Clueless

Watching Rep. Mark Kennedy of Minnesota debate his Democratic opponent Amy Klobuchar on Meet The Press this morning – what a dope he is. Ms. Klobuchar is clearly capable of forming thoughts and articulating them while Kennedy robotically spews tired, failed Rethuglican talking points. He's a perfect example of the rot and ineptitude on display in Washington.

Minnesotans have an easy choice when voting for their US Senator this November, press the button for Amy Klobuchar.

America has suffered enough. Vote Democrat.

Posted on The Human Stain

Anger is Good

Glenn Greenwald has a good post this morning The Virtues of Anger and Passion, that discusses a couple of important issues – first, how totally disconnected the supposed Democratic political experts are from the reality of America's citizens and second, how being angry is good when thinking about the disastrous condition Bush and his thugs have put America in. Some excerpts:

The single most erroneous and destructive premise among the Beltway political class -- which includes the Democratic consulting class along with their intellectual twins in the David-Broder-led punditry circles -- is that anger and passion are the enemies of successful political movements. They preach a mindset of fear and defensiveness -- never articulate a view too strenuously and never be driven by principle or passion because to do so renders one an unmoderate extremist who will alienate normal Americans........

Democrats so rarely mold, shape or drive public opinion because their consultants and pundits operate from the premise that passion and principle are to be avoided at all costs. Stripped to its essence, the core advice of these consultants, which most national Democrats have been embracing, is to follow, not lead. But Americans -- understandably -- want to elect leaders, not followers, and that is why nothing has been more damaging to the Democratic Party brand than the self-consciously clever, soul-less, fear-driven advice of their consultants to abandon their own beliefs............. (emphasis added)

The Democratic consultants who told Joe Sestak not to advocate troop withdraw from Iraq -- even though, as a military veteran and national security expert, that is what he believes is best for his country -- suffer not only from a serious character defect but also towering strategic stupidity. Everyone other than the most self-deluded Bush followers recognize that the core impetus for the collapse of the Republican Party's popularity is the public's anger and disgust over the deceitful way we were led into Iraq and the subsequent ineptitude and dishonesty that has characterized our ongoing disastrous occupation............

Why would anyone advise a Congressional candidate -- let alone a military veteran and national security expert -- to sound as much as possible like the embarrassingly unpopular George Bush when talking about the equally unpopular war in Iraq? It's because they have an intrinsic and by-now instinctive fear of their own political views and have adopted, as their guiding principle, the mandate that all strongly-held (and, even more so, clearly articulated) convictions must be avoided at all costs......

But all of this happens precisely because Republicans want Democrats to be afraid of advocating their views and to think that they have to run away from them. The Rovians know what the hapless Democratic consultancy mystifyingly fails to see -- that anger and passion are the keys to political success. Several months ago, I wrote a post about the virtues of anger in response to a worried, fretful column by Richard Cohen lamenting (based upon some mean e-mails he received) that the Democrats will be doomed by anger. This is part of what I wrote:

Most successful political movements need passion. Anger, when constructively directed, is a potent and inspiring passion. It is noble to be angry about dangerous situations and corrupt leaders, and there are few passions which can compete with anger for inspiring oneself and others to meaningful action. Conversely, those who are entirely devoid of anger are often lifeless, limp, uninspiring figures who seem to be drained of soul and purpose. . . .

. . . That is why the Right encourages this idea among Democrats that anger is fatal and to be avoided - even as they perfect the art of using it themselves. They know from lots of experience that a political party that coalesces around its impassioned anger can be very successful. The sooner Democrats figure that out, the better off they will be.

Get angry America, let it boil. Then go vote!!

Posted on The Human Stain

Finally – Truth

It's certainly nice to be right. It's about the oil – it always was.

President Bush keeps revising his explanation for why the U.S. is in Iraq, moving from narrow military objectives at first to history-of-civilization stakes now.

Initially, the rationale was specific: to stop Saddam Hussein from using what Bush claimed were the Iraqi leader's weapons of mass destruction or from selling them to al-Qaida or other terrorist groups.

But 3 1/2 years later, with no weapons found, still no end in sight and the war a liability for nearly all Republicans on the ballot Nov. 7, the justification has become far broader and now includes the expansive "struggle between good and evil.........

"We can't tolerate a new terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East, with large oil reserves that could be used to fund its radical ambitions, or used to inflict economic damage on the West," Bush said in a news conference last week in the Rose Garden.

