Once Again, It’s Time...

Mr. Ratfucker feels something needs to be said. He has received a laudatory and complimentary e-mail from a reader who lives in a Red State. Mr. Ratfucker loves laudatory and complimentary comments. The reader in this Red State is something of an earthshoe wearer--a maker of things, a worrier about the environment, sincere. The reader is concerned about something he feels Mr. Ratfucker might want to look into. He offered to lead Mr. Ratfucker to appropriate websites if Mr. Ratfucker would follow up on the matter. It’s very important and only bloggers are going to investigate, the reader said. But he can’t pursue it on his own and would only act as an anonymous commenter because John Ashcroft might come knocking at the reader’s door. In spite of the laudatory and complimentary comments, Mr. Ratfucker feels that all those living in Red States had better get over being lily-livered asskissing shiverers and shakers and start shouting out their worries and apprehensions to legislators, newspapers and anyone who will listen. Mr. Ratfucker believes that those who remain silent when wrongs are being committed are guilty of wrong-doing themselves. Mr. Ratfucker is convinced the Red States are on the wrong path and that the nation is being run by thugs because the reader and people like him won’t speak up. Mr. Ratfucker has no interest in carrying anyone else’s water. There are times when silence is immoral. When the Nazi movement was spawned in Germany in 1938 was one of those times. When Joseph McCarthy came to power in 1954 was one of those times. Speaking out in favor of the Civil Rights movement in 1955 was one of those times. And right now today when we have Fascism in the White House is one of those times. Mr. Ratfucker has a bit of counsel for people who are getting the benefits of acting like Republicans in Red States but want to rat-out the Repubs on the sly: Reconnect with your balls and speak out in your own name. It’s your future at stake.

What Nonsense! Colombians Plot to Kill Bush

The New York Times has a story this morning quoting Colombian Defense Minister Jorge Alberto Uribe (no relation to President Uribe) as saying that Marxist rebels were planning to assassinate President Bush last Monday during his little touchdown stopover in Colombia to meet President Alvaro Uribe. No details, no proof. Did your bullshit detector go off? Yeah...mine too. First, anyone who read anything about the Bushmaton visit to the country that produces three-quarters of the world’s cocaine supply, knows that he was in an armored SUV, that helicopters constantly circled overhead and that the security precautions were so excessive that the Prez could not have been safer in his own bedroom. Over the past 15 years the US has poured more than $25 billion into Colombia to eradicate cocaine production and to oust the drug lords and it hasn’t eradicated anything outside of food crops desperately needed by the hungry. The small arms used by the drug lords are weapons the US sent to Latin America to arm paramilitary groups. The drug lords have put on paramilitary uniforms and are now parading around as soldiers who fight the drug wars. But in fact, they are still drug lords producing and trafficking in drugs, only now they are dressed up in military costumes. Bush has just asked Congress to give $566 million to Colombia for the coming year. Three-quarters of the money will be used for military assistance and police training. Colombia has received $3.3 billion since 2000. Most of the money has gone toward military assistance. And our government knows the assistance goes to paramilitary groups who actually are the drug traffickers. So bullshit me not. We are arming paramilitary groups who are protecting the drug trade in not only Colombia but all of Latin America. And why would we do this? To look as though we are stamping out drug trafficking when in fact the US has no interest in stamping out the drug trade anywhere. Not in Afghanistan, not in Burma, not in Latin America and not in the US. We do have an interest in shoring up the oil industry in Colombia now that the situation in Iraq is going from bad to worse. But the US letting drug producers off the hook is just an ongoing quid pro quo. We set up puppet governments around the world who protect our business interests and the US benefits enormously from drug money spent at home. What we are doing in Latin America is what we have been doing for 40 years. We are arming paramilitary groups who protect US business interests. And that crappola about an assassination attempt on the Bushmaton, what does that accomplish? It makes Bush look like a hero. He’s not. It makes the US look serious about stamping out drugs. We’re not. It makes it appear that the fearless Prez is in danger because of his tireless opposition to sin. He’s isn’t and he’s not. But seriously, folks, who would benefit from an assassination attempt on Bush if it were successful? The White House. Cheney could finally come out of the closet and be the real President of the United States. Nobody else cares.

Is Any Dirty Trick Too Dirty for the White House?

Do yourselves a favor and read Cannonfire’s posts for today and yesterday. Joe Cannon (Cannonfire.blogspot.com) quotes from an article by journalist, Wayne Madsen--who has credentials from here to there--which appeared on November 25 in Madsen’s Online Journal (http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/112504Madsen/112504madsen.html). The article is about the funding of voter fraud in the recent election. The Madsen expose is fascinating, but, as Cannon is quick to say, it easily could be a hoax perpetrated on Madsen. If this is a hoax, could it have come out of White House evil genius Karl Rove’s bag of tricks? By me, that is the most possible of possibles. There is no trick too foul, too mean, too underhanded for the White House to declare it out of bounds. For any scam to work well, it has to have a grain of truth as its working premise. If most of this story about voter fraud being paid for by the White House is a con orchestrated by the WH to discredit all stories about voter fraud, you can bank on one fact. There is a kernel of truth in it. The substructure for funding covert schemes already exists. Remember BCCI, Ollie North, the CIA under Bush Sr. paying Saddam Hussein as an assassin. Funding a massive voter fraud operation could have been implemented. Was it? We don’t know yet. But there is a fatal flaw in all the brilliant and cunning deceptions engineered by Rove and the other gnomes of Foggy Bottom. They are like serial criminals whose crimes become more bizarre and risky because their compulsion is too strong to resist. The BushMen are out of control and they can’t quit. Anybody else see a race car with no brakes heading for a brick wall?

Do You Love It or What?

Colin Powell, who stood in front of the UN and willingly made fraudulent claims for Prez Bush to justify our invading Iraq, who a year ago said he was quitting his Secretary of State position but put his pride in his back pocket and recently let it be known he would stay on if asked, whose claim on November 22 that Iran was trying to fit missiles to carry nuclear weapons was based on unverified claims of a single source, just released a statement that the voting in Ukraine's presidential election was “riddled with fraud and that the United States could not accept a victory by Victor F. Yanukovich as legitimate”. Since being appointed Secretary of State by GWB, Mr. Powell’s credibility rating has plummeted from awesome to below lying sack of crap. Perhaps the rigors of a job that requires him to blatantly lie, cheat and deceive have robbed him of his innate sense of right and wrong. In the kindest possible interpretation of his election fraud claim, perhaps he misspoke. Perhaps he meant to say that President Bush’s election was riddled with fraud and the United States could not accept his victory as legitimate. Else, why would the Secretary of State of the US make such an assertion about another country when his own country is twice guilty for the same crime? The alphabet soup crowd in the Pentagon is in serious trouble trying to keep their trained monkeys in their cages. Two more high-level CIA undercover officials have quit because the new Spookmeister Porter Goss is making sweeping and ill-conceived changes. And last night, CNN’s Aaron Brown interviewed Dr. David Graham, a drug safety monitor who has been with the FDA (Food and Drug Admin.) for 20 years. Graham has just blown the whistle on the FDA for its policies of protecting drug manufacturers instead of the public. Graham is telling all whether he gets sent to Coventry in a meaningless corner of the FDA or not. And then there was that pic that’s been circulating around the web of President Bush in a high-level meeting with world leaders with his fly unzipped. Get a grip George. But not to worry, the Bushmaton is at his Crawford, TX ranch for Thanksgiving. And no doubt will be getting a meds re-evaluation and whatever else the White House programmers do when their bots need fine-tuning.

