn't big brave Blackwater go into Fallujah and avenge their own? Because they might get shot back at instead of just blowing away unarmed people?

It's a lot more complicated than that, but the mercs pretty much asked to get blown away, and they did. The Marine offensive was a political response from on high, sort of telling the insurgents, "You can't do that to the employees of big Repuglicant contributors without repercussions. We got real fighting men who'll see to that!"

Deep Dick Dark Secrets

Salt Lake Tribune

Vice President Dick Cheney will speak to a super-secret, conservative policy group in Utah on Friday during his second trip to the state this year.

"The media should not know when or where we meet or who takes part in our programs, before [or] after a meeting,'' a list of rules obtained by The Times showed. The group did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment.

The 'elite' meeting to fuck the rest of us over, as usual.

I hope the 'secret location' leaks out. We could call in a fire mission and get 'em all with one round while they're all bunched up. Ah, to dream...

The war on voting rights continues

Glenn W. Smith with today's 'must read' on easy credit cards and difficult voter registration:

Posner is an outspoken advocate for "elite democracy." Issues are too complex for Americans to deal with, and so it is necessary that key decisions be made by a select few. Voting, Posner says, is good to have as a possible corrective on elites if they should get carried away with their power. But it is not important, Posner says, that many Americans participate in American political life.

These power-mad right-wingers, so different from the individualistic, Barry Goldwater conservatives of old, really do believe themselves to be our anointed strict fathers. No other authority approaches their own, at home or abroad. That is why attacks on voting rights are not so different from the Bush doctrine of pre-emption. No other world leader is Bush's equal; therefore in the eyes of these elites, we are not one of many sovereign nations, we are the only sovereign nation. With regard to voting rights, since we are supposed to do what we are told by our authoritarian leaders, how could it matter to us whether or not we have unobstructed access to the ballot box?

We are no longer sovereign individuals. That term is reserved for the conservative elite, just as the term sovereign nation is reserved for only one country, the country these elite believe they embody and rule.

I suppose it is easier to believe that attacks on voting rights are just partisan squabbling, that Bush is just another conservative, that an imagined ever-swinging pendulum will swing back one day. That democracy can thrive without an effort, like the moon circling the earth.

There is no pendulum. There is only us. And if we don't save democracy, no one will. God help us if the Supreme Court should agree with Posner that barriers to the ballot box are no big deal. They've already stolen one election from us. Now they have the opportunity to steal all future elections in a single ruling.

They for damn sure will if we let them.

The great American hypocrisy tour

Mark Morford's in rare form today! Don't miss it!

Larry Craig's bathroom stall! Haggard's meth hotel! See all the sites of GOP shame. Fun for kids!

[...] Love the idea of a crazy road trip across our fine 'n' scandalous land, one in which you get a real taste of just what kind of crow the local politicos get to eat for breakfast?

Well, search no more, good patriot. Your adventure travel package has arrived.

But who cares? Because it's the latest craze in domestic tourism, specially designed for happy cynics and satirists and fatalists and contrarians and atheists and liberals alike, all you savvy fans of "The Daily Show" and DailyKos and the New Republic and the Nation and pretty much anyone who finds delight in learning of yet another bitter BushCo conservative caught with his hands in the tacky polyester pants of his fellow countrymen. Best of all, it's totally free!*

(*Note: does not include additional costs of food, gas, oil, environmental devastation, condoms, souvenir baggies of crystal meth, cocaine, Viagra, hookers, STD meds, or the sad and savage toll on any happy or optimistic outlook you may have deluded yourself into believing actually exists on this planet.)

Itinerary follows.

(*Note: snorting of meth not allowed on tour bus, unless you're really quiet and do it in the back. That means you, Mr. Romney.)

Please note, the options listed here are merely the beginning. Call us in advance, and we will happily customize your trip to your exact specifications. Feel free to mix and match your desired tour stops from our enormous master list of suspected/convicted Republican pedophiles, adulterers, drug users, johns, felons, bribers, sodomizers, deviants, closeted homosexuals, and deadbeat dads who have besotted the "family values" party for the past, well, pretty much forever.

