Important enough to smash the silence

If you're like me, you've been looking for the email that crazy Dr. Nicholas Bartha wrote before he (allegedly) blew up his Manhattan townhouse. Thanks to Gawker, I found a copy of it. Unfortunately, it's a PDF file but it's worth a read anyway.

The guy's definitely a hardcore Republican. And he's definitely crazy-- in more than just your standard wingnut way. Or maybe it's just hypertrophied into this nutsiness.

Also, here's a New York State appeals court decision concerning his divorce. His wife filed for divorce on grounds of cruel and inhuman treatment, and was granted the divorce.

Here's Dr Bartha in action:

We affirm the determination awarding a divorce to plaintiff on grounds of cruel and inhuman treatment. Plaintiff's proof, when viewed cumulatively, established by a preponderance of the credible evidence that defendant had engaged in a course of conduct which was harmful to the plaintiff's physical and mental health, thus rendering cohabitation unsafe or improper (Domestic Relations Law § 170 [1]).

This was not a case of ordinary marital dissatisfaction or even "riotous quarrels" as defendant suggests. Defendant intentionally traumatized plaintiff, a woman of Jewish origin born in Nazi-occupied Holland, with swastika-adorned articles and notes affixed around their home, and became enraged when she removed them. He ignored her need for support and assistance while she was undergoing surgery and treatment for breast cancer (see Siczewicz v Siczewicz, 92 AD2d 915, 916 [1983], appeal dismissed 59 NY2d 968 [1983]). He systematically cut off her access to marital funds and credit as a means of psychological abuse.

What a sweetheart.

2006 Commencement Address

Stephen Colbert gave the commencement address at Knox College yesterday. It's up in full on the College's website, and it's good:

Colbert's 2006 Commencement Address

One bit:

And when you enter the workforce, you will find competition from those crossing our all-too-poorest borders. Now I know you’re all going to say, “Stephen, Stephen, immigrants built America.” Yes, and here’s the thing—it’s built now. I think it was finished in the 70s sometime. From this point it’s only a touch-up and repair job. Essentially if Congress enacts it, soon English will be the official language of America. Because if we surrender the national anthem, the next thing you know, they’ll be translating the Bible. God wrote it in English for a reason! So it could be taught in our public schools.

Reynolds Ridiculous

Glenn Reynolds, Disgusting.

I'd like to add that if Iraq-war critics were to follow Reynold's logic, then he and his cohorts calling them UnAmerican, moral lepers, etc, etc, ad nauseum -- essentially painting everyone who doesn't slavishly follow Bush a "moral monster" -- then there would be "no point in behaving morally."

And Reynolds would hate them even more, but not see how his own logic justifies it.

I'd certainly never do that, or even find it "uncontrovertibly obvious" as Reynolds does -- because I'm not unAmerican and even George W. Bush with all his many failures can't make me one.

What a moral leper Reynolds is.

Bush's Base

I heard David Brooks on PBS Newshour tonight say (in paraphrase) it was commendable that Bush stuck with his principles on immigration, rather than throwing his conservative base red meat by being tougher on enforcement.

That's one way to look at it. But I think what's actually going on is much more obvious: Bush stuck with the his primary constituency: big business and the very rich. They want cheap labor howeve they can get it, and illegal immigrants certainly work cheap.

Any other element of the Republican coalition regularly gets the shaft, but not the wealthy.

• I'm dubious if there are any real Libertarians who are Bush fans: he's consolidated power in the executive and greatly increased the police power of the government over citizens, not to mention ballooning government's size. They'd have to be masocho-libertarians (or more likely, faux libertarian Republicans like Glenn Reynolds) to stick with him.
  
  
• The hardcore fundie Republicans regularly get bones tossed their way, but he has no fear of sending them packing when the chips are down. Typical of Republican presidents, he won't go to the large DC anti-choice rally, but will make a statement over the phone.
  
  
• The paleocons get dissed regularly too (Foreign entanglements, government size, deficit among his abuse of the Reagan conservative).
  

I can't really think of a time when he's really stuck it to the very wealthy and business, especially big business, however. And, of course they are his true people:

Bush gazed around the diamond-studded $800-a-plate crowd and commented on the wealth on display.

"This is an impressive crowd - the haves and the have-mores," quipped the GOP standard-bearer. "Some people call you the elites; I call you my base."

I suppose you could call his stance on immigration standing by his principles. I call it dancing with the one who brung him.

Funny UK Politics

Beginning tonight, BBC America is airing The Thick of It, a political satire -- and a satire about the workings of politics -- that hits the mark.

Narrative political satire hardly exists on American television nowadays. There is a good satirical fake news program (The Daily Show) and a fine fake talk show (The Colbert Report), and some abysmally toothless skits performed on the likes of Saturday Night Live. None of those are really narrative programs about the workings of politics. In 2001 Comedy Central turned Stone and Parker (of South Park) loose to create That's My Bush which featured a dimwitted Texan as President. That show wasn't really about politics -- it was a satire based on the tropes of sitcoms, and nearly incidentally set in the White House. It was fairly dumb and very rarely funny about politics, though occasionally it was worth a laugh for other reasons. You'd have to reach back farther in time to come up with an American TV political satire that is about politics itself and not primarily focused on the media, as was Franken's LateLine.

As for politician satire in movies -- we Americans don't seem to do it very well anymore, either. Bulworth? I couldn't sit through it. Dave? A very bland romantic comedy with some soporific "politics" grafted on. There are many good movies with political themes (here's but one: Citizen Ruth), but few in recent times that poke fun at the general run of politics in D.C.

The Thick of It really is about politics and the people who do politics. It doesn't get laughs with jokey one-liners about how fat this minister is or how stupid that aide is (though plenty of stupidity is displayed). Shot mockumentary style, it follows the workings of a fictional government department in constant hot water with the Prime Minister, his vicious Scottish enforcer, the press, and even members of the public. .

It's the creation of Armando Iannucci, who has had a hand in quite a few funny things (Alan Partridge in various incarnations, On The Hour, and The Day Today, for instance). The cast is a treat, led by the wonderfully befuddled Chris Langham recently of the peculiarly funny series Help! and the magnficient creation that is People Like Us, in both its television and (marginally superior, to me) radio incarnations.

As might be expected, a lot of people compare The Thick of It with the 1980's classic Yes, Minister, another stellar UK political satire. They both are top-notch examples of the sitcom styles of the time applied to politics. They both have more going on than just being laugh-machines. And they develop themes in ways that US sitcoms (even the best ones) don't even attempt to. (Iannucci himself has described Thick as a cross between Yes, Minister and The Larry Sanders Show--which is not a bad description.)

So, Americans with access to BBC America, tune in tonight for the following five Friday nights at 9 pm ET, 10 pm PT for a little something you can't get at home.

I'm praying that BBC America doesn't do it's usual schedule-juggling, which can make watching a series a true headache. But, in this case, it'll be worth it. On the positive side, however, BBC America has a page with links to a slang guide and a glossary. Though each is paltry, they should help us Yanks understand the lingo a little bit better.

For Thee, Not for Me

President Bush: "'Deadlines are important,' he said. 'Deadlines help people understand there's finality, and people need to get after it, you know?'"

Deadlines: for the little people.

Not for Bush when serving up troops for slaughter in Iraq.

Weighing In

Atrios came up with a list of policies that most Democratic bloggers could support. Uggabugga
does some analysis on it from the (likely) point of view of various breeds of Republicans. Worth a look.

For my part, I find nothing objectionable in Atrios' list. I'd say "yes" to everything, and "Hell yes" to nearly everything. That's from a purely policy perspective. From a political perspective I'm sure I'd have varying opinions about what Democrats should emphasize and de-emphasize, depending on which week you ask.

Finally, Uggabugga closes with a comment I'd like to emphasize:

Setting foreign policy aside, it seems clear from the matrix above that Atrios' List is not radical. That the epithets "far left" and "fanatics" are totally inappropriate for those inclined towards progressive policy positions. That 40% of the nation would support or accept such policies. And that to be even having this discussion shows how much the "center" has moved to the right by commentators, pundits, and hacks

Precisely. That's why bloggers who aren't Republicans get so sick of the conventional wisdom that pundits puke up with such regularity.

No wonder we're pissed off.

There's one thing the Goss resignation confirms

For one of the most important jobs in what he calls the "War on Terror," Bush made a bad apointment. The guy couldn't even last out two years.

There are many other reasons I thought and thing Goss was a bad choice. But a hurried resigation in under two years is one that'd be hard for anyone to argue with.

Goss-titutes, Presstitutes: Same Diff?

