The End Game

The Democratic leadership has made a difficult strategic decision grounded in the realpolitik of the modern American constituency: they don't want to own the 'failure' of this war.

Look at it this way: if the Democrats set a timetable or cut funding or limit Bush in anyway, they set themselves up for blame once the war is officially 'lost'. The cry will be "We could have won the war, but we were hamstrung by an oppositional Democratic Congress."

By caving in to Bush, they've given him the rope he needs to hang himself, if only they can keep it around his neck. This gawdawful war will continue, and it will still be raging come election eve, November 4 2008, hanging like a bloody albatross around the neck of every GOP candidate.

The cry will be, "You Republicans have lost the war. The time is come for Democrats to take over and fix this mess you've created."

Meanwhile, the sand runs red with the blood of our sons and daughters, and of the many innocent civilians caught in the crossfire. God rest their poor weary souls.

To those loyal readers who give a damn, thank you, but I won't waste any more time preaching to the choir. I have a book that I need to write; perhaps one day it will find an audience.

May the Good Lord forgive our beloved U.S.A. her sins, for surely the world will not.

Nuremburg (or worse) awaits us.


-

Kucinich Files Impeachment Articles against Cheney

Article I

The Vice President of the United States, Richard B. Cheney, has purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States by fabricating a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to justify the use of the U.S. Armed Forces against the nation of Iraq in a manner damaging to our national security interests.

Article II

The Vice President of the United States, Richard B. Cheney, has purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States about an alleged relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda in order to justify the use of the U.S. Armed Forces against the nation of Iraq in a manner damaging to our national security interests.

Article III

In his conduct while Vice President of the United States, Richard B. Cheney, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of Vice President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has openly threatened aggression against the Republic of Iran absent any real threat to the the United States, and done so with the United States' proven capability to carry out such threats, thus
undermining the national security of the United States.

The full text of H. Res. 333 is now available here along with supporting documentation.

It's a good start, but we're waiting and hoping for more:

Article IV war profiteering
Article V treason
Article VI obstruction of justice
Article VII malfeasance of office

Mad! Mad! Mad!

"Fredo has become a festering canker on Bush's ass, rendering his espression of "confidence" an exquisite shade of petulant. Bush radiates peevishness like an arrogant frat boy."

- M. Peach






Bush Rebuffs GOP Pressure For Gonzales to Step Down

By Peter Baker and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers

President Bush yesterday stood by his embattled friend, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, defying the broad bipartisan consensus emerging in Washington after this week's Senate hearing that Gonzales has so badly damaged his own credibility that he should resign.

Bush expressed "full confidence" in Gonzales through a spokeswoman and praised his "fantastic" service, in hopes of quashing speculation that the attorney general would be pushed out. But a wide array of Republicans described Gonzales with phrases such as "dead man walking," and even some White House aides privately voiced hope that he will step down on his own.

The continuing erosion of Republican support suggested that Gonzales lost ground during a day of often-hostile questioning by the Senate Judiciary Committee, rather than repairing the damage caused by the dismissal of eight U.S. attorneys. Nearly every committee Republican appeared skeptical of Gonzales's handling of the firings and their aftermath. Telephone calls yesterday to dozens of GOP lawmakers, lobbyists, and current and former Bush administration officials found almost no support for the attorney general.

"Congressional confidence in his ability has eroded severely," said Rep. Adam H. Putnam (Fla.), the third-ranking House Republican leader, who yesterday became the latest to call for Gonzales's resignation. "There is widespread concern among my colleagues about the leadership shown by the attorney general. . . . This has now reached the point where it's larger than any one man."

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), a Judiciary Committee member, said Gonzales should "have a frank discussion with the White House," adding: "If he and the president decide that he cannot be an effective leader moving forward, then he should resign. As he said during the hearing, 'It's not about Al Gonzales.' The bottom line is that he must do what is in the best interest of the Department of Justice."

- more -



All Roads Lead To Rove?

"There's enough evidence to indicate that Karl Rove was involved up to his eyeballs."
- David Iglesias, former U.S. attorney


Questions remain about who engineered the firings of U.S. attorneys

By Margaret Talev and Ron Hutcheson
McClatchy Newspapers

The Senate Judiciary Committee's grilling Thursday of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was rich in human drama but failed to resolve Congress' central questions.

After thousands of pages of documents and hours of testimony from Justice Department officials, it remains unknown who in the Bush administration conceived the plan to fire eight U.S. attorneys and why.

Gonzales' testimony Thursday left senators convinced he wasn't behind the plan or its execution and in fact knew far less than a department head should have about the details. Former and current members of Gonzales' staff who've been interviewed by congressional investigators also have said their roles were limited or nonexistent.

Absent another explanation, the signs point to the White House and, at least in some degree, to the president's political adviser, Karl Rove.

