Never Mind the Political Analysts

What does Romney’s win in the Michigan primary really mean? 1) Michigan voters prefer a lying opportunist to an aging, ailing Bush-clone, an ignorant born-again religious fanatic, a lying warmonger, and an aging, ailing actor. 2) No matter who becomes the candidate for President, Republicans will have to hold their noses to vote in the general election next November. That’s it. Last night, CNN’s Senior Political Correspondent Cindy Crowley said, “If Mike Huckabee should win, it will prove that he is not just a quirk out of Iowa.” Obviously, the jerk out of Arkansas is just that, a quirk out of Iowa. The evangelicals in Michigan voted for Romney rather than give Huckabee the nod. As much as the pundits and pollsters are badmouthing the word “change”, voters are looking for change. No matter who is inaugurated in 2009, Congress will have to clean up the messes the Bush administration created in the Middle East and in the US. What’s to be done about Blackwater? The Bush State Department has hogtied the Bush Justice Department so that investigating the criminal acts of guns-for-hire outfits like Blackwater is nearly impossible, let alone prosecuting the criminals. The New York Times reported this morning: “In a private briefing in mid-December, officials from the Justice and State Departments met with aides to the House Judiciary Committee and other Congressional staff members and warned them that there were major legal obstacles that might prevent any prosecution. Justice officials were careful not to say whether any decision had been made in the matter, according to two of the Congressional staff members who received the briefing... Since the September shooting, the State Department and the Pentagon have reached an agreement to put private contractors under greater military control.” But that is not enough and voters know it. Having had a taste of an out-of-control Executive Branch, voters want to rein in the Executive Branch. The Patriot Act has to be revisited and changed. Voters don’t like being spied on and surveilled. The mess in Iraq has to be cleaned up, and the US has to get out. Voters know this. Dare I say it doesn’t matter who the President is? Actually, it doesn’t matter. The President of the United States can do nothing by himself/herself. For a candidate to utter words like, “When I am President, I will...." or “Vote for me, I will....” is ridiculous. The President of the United States is powerless to do ANYTHING on his own. During the last seven years, Republicans have been as tricked and deceived by the entire Bush administration as Democrats. The Bush administration lied to all of us. Both sides of the aisle in Congress were lied to and deceived by the fascists in the White House. And now, all of us want change. The voters in the United States do not like being governed by a dictator. McCain and Giuliani want things to go on as they have gone on since 2000. Nevertheless, should either one win the Republican candidacy, and should either one become president, he would be forced to follow the lead of Congress in changing the direction the US is presently headed in. The tipping point has been reached. All the blather about Republican policies and Democrat policies and this candidate is different from that candidate is window-dressing. What has been cannot go on. And what has been will not go on no matter who becomes president.

Another Victory for Doctors and Drug Stores

The medical profession, in cahoots with the pharmaceutical industry, just won another coup in its continuing effort to put everyone under a doctor’s care and on drugs. Recently, when I saw an ad on television for yet another drug we are supposed to tell our doctors we desperately need, my first thought was: My God! That woman is a self-absorbed whiny hypochondriac. The drug being hawked by a Central Casting type we all recognize as our complaining spinster aunt was Lyrica and the disease was something I had never heard of—fibromyalgia--which, we were told causes debilitating pain throughout the body. An article in the New York Times this morning (“Drug Approved. Is Disease Real?”) reports that the drug touted in the television commercial is manufactured by Pfizer, that it has been approved by the FDA, and Eli Lilly and Forest Labs have now asked for FDA approval for similar drugs to counteract “chronic, widespread pain of unknown origin”. Lyrica acts on the brain’s perception of pain. And although Lyrica does nothing to cure the pain, which may or may not be intolerable, may or may not have physical origins and may or may not be caused by a real disease, the side effects caused by Lyrica are very real and include severe weight gain, dizziness. sleepiness and edema. Funnily enough, even though the spinster aunt in the ad is skinny, most sufferers of chronic pain are obese. Furthermore, the article says many doctors not only dispute the need for the drug, they dispute the existence of the disease. Lyrica is used to treat diabetic nerve pain and seizures. But in June it received FDA approval for use in treating "fibromyalgia". Its sales reached $1.8 billion in 2007, up 50 percent from 2006. The NYT reports “Analysts predict sales will rise an additional 30 percent this year, helped by consumer advertising.” The NYT goes on to say, “Doctors who are skeptical of fibromyalgia say vague complaints of chronic pain do not add up to a disease. No biological tests exist to diagnose fibromyalgia, and the condition cannot be linked to any environmental or biological causes...The diagnosis of fibromyalgia itself worsens the condition by encouraging people to think of themselves as sick and catalog their pain, said Dr. Nortin Hadler, a rheumatologist and professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina who has written extensively about fibromyalgia.” Am I saying that the million people who report having chronic pain are imagining it? No. I am saying pain is not a disease. I’m saying pain is a symptom. I’m saying that drugs like Lyrica and drug companies and doctors who promote it are simply the 21st century’s version of snake oil salesmen. I’m saying chronic fatigue, chronic pain, chronic complaining, chronic visits to doctors because “they can’t find what’s wrong with me”, are not drug-treatable diseases. I'm saying that although the complainants may find temporary relief in using drugs, they do not have a specific disease. I’m saying that the medical profession turning the populace into drug-dependent addicts who need to visit their so-called health providers regularly in order to get a fix is scamming us and we have become a nation of foggy-brained, passive, low-energy, ego-centered, hypochondriacs because of it.

