If I...

Were Republican I'd avoid ATRIOS like the plague.

www.atrios.blogspot.com

scum of earth.

From Vegas

I'm here in Las Vegas working for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, and I look around at people and to think, "Half these people are going to vote for Bush. Do they even care about how much he and his cronies lie?"

Frankly, I don't think they do, and many of these people raise children.

Well, these two articles here say a lot about Republicans/Conservatives. Sure, some of them would never commit these acts, but at the same time, when you know something is false in life, or wrong, it is your duty as a human being to step to the plate and do something about it. Silence is not an excuse.

NYTIMES on the Swift Boat

This article says everything, really.

Tone Changers

Discussing the issues:

The leader of the attack, John O'Neill, a Swift boat veteran and Texas lawyer, has been a detractor of Mr. Kerry for decades, ever since the Nixon White House recruited him to rebut Mr. Kerry's criticism of Vietnam policy. And the chief donor to the Swift boat broadside is a Texas businessman, Bob Perry, who is known for giving millions to the campaigns of President Bush and other Republicans.

Notice Dumbya hasn't said the attacks are wrong, which means, he's fine with it.

Pfff

Strength Projector.

Prison Scandal

From NYTIMES:

A high-level Army inquiry has found that senior American commanders created conditions that allowed abuses to occur at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq by failing to provide leadership and enough resources to run the jail, according to Pentagon and military officials.

Remember this?:

Bush, "the actions of these few people do not reflect the hearts of the American people..."

It seems that few grows all the time, but then again, can we even define "few?" Trying to do that would be fuzzy math.

Truth is, this came from the top, evident by this:

Karpinski said the resources arrived after Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, then commander of the U.S. military prison for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo, visited Abu Ghraib between Aug. 31 and Sept. 9. She said Miller told her he wanted to "Gitmo-ize" Abu Ghraib's operation because the intelligence gathering there was not producing the desired results. Miller has said he never used that phrase.

"I think General Miller's visit gave them ideas, inspired them, gave them plans, told them what they were succeeding with in Gitmo," Karpinski said. She added that intelligence officers were "under great pressure to get more actionable intelligence from those interrogations."

USA! USA! USA!

Indy Thinker

Congressman Doug Bereuter of Nebraska:

A respected Republican voice on intelligence issues who is retiring from Congress, is telling his constituents that he now considers the war in Iraq a mistake despite his earlier support for the invasion.

In a four-page letter being distributed to constituents who call or write about the war, Mr. Bereuter said that initiating the pre-emptive military strike was not justified because of what he described as a massive intelligence failure.

"I've reached the conclusion, retrospectively, now that the inadequate intelligence and faulty conclusions are being revealed, that all things being considered, it was a mistake to launch that military action, especially without a broad and engaged international coalition," he wrote.

Balls and conscience.

Like Things

Like it's like "sovereignty", it's like "democracy", just not:

The selection of Iraq's interim national assembly, envisioned as an introductory exercise in legislative democracy, dissolved into bitter feuding Wednesday as a slate of independent candidates withdrew from the contest, handing a controversial victory to a bloc dominated by large political parties.

Some political independents stormed the stage and later angrily walked out of the meeting hall where a national conference of more than 1,100 Iraqi leaders had convened for four days to elect an assembly. Independents said their quest for representation was sabotaged by major political parties expected to support interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.

After the withdrawal of the independents, conference organizers approved a slate of candidates from the major parties without a secret vote. Four cardboard ballot boxes placed on the stage remained unused, and many delegates abandoned the meeting hall to collect their $100 per diem payments instead of participating in a show of hands.

"There was no transparency," growled Ismael Zayer, a newspaper publisher who had helped organize the slate of independent candidates that withdrew. "The parties didn't give us a chance. They played this game in the most unfair way."

This is working out well.

POWs and Kerry

I'm reading this article about Kerry speaking to Vets and it mentions that he was less warmly received than Bush, which gets me thinking: Should I care about Vets health benefits even though the President and his minions continue to lie about what they do for them?

