Lies Have Consequences pt.1

1. jayackroyd - 6/24/2004 5:46:32 PM

Here's a blank slate for jexster to begin his compositions on.

2. jexster - 6/24/2004 5:50:49 PM

The Coup: US Attorney Interviews Bush in Plame Treason Case

3. jexster - 6/24/2004 5:59:10 PM

PRAYER CARD




Conquistador your stallion stands
in need of company
and like some angel's haloed brow
you reek of purity
I see your armour-plated breast
has long since lost its sheen
and in your death mask face
there are no signs which can be seen


And though I hoped for something
to find
I could see no maze to unwind


Conquistador a vulture sits
upon your silver shield
and in your rusty scabbard now
the sand has taken seed
and though your jewel-encrusted blade
has not been plundered still
the sea has washed across your face
and taken of its fill


And though I hoped for something
to find
I could see no maze to unwind


Conquistador there is no time
I must pay my respect
and though I came to jeer at you
I leave now with regret
and as the gloom begins to fall
I see there is no, only all
and though you came with sword held high

you did not conquer, only die


4. jayackroyd - 6/24/2004 5:59:40 PM

Pollack concedes the key point.

Bill Galston is one helluva debater. In the fall of 2002, well before the invasion of Iraq, I faced Bill--a University of Maryland professor and a former colleague of mine in the Clinton administration--in a public debate, and he kicked my rhetorical ass. He did it by holding up a copy of my book, The Threatening Storm, and saying to the audience, "If we were going to get Ken Pollack's war, I could be persuaded to support it. But we are not going to get Ken Pollack's war; we are going to get George Bush's war, and that is a war I will not support." Bill's words haunted me throughout the run-up to the invasion. Several months ago, I sent him a note conceding that he had been right.

5. jayackroyd - 6/24/2004 6:25:50 PM

Send a letter to Dick Cheney's lesbian campaign manager.

6. jexster - 6/24/2004 6:41:18 PM

AUGUST 2002

Against every precedent in international law, in violation of the United Nations Charter, and without consent of the American Congress, the Bush Administration was proposing to sack a heathen city that had done it no demonstrable harm, and the news media were by and large happy to welcome the event with obedient commentary supportive of the belief that if America allowed Saddam to acquire weapons of mass destruction we would suffer consequences frightful to contemplate and terrible to behold.

The lead editorial in The Economist on August 3 summed up the consensus of leading opinion in two sentences: "The honest choices now are to give up and give in, or to remove Mr. Hussein before he gets his bomb. Painful as it is, our vote is for war."

7. jexster - 6/24/2004 6:41:32 PM

Give up to whom? Give in to what? The government didn't stoop to answer simpleminded questions; neither did the grand viziers of the print and broadcast media, who preferred to discuss the complexities of the logistics rather than the purpose of a policy apparently directed at nothing else except the fear of the future, that always dark and dangerous place, where, in five years or maybe ten, something bad is bound to happen. Competing television networks scheduled different time slots for the Pentagon's forthcoming fireworks display — before and after November's congressional election, in early January when the weather around Baghdad improved, next April because the Air Force needed six months to replenish its inventory of precision bombs. Competing newspaper columnists advanced competing adjectives to characterize the "extreme danger" presented to "the entire civilized world," but none of them offered evidence proving that Saddam possessed weapons likely to harm anybody who didn't happen to be living in Iraq; important military authorities appeared on the Sunday-morning talk shows to endorse policies of "forward deterrence" and "anticipatory self-defense," but none of them could think of a good reason why Saddam would make the mistake of attacking the United States; the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on July 31 and August 1 conducted hearings on the question of Iraq and learned that its expert witnesses couldn't say for certain whether they knew what they were talking about. Lewis Lapham "The Road to Babylon"

8. jexster - 6/24/2004 7:38:19 PM

"Let the Eagle Soar" [Remix] John Ashcroft

9. jexster - 6/24/2004 8:10:06 PM

KABUL, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Two U.S. Marines were killed and one wounded when their patrol was ambushed during an operation in eastern Afghanistan (news - web sites) against Islamic militants who have vowed to disrupt landmark elections due in September.




News of the casualties came as President Hamid Karzai appealed to NATO (news - web sites) Friday to make good its pledge to send more troops to protect the elections and ensure they can be held on time.

10. jexster - 6/24/2004 8:15:09 PM

Bush Out of Bullets
US Army Told Not to Use "Made-in-Israel" Bullets Against Muslims

11. jexster - 6/24/2004 8:31:07 PM

Kabul for Kerry
Americans in Afghanistan Hold Kerry Fundraiser

12. jexster - 6/25/2004 12:06:52 PM

They loved Kennedy...loved Raygun (His Name Be Praised!)

Ireland Hates Bush

13. jexster - 6/25/2004 12:38:20 PM

14. jayackroyd - 6/25/2004 3:19:06 PM

From a Rolling Stone rountable:

Joe Biden: I was in the Oval Office the other day, and the president asked me what I would do about resignations. I said, "Look, Mr. President, would I keep Rumsfeld? Absolutely not." And I turned to Vice President Cheney, who was there, and I said, "Mr. Vice President, I wouldn't keep you if it weren't constitutionally required." I turned back to the president and said, "Mr. President, Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld are bright guys, really patriotic, but they've been dead wrong on every major piece of advice they've given you. That's why I'd get rid of them, Mr. President -- not just Abu Ghraib." They said nothing. Just sat like big old bullfrogs on a log and looked at me.

15. jexster - 6/25/2004 8:30:46 PM



The Bay Area Steering Committee....

16. jexster - 6/26/2004 1:30:16 AM

Imperial Amnesia


By John B. Judis





John B. Judis is a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. This essay is adapted from his forthcoming Folly of Empire: What George W. Bush Could Learn from Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson (New York: Scribners, 2004)

The United States invaded a distant country to share the blessings of democracy. But after being welcomed as liberators, U.S. troops encountered a bloody insurrection. Sound familiar? Don’t think Iraq—think the Philippines and Mexico decades ago. U.S. President George W. Bush and his advisors have embarked on a historic mission to change the world. Too bad they ignored the lessons of history.

17. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 8:44:38 AM

Where did the last topic go?

rolling eyes

Why do you do this dorkwad crap, jayackroyd?

18. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 8:48:39 AM

Yeah, yeah, I know.
Because you can.

I'm sick in the head, too.

19. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 8:49:36 AM

burst of tears

20. jayackroyd - 6/26/2004 10:04:42 AM

I have no idea what you are talking about.

21. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 10:20:21 AM

Really?

What was that last topic that had jexster's name in the lights?

Why is it gone?

Thanks, much.

22. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 10:28:54 AM

I ASSumed you changed it because you didn't like what was going on.

Tra la la.

23. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 10:30:05 AM

I suppose I wouldn't like a charge of censorship, either.

24. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 10:46:31 AM

Yeah, sorry, that was a slap in the face. Maybe I should go be a hermit in the desert of NYC for a while. I dunno. Such pain, it cuts one up.

Tanks alot for running da joint.

25. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 10:51:56 AM

Why certainly, I'd love to be a bridesmaid.

26. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 11:03:15 AM

I had no idea!

27. Ulgine Barrows - 6/26/2004 11:10:41 AM

Lies Have Consequences!



Bwaaah.

28. jexster - 6/26/2004 5:10:38 PM

Operation Iraqi "Freedom"
Elections Might Have to be Postponed, Martial Law Imposed - Allawi

29. jayackroyd - 6/26/2004 7:49:42 PM

Jexster and I worked out the title of the thread.

30. robertjayb - 6/26/2004 10:02:21 PM

Newsweek claims bushie source flip-flop...(Treat as suspect: It is Isikoff)

July 5 issue - A captured Qaeda commander who was a principal source for Bush administration claims that Osama bin Laden collaborated with Saddam Hussein's regime has changed his story, setting back White House efforts to shore up the credibility of its original case for the invasion of Iraq. The apparent recantation of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, a onetime member of bin Laden's inner circle, has never been publicly acknowledged. But U.S. intelligence officials tell NEWSWEEK that al-Libi was a crucial source for one of the more dramatic assertions made by President George W. Bush and his top aides: that Iraq had provided training in "poisons and deadly gases" for Al Qaeda. Al-Libi, who once ran one of bin Laden's biggest training camps, was captured in Pakistan in November 2001 and soon began talking to CIA interrogators. Although he never mentioned his name, Secretary of State Colin Powell prominently referred to al-Libi's claims in his February 2003 speech to the United Nations; he recounted how a "senior terrorist operative" said Qaeda leaders were frustrated by their inability to make chemical or biological agents in Afghanistan and turned for help to Iraq. Continuing to rely on al-Libi's version, Powell then told how a bin Laden operative seeking help in acquiring poisons and gases had forged a "successful" relationship with Iraqi officials in the late 1990s and that, as recently as December 2000, Iraq had offered "chemical or biological weapons training for two Al Qaeda associates." (more)


31. robertjayb - 6/26/2004 10:04:06 PM

(cont'd)

Meanwhile, NEWSWEEK has learned, Pentagon officials are culling through captured Iraqi documents they say will provide hard evidence of multiple contacts between Iraqi officials and Qaeda members over a decade. Current plans call for a massive "document dump" before the election. But officials acknowledge ultimate proof may prove elusive. "It all depends on what your definition of a relationship is," said one.

heh-heh

32. jayackroyd - 6/26/2004 10:06:38 PM

The last graf is the most interesting:

Meanwhile, NEWSWEEK has learned, Pentagon officials are culling through captured Iraqi documents they say will provide hard evidence of multiple contacts between Iraqi officials and Qaeda members over a decade. Current plans call for a massive "document dump" before the election. But officials acknowledge ultimate proof may prove elusive. "It all depends on what your definition of a relationship is," said one

The last quotation is particularly funny.

It'll be interesting to see how they phrase this. They didn't have any evidence before the war, but they found some afterwards?

33. wonkers2 - 6/27/2004 12:07:02 AM

Isikoff has a lean and hungry look!

34. jexster - 6/27/2004 4:41:45 PM

We sold out in Fayetteville, home of Fort Bragg," in North Carolina, Mr. Moore said on Sunday. "We sold out in Army-base towns. We set house records in some of these places. We set single-day records in a number of theaters. We got standing ovations in Greensboro, N.C.

"The biggest news to me this morning is this is a red-state movie," he said, referring to the state whose residents voted for George W. Bush in the 2000 election. "Republican states are embracing the movie, and it's sold out in Republican strongholds all over the country."

Harvey Weinstein said: "It's beyond anybody's expectations. I'd have to say the sky's the limit on this movie. Who knows what territory we're in."

Temperature's Rising

35. jexster - 6/27/2004 4:44:01 PM

Yes Ugggie Jay chose the title....I wanted GWB: In Your Death Mask Face, No Signs Can Be Seen..


Lies have consequences is a line I have used often...for about a year now.

36. jexster - 6/27/2004 6:06:44 PM

From CAP: IRAQ
Leaving on a Jet Plane

In a move highlighting the severe threat the insurgency poses to security in Iraq, chief U.S. administrator Paul Bremer formally transferred sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government two days early. The "near secret" ceremony was attended by just "a half dozen Iraqi and coalition officials held in the heavily guarded Green Zone." The acceleration of the transfer date was "an apparent bid to surprise insurgents and prevent them from trying to sabotage the step toward self-rule." President Bush – in Turkey for a NATO summit – "marked the transfer with a whispered comment and a handshake with British Prime Minister Tony Blair." After handing a few legal document to Iraqi chief justice Mahdi al-Mahmood, Bremer immediately "left Iraq on a U.S. Air Force C-130." But the early handover does not change the reality on the ground – Iraq's newly-sovereign government is beset by a growing insurgency, faced with enormous political challenges, and tasked with taking over the management of a tumultuous transition. Today, American Progress released a new plan outlining clear steps the Bush administration should take to promote peace and stability after the transition.

IRAQ OPERATIONS STOKE RAGE: Bush touted the war in Iraq as an effort not just to oust Saddam Hussein, "but to begin transforming the Middle East." But U.S. and foreign officials say the way the administration has handled the invasion and occupation of Iraq has "led to rage at the United States across the Islamic world and beyond." As a result, "Al-Qaeda's recruitment has been stoked and would-be reformers drowned out." A new report by Georgetown University's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy concludes that the United States "is now vulnerable to strategic reversal in the region."

37. jexster - 6/27/2004 6:17:25 PM

Obe Juan:

Paul Bremer suddenly left Iraq on Monday, having "transferred sovereignty" to the caretaker Iraqi government two days early.

It is hard to interpret this move as anything but a precipitous flight. It is just speculation on my part, but I suspect that the Americans must have developed intelligence that there might be a major strike on the Coalition Provisional Headquarters on Wednesday if a formal ceremony were held to mark a transfer of sovereignty. Since the US military is so weak in Iraq and appears to have poor intelligence on the guerrilla insurgency, the Bush administration could not take the chance that a major bombing or other attack would mar the ceremony.

The surprise move will throw off all the major news organizations, which were planning intensive coverage of the ceremonies originally planned for Wednesday.

This entire exercise is a publicity stunt and has almost no substance to it. Gwen Ifill said on US television on Sunday that she had talked to Condaleeza Rice, and that her hope was that when something went wrong in Iraq, the journalists would now grill Allawi about it rather than the Bush administration. (Or words to that effect). Ifill seems to me to have given away the whole Bush show. That's what this whole thing is about. It is Public Relations and manipulation of journalists. Let's see if they fall for it.

Allawi is not popular and was not elected by anyone in Iraq. The Kurds were sullen today. There were no public celebrations in Baghdad. When people in the Arab world are really happy, there is celebratory fire.

38. jexster - 6/27/2004 6:17:46 PM

Followed by Bush airstrikes

39. jexster - 6/27/2004 7:07:54 PM

The occupation of Iraq has increasingly undermined, and in some cases discredited, the core tenets of President Bush's foreign policy, according to a wide range of Republican and Democratic analysts and U.S. officials

Iraq Occupation Erodes Bush "Doctrine"


Lies have consequences

40. jexster - 6/28/2004 2:32:29 AM

“I came to praise the heroes of Falluja!”—“Ya Allah! Ya allah!”—

41. KuligintheHooligan - 6/28/2004 5:34:37 AM

Same-Sex 'Marriage' Goes to School
Out of the Closet and Into the Classroom

If you're looking at the same-sex "marriage" debate and thinking it won't affect you, allow me to bring the truth home to you—before your own children bring it home themselves.

Imagine finding out that your kindergartner's teacher read the story Heather Has Two Mommies or Daddy's New Roommate before nap time. Having two daddies or two mommies is just the same as having one of each, she explains.

Or perhaps you'll learn over the dinner table that a special speaker visited your middle-schooler's health class. The speaker instructed your pre-teen about homosexual sex—in graphic detail. Then the speaker asked for volunteers to role-play. One student was to act the part of "a young lesbian who's really enraptured with another woman" and who's "thinking about having sex."

If this appalls you—and it should—you need to know that this is not fantasy, but a foretaste of what will likely become the norm in public schools across America if you and I fail to protect marriage. You see, the speaker and role play I described happened in Massachusetts at a conference. Public school teachers received in-service points for attending, and students were bused from across the country to take part. After the workshop—which was much more graphic than I've described— teachers could even sign up to have these same speakers visit their classrooms.

42. KuligintheHooligan - 6/28/2004 5:35:21 AM

The conference was sponsored by a group called GLSEN—the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network. GLSEN has sponsored over two thousand Gay-Straight Alliance Clubs in public high schools and middle schools across America and leads an aggressive campaign to, in the words of the Boston chapter leader, "challenge the anti-gay, hetero-centric culture that still prevails in our schools." GLSEN and groups like it use the legitimate goal of stopping bullying in our schools to advance their real agenda of promoting the homosexual lifestyle.

And in 2003, it rolled out a high-school curriculum to present the same-sex "marriage" debate. Just looking at the curriculum objectives shows the bias and coercive strategies of this group. One objective states: "Students should understand both the historical parallels to marriage prohibitions against same-sex couples as well as the similarities among racism, homophobia, and all other oppressions." Students also have the chance to read about homosexual relations and then consider what it would be like to be in a same-sex wedding.

Unfortunately, GLSEN isn't the only group pumping the homosexual agenda to our school children. Take, for instance, this quote as an example of revisionist history from a textbook called A History of Western Society published by Houghton Mifflin:

"Early Christians, too, considered homosexuality a conventional expression of physical desire and were no more susceptible to anti-homosexual prejudices than pagans were. Some prominent Christians experienced loving same-gender relationships that probably had a sexual element."

My friends, if marriage is redefined, we can expect gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender propaganda promoted to every age school child, reflected across our textbooks with pictures, stories, and revisionist history. So if you're sitting out there thinking that legalizing same-sex "marriage" won't really affect you, think again.

43. arkymalarky - 6/28/2004 8:10:30 AM

For pete's sake, Kuligin. Are you wearing a sandwich board?

44. jayackroyd - 6/28/2004 1:23:15 PM

Pretty funny.

First, one has to doubt the provenance of this story. Second, nothing has bappened in any classroom. Third, KtH has obviously never been to an education conference.

But funniest of all is now we'll see how the evil Jexster deals with spam in his thread. What should I do jex? Delete it? Move it to Sex? Or, just live and let live?

45. thoughtful - 6/28/2004 2:33:03 PM

I object to the inclusion of transgender with gay and lesbian and bisexual.

Someone with physical abnormalities in their reproductive organs is as much a victim of fate as is someone born without arms or a harelip. We certainly don't fault them for trying to cope with their infirmities. Some are victims of gender assignment surgery, where to ease the worries of the parents when the child is born with defects leading to indeterminate gender, doctors "choose" the sex of the child and perform surgery to create them as such, with no regard to what sex the child really is in his/her heart and mind. These are very painful, very sad situations. These people have enough problems without being piled on by a bunch of homophobes.

46. jexster - 6/28/2004 4:44:25 PM

No Jay I have no rules....I welcome any and all!


This is Allah's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes!

The Long National Coma is Over: War President Outflanked Again!

"For a year after 9/11, the executive branch got the benefit of the doubt," said Norman J. Ornstein, a political scientist at the predominantly conservative American Enterprise (news - web sites) Institute. "That was the case, for example, when Congress voted to authorize the war in Iraq (news - web sites). But it's not the case anymore."


"Part of it is time passing" since the terrorist attacks, he added. "I couldn't say the court's decisions would have been different if it were, say, three months after 9/11, but they very well might have been."



Dellinger and other liberals described Monday's decisions as bold, sweeping and stinging in their effect on the Bush administration.





"The opinions cut the heart out of the position that was argued in the [Justice Department] memorandum on the president's authority to order torture," he said. "They are sweeping in their affirmation of the right of judicial process."

"It's a major loss for the position of the executive branch," agreed Lawrence H. Tribe, a professor at Harvard Law School. "A strong majority of the court has said … 'We won't interfere with the executive's conduct of the war — but the executive can't interfere with the courts' task of making sure the Constitution's core principles are obeyed.'

"So the system has pushed back. And it's a push-back on several fronts — the courts, the 9/11 commission and public opinion."

47. jexster - 6/28/2004 4:47:37 PM





"provenance" Good Word Jay!

48. jexster - 6/28/2004 4:48:58 PM


Dykes on Bikes led the San Francisco Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Pride Parade as it progressed up Market Street



49. jexster - 6/28/2004 4:51:47 PM

I think Kully just wanted to see salacious pictures. The Kiddie Block on his computer deprived him of the pleasure he seeks


50. jexster - 6/28/2004 4:53:38 PM

51. Wombat - 6/28/2004 4:55:38 PM

The handover in Iraq may actually serve to make US forces even more vulnerable to attack. The various insurgent/terrorist groups may refrain from attacking Iraqis for the moment. However, attacks on US forces may lead to a win-win situation. If the US forces do not retaliate (and the Iraqi government tut-tuts but does nothing), the insurgents look stronger. If the US forces do retaliate, and the Iraqi government supports and assists, the insurgents gain legitimacy.

52. jexster - 6/28/2004 5:26:48 PM

Too much gay stuff!!

You slay me Wombat

53. jexster - 6/28/2004 5:29:11 PM

Poignant Protest: Grieving Mother Summons Journalists to Take Photosof her Son's Coffin (NBC11)


"The mother of a soldier killed in Iraq summoned news outlets to photograph her son's flag-draped casket arriving at Sacramento International Airport to protest a Pentagon policy banning media coverage of America's war dead. Nearly a dozen reporters, photographers and television crews watched as the coffin of Army Sgt. Patrick McCaffrey, 34, was transferred to a hearse outside an airport cargo terminal shortly before midnight Sunday, officials said. 'I don't care what President Bush wants,' his mother, Nadia McCaffrey, told the Los Angeles Times. Patrick 'did not die for nothing ... The way he lived needs to be talked about. Patrick was not a fighter, he was a peacemaker.' McCaffrey said she planned to continue speaking out against the war. 'This is enough,' she said. 'We have to react.' "

54. jayackroyd - 6/28/2004 5:36:39 PM

51

This is a very volatile and unpredictable situation--as evidenced by the handover taking place in a bunker, unnanounced until afterwards.

Essentially they're betting on Allawi. Pile all the chips up on 26 black, and spin the wheel. I don't think he's a technocrat uninterested in power, carrying the country through until an election. I wonder just how much the CIA has on him.

56. jexster - 6/28/2004 6:42:08 PM

History Channel ran a pretty decent recent history of Iraq's various players and contrary to CPA spin, he apparently is a player (recall that the objective was to get "technocrats").

Seems tho that Chalabi, SCIRI and DAWA are ahead of him for the cat bird's seat according to Juan Cole and others who appeared in the Special

57. jexster - 6/28/2004 6:42:39 PM

58. jexster - 6/28/2004 6:54:27 PM

Our Contingent....NBC 11





59. jexster - 6/28/2004 7:01:36 PM

KRON4



60. judithathome - 6/28/2004 7:11:18 PM

Jex, please use your influence and get that Mayor to get a decent haircut. His hair looks like it came out of the movies...and not good ones.

61. thoughtful - 6/28/2004 8:24:57 PM

jex? did you not post the ker-pow from the prof today?

"Let's say the obvious. By making Iraq a playground for right-wing economic theorists, an employment agency for friends and family, and a source of lucrative contracts for corporate donors, the administration did terrorist recruiters a very big favor."

62. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:39:17 PM

Haven't even had a chance to read it yet..

Tommorrow is THE BIG DAY...Ten Year Planning Council is presenting The Ten Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness in SF to Le Maire and the Exec Director of the WH Interagency Council (aka "Bush Homelessness Compassionate Conservative Czar")

63. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:41:20 PM


One thing I admire about John Kerry's approach to Iraq is that he never fails to keep in view the sacrifice of the American soldiers and the positive contributions they have made. The Bush administration has grossly mismanaged post-war Iraq, but that is not the fault of US troops, who are mostly dedicated young people thrust into an unfamiliar situation in which their lives are in danger. They did rid Iraq of a genocidal regime, and they have done a lot of behind the scenes community service work in Iraq. I hope Americans, as they increasingly turn against the Iraq war (with every reason in the world) will not repeat the error of some in the 1970s, who despised Vietnam vets along with the Vietnam war.

One officer confessed to me last fall when things were obviously turning bad, "Dr. Cole, I'm in a business where if I'm ordered to shoot over there, I shoot over there." He clearly was unhappy with the policies pursued. But what could he do. The American public owes it to these troops to give them a civilian leadership who will do right by them.


Cpl. Hassoun has risked his for the United States of America.


He is not only a Marine, but an Arab-American Muslim. All Americans owe him and his family a debt of gratitude that cannot be repaid. The next time any American looks askance at someone for having an Arabic accent or appearing Arab, they should remember Cpl. Hassoun. I only hope he can escape his captors so that we can remember his further exploits.

64. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:42:36 PM

Its a running joke amongst the gay boiz...and the Mayor joins in....I guess Kimberly likes it...as do the Mousse Manufacturers of America

65. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:47:36 PM





Andrew David La Mont was one of four Camp Pendleton Marines who died May 19, 2003, in a helicopter crash.

Age: 31 Hometown: Eureka, Calif.
Died: 05/19/2003
Service: Marines Rank: Capt.
Unit: Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron - 364, Marine Aircraft Group 39, 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, Camp Pendleton, Calif.

66. PelleNilsson - 6/28/2004 8:48:18 PM

It's all part of the Gay Conspiracy.

67. jayackroyd - 6/28/2004 8:49:19 PM

toys.

68. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:54:48 PM

Another timely piece Thoughtful. Thanks for reminding me!

Who Lost Iraq?

What the figures don't describe is the toxic mix of ideological obsession and cronyism that lie behind that dismal performance.

69. jexster - 6/28/2004 8:59:02 PM


Bush's Rating Falls to Its Lowest Point, New Survey Finds
By ADAM NAGOURNEY and JANET ELDER

President Bush's job approval rating has fallen to the lowest level of his presidency, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll. The poll found Americans stiffening their opposition to the Iraq war, worried that the invasion could invite domestic terrorist attacks and skeptical about whether the White House has been fully truthful about the war or about abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison.


70. jexster - 6/28/2004 9:03:50 PM


71. jexster - 6/29/2004 2:29:14 AM

BUSH MISLEADS ABOUT TRANSFER OF POWER IN IRAQ

Speaking at the NATO conference in Turkey yesterday, President Bush said, "15 months after the liberation of Iraq...the world witnessed the
arrival of a free and sovereign Iraqi government." [1] The reality, however, is much different.

The same day that U.S. administrator Paul Bremer officially ended the occupation, U.S. prosecutors refused to abide by an Iraqi judge's order
acquitting Iraqi citizen Iyad Akmush Kanum of attempted murder of coalition troops. [2] Instead, the prosecutors returned Kanum to the
infamous Abu Ghraib prison, claiming that "they were not bound by Iraqi law."

In the days leading up to his departure, Bremer "issued a raft of edicts" in an effort to "exert U.S. control over the country after the
transfer of political authority."[3]

Specifically, Bremer empowered a seven-member appointed commission "to disqualify political parties and any of the candidates they support." Bremer also "appointed Iraqis handpicked
by his aides to influential positions in the interim government" with multi-year terms to "promote his concepts of governance" after the
handover.

Iraq remains plagued by violence and "the primary military responsibility for fighting the insurgency remains as much in American hands as it did yesterday."[4] As a result, the New York Times concludes it is "ludicrous for administration officials to suggest that America's occupation of Iraq has now somehow ended."

72. jexster - 6/29/2004 2:29:24 AM


SOURCES:
1. "Remarks by President Bush and Prime Minister Blair," Whitehouse.gov, 6/28/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=42686.
2. "Prisoner 27075 learns limits of sovereignty, Financial Times, 6/29/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=42687
3. "U.S. Edicts Curb Power Of Iraq's Leadership," Washington Post,
6/27/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=42688"
4. "A Secretive Transfer in Iraq," New York Times, 6/29/04,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=42689

Not to mention that the so-called "US Embassy" in Baghdad will be the largest in the world with over 1000 US employees and their Iraqi puppets.

73. jexster - 6/29/2004 3:17:52 AM

"Let the eagle soar,

Like she’s never soared before.

From rocky coast to golden shore,

Let the mighty eagle soar.

Soar with healing in her wings,

As the land beneath her sings:

'Only god, no other kings.'

This country’s far too young to die.

We’ve still got a lot of climbing to do,

And we can make it if we try.

Built by toils and struggles

God has led us through."



74. jexster - 6/29/2004 3:21:52 AM


Rashid Khalidi's talk at UCLA, "Government Attacks on Area Specialists Called Disservice to U.S. Middle East Policy," is absolutely essential reading.


Khalidi covers the group-think at the Pentagon, the exclusion and intimidation of State Department Middle East experts, the willful disregard by the Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz/Feith crew of Middle East expertise generally, and the recent attempt to muzzle academic Middle East specialists. Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor at Columbia University and the author of an important recent book, Resurrecting Empire: Western Footprints and America's Perilous Path in the Middle East (Beacon Press, April 2004).

posted by Juan @ 6/29/2004 06:03:30 PM

75. jexster - 6/29/2004 3:58:14 AM


Talking Points Memo wrote:
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 2004 21:28:17 -0400
To: john mccutchen
From: Talking Points Memo
Subject: Re: Stressful Vacation????

it was actually very relaxing. don't blame it on antigua. stresses awaited me on my return.

At 08:45 PM 6/29/2004, you wrote:

Must have been Josh if your take on the CBS/NyT poll is any indication. Stike Antigua off my list

The most troublesome thing for Bush in the latest CBS/NyT poll is not that his approval rating is the lowest of his presidency (42%).


It is not that a whopping 57% think that the country is headed in the wrong direction; that 60% disapproved of his Iraq policy, or that 60% say the war was not worth the cost.

The most troublesome thing is not even that 45% of the public do not have an unfavorable opinion of Bush personally.


The most troublesome thing for Bush and the key to this election is that 40% do not know anything about John Kerry.



Bush hasn't rebounded at all. His horserace numbers are stuck in the low forties and will be from here on out - at best.

You are too young to remember The Limbo...how low can he go





This is Kerry's to lose.



John McCutchen, Esq

76. jexster - 6/29/2004 2:41:26 PM

The New and Improved Iraq
By Juan Cole

The price of the kind of political inclusion that might bring stability, however, may well be a complete American departure from Iraq

Let the eagle soar
As the land beneath her sings:

'Only god, no other kings.'

77. jexster - 6/29/2004 3:20:18 PM

“With the benefit of minute hindsight, Saddam Hussein wasn’t the kind of extra-territorial menace that was assumed by the administration one year ago. If I knew then what I know now about what kind of situation we would be in, I would have opposed the war.”

Those words are William F. Buckley’s, from an article in yesterday’s New York Times marking Buckley’s decision to relinquish control of the National Review, the flagship journal of the conservative movement he founded 50 years ago.


Poor Bill....20/20 foresight obscured by cataracts

78. KuligintheHooligan - 6/29/2004 9:56:25 PM

"First, one has to doubt the provenance of this story. Second, nothing has bappened in any classroom. Third, KtH has obviously never been to an education conference."

jay, the only reason why you doubt the story is because it seems unbelievable, right? But it is true, entirely. You want to e-mail the woman who was there? You can do it if you like, Mr. Skeptic.

Secondly, "nothing has happened in any classroom" is such a blanketly ignorant statement I'm shocked you've said it. How on earth, Mr. Skeptic, can you say it? Have you been to each and every classroom, or do you just take it on faith that it has never happened in ANY classroom?? However, it has. You just don't know it.

Thirdly, this is a red herring and gratutous comment:

"Third, KtH has obviously never been to an education conference."

It is pointless to make, but wrong on top of it. I am an educator, you putz. But even if I wasn't, reporting what another educator has seen isn't wrong to do.

The bottom line is, you just don't want to know the truth, so you shrug it off as if it isn't there.

Lies have consequences, jay. Even for you.

79. jexster - 6/29/2004 10:46:14 PM

Oh I wish I wuz in the land of cotton....

Just How Far South Has the Public Gone on Iraq?

Pretty darn far. Yesterday, I mentioned that Bush's approval rating on Iraq among independents is now a sizzling 29 percent.

Here's some more data from that CBS News/New York Times poll that shows how extremely unhappy the public (especially independent voters) is with the Iraq situation. I was particularly struck by this finding: the public, by more than 3:1, thinks that US involvement in Iraq is creating more terrorists who are planning to attack the US (55 percent), rather than less (17 percent). Wow. More potential airline highjackers, bioterrorists and what have you, rather than less. That's really an amazing finding and shows how far the administration's strategy for the war on terror has sunk in public esteem.

Similarly, by about 4:1, the public thinks that US military action against Iraq has increased (47 percent) rather than decreased (13 percent) the threat of terrorism against the US. Looked at another way, 85 percent think the Iraq war has either made no difference or increased the threat of terrorism.

Moreover, by about 2:1 (60-32), the public believes the result of the war with Iraq has not been worth the associated loss of American life and other costs (that result skies to 65-28 among independents). And we're edging toward a majority saying we should have stayed out to begin with (and we're already there among independents).

80. jexster - 6/29/2004 10:47:39 PM


But will the handover of sovereignty to the Iraqis get views on Iraq headed north again. I doubt it, unless the situation on the ground in Iraq improves dramatically, which seems highly unlikely. And keep in mind how the public is viewing this handover: they're for it, but they regard it as a sign of failure, not success, for Bush's policy. A just-released Gallup poll finds 60 percent saying the handover, given that stability has not yet been established, does indicate that US policy is failing, compared to 32 percent who think the handover means success (and it's 66-25 among independents).

Note also that 70 percent now think significant numbers of US troops should remain in Iraq for two years or less, but only 36 percent believe that goal will be attained.

81. KuligintheHooligan - 6/29/2004 10:54:35 PM

Let's see, we lost about 1000 American lives in Iraq over the past year. And we slaughtered about 1.2 million American lives via abortion in the same time period.

Interesting.

82. KuligintheHooligan - 6/29/2004 10:56:04 PM

"Women have a right to chose what to do with their bodies!"

Even if that means the needless slaughter of more American lives.

Lies have consequences!!

83. KuligintheHooligan - 6/29/2004 10:59:08 PM

"A slim majority of Americans believe it is okay for a woman to abort the unborn human being inside her womb."

Well, I guess if the majority says so, it must be okay, right jex?

Lies have consequences!!

84. KuligintheHooligan - 6/30/2004 1:17:52 AM

"It is not that a whopping 57% think that the country is headed in the wrong direction"

What a coincidence. 57% of those who cast votes in 1992 did NOT want Clinton to be elected, yet he was! Strange coincidence, isn't it?

85. jexster - 6/30/2004 3:55:43 AM

No

86. jexster - 6/30/2004 3:55:59 AM

Next inane question?

87. jexster - 6/30/2004 3:56:39 AM

And we slaughtered about 1.2 million American lives via abortion in the same time period.

How many funerals?

88. jexster - 6/30/2004 3:57:37 AM

Any of them baptized?


Ten percent were gay

89. KuligintheHooligan - 6/30/2004 4:45:29 AM

None of them were gay, jexter. You know that full well.

I'm sorry you are so callous about all that human life needlessly wasted.

90. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:10:29 PM

No I do not know that "full well". Tell me. And while I oppose abortion, when you idiots start talking about human beings being "slaughtered" it is all I can do not to laugh out loud at such silly hyperbole.

You only hurt your own cause - one which I have some sympathy for

91. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:15:47 PM

Speaking of lies and consequences...

San Francisco Homeless Plan Could Be Model for the Nation Los Angeles Times

Why lies? Principally, though not exclusively, because we emptied our mental institutions accross the country, following the example of that great champion of humanity, St. Ronald Raygun, on the promise that we would also establish community mental health services and residential treatment.

At the same time, we slashed housing for the poor. The result, to make a long story short, the consequence - in 1981-82 tens of thousands of homeless persons began appearing on our streets....its a long and a sad story.

I am happy I have been able to lend a hand toward solving it.

92. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:37:12 PM

Editorial: A bold vision on homelessness

93. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:45:41 PM

The San Francisco Plan to Abolish Chronic Homelessness

US San Francisco Unveils 10-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness
U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness

"The promise of America remains unfulfilled as long as any one of our neighbors is without a place to live. We need to keep that promise for every American. We have a higher calling than the testimony of our streets and shelters. Our work is not to preserve the status quo, no matter how well intentioned. Our mission is to end homelessness."

ICH Executive Director Philip Mangano

94. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:49:20 PM

"For the first time in the 20 years I have been in public life, I feel the united excitement, the electric energy, the profound intelligence, and the strong will to end chronic homelessness in our great City. It's time to roll our sleeves up and get to work on what will be one of the most rewarding accomplishments of anyone's life."

Angela Alioto, Chairwoman of SF Ten Year Planning Council to End Chronic Homelessness

95. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:53:10 PM

Juntos Podemos

Community Development as an Assurance Game
The San Francisco Ten Year Planning Council


I AM THE AGE OLD PROBLEM: I WAS BORN
I GREW UP TO BE ONE OF "THEM"
I AM THE CAUSE AND THE REASON FOLKS MOURN
I AM THE FLAW IN THE BEAUTIFUL GEM

IF IT WEREN'T FOR ME, SEE HOW FREE YOU WOULD BE?
YOU COULD LIKE YOUR LIFE IN PEACE AND BEAUTY
YOU WOULD NOT HAVE TO LOOK AT ME
YOU WOULD NOT HAVE TO THINK OF ME AS YOUR DUTY

I once had a mother who loved me
And I suppose you did too
There must be a way that we could agree
On a Plan for me to stop bothering you

THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH JAILS TO HOLD US
NOR ENOUGH GUARDS TO KEEP US INSIDE
THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH LOCKS AND KEYS AND FENCES
NOR WALLS ENOUGH BEHIND WHICH TO HIDE

WHEN YOU ASK: "HOW CAN I HELP YOU?"
Excuse me, please; your arrogance shows
LISTEN SWEET ANGEL, Adjust your view;
To perceive what those disgusting "THEM" know....

IT IS "WE" WHO POSSESS THE ENERGY
BE NOT THE MOSQUITO WHICH BITES
"THINK", DEAR ONE. HOW YOU WANT IT TO BE
Service will bring it about, NOT FIGHTS. - Anonymous


96. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:55:00 PM

I. Introduction
"Service will bring it, about NOT FIGHTS" "Juntos Podemos" ("Together we can"). Between these two slogans lies the San Francisco Ten Year Plan Council=s work and this paper=s topic.An 82 year old homeless woman delivered the poetic admonition. Her advice was delivered to the Council on May 27, 2004, the second and final day of public hearings on San Francisco's Plan to end chronic homelessness. The anonymous poet's charge echoed prose of recently elected Mayor Gavin Newsom's campaign theme and each has begun to find concrete expression in Chairwoman Angela Alioto"s stewardship of the thirty three member Council.

97. jexster - 6/30/2004 2:55:08 PM


The Council and its five committees, have been holding regular meetings, retreats and hearings for over three months. Mayor Newsom established the Ten Year Planning Council in March, 2004 and charged the Council to review City programs serving the homeless; to develop with a plan to end chronic homelessness in San Francisco within ten years, and to help him build sustainable alliances among City departments, non-profit service providers, the business community and the public and accomplish that goal..
That mission, of course, remains to be realized. The Council, as of this writing, has only just begun drafting the Ten Year Plan that it is to submit to the Mayor by June 30, 2004. Once the Council adopts a final version, the truly difficult challenges remain. The Mayor and City government must accept, monitor, and implement the Plan. More importantly, the City as a whole must embrace the Plan and sustain the will to attain its interim and final goals. Along the way, not only must the City surmount formidable fiscal challenges, it must overcome its decades-old legacy of political inertia and infighting if these goals are to be attained .With the Ten Year Council=s work, the City is taking the first of many "small steps" toward realizing the goal of taking the chronically homeless off of its streets and restoring them to the mainstream community. Although achievement remains for a future, years-distant, we can already see in the process the dynamics, the prerequisites, and the process taking shape. It is that very dynamic and emerging process that this paper examines. It is a process of mobilizing social capital, civic capital, and political will to achieve community development through small steps in an assurance game

98. jexster - 6/30/2004 3:03:35 PM

The Ten Year Planning Council, and committees of the Council, met eighty-five (85) times, beginning on March
19, 2004 and ending on June 30, 2004, when the Plan was presented to Mayor Gavin Newsom. Public hearings
were held at San Francisco City Hall on May 26 and May 27, 2004.


More than 785 individuals representing over 400 organizations participated in one or more of these eighty-five meetings, and provided valuable contributions of information, funding, meeting space, and time toward the
creation of this report.

The San Francisco Foundation provided fiscal sponsorship of the Council's work, and contributed accounting services to facilitate payment of expenses. As of the printing of this report, generous contributions to support the work of the Council had been received from: The San Francisco Hotel Council, Pacific Gas & Electric Corporation, the Gap Inc., Plumbers and Pipefitters Union Local 38, the Levi Straus Foundation, the McKesson Corp, Charles Schwab Corporation, the San Francisco Foundation, the San Francisco Restaurant Association, JP Morgan Chase, the Bank of America, Providian Financial Corporation and Mr. Larry Nibbi.

99. jexster - 6/30/2004 7:43:13 PM

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A U.S. Marine was killed in action on Thursday in western Iraq (news - web sites), scene of clashes between American troops and insurgents on the outskirts of Falluja.



Nicholaus E. Zimmer died May 30, 2004, in Kufa, Iraq, when his vehicle came under attack by rocket-propelled grenades.

Age: 20 Hometown: Columbus, Ohio
Died: 05/30/2004
Service: Army Rank: Pfc.
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 37th Armored Regiment, 1st Armored Division, Friedburg, Germany

100. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 2:20:15 AM

"And while I oppose abortion, when you idiots start talking about human beings being "slaughtered" it is all I can do not to laugh out loud at such silly hyperbole."

Then what do you call it, jexster? What do you call going into a woman's womb and cutting to pieces an unborn human being? What do you call it when the baby is pulled partially out of the womb, a large needle driven into the base of the skull, and the brains sucked out until the head collapses? The word "slaughter" to you is "silly hyperbole?!!"

You are a moron.

101. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 2:22:20 AM

On average now, 1.2 - 1.3 MILLION humans cut to pieces, their lives terminated, EACH AND EVERY YEAR via abortion. 25% of all pregnancies in America.

This isn't "slaughter" in your book, jexster?! Since Roe v Wade, over 40 MILLION AMERICAN LIVES LOST isn't "slaughter" to you?!

What a perverse world you live in. Well, at least your mind fits it nicely.

102. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 2:50:02 AM

The last Battleground Poll has come out and superficially it appears that the electorate has softened on Republicans and on President Bush. My past articles have noted that the best news for conservatives in the Battleground Poll is underneath the first few layers of information. So, the first question shows President Bush with only a two percentage point edge over Senator Kerry. Big worry? Not at all.

Skip the first question. Skip, in fact, all the questions that relate to issues and preferences in voting. These assume that voters are paying attention to the actual campaign, which they are not doing at this point. Focus instead on the two crucial areas that will decide the election: “What do Americans think of President Bush as a leader?” and “How do Americans view themselves ideologically?”

More Americans view President Bush very favorably than view Senator Kerry very favorably. In fact, more Americans view Senator Kerry very unfavorably than view him very favorably, which is not true of President Bush.

A whopping forty-seven percent of Americans, in another question, strongly approve of President Bush as a person while only twenty percent strongly disapprove of him as a person. When strong and mild approval and disapproval are considered, an astounding sixty-three percent of Americans approve of President Bush as a person while only twenty-nine percent disapprove of him as a person. [CONT]

103. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 2:50:52 AM

Questions 30 through 35 in the poll deal with leadership issues. Which candidate is more honest? Which candidate is more willing to lead? Which candidate is most consistent? President Bush swamps Senator Kerry on three of these six questions and he ekes out narrow pluralities on “Shares my values” and “Is honest and trustworthy,” while narrowly losing “Cares about people like me.”

There you have the gist of America's relationship with George W. Bush: the people like him and trust him. They have known him well for four years and formed opinions about him as early as May 1998, over six years ago. Nothing has changed in how they view him as a person. Despite Michael Moore and all the sleaze, slime and sewage, Americans very strongly like George W. Bush, the man.

What about the issues and party gap? Why has this not translated into a stronger lead over Senator Kerry? The economy has been wrongly perceived as weak (that is changing and people are increasingly seeing the economy as good.) The war on terrorism has been wrongly perceived as failing (early transfer of power, NATO participation and UN concurrence with our action is increasingly changing that view.)

Most important, people do not see John Kerry as a liberal. An opinion on which candidate is better on taxes means little until the voter knows that one candidate supports higher taxes and more government spending while another does not. How do we know which way the electorate will break when the issues have been defined? [CONT]

104. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 2:52:02 AM

As I have noted in all my past articles on the Battleground Poll, the key question is near the end of the questionnaire. Skim the fluff and go to question D3, which asks Americans how they define themselves ideologically. Fifty-nine percent of Americans call themselves “very conservative” or “somewhat conservative.” Thirty-eight percent of Americans call themselves “very liberal” or “somewhat liberal.”

Two percent of Americans called themselves “moderate” and two percent did not know (or refused to answer.) Factor those four percent out, and more than sixty-one percent of Americans are “conservative.” This means that Democrats can win only by pretending that President Bush is an arch-ultra-far-Right Wing Conspiracy member. That dog won’t hunt.

Behind President Bush are solid moderate or liberal Republicans like Colin Powell, John Danforth, John McCain, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Rudy Giuliani (who was the candidate of the Liberal Party of New York when he ran for Mayor of New York). Behind him also are moderate Democrats like Zell Miller and liberal Democrats like Ed Koch.

Kerry has no conservatives and no Republicans at all behind him, and he has a voting record which is among the most liberal in Congress. The great news in the Battleground Poll and in the three prior Battleground Poll results has been that the nation is overwhelmingly conservative. Those numbers have not budged in three years.