Crazy George’s Latest Statement

Last week, President George W. Bush went to the Middle East where he is reviled and hated more than he’s reviled and hated in the United State (if possible). His plans are to invoke peace between Israel and Palestine, both of which nations look with contempt and disdain on the little fascist putz more than they look with contempt and disdain on each other. Nevermind. George W. Bush not only is confident that before his term is ended he can be the cosmic force that unites Israel and Palestine. But also, when he was in Kuwait yesterday, this is what he told US troops about the war in Iraq: “There is no doubt in my mind that when history is written, the final page will say that victory was achieved by the United States of America for the good of the world.” And the horrible fact is that George W. Bush is no deluded and insane that he believes what he said is true even though there is no way on God’s green earth that victory of any sort can be achieved by the United States in Iraq in any time frame even by the day before last times. And another horrible fact is that apparently George W. Bush has forgotten that he started the war in Iraq for no good reason, but in order to gain control of Iraq’s oil, and certainly NOT for the good of the world. I am of the belief that the Prez doesn’t use speech writers these days. I am of the belief he is writing his own crazed rhetoric himself, and that he speaks off-the-cuff without monitoring or filters because the Bush administration and the Republican Party have decided George W. Bush is beyond reclaim and that the pathetic little madman can hang by his thumbs for all they care.

What’s New?

Well, certainly nothing new in the Bush administration. And nothing new in Iraq. As Lou Dobbs made clear on A Daily Show last night, there's nothing new in the political arena—the pollsters and pundits are already making unfounded and rash predictions about the outcomes of the next primary caucuses. Nothing new in Ron Paul’s campaign for president--he’s acting like the idiot he can't help being with regard to the racial bigotry in the Ron Paul Newsletter during the 80’s and 90’s--he says he didn’t write it and didn’t read it. Nothing new about William Kristol—he just turned 55 and is as smug, smirky and arrogant about being a vicious snide little autocrat as he was twenty years ago. So, since there is nothing new in the news, you might as well read the New York Times review by Michael Wilson of the new public toilet near 23rd and Madison in NYC (“Greetings, Earthlings, Your New Restroom Is Ready”)--the first of 20 planned new public toilets in NYC. It sounds like the perfect ruse to entice fools like Kristol and Ron Paul into permanent flushdom and off the earth. I envision Public Service Flushlets every five blocks in large cities. With all those colored buttons available in the new facility in Manhattan, surely they can be outfitted with asshole-to-mass-hole sensors. The only clue would be when someone asks: “Have you seen Newt Gingrich lately?” And the answer is: “No. The last time I saw him he was heading for a Public Service Flushlet.”

