The right-wing blogs continue to play down the case against Libby/Rove, pretending to see no wrongdoing. After today, don't believe them.

Kevin Drum puts it best:

For now, here's the bottom line: Fitzgerald didn't charge Scooter Libby with mistakenly making a few unimportant false statements to the grand jury. He charged him with deliberately constructing a false story about how he learned about Valerie Plame, and then repeatedly telling this story to both FBI agents and the grand jury. That story was a lie, and it was a premeditated lie designed to cover up the fact that he had engaged in a long and persistent effort to uncover information about Joe Wilson's wife and disseminate it to reporters.

Libby could have told the truth, but then he would have had to admit his role in outing a CIA agent in order to score political points against a critic of the administration. He didn't want that campaign to become public, so he invented a cover story, repeated it under oath, and stuck to it on multiple occasions.

It's serious stuff.

Will a Rove indictment be necessary to fatally wound Bush for the next 2+ years? Has the public seen enough already to all but consider Rove guilty and a forever-tainted official? Or lacking an indictment, will they eventually forgive & forget, no doubt helped by the tidal wave of brainwashing rhetoric sure to come from the GOP?

With the onset of this in-house turmoil, GW will likely replace existing charlatans with new charlatans. Nothing will change because the deeper problem is at the nexus of power: GW himself. He's not wise and he surrounds himself with these types of bottom-feeding cronies and filthy dirtbags, making it just a matter of time before bad decisions are put forth due to incompetence and laws are broken due to the lack of morals in those chosen to serve.

A fish rots from the head....

No doubt the timing of the Miers announcement (which comes as a shock, NOT) was purposeful, wag-dogging the Fitzgerald indictment announcement, but does it really serve the intended goal? Yes it may drown out the indictment news due to sheer noise and crowding out of newspaper headlines, however my reaction may be the one many Americans experienced. I just shook my head and absorbed (further) the astounding mess this administration has created and sadly forces the country to wallow in.

The bang-bang announcements help to crystallize the obvious realization that the current state of affairs is like an Etch-a-Sketch screen that is bombarded with hundreds of crazy lines: it begs for a vigorous, thorough shaking to clear the screen and start anew. There's really nothing worth saving, nothing meaningful to build on, but instead too much that needs to be erased with enormous amounts of required fixing to occur.

The next decade or two will be all about mending the damage that's been inflicted on the country and getting us back to square one -- if it's not too late already. GW's eight years will go down as the most unproductive and wasteful in the Republic's history.

UPDATE: The day came and went, no Fitzgerald announcement. Was this to be all along or did he wait due to the Miers news? Do we have a cat-and-mouse game in process? Nonetheless, Fitzgerald best be ready for an organized, Swift Boat-ish smear campaign ("criminalization of politics" etc.) the likes of which has not been seen versus a completely decent & fair person.

Needlenose is describing in premise what I supported during Clinton's Monica mess: for Bill to resign and allow Gore two years of on-the-job performance to run on come 2000. Then it was easy to see that post-hearings Clinton would become lame-duckish so what better for the party then to give Gore a substantive running start. In my mind, it would've made all the difference for Gore's chances, allowing not just the image of President to take hold and resonate but also for him to more easily distance himself from Bill's stupid indiscretions.

That said, I'm not sure if I completely agree with Needle's dire warning for the Dems. Yes, it would hoist Condi into a better position to run in '08 but nonetheless she would still have hefty obstacles to overcome. If Bush remains unpopular, it will be very difficult for her to distance herself from his wreck-of-a-legacy (similar to Gore with Clinton/Monica problem), and in this case she was complicit on many of the issues and reasons for why GW's eight years were awful. Is it any wonder why McCain in particular is already creating distance between himself and Bush on the issues? Rice as VP will just make it that much easier for him to run against her. Also, let's be brutally realistic, her other obstacles include she's 1) a woman, 2) African-American, and 3) never married. Those three facts combined with her close association to GW will likely be enough to sink her, esp. versus a popular McCain.

The question is, given the above and assuming she does in fact want to run in '08, will she decline the VP spot if it's offered?

Guess in which red state these fine folks reside.

Kay Baily Hutchinson (R-TX) on Meet The Press yesterday:

"I certainly hope that if there is going to be an indictment that says something happened, that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn't indict on the crime so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation were not a waste of time and dollars."

Compare the above to her quote years ago about the Clinton impeachment:

"The edifice of American jurisprudence rests on the foundation of the due process of law. The mortar in that foundation is the oath. Those who seek to obstruct justice weaken that foundation, and those who violate the oath would tear the whole structure down. Every day, thousands of citizens in thousands of courtrooms across America are sworn in as jurors, as grand jurors, as witnesses, as defendants. On those oaths rest the due process of law upon which all of our other rights are based. The oath is how we defend ourselves against those who would subvert our system by breaking our laws. There are Americans in jail today because they violated that oath. Others have prevailed at the bar of justice because of that oath. What would we be telling Americans -- and those worldwide who see in America what they can only hope for in their own countries -- if the Senate of the United States were to conclude: The President lied under oath as an element of a scheme to obstruct the due process of law, but we chose to look the other way? I cannot make that choice. I cannot look away. I vote `Guilty' on Article I, Perjury. I vote `Guilty' on Article II, Obstruction of Justice."

Wow, just look at the sheer volume of bloviating she had to convey regarding Clinton, as compared to Rove/Libby.

The level of hypocrisy is both astounding and yet unsurprising.

Jonathan Chait states the obvious:

Bush is mainly interested in harvesting votes from religious conservatives in order to implement an agenda dominated by his economic backers. In liberal-ese: Social conservatives are hapless GOP dupes.

I agree, and have for years. In fact, Bush is playing this hand quite shrewdly. The religious right are indeed zombie-like voters, usually basing their entire rationale on one, maybe two, issues, and that's it. If a candidate is against abortion rights and gay marriage then that person is VERY likely to get their vote no matter what they stand for on anything else. If the candidate also supports anti-environmental measures or the NRA or tax cuts for the extremely rich, well that doesn't matter, it's ignored. What counts are those few issues that would seem to insure that the voter is on the side of Jesus. But as I constantly remind, Bush endorsed pro-choice Specter over pro-life Toomey, i.e. politics before supposed principles.

Again, can you blame Bush? He realizes he can continuously stomp on these folks since they have no alternative. What are they going to do, vote for the Satan-loving Democrat? Behind closed doors, he and Rove simply laugh at the fools -- but thank the Lord they exist! As Chait writes, "With allies like these, Bush doesn’t have much incentive to work harder to reward his social conservative base."

From Harold Meyerson in The Washington Post:

Congress is back in session, and it's gunning for the American poor.

A revolt of House conservatives has persuaded that body's Republican leadership to offset the increased federal spending going to rebuild the Hurricane Katrina-devastated Gulf Coast by reductions in Medicaid, food stamps and other programs for the indigent. If things go according to plan, this week the House will begin to cut $50 billion from those efforts.

The emerging Republican response to Katrina, apparently, is to comfort the drenched poor and afflict the dry.

For a moment last week, it looked as though the Republicans were going to enact across-the-board spending cuts.

That, however, would have meant less money for defense contractors and the highway industry and other contributors to congressional Republicans' campaigns. GOP committee chairmen made that point so forcefully that the idea was scrapped.

The beauty of taking the cuts out of Medicaid and student loan programs, by happy contrast, is that it doesn't reduce the flow of funds to the Republican campaign committees by a single dime.
<..>
What we have here is an ideologically driven dereliction of duty. If the Bush White House had been put in charge of the Manhattan Project, Oppenheimer and Teller would still be puttering around in the New Mexico desert today.

And it gets worse. The same Republican zealots who demand fiscal responsibility by cutting $50 billion for the indigent sick are now also demanding a new $70 billion in tax cuts, including the permanent repeal of the estate tax, that would chiefly benefit the rich. For a few brief weeks after Katrina, Republicans actually suspended their advocacy of tax cuts, but this onset of sanity came to a shuddering halt once the cameras were removed from the Superdome.

Not that it seems to bother them in the least, but the Republicans' post-Katrina priorities and those of the American public couldn't be more diametrically opposed. Earlier this month, Peter Hart's polling firm asked respondents if they believed cutting Medicaid and like programs by $35 billion (the GOP's targeted cut had not yet risen to $50 billion) and cutting taxes by $70 billion was the right or wrong priority. By a margin of 67 percent to 24 percent, the respondents said it was wrong. And in a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll last week, 48 percent of those questioned said they wanted the Democrats to control the next Congress, while just 39 percent favored the Republicans.