David Iglesias, the former New Mexico U.S. attorney and one of the eight fired last year, said investigating the White House's role is the logical next step - one that would follow existing clues about Rove's involvement.

"If I were Congress, I would say, `If the attorney general doesn't have answers, then who would?' There's enough evidence to indicate that Karl Rove was involved up to his eyeballs."

- more -

Trump: Bush is the Worst President in History

First The Donald, and now Lido:

""We've got a gang of clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a cliff. We've got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can't even clean up after a hurricane... But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when politicians say `Stay the course.'

"Stay the course? You’ve got to be kidding. This is America, not the damned Titanic. I'll give you a sound bite: Throw the bums out."

‘They don’t know where the hell they’re going’

Three Generals Spurn the Position of War 'Czar'
Bush Seeks Overseer For Iraq, Afghanistan

By Peter Baker and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers

The White House wants to appoint a high-powered czar to oversee the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but at least three retired four-star generals approached by the White House in recent weeks have declined the position.

Retired Marine General John Sheehan, a former top NATO commander who was among those rejecting the job, said he believes that Vice President Cheney and his hawkish allies remain more powerful within the administration than pragmatists looking for a way out of Iraq.

"The very fundamental issue is, they don't know where the hell they're going. So rather than go over there, develop an ulcer and eventually leave, I said, 'No, thanks.'

- Marine Gen. John J. "Jack" Sheehan (ret.)

Sheehan, a 35-year Marine, served on the Defense Policy Board advising the Pentagon early in the Bush administration and at one point was reportedly considered by then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs. He now works as an executive at Bechtel Corp. developing oil projects in the Middle East.

In an interview yesterday, Sheehan said that Hadley contacted him and they discussed the job for two weeks but that he was dubious from the start. "I've never agreed on the basis of the war, and I'm still skeptical," Sheehan said. "Not only did we not plan properly for the war, we grossly underestimated the effect of sanctions and Saddam Hussein on the Iraqi people."

In the course of the discussions, Sheehan said, he called around to get a better feel for the administration landscape.

"There's the residue of the Cheney view -- 'We're going to win, al-Qaeda's there' -- that justifies anything we did," he said. "And then there's the pragmatist view -- how the hell do we get out of Dodge and survive?"

All three generals who declined the job have been to varying degrees administration insiders. The White House has not publicly disclosed its interest in creating the position, hoping to find someone President Bush can anoint and announce for the post all at once. Officials said they are still considering options for how to reorganize the White House's management of the two conflicts. If they cannot find a person suited for the sort of specially empowered office they envision, they said, they may have to retain the current structure... More

comments from C&L:

On the surface, shaking up the chain of command like this reeks of desperation. The whole endeavor seems geared towards creating a White House photo op, where the president can say, “See? I’m doing something.”

Except he really isn’t. Even if Bush could find someone for this very bizarre job, what, exactly, would the person do? As Kevin Drum explained, “We already have Secretaries of State and Defense, we already have a military chain of command, and we already have an NSC that’s supposed to coordinate all this stuff. Does anyone truly think that a shiny new White House staffer with no budgetary authority, no bureaucratic support, and little in the way of institutional levers of control is going to be able to magically get everyone on the same page sometime in the next few months? It’s a suicide mission.”

Time: “Clearly Unfit To Lead”

"The three defining sins of the Bush Administration --arrogance, incompetence, cynicism-- are congenital: they're part of his personality. They're not likely to change. And it is increasingly difficult to imagine yet another two years of slow bleed with a leader so clearly unfit to lead.




An Administration's Epic Collapse

By Joe Klein
Time - Vol. 169, No. 16


The first three months of the new Democratic Congress have been neither terrible nor transcendent. A Pew poll had it about right: a substantial majority of the public remains happy the Democrats won in 2006, but neither Nancy Pelosi nor Harry Reid has dominated the public consciousness as Newt Gingrich did when the Republicans came to power in 1995. There is a reason for that. A much bigger story is unfolding: the epic collapse of the Bush Administration.

The three big Bush stories of 2007--the decision to "surge" in Iraq, the scandalous treatment of wounded veterans at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys for tawdry political reasons--precisely illuminate the three qualities that make this Administration one of the worst in American history: arrogance (the surge), incompetence (Walter Reed) and cynicism (the U.S. Attorneys).

