Why, CBS?

Why, CBS?

I'm greatly disappointed that Dan Rather and CBS News were careless in using forged documents. I applaud the blogging community for their efforts to pinpoint truth.

Regardless of the fact that I trust the "mistake" was made in good faith, CBS has sunk in my own view over a period of time. See my posting of November 4, 2003.

I'm disgusted with the state of the television news media altogether.

FOX news is all one-sided lies, all the time.
CBS has shown they cannot keep up with the pace.
MSNBC is a very ugly FOX-lite.

Where does an American interested in the truth turn nowadays?
Who do they trust?
As for me, I trust my fellow bloggers, regardless of their ideology, far more than I trust the big machinery that turns the wheel of the American TV news media.

Judy Woodruff, Lester Holt, and Tom Brokaw showed themselves to be instruments of gobbledygook propaganda during the Democratic candidates' debates. Peter Jennings disappointed me most of all during that period.

Excerpt from my own post-Feb 16-:

"I have been reading and listening to allegations left and right about President Bush and his questionable National Guard service in the established media. It started with Peter Jennings of ABC (during a Democratic debate) confronting Wesley Clark (of all people) about the Bush/AWOL allegations. What right did Jennings have to raise this issue at such a totally inappropriate time? It was sleazy. Not only did he hurt President Bush, he also hurt Wesley Clark's campaign. It was the lowest thing I think Jennings has ever done..."

Ted Koppel is, perhaps, the only network journalist who still has my trust.

It's no wonder people are turning to the internet where the real stories are born.

In this case, the media turned bloggers' hard work into their own major storyline.

While I applaud the exposé, it has become a sideshow that causes Americans, at this crucial time, to take the focus off important issues that affect our very security. I watched MSNBC today and their news-focus was 70% Dan Rather and 30% left for other issues.

Television journalists are egocentric and love to do stories on their own profession. Combine that ego with a right-tilted bent, and you have FOX News on an acid trip.

Everyone in TV journalism should remember there is a war going on in this country and that Dan Rather isn't the one responsible for all the violence.

I refer you to my post of September 12. The media would never pick up on some of the left bloggers' developing stories because I firmly believe they are a tool of a corporate oligarchy that is obviously embroiled in a conflict of interest with the TRUTH.

We're heading in the wrong direction in Iraq, and the president refuses to admit it. The press will not assist Americans in making healthy decisions in November because they have never bothered to investigate the glaring problems that Bush has refused to acknowledge exists.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anonymoses says: "CBS admits errors. When will FOX, NBC, ABC, etc.?"

Israelis arrested on 9/11 sue U.S.

Israelis arrested on 9/11 sue U.S.

Their names are Paul and Sylvian Kurcheil, Omer Marmari and Vyron Shmuel.
The Haaretz story is here.

Stanley Hilton Claims Bush Authorized 9/11 Attacks

"I think people ought to just think about the consequence of having someone like Bush in the White House and the danger for the future that these sort of individuals pose. This is not just a historical event of the past. This is part of the plan and the camera is still rolling. They have an agenda. These individuals are extremely dangerous."

--Stanley Hilton, former Bob Dole chief of staff

Stanley Hilton Claims Bush Authorized 9/11 Attacks

This story is making the rounds and I don't know what to make of it yet. I have a feeling people will be talking a lot about it.

Awoken.info has the Hilton interview with Alex Jones.
Shaula Evans has the story at BOP.
Anonymoses has a summary.

"We have to prove three things; that the defendants are guilty, that the crimes are unconstitutional and that the plaintifs (who all must be US taxpayers) were harmed by the crimes alleged.
The primary allegations are that the defendants (the Bush Administration, The FBI, The Pentagon, and The CIA) were involved in the facilitation of the 9/11 attacks, that The USAPATRIOT Act is intentionally unconstitutional, and that the Iraq War has nothing to do with 'fighting terror'."

--Abel Ashes, one plaintiff in pending lawsuit

http://www.deprogram.info

Alex Jones interviews Hilton, 2003

http://www.propagandamatrix.com/archiveprior_knowledge.html

Booker Elementary Principal Confirms Bush Didn't See WTC Footage Before He Entered Classroom

President Meets with Displaced Workers in Town Hall Meeting - states he saw first plane hit on TV monitor

Warnings Ignored

William Rivers Pitt wrote, in 2002, that the LIHOP Theory is not so easily dismissed in light of the main obstacle to the completion of the pipeline, which was the fact that it had to pass through Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
*The LIHOP Theory puts forward the accusation that Bush and his people allowed the September 11th attacks to take place, despite the fact that they had been repeatedly warned of an impending strike.

"It is now Sept. 2, and I still haven't heard any updates to the lawsuit filed in August. Of course it is of no surprise that this was completely absent from the national news,(what with the media completely controlled by 5 owners in the US alone) I imagine that Monica L. dress was of more importance than this."

--Stanley Hilton

The Hegelian Dialectic in History: Operation Northwoods In the early 1960s, America's top military leaders reportedly drafted plans to kill innocent people and commit acts of terrorism in U.S. cities to create public support for a war against Cuba.
Northwoods-Unclassified pdf file

Kairos

Kairos

'Kairos' refers to the "timeless realm" of God, a space in time where measurable time does not apply. We pause upon the brink of the unknown; we are each a part of the same phantom corps moving about the earth. The book of history remains empty and blank out ahead of us.

Who are we, as individuals, to think we can effect those now-white pages?

We are living in a moment of time which I believe will prove itself to be a great turning point in the history of not only America, but all of mankind. In order to have this moment in history be a reflection of purpose and principle in our lives, we simply must learn to speak a different language than those who are seeking to control the political agenda today in America.

We must learn not only to avoid speaking in the tongue of right wing talking points, but to create a new language for all men and women to recognize and understand. It must be a language which would be the basis of new and inspired conversations.

The book of history awaits. We each need to give substance to our reality, but we can only do it in concert with one another. I believe the good of mankind depends upon it.

So, here is our kairos time. We're pebbles in a great sea. Our language, uttered at the right time and with the right intonation, could make all the difference.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A book for the must-read list:

Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think by George Lakoff


Daily Kos and readers sound off
*It's also gives proper explanation to the difference between conservative and liberal blogs -- where high-traffic conservative bloggers serve not to build community (most have no comments), but to amplify their party's agenda (doing what "father" tells them to do, like good, disciplined, obedient children). We, on the good side of the ideological fence, believe in "open, two-way communication", hence the use of comments and the building of "community" on most of the top progressive bloggers.

U.S. Becoming A Loser in World Politics?

U.S. Becoming A Loser in World Politics?

I want us to be winners and to do it soon-- with decent and honest American strength.

What do you think of these statements?

Iraqis who are fighting America's occupation are simply a few people who have "perceived the liberation wrongly"?

"American is not fighting the Shia now. And the Shia are not fighting America now. It's a small group of people who has perceived the liberation wrongly for their own political gain and for their own personal ambition.”

Iraq's interim government national security advisor Mowaffak al-Rubaie made these statements on CBS' 60 Minutes this evening.
You'd think he was talking in a foreign language..it's such crazy spin.
Talk about your excuses and denials.
Does he think Americans are that stupid?
Might he be correct in his thinking, to a large extent?

The UN Speech, the Defiance, the Plea, and the Reality

President Bush's UN speech, due this Tuesday, comes amid fresh new tensions over Iraq. Last week, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan accused the U.S. (who supply 90% or more manpower and funds) and allies (who supply less than 10%) of launching an illegal war to remove Saddam Hussein.