You'd think these figures would give the Republicans pause. Instead, they increasingly act as though they were immune to the laws of political gravity. Republicans have grown so accustomed to winning elections by gerrymandering districts, activating their faithful and attacking Democrats over trumped-up issues that they believe they can survive even major shifts in public sentiment.

Perhaps their obscene hubris stems from their knowing confidence in the tipping point that favors them: the no-paper-trail electronic voting machines; whatever state uses them "miraculously" becomes a red state.

What happened to the uproar and calls for investigating the flaws in these robo-vote-deliverers? Reid? Pelosi? Anyone??

In just the last two evenings, avowed "traditionalist" Bill O'Reilly has had the following topics featured on his TV show: Mexico and illegal immigrants, the Horowitz murder, hurricane Wilma, a high school principal banning a prom, the Minnesota Vikings sex/boat scandal, and John Gibson discussing his "War On Christmas" book. (And of course Bill plugging his "Factor gear," i.e. shilling coffee mugs and doormats at a price).

Do you notice any oddly missing topics of the day? Yeah, right, where's the controversy surrounding DeLay, Rove, Libby, and Frist, not to mention Bush and Cheney? The only item I noticed in the two evenings was when Dick Morris appeared to plug his book. He first commented on illegal immigrants (of course, to O'Reilly the #1 problem facing the country), and then O'Reilly brings up Miers but then when finally referring to Rove/Libby (forget DeLay's recent mugshot, etc.) all he did was in ten seconds time ask Morris for a prediction on indictments. That's it, no discussion, nothing. And then back to plugging Dick's book.

I know, I know, you can't take this guy seriously, who in their right mind would? But that's the sad part, many people do.

And the GOP implosion accelerates.

Those who thought investigations were a wonderful thing when Bill Clinton was president are suddenly facing prosecutors, and they don't like it. It seems like a hundred years ago when Clinton's defenders were accusing his opponents of using special prosecutors, lawsuits, criminal charges and, ultimately, impeachment to overturn the will of the voters.

Clinton's conservative enemies would have none of this. No, they said over and over, the Clinton mess was not about sex but about "perjury and the obstruction of justice" and "the rule of law."

The old conservative talking points are now inoperative.
<..>
These cases portray an administration and a movement that can dish it out, but want to evade responsibility for doing so and can't take it when they are subjected to the same rule book that inconvenienced an earlier president. An editorial in the latest issue of the conservative Weekly Standard is a sign of arguments to come. The editorial complains about the various accusations being leveled against DeLay, Libby, Rove and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and it says that "a comprehensive strategy of criminalization had been implemented to inflict defeat on conservatives who seek to govern as conservatives."

I have great respect for my friends at the Weekly Standard, so I think they'll understand my surprise and wonder over this new conservative concern for the criminalization of politics. A process that was about "the rule of law" when Democrats were in power is suddenly an outrage now that it's Republicans who are being held accountable.
-- E. J. Dionne Jr., 10/18/05

In sum, it's irony and hypocrisy in their most primal, naked state. Period. (And they're the chosen party for followers of Jesus?! Incredible.)

But after all, isn't this always what this version of the GOP has represented? Whether it be supposedly pro-life Bush endorsing pro-choice Specter, or lockem-up-and-throw-away-key Rush Limbaugh doctor shopping for drugs, or supposed free-market Republicans insuring that a prescription bill was passed that blocked price competition, this party for far too long has been about saying one thing and doing another, bilking the distracted public every step of the way.

May the might of justice slam them hard.

I completely agree with this. McCain is offering up more of a GW alternative than anything brewing in the Dem tent. Amazingly, he appears to be more at odds with Bush/Cheney on issues than any potential Dem prez candidate. Yeah, where is Cheney -- but likewise, where the hell is Hillary?

As for Reid, he simply must go. He's been a disaster. Incredibly, he has managed to make Daschle look like DeLay!

It would be bad enough if you simply focused on that absurd filibuster deal he helped orchestrate. Recall where he pledged not to filibuster in exchange for nothing. But then how also do you explain his voting "Ney" for Roberts but indicating to Bush that he's A-OK with Miers? Huh? I am simply stumped as to the logic behind these actions.

I understand any Dems reservations with Roberts, but at least he was on-paper absolutely qualified and although it was difficult to discern his biases on certain issues, we could at least hang some hope on his apparent high-intellect and respectful knowledge of the Constitution. Now turn to Miers, who lacks much of what I just described about Roberts, and worse yet has pledged to GW/Rove (thanks Dobson) that she will overturn Roe/Wade. As opposed to Roberts, Miers is being sent in as a one-purpose-only justice, like a heat-seeking missile and Roe/Wade is the hapless target. Anything else she rules on will likely match the Thomas mode of functioning: plagiarize Scalia.

Yes, Reid either must go or perhaps even better, other figures in the party should compete for the high-profile pulpit, speaking out and behaving in a way that makes he/she the defacto leader. Much like DeLay runs the House even though Hastert is the official stooge in charge.

Regarding the sham 212-210 vote for helping out the profit-laden oil companies with taxpayer money, it would be nice if we discovered what DeLay offered the two Republicans to flip their votes. It took 45 minutes past the deemed time for the vote to close -- so what graft was finally agreed upon in that lengthy time? Reason would dictate it must've been some generous enticing to get the two flippers to say "it's a deal!"

Imagine how many close votes could've been changed under Clinton's eight years if he had a corrupt Congress that was willing to operate as they pleased, defying rules and keeping vote times open until the outcome was finally modified. These are people who respect our government and the Constitution? It's beyond shame.

"Right now, with the Bush administration in meltdown on multiple issues, we're hearing a lot about President Bush's personal failings. But what happened to the commanding figure of yore, the heroic leader in the war on terror? The answer, of course, is that the commanding figure never existed: Mr. Bush is the same man he always was. All the character flaws that are now fodder for late-night humor were fully visible, for those willing to see them, during the 2000 campaign." -- Paul Krugman, 10/14/05

"The conservative standard is clear - when a Democratic President is the target it is about the 'rule of law' and when the 'victim' is a Republican it is about the 'criminalization of politics.' It is particularly rich that Tom DeLay, the relentless pursuer of Clinton, is making this claim." -- Bull Moose

Bloomberg: "In an interview yesterday, [Joseph] Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame's career. If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed -- and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath -- while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones' sexual harassment suit against then-President Bill Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time."

Beautiful, delicious irony.

So John Fund writes that Dobson was assured Miers would overturn Roe v. Wade. Imagine if under Clinton a similar such arrangement was made for Rev. Jesse Jackson....

"If a senior White House staffer had intentionally outed an American spy during World War II, he'd have been shot. We're at war, George Bush keeps reminding us. We cannot continue with business as usual. A pre-9/11 mentality is deadly. Putting the lives of our troops at risk is treason. Then why is the White House and the Republican party engaged in a concerted campaign to make treason acceptable during a time of war?" -- AMERICAblog

From the Financial Times:

Even among the strongest advocates in Washington of the war in Iraq there is a sense of alarm these days, with harsh criticism directed particularly at the draft constitution, which they see as a betrayal of principles and a recipe for disintegration of the Iraqi state.

Expressions of concern among conservatives and former Iraqi exiles, seen also in the rising disillusionment of the American public, reflect a widening gap with the Bush administration and its claims of “incredible political progress” in Iraq.

Over the past week, two of Washington's most influential conservative think-tanks, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Heritage Foundation, held conferences on Iraq where the mood among speakers, including Iraqi officials, was decidedly sombre.

Just more evidence of the rightwing suddenly and miraculously waking up to reality -- the timing coincident with the wheels fast falling of the GW fantasy train. Yup, the implosion continues.

Oh, and more evidence: McCain shrewdly backing positions that are in stark contrast to GW's (recent example: bill against torture). He knows to begin now to create massive distance between what he believes and what the current mess of an administration supports. Any hopeful GOP presidential candidate is going to do likewise, to quite overtly be on the side of issues that oppose GW/Cheney/Rove. It's no-brainer stuff.

I ask, does anyone buy that the wingnuts are truly annoyed that GW selected Miers? I don't. Instead, I believe they're using this latest GW decision to finally jump ship, from one that is sinking mighty fast. GW's poll numbers continue to plummet each week and with indictments mounting many extreme followers have come to the realization that this is as good a time as any to flee association with a certain loser and to start anew.

Ann Coulter recently said on Bill Maher's show that unlike liberals, the rightwing has principles. Hah! The audience erupted into giggles as Maher correctly feigned laughter. What the rightwing does care about more than anything else is winning, getting their way. When signs point to this not happening, they panic, first attacking each other and finally just abandoning their own currently in power. Principles -- yeah, OK.

