Now British soldiers are also caught on film abusing prisoners.

Of all the great heroes serving in Iraq, it takes just a few people to fuck everything up. Iraq is lost- we just can't bring ourselves to admit it yet.

Update- May 14, 2004: Mirror says the images are probably fake.
Damage done, boys, damage done.

We're bound by the Geneva Convention (when we feel like it) so we can't torture prisoners constantly. Our hired guns have no such restrictions.

Colonel Jill Morgenthaler, speaking for central command, told the Guardian: "One contractor was originally included with six soldiers, accused for his treatment of the prisoners, but we had no jurisdiction over him. It was left up to the contractor on how to deal with him."

She did not specify the accusation facing the contractor, but according to several sources with detailed knowledge of the case, he raped an Iraqi inmate in his mid-teens.

Col Morgenthaler said the charges against the six soldiers included "indecent acts, for ordering detainees to publicly masturbate; maltreatment, for non-physical abuse, piling inmates into nude pyramids and taking pictures of them nude; battery, for shoving and stepping on detainees; dereliction of duty; and conspiracy to maltreat detainees".

link...

Paul Krugman analyzes the Iraq situation one day short of a year after "Mission Accomplished."

"We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." That's from George Orwell's 1946 essay "In Front of Your Nose." It seems especially relevant right now, as we survey the wreckage of America's Iraq adventure.

Tomorrow a year will have passed since George Bush's "Mission Accomplished" carrier landing. Throughout that year — right up to the surge in violence this month — administration officials assured us that things were going well in Iraq. Living standards, they said, were steadily improving. The resistance, they insisted, consisted of a handful of dead-enders aided by a few foreign infiltrators — and each lull in attacks brought pronouncements that the campaign against the insurgents had turned the corner.

So they lied to us; what else is new? But there's more at stake here than the administration's credibility. The official story line portrayed a virtuous circle of nation-building, one that could eventually lead to a democratic Iraq, allied with the U.S. In fact, we seem to be faced with a vicious circle, in which a deteriorating security situation undermines reconstruction, and the lack of material progress adds to popular discontent. Can this situation be saved?

Even among harsh critics of the administration's Iraq policy, the usual view is that we have to finish the job. You've heard the arguments: We broke it; we bought it. We can't cut and run. We have to stay the course.

I understand the appeal of those arguments. But I'm worried about the arithmetic.

more...

I know these don't fit on the page all pretty in some browsers... I'm crazy like that... I'll post stuff that doesn't fit! I'm outta control!

Here's a short video clip of Brit Hume claiming that the Bush White House is "not a very leaky White House."

I know, it made me laugh too. Enjoy.

Link

Let’s start with this. What’s the signature pattern of Bush’s life?

When he faces a challenge or a tough scrape, he lets his family and friends bail him out. He has always let others do his fighting for him.

You see it in his failed businesses, where well-heeled family friends again and again came in to bail him out. It’s there in the legal scrapes. And it’s there in the whole matter of ducking service in Vietnam — first by getting his father’s and his father’s friends’ help in jumping the queue to get into the Texas Air National Guard, and then again with help cleaning up the subsequent unfortunateness while he was serving in the Texas Air National Guard.

(As was reported this week in Salon, despite assurances to the contrary from the White House, the president still refuses to release his complete Vietnam-era service record.)

Link

Link (3.05MB Real Video File)

MATT DRUDGE IN RARE TV APPEARANCE: LIVE FRIDAY, APRIL 30, 8 AM ET ON C-SPAN'S WASHINGTON JOURNAL...

Atrios, Daily Kos, Calpundit and others were all over this in February when it broke- I had the images but apparently never got around to posting anything about this. Weird.

Here, finally, are the images of Bush's unredacted and redacted records.

From the version of the records obtained by Marty Heldt in 2000:



And the White House's 2004 version:



Here is today's Salon article about these growing questions about James Bath's relationship with the President and Marty Heldt's site with the original docs.

This is scary. A man's name was redacted from Air National Guard records released by Bush a few months back. What's interesting is that most other people's names were not redacted. Further, the redacted man was suspended from the guard within a month of when Bush was suspended. That's weird enough, but it turns out that other records show the man's name was James R. Bath. It seems to turn out that Bath worked for the CIA, possibly as a liason to wealthy Arab families including: the bin Ladens.

Here are three questions a one Web site is suggesting be posed to Bush:


3. President Bush, was your friend from the National Guard, James R. Bath, arrested for cocaine around the same time? Is this why both of your National Guard records show suspensions in 1972 for refusal to submit to annual medical exams? Is this why you were no longer allowed to fly? If so, why did you make up the story that you no longer WANTED to fly?

5. James R. Bath was appointed by your father as a CIA operative in 1976 leasing aircraft in Houston and serving as a liaison between wealthy Arab sheiks (including the Bin Ladens) and American entrepreneurs. According to all sources, Baths company served as a front for the CIA. Before 1976, Bath was broke, according to all accounts. What was it that prompted your father to select James R. Bath in 1976? Did he hold incriminating evidence against you?

6. James R. Bath, representative of wealthy Saudi sheiks, channeled investment money into your first company in 1977, Arbusto Energy Corporation of Midland, Texas. Were you personally acquainted with Salem bin Laden (Osamas brother) and Khalid bin Mahfouz (Osamas brother-in-law) who poured thousands into your first company and millions into your subsequent enterprises?