Here we are, six weeks out from the U.S. presidential election, and Bush is having to face the facts. We now know, officially, that he has not been telling us citizens the full story about Iraq after last week's appearance of a leaked CIA assessment which had pessimistically warned that a civil war in Iraq remained a rational possibility.

A new report on Iraq's WMD has confirmed earlier assessments that Saddam had no WMD stockpiles, but merely dreamed of building an arsenal if UN sanctions were lifted. Some imminent threat that turned out to be.

With international polls showing the Iraq war has caused major dives in the world's opinion of the U.S. government, Bush has almost totally changed the subject and intimated that his UN speech this Tuesday would focus on U.S. goodwill projects.

Sandwiching a gigantic flip-flop in the bundle of those "goodwill projects", Bush will be desperately trying to get the U.N. to cooperate with him. The only way this will happen is for Bush to show humility.

I have suggested that Bush should show some humility to the U.N. all along, but I don't expect that a leader like Bush would ever listen to Americans like me, because we do not wish to compromise the decency of humanity for an arrogant political agenda. We value life too much to see children of any nation being made the scapegoats in any unnecessary and optional war. Bush calls us decent Americans "hand-wringers", usually through his mouthpiece Scott McClellan. Shame on Mr. Bush for this indecent mischaracterization of our American decency.

Political scientist Larry Sabato thinks that a cold-shoulder from the UN after Bush's UN speech on Tuesday might only strengthen America's support of Bush. In a land called Bushworld, I imagine that could be true. In the real world where people have been properly informed of facts on the ground in Iraq by an American media which (allegedly) rejects propaganda, I would think Americans would start to realize, if they haven't yet, that something is dreadfully unreconciled between Bush's words and the brutal reality of the results of his actions.

Allawi and Blair:
Mr. Bush, kindly step away from our entreaty

Iraq's Prime Minister Ayad Allawi insisted yesterday that U.S. and Iraqi forces were "winning" the fight against 'insurgents' and said progress would be made to calm the violence (ie: kill people) before the January elections. With all respect, Iraq isn't winning anything and America is bleeding the lives of our own loyal, trusting and brave troops in the name of Iraq.

Allawi claims the Iraqi 'insurgency' is "not getting stronger; it's getting more desperate. We are squeezing out the insurgency". What Allawi means is that U.S. troops will have to kill hundreds upon hundreds of Iraq's citizens in the next couple of months (with many innocents caught in the crossfire). This may not happen right away, but surely it shall take place as soon as the new wave of U.S. reservists are snuck through the back-door draft and shipped abroad. Allawi says Iraq's rebels are growing desperate. With all respect, they've been "desperate" since the war began in March, 2003, and look at our consistent failure to maintain any security.

Tony Blair and Allawi appeared together yesterday (with the oh-so obvious omission of "bad-world-PR-Bush") to come pleading to the world: "Help us, world!"

As long as the world understands that Bush, in all his arrogant and defiant defense of his failures, is still behind (or anywhere near) the pleading itself, the pleading will fall upon deaf and untrusting world ears.

The fact that Blair and Allawi are taking up Bush's Manichaean cross and connecting the preemptive Iraq war with Bush's "war on terror" also doesn't help gain world trust, especially when the great "march toward freedom" is no more than a promise to a march toward more poorly-planned, violent and fruitless bloodshed. (And will someone please tell Mr. Bush that Russia doesn't seem to be marching in freedom's direction, but instead seem to be joining Iran and North Korea's parade in marching toward far less open societies?)

As long as Blair, Allawi, and Bush insist this is a war on the symptoms of terror rather than a war on its root causes reflected in the mirror of another culture's ideals, the U.S. will be the political losers of the world, along with the UK and Iraq.

The world's not ignorant of facts on the ground, even if at least a third of America's voters seem to be. Bush has misled our nation into war, mismanaged its aftermath, and abused the trust of his own people and the trust and support of the world.

Bush Flip Flops on U.N.

Bush Flip Flops on U.N.

..about that permission slip.....

"In the global war on terror, as in Afghanistan and Iraq, President Bush has brought many allies to our side. But as the President has made very clear, there is a difference between leading a coalition of many, and submitting to the objections of a few. George W. Bush will never seek a permission slip to defend the American people."

*Crowd cheers wildly.

--Dick Cheney, RNC speech, 1 Sept 2004

*Many allies?!



The vice president mocked and derided the U.N. at the RNC earlier this month to the crowd's gleeful cheering. President Bush gave his weekly radio address today and without elaborating, said that he'd visit the U.N. later this week and offer "some additional proposals to expand prosperity and accelerate the march of freedom in our world."


He added: "Never in the history of the United Nations have we faced so many opportunities to create a safer world by building a better world. For the sake of our common security, and for the sake of our common values, the international community must rise to this historic moment. And the United States is prepared to lead."

He's speaking to twin crowds.
Flippy floopity floppity.

"Oh, please, U.N., may I have a permission slip to obtain your assistance at this "historic moment"-- when my lack of ability to lead the optional war in Iraq is bringing about too much negative news for which my pal Karl Rove can no longer think of fitting excuses?"

Signed
Your bestest friend George

Cartoon / Hitchens

Credit: Steve Bell

"I become irritated or disgusted only when anyone attempts to enlist these now voiceless dead for their own purposes. Respectful silence would be a far better response."

--Christopher Hitchens

I respectfully and wholeheartedly disagree with Mr. Hitchens. Those deaths mean everything to our political reality and cannot be swept under the rug for any critic's values or personal satisfaction. Perhaps I can write a flowery poem for Mr. Hitchens and he will see my point.

NYC gets black eye for RNC protester detention

NYC gets black eye for RNC protester detention

Preventative detention: Tactics used to manage the NYC arrest process to keep arrested protesters away from judges and in police custody until President Bush spoke on the last night of the convention.

"Some of the people were seen on national television. There was a serious threat in Madison Square Garden..."

Michael C. Cardozo, speaking about 12 people who got onto the floor of Madison Square Garden during the RNC and disrupted a speech by a White House aide.

Yes, some of the people were seen committing serious offenses on the floor of the RNC. The most obvious threat to anyone's safety was this guy. He was liable for kicking a woman after she was pulled to the floor of the RNC. That, my dear readers, makes the Parlock clan's crocodile tears over a torn sign look "girlie-man" by comparison. I'll cry tomorrow...or as soon as the Gallup polls stop cheating.

Where Is The Outrage?

Dead Soldier's Mother Arrested
Where Is The Outrage?


Police haul a grieving mother away

Howard Dean on Bush/Assault Weapons

Howard speaks..

Howard Dean on Bush/Assault Weapons

Howard Dean's common sense is keen and he pulls no punches. His aggressive gumption and spirited bluntness (along with one scream) are what caused his presidential candidacy to burn and burn out, althought I submit to you that, as a Democratic candidate, he was far clearer on his Iraq stance than his then-opponent John Kerry.
He wrote an opinion piece this week on the failure to renew the automatic weapons ban, and I think he hit the nail directly on the head.

This week, Bush has benefitted politically by his silence as Tom Delay worked his voodoo to ensure that our American streets would become far less safe.

Some of my readers will tell me it's all about hunting the range where the deer and the antelope play. Perhaps we'll carry the first kid who dies from a wound produced by one of these legally-purchased guns to your doorstep for your inspection and you can have a chat with that kid's mother. Or the first cop who gets knocked off--why don't you have a chat with his widow about your home on the range?