He also used the “oil” word a couple more times:

The stakes couldn't be any higher, as I said earlier, in the world in which we live. There are extreme elements that use religion to achieve objectives. And they want us to leave, and they want us to -- and they want to topple government. They want to extend an ideological caliphate that is -- has no concept of liberty inherent in their beliefs. They want to control oil resources, and they want to plot and plan and attack us again. That's their objectives. And so -- and our strategic objective is to prevent them from doing that. And we're constantly changing tactics to achieve that objective.....

Our policy is to help this country succeed, because I understand the stakes. I'm going to repeat them one more time. As a matter of fact, I'm going to spend a lot of time repeating the stakes about what life is like in the Middle East.

It is conceivable that there will be a world in which radical forms, extreme forms of religion fight each other for influence in the Middle East, in which they've got the capacity to use oil as an economic weapon.

Americans dying by the thousands, Iraqis dying by the hundreds of thousands, because of what?

Oil.

Posted on The Human Stain

His Own Medicine

“When you rape a person, when you violate a child – you lose your civil liberties...” so said Rep. Mark Foley.

Now known as a Republican child predator, he has quickly resigned from office.

He can make new friends in jail.
Posted on The Human Stain

With a Straight Face

When Condoleezza Rice appeared before the 9/11 Commission to testify about government actions in the aftermath of the attacks, she held up her hand and testified under oath. This is what she vowed:

KEAN. Thank you.

Dr. Rice, would you please rise and raise your right hand?

Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

CONDOLEEZZA RICE. I do.

“I do.” Repeat that - “I do.” She affirmed to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Apparently, she doesn't know what she vowed to do.

CIA Director George Tenet and his counterterrorism head Cofer Black sought an urgent meeting with then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice on July 10, 2001.....They went over top-secret intelligence pointing to an impending attack and "sounded the loudest warning" to the White House of a likely attack on the U.S. by Bin Laden.

Woodward writes that Rice was polite, but, "They felt the brushoff." Tenet and Black were both frustrated. Black later calculated that all he needed was $500 million of covert action funds and reasonable authorization from President Bush to go kill Bin Laden and "he might be able to bring Bin Laden's head back in a box," Woodward writes.

Black claims the CIA had about "100 sources and subsources" in Afghanistan who could have helped carry out the hit..... Woodward claims the intelligence Tenet and Black shared with Rice included communication intercepts indicating the likelihood of an Al Qaeda attack on U.S. soil.

Tenet said he had hoped the meeting would shock Rice into encouraging the President to take immediate action against Al Qaeda.

Black, looking back at the July 10, 2001, meeting with Rice, concludes, "The only thing we didn't do was pull the trigger to the gun we were holding to her [Rice's] head."

Woodward says that Tenet described the meeting as a "tremendous lost opportunity to prevent or disrupt the 9/11 attacks."

From Think Progress:

Suspiciously, the Commissioners and the staff investigating the administration’s actions prior to 9/11 were never informed of the meeting. As Commissioner Jamie Gorelick pointed out, “We didn’t know about the meeting itself. I can assure you it would have been in our report if we had known to ask about it.”

The Commission interviewed Condoleezza Rice privately and during public testimony; it interviewed George Tenet three times privately and during public testimony; and Cofer Black was also interviewed privately and publicly. All of them were obligated to tell the truth. Apparently, none of them described this meeting, the purpose of which clearly was central to the Commission’s investigation.

Moreover, document requests to both the White House and to the CIA should have revealed the fact that this meeting took place. Now, more than two years after the release of the Commission’s report, we learn of this meeting from Bob Woodward.

Was it covered up? It is hard to come to a different conclusion..... At a minimum, the withholding of information about this meeting is an outrage. Very possibly, someone committed a crime. And worst of all, they failed to stop the plot.

Now either Rice lied to 9/11 Commission or she is tremendously incompetent. If the former – she deserves jail along with some of her work compatriots. If the latter – she ill-serves our nation and her continued presence in government will cause more unnecessary deaths and despair. She needs to go – and fast.

Posted on The Human Stain

Shafting Everyone

Emperor in Chief – George Bush is an equal opportunity abuser. Internationally or domestically, he enriches his well connected friends at the expense of citizens. Chimpie is not a racist – he looks upon all people not part of his clique with total disdain. Live in New Orleans? Too bad.

Disaster profiteers make millions while local companies and laborers in New Orleans and the rest of the Katrina-devastated Gulf Coast region are systematically getting the short end of the stick, according to a major new report from the nonprofit CorpWatch.

The CorpWatch report also exposes abusive "contracting charge pyramids" where the companies doing the actual reconstruction work often get only a tiny (and insufficient) fraction of the taxpayer money awarded for projects and widespread non-payment of local companies and laborers, including what has been alleged to be the deliberate and systematic exploitation of immigrant workers, including undocumented individuals.