Chris Vlasto has a story up on ABC News that's trying to stir up some controversy about John Kerry's military honors and what he did or didn't do with his medals and ribbons.

You may remember Vlasto from such hard news stories as, "HOWARD DEAN's driver BEATS HIS WIFE" and "SADDAM HAS A MISTRESS" and "THE CLINTONS ARE CORRUPT WHORES"

This is the same Chris Vlasto who paid for a celebratory dinner for Paula Jones after they had succeeded in compelling Clinton to testify under oath about his sexual history.

Yeah, this is a reporter you can trust.

Today in a federal court in Washington, senior government lawyers will try and gag Mrs Edmonds, claiming that disclosure of her evidence "would cause serious damage to the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States".

Mrs Edmonds, 33, a Turkish-American who had top secret security clearance while working for the FBI, claimed earlier this month that information she had seen while working in the bureau's headquarters in Washington proves senior officials knew of al Qaeda's plans to attack the US with aircraft months before the strikes happened.

She said the claim by the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, that there was no such information was "an outrageous lie".

Link

If she wasn't telling the truth, would they bother gagging her?

Attorneys warned firm that use of uncertified vote-counting software violated state law

By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER

Attorneys for Diebold Election Systems Inc. warned in late November that its use of uncertified vote-counting software in Alameda County violated California election law and broke its $12.7 million contract with Alameda County.

Soon after, a review of internal legal memos obtained by the Oakland Tribune shows Diebold's attorneys at the Los Angeles office of Jones Day realized the McKinney, Texas-based firm also faced a threat of criminal charges and exile from California elections.

Yet despite warnings from the state's chief elections officer, Diebold continued fielding poorly tested, faulty software and hardware in at least two of California's largest urban counties during the Super Tuesday primary, when e-voting temporarily broke down and voters were turned away at the polls.

Link

I'll never trust Diebold to count the vote fairly- they're irreparably corrupted. Last year, the CEO of Diebold promised to deliver it's home state of Ohio's electoral votes to Bush in a fundraising letter to Republicans. Is it really just a coincidence that Diebold's machines have no way to verify that the count is correct? No audit trail?

If there's a problem with the count (like in Florida, when Al Gore was given NEGATIVE 16,022 votes and George W. Bush was given 4,000 extra votes) nothing can be done? Is it still sane to assume these procedures were not put in place because Diebold just hadn't thought of using the same technology ATMs have used for decades? Or is a more likely answer that Diebold has a horse in this race, and audit trails could make things inconvenient for their candidate?

ATMs work- they give you a paper receipt. That's not a failure of our so-called paperless society- it's accountability. It's reassurance. That's what we need when voting- and it's incredible that it's not there yet.

Flipping around one morning this week I caught this little exchange on Fox News where they were discussing how unfair it was that Kerry wasn't being made fun of for his shrapnel wounds from Vietnam.

It was such an obvious attempt to denegrate Senator Kerry's service to our country that I figured I should share... and add a little commentary and music while I was at it. Enjoy.

Link

All week there have been rumors that a $1.5 Million fine was coming down against Viacom this week from the FCC. Meanwhile, Howard's ratings have exploded. Usually the all-news WINS station takes the #1 slot, but no longer.

Will this cause the FCC to reconsider it's content regulation campaign?

Time will tell...
Here are Drudge's unsourced figures:

HOWARD STERN TRIUMPHS IN NEW YORK CITY: BACK TO #1 AFTER INDECENCY FIGHT: ARBITRON ratings released this hour show badboy Howard Stern rocketing back to the top in New York City with a 7.2 share in 12+ listeners and a stunning 10.0 share in ages 25-54 [Up from a 5.9 12+ in the fall]... Stern, once again at the center of an indecency fight with the Feds, takes NYC morning drive for the first three months of the year, over all-news WINS [6.4 share], WABC's CURTIS & KUBY [3.4 share] and WFAN's Don Imus [2.6]...

Developing... HARD!

Bush:


Kerry:


The choice is clear.

(Kevin Drum provided the pretty pictures)

Pentagon official: Iraq military operation to cost more than expected
By Scott Lindlaw, Associated Press, 4/21/2004 16:13

WASHINGTON (AP) A top Pentagon official said Wednesday the Iraqi military operation ''is going to cost us more money'' than anticipated, and the White House kept open the possibility it will seek additional funds before the end of this election year.

A rough first estimate showed that the decision to keep 20,000 troops in Iraq for some 90 days longer to deal with increased violence will cost about $700 million, Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House Armed Services Committee.

More...

Today's winner of the coveted Overspun.com DUH award goes to General Richard Myers. I mean, DUH!

The transcript made it clear that the foreign dignitary Woodward was discussing was Bandar, although Rumsfeld would not say that. "We're going to have to clean some of this up in the transcript," Rumsfeld said in the omitted passage. "We'll give you a -- I mean you just said Bandar and I didn't agree with that so we're going to have to -- I don't want to say who it is but you are going to have to go through that and find a way to clean up my language too."

All told, the Pentagon transcript omits a series of eight questions and answers, some of them just a few words each. Yesterday Rumsfeld described the deleted passages as "some banter."

Larry DiRita, the Pentagon's chief spokesman, said the deletion was an honest disagreement and defense officials were reviewing the passage to determine whether to restore it to the published version.

