Apparently after 9-11, the EPA wanted to tell New Yorkers lots of things about their environment. It seems that the 1600 Crew had different ideas...but lying about 9-11 was becoming a team sport with them ("We didn't know!" "Saddam did it, or at least was involved!" "We need the PATRIOT Act!"). The Crew banned the EPA from getting the word out about what residents of Manhattan needed to do to be safe, enviromentally speaking.

At the direction of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the EPA's inspector general has revealed, the agency that's supposed to protect the public health against environmental hazards added "reassuring statements" to its press releases in the days after the terrorist attack, and deleted "cautionary ones."

The EPA wanted to tell residents to obtain "professional cleaning" - that is, environmentally safe cleaning - to remove from their homes tons of dust containing asbestos, dioxin, lead, pulverized plastics and steel and glass. The White House removed this from a press release.

The EPA wanted to caution about the health risks to "sensitive populations" - the elderly, kids, and those already suffering from respiratory problems. The White House said no.

You'll never get the truth, until it's too late and thems the facts, Jack!

Is the SCLM finally starting to waken at its periphery? Here's a column from the Chicago Trib (login: gorevidal/gorevidal) that actually raises the bullshit flag on the 1600 Crews policy in Iraq, and names names, Douglas Feith you recalcitrant neocon warmonger you, hanging with Manucher Ghorbanifar of Iran-Contra fame...

First, it is generally accepted (except by the war's avid authorities) that the reasons for invading Iraq were false. Second, the war party around the White House and the Pentagon are responding to their incredible failures of judgment not by modifying their policies in the Middle East, but by doing more and still more of the same.
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The joke around town is that the Bush zealots had all along been scheming to attack Iraq to get all the terrorists in the world to pour in there--to get them all in one place.

Meanwhile, the administration is unwilling to take actions that could ameliorate the situation--such as putting forth a UN resolution that would share the military and reconstruction burdens in Iraq. Part of the reason is their zealotry, carefully clothed in the fancy dress of "democratization"--and part of it is that neither they nor their friends or children are actually fighting or suffering in this war.
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Officials from the civilian Pentagon offices of Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, the man most responsible for the failures of reconstruction in Iraq, recently met surreptitiously with Manucher Ghorbanifar, the Iranian middleman in U.S. arms-for-hostage trades to Iran in the mid-1980s, in Europe. The reappearance of the discredited Iranian arms dealer clearly indicates how conspiratorial the Iraqi war is becoming.
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Perhaps the only hope lies in the story going around town that President Bush has told the Pentagon he wants "no more American dead" after next March. By then, the electoral campaign will be well under way, and perhaps zealotry will give way to reality--or at least to a change in administration.

From the local fish-wrapper, otherwise known as the Columbus Dispatch, this guy has some pretty fine sentiments...hope there are a few more like him in our "battleground" state, it might give Unka Karl the fits and shits he so richly deserves...

Ohio’s elected representatives have lost touch with their suffering constituents

Saturday, August 30, 2003

I received a letter from U.S. Rep. Bob Ney, R-St. Clairsville, on the day my wife of 49 years passed away. The letter pointed out his deserved recognition as a better-than-average representative of the people of his district and requested a donation for his re-election campaign.

There’s little I would like more than to be able to send a contribution to him, as I once did, and to consistently support charities and less-fortunate individuals.

Unfortunately, I cannot, thanks in part to the fact that those who are supposed to represent Ohioans in federal government have lost touch with reality.

Example 1: The $250 Ohio survivingspouse legal benefit was discontinued Jan. 1. Also, Social Security says there will be no death benefit for my wife’s survivors, as she supposedly didn’t earn enough, and her $167 monthly checks will end. Her family is being penalized because she chose to work with handicapped children, a low-paying job.

Example 2: The much-hyped federal "tax cut" is in reality a tax transfer from the wealthy and the corporations to the states and those less likely to donate to politicians — the old, the sick and the too-busy-trying-to-live-on-minimumwage-jobs.

One of the benefiting corporations closed me out four years short of retirement, at 31 percent of my earned retirement. Then it cut another $700 a year, or 18 percent, in 2002.

These kinds of legal theft and quiet cuts are more common than most people suspect. Think Enron.

I must have missed the news when our "gravely concerned" politicians insisted upon their pay being cut. Don’t hold your breath.

I am among the fortunate who are able to work, but there are seniors unable to work, and other working poor who now must pay the additional 1 percent Ohio sales tax out of their already-limited incomes. I’m sure they won’t mind adding more water to get five or six quarts out of a gallon of milk so the country can send billions more to try to buy foreign "friends."

My wife and I taught our children by word and deed to have a strong work ethic, obey the law and always vote. What a disservice we did them. I’m almost afraid to vote, not knowing which insurance or pharmaceutical company I’m voting for.

We should have taught them to be good liars; at least then they may have done as well as the average politician.

The only gold to be found in the golden years is the gold extracted from us.

WILLIAM BARNES

West Lafayette

It just can't get any more unbelievable. If the 1600 Crew spends any more pandering to the Religious Right wingnut-morons, they're going to move Fortress 1600 into the caves next to the Dead Sea and start wearing robes and sandals...

President Bush ordered the State Department on Friday to withhold U.S. family planning help from overseas groups that promote or perform abortions with their own money.

The decision expands an order issued two years ago that applied only to family planning money administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development, a division of the State Department.
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"At this time, the face of HIV/AIDS in Africa is a young woman, and family planning services are integral," said Terri Bartlett, vice president of Population Action International, a research-based advocacy group in Washington. "They are all reproductive health care services."

Said Gloria Feldt, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund: "The world's poorest women and their children again are bearing the brunt of Bush's obsession with appeasing his domestic political base. This is the real face of Bush's compassionate conservatism."

My question is, if the UN heads into Iraq, will President Deserter-boy use it as an excuse to cut and run? After all, the UN needs funding and the CheneyBurton Corporation, with a little well-placed graft can, I am sure, keep their fat no-bid contracts, especially if they sub parts out French, German and Russian companies. I hope I'm not being too cynical here...

"Regarding the possible participation of international forces in Iraq under U.S. command, we don't see anything wrong with this," Putin told a news conference on the Italian island of Maddalena, near Sardinia.

"It is possible, but it would require a decision from the U.N. Security Council," he said.

Russia, along with two other heavyweight Security Council members Germany and France, opposed the U.S.-led war that toppled Saddam on April 9. The three countries now favour a larger role for the United Nations in Iraq.

Since Bush declared major combat over on May 1, U.S. troops have faced persistent and often deadly attacks and the U.S.-led administration in Baghdad has been plagued by sabotage to the country's protentially lucrative oil industry.

"This is the greatest crime ever against the Muslims in this holiest place," said Sheikh Ali Jabbar, a cleric at the Imam Ali mosque, as women dressed in black slapped their heads in grief.

The mosque contains the tomb of Ali, son-in-law and cousin of Prophet Mohammed, the founder of Islam.

Thousands of shoes lay around the mosque, left behind by worshippers and scattered in all directions by the bomb.

Ten years from now, what's this going to look like? Will there be another Wall in the Capitol Mall? Is Iraqi Oil or the lust for it going to be the seminal event that changes the way America is perceived in this century and perhaps beyond, especially as the arguments for invasion grow weaker by the day? Damn, it was a bad year for my crystal ball to break.

There are bad ideas, then there are really bad ideas, and here's one: allowing Microsoft to automatically update your computer if you are a Windows 2000 and beyond user (I guess). Little rich-guy Billy wants to be able to do that to stay on top of security "issues" like the recent worms unleashed on the us all.

Q. Have you considered enabling the Windows XP Firewall by default?

A. The fact is there has been a fire wall inside of Windows that would have blocked MSblast [the worm]. We're doing a better job of getting information out to people of how to turn that on and when they should turn that on. The idea that it would be on by default is something that we have to push the technology to make that work for people. It looks like we've got a solution to do that.

Q. Some people are concerned about the automatic distribution of patches because of the possibility of doing widespread damage.

A. These patches will be signed by us, and things that are put into the critical security path that we have to pass through we have to be very careful that there is no regression in those things. It's a channel that has to be used not for features, but just for very critical things. We have some other ideas such as something called behavior blocking that will obviate the need in many cases to use patches.

As to the "firewall" component of XP being turned on by default, thanks, but no thanks. Nothing like slowing the whole machine down by having their bloatware do stateful packet inspection, redraw your screen at the same time, and perform all of its other functions.

I am sure that like all other MS products that are "bundled", it will eventually cost $$$ to use it as soon as they get enough users "addicted" to it by giving it away, the tactic they used with NT workstation and NT server, both inferior products, but with great market penetration, because there were so many "pirated" versions installed from "evals" that folks could not afford to get rid of them once the evaluation expired.

FYI: we did a test of installing Win2003 server and Netware 6 on two identical Dell servers, with LSI raid cards, external RAID arrays using raid 1 + 0 (don't ask) and Broadcom Gigabit over Copper cards time to install (not including finding drivers if available/required):

Win2003 server: about 3 hours 45 minutes, including multiple reboots and F6's (hey, Microsoft when's that going away?) and it still does not support the tape drives for backup...no drivers are out there yet that have been "logo tested". So bad luck if your server crashes.

Netware 6: about 25 minutes to up and running from CD insertion/boot to being on the network. No reboots required and all the drivers were there/usable, we did one reboot after all the setup was done, to watch the NLM loads.

But CIO's the world over swear by Microsoft. I think that the Command Line Interface scares the shit out of them and always has. I also think that they all wanted to believe in Larry Ellison's "thin client/network computer" fantasy...which has never come to pass, and now they can't leave the Microsoft Server world without looking like fools...when a friends company transitioned from Netware to MS servers, they went from 20 to over 100 servers to do the same things...how is that reducing TCO?

Bill wins, security stinks and we are all poorer for it. Don't even get me started on how badly "Active Directory" sucks.

Hard to call them casualties of the 1600 Crew economy, but victims fits I think. The two folks profiled in this Washington Post story seem like a Joe and Jane Six-Pack kind of couple. The went west to Vegas looking for something more, and found less; much less. It seems that some of what happened to them was self-induced, but it's also hard to believe that a healthy economy would not have afforded them a better shot at self-sufficiency and a future.

"On the Internet, it's very deceiving. It makes it look like you can start working the day you arrive," Arreguin says, explaining the decision to come to Las Vegas. He says he has worked in construction for 24 years, that he did metal framing on just about every skyscraper in downtown Houston, and that contractors in Las Vegas couldn't have cared less. Every one of them said the same thing, he says, that without a driver's license, which he didn't have, and access to a reliable car, which he didn't have, they had no use for him.
...
...There were the three months in the Salvation Army shelter, and the walks along the Strip where they were told they could not be hired as waiters or busboys or janitors without an identity card from the Sheriff's Department ($35) and a health card showing they had been tested for communicable diseases ($35), money they didn't have.
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There is another view, of course. In Las Vegas, where the unemployment rate was down to 4.9 percent last fall, the current rate is 5.6. In Phoenix, where they stop the first night to change buses, the pre-recession unemployment rate was 2.7 percent; now it's up to 5.8. In Luna County, N.M., where they stop for a snack break, the rate is 24.1 percent. In El Paso, it has gone from 8.8 percent when they passed through on their way to Las Vegas to 10.1, and in Houston, now less than eight hours away, the rate has gone from 7.9 percent when they left to 9.3.

Bigger picture, it's a buyers market for employer with numbers like those cited in the story...again, it's with almost three years at the helm, the 1600 Crew can't lay the blame for this on the Clenis™ anymore. It's not going to work, people like Alex and Dixie are proof that all is not right with the world and all the wishing and hoping of Rangers and Pioneers will not make it so...I hope that Alex and Dixie and those like them register to vote and vote against the 1600 Crew next year...it would be a move in the right direction for them. At least in my humble opinion.

The reaction of the "top brass"? To be expected. It's never a problem in the military until it (a) hits the media or (b) a congressman shows up. Every branch of the service actually trains people for event (a) and prays to never have event (b) occur at a unit level...they prefer to handle "congressionals" at their liason offices in DC (John McCain did that just before entering politics).

So the rapes were reported, I blogged a bit about this last February when it started coming out, before there were wholesale command "changes", and commitees appointed to look into the "allegations". Yeah, OK.

My opinion, FWIW, the problem with a lot of this is purely cultural. I am not a Service Academy graduate, but I can share a truism we used to use: four years into the fleet, and you couldn't tell an Annapolis guy from an AOC (Aviation Office Candidate, remember "Officer and a Gentleman"?)...anyhow, the "performance" issues aside, what's the big difference? Attitude. Almost to a man, the Naval Academy grads I knew were "taught" how to "game the system". Their "honor code" was a convenient tool for punishment of the "unworthy" or "dissenting" square peg, and after graduation, many openly bragged about "going over the wall" into town for a little extra liberty.'

Thus it came as no huge surprise to me when they had the scandals at the Naval Academy in the early to mid-90s, and a Very Most Senior Officer, an officer I had known from the fleet, was ummmm "involved" for sort of looking the other way while various acts of inappropriate behaviour were on-going. He was a guy who was definately in the Ring-Knockers Protective Association. He also once gave a litle spiel at an all-pilots meeting about how what happened on the other side of the International Dateline stayed there...oh, and he was married and had kids. I can pretty much swear to the Hairy Thunderer that he was about the first one out the gate and over Shit River when the Liberty Call sounded in the Philippines and other ports, and it wasn't the Christian Science Reading Room he was headed for. The thing was he saw nothing wrong with this behaviour, and was only worried about it affecting his marriage, not the obvious moral questions it raised.

So the youngsters at the various Academies who lead pretty sheltered, disciplined lives see these folks, and make bad decisions...really bad decisions. Then, they are afforded protection first from their peers in the form of 'honor councils' (of which I understand the Air Force Academy has the worst i.e. the most likely to be partial and biased against a "defendant"), more protection of the institution comes from the officers directly supervising the cadets; they don't want any trouble, they just want to do their tour and get back to the "fleet" as it were, and then the more senior officers don't want the "honor" of their Academy "stained". Well I got news for them, clorox ain't getting this stain out. Ever.

If this scandal were to shut down the Air Force Academy, I don't honestly think it would hurt that particular branch of the service. I think that their ROTC and OCS system could easily pick up the slack. They clearly can't deal with this, and have been and still are in denial about it.

We always used to joke about the Air Force, now I'm not so sure that some of that humor was so off track...there are lots and lots of great folks in the Air Force, but I wonder how well they are being served by their bosses. Obviously there must be an informal course on CYA being taught at the USAFA, and all these folks are honor graduates.

For the record, I am an NROTC grad. No service academy time at all...except I got a flight physical at the Naval Academy once, since they had a real flight surgeon.

There is not a doubt in my military mind that this adminstration makes the lying-bastard Nixon boys look like rank amateurs...no doubt at all. Hell, half the administration seems to be carry-over party hacks from the days of Tricky Dicky; just elevated to newer better postion. Via Atrios we learn (and I'm sure that everyone has been there already) that an analysis of the Walking Battery's actions and responses to Congress have led to responses that are to be tactful, less than truthful....written by John Dean, one of the principal Nixon Water Carriers who saw the light after a little felony conviction action...post-Watergate.

So what did the Duracell with Legs lie about? Well, everything seemingly, at least related to his Energy Tasl Force documents.

hen this August's Report was issued. It was not the thorough, comprehensive Report GAO wanted it to be. (Indeed, GAO's Comptroller General has stressed that "the Vice President's persistent denial of access to" records "precluded GAO from fully achieving our objectives and substantially limited our analysis.") But it is enough to shock, and disturb, the reader.

The Report shows that Cheney's claim to Congress, in the August 2, 2001 letter, that responsive documents were provided to GAO, was plainly false.

According to the Report, Cheney provided GAO with 77 pages of "documents retrieved from the files of the Office of the Vice President responsive to" GAO's inquiry regarding the Energy Task Force's "receipt, disbursement, and use of public funds."

To any lawyer, a mere 77-page document production seems suspiciously slim - especially when it is meant to represent information from a group of people on a fairly broad topic. Surely there were more documents that were not turned over.

Moreover, it turned out, as the Report reveals, that the documents that were turned over were useless: "The materials were virtually impossible to analyze, as they consisted, for example, of pages with dollar amounts but no indication of the nature or purpose of the expenditure." They were further described as "predominantly reimbursement requests, assorted telephone bills and random items, such as the executive director's credit card receipt for pizza."

In sum, the incomplete document production was not only nonresponsive - it was insulting. So the GAO pressed for responsive documents numerous times in different ways: letters, telephone exchanges and meetings.

Perhaps the most pointed of these was a July 18, 2001 letter from the Comptroller to the Vice President. It noted that GAO had "been given 77 pages of miscellaneous records purporting to relate to these direct and indirect costs. Because the relevance of these records is unclear, we continue to request all records responsive to our request, including any records that clarify the nature and purpose of the costs." (Emphasis added.)
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Despite receiving this letter, Cheney still claimed to Congress, a few weeks later, on August 2, that responsive documents had been produced.
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Nor can there be any question that Cheney knows what it means to produce responsive documents - and not to do so. In the same paragraph of the August 2 letter in which he claims he was responsive to the Energy Task Force request, he makes a lesser claim with respect to another GAO request - stating that there, he had merely "provided substantial responses." (Emphasis added.)

Plainly, Cheney knows the difference between being responsive; offering a substantial response; and sending insulting non-responsive materials, featuring unexplained phone bills, columns of unidentified figures, and a pizza receipt.

Thus, Cheney's claim to have produced responsive documents was a false statement and, all evidence suggests, an intentional one. That means it is also a criminal offense - a false statement to Congress. (In a previous column, I discussed the false statements statute and its application.)

If there were ever a reason for two-party control of government, this is it. No one will ever investigate this, certainly not any republican congresscritters, and the press as usual, is asleep at the switch. I guess they must be having a blow-dryer sale, or mousse is on special down to the MegaMart or something. Wouldn't want to risk those nicknames or an invitiation to the B-B-Q dinner.

The 1600 Crew mantra for the new century:

via commentor Lurch, here's a little "memory hole" excerpt of an interview with Seymour Hersh...you know, real journalist, Pulitzer Prize winner, guy who broke the My Lai Massacre story (sorry about that Colin).

SY HERSH: They're whacking everybody they can whack that looks like a bad guy.

JANE WALLACE: And suddenly they're told to back off--

SY HERSH: From a certain area--

JANE WALLACE: -- and let planes fly out to Pakistan.

SY HERSH: There was about a three or four nights in which I can tell you maybe six, eight, 10, maybe 12 more-- or more heavily weighted-- Pakistani military planes flew out with an estimated-- no less than 2,500 maybe 3,000, maybe mmore. I've heard as many as four or 5,000. They were not only-- Al Qaeda but they were also-- you see the Pakistani ISI was-- the military advised us to the Taliban and Al Qaeda. There were dozens of senior Pakistani military officers including two generals who flew out.

And I also learned after I wrote this story that maybe even some of Bin Laden's immediate family were flown out on the those evacuations. We allowed them to evacuate. We had an evacuation.

JANE WALLACE: How high up was that evacuation authorized?

SY HERSH: I am here to tell you it was authorized — Donald Rumsfeld who — we'll talk about what he said later — it had to be authorized at the White House. But certainly at the Secretary of Defense level.

JANE WALLACE: The Department of Defense said to us that they were not involved and that they don't have any knowledge of that operation.

SY HERSH: That's what Rumsfeld said when they asked him but it. And he said, "Gee, really?" He said, "News to me.

Yeah, "no evacuations" my butt...those flights were reported even on the "friendly" media, because aircraft going out of Kabul was not a normal event. Strange how the reports got "shut off" after about 24 hours.

More 1600 Crew loyalty...but not to Americans, unless they can pony up the big bucks, or have the correct pedigree...

Well, not really. But this little gem that passed GEN Sanchez's lips has to be for the purpose of ensuring that post-retirement large dollar defense contractor "job" consulting or some such. Sanchez is the biggest flag-rank 1600 Crew apologist/cheerleader in the theatre.

The commander of U.S. forces in Iraq said Thursday there was no need for more U.S. troops in the country and blamed continuing violence on insufficient intelligence and lack of cooperation from the Iraqi people.
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"Putting more soldiers on the ground is not going to solve the problem if I don't have the intelligence to act on," Sanchez said at a news conference.

Sanchez said casualty figures since the end of major fighting in Iraq -- declared by President Bush on May 1 -- were "about what we would expect to get in this kind of conflict." Since May 1, 143 U.S. soldiers have died -- five more than during the war itself.