As I've been predicting since early January, the GOP will implode -- if it hasn't already.

It's hilarious. The wingnuts remain pissed off about the Miers nomination. They simply don't believe that she can be trusted to not turn Souter on them. This despite both Cheney (on Limbaugh's show) and Rove (to Dobson) have attempted to calm the base by assuring them that Miers will do what they desire. And yet the continued resistance.

Hmm, it appears as if the rightwing does not trust the word of Cheney, Rove, or GW these days. Is there anyone left who believes anything these clowns have to say? Even their staunch followers are highly skeptical and doubtful regarding their reassurances -- speaks volumes.

"Everybody is hoping that something will happen on Miers, either that the president would withdraw her or she would realize she is not up to it and pull out while she has some dignity intact." Look for a new nominee, either by forced withdrawal or an unflattering leak. It's actually quite pathetic that GW chose an already flawed crony as opposed to a more qualified person on paper and yet one who was extreme enough in his/her views that it would've meant for a bitter, dragged out fight. GW chose the more timid and safe route. He's showing his true colors.

Apparently DeLay is still running the House show. That's not surprising. What is is that he still wields power enough to change votes. He's feared and his underlings are just a hoarish bunch of cowed suck-ups.

Fitzgerald is putting together quite a blockbuster case. You go boy!

Kevin Drum makes an excellent point regarding the many people who say Rumsfeld should've originally sent more troops to Iraq:

Why do people keep saying stuff like this? The fact is that we didn't, and don't, have any more troops. Rumsfeld's misjudgment wasn't that he decided to use fewer troops than he could have, his misjudgment was in thinking that the occupation could be pulled off successfully with the troops we had available.

Bottom line: if you argue that we needed more troops in order to invade and occupy Iraq properly, you're just arguing that we shouldn't have invaded and occupied Iraq at all. When will conservative supporters of the war own up to this?

Finally O'Reilly utters something truthful.

From Reason.com:

First Five Years, Percentage Changes in Real Discretionary Spending

LBJ: 25.2%
Nixon: -16.5%
Reagan: 11.9%
Clinton: -8.2%
Bush: 35.2%

GW blows away LBJ, but look at Reagan compared to Clinton.

USA Today: "A newly released report published by the CIA rebukes the Bush administration for not paying enough attention to prewar intelligence that predicted the factional rivalries now threatening to split Iraq.
Policymakers worried more about making the case for the war, particularly the claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, than planning for the aftermath, the report says." Simply more proof of thorough and complete incompetence.

Regarding Frist, another guy who's toast: "What I find most appalling is the Senate calls it a qualified blind trust when it's not blind," Clark said. "Since the Senate says it's OK, the Senate has made it a political question. It's up to the voter. But there's no doubt it's a conflict of interest."

Wasn't invading Iraq supposed to make oil cheaper for the U.S.?

Hasn't Al-Qaeda's #2 guy been killed about 9 times over?

"Call it environmentalism, Bush style. A new federal tax credit will help allay the extra cost of purchasing hybrid vehicles, but the Byzantine formula for calculating the savings provides greater financial incentives for buying heavy SUVs than more fuel-efficient cars."

Recruiting efforts has dropped off so much thanks to GW's Iraq debacle that the Army is now borrowing personnel from the Air Force.

"The U.S. administration is spending about $7 billion a month to wage the war on terror and costs could total $570 billion by the end of 2010."

From Harpers:

Year in which perfluorochemicals, used in Teflon and other nonstick products, were first introduced : 1956

Percentage of U.S. children who now have one of these nonbiodegradable chemicals in their bloodstreams : 96

Minimum number of prescription drugs currently under investigation for Medicaid price-gouging or marketing fraud : 500

Percentage markup that Abbott Laboratories charged in 2001 on solutions of sodium chloride, i.e., salt water : 20,735

Just desserts.

From the Washington Post:

Republican politicians in multiple states have recently decided not to run for Senate next year, stirring anxiety among Washington operatives about the effectiveness of the party's recruiting efforts and whether this signals a broader decline in GOP congressional prospects.
<..>
With an unpopular war in Iraq, ethical controversies shadowing top Republicans in the House and Senate, and President Bush suffering the lowest approval ratings of his presidency, the waters look less inviting to politicians deciding whether to plunge into an election bid. Additionally, some Capitol Hill operatives complain that preoccupied senior White House officials have been less engaged in candidate recruitment than they were for the 2002 and 2004 elections. These sources would speak only on background because of the sensitivity of partisan strategies.

Historically, Senate and House races are often won or lost in the year before the election, as a party's prospects hinge critically on whether the most capable politicians decide to invest time, money and personal pride in a competitive race. Often, this commitment takes some coaxing.
<..>
A senior Republican familiar with the recruiting process agreed that the climate has shifted for the GOP because of a confluence of problems from Iraq to Hurricane Katrina and high gasoline prices: "Looking at polls from June or July and then looking at them now, the deterioration is really bad."

Another Republican, pollster Tony Fabrizio, said a recruiting chill was inevitable. Candidates "aren't stupid," he said. "They see the political landscape. You are asking them to make a huge personal sacrifice. It's a lot easier to make that sacrifice if you think there's a rainbow at the end."

Hey wingnuts, apparently poor poll numbers do have some impact. Remember this the next time you swiftly wish to dismiss anything other than rigged elections. As for the above, I sure hope the Dems are actively taking advantage of these circumstances, but there's no guarantee. Most evidence still points to the other party remaining in some sort of stunted coma, as if the severely wounded DeLay and Rove still wield tremendous whipping power. Hey, and perhaps they still do; in DC, it takes more than a few indictments to neuter a man.

"President George W. Bush's overall job approval rating has reached the lowest ever measured in this poll [since 1983], and evaluations of his handling of Iraq, the economy and even his signature issue, terrorism, are also at all-time lows."

Washington Post:

"The CIA will not seek to hold any current or former agency officials, including ex-director George J. Tenet, responsible for failures leading up to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, CIA Director Porter J. Goss said yesterday, despite a recommendation by the agency's inspector general that he convene an "accountability board" to judge their performance."
<..>
"The inspectors general of the departments of State, Justice and Defense completed their own investigations without publicized disciplinary actions taken against anyone. The CIA's report, which severely criticized actions of senior officers, will remain classified, Goss said in his announcement, which was welcomed by some former officials mentioned in the document but assailed by families of victims of the attacks."

So in other words, Goss protects the guilty at the expense of the innocent. Just one more crony in high power.

Molly Ivins:

Separation of church and state is in the Constitution because this country was founded by people who had experienced both religious persecution and state-supported religions. I think John F. Kennedy's 1960 statement to Baptist ministers ("I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.") should stand as a model of how public servants should handle the relation between religious belief and public service.

Nevertheless, we are now beset by people who insist on dragging religion into governance--and who themselves believe they are beset by people determined to "drive God from the public square."

This division has been in part created by and certainly aggravated by those seeking political advantage. It is a recipe for an incredibly damaging and serious split in this country, and I believe we all need to think carefully before doing anything to make it worse.

As an 1803 quote attributed to James Madison goes: "The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe with blood for centuries."

Financial Planning.com:

It is possible that this Peak Oil is an empty threat, like Y2K--something to keep alarmists up at night. But even if this is so, bear in mind that preparations for Y2K served the U.S. well in a later emergency, the terrorist attacks of 2001. Despite serious damage to electric, phone and data lines in lower Manhattan, the vital financial information generated there was never endangered.

Likewise, it can't hurt us to prepare for Peak Oil. In the worst case, we'll have spent some money to develop alternative energy sources while oil remains plentiful. That's hardly a disaster, and could even have positive economic consequences.

I think Chad might be on to something:

I'll be the first to say that my skills for political analysis are pretty much on par with my aptitude for Nigerian basket-weaving: both are non-existent. Which is why I feel comfortable saying that I think Miers is a set-up.
<..>
I think Bush has chosen a nominee that he expects will be shot down. On the chance she is confirmed, she's still a strong conservative voice on the Supreme Court.

However, if rejected, how much harder would it be for the Dems to shoot down a second, more qualified (and possibly more conservative) nominee?

As I referred in a prior post, say what we will about GW's unimpressive intellect, the man does get advice from some pretty cagey and shrewd folks. If Chad's right, in the confirmation hearings, look for the Republicans to do the heavy hammering against Miers. By doing so, they'll throw red meat to the highly upset voter base and at the same time insure Miers' sinking, allowing for a second go-around with a more qualified on paper, and more hard right leaning, nominee.

