WHIG Pigs May Be Indicted

Democratic Underground had an interesting item yesterday posted by Stevendsmith. The post said that Larry C. Johnson had reported Patrick Fitzgerald was considering 22 indictments, including “Stephen Hadley, Karl Rove, Lewis Libby, Dick Cheney, and Mary Matalin”. Johnson said Hadley had told friends he expected to be indicted. The disinformation White House Iraq Group started by Karl Rove and Andrew Card in 2002 with the aim of fraudulently pushing the US into attacking Iraq had nine original members: Karen Hughes, Mary Matalin, James R. Wilkinson, Nicholas E. Calio, Condoleezza Rice, Stephen Hadley and I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby (plus Rove and Card). How has Mary Matalin sunk so low? And who is Stephen Hadley? Mary Matalin is a Republican political strategist who has been an assistant to George W. Bush and counselor to vice president Dick Cheney. No, she does not have a law degree. She went to Hofstra law school but dropped out after one year. She has few qualifications that would account for her place in the rarified circles of Republican politics other than the unerring instinct of a predator and brass balls the size of the Capitol dome. She is the odd couple partner of James Carville, famous Democrat political strategist to Bill Clinton. Matalin resigned from the White House in December of 2002, five months after the inception of WHIG and six months before the Wilson/Plame leak. It’s been reported she’s already testified before Fitzgerald. It would be a gift from heaven to see this arrogant, smart-ass, former beautician-turned-political dreadnought put in her place by an indictment. When Condoleezza Rice was appointed Secretary of State by GWB, Stephen Hadley replaced her as National Security Advisor. Hadley has been in the Department of Defense in various positions since 1986. He’s an old-line faithful Republican who can be counted on to lie and to defend lies when it is advantageous to any GOP agenda. He might see an indictment as a badge of honor but I see it as just deserts for a career Republican gofer and water boy. Speaking of which, has anyone seen Robert Novak recently?

William Kristol Is a Smug Devious Sack of Crap!

Did you ever notice when William Kristol says something cruel and mean he always smiles? As if the smile means he’s not a bullying little putz, but rather a compassionate superior being. I watched Katherine Hepburn in “Suddenly Last Summer” last night. She did the same thing as an actress. When she played a spiteful mean bitch she said every nasty line with a smile. It was chillingly effective. But back to Weekly Standard editor Wiliam Kristol. He is quoted in this morning’s NYT. You can just see the snide, patronizing, condescending smile as Kristol says, regarding the White House chief of staff Andrew Card’s role in pushing the Harriet Miers nomination, “(Critics) could perhaps hold Andy accountable for not saying, 'Mr. President, this is going to be a mistake’.” Kristol added, "He's always been - weaker is not quite fair, but he's always been a less powerful chief of staff than we're used to. It worked well for a while. It seemed he was good at coordinating Karl and the vice president and Josh Bolten and Condi. And, again, to give him credit, in the first term things went pretty well, you have to say. So I don't really put the blame on Andy; he's doing what he's always done." If William Kristol has decided to blame Andy Card in one sentence, and take back the blame in the next, could it be that William Kristol wants to call attention to Andrew Card because Card is Karl Rove’s boss? Could it be Kristol’s way of saying Rove isn’t the bad guy, the buck stops at Card’s desk. Just look at those big-shot plotmeisters ratting each other out! It’s all over blogland this morning that Judith Miller made a veiled threat to Dick Cheney in her Grand Jury testimony. Scooter Libby seems to have made a veiled threat to Judith Miller. William Kristol wants us to look at Andy Card not Karl Rove. And what with all the attention on the Supreme Court nomination and Fitzgerald’s Grand Jury, the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) has nearly been forgotten. WHIG’s sole purpose was to market the Iraq war to the public. It was a task force chaired by Karl Rove and set up by Andy Card in August 2002. The plan was to ratchet up fears about the danger Iraq posed to the US. The operative phrase used by the group to instill fear and panic was “mushroom cloud”. William Kristol masterminded the Project for the New American Century. He wrote the mission statement, which proposed a pre-emptive strike strategy to ensure US global supremacy. Kristol’s plan was then taken up by WHIG. Scooter Libby signed Kristol’s PNAC Statement of Principles and Libby is a member of WHIG. Since attention is now focusing on Cheney, and away from Libby, the toads in the White House swamp are scrambling around for a convenient scapegoat for Cheney. Kristol is pointing at Card. How about pointing at Kristol? He’s always been all over, smiling and pontificating, throwing mudballs, plotting, scheming, seeming to stay above the fray but getting down and dirty in the trenches, calling for war and global aggression while playing both sides against the middle. Yep. I just found my pick for oily craven manipulating pismire most likely to be behind the Wilson/Plame leak and all other disasters of the Bush administration: William Kristol, Wicked White House Slimemother and Pot-Stirring Master Bastard.

Harriet on Hot-Seat Today

Harriet Miers gets her chance to rebut the jeers and boos today. She will finally go before the Senate and answer questions. Hang onto any photos you have of Bush’s Consigliere since she got her SCOTUS nomination on October 4th, so you can do a before and after. Apparently Miss Harriet had a 20-man-team makeover yesterday. On October 12th, Eleanor Smeal (Feminist Majority Foundation head) had a few choice words to say about “the hue and cry” over Miers’ qualifications. Smeal asked if a man would be subjected to questions about mental capacity. One answer and one question back atcha, Ms Smeal: Clarence Thomas was subjected to heated interrogation about his qualifications and even more embarrassing topics when he was nominated to the Supreme Court. And, has any man ever had a 20-man-team makeover prior to going before the Senate? You can’t bitch and moan about a double standard when the person in question exploits the double standard. Has Ratbang Diary become Gossip Central today? Oh yeah. We do it all when it fits. Like…did you hear that Condi Rice and Harriet Miers are good friends…really really good friends for years and years? As in, really really really good friends for years and years and years. Well…that’s what I heard.

Judith Miller and Her Can of Worms

The NYT features two stories this morning about their reporter Judith Miller who spent 85 days in jail, supposedly for protecting the identity of her sources for an article she intended to write but never wrote. One article, “The Miller Case: A Notebook, a Cause, a Jail Cell and a Deal", by Don Van Natta, Jr., Adam Liptak and Clifford J. Levy, is an overview of the whole Miller saga. The other, “My Four Hours Testifying in the Federal Grand Jury Room", is Judith Miller’s own account of her testimony before Patrick Fitzgerald and the Grand Jury. The following paragraph is what an old editor of mine called the “so-what paragraph”. It’s inserted in an article to edify the people who have been living in a cave. This is the lead paragraph in Judith Miller’s NYT account about her testimony and will serve as a so-what. “In July 2003, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former ambassador, created a firestorm by publishing an essay in The New York Times that accused the Bush administration of using faulty intelligence to justify the war in Iraq. The administration, he charged, ignored findings of a secret mission he had undertaken for the Central Intelligence Agency - findings, he said, that undermined claims that Iraq was seeking uranium for a nuclear bomb.” Okay. So much for the back-story. The only addition necessary is to mention that columnist Robert Novak started a furor in his syndicated column on July 14, 2003 by saying that Joseph Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame, was a covert agent in the CIA. I’ve been reserving judgment on Miller since she went to the slammer. At first, it seemed honorable that she was willing to serve jail time because she wouldn’t name names. It’s the journalist’s right, after all, not to name names. But also, the specter of Joseph McCarthy and the HUAC hearings hovers over any demand to name names. Since the McCarthy hearings, forcing people to name names gives rise to renewed fears of sliding down that slippery slope again. But now, I no longer have a problem with judging Judith Miller. As of this morning, it’s clear to me that she went to jail to protect herself and to protect another source, which so far is unnamed, unrevealed, and safe as a virgin in a convent. There’s that hogwash about Miller needing to have the vice president's chief of staff Lewis Libby tell her himself that she could name him as a source. In December 2003, F.B.I. investigators asked Libby and other officials in the White House to sign waivers saying that previous promises of confidentiality to reporters could be disregarded and that the reporters could reveal their sources. Libby signed the waiver. But NYT executive editor Bill Keller said, "Judy believed Libby was afraid of her testimony.” Keller said he didn’t know why Miller thought Libby was afraid, but he added, “She thought Libby had reason to be afraid of her testimony." Uh huh. Read, Judy Miller was afraid of Scooter Libby, not visey-versey. Don’t forget that when the White House was shouting loudest that Iraq definitely had WMD’s, Judith Miller was staunchly on the White House side. Someone high up in the Bush administration had convinced her there were WMD’s in Iraq and she wrote articles to that effect. In fact, when the NYT came under fierce condemnation for its seeming pro-WMD bias, Keller told Miller she was off the Iraq beat. And then there’s the part about NYT’s lawyer Floyd Abrams wanting Patrick Fitzgerald to question Miller only on conversations she’d had with Libby about Wilson/Plame. Plus the fact that Abrams asked Fitzgerald to promise that Miller would not be called back to answer questions about anyone other than Libby. When Miller got the assurances she needed from Libby (in a jailhouse conference call with Libby and lawyers from both sides), when she had been assured she would be queried only on the Wilson/Plame conversations and that she would not have to answer questions about other sources, then, and only then did she agreed to testify. The biggest question in this whole matter is, who is the other person(s) Judith Miller spoke to regarding the Wilson/Plame matter? That’s the most important question in all of this. And we probably will never know. So all this crap about Judith Miller protecting her sources is crap. Judith Miller is protecting herself and the Bush administration. Which is what she always has done and will do into the foreseeable future.

How Do You Like That!

Remember the dozen pro-Bush guys from the 42nd Infantry Division in Tikrit who shilled for the Bush administration in the staged videoconference this past Thursday? Turns out, mouthy Master Sgt. Corine Lombardo who was so articulate about "working side-by-side, training and equipping 18 Iraqi army battalions", is a Bush ringer. Ward Harkavy, who writes “The Bush Beat” for The Village Voice. spotted Lombardo sitting in the front row of the staged photo from Tikrit. Master Sgt. Lombardo is a Public Affairs tool. She writes a regular column for “Operation Liberty Torch”--a pro-army rag--for the 42nd Infantry Division. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But during the fake “conversation” between GWB and the troops, Lombardo never owned up to the fact that her first and foremost job is to make the BushMen look good in Iraq. Boy, it must be like paying $1000 for really bad sex. All this money being spent on fake photo-ops, fake journalism, fake snow jobs, and the war in Iraq still looks like the pig’s ear that it is: a war of aggression instigated by arrogant third-rate politicians who had avoided being in the military, planned by over-the-hill Pentagon officials who decided to wage a war on the cheap, and carried out by an insufficient number of ill-equipped and inexperienced military personnel. Trying to cover up the Iraq stinkhole is bad enough. But WaPo reported a true story yesterday that shows the depths of incompetence to which our government has sunk. The US Army is sending bills to our wounded and maimed soldiers for everything from military housing to travel for follow-up hospital treatment to military gear found missing after their injuries. The military says these bills were mistakes and they are being rectified. Mistakes? Computer errors? Who cares? We’re talking about people who believed in their government enough to fight an unnecessary war. These people should be honored not billed. Mistakes? I rest my case. Could the Bush administration and the Pentagon fuck up any worse? Oh yes! I am sure they could and they will. Wait for it!