The red states are running the show,
causing red, red blood to run
through streets of blue state cities
all for the love of a gun.

Home, home in the target's range
where the gangs and the terrorists play
where seldom is heard one common sense word
and Bush bows to the whims of Delay.

--Iddybud

Howard Dean excerpt:

Where I come from, chief executives are supposed to lead. Where I come from, when the chief says he supports something and his party controls the House and the Senate, what the chief really wants, he gets.

I would have more respect for President Bush if he had come out and said, "I changed my mind, and I'm not supporting the reauthorization of the assault-weapons ban."

But, he did not do that. America needs a president with the real courage to say what he believes -- no matter what the latest poll numbers show.

LINK

The Truth Will Not Be Televised

The Truth Will Not Be Televised

The truth will not be televised,
but you will see it trickling in
to this blog, drip by drip,
until the river of truth flows
through a canyon of hard-won hope.

--Iddybud

Scott Lewis, an Army Reserve sergeant home after 15 months in Iraq, spoke just a few words.

"We need some new ideas in Iraq," he said. "People criticize John Kerry for changing his mind about Iraq, but I think that's actually a strength. And I'm a Republican."

Doug Madory, a recently discharged Air Force captain, was the last. He spent four months in Iraq, but most of his deployment was spent in Italy.

He spoke of the way Italians embraced American servicemen in brotherhood after Sept. 11 and said, "President Bush squandered a good deal of that support all through Europe by rushing headlong into Iraq. George Bush should be held accountable. . . . People around the world are with us, but are not with George Bush."



From David Broder, 16 September

Dan Rather!? Where Was the Outrage When...

Dan Rather!? Where Was the Outrage When...

Laura Rozen is feeling intimidated when it comes to reporting on any news which may be construed as unfavorable to American power these days.

I want you to read her statement, and then I have a question upon which you may ponder and discuss with me:

The neocons call those reporting unfavorably on Iraq, on the FBI counterintelligence investigation of alleged espionage, and who allegedly leaked US Iran intel to Chalabi, etc. "McCarthyites". But who's really McCarthyite?

Let's be clear about what is going on here. They are trying to intimidate people from reporting on an existing investigation. To act as if it does not exist, as if that will make it go away. They are not just saying the allegations are not true, which they have a right to say, if that's their opinion. They are obviously not the judge or jury. They are trying to make it illegitimate to even report on the investigation at all. As if reporting on its existence is in and of itself an unethical act.

Think about it. Would they also want us not to report on allegations of, say, Saudi espionage in the US, or of Congressional investigations into terrorist finance? No, they champion that.

What about French espionage at, say, NATO? We've heard of those cases during the Kosovo war. No, they champion reporting on that.

They just want to prevent reporting on an existing investigation into who allegedly leaked US Iran intel to Chalabi and Aipac. Does that investigation make some of those people uncomfortable? Sure. Does that give them a right to try to threaten and intimidate people trying to report on it? To understand and report what the investigation is about? An investigation, after all, that the reporters did not create, but government agencies did?

That's insane.

Question: Where was the outrage?

The Dan Rather flap is flitting all over media creration. It is saturating and drowning the American consciousness. It is sating the right wing pundits.

Where was the outrage when Bush's lies were exposed and we reached the tipping point when we realized there would be
no WMD found,
there was no imminent threat from Iraq,
there were to be no flowers nor would there be roses,
that civil war was fast approaching, a scenario which the Pentagon (unbelievably) never saw coming,
that over 1000 of our trusting troops' lives were erased by a sick foreign policy, manipulation of known-to-be shaky intelligence, and a poorly planned pre-emptive attack?

Where was the outrage?

Rather than crying for Rather's lather (pun intended), why is the American public not appropriately aware of the facts about what has become a far worse security mess than Vietnam ever was?

Is it because anyone in the media who dares to cross the Bush administration and/or the Neocons are turned to anti-Semitic toast the moment they get a bit too appropriately noticeable?

Consider me the canary in the coal mine.
I think some of us are in danger by speaking freely here in America.
You're free as long as you stick to the right-wing/neocon talking points.
I sense that our first amendment freedoms are not only being manipulated, but are being absolutely throttled by the fear of recrimination of a most personal nature. No tin foil hats here, people. This is the way it is in America at this sad moment in our history

Our troops may not realize it, but lately they are only fighting for 50% of America's freedom.

RIP: Johnny Ramone

Godspeed, Johnny

RIP: Johnny Ramone

Johnny Ramone has died at the age of 55. Losing a five-year battle against prostate cancer, he died in his sleep at his Los Angeles home yesterday afternoon. He was surrounded by family and friends. Along with his wife, Linda Cummings, friends including Pearl Jam rocker Eddie Vedder, singer Rob Zombie, Lisa Marie Presley, Pete Yorn, Vincent Gallo and Talia Shire were gathered at Ramone's bedside yesterday.

Annan: Iraq War Was Illegal

Annan: Iraq War Was Illegal

From a BBC World News Interview with Kofi Annan:

Owen Bennet-Jones: So-you don't think there was legal authority for the war?

Kofi Annan: I have stated clearly that it was not in conformity with the Security Council - with the UN Charter.

Jones: It was illegal?

Annan: Yes, if you wish.

LINK TO INTERVIEW TEXT

LINK TO VIDEO OF INTERVIEW

Edwards: No draft with John Kerry presidency

Edwards: No draft with John Kerry presidency

"There will be no draft when John Kerry is president."

--Senator John Edwards, speaking in Parkersburg, W.V. yesterday, when asked whether the draft would be reinstated

Theocracy Watch: Pennsylvania Speaking Tour

Theocracy Watch: Pennsylvania Speaking Tour

Are We Becoming a Theocracy?
How Dominion Theology Is Subverting the U.S. Constitution

Beginning this Saturday in Pittsburgh, PA, Joan Bokaer of the Theocracy Watch website, along with a team of volunteers, will be on the road, making presentations meant to inform people in Pennsylvania and New Jersey about the disturbing rise of the Religious Right in the Republican Party. In this talk, the speakers examine dominionism in U.S. government, tracking the key players in this movement and exposing their plan to remove the barriers between church and state and replace the U.S. Constitution with Biblical law. Joan’s meticulously researched evidence—in the form of congressional voting records, party platforms, speeches, legislation, and media reports—illustrates just how dramatically their seizure-by-stealth of much of the political system has succeeded.

The speaking tour schedule is here.

NBC Won't Have DNC Revisiting Bush Interview

NBC Won't Have DNC Revisiting Bush Interview

They won't play partisan politics...and maybe they figure it was damning enough for poor George the first time around. -wink-

NBC's lawyers are working on rendering silent the "Meet the Press" footage used within this DNC ad. CBS has not yet said if they will or will not ask the DNC to cease the use of the "60 Minutes" footage with Ben Barnes in the same ad.

Progressive Leaders Endorse Kerry, not Nader

Nader's Top Endorsers from 2000 Urge
"Swing States" Support for Kerry

The swing states are getting a clear message from top Progressive leaders. In a recent proclamation, the message is:

Vote for Kerry, not Nader.

See a partial list of signers here.
These are not pantywaist progressives.
These progressives are the real deal. Among them are Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Cornel West, Rabbi Michael Lerner, and Norman Solomon.
They're the big guns of progressive politics and they are stressing the necessity of strategic voting in swing states this time around.