To hell with Hawaii and Disneyland this year, and take the kids on a trip of a lifetime. What are you waiting for? Book your vacation before Christmas and get a free framed copy of the marriage license confirming Jerry Falwell's secret gay marriage to Pat Robertson! Call now!

Well, not exactly my dream vacation (or 'cruise' you might say. Heh.), but definitely a hoot to read about. It's hard to imagine having enough vacation time to see all the sites (sights?) of hypocritical Repug 'doings', so this may appeal more to retired folks.

Condemnation much?

Iraq vet and Dem Rep Patrick Murphy on Rush Lintball from TPM:

"Someone should tell chicken-hawk Rush Limbaugh that the only phonies are those who choose not to serve and then criticize those who do. I served proudly, so did two of my fellow paratroopers in the 82nd Airborne who spoke out and died just weeks ago. Generations of American veterans have worn the uniform with pride and we know it is no contradiction to serve your country and still disagree with the Bush-civilian leadership that mismanaged this war."

Any resolutions coming down the pike to condemn this asshole's verbal diarrhea? Yeah, thought so.

For those of you who don't know (understandable because I try to avoid Lintball's wet verbal shits too), ol' Rush declared soldiers who speak against the war to be "phony soldiers".

I wonder if Armed Forces Radio will continue to allow him to broadcast to the troops in Iraq? Does the Pentagon allow this nitwit who never served disrespect a goodly portion of the people in uniform over there, gallantly serving? Will the same people who were "outraged" by the "attack" on Gen. Petraeus be just as outraged by the disrespect of the grunts?

It would seem to me the "phony soldiers" are the ones who are making a hundred grand a year to indiscriminately kill innocent Iraqi civilians, hampering what little opportunity our guys have to maybe bring about peace.

The "phony soldiers" are those like our President, who feels compelled to dress up in military garb when he uses the troops a props but couldn't put up when it counted. When he wore the uniform, he couldn't wait to get out of it, even though he served stateside and would never see combat, not in a front line unit during Vietnam.

The "phony soldiers" are the ones sitting behind their computers, of enlistment age and able-bodied, cheering for war with no intention of ever serving even though some their friends and neighbors are on their fourth tour of the meatgrinder.

The "phony soldiers" are the flag officers who put their careers and egos ahead of the people in the trenches. The ones who went along with whatever Bush wanted, who sat back when they knew what the consequences of attacking Iraq would be. Cheney knew it in '92, Bush 41 knew it before the balloon went up on Gulf 1, and you can't tell me the admirals and generals didn't know in '02 when we began this folly.

So, dear congresspeople and senators, do we condemn Rush Limbaugh for disrespecting the troops or do we let him slide because, well you know, those soldiers who would stand up and criticize are ... phony.

Your Republican ticket

Playing to the base in '08. Heh ...

Pic courtesy of Dr. Attaturk.

Much as I bitch about the Dems ...

They are still head and shoulders above the Rethugs. Shakes:

This would be one example of why, despite our many legitimate grievances with the Democrats, there is still an essential difference between the two parties. The Matthew Shepard Local Law Enforcement Enhancement Act would never have passed (or probably even been brought up for a vote) under Republican leadership.

...

Defense stocks hit new highs

Boston Herald

Defense stocks on Wednesday hit new highs as Defense Secretary Robert Gates requested an extra $42 billion in funding from Congress to cover military costs in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2008.

The AMEX Defense Index, which tracks 14 major defense company stocks, rose 14.25 to a high of 1,686.72 in afternoon trading. Since last year, the index has risen roughly 47 percent, outperforming the broader S&P 500 index, which has climbed nearly 15 percent over the same period.

Although the anticipated request for more funding does not come as a surprise to Wall Street, the Pentagon’s message nevertheless reinforces the idea that defense spending will remain high in the near-term, said Myles Walton, a CIBC World Market Corp. analyst.

The Military/Industrial Complex is doing well. The rich are getting richer from the war crimes paid for with our grandchildren's money. Mission accomplished. Bastards.