Blackwater Used CS Gas to Clear a Traffic Jam

The New York Times reported this morning that in 2005 a Blackwater helicopter dropped a tear gas substance on Iraqi civilians and US military personnel in Baghdad. “The American military in Iraq can use CS gas only under the strictest conditions and with the approval of top military commanders,” the NYT said. “An armored vehicle on the ground also released the gas, temporarily blinding drivers, passers-by and at least 10 American soldiers operating the checkpoint...Both the helicopter and the vehicle involved in the incident at the Assassins’ Gate checkpoint were not from the United States military, but were part of a convoy operated by Blackwater Worldwide, the private security contractor that is under scrutiny for its role in a series of violent episodes in Iraq, including a September shooting in downtown Baghdad that left 17 Iraqis dead,” the NYT report said. “This was decidedly uncool and very, very dangerous,” Capt. Kincy Clark of the Army, the senior officer at the scene said online later that day. Uncool? I would say so. But the real kicker was the information that there was no violence at the checkpoint where the CS gas was dropped. The Blackwater convoy was stuck in traffic and used the tear gas to clear the traffic jam. Guess what Anne Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Blackwater said about the incident? The CS gas was dropped by mistake. “Blackwater teams in the air and on the ground were preparing a secure route near a checkpoint to provide passage for a motorcade. It seems a CS gas canister was mistaken for a smoke canister and released near an intersection and checkpoint.” Blackwater says it is permitted carry CS gas under its contract at the time with the State Department. But a State Department official says the contract did not specifically authorize Blackwater personnel to carry or use CS gas, but it did not prohibit it. The NYT said, “The military tightly controls use of riot control agents in war zones. They are banned by an international convention on chemical weapons endorsed by the United States, although a 1975 presidential order allows their use by the United States military in war zones under limited defensive circumstances and only with the approval of the president or a senior officer designated by the president.” Michael Schmitt, professor of international law at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. said, “It is not allowed as a method or means of warfare...There are very, very strict restrictions on the use of CS gas in a war zone.” While standing at the checkpoint Captain Clark said he saw a Blackwater helicopter overhead. In a personal journal posted online the day of the incident, Captain Clark wrote: “We noticed that one of them was hovering right over the intersection in front of our checkpoint. There was a small amount of white smoke coming up from the intersection. I grabbed my radio and asked one of the guard towers what the smoke was. He answered that it looked like one of the helicopters dropped a smoke grenade on the cars in the intersection. I asked him why were they doing that, was there something going on in the intersection that would cause them to do this. He said, nope, couldn’t see anything. Then I said, well what kind of smoke is it? “Before he could say anything, I got my answer. My eyes started watering, my nose started burning and my face started to heat up. CS! I heard the lieutenant say, “Sir that’s not smoke, it’s CS gas.” Captain Clark’s wrote, “the gas caused a complete traffic jam in front of our checkpoint, armored cars in the convoy made a U-turn — and threw another CS grenade...it just seemed incredibly stupid...the only thing we could figure out was for some reason, one of them figured that CS would somehow clear traffic. Why someone would think a substance that makes your eyes water, nose burn and face hurt would make a driver do anything other than stop is beyond me. Army Staff Sgt. Kenny Mattingly said he was puzzled. “We saw the Little Bird (Blackwater helicopter) come and hover right in front of the gate, and I saw one of the guys dropping a canister...There was no reason for dropping the CS gas. We didn’t hear any gunfire or anything. There was no incident under way.” And Blackwater thugs are still making their incredibly stupid, arrogant mistakes in Iraq, and lying about it while the State Department covers up for them and claims an investigation is going on when no investigation is going on. The war in Iraq is not going well or even better, it is simply stagnating. As of January 9th 3921 American soldiers have been killed in Iraq for no reason other than to keep the Bush administration's ego war going on and on and on. But Blackwater, and all of Vice President Cheney’s companies (Halliburton and offshoots and branches of Halliburton) are making tons and tons and tons of money.

What Happened in New Hampshire?

While the pollsters and pundits who believed the pollsters scrambled around last night trying to justify and/or understand why they were so wrong, the fact remains that in the New Hampshire Democratic primary yesterday, people voted for the person they believed could win the election for president next November. Last night, everyone and his Aunt Maude floated reasons why the polls were wrong. The one I loved was that the polls were right, but voters can’t be trusted: i.e., voters changed their minds at the last minute and voted for Hillary Clinton because she had come close to tears the day before. Others said women voters made Clinton the victor. And still others said pro-union people decided the primary in Clinton’s favor. The most likely scenario is that the voters had been in Clinton’s camp from the gitgo, listened to what Obama had to say, but voted for Clinton. As ever, the trouble with polls is that the sampling is too small to give a real picture of the topic being polled. In New Hampshire, the polls relied on as few as 600 queries. As far as the Republican winner McCain is concerned, it was no contest. For the voters to know beyond a doubt way before the primaries were held, that Romney is an opportunist and liar, that Giuliani is a loose cannon neocon with ethics problems, that Huckabee is terminally ignorant and a religious fanatic and that Thompson is an aging actor with leukemia who was pushed into the fray by his trophy wife, left only one nominally viable candidate: John McCain. The campaign strategists want us to know today that Clinton and McCain came out ahead because the strategies were brilliant and the strategies influenced the voters at the last second to vote for Clinton and McCain. Wrong. Clinton won because the voters knew months ago she was the right choice. And McCain won because he may be an old fool but he’s not Romney, Huckabee, Giuliani or Thompson. What’s the mystery? What’s the wonderment? There is none. The outcome just figures.

What Can One Say?

Not much. The Repubs have managed to cause the economy to spiral downward. The Repub’s war in Iraq goes on and on and on. It cannot be won. Republican President Bush is an idiot, a dupe and is mentally unstable. Republican Vice President Cheney is malicious, spiteful, sick and insane. Do I care who comes out as the Democratic frontrunner? No. Any of the Dem candidates will be fine by me. Their differences are differences in style only. Clinton, Obama and Edwards will not hurt the world, or the US. Do I care who comes out as the Repub frontrunner? No. All of the Repub candidates are jokes. McCain is an old fool. Romney has no firm beliefs in anything and Huckabee is ignorant and silly. They all will do whatever the neocon corporate asslickers demand. Do the caucuses in Iowa and New Hampshire matter? Not really. The only thing that matters is the election next November. Will the US continue to be a fascist Republican-run nation, or will the voters decide they have had enough of Third-Reich politics? That matters. Does it matter whether Obama, Clinton, or Edwards runs against McCain, Romney or Huckabee? No.