A Cloying T’Day Message? Don’t Look at Me!

The story goes that the new Americans and the Native Americans broke bread together to celebrate the first harvest feast in 1621. Nice story. It leaves out the fact that we’ve screwed the Native Americans ever since. At a moment in history when the White House fully intends to screw not only all the American people but the whole world, I am not feeling at all sanguine. Nor do I think it is appropriate to lose sight of the fact, even for a day or weekend, that the GOP Neofascisti plan to systematically destroy all vesitges of democracy in the United States during the next four years. One of our problems is that we have allowed ourselves to be lulled into a comfortable sated snooze. And celebrating that overlong nap by feastng and giving thanks that the party in power has at least allowed us to go on living is a desecration of the blossoming idea of democracy in 1621. But then, oppressing the natives in our host country because we had been oppressed in our birth country was a desecration of the idea of freedom in the first place. An article originally appearing in the German newspaper, Die Zeit, was reprinted this morning in Daily Kos. The article refers to the fact that the Supreme Court not the American people made George W. Bush President of the United States in 2000. The whole world knows the 2000 election was a fraud. The whole world is wondering how we have the balls to invade Iraq and preach nonsense about giving them democracy when our own President and Vice President got into office by chicanery, lies, deceit, dirty tricks and fraud. Any prayer that offers thanks for the United States being blessedly free of attacks and bombing, must add the words “so far”. Any prayer offering thanks for the safe haven accorded those who live in the United States must add the words “so far”. Any prayer giving thanks for the rights inherent in the Constitution must add the words, “until the George W. Bush team has its way”. This is not a time for thanksgiving. This is a time for being wary and cautious. The United States has always danced on the razor’s edge that separates democracy from imperialism. Now, after 228 years, we have toppled into undisguised imperialism. This is not a time for thanksgiving. It’s a time to regroup and to figure out a way to defeat the neofascists who now occupy the White House.

Watch the White House Decide Who to Pay Off

The New York Times and CBS News just collaborated on a new poll (855 adults) assessing what voters really want. Only 6% said moral values was a deal-breaker in their voting. A majority support same-sex marriage or legal recognition of same-sex partnerships. Tax cuts were not a big vote-getter apparently, with two-thirds of those polled saying that cutting the deficit was more important than cutting taxes. Top issues in the minds of those polled were jobs and the economy. And a majority of respondents said the US should never have invaded Iraq in the first place. In a CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll (1,015 adults) released yesterday nearly two-thirds of respondents feel Israel and the Arab nations will never resolve their differences. It’s unclear how many Jewish voters followed ex-NYC Democrat mayor Ed Koch and voted for Bush because they felt he was pro-Israel. However, Bush owes something to the Jewish faction that supported him with big campaign donations. It will be interesting to see whether the White House decides that alienating their Jewish friends is of no great importance. In which case, Ed Koch will get no payback and the White House will maintain its current position on the Israel/Palestine war. That is, they will do nothing. And why should they? They’ve gotten what they needed by making promises. No real reason to make good. Ditto the religious right. Watch whether they get token support (little anti-abortion/anti-gay riders attached to bills with no chance of being enacted) or whether the White House will fight tooth and nail to crush the pro-choice and equal-rights-for-gays factions. The newest tally for US soldiers who have died in Iraq during November is 101. They were mostly Marines. The Pentagon froze their death count at 51 but now have to admit it’s at least 101. According to the CNN poll, 61% of those polled said they feel offensives in Falluja and elsewhere will make Iraq better. The real news is not getting through to John Q. and Mrs. J.Q. Public. It needs to be noted that many Iraqis really liked Saddam because they didn’t know the facts. How is that different from people supporting the White House because they don’t know the facts? And whose fault is that? The press for not telling the truth? The White House for telling lies? The public for being gullible? All of the above. As the old “X-Files” used to say, The Truth is Out There. And it’s up to blogs to keep hammering away with the truth. At least Americans have an alternative to the managed news. All they have to do is read it.

The White House is Too Clever By Half

Bearing in mind that the White House means the programmers and President Bush is the delivery tool, is Karl Rove’s devious double bind governing style effective or has it hopelessly obscured the GOP message? On Saturday a few conservatives in Congress blocked the passage of a compromise bill to enact the recommendations of the 9/11 commission. President Bush and Vice President Cheney were reported to have vigorously used their telephones (Bush from Air Force One on his way to Chile, Cheney from Washington) to try to convince House Judiciary Committee Chair, F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr. (R-WI) and House Armed Services Committee Chair Duncan Hunter (R-CA) to drop their opposition to the bill. By Sunday, some pundits were saying that the pleas from Bush and Cheney were lukewarm and that the duo didn’t really want to unblock the blocked bill. Those who want the bill to pass--Dems and moderate Repubs--say those who are against it are trying to preserve the status quo. What would be the benefit for the administration to publicly defend the bill and privately want to defeat the bill? A few cliches come to mind: Having your cake and eating it too; playing both sides against the middle; working both sides of the street. But the real White House motivation is: Not letting the right hand know what the other right hand is doing. And the reason for this strategy is to seduce the warring factions within the Republican party into believing that all debts owed for election favors are being paid when in fact no one is being paid and everyone is getting cheated. How long will the White House try to fool all the people all the time? As long as it works. And how long will it work? Until the Republicans who are honest, good, and well-intentioned call the game. The biggest threat to the new White House gang is from life-long Republicans, not from Democrats.

Is It Okay That the Carlyle Group Owns the GOP?