Meanwhile, that progressive-hugging fellow (grin), Jeb Bush, is trying his hardest to give his brother a "leg-up" on the election by overseeing a senior Republican-appointed official ordering Nader's name reinstated on the Florida ballot.

Bush's Failure

Bush's Failure
Iraq Storms Toward Tragedy

Ahman Mohammad, his chubby, 20-year-old face scarred with burn marks, his arms charred to the bone, lies on a blood-stained bed at Karkh Hospital and tries to make sense of the day’s horror, etched in his mind like a Hieronymus Bosch painting.

"Human beings were piled one on top of the other like pieces of meat," he says, shivering. "I’m all choked up with shock. I saw it with my own eyes."

Today's Scotsman editorial documents the many failures on the Iraq war, and recommends:
-The administrations in the US and Britain need to focus on Iraq as their number-one priority
-Elections must go ahead as soon as possible, in order to isolate the insurgency.
-The security situation in Baghdad must be stabilised as soon as possible. If that means more coalition troops being deployed, so be it.

The Scotsman also has a piece by Borzou Orzou Daragahi (in Baghdad) about distraught Iraqis, who are are blaming the US as more innocent blood is shed. Hossein Ali Hossein is a 41 year-old train driver who was sitting in a tea shop when an explosion occurred. He said: "This was a peaceful, modest lower-middle-class neighbourhood where everyone cared about everyone. I was born here. This explosion has changed everything in this neighbourhood forever."

Last, at the Scotsman, Colin Freeman gives us a brutally honest assessment of the lie "turn-over of sovereignty" has become. Iraq is listing towards total anarchy, and the fact that US troops regularly give the enemy an easy hiding--killing scores, sometimes hundreds at a time--is no comfort.

The bullish confidence of George W. Bush boasting of his successes at the election rally podiums is startling in contrast to the news coming out of Iraq.

K Street: Exclusiveness of American Avarice

K Street: Exclusiveness of American Avarice

While you shell out your hard-earned tax dollars to the Federal government, the fat cats of K Street hire the washed-up Republican Congressmen who took major corporate contributions for many years, ensuring a continuity of the great mammonite partnership-- the Republican/Corporate oligarchy.

They have plans for your tax dollars and they don't
care what your ideology might be.
It's not about you or your democratic freedom.
It's about their power and their agenda.

Seven figures isn't too bad for a position with the K Street Project, a GOP-led effort to persuade lobbying firms to hire Republicans in their top positions.
Democrats are virtually persona non grata.

Go K Street.

Maybe we'll soon see more tax breaks that encourage businesses to buy Humvees for delivery vehicles.

Woo-hoo. Celebrate.

Dan Rather Isn't Running for President

This is not Dan Rather

Dan Rather Isn't Running for President

I think Dan Rather should ask Marian Carr Knox, the 86-year old retired Ellington AFB secretary who worked for Lt. Col. Jerry Killian to give him an exclusive interview. I have a feeling she'd be a fascinating woman. If there's a mea culpa due to the American people over this memo authenticity flap (and I think there may be), it could be offered with a healthy dose of 'first-hand witness'. She might be characterized by those who wish to destroy her credibility as a sweet but confused old lady, but I think most Americans would love to see her side of the story.

In the LA Times, Lt Col Killian's son Gary D. Killian ('bless his heart') is trying to impugn Marian Carr Knox's credibility, saying:

"I had more time to talk to my father and know what he thought about those things than Ms. Carr, bless her heart."

I don't buy this sugared-up line of thought at all. I believe there are plenty of things we discuss at work that we never carry home to our children and our spouse. (Unless we're incredibly obsessed with our careers).

The story is a circus. Killian's son admits to being partisan (toward Bush) and so does Marian Carr (anti-Bush).

Ben Barnes' daughter thinks he lied, but she admits to having a strained relationship with her father. (It makes you thankful for having a good family relationship. Hell hath no fury like a daughter scorned).

The Bush campaign and the bloggers who love them best have been successful in getting the media to blur the actual content of Ben Barnes' message (he got Bush into the Guard so he could avoid Vietnam) with the Dan Rather memo circus.

Editor and Publisher reveals a disturbing story, leading me to believe that someone may have been trying to manipulate CBS (not that CBS shouldn't have known better):

USA Today has revealed that it, too, received letters and memos purportedly written in the early 1970s by Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, Bush's former commander in the Texas National Guard.

USA Today, like CBS, has refused to say how it got them, beyond saying that it was "from a person with knowledge of Texas Air National Guard operations. The person refused to be identified out of fear of retaliation. It is unclear where the the documents, if they are real, had been kept in the intervening three decades."

This may or may not be the same person who leaked them to CBS. Like the CBS documents they are copies, not originals.

See:

USA TODAY: Amid criticism, CBS stands by its reports

USA TODAY: Memo debate eclipses content

The World Is Drifting Toward Tragedy with Bush

The World Is Drifting Toward Tragedy with Bush

"Today, we heard more of the same distortions from the President about the situation in Iraq. George W. Bush keeps saying that things are getting better even when we all know that's just not true. The fact is, no matter what he says, all of us can see for ourselves what's happening in Iraq - we can see it on the front pages and on the nightly news. But why would we expect George Bush to level with us about Iraq? He never has. So I'll be straight with you: things are getting worse. More than a thousand Americans have been killed. Instability is rising. Violence is spreading. Extremism is growing. There are now havens for terrorists that weren't there before. And the Pentagon has even admitted that entire regions of Iraq are now controlled by insurgents and terrorists. The situation is serious and we need a president who will set a new direction and be straight with the American people."

--John F. Kerry 9-14-04

Kristen Breitweiser Endorses Kerry

9/11 Widow Kristen Brietweiser
Endorses John Kerry

"I don’t really know what happened to him. I don’t know whether he jumped or he choked to death on smoke. I don’t know whether he sat curled up in a corner watching the carpet melt in front of him, knowing that his own death was soon to come or if he was alive long enough to be crushed by the buildings when they collapsed. These are the images that haunt me at night when I put my head to rest on his pillow."

--Kristen Breitweiser, speaking about her husband Ronald, who died on 9/11/01

I believe this is one of the most important endorsements John Kerry could have received. Kristen Breitweiser has often been the topic of my conversations here at Iddybud. She was featured in my second and third anniversary 9/11 blog presentations.I respect her greatly for having had the fortitude and persistence in speaking out for the 9/11 Commission at a time when the Bush administration was doing nearly everything in their political power to put a stop to it. Kristen asked the right questions. She expected answers, as any of us women who might have lost their husband or family member might expect the government to answer our questions.

Kristen wanted to know why her husband Ronald had to die that beautiful horrible day in September.
She wanted to know if our governmental agencies were doing their job on that fateful morning.
She only wanted to know.

Kristen has said she finds it strange that Bush would pin his re-election hopes on an event like 9/11 because she thinks it was the chief failure of his administration. She said the highly critical Sept. 11 commission report should be enough to make any politician think twice about invoking the attacks.

"I don't understand how 9/11 can be a platform for his re-election," said Breitweiser, who voted for Bush in 2000. "Every day that goes by since Sept. 12 I see as a squandered opportunity by the administration in fixing problems everyone knows need to be fixed."

Freedom Thieves: Shays/Meehan/McCain/Bush/Kerry

Freedom Thieves:
Shays/Meehan/
McCain/Feingold
Bush/Kerry

Most of the Shays-Meehan campaign finance reform favored politicians' organized interests over individual liberty.

Suing the FEC over 527s reveals these Congresspeople as Americans with a divested interest in seeing my speech--and yours--cut down to silence.