Josh Marshall complains about CNN not mentioning important information regarding Porter Goss' resignation.

MSNBC, after interviewing several folks such as Wayne Allard, Dana Priest, and John Harwood (a better lineup than the vacuous TV-newsreader types CNN had ping-ponging vacuities), finally had Norah O'Donnell on.

She first noted that it was hightly unusual for no reason to be given-- not even "to spend time with family" or "health issues." It may come, but usually it's right out front in these announcments. Also, there's no replacement named, which is odd, especially such an important slot in the "War on Terror." Finally, she mentions that it's typical for bad news to be mentioned on Friday afternoon .

Then she gave a discourse on Dusty Foggo and his relationship with Goss.

Way to go Norah. I don't always think she does a great job, but in this case she mentioned the elephant in room. It's sad that this is commendable, but compared to the other dolts bloviating about nothing, it's something.

UPDATE: Now Timmy Russert is on, saying he spoke with a high-level White House source, telling their line. Here's the White House story, according to Russert: Goss has put in important changes, now they think it'd be better to have another person in charge who can "heal" things. Discussions between Goss and Negroponte have been taking place for weeks and the new DCI will be suggested by Negroponte.

Cover story, or the "inside story?" This is precisely the kind of story I wouldn't trust Timmy with. But, he could possibly be right. Hookers could be the explanation, too.

Line-Crossing

USNews.com tells us that

"Colbert crossed the line," said one top Bush aide, who rushed out of the hotel as soon as Colbert finished. Another said that the president was visibly angered by the sharp lines that kept coming.

"I've been there before, and I can see that he is [angry]," said a former top aide. "He's got that look that he's ready to blow."

I'd be interested in hearing what exactly was over the line in Colbert's routine.

I'd bet the real answer is that, for Bush and his gang, any substantive criticism of the President in his presence is over the line.

Making fun of Bush's lamentable vefbal skills is fine--Bush does that himself. Making fun of his policies that actually, you know, kill people and bankrupt the US--horrors!

The bubble wasn't quite intact for 20 minutes or so. Thankfully, Bush went right back to his castle, where his sycophants can tell him how great he is.

One again: bravo, Colbert.

More Colbert

A few more miscellaneous things about the Colbert act.

1) Someone put the C-Span video on MyTube.com, in three parts. It's gone viral, and part one is currently the most viewed video on MyTube.com, with 342,591 views in the day it's been up. [Update: I just checked back after around three hours and now it's been viewed 400,989 times. So that's about sixty thousand views in three hours or less.]

2) In ilne with the above, as James Wolcott notes, it's likely his routine played better on television than in the room. I have a few ideas why that may be the case:

• The DC politico-tainment nexus is really parochial. For instance, take this bit from Lloyd Grove's column today:
  

  As for the after-dinner entertainment, the conventional wisdom was that Bush killed with his self-mocking routine — "The President was fantastic," gushed staunch Dem Patricia Duff — while the hired talent, Comedy Central star Stephen Colbert, bombed badly. "It was an insider crowd, as insider a crowd as you'll ever have, and he didn't do the insider jokes," said BET founder Bob Johnson.

  
  Colbert should have made jokes about how Laura smokes cigarettes, maybe? That's "inside."
  
  No, they wanted tame jokes about, say, someone's renowned eating habits. They wanted the lame kinds of pabulum jokes that Leno pumps out, or that Bush makes about himself. Faux "insider" stuff that makes them feel part of the club, but which isn't really funny even you are inside-- you laugh at getting the reference that the hoi polloi won't grasp.
  
  Which is a good example of the cocktail weenie thinking of these dolts, and why we're in such a state today. There are somethings that the public shouldn't really care to know. Unless Patrick Fitzgerald calls them to testify, we'll never know the backchannel bullshit that goes on which keeps reporters plugged in to their sources.
  
  So Colbert, by not playing to that fake insider bullshit, talked to the folks at home more than the tuxedoed masses in the room. And the ones who haven't drunk the Bush Koolaid by and large find Colbert funny.
  
  
• At the end of Hardball today, Mike Allen of Time magazine said that the rule for comedy at these things is they're meant to "singe, not burn." And Matthews said (on the first airing -- it was excised on the 7 p.m. repeat) that the president is more than a politician -- he's the head of state, indicating that Bush deserved more respect.
  
  But Colbert didn't make fun of Bush's pecadillos (Bush does that, after all). He lacerated his governing style, his failures and the assistance given to these failures by the attendant media. Of course they're not going to like that.
  

3) The reaction to Colbert points to the overall tameness of what passes for political comedy these days. The line that Leno, Letterman and Conan take on Bush is that he's not o bright and he can't speak. 90 percent of the jokes are about that, and that's not political humor. It's the equivalent of making fat jokes about Pavarotti: a punch line is supposed to be funny merely because it makes the point that Pavarotti is fat, or Bush isn't bright. That vein of comedy was thoroughly mined even before Bush's first year in office.

Get it? Bush doesn't speak fluently! Bwahahahahahahahah! Hilarious.

But that's the kind of toothless "humor" that passes for political satire nowadays. Anything that actually gets into politics, rather than personal traits, is somehow out of bounds to these people.

It's so toothless that Bush uses it about himself. And the crowd laps it up.

Colbert in DC

I've read quite a bit of commentary on Stephen Colbert's act before the White House Correspondent's Dinner. I'm not surprised that the most doctrinaire Bush-supporters seemed to find it unfunny. But the vituperation from Lucianne Goldberg (calling him a "psychopath" and a "coward" among other things) indicates that the jokes weren't entirely lost on them.

There seems to be a consensus that Colbert didn't get a lot of laughs. I'm not sure about that, since these things are miked so you can't really hear the room noise. Maybe the people in the peanut gallery were enthusiastic. Bush did get laughs for his toothless routine with an impersonator-- but people generally laugh at the boss' jokes, and his routine was fairly well crafted by his writing team.

Colbert is a strange creature to be appearing at such an event. Usually when people think of after-dinner speakers, they think of what is essentially standup comedy. Setup. Punch line. Repeat endlessly.

I doubt Colbert has done much, if any, standup comedy. He has come out of the improv comedy world, which has a different ethos. Even more important than getting laughs is creating a world, fully inhabiting it and committing to it, and exploring that world to uncover new angles to it. The laughs are almost incidental.

Colbert has committed to his world in a way that few of his ilk manage. He becomes his faux-Colbert rightwing tubthumper, and virtually never surfaces out of character.

Quite a few of the jokes he delivered were funny (to me at least) when abstracted from his persona. But, if you're in on the character, they're even funnier. Gestures and asides become more meaningful. For instance, Shakespeare's Sister comments:

Throughout the entire thing, he would periodically look evenly at Bush, holding his gaze and addressing him directly as “Mr. President.” Bush looked back at him with a face of stone (save for one time when Colbert flubbed a set-up). Standing in front of a room full of people who didn’t, couldn’t, laugh, letting them have it with everything he’s got, sweating bullets, Colbert would look dead at Bush and never blink.

Now that's committing to a character!

I've come to appreciate Colbert's skill since I've been watching The Colbert Report. I believe the only time I've seen him completely emerge from character on that show is when he busted out laughing at the compound name (a la "Branjelina") for the couple of Felicity Huffman and William H. Macy: Filliam H. Muffman. For a few seconds, he was laughing as Stephen Colbert, not the "Stephen Colbert" character. Even then, his real self was revealed not by words, but by laughter.

I loved his Correspondent's Dinner bit. Here is a roundup of blog commentary. Watch it via YouTube.com or download it via torrent.

On other thing from Lucianne's commentary, pointed out by Glenn Greenwald. Lucianne wrote:

Steve Colbert was utterly disgusting. . . He was rude, snarky and unpatriotic toward the President and First Lady."

You can't be unpatriotic to the President and certainly not to the First Lady. They are not America.

It's also, of course, highly ironic that Lucianne thinks pointing out the weaknesses of the President s "unpatriotic," considering her history with Bill Clinton. I suppose her apparent obliviousness to irony may help explain her reaction to Colbert.

For a visit to an alternate planet, check out the Free Republic thread documenting their responose to the Dinner. Including this gem:

t's so hard to remember these people aren't be ironic! example: I suppose you're right. He wasn't trying to be funny. He was taking the opportunity of being face to face with one of the greatest, kindest, most loving men on earth to shoot arrows of evil at him.

In stead of being angry with Colbert last night, I should have been praying for the spiritual protection of the President and First Lady.

I confess that I didn't think of that until later, when I did pray that any wounds they may have received would be healed.