Can't Win with 'Em, Can't Go To War without 'Em

The Brookings Institution has a report on outsourcing security to private military 'contractors'. Good read.

The use of private military contractors appears to have harmed, rather than helped the counterinsurgency efforts of the U.S. mission in Iraq. Even worse, it has created a dependency syndrome on the private marketplace that not merely creates critical vulnerabilities, but shows all the signs of the last downward spirals of an addiction. If we judge by what has happened in Iraq, when it comes to private military contractors and counterinsurgency, the U.S. has locked itself into a vicious cycle. It can't win with them, but can't go to war without them.

The study explores how the current use of private military contractors:

Several.

Inflames popular opinion against, rather than for, the American mission through operational practices that ignore the fundamental lessons of counterinsurgency. As one set of contractors described. "Our mission is to protect the principal at all costs. If that means pissing off the Iraqis, too bad."

Weakened American efforts in the "war of ideas" both inside Iraq and beyond. As one Iraqi government official explained even before the recent shootings. "They are part of the reason for all the hatred that is directed at Americans, because people don't know them as Blackwater, they know them only as Americans. They are planting hatred, because of these irresponsible acts."

Shorter: The mercs are hurting rather than helping the situation, not that there's much that can help anyway. No oversight, no accountability, no enforcement, not subject to any law. and at terrific expense.

Who was the fuckin' idiot that started this shit, anyway? My guess is Bremer and Rumsfeld. It's still Bush's fault.

Never Coming Home

Someone ought to tie Bush to a chair and run this for him in an endless loop:

Iraq War: Love and Personal Loss

A slide show of photographs. You won’t come away with dry eyes.

JG.

Cross posted at: Jersey Guy

Checkpoints ...

Trudeau gets it.

Click to embiggen.

This probably looks familiar to the Vietnam guys too.

Vets' care ...

Or the lack thereof. X finds that, even after all the Walter Reed hubbub, vets' care, you know, the guys who gave limbs, minds, and other body parts for this country, is still severely lacking.

...

The AP reports that staff shortages mean that nearly half of returning wounded veterans who are eligible for treatment don't receive any. Delays of 177 days or more for disability payments still persist. And the continued lack of a viable system for transferring medical records from facility to facility means further delays in treatment.

...

Now the Chimp wants another $190bln to continue what is nothing more than a delaying action. How many more lives for this war that should have been defunded this past spring? How much more money to this war that does nothing but kill and maim Americans who can't even get timely care after making the ultimate sacrifices for this uncaring administration? Is there anyone in a position of power who can say 'enough is enough'? Seems like there ain't.

Supportin' the troops. Yeah, right ...

Burning the troops

Click to Surge

The War Party

Matt Taibbi rakes the Repug candidates over the coals. An 'enjoyable read'.

[...] In other words, who cares about Iraq when you might get raped by a Mexican busboy?

In the face of the awesome political catastrophe that has befallen the Republican Party in the form of George W. Bush, the response of its new leaders has not been to re-examine their perverted values, their vicious tactics or even their position on Bush's singularly idiotic and supremely characteristic policy mistake, the Iraq War. Instead, the party is closing its eyes and trying, Dorothy-like, to wish its way back to Kansas, back to the good old days of mean-spirited, blame-the-darkies politics of Newt Gingrich, a time when electoral blowouts could be won by offering frightened Americans a chance to pull a lever against gays, atheists and the collective rest of onrushing modern reality.

If this were ten years ago, when America was safely suckling on the Internet bubble and restricting its overseas dabbling to military exhibition games like Kosovo, this back-to-the-good-old-days bullshit would be mere vileness. But thanks to the GOP's excellent leader, Mr. Bush, America is no longer in any position to hide from reality. We are now fully and catastrophically engaged in reality. And reality is kicking our ass, in Iraq and Afghanistan and everywhere else in this world that hates us more and more with each and every passing day. The party's response is to blow that off, pretend it's not happening. Six years after 9/11, Bush's would-be replacements are still reading My Pet Goat. Their solution to the Iraq dilemma is to keep talking tough, as if our kids were not getting arms shot off from Basra to Tal Afar, as if bin Laden weren't still scoring record recruiting numbers in between bong hits on Al Jazeera.

