OH PLEASE...

My prediction about the new president of Iran supposedly being one of the Iranian hijackers in 1979: this is one of those stories that we'll look back on as one of the ways in which the Republicans swept Congress in the 2006 election. We've already been told that "Al Qaida [is] hiding in Iran" and now we're told that the new president of that country is a "terrorist" as Tucker Carlson just did. And not just any terrorist, but one involved with the one of our most ignominious encounters with Middle East culture prior to Sept. 11.

I will bet dollars to doughnuts that Ahmadinejad was in fact not actually one of the captors, and he and others have already protested to the contrary. However, let's remember that in these times, facts, truth, and reality have no bearing on anything our leaders do. What matters is that today Bush said that if Ahmadinejad was one of the captors, that raises "serious questions" or some such rubbish. The Bush smear jihad never ends: McCain, Gore, Paul O'Neill, Max Cleland, Kerry, Durbin, and now Ahmadinejad.

It's the only winning strategy the Repukes have: demonize and terrify, demonize and terrify, demonize and terrify--or if you prefer, call it "the ol' smear 'n' fear". Mark my words, after this case of mistaken identity thunderstorm blows over, we'll get the facts in a light breeze that no, in fact Ahmadinejad was not one of the captors. But by then conventional wisdom will already be fixed--the new president of Iran is a cold-blooded terrorist and always has been. So when the Iran invasion is rolled out, that will already be set in the public's mind.

LINCOLN MEMORIAL

And then there's this story about changing the video at the Lincoln memorial because it contains footage of pro-abortion and pro-gay rights activists but not Promise Keepers or other Christo-fascist rubbish. What makes these Christ thugs think that abortion and gay rights activists aren't Christians and that those movements aren't in fact rooted in Christian sentiment? Did Jesus ever say anything about homosexuality or abortion? No, he did not--not one word. Did he say anything about loving people even if they don't love you and giving people as much as you are able if not more? Ummm, yeah, he did.

Not only that, but the fight for abortion and gay rights are civil liberties issues, of a piece with the black struggle for equality--civil rights are civil rights. The Promise Keepers are about men being better fathers--a noble undertaking, but not necessarily the moral equivalent of fighting for civil rights. This just feeds into what has become the conventional wisdom among evangelicals--that Christianity is under fire in the U.S. and this Lincoln Memorial video is just one more strike against it.

Well, let's put it this way, no one is trying to introduce a constitutional amendment that says only Catholics can marry or that Baptists can't get married or what have you. The Christian persecution complex is only perceived and objectively not real, whereas homosexual persecution is perceived because it is objectively real.

If only Fred Phelps would get as impassioned about the other things in the various lists in which homosexuality is included in the Bible--he might picket the White House with signs saying "God HATES Liars"...

IT IS WORTH IT...

...if you work for Halliburton
...if you work for Fluor
...if you are Osama bin Laden

Really, can George Bush really convince people that this war is worth it? Hopefully not--people are finally starting to come around, based on a couple of recent polls. But we all know how to listen to a Bush speech--everything that he asserts as being true isn't. So when he says bullshit like "It is worth it," that means that in reality, the war isn't worth it, and so forth.

For the real dope on Iraq and how things have progressed, or rather, devolved, Antiwar.com had some great links today, this one from the Independent foremost among them...

Canada seems so civilized...they're going to legalize gay marriage. And I guess we'll just continue to oppress people down south in Washington D.C.

HAS THE NEXT "DOWNING ST. MEMO" ALREADY GONE...DOWN?

Meaning, of course, when the fight that Bush is now trying to pick with Iran starts (with another OK for Bush to use force hitting Congress in Oct. '06, natch) in spring '07, will we be seeing a leak of a memo that was written I don't know--yesterday?

The reason I ask this is because we've seen a drip-drip-dripping of these types of stories on Internet portals and such: on the MSN home page, one of the headlines is "Al Qaida hiding in Iran?" and then when clicked on, the headline is "Al Qaida Finds Safe Haven In Iran." These hints are being drop-drop-dropped in the laps of the ever-credulous mainstream media and right now they're not front-page, blaring news--i.e., the other two headlines on the MSN homepage right now are "3 N.J. boys found dead" and "2nd case of mad cow in U.S." Not pleasant stuff, but the Iran tease is third in the list.

And then, the story is not about Al Qaida finding "safe haven" in Iran or setting up a camp there as the headlines would have you believe, it's about some complicated deal the Iranians supposedly worked out with the Saudis to detain some Al Qaida leaders. Or something. At any rate, the damage is done to Iran's reputation to the casual headline-glancer--if you don't read the story, you see the phrase "Al Qaida hiding in Iran" and maybe you see the question mark at the end, maybe you don't. Maybe you can't remember later if there was any punctuation, but that one phrase sticks in your mind "Al Qaida hiding in Iran." So when Foxbaugh Coulterannity starts to talk about how Iran is our enemy and they need to do what we say and they're a terror state with links to Al Qaida, the headline-glancer subconsciously remembers that phrase "Al Qaida hiding in Iran." The glancer thinks: I know Al Qaida was deemed responsible for 9/11 and...now...they're...in...Iran? Did they have some hostages or somethin'? Aren't they fuckin' crazy towelheads like the rest of 'em? Damn right Mr. Foxbaugh, let's go get 'em--I read somewhere that Al Qaida is hidin' in Iran! I'll glady send everybody else's sons and daughters to fight over something that has come to us on the word of a handful of anonymous sources--and let's make sure I get my $300 in tax "relief" while we spend another $300 billion we don't have! Because Al Qaida is hiding in Iran!"

So let's ask right now--does everybody know now, like people are saying "everybody knew" in summer '02, that we're going to invade Iran? Or is it in fact, an open question? Scott Ritter of course has made his prediction and Seymour Hersh has done his story on U.S. operations in Iran.

Let's look around and take note--are we being told that the president has already decided to go to war with Iran? Are we being told that right now? Is that what we should get from these little popcorn kernels of news?

I wish a White House reporter would ask every day, starting right now, if the President has already decided to go to war anywhere. And a different reporter should ask every day "Has President George Walker Bush [gotta be very specific so that no conservative asshole can come along in 2 or 3 years and say that the answer to this question was just some flunky's opinion] decided today or any time this week to go to war or commit troops to any other country in the world besides Iraq and Afghanistan?"