God bless them both, and protect them from the attacks of the Evil One!

The great thing about that thread is that it's full of statements like that: words which Colbert could say in character and the very same people would, I presume, find them repugnant.

I laugh at that kind of thing whether it's from the Freeper freaks or from Colbert's mouth--though there's a meta-laugh when it comes from Colbert. Free Republic is like a ready-made idea factory for Colbert.

Another Worthy Charity

Juan Cole of Informed Comment has set up a foundation that will translate books important to American thought and history into Arabic. It's shocking how few English-language books are available in Arabic.

Since we're in a battle of ideas, perhaps proliferating our ideas will bear more fruit than merely proliferating our weapons systems.

Read about the Foundation here, and contribute if you can.

On Bush's Watch

Before we move onto what should be done about it, let's take a moment just to reflect.

Iran says it joins 'countries with nuclear technology'

Yet another major foreign policy catastrophe, thanks to George W. Bush.

Is there a single thing besides winning elections that Bush and crew can do right? It sure seems that "winning is the only thing" is true of the Republicans--it's the only thing they can do.

Unfortunately, everything else they touch they screw up, and leave America worse off.

Even some honest Republicans admit it. From the National Review Online:

"I voted for President Bush twice, and contributed to his campaign twice, but held my nose when I did it the second time. I don't consider myself a Republican any longer. Thanks to this Administration and the Republicans in Congress, the Republican Party today is the party of pork-barrel spending, Congressional corruption — and, I know folks on this web site don't want to hear it, but deep down they know it's true — foreign and military policy incompetence. " , I think this Administration is the most politically and substantively inept that the nation has had in over a quarter of a century. The good news about it, as far as I'm concerned, is that it's almost over.

Unfortunately for the United States, the disasters this Administration can reap for us in three years is unimaginable.

A Conservative government: rule by crazed idiots.

Manon Ossevoort - Op de tractor naar de Zuidpool en terug?

On a BBC World report from Sudan just a minute ago, I heard the reporter describe the horrible poverty in a village.

Later, when the reporter was on the road, he saw the strangest sight he'd ever seen, he said. A blonde girl on a tractor surrounded by Sudanese locals. She is a Dutch woman named Manon, and she's traveling by tractor from her home country, through the Balkans, down to Egypt, and to the southern tip of Africa. There she plans to somehow hitch a ride to the Antarctic and then to the South pole. She's collecting scraps of paper with "dreams" from people she meets on her journey, which she will carry to the bottom of the globe.

Here is what I must presume is her website, in English:
Manon Ossevoort - Op de tractor naar de Zuidpool en terug?

I don't have high hopes for her journey but I admire her sweet and gentle lunacy. Good luck Manon.

Funny Flight

BBC7 is airing Flight of the Conchords, a screamingly funny rendering of the London exploits of one of New Zealand's two or three best acoustic folk comedy duos, namely Flight of the Conchords. Funny songs and funny stories, aired originally on Radio 4 not long ago.

It's free! Check the BBC Radio Player - Audio on Demand late every Monday (the files stay up for 7 days afterwards) for the next six weeks.

One of the best recent comedies on BBC radio.

You may have seen Flight of the Conchords playing their songs live in person, on HBO, or in other television venues. Funny guys. Also, you may wonder why a New Zealander is doing Outback Steak House commercials in the US. Gotta keep the livestock in bling, probably.

B-a-a-h!

Quagwalk: That's Been the Plan All Along!

Cheney speaks!

Interview Dick Cheney, NBC, "Meet the Press," Transcript for March 16, 2003: "MR. RUSSERT: If your analysis is not correct, and we’re not treated as liberators, but as conquerors, and the Iraqis begin to resist, particularly in Baghdad, do you think the American people are prepared for a long, costly, and bloody battle with significant American casualties?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: Well, I don’t think it’s likely to unfold that way, Tim, because I really do believe that we will be greeted as liberators."

He qualifies it a little in the remaining answer, but it's pretty clear that on the eve of the war, Cheney and his administration are either not thinking one bit about insurgency and civil war (which would be incompetent), or if they're thinking about it, they're hiding the likelihood of an insurgency from the American people (which would be misleading and dishonest, though not technically a bald-faced lie--more like a pellet-in-the-face lie).

Such is the hard-won reputation of Bush and his administration as either incompetents, liars, or idiots. It's one or the other, but one just can't be sure.

As it turns out, Bush's true plan, revealed in his press conference today, is for his successors to clean up his mess. And since he now claims the following:

Secondly, I am confident -- or I believe I'm optimistic -- we'll succeed. If not, I'd pull our troops out. If I didn't believe we had a plan for victory, I wouldn't leave our people in harm's way. And that's important for the woman to understand.

I guess whatever he does is his "plan," no matter how half-assed and wrong it is proven to be, and over and over our soldiers are buffetted by events that Bush can't even comprehend.

Reuters AlertNet - Swedish foreign minister resigns over cartoons

I don't know Swedish laws or mores, but just from what's in this Reuters dispatch, I'm glad this woman lost her job:

Swedish Foreign Minister Laila Freivalds quit on Tuesday after a row over the closure of a Web site with cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, embarrassing Prime Minister Goran Persson six months ahead of elections.

[....]

But she was forced to resign when it was revealed this week that she had not given full information about her role in the closure of a site belonging to a far-right political party which published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad offensive to Muslims.

Idiocy is a global phenomenon.

Bush: One-Way Loyalty

I've long said that Bush's reputation for loyalty is undeserved -- he demands loyalty but does not return it.

Nice to see that even some relatively honest conservatives believe it too. From Bruce Bartlett, writing to Andrew Sullivan.

I disagree with your characterization of Bush as being famously loyal — a view so widely stated that you can be excused for repeating it. Bush is loyal ONLY to toadies, suck-ups and sycophants. Anyone who shows an ounce of independence — or loyalty to the country above loyalty to him — is punished or dispensed with. You mention Paul O'Neill, but a better example is Larry Lindsey. [....] As I say in my book, loyalty with Bush is strictly a one-way street: total loyalty is demanded, but none is ever really offered in return.

This has been apparent for years. Too bad it wasn't written by Sullivan or any other conserva-blogger when it would have mattered.

Typically, Sullivan misses the point. Bush is disloyal to others, and there are enforcers to make life miserable for those who are not totally loyal to him. Sullivan thinks Bush is a "nice guy." I'm sure Shinsecki, Lindsey, O'Neill,et al don't think the bullshit that happened to them is "nice."

Sullivan really is a tool.

Don't forget that Bush has kept Karl Rove, who loves to slime opponents -- including falsely insiuating pedophilia (how does one do that nicely?) in a Alabama judgeship race, that GW Bush was an enforcer for his father, and that Bush was a protege of Lee Atwater, another classic republican slimer (who tried to repent on his deathbed).

You know him by the company he keeps for decades. Not a nice guy.

Straw Man Bush

From the Associated Press:
Bush Using Straw-Man Arguments in Speeches

When the president starts a sentence with "some say" or offers up what "some in Washington" believe, as he is doing more often these days, a rhetorical retort almost assuredly follows.

The device usually is code for Democrats or other White House opponents. In describing what they advocate, Bush often omits an important nuance or substitutes an extreme stance that bears little resemblance to their actual position.

He typically then says he "strongly disagrees" — conveniently knocking down a straw man of his own making.

Bush routinely is criticized for dressing up events with a too-rosy glow. But experts in political speech say the straw man device, in which the president makes himself appear entirely reasonable by contrast to supposed "critics," is just as problematic.

AP notices this only about six years too late.

Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit: Not only a Hack, but Diametrically Wrong

Glenn Reynolds, amazingly a Law Professor at University of Tennesse, warblogger, and now author of a book about blogging, wrote the following a while back-in April 2003 when many had died but GW Bush was still riding high:

Yeah, there has been a lot of pro-war gloating. And I guess that Dawn Olsen's cautionary advice about gloating is appropriate. So maybe we shouldn't rub in just how wrong, and morally corrupt the antiwar case was. Maybe we should rise above the temptation to point out that claims of a "quagmire" were wrong -- again! -- how efforts at moral equivalence were obscenely wrong -- again! -- how the antiwar folks are still, far too often, trying to move the goalposts rather than admit their error -- again -- and how an awful lot of the very same people who spoke lugubriously about "civilian casualties" now seem almost disappointed that there weren't more -- again -- and how many people who spoke darkly about the Arab Street and citizens rising up against American "liberators" were proven wrong -- again -- as the liberators were seen as just that by the people they were liberating. And I suppose we shouldn't stress so much that the antiwar folks were really just defending the interests of French oil companies and Russian arms-deal creditors. It's probably a bad idea to keep rubbing that point in over and over again.