Special interests belong to American individuals--and not to the members of Congress as a cartel.

If their lawsuit is successful, these 527 groups will be forced to register as political action committees and thus be confined to using hard money only. If 527s are outlawed, there will be other ways for these groups to form legally.

My emphasis here? I firmly believe that all these politicians are doing is showing us their contempt for American voices having a power equal to that of Congresspeople's favorite lobbyists and corporate contributors.

An oligarchy cannot stand when individual voices break down the shrouded concentration of corporate power through individual freedom of speech. In this case, "money" is the same as "freedom" for individuals as much as "money" is "freedom" to corporate special interests.

They've wasted our hard-earned tax money and become embedded with the lobbyists of Washington D.C. for too long. Their regrettable use of pork-barrel spending to lure PAC money has made political competition nearly impossible.

American individuals have found a powerful political voice in the 527 option. I'm not surprised that members of Congress and President Bush and his challenger John Kerry would be intimidated.

But to see them sue to cut off our individual voices--it's criminal. It runs against all tenets of freedom and liberty. Free speech can harm no one except the most corrupt Representatives, when all is said and done. Americans should be trusted to form their own common-sense opinions in an atmosphere of sheer freedom.

I pray the Supreme Court will find a way to legally accomodate the American individual and not the D.C. cartel.

See this editorial that praises Bush for his "progressive" stand on 527s. What is wrong with this picture? It's thievery of American freedom in the name of bipartisanship. Why is this one of the only issues on which Congresspeople can "get along" when it runs contrary to individual freedom?

Have you noticed that neither Bush nor Kerry has asked their supporters to discontinue 527 activity immediately?

Russia Going Back to Authoritarian Rule

Russia's Democracy: Another Casualty of the Iraq War

During Ronald Reagan's presidency, the spell of Communism was broken and the Berlin wall came down.

During Dubya Bush's presidency, Russia turned back toward Soviet rule.

It's nothing surprising. Russia's been sliding back toward Soviet-style rule for years now.

What should be shocking is the fact that our president watched Russia slide back toward its ocean of Soviet illness and has done nothing to abate the undertow. The sands of democracy erode beneath the Russian people's feet.

The Bush administration has squandered many opportunities to keep Russia from sliding back toward authoritarian rule. What was our foreign policy toward Russia? Did we even have one?

The leverage the U.S. had before 9/11 was softened like mashed potatoes by the (greatly restrained) State Department in order to attempt to get Russia's cooperation on Bush's Manichaean war on terror. The Bush administration deliberately looked the other way, knowing fully well that Chechnya was a victim of Russia's cruel denial of human rights.

Russia agreed to help us in Afghanistan. In the tradition of Gorbachev and Yeltsin, Putin had been consistently pursuing wide-ranging security cooperation with dominant Western powers--especially the U.S. Then came Bush's disastrous Iraq war, which contributed greatly to a near-total breakdown of trust of the Bush administration--in over half of domestic America and abroad.

Bush's dogmatic insistence and race to unilaterally take out Saddam Hussein caused him to proceed with blinders, neglecting a diplomacy that was sorely needed and inviting distrust of America and inviting right-wing radicals-East and West- to follow America's pre-emptive lead. Putin recognized the Iraq war (and rightly so) as a war evocative of the Cold War-era rather than a new and necessary type of warfare where we don't rub out regimes, but instead rub out terrorist networks.

That breakdown in trust has led to Russia's falling away from democracy and contributes to European instability which endangers our nation's interests in Central Asia. It has lead many in the world to believe that the Bush administration's National Security strategy did not take into serious consideration the fact that the Berlin Wall had fallen in the first place. It's no wonder all nations of the world (except for three) hope there is a change in American leadership this November.

As historians look back with retrospect, Bush's greatest historic error will have been his alliance with Neoconservatives--rabid Russia haters who hide themselves in 'freedom-fighters' clothing while placing Israel's interests above America's best interests.

As punishment for their refusal to join America in the Neoconservative war on Iraq, Russia was made to appear, by frothing Bushite propaganda, as little more than a thief-nation which robbed in the name of the U.N.'s Oil-for-Food program (when myriad nations, including the US, reaped untold benefit from the same easily-corruptible program).

Any morally-trained child could tell you that, if you alienate a friend in need, that friend will slide into despair. If we hold liberty as our American mainstay, the people of Russia should have been considered friends. We should have acted, in accordance with the America's best interests, to ensure that the people of Russia remained free. As overwhelmingly troubled as the old U.S.S.R. was, Ronald Reagan understood that, unless you employed diplomacy with hope and good faith, you will never forward America's best interests.

Colin Powell has been kept on a short leash by the president and allowed himself to be used badly in the lead-up to the Iraq war (in the name of loyalty to the president). Shamefully, Powell has been the most-wasted American asset.

While I truly believe Ronald Reagan acted in his nation's best interests, I believe Bush has acted with contempt for America's best interests, or at best, Bush has simply been an incapable leader.

This is only one glaringly dreadful consequence of failure of American leadership. Faltering US/international relationships and the quickly disintegrating Israeli-Palestinian relationship, the rise of Fundamentalist popularily in Muslim states, and the growth industry for new terrorists are more examples of failure in American leadership.

Not only has Bush admitted the war on terror is unwinnable, we've lost Russia's democratic promise. Putin has, in effect, coopted and encouraged the right-wing flank of the Western political spectrum and the Bush administration is a beautiful example.

Wartime restrictions on citizens' freedoms in the US have allowed Putin and his pro-Kremlin media, through America's example, to recast Russia’s domestic dictatorship of the law as a standard towards which the US itself has allegedly turned.

Bush-supporters are afraid to look into the sterile eyes of the truth, because what would stare back at them would shatter their frozen, false beliefs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
See Washington Monthly for Robert Kagan's statement on the issue of democracy in Russia.

Andrew Sullivan on Media Wars 2004

Andrew Sullivan on Media Wars 2004

"...it's real and dynamic and open. It's democratic. And if you're interested in politics, it keeps you looking forward to opening your laptop each morning."

-Andrew Sullivan

Andrew Sullivan has written what I consider to be a brilliant piece on the shift in political influence via modern media wars. Sullivan cites three genuinely new power-brokers in American politics and culture in this election season. They are cable news, the blogosphere, and "527s".

Question:

• Bloggers: Andrew believes you've arrived. How does it feel to sit at the wheel of democracy?
• Do you believe you have more of a political voice with the blogosphere and 527s?
• Do you believe your chosen political "side" is doing a good job in the mainstream arena?
• Any other comments?

Political Ads--Bill Hillsman's Views

Political Ads-
Bill Hillsman's Views

There is an interview about political ads at Mother Jones that I found to be fascinating. The interviewee is Bill Hillsman, who made his name in political advertising with spots (featuring candidates such as Paul Wellstone and Jesse Ventura) that bucked the tired old formulas and really got people talking.

Excerpt:

MJ.com: Which presidential campaign do you expect will do a better job reaching swing voters?

BH: I think Bush’s campaign will be better at it. They were in 2000, the Republicans were absolutely better at that during the 2002 midterm elections, and Bush’s people are just better at it than Kerry’s people. In fact, I don’t think Kerry wins unless some independent groups come in and do a good job with those voters. But if you look at what’s been going on so far with the Media Fund people and the MoveOn people, they can’t get out of the way of themselves. They don’t really know how to do ads that are aimed at these swing voters because they’re not those types of people. So they sort of do these “anybody but Bush” ads that have no real relevance to independents or swing voters. All they’re really doing is spending a lot of money to talk to their base, which is already convinced.