Ask that fucking question every day starting right now and then when Son of Downing Street is leaked, we'll know for sure whether "everybody knew" that the President has decided on war or not. But no, we're in such a tizzy about whether Korpulent Korporate-whore Karl insulted liberals and is the current Downing Street memo real or fake or new or old or whatever that talk of war with Iran is going to be floated ever so quietly, like brushes on a snare.

And then, after Labor Day '06, the new product line will be introduced, all Democratic veterans will have their pictures morphed into Saddam Hussein's in attack ads, all in the hope that Republicans will at least not lose any seats in Congress. Because if there was ever a time that they need to keep a majority, it's now. If they don't, in a variation of what the Thing might say "It's impeachin' time!"

EVIL GENIUS? NO, JUST EVIL...

So "evil genius" Korpulent Kocksucker Karl Rove does exactly what I pointed out yesterday--he conflates criticism of the war or our tactics with criticism of the soldiers:

"Has there ever been a more revealing moment this year?" Mr. Rove asked. "Let me just put this in fairly simple terms: Al Jazeera now broadcasts the words of Senator Durbin to the Mideast, certainly putting our troops in greater danger. No more needs to be said about the motives of liberals."

And then another wacko had this to say:

Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.), who joined Pryce at the press conference, told Cybercast News Service that it "is just inconceivable and truly incorrigible that in the midst of the war, that the Democratic leaders would be conducting guerrilla warfare on American troops..."

Oh my, this is politics at its dirtiest...another Repuke said that "what we've seen from Democrat leaders is a growing pattern of jumping at any chance to point the finger at our own troops, bending over backwards to promote the interests of terror-camp detainees while dragging our military's honored reputation through the mud."

You can plainly see the button-pushing, hyperbolic phrases--"our military's honored reputation," "guerilla warfare on American troops." What Dick Durbin said had nothing to do with besmirching our military's honored reputation--it merely pointed out that the tactics which have been authorized by our leaders, i.e., Rumsfeld, et. al. are plainly against what America stands for.

The whole war is wrong, not the troops. Love the troops, hate the war. But these motherfuckers are playing the dirtiest of games--deliberately misrepresenting what Democrats and antiwar activists have said for their own political gain. It's what Bob Somerby of the Daily Howler has been pointing out for seven years now--these people are making a joke of our public discourse.

So we have to fight back and fight back hard and dirty. Like Dr. Alterman has been saying recently, we have to abandon our so-called "principles" of fair play and logic and so forth. We're after results, not a game fairly played. We have to get it together and not have Democrats/liberals backbiting and contradicting each other. We have to present a united front and do our bickering in private.

Our main goal has to be getting these Repukes out of power and reminding Red-Staters and the media that it is perfectly acceptable and logical to LOVE THE TROOPS, HATE THE WAR...

FUNERALS AND FOLDEROL: LOVE THE TROOPS, HATE THE WAR

Sgt. Arnold's funeral was today. He and another Mississippian, Terrance Lee, were both killed in Iraq when an IED went off near the vehicle they were riding in on June 11. I saw on the AP wire today that Lee was posthumously promoted to sergeant, which at first I took as an insult to Lee and a morale killer for other troops, i.e., want a sure-fire way to get that promotion--just die in battle! But now that I think about it, maybe it was something that was pending anyway and his promotion will give his family a little more money. After all, he has two young children already and his wife is expecting their first child together in September.

This kind of stuff makes me sick inside. Sgt. Arnold's wife missed his last phone call and their 28th wedding anniversary would have been in July or August and he had grandchildren, for God's sake. Sgt. Lee is more than a decade my junior--that's so odd to me for some reason.

But please, oh please can we not end this war yesterday? Even Republican Rep. Walter "Freedom Fries" Jones has had his fill. But there's too much of attitudes like Bill O'Reilly's--who said that Sen. Durbin and the employees of Air America have committed treason and should be put in chains--and this obviously anti-anti-war (I didn't want to say "pro-war," because only criminals like Bush and Cheney deserve that epithet) propaganda piece I saw on a forum today. Here's a link and here's the text in full:

I was sitting alone in one of those loud, casual steak houses that you find all over the country. You know the type--a bucket of peanuts on every table, shells littering the floor, and a bunch of perky college kids racing around with longneck beers and sizzling platters.

Taking a sip of my iced tea, I studied the crowd over the rim of my glass. My gaze lingered on a group enjoying their meal. They wore no uniform to identify their branch of service, but they were definitely "military:" clean shaven, cropped haircut, and that "squared away" look that comes with pride.

Smiling sadly, I glanced across my table to the empty seat where my husband usually sat. It had only been a few months since we sat in this very booth, talking about his upcoming deployment to the Middle East. That was when he made me promise to get a sitter for the kids, come back to this restaurant once a month and treat myself to a nice steak. In turn he would treasure the thought of me being here, thinking about him until he returned home to me.

I fingered the little flag pin I constantly wear and wondered where he was at this very moment. Was he safe and warm? Was his cold any better? Were my letters getting through to him? As I pondered these thoughts, high pitched female voices from the next booth broke into my thoughts.

"I don't know what Bush is thinking about. Invading Iraq. You'd think that man would learn from his old man's mistakes. Good lord. What an idiot! I can't believe he is even in office. You do know, he stole the election."

I cut into my steak and tried to ignore them, as they began an endless tirade running down our president. I thought about the last night I spent with my husband, as he prepared to deploy. He had just returned from getting his smallpox and anthrax shots. The image of him standing in our kitchen packing his gas mask still gives me chills.

Once again the women's voices invaded my thoughts. "It is all about oil, you know. Our soldiers will go in and rape and steal all the oil they can in the name of 'freedom'. Hmph! I wonder how many innocent people they'll kill without giving it a thought. It's pure greed, you know."

My chest tightened as I stared at my wedding ring. I could still see how handsome my husband looked in his "mess dress" the day he slipped it on my finger. I wondered what he was wearing now. Probably his desert uniform, affectionately dubbed "coffee stains" with a heavy bulletproof vest over it.

"You know, we should just leave Iraq alone. I don't think they are hiding any weapons. In fact, I bet it's all a big act just to! Increase the president's popularity. That's all it is, padding the military budget at the expense of our social security and education. And, you know what else? We're just asking for another 9-ll. I can't say when it happens again that we didn't deserve it."

Their words brought to mind the war protesters I had watched gathering outside our base. Did no one appreciate the sacrifice of brave men and women, who leave their homes and family to ensure our freedom? Do they even know what "freedom" is?