Should I be concerned for the soldiers who go off to poorly planned wars, yet come home to cheer for a man who offers them nothing but lip service and lies?
I know it's the compassionate person inside me that forces me to care, and the fact that I hate liars like these people, but there really may come a point, possibly in November, where I'll throw my hands in the air and say, "If you're going to allow these people to ruin this country because you're too blind to see the truth, well, you get what you deserve."

In the end, I know I'll be just fine, but thoughts like that actually make me a Republican, and frankly, I'd rather be dead.

Clueless Journal

The WSJ pens this garbage:

We wish this Presidential election had nothing at all to do with Vietnam. There were good people who served and good people who didn't, good people who supported the war and good people who protested it. What happened really shouldn't be an issue more than 30 years later unless you lie about it. So why do the Democrats keep bringing Vietnam up, and to their own detriment?...

Now comes Tom Harkin. On Monday the Iowa Senator lashed out at Dick Cheney, claiming the Vice President had no right to criticize Mr. Kerry's policies for the war on terror because Mr. Cheney had a deferment back then: "When I hear this coming from Dick Cheney, who was a coward, who would not serve during the Vietnam War, it makes my blood boil."

Even if Tom Harkin wasn't in Vietnam it doesn't make Dick Cheney any less of a pussy, right? I think the comment holds regardless who is saying it. It's as if a rapist cannot point out that someone is a rapist.

Vietnam issue is simple. Kerry chose to go, Bush chose to blow coke.

Digressing, it's one thing to call the Times, WaPo, or other liberal, but the ridiculous bias of the Journal is off the charts. I mean, do you see a NYTIMES Editorial Roundtable TV show like you do for the Journal? These clowns are considered legitimate while their writers pen books and Op/Eds about the horrible democrats, left of Lieberman of course.

Bear Knows Best

Even the bear hates Busch:

``He drank the Rainier and wouldn't drink the Busch beer,'' said Lisa Broxson, bookkeeper at the campground and cabins resort east of Mount Baker.

Questions Asked

Atrios and Taibi.

Olympics

They're not doing well? Why not? Hurricanes? Phish shows :) Why are the seats empty?

The answers seem obvious to me, but I wonder if anyone is watching.

I think the lack of a world power opposite the US really hurts.

Wollesens

Tomorrow night, Howard Johnson's in Times Square. Must see/hear music. Too bad I'll be in Vegas working for the UFC.

Polls

Rush Limbaugh's favorite, The Zogby:

Massachusetts Senator John Kerry is favored over President George W. Bush (47%-43%) among likely voters when Ralph Nader, Libertarian, Constitution and Green Party presidential candidates are factored into the 2004 presidential race, according to a new Zogby America poll. The telephone poll of 1011 likely voters was conducted Thursday through Saturday (August 12-14, 2004). Overall results have a margin of sampling error of +/-3.1.

Rush loved Zogby!

If the polls are close now, assuming things stay the same, this race shouldn't be close, but you never know.

WWJD?

Who would Jesus vote for?:

James C. Moore, co-author of "Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George Bush Presidential," drew laughter and applause when he offered his view to the moderate to left-leaning crowd of about 250 clergy and lay leaders.

"If ever there were a bleeding-heart liberal, it was Jesus Christ," Moore said at Congregation Agudas Achim synagogue. "I think the carpenter from Galilee was the original Democrat..."

Some research has found that white Christians who attend worship services at least once a week are far more likely to vote Republican, while less frequent worshippers and those who are not religious tend to lean Democratic. Many analysts have criticized Democrats for failing to more effectively reach religious voters.

Considering Bush doesn't attend church I guess he'll vote Kerry.

Living in the Past?

Dumb Ass speaks about defense:

"We say to those tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world: 'You fire, we're going to shoot it down,"' Mr. Bush said.

Addressing workers at defense contractor Boeing in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania, Mr. Bush said those who oppose missile defense are "living in the past. We're living in the future. We're going to do what's necessary to protect this country."

