WaPo Front Page: An electrified protest in DC

Even the Post noticed the energy:

Tens of thousands of people packed downtown Washington yesterday and marched past the White House in the largest show of antiwar sentiment in the nation's capital since the conflict in Iraq began.

The demonstration drew grandmothers in wheelchairs and babies in strollers, military veterans in fatigues and protest veterans in tie-dye. It was the first time in a decade that protest groups had a permit to march in front of the executive mansion, and, even though President Bush was not there, the setting seemed to electrify the crowd.

Signs, T-shirts, slogans and speeches outlined the cost of the Iraq conflict in human as well as economic terms. They memorialized dead U.S. troops and Iraqis, and contrasted the price of war with the price of recovery for areas battered by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Riffs on Vietnam-era protests were plentiful, with messages declaring, "Make Levees, Not War," "I never thought I'd miss Nixon" and "Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam." Many in the crowd had protested in the 1960s; others weren't even born during those tumultuous years.

Protest organizers estimated that 300,000 people participated, triple their original target. D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey, who walked the march route, said the protesters achieved the goal of 100,000 and probably exceeded it. Asked whether at least 150,000 showed up, the chief said, "That's as good a guess as any.

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It was a HUGE Crowd in DC today

Okay, there was a massive protest in DC today. But looking over coverage of today's march, stories vary. The local NBC affiliate reports "Few Arrests Made In Anti-War Rally." Yeah, because it's not news in DC when hundreds of thousands of protesters show up?

Clearly, though, there is an anti-war movement in America:

More than 100,000 protesters flooded Washington on Saturday to stage dual demonstrations against the U.S.-led war in Iraq and economic globalization, before coming together to demand President George W. Bush bring troops home.

"We need a people's movement to end this war," said Cindy Sheehan, an anti-war protester whose son was killed in fighting in Iraq. Camping out in Crawford, Texas, during much of August while Bush was vacationing there, Sheehan's rallies drew crowds there that sometimes numbered in the hundreds as she demanded a meeting with Bush.

Bush, who met with Sheehan in 2004 after her son was killed, refused to meet with her again.

"We'll be the checks and balances on this out-of-control criminal government," Sheehan, who has become the anti-war movement's best-known face, told the group gathered at the Ellipse, a park behind the White House.

In Los Angeles, about 15,000 people protested peacefully, while thousands more marched in San Francisco and in London urging an end to military action in Iraq nearly 30 months after an invasion ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

The crowds in Washington swelled through the day, and by late afternoon organizers of the anti-war demonstration said 300,000 people had assembled -- exceeding an anticipated 100,000. Washington police declined to comment on the size of the rally.

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Open Thread

Chat please. Read the rest of this post...

Bill Maher On Bush's Drinking

On "Real Time," Bill Maher spoke about the National Enquirer story claiming Bush is drinking again (something John alerted to you earlier this week). Maher joked, look at the proof: Bush is always late, runs up tabs he can't pay and gets in fights with people who weren't bothering him. Maher also called Bush a "Category 5 President." Read the rest of this post...

DC is actually an exciting place today

DC actually has a buzz today...and this city never has that feeling of energy. From what I could see, it really is an eclectic crowd. Chimpy's out chasing hurricanes, but the message is loud and clear from the anti-war protest:

Opponents of the war in Iraq marched by the tens of thousands Saturday in a clamorous day of protest, song and remembrance of the dead, some showing surprisingly diverse political views even as they spoke with one loud voice in wanting U.S. troops home.

The surging crowd, shouting "Bush out now" and "Peace now," marched in front of the White House and then toward the Washington Monument in an 11-hour marathon of dissent.

They were young people with green hair, nuns whose anti-war activism dates to Vietnam, parents mourning their children in uniform lost in Iraq, and uncountable families motivated for the first time to protest.

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W: Hurricane Hunter

Might be ok for a show on the Discovery Channel, but for a President?:

George Bush has become a hurricane hunter. Like those pilots who fly into the storm, Bush has been criss-crossing the country looking for the best ways to show that he’s offering a competent and compassionate response to Hurricanes Rita and Katrina. Yesterday, he cancelled a trip to Texas at the last minute, flying straight to Colorado where he could visit the military’s Northern Command and follow the progress of Rita from there. Apparently the word didn’t reach the rest of the staff so a hundred reporters, including this one, went on to Texas anyway. Bush spoke to reporters a few moments ago after he came out of the Northern Command saying “the first order of business” is to dispatch search-and-rescue teams to the Rita-ravaged areas of Texas and Louisiana and urging evacuees to heed warnings about returning home to soon.

Bush aides pride themselves on their crisp scheduling but Bush is winging it—literally—day by day.

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Open Thread

What's your caption for this A.P. photo? Read the rest of this post...