I glanced at the table where the young men were sitting, and saw their courageous faces change. They had stopped eating and looked at each other dejectedly, listening to the women talking.

"Well, I, for one, think it's just deplorable to invade Iraq, and I am certainly sick of our tax dollars going to train professional baby killers we call a military."

Professional baby killers? I thought about what a wonderful father my husband is, and of how long it would be before he would see our children again.

That's it! Indignation rose up inside me. Normally reserved, pride in my husband gave me a brassy boldness I never realized I had. Tonight one voice will answer on behalf of our military, and let her pride in our troops be known.

Sliding out of my booth, I walked around to the adjoining booth and placed my hands flat on their table. Lowering myself to eye level with them, I smilingly said, "I couldn't help overhearing your conversation. You see, I'm sitting here trying to enjoy my dinner alone. And, do you know why? Because my husband, whom I love with all my heart, is halfway around the world defending your right to say rotten things about him." "Yes, you have the right to your opinion, and what you think is none of my business. However, what you say in public is something else, and I will not sit by and listen to you ridicule MY country, MY president, MY husband, and all the other fine American men and women who put their lives on the line, just so you can have the "freedom" to complain. Freedom is an expensive commodity, ladies. Don't let your actions cheapen it." I must have been louder than I meant to be, because the manager came over to inquire if everything was all right. "Yes, thank you," I replied. Then turning back to the women, I said, "Enjoy the rest of your meal."

As I returned to my booth applause broke out. I was embarrassed for making a scene, and went back to my half eaten steak. The women picked up their check and scurried away.

After finishing my meal, and while waiting for my check, the manager returned with a huge apple cobbler ala mode. "Compliments of those soldiers," he said. He also smiled and said the ladies tried to pay for my dinner, but that another couple had beaten them to it. When I asked who, the manager said they had already left, but that the gentleman was a veteran, and wanted to take care of the wife of "one of our boys."

With a lump in my throat, I gratefully turned to the soldiers and thanked them for the cobbler. Grinning from ear to ear, they came over and surrounded the booth. "We just wanted to thank you, ma'am. You know we can't get into confrontations with civilians, so we appreciate what you did."

As I drove home, for the first time since my husband's deployment, I didn't feel quite so alone. My heart was filled with the warmth of the other diners who stopped by my table, to relate how they, too, were proud of my husband, and would keep him in their prayers. I knew their flags would fly a little higher the next day. Perhaps they would look for more tangible ways to show their pride in our country, and the military who protect her. And maybe, just maybe, the two women who were railing against our country, would pause for a minute to appreciate all the freedom America offers, and the price it pays to maintain it's freedom.

As for me, I have learned that one voice CAN make a difference. Maybe the next time protesters gather outside the gates of the base where I live, I will proudly stand on the opposite side with a sign of my own. It will simply say, "Thank You!"

(*Lori K is a 31 year old teacher and proud military wife. A California native, Mrs. K currently lives in Alabama)

To those who fought for our Nation: Freedom has a flavor the protected will never know. GOD BLESS AMERICA.

Now this little tearjerker was posted in this forum under the heading "Military Wife Speaks Out," as though it were an actual interview with an actual person. So you start reading it, and even I got drawn in, and then you forget that you thought you were hearing from a real person and it's not till it's over that you realize that it had to have been written by some gay-bashing, Bible-thumping, jingo-jango, the-military-is-great-even-when-they-torture-prisoners type of Republican propaganda group. Unless you are a member of such a group, then you think "Right on! That brave woman put those snooty college whores in their place--they think they're so goddamn smart but they don't realize they shouldn't even be allowed to say such things--or even think them! This is America!"

But the whole argument that this pile of dung is based upon is this: American soldiers are protecting the righteous conservatives as well as the ungrateful liberals by being in Iraq. The problem is, they're not protecting us.

Look, everyone understands they're just doing their job and that the nature of the military is that you follow orders and shut the fuck up. The antiwar movement has no beef with the soldiers, in fact, the antiwar movement wants the soldiers out of harm's way as soon as possible (if I may presume to speak for the antiwar movement for a hot minute). Hell, if the antiwar movement had its way, the soldiers would have never gone to war in the first place.

And that's why bullshit like that exists, because the anti-antiwar people know that their cause is helped by making people think that the antiwar movement is against the soldiers when in fact the antiwar movement is against the policy of the war. Of course, the soldiers are the tools that are used to implement the policy, but nonetheless, they are completely separate from the policy.

Of course, every time a pro-war or anti-antiwar person is on TV and is asked about 6 out of 10 people being against the war (i.e., Karl Rove on "Hardball" last night, they make sure to make their answer about the brave sacrifice of our soldiers rather than addressing whether or not the policy is wrong. For Christ's sake, it's perfectly clear and logically acceptable that you can feel sorry for the troops and wish them no ill and simultaneously realize that the war is the most vile thing ever.

And maybe that's what a lot of this Christo-fascist-yellow-magnetites are thinking, i.e., "if I speak out against the war, I'll be hurting the troops." And Rush and O'Lie-ly and Hannity and all the others have worked very hard to put that idea in people's heads--if you criticize the war, you're criticizing the troops. But of course nothing could be further than the truth. Maybe more of these pro- and anti-antiwar types will come around if we do a better job of helping them realize that critcism of the war is not even remotely close to a criticism of U.S. soldiers.

VIETNAM & KKK

So Killen got convicted of manslaughter, not murder. Well, at least that's something.
Well, I'll say this, Killen and the KKK may have gotten rid of three civil rights workers, but the civil rights movement kicked their ass. It's still kicking their ass, and amen to that.

VIETNAM

Oh the irony is so rich. Vietnam's prime minister comes to visit--he probably didn't have a problem with Bush, because Bush got out of having to fight against the Vietnamese. He was boldy and bravely not living up to his Air Guard commitments, remember? But Bush will finally get to see Vietnam next year, from the comfort of air-conditioned motorcades in exquisite government buildings. Unlike John Kerry, who first saw it through shrapnel and gunfire. But yeah, Bush is the big "commander-in-chief"...it's disgusting...

ALL DOWNING STREET, ALL THE TIME...

If only the Downing Street memo had been abducted in Aruba...


Oh yeah, fuck you, Dana Milbank and thank you, Greg Mitchell...