We're going to shoot it down? Really? Are we? I'd love to see that happen.

Maybe someone should tip him off that it doesn't work?

I'm living in the future too, Dumbya, and you're not part of it.

Dick

VP's former Company under fire:

The U.S. Army is threatening to partially withhold payments to Halliburton for the logistical support the company provides for troops in Iraq. The reason: allegations of millions of dollars in over-charges for food, shelter and services.

"There was no regard for spending limits," says former employee Marie DeYoung.

It's called NO BID contracting.

Thank goodness the story of Halliburton committing fraud under Cheney was covered so wonderfully by the liberal media last week. But fear not, it won't happen again, and I know this because of this passage:

Halliburton and controller at the time, Robert C. Muchmore Jr., settled the SEC charges without admitting wrongdoing by agreeing not to break the law in the future and paying fines.

That's settled.

Coming Undone

It only took like 2 weeks to poke holes in this case.

Bruuuuce!

Senator with no shot takes aim at non-candidate:

Conservative Party candidate Marilyn O'Grady appears in a 30-second televison commercial, urging her supporters to show their solidarity to Bush by not buying Springsteen's music.

"He thinks making millions with a song-and-dance routine allows him to tell you how to vote," O'Grady says in the spot. "Here's my vote: Boycott the Boss. If you don't buy his politics, don't buy his music."

Bruce should be worried since Republicans like O'Grady are against extending unemployment benefits.

I think it's great when politicians start focusing on musicians, and the like. It means they have no focus.

I wonder if Republicans would do this if they had more than 5 or 6 entertainers on their side. It seems every single one that's on their side actually uses their fame to run for office (Reagan, Schwarzenegger, Bono, Kemp, Largent, Thompson...). Once again, GOP, the Grand Opportunists Party.

Pixies

New tour, same attitude:

...But according to lead singer Charles Thompson -- also known as Frank Black or Black Francis -- they'll be doing one thing differently this time around: They won't be rushing to find a label.

"Record companies, schmecord companies," Thompson said. "Who needs 'em?"

Reflecting the changes in an industry trying to keep pace with fast-evolving technologies and the fickle tastes of the fans, the Pixies' much-awaited reunion is taking place not in a studio but at small live houses and multiband extravaganzas from Winnipeg, Canada to Ljubljana, Slovenia.

And instead of working up new material, they are focusing on selling tickets, T-shirts and CDs mass-produced on site at the venues.

"The record business is really bad right now," Thompson, aka Black Francis, said in an interview with The Associated Press after performing recently at the Fuji Rock Festival. "That's not where the money is. The business is with the real customers, the fans. They're the ones who say, 'OK, we'll come and see you perform.' That's who we're trying to connect with."

Can't wait to see 'em.

Zero Responsibility

and even less credibility:

According to a Post report attributed to a senior U.S. official, "(Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan)Khan became part of a sting operation organized by the CIA after he was captured last month [July 13] and agreed to send coded e-mail messages to al Qaeda contacts around the world." That sting operation was blown instantly by the leak of Khan's name...

...Had he been able to continue e-mailing members of al Qaeda, security agencies could have rolled up many more members of the network. But once Khan's name was in the paper Aug. 2, any chance of exploiting him further was gone...

So where did the leak originate? National security adviser Condoleezza Rice initially seemed to agree with a statement by CNN's Wolf Blitzer that Khan's name had been disclosed on background in Washington. "On background," she said, noting that the challenge was "giving enough information to the public so that they know that you're dealing with a specific, credible, different kind of threat" without harming intelligence operations. A National Security Council spokesman said later that Rice had misspoken in appearing to confirm that the leak came from U.S. officials. So it remains unclear who outed Khan...

Misspoken.

McGreevey

Hey, we're just kidding, Jimmy.