Nah.

Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit and somehow a law professor, wrote that in April 2003.

Bush screwed up abjectly despite Reynold's pom-pom waving. Too bad people had to die in the many thousands despite Reynolds' cheerleading.

Of course, Glenn did not sign up to die in IED or mortar fire. Glenn just wanted to InstaEnjoy the InstaWar he was InstaCheering for.

Yay! That was so good in 2003! Yay!

I wonder who is now, in 2006, moving the goalposts from Glenn's Instapundit's emphatic triumphalism of 2003.

Reynolds is a libertarian, so he says. Read the above and sniff out his magnificent libertarianism.

Discourse like Reynold's has made the term "Libertarian" kind of like "psychic:" It mainly denotes a pathetic form of bullshitting.

Schmibertarian!

Explanation for Hiatus

The blog has been a bit slow recently. We've been burned out and exhausted.

Surely just a couple more five-week long vacations at the ranch and Bush will no longer be an incompetent, lying idiot.




Source: Pew Poll Mar 15, 2006

HTML / Text version, which Blogger had difficulty accepting despite my labor texting and HTMLing that image, resides here. Thanks and links will be appreciated.

Some Comment

Searching for something else on IMDB, I ran across the most evocative comment I've seen there recently. It's for the movie Brilliant (2004), with Ereka Eleniak and Bruce Boxleitner. I'll reproduce the comment in full below -- I won't be surprised if it disappears from IMDB.

Hopefully it never gets released, 21 December 2005
1/10 rating
Author: magwell-1 from A remote cabin in the wilderness

I was a crew member of this film. Apart from the fact that the crew were ripped off for our last week's salary and had to endure the daily wrath of a psychotic director, I can only say that the film doesn't deserve to see the light of day and should be left to rot in a vault for eternity. Yes, it's a hack job all the way, so be thankful that it currently sits in limbo, unreleased, due to the fact that producer, Bill Mariani owes money to suppliers and crew members all over town. How they managed to lure Erika Eleniak and Bruce Boxleitner into appearing is a mystery. Mariani probably burned them as well. By the way, ignore the credit for Carmelo Caruna as one of the "producers" of this film. He was just a front for Mariani so suppliers wouldn't go after him for debts owed from the last film he produced, the equally awful Samhain.

It could be false, but I tend to believe it. If so, can't blame the guy for venting a bit.

Chris Matthews: Idiot and Jerk

Thanks to the people who set up Open Letter To Chris Matthews.

Matthews is not outright Foxian, but he's even worse in a way. Everyone knows the people on Fox are already in the tank for the Republicans. Matthews may fool some dolts into thinking he's actually fair and balanced.

I used to be able to stomach the guy. He was always dimwitted and shallow as a petri dish, but he'd at least occasionally have someone on who wouldn't just parrot the same bullshit.

Then I just got tired of him:

• having right-wingers such as Pat Buchanan or Byron York on at the same panel as impartial reporters, so the wingers could spin the hell out of whatever the reporters said, and it could pass unrebutted.
  
• being too stupid to catch the details of whatever topic he was dealing with. If it is more complicated than his gut could interpret, he is lost.
  
• downplaying the Abramoff scandal and trying to make it seem that Delay and Abramoff were just doing what Democrats were doing. That really pissed me off. He's apparently still pulling that idiocy.
  
• being so singularly obsessed with Hillary Clinton, and always negatively. He treats her as an object of derision both for herself and as a facet of the Democratis party. which he obviously doesn't like either. He's really got a hardon for Hillary -- it got so I couldn't watch the show without him bringing her up in all kinds of ridiculous associations. I don't want her to be the nominee in 2008, but I manage to spend whole weeks without thinking of Hillary Clinton. Matthews can't manage that.
  

All that and many other things finally got me to turn him off. I used to like to watch Matthews to lead into Olbermann. But no more. I turn off the TV or watch CNN (Blitzer isn't much better but at least he's not bloviating idiotically about politics all the time) rather than listen to Matthews' hydrocephalic obsessions.

Matthews really is borderline retarded. I could deal with that if he weren't an asshole on top of it.

Texting The Iraq War

Iraqi Invasion: A Text Misadventure

Oval Office

You are standing inside a White House, having just been elected to the presidency of the United States. You knew Scalia would pull through for you.

There is a large desk here, along with a few chairs and couches. The presidential seal is in the middle of the room and there is a full-length mirror upon the wall.

It's hilarious.

The Crisco Caper, Redux

Ministers Consecrate Alito Hearing Room

Wow. "Consecrating" and anointing with oil a room in the Hart Building to be used for Alito's hearing.

Of course, that freakish troll Pat Mahoney -- of Operatoin Rescue and the Terri Schiavo idiocy -- is involved.

It gives me a chance to quote a relevant poem.

Pointy Birds

Oh pointy birds
Pointy pointy
Anoint my head
Anointy Nointy.

Funny Sad

Rough paraphrase of John Dean on Al Franken's radio show just now.

"If Nixon had Bush's lawyers, they would have taken the Gulf of Tonkin resolution and said it gave him authority to break into the Watergate."

It would be funny if it weren't true.

Bill "Sixty Percent" O'Reilly

Sixty Percent: Sounds good to me.

Thanks, Waas.

As for video referred to, check here.

Blithering Idiocy at CNN

Joe Klein a fool? His recent hire removes all doubt.

CNN signs Bill Bennett as an analyst.

Bill Bennett's main fall from grace is his stunningly voracious gambling --his quasi-racist recent comment is just icing on the cake.

The Abramoff scandal, repeatedly called the largest corruption case in DC in decades, involves to a great extent Indian tribes and casinos.

One thing that Dems should point out is the hypocrisy of Christtian conservatives like Ralph Reed supporting gambling by lobbying for these groups. I'm sure there are other aspects of casino gambling that will be important too.

Of course, personal relations among those on the panel with Bennett will likely mute those comments.

So CNN will cripple itself in covering one of the great corruption scandals in history.

Idiots.

Daily Kos: Scared

Daily Kos: Scared:

If we are relying on George W. Bush to protect the US, then God help us.

I won't rely on him to protect the United States.

Protecting his poll numbers? He'll try to do that.

Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal: More High-Quality Thought From National Review's Electronic Archives

Did you know that in the pages of National Review Martin Luther King was a really lousy public speaker?

True, dat.

And they haven't improved by picking up Jonah Goldberg.

Carrying on the distinguished history.

Public Domain Movie Torrents

http://www.publicdomaintorrents.com/ has scores of movies for download via Bit Torrent. For those so inclined, they offer alternate rendering formatted for Ipod or other handhelds, as well as standard renderings (Mainly Divx).

I can't vouch that every movie there is public domain, but the ones I checked apparently are. A few movies not from the early part of the century are included, and I'm sure many of them have interesting reasons for being Public Domain (like Plan 9 from Outer Space or Night of the Living Dead).

Archive.org has quite a few movies no longer under copyright control, too -- including many of these. But the highly seeded torrents here can give you a pretty impressive download speed.

To give you an idea of the selection, here are the ten top seeded films at PublicDomainTorrents.com:

Metropolis.avi
Plan_9_From_Outer_Space.avi
Night_of_the_Living_Dead.avi
Nosferatu.avi
Buster_Keaton1.avi
The_Little_Shop_of_Horrors.avi
Buster_Keaton2.avi
Superman_Festival.avi
Santa_Claus_Conquers_the_Martians.avi
flash_gordon_ep01.avi
The_Memphis_Belle.avi
Betty_Boop_My_Friend_the_Monkey.avi
Prehistoric_Women.avi
Tom_and_Jerry_Festival.avi
Sherlock_Holmes_A_Study_in_Scarlet350.avi
Metropolis700.avi
Keystone_Cops_Festival.avi
Betty_Boop_Rhythm_on_the_Reservation.avi
Voyage_to_the_Planet_of_Prehistoric_Women.avi
Buster_Keaton1.mp4

The site holds many more movies, too. There are many good movies there, a lot of schlocky kitch, and a few great movies,too--such as Metropolis and some of the Keaton movies.

For those who don't know about BitTorrent technology, find out about it here. You're realling missing something if you don't have it, particularly if you're on broadband. My current preferred client, for what it's worth, is Azureus.

Does This Thing Still Work?

"Hey, Ahmad, maybe you could get the United States to invade Iraq to restore democracy."

Seen Here

War on Jews?