[...] That's the best-case scenario for the Republican Party at the moment. First they screwed up, sending thousands of Americans to their deaths. Then they refused to apologize. And now they're going to pay.

Not enough.

My Bidet B'day

I got this birthday card from my friend Bev, who's one day younger than I am:

Clicking will reveal a load. Of inner beauty

Inside says "...ain't for sissies". No shit. The beauty is if you wanna ride around on a pink bicycle, you may. Or a moped or a pot-bellied pig. Fuck it, yer on the downslope, why give a rat's ass what anybody else thinks?

Today is also the earliest possible date for me to be eligible for the Gummint Rockin' Chair Money, which I have applied for and will start rollin' in soon. You kids keep workin'! Also, respect yer elders whilst yer out there snappin' yer whippers.

Besides being a day upon which the Lord shone on the Earth with my birth, many other notables share my natal day and many interesting things have happened. it is also "Whatdafuck? Day" on Easyriders calendar and the Full Harvest Moon, which I will (hopefully) not try to replicate tonight at dinner at Lanza's.

STOP Lieberman

USalone

In case you thought it was just an aberrant moment of lunacy last week when Lieberman pressed General Petraeus for an attack on Iran, just before the weekend he introduced an amendment to the defense bill to authorize exactly that.

No, we are not kidding. He has drafted language that any impartial observer would interpret as a DECLARATION OF WAR against Iran, and he is pressing for a vote as fast as possible.

Go read the language of the amendment and send a message to Stop Lieberman From SNEAKING An Iran War Declaration Through The Senate.

Update:

It passed.

By a vote 76-22, the Senate passed the Lieberman-Kyl amendment, which threatens to “combat, contain and [stop]” Iran via “military instruments.” Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) called the amendment “Cheney’s fondest pipe dream” and said it could “read as a backdoor method of gaining Congressional validation for military action.”

Also a list of the Senators who voted against it.

Do they think giving The Dick that kind of leeway means he won't use it? Idjits.

Insulting ...

Mrs. F and I talked about this yesterday afternoon, after seeing the CNN coverage of Ahmedinejad's speech at Columbia. What the fuck is the deal with Columbia's president?

I mean, I feel the same way about the Iranian; he's an uneducated, lying little fundamentalist shit. But if you're going to invite him to speak at your school, it seems bad form to insult him before he speaks. I could understand a rebuttal afterward, but I'm just confused about what this supposedly educated twit was trying to do. Why'd he bother inviting Ahmedinejad in the first place? Were I the Iranian, I'd have got up and walked out.

I see Nicole got the same message I did.

...

However, like him or not (and I don’t), Ahmadinejad IS the head of a foreign state invited here to speak. That’s why Columbia’s Dean Lee Bollinger’s scathing opening statement was so shocking in its rudeness. Can you imagine the outcry if Bush had been invited to give a speech at a foreign university and gotten that kind of reception? Can you imagine how this looks to other countries?

...

Can you imagine the wingnut heads exploding? Heh ...

A sham ...

Josh Marshall has an interesting tidbit:

My ability to bring you the full details on this are, to put it charitably, limited by my inability to accurately translate Spanish. But it seems someone in the Spanish government has leaked to El Pais transcripts of conversations between President Bush and then Spanish Prime Minister Aznar just before the outbreak of the Iraq War. The gist seems to be that Bush was rather candid about the fact that the efforts to find a peaceful solution to the crisis were a sham and that the war was a done deal.

...

As I've said forever, the war in Iraq was a done deal in the neocon playbook since 1999. They just had to find the right excuse. (And the right idiot in the Oval Office)

Great thanks to our pal Cookie Jill for the heads up.

Not us ...

Boy, the wingnuts sure stand up to condemn Ahmedinejad's anti-gay sentiment. Have they looked in the mirror lately?

...