“One year after disaster struck, the slow-motion rebuilding of the Gulf Coast region looks identical to what has happened to date in Afghanistan and Iraq. We see a pattern of profiteering, waste and failure - due to the same flawed contracting system and even many of the same players" says CorpWatch Director Pratap Chatterjee. "The process of getting Katrina-stricken areas back on their feet is needlessly behind schedule, in part, due to the shunning of local business people in favor of politically connected corporations from elsewhere in the U.S. that have used their clout to win lucrative no-bid contracts with little or no accountability and who have done little or no work while ripping off the taxpayer."

“Big, Easy Money” report author Rita J. King said: "The devastation of the Gulf Coast is tragic enough, but the scope of the corporate greed that followed, facilitated by government incompetence and complicity, is downright criminal. Sadly, disaster profiteering has become commonplace in America. Well connected corporations are growing rich off of no-bid contracts while the sub-contractors - the people who actually perform the work - often do so for peanuts, if they get paid at all."

Click to read the report text version or PDF.

This is an administration incapable of competence, embued with corruption, inhabited by amorality. Bush, his acolytes, and their syncophants are bad for America and bad for humanity. They need to go. This can be changed – starting in November 2006 and finishing in November 2008.
Posted on The Human Stain

Reality

Blinded by self delusion and possessing extremely shallow intellectual capabilities, Chimpie cannot see truth. This is a good post from Consortium News by Brent Bodowsky titled 'Dereliction of Duty'. Some excerpts:

Time and time again, itemized in detail below, George Bush has shown contempt for his commanders, disrespected their advice, demeaned them publicly and privately, and taken action after action that directly harmed the safety of our troops and caused great damage to the mission and our national security.

What we have witnessed on a massive scale is a dereliction of duty of unparalleled proportion, from those who sent these young men and women to war, where they heroically did their duty, while politicians used them as cannon fodder for partisanship while committing derelictions of duty that did them great harm.

Did our commanders not unanimously and aggressively oppose the use of torture which they unanimously and aggressively believe creates danger for our troops, tarnishes our reputation around the world, creates new terrorists and violates cardinal rules of war that they hold sacred?

Is it not 100% true that the torture practices advocated by this President directly disrespect two centuries of good advice and military ethics and directly violate the advice and good judgment of commanders today?

Do you deny that our commanders urgently requested reinforcements at Tora Bora when we could have killed Bin Laden and were outraged when the cavalry did not come to finish the kill, but were sent to Iraq instead by a President who always claimed, falsely, that he followed his commanders advice and now claims, falsely, that his political opponents offer nothing but cut and run which he, himself, did at Tora Bora?

Do you not confess that our commanders are appalled that Iraqi politicians are unwilling and unable to deal with murdering militias, who have stepped into the void created by the failure of Iraq police to stand up, and who spend half their time committing sectarian murder against each other, and the other half planning the murder of American troops?

Do you believe it serves democracy, our commanders or our troops when more than 60% of Iraqis support the killing of American troops, and more than 70% want our troops to leave within range of a year?

Do you question my assertion that time and time again, on issue after issue, at great cost to the mission and the troops, commanders faced political pressure and abuse, and were threatened not to speak their minds, while civilian leaders put on their American flag pins and went to their 4 of July picnics and stated, falsely, shamefully, that the commanders agree with every decision the civilians made, and get everything they privately ask for?

Do you not admit that the Senate Intelligence Committee report that you want covered up until after the election will list countless false statements by high level officials who failed to tell the truth, about what was in the true interest of our troops?

Do you not accept the incontrovertible fact that our entire American intelligence community believes that the current Iraq war strategy is creating new terrorists, more terrorists, and great dangers and that our commanders have long been fighting like hell for policies that address political, diplomatic, economic and humanitarian issues that have been so devastatingly neglected by civilian leaders, over the objection of our commanders?

And do you not confess and admit that our commanders are appalled that ideologues run to talk shows and political speeches, and blow the winds of war from the lips of those who have done enough damage to our military for a lifetime, who have no experience in war themselves, but talk of a new war here, and a new war there, as though war is a dinner party discussion, or cheap talk show talk?