Wow, this seems pretty blatant to me:

During the debate, Democratic members asked the Republican author of the resolution, Rep. Jo Ann Davis (R-VA), if she would permit the symbols of Chanukah and other holidays to be included in the protection of the resolution -- and she refused.

Protect Christmas, which is not actually under attack, and refuse to protect Chanukah.

You Jews are on your own. Watch your crystal.

Scissors, pocket knives, clippers -- OK by me

Since republicans seem to paint Democrats as crazy inhuman idiots, I figure I should occasionally point out that the caricature they paint of us is idiotic.

I have no problem with small scissors, pocket knives, and clippers being allowed on planes. I have lost at least a couple well-loved pocket knives to TSA screening at airports.

Plan to Allow Scissors on Planes Opposed

Not by me! I don't oppose these things being brought on board, and I'm about as strong a Democrat as can be imagined.

I'd prefer they were scanning checked baggage more thoroughly, if all things were equal. But the pilot door is strengthened now, so a Swiss Army Knife isn't about to break through it and kill the plane's captain.

Bullshit, Rinse, Repeat

Bush Speaks:

Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the Battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country.
.....
The Battle of Iraq is one victory in a war on terror that began on September the 11th, 2001, and still goes on.
.....
The liberation of Iraq is a crucial advance in the campaign against terror. We have removed an ally of al-Qaida, and cut off a source of terrorist funding. And this much is certain: No terrorist network will gain weapons of mass destruction from the Iraqi regime, because the regime is no more.

Yeah, those excerpts are from the disastrous "Mission Accomplished" speech of May 2, 2003. The whole tawdry text is worth rereading, particularly in light of his horseshit speech today.

Update: Uggabugga takes a closer look at the nothingness in the heart of Bush's "victory" document. Nothingness is being kind: Horseshit is more like it.

Marc Maron and Morning Sedition are Ending It

I hoped this would not happen, but Air America Radio is ending Morning Sedition. Marc Maron just announced that Dec 15 will be his last day.

Air America Radio has offered him an evening slot "in Los Angeles" (they're still negotiating so questions like "would that be national but broadcasting from LA?" are unanswerable: Marc did say such a show may be syndicated elsewhere later in the evening or perhaps on weekends). Mark Reilly stays -- his show will be from 5-7 a.m. eastern time, and Rachel Maddow will take over from 7-9 a.m.

That's really too bad. Maron, who I liked pretty well as a standup, really came alive as a radio voice . The scripted bits were hilarious and his unscripted patter was striking, thoughtful and often guffaw-inducing. Funny but not idiotic stuff for early mornings.

I have to largely agree with the WFMU blog (they did two good posts: one, and two about Air America's schedule). AAR is changing to all-earnest and mostly boring all the time. I can't stomach Randi Rhodes' mainly mindless screeds. Jerry Springer sounds lke he's lecturing second graders--and putting them to sleep. Al Franken more and more drifts into civics lessons and dull-as-dust Goo-goo features. I like Sam Seder fine but Janeane Garofalo (who spends lots of time making useless blanket pseudo-psychiatric pronouncements about conservatives) makes me hit the off button. (I often like her in other contexts but not in political commentary and especially not on her radio show).

Ok, Franken has a big name, and all the others have their followings I'm sure. But to keep all those people who either make me snore or wretch, yet get rid of what I find a really funny and insightful stretch of radio indicates I'm not the listener they're looking for--and I'm a firm Democcrat and pretty liberal. If they are losing me then, well ... I just hope their current market research is better than their startup business plan.

There's really no reason for me to listen to AAR anymore. Virtually all the news and commentary on AAR I get days or hours earlier from the bigtime media or blogs. There are few moments when anyone there is saying something new to me or in a compelling or original manner.

Preaching to the choir is fine but don't all use the exact same friggin arrangements and please vary the tempo a little bit.

I wish AAR well. I'll probably sample them now and then but I hope to God they get their act together. If they think they're gonna take on rightwing clowns like Limbaugh with a snoozefest, they're insane. When I was in radio wasteland recently I actually tuned in to Limbaugh a little (he was on at least four separate radio stations I could receive at the same location in central Pennsylvania!) and while I didn't enjoy him, I listened for a bit and didn't reflexively turn off the radio like I do when I hear Springer, Rhodes, or Janeane. The guy's a radio entertainer, even though he's full of shit. AAR should at least have learned the lesson by this time that radio needs to entertain -- and started by canning Springer.

(Yes I did write AAR about this, as did many others. Didn't work. )

Bullshitting Us Into a War of Choice

Jacob Weisberg

Powell's old colleagues now defend themselves by saying they didn't know their claims about Iraq weren't true. But the truth is most of them didn't care whether their assertions were true or not, and they still don't.

Mark Schmitt:

The President could have been given every bit of intelligence information available, and he and/or Cheney would have reached the same decision because they would have discarded, discounted, or disregarded most of it. Information that was Useful to that goal was put in one box, Not Useful put in another. Entire categories of information were assigned to the Not Useful box because their source was deemed an opponent of U.S. military action, or assumed to have some other motive.

Harry Frankfurt on Bullshit:

It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off: he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose.

The Bush Adminstration:

The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." ... "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

Well, not quite all of us. The thousands of Americans and tens of thousand of Iraqis who have died won't get a chance to study anything.

Finally, Juan Cole:

Let me finish with a word to W. As for your legacy two decades from now, George, let me clue you in on something--as a historian. In 20 years no Iraqis will have you on their minds one way or another. Do you think anyone in Egypt or Israel is still grateful to Jimmy Carter for helping bring to an end the cycle of Egyptian-Israeli wars? Jimmy Carter powerfully affected the destinies of all Egyptians and Israelis in that key way. Most people in both countries have probably never heard of him, and certainly no one talks about the first Camp David Accords anymore except as a dry historical subject. The US pro-Israel lobby is so ungrateful that they curse Carter roundly for all the help he gave Israel. Human beings don't have good memories for these things, which is why we have to have professional historians, a handful of people who are obsessed with the subject. And I guarantee you, George, that historians are going to be unkind to you. You went into a major war over a non-existent nuclear weapons program. Presidents' reputations don't survive things like that. Historians are creatures of documents and precision. A wild exaggeration with serious consequences is against everything they stand for as a profession. So forget about history and destiny and the divine will. You are at the helm of the Exxon Valdez and it is headed for the shoals. You can't afford to daydream about future decades.

Worst President ever? It's very likely.

Titles of Bob Shrum's Book

Oliver Willis » Contest: Guess The Title Of Bob Shrum’s Book

I wrote a few.

Disobeying the President's Orders

Digby has been on a great tear today responding to the perfidy of Woodward. He's really nailed it -- the DC faux-journalist class is a set of courtiers to the Bush administration.

One thing I haven't seen noted by anyone (though I'd say someone has indeed pointed it out) is that this Senior Adminstration Official or White House Official who implicated Woodward did so just recently-- in the past couple weeks.

This official came forward after two years of investigation, after the grand jury had closed, after indictments were handed down. In fact, they weren't fully forthcoming with the investigation despite Bush's orders.

"The president has always said that leaking classified information is a serious matter, and certainly no one wants to get to the bottom of this more than he does, so that we can find out the truth,'' McClellan said. "The president has said from early on that if anybody has information, they should come forward and share it with those who are leading this investigation.

Whoever this official was, they are at least subordinates who are insubordinate. They didn't do what Bush ordered them to do.

Who does that sound like?

Scary!

He looks animatronic, she looks undead.

That is the picture as presented on Yahoo news. Link to the photo in context of the page is here.

The Secrets of Jay Sekulow

Many of us are familiar with Jay Sekulow. He's a lawyer who goes on air to defend -- whether defensible or not -- the far reaches of the fringiest Christian legal faux-theory.

Law.com has an interesting profile of Sekulow. Good quote:

"Some of us truly believed God told us to serve Jay," says one former employee, who requested anonymity out of fear of reprisal. "But not to help him live like Louis XIV. We are coming forward because we need to believe there is fairness in this world."

Man, these fundies are strange. And they pick strange bedfellows.

Bush's Endzone Dancing

USATODAY.com - Bush sets out to salvage 2nd term: "'This president doesn't dance in the end zone when things are good, doesn't throw in the towel when things are bad,' says Mark McKinnon, media director in Bush's presidential campaigns."

Bwahahah, that's really funny, McKinnon. Remember the ridiculous "mission accomplished" premature celebration that Bush did?

Bush waylaid an aircraft carrier, then waylaid a jet, was flown in the jet to the carrier where he had the seamen line up behind him for a photo op, and stood in front of a huge banner saying "Mission Accomplished."