Filmmaker Michael Moore (Fahrenheit 9/11) and author Craig Unger (House of Bush House of Saud) have fully documented the number of government officials--present and former--who are involved in the management of the Carlyle Group and that the Carlyle Group runs the United States. But let me recap, in case you’ve forgotten. The Carlyle Group provides investment capital for companies, it is the brains behind management-led buyouts (MBO’s) and it pimps the sales of weapons between defense contractors and governments all over the world. Its directors and advisors have been former President George Herbert Walker Bush, former UK Prime Minister John Major, former US Secretary of Defense Frank Carlucci (now Chairman Emeritus), former Jimmy Carter policy adviser, David Rubinstein (now Carlyle managing director), former White House chief of staff, James A. Baker, former head of the Office of Management and Budget Richard Darmen, recently resigned Secretary of State Colin Powell, former head of the SEC and the American Stock Exchange, Arthur Levitt and the ubiquitous Bin Laden brothers. This is disturbing because anyone connected with the Carlyle Group is in a position to profit from its weapons contracts between companies like Halliburton and the US government (and other governments). Not to mention the ugly thought that shareholders and directors profit from medical supplies of anti-chemical warfare inoculations which are pimped between manufacturer and the US government by the Carlyle Group. It was the Carlyle Group that acquired Caterair, a catering company for airlines. And it was David Rubinstein who talked to Caterair about a ne’er-do-well rich kid whose name would be an asset for Caterair’s management. The rich kid was George W. Bush. The kid never did anything for the company but tell bad jokes, goldbrick and collect a salary. Finally Rubinstein told him he should probably find another career. But the Bush name has never done the Carlyle Group any harm. And the rich kid did find something else to do. We can thank the Carlyle Group and Daddywarbucks Bush. Throw a dart at the map and you will find a Carlyle Group company in that region distributing arms, selling weapons, buying defense companies and in general, affecting the economy and safety (or ensuring the lack thereof) of that region. The Carlyle Group effectively runs the GOP and GOP policy. And it is not Okay. It is monstrous and it is corrupt. War is just another business to the Carlyle Group, but war is its biggest profit-making business. And the business of war is putting a lot of money in GOP pockets. The Big Three is not George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Condi Rice. The Big Three is Karl Rove, Dick Cheney and the Carlyle Group.

Not So, David Gergen

Another article in today’s New York Times needs debunking. David Gergen’s editorial, “The Power of One”, makes one assertion that is certainly true. The Bush administration resembles the Nixon administration. But his other assertion is very much in error--that George W. Bush is in charge of his administration. David Gergen was an advisor to President Richard M. Nixon of Watergate fame so his expertise on that administration cannot be doubted. In fact, when speculation was running rampant on who Deep Throat might be, David Gergen was a front-runner in the top suspects list. In the end, he was beaten out among the theorists by Fred Fielding (lately a Commissioner on the 9/11 Commission) who had been deputy to White House Counsel, John Dean. Of course, to this day, no one will confirm who Deep Throat was (or is). Gergen’s editorial likens Nixon’s troika (Bob Haldeman, John Ehrlichman and Henry Kissinger) to Dick Cheney, Karl Rove and Condoleezza Rice in the Bush administration. This would be true if Bush were at the helm. But he isn’t. Gergen has given Bush a larger-than-life persona which Bush does not and cannot inhabit. Gergen backs up his claim by quoting Woodrow Wilson, “the president is at liberty, both in law and conscience, to be as big a man as he can.'' Gergen says, “President Bush comes Texas-sized”. No he doesn’t. George W. Bush is not a man of stature. His persona is even smaller than his physical build. He is maybe Rhode Island-sized. Karl Rove runs things, and Rove’s troika is Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and the CEO of the Carlyle Group, Louis V. Gerstner, Jr. George W. Bush isn’t even in line to be a fly on the wall in troika meetings, let alone run a troika. And Condi Rice? Please! If we are going to understand how the Republicans came to power and how they plan to run roughshod over our rights, rape our legal system, and terrorize our populace, then we have to understand what the GOP power structure is and who is running the government. Our leaders are not little George Bush and his hand-holder, little Condi Rice. We are being lead around by the nose by Karl Rove, Dick Cheney and the Carlyle Group. Them’s the facts guys. Half the battle won is knowing who the enemy is.

Religious Right Doctor Weighs in on RU486

It’s not easy to to set the record straight on the RU486 pill. The pro-life folks have a very effective media blitz at their disposal. But we keep trying. The drug was approved by the FDA as an abortion inducer in September 2000 and is marketed under the Mifeprex name. The pro-life folks tried to keep it from coming to the US after it was developed in France. Failing that, they’ve been on a mission to get it banned using the reports that women have died who have used the pill as the focus of their outrage. The FDA just strengthened the label language on Mifeprex after the most recent death was reported in January. One big problem with the pill(s) is that the procedure has two stages. It’s potentially dangerous not to take the second pill after having taken the first one. Donna J. Harrison, a pro-life OB/Gyn doctor and Mifeprex foe voiced her adamant disapproval of the drug in an article in the New York Times this morning. She is chairman of the subcommittee on Mifeprex of the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists. It is not clear why Dr. Harrison has not mounted a campaign against drugs routinely advertised on network and cable TV whose fast-talker caveats make one’s hair stand on end. We are advised that liver failure, kidney failure and death may occur from taking these advertised drugs. But the ads go on to say, ask your doctor to prescribe them anyway. Apparently the dangers in taking pharmaceuticals advertised on television are of no interest to pro-life doctors. The facts are: Since Mifeprex was approved, six women have died who took the drug. The deaths were caused by infection, hemorrhage, pregnancies in the fallopian tubes and heart failure and could have been caused by many factors. I don’t say that the deaths or illness of women who have taken Mifeprex shouldn’t be investigated. But I also would like to see serious investigations into the deaths and illness of women who have carried unwanted pregnancies to term because of beliefs of pro-life doctors.

Bush’s Ponzi Scheme War

Without the war in Iraq, the BushMen didn’t have a prayer of winning the recent election. The administration likes to keep the fiction going that people who voted for values (read, anti-abortion and anti-gay) were the deciding factor. They weren’t. Finishing what the White House started in Iraq was a top priority in the minds of voters. The fact that Bush started the war was a determining factor in voting for Bush to be the one to finish the war. How can the BushMen pay their debt to the original war supporters in Congress plus pay off their debt to new supporters while the war in Iraq is going sour? In a word...impossible. It’s a Ponzi scam. The inverted pyramid has to topple. In a real Ponzi the con-meisters will have taken their money to the Caymans way before the new investors get wise. The BushMen have no place to go. How do they plan to carry off their impossible con? It's starting to look like they have no real plan other than warning people not to reveal secrets and building a wall around themselves. In a Ponzi, the new patsies get stiffed. Please note. The BushMen have already stiffed the born-agains who want their payoff. They expected the White House to deliver a coup de grace to pro-choice legislators. But the WH is saying, Get lost. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah and Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee) already has said he supports Arlen Specter against the hatchet men in Congress. The far-right religious fanatics may be small in numbers but they are mean as snakes and they have no loyalty except to themselves. Stiffing them is a bad move for the WH. And purging the Cabinet and CIA of ideologically impure members is another bad move. The singing and whistle-blowing from the ousted and maligned promises to drown out the GOP’S threats and bullying. Bank on it. With every passing day, the war in Iraq becomes more unmanagable and more of a malodorous mess than the day before. The BushMen have tried to float their occupation of Iraq as a model for pre-emptive war which justifies US global supremacy. Is it possible the GOP is so arrogant and clueless that it doesn’t realize the limits of its con? Put another way, is it possible the GOP is so deluded and lawless that it believes its Ponzi will never crash? Oh you betcha! But in a free society--and no matter how much the GOP Gestapo wants it to appear otherwise, we are a free society--the truth always comes out. In a free society those who have been muzzled always spill the beans. In a free society the status is never quo and things always change.