Question:

• What kind of Kerry ads would you imagine swing voters would be drawn to?
• What issues would best motivate swing voters to vote for Kerry in November?

For Whom Would Sun Tzu Vote?

For Whom Would Sun Tzu Vote?

"Bush's campaign has mastered at least one of Sun Tzu's ancient rules of warfare: When you are weak, appear strong."

Many people on the left believe that John Kerry should have answered the president this summer by saying no, he would not have gone to war in Iraq, knowing what he knows today. Writer Steve Sebelius suggests it would have shown that Kerry has learned something, and is putting it into practice.

I often complain that our current president makes many errors of judgement, then stands by them, even when we all can see clear evidence to the contrary.

This is not proof of an inherently wise leader.

This causes me to ask the question:

The Bush campaign points to and mocks John Kerry, who, in real time, is putting into practice all he's learning before the eyes of the world, regardless of their characterization of him as "flip-flopper".

* See my comments about Sun Tzu and Bush on August 29th

Question:

• Take some time and study the Art of War.
• Who, in the eyes of Sun Tzu, do you believe would truly be the wiser of the two leaders?
• Why?

Bloggers' Pie Still in the Sky

Bloggers' Pie Still in the Sky
Oh, how I identify.

The Washington Times Insider features an article about the money (or lack thereof) being made in the world of blogging.

At Raw Story, Avery Walker has some advice for the overrated blogosphere.

"I love oxblog, wonkette, iddybud and American Amnesia as much as the next guy. More, in fact. These people find stories that have otherwise slipped through the cracks and follow them with a tenacity that print journalists sorely lack. But we have to remember that these people have some of the best blogs out there. Many of these bloggers are, in fact, writers and journalists who use their blog as a way of expressing themselves outside of the restrictions of print media.

*Thanks, Avery.*

LA Times Credits Bloggers/Exposes Rightwing Media Chain

LA Times Credits Bloggers/Exposes Rightwing Media Chain

In the LA Times today, from a story titled
"No Disputing It: Blogs Are Major Players-Netizen's late-night post questioning CBS claims about Bush's service spreads at warp speed.":

"It was amazing Thursday to watch the documents story go from FreeRepublic.com, a bastion of right-wing lunacy, to Drudge to the mainstream media in less than 12 hours. That's not to say the documents didn't deserve examination. But apparently the entire thing was cooked up by a couple of amateurs on Free Republic. The speed with which it moved was breathtaking."

--Jim Jordan, a strategist for independent Democratic groups opposed to Bush

When we speak of the right wing "conspiracy", we can clearly see it's no conspiracy at all. As a matter of fact, mainstream media plays directly into the steamroller we tend to mislabel as the "right wing conspiracy".

Last week when the CBS forgery story was sprung, I visited one of my favorite blogs called The Moderate Voice, which is written by veteran journalist Joe Gandelman. (Joe also writes for Dean's World).

Joe had quoted the NY Post's house-neocon John Podhoretz as saying:

"THE populist revolution against the so-called mainstream media continues. Yesterday, the citizen journalists who produce blogs on the Internet — and their engaged readers — engaged in the wholesale exposure of what appears to be a presidential-year dirty trick against George W. Bush."

My thoughts at the time were:

I think he's mainly talking about the infamous squeaky wheel known as Matt Drudge (who gets his "tips" from God-knows where, but it's surely steeped in rightwing poop).

While I do not begrudge Drudge (bad pun intended), I think the marvelous "populist revolution" of which Podhoretz speaks is not worth much more than the gossip-mill that spits it out.
Drudge is the new Paul Revere, except he runs through the wires screaming "The lefties are coming! The lefties are coming!"

The thing that is most troubling is the emphasis and weight placed on Drudge's gossip-train by our mainstream media.

How low have we sunk in American journalism?
Have our journalists become as incurious as Bush himself?

This chain-of-events is all too familiar.
The left dares to speak out against King George.
Suddenly, a major story pops up on the Drudge report and it's suddenly scandal!

Key word: "suddenly".

Mainstream media, in their race to keep up with the gossip train, falls incredibly short of fairness, balance, and truth.
For instance, ask yourself why this forgery story is on the front pages instead of the real issues facing America at this moment?
Perhaps it's a story as old as time. Sensationalism sells.
Sensationalism isn't going to unite America, though. Nor will it create an opportunity for Americans to make serious choices.
The only "revolution" I see is the right getting one step closer to making America a nation ruled by one party.
Ben Franklin would spin in his grave like chicken rotisserie if he could hear Podhoretz ramble on.

My point?
Until the mainstream media learns it cannot compete with gossip generated by bloggers, they will be considered just another arm of the right wing.

The mainstream media cheapens America. Journalists and editors all over America serve to dumb down the public by allowing the right wing mouth-machine to hijack the great American discussion.

David Broder recently wrote about the fact that neither Bush nor Kerry are presenting a vision of the future in this presidential campaign of distortion. It has been nearly impossible for John Kerry to talk about America's future when the Bush campaign, the right wing mouth-machine, and the mainstream media facilitate a tornado of diversion.

Outside of narrow talking points, I have not seen the mainstream television media give voice to Kerry or Edwards' bigger ideas. It's as if the executives of mainstream media are intentionally and heavy-handedly keeping those ideas from reaching Americans.

The devil is in the details, in this particular case- a "th" on a typewriter. How easily Americans are being distracted from the most serious issues they've ever faced by the media's hyperfocus on Dan Rather.

Newsmax, a right wing media haven, is saying today in their headlines that the CBS flap will be the factor that causes Kerry to lose the November election.

If an election is lost upon the predication that there's a dubious chance that a document may be fake as opposed to a President's lies being responsible for sending over 1000 troops to unnecessary death, then God help America.

I am happy to say that I am a blogger who speaks to the bigger picture and the realistic issues, and I always will. If visionary bloggers never get a second glance from the LA Times or the NY Post, it's their loss. Suffering from a cultural attention-deficit-disorder as we do, believe it's also America's loss.

To date, Syracuse.com has been the only mainstream media outlet who has appreciated some of my thoughts. I am grateful to them for the opportunity to get my message out.

If anyone is asking "Where is the 'Drudge' of moderate-to-left America?", my answer is the same as yours. The mainstream media loves Drudge. They've loved him since the Clinton scandal.

In the words of James Wolcott:

Unlike Bush, Kerry can't delegate his aggression to Cheney, Fox News, and a yapping band of attack poodles; the Democratic party doesn't have that same threshing infrastructure. He has to go it almost alone and run the risk of being too forceful and coming across as "unlikeable" in the eyes of gardening clubs like The Capital Gang. Pundits prefer their Democrats soft and emasculated, it makes them so much easier to fillet.

I know there are serious and intelligent voices out there. So does the mainstream media. It's obvious that they don't care. They've been Drudged-down and they're taking American trust down the toilet of mainstream journalism along with them.

I thank the LA Times and Peter Wallsten for this story. I think they've done a good job of telling it like it is. They remain one of my favorites for their fine writing and editorial staff.

"Just Like Bush"-A Child's Tale

"Just Like Bush"-
A Child's Tale

Part Three:

So, children...
After the terror in Beslan, the Kremlin reached for harsh levers, refusing to negotiate its way out of the Chechen war for fear it would look weak and embolden other separatist movements in Russia.

George W. Bush would never have negotiated with terror. Why should Vladimir?