Raw Story pointed this out: UK official says WMD claims were totally implausible

PARSING THE MEMO

For fun, let's parse this section of the memo, frequently referred to as the "most damning" section in the hopes that it will give us 1)insight into what was said and 2) ammo to repel belittling attacks on the memo after having gained such insight:

“Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.”

"Bush wanted to remove Saddam": OK, so did everybody else. That's not so terrible.

"through military action"--Why did he want to do it through military action? Weren't there other ways of doing it? Buying him off, for instance? Staging an Allende-esque coup, for example? Negotiations about ending sanctions, inspections, etc.--there were many options available to Bush besides military action. Already, the "damning" stuff has started.

"justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD"--Ah! That's how they'd make the case that only military action on our part could/should be used--because Saddam is known to reward terrorists and encourage terrorism and supposedly has WMD. But as Powell and Rice both indicated pre-9/11, Iraq was known to not have this capability. And of course, that's why 9/11 was such a godsend for Bush, because even though Iraq was in fact a weak nation lacking the means to inflict harm on the US (again, by the administration's own admission), the spin on 9/11 was that just when we think we're safe, the "evil ones" will strike.

"But the intelligence and facts"--Dearlove knew that the "intelligence" that Saddam had little to no capability to strike the U.S. created the "fact" that Iraq was therefore not a threat to the U.S. or, as Powell pointed out, his regional neighbors. To justify the war, the intelli-facts had to be and were being fixed around the policy.

"were being fixed around the policy": The right wing freakos want to argue that this is a British colloquialism that is being misunderstood by the American public, that to Britons, "fixed around" means "telling the absolute truth" or some such rubbish (too British?--"garbage" would've worked just as well). But that is merely a continuation of the semantic game the Repukes have gotten too good at (thank you, Frank Luntz)--create the slightest doubt that words may not mean what they seem to mean, and then hammer away at it. But "fixed around," from the context of the memo, clearly means "being obfuscated" or "being used to bamboozle the American public"--as Alex Hamilton pointed out at DailyKos, if "fixed around" didn't mean "doctored," there would be no need for the explanatory "but" at the beginning of the sentence. What the memo is saying is that, the Americans know and we know the case against Saddam is weak (the memo goes on to say that our "NSC had no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record [because they know that would show Iraq to not be a threat]"), but not to worry, the Yanks will convince their people otherwise in accordance with the Bush admin. desire to go to war.
Note that there are no other incidences of British slang throughout the memo--this was serious business and slang was not being employed.

HOLY ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT, BATMAN...

Just watched most of the Conyers (God bless that man) hearing on C-Span 2. It re-airs tomorrow on C-Span 2 at 8:00 Eastern. It's good, real good...damn good. My wife says, "Yeah, but nobody's watching this." They may not have seen this hearing, or even the next few hearings, but there will be a hearing that the American public at large will be aware of and attend to.

What I found most pleasing about it was the frequent use of the word "impeachment" and the reassurance that the Downing Street Memo is in fact the "smoking gun" that proves Bush's mendacity. The witnesses at the hearing were spectacular--I had heard of John Bonifaz and Ray McGovern but hadn't seen them on TV (what a shock--what with our "liberal media" and all). Cindy Sheehan was very important to have on hand as well.

But yes, the Downing St. document is the smoking gun. On Countdown, James Vandehei of the Wash. Post tried to downplay it with the Repuke-lickin' talking points--there's nothing new in it, we've known everything in it for years now, etc. But he did point out--and in the process undermining his attempt to undermine the DSM--that the DSM is our first evidence on paper of what was going on.

Well, Vandehei, then at least that is what is new (even though there's so much more). We didn't have a paper trail before, and now we do. That's extremely important.

LYNCHING

I don't know about you, but I get the impression that Thad Cochran and Trent Lott and some of their rich, elitist Republican fellow travelers are pro-lynching. Why in God's holy name would any senator in 2005 think that they shouldn't sign on as a co-sponsor to the lynching apology? Didn't Trent Lott learn anything from sucking Strom Thurmond's wrinkled dick? He and Cochran are complete and utter jackasses. I wish I could say they'd lose their seats when their times come, but this is Mississippi. This poll shows why Lott and Cochran will retain their seats (should show up on this page tomorrow).

SUPERHEROES DON’T DIE

This story says it all...a soldier from a town near where I grew up died in Iraq on Saturday. This story from the local paper really validates everything that’s ever been said about the poor being sent to fight the rich man’s war, i.e. :

CARRIERE - A gray 1949 Chrysler will become a tribute to Sgt. Larry Arnold Sr., killed Saturday in Iraq by a roadside bomb, his son said Monday. [snip]
The car has tremendous sentimental value, said Larry Arnold Jr., sitting outside the mobile home where the family lives in rural Pearl River County.

People don’t live in “mobile homes” by preference. If a person has a choice between a tornado magnet or a real house, they don’t choose the magnet. Could it be that the Arnolds couldn’t afford a real, non-mobile home and that’s why they lived in a trailer? Being from the area and knowing its vast quantities of trailer parks and very low income statistics, I’d say that of course that’s why this “superhero” lived in a trailer (“superhero” is what his son described him as).

Unfortunately, one of Arnold’s sons is also in the military–does the same fate await him, too?
Also, according to the article, the father died after reaching retirement eligibility. What a pisser. George W. Bush and the neocons preyed on the patriotism, sense of duty, and lack of other choices of people like Sgt. Arnold. Here’s how Arnold’s wife put it:

"He had his 20 years just about the time they got the orders for activation," Melinda Arnold said.
Her husband did not try to avoid the second tour of duty in Iraq.
"He wanted to go over there and finish what he started with the 890th," she said. "He wanted to finish his mission."
The troops remaining in Iraq stayed on his mind during Arnold's two-week leave in early May, she said.
"The whole time he was home, he worried about the guys in Iraq," she said. "He wasn't comfortable."

Obviously Sgt. Arnold was a real man of loyalty with a powerful sense of kinship with his brothers in arms. He even decided to forego retirement to be with his men on what their commander-in-chief told them was a vitally important mission, to supposedly defend America from an inevitable and devastating “nuke-you-luhr” attack (now that I write this, maybe that’s why Bush the Criminal insists on that pronunciation–because it implies that you will be nuked–“nuke-you-luhr”).

Grandfathers Dying

Not only is Arnold a father of three, he also had two grandchildren and was married to Melinda for almost 28 years. He was 46 years old. That’s who this foul, evil war is killing–grandfathers and faithful, devoted husbands–and not just on the American side. If that fact doesn’t utterly sicken you deep within, given that every reason we were told we had to invade and occupy Iraq has now turned out to be not just untrue but in fact vicious, sinful lies, then you literally have no soul.