Off to God's Country (Brooklyn, NY)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

So Ridiculous 2

President George W. Bush announced yesterday from Crawford Texas that he planned to veto a military policy bill that includes an added pay raise for service members and improvements in veterans’ health benefits, which would have taken effect next Tuesday. Since the Prez can barely read a teleprompter because of his mental impairments, and medications, we can hardly blame him for failing to catch earlier an obscure provision in the bill that makes it untenable to Republicans. It is Section 1083 of a 1300-page, $696 billion military authorization bill that suddenly caught the attention of White House lawyers. And this was only after Iraqi officials complained to American ambassador Ryan Crocker in Baghdad ten days ago. What had the Bush administration lawyers been doing all this time? Preparing statements about how the war in Iraq has improved? Which it hasn't. Preparing statements about how the Republican candidates for president will keep the US safe? Which they won't. Shredding documents and destroying tapes? That sounds right. In any case, the final military policy bill was adopted by overwhelming margins, 370 to 49 in the House and 90 to 3 in the Senate and now the Prez is going to veto it because his minders and lawyers failed to notice Section 1083. According to the New York Times this morning, Senate sponsor of the provision, Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), said Section 1083 would “help plaintiffs in lawsuits against Iran and Libya, including relatives of Americans killed in the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 and in a Berlin disco in 1986.” But Bush’s statement yesterday said, “Exposing Iraq to such significant financial burdens would weaken the close partnership between the United States and Iraq during this critical period in Iraq’s history.” It certainly is an embarrassment for the White House and its legal staff, which is scrambling around trying to explain away why they didn’t act sooner. This lapse has exposed the Prez to even more criticism and derision than he has been experiencing recently, which says a lot. And now Senator John Warner (R-VA) looks like an idiot because he approved the bill. This morning he told the NYT, “The White House prepared a very detailed legal memorandum, and I am convinced that they are correct.” Where was this legal memorandum weeks ago, one might ask? The NYT reports that, “While removing the provision would involve only a minor amendment, the veto could reopen many of the contentious issues that stalled the legislation’s approval in the first place, including efforts by Democrats to impose conditions on spending for the military operations in Iraq.” And it looks like the Bush administration is siding with the Iraqi government over Americans who have suffered in terrorist attacks. So ridiculous!

So Ridiculous

Pakistan’s ex-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto sent a message to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer two months ago. She asked that it not be made public unless she was assassinated. The message said, "Nothing will, God willing, happen. Just wanted you to know, if it does, in addition to the names in my letter to Musharraf of October 16, I would hold Musharraf responsible. I have been made to feel insecure by his minions. And there is no way what is happening, in terms of stopping me from taking private cars or using tinted windows or giving jammers or four police mobiles to cover all sides, could happen without him." And sure enough, yesterday she was assassinated as she had foreseen. When she left a political rally, she raised herself up through the sunroof of the car she was riding in, waved at the crowd and she was shot in the neck or head. Bhutto’s friend, Mark Siegel, sent the message to Blitzer. Siegel said, “She had asked for special vehicles. That was denied to her. She had asked for special tinted cars. She had asked for four police vehicles to surround her at all times. She basically asked for all that was required for someone of the standing of a former prime minister. All of that was denied to her.” Mahmud ALidurrani, Pakistani Ambassador to the United States said police vehicles surrounded her and 7000-8000 security people were deployed for that purpose. He said, “I think the government of Pakistan provided her all the security that was necessary. Now, you tell me, even without jammer or tinted windows, the way she was hit, she would have been hit with tinted windows or without tinted windows.” And that, of course, is indisputable. Whether by idiocy or design, Benazir Bhutto was assassinated because of her own actions. By whom? Who knows? Extremists, surely. Which ones? Who knows? Cui bono? Who benefits? Not Musharraf. Not Pakistan. Factions against Musharraf benefit. Oh my! Could that be the Bush administration?