So 100,000 more Chechens were slaughtered and 100,000 more terrorists were born.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The moral of the story:
No one wins when you rage, with hatred and bloodthirst, against a tactic.

Learn To Love

Learn to love what you do, or stop.

9/11/04

On 9-11-

My prayers go out to all who lost loved ones three years ago today.
In their memory, I reprint the 2002 Congressional testimony of Kristen Breitweiser, who lost her beloved husband Ronald on that dreadful day.
Listen to Kristen's voice.
It took quite a while for Kristen's voice to be heard. After many Stonewalls and U-Turns, the Jersey girl got what she and other 9/11 families had hoped for.

"The mortal citizens of a planet are praying right now that we will bear in mind, better than ever before, that no kind of bomb ever built will extinguish hatred."

-Barbara Kingsolver / 9-23-01

Statement of Kristen Breitweiser, Co-Chairperson September 11 Advocates, Concerning the Joint 9/11 Inquiry
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
Reprinted from September 18, 2002


I would like to thank the families of the 3000 victims for allowing me to represent them, here today, before the Joint Intelligence Committee. It is a tremendous honor. Testifying before this committee is a privilege and an enormous responsibility that I do not take lightly. I will do my best not to disappoint the families or the memories of their loved ones.

Toward that end, I ask the members present here today to find in my voice the voices of all’ of the family members of the 3000 victims of September 11th. I would also ask for you to see in my eyes, the eyes of the more than 10,000 children who are now forced to grow up without the love, affection, and guidance of a mother or a father who was tragically killed on September 11.

I would now like to thank the members of the Joint Intelligence Committee, Eleanor Hill, and her staff for giving the families this opportunity to be heard. It has been an excruciating and overwhelming 12 months, and it is now time for our words and our concerns to be heard by you.

My three-year old daughter’s most enduring memory of her father will be placing flowers on his empty grave. My most enduring memory of my husband, Ronald Breitweiser, will be his final words to me, “Sweets, I’m fine, I don’t want you to worry, I love you.” Ron uttered those words while he was watching men and women jump to their deaths from the top of Tower One. Four minutes later, his Tower was hit by United Flight 175. I never spoke to my. husband, Ron, again.

I don’t really know what happened to him. I don’t know whether he jumped or he choked to death on smoke. I don’t know whether he sat curled up in a corner watching the carpet melt in front of him, knowing that his own death was soon to come or if he was alive long enough to be crushed by the buildings when they collapsed. These are the images that haunt me at night when I put my head to rest on his pillow.

I do know that the dream I had envisioned, that I so desperately needed to believe—that he was immediately turned to ash and floated up to the heavens, was simply not his fate. I know this because his wedding band was recovered from ground zero with a part of his left arm. The wedding band is charred and scratched, but still perfectly round and fully intact. I wear it on my right hand, and it will remain there until the day I die.

September 11th was the devastating result of a catalogue of failures on behalf of our government and its agencies. My husband and the approximately 3000 others like him went to work and never came home. But, were any of our governmental agencies doing their job on that fateful morning? Perhaps, the carnage and devastation of September 11th speaks for itself in answering this question.

SEE REMAINDER OF STATEMENT HERE

~~~~~~~~~~



REALITY: Who would think you'd see a sign like this at the site of the World Trade Center just three years after the 9/11 tragedy?

~~~~~~~~~~

Commending an AP Politics Writer

Commending an AP Politics Writer
This is the way it should be done.

I highly respect Pete Yost from the Associated Press for quoting Dubya Bush at a West Virginia rally yesterday and then following up on Bush's biting rhetoric with some facts. We just don't see enough honest journalism like this anymore.

THE RHETORIC: "The newest wrinkle is that Sen. Kerry has now decided we are spending too much money in Iraq even though he criticized us earlier for not spending enough," Bush said. "One thing about Senator Kerry's position is clear. ... If he had his way, Saddam Hussein would still be in power and would still be a threat to our security and to the world."

THE REALITY: Kerry has not chided Bush for spending too much money on the war but has criticized the president for engaging in "a war of choice" without obtaining more financial support from allies. The war has cost nearly $200 billion that, according to Kerry, could have been used for domestic programs.

Mr. Yost wrote about the fact that Zell Miller was campaigning in West Virginia with Dubya.
Yost followed up with this fact:

THE REALITY: Miller's keynote address at the Republican convention galvanized delegates and left Democrats fuming over what they called an angry, inaccurate rant by the Georgia Democrat.

Does Lack of Vision Perpetuate American Fear?

"Fear is not the natural state of civilized people."

--Aung San Suu Kyi

Does Lack of Vision Perpetuate American Fear?
James Wolcott believes so, and explains how our cultural attention-deficit disorder stymies our progress
[LINK]

"Now there are lots of reasons bruited about for why this election is dragging so much dead baggage.
• The group narcissism of the baby boomers.
• The unhealed wounds of Vietnam.
• An attempt to misdirect attention from a war we're in the process of losing (Iraq) to thrash about in the big muddy of a war we lost thirty years ago (Vietnam).

All very plausible explanations. One or all may be true.

But I also think that the future is what this election wants to avoid. The country now has such short attention span that it can't/won't concentrate on the future, finds it too taxing, would rather back up into the future than face it honestly."