Interestingly, most right-wing bloggers have expressed this same exact view and have rightfully condemned the anti-gay sentiment, even going as far as locating footage of executed gay men in Iran, but they don't seem to see their similar extremism and hate against the GLBT community in the US.

...

I listened to the translation of Ahmedinejad's speech this afternoon at the U.N. Sounded a hell of a lot like a Christian preacher.

More racist GOP

Bob Herbert

I applaud the thousands of people, many of them poor, who traveled from around the country to protest in Jena, La., last week. But what I’d really like to see is a million angry protesters marching on the headquarters of the National Republican Party in Washington.

Enough is enough. Last week the Republicans showed once again just how anti-black their party really is.

At the same time that the Republicans were killing Congressional representation for D.C. residents, the major G.O.P. candidates for president were offering a collective slap in the face to black voters nationally by refusing to participate in a long-scheduled, nationally televised debate focusing on issues important to minorities.

They won’t be there. They can’t be bothered debating issues that might be of interest to black Americans. After all, they’re Republicans.

This is the party of the Southern strategy — the party that ran, like panting dogs, after the votes of segregationist whites who were repelled by the very idea of giving equal treatment to blacks. Ronald Reagan, George H.W. (Willie Horton) Bush, George W. (Compassionate Conservative) Bush — they all ran with that lousy pack.

n one of the vilest moves in modern presidential politics, Ronald Reagan, the ultimate hero of this latter-day Republican Party, went out of his way to kick off his general election campaign in 1980 in that very same Philadelphia, Miss. He was not there to send the message that he stood solidly for the values of Andrew Goodman. He was there to assure the bigots that he was with them.

“I believe in states’ rights,” said Mr. Reagan. The crowd roared.

In 1981, during the first year of Mr. Reagan’s presidency, the late Lee Atwater gave an interview to a political science professor at Case Western Reserve University, explaining the evolution of the Southern strategy:

“You start out in 1954 by saying, ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger,’ ” said Atwater. “By 1968, you can’t say ‘nigger’ — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff. You’re getting so abstract now [that] you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things, and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites.”

In 1991, the first President Bush poked a finger in the eye of black America by selecting the egregious Clarence Thomas for the seat on the Supreme Court that had been held by the revered Thurgood Marshall. The fact that there is a rigid quota on the court, permitting one black and one black only to serve at a time, is itself racist.

Mr. Bush seemed to be saying, “All right, you want your black on the court? Boy, have I got one for you.”

Republicans improperly threw black voters off the rolls in Florida in the contested presidential election of 2000, and sent Florida state troopers into the homes of black voters to intimidate them in 2004.

Blacks have been remarkably quiet about this sustained mistreatment by the Republican Party, which says a great deal about the quality of black leadership in the U.S. It’s time for that passive, masochistic posture to end.

There is another prominent minority now, but the Repugs treat them the same way - vote for us, then we'll fuck you. When they gang up, ot even if they don't, the Repugs are toast. 'Bout fuckin' time.

Quote of the Day

Sy Hersh on Iraq, by way of BooMan:

... As far as I am concerned, there are only two issues: Option A is to get out by midnight tonight, and Option B is to get out by midnight tomorrow ...

Off to the shop ...

Ahmedinejad ...

Juan Cole:

...

There is, in fact, remarkably little substance to the debates now raging in the United States about Ahmadinejad. His quirky personality, penchant for outrageous one-liners, and combative populism are hardly serious concerns for foreign policy. Taking potshots at a bantam cock of a populist like Ahmadinejad is actually a way of expressing another, deeper anxiety: fear of Iran's rising position as a regional power and its challenge to the American and Israeli status quo. The real reason his visit is controversial is that the American right has decided the United States needs to go to war against Iran. Ahmadinejad is therefore being configured as an enemy head of state. [my em]

...

And were our "American Principles" still intact ... well, I thought we were all about free speech? That was before 9/11, I know. Look, I give a shit about Little Mahmoud. He's the Islamic Bush anyway, just another idiot who got control of a country. Most of the Iranians on the street feel the same way about him as we do about the Chimp, another national embarrassment. Bush worries me more than he does.