Conservatives have won the battle for America. All that remains is showing America that the likable President Bush is a conservative and the aloof Senator Kerry is a Leftist. Twenty years ago, another proud liberal senator ran against a conservative former governor of a Southwestern state running for reelection as President. The race looked close for awhile, but not on election day. Not this time either. [END]

105. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:36:11 AM

Intelligence Wars: How the CIA Deals With the Fantasies of GWB

106. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:36:54 AM

I call an unborn human being a fetus, not an American, not a Christian, not a human being.

107. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:58:32 AM

How do we know which way the electorate will break when the issues have been defined?

Because the issues already have been defined. GWB's reelection is THE issue and his poll numbers are stuck at 44%.

Here are some other key indicators all of which add up to one thing - The Public has rejected the incumbent and is nearing the time (within weeks) that it will begin to decide whether to embrace John Kerry.

109. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:00:52 AM

In fact, the public now disapproves of Bush positions by substantial margins on all issues of domestic and foreign policy preferring Democratic positions on all with one exception...

The WOT and here Bush has slid twenty points to about even...

110. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:02:28 AM

Frank Newport, editor-in-chief of The Gallup poll:



Based on historical patterns, Bush's job approval rating is thus underperforming the pattern of presidents who have won re-election. In the broadest sense, Bush's job approval rating has generally been remarkably stable this year, averaging about 50% (which is a symbolic dividing line for an incumbent seeking re-election) since mid-January. The current downtick in his ratings puts him below the pattern of successful presidents. Having a rating below 50% (as is the case with his last four ratings) is not a good sign for an incumbent. If Bush wins this November, he would be the first president since Harry Truman to come from a below 50% rating to win re-election.

The fact that Bush has been behind the likely Democratic nominee, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, in several Gallup Poll re-election trial heat ballots this year, means that Bush's re-election probabilities are lower than those of his successful predecessors. None of the five presidents who won re-election were behind their eventual opponent in any trial heats after January in the year prior to their election. If Bush wins this year, he will become the first president to come from behind in election year spring polls to win.

The trial heat patterns of the three presidents who eventually lost were erratic enough, however, to suggest that fluidity is the norm rather than the exception in trial heat ballots at this point in the campaign.





You can stick a fork in that turkey...he's done

This race is Kerry's to lose....40% of the US public does not know who he is yet he is leading in most horse race polls

111. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:03:40 AM

What's Bush gonna do Kulligan man? Slime Kerry? Reintroduce himself to the American public? Spend another 70 million bucks on attack ads?

112. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:04:48 AM

Oh I know....


Culture War President!


Gavin Newsom cut those slime balls off and fed them to Bush three months ago.


113. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:44:13 AM




Get the picture?


Lies have consequences

114. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 6:35:51 AM

"You can stick a fork in that turkey...he's done"

It's truly amazing how much slime and filth and misrepresentation and lies you fling around, jexster, if you think that Bush has no way of winning. Why, from the fixation you have on the man, one would think you are actually worried he might still win.

You see, your own actions expose your fears and contradict your arrogant, over-confident words. This race is far, far from over. You are just too blinded with hate and partisan rhetoric to see that, although, deep down inside, you know it to be true. That's why you are so fixated on the whole thing and just keep your lies machine churning out nonsense.

115. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 6:38:53 AM

"40% of the US public does not know who he is yet he is leading in most horse race polls"

Only an arrogant fool would admit that his guy is actually losing in some polls, and then state that it is no contest!! You are a moron jexster, nothing less.

Anybody with sense realizes that this election is far, far from over, and is anybody's ballgame right now.

Also, you make the false assumption that once that 40% learns more about Kerry (assuming your figure there is accurate) that they will like him. I seem to recall another liberal New England senator in exactly the same boat not too long ago, enjoying decent numbers, until the American public really got to know him. Dropped like a rock afterward.

You are just a fool if you think this thing is over. My prediction: Bush will win by the hair of his chinny, chinny chin.

116. marjoribanks - 7/1/2004 3:02:30 PM

This race is far, far from over. You are just too blinded with hate and partisan rhetoric to see that, although, deep down inside, you know it to be true. That's why you are so fixated on the whole thing and just keep your lies machine churning out nonsense.

It's not a lie, Hooligan, if you state your opinion (repeatedly and vociferously) that Bush is going to be defeated in November.

I'm, by nature, cautious and ambivalent about political prognostication. However, I too believe - like Jex - that Bush is gone, already lame duck, and that the spirit of anti-incumbency that we have seen show up at the polls in several countries (Spain, India) is an indicator that the loss here will be quite complete and will be followed by the icing of a Dem majority in Congress as well.

This much is true - no sitting President has ever come back to win a referendum in the same year that he has rec'd such negative poll numbers. The race isn't over, you're right about that, but a Bush recovery would be unprecedented and I'm certain that he isn't capable of something like that.

117. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:02:36 PM

Because I want to BURY HIM

118. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:05:53 PM

But as far as "lies" go, I really cannot claim credit because the "lies" that have you so upset, and understandabley so, come from respondents who answered the pollsters' questions...

Bush's "Christian Soldiers" Marching as to War

119. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:06:41 PM

Stick a fork in him..he's done

120. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:11:08 PM

....The Polls Are All Singing the Same Song


Another major poll, another boatload of bad news for the Bush campaign.

Here's the latest from NBC News/Wall Street Journal on what the public thinks, very consistent with other recently-released data.

1. Bush is doing a lousy job. His overall approval rating is 45 percent, with 49 pecent disapproval, lowest ever in this poll. His approval rating on the economy is identical, an improvement from NBC News' May rating but still net negative and about in line with their March rating, which pre-dated almost all of the recent job growth. His foreign policy rating is lower at 44/52 and his rating on "dealing with the war on terrorism" is now under 50 percent, with approval (48 percent) barely higher than disapproval (47 percent). The last time NBC News asked this question was in January and it makes for quite a contrast. In January, Bush was a net +32 on his war on terrorism approval rating (63/31). Now he's down to +1--a big, big change.

2. The country's not going in the right direction. In the NBC News poll, just 36 percent think so, up 3 points from May, but still down 7 points from March in this poll.

3. The economy is still in trouble. A strong majority (57 percent) continues to think that "the signs point to an economy that is going to be in trouble--jobs are moving overseas, the budget deficit is growing, and too many jobs do not have health insurance or pensions" rather than "the signs point to an economy that is going to be strong--jobs are being created, inflation is low, and the stock market is up".

121. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:11:18 PM



4. The war wasn't really worth it. The number who believe removing Saddam from power was worth "the number of US casualties and the financial costs of the war" is down to 40 percent, the lowest ever in this poll, with a majority (51 percent) saying it wasn't.

5. The war hasn't made us safer. A majority (51 percent) thinks the threat of terrorism against the US has been increased by the Iraq war, compared to only 14 percent who think it has decreased.

6. Bush lied or at least exaggerated. A majority (53 percent) now say that Bush "exagerrate information to make the case for war" rather than provided the most accurate information (42 percent). Three months ago, this question returned a 49-49 split. Also, for the first time, a plurality (47 percent) say Bush "deliberately misled people to make the case for war" rather than gave the most accurate information (44 percent). That's a reversal from three months ago when, by 53-41, people said Bush did not deliberately mislead people.

7. Let's try to get out of here, shall we?. By 53-37, the public worries more that we will stay in Iraq too long than that we will leave too soon. A majority (55 percent) either want to leave immediately/as soon as possible (24 percent) or according to a specified timetable but within 18 months "regardless of the situation at the time" (31 percent). And 74 percent say that, if Iraqi civilian leaders can't govern effectively, the US should not take back control but rather let the Iraqis work things out for themselves.

That's what the public thinks. Over to you, John Kerry

122. jayackroyd - 7/1/2004 4:13:42 PM

Banks--

I think jexster's formulation--It's Kerry's to lose--is accurate. There are till plenty of ways for him to fail. Also, his opponents are without scruple.

123. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:23:42 PM

That's right ...that's why its so interesting...that's why I am having so much fun!


I was at the parade the other day...and HORRORS a guy I know and his wife brought their 3 month old first child wrapped him in a NEWSOM shirt and marched him in the GAY PARADE!!!

Made me walk down memory lane to my own baby pic taken when I was the little nipper's age...taken with a huge I LIKE IKE button on..


My first campaign...

My second, at seven

124. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:25:41 PM

I warned the young mother that she might be growin a repuglican fag basher in her baby backpack

125. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:36:26 PM

I wish I could post the picture I just received in an email...but take my word for it..

A clothing label from a small American company which sells in France:



The translation:

Wash with warm water.
Use mild soap.
Dry flat.
Do not use bleach.
Do not dry in the dryer.
Do not iron.
We are sorry that our president is an idiot.
We did not vote for him.

126. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:44:58 PM

Escape From the Green Zone
The administration has gone from Shock and Awe to Sneak and Shirk.

127. jayackroyd - 7/1/2004 4:45:36 PM

email it to me jex. I know some people who would find it amusing.

128. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:49:54 PM

It comes up with an X when I try to forward...I have axed the guy if he has a link

129. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:50:47 PM

KulliganMan....

Conquistador your stallion stands
in need of company
and like some angel's haloed brow
you reek of purity
I see your armour-plated breast
has long since lost its sheen
and in your death mask face
there are no signs which can be seen

And though I hoped for something
to find
I could see no maze to unwind

Conquistador a vulture sits
upon your silver shield
and in your rusty scabbard now
the sand has taken seed
and though your jewel-encrusted blade
has not been plundered still
the sea has washed across your face
and taken of its fill

130. jexster - 7/1/2004 4:55:54 PM

As Paul Bremer was sneaking out, Ahmad Chalabi, the swindler who has bilked America out of millions, was sneaking in. He was smiling from ear to ear at the swearing-in ceremony for the new prime minister, Iyad Allawi (a ceremony so secretive that coalition officials confiscated reporters' cellphones to enforce an embargo on the news for security reasons).

If Americans needed any more confirmation that they're viewed as loathed occupiers, not beloved liberators, it came with the sad little spectacle of a hasty, heavily guarded hand-over that no Iraqi John Trumbell will memorialize in an oil painting of the Declaration of Iraqi Independence.

Dick Cheney and the neocons had once hoped for a grand Independence Day celebration, no doubt, where Saddam's toppled statue once loomed, dreaming of a parade of Iraqi high school pep squads and the Iraqi Olympic bobsled team; sky boxes for Halliburton executives; grateful Iraqis, cheering and crying; President Bush making a surprise drop-in from the NATO summit meeting in nearby Turkey, with "Mission Accomplished" pen sets for the new government; Katie, Matt and Diane beaming it back to proud Americans.

Instead, there was no real transfer of power because there was no power to transfer.



REPENT all ye who enter here!

131. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:05:43 PM

I have a little thing on my RealPlayer

Cartman: "If I were gonna build a chemical weapons plant, I wouldn't make it look like a chemical weapons plant would I? I'd make it look like a chocolate chip factory or something...

Followed by Procol Harum's Consquistador...

Michael Moore should hire me for his next

132. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:13:18 PM

I seem to recall another liberal New England senator in exactly the same boat not too long ago, enjoying decent numbers, until the American public really got to know him.

Well I am not sure what you are recalling...Dukakis?

Not a Senator, a governor running against a Bush who was seeking his first term, not re-selection.


Or maybe you had Daniel Webster in mind

I'd make it look like a chocolate chip factory Kulli

133. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:17:30 PM

Before I forget Kully, a question...

Bush has this Federal Marriage Amendment right?

Why didn't he introduce the Anti-abortion amendment that has been sitting around since what 1973???

If I were you I'd stay home

That'll show the lying son of a fat bitch

134. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:30:18 PM

Marlon Brando's dead

135. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:31:17 PM

But the Spirit of Apocalypse Now lives on

Michael Moore's Public Service


Howzat for a segue?

136. robertjayb - 7/1/2004 5:41:10 PM

re Brando. I recently glimpsed a sad story about him living alone in impoverished circumstances. Too bad if true.

Anyway, R.I.P., Marlon.

137. jayackroyd - 7/1/2004 5:42:47 PM

It comes up with an X when I try to forward...I have axed the guy if he has a link

Copy and paste it into word.

138. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:42:51 PM

Blessed are the poor..

Marlon was a mensch

139. jexster - 7/1/2004 5:48:27 PM

Jobs Growth Slows Sharply in June

This is Allah's doin Kulli...and you can't beat The Lord of Hosts!

140. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 6:28:16 PM

"The race isn't over, you're right about that, but a Bush recovery would be unprecedented and I'm certain that he isn't capable of something like that."

Yes, yes, marjoribanks, and no doubt you were with the people who believed the Yankees would easily win the Series last year, and the Lakers would coast to a victory over the Pistons.

Anybody who, right here, right now, says this election is already a done deal, given the current polling data, is just plain nuts and blinded by wishful thinking. This thing is far from over.

And before you guys start labeling my opinion as "partisan nonsense," keep in mind that one of your own Bush haters, judithathome, has already voiced her opinion that she believes Bush will win. REASONABLE people know that this thing isn't over yet, and that proclaiming victory this early in the game is just plainly naive and stupid.

141. marjoribanks - 7/1/2004 7:40:44 PM

Hooligan,

Reasonable people would realize that the odds are turning extremely prohibitive against a Bush recovery to electoral win. Of course, the election still has to take place - but it is not looking good at all for the incumbent and if history is any indicator he will not be re-elected.

It's simple as that, you may wish to find solace in non-factual platitudes but them dawgs won't hunt come November.

142. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 8:12:55 PM

Perhaps you can provide other fortunes to be read, marj. We could have a special thread for you, with virtual Tarot cards and tea leaves included.

And history goes both ways on this score, marjie. Dukakis enjoyed slim leads at this point as well, running up to the conventions. But once the public got wind of what he really was like, he sank like a rock.

It could easily go either way right now. Anybody that says differently is just being naive.

Also, don't forget that Gore won the popular vote count, but lost the electoral college. Raw numbers in and of themselves can be a fair indicator, but they don't tell the whole story. It will be state by state, as it should be. And recall further that even in the week before the last presidential election, Gore had a lead in some polls of as much as 7%! Yet he ain't sitting in the Oval Office my friend.

All I am saying is, right now, it is just plain foolishness to conclude that Kerry has already won. Can he win? Of course he can! Will he win? I think he'll lose, but just barely, just like the last time. Split right down the middle this country is.

Lastly, consider that if the Bush haters here are right, Bush has done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING RIGHT. Nothing. Worse president ever, blah blah blah. Yet he is running neck and neck. No wonder folks like jexster appear nervously fixated on this thing. The guy is a complete failure in every way you measure it, so you naysayers claim, and yet he is right in there. That should scare you. Because regardless of how much of a failure you claim he is, the American public obviously doesn't see things the same way you guys do. Again, if it is so OBVIOUS, Bush should be losing in a landslide right now. Yet in some polls, as jexster just admitted yesterday, he is even WINNING. Amazing.

143. judithathome - 7/1/2004 8:23:20 PM

But once the public got wind of what he really was like, he sank like a rock.

You mean, once the slime machine started going full steam. There's no doubt in my mind that it will happen again, especially if Kerry is leading by some few points closer to election. They are alredy gearing up, comparing Dems to Hiltler and trying to make Kerry's wife look like some lunatic just because she has money... money she didnt earn herself which is so perplexing because many of the Republican billionaires, including Bush, didnt earn the money they have, either. Usually, being filthy rich is a assest to Republicans but not if you happen to be the "wrong sort" of moneied person in this country.

144. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 8:38:16 PM

But smart, intelligent Americans will see through all that nonsense, judith, right? I mean, after all, they did when it came to Clinton.

145. judithathome - 7/1/2004 8:54:32 PM

Well, yes they did. But I think America has been overtaken by pod people now and they can't think for themsleves. ;-)

146. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 9:01:02 PM

Personally, I think they can think for themselves. That is why Bush is still hanging in there in the polls, given the slime that has been slung against him. I mean, really, just take a look at The Mote. Look at how much hate is spewed each and every day here by the Bush haters. The guy can't even feed his dog right!

And the most amazing (and obviously hypocritical) thing to me is, these same people are the ones who chastise the "Bush Slime Machine." My gosh, man, don't they even look at themselves in the mirror anymore??

147. judithathome - 7/1/2004 9:14:02 PM

Excuse me? Are you saying Bush didn't lie? Didn't present misleading information about the WMDs and the threat Iraq posed? Didn't pass a tax cut that benefits the richer among us while claiming it benefitted the poorest? Isn't slanting the reports about jobs creation?

Isn't going to cut veteren's benefits after claiming to be such a "soldier supporter"? Didn't lie about the senior drug prescription bill?

You live with rose colored blinkers, Kuli. The truth is not slime.

148. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 9:39:27 PM

I've already talked about length about my preceptions concerning Iraq and what was or was not known AT THE TIME. There was very clearly a good reason to believe Saddam had WMDs, etc. etc. You can believe the worst all you want to about the man, and create your grand conspiracy theories about him. That's perfectly your right as a blinkered American citizen. :-)

And for the umpteenth time, the rhetoric about Bush benefitting the rich and not the poor is bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Perhaps you can sell that nonsense to people who don't know better, but I do, because I am "the poor" based on my salary, and I have benefitted a great deal by the Bush tax moves.

149. judithathome - 7/1/2004 9:55:24 PM

Let me ask you this...say you got $300 from the tax cuts. And your property taxes come due later in the year...and your taxes have encreased by $400. And your state has increased taxes on things you purchase. And your kid's school taxes have increased. And taxes on gas have increased.

How much have you benefitted now? Of course, having seventeen children probably gave you more than $300 but still....

In the meantime, your mutual fund has stalled and then you lose your job and you have to go into your savings to make it through the time you are looking for work. How much has Bush benefitted you then?

And I mean the editorial you, not YOU personally.

Far more people are in the out of work, gutted their savings, lost money in stocks, and increased local and state taxes boat than you'd believe, Kuligan. And they don't really see Bush as this beneficent provider that you do.

150. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 10:09:48 PM

"How much has Bush benefitted you then?"

judith, I'm trying to be as nice as possible here, but your last post was filled with tons of red herrings and non-sequiturs. For starters, my property taxes and state taxes in Illinois have nothing to do with Bush's federal taxes moves. The state sales tax here in Illinois just went up from 6.75% to 7.25% July 1st. This is Bush's fault??! My local school taxes are Bush's fault?!

Geez, are you jaded.

As for gas taxes, I am unfamiliar with that. I thought the prices were going up because of oil prices. Perhaps you can point out to me the federal tax hikes on gas instituted by Bush.

151. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 10:16:17 PM

"In the meantime, your mutual fund has stalled and then you lose your job and you have to go into your savings to make it through the time you are looking for work."

The bubble burst, judith. It could well be argued that the over speculation during the last Clinton term caused the collapse in the Dotcom and telecommunications markets. For example, Lucent cut over 50,000 jobs as a result of the collapse. I happen to live in the telecommunications heartland of America, so I am told.

However, I am generally loathe to attribute such things to presidencies, be they dem or repub. Markets fluxuate, markets change. But clearly, in the context of our discussion, the Bush tax cuts have not caused corporate America to axe more jobs.

If Bush had entered office and instituted tax hikes on the scale of Clinton's last ones, one wonders how much worse things might be today. But again, I'm more apt to lay "blame" on the markets themselves.

152. judithathome - 7/1/2004 10:35:02 PM

The state sales tax here in Illinois just went up from 6.75% to 7.25% July 1st. This is Bush's fault??! My local school taxes are Bush's fault?!

I give you a little too much credit for being able to follow my logic, I guess. Of course I'm not saying it's Bush's fault that you state taxes went up but you have to pay more regardless...the state is making up for the money Bush GAVE you back so you are no better off. That's what I meant.

If Bush had entered office and instituted tax hikes on the scale of Clinton's last ones, one wonders how much worse things might be today.

Oh yes, because the ecomnomy was just in the toilet when Clinton's policies were in place, wasn't it? And the deficit...well, it was simply deplorable NOT HAVING ONE.

153. judithathome - 7/1/2004 10:37:02 PM

That's it for me...I have to go spend some money on my car repairs. I guess I will doing what Bush suggests to boost the economy and fight the terroists...spend, spend, spend.

154. wonkers2 - 7/1/2004 10:45:34 PM

NOBODY, but nobody has suggested that Bush should have "instituted tax hikes." Many have suggested, however, that his tax cuts were excessive and not targeted to do the most to stimulate the economy. His program was a give-away to rich individuals and welfare for corporations.

155. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 11:05:31 PM

"the state is making up for the money Bush GAVE you back so you are no better off. That's what I meant."

This is naive at best, judith. Hiking up the sales tax in Illinois has been in debate for years, long before the recent Bush tax moves. What actually made it easier now, though, was a Democratic governor, whereas we had a string of Repub ones before that who consistently opposed it!!

156. judithathome - 7/1/2004 11:15:35 PM

I'm talking about more than the state where you live, Kuligan. And about more than sales taxes. EVERYTHING in my state, for example, has gone up. Property taxes, which pay for schools in my state have increased A LOT in the past 2 years. With a Republican clone of George Bush in office.

157. judithathome - 7/1/2004 11:16:33 PM

And of course, your answer is that I am naive but I am not the one buying this Bushwa hook, line, and sinker. You are.

158. KuligintheHooligan - 7/1/2004 11:17:09 PM

And this, you still claim, is all Bush's fault? Come on, judith, even you can't be that obtuse.

159. robertjayb - 7/2/2004 4:12:50 PM

How Chalabi played the press...(Columbia Journalism Review)

Judith Miller is on the list, but she’s hardly alone.
Ahmad Chalabi’s defectors told stories to a lot of
reporters who now wish they’d kept their distance.

160. KuligintheHooligan - 7/3/2004 2:36:10 AM

As they say, lies have consequences.

161. jexster - 7/3/2004 9:29:06 AM

Gy George I think she's got it!

Why Iraq Will End as Vietnam Did

By
Martin van Creveld

Martin van Creveld lives and teaches in Jerusalem. He has written several books that have influenced modern military theory, including Fighting Power, Command in War, and most significantly, The Transformation of War.



As Shakespeare once wrote, they have their exits and their entries. Between about 1975 and 1990, following the US defeat in Vietnam, military history was extremely popular among the US Armed Forces. After 1991, largely as a result of what many people considered the “stellar” performance of those Forces against Saddam Hussein, it went out of fashion; after all, if we were able to do that well there was not much point in studying the mistakes our predecessors made. Now that comparisons between Vietnam and Iraq have suddenly become very fashionable indeed, history is rushing right back at us. Here, I wish to address the differences and the similarities between the two wars by describing Vietnam as it was experienced by one man, Moshe Dayan...





162. jexster - 7/3/2004 9:29:19 AM

...

That, of course, was precisely the problem. In private life, an adult who keeps beating down on a five year old—even such a one as originally attacked him with a knife—will be perceived as committing a crime; therefore he will lose the support of bystanders and end up by being arrested, tried and convicted. In international life, an armed force that keeps beating down on a weaker opponent will be seen as committing a series of crimes; therefore it will end up by losing the support of its allies, its own people, and its own troops. Depending on the quality of the forces—whether they are draftees or professionals, the effectiveness of the propaganda machine, the nature of the political process, and so on—things may happen quickly or take a long time to mature. However, the outcome is always the same. He (or she) who does not understand this does not understand anything about war; or, indeed, human nature.



In other words, he who fights against the weak—and the rag-tag Iraqi militias are very weak by indeed—and loses, loses. He who fights against the weak and wins also loses. To kill an opponent who is much weaker than yourself is unnecessary and therefore cruel; to let that opponent kill you is unnecessary and therefore foolish. As Vietnam and countless other cases prove, no armed force however rich, however powerful, however, advanced, and however well motivated is immune to this dilemma. The end result is always disintegration and defeat; if U.S troops in Iraq have not yet started fragging their officers, the suicide rate among them is already exceptionally high. That is why the present adventure will almost certainly end as the previous one did. Namely, with the last US troops fleeing the country while hanging on to their helicopters’ skids.

163. Ulgine Barrows - 7/3/2004 9:50:19 AM

'To kill an opponent who is much weaker than yourself is unnecessary and therefore cruel.'


I don't think so.

164. Ulgine Barrows - 7/3/2004 9:50:48 AM

165. Ulgine Barrows - 7/3/2004 9:51:27 AM

fix it, hon

166. Ulgine Barrows - 7/3/2004 9:55:14 AM

You haven't dealt with many sick animals, have you?


I know people don't like comparisons between the odd sick monkey or cow or goat or chicken or cat or dog, and they not always seen as opponents, but it's not cruel to put down an animal in hopeless pain.

167. Ulgine Barrows - 7/3/2004 10:33:32 AM

jayackroyd. I don't know quite what to say to you.

Other than, you're more bored than me, with money to burn.

If I had the odd million lotto winnings, I'd make a playground like in that Japanese movie, sorry I forgot the name.

Maybe not though, there are lots of kids out there, not inclined to sports.

This here is a playground for the sports misfits?

What is you all's motivation for running this joint?

How can I become a millionaire by 35 without inheriting?

Did you chuckle, reading that?

168. jexster - 7/3/2004 1:00:39 PM

The point, sine you evidently missed it, is not that waging war against a weak opponent is per se cruel as a moral matter...the point is at the heart of asymmetrical wars and that is, the perception that all of us have, or most of us have, those who understand war and who understand human nature is thus.


Now that is not only a near truism in fact..this underdog syndrome, it is a painful fact of life for powerful nations which is learned time and time again...From Russia in Afghanistan, to the US in Vietnam and Iraq to Israel in Palestine...to Hitler in Eastern Europe, the Japanese in China...

The question naturally arises "Why is this big power making war on the little one?"

The answer - because the big power can - undermines support for such wars domestically and it fuels resistance among the weak...

This is a fundamental asset for the conquered...and helps explain much of why no great power occupier has prevailed against a nationalist insurgency in over 100 years.

This is why Bush is the Second Devil in Iraq and why only 2% believe Bush's lies of liberation

This is why the US has already lost

169. jexster - 7/3/2004 1:03:11 PM

Hells bells its why we have a holiday tommorrow and not on the friggin monarch's birthday!

170. jexster - 7/3/2004 1:11:09 PM

War is not a trip to the vet. War is not a sporting event. War is not a game.
People are not monkeys to be euthanized, dehumanized though invariably the aggressor and colonizer comes to this view at least implicitly.....


Without this dehumanizing through fear mongering and thinly vieled appeals to ethnic/religious hate there would have been no torture gulag ..there would not even have been an invasion...

171. jayackroyd - 7/3/2004 3:42:46 PM

my preceptions concerning Iraq and what was or was not known AT THE TIME

At the time the war was started it was known that

1) Iraq had no nukes and no nuclear program (al Bareida said that in his report). And the yellowcake story was false (Wilson)
2) It was possible that there were no chemical or biological weapons in Iraq. None had been found, as of the start of the war, despite inspectors having been provided with the best intelligence the Americans could offer (Blix, same reporting session, who recommended extending the inspection period with a protocol that would prove the negative).
3) There had been no dealings with al qaeda. bin Laden viewed the socialist regime of Saddam Hussein as an enemy, not a collaborator. The only al qaeda elements in Iraq were in the Kurdish region, in opposition to the government. (Multiple sources report that the US could have taken out those elements, but did not.)

That's what was known AT THE TIME.

172. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:20:14 PM

Judith...no matter which state you live in, no matter the county or city...the increased taxes ARE very definitely Bush's fault to substantial and quantifiable degree..for a number of reasons:

1. Devolution of nationwide program and policy obligations to state and local governments while federal funding is either non-existent (unfunded mandates) or cut and underfunded - No Child Left Behind, Medicaid, Section 8 rent subsidies, Medicare reimbursements to public hospitals, VA cut backs to services for Veterans...the list is long..

2. Tax cuts to the rich and to corporations - the most inefficient fiscal tool for recession instead of countercyclical program funding increases, cuts at a time when the states had the most need and the US public could receive maximum job recovery benefit. This is so because only a fraction of tax cuts to wealthy individuals are spent on consumption and a substantial portion of the corporate payola is shipped off shore - again lost multiplier effects, less stimulative impact.

3. The stimulative effects of the modest middle class recession tax cuts are over. Now its the rich who will collect and the state and local governments who will suffer.


The core problem for states is two fold......the Federal government, not just Bush, has fondly passed along programatic resposibilities to states. This is devastating for a couple of reasons. First, the federal government is the only entity in a position to fund national policies especially broad social policies of national importance and demand...this is most acute in social and social safety net programs...

173. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:22:05 PM

Of course you can see the political scam iat work in the minds of the hoi poloi and the booboisie class eg, "is it BUSH's fault?" The citizens look to the state and local government to provide services but the funding and the policies are national in scope. Revenue sharing and devolved government are very good concepts in the main and a very liberal 60's innovation...unfortunately them that don't got da gold get fucked, those who have the gold pass the buck and the bullshit






You bet it is.

Spending for Iraq through Sept 30 - 185,000,000,000 and a defense budget built to another specification and bloated to a by gone faretheewell...

We need our NMD ..you remember...the Missile defense that is an R&D flop now in deployment ...can't hit shit...except the deficit

You bet you can blame Bush...I can cite a couple more examples ..and you'll be set for your next battle of wits with the Morons among us....


Leave no Moron behind nor in peace..

And who says lies don't have consequences!

Mostly though the liars aren't the ones who suffer them

174. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:32:26 PM

Even a cultural conservative can see, as did the little boy of old, that our emperor hasn't a stich and that our WarLord is neither warrior nor lord...Just another failed enterprise...a failed state to add to the list of failed Bush companies





On War #74

Spillover

By William S. Lind

How are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan going? Perhaps the best way to answer that question is to look at what is happening in Saudi Arabia.

Until about a year ago, Saudi Arabia was one of the safest countries on earth. Crime was rare, and everyone, including Americans, was secure almost anywhere in the kingdom. In a world where the most important distinction will increasingly be that between centers of order and centers of disorder, Saudi Arabia was a center of order.



175. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:34:11 PM

That is no longer true. War has come to Saudi Arabia, Fourth Generation war waged by Islamic non-state forces. Battles are almost a daily occurrence. Foreigners, on whom the Saudi oil industry heavily depends, are frequent targets for assassination. A number of incidents suggest the Fourth Generation forces have penetrated Saudi security forces – not surprising in a strict Islamic country where the non-state elements represent an even stricter Islam. They have the moral high ground.

In Washington, the “bouffesphere” whispers nervously about Saudi Arabia’s future. It is obvious that the trend-line is not favorable. When will the House of Saud fall? What will replace it? Will the cheap oil on which America depends continue to flow? Schemes abound – send the Marines to “secure” the oil fields and exporting facilities, impose democracy (including, of course, Feminism) on the Saudi monarchy, give Mecca and Medina back to the Hashemites – but the debacle in Iraq effectively makes it impossible for us to act elsewhere. Plus, invading the homeland of Wahhabism would make Iraq seem like a walk in the park.

176. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:34:29 PM


What Washington cannot understand is that the crumbling of Saudi Arabia is part of the war in Iraq, and that in Afghanistan as well. We still think of wars as delineated by state boundaries, because we still envision a world made up of states.



Non-state forces such as al Qaeda use a very different map. Their map has no state boundaries on it; they only think of the dar al Islam, the Islamic world, and the dar al harb, the world of war. For them, our presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is an invasion, not of two countries, but of the dar al Islam. Their response can come anywhere, with equal validity; it is all one “battlespace,” to use the U.S. military’s latest buzzword for battlefield (an historical question: do all failing militaries change their terminology frequently?). Their actions in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Europe and North America are all one. Reacting to what we do in one state with actions in another is no different from, in conventional war, counterattacking in the south when your opponent attacks in the north. Like the Washington Establishment, al Qaeda also believes in “one world.”

177. jexster - 7/3/2004 5:34:38 PM

If we use our enemies’ map, it is difficult not to conclude that we are losing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition to increasing instability in Saudi Arabia, we see General Musharaf tottering in Pakistan, President Mubarak of Egypt flying to Germany for “back surgery” (is that diplomatic-speak for terminal cancer?), Islamic militancy rising in Europe, and who-knows-what in the way of terrorist incidents being prepared in the United States itself. All of these play in the Afghan and Iraqi wars, no less than car bombs in Baghdad and ambushes outside Kandahar. It is all one war, one battlefield. State boundaries mean nothing.

Of course, it is not going very well on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan either. But in this war, events in those places are in effect merely tactical. The strategic centers of gravity are in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt. Al Qaeda, I think, understands this. Washington does not. That fact alone suggests we have only seen the opening moves in what promises to be a very long war.

William S. Lind is Director of the Center for Cultural Conservatism at the Free Congress Foundation

178. jexster - 7/3/2004 6:03:05 PM

The CIA insurgency intensifying...

L&C issues a falling shoes alert for all 50 states through October...


CIA Felt Pressure to Alter Iraq Data, Author Says

LA Times: "In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, CIA analysts were ordered repeatedly to redo intelligence assessments concluded that Al Qaeda had no operational ties to Iraq, according to a veteran CIA counter-terrorism official who has written a book that is sharply critical of the decision to go to war with Iraq.

Agency analysts never altered their conclusions, but saw the pressure to revisit their work as a clear indication that Bush administration officials were seeking a different answer regarding Iraq and Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the CIA officer said in an interview with The Times...

The officer is the author of a forthcoming book titled, 'Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror,' published by Brassey's Inc. of Dulles, Va. He is listed as 'Anonymous' on the book, which describes him as a 'senior U.S. intelligence official with nearly two decades of experience in national security issues.' "

{including Osama wet ops chief spook]

179. jexster - 7/3/2004 6:20:15 PM

Much much more too...

- Bush play at the UN was a charade

- Bush and Blair had actively interfered with Blix's insnpetion efforts

- Not one of the top 20 odd WMD site claims had proved true

- Bush's war plans, operational assumptions, occupation plans, were fundamentally flawed.

- The Invasion of Iraq was a major strategic blunder in the war against Al Qaeda...

- Saddam's regime was impotent and no menace to anyone not living in Iraq..this much the Bushies themselves admitted in their "cakewalk" cant...


- The invasion would create a serious risk of major regional instability in the Persian Gulf

- The invasion would open a new breeding ground for jihadists

- The Bush Administrations internal wars had rendered it impotent to deal with post invasion phase of the war

180. jexster - 7/3/2004 6:21:38 PM

Toy Stories and fairy tales

181. judithathome - 7/3/2004 6:26:28 PM



Jex, thanks so much for your posts about how the Bush tax cuts don't benefit us regular guys...I wonder if Kuligin will read them? I know they won't change his mind.

182. KuligintheHooligan - 7/3/2004 7:31:52 PM

Judith, you know, I could say all day long that all men are losers, and you could tell me, "My husband isn't!" And even if I repeat the mantra time and time again, it won't convince you because you EXPERIENCE otherwise.

The same applies here. You can talk all day long about how the Bush tax cuts only benefitted the rich but I know better because they have benefitted me greatly.

183. judithathome - 7/3/2004 7:56:31 PM

Well, Kuligin, good for you. But I wasn't talking about you or me or my husband. I was addressing what Bush said, that his tax cuts benefitted the less wealthy half of the tax paying public.

Maybe your experience has been different because you have so many children and got tax cuts or rebates on each of them, I don't know. But for a MAJORITY of the nation, that hasn't been the case.

And again, good for you that you have benefitted.

184. judithathome - 7/3/2004 7:58:54 PM

And by HALF, I didn't mean that half the public is less wealthy...I don't know the actual numbers. Should have used PART.

And by MAJORITY of the nation, I should have clarified the majority of lower income taxpayers.

185. alistairConnor - 7/4/2004 10:32:57 AM

Hey what are you people doing, discussing issues in Jexster's blog????

I think I'll complain to the management.

On the theme of lies, "what was known at the time", and whacked-out propagandists :
Did one woman's obsession take America to war?

She is a conspiracy theorist whose political conceits have consistently been proved wrong. So why were Bush and his aides so keen to swallow Laurie Mylroie's theories on Saddam and terrorism?

186. wonkers2 - 7/4/2004 3:24:56 PM

That's an amazing and scary article!

187. jexster - 7/4/2004 6:44:29 PM

Iraq Buries the Central Bush Election Theme TRB

This week's ABC News/Washington Post poll may contain the worst news the Bush campaign has received all year. ..

For close to three years now, the president has staked his reelection on the war on terrorism. It was September 11 that first sent Bush's approval ratings into the stratosphere--from 55 percent on September 9, according to ABC and the Post, to 86 percent four days later. As memory of the attack faded, Bush's numbers drifted downward again, hitting 59 percent in January 2003. But Iraq returned the war on terrorism to political center stage, and, on April 9, the day Baghdad fell, Bush's approval ratings were back up to 77 percent.

188. jexster - 7/4/2004 6:44:39 PM



In the 14 months since, things in Iraq have gone from good to bad to worse. In response, the Bush administration has waged an unrelenting p.r. campaign to make sure Americans see Iraq not as a separate conflict, but as "the central battle in the war on terrorism."

This winter--after it became clear that Saddam Hussein's capture wouldn't stop the Iraqi insurgency--that p.r. strategy began to fail....


For the White House, the failure of this linkage strategy was bad news--since it left the president with one foreign policy strength (terrorism) and one growing weakness (Iraq). But, this week, the news got far worse. According to the new ABC/Post poll, the public is connecting Iraq and terrorism once again. Except now, instead of terrorism pulling Iraq up, Iraq is pulling terrorism down. Bush's approval on Iraq has dropped to 44 percent, down three points from February. But his terrorism rating has plummeted to 50 percent, a whopping 14-point drop. For the first time in more than a year, the Iraq and terrorism numbers are within a few points of one another. The public again believes that Iraq is the central battle in the war on terrorism. Except now it fears America is losing both.

The stark reality is that the Iraq war now looks like a massive political mistake. Not only hasn't it given Americans a new reason to support President Bush, it has undermined one of the key reasons they already had.



189. jexster - 7/4/2004 7:21:14 PM

You are welcome Judith..

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities has a series of analyses on this issue. It is huge topic in urban administration and urban political theory.

Case in point.. San Francisco's budget is about $5 Billion but the General Fund Budget is about 1.25 Billion. The rest is pass through of grants (CDBG etc) or programmatic reimbursements (MediCal, Medicare etc). Going into this fiscal year the City was looking at a General fund budget deficit of $350 million.


3 recent:

Passing Down the Deficit: Federal Policies Contribute to the Severity of the State Fiscal Crisis


A Brief Overview of State Fiscal Conditions and the Effects of Federal Policies on State Budgets


Declining Federal Grant Funding Puts Squeeze on State Budgets

190. KuligintheHooligan - 7/4/2004 9:38:26 PM

"Maybe your experience has been different because you have so many children and got tax cuts or rebates on each of them, I don't know."

I only have one more child than I did under Clinton's second term, so it simply cannot be explained in this way.

Also, please define "the rich," and then give me your estimate for what % of the population they comprise. Perhaps this will begin to show you how lame your argument is here.

And stop changing your argument as you go along. This is what you said earlier:

"the Bush tax cuts don't benefit us regular guys"

But they do, and I am proof of that. Just admit you, your rhetoric and hyperbole are proven wrong by FACT, judith. Spout your ignorant lies all you want to, but they are still lies nonetheless.

Here is how you then changed your tune:

"But I wasn't talking about you or me or my husband. I was addressing what Bush said, that his tax cuts benefitted the less wealthy half of the tax paying public."

Yes, you were talking about me and you, unless "us regular guys" doesn't include you?? Then, get some English leasons, judith. Don't use "us" if you don't intend to include yourself!

This is what you constantly do, say one thing, then change your position and claim you are still saying the same thing!

191. judithathome - 7/4/2004 10:48:30 PM

Kuligin, it is obvious I can say nothing that you won't disagree with.

How's this...let's make it personal: The Bush tax cuts have not benefitted me or anyone I know except for the guy across the road who is a millionaire many times over and another guy who inherited his wealth from a man he cared for during the (rich) man's later years. Two people with more money than I could ever spend in my most industrious year of trying. THEY benefitted; I and others of my income bracket did not. This is just people I know personally...now I know you have benefitted from Bush's tax cuts. So I will put you in that lonely column of people with less money (just a suspicion) than those two who have oodles.

192. jexster - 7/5/2004 8:02:04 PM

The Failed War Presidency of GWB.

U.S. Response to Insurgency Called a Failure

WASHINGTON — Almost a year after acknowledging they were facing a well-armed guerrilla war in Iraq (news - web sites), the Pentagon (news - web sites) and commanders in the Middle East are being criticized by some top Bush administration officials, military officers and defense experts who accuse the military of failing to develop a coherent, winning strategy against the insurgency.






Inadequate intelligence, poor assessments of enemy strength, testy relations with U.S. civilian authorities in Baghdad and an inconsistent application of force remain key problems many observers say the military must address before U.S. and Iraqi forces can quell the insurgents.


"It's disappointing that we haven't been able to have better insight into the command and control of the insurgents," said one senior official of the now-dissolved Coalition Provisional Authority, recently returned from Baghdad and speaking on condition of anonymity. "And you've got to have that if you're going to have effective military operations


Talk about your rats on sinking ships!

The Bushies are so terrified they're launching attacks against our SOLDIERS!

193. thoughtful - 7/5/2004 8:11:34 PM

Hahahaha! Where are the dems questioning THEIR patriotism...turning on our soldiers like that!

194. jayackroyd - 7/5/2004 8:12:09 PM

191

Judith,

The child tax credit benefited everybody. If you were of low income, and have several children, your tax bill would have been reduced considerably. I assume, but don't recall that it would also have increased your earned income credit if your income were that low. That provision was the price of passage in the senate, if I remember right, but it is nonetheless part of the package.

195. jayackroyd - 7/5/2004 8:12:49 PM

everybody->everbody with kids.

196. jayackroyd - 7/5/2004 8:33:53 PM

The most current post in Political Animal (in the butterscotch bar) hits on exactly the problem. Referring to a libertarian reluctantly for Kerry, Kevin Drum writes:

it's not just his ideology that makes Bush a bad president, it's his seemingly utter contempt for policymaking of any kind. He just doesn't care whether specific facts are true or false or whether specific policies will work or not.

It's something that's frankly hard to get your arms around, this idea that Bush apparently doesn't think that policy analysis is even a valid field of study. And yet it seems to be true: he has about the same respect for policy that creationists do for, say, carbon dating, and with the same disastrous results for his ability to understand and influence the real world.

197. jexster - 7/5/2004 9:21:12 PM

Bye-Bye, Bush Boom
By PAUL KRUGMAN

When does optimism — the Bush campaign's favorite word these days — become an inability to face facts?

198. jexster - 7/5/2004 9:22:09 PM

Bush apparently doesn't think that policy analysis is even a valid field of study

That's MY field of study! One of em at any rate

199. jexster - 7/5/2004 9:25:42 PM

This pretty well caps Judith's discussion..

And economic growth is passing working Americans by. The average weekly earnings of nonsupervisory workers rose only 1.7 percent over the past year, lagging behind inflation. The president of Aetna, one of the biggest health insurers, recently told investors, "It's fair to say that a lot of the jobs being created may not be the jobs that come with benefits." Where is the growth going? No mystery: after-tax corporate profits as a share of G.D.P. have reached a level not seen since 1929.

What should we be doing differently? For three years many economists have argued that the most effective job-creating policies would be increased aid to state and local governments, extended unemployment insurance and tax rebates for lower- and middle-income families. The Bush administration paid no attention — it never even gave New York all the aid Mr. Bush promised after 9/11, and it allowed extended unemployment insurance to lapse. Instead, it focused on tax cuts for the affluent, ignoring warnings that these would do little to create jobs.

After good job growth in March and April, the administration declared its approach vindicated. That was premature, to say the least. Whatever boost the economy got from the tax cuts is now behind us, and given the size of the budget deficit, another big tax cut is out of the question. It's time to change the policy mix — to rescind some of those upper-income cuts and pursue the policies we should have been following all along.

200. jayackroyd - 7/5/2004 9:46:39 PM

Krugman, as he almost always is, is right. (This is the same argument made on Political Animal, btw--that policy analysis doesn't enter into their decision-making, and their assessment of the policy's efficacy does not permit the introduction of facts.) If they're gonna claim a Keynsian stimulus effect, then they need to implement a Keynsian stimulus directing the tax cuts at those with a high marginal propensity to consume.

201. jexster - 7/5/2004 10:03:57 PM

I find their hosility toward policy analysts personally offensive

202. jexster - 7/5/2004 10:05:25 PM

I mean that I had never quite thought of Bushevism as a personal professional animus..I just thought they were whack jobs

203. jexster - 7/5/2004 10:08:52 PM

The Continuing Saga of the Coup d'etat..that's french for coup d'etat..

A remarkable turn of events.

We know that the chief architects of the war -- at the White House and the Pentagon -- waged a running battle with the CIA for the eighteen months leading up to the war, both on the WMD front and on their too-skeptical take on Iraq's ties to al Qaida. It was the Intelligence Community that was the proverbial stick in the mud holding up the aggressive posture favored by these other forces within the administration.

But it now turns out that while the White House claimed the CIA was too cautious and naive about the dangers emanating from Iraq, in fact, the Agency was hoodwinking the president into believing the worst about Iraq and keeping him and his advisors in the dark about the weakness of their claims.