Iraq comes first, as always. From the start, it has been obvious that personal motives have skewed the President's judgment about the war. Saddam tried to kill his dad; his dad didn't try hard enough to kill Saddam. There was payback to be had. But never was Bush's adolescent petulance more obvious than in his decision to ignore the Baker-Hamilton report and move in the exact opposite direction: adding troops and employing counterinsurgency tactics inappropriate to the situation on the ground. "There was no way he was going to accept [its findings] once the press began to portray the report as Daddy's friends coming to the rescue," a member of the Baker-Hamilton commission told me. As with Bush's invasion of Iraq, the decision to surge was made unilaterally, without adequate respect for history or military doctrine. Iraq was invaded with insufficient troops and planning; the surge was attempted with too few troops (especially non-Kurdish, Arabic-speaking Iraqis), a purposely misleading time line ("progress" by September) and, most important, the absence of a reliable Iraqi government.

General David Petraeus has repeatedly said, "A military solution to Iraq is not possible." Translation: This thing fails unless there is a political deal among the Shi'ites, Sunnis and Kurds. There is no such deal on the horizon, largely because of the President's aversion to talking to people he doesn't like. And while some Baghdad neighborhoods may be more peaceful--temporarily--as a result of the increased U.S. military presence, the story two years from now is likely to resemble the recent headlines from Tall 'Afar: dueling Sunni and Shi'ite massacres have destroyed order in a city famously pacified by counterinsurgency tactics in 2005. Bush's indifference to reality in Iraq is not an isolated case. It is the modus operandi of his Administration. The indifference of his Environmental Protection Agency to the dangers of carbon dioxide emissions was rejected by the Supreme Court on April 2.

On April 3, the President again accused Democrats of being "more interested in fighting political battles in Washington than providing our troops what they need." Such demagoguery is particularly outrageous given the Administration's inability to provide our troops "what they need" at the nation's premier hospital for veterans. The mold and decrepitude at Walter Reed are likely to be only the beginning of the tragedy, the latest example of incompetence in this Administration. "This is yet another aspect of war planning that wasn't done properly," says Paul Rieckhoff of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "The entire VA hospital system is unprepared for the casualties of Iraq, especially the psychiatric casualties. A lot of vets are saying, 'This is our Katrina moment.' And they're right: this Administration governs badly because it doesn't care very much about governing."

Compared with Iraq and Walter Reed, the firing of the U.S. Attorneys is a relatively minor matter. It is true that U.S. Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President, but they are political appointees of a special sort. They are partisans, obviously, but must appear to be above politics--not working to influence elections, for example--if public faith in the impartiality of the justice system is to be maintained. Once again Karl Rove's operation has corrupted a policy area--like national security--that should be off-limits to political operators.

When Bush came to office--installed by the Supreme Court after receiving fewer votes than Al Gore--I speculated that the new President would have to govern in a bipartisan manner to be successful. He chose the opposite path, and his hyper-partisanship has proved to be a travesty of governance and a comprehensive failure. I've tried to be respectful of the man and the office, but the three defining sins of the Bush Administration--arrogance, incompetence, cynicism--are congenital: they're part of his personality. They're not likely to change. And it is increasingly difficult to imagine yet another two years of slow bleed with a leader so clearly unfit to lead.

GUILTY!

Who was Libby lying to protect?
Colonel Plum?
Professor Mustard?

CHENEY!


update: The right-wing corporate media goes ape-shit.

Bush Budget Screws Troops

“It's clearly a budget.
It's got a lot of numbers in it.”
-G.W. Bush, 5/5/2000

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration plans to cut funding for veterans' health care two years from now — even as badly wounded troops returning from Iraq could overwhelm the system.

After an increase sought for next year, the Bush budget would turn current trends on their head. Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly (by more than 10 percent in recent years) White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter.

The proposed cuts are unrealistic in light of recent VA budget trends — its medical care budget has risen every year for two decades and 83 percent in the six years since Bush took office — sowing suspicion that the White House is simply making them up to make its long-term deficit figures look better.


(That's right - George proposes to balance the budget on the backs of the wounded troops that he sent off to war. But come on, his hands are tied. He can hardly repeal those massive tax cuts for the richest 1% of Americans now, can he?) - DU

"Money trumps peace"

"Let's put it this way, money trumps peace, sometimes."
- George W. Bush
press conference - February 14, 2007






Uh yeah, well... OK then, as long as it's only, like, sometimes, and not, you know, like, all the time.

Wouldn't it be nice to have a man of principle as Preznit, rather than this spineless babbling imbecile?

Bush proclaims his legacy: "Compassionate Conservatism"

"I made a name by being compassionate."
- G. W. Bush

Key accomplishments in this area: a pilot program that houses 141 homeless veterans in Chicago, an extended web-based service referral system, and centers for faith-based and community initiatives that hosted 110 grant-writing workshops around the country.
- www.whitehouse.gov




(3,125 U.S. troops (and 60,000 Iraqi civilians) not available for comment.)

A delusion is commonly defined as a fixed false belief and is used in everyday language to describe a belief that is either false, fanciful or derived from deception. In psychiatry, the definition is necessarily more precise and implies that the belief is pathological (the result of an illness or illness process).