There's no reason for this hubbub aside from firing up the masses for an attack on Iran.

I'll give you something to think about before I split. Do you think, if Iran developed a nuke, they would allow it to get into the hands of terrorists? (We have more to worry about from an already-nuclear Pakistan in that regard.) Don't you think a nuclear attack (suitcase bomb, dirty bomb), were it traced to Iran, would be met with an all-out nuclear response? The Minuteman IIIs and B-52s would be launched within minutes. The Soviets knew it for 60 years and they had just as many missiles pointed at us.

The Iranian mullahs (who actually run the country) and Ahmedinejad don't want to lose their power and position. They certainly don't want to give up the money they're making off the oil. (You don't think everyone over there is waiting in line to get fitted for a bomb belt, do you?) The U.S. would survive an attack, Iran would not. Regardless of their rhetoric, the leaders over there aren't willing to sit at Allah's right hand just yet.

Say nothing ...

Just act tough. It seems to be the Rethug watchword since they gave us the Chimp:

...

It's almost as if saying ridiculous non-sequitors and non-answers is now the preferred form of political discourse. Can it be that the dim-witted Reagan/Junior are now actually the new Republican leadership archetype?

...

Indeed, easily manipulated by those who actually hold the power; William "The Bloody" Kristol and his neocons, Dick Cheney, and AIPAC. The next Rethug nominee will be just as big a fool as the last one.

Irony is dead ...

Your leader thanks to Holden, who reads WH transcripts so you and I don't have to:

When the 110th Congress took office earlier this week [sic], the leaders promised to make the legislative process more transparent, and to prove they could be responsible with the people's money.

The idiot can barely talk, has nothing to say, and he thinks people are going to pay him?

The Ostroy Report

What Does Post-Presidency Look Like for George Bush? Will Anyone Actually Pay this Nitwit to Speak?

That's right, George. Clinton does make a lot of dough. That doesn't mean you're going to. I mean, honestly folks, who in their right mind would pay good money to hear him speak? He could care less about the issues on a micro level; he's extremely limited and has the curiosity and attention-span of a 10-year-old; is narrow-minded; and can't string two intelligent, coherent sentences together without the bail-out of a TelePrompTer. Just what the heck would he speak about anyway? His successful military strategy? His deft handling of matters economic...like how to balance a budget and minimize debt? How to win friends and influence people through skillful diplomacy? How to attract the best and brightest and most ethical staff? If it wasn't so pathetic it'd be funny.

This one's worth going to read just for the 'comments'. Well, some of them anyway.

Black & White

Out from behind the paywall, Paul Krugman on Repuglicant racism in the wake of the Jena travesty of justice:

And yes, Southern white exceptionalism is about race, much more than it is about moral values, religion, support for the military or other explanations sometimes offered. There’s a large statistical literature on the subject, whose conclusion is summed up by the political scientist Thomas F. Schaller in his book “Whistling Past Dixie”: “Despite the best efforts of Republican spinmeisters to depict American conservatism as a nonracial phenomenon, the partisan impact of racial attitudes in the South is stronger today than in the past.”

Republican politicians, who understand quite well that the G.O.P.’s national success since the 1970s owes everything to the partisan switch of Southern whites, have tacitly acknowledged this reality. Since the days of Gerald Ford, just about every Republican presidential campaign has included some symbolic gesture of approval for good old-fashioned racism.

And all four leading Republican candidates for the 2008 nomination have turned down an invitation to a debate on minority issues scheduled to air on PBS this week.

But to get the Republican nomination, a candidate must appeal to the base — and the base consists, in large part, of Southern whites who carry over to immigrants the same racial attitudes that brought them into the Republican fold to begin with. As a result, you have the spectacle of Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, pragmatists on immigration issues when they actually had to govern in diverse states, trying to reinvent themselves as defenders of Fortress America.

And both Hispanics and Asians, another growing force in the electorate, are getting the message. Last year they voted overwhelmingly Democratic, by 69 percent and 62 percent respectively.

In other words, it looks as if the Republican Party is about to start paying a price for its history of exploiting racial antagonism. If that happens, it will be deeply ironic. But it will also be poetic justice.