Let’s Get a Few Things Straight

1) No way did the President of Pakistan General Pervez Musharraf want ex-Prime Minister of Pakistan Benazir Bhutto dead. Bhutto came back to Pakistan determined to be a martyr and she got her wish. Musharraf was just as determined that she should not taint his presidency with her death. He would have gritted his teeth and held his nose and somehow used her as an ally. 2) No way is George W. Bush the most admired man in America. A USA Today-Gallup poll conducted this month says that GWB is the most admired man in America. It’s a put-up job. USA Today/Gallup conducts a poll every year and the sitting president always comes out as the most admired man in America. Frank Newport (Gallup’s editor in chief) said, “Bush's support — he was the choice of 10% of 1,011 Americans polled — was the lowest since he took office in 2001 and 2 percentage points above the No. 2 choice, former president Bill Clinton.” 3) The news coming out of Iraq is not good news. The situation has not improved it is simply stagnant. Our soldiers are tired and the Iraqi insurgents are tired. As of this morning, 3900 American soldiers have died in Iraq in this senseless, illegal war. The US has not improved the lot of the Iraqis...they hate us and want us to get out. 4) John McCain is the perfect symbol for the US policy in Iraq. McCain is old, he’s tired, he’s irrelevant, he’s deluded and he’s insane. 5) The American people do not give a mink-dyed rat’s ass about anything anyone on television or in any of the mainstream media is saying about any of the candidates for president. 6) The American people do not give a damn about anything President George W. Bush says on any subject. His lips move. No one listens. 7) The American people are quietly making up their own minds about everything and they will be heard when they vote. But until we can vote and make our desires and druthers manifest, we are tuning out and just patiently waiting for the comics to come back.

The Unexplored Question Re 2008 Election

Every trait of every candidate and every issue likely to sway voters is being dissected and examined as to the possible effect it may have a year from now on the election. Save one: The satiety quotient. 1) How sick and tired of hearing about the election and the candidates will voters be by November 4, 2008? And, 2) what effect will that “up to here” disgust have on choosing a president for the United States? The answer to 1) is: VERY! The answer to 2) is: NONE! People will vote from their gut as they always have. And by that, I do not mean they will vote emotionally. I mean, the majority of voters will pick a candidate they think will first, be good for their party, and second, be good for the country. I say the majority of voters. There will be the same old 20% who will vote as a way to tilt God’s image of themselves, or will vote as a way to not vote, or will vote for a moron to attest to their own self worth. Recently, the question of likeability has been explored. Likeability does not matter. Dislikeability matters a lot. Having a sense of humor will not get you votes. Having no sense of humor will knock you out of the box. On-the-job experience does not matter. It’s a selling point. Selling points don’t matter to voters. Selling points sell the people using selling points, as in, speechwriters and campaign managers. The people who use selling points keep their jobs by using selling points. But voters don’t care about selling points. Being a silly, over-the-hill old poop matters. Being two silly, over-the-hill old poops on the same ticket is manna from heaven for comics. Case in point: This morning, in his Op/Ed column in the New York Times (“A Résumé Can’t Buy You Love”), Frank Rich quoted Republican candidate Mike Huckabee’s rejoinder on Don Imus’s radio show. Huckabee said, “I may not be the expert that some people are on foreign policy...but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.” As Rich said, “So much for the gravitas points earned during a five-and-a-half year stay at the Hanoi Hilton.” Huckabee’s slap at John McCain was very funny. But Huckabee’s sense of humor can’t erase the fact that he’s an ignorant, nonsense-spewing religious fanatic. And McCain’s constant yammering on being a prisoner of war in Viet Nam only underlines the fact that he’s old and irrelevant and a butt of jokes, particularly since he’s teamed up with Joe Lieberman, another old and irrelevant butt of jokes. The voting public already is only listening with half an ear to the talking heads and pundits. I cannot imagine whom the Republicans can find to vote for, but then, I’m a Democrat, and I know whom I will vote for.

Do I Believe Anything the Bushies Say?

Let me say this to that. This morning a news story came out that the Ceremonial Office of the Vice President caught fire and clouds of black smoke came billowing forth. The VP's Ceremonial Office is the old Eisenhower Executive Office located next to the West Wing on the White House premises. The news story reported Cheney was not in his Ceremonial Office at the time, but was across the street. My faith in the truth of news stories from the White House has eroded to the point that the only thing I believe in the official story about the fire is that the Ceremonial Office of the Vice President caught fire this morning. Anything else in the story I believe is either the opposite of the truth or not the truth. Therefore, my scenario goes like this: The Ceremonial Office of the Vice President is used only for the ceremony of shredding documents and destroying information filed in Vice President Cheney's other office. Cheney, who should not smoke and drink, was smoking and drinking in the wee hours of Wednesday morning in his Ceremonial Office while destroying documents pertaining to everything in the world that he’d had has nasty fingers in during the past week. Which is to say, everything in the world. While laughing maniacally over a particularly nasty piece of executive manipulation and chicanery, the VP spilled booze on papers lying on the floor. The papers partially dried, but a cigarette butt fell on them and ignited, causing a slow-burning fire that escalated after Cheney fell into a boozy nod. Cheney was spirited out by way of a secret passage by the Secret Service. Is my version the true one, or is the news story the true one? The problem is, we have no way of knowing. Therefore, I choose my version.