You might say that it turns out that the CIA was doing to President Bush what many of us were under the impression President Bush and his advisors were doing to the country.

This is the ironic and tragic tale told by James Risen in Tuesday's New York Times.

Somehow I thought that our best reporters had learned a lesson about peddling self-interested government leaks without applying common sense, context or critical, dissenting voices. But apparently not.

-- Josh Marshall

204. wonkers2 - 7/6/2004 12:56:05 AM

No wonder Tenet resigned! If he had been an honorable Japanese he would have fallen on his sword. I'm gradually losing what little faith I had in the big guys in Washington. Not many around today like Harry Truman or Robert Norris or Paul Douglas.

205. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:06:17 AM

The NyT ought to give its reporter a subscription.


SECTION: Section E; PT2; Column 3; Leisure/Weekend Desk; BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Pg. 35
MICHIKO KAKUTANI

BODY:



A PRETEXT FOR WAR
9/11, Iraq, and the Abuse of America's Intelligence Agencies
By James Bamford
420 pages. Doubleday. $26.95.


In the walk-up and wake of the Iraq war, it's no secret that one of the most bitter battles in Washington has been between the C.I.A. and the State Department on one side, and neoconservative hawks in the Pentagon and White house, on the other.

Intelligence and State Department officials have characterized the neocons as hawkish ideologues who entered office before 9/11 with an agenda to depose Saddam Hussein. They have accused the hard-liners of cherry-picking and hyping intelligence in order to sell the war against Iraq.

The hawks have characterized the C.I.A. as a bunch of risk-averse, bean-counting bureaucrats, hobbled by what Richard Perle has called ''ideologically liberal assumptions.'' They have accused the agency of continuing intelligence failures, from the overthrow of the shah's government in Iran in 1979 to the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

As James Bamford, the author of two respected books on American intelligence, tells it, there is plenty of blame to go around. His new book, ''A Pretext for War,'' draws a damning portrait of the country's intelligence agencies as woefully ill equipped to deal with the threats of terrorism and a post-cold-war world. It also draws a scathing picture of ideologues in the Bush administration, manipulating dubious evidence about links between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein and flawed information about weapons of mass destruction in the push toward war.

206. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:08:42 AM

In addition Mr. Bamford suggests that the C.I.A. caved to pressure from administration hard-liners. He quotes a C.I.A. case officer who says that in January of 2003, one of the agency's higher-ups called a meeting and said, ''You know what -- if Bush wants to go to war, it's your job to give him a reason to do so.'' And he writes that the C.I.A. chief George Tenet said of the provocative intelligence about Iraq that Secretary of State Colin Powell presented to the United Nations in February of 2003: ''I'm standing behind it one hundred percent,'' even though much of that intelligence later turned out to be flawed, and Mr. Tenet stated in 2004 that his agency ''never said there was an 'imminent' threat'' from Saddam Hussein.

Much of the information and many of the theories in Mr. Bamford's book will be familiar to readers from earlier magazine and newspaper articles, and other books: most notably, Bob Woodward's ''Bush at War'' and ''Plan of Attack;'' ''Ghost Wars,'' Steve Coll's exhaustive history of the C.I.A., Osama bin Laden and Afghanistan; the former counterterrorism czar Richard A. Clarke's best-selling expose of the war on terror, ''Against All Enemies;'' and ''Inside 9-11,'' a detailed chronicle of the terrorist attacks of 2001 by Der Spiegel journalists.

207. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:10:09 AM

But Mr. Bamford unearths new details about everything from the identity of one of the undisclosed locations used by Vice President Dick Cheney after 9/11 (Site R, a secret military command post on the Maryland-Pennsylvania border) to the failures of a special C.I.A. unit charged with tracking Osama bin Laden, and he connects the many dots, both old and new, to create a vivid, unsettling narrative.

Discursive in organization, ''A Pretext for War'' provides selective context for the failure to prevent the attacks of 9/11 and the Bush administration's path to war. Mr. Bamford is highly persuasive in recounting the many ways in which American intelligence agencies failed to adapt to the end of the cold war: they lacked specialists in many key Middle Eastern languages and a sufficient number of analysts to grapple with an avalanche of cyber-age data, and even though Americans like John Walker Lindh had been secretly joining Al Qaeda, operatives appear to have made little effort to penetrate terrorist organizations, preferring the decorous, low-risk tack of trying to recruit foreign embassy officials at cocktail parties.



208. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:10:38 AM

Mr. Bamford does not address the broader question of how cold war paradigms shaped the thinking of key Bush administration members like the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and Mr. Cheney. And unlike James Mann in ''Rise of the Vulcans,'' he does not delve into many of the larger factors shaping the hawks' thinking -- from their experiences in dealing with the Soviet Union to their appropriation of the Wilsonian idea of exporting democracy abroad.

What he does focus on is the role that Israel has played in shaping American policy. Mr. Bamford contends that ''the blueprint for the new Bush policy'' on the Middle East ''had actually been drawn up five years earlier by three of his top national security advisers'' (Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser) for the Israeli prime minister at the time, Benjamin Netanyahu (who rejected the plan), and that when they entered office in January 2001, all these hawks needed was ''a pretext'' for war against Iraq. Citing a report from the British newspaper The Guardian, Mr. Bamford adds that the Office of Special Plans, a Pentagon unit set up by Mr. Feith, ''forged close ties to a parallel, ad hoc intelligence unit within Ariel Sharon's office in Israel,'' which ''was designed to go around the country's own intelligence organization, Mossad.''

209. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:11:05 AM


In recounting the failures of intelligence before 9/11, Mr. Bamford points to missed clues about the hijackers and the poisonous rivalry (not to mention fatal lack of communication) between the C.I.A. and F.B.I. He also writes that a special unit of the C.I.A. named Alec Station, which was set up in 1996 ''with the sole mission of collecting intelligence'' on Osama bin Laden and ''disrupting his network,'' had an abysmal record: that ''after four years and hundreds of millions of dollars,'' it failed ''to recruit a single source within bin Laden's growing Afghanistan operation.'' He adds: ''It was George Tenet's biggest secret. Not only was Al Qaeda never penetrated, neither the Counterterrorism Center nor Alec Station ever picked up a single piece of usable intelligence on bin Laden or his organization, the country's greatest threat.''

210. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:11:28 AM


Mr. Bamford is equally scorching on the subject of an alternative intelligence gathering operation (called the Policy Counterterrorism Evaluation Group) set up at the Pentagon by Mr. Feith and Mr. Wurmser, arguing that it ''was little more than a pro-war propaganda cell'' designed ''to produce evidence to support the pretexts for attacking Iraq.'' He also denounces the Pentagon's heavy reliance on intelligence acquired through Ahmed Chalabi, the head of the Iraqi National Congress and a longtime friend of many prominent administration hawks. Though much of the information from Mr. Chalabi's sources about weapons of mass destruction later turned out to be incorrect or fabricated, Mr. Bamford writes, it was funneled to the White House and to the press -- most notably, The New York Times -- to help sell the ''war to the American public.''

Both President Bill Clinton and President George W. Bush are taken to task in these pages as well. In describing the country's vulnerability in the face of terrorism, Mr. Bamford repeatedly notes that budget cutbacks during the Clinton administration weakened the country's intelligence agencies, and he writes that the now famous Aug. 6, 2001, President's Daily Brief -- titled ''Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.'' -- seemed ''to have made little impression'' on Mr. Bush.

He observes that when George Tenet, the head of the C.I.A. during both administrations, declared war on terrorism -- in the wake of the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa -- it was so low-key that senior officials at the Pentagon and the F.B.I. had not heard of it. And he points out that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who actually controls a large portion of America's spy world, was ''far more concerned with downsizing the Pentagon than reorganizing and reinvigorating the intelligence community'' when he entered office.

211. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:11:37 AM



In the end Mr. Bamford's conclusions are alarming, if not unfamiliar ones: that incompetence, timidity and a lack of readiness contributed to the failure to prevent the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and that misinformation, ideological agendas and poor intelligence led to the decision to go to war against Iraq.

212. jexster - 7/6/2004 3:47:04 AM

And the Lies Continue: 9/11 Panel Reports Cheney Had NO New Evidence of Iraq/Al Qaeda link


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Sept. 11 commission, which reported no evidence of collaborative links between Iraq (news - web sites) and al Qaeda, said on Tuesday that Vice President Dick Cheney had no more information than commission investigators to support his later assertions to the contrary.


The 10-member bipartisan panel investigating the 2001 attacks on New York and Washington said it reached its conclusion after reviewing available transcripts of Cheney's public remarks on the subject.


The vice president has asserted long-standing links between the former Iraqi president and Osama Bin Laden's Islamist militant network.


"The 9-11 Commission believes it has access to the same information the vice president has seen regarding contacts between al Qaeda and Iraq prior to the 9-11 attacks," the commission said in a statement.

213. alistairConnor - 7/6/2004 11:54:18 AM

that's french for coup d'etat...

Actually, in French we more commonly say putsch.

214. PelleNilsson - 7/6/2004 1:01:27 PM

Talking about foreign terms, there is a nice German word, Schlamperei, for the US ineptitude in Iraq. Pronounceed with a nice fruity sh-sound the word invokes the phenomenon.

215. jexster - 7/6/2004 5:28:15 PM

BAGHDAD — Insurgent violence flared in Iraq (news - web sites) on Tuesday after more than a week of relative calm, killing four U.S. Marines in the west, a city official in Baghdad and at least 13 mourners at the funeral for an assassination victim in the volatile region north of the capital.

216. jexster - 7/6/2004 5:33:28 PM

If the Bosche had won as they should have, I wouldn't be having these problems AC....


Sunni Resistance to US Presence Hardens


It is the presence of US troops that is keeping Iraq a failed state.

217. jexster - 7/6/2004 5:50:21 PM

Mylroie as Bush Rasputine

"Peter Bergen, veteran journalist and al-Qaeda expert, raises the question of whether the bizarre and crackpot theories of Laurie Mylroie have undue influence high in the US government. Mylroie alleges that Iraq was behind the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, a thesis for which there is no evidence whatsoever. Yet she seems to have convinced Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz of it.

In the academic world, we don't get to publish our books at academic presses without peer review. When Princeton University Press considered my book, written out of the Egyptian National Archives, on the 19th century Urabi Revolt, the editor sent the manuscript to eminent experts in 19th century Egyptian history. Now, I lived in the Arab world for 6 years, have a degree in Arabic studies from Cairo, and had a Fulbright grant for my research. I spent a year working almost daily in the archives in Cairo. I had an academic position in a major department at a major university. But Princeton University Press did not trust me. They still had the book refereed.

218. jexster - 7/6/2004 5:50:38 PM



In contrast, the American Enterprise Institute publishes anything Mylroie hands into them, no matter how fantastic. She does not speak Arabic, has never been in any Iraqi archive, and has no standing in the Middle East field. Her books don't have to be refereed, apparently. The poor lay reader who finds her book in Borders has no way of distinguishing it from the trade paperbacks of Princeton University Press. And then the mere fact of the book's existence can become a reference-point in political debate. No university press would have published Mylroie's pablum, because academic researchers would have shot it down for poor evidence and bad reasoning.

You'd think that where people are writing about issues that involve life and death, war and peace in the contemporary world, it would be more important to have the books refereed. Nineteenth century history we could get wrong and survive.

The tragedy is that people will go on believing Mylroie's weirdness, and she will keep getting invited on t.v. and to speak to Congress, and AEI will not suffer a loss of credibility because of this fiasco. If an assistant professor in a university wrote such nonsense, the person would never get tenure and would end up unemployed.

I guess if you have the backing of enough incredibly rich people, you can get away with almost anything."


posted by Juan @ 7/7/2004 07:38:15 AM

219. jexster - 7/6/2004 5:57:04 PM

People are catching on...

The Crackpot Hegemon

' Post 9/11, the top strategists of this administration followed their President happily into the "war on terror," the wilder among them imagining it as World War IV, the equivalent of, if not World War II, at least the Cold War, and so engendering dreams of another half-century twilit struggle to victory. Endless years of war would release them to act exactly as they pleased. The President (and his speechwriters), dreaming "Good War" dreams from his movie-made childhood, then elevated a pathetic "Axis of Evil" (Iran, Iraq and North Korea, none of which previously knew of their close relationship) to the role of the Axis powers (Germany, Japan, Italy) in World War II;

and so, with an enemy of nation states in hand, far more worthy of a world at war than Osama bin Laden and small groups of fanatic Islamists, they announced a policy of global supremacy not over terrorists, but over all the other nations of our planet, swearing that no future bloc of powers would be allowed to interfere with our benevolent hegemony over the Earth -- and of preventive war.

220. jexster - 7/6/2004 6:13:35 PM

"Iraqi Freedom" - The Last Lie to Die...

We Hold These Truths to be Self-Evident
Emergency Laws Announced

Legislation without representation...what a concept!

221. jexster - 7/6/2004 7:19:35 PM

LAT: Bush's Crony Capitalist Corruption Continues

WASHINGTON — A senior Defense Department official conducted unauthorized investigations of Iraq (news - web sites) reconstruction efforts and used their results to push for lucrative contracts for friends and their business clients, according to current and former Pentagon (news - web sites) officials and documents.

222. PelleNilsson - 7/6/2004 7:38:40 PM

Schlamperei.

223. thoughtful - 7/6/2004 7:56:07 PM

Every business w ever ran got f'd up. Why would anyone think he'd be better at running a country?

224. jexster - 7/7/2004 1:14:02 AM

Ground War
Steve Rosenthal Wages a $100 Million Battle to Line Up Democratic Votes

225. jexster - 7/7/2004 4:29:16 AM


July Suprise???
Spencer Ackerman, John Judis - The New Republic

Bush officials are pressuring Pakistan to catch Osama bin Laden or his top deputies before the election. Some even have a specific date in mind--the middle of the Democratic convention

226. neato - 7/7/2004 10:27:36 AM

Jex, what do you think about those poor sods imprisoned by the U.S.in Guantanamo Bay without trial or access to legal representation. There are 2 Aussie blokes there, one is having a military trial of some sort, but the other (Habib)is mentally ill, and has had 6 months before this in an Egyptian jail where he was tortured. These 2 are probably the lucky ones, as there is a lot of pressure on the Australian Govt to do something.

227. alistairConnor - 7/7/2004 10:41:19 AM

Mylroie as Bush Rasputine

But is she as well-equipped?

That would explain a lot.

228. Magoseph - 7/7/2004 1:39:25 PM

Ali, if the Guardian's article is half-way correct about this, it is almost beyond belief. What frightens me is the level of incompetence that is suggested here.

On second thought, that just can't be true.

229. jexster - 7/7/2004 3:41:55 PM

I think that people being held by US forces should have access to US courts as well as US torture.

I have always thought so Neato.

230. jexster - 7/7/2004 3:45:58 PM

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Three US soldiers and one Iraqi national guardsman were killed, while another 18 US troops and three Iraqis were wounded, in a mortar strike that collapsed the Iraqi national guard headquarters in Samarra, a military spokesman told AFP.



Eric S. McKinley died June 13, 2004, in Baghdad when his vehicle was attacked.

Age: 24 Hometown: Corvallis, Ore.
Died: 06/13/2004
Service: Army Rank: Spc.
Unit: Army Reserves Company B, 2nd Battalion, 162nd Infantry Regiment, Corvallis, Ore.

231. jexster - 7/7/2004 3:48:27 PM

And now that you mention it Neato, I've long wondered at how ineffective the persistent protests of our "allies" Britain and Australia on behalf of the rights of their nationals have been

232. jexster - 7/7/2004 4:04:18 PM

Iraq is now another Palestine

The first Bush and his Gulf war paved the way for the age of terror.

233. jexster - 7/7/2004 5:51:20 PM



A bipartisan Senate report to be issued Friday that is highly critical of prewar intelligence on Iraq will sidestep the question of how the Bush administration used that information to make the case for war, Congressional officials said Wednesday. But Democrats are maneuvering to raise the issue in separate statements. Under a deal reached this year between Republicans and Democrats, the Bush administration's role will not be addressed until the Senate Intelligence Committee completes a further stage of its inquiry, but probably not until after the November election.

As a result, said the officials, both Democratic and Republican, the committee's initial, unanimous report will focus solely on misjudgments by intelligence agencies, not the White House, in the assessments about Iraq, illicit weapons and Al Qaeda that the administration used as a rationale for the war.




Well, Isn't That Convenient!

234. jayackroyd - 7/7/2004 5:52:13 PM

What frightens me is the level of incompetence that is suggested here.

This is a comment that we've been seeing, sometimes in very strong terms, from former members of the military and the diplomatic corps for a while. It's at the heart of Clarke's and Suskind's book. We're starting to hear similar comments from the traditional conservative wing of the Republicans, and from the libertarian types.

This administration's future depends entirely on keeping the know-nothings confused and ignorant, reassuring the people who believe the president would not lie to them on a critical issue. A Bush victory would be a national disaster. With no veep looking to run, our only hope would be that doing what they really want to do would screw the pooch for Jeb.

235. jexster - 7/7/2004 9:20:00 PM

'Kenny Boy' Lay's indictment hands Kerry a potent issue

236. jexster - 7/7/2004 10:09:57 PM

In the final episode of Republican Survivor, Anne Coulter and Duhbya set off on a scavenger hunt...the first to find 1)a collaborative relationship between Saddam and Al Qaeda 2) weapons of mass destruction in EyeRak or 3)a leprechaun riding a unicorn wins...

237. jexster - 7/7/2004 11:01:39 PM

Bush Lied About Size, Strength, Nature, Origins of Iraq Insurgency: US Sources, Experts

238. jexster - 7/7/2004 11:31:00 PM

Defense and the National Interest: The Iraq Budget Bomb - Follow the Money, If You Can

Excess Appropriations & Slush Funds -- a Quaint Trip into the Past

By Werther

239. jexster - 7/8/2004 2:50:16 AM

Oil on Canvas

240. jexster - 7/8/2004 4:25:05 AM

Bush War Crimes: Women and Children Taken Prisoner By Coalition Forces - "Save the Children" Intervening

241. neato - 7/8/2004 6:02:25 AM

re 231, Jex, I believe the British were reasonably effective, but the Australian Govt hasn't really bothered about its Nationals in Guantanamo Bay, they simply couldn't give a stuff, and/or don't want to get off-side with the U.S. One of the Australian "detainees" wasn't even fighting - just in the wrong place (pakistan) at the wrong time (9/11)

242. jexster - 7/8/2004 4:36:31 PM

INC: Bush "Embellished" Our Intelligence

[Don't insult ours]

Shortly after President Bush declared war on terrorism in the fall of 2001, the Iraqi National Congress, the exile group led by Ahmad Chalabi, sent out a simple, urgent message to its network of intelligence agents: find evidence of outlawed weapons that would make Saddam Hussein a prime target for the United States.

Inevitably, that request reached Muhammad al-Zubaidi, himself an Iraqi exile who had been working to undermine Mr. Hussein for 24 years from posts in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and northern Iraq. Under the playful name of Al Deeb - Arabic for The Wolf - Mr. Zubaidi, now 52, served as a field leader for about 75 to 100 people who collected information on the machinations of Iraq's police state.



Over the next three months, Mr. Zubaidi and his associates gathered statements from defectors who said they had knowledge of Mr. Hussein's military facilities and who had fled Iraq for neighboring countries.

In short order, that same group of defectors took their stories to American intelligence agents and journalists. The defectors spoke of a nation pocketed with mobile weapons laboratories, a new secret weapons site beneath a Baghdad hospital, a meeting between a member of Mr. Hussein's government and Osama bin Laden - accounts that ultimately became potent elements in Mr. Bush's case for war.

243. jexster - 7/8/2004 4:58:48 PM

Zarqawi not al-Qaeda: Comment by David Wright - a former Defense Department analyst and former Army Reserve strategic intelligence analyst

244. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:06:12 PM

This guy just can't catch a break.

First, the CIA sandbags President Bush with a bunch of bogus intelligence about Iraq.

Now it turns out that the military payroll records that could have helped prove that he really did serve his Air National Guard duty in Alabama in 1972 and 1973 were "inadvertently destroyed" in a tragic microfilm accident.

The Times has more on the president's latest brush with cruel fate.

-- Josh Marshall

245. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:14:35 PM

Cheney's Continuing Lies: CIA doubts hijacker met with Iraq agent
Tenet statement runs counter to Cheney's

246. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:17:08 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. intelligence agencies overstated the threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, relied on dubious sources and ignored contrary evidence in the run-up to the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq (news - web sites), a Senate committee reported on Friday.







In a harshly critical report, partly blacked out for security reasons, the Senate Intelligence Committee took U.S. spy agencies to task for numerous failures in their reporting on alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, which helped President Bush (news - web sites) build a case for war.


No such weapons have been found.


U.S. Sen. John Rockefeller (news, bio, voting record) of West Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said the Senate would not have voted overwhelmingly in 2002 to approve the war if it had known how deeply flawed the intelligence was.


"The administration at all levels, and to some extent us, used bad information to bolster its case for war. And we in Congress would not have authorized that war, we would not have authorized that war, with 75 votes, if we knew what we know now," he said.

247. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:18:20 PM

That is PART of the truth on the LIES...

Here's PART of the consequences:

Rockefeller said the Iraq war left the United States less safe and would affect national security for generations.


"Our credibility is diminished. Our standing in the world has never been lower," he said. "We have fostered a deep hatred of Americans in the Muslim world, and that will grow. As a direct consequence, our nation is more vulnerable today than ever before

248. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:21:42 PM

249. jexster - 7/8/2004 6:37:16 PM

Who is Scooter Libby?

The Guy Behind the Guy Behind the Guy


When historians finally lift the curtain on the Bush administration, they will discover that Irv Lewis "Scooter" Libby was one of the most important men pulling the levers. Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, has been center stage for every one of the administration's national security scandals – the Iraq intelligence debacle, secret meetings about Halliburton contracts in Iraq, and the leaking of a CIA's agent's identity to the press – and doubtless others we have not heard of yet.

Such a role is not unusual for Libby, who has more titles in the Bush White House than can fit on a business card. Essentially Libby is Dick Cheney's Dick Cheney – an odd combination of H.R Haldeman and Harry Hopkins, seemingly managing every detail of the vice president's professional life.

For the past three years, that has meant scooting from scandal to scandal.

250. thoughtful - 7/8/2004 7:19:14 PM

Of course, my question to jay rockefeller and the administraion is, given how hell-bent this group was on going into iraq, if congress did not authorize, would it have made any difference at all?

251. thoughtful - 7/8/2004 7:20:22 PM

jex, did you post about how the senate has already agreed to focus this part of the intelligence report on the cia and postpone the investigation of the admin's role until after the nov elections?

252. thoughtful - 7/8/2004 8:48:52 PM

jex, did you post about the other thing bush has in common with hoover besides job loss during his term in office? He's the only pres since hoover NOT to meet with the naacp.

253. jexster - 7/8/2004 9:45:57 PM

I didn't know that. RU sure? I thought Poppy passed too.

254. jexster - 7/8/2004 9:47:25 PM

The Republican Senate agreed to postpone the investigation. Yes.

Half is better than nothing though. We are already hearing from the CIA alums on this...

255. jexster - 7/8/2004 9:54:04 PM

Report Says Key Assertions Leading to War Were Wrong



And of course, there are Konsequences for Kulligan here as well.

If we'd known the truth, and if Bush's own statements on the subject are to be believed (a big "if" indeeed), the Senate never would have authorized the war.

Saddam would still be in power.

256. jexster - 7/8/2004 10:01:48 PM

A hint of regret, Sen. Rockefeller?

I'm sure they'll show it again later on C-SPAN. So if you get a chance, definitely try to catch a bit of the Roberts-Rockefeller press conference this morning announcing the release of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee report on the Iraq intelligence failure.

Sen. Rockefeller and the rest of the Democrats on the Committee voted unanimously to approve the report that a) places all the blame for the intelligence failures on the CIA, b) specifically -- and quite improbably -- rules out administration pressure as a cause of the problem, and c) avoids any discussion of how or whether the administration manipulated or distorted intelligence community findings to build their case for war.

The very structure of the investigation, as Rockefeller noted, necessarily pushed any discussion of the administration's responsibility for or role in the debacle back until after the November election -- a veritable tour de force of political convenience.

Yet in his comments at the press conference Rockefeller seemed to say that each of these conclusions was either false or so incomplete as to be deeply misleading.

As one of the first reporters to get a question in perceptively asked, why exactly then did they vote for it?

257. jexster - 7/8/2004 10:01:57 PM



Good question.

The reality is that the CIA is responsive to its president, its master. Its over-responsiveness is one of its key institutional flaws -- not just under this president, but under previous ones too. The CIA really did believe at least that Iraq continued to maintain some stocks of chemical and biological weapons. But its reports, analyses and judgments escalated dramatically in their certainty and scope after President Bush was sworn in to office (significantly, even before 9/11). Those at the CIA with more alarmist views gained favor at the White House, while those who were more skeptical lost it.

Remember in all of this that the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), which Sen. Roberts noted was the focus of the Senate report, was hastily cobbled together after the White House had spent a year making its quite alarmist case about Iraq's illicit weapons.

There is no bright line separating the administration's hyping of the threat and manipulation of the evidence and the CIA's own misreading of the evidence and its institutional decision to service the president's needs.

The aim of the administration's defenders -- Senator Roberts, et al. -- is to draw such a bright line (I'm tempted to say 'forge' but let's say 'draw'), thus suggesting the reasoning that because the CIA is guilty, that the White House must be innocent. But that's not true. It is itself yet another deception. They're both guilty -- only of different things.

The CIA is guilty: of aiding and abetting.

-- Josh Marshall

258. thoughtful - 7/8/2004 10:10:07 PM

jex, see here

Since the days of Warren G. Harding, presidents have met at the White House with leaders of the NAACP. Not President Bush — at least not yet.


NAACP President Kweisi Mfume, shown speaking at the organization's convention, says President Bush has been "aloof." (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)

More than halfway through his presidency, Bush has yet to receive the nation's oldest civil-rights group or the Leadership Conference of Civil Rights, an umbrella organization.

259. Magoseph - 7/8/2004 10:25:22 PM

Jex, do you suppose the CIA is going to fight back now?

260. thoughtful - 7/8/2004 10:32:05 PM

Magos, i think this is all out war.

Perhaps Bush's "destroyed" military record will mysteriously appear....or perhaps it will "leak" that laura bush had an abortion...or pictures of W drinking again...something's going to happen, especially now that the beast is headless.

Hmmm, i wonder whatever happen to those radar images that show the contrail from air force 1 flitting around the country in loop-de-loops during 9/11??? Might be nice to leak that during the RNC in NYC...and throw in the contrail from the bin ladens fleeing the country for good measure.

261. jexster - 7/8/2004 11:11:37 PM

Senate Report: Cheney Lied - No Al Qaeda Ties

262. jexster - 7/8/2004 11:15:19 PM

They already have Mago..Cannistraro quoted in the Guardian pointed out the obvious. The SSIC focus on the NIE is misplaced. The pressure had already been applied by then, the war already decided upon.

We'll see ALOT more...9/11 Commission coming within a couple weeks

263. jexster - 7/8/2004 11:16:10 PM


The lie that killed my son
Lila Lipscomb believed in Bush's case for war in Iraq. But when her son died in action, her faith in the American way was shattered

264. jexster - 7/8/2004 11:17:58 PM

Yea THoughful, now that I think back, the NAACP didn't invite Poppy in 1992

265. jexster - 7/8/2004 11:43:33 PM

Bush Pressures Afghanistan to Violate Constitution, Endanger Voters: Presidential Elections Set for 10/9 to Give Bush FP Boost; Parliamentary Elections Postponed to Spring - Too Dangerous???

266. jexster - 7/9/2004 2:31:23 AM

Newsweek GenNext Poll:Young Voters Moving Democratic (Even Before Edwards!)

267. jexster - 7/9/2004 3:06:09 AM

"I wanna know the truth. I wanna know the facts" Liar of the US..


Hell he coulda asked ME!

268. Ulgine Barrows - 7/9/2004 9:38:00 AM

Or, worn a different hat.

269. jexster - 7/9/2004 4:10:09 PM

Yesterday's report by the Senate intelligence committee left in shreds two of the Bush administration's main rationales for the war in Iraq: that Iraq had illicit weapons and that it cooperated with al Qaeda.




As Rationales for War Erode, Issue of Blame Looms Large

270. jexster - 7/9/2004 4:42:21 PM

Admiral Stansfield Turner: "The Senate Report does not actually say that there was no pressure. It says that it is normal for intelligence agencies to give policy makers what they want. It is not normal for the Vice President to make ten visits to the CIA while the Intelligence Estimate that the President wanted to make his case for war was being prepared."

"That would be interpreted as extraordinary pressure to produce what the President wanted"

DUH

271. jexster - 7/9/2004 4:51:12 PM

Toxic Duhbya: Politically Eviscerated Blair Considered Resignation

272. jexster - 7/9/2004 5:09:14 PM

I don't know where Roberts got his NO PRESSURE conclusion. Pages 304 to 312 of the report describes intense pressure to create an Al Qaeda link, pressure which seems to have alarmed the CIA Ombudsman for Politicization and which came from Douglas Feith's office of Intelligence Cookery in DoD (OUSDP)

273. PelleNilsson - 7/9/2004 6:19:19 PM

"Ombudsman for Politicization" sounds like a very Bolshevik idea.

274. jexster - 7/9/2004 6:53:43 PM

NyT: The Bushevik Plan to Steal MISSOURI


"This year in Missouri, it's hard to imagine that voters can have great confidence in the objectivity of the secretary of state, Matt Blunt, who is active in the Bush-Cheney campaign and is himself a candidate for governor. He has insisted on staying on the job, and he has ruled on important election matters in ways that help his own campaign... Right now, Mr. Blunt is trying to stop St. Louis from holding early voting this fall. The Missouri legislature voted to join the
majority of states that allow voters to cast ballots in advance of Election Day. St. Louis - where many voters were wrongly prevented from voting in 2000 because of the incompetence of election officials - announced plans for early voting, a move that would give eligible voters a better chance of making sure that their ballots were properly cast. Republicans have opposed early voting in the city, which has a large black population and votes overwhelmingly Democratic."

275. jexster - 7/10/2004 12:09:49 AM

Aussie PM under fire over CIA report



The political pressure is piling on Australian prime minister John Howard following a damning US report showing the CIA's pre-Iraq war intelligence failures.



The opposition Labour Party said on Saturday that the report showed Prime Minister John Howard had taken Australia to war on the basis of a lie and owed the electorate an apology

276. jexster - 7/10/2004 12:15:48 AM

Additional Views of Senator Dianne Feinstein



July 9, 2004

The flawed intelligence documented in the Committee’s report presents a clear case that we need to restructure the Intelligence Community. As the Committee’s report documents, intelligence contained in the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), as well as in statements to Congress and the American people by the Administration regarding both Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction and ties to al-Qaida, were inaccurate. The doctrine of preemption inherently requires the Intelligence Community to be right every time on the nature and imminence of threats. In this case, the intelligence was flawed.

Doctrine of Preemption

We must learn a great lesson from this experience: the doctrine of preemption is flawed. Unilateralism and preemption and an over-reliance on the military dimension of U.S. power may well be leading us in a direction that weakens, rather than strengthens, our ability to meet the challenges of the new asymmetric world. I fear that our current foreign policy is adding thousands to the terrorist movements across the globe.

Without the imminent threat of weapons of mass destruction or evidence of a clear threat, Iraq appears not to have been a preemptive war to prevent an attack by the government of Iraq against either America or American interests; rather, it was America's first preventive war, the purpose of which was to topple the regime of Saddam Hussein. Preventive war targeted against speculative threats is not legitimate under international law.

277. jexster - 7/10/2004 12:16:06 AM


It's critical that, even with our focus on Iraq, we don't lose focus on the ongoing war on terror, where preemption may be both justified and necessary. Al-Qaida is still active recruiting, organizing, and in places, merging with other terrorist organizations. American interests at home and abroad remain vulnerable to asymmetric attack. And by shifting the focus of the war on terror from al-Qaida to Iraq, we must not allow al-Qaida to recuperate and strike again.

By endorsing unilateralism and preemption, we may well be paving the way for others -- China, Russia, India, Pakistan, North Korea -- to likewise adopt these same policies to carry out their national aspirations. As Henry Kissinger put it, "It's not in America's national interest to establish preemption as a universal principle available to every nation." And I agree. But by walking away from or undermining effective multilateral institutions, by alienating friends and allies, the United States may well find itself with fewer options at its disposal and fewer friends to help us out.

278. jexster - 7/10/2004 12:16:13 AM


For the past half century, our country has embraced international cooperation, not out of vulnerability or weakness, but from a position of strength. The United States has the right to carry out military strikes against terrorists who would strike us, and there should be no doubt that we will. But many of the threats and problems we face today may not be effectively countered simply with the blunt application of military force. Diplomacy, treaties and robust foreign assistance programs have important roles to play if we are to be successful in meeting today's foreign policy challenges. A world in which no nation is bound by treaties or international accords, and in which might makes right, is not a world where the United States is better off. Our strength as a nation emanates not just from our power, but also from our moral stature and our principled stand for truth, for justice and for freedom.

Summary

The Senate vote on the resolution to authorize the use of force in Iraq was difficult and consequential based on hours of intelligence briefings from Administration and intelligence officials, as well as the classified and unclassified versions of the National Intelligence Estimates. It was based on trust that this intelligence was the best our Nation’s intelligence services could offer, untainted by bias, and fairly presented. In this case it was not.




279. jexster - 7/10/2004 12:53:04 AM

The NEXT Best thing to dumping Cheney...

WASHINGTON - Over and over, President Bush (news - web sites) has proclaimed fierce loyalty to Dick Cheney (news - web sites) as his running mate for a second term but questions stubbornly linger about whether the vice president will remain on the Republican ticket.

Cheney's approval ratings have plummeted amid persistent questions about his role in promoting the Iraq (news - web sites) war and in handling the Sept. 11 terror attacks.


Some prominent Republicans grumble — in private — about Cheney's behavior and his dominant role in administration decision-making. There also is unease in GOP circles about comparisons between the youthful, energetic John Edwards (news - web sites), the Democratic vice presidential candidate, and Cheney, a veteran of decades of political wars who seems uncomfortable on the campaign trail.



Is keeping him on the ticket!

280. judithathome - 7/10/2004 12:56:56 AM

I think all this Cheney-dumping talk is from the left; they are trying to stir things up and get Bush scared. There is no way in hell Bush is dumping Cheney. Cheney is the one running the entire show. HE, not Karl Rove, is Bush's brain. And Bush is not stupid enough to blow his own brains out.

Oh, he's an idiot but he's a careful idiot.

281. jexster - 7/10/2004 3:50:49 AM

No comment necessary -



Kerry: "US Needs to Wipe Slate Clean on Iraq"


Bush Speaks Out Against Gay Marriage

282. jexster - 7/10/2004 4:13:48 PM

Kerry Vows to Return Truth to Presidency

283. jexster - 7/10/2004 4:42:44 PM

Bad Iraq Intelligence Cost Lives, Kerry and Edwards Say

In a joint interview, John Kerry and John Edwards said that slipshod intelligence invoked by the president to invade Iraq had cost the nation lives, money and prestige.

284. jexster - 7/10/2004 4:52:53 PM

Guerrillas operating near Fallujah killed four Marines on Saturday.

285. jexster - 7/10/2004 4:57:13 PM

Day of Reckoning for the Kurd Koming Fast

286. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:02:03 PM

Lies and Incompetence Have Consequences:
Radical Jihadist Network Aims to Overthrow House of Saud

287. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:09:12 PM

Bush Forced Key Revisions to NIE

WASHINGTON — In a classified National Intelligence Estimate prepared before the Iraq (news - web sites) war, the CIA (news - web sites) hedged its judgments about Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and weapons of mass destruction, pointing up the limits of its knowledge.


But in the unclassified version of the NIE — the so-called white paper cited by the Bush administration in making its case for war — those carefully qualified conclusions were turned into blunt assertions of fact, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee's report on prewar intelligence.

288. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:10:10 PM

Bush, Dems to war over 'values' (USATODAY.com)

289. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:11:06 PM

Armed with Senate report, Kerry charges that Bush abused power over Iraq

290. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:13:18 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) got a boost in the polls after picking Sen. John Edwards (news - web sites) as his running mate and would beat President Bush (news - web sites) if the election was held now, according to a new Newsweek poll.







The Kerry-Edwards ticket is leading Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) by a margin of six percentage points, 51 percent to 45 percent, the poll said.


The survey of 1,001 adults, to be published in the July 19 issue of the magazine, was taken July 8-9 and has a margin of error of plus or minus four percentage points.

291. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:14:15 PM

Key Conservatives Uneasy About Bush

292. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:17:59 PM

nearly 150 conservatives listened in silence recently as a veteran of the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations ticked off a litany of missteps in Iraq by the Bush White House.


"This war is not going well," said Stefan Halper, a deputy assistant secretary of state under President Reagan.


"It's costing us a lot of money, isolating us from our allies and friends," said Halper, who gave $1,000 to George W. Bush's campaign and more than $83,000 to other GOP causes in 2000. "This is not the cakewalk the neoconservatives predicted. We were not greeted with flowers in the streets."


Conservatives, the backbone of Bush's political base, are increasingly uneasy about the Iraq conflict and the steady drumbeat of violence in postwar Iraq, Halper and some of his fellow Republicans say. The conservatives' anxiety was fueled by the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal and has not abated with the transfer of political power to the interim Iraqi government.


Some Republicans fear angry conservatives will stay home in November, undercutting Bush's re-election bid.


"I don't think there's any question that there is growing restiveness in the Republican base about this war," said Halper, the co-author of a new book, "America Alone: The Neoconservatives and the Global Order."

293. jexster - 7/10/2004 8:18:11 PM

"I am bitterly disappointed in his actions with this war. It is a total travesty," said Tom Hutchinson, 69, a self-described conservative from Sturgeon, Mo., who posted yard signs and staffed campaign phone banks for the Republican in 2000. Hutchinson said he did not believe the administration's stated rationales for the war, in particular the argument that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) had weapons of mass destruction.


Hutchinson, a retired businessman and former college professor, said his unease with Iraq may lead him to do something he has not done since 1956: avoid the voting booth in a presidential election.


Jack Walters, 59, a self-described "classical conservative" from Columbia, Mo., said he hadn't decided which candidate to vote for.


"Having been through Vietnam, I thought no, never again," Walters said. "But here comes the same thing again, and I'm old enough to recognize the lame reasons given for going into Iraq, and they made me ill."


The tension has been building in official Washington, where conservative members of the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations committees have pressed the administration for answers on combat operations; disagreed with the Pentagon (news - web sites) on troop levels; and expressed frustration with an administration they feel has shown them disdain by withholding information.

294. jexster - 7/10/2004 11:22:39 PM

Oh Puhleeze!

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq (news - web sites)'s national security adviser said Sunday unconventional weapons material might have gone to neighboring states in the war and Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is probably trying to get some.

295. jexster - 7/11/2004 1:02:23 AM

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Insurgents ambushed two U.S. military patrols north of Baghdad on Sunday, separate attacks that killed three U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi civilian.



Christopher E. Cutchall was killed Sept. 29, 2003, when an explosive device detonated near his vehicle west of Baghdad

Age: 30 Hometown: McConnellsburg, Pa.
Died: 09/29/2003
Service: Army Rank: Staff Sgt.
Unit: 3rd Battalion, 69th Armor, 3rd Infantry Div., Fort Stewart, Ga.

296. jexster - 7/11/2004 1:59:04 AM

The United States went to war on the basis of false claims. More than 800 Americans and countless Iraqis have lost their lives because of these false claims. The American taxpayer has to pay up to $200 billion--and maybe more--because of these false claims. The United States' standing in the world has fallen precipitously because of these false claims. Two days before the war, when George W. Bush justified the coming invasion of Iraq by saying "intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal" weapons of mass destruction, he was dead wrong. And when he later claimed his decision to attack Iraq had been predicated upon "good, solid intelligence," he was dead wrong.

The debate is over--

297. jexster - 7/11/2004 2:02:04 AM

For months, Bush and his crew repeatedly said Iraq was a "grave and gathering threat." That was the primary rationale for war. The Senate intelligence report is further proof that the war was launched on lies. There was no good intelligence that Iraq had WMDs. There was no good intelligence that Hussein was in cahoots with Al Qaeda. Will Bush admit that this war was based on false information? The report does give his defenders an escape route: they can point an accusing finger at the hapless hacks of the CIA. But Bush made hyperbolic assertions about the Iraq threat that were not only unsupported but contradicted by the existing intelligence. Along with Tenet and the culprits at the CIA, Bush and his posse deserve to take the rap for one of the most immense and consequential strategic failures in US history. But unlike the CIA crowd--which messed up by producing misinformation--Bush peddled both misinformation and disinformation to grease the way to war.

298. jexster - 7/11/2004 2:08:45 AM

Washington -- The Senate's report on prewar intelligence about Iraq, which asserts that warnings about its illicit weapons were largely unfounded and that its ties to al Qaeda were tenuous, also undermines another justification for the war: that Saddam Hussein's military posed a grave threat to regional stability and American interests.

In a detailed discussion of Iraq's prewar military posture, the report cites a long series of intelligence reports in the decade before the war that described a formerly potent army's spiral of decay under the pressures of economic sanctions and American military pressure.


The committee's report implies that opponents of the war were essentially correct when they argued that Iraq posed little immediate threat to the United States.

299. jexster - 7/11/2004 3:27:58 AM

"Bring 'Em On?"
A Former Special Forces Soldier Responds to Bush's Invitation for Iraqis to Attack US Troops
By Stan Goff


In 1970, when I arrived at my unit, Company A, 4th Battalion/503rd Infantry, 173rd Airborne Brigade, in what was then the Republic of Vietnam, I was charged up for a fight. I believed that if we didn't stop the communists in Vietnam, we'd eventually be fighting this global conspiracy in the streets of Hot Springs, Arkansas. I'd been toughened by Basic Training, Infantry Training and Parachute Training, taught how to use my weapons and equipment, and I was confident in my ability to vanquish the skinny unter-menschen. So I was dismayed when one of my new colleagues—a veteran who'd been there ten months—told me, "We are losing this war."

Not only that, he said, if I wanted to survive for my one year there, I had to understand one very basic thing. All Vietnamese were the enemy, and for us, the grunts on the ground, this was a race war. Within one month, it was apparent that everything he told me was true, and that every reason that was being given to the American public for the war was not true.

We had a battalion commander whom I never saw. He would fly over in a Loach helicopter and give cavalier instructions to do things like "take your unit 13 kilometers to the north." In the Central Highlands, 13 kilometers is something we had to hack out with machetes, in 98-degree heat, carrying sometimes 90 pounds over our body weights, over steep, slippery terrain. The battalion commander never picked up a machete as far as we knew, and after these directives he'd fly back to an air-conditioned headquarters in LZ English near Bong-son. We often fantasized together about shooting his helicopter down as a way of relieving our deep resentment against this faceless, starched and spit-shined despot.

300. jexster - 7/11/2004 3:29:09 AM


Yesterday, when I read that US Commander-in-Chief George W. Bush, in a moment of blustering arm-chair machismo, sent a message to the 'non-existent' Iraqi guerrillas to "bring 'em on," the first image in my mind was a 20-year-old soldier in an ever-more-fragile marriage, who'd been away from home for 8 months. He participated in the initial invasion, and was told he'd be home for the 4th of July. He has a newfound familiarity with corpses, and everything he thought he knew last year is now under revision. He is sent out into the streets of Fallujah (or some other city), where he has already been shot at once or twice with automatic weapons or an RPG, and his nerves are raw. He is wearing Kevlar and ceramic body armor, a Kevlar helmet, a load carrying harness with ammunition, grenades, flex-cuffs, first-aid gear, water, and assorted other paraphernalia. His weapon weighs seven pounds, ten with a double magazine.

301. jexster - 7/11/2004 3:30:12 AM

His boots are bloused, and his long-sleeve shirt is buttoned at the wrist. It is between 100-110 degrees Fahrenheit at midday. He's been eating MRE's three times a day, when he has an appetite in this heat, and even his urine is beginning to smell like preservatives. Mosquitoes and sand flies plague him in the evenings, and he probably pulls a guard shift every night, never sleeping straight through. He and his comrades are beginning to get on each others' nerves. The rumors of 'going-home, not-going-home' are keeping him on an emotional roller coaster. Directives from on high are contradictory, confusing, and often stupid. The whole population seems hostile to him and he is developing a deep animosity for Iraq and all its people—as well as for official narratives.

This is the lad who will hear from someone that George W. Bush, dressed in a suit with a belly full of rich food, just hurled a manly taunt from a 72-degree studio at the 'non-existent' Iraqi resistance.

This de facto president is finally seeing his poll numbers fall. Even chauvinist paranoia has a half-life, it seems. His legitimacy is being eroded as even the mainstream press has discovered now that the pretext for the war was a lie. It may have been control over the oil, after all. Anti-war forces are regrouping as an anti-occupation movement. Now, exercising his one true talent—blundering—George W. Bush has begun the improbable process of alienating the very troops upon whom he depends to carry out the neo-con ambition of restructuring the world by arms.