"I had discussions with the author about passages that would be excluded from the transcript by mutual agreement, and this passage was one of those sections," he said. "It was excluded specifically because the secretary was not in a position to validate or confirm the details that the author was raising."

Woodward said: "As the transcript shows, it was not off the record. I was surprised that it was deleted because it obviously dealt with a critical issue and was important corroborating information for the book. I asked DiRita to restore it on the Pentagon Web site."

Link

Kevin Drum points to a Washington Post article this morning focusing on the need for supplemental funding and the Bush administration's refusal to acknowledge it because of the coming election.

This isn't something we can dick around with- the soldiers are there and Mr. Bush needs to fund them. It's Bush's war- he can't start cheaping out now.

So here's what we now know:
John Kerry was treated two separate times for shrapnel resulting from attacks on his boat.

George Bush was treated for hemorrhoids.

I think that tells the whole story right there.

via bartcop

A new threat has suddenly emerged, a possible terrorist attack before the election. It could happen! We should be worried!

Of course, the problem with all this is we already knew that. Nothing changed from last week... Why bring it up this week? Three words: That Fucking Book.

The White House is now engaged in a desperate campaign to distract the American people from the multiple illegal acts President Bush has recently admitted to. Here's an important point to keep in mind:These aren't allegations, these are quotes from the president and his staff. Ladies and gentlemen, these are not assertions. These are facts[.] (Okay, I cribbed that bit from Colin Powell's UN speech... but I assure you, unlike Powell, I'm not lying.)

Drudge has two headlines up at this moment dealing with this sudden threat- "Bracing For Terror" and "Terror Operatives In Place" while there's one headline of Condi denying everything she told Woodward. And thus, the distraction machine is in motion.

I find it hard to believe something this lame could distract us from these illegal, treasonous acts, but I've been surprised too many times to count with the ignorance/indifference of the American people. I won't be too surprised tomorrow when I hear, "President Bush struck that deal with the Saudis to get us some cheap gas! Hey, if that gets him reelected, well, that's an unintended consequence."

Watergate was some guys breaking into an office. This is about killing literally thousands of innocent people for no reason, making secret deals with the country that funded the 9/11 terrorists in order to help with reelection, not to mention lying constantly to the American people. Why hasn't anyone called them on this?

Everyone agrees that President George Bush's lobotomy has been a tremendous success.

...and that's just the opening line.

Link

Screaming "9/11 Changed Everything!" over and over won't work in this case...

Prince Bandar enjoys easy access to the Oval Office. His family and the Bush family are close. And Woodward told 60 Minutes that Bandar has promised the president that Saudi Arabia will lower oil prices in the months before the election -- to ensure the U.S. economy is strong on election day.

Woodward says that Bandar understood that economic conditions were key before a presidential election: “They’re [oil prices] high. And they could go down very quickly. That's the Saudi pledge. Certainly over the summer, or as we get closer to the election, they could increase production several million barrels a day and the price would drop significantly.”

Of course, those of us paying attention have known for years the close relationship shared by the Bush family and the Saudi royal family. Now the facts finally being presented to a larger audience. What the hell took so long?

"...The end of July 2002, they need $700 million, a large amount of money for all these tasks. And the president approves it. But Congress doesn't know and it is done. They get the money from a supplemental appropriation for the Afghan War, which Congress has approved. ...Some people are gonna look at a document called the Constitution which says that no money will be drawn from the treasury unless appropriated by Congress. Congress was totally in the dark on this."

That's what we call an impeachable offense. If this is true, Mr. President, you're going down.

Watch 60 Minutes Sunday.

That smirk is contagious.

Hillary wants to be on the VP ticket so that she dispels the notion that the Clintons are sabotaging the campaign and so that she can also go out there and really be the star. She'd be the star because she'll be the one bringing excitement to it. And, by the way, she'll get all kinds of criticism and the Republicans will launch all they've got at her, and she'll endure that. They know that they're pretty confident Kerry is going to lose and if Kerry wins there's always Fort Marcy Park. So they're rolling the dice on this.

Via No More Mister Nice Blog

Questioned by former Rep. Tim Roemer, D-Ind., Tenet said he did not speak with President Bush during August, 2001, a period marked by concern over possible terrorist attacks. ``He was on vacation and I was here,'' Tenet said, although he also added that he could have picked up the phone and called the president at any time if he had felt a need to do so.

"Bin Laden planning multiple operations"
"Bin Laden network's plans advancing"
"Bin Laden threats are real"
Wouldn't you have done something? Bush went on vacation.

"The indecency debate is traditionally a pendulum that swings -- there are reactions and overreactions," says Stuart Shorenstein, a communications attorney and partner at Wolf, Block, Schorr and Solis-Cohen LLP. "But this is clearly unprecedented. It's a witch hunt. In 2001, FCC chairman Powell said the government is not my nanny. Well, the nanny is back."

"I'm confident I have [made mistakes], but you put me on the spot and I'm not quick enough on my feet to come up with one." -w.

"We'll give it another week. If it doesn't improve, we'll have to leave," says Trevor Holborn of the Amman-based Shaheen Group, one of hundreds of foreign workers who have suspended their operations and headed for shelter inside the walls of the Green Zone, the heavily fortified enclave where the occupation has its headquarters.

"We still have people in Iraq, but we may not able to work on a day to day basis," said a contractor with a big US energy company. "Right now Iraq is not a safe place to work, and the safety of our staff comes first."