Mr. Krugman says things so nicely. I don't care whether it rhymes or not, and I don't care if it's just or not. Just get rid of the racist Repug sonsabitches.

Generals Speak Out

A twofer at Truthout:

AP:

Corpus Christi - Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez said Saturday there is a "crisis in national political leadership" and that partisanship is preventing a strategy that would help the U.S. take on the threat of Islamic extremism.

Thank you for saying it where people can hear it, General. Too bad the MSM won't.

After his speech, Sanchez wouldn't name names, but told The Associated Press he was referring to "the most senior leadership in our nation."

Sanchez said Saturday he is not surprised that the U.S. still has a presence in Iraq, nor is he surprised at current troop levels. But, he said, focusing on troop numbers will not end the conflict.

What may put a start to the end of this deal is if a buncha you old Flags go get those creeps and rendition them somewhere. The Hague would be nice, but anywhere with iron bars will do. Maybe some palm trees and scantily-clad brownskin gals...

Mark Sauer:

What might be called The Revolt of the Generals has rarely happened in the nation's history.

In op-ed pieces, interviews and TV ads, more than 20 retired U.S. generals have broken ranks with the culture of salute and keep it in the family. Instead, they are criticizing the commander in chief and other top civilian leaders who led the nation into what the generals believe is a misbegotten and tragic war.

It was a decision none of the men approached cavalierly. Most were political conservatives who had voted for George W. Bush and initially favored his appointment of Donald Rumsfeld as defense secretary.

But they felt betrayed by Bush and his advisers.

"The ethos is: Give your advice to those in a position to make changes, not the media," said Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, now retired. "But this administration is immune to good advice."

Listening to good advice, indeed common sense, are not Cheney maladministration policy.

Please read the rest of these.

Succinct

Blue Girl on the faux outrage over the MoveOn ad:

...

IOKIYAR*? I guess so - Republicans can demean and degrade and insult veterans, but if a Democrat asks legitimate questions the foam-flecked fuckwits get in a lather?

Until someone can explain this, you outraged lot can quietly and expeditiously fuck right the hell off.

...

They disrespected Max Cleland, a man who gave three of his limbs in combat. They disrespected John Kerry, who was wounded three times in combat. But yet, if someone points out what an ass-kissing shill Petreaus is, it's the end of the world. Blue Girl has some good advice:

...

Make a donation to MoveOn today!

As with many others, I refuse to donate to the Dems, on any level, until they make a real effort to get us out of Iraq. The mealy-mouthed horseshit they've been playing since January ain't cutting it. MoveOn gets what I would have given them.

And just a note: I was annoyed when the Chimp disparaged McCain in 2000, but I lost any respect I had for the man when he took up Bush's cause. McCain deserves everything he gets. I won't stand up for a man who doesn't respect himself.

Update:

And before I split, before I hear about coming down on the Dems once again, let me say this. In 2002, when the Chimp was rattling his saber at Iraq, how many Dems went along with it because they had the "what could go wrong" attitude? They figured we'd drag our beefy cock across Mesopotamia and in a couple weeks, everything would be happy, like after Gulf 1. They listened to all that tough guy talk from Bush and Rummy and they got all big and beefy too. Iraq is their war too and I'm tired of this "it's Bush's mess, let him sit in it" attitude from them now. Like I've said many times before. People are dying every day thanks to the Dems' political expediency. It's time to end it, defund it, impeach the White House, whatever it takes, whether you destroy a talking point for '08 or not. Even if it costs them their jobs.

*It's OK If You're A Republican.

e-Brain

Being a dedicated Brainiac, and a glutton for punishment to boot, I signed up to get Alternate Brain via e-mail. I'm a little slow on the uptake sometimes so I don't know how long this has been offered, but Fixer goes to great lengths to keep The World's Best Sidebars polished up.

Left sidebar, scroll down just past what I call the "Brainer King - Have It Your Way" entry and sign up. The Brain will come to your inbox in toto every time there's a new entry, which is about every ten minutes. Just kidding, but generally daily. You can get it in any language you've ever heard of, and some you haven't.