Somewhere in Balad, or Fallujah, or Baghdad, there is a soldier telling a new replacement, "We are losing this war."




302. sakonige - 7/11/2004 5:26:36 AM

Jexter, does the Homeland Security Dept's request to the Justice Dept for information on how they could suspend the elections in November in case a terrorist attack occurs seem ominous to you?

303. jexster - 7/11/2004 5:40:24 PM

No. Seems well planned to terrorize the electorate.

If the Bushies were serious, they'd be debating a constitutional amendment to grant power to suspend election days not ban married gays.

304. jexster - 7/11/2004 5:44:28 PM

Justin Hunt, a young man from Wildomar, Calif., about 75 miles east of Los Angeles, was determined to join the Marines. When recruiters pointed out that he was grossly overweight, he spent a year losing more than 150 pounds. Then he signed up and was promptly sent to Iraq, where he was killed last Tuesday in an explosion. He was 22.

Three American soldiers, not yet publicly identified, were killed yesterday in two separate attacks on military patrols north of Baghdad. On Saturday four marines were killed in a vehicle accident near Falluja. And five more American soldiers were killed Thursday in a mortar attack on a base in the Sunni-dominated city of Samarra.

For what?

Justin T. Hunt was killed July 6, 2004, in Anbar province, Iraq.

Age: 22 Hometown: Riverside, Calif.
Died: 07/06/2004
Service: Marine Rank: Lance Cpl.
Unit: 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.

305. jayackroyd - 7/11/2004 6:31:17 PM

The problem the president now has is that he can no longer claim that the war was properly waged as a response to a threat to Americans. He can say he thought so, but was mistaken--but he screwed the pooch on that defense some time ago.

There is some bleating from the left that the democrats on the commission let Bush off the hook by blaming the CIA. They're wrong. Getting a unanimous, bipartisan statement that the reasons given for entering the war were wrong is far more important than blaming Bush directly.

306. jexster - 7/11/2004 6:44:03 PM

Good point. Had the Senate SIC issued one overarching report on the Bush Administration, there'd be a majority and minority report and the main point would have been lost.

Hadn't thought of that, but you're absolutely right.



307. jexster - 7/11/2004 6:47:13 PM

And speaking of bi-partisan reports...

9/11 Report to Dismiss Bush Al Qaeda Claims & Mismanagement of Intelligence

WASHINGTON, July 11 - The commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks is nearing completion of a final, probably unanimous report that will stand by the conclusions of the panel's staff and largely dismiss White House theories both about a close working relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda and about possible Iraqi involvement in Sept. 11, commission officials said.

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The report, which is expected to be made public several days before the panel's mandated deadline of July 26, will also probably be unwelcome at the White House because it will document management failures at senior levels of the Bush administration that kept the government from acting aggressively on intelligence warnings in the spring and summer of 2001 of an imminent, catastrophic terrorist attack, the officials said.

Campaign advisers to Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, have said they eagerly await the commission's report, believing it will damage President Bush by showing that he and his senior aides were inattentive to dire threats before Sept. 11 and may have misled the nation about the reasons for the war in Iraq.

308. jexster - 7/11/2004 11:56:33 PM

IRAQ'ed "Intelligence" Center for American Progress

The report released by the Senate Intelligence Committee on Friday confirmed widespread doubts about the accuracy of the intelligence President Bush used to make his case for war in Iraq, but left unanswered several questions surrounding Bush and his administration's role in the production and use of that intelligence. The findings in the report offered a "broad indictment" of the CIA, and "left in shreds" the Bush administration's main rationales for war. However, it stopped short of addressing the pressure applied by the administration in gathering that intelligence, including repeated trips to CIA headquarters by Vice President Cheney, the creation of a secretive Office of Special Plans to filter intelligence, and several pre-war statements exaggerating intelligence estimates or ignoring conflicting points of view.

309. jexster - 7/11/2004 11:57:15 PM

UNDER PRESSURE: The report states there is no evidence intelligence analysts were pressured to change their judgments or alter " intelligence products to conform with administration policy," but committee co-chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) indicated he "voted for the report in spite of that with which I did not agree, that is the subject of pressure. I think there was a lot of pressure." The evidence supports Rockefeller's suspicions: if analysts weren't sufficiently intimidated by Cheney's "repeated trips to CIA headquarters in the run-up to the war for unusual face-to-face sessions with intelligence analysts poring over Iraqi data," they may have noticed when the Pentagon set up a rival intelligence-gathering outfit, the Office of Special Plans, which "rivaled both the C.I.A. and the Pentagon's own Defense Intelligence Agency, the D.I.A., as President Bush's main source of intelligence regarding Iraq's possible possession of WMD and connection with Al Qaeda." Rockefeller said, "the ombudsman of the CIA, whose job it is to listen to people's complaints said that in his 32 years of work in the CIA, he had never seen so much hammering, i.e. pressure, on the intelligence community."........

310. jexster - 7/11/2004 11:58:31 PM

HELPING OUT THE COMMITTEE: The Senate Intelligence Committee will soon begin a "follow-up investigation that will examine prewar statements by President Bush and other administration officials." According to the LA Times, Chairman Pat Roberts (R – KS) has asked members of the panel "to submit lists of claims made by White House officials and other policymakers that would be scrutinized to determine whether they were exaggerated or unsupported by intelligence assessments available before the invasion of Iraq." Here are a few exaggerated or unsupported claims that could help get the panel off to a good start:


311. jexster - 7/12/2004 2:17:42 AM

"No one is going through what we are going through" - SADR CITY, BAGHDAD, Iraq


Sgt. Reggie Butler saw his gunner buddy die inches away from him as they patrolled in Sadr City. "I'll do everything I can to bring all the soldiers back," he says. "Anything."

312. jexster - 7/12/2004 2:55:57 AM

CONNECT THE DOTS: Official Warnings That Bush War Claims Were Garbage


314. jexster - 7/12/2004 3:40:38 AM

JULY 9, 2004 - SENATE SELECT COMMITTEE RIPS BUSH ADMINISTRATION WAR CLAIMS

JULY 12, 2004 - BUSH ADMINISTRATION ANNOUNCES THAT IT IS CONSIDERING PLANS TO CANCEL NOVEMBER ELECTIONS

JULY 12, 2004 - SENATE BEGINS DEBATE ON GAY MARRIAGE BAN AMENDMENT

315. jexster - 7/12/2004 3:40:29 PM

Ahmed Chalabi's List of Suckers
Douglas McCollam, Columbia Journalism Review.
Judith Miller is only one of the many reporters from almost every blue-blooded news outfit in America who were played by the Iraqi exile.

316. jexster - 7/12/2004 5:04:31 PM

Remember Salam Pak, the "terrorist" training camp that the Bush Lie Machine made so much of?

Chalabi garbage..in fact a COUNTERTERRORISM training camp for Saddam!!!

To paraphrase GWB yesterday, "how can you believe a madman!"

How indeed?

Would be nice to have some of Saddam's anti-terrorist trainees on board about now...

There still remain claims and counterclaims about what was going on at Salman Pak. But the consensus view now is that the camp was what Iraq told UN weapons inspectors it was — a counterterrorism training camp for army commandos. Drogin of the Los Angeles Times says that the CIA never believed that terrorists were trained at the camp, and that there is no evidence they were. He notes that a 2002 White House white paper attributed all information about foreign terrorists training at Salman Pak to secondary sources. "If they attribute it to someone else,' Drogin says, "it means they really don't think it's true. No one will put their credibility on the line for it.' Knight Ridder's Landay, who has also looked into Salman Pak, says his sources don't find it credible that Hussein was engaged in terrorism training. "Why would Saddam run a training camp for Islamic terrorists involving hijacking planes and trains in full view of American satellites and spy planes?' Landay says. "And why would terrorists go there when they had the same kind of camps in Afghanistan?'

317. jexster - 7/12/2004 5:44:32 PM

The Corruption of Intelligence

Ray McGovern,CIA
The Senate Intelligence Committee reveals how CIA analysts cooking up outright lies. But the greater blame lies with the White House.

318. jexster - 7/12/2004 5:46:27 PM

(Note to Condoleezza Rice: Anonymous' name is Michael Scheuer; he is an overt employee; you can get his extension from the CIA operator.)

319. jexster - 7/12/2004 6:16:17 PM

WPost Sunday Outlook: CIA Insider

Note from Outlook: He may be the best-known "Anonymous" man in Washington these days. Over the past two weeks, he has appeared for interviews -- always in the shadows, his face unseen -- on almost every national television network. He is a 23-year veteran of the CIA and the author of a new book, "Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror." As a CIA employee, he had to submit his manuscript for agency review. The CIA allowed him and his Virginia publisher, Brassey's, to go ahead with the book on the condition that he maintain his anonymity.



By requiring him to withhold his identity but allowing him to publish as Anonymous, the CIA has actually drawn attention to the book (it briefly alighted on Amazon.com's best-selling top 10 last week). That prompted the Washington speculation machine to wonder whether the book somehow serves the CIA's interests.

At this point, his name is about the only basic biographical detail that hasn't become known.

[see above]

320. jexster - 7/12/2004 6:18:34 PM

Hated For Our Policies, Not Our Values

One of the greatest dangers for Americans in deciding how to confront the Islamist threat lies in continuing to believe -- at the urging of senior U.S. leaders -- that Muslims hate us and attack us for what we are and what we think, rather than for what we do. The Islamic world is not so offended by our democratic system of politics, guarantees of personal rights and civil liberties, and separation of church and state that it is willing to wage war against overwhelming odds to stop Americans from voting, speaking freely, and praying, or not, as they wish. With due respect for those who have concluded that we are hated for what we are, think and represent,

I beg to disagree and contend that your conclusion is errant and potentially fatal nonsense.

321. jexster - 7/12/2004 6:19:56 PM

Only when U.S. leaders stop believing that bin Laden and his allies are attacking us for what we are and what we think can we put aside our ill-advised and hallucinatory crusade for democracy -- our current default response.

322. jexster - 7/12/2004 6:24:39 PM

Due to our hubris, what we today identify and promote as a nascent Afghan democracy is a self-made illusion on life-support; it is a Western-imposed regime that will be swept away if America and its allies stop propping it up with their bayonets.

323. jexster - 7/12/2004 7:00:36 PM

Why look what just appeared in Talking Points!

(July 13, 2004 -- 10:26 AM EDT // link // print)
Ahmed's Willing Bamboozlers ... the whole sordid tale from the Columbia Journalism Review: "How Chalabi Played the Press."

-- Josh Marshall


Funny how that happens:
(July 13, 2004 -- 10:26 AM EDT // link // print)
Ahmed's Willing Bamboozlers ... the whole sordid tale from the Columbia Journalism Review: "How Chalabi Played the Press."

-- Josh Marshall

324. jexster - 7/12/2004 7:01:38 PM

Posted on TPM 45 minutes after the following

From: "john mccutchen" Add to Address Book
Subject: Ahmed Chalabi's List of Suckers
To: "Joshua Marshall"


Ahmed Chalabi's List of Suckers
Douglas McCollam, Columbia Journalism Review.
Judith Miller is only one of the many reporters from almost every blue-blooded news outfit in America who were played by the Iraqi exile.

325. jexster - 7/12/2004 10:13:26 PM

Tony Blair's claim that Saddam Hussein posed a 'current and serious' threat to Britain is challenged by dramatic new allegations today that Britain's spy chiefs have retracted the intelligence on which it was based.

Retracted, Redacted, Revised, Repudiated

326. jexster - 7/12/2004 11:04:23 PM

A friend just sent a clip of an SNL Skit on Bushie Homeland Security (DeNiro)..."Haid D'Saalmi" send email if ya want..its a big file

327. jexster - 7/13/2004 2:53:23 AM

The Gang That Couldn't Whip Up on Sissies


Washington -- Sharp internal divisions sent Senate Republican leaders scrambling behind closed doors Monday to salvage a constitutional amendment to ban same- sex marriage from an embarrassing defeat that could leave it short of even a simple majority.

The disarray broke out just two days before Republican leaders had planned a politically sensitive vote to put senators on record about whether a constitutional amendment should declare that marriage remain the union of one man and one woman.

But instead of a landmark debate, Republicans found themselves filibustering their own amendment to stop it from coming to the floor

328. jexster - 7/13/2004 3:36:40 AM

Now, that's pretty pro-life...

Tom Coburn, a former member of the House of Representatives from Oklahoma, who is campaigning to become the Republican party's candidate to replace retiring Senator Don Nickles, recently said he supports the death penalty for doctors who perform abortions.

"I favor the death penalty," Coburn told the AP last week, "for abortionists and other people who take life."

The Republican primary is July 27th; the winner will face likely Democratic nominee Brad Carson.

-- Josh Marshall

329. OhioSTOPAS - 7/13/2004 3:49:15 AM

Would Tommy Coburn (must EVERY politician from Oklahoma be a dimwitted Neanderthal?) also criminally punish the woman who seeks an abortion? She'd at least be an accomplice, wouldn't she?

330. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 7/13/2004 5:29:32 AM

331. jexster - 7/13/2004 4:23:01 PM

Why can't US political cartoons be more like this?

332. jexster - 7/13/2004 4:31:52 PM

THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ
Advocates of War Now Profit From Iraq's Reconstruction
By Walter F. Roche Jr. and Ken Silverstein LAT




Lobbyists, aides to senior officials and others encouraged invasion and now help firms pursue contracts. They see no conflict.

333. jexster - 7/13/2004 4:53:35 PM

334. jexster - 7/13/2004 4:56:06 PM

Some in Congress Rethinking War Vote Based on False Data - LAT

Several Republicans are among those raising doubts that another preemptive attack could win support

335. jexster - 7/13/2004 4:56:27 PM

les toys

336. jexster - 7/13/2004 5:13:52 PM

Wiz...do you know how very close to the bone Message # 330 is???


Ken Lay's fraud attorney and GWB's treason defense attorney are the same attorney

337. jexster - 7/13/2004 5:19:49 PM

Hello, God? It's Me, Dubya

Lord? Bush Jr. here. I'm confused. Why won't you crush Kerry and smite the heathens? Hello?

338. jexster - 7/13/2004 5:21:24 PM

Look, I've done everything you asked. I've been good. Haven't I?

I take the message to the people, don't I? I spout that evangelical born-again crap in pisswater Podunk conservative churches across this burned-out fear-drunk nation like I was emceeing a freakin' rodeo in Crawford. And they eat it up, Lord. They eat that stuff up. Hell, I even believe a lot of that fire-breathin' Second Comin' evildoer-hatin' stuff myself.


And looky here! Look how much dough I induce those evangelical suckers to cough up into the coffers of the GOP (that's God's Own Party -- just for you, Lord!). Doesn't that cut me a little slack fer when I skip over the part where Jesus says "Blessed are the peacemakers?"

Or when he says to turn the other cheek? Or love thy enemies? Or when the Bible says, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control"? Or any of that other pointless pacifist hippie junk?

339. jexster - 7/13/2004 5:25:37 PM



That's me on the right, in the red t-shirt just on the left shoulder of the bodyguard

340. jexster - 7/13/2004 5:32:55 PM



Fag Burning Amendment Backfires on GOP

341. jexster - 7/13/2004 6:06:59 PM

342. jexster - 7/13/2004 6:56:00 PM

Bush must think we are a nation of retards

' The dictator in Iraq had the "capability of producing weapons of mass murder. And now, the dictator is a threat to nobody, and the American people are safer." '


Bush must think we are a nation of retards if he believes we will buy this language of Saddam having the "capability" to produce weapons of mass destruction. All countries have the "capability." The point is that Iraq had given up its WMD programs and destroyed the stockpiles. The US was not in any danger from Iraq, and so cannot be safer because it was invaded.

Worse, the American invasion of Iraq is a major recruitment poster for al-Qaeda.

Not only has the Bush administration angered the Sunni Muslim world with its invasion and hamhanded occupation of Iraq, but it has managed to turn the Shiites against us too, by desecrating the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala this past spring.

343. jexster - 7/13/2004 6:57:04 PM

' He said Pakistan used to be a safe transit point for terrorists on missions of murder. "Now Pakistani forces are rounding up terrorists, and the American people are safer." '


This is a nice sound bite but bears no resemblance to reality. The major jihadi groups in Pakistan are still operating, and the Pakistani government has been largely unable or unwilling to stop them. The Pakistanis did arrest some 500 al-Qaeda Arabs, but Pakistani courts have not cooperated with its attempts to subject the jihadis to mass arrests. A major jihadi leader was sitting in parliament until he was assassinated recently!


' In Saudi Arabia, terrorists were meeting little opposition, but today the Saudi Government is taking the fight to al-Qaeda, and the American people are safer, he said. '


In Saudi Arabia, Americans were relatively safe before the Iraq war. Now Americans are in danger in Saudi Arabia, and are fleeing the country. This is an improvement?


' Not long ago, Libya was spending millions to acquire weapons of mass destruction. "Now, thousands of Libya's chemical munitions have been destroyed. Libya has given up nuclear processing equipment, and the American people are safer," he claimed. '


Oh, give it up. Libya had been trying to make that deal for years.

Pursuing a policy that makes us highly unpopular with 1.3 billion people is not a means of making us safer.

344. jexster - 7/13/2004 6:57:13 PM


So, no, Americans are not safer, Mr. Bush. They face the threat of substantial narco-terrorism from Afghanistan. Iraq is a security nightmare that could well blow back on the American homeland. Pakistan remains a military dictatorship with a host of militant jihadi movements that had been fomented by the hardline Pakistani military intelligence. Saudi Arabia is witnessing increased al-Qaeda activity and attacks on Westerners. And the Israeli-Palestine dispute is being left to fester and poison the world.

These are not achievements to be proud of. This is a string of disasters. We are not safer. We face incredible danger because of the way the Bush administration has grossly mishandled the Middle East. Juan Cole

345. wonkers2 - 7/13/2004 7:49:02 PM

A revealing story about a bombastic, lying asshole here

346. jexster - 7/13/2004 7:59:22 PM

Revision Thing - Revision Thing
A history of the Iraq war, told entirely in lies
Posted on Saturday, September 20, 2003.

All text is verbatim from senior Bush Administration officials and advisers. In places, tenses have been changed for clarity. Originally from Harper's Magazine, September 2003.

"SourcesOnce again, we were defending both ourselves and the safety and survival of civilization itself. September 11 signaled the arrival of an entirely different era. We faced perils we had never thought about, perils we had never seen before. For decades, terrorists had waged war against this country. Now, under the leadership of President Bush, America would wage war against them. It was a struggle between good and it was a struggle between evil.

It was absolutely clear that the number-one threat facing America was from Saddam Hussein. We know that Iraq and Al Qaeda had high-level contacts that went back a decade. We learned that Iraq had trained Al Qaeda members in bomb making and deadly gases. The regime had long-standing and continuing ties to terrorist organizations. Iraq and Al Qaeda had discussed safe-haven opportunities in Iraq. Iraqi officials denied accusations of ties with Al Qaeda. These denials simply were not credible. You couldn't distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam when you talked about the war on terror.

The fundamental question was, did Saddam Hussein have a weapons program? And the answer was, absolutely. His regime had large, unaccounted-for stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons--including VX, sarin, cyclosarin, and mustard gas, anthrax, botulism, and possibly smallpox. Our conservative estimate was that Iraq then had a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical-weapons agent. That was enough agent to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets.

347. jexster - 7/13/2004 7:59:29 PM

We had sources that told us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons--the very weapons the dictator told the world he did not have. And according to the British government, the Iraqi regime could launch a biological or chemical attack in as little as forty-five minutes after the orders were given. There could be no doubt that Saddam Hussein had biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more.

Iraq possessed ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles--far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey, and other nations. We also discovered through intelligence that Iraq had a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We were concerned that Iraq was exploring ways of using UAVs for missions targeting the United States. "

348. jexster - 7/13/2004 11:23:49 PM

Acting DCI Strikes Back!
On Wolf Blitzer


- Don't just focus on the Oct 2002 NIE (Bush cooked that for the VOTE)
- So focus on the NIE - Bush lied about Al Qaeda and NUKES
- So focus on the NIE - There was plenty of dissenting info which could have been the subject of serious debate - not my problem yall didn't bother to have one

349. jexster - 7/14/2004 3:00:28 AM

Facing the Enemy on the Ground
Scott Ritter

The Iraqi resistance has been years in the making. And with the help of American involvement, the insurgency will continue to flourish and grow until no force can defeat it.

350. jexster - 7/14/2004 3:22:57 AM

Fact of the Matter Is That Facts Didn't Matter
By Robert Scheer

Well, the CIA managed, barely, to get one thing right on Iraq: There never was a case for linking Saddam Hussein with Osama bin Laden or the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, a key rationale for President Bush's invasion of Iraq

351. rdbrewer - 7/14/2004 4:37:54 PM

Heh.

352. PelleNilsson - 7/14/2004 4:49:11 PM

Very constructive, brewer. Thank you.

353. jexster - 7/14/2004 5:00:24 PM

Coalition of the Fleeing

354. jexster - 7/14/2004 5:01:21 PM

Hey RD...where can I find some of those cutesie Smirking Duhbya's?

Prefer one in cowboy boots.

355. jexster - 7/14/2004 5:04:45 PM

Back in the good ol' days of the Cold War, I returned from a visit to East Germany and was instantly berated by one of its diplomats in Washington. He wanted to know how I could have written that East Berlin was bleak and dismal when everyone knew that West Berlin was really that way. For years, I've wondered what happened to that man. Now I think he's the president of the United States.

When it comes to telling you right to your face that black is white, maybe no one compares with George W. Bush. Last week, for example, he responded to yet another report that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction by saying that it didn't matter. "Although we have not found stockpiles of weapons, I believe we were right to go into Iraq," Bush said. "America is safer today because we did."

Bush Safely in Denial

356. jexster - 7/14/2004 5:32:59 PM

Powell Lies People Die
Powell's "Adlai Stevenson" Moment, Chock Full O Boners

357. jexster - 7/14/2004 5:34:10 PM

Powell's Feb. 5, 2003, speech to the U.N. Security Council was crafted by the CIA (news - web sites) at the behest of the White House. Intended to be the Bush administration's most compelling case by one of its most credible spokesmen that a confrontation with Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) was necessary, the speech has become a central moment in the lead-up to war.


The speech also has become a point of reference in the failure of U.S. intelligence. Although Powell has said he struggled to ensure that all of his arguments were sound and backed by intelligence from several sources, it nonetheless became a key example of how the administration advanced false claims to justify war.

358. jexster - 7/14/2004 7:27:48 PM

The Incredible Lying Bush Regime
Lies in their Own Words (audio)

359. thoughtful - 7/14/2004 8:05:23 PM

So, I had a conversation with my very right wing friend who says the following:

- they did find cannisters of serin and mustard gas in iraq so w is not lying

- w did not lie about his national guard service...rather he was excused so he could campaign and he made up the time at other times which was normal for national guard service as he was just in the reserves

- w did not lie about his arrest record...rather he just refused to talk about it.

It's all a matter of seeing what you want to see and hearing what you want to hear.

360. jexster - 7/14/2004 9:34:51 PM

Gullible's Travels - Ignorance is Bush

361. jexster - 7/15/2004 12:22:47 AM

This October could be full of surprises.



Shortly before I left Washington for the summer (in the good old days whose passing I regret, few stayed in Washington in summertime), my informal intelligence network gave me an interesting report: Iran was beginning to mass troops on the Iran-Iraq border. Did this portend overt Iranian intervention in Iraq? I said I didn’t think so. Events in Iraq are not unfavorable to Iran, and the risks of direct intervention would be great.

However, there is a potential situation that could lead to Iranian intervention: if it were in response to an American-Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Such an attack may very well be on the agenda as the “October Surprise,” the distraction George Bush desperately needs if the debacle in Iraq is not to lead to his defeat in November.

There is little doubt that Iran has a nuclear weapons program, one that is operating under forced draft to produce a nuclear deterrent as quickly as possible. Iran, along with everyone else in the world, knows that the best way to be safe from an American attack is to have nukes. Even the most howling neo-cons show little appetite for a war with North Korea.

The problem is that, while an Iranian nuclear capability may be directed at deterring the United States, it also poses a mortal threat to Israel.





362. jexster - 7/15/2004 2:10:43 AM

WASHINGTON - An audit of Iraq (news - web sites)'s oil revenues revealed a lack of adequate financial controls and an inability to get information on large non-competitive contracts, including one awarded to Halliburton, the board established to monitor Iraq finances reported Thursday.



The International Advisory and Monitoring Board on Iraq released an audit prepared by accounting firm KPMG, which cited concerns about an inability to track how much oil is being produced in Iraq and a lack of proper internal controls on the money being spent.


The board, which met Wednesday and Thursday in Washington, said it had been unable to gain access to audits already done by U.S. agencies on a number of noncompetitive contracts awarded for various Iraq reconstruction projects including one given to Halliburton to repair Iraq's oil production facilities.

363. jexster - 7/15/2004 10:07:53 AM

Most Coveted Item in Iraq:

A Passport Out of the Country

Mission Accomplished

364. jexster - 7/15/2004 4:48:36 PM

Iran Atomic Shopping Raises Bomb Fears

"Now that the U.S. has proved it is prepared to fight anybody for no reason at all, they should be forgiven if they redouble their efforts.

Even if the Islamic Republic is overthrown, as some hope, the new government in Tehran will surely follow the same nationalist line as its predecessor did. A nuclear Iran is likely to be followed by a nuclear Turkey. Next will come a nuclear Greece, a nuclear Saudi Arabia (assuming the country can survive as a single political unit), and a nuclear Egypt.

Welcome to the Brave New World, Mr. Bush." - Martin van Creveld



365. jexster - 7/15/2004 4:52:08 PM

US Not Prepared - General

One of the nation's top generals during the invasion of Iraq (news - web sites) said Thursday that the insurgency took U.S. military leaders by surprise because they believed the assurances of Iraqi opposition groups and defectors that American forces would be welcomed.

Gen. John Keane, who served as the Army's vice chief of staff during the war and who has since retired, told the House Armed Services Committee: "We did not see it coming. And we were not properly prepared and organized to deal with it. . . . Many of us got seduced by the Iraqi exiles in terms of what the outcome would be."

366. jexster - 7/15/2004 5:02:37 PM

GOP To Give Up on Swing Voters - Burn Fags and Feed Base Strategery

367. jexster - 7/15/2004 5:10:07 PM

Iraqi Boys Sodomized at Abu Ghraib>

Sy Hersh, the journalist who broke the Abu Ghuraib prison torture scandal, told an American Civil Liberties Union audience that film exists of young Iraqi men at Abu Ghuraib being sodomized by US troops. He said, "The boys were sodomised with the cameras rolling, and the worst part is the soundtrack, of the boys shrieking. And this is your government at war."

Hersh believes that President Bush and Vice President Cheney are guilty of trying to cover up war crimes.

Does anyone else see an irony here? Isn't this the same administration that just tried to tinker with the United States constitution in order to prevent government sanction for sodomy?

368. jexster - 7/16/2004 5:11:18 AM

62% now say Iraq not worth the cost...

51% now say the US should not have invaded...

CBS/NyT Poll

Kerry +5%

The internals point strongly to a general and deepening rejection of Bush and a country that will be looking very closely at the Democratic Convention...


Kerry has to close the deal

369. jexster - 7/16/2004 3:42:52 PM

MOSUL, Iraq - A roadside bomb hit a U.S. convoy Saturday, killing one U.S. soldier and wounding a second, the U.S. military said.




The attack occurred near Beiji, about 90 miles south of the northern city of Mosul. The soldier was assigned to Task Force Olympia, which is based in Fort Lewis, Wash.

370. jexster - 7/16/2004 4:19:35 PM

Report on the Stable Framework Favoring John Kerry's Election

371. jexster - 7/16/2004 6:13:34 PM

IraN not IraQ helped the Al Qaeda 9/11 hijackers. Had a formal working relationship. Gave the hijackers clean passports. IraN not IraQ has the nuclear program,- see 9/11 Commission Report out next week


OOOPS

372. jexster - 7/16/2004 8:25:44 PM


Two Northern California Soldiers Die For Lies, Incompetence in IraQ


Two Northern California families lost loved ones in Iraq (news - web sites) over the last few weeks.

William Emanuel, 19, was an Army infantryman from Stockton. He was killed last week in a mortar attack just north of Baghdad. Emanuel had been in Iraq since February.


Jesse Martinez, 20, was an Army private from Tracy. Martinez died when a vehicle carrying him and three other soldiers overturned outside of Mosul. Martinez was scheduled to return home for leave in two weeks.


373. jexster - 7/16/2004 8:34:35 PM

LIES AND INCOMPETENCE HAVE CONSEQUENCES

374. jexster - 7/16/2004 9:15:14 PM

If they hadn't been so busy cooking intelligence on IraQ...


"Citing a recently discovered December 2001 memo buried in the files of the National Security Agency, the commission report states that Iranian border inspectors were instructed not to place stamps in the passports of Al Qaeda fighters from Saudi Arabia who were traveling from bin Laden’s camps through Iran, according to U.S. officials and commission sources familiar with the report."

375. jexster - 7/16/2004 9:43:56 PM

Good Enough for Government Work...




376. wonkers2 - 7/16/2004 10:08:15 PM

"Kerry has to close the deal." Kerry is a strong closer as in his close race with Phil Weld and his victory in Iowa this year.

377. judithathome - 7/16/2004 10:20:04 PM

Who is Phil Weld?

378. jayackroyd - 7/16/2004 10:57:24 PM

William Weld was Kerry's last opponent, a popular centrist Republican governor.

379. judithathome - 7/16/2004 11:32:08 PM

I know who William Weld is...didn't know he was called Phil.

380. jayackroyd - 7/16/2004 11:41:10 PM

Wonkers just made a rhyming mistake.

381. jexster - 7/17/2004 12:15:17 AM

Bill
Phil
Will
Iraq
Iran

What's the difference?

382. jexster - 7/17/2004 2:27:37 AM

9/11 Commission Finds Links Between IraN and Al Qaeda

383. jayackroyd - 7/17/2004 2:55:30 AM

The difference is that we know who wonk meant. The administration wasn't making an innocent spelling mistake.

And this is NOT news. There have been joustings, collaborations, mutual agreements to not poach on each other's territory, agreements not to escalate the Sunni-Shiite issues in pursuit of the larger goal of islamist government between al qaeda and Iran. Their laundering 9/11 passports is hardly surprising.

And, again, this detente between the islamists of Shiite Iran and Sunni al qaeda has been on the public record for some time. The media has done a terrible job of getting the truth out to the American people.

And, you know, it's kinda funny that Ace shows up at this juncture--because the stuff he used to post in support of the administration was so lame and always wrong, and now the lameness of the administration's postion is becoming more and more apparent.

384. jexster - 7/17/2004 3:10:11 AM

This is the greatest treasure the United States has, our enlisted men and women. And when we put them into harm's way, it had better count for something. It can't be because some policy wonk back here has a brain fart of an idea of a strategy that isn't thought out. Anthony Zinni

385. angel-five - 7/17/2004 3:19:39 AM

I hope Zinni gets tapped for NSC advisor.

386. jexster - 7/17/2004 4:16:33 AM

Your Corps
My Corps
Our Corps

Marine Corps: He'd clear the air!


387. jexster - 7/17/2004 7:01:59 PM

Blair Admits Mass Graves Claims "Untrue"
Its Official. Bush Killed More Iraqis Than Saddam


Now why am I not surprised?

388. jexster - 7/17/2004 7:34:13 PM

Inflation-adjusted wages fall again in June
Down six of the last seven months

Perhaps that explains why Bush's economic approval rating in the latest CBS/NyT Poll (42/51) is lower than it was in February (44/50).

Bullshit don't buy groceries.

389. jexster - 7/17/2004 7:48:40 PM

Bush's Risky Bet that Gay Marriage Will Inflame Electorate

390. jexster - 7/18/2004 12:54:00 AM

9. With all the brouhaha in the Senate about the gay marriage constitutional amendment, the number who think gays should be allowed to either marry or form civil unions continues to climb--from 55 percent in March, to 57 percent in May to 59 percent in this latest survey.

10. The highest number ever (60 percent) think the US should not attack another country unless the US is attacked first.

11. The Democrats have an 8 point advantage in party ID without leaners and a 14 point advantage with leaners.


Eight other points in Is there such thing as too much bad news for Bush?

391. jexster - 7/18/2004 9:34:21 PM

Video: Carnage in Baghdad

392. jexster - 7/19/2004 1:13:01 AM

Top commanders in Iraq allowed dogs to be used in Prisoner Interrogations

393. jexster - 7/19/2004 2:53:02 AM

Bush's Foreign Fantasy
The president thinks the world is safer than it was three years ago. Which world is he living in?



We represent the Lollipop Guild
The Lollipop Guild, the Lollipop Guild
And in the name of the Lollipop Guild
We wish to welcome you to Munchkin Land

394. jexster - 7/19/2004 3:08:33 AM

Sorry for the link to the Mayor of Munchkin land, GBW..here's Fred Kaplan.

395. jexster - 7/19/2004 2:00:46 PM

Douglas Feith's Warped World:

How the Likud Party's Campaign of Disinformation Led to War on Iraq

396. jexster - 7/19/2004 6:38:51 PM

FALLUJAH, Iraq - A U.S. Marine was killed in action Tuesday in Anbar Province, a Sunni-dominated area west of Baghdad, the military said...



Benjamin R. Carman was killed April 6, 2004, in fighting in Anbar province.

Age: 20 Hometown: Jefferson, Iowa
Died: 04/06/2004
Service: Marine Rank: Pfc.
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.

397. jexster - 7/19/2004 6:57:17 PM

Weapons of Mass Deception

News reports today that UN Weapons Inspectors will be returning to Iraq, not to look for WMD, but to confirm they never existed thus enabling the UN to formally lift sanctions.


The absence of evidence, as it turns out, is evidence of absence.

398. wonkers2 - 7/19/2004 8:09:58 PM

Jex, the Feith, Likud links don't work.

399. jayackroyd - 7/19/2004 8:13:43 PM

Sure they do. It's a UPI analysis piece that rehashes the same old stuff.

400. jexster - 7/19/2004 10:03:53 PM

Yes. Its the "same old stuff" to you and to me. The UPI Feith link is basically a summary of Feith material in:

"Plan of Attack," - Woodward

"Against All Enemies" - Clarke

"A Pretext for War," James Bamford's book on the abuse of U.S. intelligence agencies both before and after 9/11

Not news to either you or me who've known that the IraQ adventure was PNAC/INC/Likud crap in a crockpot for almost three years.

But certainly for most people.

401. jexster - 7/19/2004 11:14:23 PM

Similarly, this is not new either. It should sound familiar in fact:

the Pentagon's attempt to force an apology from Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., for mentioning the contributions to public misinformation made by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith puts the dispute in perspective.



In a letter obtained by The Washington Times, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Legislative Affairs Powell Moore challenged Rockefeller to substantiate the "serious charge you floated" or issue an apology. It was an artful non-denial. The charge itself wasn't explained, and Moore knows that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has agreed not to reveal the role of the White House and Pentagon until after the 2004 presidential election.


Familiar?

It should be for that is the very same tactic Hastert and Frist used in their failed attempt to smear Clarke, Gorelick and ultimately the 911 commission whose report comes out this week.

Its the Grand Old Party's "drive by slime"

402. jexster - 7/20/2004 5:50:09 PM

Sgt. Frank Carey went over with the 3rd Infantry Division. At first, he was "excited. It was like 'Red Badge of Courage.' " That feeling lasted through the initial invasion. "There was just elation, that we'd been bombed and we were still in one piece. That it had gone pretty smoothly."

But then came the occupation. "I didn't know what the plan was and I was hoping someone two grades above us knew and wasn't telling me for some reason.

Then it dawned on me: I don't think there is one. It was a very uneasy realization."

403. jexster - 7/20/2004 6:38:36 PM

IraQ, IraN...it is all so very confusing.

Can't tell one from the other without a roadmap!

Halliburton Ties to Iran Probed

Grand jury investigates whether the company violated sanctions by illegally operating in Iran.


404. jexster - 7/20/2004 7:47:54 PM

David Kay [CIA]Blasts Bush & Blair over Iraq WMD's

Bush and Blair "should have realized before going to war that intelligence on Iraqi weapons was weak and did not indicate Saddam Hussein posed a danger to the West, America's former chief weapons inspector in Iraq said Sunday. David Kay resigned from the CIA in January and his conclusion then that Iraq did not have stockpiles of forbidden weapons caused serious problems for both Bush and Blair, undercutting their main justification for war. He told Britain's ITV network that Bush and Blair 'should have been able to tell before the war that the evidence did not exist for drawing the conclusion that Iraq presented a clear, present and imminent threat on the basis of existing weapons of mass destruction.'

'That was not something that required a war,' he said... Kay said two recent reports on intelligence failures in Iraq showed that American and British information-gathering and analyzing systems were 'broken.' 'I think they are a scathing indictment,' he said."


405. jexster - 7/20/2004 11:58:24 PM

Charlie Cook is Off to the Races!

Had a good trainer! :=)

All in All, Kerry Is in a Pretty Good Position - Ruy

I've made some criticisms of the Kerry campaign (see yesterday's post). And loose talk of a Kerry landslide makes me extremely nervous. Still, it can't be denied that, as we head into the convention, Kerry is in a pretty good position and his opponent appears to have the short end of the stick.

Charlie Cook's latest column on the National Journal website (if you don't have access to their webite, you can sign up to get his column free here) crisply summarizes why the seeming deadlock in the horse race is actually very bad news for Bush:



Last week in this space, I discounted the widely held view that the knotted polling numbers between Bush and Kerry meant that the race itself was even. I argued that given the fact that well-known incumbents with a defined record rarely get many undecided voters -- a quarter to a third at an absolute maximum -- an incumbent in a very stable race essentially tied at 45 percent was actually anything but in an even-money situation. "What you see is what you get" is an old expression for an incumbent's trial heat figures, meaning very few undecided voters fall that way.

......This is certainly not to predict that Bush is going to lose, that this race is over or that other events and developments will not have an enormous impact on this race. The point is that this race has settled into a place that is not at all good for an incumbent, is remarkably stable, and one that is terrifying many Republican lawmakers, operatives and activists. But in a typically Republican fashion, they are too polite and disciplined to talk about it much publicly.
i>

406. jexster - 7/20/2004 11:59:40 PM

In a funny way, if this race were bouncing around, it would probably be a better sign for President Bush. It would suggest that there was some volatility to the race and that public attitudes had not yet hardened, and were thus still an eminently fixable situation. The dynamics of a presidential race usually do not change much between July and Election Day. This year, however, the race is much more stable than usual, which is ominous for an incumbent under these circumstances. The bottom line is that this presidential race is not over, but the outlook is not so great for the players in the red jerseys.

407. jexster - 7/21/2004 12:00:03 AM

Well said, Mr. Cook. A related analysis that I highly recommend may be found today in Salon. Written by political scientist David Gopoian, "Maxed-Out GOP" argues that:

408. jexster - 7/21/2004 12:00:30 AM

There are many reasons for the Democrats to be hopeful heading into Boston next week, but the most important of these may be that the Bush campaign has maximized its potential and trails in the polls. There is a boundary to the limits of any political coalition, and the Bush-Cheney campaign is near the edge of its electoral reach.
The Bush campaign has mobilized its core base of conservative white male Republicans very effectively.

409. jexster - 7/21/2004 12:00:37 AM

Now what? Now is when Karl Rove wishes he were Mary Beth Cahill, John Kerry's campaign manager. From nearly every angle that the Bush strategists peer, the turf they view for expanding their coalition is decidedly less friendly than the landscape enjoyed by Team Kerry.


Exactly. Gopoian goes on to offer some very interesting analysis based on estimating expected Republican and Democratic support from key voter groups and comparing currently observed Bush and Kerry support with the expected levels of support. (He doesn't go into detail on the methodology for his estimations, but it's basically done by looking at the partisan composition of different groups and combining that with historical patterns of partisan support for Democrats and Republicans.)

Gopoian shows that Bush has large shortfalls in support among independents (15 points below expectations), moderates (6 points lower) and liberals (11 points). He is maxed out among conservatives and is unlikely to make more gains there. Kerry, on the other hand, needs to make comparativelly modest progress among Democrats and moderate-to-liberal whites. As Gopoain puts it: "...Kerry needs to make small gains among friendly voters, while Bush needs to make huge gains among relatively unfriendly voters."

Not so good for the Bush team. Gopoian also has some interesting things to say about the demographics of the friendly voters Kerry needs to make progress among. Basically, we're talking about whites of moderate-to-low levels of education--more the white working class than, say, white professionals.

I'll be posting more about this last issue in days to come.

410. angel-five - 7/21/2004 12:24:37 AM

Damn it, Jexter.

411. jexster - 7/21/2004 2:21:29 AM

Waaa...


I have it on excellent authority that Charlie Cook and I see the race at the present time the same way.

Kerry +>5

412. OhioSTOPAS - 7/21/2004 3:09:01 AM

"Remember we discovered mass graves with hundreds of thousands of men and women and children clutching their little toys . . ."

President Pants-On-Fire to David Frost.

413. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 7/21/2004 3:46:31 AM


414. jexster - 7/21/2004 5:09:46 AM

Unbelievable Ohio...so did Frost call him on the lie????


Not 5 days after Blair admitted that 400,000 bodies in mass graves story was a crock.

He can make up anything he wants to..and he will..count on it

415. jexster - 7/21/2004 5:23:39 AM

From "Max'ed Out" above...

Making their experiences matter politically is Kerry's job next week and beyond. To do so, he needs to remind these voters of the icy indifference that has characterized the incumbent president's insensitivity to their daily experiences by asking them:

"Who are you going to believe -- President Bush or your own eyes?"

No shit


- - - - - - - - - - - -

416. jexster - 7/21/2004 5:31:03 AM

Get your free here

417. jexster - 7/21/2004 6:21:18 PM

The U.S. military has spent most of the $65 billion that Congress approved for fighting the wars in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) and is scrambling to find $12.3 billion more from within the Defense Department to finance the wars through the end of the fiscal year, federal investigators said yesterday

The Emperor Has No Credibility, No Support, No Clothes, No Bullets

Best line from the 911 Press Conference "We didn't set about to try an prove a negative. We laid out the facts and the evidence"

418. jexster - 7/21/2004 6:22:25 PM

toys

419. jexster - 7/21/2004 9:31:46 PM

Our military is low on parts, pay and morale.

If called on by the commander-in-chief today, two entire divisions of the Army would have to report ... Not ready for duty, sir.

This administration had its moment.

They had their chance. They have not led. We will. Howdy Doody 8/3/00




The toll Bush has taken on US military morale - Philadelphia Inquirer:




Scaling back the military and political goals in Iraq's Anbar province has hurt morale among U.S. soldiers stationed there, and some have begun to question openly not only their mission but also the leaders who sent them to Iraq in the first place . . .

"I'm tired of every time we go out the gate, someone tries to kill me," Staff Sgt. Sheldon Rivers said.

Asked whether most Americans had an idea of how bad the security situation was in Ramadi, Sgt. Maj. John Jones said . . . "It's just like the West," Jones said, "when we were trying to settle it with the Indians." . . .

Staff Sgt. A.J. Dean [said] . . . "I don't have any idea of what we're trying to do out here," he said, "... and I don't think our commanders do either. I feel deceived personally. I don't trust anything Rumsfeld says, and I think Wolfowitz is even dirtier" . . .

420. jexster - 7/21/2004 10:25:11 PM

Who leaked on Sandy?

Clearly, no one in-the-know breathed a word of this until a couple days ago -- as the Kerry campaign found out to its own moritification. Yet from the moment the story broke every paper seems to be finding multiple sources who are willing to talk freely about minute details of the case.

Look over at Google News and you'll see that even the Akron Gazette and the Curryville Crier seem to be getting hourly exclusive scoops.

In my experience criminal investigations aren't nearly that porous -- with multiple sources talking to multiple publications, and all on cue -- unless someone on the inside has greenlighted the leaks. What's more, if the law enforcement officials and political appointees hadn't been talking up until this point, why would they be chattering so loud now ?

-- Josh Marshall

421. jexster - 7/22/2004 1:37:11 AM

422. jexster - 7/22/2004 3:04:11 AM

John Kerry can win, given George W. Bush's incompetence, and White House strategists realize that. By Kevin Phillips

423. jexster - 7/22/2004 3:15:34 AM

Maybe its the gene pool

"There is a more stark yardstick that even cautious Democrats should understand: In 1991-92, George H.W. Bush, prior to his defeat, fell from a record high job-approval rating of 90 percent after the Gulf War to a low 30s summer bottom before the election. His son, who hit the low 90s right after 9/11, by early June had fallen to 42-43 percent, another fifty-point decline. No elected President has ever done this; the Bushes have done it twice. Maybe it's the gene pool. " Kevin Phillips

424. jexster - 7/22/2004 3:24:00 AM

Dear Jexie,

In just seven days, we'll all be watching as John Kerry accepts the Democratic nomination for president of the United States. Then the real fun starts. At that moment, we kick off the official start of the campaign to send George W. Bush back to Crawford, Texas.