Oh No He Didn’t!

Oh yes, he did! So afraid of what noncoms might actually say, the BushMen staged another scripted teleconference with our folks in uniform. This time, it was troops from the 42nd Infantry Division in Tikrit (right…Saddam’s birthplace) who were told what to say and when to say it yesterday as President Bush stood safely behind a podium at the White House. It’s only a matter of time until Bush is caught on videotape or on an open mike saying something incriminating. But it was the Pentagon’s Allison Barber who was caught on camera yesterday coaching the troops and giving them questions to ask. The Associated Press reported this morning that, “After asking for some water bottles to be removed from the shot, Barber then staged what was described as a brief rehearsal, in which she asked the soldiers to act out the order of their answers and which topics each would cover”. Half of the soldiers speaking on camera were officers, Paul Rieckhoff, director of the New York-based Operation Truth, an advocacy group for U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, said, adding, "If he wants the real opinions of the troops, he can't do it in a nationally televised teleconference. He needs to be talking to the boots on the ground and that's not a bunch of captains." So…we’ve had the amateur Mission Accomplished theatrics. The obviously fake Thanksgiving turkey in Baghdad in 2003. The hovering helicopters and stage set constructed for Bush’s visit to the Katrina disaster on September 2nd that was dismantled as soon as he left. And the amazing thing is, these half-assed White House movie-of-the-week producers haven’t caught onto the fact that while they are creating bogus films of bogus events of a bogus president, cameras are filming their fakery. What a bunch of stupid clumsy dithering morons. I guess John Edwards was right when he said the GOP’s problem isn’t arrogance, it’s incompetence.

Why Did Bush Nominate Miers in the First Place?

AMERICAblog this morning posted, “Okay, you know it's not going to happen (if) Hill staffers are emboldened enough to challenge the President.” Joe in DC was referring to a New York Times article reporting, “lawyers for the Republican senators on the Judiciary Committee are expressing dissatisfaction with the choice (Harriet Miers) and pushing back against her, aides to 6 of the 10 Republican committee members said yesterday.” And now it comes out that Karl Rove is the one who gave James Dobson the secret info on Miers, which led Dobson to his unqualified support. But the flea in Dobson’s ear made Dobson say, "I can't reveal it all, because I do know things that I'm privy to that I can't describe, because of confidentiality." I must say, I have moments of wondering if Rove hasn’t been setting up GWB for a monumental fall since 2000. But let’s say that Rove and Bush were on the same page about Miers. Why would they nominate someone who didn’t have a prayer? How about payback? They owed her a gigantic quid pro quo and only an extraordinary quid would justify her equally extraordinary quo. At least she does have a law degree. And she is Bush’s consigliere. What on earth did she do to earn the humongous payback of being nominated to the Supreme Court? The perfect thing about this giving and taking back is that Bush and Rove may have been the godfathers on the reward end, but others are doing the taking back. Like stealing back the ransom bag, it's all win. Except, that little detail about what did Miers do for the White House? There is a trail and it will be followed, you can bet the rent on that.

Mush and Gush From Harriet Miers

This morning’s NYT gives a view of Harriet Miers at her kiss-up sycophantic best. Quoting from over 2000 pages of personal notes and correspondence released by the Texas State Library and Archives Commission, an article by Ralph Blumenthal and Simon Romero shows Harriet Miers to be an embarrassingly fawning toady. The notes go back to 1995 when then-Texas Governor George W. Bush named Miers to chair the Texas lottery commission. Prior to that appointment Miers had worked at the Locke Purnell Rain and Harrell law firm. Just before becoming Bush’s consigliere, she was Co-Managing Partner at Locke Liddell & Sapp. And let’s be clear about what a managing partner does. A managing partner is a glorified office manager who also practices law. And Miers was a co-, not a sole managing partner. But back to Harriet Miers real career: Suck-up par excellence. Miers to Bush after his 51st birthday: "You are the best governor ever - deserving of great respect.” Miers to Bush on March 25, 1995 (Thank you) “for taking the time to visit in the office and on the plane back—cool. Keep up all the great work. The state is in great hands. Thanks also for your and your family’s personal sacrifice.” Miers to Bush in October 1997: “Hopefully Jenna and Barbara recognize that their parents are ‘cool’- as do the rest of us. All I hear is how great you and Laura are doing. Texas is blessed.” Miers to Bush after an Anti-Defamation League dinner in 1996 honoring Miers: “Texas has a very popular governor and first lady! I was struck by the tremendous impact you have on the children whose lives you touch.” With George W. Bush, the kiss-up tactic works. He believes it all. No matter how high it’s piled GWB believes every ingratiating word. One of the more interesting facets of the Miers story is that she, like the other women in GWB’s professional life seem totally sexless. Condi Rice, Karen Hughes, and Harriet Miers have a job to do: feed George Bush’s ego and delusions. They have other titles, but they get paid to keep the narcissist happy and this has nothing whatsoever to do with anything sexual. The women may fawn, preen, smile, cajole, praise and gush. But they come across as neuter gender fembots. And they've been programmed to make the Bushbot believe he’s president.

WaPo's William Raspberry: Better Than Abortion

William Raspberry's Op/Ed piece in the Washington Post this morning is interesting on many levels. He says there is a better cure to the US soaring crime rate than following William Bennett's suggestion to abort all black babies. For starters, it's interesting that Raspberry who is black doesn't fume and foment over Bennett's remark. He gives a number of possible responses to Bennett, but he doesn't get riled and defensive. Raspberry tells a true story about how the problem of raging elephants was handled in South Africa's Kruger National Park. And he relates the Kruger National Park solution to young black men in America: Too many young black men have no older black men to teach them how to be responsible productive adults. And the reasons he gives for this dilemma, at least by me, are 100% right. I see a great parallel between the response of powerful adult white men to the black community, and the response of powerful adult white men to poor people. Yes, you can substitute the word Republicans when I say powerful adult white men. The Republican Party's message to the black community and to all poor people is that blacks and poor folks have gotten themselves into the spot they are in by not being powerful wealthy and white. Ergo: Fuck you all for having so little forethought. This overall attitude of the Republican Party is a disgrace. But worse than being a disgrace, it has hurt the entire US population because it has brought about an underclass that now is finding it difficult, if not impossible, to help themselves. I wouldn't go so far as William Bennett in suggesting a solution. That is to say, I wouldn't actually suggest killing all wealthy white adult Republicans. But getting the worst of the lot out of public office would go a long way toward healing what's wrong with America.

Oh Hah! Oh Hee! Oh He-ho'!

The name Jeff Gannon/James Guckert is coming back to haunt the White House re the Wilson leaks. Specifically, how did Jeffy/James get hold of “an internal government memo prepared by US intelligence personnel”? Joe Conason posted an article in Salon.com on October 7 in which he said, “On Oct. 28, 2003, Gannon posted an interview with Joseph Wilson on the Talon Web site, in which he posed the following question: 'An internal government memo prepared by U.S. intelligence personnel details a meeting in early 2002 where your wife, a member of the agency for clandestine service working on Iraqi weapons issues, suggested that you could be sent to investigate the reports. Do you dispute that?'” How did Gannon get the memo? Conason says Gannon “hinted” that he got it from the Wall Street Journal. Maybe so. But Gannon was regularly visiting the White House at the time. Raw Story carried an article on April 25, 2005 showing the findings of Rep. Louise Slaughter (Ranking Member House Rules Committee) and Rep. John Conyers, Jr. (Ranking Member House Judiciary Committee). By using FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) Slaughter and Conyers requested and received documents, which had been released by the Secret Service re Gannon's access to the White House. Slaughter and Conyers wrote a letter (see http://rawstory.com/exclusives/byrne/slaughter_conyers_gannon_response_425.htm) to press secretary Scott McClellan asking him to explain why Gannon was given access to the White House on more than 200 occasions, sometimes checked into the White and didn't check out, and sometimes spent the night in the White House. Gannon had no press credentials except those from Talon. com. Talon was subsequently found to be a bogus news site. And Gannon was a male prostitute at the time. Oh you sly White House dogs. It's been widely reported that in 1976 Bush was sent to “Worthy Creations” in El Paso, TX to get degayed. A year later, he was straight, born again and married to Laura Welch. But now it's beginning to look like all that degaying, detoxing, and reborning just didn't work. Which, you know, would be pretty much George W. Bush's own damn bidness if he weren't POTUS and if his addictions didn't imperil our nation. Is it possible someone else in the White House inner circle was using Jeff Gannon's many-faceted services? Sure. But think about it. Who lives in the White House day and night?

The President Speaks

The President says nothing. Yesterday President Bush gave a speech to the National Endowment for Democracy at the Ronald Reagan Amphitheater in Washington, DC. It was touted as being a major speech giving unprecedented details about Al Qaeda's terrorism against the United States. But this so-called major speech turned out to be a rerun. It was a trip down memory lane to GWB's finest hour, September 11, 2001. One would think the President would want to forget his braggadocio and bombast about bringing Osama in dead or alive. But no. He chose to resurrect that embarrassing moment by mentioning Osama Bin Laden five times. Did he mention the bomb threat to New York's subway system yesterday, which happened in real time and represents a real danger? No. He chose to bask in the glory of a time when he felt he was in control. Which is GWB's modus operandi. His regular radio address on August 27th made no mention of Katrina but focused on the Iraqi constitution. The President's speech yesterday was an empty speech from an empty suit. It was not without a moment of comic relief, however. Albeit, unintended comic relief. The President said, “There's always a temptation in the middle of a long struggle to seek the quiet life, to escape the duties and problems of the world, and to hope the enemy grows weary of fanaticism and tired of murder.” He was cautioning Americans not to become complacent and relax in the war against terrorism. He went on to say, “The enemy is never tired, never sated, never content with yesterday's brutality. The enemy considers every retreat of the civilized world as an invitation to greater violence.” Yes indeedy! Seeking the quiet life is always a temptation. In August, GWB took the longest retreat of any president in 36 years. When he reluctantly cut short his vacation on September 1 to return to Washington to deal with the reality of Katrina he had logged 319 vacation days which is 20 percent of his presidency. We must remember though, a president who needs mechanical devices to aid his off-the-cuff remarks no doubt needs those devices to be up-graded and fine-tuned often and in privacy. Go back and look at the video of GWB's October 5 press conference. He was back to pauses while listening to his earpiece and quick-talk after getting his cue. I'm thinking a cochlear device implant. And the president smiles and smiles. But as Shakespeare's Yorick says to himself (Hamlet Act 5, Scene 1): “You're the reedy smile a hopeless man wears when tragedy kisses him on the forehead.”