That may be the largest "Dance in the end zone" in American political history.

And, of course, Iraq has really gone horribly since then, and Bush's reasons for invading Iraq have all proven false.

Libby's Bad Bets

Why do Libby's lies seem so stupid in retrospect?

I can guess at two reasons:

1) When he concocted his scheme he thought that Ashcroft would dispatch the Plame inquiry quickly.
2) He thought that reporters would hold firm and not reveal him as a source.

1) The Ashcroft Angle: Libby's initial lies to the FBI that led to the false statement charges were in October and November, 2003. From the press release accompanying the indictment:

The false statement charge in Count Two of the indictment alleges that Libby lied to FBI agents on October 14 and November 26, 2003, regarding the conversation with Russert on July 10, 2003. Count Three charges Libby with making false statements to FBI agents during the same FBI interviews in October and November 2003 relating to his July 12, 2003 conversation with Cooper.

Ashcroft's recusal came after those initial Libby lies, in late December 2003. I bet Libby wasn't happy when he found out that Ashcroft had recused himself.

2) The Journalist Backstop: Kevin Drum puts it well in this post. "Apparently Libby figured he'd never be caught out because the reporters would stay mum and go to jail on his behalf. He lost that bet."

So long Scooter. Let's hope "Official A" joins you soon.

Merry Fitzmas: It Speaks to All of us

Merry Fitzmas

I hate the commercialization of Fitzmas.

Years ago, Fitzmas didn't used to be about the money.

Miller, the Opposite of a Reporter

Jay Rosen has a good quick take on the Judith Miller Lie-A-Culpa:

"Miller cannot recall where the name at the center of the case came from? Wowzer. Sure to be the center of controversy over the next week. Claiming memory loss about the most important fact in the story is weak. Very.

Miller actually subtracts from public knowledge in this part, a feat. She introduces into the narrative a new “source” who must have been around to plant the name on her, and then promptly tells us she cannot remember anything about him. So we know less if we believe her." [emph. added]

"So we know less if we believe her." That's sterling work by a faux reporter!

I'm sure Rosen's more in depth followups will be worth reading.

Some Things You Can't Take Back

Let's hope Howard Fineman is right about the Conservative Crackup.

Everyone keep your eyes peeled and your recorders running: People will definitely say things they will regret later.

Whee!

Serious As A Federal Indictment

Atrios wrote:

A few people wrote in to say that a little while ago on Hardball, Tweety and the gang were suddenly taking the whole Fitzgerald investigation very seriously. Anyone see it?

I think this segment of Hardball is repeated at 7 PM eastern. Guests in the opening segment about the Plame crimes were Howard Fineman of Newsweek, Michael wolff of Vanity Fair, and one of the authors of Bush's Brain (I believe).

They were certainly taking it seriously. Matthews, even. (Tweety had his usual adoration of the republicans by going out of his way to indicate that probably no crime had been committed (huh?). Recently he asked a guest if Fitzgerald understood how hardball politics is played, indicating that any crime involving national security is ok by Matthews so long as a republican is doing it. Matthews really is a horrible creature, and none to bright or detail-oriented.)

My favorite aspect of the show were several archival footage montages of Rove in different settings (walking with Bush, talking to the camera, in an office, etc.).

These are precisely the type of montages used on live news coverage when a public figure dies. This time, let's hope, it's a political death. Of course, Republicans resuscitate criminals to be either pundits (Oliver North, Gordon Liddy, Lawrence Kudlow, et al.) or within the administration (Eliot Abrams, anyone?).

I was pleased to see Rove in these "bye-bye" montages. Let's hope he is indicted.

Update: I thought of another aspect of Hardball that made it far better than the usual Tweety-fest. Matthews and David Shuster both pointed out how the White House slapback against Wilson (which dragged in Plame) was over the lies about Iraq's nukes. Matthews essentially held that the fear-mongering about Iraq's nonexistent nuclear capability was what pushed American public opinion over to support the invasion of Iraq.

If there were no fake story about Hussein with nukes, there would have been no Iraq war. That's why they started sliming Wilson-- to ensure their war. And that's a very strong case that the war was waged on knowingly false pretenses, not just "mistaken intel."

That point should be rammed home over and over. It is the moral abcess at the center of the Bush administration. And Americans have died due to this lie.

Matthews colored in a bit of that story in his Hardball show on Monday.

Firedoglake is a great stop for Plame-crime-related writing. They pointed out to me that Crooks and Liars has some of Monday's Hardball up for viewing online.

Well worth watching.

Bad People

Look at what William Kristol is saying. Think Progress has a great catch, and caps it with a plaintive call:

"The best way to stop the criminalization of politics is to get the criminals out of politics."

I think instead one should say "If you don't want criminals in politics, tell folks in your party not to talk about CIA agent's identities to reporters."

Bill Kristol has a point, just not the one he was trying to make.

Don't out CIA agents should be a firm rule. I hope it's a firm law.

John M. Barry, Mr Synchronicity

Radio and TV bookers have had John M. Barry on speed dial in recent weeks.

The Katrina disaster got him on many media outlets and his book Rising Tide into reprint.

I saw him tonight speaking about his book The Great Influenza with Avian flu as the appropriate peg.

When I checked a couple hours ago, both books were in the 120s in Amazon's bestsellers list. Kudos to Mr. Barry for writing historical non-fiction that speaks to our day.

Oddly enough, another book he wrote is Ambition and Power, about the fall of former House Speaker Jim Wright.

What synchronicity. Tom Delay isn't speaker, but no one could seriously say he was less powerful than Denny Hastert.

John M. Barry, you have eerie powers.

The Mind of Harriet Miers

All you need to know about Harriet Miers, just appointed by Bush to a Supreme Court seat. From staunch Conservative David Frum:

"In the White House that hero worshipped the president, Miers was distinguished by the intensity of her zeal: She once told me that the president was the most brilliant man she had ever met. She served Bush well, but she is not the person to lead the court in new directions - or to stand up under the criticism that a conservative justice must expect"

It's cronyism squared. It's like nominating your puppy to a seat.

Or it's the "Michael Brown-ing" (Brown being "Drownie" of FEMA) of the entire Federal government. Apparatchiks everywhere.

Not the Combo He Was Going For

Bush, Cheney and Rove were not doubt looking to have Bush cast as a combination of Reagan and Teddy Roosevelt-- or something like that.

With the scandals creeping up the White House ranks, and with his so-called "malaise" speech, he's starting to look like another hybrid altogether: a combination of Nixon and Carter.

Maybe when the "declare victory and get out" of Iraq day finally comes, we can add LBJ. And, when the economy goes all to hell due to energy costs and Bush's mishandling, maybe Hoover too.

Christ, how much pain does the US have to go through for the greater glory of George W. Bush (aka Nixon + Carter)?

Dividing Line

There are a lot of dividing lines in the US. I suspect one dividing line in the death photos for porn is between those who are more upset about the porn versus those who are more upset about the necrophotographia.

Comrade, Celebrate the Party's Martyrs! or else....

Steven Clemons catches (and modifies just a bit), a voice mail that Commerce Department employees got encouraging them to march in the ironically named "Walk for Freedom."

And apparently the voicemail workd -- at least a bit:

"When I consulted with various members of the media who covered the so-called Freedom Walk that co-mingled a memorial to 9/11 victims with a rally for our actions in Iraq, they reported that many of those who attended the several-thousand person rally were "unenthusiastic civil servants" from the Labor, Commerce, and other Departments who were pressured to attend."

Apparatchiks unite!

Undercounting?

Will they try to undercount the deaths due to the Hurricane? Maybe so.

Looks to me like the undercounting may have already started, and in a huge way:

From the Times-Picayune blog:

Lee reports on deaths in Jefferson
Friday, 10:05 p.m.

"Sheriff Harry Lee said Saturday night that the Jefferson Parish Coroner’s office had processed 152 bodies, but only 20 of those were deaths related to Hurricane Katrina. He said the coroner’s office was picking up bodies that are reported lying in the street and handling them to FEMA’s specifications. He also said that body count does not include bodies that may have been taken to the morgue in St. Gabriel. "

They've processed 152 bodies, but only less than 1/7 of those deaths are due to the Hurricane? Huh?

Does FEMA have standards for what counts as a "death due to Hurrican Katrina?" If so, what are those standards?

State, Local, Federal

Republicans and republican mouthpieces want to blame the local and state authorities for the response to Katrina. At least for this Democrat, I'm fine with that.

With the added caveat that follows: who is surprised when the notoriously clueless governments of Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana really screw things up? If they'd have done an exemplary job I'd have been more suprised.