Here’s The Thing About the Steroid Report

I really like former Senator George Mitchell. I always have. And if anyone is going to head up an investigation of steroid use in baseball, I’m glad it’s George Mitchell. But do you love the headline in the New York Times this morning, or what? “Player Cooperated, and His Name Was Left Out of Report” The headline invites us, of course, to make nasty assumptions about the Mitchell report. Then we find out that the player “had persuasive evidence” and that’s why his story was believed. What's with the NYT and a headline like that? And why not believe him the guy? The snitch that named 90 players was believed. And that snitch was believed because we’ve all known steroid use has been going on for decades. Steroid use became illegal in 2002 but it was not banned until 2005. George Mitchell is a reasonable man. He is not taking a hard line. He doesn’t even believe prosecutions on the drug users should go forward. And he’s right about that. Everyone in baseball and in the world has known about steroid use in sports. And everyone has condoned it, from club managers down to trainers. So why prosecute the little guys? And yes, of course, there should be a “from now on” ruling about jail sentences for steroid providers and users. And yes, of course, anyone selling steroids or providing it to high schoolers and college kids should be jailed. And yes of course, there has to be a widespread education campaign to inform kids about why steroids must not be used. But I gotta say. One thing in the NYT story this morning gave me a hearty laugh: “Some members of Congress expressed dismay that they were misled by testimony two years ago by baseball officials over a 2004 testing program that had been secretly suspended...Three key members of Congress, in separate interviews Friday, said baseball officials should have revealed those problems during testimony in 2005 to House committees.” Congress was dismayed it had been misled? Oh hahahahahahahaha! Do you think it’s just vaguely possible that Congress didn’t want to know it had been misled? Do you think it’s just vaguely possible that the baseball mega-buck interests that kiss Congress’s ass made sure the 2004 testing program was suspended? The fingers-in-ears...la-la-la...I-don’t-want-to-hear-it Congress has struck again.

Astonishing? What’s To Astonish?

This morning the New York Times says, “It is astonishing that President Bush would even think of vetoing” the energy bill that may come up for a vote in the Senate today. It’s not in the least astonishing. It would be astonishing if the Prez didn't veto the bill. The deluded and clinically insane President of the United States vetoes bills because he can. It’s a game he likes to play because he can win. Not only can he win, the game has been rigged so that the odds are in his favor. And those who rigged the game are those who put a deluded and clinically insane man in the White House. That is to say, the Bush administration, the neocons and the Republicans in Congress gave a crazy fascist the power to act unilaterally and without conscience. Now if the NYT editorial (“A Shameful Presidential Threat”) had said it’s astonishing that the Senate’s Republicans are so corrupt, short-sighted and greedy that they may not override the president’s veto out of hand, that is true. To quote the Times again, the editorial says, “By almost any measure, it is the most important energy bill that Congress has entertained in many years... In a statement Tuesday, however, the White House demanded that the bill be amended to make the industry-friendly Transportation Department solely responsible for regulating fuel economy as well as carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles...This would directly reverse the Supreme Court’s historic decision in April declaring that greenhouse gases are air pollutants under the meaning of the Clean Air Act and giving the Environmental Protection Agency the power to regulate them. It would also have the effect of stripping California and other states of the power to impose their own automobile emissions standards... But for the White House to advance industry’s cause at the 11th hour of the debate over a breakthrough energy bill is inexcusable.” Inexcusable, perhaps, but it is not astonishing because a presidential veto is to be expected. However, if the Senate does not override this veto threatened by an insane President, then that would not only be reprehensible, dishonorable, disgraceful and inexcusable, it would be criminal.

AMERICAblog and “American Prospect”

Yesterday, John Aravosis over at AMERICAblog quoted an “American Prospect” article by Courtney E. Martin (“All the News That's Fit to Depress”). Martin said, “Being informed is depressing”. How true! Staying on top of the news is depressing. But it goes further than that. It’s the clear seeing that is depressing and horrifying. Getting a handle on how the Bush administration works is like being present at the autopsy of a murdered friend. The information is ugly, monstrous and difficult to deal with. In the early days of the first George W. Bush term, it was so much easier just to despise the man for his arrogance, mental problems and stupidity. But now, seven years later, it’s possible to be privy to precisely how George W. Bush and the Bush administration got from Point A to Point B and right on down the whole insane spiral that finally culminates in today’s annoying press conference by GWB. The knowledge is maddening and depressing. And the most depressing thing is that all the Republican candidates for President and many Republican voters see absolutely nothing wrong with the executive branch malfeasance and ineptitude fostered by the Bush administration. Not only do they see nothing wrong, they intend to continue the unethical, immoral, corrupt policies and methods if they can get another Republican team elected in 2008. Courtney Martin wrote: “I also can't help but wonder if the average liberal American's love for Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert isn't a direct result of the emotional relief that comes from being told: "This is the news. Now laugh at it." The action becomes the laugh. The instinct to torture yourself over how to respond to the situation in Sudan is displaced by a chuckle at how badly other people -- namely our eternally comic president -- are responding. “I enjoy those shows too, but it's not enough. We can't settle for laughing our outrage away when there is so much violence in the world -- some of which we are directly responsible for. We also can't keep shoving the lesson of informed citizenship down good people's throats -- Do your duty! Stay informed! -- if we aren't going to create new ways of responding to all that information. It's actually a destructive recommendation in many ways -- pushing people to grow accustomed to disaster, disconnected, numb, and ethically dumbfounded. At the very least, it's breaking our hearts.” As Martin says, “there's got to be a better way”. But what that better way might be, I do not know. What I do know is that staying informed about how George W. Bush and the Bush administration is ruining America is depressing.