Bush Administration: Arrogant or Incompetent?

Last night, on The Daily Show, former US Senator (D-NC) and John Kerry running mate John Edwards, said he believed the Bush administration is not as arrogant as it is incompetent. By me, the arrogance of the Bush administration is the one factor that has guaranteed its incompetence. Arrogance has allowed unqualified cronies to be placed in important positions. Rumsfeld was Cheney's crony. But giving him the job of masterminding the invasion of Iraq guaranteed that the so-called preemptive war would fail. Condoleezza Rice was the designated minder who fed GWB's ego and kept him off the sauce. But making her Secretary of State guaranteed that the United States would not only have a bungling Secretary of State but that GWB would start drinking again. Making Bush's old friend and suck-up Michael Brown head of FEMA guaranteed that FEMA would have an ineffective leader and that the organization would collapse during an emergency Giving suck-up Chertoff the job that had been vacated by suck-up Ridge guaranteed that Homeland Security would secure nothing other than Chertoff's employment. Julie Myers was a special assistant handling personnel issues for Bush when she was picked to head Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The list goes on and on. And now, at the exquisite moment when all the scandals, mismanagement and incompetence have come home to roost, in a masterstroke of arrogant stupidity and political favoritism, Ellan Miers has been appointed to the Supreme Court by the ur-putz, ne plus ultra, George W. Bush. It is no wonder the Bush administration is incompetent. The White House has conducted its affairs as though it were a frat house with all the funloving pranksters, excesses, drinking, and strange bedfellows that life in a frat house implies. It's hard to believe it's only been eight months and seventeen days since George W. Bush was inaugurated. So many offenses…so little time.

The Repubs Have a Real Problem Now

And God knows, they deserve it. Their puppet-king has decided to rule, for real. It's classic, of course. A rube is put forward because he is good-looking or has connections or his country boy ignorance appeals to the rabble and then the rube realizes he actually has power. The case of Arthur Godfrey comes to mind. He was a TV icon in the 1950's, who came to a bad end. Budd Schulberg wrote a story, “A Face in the Crowd, which was made into a great movie in 1957 and introduced Andy Griffith. Same story…a rube becomes so popular that he becomes a political juggernaut who is impossible to control. The denouement was classic too. George W. Bush wants to be President. You could see it during his press conference yesterday. When he said he'd been listening to ideas from Senators, it was pure George W. Bush. He looked right into the camera with a sincerity not seen in a press conference in decades. And he divulged a George W. Bush epiphany that was so stunningly stupid it made one gasp. Not that the epiphany didn't occur. It probably did. But only GWB would have used it as a justification for naming an unqualified personal friend to the Supreme Court. He said he'd been listening to Senators and, he said, “One of the most interesting ideas I heard was, 'Why don't you pick somebody who hasn't been a judge? Why don't you reach outside the' -- I think one senator said - 'the judicial monastery?'” In that brief moment, we saw a delusional President who believed he could put forward any off-the-wall brainwave and it would be accepted as words of wisdom. The President was asked, “In your own mind”, how much political capital he had left, And the Prez said “Plenty. Plenty.” He said he was going to spend this political capital on getting a fiscally responsible budget out and decreasing nonsecurity discretionary spending. Nonsecurity discretionary spending is less that one-fifth of the budget and decreasing it will do nothing to decrease the out-of-control spending of the federal government. Nonsecurity discretionary spending includes things like money spent on education. The operative words, of course, in the bit of dialogue in yesterday's press conference were, “in your own mind”. In the President's own mind, he is a leader, and it was clear yesterday, he has decided to lead without interference from his doctors, his minders or his advisors. Well, he's the GOP's problem. They created their monster and they don't want GWB to be President any more than we do. But what are they going to do about it? If I were the Prez, I'd stay out of helicopters. I'd even stay out of Air Force One. Matter of fact, I wouldn't even get on my mountain bike. But there's always the Leave-the-microphone-on-when-he-doesn't-know-it trick. That works well.

Let's Get Something Straight

This morning the NYT is floating the preposterous idea (“Miers Known as a Hard-Working Advocate for the President”) that Harriet Ellan Miers and Sandra Day O'Connor are equals. “Last May,” the article says, “the Texas Center for Legal Ethics and Professionalism gave Harriet E. Miers its second annual Sandra Day O'Connor Award. On Monday, President Bush proposed Ms. Miers for something a little bit bigger: Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on the Supreme Court. The parallels to the woman she would replace are apparent.” They aren't apparent to me. Mainly because the idea is a crock. Both women were born in Texas. Both women are Republicans. And there ends the similarity. Miers is 60 years old. She has distinguished herself by being a blatant suck-up to President George W. Bush. She even said he was the most brilliant man she'd ever met. That alone should disqualify her from SCOTUS for being insane or a shameless lying sycophant. She has worked in a third-rate law firm, been head of the Texas Lottery and served as a Member-At-Large on the Dallas City Council. She is unmarried and has no children. Miers got her law degree at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. SMU does not have ranking as even a second-tier law school. And Miers did not make Law Review at SMU. Contrast that with Sandra Day O'Connor's accomplishments. She became a Supreme when she was 51. O'Connor got her law degree in California at Stanford University. Stanford's Law School is ranked third in US law schools (Yale is first, Harvard second) in the first-tier group. O'Connor earned her LLB in two years. She was editor of the Stanford Law Review. She married John O'Connor when she graduated from law school. They had three sons, all born between 1957 and 1963. When the O'Connors returned from Germany where John O'Connor had served in the Judge Advocate General's Corps in the US Army, Sandra resumed her career full-time. The O'Connors settled in the Maricopa/Phoenix area in Arizona. Governor Jack Williams appointed Sandra Day O'Connor to a vacant seat in the Arizona Senate in 1969. O'Connor won re-election in 1970 and 1972. In 1974, she successfully ran for judge on the Maricopa County Superior Court. In 1979 she won an appointment to Arizona's Court of Appeals. When Justice Stewart Potter resigned from the Supreme Court in 1981, President Reagan chose O'Connor as Potter's replacement. The biggest problem with Harriet Miers having no obvious qualifications for being a Supreme is that she has left no paper trail. We don't know where she stands on important issues. By all accounts she is a nice person and she works hard. But what does she stand for? She's obviously willing to say anything and do anything to sit at the feet of a fool, George W. Bush. But how would she vote as a Justice on the Supreme Court? We have no way of knowing.

Harriet Who?

Why, Harriet Ellan Miers. You know, the White House Counsel who has never been a judge but who has been honchoing the Bush administration effort to pick Supreme Court nominees. Ah. That Harriet was just nominated by the White House to be the Supreme to succeed Sandra Day O'Connor. And in case the name Harriet Miers does not immediately call to mind the bio and curriculum vitae of a mover and shaker, Consigliere Miers hails from Dallas, TX. Ah. Consigliere Miers was appointed White House Counsel when former White House Consigliere, Alberto Gonzales, was appointed Attorney General. Ah. What ain't Harriet Ellen Miers? She ain't no Sandra Day O'Connor. What is Harriet Ellen Miers? She's a Texas GOP suck-up with a law degree. Here's her bio from the American Justice Partnership: “Harriet Miers serves as Counsel to the President. Most recently, she served as Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief of Staff, and prior to that she was Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary. “Before joining the President's staff, she was Co-Managing Partner at Locke Liddell & Sapp, LLP from 1998-2000. She had worked at the Locke Purnell, Rain & Harrell firm, or its predecessor, from 1972 until its merger with the Liddell Sapp firm. From 1995 until 2000, she was chair of the Texas Lottery Commission. In 1992, Harriet became the first woman president of the Texas State Bar, and in 1985 she became the first woman president of the Dallas Bar Association. She also served as a Member-At-Large on the Dallas City Council. “Harriet received both her undergraduate and law degrees from Southern Methodist University.” Well, I'll tell you what…for a come-from-nowhere legal hack who has gotten where she is by brown-nosing the Texas mob, Ms Harriet may have won the Texas Lottery this morning.

Let’s Get Real About the Abortion Issue

Yes, it’s a hot-button topic. Yes, the self-righteous morons who want all women to carry all fetuses to term or die trying are maddening. Yes, it divides the US into them and us camps. But the actual importance to women on whether these far-right religious fanatics can overturn Roe v. Wade or not, looms as less of a threat every day. If Roe v. Wade is overturned, it means that states can ban abortions, it doesn’t mean they will or that they must. Today’s NYT has an interesting article on the subject: “Abortion Might Outgrow Its Need for Roe v. Wade”. Back when the birth control pill first came out, we all knew it could be used as a morning-after pill. The original pill was much stronger than it needed to be to prevent pregnancy. Doctors in the women’s health field were not shy about telling us that the pill had a secondary use. Now, the birth control pill cannot be used in that way. But now it doesn’t need to be used in that way. As the NYT article points out, a pill that was approved in 1988 as a treatment for ulcers, Cytotec (misoprostol) was found to cause miscarriages and has been used for nearly two decades for self-induced abortions. In the NYT article, Dr. Jerry Edwards, an abortion provider in Little Rock, Ark. is quoted saying, "We won't go back to the days of coat hangers and knitting needles. Rich women will fly to California; poor women will use Cytotec.” Right now, any woman or girl of any age can go into any Emergency Room and ask for a morning-after pill and she will be provided with the means for inducing a miscarriage. Norma McCorvey, the original Jane Doe in the Roe v. Wade case who found God, became a born-again and now preaches against abortion, says, in her typically florid way, "When women start using these self-induced drugs, and start seeing body parts in their potty, they're going to go bananas… it's going to be horrible." No. Ms McCorvey. That’s not what is going to happen. Most women who find they are pregnant do not wait until a fetus is fully formed and viable before they decide to terminate a pregnancy. What these women will find in their potty is blood, because in the vast majority of cases, morning-after pills are used in the first two weeks after conception. The real issue is not about whether radicals and fanatics can overturn Roe v. Wade. Because it doesn’t matter. Women always have and always will have abortions. And now that abortions can easily be self-induced and now that antibiotics make dealing with infection a foregone conclusion, the holier-than-thou-crowd (who fight abortions until wives and daughters need them) doesn’t have much of a platform to stand on. Here’s the real issue: Will born-agains and religious fanatics insist that women be left to bleed to death if they go to Emergency Rooms for treatment of a failed self-induced abortion? Will they demand that these women be put in prison? They may. And that stance, which never will be enacted as law because 60% of Americans are pro-choice, would go a long way to making anti-abortion fanatics totally irrelevant.