The sign says “Lcpl Boudreaux killed my Dad, th[en] he knocked up my sister!”

The thing about the article is that the investigation is focusing on if the claims made on the sign are true. So, if he didn't actually kill Dad and didn't knock up Sis all's forgiven? Ugh...

The military's response to all this is astoundingly ham-fisted- check out this quote:

“This picture and sign directed towards a Muslim family is inexcusable,” [Gunnery Sgt. Jamal Baadani, the president and founder of the Association of Patriotic Arab Americans in Military] said via e-mail. “Inexcusable because if this lance corporal was given a basic class on Islam, he would have known that remarks such as ‘knocking up’ a Muslim Arab woman is not tolerated and violates the honor of a Muslim woman and her family."

You see Muslims, unlike those of us from other parts of the world, are sensitive about being raped and having their parents killed. They're wacky like that. Perhaps we should study their reactions to other atrocities so we will know how they will react in any given situation.

Update: Looking at the full size version it looks like a fake to me. Still, the military spokesman talking about Iraqi's like they're animals to be studied was what really annoyed me about this whole thing.

Until Air America's site has it's own archives, here's the place to get the shows.

Every day I pray for more smartantarianism from our president. Every day I'm disappointaged.

Question: Did you see . . . the President's Daily Brief from August of '01 as a warning?

President Bush: Did I see it? Of course I saw it; I asked for it.

That's a lie. The CIA confirms he never asked for the briefing.

President Bush: [T]hat PDB said nothing about an attack on America.

Perhaps the President neglected to read the title of the briefing, or the thing about the hijacking, or the thing about the casing of buildings in New York.

Moments later:

President Bush: The question was, who was going to attack us, when and where, and with what. And you might recall the hijacking that was referred to in the PDB.

So now the president is contradicting himself inside of a minute. As if we needed more evidence that this guy does not have the candlepower to be President of the United States.

...and went on a month long vacation.

This is becoming a theme. Sorry. It's just hard to catch the man actually at work.

Vacation.

So reports Bob "EVIL" Novak about the troop levels in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Bush plan was to have the number of troops down to 30,000 by the end of summer 2003. It almost sounds like a bad joke, since there are currently 135,000 troops in Iraq, and that number is considered inadequate for the job.

When the generals were made aware of the (badly missed) target of 30,000 it was perfectly reasonable for them to be outraged. This whole war has been a catastrophic miscalculation by the Bush administration... What's one more?

Please note that Overspun runs everything Bob Novak says through an intense series of bullshit detectors before posting. This one came up clean except for a gratuitous spin on Ted Kennedy's recent Iraq/Vietnam comments.

This is probably the toughest, and best, assessment of Rice's testimony I've seen. It's certainly stronger than Andrew Sullivan's lame retort.


From Wonkette.com

Read the transcript. It really says something that this is the worst they could find. Even reading the transcript out of context I don't see how a reasonable person can say that this even approaches indecency as previously defined by the Supreme Court. This is clearly an assault on free speech in this country, and we need to do something.

Clear Channel should fight it, but they won't. They will likely write off this fine as just another huge contribution to the Bush administration.

For more information on Clear Channel's intimate relationship with George W. Bush, click here.

Here's Howard's response from his site:

Howard's Response To The FCC's Actions:
"This is not a surprise. This is a follow up to the McCarthy type "witch hunt" of the administration and the activities of this group of presidential appointees in the FCC, led by "Colin Powell Jr." and his band of players. They and others (a senator from Kansas City to a congresswoman from New Mexico) are expressing and imposing their opinions and rights to tell us all who and what we may listen to and watch and how we should think about our lives. So this is not a surprise. It is pretty shocking that governmental interference into our rights and free speech takes place in the U.S. It's hard to reconcile this with the "land of the free" and the "home of the brave". I'm sure what's next is the removal of "dirty pictures" like the 20th century German exhibit in a New York City Museum and the erotic literature in our libraries; they too will fall into their category of "evil" as well.
Howard Stern, April 8th 2004

That was the title of the famous August 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Briefing. A month later bin Laden struck in the U.S.

How the hell do you spin that? Ask Condi, I guess...

There's talk of a possible fine coming out of the FCC today against Howard Stern for $495,000.

The irony is the fine isn't technically against Howard, but against his radio station. The owners of the radio stations where the complaint was made? Clear Channel.

The FCC is keeping the door open for fining additional radio stations for airing the same show.

Sign the petition, stop these morons before they kill free speech entirely.

... and the crowd doesn't appreciate it:

BEN-VENISTE: Did you tell the president, at any time prior to August 6th, of the existence of al-Qaida cells in the United States?

RICE: First, let me just make certain ...

BEN-VENISTE: If you could just answer that question, because I only have a very limited ...

RICE: I understand, Commissioner, but it's important ...

BEN-VENISTE: Did you tell the president ...

RICE: ... that I also address ...

(APPLAUSE)

It's also important that, Commissioner, that I address the other issues that you have raised. So I will do it quickly, but if you'll just give me a moment.

BEN-VENISTE: Well, my only question to you is whether you ...

RICE: I understand, Commissioner, but I will ...

BEN-VENISTE: ... told the president.

RICE: If you'll just give me a moment, I will address fully the questions that you've asked.

(five minutes of restating the question later...)

RICE: I really don't remember, Commissioner, whether I discussed this with the president.