Forget the Cabinet...They Are Window Dressing

Jeff Greenfield said something interesting for once on CNN’s News Night last night. He said that the people who head up the President’s cabinet are of little importance. They will be trotted out for special ceremonies and make a pronouncement once in awhile. But in the Bush administration they will never stray from the official party line which comes from the White House. In essence, don’t trouble yourselves about who goes and who is appointed, it’s immaterial. Understanding this makes it easier on those of us who have paid attention to the President’s cabinet in the past. At one time the secretaries in the cabinet were allowed to have different opinions from the President and they voiced them. At one time the cabinet was a source of advice for the President, one of the necessary checks and balances in a democratic society. No more. So forget the cabinet. They will say whatever the White House tells them to say. Which is something else to remember. The President and the White House are two different things. The President is the lifelike virtual humanoid who narrowly won the recent election. The men who make government policy and speak into the humanoid’s earpiece are called The White House. Do not be taken in when reading nonsense like “the President has decided to take personal control of his administration”. The president decides NOTHING. The President’s decision mode has been made inoperable. Where Condi Rice is concerned, knowing that she will have no opinions of her own as Secretary of State is a blessing. The old “Condi on-TV off” rule that served us so well while she was National Security advisor still applies. For the next four years you can forget that Condoleeza Rice exists. Because in fact, she doesn’t. Rule Number One in the new Fascist administration: Only the wizards in The White House who operate The Great Bushmaton exist. Everyone else is window dressing.

Condi Rice For Secretary of State? TMYFK!

Throw unity out the window. Tell me you're fucking kidding!!! If (when) President Bush names National Security advisor Condoleeza Rice as successor to Colin Powell he will assure dissension in his own party. And he will be seen throughout the world as rewarding a sycophant rather than appointing someone with appropriate skills in foreign policy. Pop Quiz Choose a Condi attribute uniquely qualifying her for Secretary of State: Ice skater, pianist, Stanford U. Provost, national security failure, kiss-ass loyalist, grating personality. Confirmation of appointments is a long process. It may be nine months before the BushMen have a Cabinet with sub positions filled. Can you say lame duck? The mass exodus from GOP power positions has been caused either by Republican antipathy to the growing Fascism within the party, or by President Bush demanding resignations. It doesn’t matter. Not having key positions filled for months on end weakens the party as a whole and puts a crimp in the Texas Despot’s mandate thing. Cowardly as the MSM is, it’s interesting they are using words like “purge” and “demands for loyalty” regarding the activity in the post-election White House. There are 36,000,000 people in the USA over the age of 65. For them, purge and loyalty oaths are a grim reminder of the McCarthy era and the USSR. These are unfortunate memories for the BushMen to be dredging up in the minds of Americans now that they're trying to sell totalitarian rule as the Bush version of democracy.

38 US Soldiers Dead in Falluja. Why?

In a live interview from Falluja on November 11th, the Washington Post’s embed, Jackie Spinner, answered a question from a viewer in Boston, MA who asked, “What do we do when we take Falluja?” Spinner said, “No one I've talked to believes that solving the Falluja problem will end the violence in Iraq. But, as one Marine officer told me, not solving the Falluja problem will not end it either.” So what the hell are we doing there, you may ask. The short answer is: We have killed US soldiers and Fallujans to put a man in the White House. In 2000 President Bush was not elected in his own right. The War in Iraq gave him a legitimacy he never would have had without it. The offensive in Falluja was a campaign ploy to sell George Bush as a war-time President who needed to finish the job. The fact that it was over-hyped and over-sold during the last weeks of the Republican campaign doomed it to failure. We gave the insurgents a war-plan, a map as to what we were going to do, where we were going to do it and how. Thirty-eight American soldiers are dead because the team in the White House used their unnecessary war as a plank in an election platform. How cynical is that! And if a cynic is one who believes that human conduct is wholly motivated by self interest, Republican majority leader, Senator Bill Frist proves the point. He said on Sunday that 74-year-old Arlen Specter, who has been a loyal GOP Senator for 24 years “needed to convince his fellow Republicans that he deserved to be chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee”. This stern rebuke to a standup foot soldier of the Republican party came about because Specter had the temerity to suggest that the GOP plan to hijack the Congress and Senate would not be an easy coup. What kind of gang-banger proof of allegiance will be required of Specter? Must he smear a Democrat with lies to show he’s one of the BushBot boys? Must he once again swear that the spurious findings of a questionable commission (such as the Warren Commission) is actually beyond reproach? Or must he humiliate himself in public? What proof of loyalty will satisfy the White House? Oh surely not that. Even the Repugs wouldn't ask that of their true believers. Would they?

Mission Accomplished No. 3--Woohoo!

No. 1-On May 2, 2003 GWB says Mission Accomplished in Iraq* No. 2-On November 9, 2004 AG Ashcroft says mission accomplished to bring security to the world* No. 3-On November 14, 2004 Iraqi officials say mission accomplished in Falluja* *Fineprint...the above stories of accomplishment are virtual reality games being played by the White House and do not represent real events or real people either alive or dead. Hard to know what has really been going on in Falluja. This morning Salon.com reports two versions of the events. The official line is that the entire city has been occupied, that the insurgents have been subdued and driven out, that the combat has been intense and that Iraqi officials say the mission has been accomplished. But a US officer, speaking on the QT, says, Not so fast...Falluja was occupied but not subdued. One thing we know for sure, the George Bush White House version of any event, no matter how small, will contain a lie, will be a mixture of lies and truth or will be a wholly fabricated piece of fiction worthy of a guts and glory screenplay. But there is one fact that the BushMen cannot gloss over or fictionalize or throw rose petals on or cosmetize. The death count. Just during the attack on Falluja, 31 more US soldiers have been killed. And since the war began 1,231 US soldiers have been killed. Last Thursday, Veterans Day, there was a big to-do about ABC showing the war movie, “Saving Private Ryan”, starting at 8:oo in the evening...family viewing time. Children and parents are supposed to be protected from hearing cuss words during family viewing time. God forbid parents should have to answer questions like, If I fight in a war will I die? Will all soldiers go to hell for saying bad words? What are those men fighting for? Is war good? If I die fighting will I go to hell for saying bad words? If I fight can I say bad words? Do those men fight because they like it? Who made those men go to war? God forbid parents should have to sit and think about the effects of war for two hours. The people in the United States need to think soberly about 31 more young men dying in an unnecessary war. The children of the people in the United States need to think about soldiers dying and being maimed in George Bush's unnecessary war. Because it's today's children who will go to Iraq and finish the war and pay for the war until they die or go to Iraq and die in Iraq.