Here's The Thing

Let's say, for argument's sake, that the New Testament stories of the Last Supper are fairly accurate. Let's say that, in spite of all the magical nonsense, political propaganda and editing and rewriting, the basic story of that last Seder is true. Let's say that back in that day, a man named Jesus wanted to reform some of the practices of Judaism, and the theocracy in power was dead-set against him. Let's say that Jesus knew a ratfink mole from the tradition-bound theocracy had wormed his way into Jesus' band of friends. Let's say Jesus knew he would not be alive to honor another Shabbat after Passover. Let's say Jesus called his friends together so they could have their Seder together, knowing that Judas had sold him out. Let's say Jesus took a loaf of bread, said a prayer of thanks and passed it around, then took a chalice of wine, said a prayer of thanks and passed it around and then said, “Look, I know one of you has given me up to them, I even know who it is, but remember what we stood for, guys. Every time you eat and drink, think of me and then just keep on keepin' on.” Let's say Jesus said something like, “When you do this, remember me”. Here's the thing: There is not one single account that reports that Jesus said, “It's not kosher for you to eat bread and drink wine and remember me unless a guy in a dress gives you permission, says some mumbo-jumbo and decides whether you are worthy to think of me while having a teaspoon of wine and eating something called a wafer that doesn't even resemble stale matzo brei.” See…the thing is, Jesus never said that. All he said was, “When you do this, remember me.” So you know what? Why not just cut out the middleman? Whoever you are, if it feels right to remember a man who had integrity, wanted to fight injustice and wasn't afraid to die for his beliefs, then go ahead, have some supper, drink a glass of wine, and remember that man because all the stories say he was good, kind, just and honorable. And that is more than can be said for the pompous assholes in the Vatican who are more diabolical, self-serving and greedy than the worst fanatics who wanted Jesus dead.

Lest We Forget

Following is a timeline for the Watergate Scandal, which lead to the eventual resignation of President Richard M. Nixon. Nixon was re-elected in a landslide on November 7, 1972. He actually did have a mandate. And yet, he was brought down by lies, deceit, shenanigans, corruption and the hubris of a Republican administration. June 13, 1971 The New York Times begins publishing the Pentagon Papers (a secret history of the Vietnam War). The Washington Post begins to publish the papers later that week. September 3, 1971 The White House "plumbers" unit (so-named because they plugged leaks in the administration) burglarizes a psychiatrist's office to find files on Daniel Ellsberg, the former military analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers. June 17, 1972 Five men are arrested at 2:30 a.m. trying to bug the offices of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate hotel and office complex. June 19, 1972 The Washington Post reports that a GOP security aide is among the Watergate burglars. Former attorney general John Mitchell, head of the Nixon reelection campaign, denies any link to the operation. August 1, 1972 Washington Post reports a $25,000 cashier's check, earmarked for the Nixon campaign, wound up in the bank account of a Watergate burglar. September 29, 1972 Washington Post reports that John Mitchell, while serving as attorney general, controlled a secret Republican fund used to finance widespread intelligence-gathering operations against the Democrats. October 10, 1972 Washington Post reports that FBI agents establish that the Watergate break-in stems from a massive campaign of political spying and sabotage conducted on behalf of the Nixon reelection effort. November 7, 1972 Nixon is reelected. It's one of the biggest landslides in American political history. Nixon gets more than 60 percent of the vote. Dem nominee, Sen. George McGovern (SD) suffers a humiliating defeat. January 30, 1973 Former Nixon aides G. Gordon Liddy and James W. McCord Jr. are convicted of conspiracy, burglary and wiretapping in the Watergate incident. Five other men plead guilty. April 30, 1973 Nixon's top White House staffers, H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, and Attorney General Richard Kleindienst resign over the scandal. White House counsel John Dean is fired. May 18, 1973 The Senate Watergate Committee begins nationally televised hearings. Attorney General-designate Elliot Richardson appoints former solicitor general Archibald Cox as the Justice Department's special prosecutor for Watergate. June 3, 1973 WaPo reports John Dean told Watergate investigators that he discussed the Watergate cover-up with President Nixon at least 35 times. June 13, 1973 WaPo reports Watergate prosecutors have found a detailed memo addressed to John Ehrlichman describing burglary plans for Ellsberg's office. July 13, 1973 Former presidential appointments secretary Alexander Butterfield tells Watergate Committee that Nixon had recorded all conversations and telephone calls in his offices since 1971. July 18, 1973 Nixon orders the White House taping system disconnected. July 23, 1973 Nixon refuses to turn over the presidential tape recordings to the Watergate Committee or to the special prosecutor. October 20, 1973 Nixon fires Archibald Cox and abolishes the office of special prosecutor in what is called The Saturday Night Massacre. Attorney General Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William D. Ruckelshaus resign. Pressure to impeach Nixon mounts in Congress. November 17, 1973 Nixon declares, "I'm not a crook,” claiming he's innocent in the Watergate case. December 7, 1973 White House can't explain an 18 1⁄2-minute gap in one of the subpoenaed tapes. White House Chief of Staff Alexander Haig says it may be "some sinister force" that erased the segment. April 30, 1974 The White House turns over more than 1,200 pages of edited transcripts of Nixon tapes to the House Judiciary Committee. Committee won't accept transcripts and demands the tapes. July 24, 1974 The Supreme Court rules unanimously Nixon has to release the tape recordings of 64 White House conversations. Supreme Court rejects executive privilege claim. July 27, 1974 House Judiciary Committee passes the first of three articles of impeachment and charges obstruction of justice. August 8, 1974 Richard Nixon becomes the first U.S. president to resign. Vice President Gerald R. Ford becomes president. Ford later pardons Nixon of all charges related to the Watergate case.

Way To Go, Ms Hughes!

Nanny Rice's gofer, Karen Hughes, blew it. Twice, yet. Hughes was a genius at flattering George Bush and keeping his spirits buoyed and his delusions alive and well when she was his so-called senior presidential adviser. Ergo, the White House Ladies decided she was the perfect person to mend the fences Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice kicks over and tramples. Hughes was appointed Under Secretary of State last March. Her duties are to polish the US image around the world. Tuesday was Hughes's first foray into the tricky field of diplomacy. She went to Saudi Arabia to speak with Saudi women about how great it is to be a woman in the great democracy of the great United States of America. She told the Saudi women she would be only too happy to support them when they sought to emulate US women and raise their status. The Saudi women were insulted. They let Hughes know it. Nevermind. Undaunted, Under-Helper Hughes went to Turkey yesterday to speak to the Turkish women about how great it is to be a woman in the great democracy of the great United States of America. She told the Turkish women she would support their efforts to raise their status and be free like American women. The Turkish women were insulted. They let Hughes know it. To top it off, Hughes told a huge lie to the Turkish women and they were only too well aware it was a lie. In attempting to defend the war in Iraq, which the Turkish people have decried and protested, Hughes said. "I can appreciate your concern about war. No one likes war…my friend President Bush did all he could to avoid a war in Iraq.” What a stupid lying twit. What an arrogant, silly, witless stooge. Two assignments. Two failures. I wonder how many more countries the Hughes moron is going to visit before she realizes that saying “my friend President Bush” will cause more boos than lighting a cigar at a Smoke-Enders convention.

The One and Only Agent 86 Maxwell Smart

Those close-set eyes, that clueless demeanor, the self-centered attitude and cavalier optimism in the face of disaster. Don Adams may no longer be with us, but he will never be forgotten as Agent 86 in the 1960’s NBC/CBS “Get Smart” TV series. He was so successful as Maxwell Smart, in fact, that it became impossible for producers or the public to see him in any other role. It seems impossible now to imagine anyone else as Agent 86. Who else could have played the role? Well, there is one other person. Close-set eyes, clueless demeanor, self-absorbed attitude, cavalier optimism. It’s only a matter of time until the Bush White House gets its just due: a TV series based on the worst administration, Republican or Democrat, ever to have foisted itself on the American people. We had an ideal TV President in Martin Sheen’s Josiah “Jed” Bartlett in “The West Wing”. We now have a woman President in Geena Davis’s new TV show, “Commander in Chief”. If President George W. Bush had not existed in reality, television would have had to invent him. Don Adams, who played George W. Bush but didn’t know it, died on September 26th at the age of 82, long may Maxwell Smart live. But we still have SNL’s Will Ferrell, who has the Bush persona down. And we have David Hyde Pierce who played a depressed and suicidal United States congressman in 1992’s “The Powers That Be”. And was, would you believe, hilarious. We still have “Get Smart” writers, Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. With the Bush polls plummeting, the unnecessary war in Iraq going nowhere but into a black hole of failure, and new false moves and wrong-headed decisions occurring daily, the TV industry may decide to laugh the BushMen into oblivion with a sit-com they deserve. Supporting cast: Laura Bush: Renee Zellweger Dick Cheney: Jason Alexander Karl Rove: Dennis Franz Condoleezza Rice: CCH Pounder Scott McClellan: Paul Giamatti Michael Chertoff: Michael Richards Michael Brown: Gordon Clapp

John L. Allen Jr. Explains It All To You

Allen has an editorial in the New York Times today: “At the Vatican, Exceptions Make the Rule”. Boiled down to essentials, Allen says the Vatican ALWAYS says one thing and means another. Allen was specifically writing about the recent document from the Vatican stating that forthwith there will be no more homosexuals accepted in seminaries. But Allen says, in general, the Vatican makes pronouncements and knows people will fall short of putting them in practice. In other words, there will be homosexual seminaries. Allen is okay with this. “Some in the Anglo-Saxon world see this as a form of hypocrisy: the church apparently issues laws while winking at disobedience. But Vatican officials view it instead as a realistic concession to fallen human nature.” And there you have it folks: This is the Roman Catholic rule-of-thumb that makes it difficult for Roman Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, in fact EVERYONE in the world to understand the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. The Rule is: When the Vatican issues an edict, the Vatican expects you to do the opposite. However when you do the opposite, the Vatican will tell you that you are going to hell for doing what the Vatican knows and expects you will do. Hypocritical? Yes. But that's putting it mildly. Making a rule, saying you'll show compassion if the rule is broken and kicking people in the ass when they break the rule is out-and-out sadism. The Vatican says no contraceptives and no abortions. But the Vatican expects people to use contraceptives and have abortions because we are all human. However, the Vatican says that if we use contraceptives and have abortions we are on the fast road to going to hell. We can keep from going to hell by not using contraceptives and not having abortions. But the Vatican knows we will use contraceptives and have abortions. So who comes out of this no-win situation smelling like roses? The Vatican. It has warned people about the wages of sin and it has shown compassion. The Vatican is pure. The Vatican does not err. The only trouble is: You can't fool God. Even when you sit on a throne in Vatican City, God is the ultimate bullshit detector. Look out, Pope Ratz. God is onto you and your red-gowned handmaids.