Way down south in Dixie, some one needs to shove some tall cotton up some rednecks backside...seems that all the good christo-fascist folks are not in Montgomery worshiping the Judge Roy Moore Graven Image™ which has seemingly been carted away in the same ignominy as the ashes of executed Nazi war criminals...no their brethren are out there shooting at and burning Mosques. Brave folk that they are, they even leave anonymous notes...

The pungent smell of charred wood permeated the small white tent where a group of Muslims gathered for evening prayers this week.

As members prayed, they faced the burned-out remains of a two-bedroom gray brick house that had served for almost a year as a temporary Islamic Center for about 100 coastal families. The house was torched before dawn Sunday, investigators say.
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Al-Farooq Masjid, one of the largest Islamic centers in metro Atlanta, posted a notice of the arson on its Web site and has begun a campaign to raise money to help restore the Savannah center. Christian and Jewish groups in Savannah also have offered to help build a new mosque.
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"With the [U.S. military] casualties in Iraq mounting, [Islamic groups in the United States] fear that Muslims all over the U.S. will face similar challenges," a note on the Web site says. (emphasis added)
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Among treasures destroyed in the fire were a rare 200-year-old, handwritten copy of the Quran that was donated to the center along with other old and valuable copies of the Islamic holy book.

Ahmed said the fire followed two disturbing incidents. At a monthly board meeting Aug. 3, Ahmed said, board members found five bullet holes in the garage door.

"We first noticed the bullet holes in the walls at the back of the garage and discovered the bullets had been fired through the garage door," he said. "This is where the women and children always held their services."

On Aug. 18, someone broke into the apartment of Mohammed Hafez, a graduate student at Georgia Tech's Savannah campus, while he was at pre-dawn prayers at the center. Hafez, 26, moved to Savannah in January from Egypt to pursue a doctoral degree in engineering. His laptop computer, his cellphone and a small amount of money were taken; the intruders left behind a swastika-emblazoned threatening note, he said. "It said, 'We want you Muslims' life. Get out of Savannah. We are watching you 24-7,' " Hafez said. Police and the FBI were notified of both incidents.

Don't look for speedy work from the Asscrack crew, they're still looking for porno-distributing bong sellers. Tough work, but somebody on the federal payroll has to do it for Johnny; otherwise real criminals might get caught. Besides, they are still trying to determine if this might be a "hate crime".

Quack. Hark! I hear a gekko.....

Knowing that any conflict with the North K's would be a high-order disaster, the 1600 Crew has studiously avoided any conflict. Sure, Chickenhawk DoD court jester John "stop the recount" Bolton has talked tough, but everyone just patted him on the head and sent him away. Just like you do to that annoying kid at a big family dinner...

So, tough cowboy rhetoric, a political-appointee 1600 Crew moron in charge of policy and what's the yield?

That may be the operative question...seems the North K's want to find out too. They are formally announcing their "nuclear" status, and planning operational tests of their weapons. Hmmmm, hey Auntie Donnie, guess they have more than "one or two", eh?

North Korea startled a six-nation conference on East Asian security by announcing its intentions to formally declare its possession of nuclear weapons and to carry out a nuclear test, a Bush administration official said Thursday.
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James Kelly, the chief U.S. delegate, demanded that North Korea engage in the verifiable and permanent dismantling of its nuclear weapons programs, in return for which the United States would provide security guarantees and economic benefits.
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Tensions and hostilities have been escalating since October, when Pyongyang acknowledged — to Kelly himself — that it had restarted a nuclear program it supposedly shut down. The United States has demanded that North Korea stop the program immediately, while the impoverished North has refused to budge without guarantees of security and economic aid.

If the North K's are now resorting to nuclear blackmail to get economic aid, what's the next step an invasion of the South?

Wait, I have it...let's see if Pyongyang will pledge peacekeepers for Iraq in return for oil and food...gee, I'll bet they bite before say, the French.

My kingdom and/or a hundred bucks or some free flying lessons in trade for anyone around central OH! IO! who can teach me the fundamentals of Mac Gimp. I am starting to feel pretty computer-illiterate...geez, I can fly a plane, keep all our routers and switches humming along, fix any version of Netware from 2.15 on, and this stupid program is giving me fits.

Yes, I have the "Gimp for Linux Bible" and "Grokking the Gimp". I'm still annoyed.

Grrrrrr. I feel like such an .... end-user.

Jessica Lynch, y'all remember her right? Well the Army has seen fit to seperate her from Active Duty, effective today or whenever she finishes her terminal leave, if any. Guess that she must have been a 2x6 (two years active, 6 years reserve), or they let her out to pursue "other" things. Last I heard, she wanted to hang with her sweetie, and go to college, which any book deal might help...no student loan debt for her.

Goodwin said Lynch had not signed a book deal with anyone as of today, although Pulitzer Prize-winning author and former New York Times reporter Rick Bragg has been a guest at the Lynch home to do research. The Times has reported Bragg will be paid $1 million to tell Lynch's story.

Now, will someone tell me what's up with the other "survivors" of the same incident, like Shoshana Johnson? Is she out too? Is she getting lots of attention too. No? Guess the SCLM just doesn't find a young African-American Female soldier to be quite the story...

Had to rent the TT today and see it again, so the blogging is a bit sparse. Sorry about that. Still annoyed that Peter Jackson messed with the storyline by adding romantic interludes and the whole Faramir-tries-to-take-the-Ring thing...always thought that Faramir's character in the book was pretty good, because he didn't behave like his brother. Oh well.

Looking forward to the RoTK. Not buying the TT until the "extended" DVD comes out, don't need two copies. Fool me once, etc....

So the question, "why have Kenny-boy and Co. not been prosecuted?" is right up there in American Political Discourse...and we have all been wondering, wondering, wondering. Now, heeeeeere's the answer....

"Retroactive legislation moving rapidly through Congress would make it easier for corporate wrongdoers to escape responsibility for defrauding investors, harming the environment and otherwise maximizing profits at the expense of the health and financial well-being of ordinary citizens," says Nan Aron, president of Alliance For Justice, a nonprofit corporation based in Washington, DC. "In the wake of the worst corporate scandals in fifty years, rather than acting to deter wrongdoing, Congress is poised to encourage more white collar misconduct with passage of a so-called class action reform bill which actually retroactively helps several of our most notorious corporate miscreants escape accountability."

President Bush Wants Senate to Debate the Retroactive House Bill Which Lets Ken Lay Off Hook and Usurps Federal Judicial Discretion
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How would the House provisions let Ken Lay and other white collar wrongdoers off the hook? HR 1115 retroactively applies all of its provisions to all current class actions pending in federal court in which the plaintiff class has not yet been certified, granting current defendants strong new powers to postpone financial liability for years and, perhaps, escape it entirely. (The Senate bill also strongly favors defendants, but would only apply to future cases.)

If this passes, there needs to be a lot said about this in congressional elections next year. There seems to be an expectation of some sort of "justice" for the Energy Thieves so well-beloved by the 1600 Crew, and this pretty much seems to put a nail in the coffin of any real, meaningful justice goiing forward...keep the article handy and use it against your congresscritter if they supported it, especially the way energy prices and all seem to be increasing.

So the Deserter went off to go fund-raising and happened to stop by the American Legion convention in St. Louis, where he whored for donations with this sentiment:

President Bush defended his policy on Iraq today, declaring that the United States had struck a blow against terrorism in overthrowing the government of Saddam Hussein. And Mr. Bush said the United States might carry out other pre-emptive strikes.

``Having fought under the American flag and seen it folded and given to families of your friends, you are committed, as am I, to protecting the dignity of the flag and the Constitution of the United States,'' he said, to loud cheers.

Of course, as in the Iraq debacle, no member of the Chimp Clan is in uniform, and in any future "pre-emptive" strike, I doubt we'd find too many drawing weapons and paychecks from the DoD, except as consultants...and then it would be limited to the paychecks part. Bush 1 and his daddy were aberrations I guess, all the rest have yellow streaks as wide as Constitution Avenue running down their backs...

Indeed.

In a Beobachter WaPo OP-ED today Senator Robert Byrd of WV has lots of observations for the 1600 Crew, and a quote that is well, ironic.

Candidate George W. Bush spoke about the need for humility from a great and powerful nation. He said, "Let us reject the blinders of isolationism, just as we refuse the crown of empire. Let us not dominate others with our power -- or betray them with our indifference. And let us have an American foreign policy that reflects American character. The modesty of true strength. The humility of real greatness."

How PNAC. They live, others die.

The resurgent Taliban and Islamist movement in Afghanistan should come as no surprise to anyone who has been semi-conscious, not on vacation, and keeping half and eye on on Afghanistan and Pakistan. The situation there has never been under control, the 1600 Crew has shamefully neglected the puppet government it installed, the US Forces it left there, and has forgone any semblance of caring about bringing the country forward from the 12th Century conditions it found after the insta-conquest in 2001.

The Taliban has not forgotten its country, and it wants it back. Knowing that the attention of the 1600 Crew is focused on finding a producing oil patch for President Dry-Hole, it has been quietly reconstituting itself, and seems to be in no hurry...kinda like the North Vietnamese, and there's a scary parallel.

Progress in science and technology has a direct impact on battlefields, where missile technology, supreme aircraft, nuclear bombs, chemical weapons and the like have changed the dynamics of fighting over the years.

However, despite such advancements in technology, the human element, notably inspiration, remains a decisive force in any struggle. The Taliban, perhaps, realized this a long time ago, and in their period in power in Afghanistan from 1996-2001 they placed much emphasis on generating the human resources that would be committed to their cause.
...
But the left curve from the heart of Chaman takes one to a different world, the world of dozens of tiny villages along the border, which, according to one Akram of the Edhi Welfare Trust Center in Chaman, are too numerous to be counted. Edhi is one of Pakistan's largest non-government organizations.
...
Says Akram, "My experiences with the Edhi Center in Chaman have been very bad. It is a completely mullah-dominated society. If you live in Karachi [from where Akram hails] you know that people trust our [Edhi] services all over Pakistan, we give most of the donations we receive to our trust. Here, our experience is different. You will know that fitrana for example, [a fee that all Muslims pay to a needy person before saying their Eid, a major Muslim festival, prayers] comes to 300 rupees [US$5]. Similarly, the number of sacrificial animal skins - cows or goats - comes to seven. Here in Chaman, even these seven skins and the 300 rupees are donated by army officers posted in Chaman, not by the local people. And then these entire donations go to the Islamic seminaries. Here the people say that their lives and deaths are with the mullahs, not with you people."
...
The Taliban and their supporting parties in Pakistan have invested everything in this region. At the time that the Taliban faced the crunch in Afghanistan (driven out of power in late 2001 and on the run thereafter) their madrassas around Chaman remained well guarded against ideological impurity and outside influences. This investment has paid off, as now the seminaries that dot both sides of the border provide the best fodder for the resistance movement.
...
One can only believe that the Taliban foresaw this development. Maybe not. In any case, the seminaries that now flourish around Chaman have more than adequately filled the void of their city counterparts.

And, crucially, they have in their advantage, because of their history and their remote location, that they are well beyond the writ of either the Pakistani or the Afghan governments. They will thus continue to serve as feeders for the Taliban in Afghanistan for a long time to come.

Allegations are running rampant across the internet and blogtopia in particular that Chimpy's butt-boy Karl Rove was very directly involved in the Joseph Wilson/Valerie Plame affair.

Like everyone else, I am following the story with great interest, since it's sort of like Watergate's Ehrlichman/Haldemann connection to Nixon, same level and access and all...I do have a piece of advice for Unka Karl, if you have to go to the bad place that Colson/Magruder and the rest went, remember to ask for clothing with vertical stripes because, well those horizontal stripes will make you look a little chubby.

Just a fashion thought...FWIW.

The governor of Alabama is trying to raise some revenue for his state by raising taxes, which you know, makes a little sense to pay for stuff like traffic lights and education and police and firefighters. Minor requirements of life in the universe as we know it.

I have a suggestion, why not put Judge "Pet Rock" Moore on un-paid leave? I'm sure that the savings might buy some school supplies for some school district somewhere in Alabama, and it would be well, fair. After all, I'm pretty sure that the Hairy Thunderer will be happy to pony up for the good Justice's utilities, mortgage, car loans, grocery billl and such right after he's done settling the conflicts in Israel, Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and other places where there is religiously inspired violence. Until then, Judge Pet Rock can talk about himself, a favorite topic:

In a speech in front of the monument last week he mentioned God 12 times and himself 21 times. And now he's been suspended from the Supreme Court, the real question is: anyone want to bet against Roy Moore running for governor of Alabama in the not-too-distant future?

Oh, and how does a two-and-a-half ton stone tablet with the 10 Commandments not count as a Graven Image?

Didja know that President "Didja See that Drive?" has really bad re-elect numbers. That's wonderful. Here's another number, but it's kind of sad and frightening at the same time.

This is Bush's 26th trip to Crawford as president. In 949 days in office, he has spent 166 days at the ranch or on the way there.

Apologies to Firesign Theatre, big time...but yet another one from the TV Newspaper...could not find the link, but it's on page 6A of the Print Edition.

Sad but true, the soldiers in Iraq are getting the short end of the stick again, seems that they can't get enough US-made weapons. Can they all come home now, Auntie Donnie? Not so fast...

US troops in a armor battalion around Baquoba are using captured Kalashinkov AK-47 assault rifles because the soldiers there are short of American-made rifles. The shortage arises from the nature of the fighting. A four-person tank crew is issued two M-4 assault rifles and four 9mm pistols.
...
They are hunting insurgents on foot and in small vehicles, so everyone must have a rifle.
...
AK-47s, developed by the Russians, are the preferred weapon of many troops around the world, because they are light, durable and powerful, and they jam infrequently.

Lt. Col. Mark Young, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 67th Armor Regiment of the 4th Infantry Division, says soldiers must demonstrate proficiency with the AK-47 before being allowed to carry one.

Still amazed at the putzes in the Pentagram. Daily.

Yet another gem from the free USA Today, seems that the Army is considering extending overseas tours for soldiers in fun places like Iraq and Afghanistan (and South Korea, which is certainly not as dangerous as the other two...yet) because of well, a manpower shortage. Interesting.

For the first time since the all-volunteer Army began in 1973, significant numbers of U.S. combat soldiers may have to start serving back-to-back overseas tours of up to a year each in places such as Iraq, Afghanistan and South Korea, top Army officers say.

Grappling with large, simultaneous deployments around the world, Army planners are trying to determine how many troops will have to serve extra tours.
...
Army officials are worried that the added tours will lower morale and cause a wave of exits throughout the Army. A key concern is that the deployments will cause an exodus of experienced, mid-career veterans such as sergeants, staff sergeants and captains, who are harder to replace than younger soldiers.

If we start seeing these kinds of things happen, how long before someone starts talking about conscription to fill out the ranks, especially if the retention rates start to go through the floor in the next 18 to 24 months. The problem of replacing officers that split is somewhat trickier...you can't draft officers, and I doubt that after all these years of having a college-educated officer-corps, the Pentagram Biggies will be thrilled to go back to promoting mid-level NCOs into their midst. Just a thought.

One of my favorite quotes (and this is from memory, so forgive me) from President Never-did-his-Multiplication-Tables was when he said that "tens and tens of Iraqi citizens" were coming up to our soldiers to thank them for being there...yeah, the other like 24,683,213 (from the CIA Factbook minus Chimpy's 100) are probably wishing we'd get the F*** out of Dodge.

Tens and Tens...what a moron.

One of the little gems of travel is that USA Today that shows up outside your door at "finer" hotels (and after this weekend I use that term loosely). It provides minutes of entertainment flipping through the pages to find graphics for kindergarteners and stories for those whose attention is about that of my mutt.

Well you know that republican congresscritter who had the little traffic accident in South Dakota? Bill Janklow, or William to his friends, did have a little fender-bender that cost the life of a motorcyclist:

An accident report estimated that Rep. Bill Janklow was driving 70 mph to 75 mph on a 55-mph county road when he blew a stop sign and struck a motorcycle, killing the biker.

The report increases the possibility of criminal charges against the congressman and former four-term governor, who has exerted enormous political power over South Dakota politics for nearly 30 years.

The price of inmate-built homes sold to low-income families will rise in October, the South Dakota Housing Development Authority said. The authority's board voted to increase the price of the 960-square-foot Governor's House to $28,000, up from $25,500. A larger version of the house designed for use as a day-care center will rise from $28,750 to $31,500. Prison inmate crews have built the homes since former governor Bill Janklow started the program in 1996.

Back from worm-hunting...found one blaster worm that was broadcasting to the universe, killed it deader than dead, imagine a user with no virus protection running on their workstation (took it off, made it too "slow" grrrrrr)...thanks for being patient...

More bloggy goodness coming, stay tuned and welcome to all my visitors from BartCop Nation!

See ya in a few!

Light Blogifying today, on the road hunting for worms at a remote office. No luck catching any yet (thank goodness). Hope to get on-line tonight and blog a bit, Chimpy's "Press Availability" yesterday ought to be good for some fun. (Can people and fish really get along?)

Later.....

If the 1600 Crew tried any more overreaching, they might as well just start becoming like that character in the Fantastic Four comic, you know the one who could stretch and bend any which way...the new and improved Patriot Act II, AKA the "Victory Act", which I suspect has as much to do with Victory as "Clean Skies" does with clean air, and "Healthy Forests" does with actual, growing green things is on its way to the Senate Judiciary Committee if Orrin Hatch can help it.

The alleged "Victory Act" seems to be all about melding the oh-so-successful "War on Drugs" with the War on Terra™, and we know how successful the War on Drugs has been. If that merger takes place, let's just save us all some time and tax money and hand the keys to the country over to Osama and his ilk now.

Here are some of the proposals being backed by Orrin Hatch (R-Loves Leather):

• Allow the FBI to get a wiretap order on a wireless device, such as a cell phone, from any district court in the country
  
• Force defendants who are trying to exclude illegal wiretap evidence to prove police intentionally broke the rules
  
• Further restrict judges' sentencing discretion in drug cases
  
• Ease restrictions on government access to sensitive financial records
  
• Increase penalties for selling drugs to people under the age of 21
  
• Make it easier for the government to seize or freeze assets of people accused of money laundering
  
• Remove gradations of sentencing for those convicted of selling amphetamines so that anyone convicted of possessing more than 250 meth pills would automatically go to jail for 200 years
  
• Increase the ability of the FBI to self-issue subpoenas for terrorism investigations without having to consult a judge

And what makes them think that someone knowing they are goiing to face 200 mandatory years (where the fuck did that come from?) is going to go peacefully? Not to mention, all the draconian laws on the books have not stopped the use of other illegal substances...let's choose Crack and Pot, if the laws worked, then both would be but a really bad memory...but I don't see that.

As for all the changes to sentencing guidelines, let's just skip all the expensive and boring judicial stuff and go straight to the stocks and pillory...hell, there's even an football stadium in Kabul that might be available for some events.

Why not just take down that statue with the ridiculous drape and put up what Asscrack really wants; statues of Lavrenti Beria and Heinrich Himmler, with a portrait of Reinhardt Heydrich between both statues.

Seig Heil, Baby - Lorenzo St. Dubois

Nothing gets by our friends at Faux News, here's a lead headline (I'm sure the author will get a tongue-lashing, it's off-message for Faux)

U.S. Military: Terrorism No. 1 Threat in Iraq

Terrorism is the biggest threat to Iraqis and coalition forces working to rebuild the country, particularly in regions where support for deposed leader Saddam Hussein was the strongest, U.S. military officials said Thursday.
...
"It's clearly a problem for us because of the sophistication of the attacks and because of their tactics to go after Iraqis," Gen. John Abizaid, who is in charge of U.S. Central Command, said during a Pentagon briefing.
...
"They are clearly a problem for us because of the sophistication of their attacks and because of what I would call their tactics to go after Iraqis," he said.

"Clearly, they're going after Iraqis that are cooperating with us. They're going after soft targets of the international community. They're still seeking to inflict casualties upon the United States."

This must be the guerilla war that Auntie Donnie said didn't exist and would not happen. How long before the radical Islamists move the fight from Iraq, all because of the PNAC pipedreams...and we are all sorrier than sorry for their "leadership"?

Well someone had to be making a buck from the little conflict over in the desert, right? Well someone is, and here's the list. Now I would never be one to be cynical or anything, but does is seem strange to see this:

Citing security concerns and time constraints, they hand picked the companies that would be allowed to bid for the contracts (American firms only, thank you), and in some cases they awarded colossal sums with no bidding at all.