In Philadelphia, We Have a New Mayor

Mayor Michael Nutter will take office in January. He’s Black. Our last Mayor, John Street, is black. Race and religious affiliation have had little impact on who becomes Mayor of Philadelphia. So far, Nutter is doing all the right things. First crack of the bat, he canned our Police Commissioner. And he’s given the trade unions (which have a stranglehold on Philadelphia and are notoriously anti-black and anti-minority) the directive to stop their bigoted hiring practices. We knew last May after the primary that Nutter would be our Mayor. No one had heard of the Republican candidate, Al Taubenberger, and this is a Democrat town. But the reason I mention these local politics is that the main thing people in Philadelphia are saying..right after they say, “maybe this town can rise from its ashes”...is: “I hope Nutter will be allowed to do all the good things he wants to do”. And that hope is being voiced because Philadelphia’s City Council, police force, political machines of both parties, unions, and State politicians are notoriously corrupt. And the reason I mention that local fact is that any candidate for President of the United States is faced with the same daunting challenge. Will any of the candidates for president be allowed to change anything when he/she is elected to office? Frank Rich’s interesting article in this morning’s New York Times calls Mike Huckabee the Republicans’ Barack Obama. Huckabee and Obama talk the talk and in their limited way (Huckabee was governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007 and Obama has been in the Illinois State Senate and the US Senate since 1996), they both have been walking the walk. But neither has been put under the political microscope and tested during a major upheaval in the way Clinton, Giuliani and Romney have been sliced, diced and disected. And in that way, both Obama and Huckabee are tempting as candidates. We have no idea what they will do when the shit hits the fan, as it surely and inevitably will. Huckabee says he will abolish the IRS. For this, he received a standing ovation when the proposal issued from his mouth. And of course, as president, he could never abolish the IRS. It would not be allowed. It is not even remotely possible. But the idea resonated with everyone who heard it. What would any of these candidates be allowed to do as far as changing the modus operandi of the present political system when he/she becomes president? Not much. And unless a new brilliant rising star appears on the political horizon who can engage the hopes and allay the fears of the American voting public, we are going to get a political warhorse who knows the ropes for president. Because most people are likely to vote for the devil they know.

Since George W. Bush Is Never Wrong....

...he’s not about to admit that Iran is no threat to the world in general or to the US in particular. That’s a given. But what is interesting is the justification that director of national intelligence Mike McConnell is giving for not advising the Prez fully about new intelligence re Iran and its lack of nuclear capabilities. McConnell feared that since the Prez and the neocons in the President’s cabinet had made a huge misstep before and had willfully misinterpreted raw intelligence (as in, lying the US into a war in Iraq), McConnell was afraid they would do it again. And McConnell may have been right to keep Crazy George (and his equally nutty cohorts) in the dark. But McConnell having good reason to sit on intelligence reports because he couldn’t trust the president of the United States is simply proof that the Republicans, the Bush administration, the neocons running the Bush administration, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are WRONG. It does not prove that McConnell and Bush’s minders are right. The New York Times made this statement this morning: “A senior intelligence official and a senior White House official said that Mr. McConnell had been cautious in his presentation to Mr. Bush in an attempt to avoid a mistake made in the months leading to the Iraq war, in which raw intelligence was shared with the White House before it had been tested and analyzed.” I have no problem with institutions for the criminally insane keeping sharp objects and weapons away from their patients. That’s prudent. But I have a problem with the United States having a president and vice president who are criminally insane and therefore the national intelligence director has to keep information from them to keep the world safe. AND, I have a problem with three Republican candidates for president—John McCain, Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani--seeing nothing wrong with Bush and Cheney being crazy as loons and they intend to follow in their footsteps. What a situation! The president’s advisors can’t advise the President because the President is nuts. And they can’t advise the Vice President because the Vice President it nuttier than the President. In addition to that, most of the President and Vice President’s advisors have fled the sinking US ship of state because they knew the President and Vice President were criminally insane and they used that knowledge to promote their own agendas. What a bunch of maroons!

Oh My Goodness! Bush Was Lying About Iran?