Let's Review Narcissism

The Narcissists' Credo: I can manipulate anyone and everyone. I am all-powerful. If you accept that, you are a genius. If you don't accept it you are useless to me and must be punished. Narcissism and Drug/Alcohol Abuse: Narcissism is painful when the narcissist is opposed or ignored. Pain needs to be alleviated. Narcissists often self-medicate with drugs and alcohol. Traits of the Narcissist: 1. An exaggerated sense of self-importance. 2. Preoccupation with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love. 3. Believes he is "special" and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions). 4. Requires excessive admiration. 5. Has a sense of entitlement. 6. Selfishly takes advantage of others to achieve his own ends. 7. Lacks empathy. 8. Is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him. 9. Shows arrogant, haughty, patronizing, or contemptuous behaviors or attitudes. Prognosis for the Narcissist: Not likely to change. Not likely to go into therapy. Not likely to commit suicide. Very likely to get worse. Very likely to need hospitalization. Advice to Anyone Involved with a Narcissist: Run. Is President George W. Bush a Narcissist? Oh you bet your sweet ass he is!

Amy Welborn Says: Church Purge “Badly Needed”

Amy Wellborn is a so-called Catholic conservative. (As in, the Pope and the church may not be right but they are never wrong.) Today, in a New York Times Op/Ed column, “The Sins of the Seminaries”, Ms Welborn asks, ”Why is it considered unfair to expect priests and seminarians to live by the values of the institution they serve?” Welborn answers herself saying, “Others may call it a purge, but I call it truth in advertising.” There is only one thing wrong with Welborn's conclusion: “A seminary has a dual responsibility. It owes the future priest preparation for a life of sacrifice, unique witness and engagement with other human beings at moments of joy and pain in a society that has no respect for his vocation. But a seminary also owes us, the people in the pews, psychologically mature priests who aren't engaged in an eternal and ego-driven struggle with their own problems, who are prepared to serve, to teach and preach - with integrity and honesty.” Sounds good. But it's wrong. Seminaries have never ever, no NOT EVER, prepared its priests for a “life of sacrifice”. They have never had a major goal to give the people in the pews priests who are “psychologically mature”, priests that “aren't engaged in an eternal and ego-driven struggle with their own problems”. Seminaries and convents have always been a place where psychologically immature people have found a safe haven for their psychologically immature outlook to fester and become even more psychologically immature. Yes, seminaries and convents can turn out good priests and nuns, but it is against all odds. Convents used to be the place where families stowed their unmarriageable spinsters and a place where the Catholic Church could find free laborers to do its scut work and to teach children. That kind of unpaid forced labor is not a prescription for a happy well-adjusted work force. When the time came that unmarried and unmarriageable women could make their own way in the world, the Church's convents began to empty out. Seminaries have always been rife with pedophiles and homosexuality. The history of the Vatican shows a history of murders and avarice right in Vatican City that goes back to the earliest popes. It's a bit late to order a purge so that the Church can guarantee that their seminarians will be psychologically mature and perversion free. The RCC has always spoken about itself as though its leadership were spotless. There were the requisite demurrals about priests, nuns and the Pope being only human, of course. But the subtext from the Church is that men and women of the cloth have actually attained its impossible requirement for mankind to be inhumanly pure. And, as mankind will always do, because mankind cannot be pure, the men and women in the Church have always lied and engaged in cover-ups when immorality in the Church has been revealed. It's foolish to speak about a needed purge of seminaries and not speak about a needed purge of the Catholic Church hierarchy. Which brings us to lies and necessary purges in other places. You will remember, I am sure, that last week we were informed that our heart-attack prone VP, Dick Cheney, would undergo a procedure this weekend to repair an aneurysm behind his left knee. We were told he also had an aneurysm behind his right knee, but only the left knee artery bulge would be fixed. The procedure would be performed under a local anesthetic and would involve a short hospital stay. This morning we have been informed that the right knee was also fixed and that the procedure took six hours under a local anesthetic. A Sarasota cardiologist, Mike Mollod, was quoted in all the official White House bullshit that “It is not a very risky surgery”. As though a local makes it routine. As though not risky in a healthy man means not risky in seriously ill Dick Cheney. We have no idea what actually took place during those six hours yesterday. But this morning, doctors are weighing-in on the whole affair. (See NYT's “Vice President Has Procedure for Aneurysms in His Knees” by Lawrence K. Altman.) It was “irresponsible” to do both knees during the same operation, one doctor said about the “intraoperative decision”. Intraoperative decision is medical-speak for, “we decided to do it during the first surgery”. Which means, “we found a life-threatening situation going on and we had to change our plans”. The White House wouldn't let the doctors who did the surgery speak to the press. A statement from Cheney's office this morning said Cheney is "awake, alert, and comfortable" and that "he's due to be briefed on the impact of Hurricane Rita in Louisiana and Texas, as well as the federal, state and local response.” I wouldn't bank on it. If Cheney goes into a coma, his office will say, “The Vice President is napping and resting comfortably.” When he dies, the report will be, “Mr. Cheney's knee surgery has caused a complication which requires the VP to stay off his feet for an unspecified amount of time.” When he's trundled off to the mortuary the White House will say, “The President has been called back from Texas to consult with the Vice President on a matter of national significance”. To show that having to go back to Washington is no big deal, the President will be shown boarding Air Force One arm-in-arm and laughing with brother Jeb. Together at last.

Yo! Self-righteous Christians!

The Ten Commandments originated as a Hebrew text. And don't you forget it! Jesus didn't write the Ten Commandments. St. Paul did not write the Ten Commandments. St. Peter didn't write the Ten Commandments. And God knows, St. Augustine who invented original sin out of whole cloth in the fourth century did not write the Ten Commandments. No pope wrote the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments do not come from a Christian text. The Ten Commandments can be found in two different versions in the Old Testament: (Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5). All Bible-thumping, Testament-quoting Christians should consult a rabbi about the meaning of the Ten Commandments and why they were given to Moses, before ranting and raving about them as though they were composed by Jesus Christ in 33 AD (or Common Era as Christians have taken to labeling the time before and after Christ's birth). Come to that, let's talk about the third Commandment. That's the one that sanctimonious churchgoers like to throw out when someone says “Goddamn”: You shall not take the Name of Adonai Your God in vain. It means: Don't call upon the Lord in a thoughtless manner because calling upon the Lord is serious and we shouldn't do it lightly. Taking the Lord's name in vain has a deeper meaning: Don't promise (swear) to do something in God's name and then neglect to do it. Cussing is the least of it. The pretentious, proud and falsely pious people who invoke the name of Jesus are more blasphemous and irreligious than cuss words could ever be. Here are some hard facts: Jesus Christ lived and died a Jew. Jesus Christ most assuredly had Semitic features; his looks had more in common with the bin Ladens than with an effeminate bearded Swedish aesthete of indeterminate gender. Jesus Christ did not start a new religion. Jesus Christ wanted to reform Judaism. Political activists started a religion called Jesus Judaism in the first century CE. The name Christian did not come into use until the Fourth Century, Constantine, a pagan from Turkey who became the Emperor of Rome, converted to Christianity in 312 CE and forced his followers to become Christians. Christianity became a major religion because people were threatened with death if they didn't become Christians. Constantine would prosper in the GOP.

Same-Old Same-Old in Philadelphia RCC

How did the Philadelphia Archdiocese respond to District Attorney Lynne Abraham's 418-page grand jury report on pedophile priests in Philadelphia? Archbishop Cardinal Justin Rigali told Catholics not to read the report. Philadelphia Inquirer staff writer David O'Reilly reported that Rigali said, “I don't think it's of value to families,” and that (the report) "gives a very slanted view.” The grand jury, which was convened by DA Abraham in 2002 was severely critical of the way the Philadelphia archdiocese covered up the criminal acts of pedophile priests going back to Cardinal John Krol (archbishop from 1961 to 1988) and including Rigali's predecessor, Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua (archbishop from 1988 to 2003). This morning the Associated Press reported that the grand jury said Krol and Bevilacqua “knew that priests were molesting children but conducted bogus 'non-investigations' designed to avoid uncovering abuse, while they and their aides transferred known abusers among parishes.” The AP said the report “names 63 priests 'whose abusive behavior was well-documented in archdiocesan files and by witnesses who testified' before the panel. All had multiple victims, and many more abusers certainly exist." The AP said, “The examples of abuse cited in the report included an 11-year-old girl who was allegedly raped and impregnated by a priest, who took her for an abortion, and a priest who falsely told a 12-year-old boy that the child's mother knew he was being raped repeatedly and allowed it.” The grand jurors said they had wanted to bring criminal charges against RCC officials in Philadelphia but Pennsylvania's statute of limitations stopped any further action. Yesterday, a spokesman for the Catholic Church said the Philadelphia grand jury report showed a bias against the Catholic Church. Some things you can count on: The GOP and the RCC will deny, deny, deny, even when they are caught with their pants down.

Vatican To Bar Gays From Becoming Priests

Yesterday, the big news in Philadelphia was that a grand jury had found that the Archdiocese up to and including the recent tenure of Archbishop Bevilacqua had protected pedophiles while doing nothing to protect their victims. Now today we hear that the Vatican plans to bar gay men from becoming priests. An article in today's New York Times about the Vatican's new strict rules against homosexual priests reminds us that Pope Ratz said last spring that there was a need to “purify” the church. Apparently, this is his first step. Yo, Pope Ratz, you ignorant ninny…ridding the church of gay priests will not rid the church of pedophile priests. Pedophiles are nearly 100% heterosexual. The new rules will be published soon, but the information that is now being leaked makes it clear that new recruits to seminaries are the main focus of this item on the church's purification agenda. The NYT reports that a church official said, “the ban would pertain only to candidates for the priesthood, not to those already ordained.” Which must make all the bejeweled red-gowned cardinals in the Vatican sigh in unified relief. The church official also said, “the document did not represent any theological shift for the church, whose catechism considers homosexuality 'objectively disordered'.” But one does wonder exactly how the purge of all the objectively disordered candidates for the priesthood will be accomplished? Maybe an objectively disordered-sniffing dog has been developed? Perhaps a potential-to-become-objectively-disordered gene has been found? One also wonders: If gay men with an urge to get into the god-business are banned, and the RCC won't let priests marry, and women can't be ordained, and priests who are gay are quitting because they don't want to live a lie, how is the RCC going to replenish its priest pool which isn't large enough to serve the church as it is? And maybe that's the whole point. If the Pope and his flunkies can get rid of as many priests as possible and force as many congregants to leave the church as possible, then, finally, the RCC can exist for the Pope and Cardinals alone. And preserving the rich, abundant, sweet and oh-so-private life in Vatican City is the important thing, isn't it?