BEN-VENISTE: Thank you.

Imagine that over and over and you've seen the testimony.

Neal Pollack provides a summary of Condi Rice's testimony before she says a word:

Lie, lie, distortion, half-truth, pander, manipulation, pseudo-intellectual bombast. Dodge, dodge, feint, lie, dodge, avoid, subject change, lie, slander, pretentious generalization, character assassination, bald-faced lie ...

Link

Begala on today's Crossfire:

I want to come back to this question of credibility, because I think that's what this is all about and that why it's important that Dr. Rice be under oath. And I think we agree about that.

Yesterday, the White House spokesman complained that the last time Dr. Rice met with the commission, only five commission members showed up, suggesting maybe they weren't very interested in her testimony when it wasn't in public. What he failed to say is that the White House insisted that no more than three show up. That's a breathtaking lie.

This lie was passed on more than one Sunday morning show as well... seems like a White House sanctioned talking point.

...while Iraq burns.

O'Reilly on his show last night:

The Bush administration must come to grips with the true character of Iraq and begin to change strategy. The safety of the American military must become the top priority. The interest of the Iraqis themselves second. Unlike Afghanistan, where the majority of people seem to be cooperating with America, the Iraqis lay back, perhaps traumatized by decades of Saddam's oppression.

Understandable, but not acceptable. If these people won't help us, we need to get out in an orderly manner.

It's not surprising that once people started dying for this cause on a larger scale O'Reilly would get cold feet. He's the very definition of a chicken-hawk. Those of us who said from the beginning that we never should have invaded owe Bill a great big, "We told you so." I am disgusted that people are dying every day for this fake war, now O'Reilly's starting to realize we were right. Why does it take so many body bags to convince people?

O'Reilly was wrong about the invasion, and he's wrong about tucking our tail between our legs and running away now that his war is on. We started this war. Starting a war is a huge deal. We cannot run away from it. We need the rest of the world to help us fix this, but this President has shown he is incapable of doing such a thing.

This is The United States vs Iraq. It would be a different story if it were The World vs Iraq. If the rest of the world was united in this effort there would be no wavering, no second thoughts. All of these doubts would have been dealt with before an invasion. As it stands the world now hates us for ignoring them, for accusing them of being "with the terrorists", for not going along with the fiction that Saddam was responsible for 9/11.

So, what's the quickest way to "fix" Iraq? Step one is to get a President that hasn't told the rest of the world to (in so many words) "fuck off." The entire Bush administration needs to be removed from office. If we impeached the president, we would be left with the puppet-master instead of the puppet. That's not a solution.

Unfortunately we have to wait until November to get the whole team out. If Watergate was a cancer on the Presidency, this Presidency is a cancer on America.

Sounds like tonight's Nightline will be worth watching.

"Nightline" expands on a book by James Mann that detailed the birth of the program, named "Continuity of Government," during the Reagan administration. Under the plan, if the United States were facing a nuclear attack, three teams of 50 federal officials would be sent from Washington to locations across the country -- each with a Cabinet member who was prepared to become president.

That is what happened on Sept. 11. "Questions were raised by talking heads about the president's courage or lack of it because he didn't return directly to Washington," "Nightline" anchor Ted Koppel said yesterday. "This was absolutely the Armageddon plan put into effect."

Here's the excerpt of Mann's book from last month's Atlantic Monthly

Two stories came out today that I think are very closely related:
Ejaculation cures cancer and Ashcroft is making porn illegal.

This is Ashcroft's "War on your Prostate"

The Baltimore Sun article points out that Ashcroft, much like John Lithgow in "Footloose", doesn't dance because of his religion. So here we are, as a country, headed toward his baseline. No caffeine, no smoking, no gambling, no right to privacy. That's not an America I want to live in. Why are we allowing Ashcroft to turn our government into the Taliban? That's what Osama wanted all along.

Just asking...

The argument put forth by the Bush administration/United States of America in the Pledge "under God" case is that the reference to God is not a reference to God, but a reference to a reference to God. Read the article, Wieseltier's nailed it.

Breyer suggested that the God in "under God" is "this kind of very comprehensive supreme being, Seeger-type thing." And he posed an extraordinary question to Newdow: "So do you think that God is so generic in this context that it could be that inclusive, and if it is, then does your objection disappear?"

Needless to say, Newdow's objection did not disappear, because it is one of the admirable features of atheism to take God seriously. Newdow's reply was unforgettable: "I don't think that I can include 'under God' to mean 'no God,' which is exactly what I think. I deny the existence of God." The sound of those words in that room gave me what I can only call a constitutional thrill. This is freedom. And he continued: "For someone to tell me that 'under God' should mean some broad thing that even encompasses my religious beliefs sounds a little, you know, it seems like the government is imposing what it wants me to think in terms of religion, which it may not do. Government needs to stay out of this business altogether."

[...]

In his intervention at the Court, Justice Stevens recalled a devastating point from the fascinating brief submitted in support of Newdow by 32 Christian and Jewish clergy, which asserted that "if the briefs of the school district and the United States are to be taken seriously," that is, if the words in the Pledge do not allude to God, "then every day they ask schoolchildren to violate [the] commandment" that "Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord in vain."

I've desperately been searching for well reasoned explanations of the opposing view of this, but so far all I've illogical arguments centering on just what the article exposes- the politicalization of God- when you dumb down the concept of God to the point that saying "God" is no longer a reference to God you've already lost the fight.