With your help, we can beat them so decisively that even the Supreme Court can't bail them out.





My Cajun cousin

425. angel-five - 7/22/2004 3:52:19 AM

Maybe it's the gene pool.

Maybe it's because unless their numbers are artificially inflated by a war and American patriotism, everyone realizes they suck? What did either Bush do, ever, that was good for America?

426. angel-five - 7/22/2004 3:53:21 AM

Then again, maybe it's the gene pool after all.

427. jexster - 7/22/2004 4:34:34 PM

Afghan War Lord Announces Candidacy


Commander Dotsum ain't runnin as no Girlie Man PEACE president...he slowly crushes his opponents under tank treads and watches as their relatives scrape off the remains of their loved ones.

Maybe I should go to work as a precinct captain!



"I will protect your rights"

Catchy.

428. jexster - 7/22/2004 5:19:38 PM

Black Banners and Economic Warfare in Iraq

Claude Salhani of UPI reports that the recent kidnappings of truck drivers in a bid to force the companies that employ them out of the Iraq market are being claimed by a shadowy group called "the Black Banners." He speculates that this phrase has a Shiite ring to it, but quotes one observer who doubts that. Salhani writes:




The "war" in Iraq is suddenly taking a very different turn, and regrettably, not one for the better. After first targeting the military, then changing tactics by kidnapping hostages and holding them in exchange for the withdrawal of Coalition troops -- and one may add with some success -- the "insurgents" are now going after the soft underbelly of Iraq, its fragile economy.

A new rebel group, hitherto unknown, calling themselves the "Black Banners" is the latest to surface. They join the plethora of armed groups opposed to the presence of foreign forces, particularly American soldiers, in Iraq. The Black Banners have detained six hostages: three Indians, two Kenyans and an Egyptian, all nationals from "neutral" nations.


The tactic of attacking the civilian employees of companies doing work in Iraq is actually not new, and is only one of a number of current guerrilla tactics. Another is to assassinate municipal, provincial and federal officials. A significant percentage of municipal council members has been assassinated, though only The Guardian has reported on this deadly campaign at the local level.

429. jexster - 7/22/2004 5:19:46 PM



As for the trucker kidnappings, the Black Banners are a symbol of revolution in Islamic history, and not only among Shiites. The corrupt Umayyad kingdom was overthrown by the Abbasids around 750 CE when revolutionaries raised black banners in the East. The Abbasid dynasty, which created Baghdad and ruled for centuries, is seen by Iraqis generally and by Muslims generally, including Sunnis, to have created a Golden Age when the Muslim world was more glorious than Europe. So the term "Black Banners" could have a Shiite implication, but does not necessarily do so. Even secularists or Marxists could adopt black banners as a revolutionary symbol, with reference to the Abbasid revolution.

What does seem clear is that Donald Rumsfeld's peculiar idea that Iraq is "calming down" is ridiculous on the face of it.


posted by Juan @ 7/23/2004 11:09:20 PM

430. jexster - 7/22/2004 6:23:34 PM

When the going gets tough



Vacation
All I ever wanted
Vacation
Had to get away
Vacation
Meant to be spent alone




431. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:01:56 AM

A Confession


Once in a while,
I'm standing here, doing something.
And I think,
"What in the world am I doing here?"
It's a big surprise.

--- D.H. Rumsfeld

432. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:02:18 AM

toys

433. jexster - 7/23/2004 5:58:02 AM

Unprecedented Unity, Electoral Power - It is like fine oil upon the head *
that runs down upon the beard


Redefining Democratic Fundraising


John F. Kerry has created the most effective fundraising machine in Democratic Party history by tapping disparate interests -- trial lawyers, financial services executives, social liberals, teachers, Hollywood figures and others -- united by their antipathy to President Bush.



Through June 30, the machine has amassed $186.2 million, five times as much as any previous Democratic contender, starting from a small base of longtime associates, some with business before Kerry's Senate committees, and growing meteorically after Kerry's victory in the Jan. 19 Iowa caucuses.



434. Ulgine Barrows - 7/23/2004 7:38:41 AM

That hair in #427 looks as if one could scrub a floor with it.

435. jexster - 7/23/2004 8:25:40 AM

Yea Steve Bell is leeeetle strange for American taste...at least for mine..but he's funny mean

436. jexster - 7/23/2004 8:28:40 AM

This is NOT funny.

I wonder how long its going to take the media to plow through the 500 pages and 250 footnotes..


Wolfowitz Didn't Think Bin Laden Was a Threat

From the 9/11 commission report:

Tenet told us that in his world "the system was blinking red." By late July, Tenet said, it could not "get any worse." Not everyone was convinced. Some asked whether all these threats might just be deception. On June 30, the SEIB [Senior Executive Intelligence Brief] contained an article titled "Bin Ladin Threats Are Real." Yet Hadley told Tenet in July that Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz questioned the reporting. Perhaps Bin Ladin was trying to study U.S. reactions. Tenet replied that he had already addressed the Defense Department's questions on this point; the reporting was convincing. To give a sense of his anxiety at the time, one senior official in the Counterterrorist Center told us that he and a colleague were considering resigning in order to go public with their concerns.

437. Ulgine Barrows - 7/23/2004 8:32:11 AM

The hair in #427, you listed as Commander Dotsum.
Who is Steve Bell? I didn't get that gear switch, I guess.

438. Ulgine Barrows - 7/23/2004 8:59:16 AM

I googled Steve Bell and it came up with a UK site, Guardian.

Isn't that the fishwrap that has the big tits on the cover?

439. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:18:06 PM

No UG not a tabliod


In Russian that would be "Nyet" as in

Pooty Poot Just Say Nyet to Bush

MOSCOW - Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said on Saturday that Baghdad would like to have Russian peacekeepers, but the Kremlin restated its refusal to become involved in the messy conflict.

440. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:28:45 PM

Lies Have Consequences: The Tipping Point

the question that voters seem to be wrestling with now is not whether Mr. Bush is a legitimate president but whether he is a trustworthy one.

441. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:33:48 PM

"We've seen historically that when the White House develops a credibility problem, it's very difficult to recover,'' Phil Trounstine, San Jose State University

442. jexster - 7/23/2004 4:36:10 PM

"At some point, politicians can step over an amorphous line that separates good or questionable judgment from inexcusably arrogant, outrageous or incompetent behavior,"

"That shatters trust. Democracy is built on perceptions of trustworthiness. We bond with politicians who tell us they like us and are like us, but their images and stories can be built up and torn down by what they actually do. If they disappoint, they may be discarded if the alternatives don't look worse.

Professor Jeffery A. Smith,historian -University of Wisconsin and the author of "American Presidential Elections: Trust and the Rational Voter."

443. marjoribanks - 7/23/2004 4:39:35 PM

The Guardian, in the last five years, really has gone global. This has been accomplished partly by relentlessly filling its niche as the journal of leftist internationalism, party via its excellent websites, and partly due to the vacuum created in a range of Anglophone countries by the move of mass media towards a more commercial, more corporate, more pro-globalization consensus.

The Grauniad refuses to cede territory, and has thus become the flag bearer for a whole range of disaffecteds.

444. jexster - 7/23/2004 6:24:36 PM

Yes indeed. I began reading it religiously when it became obvious that the US media had entered Conintern Coma after 911

445. jexster - 7/23/2004 6:25:33 PM

From the current issue of Harpers

Mess-o-potamia

Louis Lapham: Are there any issues that can speak to a larger part of the electorate?

Kevin Phillips: The obvious thing is the mess that the Bush administration is making in Iraq....The man is the least competent military leader since James Madison let the British burn Washington.

446. jexster - 7/23/2004 8:43:18 PM

Morale dips ever lower

"I don't have any idea of what we're trying to do out here. I don't know what the (goal) is, and I don't think our commanders do either," he said. "I feel deceived personally. I don't trust anything (Defense Secretary Donald) Rumsfeld says, and I think (Deputy Defense Secretary Paul) Wolfowitz is even dirtier."

That's a quote from Staff Sgt. A.J. Dean, who sums up the morale on the ground in Iraq. Soldiers are tired of risking their lives for reasons they no longer understand and are increasingly angry at their government for forcing them to do so.

447. jexster - 7/24/2004 3:53:55 AM

If you don't think that GWB is a geopolitical incompetent whose invasion of Iraq was the worst foreign blunder in US history...

China Tells Bush to Stop Arms Sales to Taiwan

China is also conducting war game maneuvers.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't think that these Chinese maneuvers will amount to much in the scheme of things because I do not believe GWB will be president next year.


But there can be no dispute that this sort of announcement would not have occured BUT FOR the most militarily inept leadership since James Madison let the British burn Washington.

448. Ulgine Barrows - 7/24/2004 8:16:13 AM

If it's not a tabloid, then please lead me into the ecstasy, jexster.

449. jexster - 7/24/2004 5:59:22 PM

You'll have to go to the Sex thread...ask Ms. No for the Ecstasy....but be careful it is dangerous stuff.

450. jexster - 7/24/2004 6:01:14 PM

The Moron WHo Cannot Tell the Difference Between IraN and IraQ Spins US Safety

Maybe it's because I've been instructed to pack a respirator escape hood along with party dresses for the Boston convention. Maybe it's because our newspaper has assigned a terrorism reporter to cover a political convention. Maybe it's because George Bush is relaxing at his ranch down there (again) while Osama is planning a big attack up here (again). Maybe it's because there are just as many American soldiers dying in Iraq post-transfer, more Muslims more mad at us over fake W.M.D. intelligence and depravity at Abu Ghraib, and more terrorists in more diffuse networks hating us more.

451. jexster - 7/24/2004 6:09:26 PM

He explained to the commissioners that he had stayed in his seat making little fish faces at second graders for seven minutes after learning about the second plane hitting the towers because, as the report says, "The president felt he should project strength and calm until he could better understand what was happening."

What better way to track the terror in the Northeast skies than by reading "My Pet Goat" in Sarasota?



5 minute video of GWB reading "My Pet Goat While the US Was Under Attack"

452. jexster - 7/24/2004 8:56:04 PM

Bush Says "Bring Em On!"


We say "Bring them home NOW!

453. jexster - 7/24/2004 9:17:36 PM


U.S. soldiers race to the scene of a car bomb explosion in Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, July 14.

How John Kerry should handle Iraq



Thoughts on President Bush's foreign policy debacle -- and what the Democratic presidential nominee should say and do about it -- from John Judis, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Michael Lind....Salon



454. jexster - 7/24/2004 10:06:34 PM




Gavin Newsom's Mean Streets
Salon interview
GQ is calling him "the next Bill Clinton

455. jexster - 7/24/2004 10:28:54 PM

You've been criticized for your willingness to meet with gang members; I've heard the young man arrested in the Espinoza killing played in your basketball tournament in March ...

He was on the sidelines, but yes, he was there. I've got pictures of myself with guys [the police say were gang members], they were trying to turn their lives around. (Shrugs) You've got to deal with reality -- people should be accountable for their actions. There are no free rides. That being said, everybody has the capacity to change, and that's why we can't give up, and give them chances, and give them hope to turn their loves around. I think we're triangulating liberal and conservative ideas, if I may use that term again -- OK, we need accountability and responsibility from people, but we also need to provide opportunity and investment. We're doing both.

But you know, I was meeting with some current and former gang members, well, they're all former, but some may ...

456. jexster - 7/24/2004 10:29:05 PM



Slide back ...

Yeah. And I asked, Hey, what's this code of silence [about crime]? I set up a tip line, I increased rewards, we have victim protection and relocation. And two of these guys got really pissed off. "What the hell did you just say, Mr. Mayor?" I was like, "I'm sorry, I doubled rewards, I put a [crime] tip line together, I improved victim protection and set up a victim relocation program, I'm out in the community when these murders occur and I know there were 15 witnesses right there where I'm standing and they're looking out the windows at me and I'm pleading ..." And these two guys just kept looking at me and they were so pissed. Finally one said: "You wanna talk about a code of silence? Osama bin Laden. No one's talking there. You wanna talk about a code of silence, how about the Police Department? Code of silence, gimme a break. [There's a] code of silence in your own office -- a guy says something you don't like, you'll fire him. How dare you say that about our community, when it's no different in your community, in government?" It was very profound.




457. jexster - 7/24/2004 10:36:55 PM

The other guy starts talking about Iraq, and the war, and the violence, with such familiarity and detail, and I started to realize the impact of the violence and the death and the intensity, and its impact on their perspective of themselves. It made me think about the impact of this war. I don't want to overstate it, but I don't want to understate it. You're seeing many more weapons of war on our streets. There is a connection. I just don't think these things are coincidental. I see a connection between someone's desire to be in a photo with their AK-47, and the other war over there. And it does concern me that we're spending a quarter of a trillion dollars on a war on Iraq that's an abject failure, we have no cause to be there, when you've got a war in every urban district in America, you've got kids being killed by kids, with some of the same weapons they're using in Iraq.

And it's offensive when the federal government continues to cut HUD, continues to cut Section 8, cut the grants President Clinton put in for extra cops, they're cutting drug and alcohol treatment, they're not dealing with the mental health care these kids need -- boy do these kids need help, for what they've seen, the depression, that's huge.

458. jexster - 7/25/2004 3:26:29 AM

AP: Wavering Voters Have Doubts About Bush

WASHINGTON - Voters who haven't firmly committed to a presidential candidate are in a sour mood. They tend to be more disapproving of President, have a gloomier view of the economy and be more likely to think the country is headed down the wrong track. The mood of these persuadable voters prompted one veteran Republican strategist to warn the Bush campaign that dramatic steps are needed to prevent them from bolting to Democrat John Kerry.

Republican strategist Tony Fabrizio, the pollster for Republican Bob Dole's presidential run in 1996, warned the GOP about the sour mood of undecided voters in battleground states, a small slice of the uncommitted voters in the electorate.


Fabrizio, who supports Bush, wrote in a July 8 memo that such voters are "poised to break away from President Bush and to John Kerry."


"Clearly if these undecided voters were leaning any harder against the door of the Kerry camp, they would crash right through it," he wrote, suggesting the president do more to convince voters the economy is recovering and take a more aggressive stance in defining Kerry.

Political scientist David Rohde of Michigan State University said Bush is in a difficult situation because "more than anything else these voters will be affected by events and affected by their views of Kerry."

"The public has not yet concluded they want Kerry," said Rohde. "But they're considering him."

459. jexster - 7/25/2004 3:42:24 AM

"Even though he isn't speaking, he is one of the most sought-after people at this convention because his courageous deeds have spoken louder than anything that could be said in a speech," said Democratic strategist Chris Lehane.

460. jexster - 7/25/2004 11:33:41 AM

This will be interesting to watch in the coming years. I do get the sense here in the trenches of the Left Coast City of political ferment inside the party to build a strong positive and new ideological thrust. See the Salon interview at Message # 454 et seq

Wiring the Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy


A new generation of entrepreneurs wants to reinvent the Democratic Party. And forget about 2004. The elections that matter start in 2008.

461. jexster - 7/25/2004 7:15:40 PM

The Kerry Advantage Index - graph of weekly index of the fraction Kerry/(Bush+Kerry) for national polls since 1/1/04.




462. jexster - 7/26/2004 2:04:58 AM

463. jexster - 7/26/2004 5:17:50 PM



Preparing for the End
Busheviks Grinding Through Kubler-Ross Grief Stages


Keep your eye out and you're bound to see this argument -- now floated by many conservative columnists -- that Kerry may win because voters need a breather -- a time-out, if you will -- from the turbocharged rush of history we've experienced over the last three years under George W. Bush. The president has simply accomplished so much, bent the world so mightily to his will, that Americans are craving a return to normalcy, as that campaign neologism once had it.

We thirst for mediocrity -- the road more travelled -- and Kerry quenches us.

But, really, how many times has the American electorate punished a president for accomplishing too much? Frankling Roosevelt? Harry Truman? Theodore Roosevelt? Where are the examples?

464. jexster - 7/26/2004 6:14:46 PM


• Bill Clinton's DNC speech


July 26: Watch former President Bill Clinton's entire speech at the Democratic National Convention.

465. jexster - 7/26/2004 7:39:57 PM

The Financial Times reports from Bush's Mess-o-potamia

Violence is unabated before national conference

466. jexster - 7/23/2004 6:27:47 PM

Iraqi Unemployment Hits 70%


Must be the Bush gene pool

467. jexster - 7/24/2004 9:45:59 PM

The principal reason cited for growing antipathy against the U.S. is its support for Israeli policy in the occupied territories. A close second is a backlash against the U.S.-led war on terror.

Unless we change attitudes held by so many in the Islamic world, the United States stands little chance of eliminating the strategic threat posed by terrorist groups determined to strike the United States.

We cannot find isolated enemies hiding among a billion people. Charles W. Maynes, former editor of Foreign Policy:

468. jexster - 7/25/2004 5:14:40 PM

US Contractors Slash Iraqi Reconstruction Projects

469. jexster - 7/25/2004 6:05:37 PM

Juan Cole: Sadrists Boycott National Congress
As US Troops Surround Muqtada's House

Muqtada al-Sadr and his radical Shiite followers boycotted elections on Sunday that prepared the way for a national congress. On Sunday, Iraqis began choosing 1000 delegates to the national congress, which will in turn elect 80 out of 100 members of a National Assembly. This largely ceremonial body will have veto over some decisions of Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi, but is not empowered to make new laws or to repeal the laws passed by fiat by US viceroy Paul Bremer before June 30, 2004. According to AP, Sadrist spokesman Ali al-Yasseri said, ``We originally supported the idea, and agreed to take part because we know in the rest of the world, such an assembly would be considered the nation's parliament . . . But this assembly will have no legislative authority. ... This body will have no powers. We see this as a trick on the Iraqi people. It's a sad joke." The Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution In Iraq, a Shiite rival of the Sadrists, were also critical of the national assembly elections.

....
The selection process [for the national congress] has exercerbated ethnic conflict and inter-party disputes. The site of the 3-day national congress is being kept secret for fear it will be targeted by the resistance to the US occupation and its Iraqi allies.

Muqtada's group is a major one, and the decision to boycott the national congress is a blow to the legitimacy of the process. He made headlines this weekend by forcefully condemning the beheading of foreign hostages, a practice he said was contrary to Islamic law.

470. jayackroyd - 7/26/2004 9:51:09 PM

Cheney is quoted as saying this:

"Terrorist attacks are not caused by the use of strength. They are invited by the perception of weakness," Cheney said at Camp Pendleton on the Southern California coast. by Reuters.

He's right, as far as it goes. The problem is that the Iraq war has created real US weakness, and the concommitant perception of same. Afghanistan created an image of overwhelming might. The aftermath in Iraq is creating an image of an overextended military force that cannot win a low intensity war.

471. wonkers2 - 7/26/2004 10:02:47 PM

True. Moreover, Iraq had little or nothing to do with the terrorist attacks until after we invaded them.

472. jexster - 7/27/2004 2:56:31 AM

I rather think that terrorist attacks have nothing to do with perceptions of strength or weakness.

They have everything to do with tactics because that is all they are and as such are most successful against stronger, conventional forces

473. jexster - 7/27/2004 2:58:27 AM

Nice segue to


On War 77
Civil War in IraQ???




Observers continue to ask, “Will Iraq descend into civil war?” The answer is that civil war is already underway in Iraq. Most people do not see it, because it is not following the Sunni/Shiite/Kurd fault lines on which we have been lead to focus. As is usually the case in war, we are the victims not of deception but of self-deception.

In Iraq’s civil war, the most prominent faction is what America calls Iraq’s “government.” It is, of course, not a government, because there is no state. The “government’s” goal is to recreate an Iraqi state and become a real government. What are its chances of success?

474. jexster - 7/27/2004 3:00:29 AM

Fourth Generation war theory suggests that the Iraqi “government’s” strength at the physical level and weakness at the moral level means it has already peaked. Physical strength plays its greatest role early, while the moral level works most powerfully over time. As has been true ever since Saddam fell, time is on the side of America’s enemies, and time is a powerful ally.


Cheney talkin shit...again

475. jexster - 7/27/2004 3:10:37 AM

On Brain Farting Bunglers

From Inside the Pentagon

Keane: DOD leaders ‘seduced’ by exiles

FORMER ARMY NO. 2: POOR PLANNING FOR POSTWAR IRAQ HAS COST LIVES

476. jexster - 7/27/2004 3:36:53 AM

For all you heathen, pagans, children of Satan, Swedes and other accursed by Allah,


Bill Clinton's "send me" theme is from

Isaiah 6
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. 2Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3And one called to another and said:
‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.’
4The pivots* on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. 5And I said: ‘Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!’
6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. 7The seraph* touched my mouth with it and said: ‘Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.’ 8Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ 9 And I said, ‘Here am I; send me!’

477. wonkers2 - 7/27/2004 3:46:34 AM

Terrorist attacks will continue and increase as long as they are perceived by the terrorists as advancing their goals. Just as people will put more money in slot machines that pay out more.

478. jexster - 7/27/2004 4:59:24 PM

Masterpiece Theater
TNR

The genius of Bill Clinton's speech lay in a rhetorical technique perfected by Ronald Reagan: making yourself the target.

479. jexster - 7/27/2004 5:04:26 PM

480. jexster - 7/27/2004 5:36:12 PM

Lincoln Chafee Blasts Bush over Mess-o-potamian Conflict - Iraq More Dangerous Than It was Last October


Shoulda held elections while the sun shined?

481. jexster - 7/27/2004 6:16:07 PM

Meet the REAL Hero of the Jessie Lynch charade...Lies have consequences



Donald Walters was killed March 23, 2003, when the 507th Maintenance Company was ambushed.

Age: 33 Hometown: Kansas City, Mo.
Died: 03/23/2003
Service: Army Rank: Sgt.
Unit: 507th Maintenance Company, Fort Bliss, Texas


Unbearable Emptiness

482. jexster - 7/27/2004 6:29:37 PM

Quote of the day

"The pundits like to slice and dice our country into red states and blue States: red states for Republicans, blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states."

-- Barack Obama, in his speech to the Democratic convention.



Video: The Best Keynote Speech in Decades

483. jexster - 7/27/2004 7:48:27 PM

200,000 Israeli Fascists Demand Colonization of Gaza

Tens of thousands of rightwing Israeli imperialists formed a human chain aimed at stretching between Jerusalem and Gaza to protest plans of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to withdraw Israeli colonists from Gaza.

Let's just talk a little bit about Gaza. The Palestinians are largely descendants of people who have lived there for literally thousands of years. Male Palestinians and male Jews are very closely related according to DNA research. Gaza was not given to Israel by the United Nations in the 1948 partition, and it was never a site of significant Jewish population. It was conquered by Israel in the 1967 war, but the United Nations charter forbids the acquisition of territory by military force. This is a place where hundreds of thousands of people face severe poverty and even hunger, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. Palestinians in general are facing unprecedented poverty and malnutrition, including the children. So this is the place you choose to insert 7500 Israeli colonizers? While we are at it, why not steal some land from starving Ethiopians and colonize Ethiopia (oops, that was the 1930s)? I mean, it is one thing to lack compassion for people who are suffering. It is another to want to kick them while they are down.

484. jexster - 7/27/2004 7:50:28 PM


The justifications given by the fascist protesters in Israel for colonizing Gaza included the conviction that God had given them the Palestinians' land, that Palestinians did not educate their children to want "peace" (i.e. to accept being stolen from?), and that failing to colonize Gaza would somehow endanger Israel itself (hunh?).

485. jexster - 7/27/2004 7:50:54 PM


Of course I am being provocative in calling the protesters fascists. Fascism, unlike other mass ideologies such as Communism, is not easily defined (and for definitional purposes it is better to look at Spain, Italy and Japan in the 1930s rather than Germany, whose ideology was in many ways peculiar and the scale of whose atrocities, including the Holocaust, make almost all comparisons invidious). The Likud Party is deeply influenced by the thought of Zeev Jabotinsky, a Zionist extremist deeply influenced by 1930s fascism. Fascism remains a useful analytical tool for understanding modern politics. Each country's fascism has been different, since fascism is more a style than a specific ideology. Among its attributes is

1) Radical nationalism. Fascism celebrates a cult of the nation, seeing it as the ultimate human value, trumping all others. Thus, one may lie, cheat, steal, spy and murder for the nation without shame.

2) Militarism and aggressiveness. Fascist political movements are expansionist, dissatisfied with their national boundaries and seeking to colonize the territory of neighbors. Thus, Franco got his start by oppressing Muslims in the Rif and Ceuta, Spanish Morocco. Mussolini invaded Ethiopia. Japan annexed Korea and much of China.

486. jexster - 7/27/2004 7:52:00 PM


3) Racism. Fascist movements, because of their extreme nationalism, tend to demonize ethnic groups considered outside the nation. Racism becomes a justification for violence, since groups of people are defined as essentially demonic or threatening, and therefore deserving of being repressed in order to prevent them from doing evil. Milosevic justified his killing of Bosnians on the grounds that they were disloyal to the Serbian nation and easily seduced by Muslim fundamentalism. (Before Milosevic attacked them, Bosnian Muslims were the most secular in the world).

4) Favoring the wealthy, punishing the poor. Franco put down miners in Asturia and the workers of industrially advanced Barcelona. Mussolini drove Italian peasants further into poverty. Both favored wealthy elites with their policies. They despised the poor and drove them deeper into poverty. In all the territory dominated by Israel, the poorest subjects are the Palestinians, who have been made dirt poor by Israeli policies.

487. jexster - 7/27/2004 7:52:07 PM

5) Dictatorship. Fascists disliked open democratic elections. Here the Likud fascists depart from the profile, but only slightly. Although they participate in elections in Jewish-majority Israel, they do not want Palestinians to have independence. They have long favored Israeli military rule, which is to say, dictatorship, over the Palestinian population. That is, over 9 million people live under Israeli rule, but only somewhate over 6 million of them get to engage in democratic self-governing (fewer if one considers how many obstacles have been placed in the way of democratic participation by Arab Israelis). The Oslo process would have given Palestinians a democratic nation of their own; the Likud Party and its American acolytes conspired to keep the Palestinians from ever having that status, which has meant more years of living under Israeli military rule, not significantly different from Ceuta under Franco.

No American media will report the demonstrations in Israel as fascist in nature, and no American politicians will dare criticize the Likud. But the fact is that the Israeli predations in the West Bank and Gaza are a key source of rage in the Muslim world against the United States (which toadies unbearably to whatever garbage comes out of Tel Aviv's political establishment), something that the 9/11 commission report stupidly denies. If the United States is hit again, as seems likely, the fascist Likud demonstrators will be in the chain of causality. If their cause were just, the US should stand with them and risk taking the hit. But although the cause of Israel's own peace and security is just, the cause of colonizing Gaza and the West Bank is fascist. That shouldn't be defended by the US, and the loss of even one American life in defense of Israeli aggression and expansionism is intolerable.


posted by Juan @ 7/26/2004 07:08:33

488. jexster - 7/28/2004 11:54:20 AM

Chalabi Seeks Alliance With MOQTADA SADR

Radical Political Powerhouse and Ally of Teheran Expected

489. jexster - 7/28/2004 11:58:56 AM

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Fighting between insurgents and American forces west of Baghdad has killed two U.S. Marines, the military said in a statement Thursday.





A Polish soldier was killed and three were wounded in a separate attack.

490. robertjayb - 7/28/2004 4:27:33 PM

Brits say Afghanistan could implode

LONDON, England (CNN) -- A British parliamentary committee has warned that Afghanistan is likely to "implode, with terrible consequences" unless more troops and resources are sent to calm the country.

The all-party Foreign Affairs Select Committee, in a report released Thursday, said warlord violence and the struggle between U.S.-led troops and insurgents continues to be a threat to security in Afghanistan.

The wide-ranging report on the war against terrorism also said raised concerns over the failure of the UK government and its allies to limit the production of opium in Afghanistan.

Once again one is led to wonder about what the situation might be today if the bushies had not chosen to pursue their fantasies in Iraq.

491. jexster - 7/28/2004 5:29:50 PM

Stay the Course: Iraqi National Congress PPD Due to Falling Body Parts

BAQOUBA, Iraq - A national conference considered a crucial first step in the country's fledgling move toward democracy was postponed for two weeks, an organizer said Thursday, a day after a massive car bombing that killed 70 people.



The conference had been due to start Saturday. But it has been plagued by difficulties before it even began.


Key political groups have been promising to boycott, leaders in ethnically diverse areas have been unable to agree on delegates to send — and even before Wednesday's car bombing, officials have expressed worries the gathering will be a target for terror attacks.

492. jexster - 7/28/2004 5:32:08 PM

Robert....


Medecins Sans Frontieres have pulled out..the first country that they have ever pulled out of.

Forecast for August-September-October, lies locally heavy at times, especially in East Coast media regions

493. robertjayb - 7/28/2004 6:12:21 PM

(AP)---Fighting between insurgents and American forces west of Baghdad has killed two U.S. Marines, the military said in a statement Thursday.

A Polish soldier was killed and three were wounded in a separate attack.

That's 905? 907? 910?

We know the bushies don't keep count---but xomeone must. Mustn't they?

494. jexster - 7/28/2004 6:36:27 PM

12.5 Billion short for current FY...I'd say they have trouble with higher math.

495. jexster - 7/28/2004 6:38:14 PM

12 Generals and Admirals Endorse Kerry in Unprecedented Show of Support from Military Establishment

US Newswire: "In an unprecedented display of support from the military establishment, twelve retired generals and admirals endorsed John Kerry for president of the United States on Wednesday. These distinguished flag officers join the ranks of tens of thousands of veterans -- including over 500 veteran delegates in Boston Lieutenant General Edward D. Baca, Lieutenant General Daniel W. Christman, Admiral William J. Crowe, General Joseph Hoar, Lieutenant General Claudia J. Kennedy, General Merrill 'Tony' A. McPeak, Lieutenant General Donald Kerrick, General John M.
Shalikashvili, Admiral Stansfield Turner, General Johnnie E. Wilson."

496. robertjayb - 7/28/2004 6:46:46 PM

Here 'ya go...The total (for the moment) is 911...

Whoops! 911? That's a familiar number...


Apologies to Al D. for bringing this stuff up.

He just hates to be reminded that people (especially fine, young red-blooded Americans) are being killed in the bushies reelection war...the one that was going to last ninety days or so. Thinks it's unAmerican...

497. jexster - 7/28/2004 8:37:42 PM

Probably over 1000 before the election if Bush doesn't pull them all back into the safety of their bases

....a fuckin crime ALD, isn't it?

Coaltion of The Fleeing: Ukraine Wants Out

498. jexster - 7/28/2004 9:13:50 PM

How High the Bounce?


How High the Bounce?
Really, who knows? The average bounce from a challenger's convention is 7 points; if you take out the outlier 1992 Clinton convention, it's 6 points. But this year there are fewer undecided voters and Kerry's already doing quite well in the polls, relative to average challenger performance, so it will be harder for him to post big gains.

But if you want a good summary of the things to think about as you listen to Kerry's speech tonight that may affect the bounce and, more importantly, the campaign in general as we move forward, you should definitely check out Frank Newport's Gallup analysis of the political context for Kerry's speech.

499. jexster - 7/28/2004 9:33:14 PM

Dick Cheney - Liar and Crackpot Conservative

Vice President Dick Cheney gave his stump speech in Utah on Wednesday, attempting to rally the Republican faithful while the national spotlight remained on the Democrats.


Rebecca Walsh reports: "Cheney said terrorists are as determined to destroy America as the "Axis powers" of Germany, Italy and Japan during World War II."

Although it may be true that al-Qaeda is as determined to destroy the US as the Axis Powers were in World War II, this observation is a Himalayan exaggeration if it is meant to suggest a parallel. Al-Qaeda is a few thousand fanatics mainly distributed in a handful of countries. If Zacharias Moussaoui and Richard Reid are any indication, a lot of them are one step away from from collecting old soda cans on the street in their grocery carts while mumbling about the radios the government implanted in their asses.

So while their determination may be impressive (or just creepy), they are not comparable to the might of three industrialized dictatorships with populations in the tens of millions. Some 13 million men served in the German army (Heer) alone between 1935 and 1945. (And WW II killed 55 million persons, not 3 thousand).

I repeat, al-Qaeda proper only has a few hundred fighters, those who pledged allegiance personally to Bin Laden, and a few thousand if you count other Afghan Arabs and their ideological soul mates. Most of them are not wealthy or trained or competent, and a lot are just crackpots.

500. jexster - 7/28/2004 9:33:24 PM

So let's get this straight. The US has 138,000 troops stuck in Iraq, which was no danger to the US homeland. They are mainly fighting local clansmen who had never before had any beef with the US, prior to the American invasion of their country.

If Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are the SS of the age, then why aren't 138,000 US troops combing Waziristan for them? Why haven't they been captured?
....

Four more years of this kind of "success," and we really will be in danger.

posted by Juan @ 7/29/2004 08:50:07 AM

501. jexster - 7/29/2004 12:30:12 AM

BUSH ADMINISTRATION MISLEADS ABOUT AFGHANISTAN

Vice President Dick Cheney claimed yesterday that under the President's leadership we "closed down the training camps [in Afghanistan] where terrorists trained to kill Americans."[1] His comments are not only bold, but a look at the record shows they are deliberately misleading.

Just two weeks ago the Bush administration essentially contradicted the claim, warning Americans of an imminent attack on the U.S. homeland from terrorists
operating in Afghanistan.

As CNN reported on July 8, Bush administration officials are warning that "a plot to carry out a large-scale terror attack against the United States in the near future is being directed by Osama bin Laden and other top al Qaeda
members." According to the administration, these terrorists are operating in the Afghan-Pakistan border region.[2]

Unfortunately, in 2002, the Bush administration shifted key special forces out of Afghanistan, effectively removing them from the hunt for al Qaeda.

These troops were sent to prepare for an Iraq invasion.[3] That leaves the U.S. with only about 15,000 troops in Afghanistan hunting down al Qaeda, whom they now say are plotting an imminent attack against the country.[4]

Meanwhile, the Pentagon has designed plans to add troops to the 140,000 already stationed in Iraq[5] - a country that never had any collaborative relationship with al Qaeda[6] or connection to the 9/11 terrorist attacks[7] (even though the Bush administration has claimed both).[8]

502. jexster - 7/29/2004 12:30:22 AM


Sources:

1. The Vice President Delivers Remarks at a Reception for Senatorial
Candidate Bill Jones, WhiteHouse.Gov, 7/27/04.
2. "Officials: Bin Laden guiding plots against U.S", CNN.com 7/08/04.
3. "Shifts from bin Laden hunt evoke questions ," USA Today, 3/28/04.
4. "Afghanistan: 'Unrelenting Battle'," CBSNews.com, 5/26/04.
5. "U.S. force in Iraq to grow as Marine deployment pushed up," USA
Today,
6/08/04.
6. "Administration Moves to Regain Initiative on 9/11 ", New York
Times,
8/27/04.
7. "Bush rejects Saddam 9/11 link", BBC News, 9/18/03.
8. "Cheney Link of Iraq, 9/11 Challenged",The Boston Globe 9/16/03.

503. jexster - 7/29/2004 12:50:14 AM

Imperial Authorities in Iraq Cannot Document Spending

504. jexster - 7/29/2004 5:29:20 PM

More from the Continuing Chronicle of Bush Crony Capitalist Corruption...

CPA Funding Inquiry Spawns 27 Seperate Criminal Investigagtions - LAT

505. jexster - 7/30/2004 12:06:50 AM

Juan Cole offers two interesting, if not troubling, observations in today's Informed Comment.

In the first,Cole expands on the reasons for the postponement of the National Unity Congress concluding essentially that the country is rapidly balkanizing; that Allawi has no power outside of Baghdad, and that the January elections may be in serious trouble.

Cole also pens a lengthy and highly qualified endorsement of Kerry's statments on Iraq. "The Kerry Plan on Iraq:
How it Could Work if the UN were Brought In"


It is clear from both posts however that Bush's initial as well has his revised war objectives and plans have come to nothing.


"The worst military leadership since James Madison let the Brits burn Washington" Kevin Phillips

506. Absensia - 7/30/2004 12:24:29 AM

And, in the last month, the government announced all Pakistani men would be subject to body searches when entering the US to see if they had bruises, rope burns, etc., consistent with marks incurred from al Qaeda training camps.

507. robertjayb - 7/30/2004 12:31:48 AM

Calling Prince Bandar...

NEW YORK - Oil prices vaulted to new highs today on worries that financial turmoil at Russias largest oil company could cut into exports from the No. 2 supplier nation, with oil cartel OPEC already struggling vainly to cool the red hot market.

Oil futures in New York settled up $1.05 cents to $43.80 a barrel, after hitting $43.85 at midday, the highest level since the futures contract began trading in 1983. In London, Brent crude oil rose 78 cents to $40.03 a barrel.

The gains come amid heightened concern over production from Russian oil giant YUKOS, embattled by a huge tax bill. Oil prices were already on the rise due to fears of terror attacks on Middle East oil infrastructure, sparking worries over inflation in energy consumer nations.

508. jexster - 7/30/2004 12:50:47 AM

Economic Growth Slows Sharply

This is curse of Allah

509. jexster - 7/30/2004 12:59:05 AM

510. Ulgine Barrows - 7/30/2004 5:02:11 AM

That man needs some Havarti snacking cheese.

511. Ulgine Barrows - 7/30/2004 5:19:47 AM

And you are apparently confusing ecstasy with a drug. Why did you mention Ms. No?

512. jexster - 7/30/2004 7:52:59 AM

Hehehehe no confusion...just teasing..I do that from time to time

513. jexster - 7/30/2004 8:00:16 AM

Kevin Phillips on Bill Moyer's NOW summed up the view of several (Teixeira, Judis, Saletan and indirectly and privately the Bushies) that the brilliance of Kerry's speech lay not in its impact in the hall nor so much in its immediate poll bounce whatever that turns out to be but in ultimately framing, shaping and deciding the election..


In Phillips words "Kerry didn't hit a homerun. He can't cross the plate until November 2. But he did hit a triple with the bases loaded"

Phillips also echoed the view of Carlos Watson, CNN elections analyst, that with interest in the campaign already at record highs for presidential elections, we could be looking at a significant increase in turnout which, as Phillips put it, will "make Republican blood run cold".


Phillips believes that Kerry is now well-positioned to nail a big increase in turnout (Watson thinks it may go from 105 to 115 million) and that this in turn will come mostly from lower middle class, blue collar and young voters.

Phillips says look for indications that likely voter screens move toward 80%

514. Ulgine Barrows - 7/30/2004 8:59:24 AM

#200 If they're gonna claim a Keynsian stimulus effect, then they need to implement a Keynsian stimulus directing the tax cuts at those with a high marginal propensity to consume.

Cut the shit. I got a 3 percent raise and apparently I'm lucky; I don't mention it at work.
I got butter on sale last year for 99C/lb. This year butter is 4 bucks/lb. Milk has gone up. Bread has gone up. I am in such a NOT dratted good mood to buy a new car, dishwasher, roof, house paint job. My high marginal propensity to consume is twirling down the toilet.

515. Ulgine Barrows - 7/30/2004 9:11:45 AM

Hehehehe no confusion...just teasing..
That post just now popped up on my screen.


Maybe it's true.
It's really discouraging, though. Like I'm wasting time on you.

You implied Ms No was a dealer of the drug ecstasy, you cad.

Punch, punch, I will hold my tongue, no I won't.

I hate myself when I'm cruel. Take it back. Take it back!

516. robertjayb - 7/30/2004 4:21:03 PM

The liar who duped the liars...

WASHINGTON, July 30 - A senior leader of Al Qaeda who was captured in Pakistan several months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks was the main source for intelligence, since discredited, that Iraq had provided training in chemical and biological weapons to members of the organization, according to American intelligence officials.

Intelligence officials say the detainee, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, a member of Osama bin Laden's inner circle, recanted the claims sometime last year, but not before they had become the basis of statements by President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and others about links between Iraq and Al Qaeda that involved poisons, gases and other illicit weapons.


517. jexster - 7/30/2004 4:46:34 PM

Economy Good Despite Slowing Growth, Deficit -- Bush


He still doesn't get it does he?

A lie told the 100th time is every bit the lie it was when first told

518. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:08:31 PM

Today's Pants on Fire Award though goes to

Bush Shifts Stance on Treaty to Ban Production of Nuclear Weapons Materials - Will Not Permit Inspection/Verification

Dovoyai no provoyai

519. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:18:56 PM

An honorable mention...

Al Qaeda Detainee Retracted Claim of IraQ Link - Bush Continues to Lie

520. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:20:16 PM

Ooops Robert got the honorable mention for Today's award

521. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:32:31 PM

Nine Hundred Nine Dead for Lies



The latest identifications reported by the Defense Department:

- Army Spc. Joseph F. Herndon, II, 21, Derby, Kan.; died Thursday, in Hawijah, Iraq, when he was shot while on guard duty; assigned to the Army's 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division (Light); Schofield Barracks, Hawaii.

- Army Pfc. Ken W. Leisten, 20, Cornelius, Ore.; died Wednesday, in Taji, Iraq, when his vehicle struck an explosive; assigned to the Army National Guards 2nd Battalion, 162nd Infantry; Corvallis, Ore.




Nicholas J. Zangara was killed July 24, 2004, in an explosion in Tikrit, Iraq.

Age: 21 Hometown: Philadelphia, Pa.
Died: 07/24/2004
Service: Army Rank: Spc.
Unit: 1st Battalion, 7th Field Artillery Regiment, 1st Infantry Division, Schweinfurt, Germany



May they rest in peace

522. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:39:49 PM

After reading Juan Cole's Did al-Qaeda Game Bush into Iraq War?
which provides context to the NyT article, I now award today's Pants on Fire Prize to Robert for Message # 516

The Pants on Fire Doll is in the mail

523. jexster - 7/30/2004 5:59:43 PM

Key grafs:

I think Bin Laden and his lieutenants wanted to provoke wars between the US and Muslim states. I think they knew that the 9/11 attacks would guarantee a US war on Afghanistan, and that they were confident they could draw the US into the country and defeat it, as they had the Soviets.

That they were trying to provoke a US/Afghanistan war and knew their actions would provoke one is suggested in several ways. First, they made no effort to have the hijackers on 9/11 employ aliases or cover their tracks. A toddler could have traced Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdar back to al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. They made their reservations under their own names! All of the hijackers had. Counter-terrorism chief Richard Clarke was astounded that these men had even been let on the planes under those names, many of which were well known to US intelligence. Likewise, Bin Laden hand-picked the Saudi "muscle" that he sent along at the last minute, from among young men personally loyal to him, and who would be known to be his men. September 11 was a way of waving a huge red flag from Afghanistan at the American bull.

524. jexster - 7/30/2004 6:39:25 PM

Feckless is as Feckless Does: Powell's fruitless mission

The Americans should be getting out of Iraq, not flying in -only then might the country's pride be healed and the violence end

525. wonkers2 - 7/31/2004 12:02:16 AM

THE CHARGE OF THE SISSY HAWK BRIGADE

RICHARD PERLE: WHOSE FAULT IS HE?

Consider kids who bullied Richard Perle__
Those kids who said Perle threw just like a girl.
Those kids who poked poor Perle to show how soft
A momma's boy could be, those kids who oft
Times pushed poor Richard down and could be heard
Addressing him as Sissy, Wimp or Nerd.
Those kids have got a lot to answer for.
'Cause Richard Perle now wants to start a war.
The message his demeanor gets across:
He'll show those playground bullies who's the boss.
He still looks soft, but when he writes or talks
There is no tougher dude among the hawks.
And he's got planes and ships and tanks and guns--
All manned, of course, by other people's sons.

Calvin Trillin
Sept 16, 2002

526. wonkers2 - 7/31/2004 12:12:22 AM

[In an uncharacteristically prankish mood, I wrote that poem without knowing ab out Richard Perle's childhood. After it appeared, though, I heard from one of Perle's grade school classmates, who wanted to know how I'd found out that Perle had been bullied. Then another classmate wrote "The Nation" saying that she didn't remember Perle as a wimp but as simply "very serious." After gathering some true details, I answered Perle's defender in The Nation: "YOu were not one of the fourth-grade girls who used to push Richard down the hill on Fuller Street, and you didn't laugh once in sixth grade when Rocco Guntermann, from Mrs. Flynn's class, referred to Richard as 'Perlie Girl'? Fine. Whatever you say. If the U.S. invades Iraq without provocation, it wont be your fault."

She wrote again. She remembered Fuller Street and Mrs.Flynn, but she claimed there was no Rocco Guntermann. My final answer in the letters column was, "I suppose Rocco Gunhtermann, the classmate whose existence you deny, did not say to me just last week, 'We can settle this if Perlie Girl meets me near the swings at five o'clock on Friday, and tell him not to bring two teachers and his mother this time.' Would it suprise you to learn that Rocco is now a psychotherapist in Sherman Oaks?"