USAID, whose mission is to further "America’s foreign policy interests in expanding democracy and free markets while improving the lives of the citizens of the developing world," invited 21 firms to bid on eight contracts worth $1.7 billion. Many of the contract details have not been revealed to American taxpayers or the Iraqi people

KELLOGG BROWN AND ROOT (KBR) (A HALLIBURTON SUBSIDIARY)

KBR is the engineering and construction wing of the Houston, Texas-based petroleum and gas service firm; Halliburton is publicly traded on NYSE (HAL).

Amount: Unlimited

For: Repair of Petroleum Infrastructure (putting out oil fires, contingency planning)

The contract to extinguish and repair the oil infrastructure of Iraq is the true gem of the reconstruction spoils. For starters it is a "cost plus" contract in which the government pays the total cost of work done, plus a profit. The Army Corps of Engineers predicts the total value will amount to $7 billion over two years with KBR taking 7% (about $490 million) as profit. The contract also gives KBR the right to produce and sell oil inside the country of Iraq. Remarkably, this was a closed-door handout granted to KBR without bidding.

And then, of course, there is Dick Cheney's Halliburton, profiting in the millions from the oil in Iraq. Halliburton subsidiary, Brown & Root, is also in Iraq. Their stock in trade is the building of permanent military bases. Here is your permanent military presence in Iraq, and all for an incredible fee. Cheney still draws a one million dollar annual check from Halliburton, what they call a 'deferred retirement benefit.' In Boston, we call that a paycheck.

They always used to say...don't drink the water. I remember going to the Subcontinent, and being told exactly that. So, absent being able to get bottled water that looked like it had not been bottled in the backyard of the seller, I drank one of those popular cola beverages...some reason to trust the quality, right? Maybe yes, Maybe no.

The government today said Coca-Cola and Pepsi brands contained pesticides well within limits set for packaged drinking water in India, in the absence of separate norms for aerated beverages.

The government has, however, decided to constitute a joint parliamentary committee to probe contamination in colas.

Earlier this month, the Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) had reported pesticide levels in 12 soft drink brands at 11-70 times higher than the limits set by the European Union (EU).

After Auntie Donnie took his Traveling Roadshow and Big Mouth throughout the continent scorning the Europeans, after President Geographically Impaired said "allies? we don't need no stinkin' allies", called the UN "irrelevant" and headed off to kill other people's children in Iraq (ours and theirs) for no good reason, they want help in Iraq. I want some of what they're smoking delivered to me, I'll be in a light silver '68 El Camino in the local Mega-Burger parking lot just after midnight tonight when I get off work...I could use some cheering up.

About 140,000 U.S. troops are in Iraq, with more than 20,000 forces from other countries, mostly Britain.
...
Annan said the United Nations didn't intend to send U.N. "blue helmets," or peacekeepers.

The United States has brushed aside earlier discussions to assemble a U.N.-led coalition force in Iraq.
...
Annan offered the idea of "a multinational force that oversees the security arrangements with the U.N., focusing on the economic, political and social areas where we do our best work, including the humanitarian aid."

Make no mistake, it's Petrodollars not Patriotism driving these little "foreign entanglements". Count on it.

via Hesiod, who links...well not to me. [sniff] This is truly funny and I can't wait until Sunday.

Seems that Fat Tony and Sleepy could not find sufficient reason to let that "judge" in Alabama keep his pet rock with the 10 Commandments inscribed on them outside his office. Again, I have to wonder, what's the deal? Could the good judge not find a place in his front yard for the stone bearing the 10 Commandments? Why is he interupting public life and discourse to broadcast his view of the universe to everyone? I'm happy he loves religion, but why do I want to care?

Supporters of Chief Justice Roy Moore have been handcuffed and led away from the Ten Commandments monument in Montgomery. They had refused to leave the monument after Moore lost a last-ditch appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court this afternoon. The federal judge who ordered the monument's removal is now expected to consider a contempt of court finding on Friday.

From the Obvious Understatement Department: The situation on the ground in Iraq isn't getting any better.

So what's the deal? Seems that there were foreign jihadis involved in the latest vehicle-based bombing (car or truck...vehicle works for me), in Baghdad. I guess that the "flys" are coming home to see what's up in scenic Iraq, and perhaps leave a little death and destruction behind. Meanwhile, the air conditioning works in Crawford, on Barbados and I'm pretty sure it's still on in Auntie Donny's office in the E-ring.

Reports available so far on the truck-bomb explosion at a building housing the United Nations offices in Baghdad on Tuesday indicate that it was probably the work of foreign jihadi elements, with some local complicity.
...
The jihadi and other resistance elements have been saying that just as the jihad of the 1980s in Afghanistan brought about the collapse of one superpower (the Soviet Union), the present jihad in Iraq, which, according to them, is being waged in tandem with that in Afghanistan, will bring about the end of the other superpower (the United States). They claim to have already trapped the US troops in Iraq and do not want any other nation to come to the rescue of the Americans, as they want to bleed them to death.
...
Lesson 11: Bush should make an indirect signal to the Iraqi people that he realizes that serious policy mistakes have been made and he is taking action to correct them. It is not necessary to make an open mea culpa in this regard.

The only flaw in his logic is that President Dry-Drunk never admits he is wrong...about anything. So getting the 1600 Crew to admit that there is a serious policy mistake, is to first get them to admit there is/was a policy and then say those magic words: We Wuz Wrong.

Not betting the ranch on that happening.

Guess I offended somebody. Oops. Silly me.

Welcome TableTalkers...

If you have a minute, dash over to The Peoples Republic of Seabrook and wish Jack and his family well. Seems that his wife, Susan, has been in and out of the ER the last couple of days and they (the Docs) have no clue whats up.

Wish them well, and keep them in your thoughts. Thanks.

Crazy Nihonjin bastards, publishing this stuff about the Chimp, don't they know that as the press they are supposed to bow down and worship the pathetic lump of animated tissue in Fortress 1600? I mean c'mon, stop acting like the responsible press I knew in my mis-spent youth. Oh, it's the Japan Times. Never mind.

President George W. Bush has become the new Kenneth Lay. As chief executive officer of the former juggernaut Enron Corp., Lay presided over a network of deception and malfeasance that led to one of the greatest investor ripoffs in U.S. corporate history. Enron inflated reported income and conducted much of its business through off-balance-sheet transactions hidden from analysts, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the general public.
...
Bush has triggered a tectonic shift in the management of official secrets, hiding more from the public across all policy sectors -- not just national security -- than any president since the conspiracy-obsessed Richard Nixon. He has fostered a White House culture that is casual about facts and is comfortable with making unsubstantiated national security assertions.
...
The president would do well to revisit his clever quip during the presidential debates regarding his favorite philosopher. He used to say that when confronted with a challenge, he would ask himself, "What would Jesus do?"

With some reflection, Bush would realize that little of his administration's obsession with secrets and its tendency to spin false truths would be consistent with this self-revealed touchstone of faith that he shared with the nation. More importantly, however, duplicity of the magnitude now unfolding in Washington is inconsistent with democracy.
...
Bush's team may eventually be held accountable for its deceptions, but the judiciary and the legislature appear remarkably contrite given what appears to be serious executive office malfeasance. America's current board of directors -- Congress and the Supreme Court -- like the boards of Enron, MCI, Adelphia and other top-tier blue chip firms that deceived investors and the nation, is failing in its responsibility to check a president who needs to be brought into line.
...
Americans deserve honesty, and if there is malfeasance, Congress and the courts should not let it be buried in a labyrinth of official secrets for future generations to uncover.

Why don't the Media Whores want to call the 1600 Crew on this? Is the future of America more important than their self-important agendas, whatever they may be? With Congress, the Courts and the Media all performing like two-dollar hookers for the 1600 Crew, who's left to speak the truth to power? The foreign press, I guess and how sad is that?

Oh, and What Would Jesus Do? Probably take one look at Chimpy and start puking his guts out. Yeah, make me nauseous every time I see him too.

Here's another idea, I'm in...wanna join too? Check out Not Geniuses and join up too! This could be fun...

Well, now that President I Can't Count...has admitted it in public, we know (well we've always known) that the bullshit factor at the 1600 Crew and Fortress 1600 is pretty high. Just when we all thought that it could not get any worse, the Brits, Hairy Thunderer love'em, are proceeding to not just spank the Poodle for crapping in the house, but rubbing his nose in it at the same time and helping spread more stink to the 1600 Crew (yay!). Seems that their version of Dan (Lips B. Moving, I B. Lying) Bartlett, 1600 Crew Communications Director, a guy named Alistair Campbell... ordered the dossier that the Poodle used to sell NeoCon Combat Theatre 2003 to Parliment and the British people "sexed up" (Love That Terminology).

Insert Rod Serling Voice Here: Imagine if you will another dimension where the lies are truth and the truth are lies.

Alastair Campbell authorised a "substantial rewrite" of the government’s dossier on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD) after a discussion with Tony Blair, according to a damning e-mail produced in evidence yesterday at the Hutton inquiry.

The order to rewrite the dossier was given on 5 September 2002, five days before the claim that Iraq could launch WMD at 45 minutes’ notice was inserted into the document.

But even after the rewrite, there were still concerns within No 10 that it failed to make a strong enough case for war. Jonathan Powell, Mr Blair’s chief of staff, warned "the document does nothing to demonstrate a threat, let alone an imminent threat from Saddam".
...
But an e-mail from Mr Campbell to Mr Powell, dated September 5, showed that he and Mr Blair had been unhappy with the way the dossier had been presented by the intelligence community.

The e-mail read: "Re dossier, substantial rewrite with JS [John Scarlett, the chairman of the joint intelligence committee] and Julian M [Miller, chief of the assessment staff in the Cabinet Office] in charge, which JS will take to US next Friday, and be in shape Monday thereafter. Structure as per TB’s [Tony Blair’s] discussion. Agreement that there has to be real intelligence material in their presentation."

The 45-minute claim was added to the dossier on or around 10 September, but on 17 September Mr Powell was still unconvinced by the strength of the dossier.
...
However, when the document finally appeared, the 45-minute claim had been inserted into the foreword, suggesting Iraq did pose an imminent threat.

Lying liars and the lying they do. Oh, sorry I must have been talking about the 1600 Crew. Yup. I was. There might have only been 16 words in the State of the Union, but there sure has been a lot of other bullshit flowing out of the Presidential Prevaricator before and after that speech.

I have to figure that after a day like this, with the Beeb getting sort of vindicated, President Putz proving he need to take that Focus Factor stuff from the infomercials, and the memo ordering Catholic Bishops to obstruct justice while continuing to serially molest children, our friend Sullly may want yet another month of vacation, to see if the world is more to his liking at the end of month two. Nah, never happen. But it sure is peaceful without him making shit up too.

Mission sort of accomplished? Is that like being a little bit pregnant? George, does it just get easier to tell lies as you go along? Has Darrell Issa been at the White House giving lying lessons to the whole 1600 Crew?

In a stunning (not!) admission today we learn that the Mission was NOT Accomplished in Iraq. Of course there are those of us who still want to know what the mission is/was/will be besides a Chickenhawk "Get your War On" deal. But as the answers to that question will only be provided by either history-to-be-writtten or an impeachment proceeding, I'm not holding my breath.

At this point I have to wonder...why? But if I do, then it's too much...the men and women still there now need our support more than ever. Clearly as soon as President Deserter loses interest in them like he already has in the troops in Afghanistan, they will be stuck like a rear-wheel drive car in the red Tennessee mud after a rainstorm. The only reason it hasn't happened yet is the lack of international support for our "cause". If NATO or allied troops were there, you can bet Deserter Maximus would be ramping up the next NeoCon adventure somewhere (except North Korea...that's a sure-fire loser, and the NeoCons know it).

It's a shame that so many of the current crop of Presidential Candidates supported this war by voting to give the Deserter the ability to go forward into an unprovoked war. After today they have to be feeling like idiots...they sure look that way to me. Now how do they speak out about this shameful turn of events without looking like complete hypocrites?

Regime Change in 2004.

Heard that one? Thought so. Apparently President Intellectually Impaired hasn't. He seems to think that well, size doesn't matter at all. Where, well we know that he stuffed a zucchini in his flight suit, so the lying begins there. But apparently the Runnin'-Away Rabbit can't seem to count the number of Brave Men and Women from the US serving in Afghanistan in the military (wanna bet he know to a person the number of Defense Contractor Mercenaries there?). Now how sad is this? The alleged commander-in-chief, not knowing how many troops are committed to a particular operation the size of Afghanistan is pretty much a crime, not in the prosecutable sense, but in the "gee, it's a shame he's such an idiot" sense.

Asked about U.S. force presence in Afghanistan, Bush said the U.S. presence is being "gradually replaced" by other troops.

"We've got about 10,000 troops there, which is down from, obviously, major combat operations," he said. "And they're there to provide security and they're there to provide reconstruction help.
...
In fact, the 10,000 troops in Afghanistan represent the highest number of U.S. soldiers in the country since the war there began. By the time the Taliban government had been vanquished in December 2001, U.S. troops numbered fewer than 3,000 in Afghanistan.

Seems that the likely winners, or at least finalists, in the Blackout Blame Derby, FirstEnergy of -OH! IO!- were grande contributors to the Cap'n 10-Watt & Co election campaign in 2000.

The top two executives of FirstEnergy Corp., the Ohio-based utility that is a focus of investigations into last week's cascading blackouts, are key financial supporters of President Bush, according to campaign records.

H. Peter Burg, chairman and chief executive, was one of three hosts of a $600,000 fundraiser for Bush's reelection campaign in Akron, Ohio, on June 30. Vice President Cheney was the featured speaker.

Anthony J. Alexander, FirstEnergy's president and chief operating officer, was a "Pioneer" for Bush's last campaign, meaning he raised at least $100,000. Alexander also contributed $100,000 to Bush's inaugural committee.

The Energy Department has dispatched teams of investigators to the Midwest and Northeast. Democrats have questioned whether Bush's administration coddled electric companies because of his long personal ties to the energy industry. FirstEnergy's ties could increase Capitol Hill scrutiny of the White House handling of the blackout aftermath.

Bush's campaign had no comment. (emphasis added)

Records compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics show that FirstEnergy executives contributed about $50,000 to Bush's last campaign. Energy and natural resource interests gave the campaign more than $3.6 million, according to the group's figures.

When Bush was Texas governor, employees of the now-collapsed Enron Corp., the energy-trading company, were his most generous career patrons.

No 1600 Crew comment indeed -snicker-.

The Asscrack Justice Department, surprising no one, except perhaps Gollum (V[illan]-Website), has given the big "okey-dokey" to the recall bid sponsored by Cryin' Darrell Issa and being run by The Sperminator/Bonginator/Whatever-inator as a patsy for the 1600 Crew.

The Justice Department on Monday signed off on the Oct. 7 election to recall Gov. Gray Davis in response to warnings from a federal judge, who questioned whether the voting rights of minorities would be upheld.

The election, just 50 days away, is forcing some counties to make a number of moneysaving changes that until Monday lacked federal approval. The legal dispute focused on Monterey County, which plans to cut costs by reducing its usual 190 polling places to 86 and hiring fewer Spanish-speaking poll workers.

It's an old axiom in advertising that "you don't sell the steak, you sell the sizzle"...which apparently is what Johnny Asscrack is out there doing now; selling the 'sizzle' for the worst law in US History since Prohibition, the PATRIOT Act. As someone once remarked "That may be the worst idea since Greedo decided to shoot first". Second that. Anyhow, as many, many localities nationwide pass local ordinances which are Anti-PATRIOT act in nature, the Snake-Handler is doing his "PATRIOT Tour 2003" to try and drum up support for the 'vital work and intelligence it allows'.

The Bush administration, under increasing criticism over its terrorism policies, is beginning an unusual counteroffensive this week in an effort to shore up support for the prized legislation that grew out of the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

The pitch man for the campaign-style initiative is Attorney General John Ashcroft, a politically divisive figure who plans to deliver more than a dozen speeches around the country beginning on Tuesday in defense of the administration's terrorism efforts.
...
But the legislation has also become almost a dirty word in some circles in recent months. The Republican-led House voted overwhelmingly last month to repeal a key provision on the use of surveillance, 152 communities have passed resolutions objecting to the legislation because of what some saw as its Big Brother overtones, and civil liberties groups are suing to have parts of the law struck down as unconstitutional.

No word yet on whether or not free T-Shirts would go to Jose Padilla, Yaser Hamdi, Zacharias Moussaoui or the GITMO detainees as celeberity sponsors of the TOUR. Those scheduled for military tribunals, had no comment. They are afraid of being actually sizzled.

I wish we'd though of this first. Damn! Using the InterWeb thing...what an incredible idea. Ed, you call Karl and have him fire up a research group with Frank and Roger to make sure we can maximize this. If we're quick, we'll take advantage of this before they even realize what we've done.

Now be off with you, right after our getting started prayer from former White House Counsel, Charles Colson, a fine upstanding young man. Mr. and Mrs. VP, here's part of a news that has some great ideas for us to use:

President Bush's re-election campaign today launches a revamped Web site designed to encourage grass-roots activism.
...
Supporters are urged to sign up as "team leaders," who will host block parties or volunteer for the get-out-the-vote effort. And "bloggers," people who publish online diaries of news or opinion, are invited to sign up for a continually updated Bush campaign news service.

The goal is to harness the president's backers across the country "so that everyone has something to do," Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlman told reporters Monday in a teleconference preview of the site.
...
"We have for a number of years . . . believed in aggressively using the Web," he said, adding that the Republican National Committee and the president's campaign together have an e-mail list of 6 million people.

Remember our codephrase: BLOG! - Break Liberty's Oppressive Goodness! Keep up the good work and remember the two Team Leader Grand Prizes!, Dinner with Ann Coulter on the Panama Canal Cruise is just one!.

The whole issue of child abuse by the Catholic Clergy is pretty sickening. Their decades long state of denial is almost worse. There are hundreds of millions of Catholics worldwide who practice their faith, and do good work. Then there's the Vatican. Corrupt, hypocritical, violent , greedy to a fault throughout history; gee sounds almost like the 1600 Crew. But it's not, it's worse...because of its longevitiy.

A document unearthed recently from some moldy archive or another in the Vatican actually has instructions from a Pope O'Rome telling the Bishops around the world how to conceal child abuse, and obstruct justice. Why it's another Children's Crusade...just with a different objective.

The Vatican instructed Catholic bishops around the world to cover up cases of sexual abuse or risk being thrown out of the Church.

The Observer has obtained a 40-year-old confidential document from the secret Vatican archive which lawyers are calling a 'blueprint for deception and concealment'. One British lawyer acting for Church child abuse victims has described it as 'explosive'.

The 69-page Latin document bearing the seal of Pope John XXIII was sent to every bishop in the world. The instructions outline a policy of 'strictest' secrecy in dealing with allegations of sexual abuse and threatens those who speak out with excommunication.

They also call for the victim to take an oath of secrecy at the time of making a complaint to Church officials. It states that the instructions are to 'be diligently stored in the secret archives of the Curia [Vatican] as strictly confidential. Nor is it to be published nor added to with any commentaries.'

Fucking Criminals. I can't believe they actually institutionalized the sexual abuse of children. How many centuries has this been going on? Like 21 or so? Perverts.

Ha Ha Ha

Wesley Clark, who once served as NATO commander and might have presidential aspirations, attacked the Bush administration Sunday for launching a war with Iraq on "false pretenses" and spreading the military too thin amid the global war on terrorism.

"You'd be taking them to the Better Business Bureau if you bought a washing machine the way we went into the war in Iraq," Clark said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."
...
The Bush administration has acknowledged that a 16-word passage should not have been included in the State of the Union Address as part of the pitch to wage war. The statement was based on British intelligence that could not be corroborated by the CIA and had been struck from a previous presidential address.

Bush has dismissed the criticism regarding the statement and other intelligence.

"It's just pure politics," Bush said earlier this month. "The American people know that we laid out the facts. We based the decision on sound intelligence. And they also know we've only been there 100 days."

Clark also lashed out at House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Texas Republican.

Early in the Iraq war, Delay criticized what he called the corps of "blow-dried Napoleons" who appeared on television to analyze the progress of the coalition invasion. Clark was a CNN military analyst during the conflict but no longer works for the network.