Are Fun and GOP Mutually Exclusive?

The two-week GOP gloat party is nearly over. And it must seem odd, from the Bush administration perspective, that the country hasn’t lined up behind the President and cried out in unison, Praise George for George is Great! Because God knows, Karl the Rove has done his part: The press has been muzzled, the GOP rewrite of the news has become the only acceptable version, the “values” non-issue was revved up and 50% of the voters believe that born-agains who are one-quarter of our population speak for the entire population. The puppet President seems to have had his meds re-evaluated and his physical tics and signs of malfunction are under control. But there are always unpredictable glitches in any dictatorship. And unfortunately for the GOP the news coming out of Iraq can’t be manipulated enough and it’s bad, bad, bad and getting worse. And the bloggers can’t be shut down. So the fun part is beginning and it looks like fun and the GOP will be co-existing for the foreseeable future. I don’t know what the Las Vegas morning line on the GOP is. But I understand there is one. And the list of scandals that could bring down the Bush era is long and getting longer. But I would put my money on the mainstream media getting fed up and letting the sun shine on the GOP intimidation plots. What the BushMen are trying to do is hold back the dawn. Or, as the American Indian story about Chipmunk and Bear has it: Bear told Chipmunk he could do anything even stop the sun from rising. But after a night of watching the sky in the east, the sun came up on schedule and Chipmunk chanted,"The sun came up, the sun came up, bear is angry, but the sun came up." There were some shenanigans about Bear making threats that maybe he couldn’t stop the sun from rising, but he could stop Chipmunk from seeing another dawn. But because Bear was innately stupid, Chipmunk outsmarted him and Chipmunk saw many more dawning days. And Chipmunk didn’t even have bloggers to help him out.

Why is Rummy Still Around?

In the real world, there are only two reasons a boss keeps an employee on the payroll who is as bumbling and inept as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. 1) He’s a relative 2) He knows where the bodies are buried. We all know Rumsfeld and Bush are not related. It looked like Rumsfeld had made all the bad calls he could possibly make in Iraq. But no. He still had the offensive in Falluja to foul up. And now he has even surpassed himself in incompetence. The brain trust in the White House got together and reasoned that it would be a bad idea to attack Falluja before the election. They knew reports of more deaths of US soldiers and little children dying at the hands of Americans would be very difficult for the White House alchemists to spin into gold. So they decided to hold off the plans to annihilate the insurgents in Falluja until after November 2. But the masters of deceit and lies also wanted to get some mileage out of their planned attack. The plotline about George Bush being a wartime Prez always was good for a photo-op here, some PR bullshit there. So the two-bit bargain-basement production team that gave us the Shock and Awe flopperoo decided to ballyhoo the attack for a couple weeks...just to get whatever pre-election juice out of it they could. If you remember, the election hype included a whole lot of strut and brag about Bush being a strong resolute Prez, a wartime Prez who planned to reduce the insurgents to dust in Falluja. Brag-brag. Strut strut. Blah-blah. Quel surprise! The insurgents and residents of Falluja not being dumbass fools like the bunch in the White House got the hell out of Dodge before we got there. The resistance has been light, the news reports say. You’re damn right it’s been light. Bush boasted and blabbed and the smart Fallujans, insurgents included, vamoosed leaving only a skeleton rag-tag bunch for the sake of show. And this morning’s news is that the insurgents have regrouped and are attacking other Iraq cities with their main force still intact. Perhaps you’ve noticed the MSM is sounding as though the lack of resistance in Falluja is a good thing. And the fact that 18 of our soldiers have died because Bush didn’t give a rat’s ass about Iraq during his swagger and smirk campaign to get elected is being downplayed or ignored. And please, folks, do not ever say re-elected. George W-for-Warmonger was not elected the first time, he was seated by the Supreme Court. Being able to say I didn’t vote for the Fascists in the White House feels better all the time. And I expect bumper stickers to appear to that effect any day So what is it going to take to get Rumsfeld fired? Apparently nothing he does is bad enough. One can only conclude that Rummy not only has the documented goods on Junior, he has a smoking-gun file on Pops too.

The Real Values Numbers Tell the Tale

Have we all fallen under the GOP spell? Are we in a coma...WHAT? Do yourselves a favor and read Frank Rich’s column in today’s New York Times. But if that’s too much trouble, here are some figures he quotes. Only 23% of the electorate voted with “moral values” in mind. This is the same percentage of people who call themselves born-again Christians. On the gay issue, 62% of Americans believe in some kind of legal status for gays--35% believe in civil unions and 27% believe in gay marriage. And ex-NYC-Mayor Ed Koch notwithstanding (he switched from Dem to Repub because he thinks the GOP will favor Israel), the total number of Jewish Repubs was 200,000 less than the number of gay Repub voters. If you find yourself believing even one small thing that is coming out of the White House, snap out of it. WAKE UP! There are many reasons people voted for Bush/Cheney, but moral values is not high on the list. Since 78% of the voters didn’t vote with the GOP version of values in mind, the BushMen are going to have to contend with the real values of the vast majority of people in the USA. During the next four years the actual citizenry, the living, breathing John Q. Public folks will be electing representatives, senators, governors and mayors. And it’s the little people, whether they are Repubs or Dems who will be looking at their pay stubs (if they are lucky enough to have pay stubs), at their health care costs, at their children’s education and they will be wondering, What are the BushMen doing for me? If the general public actually figures out who is responsible for the content of their TV shows they are going to put two-and-two together: There is so much junk and gratuitous sexual crappola on TV because the CEO of Viacom (Sumner Redstone), the CEO of TimeWarner (Richard Parsons) and the CEO of GE (Jeffrey Immelt) all endorsed the Bush administration. It’s certainly not the cultural values of the Democrats up there on the screen. Take a look at the divorce statistics. It's the Bible thumpers who are getting divorced at a dizzying rate. According to an Associated Press report, the divorce rate in conservative states is about 50 percent higher than the national average. Texas has a divorce rate of 4.1 to 1000 people. The lowest divorce rate is in Massachusetts with 2.4 in 1000 people. But among born-agains the divorce rate is 4.2 per 1000 people. And if you don’t want to take the AP’s word for it, ask George Bama about his findings. The George Bama Research Group of Ventura, CA found that the divorce rate of born-again Christians is one of the highest in the nation. George Bama is a born-again Christian. The values of 78% of the voters who aren’t born-agains is not a problem in America. It’s the 23% who rant and rave about abortion and homosexuality who are having a raging values crisis.