While this outcome could be very negative for the Dems, let's not forget that there's some extremely explosive stuff going on that could erupt into huge news. Reports are that one or more high-ranking Bush official will soon be indicted -- this in addition to the DeLay indictments and Frist stock scandal.

I thought GW said in 2000 he was going to clean up Washington? It looks as dirty as Texas air to me.

The more things change the more they stay the same. We've seen this before, the House holding open a vote for an extra 50 minutes past schedule to strong-arm fence sitters. It succeeded as the bill passed by a razor-thin 212-210 margin. It's reported that DeLay was instrumental in all the behind-the-scenes, sleazeball shenanigans. The bill was another in a series of gifts (from taxpayers) to the already bursting-with-profits energy companies. Sacrificed: environmental regulations and the federal budget.

As we saw with CAFTA and the prescription drug bill, the House continues to defy accepted rules and make up their own procedures as they see fit, extending vote deadlines to get their way. Imagine the outcry if Dems were in control and pulled this shit. Also, the emphasis remains on producing more oil and not conserving what we use. As energy companies would want it, the #1 message is CONSUME, with weak, maudlin pleas to conserve getting just lip-service with no serious legislation passed to encourage this "virtuous" behavior.

The runaway train that is the GOP-controlled Congress continues to race us towards the grim abyss....

George Will recently criticized Bush in a NY Post piece regarding his selection of Miers, and Peggy Noonan recently did the same in the WSJ. Ho hum. Yeah, we're supposed to raise an eyebrow when GW's buddies lash out at him, but I'm not buying it.

What I believe is all this right-wing bluster is simply meant to blunt any frontal attack from Democrats. With the likes of Will, Noonan, and Trent Lott not pleased, many a liberal is going to think Miers can't be that bad. Don't fall for it!

Look, Rush Limbaugh was initially hesitant but it took a stunt like Cheney calling in to his radio program to allay any doubts, saying Miers "has a conservative judicial philosophy that you [Limbaugh] would be comfortable with." Effectively, this was a wink-wink "trust me" moment directed at Rush. Cheney was reassuring Limbaugh that she won't be another Souter (I love how the right deems this as such a heinous thing).

I am willing to bet that Cheney and his thugs metaphorically threw Miers up against a wall, forearm hard against her throat, and menacingly threatened, "You will NOT pull a Souter -- kapisch?!"

It's almost certain that she will most likely be like Thomas: a Scalia lackey. She'll change a few words but ultimately write decisions that more/less mimic that of Antonin. The fact that she lacks the impressive qualifications or seasoning as a prior judge makes her less likely to be impervious to the imposing influence of the brutish Scalia. Also, it stands to reason she might be more impressionable since there's less of a for-the-record stance on anything. Besides, like I said, I'm certain GW & Cheney et al have given her firm, definite marching orders, specifically addressing the now infamous Souter tendency.

Sound sexist? Nope, I'd say the same if it were a male with similar lacking qualifications or known positions (picture FEMA's Brown). The fact is because of Souter, there is now much less of a chance of a future Souter. He's become such a bugaboo and poster boy of what could go wrong that great measures are now taken to insure against it. I mean heaven forbid you have someone who's moderate and reasonable....

No, better to have a Scalia, who's stridently partisan enough to pen the Gore 2000 decision, a legal abomination. Mark my words, odds favor Roberts pulling a Souter much more so than Miers (not that either will necessarily become moderate).

House ethics committee has decided they won't investigate DeLay. Reason: "We don't have the resources." Ahh, but they seem to have unlimited resources to investigate Democrats, specifically with the last name of Clinton.

"Prediction: at least three high level Bush Administration personnel indicted and possibly one or more very high level unindicted co-conspirators."

I've been saying for weeks that the land down there in New Orleans will, unfortunately, be toxic and uninhabitable for many years to come. (Similar to the air around 9/11 WTC site for weeks/months after). One can only hope that people are informed of the facts, else we'll have many a lawsuit down the road against the government (which you and I will pay for).

More Americans are beginning to wake up and ask: "Why isn't energy conservation a higher priority?" And not just lip-service via GW but passed into legislation.

If you can't recruit the best, lower your standards and get what you can. More evidence that GW's trumped-up Iraq war will cost our military in quality soldiers for many years to come.

It's time to demand more polls on impeaching Bush.

Look for more and more former soldiers to run for office (nearly all as, surprise, Democrats).

Who's more nuts, O'Reilly or Pat Robertson? And why is Wesley Clark dignifying this show? Oh, and O'Reilly defames WW2 troops.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Notice how DeLay, and his defenders, have attempted to make the case against him sound more complicated than it really is. This tactic is a Rove/GOP favorite. Purposefully try to create an atmosphere of complexity and confusion about an issue that is in fact fairly straightforward and quite easy to comprehend.

In this instance, it's extremely simple. It's illegal for corporations in Texas to give money to state political races. DeLay's PAC, TRMPAC, accepted corporate money and then laundered it via writing a check to the RNC stipulating which candidates should receive the money.

He of course claims ignorance to this scheme but it stands to reason that Ronnie Earle would not have indicted him if he did not possess enough evidence and/or that Earle has someone(s) who is ready to sing against DeLay. In addition, newspaper reports have already established that DeLay was very much directly involved with the corporate contributions.

And as for Ronnie Earle himself, it's already been published here and everywhere that he's prosecuted more Dems than Republicans (12 to 3 ratio!). In addition, it's been stated that every single person that Earle has indicted over the years, whether Dem or Republican, has cried foul due to politics. You can now include DeLay in that group.

The fact is liberals can only hope that new Chief Justice Roberts will be as "partisan" a judge as Ronnie Earle has been.

The most recent issue of The New Republic has some insightful things to say about this latest bit of DeLay scandal, pointing out that his indictment actually symbolizes a greater stench:

Of course, even DeLay himself is merely a cog in a Washington Republican machine that has abandoned morality in its fanatical pursuit of power. Beyond rooting for a jury in Travis County,Texas, to return a guilty verdict in the months ahead, Democrats need to make clear to the public that his indictment represents a mere fraction of the Republican Congress’s corruption. The House ethics committee, for instance, must continue to investigate Abramoff’s sleazy lobbying, which envelops several other GOP congressmen and reveals the disgusting influence K Street lobbyists enjoy over federal lawmaking.

DeLay has taken the House and turned it into the revolting, decaying house in this movie. As TNR writes, "with any luck, it could be the beginning of a desperately needed fumigation of Capitol Hill."

Will Dick Cheney fire Libby? Likely not, esp. since Bush hasn't yet fired Rove.

Wow, the entire GOP contingent in Washington is one big rotting, festering stink hole. If their voters are not embarrassed and ashamed at this point, then nothing will do it.

Foreman William Gibson [says] he did his duty and that bound him to look at Tom Delay as just another Texan accused of criminal conspiracy... "I like his aggressiveness and everything, and I had nothing against the House majority man, but I felt that we had enough evidence, not only me, but the other grand jury members," Gibson said...

The evidence is there to prove Delay was involved in wrongdoing and also prove that he and his fellow grand jurors acted independent of political influence, Gibson said.

"It wasn't Mr. Earle that indicted the man. It was the 12 members of the grand jury," Gibson said.
---------------------
The standard GOP line on Ronnie Earle is that he's a partisan Democrat on a political witch hunt, nothwithstanding the fact that only three of the 15 politicians Earle prosecuted prior to going after DeLay were Republicans. (Earle once even prosecuted himself because his campaign was late in filing his financial disclosures.)

In DeLay's version of reality, this makes Earle a "partisan fanatic."

-- Billmon.org

Regarding the DeLay indictment, don't fall for the GOP talking point that DA Ronnie Earle is politically motivated. As Media Matters reports, "Earle's record includes the prosecution of significantly more Democratic officials than Republicans." The Coulters and Hannitys are already out in full-force trying to spin this away -- but it ain't gonna work this time.

Andrew Sullivan:

There is a clear stench of corruption coming from the Republican power-structure in Washington. It's been there for a while now. The Abramoff case illustrates it perfectly. With their incoherent big-spending policies already exposing them as conservative frauds, and with each day finding another ethical problem with the GOP leadership, the conditions are ripe for a Democratic come-back in 2006. The only question is whether the Democrats are still too pathetic to take advantage of this.

I am so relieved that the Republicans restored honor and integrity to Washington. There hasn't been even one blow job in that town since they took power.