Top 10 McGreevey Quips:

10. NJ state bird: swallow.
9. NJ TPKE renamed Hershey Highway.
8. NJ raises terror alert level to lavender.
7. We know he didn't like Bush, but this is ridiculous.
6. Now we know why McGreevey enjoyed "polling" so much.
5. What does McGreevey and the Isreali Navy have in common? Jewish seaman.
4. NJ DMC to now call rear end accidents, a McGreevey.
3. Gives new meaning to stuffing the ballot box
2. NY Post headline...McGreevey Goes Down.
1. Shouldn't take McGreevey long to get out of the governers mansion, he's already got his schitt packed!

All in good fun.

Dionne Jr.

I don't know what is going on with the WaPo today but they have all sorts of good columns. EJ Dionne's is no exception.

And Bush certainly doesn't want to talk about the facts laid out by a Congressional Budget Office report on Friday that one-third of his tax cuts over the past three years went to people who earned an average of $1.2 million annually.

Households with incomes in the top 1 percent received an average tax cut of $78,460 this year. Households in the middle 20 percent -- they average about $57,000 a year -- received an average cut of $1,090. That is a 72 to 1 ratio in favor of the millionaires...

Yes, the congressional resolution empowering Bush to wage war was far broader than it should have been. But when push came to shove, Kerry decided to take the chance in voting "yes" to strengthen Bush's hand in negotiating with the United Nations. That seeking U.N. support was never really a Bush priority and that he botched the postwar planning is the president's problem, not Kerry's. Why can't Kerry keep it that simple?

More to come.

Fareed on Kerry

Good piece, again, clarifying Kerry the Nuancer:

Bush's position is that if Kerry agrees with him that Hussein was a problem, then Kerry agrees with his Iraq policy. Doing something about Iraq meant doing what Bush did. But is that true? Did the United States have to go to war before the weapons inspectors had finished their job? Did it have to junk the U.N. process? Did it have to invade with insufficient troops to provide order and stability in Iraq? Did it have to occupy a foreign country with no cover of legitimacy from the world community? Did it have to ignore the State Department's postwar planning? Did it have to pack the Iraqi Governing Council with unpopular exiles, disband the army and engage in radical de-Baathification? Did it have to spend a fraction of the money allocated for Iraqi reconstruction -- and have that be mired in charges of corruption and favoritism? Was all this an inevitable consequence of dealing with the problem of Saddam Hussein?

I should really be throwing this whole Op/Ed up here because it's so good, but I leave it to you.

Zakaria writes about "execution" and "strategy", and I think back to Rumsfeld, Feith, and Wolfowitz all making comments that it's impossible to prepare an "exit strategy" without knowing what we're dealing with. That's just ridiculous since an exit strategy is a GOAL, beyond "finding WMD" and "liberating the Iraqi people."

The reasons there was no strategy is simple: All these people making plans believe they're never wrong, hence no apologies, ever. Being so elitist and thinking you're so accurate led them to all assume, behind closed doors, that the Arab world would except democracy because it's better than what they have.

Clearly, it is better, but they underestimated Arab hatred for the US (many of these people are Arabs before they are Iraqis). If another nation was taking on this project there may have been a different result. But seriously, what nation is that dumb? None of these folks were willing to step to a mic and say, "They will except democracy because, well, it's just better!"

No one had the balls to do that. Deep down, I think they believed it would just work out, and frankly, that's a really stupid fucking plan. For if there was an exit strategy you would have heard about it. You never heard it because none of these fools would publicly state a plan that would fly back in their faces. Although, Rumsfeld had a few of those, yet now he's remaking the armed forces.

The hope was WMD would turn up and no plan would be necessary since we would now be "safer!" Well, time for a new plan, with responsible adults running the show, even if some of them are actually NUANCERS!

Btw, when did "nuance" become an insult?

You May be a Terrorist!

Bush's America. Fun, fun.

Kerry's Consistent Iraq Policy

Kevin Drums sums it up.

I just keep thinking 'there are a lot of morons who probably could have got this war right!'

Iraq

Can you believe this war is still going? Who woulda thunk it (besides everyone except conservatives)?