Posted on The Human Stain

Eternal War

America's President inhabits a world the rest of us do not see – one filled with enemies around every corner, one where his perceptions are depressing perversions of the true world we live in. While there is danger in the world – there always is. America has coped and persevered in the past and there is no reason we cannot in the future. Chimpie is filled with a messianic self delusion that he has been given 'this mission' by God and he continues to plod onward regardless of the wrongheadedness that is apparent to all. Anyone who disagrees with his reality is labeled as naïve or traitorous or of enabling the terrorists. Since it appears most everyone is disagreeing with him - can the all these people be wrong? He is the real danger in America's reality as he is incapable of admitting error.

But Bush insisted Saturday that claims that the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq was helping foster anti-American terrorism were tantamount to buying "into the enemy's propaganda."

"The only way to protect our citizens at home is to go on the offense against the enemy across the world," the president said Saturday. "So we will remain on the offense until the terrorists are defeated and this fight is won."

The Republican president, who just two days ago branded opposition Democrats "the party of cut-and-run," argued an early withdrawal from Iraq, as suggested by some Democrats, would only embolden terrorists.

Democrats have long accused the White House of failing to foresee an Iraqi insurgency, create a viable international coalition behind the invasion, and of sending too few soldiers to do control the restive country.

Now they are also charging the president is in a state of denial. "He doesn't want to see the facts. He doesn't want to acknowledge reality," Carl Levin, the top Democrat of the Senate Armed Services Committee, insisted Friday.

Image from Austin Cline
Posted on The Human Stain

Republican Predators and Christian Phonies

One cannot find a better example for highlighting the moral turpitude, sleaze, corruption, amorality, and lack of responsibility that is the Republican Party than what is currently on display in Washington. The party that spouted and foamed about how they would restore honor and integrity to Washington is embroiled in the sleazy Rep Mark Foley sex case that shows them to be the total hypocrites they always were. Knowingly working with and enabling a child predator, the House Republican leadership (Hastert, Boehner, and staff) has shown a creepy and callous disregard for their constituents, the children of their constituents, and the American public. The young people who work in congressional offices as pages earn that opportunity through hard work, citizenship, and achievement in their schools and communities. Their parents entrust their safety to US House Representatives in whose offices these teenagers work. So much for that. Having to fend of the advances of a sex depraved Congressman and having to endure them for over a year due to the unconscionable abrogation of responsibility from Hastert and other Rethuglican “leaders” who knew of the predator in their midst is sickening and deplorable. Anyone there ever hear of the Catholic Church sex abuse fiasco?

While the Republicans squirm in their self infected miasma, what of their vaunted base? You know – the Christians, the Moral Majority, the Values Voters, the moralists from Rethuglican 'religio' groups? Surely they must be up in arms and are howling from the rooftops that this is a despicable state of affairs. Surely the idea that a high ranking member of the Republican leadership has a secret life as a child predator is causing severe angst throughout their world. Oops – sorry. Not a peep.

You see, the 'Religious Right' really has nothing to do with religion. Religion is just the draw for the suckers – a way to separate them from their cash. The 'religious right' is really about control – about authoritarianism – about fascism cloaked in religion. The religionut 'leaders' really care nothing about the values they rally around. Morally crippled and damaged, they cannot distinguish true humanistic differences between right and wrong.

Claiming to be a man of deep Catholic faith, Foley hasn't shied away from proclaiming his rectitude. "At Sacred Heart, I was taught how to be a better citizen because of their focus on discipline and moral values," he said, referring to the school he attended in Lake Worth, Florida.

Foley also received an 84% approval rating from the Christian Coalition in 2004, the most recent year we could find spur of the moment.

Indeed, Foley made get-tough laws on sexually exploited children -- particularly exploitation over the Internet -- one of his primary crusades in Congress. He was even Co-Chair of the Missing and Exploited Children Caucus. He also introduced a bill to ban online "child modeling" sites, claiming they are "nothing more than a fix for pedophiles." "They don't sell products, they don't sell services," he said. "All they serve are young children on a platter for America's most depraved. These sites sell child erotica and they should be banned."

On Bill O'Reilly's show this May, he said, "Our kids are precious. Their lives are vulnerable. The predators are winning as we speak."

Rarely has there been a clearer case of the kind of religious hypocrisy that Jesus condemned so passionately in the Gospels.

Foley rails against the depraved; he is the depraved. Foley attacks the predators; he is a predator.

Our question: where are the denunciations from the religious right? Where is Focus on the Family? Where is the Family Research Council? Do they only care about sexual misconduct when it's committed by a Democrat? The hypocrisy doesn't belong to Foley alone. The hypocrisy belongs to everyone who rails against sexual sin for political purposes then delivers a sermon of silence when the sinner happens to advance a right-wing, Republican agenda.

Image from Austin Cline
Posted on The Human Stain