UPDATE: I spoke too soon when I said earlier that there have been no blow jobs in Washington since the Honor and Integrity crowd took over.

I just watched Brit Hume "interview" Tom DeLay.

-- Digby

"Most corrupt" in Congress listed. Eleven of the 13 are Republicans.

GW is reportedly getting ready to push a second energy bill, with the main focus being easing of regulations on refiners. In other words, to allow them to pollute at will. Oh, and as I've been saying, once again no mention of conservation in the form of public policy.

From NewDonkey.com: "What a process. Enact unnecessary tax cuts, mostly for people who don't need them. Spend like a drunken sailor. Borrow money from foreign governments and future generations. And when the red ink mounts to a degree that your own political base gets disgusted, then get out there and spin!

If Democrats can't figure out how to exploit the ongoing tragi-comedy of Republican fiscal policy, then we don't deserve power."

Many are asking: is GW drinking again? Apparently it's OK to know about Clinton's BJs, but to ask this question about GW -- an admitted alcoholic -- is seemingly beyond the pale to many (not me!).

Chrysler Group is ignoring the supply/demand dynamics of higher gas prices and is betting on SUVs, preparing five new models for launch over the next few years. But then again, the SUVs have a big non-free-market advantage: favorable tax treatment. You'd think in their infinite wisdom that this administration and the GOP-controlled Congress would rescind any tax breaks for purchasing huge, gas-inefficient vehicles at a time when gas should be conserved and tax revenue is needed to help fund hurricane relief efforts?

A Saudi prince just bought over 5% of Rupert Murdoch's Fox Corp. Well, that's one way to garner favorable reporting. What are the odds we'll now see Hannity or O'Reilly blaring anti-Saudi rants? Nil.

From AP, "Blind trusts are designed to keep an arm's-length distance between federal officials and their investments, to avoid conflicts of interest. But documents show that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist knew quite a bit about his accounts from nearly two dozen letters from the trust administrators." But Frist is a God-fearing, righteous do-gooder -- it's not possible that he would choose dishonesty and greed over doing what's right!

Regarding the Katrina relief efforts, the NY Times reports, "More than 80 percent of the $1.5 billion in contracts signed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency alone were awarded without bidding or with limited competition." Favoritism and rewarding cronies continues. It's good to see the free-market Republicans crying foul about this -- not.

From Stephen Roach at Morgan Stanley, "In the US, the worker compensation share fell to a 30-year low of 65% in 2005 whereas 'economic corporate profits' currently stand at a near-record 11% share of GDP." Just wonderful. Wages at a three-decade low to GDP and yet corporate profits at a new high. Where's the trickle down to employees? Basically sums up the Bush/Cheney economic plan.

Since Bush/Cheney have been in office, we've had to witness their cavalier dismissals of anything resembling legislation towards energy conservation. Rather, they've urged and endorsed a single-note message: use even more oil.

With Katrina, we saw 10% of U.S. refiners shut down, with half of the 10% comprised of just four refineries. Bush then instructs refiners to run at 100% capacity and skip maintenance, in an effort to make up for the short fall. BUT, such breakneck production will likely lead to dangerous outcomes (accidents, equip. failure, etc.) and even more supply disruption.

It's very obvious that our dependence on oil is a huge and growing problem, esp. with little if any push from our top leaders to conserve and invest in alternatives. The longer we wait and postpone the inevitable need to diversify our energy needs away from oil, the more vulnerable we are as a nation to destructive forces out of our control -- whether it be terrorist acts or natural disasters.

It wouldn't require as much sacrifices as Cheney et al would have us believe. Technology is already available to help in this regard; it's just not being used. Look at the hybrid cars -- why did they just "suddenly" appear? Do you think Toyota and/or Honda locked some engineers in a room and ordered them to crank out a hybrid for their release? No, the technology was 95% already there, it just took gas rising a bit (again, hybrids pre-date $3 gas by at least a year) and the typically ingenious Japanese to realize a market existed for "green" consumers. All of this with zero help from Bush/Cheney or the U.S. auto companies.

Again, to stay solely entrenched with oil as prime energy source will increasingly be shown to be not just foolhardy (given its diminishing supply) and reckless (given global warming), but also a grave national security threat.

In the end, what we have is just another example of GW's #1 priority: reward cronies, and the future of the country be damned. When has he ever done anything good for the country that didn't have a special interest or contributor on the other side, hand fully extended?

The United States is on the wrong economic track and finds itself in a deepening hole of debt, former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin said Friday. Rubin's opinions and views are always worth strong consideration. He was only one of the best Treasury Secretarys in this country's history -- one of many excellent Clinton choices.

"The Pentagon has no accurate knowledge of the cost of military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan or the fight against terrorism." This from a GAO report as cited in a truly astounding and maddening story in the Washington Post. The report states, ""Neither DOD nor Congress can reliably know how much the war is costing and details of how appropriated funds are being spent." DOD has reported spending nearly $200 bil. thus far on this war and yet according to the GAO it's not known how or where this money is being spent. Is it any wonder $8 bil. was widely reported as simply missing? How many more billions of taxpayer money is unaccounted for, money that could go to Katrina and Rita relief efforts? When will the GOP-controlled Congress seriously investigate this scandal -- one that is far more serious than the thoroughly-investigated UN oil-for-food scandal?

Not that anyone cares (thankfully), but if ever you wondered what a Steve Forbes presidency would look like, just read his column in his magazine to get a good sense.

As an example, to help bring down skyrocketing energy prices, he recently lists the following solutions:

Build more refineries. And as for environmental regulations concerning such, he states, "Why not scrap them altogether?"

Open up ANWR to exploration. Estimates have reserves there pegged at enough to run the U.S. for about ten months -- quite a long-run solution. Oh, and he says the land there is not "sweeping" or "awe-inspiring" implying all the more reason to start drilling.

Permit drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). OK, so more drilling, we get it.

Wow, am I crazy or do these recommendations sound awfully familiar? 100% find-more-oil as the theme with zero recommendations for conservation, more efficiency, renewables, R&D investment, etc. Yup, he sounds like just another short-sighted oil guy -- like the two clowns currently sitting in the #1 and #2 spot. The only thing missing for Forbes -- and it's a biggie -- is he doesn't have the evil mastermind Rove, without whom Bush absolutely would not have won an election, ever.

Regarding the impending Roberts vote, I stand by what I wrote two months ago.

DeLay stated House Republicans will be looking high and low for wasteful spending that can be cut to offset expenditures to rebuild the Gulf Coast. That said, he has ruled out any tax hikes to help pay for the relief effort and in fact struck down Treasury Secretary Snow's suggestion that perhaps the extension on existing tax cuts would be postponed. In addition, DeLay did not invite the revisiting of the recent energy bill passed which was astoundingly overloaded with wasteful pork spending. Finally, proposals by Republicans to delay the full implementation of the Medicare bill -- a huge government payout to the pharma firms -- until next year was also ruled out by DeLay.

Uh, so where is he going to find the "wasteful" spending to cut? Me thinks it will be funds allocated to education, social programs, and the environment.

Just in case one doubts the new low in GW's poll numbers, just look at the recent behavior of Republican politicians; it will help you become a believer.

When asked about his continued double-digit trailing poll numbers for re-election, true-blue GW buddy Rick Santorum laid blame at Bush's feet. You have NYC Mayor Bloomberg looking to actively avoid being seen with Bush and/or other Republicans. Even Ahnold is instructing Bush to stay away.

GW is now like kryptonite to many Republicans.

From The Note:

There are two fundamental political realities that we have hinted at for several days that are known to everyone in the know in the inner circle of American politics (a/k/a: the Gang of 500) and we feel you should know them too.

The first one involves the Republican Party and precisely stated, it goes like this: The potential for the political interests of the White House and congressional Republicans to diverge is greater now than it has been since George W. Bush took office.

The second one involves the Democratic Party and precisely stated, it goes like this: Every negative impression that the Democrats have had about George W. Bush's policies and competence is being reaffirmed in the minds of party elites these days and they are as certain as they have ever been that the country at-large will begin to see what they have long seen.