WH is worried about Rove probe

Tucked near the bottom of the Washington Post's "Swagger" story was this illuminating paragraph which really deserves its own post:

In a series of private conversations over the past few months, aides began second-guessing how they handled the Social Security debate, managed the public perception of the Iraq war and, most recently, the response to Katrina. The federal CIA leak investigation, which has forced Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove and others to testify before a grand jury, seemed to distract officials and left a general feeling of unease, two aides said. Aides were calling reporters to find out what was happening with Rove and the investigation. "Nobody knows what's going to happen with the probe," one senior aide said.

They don't know what's going to happen. But, the WH staff all know that Rove was the leaker. That's what's causing their unease. They were all part of his smear campaign against an undercover CIA agent.

Rove put politics above national security. He should have been fired already. And Karl Rove can swagger his ass to jail. Read the rest of this post...

US Soldiers: Beating Iraqi Prisoners Was "Routine"

More proof that the beating and torture of prisoners held by the US was routine, widespread and condoned from above.

Three former members of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division say soldiers in their battalion in Iraq routinely beat and abused prisoners in 2003 and 2004 to help gather intelligence on the insurgency and to amuse themselves....

The abuses reportedly took place between September 2003 and April 2004, before and during the investigations into the notorious misconduct at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. Senior Pentagon officials initially sought to characterize the scandal there as the work of a rogue group of military police soldiers on the prison's night shift. Since then, the Army has opened more than 400 inquiries into detainee abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan, and punished 230 enlisted soldiers and officers.

Shameful. Thanks, President Bush for subverting everything America represented to the world. Read the rest of this post...

Texas trip cancelled because it was...too sunny

Interfering with on-going storm preparations wasn't the reason Bush ditched going to San Antonio yesterday. No, that's not why. The reason was a bad visual:

It was too sunny.

Not kidding:

Another White House official involved in preparing Mr. Bush's way noted that with the sun shining so brightly in San Antonio, the images of Mr. Bush from here might not have made it clear to viewers that he was dealing with an approaching storm.

The White House is desperate. Read the rest of this post...

WaPo: Bush trying to "regain swagger"

Isn't that "swagger" what got us in to most of this trouble in the first place?:

A president who roamed across the national and world stages with an unshakable self-assurance that comforted Republicans and confounded critics since 2001 suddenly finds himself struggling to reclaim his swagger. Bush's standing with the public -- and within the Republican Party -- has been battered by a failed Social Security campaign, violence in Iraq, and most recently Hurricane Katrina. His approval ratings, 42 percent in the most recent Washington Post-ABC poll, have never been lower.

A president who normally thrives on tough talk and self-assurance finds himself at what aides privately describe as a low point in office, one that is changing the psychic and political aura of the White House, as well as its distinctive political approach.

All the political tactics being used by the White House are aimed at restoring his "swagger":

Most of all, White House aides want to reestablish Bush's swagger -- the projection of competence and confidence in the White House that has carried the administration through tough times since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Bush likes to say his job is to make tough decisions and leave the hand-wringing for historians and pundits. He almost never entertains public doubt, which is part of the White House design to build a more powerful presidency. The term "strong leader" appears in at least 98 speeches he has given during his White House years, according to a database search, and was the subtext of his 2004 campaign strategy. He favors provocative language, declaring that he wanted Osama bin Laden "dead or alive" and taunting Iraqi insurgents to "bring 'em on."

Some would consider his supreme self-confidence what got us in to a quagmire in Iraq and what got us huge deficits and what got us a complete failure of homeland security.

And they want to restore that "swagger"? How many Americans died because of the Bush "swagger"? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Waking up slowly...what's the latest? Read the rest of this post...

Cheney going back to hospital today

And this will be the first of two procedures for aneurysms. He sure is spending a lot of time at the doctors office these days and with his track record of heart problems this could be something to watch. What's interesting here is that this is not being explained as anything serious and it is under local anesthetic but he gets a 48 hour hospital stay. Hmm, a woman gives birth to a child in the US and they have to play games with delivery times in order to get 48 hours but this guy gets 48 hours. People that are completly under during surgery are pushed out in a few hours in the new healthcare environment pushed by the GOP yet somehow Cheney is in for 48 hours. Why can't he live with the same rules that most Americans live with in the crappy healthcare system that the GOP friends have stuck the nation with? Read the rest of this post...

Rita hits near TX-LA border

Rita made landfall at 3:40AM EST with winds over 100mph. Some fires in Galveston, buildings destroyed and flooding in a few areas and of course, power outages. Friends from Houston emailed me yesterday telling me that lots of people gave up trying to get out after spending 6 hours on the highway and only going 18 miles. It sounds as though more people were evacuated than during Katrina but the homeless of Houston were left behind. (I guess the Bush people value all life but some are more valuable than others.) Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Okay, Anderson Cooper looks especially hot tonight. What about these reporters standing outside in the middle of hurricanes? Read the rest of this post...