From Time to Time...

...Mr. Ratfucker will address the concerns of readers who post comments. Mr. Ratfucker recognizes the contradiction between his gender and his name, but an inattentive reader called him a name...or rather gave him his name. And who is Mr. Ratfucker to say nay to his name-giver no matter how clueless and inane that person may be. Angry far-right Republicans weigh in occasionally to castigate Mr. Ratfucker for his anger. Mr. Ratfucker finds it difficult to understand why the angry right thinks Republican anger is righteous while the anger of Democrats is a moral character flaw. However, looking soberly at the issue, Mr. Ratfucker sees that it is in line with flip-flopping Republicans who equate Democrats changing their mind with being unfit to inhabit the earth. Mr. Ratfucker would like to point out a sample of Republican anger so full of rage that it fairly burns a hole in the blog it’s written on. Daily Kos posted an excerpt from the Human Events blog on November 9th. But Mr. Ratfucker has found, to his sorrow, that the Human Events people have removed the original lengthy post from their site (although the Daily Kos post is still available under “Wingnut wants to secede”). The long-story-short is the following paragraph, “The 12 states that must go: California, Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maryland, and Delaware. Only the remaining 38 states would retain the name, ‘United States of America.’ The 12 expelled mobs could call themselves the ‘Dirty Dozen,’ or individually keep their identity and go their separate ways, probably straight to Hell.” Mr. Ratfucker sees a fury approaching madness against 8 of the original 13 states which founded the USA and he is unclear as to why winning the last election has driven this Republican insane. Mr. Ratfucker has received a few posts from a nerdy little dweeb who doesn’t believe Mr. Ratfucker knows how to write. And although Mr. Ratfucker is always eager to learn from his betters, he feels that a writing instructor should at least know how to spell vitriolic (it’s not vitrious, you wee silly twat, and if it were vitrious, the spelling would be vitreous, you know-nothing little jerkoff) and that the spelling of spineless is not spinless. Also, the biting critique that Mr. Ratfucker can’t form a rational thought deserves to be confronted. Yes indeedy, he can: Get an education, wiseass. And from time to time, Mr. Ratfucker will give you the url of blogs that put the idiots and ignorant morons of the world in their place. Such a blog is FucktheSouth (http://fuckthesouth.com/).

Mission Accomplished (Again) Claim From BushBot

“The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been achieved,” Attorney General John Ashcroft said in his handwritten resignation letter of November 2 which was made official on November 9th. Following in President Bush’s footsteps, Ashcroft has claimed victory in his war. And just like Bush, his claim is a 100% lie. Do the brain-washed believe these claims of victory? Possibly. But the brain-washed are not the pressing issue. The most important thing for Democrats is to keep their eye on the ball and never to forget what is really going on in the GOP. Whenever you see a born-again Christian like John Ashcroft (and probably his successor) coming to power within the GOP, do not for one moment think the GOP has a deep belief in religion. The GOP has a deep belief in power. The GOP has decided to use the “God says so” strategy. It’s been an incredibly successful ploy throughout history. Whether it will work to accomplish the real aim of the BushMen remains to be seen. If the Democrats forget the level of GOP cynicism, we lose sight of the GOP goal which is global supremacy. When the BushMen bring God into their party agenda, it’s because the “God Says So” ploy works. If God proves to be ineffective, the GOP will jettison the Almighty faster than Cain sold his birthright for a mess of porridge. Whether President Bush is a true-believer or a God-biz con-artist is immaterial. The Democrats must never lose sight of the fact that the GOP using the God-card is simply a means to their ultimate goal--ruling the world.

Can the GOP Keep the Lid On Everything FOREVER?

People are saying--from astrologers in India to Salon.com writer Dennis Jett--that the Bush administration will be out of business before their term is up because of scandal. To quote Jett’s first paragraph in his November 8 opinion piece, The Curse of Bush II, “At some point in the next four years there will be a great scandal that will make Watergate look like a fraternity prank. All the elements are already in place.” With the tantalizing treasure trove of offenses that could break the back of the most secretive administration the US democracy has ever spawned, speculating is irresistible. Will it be the intimidation of print and TV news that is now being revealed? Or maybe the voter-fraud investigation by pros, amateurs and anyone who has a computer will prove how low and criminal the BushMen are. And then there is VP Cheney’s involvement with the Halliburton “Irregularities” in Iraq. How about Abu Ghraib? Or it could be an across-the-board impeachment of the whole BushMen lot for war crimes. But my personal choice is the depraved indifference (or criminal negligence...take your pick) exhibited by the Bush administration when the 9/11 attack could have been avoided. The war in Iraq is the only thing that kept George W. Bush from being a lackluster incompetent one-term president. And the war is a major factor that kept many otherwise intelligent people from booting him out of office in this past election. They feared that changing administrations while we are fighting in Iraq would cause the situation to become even more unstable. Does inaction and criminal negligence mean the same thing as causing or promoting? It does, if the result is the same. We mounted a war based on lies and deceit about the 9/11 attack. We all would be wealthy if we had a dollar for every time the Bush team and Bush supporters said “9/11” during the recent campaign. Even though he sat in stunned (or grateful) silence when told about the attack, Bush’s positive record as President was mainly based on ballyhoo about his response to the 9/11 attack. It is impossible not to wonder about the depraved negligence that brought it about. In any case, we have before us an array of crimes committed by the BushMen that may end Bush II before the term is up. Or, given their penchant for overreaching and arrogance, something we don’t as yet know about could bring them down. But as Dennis Jett says, ”Yes, the devastation will be extreme. The good news? He'll (Bush) sow his own destruction.” And, in case you’re wondering, the GOP cannot keep the lid on all their transgressions forever.

Open Letter to Andy Rooney

Dear Andy Rooney: In your long career on the “60 Minutes” television program you’ve said some very wise things and some very dumb things. But in the past year you have been more on-point and open about your antipathy to President Bush and his war in Iraq than others in the mainstream media. And it’s been refreshing. However, last night, you ended your segment on Sunday night’s “60 Minutes” by saying that the election is over and people who voted for John Kerry should “support the President...that’s what I’m going to do.” Why? Unifying this country is not my job and it isn’t your job, Mr. Rooney. Unifying, compromising, negotiating and bringing the country together is the President’s job. During his first press conference after the election George W. Bush spoke from his heart of hearts when he said he would reach out to the people who agree with him. He said that either Democrats could support his agenda or be left behind. President Bush has no interest in bringing us together. He has clearly stated his intentions. He wants to force the views of half the country on the other half. I wouldn’t support him, his agenda or the horses’ asses he rode in on if the FBI knocked on my door and ordered me to support him or die in jail. And the way things are going, we all may see that day. I am against everything President Bush so arrogantly stands for. Are you saying the Democrats in Congress should support the Bush plan to rape Social Security? Are they to support pre-emptive war in whatever country Bush deems evil? Are they now to support his giving welfare to the rich and screwing the poor? Are Americans who feel Bush’s war in Iraq is an immoral act of aggression now supposed to support that war? Are pro-choice people required to become anti-abortion fanatics because George Bush was elected? Are you saying we should stash our brains in the closet and like robots support the President in his delusions that God wants him to rule in the United States, if not the world? Being an American does not obligate me to support the President any more than supporting our soldiers means I support the war in Iraq You made an incredibly foolish statement, Mr. Rooney. It is impossible for me to support George W. Bush or his policies and I am proud to say I will not do it.