"When our airmen were flying over Kosovo, Tom DeLay led House Republicans to vote not to support their activities -- when American troops were in combat," Clark said. "To me, that's a real indicator of a man who's motivated not by patriotism or support for the troops but by partisan political purposes."

The best thing that could happen is for Clark to quit being coy and get onboard with the next Regime Change...I like many of the candidates out there now, and there's no denying the work they have done to bring their agendas to us all, but I wonder if the peson who can consign this criminal adminstration to the shitcan of history will not be Clark, for all the right reasons.

C'mon Wesley, just do it!

Well the heat wave in Europe is making one group of citizens happy; Winemakers and vinyard owners. Seems that the killer heat is actually good for the grapes, so they are expecting a bonanza in the way of great wines down the road. That's special.

Europe's heat wave is causing misery for millions, but for winemaker Pierre Aguilas, his shirt damp as he walks his rows of grapevines here in the Loire Valley, the freak weather is starting to look like cause for exhilaration.

That's because it seems to be delivering the optimal mix of warmth, water and sunshine that winemakers pray for. As the mercury stays high, people in the world of French wine are saying that 2003 could become a legendary year, like 1997 or 1976 or, reaching back in history, perhaps even 1947 -- the year that vignerons, or winemakers, mention only in misty-eyed reverence.

Blackout, schmackout...looks like another chance for the 1600 Crew to begin the enrichment of their campaign friends in the energy industry, to the tune of like 50 Billion dollars, from our paychecks as higher utility bills. According to Spencer Abraham (R-Big Fat Loser & Dolt), that's gonna be the price tag to be a-fixin' up the grid. Yeah, the one President One-Watt Bulb said did not need to be fixed...a couple of years ago.

As the Bush administration dispatched crews to investigate the largest blackout in North American history, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham warned yesterday that consumers will eventually pay up to $50 billion in higher electric bills to modernize the nation's ailing power transmission system.
...
After laboring in obscurity since his appointment in 2001, Abraham has become a ubiquitous figure on the television talk shows. Appearing yesterday on four news programs, the former Michigan senator lobbied for sweeping energy legislation that has been bottled up in Congress for two years. "We really need Congress to finish the job here," he said.

But Democratic lawmakers pushed back, urging Bush to set aside controversial aspects of the bill such as a proposal to allow drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

A Fedex Pilot in Memphis has convinced a jury that she does not owe close to a million bucks in back taxes. She contended that the IRS and by extension the Federal Government has no authority to collect taxes. It's an old argument, one which has been used many times, but this is pretty interesting, since the services her life depend on, literally, Air Traffic Control, are funded 100% from everyone's tax dollars except hers. Not too selfish, I guess.

Last week a jury in Memphis acquitted a woman of criminal charges arising from her refusal to pay federal income taxes on $920,000 she earned from 1996 to 2001. The basis for her refusal, which the jury apparently found sufficient, was that the Internal Revenue Service hadn't showed her where in the law it says she had to pay.

She wrote the IRS a letter in 1995, she said, demanding an answer to her question, and when none was forthcoming, she filed W-4 forms indicating she didn't owe tax. The IRS eventually brought criminal charges of tax evasion and filing false W-4s. If she had been convicted by the federal court jury, she would have faced up to 30 years in prison and $1.5 million in fines.

The defense employed by Vernice Kuglin, a 58-year-old FedEx pilot, was a variation on a longtime theme of tax protesters, which in essence says that Congress somehow neglected to put the trigger in the tax gun -- all this tax law but no provision saying you actually have to pay.

K: Atlanta Approach, FEDEX Heavy 1234 with you, Flight Level 240 (24,000 feet)

ATL Approach: Good evening 1234, Atlanta altimeter 28.95, descend and maintain one-eight thousand

K: 28.95, 1234 is out of two-four for one-eight thousand

ATL Approach: All aircraft overhead ATL be advised to proceed to your alternates now, ATL weather currently zero-zero, sixteen aircraft currently inbound ATL and the tower and approach are closed for business in four-five minutes. Will reopen at 1200 Zulu for business. Have a good evening and contact ATL depature now on 126.85, they have money to stay open for another hour. Good Luck.

K: Approach, 1234, @#$#$@#^^!!!! I need to land!

ATL Approach: Sorry Fedex 1234, you're number seventeen in sequence. Frequency change approved, have a good evening....United Heavy 567 contact tower now, 126.75...

All snark aside, this is not really a good thing in these days of massive deficits, but Grovel Nosetwist is probably creaming in his sans-a-belts...

[oh, and look at the second to the last paragraph in this story...if it's not gone, it proves that the Times either needs an editor, or Jayson Blair is still there somehere....it's from a story about pet insurance. Go figure.]

Idi Amin Dada. No tears here, just a wish that the brutal dictator had been brought into the dock for his crimes. Died of kidney failure. Gee, could not have happened to a nicer guy.

His reign came to an end in 1979, after Tanzanian troops invaded Kampala and Mr. Amin fled. Over the past 24 years, he lived first in Libya, then Iraq and most recently in Saudi Arabia.

Human rights groups claim he was responsible for ordering the torture and execution of hundreds of thousands of his opponents in bloody purges in the 1970s.

Of course not.

On Sunday, Saudi King Fahd and Crown Prince Abdullah sent cables of condolences to Amin's family, many of who were with him when he died at the King Faisal Specialist Hospital in the Red Sea city of Jeddah.

The cables prayed to God to "have mercy on him, give him forgiveness and send him to Heaven," the official Saudi Press Agency reported.

As what started out as almost a pissing contest between Blair and the BBC reaches a crescendo in the UK, the impact is still minimal for the 1600 Crew. If the Poodle is ultimately proven to have "faked" it with the "Sexed-up" reports that Dr. David Kelly spoke to the BBC about it, well perhaps a spanked Poodle might draw some attention on this side of the Pond.

For much of the past week a procession of witnesses has filed into Room 73 at London's Royal Court of Justice to testify, ostensibly, about one issue: what brought about the death of David Kelly, one of Britain's foremost experts on Iraq's biological, chemical and nuclear weapons programs?

Repeatedly, people involved in these hearings — led by a senior judge, Lord Hutton — have been told that this is not a trial. Yet, never far below the surface, there is an overwhelming sense that the inquiry will deliver a verdict that will mold history's view of whether Prime Minister Tony Blair misled the nation in going to war against Iraq — or even dictate his political longevity
...
Writing in The Guardian, however, Roy Hattersley, a former Labor minister, argued that on the very first day of the inquiry, intelligence officers had cast doubt on the government's claim that "we and our allies faced a real and present danger."

"If we had known in March what we know today, neither the House of Commons nor the British people would have supported the decision to go to war," he said. "The government exaggerated the threat from Iraq."
...
When Alastair Campbell, Mr. Blair's communications chief, gives evidence — an appearance scheduled for Tuesday — the spotlight will also turn on another personality, this time of a man fighting a zero-sum game to prove himself right and the BBC wrong in the question of whether last September's dossier was embellished in the name of political expediency.

Some commentators depicted Mr. Campbell's vendetta against the BBC as an attempt to deflect attention from weightier matters relating to Iraq's chemical and biological weapons, which were used as the justification for war but, as Mr. Blair's critics have frequently pointed out, have yet to be located. Dr. Kelly's death added a grim new dimension to that debate, but in the end, some analysts say, the inquiry could end up drawing attention away from the central issue of whether Iraq's arsenal posed a real threat.

He's fighting for his very existance, and its funny, I don't see too many "hands across the water, hands across the sea".

1600 Crew loyalty...toss'em an anchor, as needed.

Seems that the Blackout might have its genesis right here in the good old Buckeye State. So get your Tin-Foil Hat out now, 'cause it's Tin-Foil Hat Saturday...here's the "official" word so far:

A failure to contain problems with three transmission lines in northern Ohio just south of Cleveland was the likely trigger of the nation's biggest power blackout, a leading investigator said Saturday.

Alarm systems that might have alerted engineers to the failed lines were broken, according to FirstEnergy Corp., the Akron, Ohio-based utility that officials said owned at least two of the three lines.
...
"We are fairly certain at this time that the disturbance started in Ohio," Michehl Gent, head of the North American Electric Reliability Council, said in a statement.
...
"The system has been designed and rules have been created to prevent this escalation and cascading. It should have stopped," Gent said in a telephone conference call.

FirstEnergy, which officials said owns four of the first five lines that failed, said a system that is supposed to flash a red warning on computer monitors at the company's control center was not operational when the lines began failing Thursday afternoon.
...
Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, co-chair of a U.S.-Canadian task force that will look into the cause of the blackout, said the group is putting together investigative teams that will include experts from the government's research laboratories as well as private resources. In addition to determining the cause, the task force will recommend actions to prevent a repeat.

Tin-Foil Hat, pa-rade REST!

Enjoy the rest of the weekend...if you can.

Once again, it's getting to be Taliban 1 US 0 in the mountains and deserts of Afghanistan, where we went after 9-11, kicked out the Talib and Al-Qaida, and walked away. Walked Away. Now, the Talib want their country back. They see us flailing around in Iraq, leaving the Afghan mess to NATO forces whose only allegiance is well, on paper. And they are coming back, with guile, patience and a sense of purpose...reclaiming what we took.

Notwithstanding the changing of the guard in Kabul, which sees the North Atlantic Treaty Organization taking over command of the International Security Assistance Force, the resistance network that covers large swathes of the country is firmly in place.

This consists of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-e-Islami Afghanistan, the Taliban and fighters of Osama bin Laden's International Islamic Front grouped under the banner of the Saiful Muslemeen (the Sword of Muslims). Previously restricted to the countryside and attacks on foreign soldiers, the resistance has now targeted cities.
...
The resistance does not necessarily want to take control of towns, rather it wants to send a message to the embattled interim administration in Kabul headed by Hamid Karzai that local governments are at their mercy. This happened in Zabul, as reported in Asia Times Online on May 1 (Afghanistan, once more the melting pot ) when the town was overrun, then abandoned.

Subsequently, Taliban guerrillas again captured Zabul and hoisted their white flags on government buildings. And once again they melted into surrounding mountains after a short time, where this time they held their positions. The mountains are such that for people with local knowledge, they provide excellent coverage, even from aerial bombing. The apparent aim is to be in position to cut the supply lines of southern Afghanistan from Kabul. Already, some districts, including Hilmand and parts of Kandahar and Urugzan, have to rely on tortuous routs for supplies, or wait for air drops.
...
The evolving situation in Afghanistan - and Iraq for that matter - represents the designs of the International Islamic Front, which aims to draw the enemy (US) to battlefields, where it will be engaged in protracted warfare that will reap a heavy human and economic toll - much as happened to the former Soviet Union in its misadventure in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

If we allow that to happen, will it be the end of the 1600 Crew? I would hope so, but I can't even muster up the vitriol to wish (a reconstituted Taliban Government through a 1600 Crew policy failure) that on the Afghan people...obviously the 1600 Crew can though, because they implementing their own massive policy failure as you read this.

Right off the MSGOP site today is this story on how the Iraqis "beat the heat". I've seen all over the internet how they are Smilin' in Sadr, Belly-laughing in Baghdad, and Braying in Basra over the 24-plus hours that millions of Americans went without power in the dog-days of August here in the good ol' US of A. Here are a couple of my Faves with some some of the Iraqi Snark tossed in for good measure:

Iraqis who have suffered for months with little electricity gloated Friday over a blackout in the northeastern United States and southern Canada and offered some tips to help Americans beat the heat.

From Frequent Showers to rooftop slumber parties, Iraqis have developed advanced techniques to adapt to life without electricity.
...
3: CALL IN THE IRAQIS. Some suggested the Americans ask the Iraqis how to get the power going again. “Let them take experts from Iraq,” said Alaa Hussein, 32, waiting in a long line for gas because there was no electricity for the pumps. “Our experts have a lot of experience in these matters.”
...
2: USE FOUL LANGUAGE. “When the power goes out, I curse everybody,” said Emad Helawi, a 63-year-old accountant. “I curse God. I curse Saddam Hussein. And I curse the Americans.”
...
And the No. 1 suggestion among Iraqis for Americans suffering without power: TAKE TO THE STREETS. Some said demonstrations can be effective in persuading authorities to turn on the switch. “We held protests. After that we had fewer blackouts,” Ahmed Abdul Hussein said without even a hint of sarcasm. “I’d suggest Americans go out and demonstrate.”

However, if you need to curse anyone Greg Palast has a great starting point in an article he wrote (I guess on a laptop, with a spare battery), where he lays out what might have been the base cause of the blackout; and it does fall back to Enron, taking the long view he suggests.

Sorry Iraq, you have Bush to blame, we have Enron & Friends. Historically though they might turn out to be one and the same.

Dave over at Seeing the Forest has this story today that you need to see if you have not been to his blog already. Apparently Johm Kerry is playing the Clueless Presidential Candidate; not smart.

Dave apparently tried to get some information about Kerry's internet communication strategy from Kerry himself, and his staffers and was met with a big "huh". But the worst is Kerry's Kool Kids slander against Al Gore straight from the republican talking points of the 2000 campaign

DesMoinesRegister.com | News: 'The Dean campaign is saying you're kind of stealing their thunder on this on-line petition,' Dave Price, a reporter for Des Moines-based WHO-TV 13, to which Kerry responded with a smirk: 'Well, the last person I heard who claimed he had invented the Internet didn't do so well.'

The response earned restrained yucks from the gaggle of reporters. But Dean's staff hadn't said they invented on-line petition drives, and Kerry didn't refute that Dean's drive started first."

OK, Kerry is repeating the lie that Gore said he invented the Internet, AND saying that Gore "didn't do so well." How far out of touch with regular Democrats, and everything happening on the Internet, do you have to be to repeat THAT tired old widely-refuted smear, or to talk as if Gore lost? And what the hell is Kerry - a Democrat - doing repeating the "invented the Internet" line at all, even if it were actually true?

I am in total agreement with Dave on this, that kind of comment is inexcusable, especially since it's so, what's the word? Revisionist? John Kerry just proved that he migh have a Silver Star, a Silver Spoon, but his tongue is pure RNC-patented corrosive.

Heebus.

Wow, todays issue of the Volkischer Beobachter, I mean WaPo is just chock full of neat-o stuff. But among the best has to be this little editorial by sometime doctor (ok, maybe never), and full-time recipient of all Team Leader Blast-Faxes, Charles Krauthammer. Today ol' Chucky Love is going on and on and on and on about the appointment of Daniel Pipes to the Institute of Peace by President Lost My Rand McNally. He manages to almost get himself into a one-legged ass-kicking contest, you know the kind where you hop around in circles, trying to kick your own ass...

Who is Daniel Pipes? Pipes is a former professor at the U.S. Naval War College. He has taught history and Islamic studies at Harvard and the University of Chicago. He is a scholar and the author of 12 books, four of which are on Islam. Unlike most of the complacent and clueless Middle East academic establishment, which specializes in the brotherhood of man and the perfidy of the United States, Pipes has for years been warning that the radical element within Islam posed a serious and growing threat to the United States.

During the decades when America slept, Pipes was among the very first to understand the dangers of Islamic radicalism. In his many writings he identified it, explained its roots -- including, most notably, Wahhabism as practiced and promoted by Saudi Arabia -- and warned of its plans to infiltrate and make war on the United States itself.

Sept. 11, 2001, demonstrated his prescience. Like most prophets, he is now being punished for being right. The main charge is that he is anti-Muslim. This is false. Pipes is scrupulous in making the distinction between radical Islam and moderate Islam. Indeed, he says, "Militant Islam is the problem, and moderate Islam is the solution."

The dilemma for a free society is that radical Islam lives within the bosom of moderate Islam. The general Islamic community is the place radicals can best disguise themselves and hide. Mosques are institutions that they can exploit to advance the cause. These are obvious truths.

But when Pipes states them, he is accused of bigotry. For example, critics thunder against Pipes's assertion that "mosques require a scrutiny beyond that applied to churches and temples."

This is bigoted? How is this even controversial? Wahhabists and other radical Islamists have established mosques and other religious institutions in dozens of countries. Some of these -- most notoriously in Pakistan -- had become the locus of not just radical but terrorist activity.

The Mental Defective also points out:

President Bush is considering bypassing the Senate and giving Pipes a recess appointment while Congress is out of town. For Bush, this would be an act of characteristic principle and courage. The problem, however, is that such an act makes the appointment look furtive.
...
Who are you going to believe? Such unimpeachable and independent scholars? Or a quartet of craven senators?

Well, President Energy Not Efficient thinks blackouts are a problem. Gee, an MBA from Harvard and everything. Is there any way to see if he actually went to class and took any exams?

President Bush said he will order a review of why so many states were hit by a massive power blackout Thursday and said he suspects the nation's electrical grid will have to be modernized.

"Millions of people's lives are affected," the president said. "I fully understand that their lives will not be normal for the short run."

The first priority, Bush said, is to deal with the consequences of the blackout and "get electricity up and running as quickly as possible."

This email was received this evening...damn spam!

A ROGERS LIE -Fair and Balanced

Dear Sheeple Viewer,

I was in a fair mood, balanced by lithium in the morning and valium in the afternoon. I was pounding back my coarser urges back to a fairly balanced state by going to that video store in the District and checking out whatever Clarence Thomas had just returned, because he's a fair guy who shows that video viewing can be balanced, I just never knew Heidi could do those things with a fairly balanced jelly dong. I still don't get why she kept asking that cute little lamb for a little piece of ewe....omigod I just got it, eeeeeeew. That's not fair, it's unbalanced.

But I digress here, I was thinking how sad it is that Rush Limbaugh has a more fair and balanced sense of humor than me. but then he's fatter so there's more room for the hurt.

I would like to thank Rupie-baby (can I call you Rupie?) for allowing us to do to the news and political discourse what Ted Budy did for his victims; sex without foreplay followed by a little capital murder. Now that's certainly not too harsh an observation on Fox News, in fact I'd almost call it Fair and Balanced, kinda like getting f***** and murdered while watching TV and surviving to share the moment. We want you to experience the news in that special three-dimensional way!

Then there's the "reporters and pundits", my paid media whores:

Sean Hannity: An OUTRAGE!
Bill O'Reilly: An OUTRAGE!
Brit Hume: An OUTRAGE!
Fox and Friends (each took a letter): A-n O-U-T-R-A-G-E!
Alan Colmes: (written statement: if someone would unsuture my lips, I'd tell you it's AN OUTRAGE!)
As you can see, they are all original thinkers, with meaningful, Fair and Balanced commentary on such a major issue of the day, as they are everyday.

I guess it's a good thing that punk Al Franken did not call his book "The Other Big Fat Idiot", because that would never have made sense on all those nasty lefty blogs.

Now I need to get back to restoring the power, which I took down in a fair and balanced way, to demonstrate the might of Fair and Balanced Fox News to the potential jury pool if this litigation goes any further. I love power. Also, my boy George just made a fucking idiot of himself at a press availability about the power outage, so I better flip the switch quick to "on", before he opens his stupid pie-hole yet again,

Signed,
Oral Sergei
the
SERIAL OGRE

Not.

Those were the words of VP CopperTop during the 2000 Presidential Campaign to the members of the military. Obviously he forgot to mention that any help he and Deserter-boy might provide was going to come at the expense of reversing the cuts he outlined and implemented as SECDEF during #41's administration. How Convenient. Today we find that the 1600 Crew wants to put it to the military again.

The Pentagon wants to cut the pay of its 148,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, who are already contending with guerrilla-style attacks, homesickness and 120- degree-plus heat.

Unless Congress and President Bush take quick action when Congress returns after Labor Day, the uniformed Americans in Iraq and the 9,000 in Afghanistan will lose a pay increase approved last April of $75 a month in "imminent danger pay" and $150 a month in "family separation allowances."

The Defense Department supports the cuts, saying its budget can't sustain the higher payments amid a host of other priorities. But the proposed cuts have stirred anger among military families and veterans' groups and even prompted an editorial attack in the Army Times, a weekly newspaper for military personnel and their families that is seldom so outspoken
...
A White House spokesman referred questions about the administration's view on the pay cut to the Pentagon report.

Military families have started hearing about the looming pay reductions, and many aren't happy.

They say duty in Iraq is dangerous -- 60 Americans have died in combat- related incidents since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq on May 1. Another 69 have been killed by disease, the heat or in accidents.