National Enquirer: "Bush is Drinking Again"

LMAO! Enquirer reports Laura Bush said, "Stop, George." Nah…nah…nah…. What she said was “Stop George….” Stop George from ruining the country, from ruining my life, from ruining any hopes for a reasonable life for Jenna and Barbara, oh sob…oh dear…stop George from ruining EVERYTHING! LMFAO!!!!!!!

Jeb's Drunk Son Arrested

Well yes, of course, it's interesting that Florida Guv's youngest son (John Ellis) was arrested September 16th for drunk and disorderly. Just as it was interesting when Guv Jeb's daughter Noelle was arrested in 2002 for trying to pass off a fake prescription to get Xanax. And it's interesting that President GWB's daughters have a history of drunk and disorderly. It's all very titillating. But, the most interesting thing about the younger Bush generation is that we hear so little about Guv Jeb's oldest son, George Prescott Bush, who is 29 and has inherited his mother's Hispanic good looks. The August 13, 2005 issue of Time mag reported that: “During his uncle's two presidential campaigns, George P. Bush, son of Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Mexican-born mom Columba, crisscrossed the nation to rally the faithful, often in Spanish. Now a lawyer in Dallas, P., as his family calls him, sits on the Republican National Committee's Hispanic advisory panel and is active in urban-renewal efforts in Texas. But Bush, 29, says any run for public office is at least a decade away. 'I would only like to pursue [public office] for the right reasons, not necessarily to fill some generational gap,' he says.” So right away, we know that George P. can bullshit like a pro, that he has enormous ambitions to get into the political arena, and that it will be much less than a decade (probably by seven years) before he runs for office. And we also know that the Bush clan is not pinning its hopes on Jeb Bush. The only troubling thing that has come to light about George P. is that on December 31, 1994, he broke into the Miami home of a former girlfriend, argued mightily with her father, fled the scene, returned 20 minutes later, drove his Ford Explorer across the front lawn and left wide paths of burned grass to be remembered by. And the interesting thing about this incident is that the girl's father declined to press charges. Could it be because Jeb Bush was the Republican nominee for Governor in 1994? And you don't screw with the Bush's no how now way. At least that used to be the gospel according to the GOP. Now George P. Bush might do better to use his mother's maiden name, Gallo.

NYT Aviso: Last Day To Read Frank Rich For Free

The New York Times has decided their Op/Ed columnists are of such merit that we will be willing to pay $49.95 a year for the privilege of continuing to read them daily online. And if we aren't willing…well, the hell with us. We would get a few other perks for ponying up the fifty bucks, but those extras are window dressing. We'll pay, the NYT assumes, because we've gotten in the habit of reading the Op/Ed page and now we'll pay a fee for what used to be free. The NYT has turned out their Op/Age columnists. Call it a Pimp-page fee. By me, the Op/Ed ninnies like Maureen Dowd, John Tierney and Thomas Friedman are no loss. However, Frank Rich, Paul Krugman and Nicholas Kristoff, plus a guest writer here and there might possibly be worth an annual fee of twenty bucks for the package. Or maybe even a $10 annual ala Carte fee. But $50? Not even with Bill Maher thrown in…although…that would sweeten the pot considerably. The fact of the matter is that most bloggers will figure out a way to read the NYT columnists online for free. It's a moral obligation.

Cheney Having Aneurysm Repaired

That's what the White House says, anyway. Cheney's got an aneurysm behind his right knee and it's going to be repaired next weekend. Actually, he's got aneurysms affecting both knees, but the right knee is getting repaired. That's their story, at any rate. Which of course we don't believe. Because the White House ladies lie about everything, even when they don't have to, just to keep their hand in. When Cheney was MIA during Katrina, it was rumored he was in the hospital. Which is very plausible. He may be having an aneurysm repaired next weekend, but it's doubtful it's the benign and routine procedure being put forward. And we don't know what else has gone wrong with his failing body. Let's see…he's had four heart attacks. The most recent one (rather, the last one the White House admitted to) was in 2000. In 2001, a wire mesh stent was inserted to keep a clogged artery open. He has a pacemaker and a defibrillator. And these are the attacks, procedures and devices we know about. This is the man Bob Woodward said absolutely would run for president in 2008? Cheney will be lucky to be alive in 2008 let alone run for office. Let's have a look at the order of presidential succession in case Bush is made to resign and Cheney kicks off his mortal coil. If Condi Rice is impeached, Donald Rumsfeld fired, Michael Chertoff forced to resign, John Snow quits, and Alberto Gonzales becomes a Supreme, these names will change. By the way, the Secretary of Homeland Security used to be last in the order of succession, but was moved up to No. 8. Vice President Richard Cheney Speaker of the House John Dennis Hastert President pro tempore of the Senate Ted Stevens Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Secretary of the Treasury John Snow Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff Secretary of the Interior Gale A. Norton Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alphonso Jackson Secretary of Transportation Norman Yoshio Mineta Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson Back in July, there was a rumor that Hastert might quit the House altogether. However, with the GOP taking a long look at Bush's chances for finishing out his term and Cheney on the seriously disabled list, Hastert may be looking at the odds for his becoming president as a sure thing.

So Where Was The “Responsibility” Confession?

It was in a throw-away line inserted at minute 21 of the President's self-serving 22-minute litany of White House plans to retool its recent fuck-you approach to New Orleans. The speech was nearly over last night when Bush said, in effect, “Oh-by-the-way I am responsible but let's not dwell on that.” It's interesting that between the White House having sent the New York Times a copy of the president's speech (which was printed this morning) and the appearance of CNN's actual transcript, the speech had changed a great deal. The last two minutes turned out to be totally different from the one published by the NYT. Notably, this paragraph was added: “Four years after the frightening experience of September 11th, Americans have every right to expect a more effective response in a time of emergency. When the federal government fails to meet such an obligation, I as president am responsible for the problem, and for the solution.” So, that's that…another mission accomplished. One can imagine Bush turning to his advisors after he finished his speech, rolling down his sleeves and saying, “How's zat?” Well, Mr. Bush, the answer is, the speech didn't scatter the fairy dust you'd hoped for. You may have short-term memory problems yourself, but the American people can remember just fine. We remember that you had to be dragged from your vacation to give even a teeny bit of attention to the Katrina disaster. We remember your nanny/cum Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, was buying shoes, and seeing a play in New York at the height of the Katrina disaster. We remember that VP Cheney was MIA during the entire storm. And yesterday, the day your speech was supposed to make us forget the gaffes and malfeasance of the Bush administration, Elizabeth Bumiller reported in the NYT a new and stunning false move by the White House: “Republicans said Karl Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff and Mr. Bush's chief political adviser, was in charge of the reconstruction effort, which reaches across many agencies of government and includes the direct involvement of Alphonso R. Jackson, secretary of housing and urban development,” Bumiller said. Is there anyone who would be worse to put in charge of the New Orleans reconstructing? Yes there is…Barbara Bush. But they are probably saving her to chair the Texas Republicans For Fairness and Respect to the Black Community Coalition.

The President is a Dope

(With apologies to Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, the entire cast and crew of 1947's “Allegro” and the song “The Gentleman is a Dope”.) The President is a dope, a man of no appeal. A clumsy Joe who wouldn't know a Samba from a Reel. The President is a dope and not my cup of tea. How did he get in the White House? By fraud and perfidy. The President isn't bright, he doesn't know the score. A siege will come, he'll say “Ho-hum” and lie down for a snore. The President's eyes are blue, but little do they see. How did he get in the White House? By lies and perjury. He's got an awful problem. It stinks to heaven high. He'll try to snow the people, but they know it's all a lie. The President is a dope, he isn't very smart. He's got a mug you'd love to slug And smash with all your heart. The President is a dope, doesn't know how bad it's gonna be. Look at me laughing my ass off. He never looked good to me. As if he'd look good to me.

Prez Takes Responsibility…Ha-ha! That's Rich!!!

Read the fine print. “To the extent that the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility,” the Number One White House weasel said. Since Katrina made landfall on August 29th near Buras, LA as a Category 4 hurricane, the White House has been assuring the world the US federal government did its job right. And not only that, the White House immediately got into defense mode and sent flacks and flunkies out to declare on every available venue on TV that it was the locals and the Gulf Coast states who had failed. Ergo, the president now is taking responsibility for the determination that there were no failures by the federal government regarding Katrina. The entire lead paragraph in NYT's “responsibility” story this morning reads: “President Bush said on Tuesday that he bore responsibility for any failures of the federal government in its response to Hurricane Katrina and suggested that he was unsure whether the country was adequately prepared for another catastrophic storm or terrorist attack.” Any failures? Let me clarify that creative example of admits-nothing rhetoric. It means the White House has heard rumors there were fed failures, but hasn't proven to itself that there actually were any fed failures. The Prez is unsure we're adequately prepared? Unsure? Let's see now. How long have the rest of us been TOTALLY SURE the US is NOT adequately prepared? I believe it goes back to the idiotic “duct tape” aviso, which was on February 10, 2003. The federal government's Fire Administrator David Paulison and Homeland Security boss Tom Ridge made an announcement that to be prepared for a terrorist attack all US citizens should have duct tape and plastic sheeting to put around doors and windows to fend off a chemical or germ attack. And many US citizens dutifully bought out all the duct tape and plastic sheeting available in all home improvement and hardware stores. Eventually, smarter heads than Paulison and Ridge informed us that the duct tape and plastic sheeting would be of no help whatsoever. That incident told the entire world that Homeland Security didn't have the remotest idea how to make the US homeland secure. At the same time, the incredibly stupid duct tape gaffe let the world know (except for the dimwitted Prez of the US and his craven cronies) that the US was a sitting duck for terrorists. But now, two-and-a-half years later, the biggest head-up-his-ass President the US has ever had (and admittedly, we've had a few) says he's “unsure” the US is prepared for another terrorist attack. But wait…there's more. President Hasn't-a-Clue-and-Loves-it-That-Way George W. Bush has named David Paulison as the new head of FEMA.