But one expects the Feds to actually get things done, and they failed horribly.

And, of course, Bush's failures -- from hiring Republican hacks with no emergency experience for Fema jobs, to staying on vacation while people were dying -- were a big part of that failure.

Obama

Macy Gray wearing a "Barack Obama 2008" tee shirt tonight on CNN.

I've been thinking about Barack Obama recently. And he's got some good things to say about the current situation.

That is the deeper shame of this past week - that it has taken a crisis like this one to awaken us to the great divide that continues to fester in our midst. That's what all Americans are truly ashamed about, and the fact that we're ashamed about it is a good sign. The fact that all of us - black, white, rich, poor, Republican, Democrat - don't like to see such a reflection of this country we love, tells me that the American people have better instincts and a broader heart than our current politics would indicate.

His whole statement is really nice.

Even worse than the 38 per cent

Quite a few have pointed out the 38 per cent approval rating Bush enjoys in the recent Newsweek poll

Just as important to me is the dawning realization among the public that Bush isn't much of a leader in a crisis:

More critical to President Bush—and the GOP’s future as the nation’s majority party: most Americans, 52 percent, say they do not trust the president “to make the right decisions during a domestic crisis” (45 percent do). The numbers are exactly the same when the subject is trust of the president to make the right decisions during an international crisis.

And, from the same poll:

Demonstrating the widespread havoc that Katrina has wrought on the president’s political fortunes—even far from issues of disaster response—for the first time in the four years since 9/11, more Americans disapprove of Bush’s handling of terrorism and homeland security than approve of it.

Remember, Bush was taking an extra long vacation (and avoiding meeting Cindy Sheehan) so he could make crisp decisions:

"I think the people want the president to be in a position to make good, crisp decisions and to stay healthy," he said when asked about bike riding while a grieving mom wanted to speak with him. "And part of my being is to be outside exercising."

I'd hate to see how horrible the Katrina aftermath would have been if his decisions hadn't been so damned crisp.

Karen Hughes Defines Her Job

Karen Hughes was appointed to help mend America's image abroad in spring. Showing how important this image-mending is to Bush, she was sworn in on Friday, mere months after her naming!

Also showing how skilled she will be in communicating with the world, she opens her tenure with this horseshit:

"The images of crime being committed in the face of an awful natural disaster is hard for anyone to understand, people around the world and Americans. It sickens me as an American," she said. "How could criminals prey on vulnerable elderly citizens and children during a time of such horror?"

I'm pretty sure she didn't check a single foreign public opinion poll about Katrina or even get an honest sampling of foreigners before saying that. I'm willing to bet that the looting was not the main thing that non-Americans will take away from the Katrina fiasco. Maybe massive poverty in the richest nation on the world would be noted above looting. Or third-world conditions in the first world. Or the suffering and death caused by the utter incompetence of this government.

One of those is probably top of the heap, since everyone knows the US is a violent nation and has its share of crime -- that's common knowledge and it's an idea exported via our popular culture. But Hollywood blockbusters don't generally depict utterly hopeless poverty and the existence of an ignored black underclass on the scale the world saw on CNN International.

However, to Karen Hughes reflexive Bush-promoting mind, looting at least isn't something Bush did directly, so it takes the focus off his pathetic failure.

If Karen Hughes is going to continue speaking solely to make Bush look good and not to communicate to the world at large in good faith, she is doomed to failure. Which is bad for the US. But probably not the worst failure of the Bush administration.

Also, whatcha wanna bet that she doesn't speak Arabic? What language does she speak, if any?

This little bit from her remarks indicates she probably isn't much of a linguist:

"I've got to tell you, it's impressive to be with Condi, when you're with the Russian officials, to hear her speak the Russian language"

Wow, an American who speaks one of those funny languages -- not just pidgin Spanish. It's so impressive!

Everything this Administration touches turns into a joke.

Bush's Baby

Don't forget that it wasn't just any federal agency that failed all those people along the Gulf Coast.

It was the Department of Homeland Security, created in secret by Andrew Card with input and ultimate authority of George Walker Bush.

Bush's baby. Bush's brainchild. A brand spanking new department designed and staffed (such as it is) by George W. Bush.

Bush: Massive undeniable failure.

Not Photoshopped

Appropriate.

Adminstration at Odds with itself.

Scott Mclellan claims he doesn't want anyone to play the "blame game."

Karl Rove and Dan Bartlett are doing nothing but "playing the blame game," blaming everyone but Bush for his failure.

Seems like that would warrant a few questions to McLellan and others.

What Was Said at that Photo Op?

Here's our pseudo-compassionate leader not listening to two human props for his photo op:

Bush strides up to two African American women, who are sisters. Hovering nearby is a white guy wearing shades and shorts.

With the cameras rolling, Bush hugs the two women, one of whom starts sobbing.

Here's a partial transcript:

Bush to women: 'There's a Salvation Army center that I want to, that I'll tell you where it is, and they'll get you some help. I'm sorry . . . They'll help you. . . . '

Woman 1: 'I came here looking for clothes. . . . '

Bush: 'They'll get you some clothes, at the Salvation Army center. . . . '

Woman 1: 'We don't have anything. . . . '

Bush: 'I understand. . . . Do you know where the center is, that I'm talking to you about?'

Guy with shades: 'There's no center there, sir, it's a truck.'

Bush: 'There's trucks?'

Guy: 'There's a school, a school about two miles away. . . . '

Bush: 'But isn't there a Salvation center down there?'

Guy: 'No that's wiped out. . . . '

Bush: 'A temporary center?'

Guy: 'No sir they've got a truck there, for food.'

Bush: 'That's what I'm saying, for food and water.'

Bush then turns to the woman who's been saying how she needs clothes and tells her: 'You need food and water.'"

I'll tell you what you need, even though I met you sixty seconds ago. I won't listen to what you say. You're a prop in my photo op.

Red Tape?

CNN.com - Cut the red tape, Lott says - Sep 5, 2005: "Sen. Trent Lott berated both the Federal Emergency Management Agency and his own state's emergency management, MEMA, for being mired in red tape at a time of urgent need given the devastation left by Hurricane Katrina."

Of course, even blaming red tape is blaming Bush and his FEMA. "Emergency management" means you have the red tape worked out before the emergency, or find means to overcome it quickly during the emergency.

Therefore, this is not due to red tape: it's just more of the atrocious planning and management we've come to expect from this administration. Incompetence, thy name is Bush.

Lake George

A fitting name for the shit and poison soup that is currently New Orleans. George diverted funds to Iraq from levees and other flood control for New Orleans.

Lake George it is.

Bush Luck

I've said it before but it's pertinent again.

A major American city evacuated and unihabitable for over a month? Thousands possibly dead?

George W. Bush is bad luck for the United States.

Of course, it's not just bad luck. Bush making a patronage pit of FEMA didn't help. Hunter at DailyKos sumarizes it well with his headline: Category 4 Hurricane Determined To Strike U.S.

And, for that reason, New Orleans needs help more than it would otherwise. So find a worthy charity and give.

Dulce Et Decorum Est

Dulce Et Decorum Est Pro Shi'ite Theocracy.

Is that book Who's Who?

Josh Marshall finds Kaus making an interesting assertion.

So, is that book on the table Who's Who?

I don't know. This is the best image I could extract from the video:

I sure can't read the text, and I am not familiar enough with Who's Who to identify it at sight from a distance.

That's a promotional image of the current Who's Who from the publisher's website. Looks like a probable match to me. TV color is off, of course, and there may have been some design changes in the intervening years, but it looks probable.

Tweety

I always wondered why Atrios and others called Chris Matthews "Tweety".

Quick, Enemy of the Good

I see that Bush is planning on nominating someone to the Supreme Court more quickly than he intended. This is probably due, in part, to the flap over Karl Rover outing a CIA agent.

Hurring this process can't be such a great idea for Bush. I hope they have the same person vetting the justice nominee as they had checking up on Bernard Kerik.

And then they push the vettor to hurry up.

A Voice of the CIA

If you've wondered what a rank-and-file CIA person thinks of the Plame affair, you should stop in at TPMCafe.com, where ex-CIA agent Larry Johnson is a guest blogger. He currently has three posts up, and they're all informative both about the facts of this case and the larger issues of how Rove has hurt national security. The link above may not last long so I'll link to all three of his posts below, in reverse chronological order:

1. Mr Bush, Have You No Shame?
   
2. The Intelligence Challenge: Can We Trust Our President? [The meat of this post is a statement made in a Capital Hill hearing in October 2003 made by several people who worked with Plame at the CIA.]
   