On the heels of Screwing the Veterans, there's only one phrase truly appropriate to the 1600 Crew. I first saw it as a bumper sticker on the car of a nuke carrier crewman:

BOHICA -- Bend Over Here It Comes Again...in case you were wondering

So the Queen of the Cosmetics Counter, Katherine (TammyFaye) Harris has an explanation for the little bit of Sunshine State Censorship after all. It seems that page 219 of the ethics rule book for Members (they actually have one?) forbids Members of Congress from turning "official events" into political ones, or combining them. So in the tortured logic of the MisElection, her constituents who brought along fliers with "opposing views" were politicizing an "official" event. Ah, now I understand. Not.

Harris spokesman David Host elaborated: "A single event cannot, for the purpose of the House rules, be treated as both political and official," he said, reading from Page 219 of the chamber's ethics manual. "We had to remove all political materials, as this was an official event," he said.

Former Democratic House counsel Stan Brand called that a "tortured" interpretation of a rule that he said was intended to prevent lawmakers from using their official resources on their campaigns. "I have never heard of anybody trying to be that creative with the rules," he said.

Tony Fransetta, president of the Florida Alliance for Retired Americans, said Harris was censoring her opponents, while distributing her literature.

Not so, Host responded. "Those materials were simply materials that explained her position on the issues -- they weren't campaign materials." He said candidates planning to challenge Harris next year were trying to distribute fliers at the event, and he blamed them for the dispute.

If this were anyone else, I would give them the benefit of the doubt. I wonder when she'll call Jebbie crying and asking to have the Florida State Police start investigating those nasty ol' retired folks, they're just so annoying and probably not real Americans anyhow...they want to be heard.

To one of our most favorite Blogs, UggaBugga (younger than me, but sooo much wiser and with better graphics to boot!). If you haven't dropped by lately, make it a point to visit Quiddity and see what a great blog looks like these days.

Keep on trucking Quiddity, here's to your next quarter of a million visitors!

This story has been floating around for a couple of days, how at a "Town Hall" meeting in Bradenton FL, the Queen of the Cosmetics Counter and BallotFucker, Katherine (More makeup than Tammy Faye) Harris, had her little storm troopers confiscating materials attendees brought because it was against a some "ethics" rules. What Ethics Rules? And isn't that an oxymoron in her case specifically?

The pamphlets had been distributed in the parking lot outside by a group of geezers begging Harris to vote for real reform on Medicare drugs, not the mind-boggling bills before the House and Senate. "We are not taking anything away," Connie McKee, a Harris aide, told a questioner, according to the Bradenton Herald. "All of the material is still here, and they can pick it up when they leave. They just can't take it into the hall. The ethics laws do not allow us to let them take it in. We have to be very, very careful that there are no laws broken with our member [of Congress]."
...
Whatever. Ethics laws didn't stop Harris from passing around her own flyers telling how the economy was blossoming under Bush.

This just makes my Migraine worse...when I laugh so much. And me with no pain-killers tonight.

If the word pathetic were to be applied to the 1600 Crew again, would it be overkill? Yes, but they are pathetic. Seems that news-avoiding ABC has even managed to break the code on the "big story" of the hapless "arms dealer" who was trying to sell the government back their own mock-up of a shoulder-fired SAM missile. Yeah the missile was provided to the guy by Federal Agents. Entrapment anyone? But in this day of PATRIOT ACT fervor, if the case gets laughed out of court by some mildly astute federal judge, they've probably already got a cell for this guy in GITMO.

Administration officials are leaving out key facts and exaggerating the significance of the alleged plot to smuggle a shoulder-launched missile into the United States, law enforcement officials told ABCNEWS. They say there's a lot less than meets the eye.
...
Court documents show much of the case is based on the government's key cooperating witness, an informant seeking lenient treatment on federal drug charges, officials told ABCNEWS. He was the first person who led the government to Lakhani.
...
The missile shipped into the New York area last month was not a real missile — just a mockup — also arranged entirely by the government. The government also arranged the meetings at a New Jersey hotel and elsewhere, where Lakhani allegedly told undercover agents posing as al Qaeda terrorists about his support of bin Laden.

"One would have to ask yourself, would this have occurred at all without the government?" said Gerald Lefcourt, a criminal defense attorney.

In London today, Lakhani's neighbors described him as a quiet man who worked in the garment industry and had faced serious financial problems.

"I would have hoped the United States is thwarting real terrorism and not something manufactured because here all they're doing is stopping something they created," said Lefcourt.

Government officials said the case will show that Lakhani went along with the scheme willingly and was not entrapped. But the question remains whether any of this would have happened if the government had not set it up.

No wonder Johnny Asscrack is out in California busting porno distributors, he's got to get at least one case that might not get tossed to much mirth and merriment in less than sixty seconds...oh, sorry, it probably will.

From reader TrophiesOfWar, here's part of letter from a professional soldier to Sentor John Warner, of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Last year my son-in-law turned down promotion to Staff Sergeant (E-6) and got out of the Army after five years. He was a stellar soldier that was selected as Battalion Soldier of the Year and Brigade Soldier of the Year. He was qualified to work on two different types of helicopters and was top-rated on every evaluation report.He returned to Louisiana where he is employed as a helicopter mechanic. He works 7 days on, 12 hour days and gets 7 days off. He makes $16.50 per hour starting and can earn more by working overtime. Just working normal hours he makes considerably more than if he stayed in uniform. His medical and dental benefits are easily equal to what we offer. My daughter was raised as an Army brat and wanted him to stay in. She is now very happy he got out. They own a home, have a stable life and she knows he is home at night and safe.

If you want a committed professional force you have to make commitments, but even more importantly, you have to keep your commitments. Our National leadership has not done that. Freedom isn't free and you must be willing to pay for that security. My son in law told me " I'm not staying in the Army because they make promises they don't keep, they say you will get this, then they take it away". We've cut the Army by more than 40%, stagnated pay, cut funding at every level, increased deployment time and took away promised programs and benefits. Then we wonder why our recruiting and retention is low. You can't expect folks to make the commitment required or the sacrifice needed if you keep reducing all they were promised or expect. The very best, like my son in law will leave for a better life.

As a final thought I want to share with you what bothers me most. You don't fund them, you don't train them, you don't properly equip them or take care of them, they may fail when we need them most. The price we will pay can't be measured in dollars or social program gains. Our sons and daughters will pay the price in blood. We will fill many more bodybags than we should because
of politics. Rhetoric and social programs haven't won a war yet. We are in a dive. It gets worse monthly. If we don't take some steps to remedy the situation I advise our leaders to dust off the draft, and make it fair this time by granting no exemptions except medical. We all live here in the greatest nation on earth because that freedom has been bought with soldiers blood. Everyone bears a responsibility to serve.

I mean, it's not like the Neocon actually go there or anything, rifle in hand and ready to give it all up. Right?

As Viceroy Jerry sits in his air-conditioned palace, sipping his tall, cool evening drink and being waited on by his minions, we find that Generalissimo Sanchez (you know, the actual General allowed to speak, since the 1600 Crew are probably holding his family hostage after Gen Abzaid spoke the truth about Guerilla Warfare)....anyhow, Sanchez has revealed that tours in Iraq are likely to be 12 months...

All troops in Iraq should expect to serve for at least
a year, with brief rest breaks in the region and possibly a few days at
home, the commander of U.S. forces said Tuesday. That came as news to
some soldiers.
"It's a one-year rotation," Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez told The
Associated Press in an interview. "Every soldier has been told that
they'll be deployed for a year, and then at the end of the year we'll
be working to send them home."
But some of the 148,000 soldiers in Iraq said nobody told them how long
they would remain in the country, where guerrillas attack Americans
daily and high temperatures often top 120 degrees.

If you said once a Nazi always a Nazi, you might be talking about Schwarzeneggers daddy. But is that Nazi thing, maybe genetic? Interesting story from (of all places) Der Volkischer Beobachter, I mean Washington Post, about Arnold and his, hmmmmm, interesting affiliations with some pretty right-wing groups.

...Schwarzenegger, like many Americans, is difficult to define politically. He is apparently not strictly beholden to any hardline rightist or leftist ideology.
...
...virtually nothing has been said about the multi-millionaire actor's 15-year association with U.S. English, an organization that seeks to establish English as the official language of the United States and also has ties to right-wing nationalist movements that have stirred controversy for other politicians such as Mississippi Republican Sen. Trent Lott.

Odds are that if this story grows legs, Schwarzenegger's candadicy will go the way of Trent Lotts last Senate job, and rightly so. If he's serious about this whole governor thing, I'm betting he wishes he never heard of Prop 187. Or US English.

Has to go to Quiddity Quack. Real talent.

Our friend and commenter from the Voice Unheard, brings us to a link from CNN which is about a young female Army Sargeant, who was sent home from Iraq, and not expected to recover. But she did. Now she's been discharged, and is in the VA System, you know the one for Veterans, to whom a "Promise Made is a Promise Kept".

After Army Sgt. Vannessa Turner survived a still-unknown illness doctors feared would kill her, she thought her toughest battle was over.

But since a military flight brought Turner home she says she's had to fight to get medical treatment and can't even get personal items returned.
...
"It's easier to stay a soldier and be in harm's way than to come home and get care," said Turner, her quiet voice quaking with emotion.

Arriving at her mother's home in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood last month after hospital stays in Germany and Washington, the six-year Army veteran says she was told that despite severe nerve damage in her right leg she'd have to wait until mid-October to see a doctor at the local Veterans Affairs hospital.

She sought help from Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Massachusetts, and eventually got an appointment scheduled this week, but the experience was frustrating for Turner and her family. They look at the hero's welcome given to former prisoner of war Pfc. Jessica Lynch, who was in one of Turner's rehabilitation sessions, and see a double standard.
...
"Is this what our returning heroes from Afghanistan and Iraq can expect from their elected officials as they seek health care for their painful injuries sustained in the line of duty?" Veterans of Foreign Wars Commander Ray Sisk said.

VA undersecretary for health Robert Roswell said everyone who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom is entitled to two years of VA health care benefits.
...
For Turner, the work to rehabilitate the damaged nerves in her leg is compounded by confusion over her benefits, her quest for a doctor, and the Pentagon's initial assertions that she go back to Germany herself to get her belongings.

Turner is hesitant about the future. A year from now she'll go before a military board to see if she should be retired permanently or if she's well enough to be reinstated.

"Half my brain says yes, half my brain says no," she said. "But, ma'am, I'm a soldier. I love being a soldier. This is what I do."

I also have to wonder if one of the reasons why PVT Lynch has not been more "exposed" is because she knows the stories of women like SGT Turner, and has been able to forgo the hype the 1600 Crew wants/wanted to inflict on her, and just remain what she is, a simple American soldier, in an Army of American Soldiers. Nothing more, nothing less.

Tonight, and for most of the rest of August, the early morning hours will bring one of the coolest of Astronomical phenomena, Meteors. The Perseids will be falling into our atmosphere, best viewing, right before dawn.

Check it out...courtesy of the Hairy Thunderer, or something.

Recommendations are being made to get rid of, or at least overhaul the Department of Homeland Insecuritys color-coded system after extensive research showed that only one American benefitted from it: Short-Bus George. Seems that since he's not a "fact-checker", he never quite knew whether all those words put together in ... sentences and stuff meant anything, and since Boyfriend-killing Barbie could not always be there to help, well colors were just perfect!

• Red - bad, can I give that money back to the Saudis quietly?;
• Orange - make the police work overtime, but don't pay them for it;
• Yellow - Let Johnny Asscrack chase the porno distributors;
• Green - ummm, call Karl or Unka Dick and have something blown up.

Well, it seems that as with all good things....they want to change the system (consultants at work here?) to be more "meaningful".

A new report prepared for Congress says the color-coded national terrorism warning system is too vague, lacks specific protective measures for law enforcement and costs an extraordinary amount to be implemented.
...
Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske said the system was a "good initial step" after the September 11 attacks, but he and other police chiefs want "more specificity" about the nature of the threat.

"It does need to be overhauled," he said. "People want confidence in their public safety professionals to be on top of this issue, and right now this isn't the system getting us there."
...
The report says the federal government should consider offering better guidance to state and local law enforcement about protective measures that should be taken when the warning system is raised.

It also says the DHS should devise a new plan on how to communicate with law enforcement nationwide. For instance, it cites a police chief in Portland, Maine, who once learned from CNN that the threat system was going to be raised.

"He added that he received official notification from state authorities eight hours later," the report says.

I had to wait until my rage subsided enough to blog this. The story is via Thousand Yard Glare, one of my daily reads.

The outrage, well, you read it then tell me The original story is here.

One of the most surprising statements to come from The Power Hour interview conducted on “The Genesis Network” was that while the son, Josh Neusche, was a healthy young soldier on June 26, 2003, when he reported that he was going to serve on the secret hauling mission, by July 1, 2003, he was in a coma, and that day was suddenly classified by the military, as medically retired from the Army without Josh or his family’s consent. Josh did not die until July 12, 2003. Among other problems that this new classification created was that the DOD was no longer obligated to assist the family in getting to Germany to be with their son as he lay in a coma. Because the DOD would not provide even so much as plane or taxi fare for the Neusche family, all 650 members of the 203 Engineer Battalion each contributed $10.00 to make the family’s final visit possible. (some emphasis added)

It makes me proud to see the soldiers in his battalion got his parents over there. It's wrong on so many levels that they even had to consider doing that, much less do it; but that's what soldiers do they take care of their own. Something Chickenhawks will never, ever understand.

I hope all the tax-cutting shithead Chickenhawks and non-Chickenhawks out there are justly proud of this bit o'thrift. And that you choke on your money...all of it.

We have had two residents of the Oval Office in the last 10 years. The wrong one got impeached.

New evidence in the Dr. David Kelly affair over in the UK is proving that the Poodle may have more problems than he bargained for. It seems that David Kelly was not quite the "prevaricator" that the Poodle wanted everyone to belive he was, and his doubts about the Iraqis were taken more seriously than was first known. So, would that mean that the Poodle was responsible for the Lying Chimp lying? Seems highly likely.

The government's attempts to bolster its case for the war against Iraq suffered a heavy blow on the first day of the Hutton inquiry yesterday when it was revealed that unease about the dossier on Saddam Hussein's weapons programme ran much deeper than Downing Street has claimed.
...
Intelligence officials were sufficiently concerned about the wording of the dossier that they expressed worries to their superiors. Some said they were unhappy about the way it was claimed that Iraq could deploy some chemical and biological weapons within 45 minutes of an order to do so - the claim at the heart of the row between No 10 and the BBC.

One unnamed official, now retired, expressed concern to Martin Howard, the deputy chief of defence intelligence, in a letter which was read out. The official wrote: "As probably the most senior and experienced intelligence community official working on 'WMD', I was so concerned about the manner in which intelligence assessments for which I had some responsibility were being presented in the dossier... that I was moved to write... recording and explaining my reservations."

The inquiry heard evidence that one defence intelligence official had discussed a claim in the dossier about growth media for Iraq's biological weapons programme. After speaking to Dr Kelly as the September dossier was being drawn up, the intelligence official wrote: "The existing wording is not wrong - but it has a lot of spin.

If the claim of a 45 minute deployment capability is just plain wrong, and it seems to be, given that the only thing we have found in Iraq deployable in 45 minutes are truckloads of...sand, I'd have to say that shite pretty well fits the bill for what was sold. Poodle Shite, I'd wager.

I wish I could be a republican "pseudo-scientist". I am sure that there are hundreds, if not tens of thousands of scientists, real ones, who are as republican as the day is long, and to them I tip my hat and declare here and now...I'm not worthy. You guys (and gals) are waaay smarter than me. Not aiming this at you. It's the pseudo-scientist frauds who take money from oil companies and the like, and hide behind fancy sounding institute-ish entities, operate out of PO Boxes and influence the policies of our country as proxys for the special interests that are helping to turn this country into a populated cesspool.

Soon’s four co-authors were Sallie Baliunas, also from the Harvard-Smithsonian center; Sherwood Idso and his son, Craig Idso, both of Tempe, Ariz., who are the former president and the current president of an organization called the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change; and David R. Legates, a climate researcher at the University of Delaware.

The Idsos, who have previously been linked to Western coal interests, do not reveal the sources of financial support for their center, which on its Web site presents summaries of scientific studies purporting to raise questions about prevailing climate change theories.

The center had a budget of nearly $400,000 in 2001, the last year for which nonprofit statements to the Internal Revenue Service are available.

It operates from a post office box and offices in the homes of Craig and Sherwood Idso and a second son of Sherwood Idso, Keith Idso.

Identities of the four donors who provided the organization’s $397,000 contributions in 2001 are blanked out of the Internal Revenue Service filing, and Sherwood Idso declined in an interview to name them.

"We generally do not say anything about our funding," he said. "The feeling is that what we produce there should be evaluated on its own merit, not where any funding comes from."

Of course the pseudo-scientists and the 1600 Crew would never try and mislead you, right? Uh-huh.

Given enough time, they'll put out a study that shows the sun revolves around the earth...oh, yeah been done. But thoroughly believed by Fat Tony Scalia...

President Toxic Waste named the successor to Christie (Am not a slut for the republicans) Whitman to the EPA. The governor of the Whitest State in the Union...Utah. Of course he has an Enviromental Record that even has Tricky Dicky spinning in his grave; he caves to any special interest with money and will report for his first cabinet meeting with the obligatory mattress strapped to his back.

Over the objections of environmentalists, he advocated a major highway extension through wetlands and wildlife habitat near the Great Salt Lake. The 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals halted the project, saying the Army Corps of Engineers did not pay enough attention to wildlife or look at alternatives before approving it.

As governor, Leavitt has made several environmental arrangements with the Bush administration, most recently settling a long-standing dispute over ownership of roads across federal land. He has also negotiated several exchanges of state and federal land, some of them questioned by Interior Department auditors.

Bush said Leavitt "understands the importance of clear standards in every environmental policy."

"He respects the ability of state and local government to meet those standards, he rejects the old ways of command and control from above," the president said.

Looks like the Liberians finally get a reprieve from their President. As he headed off to the airport and exile, former President Taylor made a few Smirky-like comments and then booked it hell out of Liberia.

Liberia's newly sworn-in president vowed Monday to do all he could to bring peace to Liberia and invited rebels who waged war on his predecessor, Charles Taylor, to join his government.
...
Blah, who was Taylor's vice president, said he would follow the tradition of Liberians in which they solve their disputes by meeting in a hut in a village.
...
In an address to the nation Sunday, Taylor blamed the United States for the violence, saying Washington was backing the rebels. But on Monday, he praised President Bush.

"I know he has a good heart even though he is misled," he said. "I know God will reveal the truth to him."

As Taylor's motorcade traveled the 60 miles from Monrovia to Roberts International Airport, three U.S. Navy ships appeared on the western horizon -- the first time since their arrival in the region last week that they have been visible from the Liberian coast.

Ships laden with supplies have been unable to unload at the rebel-held port. But the West African states said they expected the rebels to pull away from their positions and allow the port to reopen.

Good thing that Liberians are doing this themselves

As the Killer "D's" keep the redistricting debate alive in Texas, the residents of of that fair state who obviously occupy the shallower end of the Gene Pool (something, by the way many Texans don't believe in), showed up to protest the protesters at a rally in Austin. Here's a sampling of their brilliant repartee:

"Republicans voted for governor, lieutenant governor, Texas Senate, Texas House and Texas resident President Bush (news - web sites) is commander in chief," said Dana Petroni. "Redistricting is a legislative process not a judicial process."

One woman carried a sign that read: "Deserters, Duty Dodgers, Get back to work!!"

This woman went to Iraq as one of the "human shields" before the war. Out of a sense of duty to her conscience, outrage at an essentially unilateral pre-emptive war, I don't really know. But now the 1600 Crew want to prosecute her, starting with fines, and perhaps imprisonment for her actions. There's something so 1600 Crew and so un-american about this. But then the 1600 Crew is sort of un-american by definition anyhow.

A Sarasota woman who served as a "human shield" during the war in Iraq faces thousands of dollars in civil penalties.

According to a letter dated March 20 from the federal Department of the Treasury, Faith Fippinger broke the law by crossing the Iraqi border -- a violation of U.S. sanctions that prohibit American citizens from engaging in "virtually all direct or indirect commercial, financial or trade transactions with Iraq."
...
n a letter Fippinger mailed to the government in May, she said she would not pay a fine.

"If it comes to fines or imprisonment, please be aware that I will not contribute money to the United States government to continue the build-up of its arsenal of weapons," Fippinger wrote in her response to the charges. She said she has no intention of paying. "Therefore, perhaps the alternative should be considered."