Make One Giant Magnet

Sgt. Arnold is the very emblem and reason we should all rip the yellow magnets off our cars, point them all to the east simultaneously and hope that the magnetic force generated will attach to the troop transports and pull them back here. We should be lying down en masse to stop traffic and striking en masse to grind our economy to a halt until our boys are back home. We should encircle the White House with Bush inside and lay siege to it until he issues the order to bring the soldiers back home and then submits to being thrown into the brig.

But I fear that none of that will happen–even Sgt. Arnold’s own son, one of the people who should be the angriest of all, misunderstands what is happening:

"He was a real life super-hero," he said of his father. "The super-heroes in comic books don't have anything on him. He went to serve his country and protect the people of Iraq and America.

But the superheroes in comic books don’t die (and even if they do, they always come back to life), and soldiers dying in Iraq are not protecting America. Saying that doesn’t mean Sgt. Arnold is any less of a true patriot who clearly loved his country more than his own life. It means that George W. Bush and company will have a hell of time come judgment day.

BEEN A LONG TIME...

...since I did some blog...

Goddamn I love Sam and Janeane on the Majority Report! Listen! Listen!

It's so kickass that Edgar Ray Killen has to be wheeled in for his trial...it's the long arm of the law, baby. Nobody's too broke down to face lady justice, Nazi punks fuck off, hey hey fuck the KKK, and all that...

Iraq support way down...finally! But hey all you fucking red-state cannon fodder types--TOO LITTLE TOO LATE! Where was this dissatisfaction around say, 7 months ago, last November, when it might have fucking mattered? We all have to learn that no one should ever vote for a Republican, not even John McCain...if Jesus H. Christ came back to earth and ran on a Republican ticket you shouldn't vote for Jesus. Don't do it--they fuck shit up.

As our fine friend the Conceptual Guerilla has pointed out, the economy is better, unemployment is decreased, and a whole host of other good things happen when Democrats hold the Presidency.

Oh, and Michael Jackson. I'm glad he was found innocent, and I'll tell you why. You can't believe the testimony of children, especially not when the stakes are this high. Teaching school for five years taught me that much. Kids lie, especially when their parents or parent or whatever tell them to. Michael Jackson ain't perfect and he is weird, but so what...

And, one last thing, the new White Stripes album blows. "Blue Orchid" is a rockin' song, but the rest of the album is pretentious fluff. And Pitchfork was dead wrong about Robbie Fulks' latest--it is great. The new Teenage Fanclub is nice--nothing new, but there was nothing wrong with what they were doing before, so why change it?

NUCLEAR OPTION & FACTS

[Added this link after writing everything below--this link should settle this argument. It's from the Department of Justice website and it says in black and white how many judicial positions there are to fill and how many are vacant. The 95% number is correct.]

So in my local paper today, there appeared these two letters to the editor (how come they don’t print two antiwar letters on the same day?) that both favored triggering the nuclear option because in their minds, Bush has had less of his judicial appointees approved than Clinton and others. Just read through these two letters to see why we’re all screwed:

LETTER 1

GOP should use nuclear option


Well, Mr. Warren ("An 'attack on people of faith?'" May 10), thank you for bringing this up. Now I will set the record straight.

What the Democrats are doing to judicial nominees is unheard of. Not in the history of the Senate have judicial nominees ever been filibustered. You see, the rules are these: the nominees must go through committee; if they pass the committee, then there is to be an up-or-down vote in the Senate. The Democrats know they will lose this, so instead of following and upholding the Constitution, they filibuster.

Basically, they are breaking the Constitution, so the Republicans have to - which is legal, by the way - use the "nuclear option."

When Bill Clinton was in office, he got over 70 percent of his nominees through. And there was not one filibuster. That is the average of any president in history. Until now.

Most of George Bush's nominees have made it through committee. Only 50 percent have made it through the whole process - the lowest of any president. If you look as to why these men have not, it is very clear that it is due to the fact that these men claim to be men of faith. Not only do they claim this, but they live up to the claim, which scares the Democrats because these men will uphold the Constitution - unlike the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in California or the courts that ruled in the Terri Schiavo case.

One more thing: George Bush should not consult with the senior Democrat on the committee. The voice of the people was heard. It's called elections.

Jim Hogan



LETTER 2

Getty Israel of Jackson stated in the Hattiesburg American Opinion page Wednesday that the Republicans seek "absolute power." She also quotes that President Bush had a confirmation rate of almost 95 percent. I have yet to locate a source for this confirmation statement.
President Bush has or had the lowest judicial confirmation rate from what I have found on the Internet. All the Republican Party really wants is an up-or-down vote on its nominees. Is that too much to ask of our representatives?
Ammon Cranford

The problem, of course is that these two writers come at this issue with a different set of facts than we liberals do. Who’s right? In this particular part of the debate, there can only be one right answer. Either Bush has a 95 % confirm rate or he has more or less half that.

FOOLPROOF & MATHEMATICAL
There is a foolproof and mathematical way to determine which percentage is right. And of course, that is to look at the number of confirmations versus the number of nominations and derive a percentage. But, the problem is that neither you nor I nor most of us in the great unwashed have the time, research resources, or the inclination to figure out this easy math problem. This is true of most, if not all, political situations.

So we have to trust the media to give us facts.

So there’s the rub–if I pointed out to one of these letter writers that The Washington Post verifies a near 95% confirm rate for Bush, you’d think that would settle the issue, right? “Oh hell no,” this writer and millions like him would say–“the Washington Post is biased in favor of the liberals–it’s part of the elite liberal media.”

Now this particular accusation about the Washington Post may or may not be true. Is the Washington Post part of the “liberal media?” Well, yes and no–it depends on what the word “liberal” means, and it means a little something different to everyone. Except the people who buy into the idea of “the liberal media,” who almost uniformly think “liberal” means “evil” and/or “anti-American.”

OK, maybe the Washington Post is liberal. For the sake of argument, let’s just say it is. But is it right about the 95% confirm rate? If the Post is correct about this, their perceived “bias” should not matter. A fact is a fact. However, the conservatives’ greatest victory has been to make their cohort blind to facts when there is suspicion that some media outlet might be biased.