What Is That Sucking Sound?

It’s the MSM kissing Bush’s Ass. Surprised? Two questions throw the MSM into a panic. Would the right-wing controlled corporations actually pull their advertising from mainstream news shows and newspapers if they don’t like what they see? The answer is Yes, and they have. Would the Bush administration bring the full intensity of the FBI, IRS and legal scrutiny on the MSM if it doesn’t fall in line with BushSpin crappola? Insiders say it’s already happened and the MSM doesn’t want a rerun. So while CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post and the LA Times quiver and shake and slavishly report and print only the GOP-approved news, inquiring minds seek out the Web and find the truth whether the jackboots in the White House like it or not. It could still happen that the MSM will wake up and realize they are so powerful in their own right that intimidation from sponsors and politicians is not only an insupportable infringement of first amendment rights...it’s an outrageous misuse of power not to mention...it’s illegal. Although legality is a quaint nicety the Repugs don’t take seriously, the law is still the one tool we have that can bring down the totalitarian government being formed by the Bush administration. This morning, Cannonfire reports that although Bob Woodward at the Washington Post was interested in the Bush Bulge story, the Washington Post refused to run it before the election, CBS promised the Bushies it would not run a story on the faked Niger documents until after the election. And stories about the GOP’s brazen attempts to suppress votes were harder to find on the MSM than born-agains in a synagogue. Right now, the blogs are what the Washington Post was in 1973. The Watergate story started small and built into a firestorm. Proof was needed and proof was found. We know voter fraud happened in this past election. We need the proof. We’ll get the proof. And don’t think the BushMen aren’t worried about us. They are!

At Last! “Values” Defined

It’s been a puzzlement. What do the Repubs mean when they vote for “values”? Finally, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has explained it all to us. Speaking on behalf of Senator Sessions, Mike Brumas is quoted in an article in today’s New York Times as saying that the Republicans are outraged over Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) reporting he warned Prez Bush it would be unlikely opponents of abortion would be confirmed for the Supreme Court. Brumas went on to say, “Some of them are saying things like they voted for values on Tuesday and this is a slap in the face.'' So now we know...having ”values” means being anti-abortion. At least that simplifies things. President Bush does not need to worry that his lying, cheating deceptive behavior during his first term will be seen as a blot on his value system. He’s anti-abortion and that is all it takes to have far-right Republican values. It also makes the Democrats job easier. Since having values really means being anti-abortion, the Dems need only seriously address pro-choice. They can let the Repubs chase their own tails about having a one-commandment value system. Not even one week after the election, and two months before President-elect Bush is inaugurated, the Republicans have made it clear they don’t want to hear about real issues. Their strategy continues to be to keep the public eye on non-issues and away from the real problems facing the administration and the country. Unfortunately for the BushMen, reality keeps intruding. We’re still in Iraq with no end in sight. US soldiers are dying. Health care is a tangled web. Bush has empowered the drug companies to rule over doctors. American jobs have gone overseas. The Patriot Act lets the government trample on our civil liberties. And one huge problem is that although the President boasted he has political capital and intends to spend it, he has no actual money in the till. He has squandered all the real bucks on his self-aggrandizing war in Iraq. Where is the money that needs to be spent on anti-terrorism? Flow-charts and colored lights haven't been too effective. The President says he won’t raise taxes. The deficit bill is at $418,000,000,000 and we know our children and grandchildren have been sold out in order to pay it. Where is the money coming from to run the country and god forbid! to defend us against a real enemy? No, I don’t think the far-right’s apocalyptic frenzy over abortion and gay people is much of a diversion from the actual mess we are in. And not the least of our problems is the Bush-led assault on the very existence of the United States and the Republic for which it stands.

Bush Advice: Get on Board or Get Out of My Way

Oh-dear-oh-dear! What a short memory the man has. The last time he voiced that particular sentiment, the world said, Screw you, Mister. Back then, our gormless President went his way virtually alone, bombed the bejesus out of Iraq, and on May 2, 2003 crowed that his mission had been accomplished. Not hardly. Nineteen months later, 1,124 US soldiers are dead, tens of thousands of Iraqis are dead, 8,111 US soldiers have been wounded and maimed, war costs are over $151 billion, our deficit is soaring into the stratosphere and we are no closer to a resolution of our occupation of Iraq than we were on the first day of George Bush’s holy war on March 19, 2003. But yesterday the newly-elected President Bush once again stood before the people of the United States and the world and said, Follow me or you’ll wish you had. Old Never-learn George. The entire planet despises the US because of the Bush administration’s mistakes. One-half of the United States thinks President Bush is a lying cheating idiot. And he picks this moment to gloat over his election, and to say if the Democrats don’t rubber-stamp his initiatives they will be left behind. And, as if that weren’t the political gaffe of the century, he added that he would only reach out to people who think the way he does. The biggest problem with Bush’s jacked-up rhetoric at his first press conference after the election is not that the Republican majority in Congress is far from being solidly behind him. The major problem with Bush’s overly confident elation is that his keepers have not warned him off making pie-in-the-sky promises he can’t keep. Or...can it be? Maybe they have warned him and his inflated feelings of self-esteem won’t allow him to listen. In any event, the president’s ambitious agenda is not going to be an easy sell as it stands. His own Republican party is cranky and on the verge of revolt. And the Senate elections coming up in 2006 have Republicans in need of placating their constituents not giving them reasons to jump ship. The Prez has a rocky row to hoe. His advisors need to rein him in. And finally, Bush’s advisors must insist on his submitting to the medical check-up he refused to have before the election. If there is some physical or mental condition that is causing President Bush to act grandiose at a time when he faces horrendous troubles, we need to know about it.