The alternative could be as much as 12 years in prison.
...
She was (in Iraq) in violation of U.S. sanctions," said Taylor Griffin, a Treasury Department spokesman. "That's what happens."

The letter, signed by David Harmon, chief of the enforcement division of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, demanded that Fippinger include in her response the purposes and dates of her time in Iraq, along with a description of any financial transactions she made.

The letter also asked for the name of any travel agent who arranged the trip, any U.S. goods she might have donated and any Iraqi goods she might have brought home.

"They're saying that I, as a human shield, exported services to Iraq by going over there," Fippinger said Friday.
...
"When you break the law, you can expect to get a fine," Griffin said. "The Bush administration is committed to the full and fair enforcement of the law."

And maybe Mr. Griffin or someone else at Treasury or Justice might want to tell me when they are going to get around to "Kenny-Boy", because he sure seems like a more worthwhile target than a 62 year-old woman with no money, just a conscience.

If the words "self-fulfilling prophecy" were less ironic, it might almost be amusing to see the 1600 Crew flailing around with a big "Mission Accomplished" banner flapping in the breeze from the Washington Monument. I seem to recall that one of the arguments for avoiding a war in Iraq was the possibility of it becoming a rallying point for terrorists and terrorist organizations that weren't Al-Qaida, but might be susceptible to ObL and his minions. Gee, guess what?

The U.S.-led administration in Iraq has received intelligence reports that hundreds of Islamic militants who fled Iraq during the war have returned and are planning to conduct major terrorist attacks.
...
The Bush administration has asserted that Ansar has ties to al Qaeda. Officials of the occupying authority, including Bremer, said it was possible that al Qaeda was in Iraq, but they said there was no conclusive proof of that.

Bremer spoke a day after a car bomb attack ripped through the Jordanian Embassy in central Baghdad, killing 17 people and wounding scores more. It was the deadliest attack against civilians since the U.S. military took control of Baghdad, and it represents a new type of security problem for the U.S.-led occupation.
...
"We have seen here a new technique for Iraq that we have never seen before, " Bremer said, referring to the car bomb used in the attack.

I guess "Bring 'em on" or whatever sounds pretty good when you are the rich-kid-deserting-son of a bitch, who now has a phalanx of highly-trained Secret Service men and women protecting you. Yeah, there's some courage...

I'm guessing it sounds a little different on the Tip of the Spear, on a hot summer night, when the latest intel says: keep your head on a swivel, they are out to get you, and your buddies and anything or anyone who is part of the occupation.

Thanks again for taking such good care of the troops Deserter-boy.

Seems inveterate diarist (and why is that a bad thing?) Sen Bob Graham has his own brand-spankin'-new blog. It even has comments. Your's truly has always wanted to see Sen Graham read the 9-11 report, unredacted into the record from the well of the senate. Now I'll just settle for the 28 Pages and see how much more starts to show up.

So I left a commnent in a blog entry called "truth". Go join the fun. It's an interesting blog and I think that having comments will make it a valuable resource, unless staffer-hacks take over 110% control of everything, then it'll just be (yawn) an alternative to Ambien.

Addendum: If Graham were to read those 28 pages in the Senate, while he had the floor, it would certainly amount to unilateral declassification, but would he be criminally liable for doing it in that venue? Inquiring minds are just ever so curious. The only people who seem to want them not revealed are the 1600 Crew, and I'm not sure embarrassment = National Security in anyones mind but Smirkys.

Head on down to the Quicki-Mart and get a bottle of ice-cold water. If you're an American Soldier serving in Iraq, it's not so easy. Apparently we are spending like a billion dollars a month to be there, but we can only get our soldiers THREE liters of water per day each.

Think about that. Three Liters of water. The temps are getting to be in excess of 120° and our soldiers don't have adequate water supplies. How many words mean disgraceful? If nothing ever pointed out the cavalier treatment of our soldiers by ol' Bring-em-on, this does it.

I wonder how much bottled water The Deserter-in-Chief has at his beck and call from the ass-sucking sycophants at the make-pretend ranch in Crawford? No droughts there, I'll bet. Not a one.

I'll even bet that Viceroy Bremer doesn't have to look real hard to find a cold drink in his air-conditioned Baghdad palace.

Nasty rotten stuff. If you didn't know that the Chimp was in Crawford screwing the country up by remote control, you might think this was actually what little grey matter he once had, sitting in a creek in New Jersey.

It smells like rotten eggs at best, decomposing flesh at worst. It looks like the pods from "Invasion of the Body Snatchers."

To the people whose homes back up onto a Tuckerton Creek tributary where the gelatinous substance recently appeared, it's just "The Blob."
...
"We've determined that it's not toxic. It's mostly like some algae or fungus,"

Now if medical science can just figure out how to reanimate that tissue...well, the 1600 Crew now has an excuse to watch "Young Frankenstein", but I doubt they'll get the jokes...Frau Blucher.....Abby-normal indeed

From the on-line Stars and Stripes Letters, this (I'm assuming Army) Staff Sargeant writes the following:

Not speaking same language

It’s no wonder why there’s been an increase of attacks on coalition personnel in Iraq. We’re here to help Iraqis gain their freedom from Saddam Hussein. In that effort, coalition forces set up checkpoints in random places throughout Iraq to stop and deter the sale or transportation of weapons. Enforcement of an 11 p.m. curfew is for Iraqis’ protection. Soldiers are trained to respect citizens and not treat them all as criminals.

But as we pass by some unit checkpoints, we see that civilians are being screamed at to get out of their vehicles. Some soldiers forget that when they don’t use interpreters, the civilians just sit there with no clue of what they’re being told. Plus there are weapons in the citizens’ faces. So now not only do the citizens not understand what to do, they’re also scared to death. Why do they feel this way? Because when military forces came around under Saddam they were treated the same way, just in a more violent manner.

We soldiers have been trained how to have our weapons at the ready — ready to engage hostile targets as they appear. We shouldn’t place our safety second. But it isn’t necessary to demoralize and threaten every citizen who’s stopped. The people who we’re stopping and scaring to death might have agreed with the coalition at one point. But after their families have been threatened and scared to death, these individuals have now more than likely changed their minds about us. Hence the increased number of attacks on coalition personnel.

What it boils down to is that Iraqis are starting to get fed up with the coalition. They’re sick of being mistreated and are starting to take matters into their own hands. We can still maintain a secure posture while treating Iraqis with the same respect that we expect for ourselves. Then maybe we can all go home peacefully and alive.

Staff Sgt. William E. Adkins
Baghdad, Iraq

But, Staff SGT Adkins, you have my vote for 0-6...direct promotion if possible. You've already shown you're smart enough...but can you stand working with the incompetants as well as the 'good guys'?

Der Volkischer Beobachter

In an editorial today, they go after Al Gore and everyone else who seems to think that somehow we might have been misled into all manner of things by the virginal little innocents of the 1600 Crew.

This notion -- that we were all somehow bamboozled into war -- is part of Mr. Gore's larger conviction that Mr. Bush has put one over on the nation, and not just with regard to Iraq.

You can see why he might want to think so. Mr. Gore believes, for example, that the Patriot Act represents "a broad and extreme invasion of our privacy rights in the name of terrorism." But then how to explain that 98 senators -- including all four Democratic senators now running for president -- voted for it? The president's economic and environmental policies represent an "ideologically narrow agenda" serving only "powerful and wealthy groups and individuals who manage to work their way into the inner circle."

But then why do so many other people support those policies? Mr. Gore has an umbrella explanation, albeit one that many Americans might find a tad insulting: "The administration has developed a highly effective propaganda machine to embed in the public mind mythologies. . . . "

Little Joeseph Goebbels would be sooo proud of his new paper.

Wesley Clark start talking.

"I never cared about the 'imminent threat,' " said one of the policymakers, with directly relevant responsibilities. "The threat was there in [Hussein's] presence in office. To me, just knowing what it takes to have a nuclear weapons program, he needed a lot of equipment. You can stare at the yellowcake [uranium ore] all you want. You need to convert it to gas and enrich it. That does not constitute an imminent threat, and the people who were saying that, I think, did not fully appreciate the difficulties and effort involved in producing the nuclear material and the physics package."

Impeachment Anyone? Sure, I'll have one order to go, hold the civility.

Isn't this the war on Terra™? Aren't we after the Evildoers of President Black-and-White? Thought so, after all how could Snake-Handler Johnny be planning the Second Annual Onanism Festival and Bong Bust without the Victory Act in place to help the war on Terra™.

Well, it seems that you know, the PNAC-ians, really really really want to spend more everymothersons blood and go to Iran, to prove they're the baddest Chickenhawk Mothers on the block. That's right folks, as impossible as it seems, the PNAC-sters found themselves an even more violent, terroristic and just rattlesnake-mean group than Ahmed Chalabi's Traveling Circus and Embezzlement show. They're called Mujahideen-e-Khalq or the "People's Mujahideen", and they are not very well-liked...anywhere. In fact, until they got the PNAC-sters attention, they were pretty high on the Terrorism Bad-Boy lists. So what's all the fuss? Glad you asked....

Does the administration of US President George W Bush still consider al-Qaeda and its associates the main target in its almost three-year-old "war on terrorism", or has its military victory in Iraq whetted its appetite for bigger game?
...
But its price - for the US military to shut down permanently the operations of an Iraq-based Iranian rebel group that is on the State Department's official terrorism list - might be too high for some hardliners, centered in the Pentagon and Vice President Dick Cheney's office, who led the charge for war in Iraq.

Members of this group see the rebels, the Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK), or People's Mujahedin, as potentially helpful to their ambitions to achieve "regime change" in Iran, charter member of Bush's "axis of evil" and a nation that is believed to have accelerated its nuclear-weapons program in recent months.

Tehran has confirmed that it is holding three al-Qaeda leaders, including Seif al-Adel, considered the network's No 3 and chief of military operations who already has a US$25 million bounty on his head; its spokesman, Suleiman Abu Gheith; and Saad bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's third-oldest son.

In addition, Washington believes Tehran also has custody of three other much-sought-after targets: Abu Hafs, a senior al-Qaeda operative known as "the Mauritanian"; Abu Musab Zarqawi, who has been depicted by the administration as a key link between al-Qaeda and former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein; and possibly Mohammed al Masri, an al-Qaeda associate active in East Africa...

All of them should be dragged into court if this opportunity passes. Missing a chance like this puts the lie to the 1600 Crew's claims of the prosecution of the war on Terra™ as any kind of a policy and makes it look more and more like a bid to build a Fascist State, with Chimpy as Hitler and VP Duracell as Goering with Asscrack playing the role of Heini Himmler.

Not getting these guys from Iran ought to be grounds for impeachment. After all, it's a National Security Matter now...not politics, right Dim-Bulb? Run along now, the Short-Bus is coming to get you.

It's not enough to lie to our faces about not knowing about the 9-11 attacks. I am beginning to believe that there was way more advance warning of the attacks than has been released. The persistent classification-itis of the 1600 Crew is enough to make event the most reluctant tin-foil hat kinda guy (me, for instance) begin to wonder...

But this piece is Newsday really has to perk your ears up:

It's not just the Saudi secret that's being kept.

The recent report of the joint congressional committee that probed intelligence failures before the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon reveals what the Bush administration doesn't want Americans to know about the American government.
...
The White House refused to provide contents of the president's daily brief. This would clear up questions about how much specific information President Bush received about an impending attack during the spring and summer of 2001...
...
The committee managed, "inadvertently," it says, to get some contents of a key briefing Bush received in August 2001. It included "FBI judgments about patterns of activity consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks...
...
The administration blocked the congressional investigators from obtaining information showing how intelligence agency funding requests were handled by the White House budget office, dating back to the Reagan administration. The lawmakers were kept from interviewing an FBI informant who had contact with two of the Sept. 11 hijackers while they were living in San Diego.

On Jan 21st, 2005, let the investigations and indictments begin. When President Stoopid loses, it'll be interesting to see how many pardons he issues...after all, look what his daddy did when he left. Pardoned the whole Iran-Contra gang and now most of them are back in the 1600 Crew. How good for America.

What dimension is this guy from again?

President Bush claimed major progress in Iraq on Friday but mourned the growing loss of American lives, 100 days after he declared an end to major combat.

"We suffer when we lose life," the president said. "Our country is a country that grieves at those who sacrifice." The tally of soldiers who have died in action there over the last 100 days reached 56 Thursday night. Mr. Bush said the soldiers had been participating in a vital "part of the war on terror."
...
Mr. Bush would not say whether he shared the assessment of the commander of coalition forces in Iraq, Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who said Thursday that U.S. forces will remain in Iraq at least two years.

Mr. Bush would only say "I will do what's necessary to win the war on terror." Mr. Bush said Americans have "got to understand I will not forget the lessons of Sept. 11," when America was hit with its worst ever terrorist attack.

As it should be.

Seems my webhost is having Apache issues, it took forever to get into the front end of MT - so if my blogging is lighter than normal tonight, it's only because I gave up and went to get some sleep.

Forgive my ISP, they don't realize they are depriving me of a good night of isomnia. ZZzzzzzzzzz

MattS over at "To the Point" has a link to an "early" release of a RoTK trailer. You need QuickTime to view it...looks pretty good. Many battle scenes, but then there were lots in the book, beginning to end.

On the iTunes...Steely Dan, "Hey Nineteen" just finished, Call and Response "Blowing Bubbles"...Missing Persons "Words"....Goo Goo Dolls "It's Over"...man this really puts you in the mood to write, NOT. Sleep maybe...going to emergency Zappa Mode.

In Montana now, just me and the Pygmy Pony...

While you read this story, you'll have to wonder if you are reading it while falling down Lewis Carroll's famous rabbit hole.

It seems a class-action lawsuit against Halliburton, for some "weird" accounting practices (imagine that), has been sort of, manipulated by the lead counsel for the plaintiffs. Yup, you read that right. The plaintiffs. And it gets better, those same lawyers are being all deferential to VP Duracell, because it's a "time of war".

Dick Cheney, US vice- president, faces being cited as a defendant in an accounting fraud lawsuit against Halliburton, where he was formerly chief executive, after escaping inclusion in earlier lawsuits allegedly because of political considerations.
...
Scott + Scott, which represents one of four lead plaintiffs, has not signed the settlement and, if the law firm gets its way, the case against the Houston-based company will face trial. This time, Mr Cheney is likely to be named as a defendant.

It is attempting to have Schiffrin & Barroway removed as lead counsel in the case and Judge David Godbey, US district judge in Dallas, has agreed to permit Scott + Scott to show at a hearing on August 25 why it wants the removal and the class freed from its proposed settlement.

Connecticut-based Scott + Scott is accusing Schiffrin & Barroway of violating court orders by agreeing to a settlement without the participation or consent of its lead partners.
...
The firm says Pennsylvania-based Schiffrin & Barroway did not convene a single meeting of the lead plaintiffs, refused to give the other firms evidence it had investigated the charges and then settled the case for $6m, even though some have estimated damages as high as $6.8bn, according to Scott + Scott documents. (emphasis added)

Neil Rothstein, counsel for Scott + Scott, said in documents obtained by the Financial Times that Richard Schiffrin of Schiffrin & Barroway "admitted that Cheney may have risk involved in this lawsuit but he was not named as a defendant because it would be inappropriate to do so in a 'time of war'."
...
Because the case centres on an accounting issue, and Mr Cheney was chief executive, there was nothing that tied him into the decision-making process on the alleged fraud, Mr Schiffrin said. Nonetheless, his firm named David Lesar, who replaced Mr Cheney as CEO, in the lawsuit. Mr Schiffrin told the Financial Times yesterday that he "honestly can't remember" why Mr Lesar was named.

The class action covers May 1998 to May 2002, a period in which both men led the company.

Mr Rothstein alleges that Schiffrin & Barroway admitted it had reached a verbal agreement with Halliburton lawyers to stall the case until it could be settled. "Lead counsel's conduct has brought a cloud over this matter," Mr Rothstein says.

It's even more amazing that the lead plaintiff's counsel would ever put themselves in this position, for any money. I always thought that lawyers were smarter than that and if they weren't they just moved to Texas and took court appointments that let them sleep in court for minimum wage. If the judge rules for Scott + Scott here, what's Schiffrin and Barroways liability if this goes to trial and the award is greater than six million, will VP V-tach be included in the festivities?

And what's up with that "time of war" crap? Since when does that make it OK to have been involved on bad deeds previously? If VP Duracell has culpability for this, then let him step up...after all wasn't he one-half of the 'personl responsibilty" duo?

After waking up and finding a big new box next to his breakfast cereal, little Bobby Magruster tore off the wrapping paper to find an empty, but still sealed box labled "Elite Force Aviator: George W. Bush - U.S. President and Naval Aviator - 12" Action Figure". As Bobby burst into tears, his mother comforted him saying, "No Bobby, that's the realistic part of the Action Figure, it went AWOL too, just like the president."

Replace 380.000 soldiers with civilians? I never realized that the corporate cash he handles on a daily basis is eating away at what little shriveled up brain he has left...we have seen that civilians are not showing up for duty in Iraq (well, duh), getting killed when they go (I'm sure their insurance is like 82 bazillion dollars a day now), and will not really want to work the kinds of hours that professional soldiers are expected to put in to keep the units "combat ready". Rumsfeld seems to think it's all some big joke, and the puchline is passing out more contracts to keep the campaign dollars and nest-feathering bucks headed his way.

Let's listen to quotes from the E-ring (is that the Ecstasy-Ring perhaps?) denizens:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday there is no need to increase U.S. armed forces for now even though the military is being stretched by commitments in Iraq and elsewhere.

“We’re absolutely open-minded about how many people we have in the armed services,” Rumsfeld said.
...
Last week the nominee to be Army chief of staff, Gen. Peter Schoomaker, told a Senate committee the Army is likely to need more troops to meet its worldwide commitments.

“Intuitively I think we need more people,” Schoomaker had said. “I mean it’s that simple.”
...
Rumsfeld was replying to a question about that testimony.

He said there were steps that could be taken to improve the efficiency of current troop levels, including putting civilians in jobs now being done by as many as 380,000 people in uniform.

“That’s a pile of people,” he said. “They need to be doing military functions.”

He'll have more fun, and he'll never hear "General, Secretary Rumsfeld is on his way over and he sounded pissed!"

Schoomaker could always offer him a bomber as he heads for the door, I guess.

One member of Congress, Senator Tim Johnson has a son in the military, VA Secretary Anthony Principi does too. I can't think of any other "high-viz" public officials whose sons or daughters are in the service right now, but there are probably a few. That's what makes this article from the Philadelphia Inquirer so...interesting.

Seems that the military is launching a new ad campaign to try and bring in new recruits, and they are not aiming it at the kids, but at their parents.

Ask Mark Jones how he's doing and he says, "I'm living a dream."

Jones, 35, is the founder and CEO of his own VIP protection service. He's an avid skydiver, a competitive ice-sculptor, and a professional cook. And he says he picked up all these skills in one place - the U.S. Army.

...Both his parents were drill sergeants.

... according to a 2002 Pentagon survey, most parents today view military service as a last resort, far behind continuing school and finding a job. The exceptions tend to be parents like Jones' who have served in uniform themselves, and their numbers are shrinking in these days of a downsized, all-volunteer military.
...
Growing parental bias, or even just ignorance of the military, threatens to compound the military's, and especially the Army's, difficulties attracting all the high-quality recruits...
...
And that was before the Iraq war. Combat there may be impressing young adults, but it's probably frightening many parents and that will hurt recruiting, said Charles Moskos, a sociologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., who specializes in the military.

"The ongoing casualties we are suffering in Iraq will definitely have a negative effect on recruitment," Moskos said.
...
It will take a lot to convince parents such as Daisy Saunders, a Washington suburbanite with two adult daughters. She might have proposed the military to them "if that was the last thing they could consider," she said recently, "but there were so many other things they could do."
...
"Parents aspire to middle-class occupations for their kids," he (George Rogers, executive vice president of Mullen Advertising) said. "And the military is not perceived as a middle-class occupation."

Between sea tours, I had the distinct pleasure of doing some recruiting until my billet disappeared, and I got sent back to sea to help man the 600-ship crack-induced pipe-dream of Prez Alzheimer and John "Not really a pilot, but I play one since I'm SECNAV" Lehman. I remember going to meetings where the CO of the Navy Recruiting District would tell us about going to DC and telling the Recruiting Command biggies how hard recruiting was going to be 15 to 20 tears out, exactly for these reasons cited in the Inquirer. Did he have a crystal ball? No, he just spent lots of time talking and listening to teachers, guidance counselors, and civic leaders who understood their communities.