--James Wolcott

~~~~~~~~~~~~

See: The Long Now Project, a cultural institution, where the necessity of mechanism or myth which encourages the long view and the taking of long-term responsibility is stressed. 'Long-term' is measured at least in centuries.

"Jesus-Loserman"

This one's making the rounds. I found it on Daily Kos.
It's from Mad Magazine.
I call it 'Jesus-Loserman'.

William Saletan: Wrong-Way Bush

Wrong-Way Bush
In the war on terror, the worst defense is a bad offense.
There isn't much we can do now about the damage the Iraq war has done to our campaigns against al-Qaida and WMD proliferation. But there is something we can do at election time about a president who persists in running the wrong way despite all pleas and evidence: We can tackle him. LINK/SLATE

Bush: Cowardice, No WMD, Nat'l Guard Updates

Bush: Guided By Moral Cowardice

From The Hill-
Bush’s National Guard years-
His moral cowardice has guided him all along
By Josh Marshall
The same sort of moral cowardice that led him to support the Vietnam War but decide it wasn’t for him, run companies into the ground and let others pay the bill, play gutter politics but run for the hills when someone asked him to say it to their face — those are the same qualities that led the president to lie the country into war, to fail to prepare for the aftermath and then to refuse to take responsibility for any of it when the bill started to come due.

Iraq Survey Group Verdict: No WMD

Nothing on their hands except...

The final [no WMD] verdict in the long-awaited report from the Iraq Survey Group will prove a great embarrassment for both leaders:
George W. Bush and Tony Blair.

National Guard Headlines

• Which is more cowardly? Bush's Alleged Service or Recently-Alleged Lack of Service?
• CBS convinced of 60 Minutes Guard document authenticity even though Bush campaign is trying hard to make it look like they're forgeries.
• Bush's Lost Year by James Fallows
• Now It's Bush's Turn to Squirm by Sidney Blumenthal
• Diagnosing Dubya-The president who mistook his wife for a hat by Timothy Noah
• Sen. John F. Kerry to Address National Guard Association Conference Sept 16
• Texas National Guard has first Iraq fatality

UPDATE:
• Daily Kos: TANG Typewriter Follies; Wingnuts Wrong
• The Moderate Voice: Were The CBS Documents On George Bush's Military Service Forged?
• At The Angry Liberal: A good summary of the latest articles
--C. Murphy Archibald, who worked on the Blount campaign, said that in the fall of 1972, Bush frequently was late for work on the Alabama campaign and often bragged about how much he drank the night before. (USA Today)

Kerry: Bush is No Good Samaritan

Kerry: Bush is No Good Samaritan

"Four years ago, George Bush came to office calling himself a compassionate conservative. Well, in the story of the Good Samaritan we are told of two men who pass by or cross to the other side of the street when they come upon a robbed and a beaten man.

They felt compassion, but there were no deeds. Then the Good Samaritan gave both his heart and his help.

It is clear: For four years, George W. Bush may have talked about compassion, but he's walked right by. He's seen people in need, but he's crossed over to the other side of the street."

--John Kerry, speaking today at the National Baptist Convention in New Orleans, LA

Dog Does WHAT?!?

Dog Does WHAT?!?



You've heard of 'dog bites man', but......click on this photo and you'll see what this dog did.

Bushes Attacked Nat'l Guard Service of Others

The Bushes Attacked National Guard Service of Others

From The Daily Mislead:
As reported in the August 23, 1988 Los Angeles Times, then Vice President George H.W. Bush's campaign co-chairman John Sununu went on national television to impugn an opponent's dealings with the National Guard during Vietnam. Sununu specifically claimed Sen. Lloyd Bentsen (D-TX) had improperly helped get his son into the Texas National Guard during Vietnam. Bentsen's son served in the very same National Guard unit at the very same time as George W. Bush. The Bush campaign's attacks came just days after Bush's allies on Capitol Hill launched a vicious attack on Gov. Michael Dukakis (D-MA) for receiving a draft deferment during the Korean War. At the time of the coordinated attack, George W. Bush was serving as a senior adviser to his father's campaign.

[A further irony is that Texas politician Ben Barnes now admits he helped both young men get into the Guard]

A Moral Course? NeoCons Willing to Overlook Terror

A Moral Course?
NeoCons Are Willing to
Overlook Terror

At TomPaine.com, Robert Dreyfuss details an incredibly hypocritical statement from semi-retired NeoCon Richard Pipes and a Guardian article pointing to the "American Committee for Peace in Chechnya" (ACPC), whose members include Richard Perle, Kenneth Adelman, Midge Decter, Frank Gaffney, Bruce Jackson, Michael Ledeen, James Woolsey, etc.

In both articles, we see Bush's Manichaean war of great moral consistency fall flat as a pancake.

In their rush to do as much damage as they can to Russia, these NeoCons are perfectly willing to look past the terror that killed hundreds of Beslan's babies last week. They're the blame-Russia-first crowd.

While it is a worthy cause to support liberty for the decent people of Chechnya, it is politically devastating to Bush's moral cause to use a double standard. After the past week's terror attacks on Russia, we can no longer look past the fact that their innocent people are being targeted by the same terror that is being practiced throughout the Middle East.

If we are Americans are a truly moral people, we will stand behind Putin in his time of weakness rather than proclaiming to the world that we wish to beat him down to nothing as everyday Russian citizens face the fiery trials of terror.

That would make us the most immoral poopyheads in the world.
That may be what the NeoCons want to be, but I don't think they are working in America's best interest, anyhow.

Allow me to say it loud and clear.
They are working in Israel's best interests.

We need to get them the hell out of OUR White House.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

James Wolcott's new blog is a joy to read.
I'm so glad he's become a blogger:

"Podhoretz and his fellow neocons will not be satisfied until there are as many world wars as Police Academy sequels."

Mr. Wolcott's witty commentary on American culture and a Canadian NeoCon who plots wars for those tacky U.S. hominids:

"[David]Frum, Canadian, has little understanding of the manicured grasp [Kitty]Kelley has on the sordid imagination of America. He has spent too much time with his coauthor Richard Perle plotting to grease America into neverending war to understand what a destructive dynamo in a bouffant is Ms. Kelley.

Gee, Thanks, George Pataki

Gee, Thanks, George Pataki

N.Y. is the most heavily-taxed state in the Union.

Go Republicans.

We Are No Safer Today Than 9/11/01

We Are No Safer Today Than 9/11/01

The LA Times Editorial staff puts it bluntly.
(I love the LA Times' editorial attitude.)

Regardless of what we think of Dr. Horror's Dick Cheney's statement yesterday, there is one clear-as-a-bell truth that has popped up its head and is waving to us all.

That truth is a'ringing and singin' throughout all of political creation this morning:

We are no safer now than we were on 9/11/01.

Howard Dean got a lot of -gasps- when he bluntly stated, on the morning of December 14, 2003, that America was no safer with Saddam Hussein caught.

If Osama bin Laden is snatched up in the next few weeks, I'll be equally blunt in joining with Steven Simon, co-author of the new book, "The Age of Sacred Terror":

"bin Laden has successfully launched a global insurgency with franchises that operate autonomously. The cancer has metastasized and it's doing fine on its own. Osama bin Laden's done his job well."

Here's a challenge to any of you. Give me real and true examples of how America has been made safer since the dreaded day the towers fell. Give me something tangible...no idealistic visions of liberty sugarplums and freedom fairies.

Shall I repeat that in case someone didn't quite get it the first time?
Hello??
We are not safer now than we were on 9/11.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The NYT Editorial beats on Dr. Horror Dick Cheney for making the statement at all. I've got to say that I was not surprised at all to hear Cheney give strong voice to the threats that face America.

Threats of terror are real and Dick knows we'll be hit again. While Bush twiddled his thumbs in Texas, an overwhelming blow to America was planned, then executed without a hitch. While we got pretty color-coded threat levels, Osama bin Laden got hundreds of thousands of inspired recruits.

The Bush administration has not stemmed the tide of terror and I predict that Europe's stability will soon be rocked and devastated by terror right under our noses...while the president and vice-president tell us there should be no priority on treaties or global organizations. While Bush and Cheney tell us we should stay the course in Iraq, where we are losing more and more control by the day.

Rather than wringing our hands over Dr. Horror's Dick Cheney's words, we should be crying out for good-faith re-engagement with the world before it's too late for not only Europe, but for all civilized human beings.

This administration is hopeless.

Plainly and simply hopeless.

I Can See Our Playgrounds Bleeding

I Can See Our
Playgrounds Bleeding

Our legislators have completely failed us.
The 10-year old federal assault weapons ban is set to expire.

Our president can push just about any part of his agenda through his puppet House of Representatives, but when Tom DeLay really wants payback, Bush gives it to him.

This time, Tom DeLay and George W. Bush will be responsible for more dead children in the halls and grounds of our schools.



Maybe a terrorist or two hiding right here in our nation will find it much easier to get hold of the Uzis that would take out as many of us out as possible at one time.

The Great Sniper of 2002 would have loved the news. I'll bet there's other perfectly insane and depraved folks out there that are waiting to be the next Sniper of the Year. With a fancy new sub machine-gun, he could have a field day.

Buy two weapons from Beretta and get two free 15-round magazines!



Disgruntled employees---just think of how many you could take out at one time with one of these babies.



Order one now from ArmaLite Inc. and get a bayonet to go with it!

Homeland Security is a joke to our legislators and our President.
They're enabling the heavily-armed and kicking our children's safety in the ass.



The power-team of Delay and Bush are proving what they think about public safety right before your eyes. I could be holding a dead child in my arms and some of you would still be in my face telling me it's all about your (godforsaken) freedom.