Delusions typically occur in the context of neurological or mental illness, although they are not tied to any particular disease and have been found to occur in the context of many pathological states (both physical and mental). However, they are of particular diagnostic importance in psychotic disorders and particularly in schizophrenia.

- From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bush asks for more reconstruction funds

Up to $12 billion dollars is missing in Baghdad.

The Federal Reserve Bank loaded pallets of cash onto giant transport planes, mostly $100 bills wrapped up in bricks, and flew them to Iraq.




"Who in their right mind would send 363 tons of cash into a war zone?" asked Representative Henry Waxman, the chairman of the House of Representatives committee on oversight and government reform.

Indeed, who?

One chunk of the money -- $1.4 billion - was deposited into a local bank by Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq but could be tracked no further. The auditors reported that they were shown a deposit slip but could find no additional record to explain how the money was used or to prove that it remains in the bank.

News of the missing billions comes as the U.S. State Department's senior adviser on Iraq, David Satterfield, outlined the Bush administration's new plans at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. President Bush is requesting $1.2 billion in additional funding for Iraq reconstruction.

The GOP response to the House inquiry regarding the missing billion$ was immediate.

"We are in a war against terrorists; to have a blame meeting isn't, in my opinion, constructive," said Representative Dan Burton (R-Indiana)

(You tell 'em, Congressman Burton! Don't let those damn-dirty-dems audit the books! That would just encourage the terrorists! And congratulations on that 12 handicap!)

What Did Bush Know, and When Did He Know It?

Bush and Cheney Must Come Clean
















by Joe Conason

At long last, the fog of mystification generated by the Bush administration and the Washington media is lifting, so that everyone can see clearly why I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby is on trial and why his prosecution is important. Whether the jury eventually finds the former White House aide innocent or guilty of perjury, the evidence shows that his bosses George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have misled the public from the very beginning about the vengeful leaking of Valerie Plame Wilson’s C.I.A. identity.

The question that now hangs over the President and the Vice President is whether they lied to special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald—the same crime for which their fall guy Scooter now faces possible imprisonment and disgrace. According to published reports, the special counsel interviewed both Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney during the summer of 2004. The only way for them to dispel the suspicion that they may have lied to him is to permit full disclosure of those interviews.

Doubts about the candor of Messrs. Bush and Cheney date all the way back to September 2003, before the appointment of the special counsel, when the President supposedly declared his sincere determination to “get to the bottom of this.”

By “this,” he meant the apparent conspiracy among administration officials to reveal that Ms. Wilson was an undercover C.I.A. officer in an effort to discredit her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV. A former U.S. ambassador and national-security official, Mr. Wilson had incurred the wrath of the Bush White House by revealing what he knew about the dubious justifications for the invasion of Iraq.

“There’s been nothing—absolutely nothing—brought to our attention to suggest any White House involvement,” said Scott McClellan, then the Presidential press secretary, in attempting to cover Karl Rove and the rest of the White House staff with a blanket exoneration.

We have long since learned otherwise. We know, for instance, that Mr. Rove, Mr. Libby and former Presidential press secretary Ari Fleischer were all involved in leaking Ms. Wilson’s identity to the media. We also know that Mr. Libby, by his own testimony, learned about her C.I.A. identity from the Vice President. They had hoped to discredit Mr. Wilson by hinting at nepotism in his C.I.A.-sponsored trip to Niger to gather information about alleged uranium trading with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. (Actually, he undertook the difficult journey to that unprepossessing nation as a public service, without pay.) In short, we know that top officials in the Bush White House were behind the campaign to discredit the Wilsons.

Where does that leave the President and the Vice President? Over the past several days, the outlines of Mr. Cheney’s role in the nasty attack on the Wilsons and the subsequent cover-up have become increasingly plain. He not only oversaw the activities of his chief of staff, but went so far as to order Mr. McClellan to “clear” Mr. Libby in a press briefing.

That incident came up during the testimony of David Addington, who now holds Mr. Libby’s old job as Vice Presidential chief of staff and was formerly counsel to the Vice President. The defense brought into evidence a note written by Mr. Cheney himself, explaining why he insisted that the White House press staff defend Mr. Libby just as vigorously as Mr. Rove, whom the Vice President seems to have blamed for the exposure of the conspiracy.

The angry note said, “not going to protect one staffer + sacrifice the guy this Pres. asked to stick his head in the meat grinder because of the incompetence of others.” Although Mr. Cheney had crossed out the words “this Pres.” and replaced them with the phrase “that was,” the reference to Mr. Bush remains perfectly legible—and deeply incriminating.