He was passed over for Captain twice, retired as a Commander with over 100 missions into North Vietnam as an attack pilot and more than 900 carrier landings (just missing the magic 1000 mark, of which there are but a handful of people). He was a good guy, who was a lot smarter than his bosses, obviously, but they knew better...

Oh, and wouldn't leading by example be Jenna and or Barb joining ROTC or the Guard or something? (Karl Rove would be going yessss), but their arrest records might make them get waivers...oh. there's a 'fixer' in the family, never mind.

But: it's "not perceived as a middle-class occupation", and certainly not one for the ruliing or "rich" class. So much for examples...

As Nitpicker points out, today is the last day of the Pat the Scat's Prayer Offensive (is there just something so wrong with that concept?) against the Supreme Court. I hope that Pat is appropriately horrified that the Hairy Thunderer ignored his pleas (please?) to strike down the three justices, but word on the street is that HT is busy creating new protein complexs to allow life to begin on the planet beta-Hydroxy II, in the Oreo Galaxy.

Robertson, who is now planning a prayer offensive against the Hairy Thunderer has something else to be annoyed about:

Liberia is in chaos, and that's bad news for televangelist Pat Robertson. Liberian President Charles Taylor has been indicted for war crimes by a UN-backed court in Sierra Leone, rebels control large chunks of the country...
...
That's not the business climate Robertson was praying for in 1998, when he invested in Liberian land containing gold that some speculate could be worth $1.7 billion. Robertson's goal: to find a way to forever fund his evangelical empire...
...
Now that Taylor's days appear numbered, it's not clear what will happen to Robertson's venture. He has spent $8.4 million with little return...

How dare the [U.S.] President say to the duly elected President of another country, 'You've got to step down.' ... I'm appalled."

St. Andrew takes a hiatus from his hiatus to sing the praises of the Terminator today; since Arnold S. is pro-choice, pro-gay, and a hard-ass republican HRH is for him! Color me shocked in lavender.

I'm sure that he'll have fun with Arnold; in fact I am sure that he'll be flogging Arnolds candidacy so hard, soon he'll be behaving like Hedly Lamarr from Blazing Saddles..."you there, give the Governor a harrumph".

As a bonus, if Sully travels to California to help the Terminator out, Bear Season in California is open from now until the end of the year, depending on where you live. Of course mounting and stuffing your conquests is considered "bad form" in some circles, but bad taste never stopped HRH from other activities in the past, so why worry now?

Imagine, Sully as the Royal Keeper of the Harrumph and the Huge White Hunter. What a country.

So they took all the special ops guys hunting down Osama bin Forgotten and tossed them into Iraq, to look for well, WMD and Saddam. Riiight. If this were happening in a novel, I'd never buy it (the book or the plot), it's too stupid...in fact, it defines the word: in-credible.

As the hunt for Saddam Hussein intensifies, some U.S. officials are suggesting that the focus on the former leader of Iraq has come at the cost of eliminating the eccentric Saudi millionaire behind the 9/11 attacks.
...
Washington shifted many of its highly classified special-forces units and officers who had been hunting bin Laden in Afghanistan, moving them to Iraq, where they performed covert operations before the war began. By December many of the 800 special-forces personnel who had been chasing al-Qaeda for a year were quietly brought back home, given a few weeks' rest and then shipped out to Iraq.
...
Now some have come to believe that the change in emphasis allowed bin Laden to disperse to other parts of the world operatives who survived the initial months on the run. "The reason these guys were able to get away," says a former Bush official, "was because we let up."

So, where is Osama, promise-boy?

Once again, and as with all things difficult, when the going gets tough, Commander Codpiece beats feet. A track record to run from, literally.

Wanna be poor in America? Think you are? Prove it. That's right. Prove it. Families who need to take advantage of the Earned Income Tax Credit, will soon have to prove their status as being members of the 'working poor'.

Some critics said the program singled out low-income taxpayers for a higher standard of proof than high-income taxpayers, with no evidence that poor families cheat on their taxes more often.

Remember, if you hate America, Vote republican. The rich guys may not like you, ever have a beer with you, but they do appreciate your support of their bought-and-paid for whores in public office.

Seems as the days go forward, there are more and more little drip-drip-drips coming from that swamp inside the Beltway. As folks begin to piece together what they know a picture is beginning to emerge of how the "imminent" threat scenario was being built, and lots of it goes back to the desk of VP Duracell. Seems he really wanted the intel to match the expectations, so he began spending lots and lots of time with the CIA boys at Langley.

Officials at the CIA and the vice president's office have explained Cheney's personal visits to CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., as a healthy indication of his attention to their work, and not an attempt to skew conclusions to fit a policy goal of toppling Saddam Hussein.

The vice president was accompanied by his chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, on the visits, which supplemented the daily intelligence briefings for Cheney and those he attends with Bush.

"He's got a deep interest in intelligence and engages actively with our folks on it," one CIA official said. "That is something which we welcome."
...
"These visits were unprecedented," wrote three Democratic members of Congress in a July 21 letter to Cheney. "Normally, vice presidents, yourself included, receive regular briefing from (the) CIA in your office and have a CIA officer on permanent detail. There is no reason for the vice president to make personal visits to CIA analysts."

Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, said two weeks ago at a hearing of the House Intelligence Committee that he knew of "at least three" intelligence analysts who said they felt pressured to draw dramatic conclusions about Iraq.

A senior intelligence official said Cheney may have not intended to apply pressure. "But whatever (Cheney) was saying, analysts certainly felt there was pressure," the official said. "There was an outcome, and they were being driven to get stuff to support that outcome."

So now it's starting to look like a wee bit of that intel community payback is coming down. Remember, these are not just intelligence professionals, they are they folks who invented the concept and practical application of the Original Mighty Wurlitzer. I think they're just tuning it up, the main performance is yet to be played.

In Columbus, Ohio today Jerry Springer announced that he will not be seeking the seat of incumbent republican Senator George Voinovich next year.

Jerry Springer, whose talk show brings foul-mouthed prostitutes, homewreckers and skinheads into living rooms every day, said Wednesday he will not run for the U.S. Senate next year.

"As long as I'm doing that show, my message, no matter how sincere and no matter how heartfelt, does not get through to the people I need to reach," he said at a news conference.
...
An Ohio Poll conducted by the University of Cincinnati in February found 71 percent of those surveyed had an unfavorable opinion of Springer, the highest such number since the poll began tracking that information in 1989.

Next time, Jerry...it's only a couple of years until DeWine is up for re-election, and by then the republicans will have so ruined the economy that the hookers on your show will look like saints compared to the Senate.

Just a little reminder to get you over hump day:

The Bakhsh booty continued a pattern of the young Bush being saved from his dire business decisions by a line of Sheik angels. His first oil company, Arbusto, going bust-o, was aided by the American financial representative of the bin Ladin family.

It's interesting that the cause of the Detainees or whatever they are should be so passionately taken up by the leadership of Al-Qaida. But then maybe not. After all, as this piece from MSGOP points out, Gitmo is not exactly a shining beacon of truth, justice and the American way. No one wants a real, live terrorist going free, but then do we want legal missteps creating more terrorists? That sure seems to be the case with the 1600 Crew and their heavy-handed approach to dealing with terrorism suspects.

Let's face it, in the case of the "20th highjacker", Zacarias Moussaoui is either a legal Einstein for managing to twist up an entire table full of DoJ lawyers, with little to no help, or the case against him just plain sucked and no amount of polish would make that turd shine. I vote for the latter. If the standard of justice is that low, then it's gonna get worse before it gets better.

...I found in Britain recently, in some ways the damage has already been done. The sense of mistrust runs so deep that the Bush administration needs to strain every sinew to prove its good faith in executing justice in Guantanamo Bay.
...
In case there was any doubt who benefits from this propaganda, the Al Qaeda leadership claimed the detainees as their own at the weekend. A tape purporting to be from Ayman al-Zawahiri, the deputy to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda’s operational mastermind, threatened unspecified revenge if the Guantanamo Bay detainees were harmed or killed.
...
...if it wants to win the war on terror, the U.S. needs to be far more open about its reasons for detaining more than 600 people. There need to be charges, evidence presented, access for defense lawyers and a fair right to appeal. It’s not enough just to pursue bad people and hunt down the evildoers. Washington needs to deliver justice in a way the rest of the world can respect and emulate.

Looks likes a small contingent of Marines will be going ashore in Liberia to assist the West African forces already on the ground there.

BUSH ORDERED that a small liaison team of U.S. troops be sent into Liberia during a conference call Tuesday with the Pentagon from his ranch in Crawford, Texas...
...
The total U.S. presence if Bush decided to go ahead with the full deployment would remain small, at only about 300 Marines, who would assist the West African troops for 60 to 90 days, the officials said.
...
The West African peacekeepers’ arrival this week began bringing a measure of calm to Monrovia, although sporadic attacks continued. A mortar wounded four people Tuesday morning, and fighting still raged elsewhere in the country.

Still, their arrival triggered celebrations on both sides of the front line in Monrovia, where 2,000 people have died in three rebel attacks since June.

Just when you thought that Mark Kleiman could not get better than busting on the 1600 Crew for the Joseph Wilson/Valerie Plame affair, he goes and writes an outstanding piece in Slate about Convicted Watergate Career Criminal Chuck Colson. Seems that Colson, no stranger to telling fibs and other Nefarious Activities, and his Faith-Based Prison Fellowship have been fêted at Fortress 1600; had singing letters of praise from Tom "End of Times" Delay; and has been the toast of the town...until a University of Pennsylvania study came out purporting to show the Benefits O'Prayer. On closer examination of the UPenn report, ummm, it showed that the results of inmate praying and stuff, ummm, made no difference in recidivism. Ooops.

The White House, the Wall Street Journal, and Christian conservatives have been crowing since June over news that President George W. Bush's favorite faith-based initiative is a smashing success.

When he was governor of Texas, Bush invited Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship to start InnerChange Freedom Initiative, a fundamentalist prison-within-a-prison where inmates undergo vigorous evangelizing, prayer sessions, and intensive counseling.
...
But when you look carefully at the Penn study, it's clear that the program didn't work. The InnerChange participants did somewhat worse than the controls: They were slightly more likely to be rearrested and noticeably more likely (24 percent versus 20 percent) to be reimprisoned.
...
Here's how the study got adulterated.

InnerChange started with 177 volunteer prisoners but only 75 of them "graduated." Graduation involved sticking with the program, not only in prison but after release. No one counted as a graduate, for example, unless he got a job. Naturally, the graduates did better than the control group. Anything that selects out from a group of ex-inmates those who hold jobs is going to look like a miracle cure, because getting a job is among the very best predictors of staying out of trouble.

It's interesting how much "faith" there is in "faith based" programs. If Colson were not a former Nixon Kool Kid would this even be of interest? Probably not, but his status in the Nixon Crew, and subsequent jail time for Watergate sure put him in the catbird-seat for lots of stuff. Someone be sure and count the register out every night, and keep Chucky away from tape recorders...no on second thought, make sure he's got one for his next trip to Fortress 1600, history might repeat itself...

And Chucky, he knows data-cooking, learned it at the feet of the past masters, the Nixon Crew, mentors of todays 1600 Crew Criminals.

Huh? Please repeat that...

• How come all the war battles were fought in National Parks?
  
• Is that the same moon we see in Vermont?
  
• Are the Amish in season?
  
• If it rains, will the fireworks be held inside?
  
• When do Caribou turn into Moose?
  

I never thought I would say this...but GWBush04. No really, it's a website that comes to us via skippy, and it's pretty funny. I'm sure that it makes the 1600 Crew nuts if they've seen it, and will if they haven't. Check it out, it's going into the Fish Pond ASAP.

Need something to laugh at these days, right? I mean TBOGG and Neal Pollack may be the hardest working funnymen in blogtopia, but they have a lives too...

Go. Read. Enjoy.

Heads up to all my still-in-the-IRR readers out there...(I think that might include me too), there's a "draft" of an interesting kind happening. Check it out:

Army Capt. Richard Hinman says he's a "draftee" serving in a volunteer army.

Think about it, says Hinman. The West Point graduate, who left the military in 1999, didn't want to go to Iraq and Kuwait. But he got his orders on Feb. 8 and was sent overseas in May.

"I wanted to get out of this kicking-in-doors-with-guns kind of thing," said Hinman, who was looking forward to more time with his two children but is now serving at Camp Doha, Kuwait. "It was a real surprise."

And a shock, Hinman said in a telephone interview from Kuwait, because he was so unprepared. Even his old uniforms had been thrown away.

Hinman is an Individual Ready Reservist, one of about 300,000 former service members available for active duty in a time of crisis, according to the Pentagon.

In Iraq, (Army Reserve Spokesman LCOL Robert ) Stone said, the Marines even deployed some IRRs to serve in infantry units.

It is difficult to measure the enthusiasm or frustration level of the average IRR overseas.

Surely there are members of the IRR who welcome the opportunity to serve again. Grateful for years of military pay and benefits and training, they are motivated by a loyalty to their former comrades and a sense of duty.

The Pentagon could not provide a list of those who have been called up.

But if there's any action over in Iran or Korea, there might be a pretty good percentage of the 300,000 IRR folks who get a letter. Very Interesting.

Where did that tape come from? You know the tape that said this:

"I swear by the almighty God ... that Crusader America will pay dearly for any harm done to any of the Muslim prisoners it is holding," the recording said.
...
The tape said all those who handed the prisoners to America or to any of its agents also will pay: "Let it be clear to those who conspire with America that America cannot defend itself, let alone defend others."

The Arabic recording said every prisoner held by the infidels should know that his release is a "debt hanging from the neck" of every Muslim fighter, and "his brothers have not forgotten that they will avenge him from the new Crusaders.
...
Al-Zawahiri's whereabouts are not known. U.S. officials believe bin Laden, who was not mentioned in the audio tape, and al-Zawahiri are hiding in the wilderness near the Afghanistan-Pakistan frontier.

Who has responsibilty for that? All the Patriot Acts, and all the press conferences in the world can't make up for the fact, that we are in the wrong country for every reason except Oil and special interests like CheneyBurton. Now that's what I call an impeachable offense.

Guess the focus group and polling data are still not in. West African Peacekeepers have started showing up in Liberia, but President Been-to-War-and-Raised-Twins has not decided whether to contribute any forces from the ships still boring holes in the ocean off Liberia.

The first contingents of West African peacekeeping troops arrived here early today, stirring hopes that months of fighting might soon end.

With American forces offshore in three warships, and President Bush still undecided about sending them in, about 200 Nigerian troops landed in helicopters at the airport but did not venture beyond it. They are the first of an expected force of 3,250 West African soldiers.

In Washington, Bush administration officials welcomed the deployment of the peacekeepers. "These developments are a clear sign that the international community is committed to bringing relief to the people of Liberia and to helping them resolve the many problems they face," said Philip Reeker, the State Department spokesman.

The United States has promised to provide logistical and financial assistance to the peacekeepers, but that aid is not scheduled to arrive for two weeks. It remained unclear whether the American troops on the warships would come ashore.

If you did Shorter Nick Kristof for today, it might look like this:

Kristof is of course talking about the anniversary of the dropping of the first Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima tomorrow. It was a horrific event, but so is a the detonation of 105mm artillery shell, or a 16-inch Naval Gunfire round if you are the recipient of it. A matter of degree? Perhaps. The involvment of "innocents" in the bombing? Perhaps.

But here's an interesting note. While I was stationed in Japan, I had relatives come visit, including my Grandmother, as big a peacnik as you'd ever find. She could never figure out (and still hasn't) why I wanted to be in the Navy. Anyhow, I took them to Hiroshima, we went to the "Peace Dome" and the museum. Interesting place, that museum, artifacts of the blast, pictures, documentary evidence of the effects of blast and subsequent damage to people and the community from the radiation. I got to reading about the numbers of people killed, both from the blast and from the effects of fall-out. Lots. Then I saw a breakdown of men, women and children. Interesting. Then there was a breakdown of "others", so I asked in my best Japanese who or what were the "others". The attendant did not know, but he was smiling, a sign (sometimes) of embarrassment, and he went to get another gent, in a suit who spoke pretty good English, I posed the question again, and he said the "others" were non-Japanese "workers", I asked "slave labor" and he answered with out answering, then he said, (and I think he immediately regretted this) "yes" and "Allied POW's as well".

That place is amazing. If you visit, look around, there's almost no mention of how the war started (I don't remember seeing much if anything about Pearl Harbor), there's nothing about Japanese War Crimes (like prisoner experiments in Manchuria), the Bata-an Death March, the mistreatment of Allied POW's, the forced prostitution of the Comfort Women by the Japanese throughout the Pacific, but by golly they can tell you the names of the family dogs through six generations for some family of fishermen who got toasted down by the water.

I have and will always maintain that it's the Japanese Monument to Crocodile Tears and one of the reasons that the Japanese will never fully own up to the their role as a major aggressor in Asia in in the 30's and 40's. They enjoy the 'victimhood' of the bombing...it justifies their previous inhumanity on many levels, something they would not be able to do, had the bomb never been dropped.

So, hey, it's Hiroshima Day, my Nihon-Jin tomodach...can we send GHWB over to puke on Koizumi's shoes? Just for old times sake.

Again, I have no dog in the whole Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The genesis of the battle, is historical, political, religious and to a large part set up (I think) by forces that wanted conflict there as a way of keeping power in a region of the world they once viewed as vital to their national interest ... the Brits. But, as the empire faded they walked away and left the same shambles they left everywhere else (India, China, Burma, Numerous African Countries...). Alrighty then.

Now, the current government, led by the Israeli Franchisee of PNAC Ariel Sharon (how much does the Perlowitz Consortium charge in monthly fees, there Ari?), wants to build a wall, a freaking wall through the West Bank, some 370 miles of it. Hello, Ariel? Can I say one word that just sort of extemporaneously sprang into my mind here? Warsaw. How about another? Berlin Wall.

Bush administration officials are considering a reduction in loan guarantees to Israel as a penalty for constructing a security fence to separate Israelis from Palestinian areas.
...
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told Bush in a subsequent visit that the barrier was designed to protect Israel from attack.

Bush said he hoped that "in the longer term that the fence would be irrelevant," but he said he understands the current sensitivity of the issue on both sides.

I doubt that the Palestinians (and at this point how many 'moderate' Palestinians are left?) want to see this wall. But how much more 'negative' reinforcement of the their status as second class citizens can they be asked to put up with before even the most forgiving and moderate Palestinian or Israeli Arab or whatever grows disgusted beyond hope and just gives up. Beyond Hope. Two very powerful words that convey a loss of much we strive for in the middle-east.

Oh, and if you thought it could not get worse, there's this;

On another issue, Reeker said Israeli legislation that would require Palestinians who marry Israelis to live apart from their spouses or leave Israel "singles out one group for different treatment than others."

With a hearing scheduled in September and constitutional issues raised, however, "We feel it's premature to comment on this legislation," Reeker said.

Technorati is such a great tool...if they gave Nobel Prizes for useful stuff, it would have to be right up there...it's how I found this little bit of info about DemVet, written by a fellow RTB'r, AlphaPatriot.

Democratic Veteran is just that - and if you can keep reading in spite of the poisonous rhetoric and stereotypical name-calling, you find that he makes some very good points. On the other hand, anyone who enjoys Barry (no - not that Barry, this Barry) will enjoy DV.

Go check out AlphaPatriot perhaps we can get him to stop being a reformed liberal and be regular one again...seems like a blog worth reading, after all, he's not Jonah Goldberg or Ann Coulter, and the sanity in his blog shows it.

There's another Rumsfeldian Debacle gonna happen. It's tangential to canning Generals, making war and behaving like Caesars Annointed War Counselor. It's the small problem of using civilians to perform the day-to-day tasks now being done by the military. Yeah, blah, blah, blah. We've been here before. Ah ha! Not so fast...

U.S. troops in Iraq suffered through months of unnecessarily poor living conditions because some civilian contractors hired by the Army for logistics support failed to show up, Army officers said.

Months after American combat troops settled into occupation duty, they were camped out in primitive, dust-blown shelters without windows or air conditioning. The Army has invested heavily in modular barracks, showers, bathroom facilities and field kitchens, but troops in Iraq were using ramshackle plywood latrines and living without fresh food or regular access to showers and telephones.

Even mail delivery -- also managed by civilian contractors -- fell weeks behind.