From Buzzflash:

Hugh Kauffman, a Senior Policy Analyst at the Environmental Protection Agency who specializes in emergency response, told Morning Sedition hosts Marc Maron and Mark Riley that a government cover-up is taking place right now, as we speak, to hide information about the dangerous toxins in the flood waters of the Gulf Coast region. Kauffman, a 35-year EPA veteran who has served in Republican and Democratic administrations, says that the Bush administration is preventing the EPA from releasing information that oil and chemical companies are mandated by law to provide. Kauffman says the Bush administration’s cover-up is endangering residents and relief workers throughout the Gulf Coast region, who are being exposed to dangerous levels of toxins, some of which have been proven to cause cancer and birth defects. Kauffman, who was the chief investigator for the 9/11 clean up, also said that the Bush administration engaged in the same practice after 9/11—covering up the truth about the dangers in the air and water and lying to the public in the weeks after the disaster. Kauffman said that over 75% of the heroes who responded to 9/11 have gotten sick and in some cases have died because of exposure to toxins at Ground Zero, and that he fears a similar fate will befall relief workers and residents in the Gulf Coast now.

A Fiscal Runaway Train

So we have GW pledging $200+ bil. to Katrina recovery efforts, a federal deficit of $500+ bil., the cost of the Iraq occupation estimated to be $400-600 bil. by 2010, combine all of this with billions upon billions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy. Throw in boondoggle bills, like this last energy bill which has more gratuitous pork than purposeful spending. Finally, energy prices are zooming up, laying the foundation for an economic recession, which would translate into even less tax revenue to pay for the spending.

How ironic to have a GOP president with the nation's financial house in such a mess. I thought it was the "tax and spend" liberals that were supposed to do this? Yet, if memory serves, it was Clinton who successfully attained fiscal prudence and grew the economy (tremendously).

GW has simply rewarded friends (cronies), pure and simple. He cut their taxes and rewards them with legislative graft in the form of federal outlays, pork projects, privatization efforts, etc. It's got nothing to do with large or small government; rather, just greasing the palms of buddies at our expense.

Because of his own incompetence re Katrina, Bush has no problem using our taxpayer money ($200+ bil.) to revive his sorry-ass image. Just classic.

On his long walk across the fake turf in New Orleans to give his highly-staged speech, Bush must've quickly grabbed a memo from the right-wing Heritage Foundation. Look for many of the supposed solutions to NO's woes to come from this "think" tank. Apparently, it's been cranking out numerous proposals and of course Bush/Rove have been listening. My favorite: in an area that is a toxic stew of chemicals, sewage, and other poisons, the HF urges the suspension of environmental regulations.

As he did with 9/11, Bush is stiffly opposing the creation of an independent panel to look into the mistakes made with Katrina, instead favoring a GOP-led inquiry body. Once again, imagine the GOP's reaction if Clinton did this -- amazing.

More outrageous gall: Bush installs Karl Rove as the person in charge of the reconstruction effort in New Orleans. Forget the fact that Rove should've been fired due to the Plame outing, what credentials does Rove have to lead this effort? The only thing he's ever reconstructed is GW's image -- over and over and over again. Look for incredible staged imagery and billions of our dollars handed over to Friends of George.

Frank Rich has been churning out one excellent column after another of late. One reason why: he's f*cking angry!

Example:

The worst storm in our history proved perfect for exposing this president because in one big blast it illuminated all his failings: the rampant cronyism, the empty sloganeering of "compassionate conservatism," the lack of concern for the "underprivileged" his mother condescended to at the Astrodome, the reckless lack of planning for all government operations except tax cuts, the use of spin and photo-ops to camouflage failure and to substitute for action.

Yup, Katrina allowed the public to (finally!) see that the emperor had no clothes.

He offers us a hint of what we can expect from Rove now in charge:

Mr. Rove has been officially put in charge of the reconstruction effort. The two top deputies at FEMA remaining after Michael Brown's departure, one of them a former local TV newsman, are not disaster relief specialists but experts in P.R., which they'd practiced as advance men for various Bush campaigns. Thus The Salt Lake Tribune discovered a week after the hurricane that some 1,000 firefighters from Utah and elsewhere were sent not to the Gulf Coast but to Atlanta, to be trained as "community relations officers for FEMA" rather than used as emergency workers to rescue the dying in New Orleans. When 50 of them were finally dispatched to Louisiana, the paper reported, their first assignment was "to stand beside President Bush" as he toured devastated areas.

It will certainly be style over substance. Hopefully the public has finally spit up the Kool-Aid and will see through all the superficial bullsh*t (midnight flight re Schiavo, flak suit on aircraft carrier, etc.).

Rich sums it up:

What comes next? Having turned the page on Mr. Bush, the country hungers for a vision that is something other than either liberal boilerplate or Rovian stagecraft. At this point, merely plain old competence, integrity and heart might do.

Here, here!

The New York Times Magazine recently had an in-depth article recounting just how Osama bin Laden was able to escape in Tora Bora.

A key segment:

One of them was Brig. Gen. James N. Mattis, the commander of some 4,000 marines who had arrived in the Afghan theater by now. Mattis, along with another officer with whom I spoke, was convinced that with these numbers he could have surrounded and sealed off bin Laden's lair, as well as deployed troops to the most sensitive portions of the largely unpatrolled border with Pakistan. He argued strongly that he should be permitted to proceed to the Tora Bora caves. The general was turned down. An American intelligence official told me that the Bush administration later concluded that the refusal of Centcom to dispatch the marines - along with their failure to commit U.S. ground forces to Afghanistan generally - was the gravest error of the war.

Apparently, the public needs to be reminded that 1) after fours years since 9/11, Osama is still free to roam the planet and yet Saddam has long been locked up, and 2) CIA director Goss said just a few months ago that we have an "excellent idea" where he's located.

I once again must invoke the Clinton rule: just imagine the above under a Clinton presidency. The rabid GOP would hoist on us constant reminders of Osama's relative freedom and the bungling of his capture. We would've seen Willie Horton type images of such in campaign ads.

And yet the Osama screw-up is just one of many instances that have accumulated proving GW and his gang to be as clueless and inept as any administration in history. I have always taken consolation in one thing: in the years ahead when GW is put into proper perspective by historians and the like -- undoubtedly casting him in the brutally negative light deserved -- I'll be able to tell my curious son and daughter, "no, I never voted for him."

Great column in The New Yorker by Elizabeth Kolbert concerning the increasing intensity of hurricanes due to global warming. Ironically, she points out that the National Association of Insurance Commissioners was to hold a conference in New Orleans on this very subject.

GW is on record stating his withdrawal from Kyoto was because it was too costly to America. Kolbert rightly states, "As Katrina indicates, this argument, too, is empty. It's not acting to curb greenhouse-gas emissions that's likely to prove too costly; it's doing nothing."

And the cost won't just be in dollars but also in human lives.

Seeing the trees for the forest.

The U.S. soldier death toll in Iraq is about to exceed 1900. On a daily basis, we read news reports of 4 dead in Iraq, 7 dead, 28 dead, etc. We quickly absorb the tragic news and move on. That's wrong.

Granted, it's not the same as thousands dying all at once due to planes smashing into buildings or massive floodwaters. But a death is a death is a death.

For each reported dead soldier in Iraq, there's a family tragically affected. Always try to imagine that family could be yours and that father or mother could be you. Empathize, tremendously.

Don't do as Bush and his neocon cadre do, treating the reality of the dead as simply aggregate data or tolerable statistics. Always humanize the numbers and translate the figure, no matter the size, into "1". Yes, 1000 dead is worse than one dead, but by overly calibrating your reaction of horror based on the magnitude of the number dead distorts the fact that one dead person is as bad as several. In either case, it's wrong.

Similarly, when Princess Di tragically died, millions of people around the world grieved her death. However, in the end, hundreds if not thousands of people around the world died of one thing or another on August 31, 1997, and their deaths on that day were just as tragic as Princess Di's. A death is a death is a death.

Lies, lies, and more lies. Oh, they just can't stop.

Media Matters reports that a Bush lackey falsely stated on CNN that poverty has declined under Bush rather than Clinton. A flat-out lie. In fact, it's the opposite.

As MM states, "the poverty rate declined every year Clinton was in office, from 15.1 percent when he took office in 1993 to a low of 11.3 percent in 2000; it has risen every year that Bush has been in office, from 11.7 percent in 2001 to 12.7 percent in 2004."



The rule remains: you can't trust anything Bush people have to say -- nothing, zilch. You must doubt first, and then do research and confirm. (9 times out of 10 you'll discover they're wrong).

I've written in the past about WSJ columnist James Taranto, specifically pointing out the lengths to which he'll twist and contort something so that ultimately he can conclude with a smug, "humorous" one-liner. You read his column and literally feel your skin crawl. He's revolting.

Well the terrific Keith Olbermann recently voted him "Worst Person in the World" on his nightly show. Keith could've just thrown a dart at any one of Taranto's columns to come up with material deserving of this title, but here's the one that was cited on the program. And as Keith concluded on air, Taranto is still (amazingly) employed by the WSJ.