And time and again, it has been shown that those who consume primarily conservative media, i.e, Fox News, etc., don’t have the facts right. Like this study that showed that Fox viewers believed Iraq was behind 9/11 even though the 9/11 commission and their dear beloved president said that such a thing was not so.

DEATH OF DISCOURSE, DEATH OF ORDER

So this is the problem. People have to see that there is only one correct set of facts about any given issue. Citizens are entitled to feel any way they’d like about these facts and the reporters of these facts, but facts are facts.

But how can this be fixed? I don’t know the answer, I’m just posing the question. I think one way that it might start to be fixed is to bring back the Fairness Doctrine in some form or another. For example, too many radio stations across the South (and, I’m assuming, the entire country) have nothing but right-wing opinions from sign-on to sign-off (or if there are left-wing opinions, they’re broadcast during hours when there are the least listeners). And no, that is not “making up” for how there were supposedly hours and hours of leftist opinion being broadcast in the past. If that had been the case (and perhaps it was, I didn’t really pay much attention until the Fairness Doctrine was rescinded), there was the Fairness Doctrine to which citizens could appeal to get their side heard. And so forth...

How can we solve any problems when each side claims completely different facts? Only one set of facts can be right. And that takes me back to the beginning–either Bush has 95% confirm rate or he has much less than that. Which is it?

And it matters which it is, because if 95% confirm rate is correct, that makes Bill Frist and the Republicans look unreasonable. And if the other is correct, then the Democrats do look like obstructionists. And that’s the whole reason this stupid debate matters–who’s really the party being unreasonable here?

And according to most conservatives, no one should trust the nation’s oldest and most respected newspapers like the New York Times and the Washington Post to tell them the answer because they are “the liberal media.” Instead, they argue, you should trust alternative papers like the Washington Times or the New York Post, both owned by men (Rev. Sun Myung Moon and Rupert Murdoch, respectively) who are openly and vehemently conservative, much more than the owners of the Times and Post are similarly liberal. So such papers can clearly be said to have a conservative bias.

OK, I gotta jump off here and get some links put in here and then get some sleep...

THE 95% IS A FACT as a "fact" is generally understood. If we are to doubt this 95% figure that is given to us by our government, would we not have to question many other "facts" given to us by our Republican-controlled government, like whether or not Bush had decided to go to war with Iraq and "fix the facts around the policy" because he and the British all knew Iraq had no WMD?

POOR GEORGE BUSH

Everybody wants to hurt him--or that's what Karl Rove wants you to think, so that everyone will love Dear Leader and have sympathy for him and acquiesce when he rises to smite the evildoers with his nuclear fist...first a "grenade" in Georgia, and today, a tiny plane comes within 3 miles of the White House. That shit sucks up all the ink and airtime, while much more important stories like the secret war memo and Tom Ridge's admission today that terror alerts were based on "flimsy" (i.e., politically motivated and campaign motivated) evidence are in the background.

It wouldn't surprise me at all to find out in six months or a year that the pilot of today's plane was personally hired by Karl Rove to fly near the White House so TV cameras could get a shot of it and the cops on the ground could make everybody run so that the Tom Ridge story would get little to no coverage. Such a story would come out on Raw Story or Americablog, maybe make A-17 of the New York Times, and that would be it. No one would ever be held accountable, just like what's happening with the war memo.

The war memo is the single most explosive piece of news to come out since the war started, and what do Rush and Chris Matthews talk about? Hillary Clinton's campaign staffer who's on trial. Because they have to start smearing her now (not that they haven't been smearing her all along). It's never too early to start your election smears. See, they have to start doing it now so that this will drag on for three years and people will just be sick of Hillary Clinton in the news and not want to have anything to do with her just because of that.

Uggghhh...

The Kurt Vonnegut postcard to Iraq that's making the rounds today is quite good...as Dickhead Rumsfeld said, "Freedom is messy"...

FOR FUCK'S SAKE...

John Conyers is the man. He's admonishing the media to stop covering the fucking runaway bride that has absolutely consequence for the country and instead, cover this:

"The London Times reports that the British government and the United States government had secretly agreed to attack Iraq in 2002, before authorization was sought for such an attack in Congress, and had discussed creating pretextual justifications for doing so."

Hello!! PNAC, anyone? Lies and falsification? This is an outrage and is so beyond the pale that 1)this happened and 2)the mainstream media is not saying word one about it.

And I felt dirty today because Bush visited my home state today...where he had this to say:

"If you're getting a social security check today, you're going to keep getting your check, I don't care what the propogandists say."

Well, it takes one to know one...and by the way, if you clicked the link to the WLBT "story"--what the fuck kinda piss poor jackassery is that? "Bush made his mark on the state?" "There was no beating around the Bush?" Bush put forth ideas to "Reform [sic] the system?"

The word "reform" means to change something for the better. Bush wants to "deform" the system. For an exhausting yet lucid discussion on Social Security and semantics, see the Daily Howler...

WEEKEND/LETTER TO EDITOR

Saw some cool stuff on Book TV this weekend--the LA Times Book Festival. Arianna's letting her hair grow out...nice. I thought Amy Goodman handled the jarhead Bush plant in the audience very well. I also liked her comment about the difference between CNN and al-Jazeera: CNN shows where the U.S. missiles take off and al-Jazeera shows where they land.

Also picked up a few DVDs this weekend--Bill Hicks and Zappa among them. They both stick it to the Repukelicans, so that's an added bonus.

Got a letter to the editor printed this past Friday, my sister's birthday. Here's a link until it goes dead and the whole text is below (with their headline included)...

No justification for the Iraq war

The top weapons inspector in Iraq has now concluded, once and for all, that there were no weapons of mass destruction in the several years prior to our illegal and immoral invasion of that country, and that there is no evidence that the nonexistent WMD were transferred to Syria, as some have argued.

Simply put, Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction.

Remember, those figments of the Bush-Cheney imagination were the main justification for our ill-advised foray into Iraq. Remember Bush's reasoning as to why we had to invade Iraq? He said that we were "facing clear evidence of peril," that "we cannot wait for the final proof - the smoking gun - that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud."

A new Gallup poll this week shows that 50 percent of Americans think that Bush misled the country about WMD. Last week Gallup had a poll showing that 53 percent of Americans don't think the Iraq invasion was worth it. Public opinion is turning against this vile, foul war and with good reason.