Mr. Ratfucker And Il Presidente Insano

Mr. Ratfucker has noticed that Michael Brown said he wasn't asked to resign. While Mr. Ratfucker feels this may be technically true, he also feels it would be more accurate if Mr. Brown had said he'd been told to resign or be served his testicoli piccoli ala Sicilianese for dinner. Il bizzarro Presidente del unito Dichiara sees the Crawford compound as a Texas branch of I Ragazzi Italiani and sometimes speaks in pidgin Italian, Mr. Ratfucker said. Il pazzo presidente also asks to be called Don Doppia V upon occasion. Recently, Mr. Ratfucker reported, Don Doppia V said that race played no part in his telling the poor black residents of New Orleans that they should use their rusted-out pick-up trucks to get out of the city or learn to swim. “Fuhgeddaboudit, “ Don Doppia V said. “I…um…how do you say 'I adore you'… um… ti amo negros.” Il mentalmente difettoso presidente then turned to his Consigliere Numero Uno and said, “Tell them how much I care.” “La scimmietta cares…um…molto,” Numero Uno said. Mr. Ratfucker reported that Numero Uno also said, “Don Doppia V cares molto about the disgraziato and povero negros in New Orleans.” Il mucchio di merda then said to his Number One, “Tell them the blame thing…plenty…you know…all around." Numero Uno said, “Sì. Ci è abbondanza di colpa da girare intorno a.” Yesterday, Mr. Ratfucker followed Don Doppia V on his tour of the Algiers neighborhood in New Orleans. “Where…dove sono…um… the shops?” DDV asked. “Whew! What a stinkerini! Really puzza. These folks got no rispetto!”

To the “Plenty of Blame to Go Around” Folks

Dear Apologists for George W. Bush: The incontrovertible facts are these: Katrina was declared a category 5 Hurricane on Sunday, August 28. Everyone in the United States knew the magnitude of the hurricane’s destruction on New Orleans. However, the President of the United States did not know until he was forced to know on Friday September 2nd that Katrina had destroyed New Orleans. The September 19th issue of Newsweek reports that, “Bush knew the storm and its consequences had been bad; but he didn't quite realize how bad”. The article (“How Bush Blew It”) goes on to say that on Thursday night (September 1), “some White House staffers were watching the evening news and thought the president needed to see the horrific reports coming out of New Orleans. (GWB’s) Counselor (Dan) Bartlett made up a DVD of the newscasts so Bush could see them in their entirety as he flew down to the Gulf Coast the next morning on Air Force One.” There aren’t enough rosepetals in the world to cover up the fact that George W. Bush is isolated and out of touch by his own personal decision to be out of touch and isolated. It’s unimaginable that the President of the United States would need a flunky to make up a DVD of newscasts about Katrina so that he would understand the magnitude of the worst natural disaster (enabled by federal inaction and cutback policies) to ever hit the United States. But that is what happened and those are the facts. We can ponder Why? We can wonder, Is GWB insane or just disinterested? We can ask, What on earth is wrong with the man? But the facts are the facts: President George W. Bush did not know because he chose not to know and had to be forced to know that a major section of the United States had been destroyed. As the Newsweek article says, “How this could be—how the president of the United States could have even less ‘situational awareness,’ as they say in the military, than the average American about the worst natural disaster in a century—is one of the more perplexing and troubling chapters in a story that, despite moments of heroism and acts of great generosity, ranks as a national disgrace.” However, perhaps an even more horrifying fact is that, according to Newsweek, “After five years in office, he (President Bush) is surrounded largely by people who agree with him.” So there you have it. We have a President, the President’s Cabinet and the President’s advisors who view themselves as royalty above the fray. And they view the citizens of the United States as subjects whose reason for being is to honor and defend the royals. The myriad governmental failures during the Katrina catastrophe is not about bureaucrcy, or the difficulty of coordinating unwieldy government agencies during times of disaster. It's about the fact that the men and women in the top positions in our government believe that royalty such as they are, have the right to vacation, shop and ignore the plight of the real world. It's about the fact that the Bush administration just doesn't give a fuck.

Frank Rich Is Not Writing Today

Me either.

FEMA Chief Reassignment

Translation of AP news story from Wonk-speak into English: Asked if he was being made a scapegoat for a federal relief effort that has drawn widespread and sharp criticism, Michael Brown told The Associated Press after a long pause: "By the press, yes. By the president, No." Translation: Yes...the fucking President hung me out to dry way before the fucking press hung me out to dry. May George Bush's hair fall out from dengue fever. "Michael Brown has done everything he possibly could to coordinate the federal response to this unprecedented challenge," Chertoff told reporters in Baton Rouge, La. Translation: Michael Brown is a useless twat. He couldn't locate his balls with a magnifying glass and a compass. Less than an hour before Brown's removal came to light, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Brown had not resigned and the president had not asked for his resignation. Translation: Karl Rove told Chertoff if he didn't can the FEMA asshole, Rove would can the Homeland Security asshole. Chertoff suggested the shift came as the Gulf Coast efforts were entering "a new phase of the recovery operation." He said Brown would return to Washington to oversee the government's response to other potential disasters. "I appreciate his work, as does everybody here," Chertoff said. Translation: Brown will oversee nothing except his own funeral for the foreseeable future. He's never worked a day in his life and would have starved to death if he hadn't been a White House snitch. "I'm anxious to get back to D.C. to correct all the inaccuracies and lies that are being said," Brown said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. Translation: I'm working on my new improved resume and it will be ready for publication shortly. But first, I'm shopping the book I've written about Michael Chertoff. Brown's official biography on the FEMA Web site says that his background in state and local government also includes serving as "an assistant city manager with emergency services oversight" and as a city councilman in Edmond, Oklahoma. Translation: Michael Brown was an assistant to the assistant to the city dogcatcher in Edmond, Oklahoma. He was fired when he tried to put a dog muzzle on a Shetland pony.

Oh Shit! Powell Is Going to Run For Office

An article in the NYT this morning (“Powell Calls His U.N. Speech a Lasting Blot on His Record”) shows Powell is in denial about what he knew and when he knew it. In an interview with Barbara Walters tonight at 10:00 (ABC), Powell says his speech in front of the UN was not only painful at the time, “it's painful now.” He felt “terrible”, Powell says, when he learned he’d been misled about the intelligence he had come to believe was true. It was “devastating”, he says, to learn later that some intelligence agents knew the information he had was unreliable but did not speak up. What a load of unmitigated tripe. When Powell was given the copy of the speech he was supposed to read before the UN, he said, “This is bullshit!” The speech was modified somewhat when he refused to read it as written. He knew at the time he would be telling a bunch of lies to the world in order to justify an unnecessary war. Colin Powell is gearing up to run for office and Barbara Walters is his first stop on the campaign trail. He is either going to try to grab the job that New Orleans ex-Mayor Marc Morial hinted was available on “Meet the Press” last Sunday--reconstruction and resettlement czar in NOLA, or he’s throwing his hat in the ring to run for President. But count on it. The man who sold out his country to kiss the ass of neocons in the Republican Party is getting ready to once again be the toady and gopher for far-right politicians in the GOP. Perhaps Colin Powell, like OJ Simpson and Scott Peterson, has talked himself into the fiction that he really didn’t do the horrible thing we all know he did do. If that’s the case, Colin Powell should be reminded every day of the monumental crime he committed. You lied us into a war, Colin Powell, and as of September 7th, 1895 American soldiers have died because of your lie.

Abraham Lincoln Said It

“If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem. It is true that you may fool all the people some of the time, you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all the time.” The Bush administration gambled and lost. Their plan was to fatten the coffers of the rich white folks in the US for the short term--just long enough to see themselves and their ilk through ten fat years. During which time the GOP, the Carlyle Group, Rupert Murdoch, William Kristol's Project for the New American Century and the Moonies would take over the world. After that, who cared? And it surely looked like the strategy was working. Tax cuts and programs to enrich the wealthy was on track. A war of opportunity on the weakest oil-producing country in the Mideast had been produced and the people supported it. Fraudulent elections had installed a mentally defective and easily manipulated puppet as President of the USA twice. Plans to make nuclear weapons illegal in all countries but the United States were under way. What could go wrong? Nature's good days and bad days are random. But the natural law of Karma is precise. The arrogant BushMen never considered that what goes around comes around and that what came around would kick them in the ass. All the political capital George W. Bush bragged about having and spending was spent in the first six months of his second term. The citizens' confidence in the GOP is gone. The respect and esteem that Karl Rove and Co. manufactured through blackmail and intimidation is gone. Iraq is in shambles. The Gulf Coast of the United States lies in ruin. So what's the Republican plan for whitewashing their sepulcher? Fooling some of the people one more time. First, they cranked up the spin-machine to deliver the Rove version of the Katrina debacle. And now FEMA is giving a debit card worth $2000 bucks to every disaster family. These morons even bribe on the cheap.

McClellan Whirls, Brown Dodges and Weaves

Editor and Publisher posted a transcript of Scott McClellan’s press briefing yesterday. McClellan tried to follow the orders he’d received from Karl Rove but the press corps wasn’t having any. McClellan used the word “focus” eleven times. As in, the president’s job now is to focus on solving problems and not play the blame game. But the press corps stayed focused on the burning question: Why? Why did the Bush administration wait so long to get mobilized? No answer. Why didn’t the president send the order for the army to send troops to New Orleans? No answer. In the Bush administration, where does the buck stop? Finally, an answer. McClellan: “The President.” Follow-up question: “All right. So he will be held accountable as the head of the government for the federal response that he's already acknowledged was inadequate and unacceptable?” Back to the prepared babble-gabble: “The President's most important responsibility is the safety and security of the American people,” McClellan said. And FEMA director Michael Brown is also dancing as fast as he can to try to explain FEMA’s slow inadequate response. To add to his woes, yesterday the Associated Press published a memo it had obtained from Brown to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, which was sent five hours after Katrina hit Louisiana. It called Katrina "this near catastrophic event" but used no urgent language. And the memo also clearly showed the real priorities of FEMA and Homeland Security. According to the memo, Brown told employees that they would be expected to "convey a positive image of disaster operations to government officials, community organizations and the general public." But midst all the stumbles, fumbles, finger pointing, and mindless rhetoric, this morning the president gave us the real answer to all the Whys. George W. Bush says “bureaucracy” caused all the problems.