The Arizona Daily Star has rid itself of columnist Ann Coulter. The editor, David Stoeffler, stated "Many readers find her shrill, bombastic, and mean-spirited. And those are the words used by readers who identified themselves as conservatives." Of course, right wing voices deserve to be heard -- but surely Coulter should embarrass any respectable r-winger.

From the Center for American Progress: "The highest priority for any president should be to keep the American people safe. When George Bush appointed Michael Brown to direct the Federal Emergency Management Agency he committed presidential malpractice. Brown lacked any relevant experience or skills before joining FEMA, but Bush appointed him anyway because Brown had the right political connections. When Hurricane Katrina struck, Brown was unprepared, uninformed and unable to respond effectively. (Bush's reaction: 'Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job.') We will never know for certain how many lives could have been saved or how much suffering could have been avoided had there been a competent federal response."

Also from CforAP, truly frightening news about how detached and removed King George is from the events that are deeply affecting this country: "In the first days of the Hurricane Katrina crisis, White House staff became worried that President Bush was out of touch with of the dire reality of the situation. Newsweek reports, 'Some White House staffers were watching the evening news and thought the president needed to see the horrific reports coming out of New Orleans. Counselor [Dan] Bartlett made up a DVD of the newscasts so Bush could see them in their entirety as he flew down to the Gulf Coast the next morning on Air Force One.'" My god, they had to burn a DVD of disturbing sound bites to shock GW into action! Our Walter Mitty.

More evidence proving Bush's infamous statement (that the levee breach was a total surprise) was false: the existence of a strategic plan, Coast 2050, that was published in 1998. The plan recognized that New Orleans was vulnerable to flooding due to deficiencies in the levees. The fact that the breach surprised our non-reading numbskull in charge is the big no surprise.

Have you noticed the lack of post-Katrina support coming from many nations in the world? Bush has been a diplomacy fiasco. His go-it-alone swaggering and lack of respect for the opinions and views of other nations has left America with fewer allies than we had 5+ years ago. The next president is going to have to spend a great deal of time and effort repairing this damage.

New Orleans will likely be dangerous for human habitation for the next ten years, says the EPA. Toxins have mixed in with floodwater saturating all areas of the region. It will be interesting to see if Bush's gutted, neutered EPA will now do anything meaningful about this dire threat -- or like the toxic air around the WTC post-9/11, choose instead to scuttle the issue and attempt to make it vanish.

Over at Technorati, meta search engine for over 17 mil. blogs:

Top Searches This Hour: #1 "Impeach Bush"

"Key rebuilding projects in Iraq are grinding to a halt because American money is running out." Just wonderful. If we're scaling back and can't pay for projects in Iraq, what does this say about available dollars for the Katrina disaster? Yet Republicans still plan to slash services -- as well as $70 bil. more in taxes for the rich. The Dems should increasingly make the tax cuts more of a lightning rod / bugaboo issue for GW and the GOP.

Hurricane Simulation Predicted 61,290 Dead.

25 Mind-Numbingly Dumb Quotes About Hurricane Katrina And Its Aftermath.

Many cities are like New Orleans in that they're dependent on frail, underfunded levees. And recall that our infrastructure in this country is in need of a $1.6 trillion fix-up (and this was before Katrina's damage). Instead, we send hundreds of billions to Iraq, and cut billions more in taxes for the rich.

Iran is getting stronger. And what if Iran turned off the oil spigot to the U.S.? Strategically, now would be as good a time as ever for them, with gas at the pump over $3.

Now lets see if he fires many others who need to go.

What the Katrina (or as another out-of-touch Bush family member called it, Corinna) debacle symbolizes about this administration:

1) Rampant cronyism.
2) The limits of privatization (Bush has been shrinking FEMA for years, looking to privatize it; remember this re Social Security).
3) Haves vs. have nots. (Reward the rich with tax cuts; Iraq fought by the have nots; ultra-stiff bankruptcy bill passed; chance of audits MUCH lower for the rich than for average citizens)
4) Inept, scant planning. (Arrogance? Lazy? Incompetence? All??)
5) Accept no blame; be not accountable; finger point.
6) If cornered, lie.
7) Etc. etc.

For all those fence sitters during the election in 2004, and for all those who continue to not have a clue when it comes to knowing what's going on in this country politically, believing they don't have the time or smarts to try to figure it all out, Molly Ivins has penned an excellent column. A must read.

From James Wolcott:

Hurricane Katrina has broken the post 9/11 spell that held everyone in thrall to terrorism and terrorism alone as the paramount menace on the horizon. (Compare the lyrical emoting Peggy Noonan has done since 9/11 with her dry, chapped response to Katrina.) Whatever the final numbers are from Hurricane Katrina, it will be harder for the WOT [War on Terror] propagandists to ritualistically invoke the "3000 dead" to the same sonorous effect. Those deaths have reached their expiration date, not for mourning, but for political, cultural, and military exploitation. Here we are coming up to the 4th anniversary of that horrible day, and Ground Zero still lacks a memorial or even a palatable design, Osama Bin Laden is unapprehended, Iraq is a vale of tears, and a dorky "Freedom March" is being staged in Washington. One can only hope that the dead of New Orleans receive a more decent and deserving memorialization than the dead of 9/11 have gotten.

Kristof today:

"The available scientific evidence indicates that it is likely that global warming will make - and possibly already is making - those hurricanes that form more destructive than they otherwise would have been," declares an analysis by five climate scientists at www.realclimate.org.

Hurricanes derive their power in part from warm water, and so forecasting models show future hurricanes becoming more severe as sea surface temperatures rise. One summary of 1,200 simulations published in the Journal of Climate last year showed that rising levels of greenhouse gases could triple the number of Category 5 hurricanes.

Moreover, there's empirical evidence that hurricanes have already become more intense (but not more frequent). Nature magazine this summer reported a new study by Kerry Emanuel, a hurricane guru at M.I.T., indicating that by one measure hurricanes have almost doubled in intensity over the last 30 years.

Mike Malloy played a clip of OxyMoron (Rush Limbaugh) saying the yokels in the Katrina debacle should drown in their own showers. Rush assumed an African-American caller was 1) speaking for his race, not himself (a racist assumption), and 2) that this person was asserting the disaster was due to racism.

First off, it never fails that Rush (or his type on the radio) simply assume that any minority caller voices opinions not representative of only that person, but rather of the entire race. It's Rush who jumps to the racist conclusion that only white people can state views that are their own -- not meant to be cast as race-based general statements.

But more so, it's the Republicans who all speak for each other via talking points memos. A recent example: they've all been spouting about how newspapers had the headline, "New Orleans Dodges A Bullet." Homeland chief Chertoff repeated this, then Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers, and several Bush lackeys on TV, all stating this exact same sound bite. What newspapers are they talking about? You'd think they'd be citing the NY Times, Washington Post, etc. Do a Google search and you'll come up with not one major newspaper having this headline -- they lied! Surprise!

The point is it's not a coincidence. They all get the same daily memo (from Rove) laying down the sound bites, buzz words, talking points for the day. Go on the air and regurgitate the lies and distortions. Happens everyday.

Hannity is notorious for repeating outright falsehoods, then being corrected, only to repeat the same lies the next day. Same with O'Reilly, Rush, etc. Just more of the hypocrisy we've come to expect from these louts.

And if there's any racism going on here, how about the fact that FEMA's plan did not consider the poor population, that approx. 30% are in poverty and over 100,000 people do not own a car? It's like trying to open a beer bottle with a fork: wrong tactic/tool for the reality of the situation.

Also, what about Barb Bush? Not just her comment that Katrina was a stroke of good fortune for these not-so-rich Americans, but her fear ("it's scary") that these minorities would perhaps stay and reside in Texas.

She raised King George and it's extremely evident. Arrogance, no compassion, twisted reality -- it obviously runs in the family.

Read and get outraged (if not so already).

But those who need to truly wake up and finally let out a shrieking scream are those zombies who voted for this incompetent boob in '04. The rest of us have long understood that GW is our national nightmare; he's the antithesis of what our Founding Fathers put in place.

It's those who've always pulled the "R" lever in the voting booths who need to finally look in the mirror, splash cold water on the face, and finally realize that these Republicans are like none before them. They're a new breed of the worst kind. These Republicans are the worst lot of public officials to ever govern in this country. They're abysmally incompetent and do not have the interests of most Americans at heart. Rather, like the pigs in Orwell's Animal Farm, they selfishly look out for just a select few -- those pigs who are deemed superior to the rest.