The next time you go to the PX - I mean Wal-Mart - look around at the dozens of soldiers you see who are stationed at Camp Shelby before being shipped off to Iraq. How many of them will lose life or limb fighting in an illegitimate war whose main justification has now been proven false, and which is now unpopular with a majority of their countrymen?

How many will have to be sacrificed before we all take heed of those yellow ribbon magnets and really support our troops by ending the war and bringing the troops home?

Clinton Kirby,

Hattiesburg


Originally published April 29, 2005

They actually printed it right--no errors or anything. Unusual...

Also, great Raimondo article over at antiwar.com today...when he's on, he is indeed on. A little sample of his commemoration of the 2nd anniversary of Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech:

Mission accomplished? If the mission was to create conditions giving rise to sectarian violence, a growing insurgency, and all-out civil war, while dragging us to the brink of bankruptcy, then, yes, you might say that. But only if you were Osama bin Laden.

They only need $60,000 to stay afloat this quarter. Please give 'til it hurts.

ARE PEOPLE WISING UP?

Jesus Christ on a pogo stick–so it comes out today that not only were there never WMD in Iraq when we were being told that failure to invade Iraq and slaughter hundreds of thousands of people and spend over $300 BILLION on our war machine would result in American cities being nuked, but Iraq never surreptitiously tried to send the nonexistent WMD to Syria or anywhere else.

Do you know why they couldn’t send the WMD to Syria or anywhere else?

Because they never had them to begin with! It was all a lie perpetrated by George “Killer” Bush’s corporate-ocracy!

If I had a child fighting in this illegal war right now, I would be so fucking pissed! That whole WMD thing was a snow job and now people’s kids, husbands, wives, etc. are being killed and/or wounded every day. For what? FOR GEORGE BUSH’S LIES!

And by the way, Clinton lied too, as have lots of other politicians. But Clinton got his dick sucked. George Bush is sending our sons and daughters to their deaths and squandering our money on a war that is illegal, immoral, ill-advised, and now, apparently by his government’s own admission, completely for naught...

The Wising Up Part

But lo, what doth I see? New polls showing that a majority of Americans are catching on the the fact that George W. Bush is a rapacious, psychopathic pinhead and the most dangerous person in the world. Here’s the skinny from the Washington Post:

The survey found that Bush's overall job approval rating stood at 47 percent, matching his all-time low in Post-ABC News polls. Half disapproved of the job he is doing as president.

On several other key measures of performance, Bush's standing with the public was at or near new lows, with less than half the public supporting the way the president is handling the economy, energy policy and Iraq. Four in 10 approved of Bush's handling of the economy, down six points since the start of the year [This strikes me as not the best way to phrase this statistic--the setup in the preceding paragraph leads us to believe we're going to hear about the public's disapproval, but these disapproving statistics are phrased in terms of the public approving]. Slightly more than a third of the public approved of Bush's energy policies, and Americans were more inclined to blame the president rather than oil companies or other countries for soaring gasoline prices.

Just over four in 10 -- 42 percent -- endorsed the way the president
is dealing with the situation in Iraq, a slight increase from the all-time low
in March of 39 percent. Almost six in 10 (58 percent) said the United States has
gotten bogged down there, and 39 percent said they are confident Iraq will have
a stable, democratic government in a year [More with this confusing phrasing--wouldn't the point of all this be clearer if the text read thusly: "58 dislike the way the president is dealing with the situation in Iraq...etc."]

Bush continues to get strong marks on his handling of the campaign against terrorism, with 56 percent supporting his actions, down five points since January. But the survey also found that the sluggish economy has eclipsed terrorism on the public's list of top priorities, fueling Bush's drop in the polls.

A third of those interviewed (32 percent) said the economy should be the highest priority for the administration and Congress, up five points in the past month, followed by Iraq (22 percent) and health care (15 percent). Only 12 percent cited terrorism as the top issue, down five points since March.

Of course this is all great, but it’s too little too late–Bush is in for a second term. So what are we gonna do about it?

THEY’RE FUCKING US AGAIN

Wages haven’t kept up with inflation for the past two months. Jane Bryant Quinn’s column in the 4/25/05 issue of Newsweek has this to say:

Bush wants to make his tax cuts permanent, at a long-term cost to the budget that’s triple the cost of making Social Security solvent again...So we’re talking priorities, not money: tax cuts versus the safety net.

So what are the Bush crime family’s priorities?

Moral Bankruptcy act, signed into law this week. Eighty-one billion more dollars for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. An energy bill that is a giveaway to corporations.

And if you support the wars we’re fighting, remember–Osama bin Laden is on the loose, and there were no WMD in Iraq. Does that sound like these motherfuckers are doing a good job? Hell, no. And for God’s sake, this is serious business. The latest $81 billion brings the total spent on these useless wars to $300 billion +...why is it that the Senate can agree 99-zip on money for war but money for education or healthcare or anything useful is oh so divisive and "political" and oh well, let them eat war...

This town is a soldier's town

And every time I go to Wal-Mart (I know, I know...), or anywhere in town at night, I see military guys being bussed in from Camp Shelby, I’m assuming. I keep wanting to say something to them, but I always think better of it...I don’t really even know what I’d say. I want to see if they support the war or not, but I’m fairly certain they kinda have to put up the bulldog front...

But this town is crawling with military types and what do they see everywhere? Fucking yellow ribbon magnets on most cars...the most egregious ones now have crosses where the loop is. So what these stupid magnets say to these guys is “We don’t want to try to stop the war so you won’t get killed, we just want to show all our shallow friends that we know how to go along with the marketing schemes foisted on us by our corporate-ocracy, so we have to have gas-guzzling SUV with the magnet so we can look sincere but really those two things just cancel each other out...”

And oil prices are still high, which means the price of everything is still high...what the fuck is going on? Please let’s wake up and do something about it, together. Watch “The Corporation.” You’ll probably have to either buy it online or rent it online if you live in a red state like I do. It is so eye-opening. Here’s a teaser–in the 30s, corporate leaders wanted to take down FDR and install a fascist dictatorship...is that what you hear in the history books written about the “greatest country in the world”?

Oh, we are all so fucked...

DID YOU HEAR?

Hey, just curious—did you hear the pope died?
Did you hear that Tom DeLay’s hold on power is getting looser and looser?
Did you hear that Iraq declared a new president?
Did you hear about the helicopter crash in Afghanistan today that killed 18 American soldiers?