It's no substitute for the real thing of course, but it has its place if you can't come to the actual Brain for some godawful reason. It's a class act. Give it a try.

“Taser this… F--- BUSH”

The Coloradoan

The Rocky Mountain Collegian on Friday published an editorial that reads, in total, “Taser this… F--- BUSH,” spelling out the expletive, along with an explanation that “this column represents the views of the Collegian’s editorial board.”

It's refreshing to see some college kids with balls instead of just the chickenhawk CRs. There may be hope yet.

While the Collegian is editorially independent, CSU retains a measure of control though a 10-member faculty-student Board of Student Communications, which can fire the paper’s editor-in-chief, David McSwane.

That'd be worth gettin' fired for! Good on yer, kid.

In a letter addressed to the university community and Collegian readers, Jeff Browne, director of student media, said he is planning to launch an internal investigation into “the decision-making process” followed in publishing the editorial.

“The decision-making process”? The kids are PISSED-OFF. They're tired of Bush's bullshit. Absolutely rightly so. As is anybody who's been watching this crap go down for over six years.

When Bush took office (literally), some of these college kids were in junior high. I personally have been pissed-off, with short breaks, since fuckin' Nixon. Kids today get up to speed a lot quicker than us Olde Fartes. They have to. It's a faster paced world.

And the four-word editorial? Blame it on text messaging. Ya gotta cut through the crap these days and get right to the attention span.

"Take ten of these and call me in the morning...if you remember."

LATimes

Washington state allows a 60-day supply of medical marijuana. Now the Legislature wants to know how much that is. Any ideas?

Well, it's hard to think of mota as coming in dosages, but I'd say, manicured and pressed into bales, about enough to fill Fixer's guest room. Just a guess, mind you.

"There are so many variables here. Even if you just look at smokers, you have to look not only at the quality of the pot, but also at the efficiency of the smoker," he says. "Some people are better smokers than others."

Duuuude...

The fall of the Godmongers

I hope Mark Morford is right!

Praise Jesus, it's the collapse of evangelical Christian rule in America. Rejoice!

Halle-fuckin'-luja! 'Bout goddam time.

Because right now, there is perhaps no greater item we as a struggling human ant farm can be grateful for, no single social emetic we can look to for inspiration or hope or a happy tingly sensation in our collective groinal region indicating a possible move away from our long-standing Dick-Cheney-in-hell attitude of shrill bleakness, alarmism and religious righteousness than the simply wonderful implosion of the evangelical Christian right that's happening right now in America.

But when you come right down to it, the Great Truism has been validated once again: Righteous fundamentalism, be it Christian, Islamic, or otherwise, has the seeds of its own destruction built right into its very framework, a priori and de facto and by default. Powered by the deeply joyless engines of fear and shame, it can never quench its own impotent desires.

And for that, we can all praise Jesus indeed.

Do. Not. Miss. This. One.

"...it can never quench its own impotent desires." They'll keep trying. On Rapture Day they'll all go to Heaven and start telling God how he ought to be doing things. He'll set 'em straighter than we ever could, and then direct 'em to the 'down' elevator.

About that vibrator, ma'am?

Looks like the government wants to know a bit too much about you when you travel:

The U.S. government is collecting electronic records on the travel habits of millions of Americans who fly, drive or take cruises abroad, retaining data on the persons with whom they travel or plan to stay, the personal items they carry during their journeys, and even the books that travelers have carried, according to documents obtained by a group of civil liberties advocates and statements by government officials.

...

But new details about the information being retained suggest that the government is monitoring the personal habits of travelers more closely than it has previously acknowledged. The details were learned when a group of activists requested copies of official records on their own travel. Those records included a description of a book on marijuana that one of them carried and small flashlights bearing the symbol of a marijuana leaf.

...

Can you imagine the dossier they have on my ass? The bright side is, I forgot the brand name of that Amsterdam reefer I puffed up as I made my way around the Med. I wonder if they'd tell me before I go back so I can get some more. Primo.