Another asked why I didn't use the word chicken hawk to describe Perle and his flock. A chicken hawk, which exists in nature, is a hawk that preys on chickens, not a hawk that acts like a chicken. A sissy hawk acts like a sissy.]

C. Trillin

527. wonkers2 - 7/31/2004 12:16:29 AM

ON THE RESIGNATION OF RICHARD PERLECAPTAIN OF THE SISSY HAWK BIRGADE FROM THE CHAIRMANSHIP OF THE DEFENSE POLICY BOARD

And so for Richard was writ
The second graf of his obit:
This soaring bird of hawkish myth
Was grounded when discovered with
His talon in the cookie jar
While reaching for a small pourboire.#

#To use Old Europe's language, French,
May seem to hawks contrarian.
Pardon. Our friends have changed too fast
For me to learn Bulgarian.

Calvin Trillin

April 21, 2003

528. jexster - 7/31/2004 12:17:03 AM

Nice to remember where we've come from and how we got here - Kerry Mocks Bush's 'Itsy Bitsy' Campaign Slogan


I think the KulliganMan of the Sewer is a GirlieMan too

529. jexster - 7/31/2004 3:02:08 AM

I thought it was IraQ that had these critters..Ace said so...



IraN Continues Building Nuke Centrifuges

I must be confused

530. jexster - 7/31/2004 3:15:13 AM

Tommy Franks Documents Bush Incompetence in New Memoir

531. jexster - 7/31/2004 3:21:12 AM

532. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:12:26 AM

July 26, 2004
. Kerry Kabinet

"This is not the same situation as a governor coming in without the contacts on the Hill, without the relationships," said Hunter Johnston, a party
strategist and Kerry fundraiser. With two veteran lawmakers - Kerry and Sen.John Edwards (N.C.) - topping the ticket, "This isn't like Bill Clinton or a Ronald Reagan," who had both served as governors but never in top positions in the nation's capital.

Johnston cautioned that it is far too early to make firm predictions. But he added, "It's a different matrix of considerations. In fact, I'd think [Kerry would] want to expand beyond the Congress for his administration."

Practical considerations could also nudge Kerry away from picking lawmakers for his Cabinet. It is likely, for instance, that Kerry would have to rule out Members from states with Republican governors who have the power to
appoint a replacement.

This could effectively rule out such prominent Democratic Senators as Chris Dodd (Conn.), Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), Joe Lieberman (Conn.), Patrick Leahy (Vt.), Blanche Lincoln (Ark.), Bill Nelson (Fla.) and Jack Reed (R.I.).

For now, the only sitting Senator who is a consensus pick for Kerry's short list of potential Cabinet Members is Joseph Biden (D-Del.), who is frequently mentioned as a prospect for secretary of State. Another, less
likely possibility is Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.).

A more likely scenario, say Democratic insiders, is for Kerry to look to the ranks of former Members of Congress. At the top of this list is former Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), who is often pegged as a potential secretary of Defense.
Party insiders also tout former Sen. Max Cleland (D-Ga.), who headed up the Veterans Affairs Administration during the Carter presidency. .

533. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:15:29 AM

Meanwhile, Democratic strategists often mention former Sen. Bob Kerrey (D-Neb.) and former Rep. Tim Roemer (D-Ind.) - both of whom are members of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks - as
possible short-list contenders for director of the CIA. In addition, outgoing Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) is considered an outside contender for that job.



Setting the Tone

Even if the ranks of sitting Senate Democrats are unlikely to be tapped for Kerry's Cabinet, Senate Republicans are a different story.

Democratic Party insiders share an almost unshakable conviction that a President Kerry would seek a Republican for a key slot, probably a job in foreign policy or defense.

This belief immediately invokes consideration - whether they are interested or not - of Sens. John McCain (Ariz.) and Chuck Hagel (Neb.), two Senators who have at times broken with President Bush on military and foreign-affairs
matters. Then there's former Sen. Bill Cohen (Maine) - someone who's already gone through the experience of accepting a party-bending appointment as
Defense secretary for President Bill Clinton. Cohen has had a close relationship with Kerry from their Senate days, Democrats say.

"The Pentagon would seem to be more likely than State as a venue for a GOP pick. Kerry advisers and associates suggest the president-elect will want someone in Foggy Bottom who would "restore" alliances that Kerry claims have
been damaged by the Bush administration's aggressive approach to world affairs.

534. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:17:59 AM



Along with Biden at the top of this list are former United Nations Ambassador Richard Holbrooke and former Sen. George Mitchell (D-Maine),

Wesley Clark, the retired general who challenged Kerry in the Democratic primaries, is often mentioned for a top foreign-policy job, perhaps as secretary of State.

Treasury Picks

As with State, the universe of possible Kerry picks for Treasury has already begun to take shape. At the top of the list is Jim Johnson, the former CEO at Fannie Mae who ran Kerry's vice presidential selection process.

Yet insiders also cite investment banker Roger Altman, a veteran of the Clinton administration who has advised Kerry on economic policy. Dark-horse candidates include Clinton-era budget directors Gene Sperling and Franklin
Raines, the current chairman at Fannie Mae, as well as Wall Street veteran Sen. Jon Corzine (D-N.J.).

535. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:22:32 AM



"I wouldn't be surprised if Altman wound up with something - I'd think
Treasury, but you never know," a Kerry adviser said. "Early in the campaign,
when Kerry was still trying to figure out how to put everything together,
including his policies, he visited with Altman up in New York quite a lot
and talked about him in speeches."

Party Diversity


Two key party sectors are black and Hispanic caucuses. The strategist, who conceded that he has no inside information about Kerry's thinking, suggested Reps. Harold Ford Jr. (D-Tenn.), William Jefferson (D-La.) and Gregory Meeks
(D-N.Y.) - all prominent members of the Congressional Black Caucus - as strong possibilities.

The rub, though, is finding a job that would be a good fit for each.
Jefferson, a member of the Ways and Means Committee, is an established authority on trade matters in the party, which may make him a candidate for U.S. Trade Representative or perhaps secretary of Commerce. But Commerce has
increasingly gone to big party money men - think Ron Brown for President Clinton and Don Evans for President Bush - and Jefferson's free-trade record would be tough for unions to swallow if he became USTR.

Jefferson and I worked on Johnston's staff way back when...waaaaaay back

More later...it is a long article...and this may be hot news in DC but I am not into counting chickens

536. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:39:37 PM

Allawi Attempting to Isolate Religious Shiites - Ally with Sunni


This puppet government is pathetic. But I shouldn't be too harsh, they're in an Ace of Spades "win-win" situation

537. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:46:40 PM

Josh Marshall and friends have been working on a story about the Bush uranium lie for six months...they're about to publish

Follow the Yellowcake Road

538. jexster - 7/31/2004 5:58:47 PM

Kerry: Bush Security Moves "Two and a half years too late"

539. robertjayb - 7/31/2004 6:38:13 PM

Way to Go, dubya! Now we do have a holy war...

BAGHDAD, Iraq --(AP via NYTimes)-- A series of coordinated bombings targeted churches in Baghdad and the northern city of Mosul during evening services Sunday, wounding at least 20 people in the first attacks on Christian places of worship in Iraq's 15-month insurgency.

The church attacks came amid a flurry of other bombings in and around the two cities that killed at least 10 Iraqis and an American soldier. The U.S. military confirmed two other explosions in Baghdad in the evening, but their target was not immediately clear.

540. wonkers2 - 7/31/2004 6:47:48 PM

I wonder what SISMI's motovation was in providing forged documents purporting to reveal Iraq efforts to buy "yellow cake?"

541. robertjayb - 7/31/2004 7:00:50 PM

Time to trot out the idiot General Boykin to remind these evil-doers that dubya was appointed by God and that our God is bigger than theirs.

542. robertjayb - 7/31/2004 7:19:21 PM

Be Afraid! Be very afraid and trust in dubya!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. security alert level in Washington will be raised to 'high' from 'elevated,' CNN reported Sunday.

The raising of the alert level in the U.S. capital will be announced shortly by Department of Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge, the network said.

543. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:24:55 PM

When are they gonna get it?

544. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 7/31/2004 7:25:11 PM

545. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:27:46 PM

More Kerry Kabinet from Roll Call:

One female House member who could get tapped for Homeland Security secretary or, less likely, the CIA is Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.). Another possible woman, perhaps for Labor or Health and Human Services, would be
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), a Kerry ally who chaired the Democratic platform committee this year.

"Leon [Panetta] is a classic example of the grid you have to get through to be [a Cabinet-level choice]," one Democratic strategist said, referring to the former California lawmaker who left Congress to become director of the Office of Management and Budget under Clinton. "There was a Member with some substantial seniority, chairman of the Budget Committee, safe seat. ...You're not going to appoint someone if you are going to have difficulty
defending the seat."

That problem could hamper Rep. John Spratt (S.C.), the top Democrat on Budget. Spratt has emerged as a favorite among Democrats for a senior slot in a Kerry administration, though he is seen in more of an advisory role than a Cabinet position. Spratt, like Panetta before him, would likely fit best at OMB.

"John is extremely credible - he's from the South, he's somebody who is concerned about balanced budgets - not spending what you don't have - and that's where Kerry comes from," Coelho said.

546. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:28:46 PM

Wonk...I suspect that is the OTHER SHOE in the Marshall Washington Monthly article...

Two words

Silvio Berlusconi

547. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:29:26 PM

Oh let's not beat around the Bush shall we!

548. robertjayb - 7/31/2004 7:29:32 PM

ORANGE: High risk of terrorist attacks.

--Coordinate necessary security efforts with armed forces or law enforcement agencies.

--Take additional precaution at public events.

--Prepare to work at an alternate site or with a dispersed work force.

--Restrict access to essential personnel only.

--No hecklers or sarky journalists at dubya campaign events.

549. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:29:39 PM

One question on the mind of party insiders is whether there will be a role for former House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (Mo.), an erstwhile Democratic primary rival who will retire from Congress at the end of the current session.

The early consensus is that Gephardt, who enjoys enormous popularity inside organized labor, would be a shoo-in for Labor secretary. Other Democrats point out that the Missouri lawmaker, who sat on Ways and Means before he
took over the leader's job, has had a career-long interest in health care policy - which might put him on the list for Health and Human Services, which is generally considered a more prestigious post.

But several people - such as outgoing Sen. John Breaux (D-La.), in the unlikely event he decides to eschew a lobbying career - are considered ahead of Gephardt in that queue. And some raise doubts about whether Gephardt would be interested in a Cabinet job at all, having just come off a
tumultuous eight years at the helm of the party.

"If I were Kerry, I would try to get Dick in the Cabinet, because I think there are a lot of roles Dick could play, and he would be very helpful to Kerry," Coelho said. "But if I were Dick, I would say, 'I've done my public
service. It's time maybe for me to go out and take care of my family, my grandkids and so forth.' I think it's time for Dick to think of himself for a change." If Gephardt does take a pass on Labor, the job could go to former
House Minority Whip David Bonior (Mich.), another union favorite.

550. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:38:16 PM

Send the Moron a Message

I saw an item about this group on the 11 o'clock local news...they had a big fundraiser in tony Los Altos Hills


Mission Accomplished
60 second TV spot

"My name is Raphael Zappala and I have a question for George W. Bush.

"Mr. President, you know that Mission Accomplished banner behind you on the aircraft carrier last year? [image of President and banner] I'm just curious, how much did that thing cost?

"You see a year after your taxpayer-funded flight, my brother, Sherwood Baker, was killed in Iraq. Before he died he told us that he had not been given a full set of body armor and that some soldiers didn’t even have flak jackets. [Images of Sherwood Baker and Zappala family]

“Sherwood also said they weren’t getting enough food for three meals. I sent him a care package myself Mr. Bush... unfortunately, he never got a chance to eat it. So tell me Mr. President, how much did the banner cost? I wonder how many soldiers that money would have fed? Or protected from taking a bullet? When you get a moment off from your perennial campaign, maybe you could get back to me about the banner.

"Now that my brother is dead, I have plenty of free time to wait for your call."

Had it with George W. Bush?
Help sponsor a message like this one


551. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:45:26 PM

“Bring ‘em on!”
60 second radio/TV spot

“My name is Jane Bright and this message is for George W. Bush. Mr. President, you remember your speech last summer, when you taunted Iraqi insurgents by saying 'Bring 'em on'? Well I'm no military expert and I don't have the help of brilliant advisors like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, but I remember thinking at the time that taunting your enemies to attack American soldiers was a pretty scary idea. My son was over in Iraq and as a mother your macho words horrified me. Three weeks later, my son, Evan Ashcraft, was killed in combat near Mosul.

"Mr. Bush, I have no way of knowing whether the insurgent who killed my son ever heard your foolish taunt. But thanks to you Mr. President I have the rest of my life to wonder about it.”

552. jexster - 7/31/2004 7:49:43 PM



Evan Asa Ashcraft was one of three 101st Airborne soldiers killed July 24, 2003, when their convoy was attacked.

Age: 24 Hometown: Oak Grove, Ky.
Died: 07/24/2003
Service: Army Rank: Sgt.
Unit: Company A, 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry, 101st Airborne Division, in Fort Campbell, Ky.


AlD's got lotsa money...I am sure he will give generously

553. robertjayb - 7/31/2004 8:15:35 PM

It's your thread, jexster. SPAM it as you wish.

554. jexster - 7/31/2004 9:34:47 PM

Banned In Kuwait

I think that's the idea Robt...

555. jexster - 7/31/2004 9:36:18 PM

We are in Condition ORANGE

Duck and cover

556. RealVoices - 7/31/2004 10:00:48 PM

Thank you Jexster for posting our website, www.realvoices.org We have had quite a number of visitors to the site from your link and the positive coverage on Channel 7 last night.

A possible electronic harrassment or "Patriot Act" issue: We are concerned that someone or something is interrupting our electronic communications, basically suppressing friendly contacts and donations, or our back communication with them. The website is up and functioning perfectly as far as we can tell. If anyone has had any difficulty reaching us by email through the "contact us" page, making a donation or accessing the website or any of its pages PLEASE let us know via this board as soon as possible. It would also help us greatly to have people test the site by emailing us via the contact page, we will repond directly by email as well as posting an acknowledgement here.

You may also call us directly, phone number is available on the contact us page. Thanks to all for your help, this is a strange new America we live in.

RealVoices staff

557. Ulgine Barrows - 8/1/2004 8:06:54 AM

I'm feeling purple.

558. jayackroyd - 8/1/2004 3:15:15 PM

I saw the elevated alert level before I read about it. For some reason, when alert levels rise, they inspect trucks at 96th street, and the cops were out in force this past weekend. Apparently, nobody is worried about bombs in Harlem.

559. thoughtful - 8/1/2004 4:31:34 PM

I heard about the higher terror alert level. Everytime I hear the potential targets...UN, citibank building... I get ticked off all over again about how they distributed the homeland security funds...don't remember the numbers, but on a per capita basis, it's something like $500 for every idahoan, and 2 cents for every new yorker. It's insane.

Do they really think al qaeda is setting aim for the Pocatella krispy kreme?

560. jexster - 8/1/2004 4:35:59 PM

Kerry Plans Substantial Troop Cut in Iraq in First Term

561. jexster - 8/1/2004 4:38:32 PM

Likud Lieberman's whining about Dean's comment "we just don't know how much of this is politics"...

Just like he whined over Dean's "there is no justification for war"

Just like he whined over Dean's "The capture of Saddam would not stop IraQ violence"



562. jexster - 8/1/2004 4:41:47 PM

You are quite welcome RV! A true public service!

563. jexster - 8/1/2004 4:42:39 PM

Turks Won't Truck Supplies to Imperial Forces in IraQ

564. jexster - 8/1/2004 4:56:03 PM

FYI..the Channel 7 piece also included a group of angry Bushies..."You'll hurt the troops" Their quick response speaks volumes.

565. jexster - 8/1/2004 5:32:29 PM

The coordinated attacks, targeting churches in separate places in Baghdad and also in the city of Mosul, is proof that the US and its Iraqi caretaker government have made no progress whatsoever in tamping down the guerrilla insurgency in the country, which appears to be able to strike at will

No Progress - Juan Cole

Electricity Riots in Najaf
Amara Council Dissolved

566. jexster - 8/1/2004 5:33:00 PM





TOYS!

567. jexster - 8/1/2004 6:06:29 PM




The Kerry/Edwards Campaign has released a 250 page (1.53MB)book detailing their program.

Download pdf here

568. jexster - 8/2/2004 12:46:09 AM

The War President Who Cried Wolf

569. jexster - 8/2/2004 3:47:41 AM

WaPo Internals

Trust Candidate on These Areas:
Trust to Handle / Net Change
Health care / Kerry +16
Terrorism / Kerry +15
Iraq / Kerry +14
Taxes / Kerry +12
Education / Kerry +12
Economy / Kerry +12
Health care / Kerry +16

Main Issues / Net Change
Economy voters / Kerry +26
Iraq voters / Kerry +13


Opinions About the Candidates
Personal attributes / Net change
Leadership / Kerry +13
Security / Kerry +13
Values / Kerry +12
Honesty / Kerry +12
Consistency / Kerry +11
Empathy / Kerry +10

570. jexster - 8/2/2004 12:43:01 PM

This is looking like Pants on Fire for the Week...


Information Behind "Terror Alerts" is Years Old

571. jexster - 8/2/2004 1:06:43 PM

"There is nothing right now that we're hearing that is new," said one senior law enforcement official who was briefed on the alert. "Why did we go to this level? . . . I still don't know that."



I DO I DO I DO...Call on me Miss Hurst!!!!

572. jexster - 8/2/2004 1:21:51 PM

On Tuesday, a U.S. Marine with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force was killed in action west of Baghdad, the military said. The Marine died of wounds suffered in Anbar province, a volatile, Sunni-dominated region that includes Fallujah, Ramadi and Qaim on the Syrian border.

He died conducting "security and stability operations," the U.S. command said. His name was withheld pending notification of kin.

In Baghdad, insurgents set off a roadside bomb late Monday, killing two U.S. soldiers and wounding two more, the military said Tuesday.

The Marine's killing brought to at least 915 the number of U.S. service members who have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq.

573. jexster - 8/2/2004 1:29:06 PM

Do you believe Bush adopted the 9/11 Commission recommendations?

"White House and Bush campaign officials have long said that the details [of White House counterterrorism proposals] matter far less than the pictures and sounds of Mr. Bush talking in any way about his campaign against terrorism, which polls show is still his strongest card against Mr. Kerry," writes Elizabeth Bumiller in the Times today.

Ain't it the truth!

But wouldn't it be nice if we had a press which would make some effort to point out instances where the 'details' utterly belie what the president says he's doing?

The issue here is the president's supposed embrace of the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, particularly on the creation of a new National Intelligence Director under whom the heads of the various intelligence agencies would operate.

The Post's Tuesday editorial notes this ... well, how shall we say it ... lack of candor, but still refers to it in bland terms.

Saith the Post: "Mr. Bush cast the plan he unveiled yesterday, to create a director of national intelligence and a national counterterrorism center, as embracing the commission's recommendations. In fact the administration's proposals differ in critical respects."

What's more, this is such a pattern for this White House that you'd think the Kerry campaign, and the Dems on the Hill, would get hold of this as a pretty manageable critique of this administration: That is, you just can't trust them.

What this White House says it's doing and what it's actually doing seldom turn out to be the same thing.

-- Josh Marshall

574. jexster - 8/2/2004 6:40:57 PM

LAT Interview: Kerry Sketches Iraq Exit Plan

575. jexster - 8/2/2004 6:49:59 PM

Continuing to cast one misleading attack after another, George Bush unveiled a new stump speech once again devoid of any ideas for how he would lead the nation but chock full of scurrilous attacks against John Kerry.

Kerry spokesman Phil Singer: "Results do matter, and the fact that George Bush's policies have resulted in record deficits, skyrocketing health costs, lower quality jobs, a military stretched thin and an isolated nation stand in stark contrast to John Kerry's plan to make America stronger at home and more respected in the world."

John Kerry has a distinguished legislative record:

>> He and John McCain negotiated an agreement with Vietnam to provide a full accounting for POW-MIAs.
>> He wrote the first bill reducing acid rain.
>> He has repeatedly led the charge in protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from drilling.
>> He has passed legislation that shut down money laundering activities of terrorists and drug traffickers.

576. jexster - 8/2/2004 6:55:00 PM

[cont]

President Clinton Praised Kerry for Putting 100,000 COPS on the Street – “When we tried to get past six years of talking tough on crime but nothing happening, rhetoric and rhetoric and rhetoric and no action, to put 100,000 police on the street, to ban deadly assault weapons to pass the Brady bill, the other side, [the Republicans] led the fight against it. But John Kerry helped us pass the toughest, smartest, best crime bill this country has seen in many a day, and the crime rate has gone down for four years in a row. John Kerry was on the right side of history.” [Public Papers of the President: Fall River, MA; 8/28/96]

Democratic Leader Tom Daschle Says Kerry Knows How to Get the Legislative Job Done in the Senate - Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle had kind words for John Kerry’s work on Campaign Finance Reform when he asked Kerry to chair the Democratic Steering Committee: "From our teen-smoking bill to HMO reform and Campaign Finance Reform, John Kerry has demonstrated that he clearly knows how to get the job done. He is a valued and trusted member of our leadership team, and I am pleased he has accepted another term as Chairman of the Steering and Coordination Committee." [Daschle Press Release, 11/19/98]



577. jexster - 8/2/2004 6:55:14 PM

Even Dr. Bill Frist, Senate Majority Leader Says Kerry’s Global AIDS Legislation is a “Huge Step Forward”: “’The Kerry-Frist bill is a huge step forward,” said [current Majority Leader Bill] Frist. “It further validates U.S. leadership in the global effort to end devastation many countries face in the fight against HIV/AIDS’.” [Office of Senator Frist, press release 7/12/02]

58 bills and resolutions John Kerry has sponsored over the years have passed the U.S. Senate. Countless others have been improved because of his work, including the Clean Air Act, the Children’s Health Insurance Program and the COPS program.

>> John Kerry has taken on the special interests and won.
>> He fought against Newt Gingrich’s anti-labor and anti-environmental regulatory reform.
>> He has fought to raise the minimum wage.
>> He has worked to shut down wasteful corporate subsidies.
>>And John Kerry played an important role in the effort to reach a settlement with the tobacco companies that ended marketing to children and teenagers.

Results DO Matter!

915 US dead, 5000 US maimed, 150 Billion: No WMD, no AlQaeda links, no "liberation", a quagmire of occupation

Nuke weapons programs on fast track in IraN and N.Korea

1,000,000+ plus jobs LOST
the largest budget deficits in US history

Corporate greed and corruption

27 criminal investigations of war profiteering by Bush campaign donors

Global Terror on the increase

Taliban and opium production rampant in Afghanistan

Osama Bin Forgotten

Three year old terror alerts....

List goes on and on

578. thoughtful - 8/2/2004 8:47:36 PM

Can't have it both ways. Now what's the true poop...will we ever know?

The story was the bushies requested pakistan to announce the capture of a key qaeda guy to divert attention from the democratic convention. Story was that they did that. Story was this guy was caught a few weeks ago, but only announced recently. Story was this guy is the one who's talking that led to the elevated alert status.

Now today's times says the alert status was raised on no new information, but information that is years old.

Can't have it both ways. What's the truth? WIll we ever know?

579. jexster - 8/2/2004 9:18:23 PM

On the importance of what I have called "reframing", Ron Brownstein of the Los Angeles Times puts the matter this way:

Listening to the procession of generals and Vietnam War veterans at the podium, Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio saw a revealing calculation in Kerry's choice of emphasis.

To Fabrizio, the Massachusetts senator was telling the White House that he believed his hold was already so great over voters primarily concerned about the economy and other domestic issues that he could focus most of his fire on Bush's strongest point: his management of the war on terrorism.

"I thought Kerry's speech was a very offensive-minded speech," said Fabrizio, the pollster for Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole in 1996. "They made it clear they were going to play on once-hallowed Republican ground — terrorism, national security and foreign affairs."

But Bush is facing what most polls suggest is a narrow majority now inclined to change direction, and a challenger who has greatly strengthened his credibility as an alternative.

....

But more likely the president will win a second term only if he can reverse the demand for change by restoring faith in his own leadership and direction.

In that, Bush needs cooperation from events. He may also need a different focus.
For months, his campaign has mostly stressed the risks of change. After Kerry's strong performance last week, Bush's greatest need now is to find a compelling case for continuity.



A Stronger Kerry Forces Bush to Make a Compelling Case

580. jexster - 8/2/2004 9:23:05 PM

Thoughtful, John Judis has been following the Bush Pakistan scam...truth is Pakistan pulled out some moth eaten nobodies to satisfy Bush's demand that they produce a big Al Qaeda connection during the democratic convention..

Bush fucked up - again...


July Surprise? by John B. Judis, Spencer Ackerman & Massoud Ansari


This afternoon, Pakistan's interior minister announced that Pakistani forces had captured, Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian Al Qaeda operative. From the July 19, 2004 issue of TNR: Bush officials are pressuring Pakistan to catch Osama bin Laden or his top deputies before the election. Some even have a specific date in mind--the middle of the Democratic convention.

581. jexster - 8/2/2004 9:28:56 PM

A Message for the KulliganMan....


John 6

53So Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; 55for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. 56Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.


Corpus Christi!

582. jexster - 8/2/2004 9:53:24 PM

Results matter SewageBreath.... and Lies Have Consequences...

George W. Bush, August 2nd 2004:


“Let me talk about the intelligence in Iraq. First of all, we all thought we’d find stockpiles of weapons. We may still find weapons. We haven’t found them yet. Every person standing up here would say, 'Gosh, we thought it was going to be different.; As did congress, by the way. Member of both parties. And the United Nations. But what we do know is that Saddam Hussein had the capability of making weapons. And ... umm … but let me just say this to you. Knowing what I know today, we still would have gone on into Iraq. We still would have gone to make our country more secure. He had the capability of making weapons. He had terrorist ties. The decision I made was the right decision. The world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power.”

583. thoughtful - 8/2/2004 10:02:07 PM

Jex, there's this

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pakistan's capture of a suspected al Qaeda computer expert and specific target information prompted the United States to raise its terror alert and warn of a possible attack soon, officials said on Monday.

The CIA provided information that helped Pakistani security forces capture Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan, also known as Abu Talha, in July, the U.S. officials told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Documents, computers, surveillance reports and sketches were recovered related to that arrest and the information prompted the heightened terror alert, officials said.

``It's greater specificity beyond what we've seen before,'' one official said. ``And they're planning something soon.''



That suggests there was in fact new data. Is it that the ny time is changing it's mind?

584. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:33:56 PM

Right...new data..what new data..new data that gave them an excuse to re-create a 3 year old terror alert???


Was this new data really OLD data newly recovered from a source they already knew of and nailed as a replacement for the BIG SCORE that Powell twisted arms to get but failed???


I wouldn't believe ANYTHING these people say is based on "intelligence"....

Fool me once...


But this is getting ridiculous...

585. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:35:29 PM

Mission Accomplished
Results Matter

Pipeline to Turkey Cut
Violence Rages Across IraQ

586. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:40:09 PM

Think Thoughtful...

What kinda Moron would target Wall St or the World Bank after 9/11?


Don't bother...

Bush, the KulliganMan and the Moronic Minions..

Not AlQaeda

587. angel-five - 8/2/2004 10:41:19 PM

a) You know, these guys watch CNN too. They know their communications have been breached. They have lots of friends in ISI. Every time the US hears something new they broadcast it. This suggests that the US public alert system is about something other than apprehending terrorists.

b) How many terrorists have been caught in the US since the implementation of the color alert system? How many have been tripped up by heightened public awareness? This, too, suggests that the US public alert system is about something other than effectively catching terrorists.

c) How much information from captured al-Qaeda terrorists has turned out to be accurate? Not much. How many planned big attacks have we heard about? A lot. How many have happened? Zero. How many have we stopped in the act? Zero. How many cells have we exposed? Zero.

d) How many do we expect to catch if every time we think they're up to something, we splash detailed plans on what they're going to hit on CNN? Zero.

The homeland security colored alert system may have its uses, but it is clear that it has, at best, been used poorly since its inception. At its worst, it has become nothing more than a political tool in the hands of an administration which has proven that there is nothing it isn't willing to use as a political tool.

We have heard about the war president, and the peace president, and the education president, and the economy president, and the welfare reform president, and all the other different kinds of president that Dubya has called himself at various times. But if he's going to be named for what he's trying to accomplish, he should just call himself the re-election president, because at this point that's all he's worried about.

588. thoughtful - 8/2/2004 10:42:01 PM

Yes, jex, I see. it is getting ridiculous. Only problem is the steady drumbeat of misinformation and growing evidence that the press doesn't know it's glutes from it's pecs makes me wonder if there is anything out there that's trustworthy any more.

Talking to a fellow I know, retiring from the reserves who's firmly in bush's camp and was explaining to me why he's voting for bush...look what bush has done for the military! I said, you mean apart from the 900+dead and thousands wounded? He said, yes, besides that, look how he's built up the military! And I said, you mean the military that is underfed and underarmored? You mean the way he's cut vet benefits and housing subsidies for the military? He brought up how deteriorated the military was under clinton...didn't even have copters that could stay in the air.

He said bush didn't lie about wmd...after all look at all the people in the clinton camp who said iraq had wmd. everybody believed it and only bush had the guts to act on it. It's no fair trying to turn it into a lie ex post.

Some folks just see the world differently.

589. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:49:05 PM

Then consider the sequence

- Powell blackmails Musharraff to produce big Al Q score during Demo convention

- Pakistan produces someone who hasn't been connected with AlQ for 5 years...big flo

- 3 days later, we get a terror alert based on 3 year old info and some shit taken from the computer of someone that everyone I've heard concedes was a "nobody"

- the "crucial info" is not described in terms any more specfic than that and is part of a news conference set to refute charges in two major papers, backed up by numerous sources that this is the same old shit...


I mean really

590. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:51:06 PM

Oh and BTW...if you watched Ridge's announcement on Sunday, he went out of his way to highlight the self-serving claim that this was REALLY REAL and not politics but REALLY REAL and REALLY REALLY a result of "the leadership of GWB in the WOT"

Not political?


Not real

591. angel-five - 8/2/2004 10:52:22 PM

The Homeland Security warning system is 'justified' by two political reasons. The first is that nobody in Washington, Dubya Bush first and foremost among them, wants to be faced with accusations that they hadn't warned the American public about a possible terrorist attack, after they so badly bungle-fucked 9/11.

The second is that Bush gets to claim 'we implemented the heightened alert system in an effort to prevent terrorism and it has worked, because since we started making people more aware of the chances of terrorism happening, there have been no terrorist attacks on US soil.' Unfortunately, I could make an equal claim about the efficacy of the brown-eyed susans I planted in 2001.

Go back and look at when the warnings were heightened. Compare them to what was happening in American politics at the time. Yet during the time after the invasion of Iraq, when pro-al Qaeda sentiments have soared, al Qaeda recruitment has strengthened and their desire to strike Americans has increased dramatically.... the terror alert system has barely fluctuated. Why? Because people associate that alert with actual danger (although they're starting to wise up now) and it's a cheap fake way for Bush to convince people that they're actually safer now.

*********************************

I say al Qaeda. We all do. But we need to stop focusing on al Qaeda. al Qaeda is a small part of Islamist anti-US terrorism that receives undue attention due to 9/11. It is the first target of US intelligence gathering. The next major terrorist strike in the US, if indeed there is another, will not be conducted by al Qaeda -- this is my prediction. And you will hear people talking about, instead, groups with 'ties' to al Qaeda. The rhetoric will shift. But attention needs to shift, now. We could kill every last al Qaeda member on earth, tonight, and the danger of islamist terrorism would only dip a bit. It's the hydra.

592. jexster - 8/2/2004 10:59:51 PM

This is the Bush Model of Deceit and Deception...

Think of it like a newspaper's retraction of a Page 1 story...


It appears a week later on page 20...small print..

That's essentially the stunt that Bush has pulled here and since he left no child behind 3 1/2 years ago

593. jexster - 8/3/2004 3:24:34 AM

Larry Johnson a former CIA official on the NewsHour tonight

"Bush's national security council spokesperson claimed we are getting cooperation from Pakistan. That is not true....What they are doing is turning over low level people in an effort to placate us"

He went on to state flatly that this terror threat alert is not based on any intelligence that there is a threat of terror attack but rather is simply evidence that an Al Qaeda network existed in the US in 2001 albeit a network we probably didn't know about and may still be here.


He couldn't understand why Bush would make such an announcement as it would make it more difficult to roll up the cell.


CALL ON ME Miss Vivian (first grade teacher)


I know! I know!

594. jexster - 8/3/2004 3:25:37 AM

It's like a scene from a John Waters movie.

These are the people who, even in the face of evidence of his casual cruelty, of his unchristian contempt for weakness, of his lying ways, see something angelic in George W. Bush and love him unconditionally.



Conservatives see something angelic in George Bush. That's why they excuse, repress, and rationalize away so much.

-------------------------------------
The Cult of Bush

595. jexster - 8/3/2004 3:29:31 AM

A-5 ...you hit on something I fear is scary...

The Bush Admin and most everyone else it seems is talking about AlQ as some sort of monolith...it may have been but it has morphed grown and is growing into totally seperate movements thanks to the feckless WOT policies of the Bush admin..

Is anyone other than ANONYMOUS and Kerry's Natl Security team paying any attention to this?

596. jexster - 8/3/2004 3:39:17 AM

A sound bite from President Bush on Monday strikes me as emblematic of the country's current crisis. He said,


"It is a ridiculous notion to assert that, because the United States is on the offensive, more people want to hurt us," he said. "We’re on the offensive because people do want to hurt us."
Let me try to help Mr. Bush with this problem. -


The number of persons in the Muslim world who wanted to inflict direct damage on the US homeland in 2000 was tiny. ...

The US was not always universally despised in the Middle East. In some countries, large majorities thought well of the US! Lawrence Pintak notes:

The latest survey results out of the Middle East show that America's favorability rating is now, essentially, zero. That's down from as high as 75 percent in some Muslim countries just four years ago.

Do People Want to Hurt us Because We're on the Offensive? Juan Cole

597. angel-five - 8/3/2004 4:10:23 AM

A-5 ...you hit on something I fear is scary...

I wish I could claim it, but, it's been being said since 2001, and unfortunately mostly ignored since then.

You cannot land a knockout blow against something as amorphous as a terrorist threat, and trying to do so mostly just creates more terrorists. Going on separate side trip wars against nations like Iraq just makes it worse. Pre 9/11 the rhetoric from the Bush White House was that Iraq had been contained, it was no longer actively pursuing WMD, it posed comparatively little to no threat to its enemies, and while Saddam was a monster, we didn't need to do anything we weren't already doing. It's kind of ironic that it took a reversal of their own policies, the deaths of nearly 1,000 American soldiers, the wounding of nearly 6,000 more, the near destruction of America's moral standing in the world and an occupation which keeps on devouring lives and billions of dollars with no real end in sight, to prove that they were initially right, and haven't been right since.

598. jexster - 8/3/2004 4:46:30 AM

American Journalism Review
Going It Alone

Accolades now come to Knight Ridder for its prescient reports expressing skepticism about claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction




When the New York Times apologized to readers May 26 for not being "more aggressive" in examining the administration's decision to invade Iraq, editors couldn't help but give a nod to a less-vaunted news organization that had been beating the Times on the story for some time: Knight Ridder's Washington bureau.

The contrast in coverage was stark at times. On September 8, 2002, the Times proclaimed in a front-page headline, "U.S. Says Hussein Intensified Quest for A-Bomb Parts." Knight Ridder had two days earlier proclaimed, "Lack of hard evidence of Iraqi weapons worries top U.S. officials." Knight Ridder continued with headlines like "Troubling questions over justification for war in Iraq" and "Failure to find weapons in Iraq leads to intelligence scrutiny," even as most other major media outlets sang a tune more in line with the Bush administration.


It wasn't until February that Michael Massing bestowed some of the first accolades on Knight Ridder, writing in The New York Review of Books: "Almost alone among national news organizations, Knight Ridder had decided to take a hard look at the administration's justifications for war."


A few weeks earlier, Knight Ridder Washington reporters Warren Strobel and Jonathan Landay received the Raymond Clapper Memorial award from the Senate Press Gallery for their coverage of the sketchy intelligence used to justify war with Iraq.

599. jexster - 8/3/2004 4:49:27 AM

3 Year Old Data - Brand New Credibilty Issues for the Liar in Chief

600. jexster - 8/3/2004 9:39:53 AM

Al Qaeda: Why Bother with the US Elections? Bush is our Best Recruiter - the Beriut Star

601. angel-five - 8/3/2004 9:54:21 AM

That is a brilliant article. (Of course, I always say that when someone agrees with what I say.)

602. thoughtful - 8/3/2004 3:01:53 PM

NYT turning up the volume? Yesterdays letters to ed were all very antibush. Re the terror alert, some made the point that the last line ridge said...this intelligence brought to you by the superb leadership of our president...or some such thing, made it clear it was just an unpaid political announcement.

Another made the point asking how long is the press going to keep repeating the charges of flipflopping kerry while calling bush's multiple flipflops being a "pragmatic politician".

Another letter the other day asked the question, how is it possible kerry can consistently be the most liberal senator in congress AND be a flip flopper on all the issues. Isn't that fundamentally contradictory?

603. alistairConnor - 8/3/2004 3:41:27 PM

Three year old terror alert.

That may terrorise three year olds -- but clearly, New Yorkers aren't fooled, nor are the markets.

They are betting that the media, and the hinterland, will be.

604. jexster - 8/3/2004 5:12:15 PM

CNN is still playing the "they had NEW info" line...

I guess they don't read the WaPo at CNN. The so-called "new info" consisted of an update made on 1/24/04 - information that is available from public sources without need for direct surveillance...


Trans - they googled

I thought the most compelling and damning critique made by Larry Johnson ex CIA who in a debate with another ex CIA analyst pointed to the fact that since there was no new infor and no threat info at all they should have - if they wanted to catch the guys - kept their mouths shut.

The other analyst (the pro-alert side) "Well you know I am sure they have info they aren't telling us"


Absence of evidence is evidence of bullshit.


USA Today points out, quoting two unnamed intelligence officials that there is NO specific threat information and that the release of the fact that the threat was three years old was held back until AFTER Bush's bullshit news conference on 911 recs.

605. jexster - 8/3/2004 5:12:54 PM

Meanwhile we must leave BushWorld for a post from the real one...

BERLIN (Reuters) - North Korea (news - web sites) is deploying new land- and sea-based ballistic missiles that can carry nuclear warheads and may have sufficient range to hit the United States, according to the authoritative Jane's Defense Weekly.



In an article due to appear Wednesday, Jane's said the two new systems appeared to be based on a decommissioned Soviet submarine-launched ballistic missile, the R-27.


It said communist North Korea had acquired the know-how during the 1990s from Russian missile specialists and by buying 12 former Soviet submarines which had been sold for scrap metal but retained key elements of their missile launch systems.

606. jexster - 8/3/2004 5:25:34 PM

Dear Jex,
Today, ACT and MoveOn PAC are very proud to announce our partnership in a truly historic event.

The Vote for Change Tour (October 1-10) includes Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band, Bonnie Raitt, Dave Matthews Band, Dixie Chicks, Jackson Brown, John Mellencamp, Kenny "Babyface" Edmonds, Pearl Jam and R.E.M and others.

This historic tour will visit 28 cities in 9 battleground states. Tickets will go on sale to the public on Saturday, August 21st. All proceeds from ticket sales will benefit ACT's work in the battleground states.

Tickets go on sale through Ticketmaster on August 21st. More details available here.

A limited number of pre-sale tickets are available from MoveOn PAC.

607. jexster - 8/3/2004 5:33:54 PM

WaPo 7/6/04



There is President Bush and John Kerry and the merry band of bragsters, pollsters, pontificators, image-shapers flashing around on the higher reaches of cable TV. These are the brand names and faces of American politics.

Then there is Steve Rosenthal, a middle-aged Jewish guy with a big belly who looks like he'd be happy to live in Takoma Park, which he does, and coach his kid's baseball team, which he does. In this presidential election, he may be the most important person you've never heard of.

Rosenthal has $100 million at his disposal, no boss and only one job: to find, track and deliver Democrats to the polls come November. "Hopefully, a byproduct of this is that George Bush will end up back in Crawford and," he adds sardonically, "spend the next several years trying to figure out if he really did make mistakes."

Usually, get-out-the-vote operations start after Labor Day. Money gets spread. Precinct captains get their big day to swagger around. Not this time. The difference is that Rosenthal, the former political director of the AFL-CIO, is already prowling around out there. He is setting up an elaborate war plan that has more than a thousand paid foot soldiers marching up to doors in 17 battleground states. They come armed with Palm handhelds loaded with voter registration data and streaming video about education and jobs.

As head of America Coming Together, one of the best-funded political interest groups created after campaign finance reform, Rosenthal -- like the Republican National Committee -- has been at this for months. Like all ruthless fighters, he is not always nice.

"He is as mean and tough and vicious as they come," says Donna Brazile, Al Gore's campaign manager in 2000, "and that makes him more attractive. He's the last great hope of the Democratic Party."


Soros is matching contributions to ACT.

608. jexster - 8/3/2004 6:34:46 PM

Report Proves Bush Knew He Was Lying About Iraq


Earlier this week, President Bush claimed "we all thought we would find stockpiles of weapons"1 in Iraq, and claimed that he had no inkling that his pre-war claims about the Iraqi threat were weak. But as a major new story released today shows, the President and other top administration officials were repeatedly warned before the invasion that its case for war was weak.

The cover story for this month's In These Times analyzes declassified government documents and intelligence reports given to the White House before the war. These documents either warned the administration about its WMD and Iraq-al Qaeda claims, or totally debunked them. In some cases, intelligence experts explicitly warned top officials not to make the claims they were making, and yet they were ignored. The story wholly refutes assertions by the White House and Republicans that it was the intelligence community to blame. In fact, as the data shows, the White House deliberately ignored intelligence to mislead America.



Sources:
Presidential Remarks, Whitehouse.gov, 8/02/2004.
Read the full article, with direct links to all source material

609. angel-five - 8/3/2004 6:46:36 PM

The fact that people are now questioning these terror alerts is not only encouraging, but indicative of the fact that the public doesn't trust Bush AND feels confident enough to speak out about it. There was a period of about two years where you barely heard any questioning of the Bush administration's rhetoric and action, when lots of good Americans felt that speaking up was a bad idea.

The fact that the Bush campaign to re-elect Bush would drive such an announcement with such shoddy information is also encouraging. But the real question is, does Bush think that another terrorist strike on American soil before the election would help him? Because if he does in fact think that, we have a lot to be worried about. Personally I believe at this point that if another strike occurs before the election, it will not work out to Bush's favor, so long as opponents are quick to tie it to Bush's mismanaging of the war on terror and slowness to implement anti-terror reform, and make the point that Bush has inconvenienced and frightened Americans for three years now and got many of our soldiers killed and curtailed our basic freedoms and still dropped the ball.

I'll reiterate my basic point again that these terror alarms aren't doing much to help catch terrorists. Quite the opposite.

610. jexster - 8/3/2004 6:55:08 PM

From the Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Last week's Democratic Convention brought a newly-energized Democratic Party...Ahhhh! TERROR ALERT! TERROR ALERT!


The Democrats and Terror


Watch!

611. jayackroyd - 8/3/2004 7:00:58 PM

The link in 608 fails.

612. wabbit - 8/3/2004 7:21:29 PM

Jexster,

To link to a post in a different thread, you must know the thread number. Look in the address window of your browser, and use the number after "thread=". To link to post #1234 in Movies:

<msg thread=35 num=1234>

613. jayackroyd - 8/3/2004 7:40:11 PM

I'd mentioned yesterday that the mid-town Citigroup building is already at a high level of security. But I was nearby yesterday, and it has been beefed up quite a bit, with two lanes of Lexington Avenue blocked off by diagonally parked police cars. The street has had concrete barriers for quite some time now, to prevent truck bombs.

At Grand Central, more of Vanderbilt Avenue was blocked off, and there were truck searches taking place at different intersections.

It would be shameful to put us to this inconvenience and expense solely, or primarily, for political purposes. It's bothersome that I can't dismiss the possibility out of hand.

614. jayackroyd - 8/3/2004 8:04:35 PM

The AMerican Journalism Review on Knight-Ridder's looking past the lies. Most interesting are the intimidation tactics used by the White House.

615. jexster - 8/3/2004 8:09:28 PM

Thanks Wabbit..that Mago.she's one sophisticated lady..now I can be one too!!

The Bush SEC Fines Halliburton for Fraud - Covers Up Cheney Involvement

Results matter!

616. jexster - 8/3/2004 8:15:41 PM

And speaking of results that matter, the Kerry Media Corps has a very slick rapid response operation.

Today I received an email asking for rapid response to newspapers and talk shows on "Results Matter"...they give you links to background information and a site that allows you to compose and spell check a letter to the editor along with email addresses to all newspapers and all editorial staff thereof that reach your zip code....