Insurgents fired a shell into a crowded street in the Iraqi capital Baghdad on Tuesday, killing seven people, including two children, and wounding 42, hospital officials said.

Delayed:

A delegation of Iraqis arrived in Najaf today try to convince a rebellious Shiite cleric and his militia to evacuate a shrine in the holy city and end fighting with American and Iraqi government forces.

Going well.

Bye

Pharewell from the Times.

Charter Schools

Not so good:

The first national comparison of test scores among children in charter schools and regular public schools shows charter school students often doing worse than comparable students in regular public schools.

The findings, buried in mountains of data the Education Department released without public announcement, dealt a blow to supporters of the charter school movement, including the Bush administration.

Maybe Bush Should Claim Chavez has WMD?

Juan Gone:

Hugo Chavez, the south-of-the-border president the Bush White House most despises these days, didn't just survive Latin America's first-ever recall referendum - he steamrolled his way to a stunning landslide victory...

It was a resounding defeat for the Venezuelan upper-class elite. That elite, which includes the owners of virtually all the country's major media companies, campaigned almost nonstop for more than two years to topple Chavez from power...

We'll see now if the Bush people only accept democratic election results where their guy wins.

Yeah, we'll see.

Pulling Out...

God, I wish George Sr had, but anyway:

The Pentagon's decision to undertake the largest reorganization of its overseas U.S. troop basing in 50 years ranks as one of the most tangible accomplishments of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who came into office pledging to shake up a hidebound bureaucracy and modernize the armed forces.

Probably a great idea to let Rumsfeld reorganize the military since he's been so succesful prosecuting the Iraq War.

But honestly, we all know why this is being done.

For Biz, Against the People

Is Dumbya:

Allies and critics of the Bush administration agree that the Sept. 11 attacks, the war in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq have preoccupied the public, overshadowing an important element of the president's agenda: new regulatory initiatives. Health rules, environmental regulations, energy initiatives, worker-safety standards and product-safety disclosure policies have been modified in ways that often please business and industry leaders while dismaying interest groups representing consumers, workers, drivers, medical patients, the elderly and many others.

And most of it was done through regulation, not law - lowering the profile of the actions. The administration can write or revise regulations largely on its own, while Congress must pass laws. For that reason, most modern-day presidents have pursued much of their agendas through regulation. But administration officials acknowledge that Mr. Bush has been particularly aggressive in using this strategy.

Read it, weep.

They don't have the sack to admit who they are, and try to pass laws. This article says everything about who they are.

I bet some call this liberal media. Isn't it more important that it's ACCURATE media?

Anybody Home?

America, America, God shed his grace on thee...:

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been questioning political demonstrators across the country, and in rare cases even subpoenaing them, in an aggressive effort to forestall what officials say could be violent and disruptive protests at the Republican National Convention in New York.

F.B.I. officials are urging agents to canvass their communities for information about planned disruptions aimed at the convention and other coming political events, and they say they have developed a list of people who they think may have information about possible violence. They say the inquiries, which began last month before the Democratic convention in Boston, are focused solely on possible crimes, not on dissent, at major political events.

I'm sorry, but I must have missed the terrorists at the anti-war protests, and there are probably never people at hospitals harassing women, or Christian psychos killing people at the Olympics, or people in trees shooting doctors in their homes. Yes, it's the protestors at the RNC and not the anti-DNC people we need to worry about.

I don't think it's right on either side, but this is ridiculous, and hardly mentioned.

Which Way for Jon?

It seems another NJ Pol has to make a choice:

Senator Jon S. Corzine, the multimillionaire banker who personally financed his own Senate victory four years ago, is under intense and competing pressures. Democrats in New Jersey are urging him to intervene in the state's political crisis and run for governor, while Democrats in Washington are pushing him to fulfill his commitment to lead their efforts to raise campaign cash and win back control of the Senate.

I find it unreal that NJ Dems need to get Corzine to take the seat. Is there not another NJ Pol who can win a short election? Hello Mr. Bradley?