According to published reports, the special prosecutor conducted interviews of the President and the Vice President during the summer of 2004. Those reports indicate that Mr. Bush, accompanied by private counsel, wasn’t placed under oath during his interview. But even if neither he nor Mr. Cheney was sworn during those encounters, that wouldn’t excuse them from telling the truth. To do otherwise would expose them to prosecution for making false statements to federal investigators—a felony—as well as possible counts of conspiracy and obstruction of justice.

Did the President ask Mr. Libby to take the fall for others in the White House? Did the President know the extent of the Vice President’s involvement in the effort to ruin the Wilsons? When did he learn what Messrs. Cheney, Libby, Rove and Fleischer had done to advance that scheme?

Most important, did Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney tell the truth when Mr. Fitzgerald and his investigators interrogated them about those issues? That is the inescapable question at the bottom of this case—and sooner or later, the Congress and the press must demand answers.

Insane President sez: "More Guns, Less Butter!"

President Bush said on Saturday that his upcoming budget proposal would emphasize restraint on domestic spending while putting defense and war costs for Iraq and Afghanistan as the top priority.

The Pentagon budget, including a detailed request for war funding in 2008, will hit $623 billion, according to a senior Defense official. That total includes $481 billion for the military's normal annual budget, a 10% increase over this year's spending.

At the same time, Bush will ask for substantial cuts in Medicare and Medicaid, the government's main healthcare programs.

The current United States military budget is larger than the military budgets of the next fourteen biggest spenders combined, and nearly seven times larger than the official budget of second-place spender China.





















Meanwhile, Forty-seven million Americans are without health insurance, dependent on the emergency room, or getting no care at all, and millions of older Americans are confronting a break in their Medicare drug coverage that will require them to pay the full cost of their prescriptions or face the painful prospect of going without.

"Guns will make us powerful; butter will only make us fat," said a Whitehouse spokesperson. "We can do without butter, but despite all our love of peace, not without arms."

Impeach, Impeach, Impeach

"Imagine if Roosevelt had lied about who attacked us at Pearl Harbor and brought us to war with China instead of Japan. Would that not be an impeachable offense?"




one of these things is not like the others.
one of these things is not the same.

Every single day the US puts out another statement about how Iran is helping in attacks against US troops in Iraq. This is nothing but complete lies. The same type of lies we heard before the Iraq War. The Iranians support the Shiites in Iraq. The insurgents laying down the IEDs against our troops and that are doing a great majority of the attacks against us are - Sunnis!

The Iranians would never support the Sunnis. The Shiite militias are mainly killing Sunnis now, not US troops. This is so obvious, but unfortunately these new set of lies are challenged by so few people, just like in the lead up to the Iraq War. People are more skeptical now, but not nearly skeptical enough as the war machine revs up again.

The LA Times at least has written an excellent piece explaining why these charges against Iran are lies. The Bush administration also warns of Iranian WMD, when every expert in the field says they wouldn't even have the capacity for a nuclear weapon another five to ten years. Gee, where have I heard lies about WMD before?

The lies that this administration clearly told about Iraq is more than enough to impeach the president and the vice president. They purposely lied during the State of the Union speech, they lied that they knew where the weapons of mass destruction were and they lied that they were certain that Saddam had them. Certain! Really, then where are they?!

They repeatedly insinuated and outright claimed that Iraq was complicit in the attacks against us on 9/11. That is a grotesque lie. Imagine if Roosevelt had lied about who attacked us at Pearl Harbor and brought us to war with China instead of Japan. Would that not be an impeachable offense?

If you insist on a violation of law for impeachment, not just gross violation of the public trust, then the Bush administration can accommodate you there as well. They brag about how they have been in violation of a federal law for five years now. They broke the FISA law - and they admit it. Mission accomplished. Bush and Cheney are felons according to the law. Will you impeach them already?

Why do I care so much to impeach these guys? Because, unlike conventional wisdom, I don't think we are going to be able to run out the clock on them. They are going to do something even more hideous before the next two years are up. Every week, Michael Hirsh from Newsweek comes on our show and tells us we have no choice but to hold our nose for two years and wait out this administration.

But that's not true. If our legislators were truly courageous, they would have a choice. That choice is impeachment. It is completely warranted and completely necessary.

Look, for me this is not a political thing. I don't give a damn which party is in power, as long as they do reasonable things. I thought George H. W. Bush was an excellent foreign policy president. I voted against Bill Clinton twice, but came to regret it because I thought he also did an excellent job in foreign policy.

I thought the Clinton impeachment proceedings were hideous and ridiculous. It is part of what drove me away from the Republican Party. But this is not the same. This is clearly not some sort of silly political vendetta; this is a matter of grave national importance. If you can't see the difference there, you are being willfully ignorant to the facts.