I did seven of the following in under ten minutes:

Editor:

On Friday July 30, the day following the Democratic Convention, President Bush took to the campaign trail to tell voters that "results matter". I could not agree more.

Results DO matter. Within days of his speech, the Bush Administration announced that it had racked up the largest deficits in American history. Three days after the speech, President Bush announced that he was adopting selected reforms recommended by the 9/11 Commission - three years after 9/11!

Yes results matter. In 1993, thanks to Senator Kerry's support, Congress passed the Budget Reform Act which led to the strongest economy in US history and a budget surplus. Nine months ago, Sen. Kerry called for the creation of a National Intelligence Director, a post with real, not sham
authority such as Bush belatedly endorsed last Monday.

We are mortgaging our childrens' future, and we are losing the War on Terror.

Results matter.



Sincerely,

617. Magoseph - 8/3/2004 8:28:04 PM

Jex, will you please repost the link from "In These Times" magazine?

618. jexster - 8/3/2004 8:49:28 PM

Violent pro-insurgent lyrics now outsell love songs in Baghdad record stores...the most popular DVDs extol the resistance and show pictures of dead US soldiers...


Your tax dollars at work

Results matter

619. jexster - 8/3/2004 8:51:43 PM

Results matter...


While Kulligan rants against "homo degenerates" CNN reports that Sgt England, the SheWolf of the Bush SS, is pregnant with the love child of a fellow Abu Ghraib torturer.


Kulligan of course cheers the torturers


Kulligan is a "homo-nausea-ic" Bush partisan


Results matter

620. jexster - 8/3/2004 8:57:59 PM

The site www.inthesetimes.com just went down..some kinda crap techno message I don't understand...

I suppose it will return

621. jayackroyd - 8/3/2004 9:32:49 PM

You jex, that's a good line. Get one of the 527s to pick it up--a series of, say, 5 ads, each beginning with the president saying "Results matter." And then describe the results of the administration's policies.

622. thoughtful - 8/3/2004 10:17:13 PM

"The site www.inthesetimes.com just went down"

must be a goper plot!!!

623. kuliginthehooligan - 8/3/2004 11:06:05 PM

"Your tax dollars at work"

Actually, having jexster sitting behind a PC spamming this and other websites with garbage is, indeed, your tax dollars at work. How much did you make today, jex, spouting the same lies and venom? How does it feel to be in the back pocket of a special interest group?

Do you get paid by the e-mail, or post? What is your daily quota?

Now, let's see, do we get pornographic gay bondages pics from jex, or a quote of Scripture? Jesus, or fags today, jex? Too close to call.

624. jexster - 8/3/2004 11:12:10 PM

Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His Blood, you have no life in you

625. jexster - 8/3/2004 11:13:44 PM

Here ya go Mago...




THEY KNEW...

Despite the whitewash, we now know that the Bush administration was warned before the war that its Iraq claims were weak

626. jexster - 8/3/2004 11:14:41 PM

If desperation is ugly, then Washington, D.C. today is downright hideous.

As the 9/11 Commission recently reported, there was “no credible evidence” of a collaborative relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda. Similarly, no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq. With U.S. casualties mounting in an election year, the White House is grasping at straws to avoid being held accountable for its dishonesty.

627. jexster - 8/3/2004 11:36:20 PM

The Bread that I give
is my flesh for the life of the world
and all who eat of this bread
You shall live forever. You shall live forever

And I will raise you up and I will raise you up
And I will raise you up on the last day!

Unless you eat of the flesh of the Son of Man
And drink of His blood,
and drink of His Blood,
you cannot have life within you

628. jexster - 8/3/2004 11:37:09 PM

Sing Kully sing you pharistical parasitical tomb bilge

629. robertjayb - 8/4/2004 12:01:19 AM

Bandar Bush, please call the White House!

WASHINGTON -- Oil prices could rise as high as $50 per barrel before the year is up, analysts say, as the world's growing thirst for crude stretches supplies thin and uncertainty abounds in petroleum-producing nations.

"The fundamental fact is that oil is tight," says Leo Drollas, chief economist for the London-based Center for Global Energy Studies. Drollas believes $40 is a more likely price in the next month or two, although if demand is strong and the weather is cold this winter prices could reach $50.

Prices might leap even higher if there was a major supply disruption, analysts said.

630. jexster - 8/4/2004 1:01:05 AM

Bandar Bush...I love it!!

Almost as good as Rancher Bushie


631. jexster - 8/4/2004 1:04:24 AM

Since Kully brought the subject up and Robert jess reminded me, George ran on his record as governor supposedly...part of that record was, with Dick Cheney, lobbying the Saudis to raise oil prices from the $12-18/bbl range during the Clinton years of peace and prosperity.


Now there's a RESULT THAT MATTERS!

632. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:12:10 AM

Dno't worry, jex, your pay check is obviously well worth it to us tax payers. I'm happy you are making a living off of the dirty games you play. God is proud of ya, buddy.

633. jexster - 8/4/2004 1:33:18 AM

CBS/NyT Kerry 49
Bush 43


ABC/WaPo Kerry 52
Bush 45


That about does my replies for the day except for this....


- Six points in a race where opinion polls have not fluctuated for months is very nice indeed

- "If, as it appears, turnout will increase to about 115,000,000 or better, and this holds in October, Republican blood will run cold" Kevin Phillips

- HELP IS ON THE WAY!

634. jexster - 8/4/2004 1:34:50 AM

You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that.

635. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:44:15 AM

"Missouri and 37 other states already have laws defining marriage as only between a man and a woman. But amendment supporters fear a court could toss aside the state law, and they believe the state would be on firmer legal ground if an outright ban is part of the Constitution.

Louisiana residents are to vote on a marriage amendment Sept. 18. Then Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah are to vote on the issue Nov. 2. Initiatives are pending in Michigan, North Dakota and Ohio.

Four states — Alaska, Hawaii, Nebraska and Nevada — already have similar amendments in their constitutions."

636. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:44:24 AM

"Missouri and 37 other states already have laws defining marriage as only between a man and a woman. But amendment supporters fear a court could toss aside the state law, and they believe the state would be on firmer legal ground if an outright ban is part of the Constitution.

Louisiana residents are to vote on a marriage amendment Sept. 18. Then Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah are to vote on the issue Nov. 2. Initiatives are pending in Michigan, North Dakota and Ohio.

Four states — Alaska, Hawaii, Nebraska and Nevada — already have similar amendments in their constitutions."

637. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:44:36 AM

"Missouri and 37 other states already have laws defining marriage as only between a man and a woman. But amendment supporters fear a court could toss aside the state law, and they believe the state would be on firmer legal ground if an outright ban is part of the Constitution.

Louisiana residents are to vote on a marriage amendment Sept. 18. Then Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah are to vote on the issue Nov. 2. Initiatives are pending in Michigan, North Dakota and Ohio.

Four states — Alaska, Hawaii, Nebraska and Nevada — already have similar amendments in their constitutions."

638. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:45:01 AM

Ooops.

639. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:45:40 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

But, of course, you know that about me, as you have already made clear. Hypocrisy personified.

640. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:46:03 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

Is this before or after you take the Lord's name in vain?

641. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:46:36 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

Is this before or after you post pornographic images and denigrate the faith of others?

642. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:47:13 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

Is this before or after you quote Jesus, state you stand for the truth, and then post lie after lie after lie?

643. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:47:57 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

Is this before or after you claim that all war is evil and an affront to God, and then tout the military records of your party candidates like Clark and Kerry?

644. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:49:34 AM

"You do not know whether God is proud of me or not, and I thank God for that."

Is this before or after you cash that paycheck which is devoted to sliming people you don't like, even if that involves other Christians?

645. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 1:50:10 AM

How much money did you make today, jex, with your slime machine? Do you get paid by the hour, e-mail, or post?

646. jexster - 8/4/2004 4:11:24 AM

I am only about half way through it, but I heartily recommend the article "They Knew" above.

Not only do they use the Senate IraQ Report and the 9/11 Commission but they literally cover every published source of consequence dealing with the Bush lies and pretexts for war on IraQ - memoirs, news articles, CIA docs, WH statements, DoD docs, UN docs, WH docs, there is nothing they have left out..

A good deal of the material I have already read and linked and frankly I had forgotten some of it. But it is all there and all extremely damning.


Now Bush is spinning his lies in a new key..."we couldn't let a man with his intentions stay in power" even though he had no programs, no weapons no links no nothing...

When asked by worried friends and acquaintances whether the President was borrowing his geopolitical theory from the diaries of Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler, I assured them that the President didn't have the patience to read more than two or three pages of a Tom Clancy novel.

True, the National Security Council was staffed by think-tank ideologues, and yes, some of the policy analysts strolling through the corridors of the White House imagined themselves wearing the uniform of the Bengal Lancers, but no, not even the Bush Administration was so stupid as to take up arms against a figment of its own imagination.

Yes indeed, Mr. Lapham, Bush just admitted proudly admitted that he would take up arms against his delusions and lie again....

647. jexster - 8/4/2004 4:11:57 AM

I do it for the Lord....my time and my talent for my Lord and my God..

648. jexster - 8/4/2004 5:00:24 PM

In an appearance before minority journalists, the Massachusetts senator said he would have jumped into action more quickly than President Bush (news - web sites) did on Sept. 11, 2001, when he learned of terrorist attacks.


The president spent seven minutes reading to Florida elementary school children after learning that hijacked planes had been flown into the World Trade Center in New York.


"Had I been reading to children and had my top aide whisper in my ear that America is under attack, I would have told those kids very nicely and politely that the president of the United States has something that he needs to attend to," Kerry said.


649. jexster - 8/4/2004 5:00:34 PM

650. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 5:40:14 PM

Lies have consequences:

651. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 5:42:21 PM

Lies have consequences:


652. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 5:43:03 PM

Lies have consequences:


653. kuliginthehooligan - 8/4/2004 5:46:45 PM

Naw, this isn't really a human being, just a growth.

Lies have consequences:


654. jexster - 8/4/2004 5:51:42 PM

Oh boy aborted fetuses...


655. jexster - 8/4/2004 5:54:23 PM



Meanwhile back in the REAL world...
Have any pictures of women who've had clothes hanger abortions?

Where's that Consitutional Amendment the GOP has been promising you morons for the last 30 years?

656. jexster - 8/4/2004 5:57:15 PM

Since you are so concerned about protecting LIFE....



Joseph F. Herndon II died July 29, 2004, in Hawijah, Iraq, when he was shot while on guard duty.

Age: 21 Hometown: Derby, Kan.
Died: 07/29/2004
Service: Army Rank: Spc.
Unit: 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry, 25th Infantry Division (Light); Schofield Barracks, Hawaii

Is Najaf Burning?....Another US Soldier Dies for Bush Lies - Fighting Erupts Throughout IraQ

657. jexster - 8/4/2004 6:00:11 PM

We might have had one of his mangled dead body for you Kully but Der Fuehrer won't let us take any...

"Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.” Flannery O'Connor

658. jexster - 8/4/2004 6:13:36 PM

Chords for Change
By BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

659. jexster - 8/4/2004 9:14:01 PM

[NyT] Bush Lies Have Consequences:

"Terror" Alert

"I don't know who on earth to believe anymore"


If he says the sun rises in the East...set your alarm for sunrise

660. jexster - 8/4/2004 9:42:56 PM

"You feel you're being manipulated all the time."

Michael Schumacher, a 54-year-old writer who was eating a bratwurst for breakfast.



Funny Kully I take it you've yet to experience that feeling ..after 30 years of NOTHIN for the Evangelical Agenda from the GOP...after letting them sucker you on that FMA scam...


I'da thought that with a razor sharp intellect like yours, youda sliced right through that bratwurst long ago


661. jexster - 8/4/2004 9:53:14 PM

Now back to your Tent Revival and Snake Handling Extravaganza!


If you plan on being SLAIN IN THE SPIRIT, being a Louisiana Boy I recommend the cotton mouth water mocassin


662. arkymalarky - 8/4/2004 11:11:04 PM

Oooh, those things are wicked.

I've wondered a lot over the years why social conservatives aren't much more upset with the trends of the Republican Party and insulted by the way they drag issues out of mothballs just to get people lathered up into voting for them once again, only to put them right back in storage once they win elections. "What have you done for me lately?" springs to mind.

663. angel-five - 8/5/2004 8:08:00 AM

Well, it's not like anyone else will have them. The Religious Right is sort of like the fat kid waiting for a prom date.

664. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 8:26:20 AM

Might be a safe date, not some jerk with tats that can't hold a job and pay rent.

665. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 8:29:29 AM

angel-five, if you have kids, I'm surprised.

Someone's got to raise the next generation of doctors; I nominate you.

666. alistairConnor - 8/5/2004 8:29:42 AM

Promise Keepers. Pseud called them Premise Sweepers.

667. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 8:33:34 AM

Guess I missed that discussion....not getting it.

668. angel-five - 8/5/2004 9:33:44 AM

a) The religious right isn't a safe date.

b) I have no living children.

c) Google Promise Keepers.

669. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 9:37:06 AM

Off to google promise keepers.

Meanwhile, are you going to raise some doctors for me?
I feel chilled.

670. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 9:38:45 AM

Somebody worth a brain needs to take up that torch.

671. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 10:11:04 AM

C'mon, we all want to love the new doctors.

I'm slightly scared theren't enough to go around.

672. Ulgine Barrows - 8/5/2004 10:15:20 AM

C'mon, we all want to love the new doctors.

I'm slightly scared theren't enough to go around.

673. jexster - 8/5/2004 6:58:09 PM

Failures of Intelligence & Intelligence Failure

INTELLIGENCE
Cheney Stopped Reforms

With President Bush flip-flopping on whether to support the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, a new report from the nonpartisan Federation of American Scientists shows that the person who has blocked many similar changes is Dick Cheney. Specifically, FAS documents that in 1992, then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney refused to support many of the same intelligence reforms that the 9/11 Commission is proposing now, including the creation of a director of national intelligence. While the President has offered rhetorical support for creating the director position, top Republican Commissioner Slade Gorton said the White House's actual proposal falls far short of what the Commission recommended. (Read a bookmarked verison of the 9/11 report)

CHENEY OPPOSED CREATION OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE DIRECTOR: According to FAS, “In a March 1992 letter to Congress, Defense Secretary Cheney “defended the status quo and objected to proposed intelligence reform legislation, particularly the Director of National Intelligence position.” Cheney wrote that proposed intelligence reforms proposed by Congress "would seriously impair the effectiveness” of government and specifically opposed empowering a director of national intelligence. He wrote that such a new office would “assign inappropriate authority” to the new director and said intelligence “ must remain under the authority, direction, and control of the Secretary of Defense" (i.e. himself).

674. jexster - 8/5/2004 6:58:16 PM



CHENEY ISSUED VETO THREAT: In his letter, Cheney not only voiced opposition to the plan, but threatened to put the full weight of the first Bush administration behind stopping them. He wrote, "I would recommend that the President veto [the measure] if [it] were presented to him in its current form." As FAS notes, “Cheney's unyielding opposition stifled the first initiative for post-Cold War intelligence reform. As a result, we now face many of the same problems, and the same proposed solutions, more than a decade later.”
Center for American Progress

675. jexster - 8/5/2004 10:51:11 PM

"In the lead up to the Iraq war and its later conduct, I saw at a minimum, true dereliction, negligence and irresponsibility, at worse, lying, incompetence and corruption." -- Marine General (Retired) Anthony Zinni, former commander in chief of U.S. Central Command; in the book about his career, “Battle Ready,” published May 2004

"I believe we are absolutely on the brink of failure. We are looking into the abyss." -- General Joseph Hoar, a former commander in chief of U.S. Central Command; testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, May 20, 2004

676. jexster - 8/6/2004 11:06:12 AM

Did Bush Terror Warnings Blow Cover of Double Agent Inside Al Qaeda?


Looks like he did it again

677. robertjayb - 8/6/2004 4:41:27 PM

Have a nice weekend...

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Assailants in Iraq killed three U.S. servicemen, one in the capital and two in the south of the troubled country, the U.S. command said Saturday.

Two Marines from the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit were killed on Friday "as a result of enemy action" in Najaf province, south of the capital, the military said in a statement.

In western Baghdad, an insurgent fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a patrolling U.S. vehicle, killing one soldier, the military said.

678. robertjayb - 8/7/2004 7:56:08 PM

Be more afraid! This is an order!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States has received information about additional possible terror targets in the country, including the U.S. Capitol in Washington, a counterterror official said on Sunday.

Homeland security adviser Frances Townsend said on CBS' "Face the Nation" the targets were in addition to the five cited last week when the terror threat alert was raised to the second-highest level for financial buildings in Washington, New York and Newark, New Jersey.

679. judithathome - 8/7/2004 8:02:50 PM

That's okay...we're going to turn a corner in September!

September Is National Preparedness Month!

Using the threat of terrorism to scare voters: all of September will be "National Preparedness Month"

680. robertjayb - 8/7/2004 10:58:22 PM

Warrant issued for Chalabi, nephew

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq has issued an arrest warrant for Ahmad Chalabi, a former governing council member, on counterfeiting charges and another for Salem Chalabi, the head of Iraq's special tribunal, on murder charges, Iraq's chief investigating judge said Sunday.

The warrant was a new sign of the fall of Ahmad Chalabi from the centers of power. Chalabi, a longtime exile opposition leader, had been a favorite of many in the Pentagon but fell out with the Americans in the weeks before the U.S. occgupation ended in June.




His nephew, Salem Chalabi, heads the tribunal that is due to try Saddam on war crimes charges.

``They should be arrested and then questioned and then we will evaluate the evidence, and then if there is enough evidence, they will be sent to trial,'' said Judge Zuhair al-Maliky.

681. judithathome - 8/7/2004 11:07:12 PM

Wonder if they will allow them to have lawyers?

682. Magoseph - 8/7/2004 11:29:12 PM

They will have a hard time to find them.

683. jexster - 8/8/2004 2:33:35 PM

I think the vendetta against Chalabi is CIA inspired. That's what they are saying on Fox News.

Allawi CIA/Baathist assassin
Chalabi - Freedom Fighting Shiite,

Allawi- Man of the Bad Bush
Chalabi - Man of the People


and besides Bush appointed Salem to prosecute Saddam....


Is Bush setting up to release Saddam to crush the insurgency, send the fundie foreign terrorists packing?


Allaw, Baathist killer to the core, just a warm up for the Comeback Kid???

684. wonkers2 - 8/8/2004 2:40:40 PM

Sounds like we have found a reasonable facsimile of Saddam Hussein!

685. jexster - 8/8/2004 2:44:47 PM

Naah...He's Baath-lite nowadays...but once that election unravels, I think he's got potential to gas his own people as Bush is wont to say these days...


Kerry's pussy footing on this issue to Nixonian for me...he ought to rip Bush up one side and down the other on a) the decision to go to war b) and the likelihood that Bush has screwed things up FUBAR

686. jexster - 8/8/2004 2:51:45 PM

Promise Keepers


The Right wing sure loves their holier than thou slogans...But ever notice how little concern they have for hypocrisy?

Promise Keepers - piece of cake, load of crap


Fraid they don't even manage to keep premises AC


687. jexster - 8/8/2004 3:02:11 PM

Thank God this one was BornAgain and left the Church!!!


KENNEBUNKPORT, Maine President Bush and his family went to church together today -- and heard a sermon that urged the wealthy to dump their worldly possessions.

The three generations in the Bush family attended Episcopal services near their Maine seaside estate.

The Very Reverend Martin Luther Agnew told the affluent congregation that "what we keep owns us, and what we give away sets us free."




Boob in Chief with Stepford Wife - Promise Keeper

688. jexster - 8/8/2004 3:21:05 PM


Bush Family Vacation Parish in the Bunk Port




At 21, too old for the Big Fat Bush BattleAxe to abuse him, just old enough to get shit faced, Little Georgie Spent Many Happy Days in a Bottle Here -



Bush Ancestral Vacation Home, Port of Bunk Maine where Little Boy Bushie learnt the fine arts of doling public largesse and tax welfare to the Big Buck Base -


[The Real Base Kully that sorry ass bunch of tent revival rejects from Armpit AL]




Summer Time and the Livin Used to Be Easy

Before Bush the Bold took to armadillo ranching on the Texas prairie

689. jexster - 8/8/2004 3:49:17 PM

In 2000 "help was on the way"

For 2004 the First Sloganeer has reached into his big bag of sacharine slogans and served up


"Results Matter!"

Are those tasty words to eat or what!


The Taliban Can
Taliban Maintains Grip Rooted in Fear
In Afghan Mountains, U.S. Forces Face Elusive Foe Bent on Disrupting Elections


Anonymous of Imperial HUbris fame speaking of the burgeoning insurgency in Afghanistan, described the War of the Trifecta as lurching toward another lose lose. He predicted that as a highly unstable situation grew worse the US would be forced to send more troops, good fodder after bad


Anonymous is getting head shed flak for his interviews at CIA.

He also told reporters that the Iraq Bungle Iraq was the best thing that has ever happened to Osama and his fellow traveler jihadista

690. jexster - 8/9/2004 3:20:29 PM

IAEA Report on IraN: No Nukes, Good News
Condimima Rice Lied Day before Yesterday


Well damn...another Bush lie..whoda thunk it

691. jexster - 8/9/2004 3:28:22 PM

New Europe Schmew Europe...Pollacks Pull Back...Coitus Bushus Interruptus in IraQ

WARSAW (AFP) - Polish troops in Iraq (news - web sites) have handed over part of the zone they administer to US forces, including the province of Najaf where more than 360 Shiite militiamen have been killed in recent fighting, the PAP news agency said.


AFP/File Photo



The handover also covers the province of al-Qadisiyah and was carried out following an order taken by US General George Casey, according to a Polish army spokesman quoted by the agency.


WARSAW (AFP) - Polish troops in Iraq (news - web sites) have handed over part of the zone they administer to US forces, including the province of Najaf where more than 360 Shiite militiamen have been killed in recent fighting, the PAP news agency said.


AFP/File Photo



The handover also covers the province of al-Qadisiyah and was carried out following an order taken by US General George Casey, according to a Polish army spokesman quoted by the agency.


The handover coincides with an official visit to Washington by Polish Prime Minister Marek Belka to discuss the Polish military presence in Iraq.


"


According to a latest poll here, almost three-quarters of Poles are against their forces' involvement in the stabilisation mission in Iraq. The figure is now 73 percent against compared to 67 percent in June.

692. jexster - 8/9/2004 3:58:25 PM

The New York Times today confirms what we have long known and what Anonymous CIA has also claimed...

Houston we have a failure...

New Leadership of Al Qaeda Emerging

One word
IraQ

693. judithathome - 8/9/2004 4:21:17 PM

Jex, have you heard about this yet?

There are tapes showing Al Qaeda types filming inside and outside of the MGM Grand, Excalibur and New York New York casinos - casing the joints in 2002 - and the FBI decided (I think along with the mayor) that too much money flows thru that city for it to get out that the city was under surveillance.

Must have listened to BushCo when he urged everyone to go out and shop a few days after 9/11.

694. judithathome - 8/9/2004 4:21:49 PM

That city being Las Vegas.

695. jexster - 8/9/2004 5:51:28 PM

From the Coalition of the Wilting -Pollack PM: We Ain't Stayin in Bush's Bloody Shithole Forever

Unfortunately, we are.

696. jexster - 8/9/2004 6:02:53 PM

I heard that on the local news last night...I am not impressed with ANY terror alerts or other info that comes out of the Bush Regime ...that's not good..there are millions just like me.

But I did see a pretty good TV series last night.."The Grid" on TNT

Now up front, I am not one for terror fear mongering and chador-veiled Muslim bashing and yes any show of this sort is only on the air because its producers are pandering to these exact fears..

That said, the show is excellent..the continuing story of CIA and SAS guys working undercover trying to infiltrate terror cells..much on location in Beruit, Amman, London..Arabic spoken with subtitles..lots of action and drama..very good character development...worth watching definitely

697. jexster - 8/9/2004 6:04:11 PM

Watch carefully..the program is a subtle indictment of the misguided reckless policies of the present regime

698. thoughtful - 8/9/2004 6:13:59 PM

I heard that and saw the video of las vegas supposedly taken by al qaeda. Hahahaha! If al qaeda wants trouble such as it's never seen, all it needs to do is rile the mob!

699. thoughtful - 8/9/2004 6:15:43 PM

And reading about the taliban reminded me...we just bought a toyota tacoma pickup. hubby figured if it's the truck of choice for the taliban trying to get around in the wild mountains of afghanistan, it ought to hold up on our streets.

700. jexster - 8/9/2004 6:44:59 PM

Neato pic from last week's Believe in America (Again) Tour...the picture reflects reports from virtually everyone on the campaign press (bus, plane, Train) that large, highly enthusiastic, and very pissed off crowds of folks greeted what appears to have been a very successful campaign event.

In fact, at the two or three points where the shadowing Imperial Embassy came close to the Tour Kerry Krowds outnumbered BushieWorlders by as much as 5 to 1.

701. robertjayb - 8/9/2004 6:54:00 PM

Caution, jexster. You are too old a dawg with too much milage to get carried away by the size of campaign crowds.

But it is fun.

702. jexster - 8/9/2004 6:57:06 PM

Dat boy ain't no fool...

Powell Won't Attend Republican Convention

703. jexster - 8/9/2004 6:58:44 PM

Its E-level that counts...

If you watched Gore's Last Stand in Pgh on Election Morning in 2000 you know what I mean..

I did having attended at Big Dog Show the day before...

704. jexster - 8/9/2004 7:02:49 PM

Wait til the Boss hits the Road in Oct!!!

E-levels off scale

705. jexster - 8/9/2004 7:55:28 PM

Jon Stewart did a number on these Bush scumbags who of course never served with Kerry except as Stewart put in the sense that Snoopy served with the Red Baron...



Bill Clinton followed to remind everyone of what gutter trash that is the Bush legion..this bucket of scum were the same ones that accused John McCain in the 2000 SC primary of being a traitor and birthin a black baby





So many disputes about John Kerry's military service record that even the 'wingers can't sort them all out ...

Deborah Orin, 8/5/04, New York Post: "The book, by Vietnam vet John O'Neill who served with Kerry, adds: 'What [Kerry's] fellow Swiftees concluded was that Kerry had a very high regard for his own wellbeing and very little nerve for facing serious combat.'

Luiza Ch. Savage, 5/5/04, New York Sun: "Mr. O'Neill did not serve with Mr. Kerry, but took over his boat several months after Mr. Kerry left Vietnam."

-- Josh Marshall

706. jexster - 8/10/2004 12:41:50 PM

PROMISE KEEPERS REDUX

Operation Iraqi Freedom what a joke!

Iraqi National Congress Office Closed

Al-Hayat reports via Agence France Presse that the head of the office of Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress in Baghdad has been told by the caretaker Iraqi government that he had 24 hours to close the office.

Ahmad Chalabi and his nephew Salem, previously darlings of the US Department of Defense, now face arrest for money laundering and murder, respectively.

It is one thing for an individual politician to be arrested. It is another for a political party to be targetted. Tuesday's report sounds like the second, and if it is true, it seems to be another indication that Iraq under US auspices is slipping back into dictatorial methods.

Ahmad Chalabi gave an interview on al-Jazeerah Tuesday in which he said that the US came to Iraq as liberators, but within a couple of months had become occupiers. He condemned the massive US military operations in Najaf and said that although he was sure he could play a mediating role to end the crisis, he realized that he would not be allowed to do so.

Al-Jazeerah also reported that Iraqi Minister of Justice, Malik Dohan al-Hasan, has threatened to resign unless the judge who indicted the Chalabis is fired. Al-Hasan has also expressed sympathy for the Mahdi Army members in Najaf.


posted by Juan @ 8/11/2004 07:02:45 AM

707. robertjayb - 8/10/2004 7:08:19 PM

Billmon's Whiskey Bar has a longish, well-linked piece on Porter Goss, dubya's man for the CIA.

708. jexster - 8/10/2004 8:28:02 PM

That is SUCH a scam! The Democrats have a grand oppo to burn some Bush if they play it right

First of all, it is obvious that Bush is using this to deflect attention from the 911 report recommendations that he does not wish to implement

Second, it is obvious that Bush wants political control of the CIA..a battle he and Cheney and the neocons have been waging now for over 3 years

Third, it is obvious that Congress in the election year session will not have time to accomodate a nomination fight and new intel legislation. In fact they do not have enough time to do EITHER.

So..don't give Bush an inch..provoke on HUGE fight over Goss in which Democrat slam Bush for his intell lies and failures and also his power grab and also his refusal to adopt 911 reforms

Fillibuster the nomination to death and use the Senate Rules to do what the Senate Fillibuster procedure is intended for - focusing public attention to Congressional debate.

Have the Congressional DEms the guts to do this?

709. jexster - 8/10/2004 8:28:56 PM

Bhutto Says Busharaff's Government May be Staging Phony Terrorist Attacks

710. jayackroyd - 8/10/2004 8:47:46 PM

MoveOn has commissioned Errol Morris to interview Bush voters who are switching to Kerry in 04. They will air some of the thirty second ads resulting from the interview during the republican convention. Several of them are very good.

711. jexster - 8/10/2004 9:52:20 PM

Bush sure did reach down to the very bottom of his sewer to get these guys...

Anti-Kerry Book Author Sorry for Slurs

Tue Aug 10, 7:15 PM ET

By JENNIFER C. KERR, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - One of the authors of a new anti-John Kerry (news - web sites) book frequently posted comments on a conservative Web site describing Muslims and Catholics as pedophiles and Pope John Paul (news - web sites) II as senile.



But as he prepared to launch the book, "Unfit for Command," Jerry Corsi apologized for the remarks in an interview with The Associated Press Tuesday, saying they were meant as a joke and he never intended to offend anyone.


In chat room entry last year on freerepublic.com, Corsi writes: "Islam is a peaceful religion — just as long as the women are beaten, the boys buggered and the infidels are killed."


In another entry, he says: "So this is what the last days of the Catholic Church are going to look like. Buggering boys undermines the moral base and the lawyers rip the gold off the Vatican (news - web sites) altars. We may get one more Pope, when this senile one dies, but that's probably about it."


Corsi, who described himself as a "devout Catholic," said the comments are being taken out of context. "I considered them a joke," said Corsi, who owns a financial services company and has written extensively on the anti-war movement.

712. jexster - 8/10/2004 9:53:28 PM

Jay I was hopin to see that ...it was a busted link a few days ago..thanks for heads up

713. robertjayb - 8/10/2004 11:09:31 PM

Speaking of GOP hit-men, a state trooper who became a paid accuser of Clinton in Arkansas (Remember the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy?) recently copped to perjury in another matter. The tale was published in The Northwest Arkansas something.

714. arkymalarky - 8/11/2004 12:02:23 AM

When you just have to have Arkansas Democrat-Gazette quality (hack, cough) news

715. arkymalarky - 8/11/2004 12:02:41 AM

online, that is.

716. jexster - 8/11/2004 12:19:55 AM

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pentagon (news - web sites) auditors have concluded that Halliburton Co. failed to adequately account for more than $1.8 billion of work in Iraq (news - web sites) and Kuwait, the Wall Street Journal said on Wednesday, citing a Pentagon report.

The amount represents 43 percent of the $4.18 billion that Houston-based Halliburton's Kellogg Brown & Root unit has billed the Pentagon to feed and house troops in the region, the newspaper said.

717. jexster - 8/11/2004 12:20:56 AM

Let's Put the DEMOCRAT back in Arkansas..damnit

718. jexster - 8/11/2004 1:39:28 AM

Pants on Fire Award Winner

LONDON (AFP) - Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) gave up all of Iraq (news - web sites)'s weapons of mass destruction in the wake of the 1991 Gulf War (news - web sites), the scientist who headed his nuclear programme, Jaffar Dhia Jaffar, said in a BBC interview.


"There was no capability. There was no chemical or biological or any what are called weapons of mass destruction," said Jaffar in what BBC television called his first-ever broadcast interview.


NO TRUTH...NO POINT...NO NOTHIN

719. jexster - 8/11/2004 2:56:27 AM

Democrats Plan to Use Goss Nomination Hearings and Confirmation Vote to Air Bush Intelligence Failures and Rebuff of 9/11 Commission


Reason for cautious optimism...these folks made lots of noise about standing up to Bush in July 02

720. jexster - 8/11/2004 3:48:26 AM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Congressman Porter Goss, President Bush (news - web sites)'s nominee for CIA (news - web sites) director, could be his own worst enemy when it comes to making the case that he deserves to lead the U.S. intelligence agency.



"I couldn't get a job with CIA today. I am not qualified," the Florida Republican told documentary-maker Michael Moore's production company during the filming of the anti-Bush movie "Fahrenheit 9/11."


A day after Bush picked Goss for the top U.S. spy job, Moore Wednesday released an excerpt from a March 3 interview in which the 65-year-old former House of Representatives intelligence chief recounts his lack of qualifications for employment as a modern CIA staffer.


"I don't have the language skills. I, you know, my language skills were romance languages and stuff. We're looking for Arabists today. I don't have the cultural background probably," Goss is quoted in an interview transcript.

721. robertjayb - 8/11/2004 7:18:44 AM

WaPo editors admit botched war, WMD coverage...

Are these toadies to power having a come-to-Jesus experience? Do they sense something in the air? Are there tremors beneath their feet?

The Post on WMDs: An Inside Story...

Days before the Iraq war began, veteran Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus put together a story questioning whether the Bush administration had proof that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction.

But he ran into resistance from the paper's editors, and his piece ran only after assistant managing editor Bob Woodward, who was researching a book about the drive toward war, "helped sell the story," Pincus recalled. "Without him, it would have had a tough time getting into the paper." Even so, the article was relegated to Page A17.





722. jexster - 8/11/2004 5:49:01 PM

Bring Them Home NOW!

Baghdad Set to Explode

"All we want is to make our country stable," said Shamari, a slight 23-year-old. "I think the only solution is to make the coalition forces leave Iraq. Today is like a day off. . . . There are no police in the street."

723. jexster - 8/11/2004 6:02:42 PM

Now WHERE have we heard THAT before?

Oh yeah..

Debray, Régis. "The indispensable nation," Harper's (1/04):15-18. Incisive critical commentary on America's imperial pretension & the impossibility of its success, from Paris Le Figaro (9/5/03).

724. jexster - 8/11/2004 6:32:09 PM


BAGHDAD — With its twin minarets and glinting gold dome, the Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf has been a beacon for the Muslim faithful for more than a thousand years. But with fighting raging around the Iraqi shrine, one of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam is reprising a different historical role: rallying point against foreign forces.





In 1920, rebels intent on kicking out British troops occupying the region gathered at the mosque and readied for revolt. Among their leaders was Sayyid Mohammed Sadr — the scion of a prominent Shiite family and a future prime minister.


Eighty-four years later, cleric Muqtada Sadr, one of Sadr's descendants, wants the U.S. military out. All eyes are once again trained on the shrine, where a final showdown between Muqtada Sadr's militia and American troops may yet take place.


World's Shiites Warn That U.S. Is Treading on Sensitive Ground

725. jexster - 8/12/2004 12:07:12 AM

The Next Lie to Die: Iraq's sovereignty
Hopes raised by power handover fading fast

726. jexster - 8/12/2004 1:02:10 AM

Half of Najaf City Council Resigns - Basra "could become another Najaf

727. jexster - 8/12/2004 1:49:24 AM

The Most Inept Military Leadership Since Madison Let the Brits Burn Washington

Dr. Cole:

Some readers have written to ask if I think the Bush administration is deliberately provoking Iran, in hopes of widening the war and getting a pretext to attack Tehran.

I don't know what in the world they are thinking. All I know is that they are acting in a hamfisted manner that is endangering the United States in the medium term for no good reason.

On Thursday, the Board of Muslim Clergy, a Sunni fundamentalist organization with substantial support from Sunni Muslims, issued a fatwa or ruling that no Iraqi Muslim may participate in an attack on other Iraqi Muslims in support of the occupying power. That is, even the hard line Sunnis, who mostly don't like Shiites, are siding with Muqtada against Allawi and Rumsfeld on this one

728. jexster - 8/12/2004 2:19:25 AM

Spies Like Goss - Political Hack

729. jexster - 8/12/2004 3:16:40 AM

WaPo Confession:
Aiding and Abetting Bush's Criminal Aggression

Admits to Underplaying Stories About Bogus Bush Claims

730. jexster - 8/12/2004 3:55:13 AM

MOSAIC of EVIL



The Politics of Truth - Joe Wilson's Website

"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
President George W. Bush, 1/28/2003

"The truth is, the administration has never leveled with the American people on the war with Iraq."
Joseph Wilson, 9/14/03


731. robertjayb - 8/12/2004 5:09:19 AM

Chalabi stenographer Judith Miller is subpoenaed...

A reporter for The New York Times, Judith Miller, was subpoenaed yesterday by a Washington grand jury investigating the disclosure of the identity of a C.I.A. undercover officer to the syndicated columnist Robert Novak and other journalists.

The subpoena to Ms. Miller was only the most recent of a series issued to journalists in a politically sensitive inquiry that has on several occasions led investigators to question White House officials.

732. judithathome - 8/12/2004 5:16:40 AM

Sensitive? Isn't that what Cheney blasted Kerry for? Robert, check out News and answer me there!

733. jexster - 8/12/2004 9:11:52 AM

See Elections thread for the Bush sensitivity group!


Sayyid Moqtada Sadr Wounded - Shiites About to Blow - Cole


Note that al-Shinabi called him "Sayyid" Muqtada. A Sayyid is a putative descendant of the Prophet Muhammad. Sayyids have a special status in Muslim societies, and even moreso in Shiite Islam. Tribesman see Sayyids as almost magical purveyors of blessings from God.

Muqtada al-Sadr is not just any Sayyid. He is the son of Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr

A panel of four on the NewsHour, a prof from USF, a journalist from IraQ, an ex-army col and some hack who used to work with the cpa..

The hack predictably towed the Imperial propaganda line, the funny thing though was how the other 3 totally ignored the guy.. It was as if he wasn't there.


NewsHour so polite

734. jexster - 8/12/2004 5:05:50 PM

The Emperor and his Little Saddam are turning Sadr into the closest thing Muslims have to a saint.

Protests Erupt All Over IraQ in Support of Sayyid Sadr

735. jexster - 8/12/2004 6:26:15 PM

God these Bushies are stupid

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Mass protests against the U.S. assault on the sacred Shi'ite Muslim city of Najaf broke out in five Iraqi cities on Friday, with some demonstrators calling for interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi to step down.


In one of the biggest protests, enraged Iraqis in the southern town of Diwaniya swarmed over the local office of his political party, ripping down signs and throwing rocks.

736. jexster - 8/12/2004 7:29:05 PM

Cheney's 'Sensitive' Hypocrisy

In yet another effort to put politics over substance, Vice President Dick Cheney yesterday blasted Sen. John Kerry (D) for his comments earlier this week insisting that America must be more "sensitive" to allies and American citizens' concerns in the "war on terror." Cheney's retort: "America has been in too many wars for any of our wishes, but not a one of them was won by being sensitive." He went on: "A 'sensitive war' will not destroy the evil men who killed 3,000 Americans and who seek the chemical, nuclear and biological weapons to kill hundreds of thousands more." Cheney's attack could have been leveled at himself and others in the Bush administration, both of whom have frequently used the "s" word. See these other examples of how Cheney's cheap political attack contradicts his own stated positions on military affairs and social issues.

PRESIDENT BUSH STRESSES NEED TO BE "SENSITIVE" IN MILTARY AFFAIRS:

SPECIAL FORCES STATE NEED TO FIGHT "SENSITIVE WAR ON TERRORISM":

VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY SAYS MILITARY MUST NOT BE INSENSITIVE:

RUMSFELD STRESSES NEED TO BE "SENSITIVE" IN THE WAR:

GEN. RICHARD MYERS SAYS MILITARY NEEDS TO BE "SENSITIVE" IN WAR:

GEN. TOMMY FRANKS SAID THE WHITE HOUSE MADE SURE TO BE "SENSITIVE":


ASHCROFT CLAIMS THE ADMINISTRATION IS BEING "SENSITIVE" IN WAR ON TERROR:

CHENEY & LOTT URGE MILITARY TO BE SENSITIVE IN CONDUCTING WAR:


CHENEY SAYS PENTAGON MUST BE "SENSITIVE" IN DEVELOPING WEAPONS:

WOLFOWITZ SAYS MILITARY MUST BE "SENSITIVE" IN WAR ON TERROR:

737. robertjayb - 8/12/2004 7:42:36 PM

Well done goodfriend jexster.

738. jexster - 8/12/2004 7:45:54 PM

I wish the hell Kerry's Kampaign would fire this off for the cameras...shit some Talk Show this Sunday would be perfect!

739. jexster - 8/12/2004 7:52:00 PM

Ten Senior Military Officials Respond to Cheney Personal Attacks


Ten senior military officials released the following statement in response to the Vice President’s attacks on John Kerry on Thursday:

“We are deeply disappointed by the tone and tenor of President Bush and Vice President Cheney’s personal attacks on John Kerry, a decorated combat veteran who served his country with courage and honor. John Kerry is talking about his plan to address the most pressing issues facing our nation – jobs, the economy, health care, the war on terror, the war in Iraq. George Bush and Dick Cheney have chosen take their campaign to the gutter. We call on President Bush and Vice President Cheney to stop the irresponsible personal attacks and tell us where they want to take the country. Tell us how they plan to win the peace in Iraq. Tell us how they plan to get us back on track with the war on terror. Tell us where they plan to lead the country. The American people and our troops deserve better.”

Signed by:

Admiral William J. Crowe (United States Navy, Retired)

Admiral Stansfield Turner (United States Navy, Retired)

General Wesley K. Clark (United States Army, Retired)

General Merrill “Tony” A. McPeak (United States Air Force, Retired)

General Joseph Hoar (United States Marine Corps, Retired)

General Johnnie E. Wilson (United States Army, Retired)

Vice Admiral Lee F. Gunn (United States Navy, Retired)

Lieutenant General Claudia J. Kennedy (United States Army, Retired)

Lieutenant General Donald Kerrick (United States Army, Retired)

Lieutenant General Edward D. Baca

740. Absensia - 8/12/2004 8:04:57 PM

Last night on Larry King, Bush said he had not seen the negative ads about Kerry and his military service. LIAR!

741. jexster - 8/12/2004 8:41:00 PM

Shiites Call for Split from Baghdad

742. jexster - 8/12/2004 9:14:19 PM

Update on the Coalition of the Wilting

Countries with troops in Mess-opotamia:
United States: 138,000


United Kingdom: 9,000


Italy: 3,000


Poland: 2,400


Ukraine: 1,576


Netherlands: 1,400


Romania: 700


South Korea (news - web sites): 660; additional 3,000 troops being sent to northern Iraq


Denmark: 500


Japan: 500


Bulgaria: 480


El Salvador (news - web sites): 380


Australia: 300


Hungary: 300





Mongolia: 173

Azerbaijan: 151

Georgia: 150

Portugal: 120

Latvia: 116

Slovakia: 105

Czech Republic: 90

Lithuania: 90

Albania: 71

New Zealand: 60

Estonia: 45

Kingdom of Tonga: 44

Macedonia: 35

Kazakhstan: 27

Moldova: 12

___

Countries that are withdrawing or have withdrawn troops:

Thailand: 423 troops leaving early on Aug. 31 instead of Sept. 20; 20 withdrawn on Aug. 10.

Norway: 10 currently in Iraq; 140 withdrawn on June 30. Cited reason: growing domestic opposition and peacekeepers needed elsewhere, such as Afghanistan (news - web sites).

Dominican Republic: 302 withdrawn on May 4. Cited reason: growing domestic opposition.

Honduras: 370 withdrawn on May 12. Cited reason: Troops were sent for reconstruction, not combat.

Nicaragua: 115 withdrawn on Feb. 4. Cited reason: lack of funds.

Philippines: 51 withdrawn on July 19. Cited reason: to save lives of hostages.

Singapore: 160 withdrawn on April 4. Cited reason: completed humanitarian mission.

Spain: 1,300 withdrawn on May 4. Cited reason: new government fulfilled campaign pledge.




743. jexster - 8/12/2004 9:20:26 PM

Have the Americans created Muqtada as a contender [for power in IraQ]by attacking him since last April?

744. jexster - 8/12/2004 11:45:28 PM

Who's afraid of the Bad Bush?


Around 2,000 demonstrators marched under the blazing sun to Najaf from the twin city of Kufa, straight through the US and Iraqi lines to the holy Imam Ali shrine, a Mehdi Army bastion since its spring uprising against US-led troops.


Showered with sweets and water, they embraced militiamen.


"All of us are soldiers of Moqtada Sadr. With our blood and our soul, we serve you Ali," chanted the demonstrators, none of whom were carrying weapons.


Militiamen refused 5,000 dinar notes being handed out by one man, waving him off. "We are mujahedeen," or holy fighters, one of them said, as the man desperately tried to shove the money into their pockets.


Sadr Lays Down Demands as Oil Prices Soar

745. jexster - 8/12/2004 11:47:10 PM

Only 46.58 in NyC...maybe the Republican delegates can take a few bbl home as gifts


Do I hear 50?