The separation of Church and state is a good thing for both sides. I just hope this Supreme Court can put aside their ridiculous partisanship and rule on the law. (Yes, I'm referring to Florida...)

As bad as things were the last few days in Iraq, they got worse today.

So many were making fun of "Dr. Doolittle" who couldn't find those weapons littering the plains of Iraq. I mean, come on, the place was lousy with 'em. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat, right?

Blix says,

"It's good that Saddam and his terror regime is gone, but when you have to settle the accounts, the negative things are heavier due to the many people who have been killed in the war and the many who will die due to the terrorism the war fuelled, [...] Also the western governments' credibility and UN'’s authority have been damaged."

Hey, he's right. Again.

Why We Went In: Version 10.0
by P.J. Crowley and Robert O. Boorstin
March 19, 2004

In the year since the invasion of Iraq, the Bush administration has repeatedly shifted its justification for going to war and constantly changed its story on intelligence, the United Nations, reconstruction, political transition and the cost to the American taxpayer. More than anything, the administration's war in Iraq resembles a software program that, at first, works brilliantly, but then catches the user in a cycle of "fatal error" messages.

Here then, in Silicon Valley terms, is a review of the Bush administration's year in Iraq:

Saddam Hussein poses an 'imminent threat' to the American people.

* Version 1.0 - Saddam Hussein is an imminent threat
* Version 1.01 - Saddam Hussein is a gathering threat
* Version 1.02 - Saddam Hussein poses a real and dangerous threat
* Version 1.1 - The smoking gun will be a mushroom cloud
* Version 1.2 - We can't afford to wait
* Version 1.3 - We never said imminent
* Version 1.3.1 - OK, maybe we did say it once or twice
* Version 1.4 - We should have been more precise

Saddam Hussein is ready to use weapons of mass destruction.

* Version 2.1 - Saddam has weapons of mass destruction
* Version 2.2 - Saddam has nuclear weapons
* Version 2.3 - Saddam has biological agents he's never accounted for
* Version 2.3.1 - The trailers are mobile labs for producing chemical weapons
* Version 2.3.2 - Unmanned aircraft are ready to spread Saddam's biological weapons
* Version 2.4 - Saddam's going to make more of all these weapons
* Version 2.5 - We all know where the weapons are
* Version 2.5.1 - Well, Saddam has used weapons of mass destruction
* Version 2.5.2 - Iraq is a big country. We'll find the weapons eventually.
* Version 2.5.3 - Saddam had weapons of mass destruction programs
* Version 2.5.4 - Saddam had "weapons of mass destruction program related activities"
* Version 2.5.5 - David Kay? Who's David Kay?
* Version 2.6 - It's not about misleading the American people - Saddam Hussein is gone and that's the most important thing
more

by eavila



by BobTheDemonOtter

Here are the originals.
Link [fark.com]

When the June 30th date was set it seemed like a long way off- plenty of time for those insurgents to lay down their weapons and start throwing roses at our boys instead of bullets. Plenty of time for them to come around to our way of thinking. Well... it hasn't exactly worked out that way.

Iraq is now on the brink of civil war. In the wake of increased violence the President has held firm on the June 30th hand over date.

The date will change- it's unfortunate, but it will. I just wish the President once in a while could look at the reality of the situation and make some intelligent judgments. I'm nobody, and I can see that Iraq isn't ready for this- particularly on a timetable based on when the US elections are held.

June 30th is a date which would have been ideal if everything in Iraq had gone according to the Bush administration's original "cake-walk" plan, which, as I'm sure you know, involved Iraqis gazing lovingly at our soldiers as we freed them by bombing the shit out of them. That lovely scene, then pretty pictures of Bush at the handover ceremony months later, cheering on the new government of a free and happy Iraq.

It's going to be moved back, or Iraq will implode into a civil war. It's sadly that simple. It's not that I want this to happen- I don't. Just looking at the situation, that's the obvious conclusion to draw. Unfortunately the President can't seem to grasp it.

When the 40,000 subscribers to Reason, the monthly libertarian magazine, receive a copy of the June issue, they will see on the cover a satellite photo of a neighborhood - their own neighborhood. And their house will be graphically circled.

Drip, drip, drip...

I was going to post video, but that's just tempting fate at this point. Here's the transcript of Russert talking to the Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the administration:

MR. RUSSERT: There's a report in a British newspaper, The Independent, about a former translator for the FBI with top-secret security clearance, says she's provided information to the panel investigating the attacks which proves senior officials knew of al-Qaida's plan to attack the U.S. with aircraft months before the strike happened. Sibel Edmonds is her name. She said she spent more than three hours in a closed session with the commission and provided information that was circulating within the FBI in the spring and summer of 2001 suggesting an attack using aircraft was months away, that terrorists were in place. Is she credible?

MR. KEAN: We've had all her testimony. It's under investigation. I can't say--we're certainly not there that she's credible or uncredible yet.

MR. HAMILTON: We've talked to her.

MR. KEAN: Yeah.

MR. HAMILTON: We've talked to people she has identified. We've looked at documents. Look, the commission gets leads by the dozens, every day. I had a dozen of them last week. And we do our level best to follow up on all of them. In this case, and several others that have been prominent in the European press, we have been very, very careful in our research. We're not totally completed with it, as the governor has mentioned.