The Biggest Lie Is Still Being Told

And the biggest lie is what? The biggest lie is that President George W. Bush is a functioning human being. President Bush has no more personhood than Willie Stark in William Penn Warren's “All the King's Men”. Warren's character, Willie Stark, was based on Louisiana's governor (1928-1982), Huey P. Long. Like Stark, Karl Rove's creature, George W. Bush, is based on an actual person. And like Stark, George W. Bush does not exist. The media continues to report that George W. Bush has meetings, makes decisions, thinks thoughts, propounds policies, arranges events and performs acts. In other words, the media has accepted Karl Rove's creation as though it were real. But Rove's creation does not think thoughts or make decisions. It can't. It is too stupid, confused and over-medicated to do anything except what it is told to do. Was there a time when George W. Bush could have lead the country? Before Bush was invaded by Karl Rove and made into a podperson, could GWB have thought thoughts and made decisions? No. George W. Bush's core character was damaged when he was very young. He was damaged both by having the genes of Barbara Pierce and George Herbert Walker Bush and by being raised by Barbara Pierce Bush. GHWB was absent during most of GWB's early rearing. When George W. Bush was made president in 2000 by fraud and deception, Karl Rove knew his creature was as damaged and incompetent as any patient in any mental institution. But GWB was perfect for Rove's plans. And those plans were that GWB was to usher-in Republican totalitarian rule. GWB was to be President for only one term, or less than one term if an accident or illness came to pass. But history intervened. 9/11 happened and even Karl Rove got stuck with coping with a robot as president of the USA for two terms. The MSM has no choice but to advance the myth that President George W. Bush is an actual person capable of leading the country. Once the MSM had participated in the creation of the Bush podperson and did not tell the truth at the time of its nomination in 1999, the MSM was locked-in to telling the lie. But we, the people, do not have to believe the lie. We, the people, do not have to accept Karl Rove's podperson as president. We can hoot. We can holler. We can protest. And we can tell the truth.

We Must NEVER Forget the Lies

Yesterday on Tim Russert's "Meet the Press", ex-New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial made a statement that sounded as though he'd forgotten who lied us into the war in Iraq. Morial said, “New Orleans must be rebuilt. It must be rebuilt as the diverse cultural gumbo that it's always been. It must be rebuilt the right way. Mary Landrieu has had legislation for a coastal restoration initiative now pending in Congress for three years and has not been able to get it passed. What we need here is a reconstruction and resettlement czar, someone like Colin Powell, someone like Andrew Young, someone with broad credibility to lead the efforts to resettle people and provide the leadership for the reconstruction of New Orleans, Louisiana, and southern Mississippi.” Colin Powell? I realize that Morial is black and Powell is black and Morial made his comment because Russert said it was the blacks in New Orleans who had been hit the hardest. But even mentioning Colin Powell's name in the same breath with rebuilding New Orleans is to ignore the fact that Colin Powell lied us into the war in Iraq. It was that war which led the Bush Administration to cut back funds to fix the levees in New Orleans. And it's that war in Iraq that left Louisiana without National Guardsmen to protect it during Katrina. Louisiana had to beg for National Guard troops from other states to help control the looters and to rescue the evacuees. Someone like Colin Powell to restore New Orleans? Have you lost your mind, Mr. Morial? Colin Powell betrayed the American people and lied at the United Nations. And now the American people are being asked to donate money to the Red Cross and Salvation Army to help the devastated people in New Orleans. It's not that the American people shouldn't donate money. The American people would donate money without being asked. But the fact is that our government needs the American people to donate funds because our government does not have the billions of dollars it will take to rebuild the Gulf States. Our government is spending billions of dollars on an unnecessary war in Iraq thanks to Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush and Karl Rove. Karl Rove and Co. began to spin its version of the Katrina debacle yesterday. All Republicans speaking on news shows were told not to deny Democrats claims that the Bush administration had been found wanting. Instead, they were told to praise the belated rescue efforts to the skies. They were told to say FEMA was wonderful, the evacuation of the Superdome was wonderful, the rescue work had become wonderful and the Bush administration is doing a great job of aiding and comforting the folks in New Orleans. In fact, FEMA spent more time arguing over who is in charge than actually getting supplies to New Orleans. FEMA sent away truckloads of bottled water from Wal-Mart because it wasn't FEMA-sponsored bottled water. And as anyone knows who watched the event on television the Superdome evacuation was a chaotic mess. On September 2nd, Rove and Co. faked a film of levee repair rather than actually getting a levee repaired. And when President Bush visited New Orleans, ZDF News reported, “the president's visit was a completely staged event”. The open-air food distribution point Bush visited in front of the cameras was torn down immediately after the president and the herd of “news people” left. The real question is: Are the American people buying the smoke and mirrors version of the Great Oz in the White House again, or have they finally looked behind the curtain and realized that the big powerful fearsome leader of the USofA is just a fat toad running a spin machine?

Two To One They're Selling You Out, Son

For sure, Cheney and Rove haven't been discussing giving George W. Bush a Medal of Honor. But until they stood behind the Prez in the Rose Garden yesterday, Cheney and Rove have been invisible during the entire Katrina disaster. What have they been doing? Since apparently they haven't been planning the US exit strategy from Iraq, maybe they've been planning GWB's exit strategy. There are only two possibilities for a president who has brought his political party to ruin in a short eight months and has three years and four months of his term to go. He can die or he can resign, because this president cannot be rehabilitated. It's been reported by Capitol Hill Blue (political e-zine) since 2004 that the president has episodes of flat-out rage including cursing and obscene gestures. If even one of these tantrums gets on television coupled with the confirmation that he has to be heavily medicated to get through a TV performance…well...what could the White House do? Sorrowfully and regretfully force a resignation on medical/psychiatric grounds. Failing that, the WH mavens could always go to the Vatican playbook (see Pope John Paul I, September 28, 1978). Yep…in the immortal words of Sam Spade, “Two to one they're selling you out, son.”

The Real Plan

August 7, 2000 The Real No. 1: We're nominating the queer from Texas. That's it. The Real No. 2: Why? N1: He acts downhome. Folks will vote for him. N2: But he couldn't find his ass with a map and a guide dog. N1: Doesn't matter. He gets elected, the Right People take over, then we off him. September 12, 2001 N2: And your plan is what? N1: I miscalculated. He looks good. January 29, 2002 N2: Axis of evil? That's yours? N1: I gave it to the writer guy. N2: When do we do IT? N1: Working on it. May 2, 2003 N2: Missionfuckingaccomplished? Can I personally shoot him? N1: Not if I pull the trigger first. November 2, 2003 N2: Now he says God chose him. Are we gonna do it or what? N1: Patience. November 16, 2004 N2: CondaleezzafuckingRice for Secretary of State? N1: Yeah. Jesus! He goes. Nanny Rice goes. Working on it. December 15, 2004 N2: The Medal of Freedom? Fucking Asshole gives Rumsfeld the Medal of Freedom? N1: Yeah. I gotta think. N2: Bush goes, Rice goes, Rumsfeld goes. N1: Yeah. But it can't point to us. February 7, 2005 N2: Did you hear him explaining Social Security privatization? N1: Yeah. It's almost worked out. He's toast. September 2, 2005 N2: You hear him about Katrina? Gonna rebuild the city he partied in…is he nuts or what? And Rice goes on-the-town with people dying and starving in Norlins? N1: Here's my plan. We get him, Condi, Rumsfeld in a helicopter over the Gulf, it goes down, they look like heroes. Too bad about the pilot though. N2: Nothing is perfect. See? There's always been a plan.

First, A Correction

Back in July, I said that Scientologist Bodhi Elfman was composer Danny Elfman's brother. I am so glad an eagle-eyed reader caught the mistake. I really like Danny Elfman's music and it makes me happy to say that Bodhi Elfman is not nearly so close a relative to Danny Elfman as I had thought. Bodhi is Danny's nephew. Whew! Keep those Scientologists at arms-length, I say. Or better yet, boot them out of the family altogether. But Onto Things That Matter Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was seen buying shoes at Ferragamo on 5th Avenue in New York yesterday and checking out the new collections on Seventh Avenue. Plus she got in some tennis practice sessions with Monica Seles. And Prez Bush will do a fly-over of New Orleans today. God forbid either of them should dirty their hands or feet with the reality of what the Bush administration policies have wrought. George W. Bush is an insane sociopath of course. But what is Rice's excuse? She's buying shoes and playing tennis while people of her own race are being murdered, raped, and die from neglect because she and the neocons used federal money on an unnecessary war of aggression in Iraq rather than fix dire problems at home. And the bottom line is: They knew. George W. Bush, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and everyone in top jobs in the White House and Pentagon knew an attack on the World Trade Center was imminent. They knew there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. They knew Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks on the WTC. They knew Iraq did not try to buy uranium in Africa. They knew the levees in New Orleans would burst if a Category 5 Hurricane hit the Gulf. They knew 100,000 people had no way to get out if the levees burst. They knew that the National Guard could not be deployed to avert civil unrest in the US because too many National Guardsmen had been sent to Iraq. They knew. And nothing they say or do can ever change the fact that now the whole world knows THEY KNEW.

Now We Know

When the criminally insane residents of the White House made plans to invade Iraq on the cheap by using poorly trained Army reserve and National Guard units, hypothetical scenarios were floated as to what would happen if: 1) The need to defend ourselves in other areas of the world arose 2) The need for National Guard units to be deployed within the United States arose 3) The need for National Guard units to be used in a natural disaster arose And now we know. We have been advised for years that the levees in New Orleans might not hold during a mega-force hurricane. And doomsday scenarios have been advanced about what might happen if these levees gave way. Now we know. While the thugs and lunatics in the Bush administration and Pentagon lived in their virtual world of happy talk and deceit, the real world descended into economic, military, and environmental disaster after disaster. Worst-case prophesies were advanced about what the event might be that would cause havoc to erupt in the United States. Now we know. It wouldn't be terrorists, it wouldn't be germ or chemical or nuclear warfare. It would be our own maniacal and crazed leaders and their screw-the-planet policies and run-amuck war in Iraq that would bring the US to its knees. And when that awful incident occurred, it was inevitable that our President would belatedly and lazily return from a five-week vacation during one of the most globally eventful months of the year, read the worst speech ever written in the history of mankind, fumble through off-the-cuff remarks on television and say things like the breaking of the levees in New Orleans could not have been anticipated. While it is impossible for mentally impaired George W. Bush to sit in a chair and look sane at the same time, the rest of us can easily do two things at once. We can give aid in the form of service and money to the Katrina victims and we also can move forward on the impeachment of the President for dereliction of duty and malfeasance (called Crimes and Misdemeanors in Article Two of the Constitution). We have the choice: Watch the Chimp go Ape or get rid of him.