Condoleezza Rice was lying about Iran? Dick Cheney was lying about Iran? We don’t have to nuke Iran to keep Iran from nuking us? Well my stars and garters! I am shocked! The New York Times this morning says a new report released by the National Intelligence Estimate yesterday means that “for now at least, the main argument for a military conflict with Iran — widely rumored and feared, judging by antiwar protesters that often greet Mr. Bush during his travels — is off the table for the foreseeable future.” The Washington Post says, “President Bush got the world's attention this fall when he warned that a nuclear-armed Iran might lead to World War III. But his stark warning came at least a month or two after he had first been told about fresh indications that Iran had actually halted its nuclear weapons program.” WaPo went on to say, “The new intelligence report released yesterday not only undercut the administration's alarming rhetoric over Iran's nuclear ambitions but could also throttle Bush's effort to ratchet up international sanctions and take off the table the possibility of preemptive military action before the end of his presidency.” Bush’s national security adviser, Stephen J. Hadley admitted that he, Vice Prez Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condi Rice and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had reviewed and debated the report two weeks ago. Steven Myers writes in the NYT today (“An Assessment Jars a Foreign Policy Debate About Iran”): “It (the report) will certainly weaken international support for tougher sanctions against Iran, as a senior administration official grudgingly acknowledged. And it will raise questions, again, about the integrity of America’s beleaguered intelligence agencies, including whether what are now acknowledged to have been overstatements about Iran’s intentions in a 2005 assessment reflected poor tradecraft or political pressure.” But Hadley countered that view by saying, “the estimate showed that suspicions about Iran’s intentions were warranted, given that it had a weapons program in the first place.” Hadley even said, “On balance, the estimate is good news...on one hand, it confirms that we were right to be worried about Iran seeking to develop nuclear weapons. On the other hand, it tells us that we have made some progress in trying to ensure that that does not happen. But it also tells us that the risk of Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon remains a very serious problem.” Or, to put it another way...there must be a pony here someplace, look at all the horseshit. Another article in the NYT (“U.S. Finds Iran Halted Its Nuclear Arms Effort in 2003”) says, “The report states that the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research judges that Iran is unlikely to achieve this goal before 2013, because of ‘foreseeable technical and programmatic problems’.” As I see it, the only recourse the Bush administration now has is to claim that everyone is lying, Iran is lying and The National Intelligence Estimate report is a lie; trust the Bush people—the only reliable, honest, Christians in the United States--Iran is still a real, ungodly threat to democracy, love, the American way and world peace, and those who don’t want to nuke Iran are traitorous blasphemers who also should be nuked off the face of the earth. And what with all this new info about White House mendacity, does anyone in the Bush administration remember that our soldiers are still getting killed in Iraq for no reason and that the US has been bankrupted by that illegal, unnecessary war? As of today, 3,882 American soldiers have died in that George W. Bush/Dick Cheney war.

I ❤ Gail Collins

Of course, you could just read her column (“Rudy’s Security Blanket”) in Saturday’s New York Times. But because it would be fun for me, let me recount some of her observations about Rudy Giuliani. Subhead: “Rudy Giuliani is one of those people who doesn’t handle power well. The more important he becomes, the more impossible he becomes.” Lede paragraph: “Rudy Giuliani has been having a bad week. Or, as he might put it, suffering persecutions never seen upon this planet since Mel Gibson was tortured on the rack, castrated, disemboweled and beheaded in ‘Brave heart’.” And then, “Rudy looked bad in that debate in Florida. The protégé he promoted for homeland security secretary, Bernard Kerik, kept showing up on TV in news clips captioned 16-COUNT FEDERAL INDICTMENT.” The bills for his golf and adultery pursuits, Collins said, “were hidden in budgets of obscure city agencies like the Loft Board and the Office for People With Disabilities.” When he was mayor of New York City, at one point NYC was paying for police guards to protect and transport not only Rudy, his children and his elderly mother, but also both his wife and his mistress. Really, they were thisclose to assigning a detail to the family retriever and a springer spaniel he was courting down the block.” “After American embassies were bombed in East Africa,” Collins said, “his administration responded by blocking off the driveways to City Hall, barring protesters and politicians from their traditional press conference site on the building steps, and banishing tourists. Meanwhile, behind the barricades, the mayor was planning to put the city’s emergency command center inside the best-known terrorist target in America.” “Does this sound like a good plan, people?” Collins wonders. “Do you want the next president putting a nuclear missile at Camp David while he moves the Situation Room to the Louisiana flood plain?” That scenario probably doesn’t sound as horrible to people who voted for the ne’er-do-well-alcoholic-mentally-challenged--lying-warmonger George W. Bush as it sounds to people who voted for Al Gore and John Kerry. But Collins adds another sobering thought by reminding us that: “The safety of New York reached its peak on 9/11, when the entire public security leadership of the city left ground zero in order to protect the mayor in his walk uptown. And then there was the aftermath, when he tried to postpone the mayoral election under the theory that the factor most critical to our survival was his continued presence at the helm.” Keep it up, Gail. Keep telling the uninformed and misinformed about what a thoroughly unwholesome corrupt piece of work Rudy Giuliani really is under his thin veneer of being an unethical bullying Republican presidential candidate.