746. jexster - 8/13/2004 12:03:33 AM

No Way Out
Is there any hope of avoiding catastrophe in IraQ?

747. jexster - 8/13/2004 12:31:44 AM

"The truly scary thing is that we cannot imagine just how very BAD the very best of our optionis truly is" Jexster, 4/04



"The dismaying, frightening thing is how imponderably difficult it will be simply to avoid catastrophe" Fred Kaplan 8/13:

748. Ulgine Barrows - 8/13/2004 7:18:58 AM

Kerry is scrumptious.

749. Ulgine Barrows - 8/13/2004 8:46:52 AM

Two hangmen hanging from a tree,
That don't bother me
At all

-Mason Profit

750. jexster - 8/13/2004 1:15:25 PM

How bout fat baby face Aryab radicals?


[Cole]Muqtada to Allawi: Resign!

In a press conference on Friday, Muqtada al-Sadr called on the caretaker government of Iyad Allawi to resign: "I advise the dictatorial, agent government to resign ... the whole Iraqi people demands the resignation of the government ... they replaced Saddam (Hussein) with a government worse than him."

Muqtada seemed to accept the current de facto truce in Najaf, but warned that his militia would fight to the death rather than leave Najaf. A spokesman conveyed Sadr's sentiments: "I will not leave this holy city . . . We will remain here defending the holy shrines till victory or martyrdom."

The report also notes, "Sadr urged supporters in other cities in central and southern Iraq to continue their uprising, saying the truce was restricted to Najaf."

Obviously, Allawi and the Americans have Muqtada right where he wants them.

751. jexster - 8/13/2004 1:16:08 PM

Ayrabs too!

752. jexster - 8/13/2004 1:23:07 PM

As Perils Grow in IraQ Sayyid Moqtada Sadr orders Kidnapped Briton's release ordered by Sadr
The journalist kidnapped in Basra was then freed even as MuqieT calls for fight to the death.


Vote for a Man of Principle a Man Without Sensititivy a Man Who Just Tells Bush to Piss Up a Rope

Muqtada for Imperial IraQi JURISPRUDENT!

753. jexster - 8/13/2004 1:57:42 PM

To the shores of Tripoli...

there were large demonstrations in Iraq and throughout the Middle East on Friday protesting the US assault on Najaf.

Protesters at a large rally in Diwaniya occupied and attacked the office of Iyad Allawi's party, the Iraqi Naitonal Accord. There were also big crowds at Baghdad, Kufa and Samawa. Even strongly Sunni Fallujah had a demosntration in favor of him. At Hilla, the Polish troops are surrounded at the police station and may need the Aemricans to come rescue them. The big crowds chanted, ""Long live Sadr. Falluja stands by Najaf against America."

There were also big demonstrations in all the major Iranian cities. In Lebanon's strongly Sunni Tripoli, anti-American protests were held over Najaf. Cole

754. jexster - 8/13/2004 9:55:45 PM

Bush's "Democracy" Bullshit:
Those they can't co-opt, they destroy

Najaf proves that the US will never allow democracy to flourish in Iraq


The US military offensive against Najaf is a dangerous and ill-judged escalation, revealing the violent reality of an occupation that has undergone only cosmetic change since the supposed handover of power to an interim Iraqi administration in June.


755. jexster - 8/14/2004 2:22:09 AM

If it seems that Bush's IraQ policy is set according to Bush slogans and talking points, that may be because it is true.


Among many examples in "A Year in Fallujah", an article from the June issue of Harpers, the reporter is talking to his friend Muhammed, a resistance fighter. Muhammed recounted how he and some of his friends came into posssession of RPG's, artillery shells and SAM-7 missiles - they just walked up to the gate of the ammo dump at the airbase on the outskirts of town and asked for them - practically...

The US soldiers who had been conditioned by Bush lies asked cheerily "So you Ali Baba?"

"yes we are"

And the troops who thought that the IraQi population had arisen en masse with candy and flowers also thought that these guys were coming to destroy Saddam's army.


Sheesh

Lies have consequences

756. jexster - 8/14/2004 2:59:03 AM

Imam Ali Shrine



757. jexster - 8/14/2004 3:25:43 AM

Seyyid Muqtada sez:"Al-isti`mar wa al-istikbar (Cole)




Muthah Fuckah!

758. jexster - 8/14/2004 4:39:17 AM

And while Bush fiddle fucks in IraQ and Muqtada declares victory over imperialism...

Al Qaeda Showing New Life
U.S. Surprised(!!!) by Signs of Regrouping

759. robertjayb - 8/14/2004 5:29:05 AM

Just watched the "Fog of War" DVD on Robert McNamara. Heartbreaking, infuriating, and sickeningly reflective of the events of today.

760. wonkers2 - 8/14/2004 1:03:38 PM

Everyone should watch this great documentary. In many ways the resemblance between McNamara during Vietnam and Rumsfeld is striking. They are both very bright and very arrogant men. Not always a good combination.

761. jexster - 8/14/2004 5:09:04 PM

BAGHDAD (AFP) - A national conference, hailed as Iraq (news - web sites)'s first experiment in democracy for decades, got off to a rocky start when more than 100 delegates walked out to protest against fighting in the holy city of Najaf.

Dozens of people leapt out of their seats as soon as UN special envoy to Iraq Ashraf Jehangir Qazi finished his opening speech. "As long as there are air strikes and shelling we can't have a conference," some shouted on Sunday.


Iraqi "Conference" Off to Rocky Start

762. jexster - 8/14/2004 5:37:03 PM

Juan Cole It takes a Following to Make an Ayatollah, an op-ed in today's Post looks at Sistani and IraQi shiism.

763. jexster - 8/14/2004 8:15:09 PM

Lies have consequences not only for Bush but for Kerry as well.


Josh Marshall nicely sums my bitch with Kerry then and now...



That doesn't mean that Kerry is in the clear on any legitimate criticism. But ironically the best argument against Kerry's position is one that is simply off-limits to the president -- namely, that Kerry should have or perhaps did know that the president was lying when he said he needed the muscle of the resolution to force the inspectors back in and have some hope of settling the crisis short of war.





Every working journalist should read this Kevin Drum post on John Kerry's position on the Iraq war and the Iraq war resolution. It's sad, but perhaps predictable, to see so many members of the print and electronic press getting led around by the nose by the Bush crew on this one.

764. jexster - 8/14/2004 11:13:18 PM

WASHINGTON - Increasing numbers of National Guard and Reserve troops who have returned from war in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) are encountering new battles with their civilian employers at home. Jobs were eliminated, benefits reduced and promotions forgotten.



Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the Labor Department (news - web sites) reports receiving greater numbers of complaints under a 1994 law designed to give Guard and Reserve troops their old jobs back, or provide them with equivalent positions. Benefits and raises must be protected, as if the serviceman or servicewoman had never left.


Some soldiers, however, are finding the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act can't protect them.


_Larry Gill couldn't return as a police officer in Thomasville, Ala., because a grenade injured a foot, making it impossible for him to chase criminals or duck bullets.


_Jerry Chambers, of Oberlin, Kan., discovered budget cuts had eliminated his job as a substance abuse prevention consultant.


_Ron Vander Wal, of Pollock, S.D., was originally told his job as a customer service representative was eliminated. He was hired after filing a civil lawsuit seeking damages.


mmmm...

Problems in the red state peut etre?

765. jexster - 8/15/2004 12:48:39 AM

Seyddid Muqtada Flexes Muscle: IraQ Natl Conference Repudiates Allawi

766. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:26:24 AM

Iraqi Conference on Elections Plan Sinks Into Chaos

Turning the corner

767. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:17:17 PM

LONDON (Reuters) - When it comes to American presidential elections, blue blood counts.



So say British researchers who predict Democratic challenger John Kerry (news - web sites) will oust President Bush (news - web sites) on Nov. 2 simply because he boasts more royal connections than his Republican rival.


After months of research into Kerry's ancestry, Burke's Peerage, experts on British aristocracy, reported Monday that the Vietnam war veteran is related to all the royal houses of Europe and can claim kinship with Czar Ivan "The Terrible," a previous Emperor of Byzantium and the Shahs of Persia.


Burke's director Harold Brooks-Baker said Kerry had his mother, Rosemary Forbes, to thank for most of his royal connections.


"Every maternal blood line of Kerry makes him more royal than any previous American president," Brooks-Baker said.


768. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:19:56 PM

Turkey Wins Pledge to Krush Kurds


769. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:20:19 PM

Ah Saddam we hardly knew ye

770. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:31:28 PM

Obe Juan Cole is indispensable when it comes to deconstructing US media bullshit...

The reports on CNN suggest that Allawi is on the verge of sending Iraqi troops into the Shrine of Ali in Najaf, despite any pledges he gave the delegates.

Note, too, that CNN's headline news reported repeatedly on Sunday afternoon and evening that the Mahdi Army fighters holed up in the shrine of Ali were "foreign fighters." This allegation is Allawi's propaganda, and simply untrue. The Mahdi Army are Iraqi Shiite ghetto youth. They are not foreigners. There may be a sprinkling of Iranian volunteers among them, but the number is tiny.

Likewise, CNN appears to have been the victim of a second-hand psy-ops campaign, insofar as it is referring to the guerrillas as "anti-Iraqi forces." The idea of characterizing them not as anti-American or anti-regime but "anti-Iraq" was, according to journalist Nir Rosen, come up with by a PR company contracting in Iraq. Nir says that they were told that no Iraqis would fall for it. So apparently it has now been retailed to major American news programs, on the theory that the American public is congenitally stupid.

The American public has no idea how bad it is in Iraq because it gets lots of contradictory reports and has no way of wading through or evaluating them. On the evidence of Sunday, I'd advise them to keep their eyes on what John Burns says. He is a veteran war correspondent with his eyes open. If he thinks things in Iraq are bad, they likely are.

WaPo and NYT Duel on Sigificance of National Congress

771. jexster - 8/15/2004 5:46:50 PM

Blasts Rock Najaf - 3 More US Soldiers Die for a Lie



Andrew R. Houghton died Aug. 9, 2004, at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., of injuries sustained on July 10 in Ad Dhuha, Iraq, when a rocket-propelled grenade detonated near his vehicle.

Age: 25 Hometown: Houston
Died: 08/09/2004
Service: Army Rank: Capt.
Unit: 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry, 1st Infantry Division; Schweinfurt, Germany

772. jexster - 8/15/2004 9:17:14 PM


BUSH MISLEADS ON DISTRIBUTION OF TAX CUTS

As a presidential candidate in 2000, George W. Bush pledged his tax cut proposals "are especially focused on low and moderate income families."[1]

Those proposals became law - but a new study by the non-partisan Congressional Budget office reveals that Bush mislead America about their distribution.[2]

According to the CBO study, the wealthiest 1 percent of all taxpayers - whose earnings average $1.2 million - are receiving an average tax cut of $78,420 this year.[3] Meanwhile, the middle 20 percent of taxpayers - whose
earnings average $51,000 - are getting only a $1,090 cut.[4] Those in the bottom 20% - averaging earnings of $16,620 - get just a $250 cut.[5]

The result: "President Bush's tax cuts have shifted federal tax payments from the richest Americans to a wide swath of middle-class families."[6]

Sources:

1. "A Tax Cut with a Purpose," GeorgeWBush.com, archived from 11/2000,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50505.
2. "Effective Federal Tax Rates Under Current Law, 2001 to 2014,"
Congressional Budget Office, 08/2004,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50509.
3. "Report Finds Tax Cuts Heavily Favor the Wealthy," New York Times,
08/13/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
4. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
5. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
6. "Tax Burden Shifts to the Middle," Washington Post, 08/13/04,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50507.

773. jexster - 8/15/2004 9:17:15 PM


BUSH MISLEADS ON DISTRIBUTION OF TAX CUTS

As a presidential candidate in 2000, George W. Bush pledged his tax cut proposals "are especially focused on low and moderate income families."[1]

Those proposals became law - but a new study by the non-partisan Congressional Budget office reveals that Bush mislead America about their distribution.[2]

According to the CBO study, the wealthiest 1 percent of all taxpayers - whose earnings average $1.2 million - are receiving an average tax cut of $78,420 this year.[3] Meanwhile, the middle 20 percent of taxpayers - whose
earnings average $51,000 - are getting only a $1,090 cut.[4] Those in the bottom 20% - averaging earnings of $16,620 - get just a $250 cut.[5]

The result: "President Bush's tax cuts have shifted federal tax payments from the richest Americans to a wide swath of middle-class families."[6]

Sources:

1. "A Tax Cut with a Purpose," GeorgeWBush.com, archived from 11/2000,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50505.
2. "Effective Federal Tax Rates Under Current Law, 2001 to 2014,"
Congressional Budget Office, 08/2004,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50509.
3. "Report Finds Tax Cuts Heavily Favor the Wealthy," New York Times,
08/13/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
4. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
5. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50506.
6. "Tax Burden Shifts to the Middle," Washington Post, 08/13/04,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1332742&l=50507.

774. jexster - 8/16/2004 1:09:26 AM


Aug. 16, 2004 | Last month, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld assured Americans that Iraq "continues to calm down." But the bitter reality is that America is losing the war in Iraq.


And it's not just because the interim Iraqi government can't stop the suicide bombers or prevail over the soldiers loyal to Shiite rebel leaders like Muqtada al-Sadr. It's also because neither the U.S. nor the interim Iraqi government can control the flow of Iraq's oil.

775. jexster - 8/16/2004 5:08:32 AM

Washington, D.C.: If the US were to pull out of Iraq today, what would happen? What would Iraq look like in five years?

Juan Cole:
Since the Bush administration dissolved the Iraqi army, it has left the country with no security except that provided by US troops. If the U.S. abruptly withdrew, it would probably mean chaos.

On the other hand, if the U.S. doesn't withdraw, that might mean chaos, too. I'd say there is a 50/50 chance of the Iraqis tossing the U.S. out of their country within the next two years. It could be done, via a movement like the Iranian Revolution of 1978-79.

_______________________

Charleston, W.Va.: Would you please comment on the possibility now being discussed in the Western media of the Mahdi militia transforming intself into a political party.

Juan Cole:
The Sadr movement clearly could become a parliamentary political party, and some leading members would like to move in that direction.

Muqtada, on the other hand, considers the American Occupation of Iraq illegitimate, and considers joining in ordinary politics at a time of Occupation to be morally wrong. In short, he thinks he is General DeGaulle and Allawi is playing Petain. I am not saying it is a legitimate assertion. I am simply explaining why I think it is unlikely that Muqtada can be coopted into a parliamentary process under American supervision.

_______________________


Obe Juan On Line Chat @WaPo

776. jexster - 8/16/2004 8:22:26 PM

777. jexster - 8/17/2004 4:59:03 PM

Forget the soccer team that practices in Jordan...


Seyyid Muqtada - Iraqi National Hero

778. jexster - 8/17/2004 6:54:00 PM

Of Rats and Sinking Ships




Rep. Doug Bereuter (R-NE): Bush's W-ar on IraQ was "a mistake", "not justified" and "a dangerous, costly mess."

779. jexster - 8/17/2004 6:59:01 PM

Sign him up!


"I've reached the conclusion, retrospectively, now that the inadequate intelligence and faulty conclusions are being revealed, that all things being considered, it was a mistake to launch that military action," Bereuter wrote in a letter to constituents in the final days of his congressional career.

That's especially true in view of the fact that the attack was initiated "without a broad and engaged international coalition," the 1st District congressman said.

"Knowing now what I know about the reliance on the tenuous or insufficiently corroborated intelligence used to conclude that Saddam maintained a substantial WMD (weapons of mass destruction) arsenal, I believe that launching the pre-emptive military action was not justified.

780. jexster - 8/18/2004 3:05:29 AM

MISSILE DEFENSE
Bush Misfires

Touting a program initiated twenty one years ago by Ronald Reagan for the purpose of shooting down Cold War-ra Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), President Bush accused opponents of his costly and "largely unproven" missile defense program yesterday of "living in the past." But it is Bush whose defense policies remain focused on outdated threats. While his administration continues to obsess about the threat of long range missiles much more likely to have been deployed during the Cold War, the president has underfunded Homeland Security and proposes cuts for programs meant to halt the spread of nuclear materials.

MISSILE DEFENSE "UNPROVEN": Speaking at a Boeing plant in Pennsylvania from a "platform flanked by two Chinooks," the president challenged America's enemies once again to bring it on: "We're going to do what's necessary to protect this country," he said. "We say to those tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world: you fire, we're going to shoot it down."

Hopefully, America's enemies will not take the president's latest taunt too seriously: in recent tests, prototype interceptors knocked out "enemy" missiles five out of eight times, "But critics say the tests were rigged. The targets were often equipped with homing devices that provided information an enemy would never provide, to help the interceptor spot it." A General Accountability Office (GAO) report said the eight attempted intercepts were "'repetitive and scripted,' and that critical parts of the system have yet to be flight-tested together."

781. jexster - 8/18/2004 3:11:56 AM

More on Star Wars II: Return of the Boondoggle (CAP) -

a regime that has lost its way and quite possibly a president, his mind

782. jexster - 8/18/2004 6:30:09 PM

National Council a Farce - Basra Delegates Withdraw (Cole

The national convention of some 1200 delegates to choose an interim national council was beset with several setbacks. It initially had to be postponed two weeks out of concerns that the country's political chaos were unpropitious to success. Some in the UN thought it should be postponed even further. When it met, it was beset with wrangling about how the delegates were chosen, and how to elect the 100-member National Council, not to mention mortar fire that fell nearby. It was also roiled by the crisis in Najaf, in which it attempted to intervene by acting as mediator. It is unclear whether the peace plan some of its delegates came up with will work or not.

On Wednesday, the 43 delegates from Basra angrily withdrew, complaining that they were slighted numerically. Basra has 1.3 million inhabitants, largely Shiite. That's about 5% of the population. So they should have had 60 delegates to a 1200-member body.

The slate of 81 candidates was preselected, which caused complaints and another list was put in competition. But then it was suddenly withdraw, leaving only the original pre-planned list. It was accepted by acclamation--there wasn't even a vote.

The whole performance was very little democratic, despite the media hype. The resulting National Council has authority over the budget and over appointment of cabinet and other high officials of the cartaker government. It cannot pass laws, being constrained by the ones passed by the Americans during the year they ran the country directly.

The caretaker Allawi government will likely ignore the National Council and do as it pleases.

783. robertjayb - 8/18/2004 7:02:59 PM

Satan-fighting general broke rules...(Ahh, that's okay. He's one of ours. Leave him go.)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Army general violated Pentagon rules by failing to properly clear speeches in which he described the war on terror as a Christian battle against Satan and should be punished, according to an inspector general's report obtained by Reuters on Wednesday.

The Department of Defense's watchdog agency said Lt. Gen. William Boykin, a top-ranking intelligence officer, used official data in some of the 23 religious-oriented speeches he gave after January 2002 which should have been cleared.

Boykin touched off a firestorm last October after giving speeches while in uniform in which he referred to the war on terror as a battle with Satan and said America had been targeted "because we're a Christian nation." He said later he was not anti-Islam or any other religion.

784. jexster - 8/18/2004 8:28:38 PM

Well I guess if a guy can't die to protect his country, dying to destroy the religion of a false Prophet will have to do...


BAGHDAD (AFP) - A US soldier was killed in the Baghdad stronghold of Shiite Muslim militia leader Moqtada Sadr.




The US military revealed Thursday that the soldier was killed by small arms fire at around 6:00 pm (1400 GMT) on Wednesday.


The latest death brings to two the number of US soldiers killed in the sprawling Shiite slum on Wednesday.

785. jexster - 8/18/2004 10:19:25 PM




Senators Ask Where $8.8 Bln in Iraq Funds Went



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - At least $8.8 billion in Iraqi funds that was given to Iraqi ministries by the former U.S.-led authority there cannot be accounted for, according to a draft U.S. audit set for release soon.



The audit by the Coalition Provisional Authority's own Inspector General blasts the CPA for "not providing adequate stewardship" of at least $8.8 billion from the Development Fund for Iraq (news - web sites) that was given to Iraqi ministries.


The audit was first reported on a Web site earlier this month by journalist and retired Col. David Hackworth. A U.S. official confirmed the contents of the leaked audit cited by Hackworth (www.hackworth.com) were accurate.


The development fund is made up of proceeds from Iraqi oil sales, frozen assets from foreign governments and surplus from the U.N. Oil for Food Program. Its handling has already come under fire in a U.N.-mandated audit released last month.


Among the draft audit's findings were that payrolls in Iraqi ministries under Coalition Provisional Authority control were padded with thousands of ghost employees.



Didn't go to US schools..didn't go to US Homeland security..didn't go to US police and firefighters..didn't go to Section 8 housing aid for the working poor...didn't go to higher education..didn't go to stem cell research..didn't go to US energy independence..didn't go to fighting jihad terror

786. jexster - 8/19/2004 1:22:22 AM

LONDON - Doctors working for the U.S. military in Iraq (news - web sites) collaborated with interrogators in the abuse of detainees at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison, profoundly breaching medical ethics and human rights, a bioethicist charges in The Lancet medical journal.



In a scathing analysis of the behavior of military doctors, nurses and medics, University of Minnesota professor Steven Miles calls for a reform of military medicine and an official investigation into the role played by physicians and other medical staff in the torture scandal.


He cites evidence that doctors or medics falsified death certificates to cover up homicides, hid evidence of beatings and revived a prisoner so he could be further tortured. No reports of abuses were initiated by medical personnel until the official investigation into Abu Ghraib began, he found.


"The medical system collaborated with designing and implementing psychologically and physically coercive interrogations," Miles said in this week's edition of Lancet. "Army officials stated that a physician and a psychiatrist helped design, approve and monitor interrogations at Abu Ghraib."

787. uzmakk - 8/19/2004 1:27:57 AM

What a good idea.

788. jexster - 8/19/2004 2:52:35 AM

Swift Texas Two-Step


Now, today Scott McClellan got asked about these ads again and again. And he kept refusing to answer the question, insisting on reframing the question as one about unregulated soft-money (that is, 527s) and all the "shadowy groups" that are out there attacking president. (In other words, this is no different from the Moveon ads that say Bush has piled up a deficit for our grandchildren or accusing him of misleading the country about Iraqi WMD) After hitting on the question again and again, that led to this exchange in which the Oregon incident finally gets brought up ...

Q Well, the charge, though, has been made not just in advertisements, but it has now been made directly to the President.
MR. McCLELLAN: And there have been a lot of false, negative charges made against the President by these shadowy groups. So if he would join us, we could get rid of all of this unregulated soft money activity.

Q Let me ask it this way: The President has said and believes that John Kerry served honorably in Vietnam, right?

MR. McCLELLAN: Yes, he's made that very clear. We've made it very clear that we will not make his -- will never raise questions about his service. We haven't, and we won't.

789. jexster - 8/19/2004 2:52:44 AM



Q This advertisement raises questions about his service, and in fact concludes that he served dishonorably. So the President thinks this ad is false, right?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, the issue here is these unregulated soft money groups that exist. The campaign finance reforms were passed in order to get rid of this kind of activity. Yet there is a loophole in the law, and the FEC has refused to address it. We think that all of this activity should be stopped.

Q Could I follow on that? Because what Terry seems to be getting at, what's clear from this event that Bush had last week --

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, let's not be selective here. Let's look at the overall activity that's going on by all of these shadowy groups. I think we're being a little selective right now. And Senator Kerry is being -- is trying to have it all ways, yet again. He says one thing, while his campaign goes out there and does another thing.



As I said, afraid to answer the question. Afraid to stand up. Just ... afraid.

Maybe pops can pull some strings. Remember, he used to be a congressman from Houston.

-- Josh Marshall

790. jexster - 8/19/2004 3:58:37 AM

Yes Uzzie I thought so too!



Josef Mengele
SS Photo 1938

791. jexster - 8/19/2004 4:15:26 PM

CIA Writing Adventure Novel

CIA Study on Iraq Weapons Is Off Course, Officials Say
The agency is trying to project what Hussein may have developed had the U.S. not invaded.


WASHINGTON — Having failed to find banned weapons in Iraq, the CIA is preparing a final report on its search that will speculate on what the deposed regime's capabilities might have looked like years from now if left unchecked, according to congressional and intelligence officials.

The CIA plans for the report, due next month, to project as far as 2008 what Iraq might have achieved in its illegal weapons programs if the United States had not invaded the country last year, the officials said.







The new direction of the inquiry is seen by some officials as an attempt to obscure the fact that no banned weapons — or even evidence of active programs — have been found, and instead emphasize theories that Iraq may have been planning to revive its programs.

The change in focus has angered some intelligence officials and at least one key Democrat in Congress and has brought charges of political motivation.

Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice) protested the decision in a sharply worded letter to acting CIA Director John E. McLaughlin last week. Trying to forecast Iraq's weapons capabilities four years into the future would be, "by definition, highly speculative" and "inconsistent with the original mission of the Iraq Survey Group," Harman wrote, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Times.

Such an effort would be a significant departure for a survey group whose primary mission when it was established last year was to locate and destroy stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons that the CIA and other agencies believed were hidden across Iraq.

792. jexster - 8/19/2004 4:19:16 PM

Another Bush Failure: The ME Demo Revolution



The Bush administration is facing growing criticism from both inside and outside its ranks that it has failed to move aggressively enough in the war of ideas against Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s al Qaeda and other Islamic extremist groups over the three years since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.




The Sept. 11 commission last month called for a vigorous strategy for promoting the image and democratic values of the United States around the world, and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) said yesterday that the administration is working hard on those efforts.


But Middle East experts -- and some frustrated U.S. officials -- complain that the administration has provided only limited new direction in dealing with anti-American anger among the world's 1.2 billion Muslims and is spending far too little on such efforts, particularly in contrast with the billions spent on other pressing needs, such as homeland security and intelligence.


On its boldest policy ideas, such as the Greater Middle East Democracy Initiative, the administration has limited its follow-through or deferred to the very governments that have most resisted democratic reforms, specialists and some U.S. officials say.

793. jexster - 8/19/2004 4:20:19 PM

"It's worse than failing. Failing means you tried and didn't get better. But at this point, three years after September 11, you can say there wasn't even much of an attempt, and today Arab and Muslim attitudes toward the U.S. and the degree of distrust in the U.S. are far worse than they were three years ago. Bin Laden is winning by default," said Shibley Telhami, a member of a White House-appointed advisory group on public diplomacy and Brookings Institution scholar.

794. jexster - 8/19/2004 5:18:01 PM

Friday, August 20, 2004
Breaking News: Mahdi Army Departs Shrine Obe Juan

Al-Jazeerah and the American cable news shows are reporting that Mahdi Army fighters handed over the keys of the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf to a representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and departed it overnight. Iraqi police are said to have entered the shrine.

However, the Mahdi militia has not laid down its arms as demanded by Allawi and the Americans, and heavy fighting is still reported in parts of Najaf. Dozens of persons have been killed both in Najaf and in East Baghdad in the past 24 hours.

It is very good news that no assault will have to be made on the shrine. That could have sparked widespread violence and protests. But even what the US military has done to Najaf in the past two weeks while fighting the militiamen has already deeply hurt the reputation of America in southern Iraq and indeed in much of the Muslim world. Although the American public seems somehow unaware that the US has just been bombing the sacred cemetery and parts of the city, some parts of which have been reduced to rubble, everyone in the Muslim world knows exactly what has been going on. They are not amused.


795. jexster - 8/19/2004 5:19:16 PM

Could Najaf Cost Bush the Election?

796. robertjayb - 8/19/2004 5:25:54 PM

Lingering Kool-Aid hangover warps war, WMD views...

WASHINGTON -- (AP) - More than half of Americans, 54 percent, continue to believe Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or a program to develop them before the United States invaded last year, according to a poll released Friday.

Evidence of such weapons has not been found.

Half believe Iraq was either closely linked with al-Qaida before the war (35 percent) or was directly involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on this country (15 percent).

797. jexster - 8/19/2004 5:27:43 PM

At least the number is shrinking

"When voters think we win" Bill Clinton ;(

798. robertjayb - 8/19/2004 5:46:17 PM

Just came across this line in an old Molly Ivins piece. I like it:

Those who think of freedom in this country as one long, broad path leading ever onward and upward are dead damned wrong. Many a time freedom has been rolled back--and always for the same sorry reason: fear.

799. jexster - 8/19/2004 6:15:42 PM

No shit! America the Beautiful has a very nasty underbelly..


The Fish Rots from the Head

An Army investigation into the role of military intelligence personnel in the abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison reports that the scandal was not just caused by a small circle of rogue military police soldiers but resulted from failures of leadership rising to the highest levels of the U.S. command in Iraq (news - web sites), senior defense officials said.

800. jexster - 8/19/2004 6:29:40 PM

801. jexster - 8/19/2004 6:37:41 PM

Inside the Right Wing Slime Machine

If anyone saw Tom Oliphant debate that Swift Bag of Shit on NewsHour last night...you saw this very tactic at work..


When they put together the anthology or college class source book of early 21st century popular political discourse they may include this column by Deborah Orin as the template example of the product of the right-wing agitprop machine, with all the familiar tactics and methods bundled together in one place.

In its own dark way it's almost irresistible, like slowing down on the highway to take in a really bad car wreck. You should really read it, with particular attention to the familiar tactic of using one discredited or unproven claim to add weight to another discredited or unproven claim -- something we might call the probabilism of innuendo.

-- Josh Marshall


Every time Oliphant shot apart one bogus bag of bullshit, he came up with two more to "support" the first.

Lately we have seen a great deal of this...attacks on Richard Clarke and that woman 911 Commissioner come to mind

It is all the same old shit.

802. jexster - 8/19/2004 7:26:08 PM

PARIS, Aug. 20 — Oil prices hit a new record today after the Iraqi insurgency increased its pressure on the country's oil infrastructure and traders feared growing unrest might interrupt crude exports.

Crude futures for September delivery traded in New York rose to $49.40 a barrel, up 70 cents, the highest level since the New York Mercantile Exchange opened in 1983

803. jexster - 8/19/2004 10:35:49 PM

Lies Have Consequences for Tony McPeak

WASHINGTON - A retired U.S. Air Force general who endorsed President Bush (news - web sites) four years ago says in a new television ad by the Democratic Party that this year he will vote for John Kerry (news - web sites) because the Democrat has "a real strategy to make America safer."


The ad featuring Merrill A. McPeak was released by an arm of the Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) a day after Kerry lashed back against allegations by a veterans group that he exaggerated his combat record in Vietnam.


McPeak, Air Force chief of staff during the first Persian Gulf War (news - web sites), claims in the ad that Kerry "has the strength and common sense we need in a commander in chief. And, something more: a real strategy to make America safer."

804. robertjayb - 8/20/2004 12:08:44 AM

"strength and common sense"

I like it.

805. jexster - 8/20/2004 12:27:21 AM

Kerry Files Complaint Against Shitfaced Veterans for Tanqueray

FORT MYERS, Fla. (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) asked the Federal Election Commission (news - web sites) on Friday to force Republican critics to withdraw ads challenging his military service, and accused the Bush campaign of illegally helping coordinate the attacks.



The Kerry campaign said it filed the complaint against the group behind the ads, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, "for violating the law with inaccurate ads that are illegally coordinated with the Bush-Cheney presidential campaign and Republican National Committee (news - web sites)."


The campaign said there is "overwhelming evidence" that the group is coordinating its spending on advertising and other activities with the President Bush (news - web sites)'s campaign for reelection.

806. jexster - 8/20/2004 5:13:22 AM

Report from Imam Ali Shrine

In Najaf
"Sadness After Sadness
Death After Death
Blood After Blood"
Allawi Government "Bleaguered", Iraqi Police, Claims a Farce

807. jexster - 8/20/2004 5:47:04 PM

Bush Crony Corruption Spreads Like a Cancer

ATHENS, Greece - Paul Hamm (news - web sites)'s gold medal just lost its luster. A scoring mistake at the all-around gymnastics final cost South Korea (news - web sites)'s Yang Tae-young the gold that ended up going to Hamm, the International Gymnastics Federation ruled Saturday. Yang got the bronze instead.

808. jexster - 8/20/2004 6:03:44 PM

No Foreign Occupier Ever Prevailed Against a Nationalist Insurgency in the 20th Century - The Record Continues ....


If there has been one message written in all that the insurgents have done, whether Sunnis or Shiites, these Iraqis say, it is a rejection of the very idea that Iraq's future can be chosen under an American military umbrella - more broadly, of the idea that America and its notions should have any place in reshaping Iraq at all.

When they were done with their spinning, senior Western officials who briefed reporters on the developments in Najaf seemed to agree.



John Burns - NyT

809. jexster - 8/20/2004 9:17:01 PM

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Attackers ambushed a U.S. patrol north of the Iraqi capital on Friday, killing one American soldier and wounding four others, while the U.S. military said two Marines were killed in action in Iraq (news - web sites)'s volatile Anbar province earlier this week.



Bum R. Lee died June 2, 2004, after being wounded in hostile action in Anbar province.

Age: 21 Hometown: Sunnyvale, Calif.
Died: 06/02/2004
Service: Marines Rank: Cpl.
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.

810. jexster - 8/21/2004 3:42:11 AM

A leading Egyptian Islamic leader has warned that a "volcano of anger" could explode in response to US-led military action in Najaf and Falluja.


In a statement on Saturday, Ali Gumaa, the mufti of Egypt and the country's highest authority on Islamic law, condemned the "continuing aggression by US-led forces on the Imam Ali shrine and Islamic holy places" in Iraq.

"After the attack on the shrines of the Prophet's noble companions, after the humiliations and the terrorizing and killing of civilians, the world cannot expect…that a volcano of anger and indignation will not explode," Gumaa said.

Gumaa is second in the Islamic hierarchy only to the shaikh of al-Azhar, Cairo's ancient university and institute of religious learning



Al Jazeera

811. jexster - 8/21/2004 3:45:39 AM

Iraqi Olympic Soccer team to Bush: F*** off!



This from Grant Wahl in Sports Illustrated:


"Iraqi midfielder Salih Sadir scored a goal here on Wednesday night, setting off a rousing celebration among the 1,500 Iraqi soccer supporters at Pampeloponnisiako Stadium. ... Afterward, Sadir had a message for U.S. president George W. Bush, who is using the Iraqi Olympic team in his latest re-election campaign advertisements. ...

'Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign, Sadir told SI.com through a translator, speaking calmly and directly. 'He can find another way to advertise himself.'"

812. jexster - 8/21/2004 4:05:34 AM

Defense and the National Interest:
How Bad Was US Iraq WMD Intel?


Bush "had PERFECT intelligence that Iraq had no WMD"

813. jexster - 8/21/2004 4:57:16 PM


Comparing the al-Hayat account with the Los Angeles Times article by David Holley and Edmund Sanders (Sanders is embedded in Najaf) shows the difference in information and sensibility between what is reported in the Western press and what appears in Arabic.

Al-Hayat writes that "the fighting extended to Kufa, where American missiles struck the historic Mosque of Maytham al-Tammar, destroying part of it."
"
The LA Times story says:




' Earlier in the morning, several hundred Marines swarmed a complex of buildings in Kufa, about 500 yards west of the main Kufa Mosque, which military officials suspect that al-Sadr's militia is using. After a heavy firefight, AC-130 warplanes bombed the buildings in a series of loud explosions heard for miles.

Later, U.S. troops raided the main Kufa police station and detained about 29 Iraqis found in a basement. Some of the men claimed they were being held prisoner by al-Sadr's forces. '


The American report says nothing about damage to the Maytham Mosque. Najaf and Kufa are key sites of early Islam, and the religious structures in them are deeply meaningful to Shiites.

The Straight "Out of Bed" Story on the Deepening Chaos in Iraq Juan Cole

814. jexster - 8/21/2004 5:32:54 PM

The Poodle Barks!


LONDON (AFP) - Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) is refusing to fly to the United States to receive a medal bestowed on him by the nation for his support over last year's Iraq (news - web sites) war.

815. jexster - 8/21/2004 6:05:10 PM

Bush Lie Alert - Health Care

Yes another one coming down...


If the Republican-controlled Congress enacted President Bush's entire health care agenda, as many as 10 million people who lack health insurance would be covered at a cost of $102 billion over the next decade, according to his campaign aides.

But when the Bush-Cheney team was asked to provide documentation, the hard data fell far short of the claims, a gap supported by several independent analyses.


WaPo

816. jexster - 8/21/2004 7:17:30 PM

Health experts inside and out of the administration say many of the assertions Bush makes about his first-term health care record and his health proposals for a second term are exaggerated, incomplete or contrary to widely accepted analyses .

In plain Swedish "cow shit"

These people seem to have quite a problem telling the truth about ANYTHING

817. arkymalarky - 8/21/2004 7:27:38 PM

The governor in AR pulled the same thing on his education plan, and he had "Democrat" allies who went right along, never even questioning the ramifications of passing the program over the short or long term. That kind of policy pushing is despicable, and the media has been very irresponsible in letting leaders get by with it without exposing what they're doing. Their negligence is lazy and unethical and potentially very damaging to the country and its most vulnerable citizens.

818. jexster - 8/21/2004 8:05:40 PM

It began with "compassionate conservative" "Help is on the way" "reformer with results" "uniter not a divider"


Extremist government by slogan...

Kerry's got to do a better job defining the Flim Flam Man as the cheap huckster that he always has been

819. jexster - 8/21/2004 8:06:49 PM

Lest we forget: "the enviornmental president" "the education president" who "leaves no child behind"

820. jexster - 8/21/2004 8:16:41 PM

Saddam gassed his own people with US approval...


Bush doesn't use gas...he's civilized

And besides AC130 gunships are so much more lethal!


The Fruits of Operation Iraqi "Freedom"










Just another BushShit slogan

821. jexster - 8/21/2004 8:52:43 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A veteran who has disputed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites)'s Vietnam war record admitted on Sunday he did not have "a single document" to prove Kerry fabricated reports of enemy fire that won him two medals

822. jexster - 8/21/2004 8:54:53 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A veteran who has disputed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites)'s Vietnam war record admitted on Sunday he did not have "a single document" to prove Kerry fabricated reports of enemy fire that won him two medals

823. jexster - 8/21/2004 10:16:05 PM

IMAGINE IF supporters of Bill Clinton had tried in 1996 to besmirch the military record of his opponent, Bob Dole. After all, Dole was given a Purple Heart for a leg scratch probably caused, according to one biographer, when a hand grenade thrown by one of his own men bounced off a tree. And while the serious injuries Dole sustained later surely came from German fire, did the episode demonstrate heroism on Dole's part or a reckless move that ended up killing his radioman and endangering the sergeant who dragged Dole off the field?

The truth, according to many accounts, is that Dole fought with exceptional bravery and deserves the nation's gratitude. No one in 1996 questioned that record. Any such attack on behalf of Clinton, an admitted Vietnam draft dodger, would have been preposterous.

Yet amazingly, something quite similar is happening today as supporters of President Bush attack the Vietnam record of Senator John Kerry


Imagine!

The George Bush Family

Seigneurs of Sleaze

824. jexster - 8/21/2004 11:36:54 PM

Isaiah 28:14-22

14 Therefore hear the word of the LORD, you scoffers
who rule this people in Jerusalem.
15Because you have said, ‘We have made a covenant with death,
and with Sheol we have an agreement;
when the overwhelming scourge passes through
it will not come to us;
for we have made lies our refuge,
and in falsehood we have taken shelter’;
16therefore thus says the Lord GOD,
See, I am laying in Zion a foundation stone,
a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation:
‘One who trusts will not panic.’
17And I will make justice the line,
and righteousness the plummet;
hail will sweep away the refuge of lies,
and waters will overwhelm the shelter.
18Then your covenant with death will be annulled,
and your agreement with Sheol will not stand;
when the overwhelming scourge passes through
you will be beaten down by it.
19As often as it passes through, it will take you;
for morning by morning it will pass through,
by day and by night;
and it will be sheer terror to understand the message.
20For the bed is too short to stretch oneself on it,
and the covering too narrow to wrap oneself in it.
21For the LORD will rise up as on Mount Perazim,
he will rage as in the valley of Gibeon
to do his deed—strange is his deed!—
and to work his work—alien is his work!
22Now therefore do not scoff,
or your bonds will be made stronger;
for I have heard a decree of destruction
from the Lord GOD of hosts upon the whole land

825. arkymalarky - 8/22/2004 2:10:37 AM

It began with "compassionate conservative" "Help is on the way" "reformer with results" "uniter not a divider"


Extremist government by slogan...

Kerry's got to do a better job defining the Flim Flam Man as the cheap huckster that he always has been

I agree, but I'm also referring to comprehensive policies whose details are all on the table and are sold as snakeoil, which any good analyst (Krugman can't do it all himself) could pick apart easily in ways the general population can understand.

Take NCLB. It's very clear that if you shut down the "bad" schools, shifting those kids to other schools, without working to repair whatever's making them "bad" in the first place OR repair what's making the students do poorly, you haven't done anything but spread the problem around and shut down the only real options for struggling students by making their "bad" schools even worse by cutting their support.

It makes no sense no matter how you look at it, and many other details within the plan (AYP, for instance) are completely unworkable over a long term, as well. But did that keep congressional Democrats from going for it, including Ted Kennedy?

826. arkymalarky - 8/22/2004 2:12:09 AM

If many more such inroads are made in public education, social security, and health care, the nation will be in deep doo doo. If it goes as far as the policy drivers would like, we'd all eventually be at the mercy of corporations for such entitlements. A scary thought, to say the least.

827. jexster - 8/22/2004 4:02:19 AM

The Kerry Media Corps is slick...

Whipped this one out on Friday...probably won't get in ..maybe the SF Ex they like flame...

Bush Family Politics - A Putrescent Patrimony

Editor:

With its so-called "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" slanders of Senator Kerry, the Bush campaign has reached new lows in political mudslinging not seen since Bush pere's Willie Horton campaign 16 years ago.

Bereft of fact and riddled with contradiction, this campaign of lies and innuendo, sponsored by two close associates of Karl Rove and George W. Bush, is the template of the Republican "bitch-slap" approach to electoral
politics.

Voters have had enough. It is time for George Bush to come out of hiding; take responsibility for once, and condemn this vile smear of a true American War Hero.




Sincerely,

ME

828. jexster - 8/22/2004 6:48:41 AM

No Flowers, No Candy, No Songs of Joy for the Liberator-Emperor Bush

Sadr City Sings the Praises of Its Cleric, Seyyid Moqtada


BAGHDAD — The singing could be heard from more than a block away as the pickup truck careened along the unpaved streets of District 10 deep in the heart of Sadr City.



Crammed into the flatbed, 25 mostly young men hoisted their semiautomatic weapons, a few of them carrying rocket-propelled-grenade launchers.


Despite a five-day onslaught by U.S. troops intent on clearing the poor Baghdad neighborhood of supporters of Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada Sadr, late Saturday they were still visible, they were still armed, and they were singing. "The Shiites will be victorious," they sang, smiling broadly with a campfire look of good cheer.

829. jexster - 8/22/2004 6:28:35 PM

October Surprise?

Monday, August 23, 2004
5 US Soldiers Killed in 24 Hours, 1 Wounded

Australian Broadcasting reports that guerrillas killed one US soldier in Mosul on Sunday with a roadside bomb. Guerrillas on Saturday killed three US Marines in separate attacks in al-Anbar province (the home of Fallujah and Ramadi).

If George Will is right that the Baath is planning a big October offensive, it is being planned in al-Anbar Province and may be launched from there. Likewise, a fifth troop died in al-Anbar in a vehicle collision.


posted by Juan @ 8/23/2004 07:05:31 AM

830. jexster - 8/22/2004 6:31:49 PM



Leonard M. Cowherd died May 16, 2004, from sniper fire and a rocket propelled grenade in Karbala, Iraq.

Age: 22 Hometown: Culpepper, Va.
Died: 05/16/2004
Service: Army Rank: 2nd Lt.
Unit: Company C, 1st Battalion, 37th Armor Regiment, 1st Armored Division, Friedberg, Germany

831. jexster - 8/22/2004 7:14:47 PM

Juan Cole has an interesting analysis of the Mufti of Egypt's condemnation of US aggression in Najaf which includes a very informative discourse on the nature of Sunnism and its reverence for the Shiite's Imam Ali

832. jexster - 8/22/2004 7:32:28 PM

For 'tis the sport to have the enginer / Hoist with his owne
petar" -- Shakespeare, Hamlet III iv.


833. jexster - 8/22/2004 7:33:01 PM

BOOM BOOM

834. jexster - 8/22/2004 9:40:35 PM

TNR Asks:

What's With Duhbya's Rep as a Funny Man?

He's just the spoiled idiot son of a fat assed bitch on wheels

835. jexster - 8/22/2004 11:17:18 PM

TNR: The Case Against GWB - Power from the People

836. jexster - 8/22/2004 11:27:26 PM

Robert Dahl, America's foremost democracy scholar, suggests another definition of democracy. "Opportunities to gain an enlightened understanding of public matters are not just part of the definition of democracy," he writes in his book On Democracy. "They are a requirement for democracy." It is not terribly controvers