How much more suffering and death will it take for these woefully ignorant voters to realize the err of their assumed good intentions?

UPDATE: Perhaps they are waking up:

Sept. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Two new polls show Americans give President George W. Bush poor marks for his handling of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, with one survey showing that Bush is now losing support even among his Republican base.

Kevin Drum has the best political blog on the internet (I only strive to be half as good). I was away over the long weekend and have just caught up with his take on the Katrina disaster. As usual, he's crisply on-point.

The following are either items from his blog or items paraphrased from his blog:

Kevin lists several reasons why he doesn't blame GW for the woeful response to Katrina but then writes, "Obviously Bush deserves criticism for his listless lack of leadership and life-as-usual politicking in the first three days after Katrina hit. Beyond that, though, what happened was the result of a long series of decisions, all flowing out of Bush's natural conservative governing instincts, that added up to make Katrina more damaging than it had to be and at the same time eroded our ability to react to its aftermath. These decisions were deliberate and disastrous, and that's why I think Bush deserves a large part of the blame for what happened."

Kevin lists a chain of events leading up to Katrina, which include: 1) 2001, "Bush appoints Joe Allbaugh, a crony from Texas, as head of FEMA. Allbaugh has no previous experience in disaster management," 2) 2001, "Budget Director Mitch Daniels announces the Bush administration's goal of privatizing much of FEMA's work. In May, Allbaugh confirms that FEMA will be downsized," 3) 2001, "FEMA designates a major hurricane hitting New Orleans as one of the three 'likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing this country,'" [compare to GW's now-infamous "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees."] 4) 2002, "Allbaugh announces he is leaving... He is succeeded by his deputy and former college roommate, Michael Brown, who has no previous experience in disaster management and was fired from his previous job for mismanagement," 5) 2004, "FEMA denies Louisiana's pre-disaster mitigation funding requests," 6) 2004, "The Army Corps of Engineers budget for levee construction in New Orleans is slashed" to help pay for war in Iraq, 7) 2005, "Funding for the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is cut by a record $71.2 million," and 8) "While New Orleans is undergoing a slow motion catastrophe, Bush mugs for the cameras, cuts a cake for John McCain, plays the guitar for Mark Wills, delivers an address about V-J day, and continues with his vacation. When he finally gets around to acknowledging the scope of the unfolding disaster, he delivers only a photo op on Air Force One and a flat, defensive, laundry list speech in the Rose Garden."

And Kevin summarizes, "Actions have consequences. No one could predict that a hurricane the size of Katrina would hit this year, but the slow federal response when it did happen was no accident. It was the result of four years of deliberate Republican policy and budget choices that favor ideology and partisan loyalty at the expense of operational competence. It's the Bush administration in a nutshell."

Kevin asks a key question, "The requirements to respond to a major terrorist attack on a U.S. city are largely identical to the requirements for responding to a hurricane like Katrina: food, medicine, maintenance of order, evacuation, and temporary shelter. So what are FEMA's plans for responding to, say, a large scale chemical weapon attack on Chicago? They'd have less warning than they did with Katrina and the requirements for aid would be largely similar. What would they do?"

Another great quote, "The hallmarks of the Bush/Rove governing philosophy — partisan discipline, industry giveaways, and relentless lying — work pretty well as long as you can disguise the results of your policies. When you can't, it suddenly becomes obvious even to your supporters that the emperor has no clothes. It's taken two years for a lot of people to realize that about Iraq. It's taken less than a week to realize it about New Orleans."

The Democrats are utter fools if they do not play up the following image come election time:

It's bad enough Rumsfeld, Rove and Condi still have a job, but if Bush refuses to fire Mike Brown, FEMA head, sometime very soon, then the Dems better run HARD on this come election time. It's an outrage that Brown was ever hired to begin with given his lack of credentials and experience for the position, but for Bush to stick his neck out and protect what by all accounts is a clear, blatant, and tragic failure in job performance should not be tolerated or accepted by any American voter.

Yesterday I was listening to Air America on the way to work and I believe I heard Congressman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss) being interviewed on "Morning Sedition." It was interesting to hear him speak, starting out tame and controlled but becoming more critical and animated as the interview progressed. It became obvious that he was initially holding back when asked about his opinions concerning the government's response to Katrina. Why? I think the clear reason -- and one that is not unreasonable -- is fear of Karl Rove.

It's been shown repeatedly that Rove will stop at absolutely nothing when it comes to Swift Boating someone, smearing a person's name and positions come election time. To a point, you can't blame Thompson's caution. If the American public exhibited capable resistance to Rove's lies and distortions, Dem politicians like Thompson wouldn't be so timid. Unfortunately, there's little evidence that the public can see through the BS. Remember: Kerry was the war coward -- not GW. How Rove was able to make Kerry look less military than GW is a question for the ages.

It reminds me of a great exchange in the movie "Mississippi Burning," when Dafoe says to Hackman, "Don't drag me down to your gutter, Anderson." Hackman fires back, "These people crawled out of the sewers, Mr. Ward. Maybe the gutter is the place we have to be." Exactly. Dafoe (read Democrats) tries to stay within the law and fight by the rules, taking the high road. But he gets nowhere and people continue to die. Hackman is the righteous realist. He knows these people and he understands that to fight them and win, you need to get down in the sewer with them.

I realize that part of being on the good side is exactly NOT employing someone like Rove; he belongs on the side of evil. However, for good to win out, perhaps the Dems need a Hackman. They had something close to him in Carville with Clinton; we haven't come close to having someone like that since.

Cronyism Costs Lives. In the next several weeks and months, one of many things we'll learn from the Katrina debacle is that hiring your best buds or top fundraisers for key governmental positions, who obviously lack the qualifications for the job, is dangerous to human life. The current FEMA head (Brown what's his name) is not only toast but worse, should've never been appointed to begin with. He couldn't successfully navigate the "tough" going over at the International Arabian Horse Assoc. (!), where he was forced to resign. Typical GW fashion to hire / promote a f*cking incompetent flunky -- ultimately costing the lives of American citizens.

Is King George the first to abuse cronyism in government? No. But it's reached monumental proportions under his rule, and at least presidents in the past looked for some remote expertise before hiring a friend. Just look at who GW appointed as head of the FDA, another key post that could cost lives: Lester Crawford, a guy with a background in veterinary medicine (yes, pets/animals) and of course worked for lobby, the National Food Processors Association. And I've lost track of how many people from industry have been appointed to key environmental positions, many of which lobbied against the regulations they're now expected to uphold. Gail Norton is a classic hire in this regard.

Can someone tell me why Clinton ever did team up with George Sr.? Was this necessary? Of course, I'm all for the causes they're championing, but couldn't Bill just do this on his own, receiving all of the limelight? Why did he have to share his name with GW's daddy? I was ready to throw up when I saw GW Sr. standing under a sign that read "Bush / Clinton" and had a Texas flag (!) imprint on it. Why not "Clinton / Bush"? And how could Clinton agree to that Texas flag thing -- they're not underwater? Why not the American flag?? And then Bush Sr. spoke first -- why? Did they draw straws? Then when Clinton was later asked about the failure of the government to respond to Katrina, he had Bush Sr. breathing down his neck (literally) so Bill went easy and cautiously with chosen words. Ugh! Is this just another '08 favor thrown to Hillary to get her looking more centrist? Carter didn't team-up with Ford -- enough already!

For those of us in states that receive a great deal of snowfall, each winter we're used to reading at least one if not more stories like this one, where with each bad snowstorm a public official does not respond fast enough in clearing the snow and tragedy results. In nearly every case, the official(s) is forced to resign.

Is the public official ever blamed for causing the snow to fall? No. The resignation comes due to failure to carry out one's duties in safeguarding and protecting the public. The person f*cked up and is held accountable.

We never hear of anyone complain -- no matter the political persuasion -- when such officials are fired. So why do we hear it now with Bush? The federal government's response to Katrina's devastation was horrendously abysmal. It ranks right up there with his response time immediately following the 9-11 attacks (recall he continued to read the children's book).

The criticism directed at him concerning this historic disaster is 100% well-deserved. Did he cause the hurricane? Of course not. Must he be held accountable for his and the government's lack of appropriate action after the fact? Absolutely. Not to mention his defunding of FEMA over the last few years and squandering valuable national resources (National Guard, hundreds of billions of US taxpayer's money, etc.) in Iraq.

Thankfully, the American public is rightfully pissed off, disgusted, and ashamed. We won't have to wait for the spineless Democrats to finally speak out.

Let's see Karl Rove attempt to spin this one away.