Most likely, my warnings here and the warnings of many others will be disregarded. We will be branded as the extremists, as the real extremists prepare for another horrible war. As the real extremists continue to trample upon our constitution (it makes my blood boil every time I think about the Military Commissions Act and how twelve unprincipled, pathetically weak Democratic Senators and every so-called moderate Republican, like Chuck Hagel, voted for that atrocity). As the real extremists continue to break the law and spy on American citizens without court orders. As the real extremists ignore Congress altogether with their so-called signing statements and authorize torture.

And all of this we might be able to bear, as we have gotten used to the lawlessness and the grotesqueries of this administration. But if they start another war with Iran, they will take all of this to another level. And then we, the alarmists, will be proven right - once again. And for our correct assessment, we will, once again, be ignored and marginalized.

Then in 2008 when the Republicans are run out of town en masse and the party is nearly finished historically, people will say, "Why didn't someone warn us?" Well, I'm warning you now. Impeachment isn't for the sake of the Democrats. They stand to gain nearly universal power if this administration actually starts a disastrous war with Iran. Nobody will vote for a Republican on the national level for another twenty years.

It's the Republicans who have to realize that this administration threatens their very existence. A war with Iran? Gas prices at ten dollars a gallon, bombings all over the world, our troops trapped in the Middle East, trillions wasted. How on God's green earth do you think you're going to recover from that?

There are only two possible answers. No, the war with Iran will go great. If you think that, you are so irrational that talking to you is a waste of time anyway. Or no, Bush and Cheney aren't that crazy. Do you really want to take your chances on that? Every single thing they have done so far indicates they are that crazy! And that's what you're betting your whole party on? That Dick Cheney and George Bush will be restrained? Good luck.

Please, either for your own political advantage or for the antiquated idea of actually helping the country, remove these guys from power before they do more damage. Otherwise, we will all live to regret it.

Cenk Uygur is co-host of The Young Turks, the new morning show for Air America Radio, 6-9AM ET.

Scientists offered $10,000 to dispute climate study

"The American Enterprise Institute is more than just a thinktank, it functions as the Bush administration's intellectual Cosa Nostra. They are White House surrogates in the last throes of their campaign of climate change denial. They lost on the science; they lost on the moral case for action. All they've got left is a suitcase full of cash."
- Ben Stewart, Greenpeace

Ian Sample, science correspondent
The Guardian

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

The UN report was written by international experts and is widely regarded as the most comprehensive review yet of climate change science. It will underpin international negotiations on new emissions targets to succeed the Kyoto agreement, the first phase of which expires in 2012. World governments were given a draft last year and invited to comment.

The AEI has received more than $1.6m from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI's board of trustees.

The letters, sent to scientists in Britain, the US and elsewhere, attack the UN's panel as "resistant to reasonable criticism and dissent and prone to summary conclusions that are poorly supported by the analytical work" and ask for essays that "thoughtfully explore the limitations of climate model outputs".

Climate scientists described the move yesterday as an attempt to cast doubt over the "overwhelming scientific evidence" on global warming. "It's a desperate attempt by an organisation who wants to distort science for their own political aims," said David Viner of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

"The IPCC process is probably the most thorough and open review undertaken in any discipline. This undermines the confidence of the public in the scientific community and the ability of governments to take on sound scientific advice," he said.

The letters were sent by Kenneth Green, a visiting scholar at AEI, who confirmed that the organisation had approached scientists, economists and policy analysts to write articles for an independent review that would highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the IPCC report.

"Right now, the whole debate is polarised," he said. "One group says that anyone with any doubts whatsoever are deniers and the other group is saying that anyone who wants to take action is alarmist. We don't think that approach has a lot of utility for intelligent policy."

One American scientist turned down the offer, citing fears that the report could easily be misused for political gain. "You wouldn't know if some of the other authors might say nothing's going to happen, that we should ignore it, or that it's not our fault," said Steve Schroeder, a professor at Texas A&M university.

The contents of the IPCC report have been an open secret since the Bush administration posted its draft copy on the internet in April. It says there is a 90% chance that human activity is warming the planet, and that global average temperatures will rise by another 1.5 to 5.8C this century, depending on emissions.

Lord Rees of Ludlow, the president of the Royal Society, Britain's most prestigious scientific institute, said: "The IPCC is the world's leading authority on climate change and its latest report will provide a comprehensive picture of the latest scientific understanding on the issue. It is expected to stress, more convincingly than ever before, that our planet is already warming due to human actions, and that 'business as usual' would lead to unacceptable risks, underscoring the urgent need for concerted international action to reduce the worst impacts of climate change. However, yet again, there will be a vocal minority with their own agendas who will try to suggest otherwise."

Ben Stewart of Greenpeace said: "The AEI is more than just a thinktank, it functions as the Bush administration's intellectual Cosa Nostra. They are White House surrogates in the last throes of their campaign of climate change denial. They lost on the science; they lost on the moral case for action. All they've got left is a suitcase full of cash."