Bush Does NOT Have a Mandate

The newly elected President sounded more giddy than sensible the day after his narrow victory when he bragged about having a mandate. A 51%-49% squeak is hardly a mandate. However, the Prez may be a little confused about the meaning of mandate. In the past, the BushMen have loosely bandied the word about as though it means “a razor-thin slant to the right”. For Democrats, the next couple of weeks are going to be the toughest of George W. Bush’s second term. It’s going to be hard to take--the victory speeches, the boasting, the neocon claim of vindication with the unsettling subtext that they plan to turn the nation into a totalitarian police state. But while we lay low and let the Republican euphoria swirl around us, we can begin to think clearly about our mandate. On November 3rd, John Kerry conceded the 2004 election to Bush. As soon as Kerry perceived that he could not prevail in a prolonged fight to contest the vote count, he conceded the contest to Bush and it was the right thing for him to do. It was the honorable thing for him to do. However, when Kerry conceded the election, it did not mean that we should stop our investigation into voter fraud. As a matter of fact it frees us to use our energies to begin an investigation in earnest. Yes, the election of 2004 was stolen. Yes, the election of 2000 was stolen. Yes, Bush could not win without the massive collusion of like-minded felonious Repugs. But how do we prove it? And that is our mission. That is where our focus needs to be aimed. That is our task. If half of this nation does not care that the Bush administration lied and deceived the world to promote an unnecessary war, we care. If half of this nation is so obsessed with homophobia and anti-abortion born-again prejudice that they don’t care if the Bush administration is pushing an agenda to authorize civil rights violations at home and global oppression abroad, we care. George W. Bush and his henchmen must be stopped. And the first step is to get proof that illegal methods were used to defraud the voters. The use of voting machines that don’t leave a paper trail may have allowed massive tinkering with the votes. But that kind of techie manipulation always leaves a trail of its own back to the diddlers. Who did it? Who authorized it? The proof is there. All we need to do is find it.

Can You Win When the Other Side Cheats?

I’m assuming the final count in Ohio and Florida will go to George W. Bush. I’m assuming that because the GOP wanted it so much and had so little faith in Bush’s ability to win honestly that they stacked the deck in both states. And if anyone knows how to play with a stacked deck, it’s the Republican dirty tricks maven Karl Rove. Even if Rove didn’t believe in his man enough to allow him to run for President and play it straight, I believe in Karl Rove knowing how to cheat. And to answer the above question, No, you cannot win the game when the other side cheats. The thing you do win is the ghoulish satisfaction of watching an undeserved victory turn to dust. I have faith in the law of karma more than I have faith in organized religion. What goes around comes around. If Bush in fact has been elected President of the United States, have a little patience. The unraveling is about to start. Now that the election is over, the biggest unresolved question is: Will the mainstream media pull its collective head out of George W. Bush’s ass and start acting like journalists? I happen to believe that the whole lot--CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The LA Times--were intimidated and threatened by the Bush administration but that is no excuse for their cowardly behavior. What was the GOP going to do, send the entire lot to a gulag in Afghanistan? Now is the time for the MSM to reconnect with its gonads and give us the real news. Journalists are worse than political hacks if they don't fearlessly and honestly report the news. And the smallest unresolved question is: When is Aaron Brown going to leave CNN? He deserves better than CNN’s mealy-mouthed, suck-up bunch of jackasses. Where he would go I have no idea. Maybe start his own cable news outfit. But night after night for him to have to deal with the king of brown-nosing fence-sitters--Jeff Greenfield--is a penance and insult he doesn’t deserve.

Selling Democracy

If I were in Iraq, amid the chaos, killing, bloodshed and guerilla warfare that George W. Bush has wreaked on the land in the name of freedom and democracy, and if I had access to either radio or TV coverage of the US election, I would wonder...who needs it? Take your ugly democracy and shove it We’ve had over 200 years to work out the kinks in this American experiment called democracy and yet, every election for president becomes more difficult and hate ridden than the last. Each new national election brings more threats of violence, disruption and disorder. Now, that may be okay for us...somehow our republic survives. But if we haven’t been able to solve the problems inherent in democratic rule in our own nation, how do we have the sheer arrogance and colossal gall to try to sell it to a culture we don’t even understand? Not only that, we went into Iraq with guns blazing. We murdered thousands of Iraqis in order to force them to adopt a system that is imperfect, often totally unmanageable and could only be understood and practiced by people who’ve been at it for two centuries. Let us fervently hope, that at least when this election is over we will abolish the Electoral College. My friend Stu, who I have known since first grade in Illinois, now lives in Indiana. He is a fervent Democrat. Which is not an easy path to walk in Indiana. Stu never fails to vote. He is a staunch believer in the right and sacred duty of Americans to vote. But he says the most difficult thing for him is knowing his vote as a Democrat doesn’t mean a damn thing in elections for President and Vice President in Republican Indiana. He may as well stay home, he says. But he votes anyway. For the popular vote to have no meaning in the year 2004 is ridiculous. Our country was founded by well-to-do, well-educated white men who believed the little folk had neither the brains nor the knowledge to elect the top leaders of the land. We have evolved to the point that the little folk are so much smarter, better educated and brainier than our legislators that now Congress cannot be trusted to decide the outcome of our elections for President and Vice President. The brand of freedom we are forcing on the people of Iraq does not include the Electoral College. What’s good enough for the people we conquer, murder and oppress ought to be good enough for us.

Who Benefits From The Polls?

A post by David Talbot this morning in Salon.com says that Zogby just released a poll of cell phone users. The cell set voted for Kerry by a landslide--55 to 40 percent. The polls have ignored cell phone users which means all the people who have opted out of landline phones have never been contacted. But even granting that many voters are out of the loop where the polls are concerned (and for many reasons), who benefits from the polls anyway? It has long been my contention that undecided voters are a tiny group. And that many people call themselves undecided because they get so much media attention. The vast majority of people made up their minds months ago. The polls aren’t going to change anyone’s mind. They’ve been 50/50 for months. So who benefits from this poll mania? Mainstream Media advertisers. Ever since the party conventions, people have been glued to their TV sets and newspapers to find out if their candidate of choice may be getting an edge in the polls. That’s money in the bank to advertisers. It’s in the best interest of media advertisers for poll takers either to fudge their poll results or to couch their questions so that the election polls wind up neck and neck. If the polls edged up to 60/40 for either candidate, people would lose interest in the horserace. And if some polls have to interview people of a certain party more than the other party to maintain the 50/50 ratio...well hey! The guy footing the bill gets what he wants. Back in August when I took a gander at Gallup’s FAQ web site , it said they need the responses of only 1000 people to get an accurate result. That number agrees with the number of responders used in other polls. But Gallup’s site included another bit of information that is telling. Getting the response of more than 1000 people is “very expensive”, the FAQ said. Zogby says his group has to call 10,000 people to get 1,000 responses. There aren’t a lot of sponsors of polls who would be willing to pony up the bucks for 4,000 responders, let alone 10,000 responders. Particularly if the poll isn’t going to get the right result. So...we have advertisers wanting people to keep tuning in and keep reading and we have the Bush administration putting the squeeze on the MSM to be nice to George Bush and it all adds up to MSM polls that aren’t worth a pile of horseshit in the Texas sun.