Though conditions have improved, the problems raise new concerns about the Pentagon's growing global reliance on defense contractors for everything from laundry service to combat training and aircraft maintenance.
...
One thing became clear in Iraq. "You cannot order civilians into a war zone," said Linda K. Theis, an official at the Army's Field Support Command, which oversees some civilian logistics contracts. "People can sign up to that -- but they can also back out."

As a result, soldiers lived in the mud, then the heat and dust. Back home, a group of mothers organized a drive to buy and ship air conditioners to their sons. One Army captain asked a reporter to send a box of nails and screws to repair his living quarters and latrines.
...
Replacing 1,100 Marine cooks with civilians, as the Corps did two years ago, might make short-term economic sense.

But cooks might be needed as riflemen -- as they were during the desperate Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. And untrained civilians "can walk off the job any time they want, and the only thing the military can do is sue them later on," Singer said.

Thanks to overlapping contracts and multiple contracting offices, nobody in the Pentagon seems to know precisely how many contractors are responsible for which jobs -- or how much it all costs.

If ya can't get a civilian combat carpenter to show up, how do you get the after-action auditor to go? Or do you just JaysonBlair-it, and split the difference, in CheneyBurton's favor?

It seems that the dead-horse-beaters in the 1600 Crew just can't get enough of trying to put Niger on the spot with being the jumping-off point for something related to The Yellowcake Road. Seems that the boys and girls at Fortress 1600 want the folks in Niger to stop telling the truth, that the President Yellercake's, SOTU - State Of The Uranium position was incorrect.

Niger's president flatly rejected claims that his country had sold uranium to Iraq, as alleged by the United States and Britain as part of their justification for attacking Iraq.

The denial came on the same day that a British newspaper reported that the United States was telling the impoverished west African desert state to keep quiet on the issue.

"Against our wishes our country has been front-page news over an affair of the sale of uranium from Niger to Iraq: this affair is nothing else than an accusation without foundation," said President Mamadou Tandja.
...
A British newspaper meanwhile reported Sunday that the United States had warned Niger to keep out of the row over uranium.

Quoting senior Niger government officials, The Sunday Telegraph said Herman Cohen, a former US assistant secretary of state for Africa, called on President Tandja in the capital Niamey last week to relay the message from Washington.

The American intervention reflects growing concern about the continuing row over claims that the United States and Britain distorted evidence to justify their war against Iraq launched in March, the paper added.

Oh, dopey moi. Telling the truth and the 1600 Crew. Mutually exclusive, oil and water, competant and leadership. Whatever was I thinking.

Never thought I'd see an editorial in THE red-state paper, The Houston Chronicle written by a retired military officer sound like they missed the days of Clinton...he was just, well, you know, smart and shit. I doubt he suffered fools gladly, and since he was not of a particularly military bent, somtimes the E-Ring careerists were a little beyond his reckoning in terms of their thinking and long-term goals. But, hey, he appointed those he thought could do the job and got on with giving us a kick-ass economy and unprecedented growth, peace and stability for eight years despite the best efforts of the republicans to savage him.

So the military felt unloved. At least one Flag Officer (AF as I recall) got to retire early for an Article 88 violation. But that was it, a retirement in lieu of a court. Buh-Bye.

So it's amazing to see this article, written by a retired AF LTCOL, who worked in the Near East Plans and Policy section. She was pretty disgusted and now that she's retired she explains why:

After eight years of Bill Clinton, many military officers breathed a sigh of relief when George W. Bush was named president. I was in that plurality. At one time, I would have believed the administration's accusations of anti-Americanism against anyone who questioned the integrity and good faith of President Bush, Vice President Cheney or Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

However, while working from May 2002 through February 2003 in the office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Near East South Asia and Special Plans (USDP/NESA and SP) in the Pentagon, I observed the environment in which decisions about post-war Iraq were made.

Those observations changed everything.
...
Groupthink. Defined as "reasoning or decision-making by a group, often characterized by uncritical acceptance or conformity to prevailing points of view," groupthink was, and probably remains, the predominant characteristic of Pentagon Middle East policy development. The result of groupthink is the elevation of opinion into a kind of accepted "fact," and uncritical acceptance of extremely narrow and isolated points of view.

The result of groupthink has been extensively studied in the history of American foreign policy, and it will have a prominent role when the history of the Bush administration is written. Groupthink, in this most recent case leading to invasion and occupation of Iraq, will be found, I believe, to have caused a subversion of constitutional limits on executive power and a co-optation through deceit of a large segment of the Congress.
...
The answers had been heavily crafted by the Pentagon, and to me, they were remarkably inadequate, given the late stage of the game. I suggested to my boss that if this was as good as it got, some folks on the Pentagon's E-ring may be sitting beside Saddam Hussein in the war crimes tribunals.

Saddam is not yet sitting before a war crimes tribunal. Nor have the key decision-makers in the Pentagon been forced to account for the odd set of circumstances that placed us as a long-term occupying force in the world's nastiest rat's nest, without a nation-building plan, without significant international support and without an exit plan. Neither may ever be required to answer their accusers, thanks to this administration's military as well as publicity machine, and the disgraceful political compromises already made by most of the Congress. Ironically, only Saddam Hussein, buried under tons of rubble or in hiding, has a good excuse.

Been said before, and I think it's going to be fully realized in years to come. The figurehead presidency we are enduring will set us back in foreign relations at least 50 years and domestically longer than that.

John DiIulio was so right.

Mayberry Machiavelli's indeed, but there's more trouble in Mayberry than just Ernest T. Bass; Dr. Frankenpolicy is in town and Goober's manning the courthouse.

Is someone doing that already? Or is it a communal thing by the VLWC of bloggers? UggaBugga has a partial transcript of his interview on the ever-friendly Fox News Sunday, I guess since it has Brit Hume as the impartial news anchor asking the Tough Questions. And I have to agree with Quiddity...this guy has to be stopped.

Reading the crap that passed from his lips you get the feeling that the Judges at the Salem Witch Trials were Liberal Judicial Activists. That there's a fiber-optic cable buried between St Peters and the Oval Office, and that the Hairy Thunderer is speaking on it even now, passing on "the word" in a form only available to the properly initiated.

ON GAY MARRIAGE ISSUE

HUME: Now, you just heard Elizabeth Birch set forth a lot reasons why she thinks the current legal situation, as it deals with gays, is unfair; that, you know, hospital visitation rights and these other things are denied. Do you think that's fair?

SANTORUM: Well, that's a separate issue. I mean, the issue here is marriage. And to me, the building block -- and I think, to most people in America, number one, it's common sense that a marriage is between a man and a woman. I mean, every civilization in the history of man has recognized a unique bond.

Why? Because -- principally because of children. I mean, it's -- it is the reason for marriage. It's not to affirm the love of two people. I mean, that's not what marriage is about. I mean, if that were the case, then lots of different people and lots of different combinations could be, quote, "married."

Marriage is not about affirming somebody's love for somebody else. It's about uniting together to be open to children, to further civilization in our society.

If you have not been by A Brooklyn Bridge, you might have missed this:

Bush is what you get when you start with Nixon's character and then subtract his intelligence.

A person sells a fake ID card, one that's good enough to get a drivers license, open a bank account and even get a job, to a "sleeper" agent of a mythical organization, let's call it 'de Mal Abalone' or dMA for short, the seller gets caught selling bogus documents, and might get deported. If another person sells medicinal pot, THEY get to go to Federal Court and be prosecuted in the War on Drugs.

The Sleeper Agent of the dMA hates America, and plans to do something really bad.

A terminal cancer patient who was a customer of the 'heinous' dealer, gets some relief from the chemicals pumped in by the oncologist, their nausea is under control and they have an appetite for the first time since they were diagnosed with cancer.

Now one person, the one who facilitated Terrorism by selling Fake ID's, is free to try and return to this country to get back in business (good chance of success, too).

The other sits in a cell, waiting for his release date, probably with no hope of early release..."drug kingpin" and all that.

The Attorney-General goes on TV and issues self-congratulatory messages about a success in the war on drugs.

The dMA agent gets her instructions, meets up with her five co-agents who just bought documents from the newly-returned forger, and heads to Washington DC.

The cancer patient goes back to the streets to buy more pot, if they decide that feels safe, thus risking arrest or worse at the hands of truly heinous dealers who are weaponized and lethal. Or worse, a well-meaning friend or relative goes for them.

War on Terror? Security?

It could happen again. We're no further along at figuring out how to allocate resources and manpower than before. Remember, billions for Iraq but no $100 hotel rooms for air marshals, until the feces flew too.

Endeavoring to be more like his hero, President Smarmy Secrets, Senate Intelligence (insert oxymoron jokes here) Committee Chairman, Pat Roberts (how butch is that name?) has decided to "crack down" on leaks from within the Intelligence Committee. Gasp. You mean that Senators, Staff, janitors or whomever on Capitol Hill might actually talk to the Press? About stuff that concerns us as American Citizens...you know, trivial things like the Pentagon Papers? Shameful.

The crackdown comes amid White House charges that senators have been leaking secrets and grumbling by House Republicans that senators employ looser rules in handling classified material.

Roberts, who took over the committee’s helm this year, said he would review the committee’s procedures over the coming August recess.

Hell, next years State of The Union will probably conclude with "....my fellow 'murcans, we have removed the thread of new-q-lar wepins, we terminated the life-tahm employmint of Ewe-say and Q-Day, Francisco Franco is still dead and Barney, is still a purple dah-no-sore. Good Night and Gott ist mit uns Amerika uber Alles (Fluch!) Gott segnen uns jeder. Seig Heil!

Tom Delay will get it.

UggaBugga has a chart revisited with the Saudi-Terra connections on it...in light of the 9-11 report, it's worth keeping a copy on your HD, since I'm thinking that if the unredacted 9-11 report hits the street, you'll need a scorecard, and UggaBugga's chart makes it waaaaay easier to keep track of the players, than trying to write it all out yourself.

Speaking of Saudi players, they keep denying complicity in the 9-11 attacks, and at some level in the House of Saud, that may be true...but with what, 7,000 princelings running around the country how can they keep track of all of them and all of their money? A chore at best...they really don't get "allowances" from the King do they? Well, maybe they do. But it occurs to me that the "donation" that the Saudi's tried to make to NYC mayor Giuliani right after the attacks really spoke of 'blood money'. Why would you do that, if not to deflect attention from something else...like complicity in the event at some level by someone who doesn't need to be exposed. From 2001:

New York Thursday rejected a 10 million dollar donation for victims of the World Trade Center attack from a senior member of the Saudi royal family after he criticised U.S. policy in the Middle East.
...
But after hearing of Walid's comments, which condemned the attack but suggested Washington should learn from it, Giuliani's office issued a statement saying the cheque had been rejected.
...
"I believe the government of the United States should re-examine its policies in the Middle East and adopt a more balanced stance toward the Palestinian cause," he added, calling for an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"Our Palestinian brethren continue to be slaughtered at the hands of Israelis as the world (looks the other way)," said Walid, listed by Forbes Magazine as the sixth-richest man in the world with a fortune of more than 20 billion dollars.

Honey...get the tin-foil out again, it's conspiracy-theory Saturday. (Hey, there's a new feature idea...)

TopDog-04 has two interesting blogs bits on the late Dr. David Kelly, whose demise may lead to the Poodle being booted by Britons annoyed with rabid mongrels. Kelly as you may remember was the scientist who contradicted the B&B; Axis of Weasels party line about the "mobile weapons lab" that produced hydrogen balloons.

It was known that as a former United Nations weapons inspector, Dr. Kelly was at odds with the statement made, by both George Bush and Blair, who claimed that two alleged mobile chemical weapons labs had been found. Dr. Kelly told the press, that he had examined the alleged labs in person and agreed with the Iraqi's explanation; the two vehicles were intended for the production of hydrogen to fill artillery balloons.

But the ol' TopDog has more (well it's a rainy Saturday, and it's good reading), check out why Jello is a BioWeapon. Bet Bill Cosby never would have done those commercials...who knew?

FACT: According to the House Armed Services Committee, Iraq had 2,160 kg of bacterial growth media — enough to produce 26,000 liters of anthrax. What is bacterial growth media you ask? Food for bacteria. Remember those high school science experiments where you grew cultures on agar? Agar (that clear, jello-like substance) was the growth media. This growth media is what Bush was referring to when he said Saddam had "biological weapons sufficient to produce over 25,000 liters of anthrax." That's right, according to Bush, Jello is now a biological weapon. (No word if the substance was in it's easily transportable powder form, or if it had been mixed with water to form a "weaponized" colloid).

From loyal reader Lurch, comes an interesting blog. Mahablog. And an article worth taking a look at...scroll down to "Late Friday Update".

Now I'm wondering, since I was ranting earlier in the week about the Holocaust survivor suit language being used against the Desert Storm POWs collection efforts, if the Executive Order cited here might not be part II of the same effort, or at least a way to further deny the funds to the ex-POWs.

But it gets better...now that we have invaded Iraq, "liberated" it's people, and the 1600 Crew is grudgingly allowing the limited reconstruction of the country (well, it takes a while to get all those CheneyBurton employees in there) the 1600 Crew has re-imposed economic sanctions on the Iraqi people. Bet they're thrilled. A quote from an Executive Order dated May 22, 2003

"Unless licensed or otherwise authorized pursuant to this order, any attachment, judgment, decree, lien, execution, garnishment, or other judicial process is prohibited, and shall be deemed null and void, with respect to the following:
(a) the Development Fund for Iraq, and

(b) all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.

Sometimes it's not nice to speak ill of the newly departed. In some cultures it's Taboo, I think. So if there's some curse that can be passed on to Hitchens, someone please say it in proxy for me (you have my permission for verbal curses only...Fish Enterprises is a decidedly non-violent firm). Anyhow, seems Snitchens just didn't like Bob Hope. He thought Hope was a boor, dolt, comedic failure. His lifetime of work at trying to provide entertainment to troops stationed in places Snitch only reads about from his Den Bestian Barcalounger an utter failure. Snitch can't abide any of it.

A Bob Hope joke was no laughing matter: It was a bland attempt at what we would now yawningly call inclusiveness.

But Snitch knows best:

Hope was a fool, and nearly a clown, but he was never even remotely a comedian.

Seems that the politcal calculus of the whole gay marriage thing is foremost in the little mind of President Anal Lube. In a move that coincides with the strangely venomous Vatican pronouncement on the "evil" of gay relationships, it almost seems too fortuitous to have ol' K-Y be so interested in monkeying with the Constitution to push a single-issue social agenda amendment (does he not remember Temperance...oh, sorry he was drunk).

So why does Prez Anal-Lube seem to interested in parting his butt cheeks for the Catholic Clergy?

"After an initial hesitation based on his own somewhat libertarian live-and- let-live instincts," Pinkerton said, "Bush has now decided to join the Republican herd and will probably sign on to an anti-gay-marriage constitutional amendment, figuring that it's a great wedge issue, especially if Democrats nominate Howard Dean."

"The radical right has had an historic temper tantrum in the days following the Supreme Court's sodomy ruling, and that has led to a wave of calls and threats from the far right that have, I think, reached the White House doors," agreed Patrick Guerriero, executive director of the gay Log Cabin Republicans.

On Tuesday, the Senate Republican Policy Committee, chaired by Arizona's Sen. Jon Kyl, issued a 12-page position paper that presaged Bush's comments and advocated passage of a constitutional amendment as the only way to halt a strategy by gay legal activists "to override public opinion and force same-sex marriage on society through pliant, activist courts."
...
Pinkerton said. Bush's stand against gay marriage "will guarantee intensity on the religious right so that Gary Bauer and Jerry Falwell will be praising President Bush to the skies."

The most interesting thing about this is watching Shrub line up to get max use out of that jar of lube, from the Falwell-Robertson-Graham axis in the morning and sloppy seconds from the child-molesting Catholics in the afternoon. A full day of buggery-pokery is had by all. And the more they hate, the bigger they smile. Chilling.

To make it a better Weekend. Read it.

The 1600 Crew has been characteristically tight-lipped about the composition of the Coalition of the Shilling for Operation Iraqi Meglo-mania. In fact, in a recent article, a 1600 Crew spokesperson refused to speculate over who might be players on said line-up. Turning our attention further afield than the White House Pressitute Corps brings an article out of the Asia Times, with an interesting listing of countries:

...Among the key countries that have pledged troops for the new multinational force are Spain, Poland, Japan and Ukraine.

Washington is also expecting smaller units from Hungary, Romania, Latvia, Estonia, Slovakia, Honduras, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Mongolia, the Philippines and Nicaragua. It has logistical support from Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and South Korea.

The Washington Post reported that some of the countries were providing troops only at a cost to US taxpayers.

The Bush administration has agreed to pay $240 million in support costs to the Polish contingent of about 9,000 troops. The costs will cover airlift transportation, meals, medical care and other expenses.

If this is what the New American Century looks like, I can hardly wait for the next one.

Did Asscrack's interference change a verdict? The two defendants in a murder trial in Puerto Rico were set free by a Jury. The case was significant, because of the insertion of Snake-Handler Johnny to try and seek the Death Penalty. Puerto Rico does not recognize the death penalty, in fact it's explicity forbidden by the Puerto Rican law, like sevral states and the District of Columbia. Never one to let little things like local values stop him, Zap-em Ashcroft sought to federalize the trial, using some tenous legal trickery, that apparently fooled no one, especially the jury.

The jury had sent out several questions to the judge, Héctor Laffitte, about one of the charges — conspiracy to interfere with interstate commerce — that the Justice Department had used in its attempt to get jurisdiction over the case.
...
Puerto Rico abolished capital punishment in 1929 and has not had an execution since 1927, when a farm worker found guilty of beheading his boss with a machete was hanged.

Polls also have found that much of the heavily Catholic population opposes the death penalty on religious and moral grounds.

Since the 1600 Crew needs criminals quick on their feet, they might want to consider nominating this guy for some job:

A Norwegian vandal who ransacked offices in a city hall and stole a pair of shoes to disguise his footprints as he escaped was nabbed after police saw him running awkwardly from the scene on pointy black high-heels.

A pair of worn-out tennis shoes found at the scene of the crime convinced police that the 19-year-old man, who could not explain his choice of footwear, was to blame.

In a most striking move of utter unintentional self-parody, the 1600 Crew sent what it thought was a bullet-proof judicial nomination to the Senate. For a Tax-Court Judge, a 15 year tenure job that no one has ever opposed a nominee for, until now. A quick run through the Federal Election Commission Database reveals a Glen L. Bower of Illinois, who donated a total of $7150.00 in the 2000 election cycle to President Money Changer, the RNC and Denny Hastert. Okay, so he's got a few bucks. Donated to buy a job. Nice for him. Problems?

Bower, a former director of revenue for the state of Illinois, had to amend his federal income tax returns for 1999, 2000, and 2001 after Finance Committee staff found improper deductions in each year totaling about $2,000.

The money does not add up to much, but Senate investigators from both parties raised red flags over Bower's deduction of a $150 Royal Doulton pharmacist's mug he gave to then-Gov. George Ryan, a $109 Tiffany bowl he gave to Ryan's secretary and several meals for staff written off improperly as business expenses.

"Mr. Bower's conduct evidences a belief that the American taxpayer should reimburse him for his personal expenses," Baucus said in a statement released yesterday. "He is wrong."

The deductions were bad enough, Democratic tax aides said, but what really angered Baucus was Bower's insistence that many of the deductions were, in fact, proper, a stance that Baucus said "raises questions about his knowledge of . . . the most basic tax laws -- and his suitability to be a competent U.S. Tax Court judge."

Bush administration officials stood by Bower yesterday. Ashley Snee, a White House spokeswoman, said Bower is well qualified for the job and has addressed the tax matter to the committee's satisfaction.

I_Can't_Stop_Laughing...Honor and Dignity indeed. Maybe they need to re-examine those returns of Ol' Glen Bower, perhaps that $7150.00 is in there somewhere too, as a 'job search expense'...he might be an evil tax-dodging mastermind, and they've missed it altogether.

1. EPA Gagged by 1600 Crew, what's next?
   
2. Calling the Chimp on policy...a major paper? No, really
   
3. Here's a letter and a half...
   
4. But, But., But...he's compassionate!
   
5. UN in, US out?
   
6. It's better 'cause I, Bill Gates say so!
   
7. Casualties? No...victims, yes
   
8. USAFA Rapes, an outrage? No question...
   
9. VP PaceMaker gives me a coronary
   
10. Francisco Franco is still dead, and Osama bin Laden is stll free