On Monday, another Exxon-funded organisation based in Canada will launch a review in London which casts doubt on the IPCC report. Among its authors are Tad Murty, a former scientist who believes human activity makes no contribution to global warming. Confirmed VIPs attending include Nigel Lawson and David Bellamy, who believes there is no link between burning fossil fuels and global warming.

Emboldening The Enemy For Dummies

(the folllowing are to be construed as "emboldening the enemy")

"It’s pretty clear that a resolution that in effect says that the general going out to take command of the arena shouldn’t have the resources he thinks he needs to be successful certainly emboldens the enemy and our adversaries."
-Defense Secretary Robert Gates

"All of the options that are being talked about on the Hill will embolden terrorists in every part of the world."
-Rep. John Boehner

"I fear that while this resolution is non-binding and, therefore, will not affect the implementation of the plan, it will do two things that can be harmful, which is that it will discourage our troops, who we're asking to carry out this new plan, and it will encourage the enemy..."
-Joe Lieberman



"Bring 'em on"

"There are some who feel like that the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is bring them on," Bush said. "We've got the force necessary to deal with the security situation."
- President George W. Bush - 7/2/2003

(not to be construed as "emboldening the enemy")

Who Gives a Fuck What the "Enemy" Feels?

Has anyone come up with a compelling, legitimate reason as to why terrorists, insurgents, and vaguely-defined enemies should dictate how the United States acts and reacts in the Iraq War?



'Cause, like, now that the word "embolden" has become such a big goddamn part of the talking point vocabulary of war hawks and Lieber-men, it sure seems like we're all supposed to worry what the "enemy" will feel if we don't act the way they think we should act.

Should it be the policy of the U.S. to check with the enemy to make sure they're cool with what we're doing? 'Cause, while the Rude Pundit ain't one of your Heritage/AEI-approved "experts" in geopolitical paradigms, it sure seems like if you're so worried that you're gonna give the enemy a reacharound with your exercise of your so-called democratic institutions, you probably oughta be more worried about your own country than about the happy, dancing enemy.

Because, like, as Joe Biden and Sam Brownback (for fuck's sake) pointed out this weekend, what the fuck does "emboldened" look like if it doesn't look like what's going on now in Iraq?


- by Rude Pundit

Senator Leahy sweats smirky Gonzo

"'You knew damn well he'd be tortured!"

Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) dressed down Attorney General Alberto Gonzales last week over the case of Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen whom the U.S. seized and sent to Syria where he was tortured.

Gonzales stumbled when trying to explain why he couldn't discuss the matter, finally promising Leahy a secret briefing on the matter. Leahy still hasn't gotten the briefing, although he says he expects to have one very soon.

"The question remains why, even if there were reasons to consider [Arar] suspicious, the U.S. Government shipped him to Syria where he was tortured, instead of to Canada for investigation or prosecution," Leahy said in a statement released today, echoing the sentiments he shared with Gonzales last Thursday. "I look forward to hearing the Justice Department's answer to that question next week."

Habeus Corpus?

"We don't need no stinking Habeus Corpus!"

Gonzales Questions Habeas Corpus

By Robert Parry
January 19, 2007

In one of the most chilling public statements ever made by a U.S. Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales questioned whether the U.S. Constitution grants habeas corpus rights of a fair trial to every American.

Responding to questions from Sen. Arlen Specter at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Jan. 18, Gonzales argued that the Constitution doesn't explicitly bestow habeas corpus rights; it merely says when the so-called Great Writ can be suspended.

"There is no expressed grant of habeas in the Constitution; there's a prohibition against taking it away," Gonzales said.

Gonzales's remark left Specter, the committee's ranking Republican, stammering.

"Wait a minute," Specter interjected. "The Constitution says you can't take it away except in case of rebellion or invasion. Doesn't that mean you have the right of habeas corpus unless there's a rebellion or invasion?"

Gonzales continued, "The Constitution doesn't say every individual in the United States or citizen is hereby granted or assured the right of habeas corpus. It doesn't say that. It simply says the right shall not be suspended" except in cases of rebellion or invasion.

"You may be treading on your interdiction of violating common sense," Specter said.

While Gonzales's statement has a measure of quibbling precision to it, his logic is troubling because it would suggest that many other fundamental rights that Americans hold dear also don't exist because the Constitution often spells out those rights in the negative.

For instance, the First Amendment declares that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Applying Gonzales's reasoning, one could argue that the First Amendment doesn't explicitly say Americans have the right to worship as they choose, speak as they wish or assemble peacefully. The amendment simply bars the government, i.e. Congress, from passing laws that would impinge on these rights.

Similarly, Article I, Section 9, of the Constitution states that "the privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."