Well, even if you didn’t hear about that other stuff, at least you heard about the Pope. I mean, wow…it was so sudden and unexpected…

Songs Of ‘05

The new Of Montreal album “The Sunlandic Twins” is really cool. The melodic and lyrical invention is worth the price, and the funky bass just makes you glad you decided to pay attention.

Also, the new John Prine album “Fair & Square” is surprisingly enjoyable. I’m surprised because I would’ve thought he’d be washed up and out of ideas by now. But he’s still got some “zazz,” if you know what I mean. He even takes a swipe at Bush, so that kicks ass off course.

Amy Ray’s new album “Prom” is also nice. I’m glad she’s getting to rock and talk about gay issues in a very open way.

WHITEWASH

So it was the intelligence on Iraq that was “dead wrong?” Oh, I see. What about this, from Alterman, back in fighting trim:

A former CIA agent quoted in The New Yorker: who resigned over his “sense that they were using the intelligence from the C.I.A. and other agencies only when it fit their agenda. They didn’t like the intelligence they were getting, and so they brought in people to write the stuff. They were so crazed and so far out and so difficult to reason with—to the point of being bizarre. Dogmatic, as if they were on a mission from God.”

Alterman provides several other such quotes. Was the Office of Special Plans looked at in this intelligence report (honestly, I haven’t even looked at it, but why should I or anyone else bother—with the Republicans in power, anyone could have predicted before this commission even met for the first time what the result would be; the pure and innocent president was misled by the evil, bumbling intel people)? Here’s what an investigative piece on the OSP in Mother Jones had to say:

Kwiatkowski, 43, a now-retired Air Force officer who served in the Pentagon's Near East and South Asia (NESA) unit in the year before the invasion of Iraq, observed how the Pentagon's Iraq war-planning unit manufactured scare stories about Iraq's weapons and ties to terrorists. "It wasn't intelligence‚ -- it was propaganda," she says. "They'd take a little bit of intelligence, cherry-pick it, make it sound much more exciting, usually by taking it out of context, often by juxtaposition of two pieces of information that don't belong together." It was by turning such bogus intelligence into talking points for U.S. officials‚ -- including ominous lines in speeches by President Bush and Vice President Cheney, along with Secretary of State Colin Powell's testimony at the U.N. Security Council last February‚ -- that the administration pushed American public opinion into supporting an unnecessary war.
Until now, the story of how the Bush administration produced its wildly exaggerated estimates of the threat posed by Iraq has never been revealed in full. But, for the first time, a detailed investigation by Mother Jones, based on dozens of interviews‚ -- some on the record, some with officials who insisted on anonymity‚ -- exposes the workings of a secret Pentagon intelligence unit and of the Defense Department's war-planning task force, the Office of Special Plans. It's the story of a close-knit team of ideologues who spent a decade or more hammering out plans for an attack on Iraq and who used the events of September 11, 2001, to set it into motion.

This is a fucking outrage. Bush should be led out of the White House in handcuffs, if not worse, for lying us into war. And after the more than 10,000 killed and wounded in his evil war of choice, he has the nerve to say today that “the strong should protect the weak” and that that attitude is spawned by a “culture of life?” Every American should be laughing in his motherfucking face. As Mike Malloy says, Bush is a giggling killer—maybe that’s why everyone holds their tongue (Happy Birthday, Air America, by the way)...


TWO BIG STORIES?

And then Hardball comes on tonight and guest host David Gregory says they’re working on “two big stories” and what springs to my mind is Schiavo (R.I.P) and the intelligence report. I was half right. The two “big stories” are Schiavo and the friggin’ Pope. I mean, Jesus Christ almighty, we’re fighting an illegal war that Bush and co. lied us into and a whitewash report comes out today about it and the big story besides Schiavo is the fucking decrepit Holy Father? For God’s sake, the man is old! Old people die! Is an old man dying a bigger story than a motherfucking war?

And speaking of Schiavo, why in hell’s bells did the mainstream media never cover that godawful story fairly? Why were there no doctors on Scarborough and Hardball with CAT scans and X-rays and MRIs showing what Schiavo’s cerebral cortex looked like? Is it because Randall Terry’s smug, adulterous ass gets better ratings than actually enlightening people? What the fuck?

Maybe these damn religious freakos are right—the end times are upon us…

ALSO, WHY SCHIAVO NOW?

Why is the Schiavo case springing up now? What important and sordid story is being deflected by this story? Is it just delaying Tom DeLay's ethics violations becoming a major issue in the mainstream media? Are U.S. troops massing on the Iranian or Syrian border so that when the media wake up from this Schiavo nightmare, invasions of either or both those countries will be faits accompli? What the fuck is going on? Is there a new terrorist attack being plotted that will final bring about full-blown fascism in the U.S.--remember how the Gary Condit story numbed the media just prior to 9/11?

ERRING ON THE SIDE OF WHAT?

This Schiavo thing is…sheesh, I don’t know. Is she or isn’t she in a persistent vegetative state? Can she or can’t she smile or talk? Is her cerebral cortex liquefied or not? As the brilliant Bob Somerby points out today, there are apparently now two realities—one for the freakos and the actual reality. Somerby points out daily the way in which the pundits from all media fuck up our public discourse.

The Schiavo case is a perfect example of a comment Eric Alterman made at the panel discussion held recently at the U.S. Comedy Arts festival in Aspen. He said something along the lines of “Today’s punditry has made uninformed opinion equal to objective fact.” And so it has.

The answer to all those questions above depend on who you ask. But I must say that the Republicans are giving a command performance—it’s an object lesson in professional bullshit-slinging, fakery, and rank hypocrisy. Err on the side of life, Dear Leader says patronizingly, when he oversaw a record number of executions while governor? While he signed a bill authorizing the discontinuation of life support ("Bioethicists familiar with the Texas law said yesterday that if the Schiavo case had occurred in Texas, her husband would be the legal decision-maker and, because he and her doctors agreed that she had no hope of recovery, her feeding tube would be disconnected")? When he lied us into war a war that has claimed over 100,000 lives? When his newly-proposed budget guts health-care programs that help families and people like Terri Schiavo?

I mean, if Bush and the ‘Pukes get away with this one, this game is so over it’s not funny. If they can claim to always be for states’ rights and then tell Florida its business in this case and so forth and just have people go along with it, then we are so fucked. If the majority of Americans can’t see his bullshit for what it truly is, then they deserve whatever ruin befalls them as a result.

Unfortunately, that ruin will come to all of us, even those of us who can see right through the ruse…