Newsweek says:

9/11 commission executive director Philip Zelikow faxed a photograph to the White House counsel's office with a note saying that if the White House didn't allow national-security adviser Condoleezza Rice to testify in public before the commission, the photograph would "...be all over Washington in 24 hours," Newsweek has learned. The photo, from a Nov. 22, 1945, New York Times story, showed presidential chief of staff Adm. William D. Leahy, appearing before a special congressional panel investigating the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Wow.

Link

Pimpin' the 9/11 committee's upcoming report like a 6 o'clock newscast, the chairman hinted today that there would "surprises" in the committee's findings. Hard to tell if this is the "no shit, Sherlock, the Bushies didn't take terrorism seriously" stuff that we already know, or if there's a legitimate bombshell on the way. One possibility? This story about a translator (who's kind of a babe and has a way cool name, Sibel Edmonds) claiming that she translated documents that warned of the attacks ahead of time. I realize for most blog readers this is old news, but it's interesting that the charges haven't caught on in the mainstream media (except CBS, which ran a story here). They're either, 1.) Wild ass allegations nobody believes, 2.) So significant that everybody's afraid to run with them because it would mean the end of the Bush administration, post haste. Again, I'm sort of stating the obvious here, but her story just cracked my consciousness (thanks to Air America, bless its anti-Bush soul). I bet a lot of other people are just hearing about this as well.

Colin Powell then:

"I'm not reading this. This is bullshit." (link)

Colin Powell now:

"Yeah, that stuff I read to the UN? That was bullshit."

Okay, that last one's not an exact quote, but that's essentially what he's saying here.

It seems Condi and Colin are going to take all the heat for all this deception we've been seeing for the last three years. They're both planning on leaving whether the president wins a second term or not, so they're now seen as expendable. The White House defense thus far on any issue has been to blame the folks that are leaving the administration for all the mistakes. The difference here is these two have yet to depart, but they're already being left to the wolves.

Bob Novak, you're a sophisticated guy, do you believe that President Bush has a problem with these African-American people, Dr. Rice and General Powell?

Drudge posted pictures of himself in celebration of the ninth anniversary of his site. For some reason I find them hilarious- it's either the late hour, my drunken state, or a combination thereof.

Here they are for posterity:


Doesn't he have a friend that could take these pictures? It's pretty obvious the first one is one of those deals where he held the camera out in one hand and snapped the picture. The second is an obvious timer shot- you can tell by the look of anticipation/constipation (not sure which) on his face.

Atrios pointed out Bill O'Reilly's suggestion for a "final solution" for Iraq the other day.

I caught ten minutes of him on the radio yesterday and he was talking the same line- empty the city, shoot anyone that has a weapon in their home on sight. He didn't get as specific as saying whether we should kill whole families or just anyone over fifteen, or just the males, but he did say he wants to put all the citizens in a camp where I suppose they could... um, concentrate. No, maybe that's not the right word... Oh well, in any event here's the video.

Let's be clear, what happened in Fallujah was heinous, but everyone in the city wasn't involved. I hate to think what would happen if the same rules were put to New York, where Mr. O'Reilly lives. Assuming he doesn't own a gun, he'd at least live, but who wants to be put in a camp every time the dregs of society do something evil?

(Feel free to mirror the videos... as always)

Here's the video of Dave's "yawning kid" analysis from Thursday , a transcript of which can be found here.

WTF?

The commission investigating the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks says it wants to know why the Bush administration has withheld documents from the files of former President Bill Clinton.

A lawyer for Mr. Clinton, Bruce Lindsey, says Bush aides have turned over only a quarter of the 11,000 pages that Mr. Clinton was ready to offer the commission. The lawyer says that as a result, the commission may not have a complete picture of the Clinton administration's anti-terrorism efforts.

A spokesman for the commission, Al Felzenberg, says the panel is negotiating with the White House to determine what documents have been held back and why. He says the White House may have "good reasons" for its decision.

The New York Times cites former Clinton aides as saying the files contain highly classified documents about efforts to subdue al-Qaida, the group that carried out the September 11 attacks.

It's just crazy- they're holding back documents on al-Qaida from the Clinton administration so they can say, "See? They didn't do nuthin' either!"

How ridiculous.

The gist of it is Karl Rove may be in legal trouble for further disseminating the Valarie Plame story after Robert Novak had published his story outing her.

The memo argues that by repeating the leak to political consultants and journalists Mr. Rove was committing a crime separate from the original leak.

Mr. Rove made clear to the F.B.I. that he had only spread the story after Novak's column went to print.

Link

This conversation took place after Dave aired CNN's apology on tonight's Late Show with David Letterman

Dave: But this whole thing just smells, doesn't it smell a little bit?

Paul: Very confusing.

Dave: It just smells just a little bit, "we were told" and "it seems unlikely" and "probably they didn't" and "I'm being told to tell you that the White House really didn't" I mean it just all seems a little too tidy, just a little too neat. And now, the, the guy, the kid in Florida and his old man was really upset in the beginning- "Err what are ya tryin' to do this is my kid... what're you tryin..." Well now everybody down there loves it, everybody couldn't be happier, everybody thought it was hilarious, so you see it's just a little too tidy. Don't you see what I'm saying?

Paul: Well it's, uh... I, I...