The clear meaning of the clause, as interpreted for more than two centuries, is that the Founders recognized the long-established English law principle of habeas corpus, which guarantees people the right of due process, such as formal charges and a fair trial.

That Attorney General Gonzales would express such an extraordinary opinion, doubting the constitutional protection of habeas corpus, suggests either a sophomoric mind or an unwillingness to respect this well-established right, one that the Founders considered so important that they embedded it in the original text of the Constitution.

Other cherished rights – including freedom of religion and speech – were added later in the first 10 amendments, known as the Bill of Rights.

Ironically, Gonzales may be wrong in another way about the lack of specificity in the Constitution's granting of habeas corpus rights. Many of the legal features attributed to habeas corpus are delineated in a positive way in the Sixth Amendment, which reads:

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed … and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; [and] to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses."

Gonzales's Jan. 18 statement suggests that he is still seeking reasons to make habeas corpus optional, subordinate to President George W. Bush's executive powers that Bush's neoconservative legal advisers claim are virtually unlimited during "a time of war," even one as
vaguely defined as the "war on terror" which may last forever.

In the final weeks of the Republican-controlled Congress, the Bush administration pushed through the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that effectively eliminated habeas corpus for non-citizens, including legal resident aliens.

Under the new law, Bush can declare any non-citizen an "unlawful enemy combatant" and put the person into a system of military tribunals that give defendants only limited rights. Critics have called the tribunals "kangaroo courts" because the rules are heavily weighted in favor of
the prosecution.

Some language in the new law also suggests that "any person," presumably including American citizens, could be swept up into indefinite detention if they are suspected of having aided and abetted terrorists.

"Any person is punishable as a principal under this chapter who commits an offense punishable by this chapter, or aids, abets, counsels, commands, or procures its commission," according to the law, passed by the Republican-controlled Congress in September and signed by Bush on Oct. 17, 2006.

Another provision in the law seems to target American citizens by stating that "any person subject to this chapter who, in breach of an allegiance or duty to the United States, knowingly and intentionally aids an enemy of the United States ... shall be punished as a military commission … may direct."

Who has "an allegiance or duty to the United States" if not an American citizen? That provision would not presumably apply to Osama bin Laden or al-Qaeda, nor would it apply generally to foreign citizens. This section of the law appears to be singling out American citizens.

Besides allowing "any person" to be swallowed up by Bush's system, the law prohibits detainees once inside from appealing to the traditional American courts until after prosecution and sentencing, which could translate into an indefinite imprisonment since there are no timetables for Bush's tribunal process to play out.

The law states that once a person is detained, "no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any claim or cause of action whatsoever … relating to the prosecution, trial, or judgment of a military commission under this chapter, including challenges to the lawfulness of procedures of military commissions."

That court-stripping provision – barring "any claim or cause of action whatsoever" – would seem to deny American citizens habeas corpus rights just as it does for non-citizens. If a person can't file a motion with a court, he can't assert any constitutional rights, including habeas corpus.

Other constitutional protections in the Bill of Rights – such as a speedy trial, the right to reasonable bail and the ban on "cruel and unusual punishment" – would seem to be beyond a detainee's reach as well.

Under the new law, the military judge "may close to the public all or a portion of the proceedings" if he deems that the evidence must be kept secret for national security reasons. Those concerns can be conveyed to the judge through ex parte – or one-sided – communications from the prosecutor or a government representative.

The judge also can exclude the accused from the trial if there are safety concerns or if the defendant is disruptive. Plus, the judge can admit evidence obtained through coercion if he determines it "possesses sufficient probative value" and "the interests of justice would best be served by admission of the statement into evidence."

The law permits, too, the introduction of secret evidence "while protecting from disclosure the sources, methods, or activities by which the United States acquired the evidence if the military judge finds that ... the evidence is reliable."

During trial, the prosecutor would have the additional right to assert a "national security privilege" that could stop "the examination of any witness," presumably by the defense if the questioning touched on any sensitive matter.

In effect, what the new law appears to do is to create a parallel "star chamber" system for the prosecution, imprisonment and possible execution of enemies of the state, whether those enemies are foreign or domestic.

Under the cloak of setting up military tribunals to try al-Qaeda suspects and other so-called "unlawful enemy combatants," Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress effectively created a parallel legal system for "any person" – American citizen or otherwise – who crosses some ill-defined line.

There are a multitude of reasons to think that Bush and advisers will interpret every legal ambiguity in the new law in their favor, thus granting Bush the broadest possible powers over people he identifies as enemies.

As further evidence of that, the American people now know that Attorney General Gonzales doesn't even believe that the Constitution grants them habeas corpus rights to a fair trial.

Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq, can be ordered at secrecyandprivilege.com. It's also available at Amazon.com, as is his 1999 book, Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & 'Project Truth.'