3. The Big Lie About Valerie Plame
   

He shoots down most of the Republican echo chamber talking points, including "Wilson said Cheney ordered him to go to Niger" [False.] "But Saddam was trying to buy uranium from Niger!" [False.] "Plame was the one who sent Wilson to Niger!" [False.].

In addition to Johnson's contributions to correcting falsehoods in Republican talking points, it's also helpful to get a feeling for how CIA agents past and present feel about the whole disgusting business. Not happy in the least.

Highly recommended in addition to your other Plame-related readings. And, to top it all off, he's a registered Republican.

Hah!

Uggabugga has a decent bumper sticker idea. But an anonymous commenter there has an even better one:

"Who do I have to blow to get a president impeached?"

What Crappy Idiots

One major thing wrong with the Iraq debacle was the utter incompetence of the Bush Administration, as evidenced by the nutcases they sent over there.

From a Larry Diamond OpEd, excerpted at TAPPED:

TAPPED: June 2005 Archives:

One young political appointee (a 24-year-old Ivy League graduate) argued that Iraq should not enshrine judicial review in its constitution because it might lead to the legalization of abortion.

Make sure to populate the US people in Iraq with those who think preventing abortion is the most important thing in the world.

Infuriating and idiotic.

Someone had a good putdown in reply, but a good retort doesn't make up for those dead and maimed due to idiocy like the above.

A much more senior Iraqi interlocutor (a widely experienced Iraqi-American lawyer) became so exasperated with the young man's audacity that he finally challenged him:

'You must have thoroughly studied the history of the British occupation of Iraq.'

'Yes, I did,' the young American replied proudly. 'I thought so,' said the Iraqi, 'because you seem determined to repeat every one of their mistakes.'

You can't trust these idiots to do anything important. Except, I guess, have an echo chamber that gets idiots elected.

Not Hard To Guess Who Said This

President Urges Patience on War:

"Why must we take this painful road? Why must this nation hazard its ease, its interest, and its power for the sake of a people so far away?

We fight because we must fight if we are to live in a world where every country can shape its own destiny, and only in such a world will our own freedom be finally secure.

This kind of world will never be built by bombs or bullets. Yet the infirmities of man are such that force must often precede reason and the waste of war, the works of peace.

We wish this were not so. But we must deal with the world as it is, if it is ever to be as we wish."

On a blog-related note, we're still here, but posting may be sparse for a bit.

Comparitive Morality

So the rightwingers believe that Amnesty International is biased against the US.

The Poor Man finds that others have made very similar complaints for having human rights complaints leveled at them -- sometimes even n vigorous language!-- by Amnesty.

And, yes, the US under Bush isn't as bad as Idi Amin and others on this list. But is "not as bad as the most horrible in history" really a position you want to retreat to? "Yes, we're moral lepers, but not as leprous as the worst to have trod the earth."

I can't be surprised by the moral positions taken by Bush supporters anymore. But it's worth noting how moral standards have slipped and moral relativism is rampant nowadays.

Derrida Bush.

And On That Bombshell

Tonight BBC America begins to air I'm Alan Partridge, a hilarious sitcom featuring Steve Coogan's most famous creation, the failed chat-show host Alan Partridge.

In the sitcom he's working as an overnight DJ on Radio Norwich and attempting to get the BBC to renew his chat show (Knowing Me, Knowing You) for a second season. The first words of the first episode of the series are as follows, which Alan announces over the fadeout of a Joni Mitchell song:

"That was "big yellow taxi" by Joni Mitchell, a song in which joni complains that they paved Paradise to put up a parking lot, a measure which actually would have alleviated traffic congestion on the outskirts of Paradise, something which Joni singularly fails to point out, perhaps because it doesn't quite fit in with her blinkered view of the world."

Watch and enjoy, and thank the BBC.

By Design

H. Allen Orr in the New Yorker writes a good piece on Intelligent Design, including this bit:

In 1999, a document from the Discovery Institute was posted, anonymously, on the Internet. This Wedge Document, as it came to be called, described not only the institute’s long-term goals but its strategies for accomplishing them. The document begins by labelling the idea that human beings are created in the image of God “one of the bedrock principles on which Western civilization was built.” It goes on to decry the catastrophic legacy of Darwin, Marx, and Freud—the alleged fathers of a “materialistic conception of reality” that eventually “infected virtually every area of our culture.” The mission of the Discovery Institute’s scientific wing is then spelled out: “nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies.” It seems fair to conclude that the Discovery Institute has set its sights a bit higher than, say, reconstructing the origins of the bacterial flagellum.

On so many fronts, this is the type of things we're up against. People with extreme agendas who are relentless in continuing to push for any crack they can to advance their cause. We think a stake was driven through the heart of an issue years or decades ago, but the retrograde groups take a new form, adopt new language and tactics, and keep pushing at every chink they can find. They're relentless and largely immune to reason. And they win a lot of battles, and may likely win some wars.

Jesusland's Air Force

You may recall that at the Air Force Academy, evangelical students and instructors are apparently harassing non-evangelicals. The Air Force ordered an investigation and a report.

Two prominent crtitics -- a Yale professor who documented harassment previously and a Academy alum who is Jewish, has a child currently attending, and who has reported harassment as well -- were not contacted during the investigation.

They really are intent on keeping the Air Force just for the red states it seems.

Crocodile Tears

Ken Layne on the Newsweek non-scandal:

"Beautiful: The White House just announced the total retraction was a “good first step.”

Ah, and Rumsfeld says “People need to be careful what they say, as well as careful what they do.” Thanks, you sociopathic bag of shit! I’ll keep that in mind!"

If the Pentagon had bothered to dispute the story when it was run by them before publication I'd have a harder time scoffing at this deplorable spectacle.

Layne nails quite a few aspects of this story, including the "crocodile tears shed by the Bush-apologist crowd."

Unpopularity Contest

Actually, it's no contest. From Editor & Publisher

Gallup: Bush Approval Rating Lowest Ever for 2nd-Term Prez at this Point: "It's not uncommon to hear or read pundits referring to President George W. Bush as a 'popular' leader or even a 'very popular' one. Even some of his critics in the press refer to him this way. Perhaps they need to check the latest polls.

President Bush's approval rating has plunged to the lowest level of any president since World War II at this point in his second term, the Gallup Organization reported today.

All other presidents who served a second term had approval ratings well above 50% in the March following their election, Gallup reported.

Presidents Truman and Johnson had finished out the terms of their predecessors, and then won election on their own for a second term.

Bush's current rating is 45%. The next lowest was Reagan with 56% in March 1985.

More bad signs for the president: Gallup's survey now finds only 38% expressing satisfaction with the 'state of the country' while 59% are 'dissatisfied.' One in three Americans feel the economy is excellent or good, while the rest find it 'only fair' or poor. "

There's more at that page.

Santorum's Mind Gutters Again

A New York Times article about the upcoming nuclear showdown in the Senate includes the following paragraph, with the creepy Santorum quote emphasized by me:

At Center of Senate Showdown, a Boxer Takes On a Surgeon - New York Times: "Senator Rick Santorum, Republican of Pennsylvania, said Senate minorities had previously restrained themselves from using the filibuster to block nominees with majority support. 'Senator Reid has refused to do that,' Mr. Santorum said. 'Now we are forced to do something that societies often do when people can't control their desires. We have to pass laws to stop their desires.'"

Report Due

I was under the impression that the Theresa Schiavo autopsy would be completed by early May.

This interesting profile of the pathologist performing the autopsy says his report will be ready in two to three more weeks. Of course, it's difficult to assess the competency of the pathologist from a news story, but I suppose it's good that he's depicted as being independent.

For those of you who missed the news in mid-April, there's this story: "State investigators found no evidence that Terri Schiavo had been abused or exploited by either side of her family, according to documents released by Florida's Department of Children and Families."

Those who were accusing the husband of abuse should apologize. Likelihood: minimal.

Mullah as Pimp

Pleasure marriages' regain popularity in Iraq

One thing freedom has re-introduced to Iraq: "Pleasure marriages," which can last from an hour to ten years. The Mullah gets a cut when he approves the contract.

Contracts for pleasure marriage strongly favor men.

Married women can't enter a muta'a, although a married man can. Men can void the contract at any time; women don't have that option unless it's negotiated at the outset. The couple agrees not to have children. A woman who unintentionally gets pregnant can have an abortion but must then pay a fine to a cleric

One thing many "kill the Arabs" idiots didn't realize was that Saddam, while a horrid scumbag, was also secular: he'd outlawed this practice.