Dave: Stuff like this never ends happily- certainly not happily for me. I was waiting for the lawsuit, I was waiting to be arrested, waiting to be beaten to a pulp. And now, oh, everybody's enjoying, oh couldn't be happier- and by the way tomorrow the young man, Tyler Crotty is his name, he'll be a guest on the show.

(applause)

Dave: But that's, um... I'm pretty sure that the White House contacted CNN. Here's what I think, the White House contacted CNN because the people in Florida were upset because their big huge fat Republican donors, "We've given you $4 million, what the hell? You put the kid on TV an' he's makin' a fool of himself, what're you tryin' to pull here for God sakes?" So now, like Bush don't have enough problems, he calls CNN and he says, well, you better stop that, clam that up, you know, stove-pipe that or... do they stove-pipe stuff?

Paul: I have... I don't know if they still do that...

Dave: That's what I think happened. And so now when they find out that dumb boy here gets wind of this, then they say [frantic arm motions] everything's fine, everybody couldn't be happier. That's, that's my theory.

If you feel like hosting a video clip of this exchange let me know. I'm out of the incredibly popular video hosting business for the moment.

Drudge is saying that Friday's NY Times will report that the CIA Leak investigation is expanding to examine whether White House officials lied to investigators.

Is this thing finally hitting the fan?

Update 11:01 PM:
Boy howdy, I think it is...

In looking at violations beyond the original focus of the inquiry, which centered on a rarely used statute that makes it a felony to disclose the identity of an undercover intelligence officer intentionally, prosecutors have widened the range of conduct under scrutiny and for the first time raised the possibility of bringing charges peripheral to the leak itself.
The expansion of the inquiry's scope comes at a time when prosecutors, after a hiatus of about a month, appear to be preparing to seek additional testimony before a federal grand jury, lawyers with clients in the case said. It is not clear whether the renewed grand jury activity represents a concluding session or a prelude to an indictment.

The broadened scope is a potentially significant development that represents exactly what allies of the Bush White House feared when Attorney General John Ashcroft removed himself from the case last December and turned it over to Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the United States attorney in Chicago.

Republican lawyers worried that the leak case, in the hands of an aggressive prosecutor, might grow into an unwieldy, time-consuming and politically charged inquiry, like the sprawling independent counsel inquiries of the 1990's, which distracted and damaged the Clinton administration.

Mr. Fitzgerald is said by lawyers involved in the case and government officials to be examining possible discrepancies between documents he has gathered and statements made by current or former White House officials during a three-month preliminary investigation last fall by the F.B.I. and the Justice Department. Some officials spoke to F.B.I. agents with their lawyers present; others met informally with agents in their offices and even at bars near the White House.

The White House took the unusual step last year of specifically denying any involvement in the leak on the part of several top administration officials, including Karl Rove, President Bush's senior adviser, and I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff. The White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, has repeatedly said no one wants to get to the bottom of the case more than Mr. Bush.

But Mr. Bush himself has said he does not know if investigators will ever be able to determine who disclosed the identity of the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Plame, to Robert Novak, who wrote in his syndicated column last July that Ms. Plame, the wife of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, was a C.I.A. employee.

Gosh darn it, this is all the Bush White House needs!
/sarcasm

Al Franken on yesterday's O'Franken Factor mentioned that Air America will archive it's shows and allow them to be streamed.

This just gets better and better.

... and yet it's being railroaded through the Congress.

Republican FCC chairman Michael Powell and the panel's senior Democrat, commissioner Michael Copps, both said they are worried about exercising the authority Congress would grant the agency if the bills become law. Powell and Copps were attending an all-day broadcast industry summit to discuss the indecency issue.

"I understand it," Powell said, referring to Congress' desire to make performers pay. "But I have some reservations with the FCC going after performers."

Powell said artists have always enjoyed protection under the First Amendment governing free speech and slamming them with large fines would be "a very touchy area for the FCC."

Sign the petition if you haven't already. Talk to your Senator. The FCC's job is supposed to be administrating the airwaves, renew a license here and there, not scan the airwaves for disagreeable programming. Now the FCC wants to expand it's content regulation to cable and satellite programming. This is a huge power grab by a commission that really doesn't have much of a purpose anymore.

Here's the dirty little secret of the indecency bill- if someone were to broadcast President Bush's Adam Clymer comment ("Major League Asshole") Bush himself could be ordered to pay up to $500,000 by the FCC.

Anybody have any tape of Rush Limbaugh playing that clip? (I don't know if he actually did, I'm not a regular listener obviously.) If Rush played the clip unedited he could be fined personally and each of his 300+ radio stations could all be fined $500,000 each. Sure, the incident happened years ago, but It's not like there's a statute of limitations on this stuff. The FCC just fined Howard Stern last week for a conversation that took place three years ago. First it's a boob, then it's talking about a Cleveland steamer, next it'll be talking smack about the president that gets you taken off the air.

Ahh... nice to get a good rant off right away in the morning.

Missle defense was top priority pre-9/11 according to... Condi Rice. Okay, somebody's going to ask her about this during her testimony, that's just a given, so you just know there's a spin team deep in the bowels of the White House working on careful phrasing that Condi can use while testifying so she's able to give some form of non-denial denial.

Money quote:

The [undelivered speech] also implicitly challenged the Clinton administration's policy, saying it did not do enough about the real threat -- long-range missiles.
more...

Unfortunately the enemy probably wouldn't slap a GPS beacon on their missiles for us to track, like what we've been using for testing Star Wars...