And you thought we'd forgotten
Barbara Comstock. Fat chance. She may be busy doing opposition research into Patrick Fitzgerald and his witness list on behalf of
Scooter and the bear, but people like Valley Girl and Alison K. have been doing opposition research into
her.
Turns out she's bosom buddies with none other than fellow wingnut ogress
Alice Fisher. From Roll Call, January 9, 2006 (Lexis/Nexis):
It's Washington. Eyebrows were raised last month at just how cozy things were at the Justice Department's Christmas party. Most notably, between Alice Fisher, the newly installed head of the Criminal Division, and her old buddy Barbara Comstock, a strategic public relations and lobbying consultant who represents two of the biggest Republican fish caught up in the corruption scandals engulfing Washington.
Comstock, a lobbyist at the Blank Rome Government Relations firm, represents indicted ex-veep Chief of Staff Scooter Libby, as well as DeLay, who's already been indicted in Texas and is treading choppy waters in the Congressional bribery scandal. Her longtime close friend Fisher, well, she has the ultimate say over which public officials are gonna get fried.
According to partygoers, the DOJ Christmas party was like a fish fry, with Comstock almost (though, come on, not really) like a PETA activist fighting to spare the lives of the Libbyfish and DeLayfish. One attendee described the party as "Lobbyist City" and said Comstock was "very conspicuous, buzzing around Alice." The term "nauseating" was also used to describe Comstock's palling around with the Criminal Division chief.
Comstock declined to comment. But her former colleague at Justice Mark Corallo did a heckuva job speaking for her.
Corallo is to Karl Rove what Comstock is to Libby; he's the flack for Rove's legal team. Maybe all that breath holding and praying that the man President Bush dubbed "Turd Blossom" doesn't get indicted has turned Corallo into some kind of neo-feminist, because Corallo thinks Comstock might be the latest victim of the Old Boys' Network's double standard. (Shocking. In Washington?)
He said he certainly didn't hear the boys complaining about him attending the solicitor general's Christmas party.
"I feel slighted," Corallo said, laughing. "No one raised eyebrows about me." He said "almost every lawyer" invited to the DOJ or the solicitor general's parties "inevitably have business before the Justice Department."
How is it that the people who regularly take a sledge hammer to the word "feminism" are so quick to invoke it whenever their tits are in a ringer? Must be convenient to have a mouth you can talk out of on both sides at the same time.
As
Redd said, Comstock's history at the DoJ is a complete conflict of interest with her current job on Team Libby:
Whether or not it is "just fundraising," it is still wrong. Comstock would have been privy to high level meetings about the information gathered by the FBI, how the DoJ could best publicly respond to questions about Rove, Libby and other members of the Administration and their conduct -- and to do so, she would also have likely had contacts with the FBI investigators heading up the search for information. Think that kind of information wouldn't be valuable to Team Libby?
A way to look at it is this: if you were a corporate defense counsel, working for Corporation X, and you left the firm to work as plaintiff's counsel, you ought to be barred from participating in any way in any cases involving Corporation X. You would have intimate, behind-the-scenes knowledge not only of how your former firm operates, but also what kind of advice they have given on settling claims, what sort of risk averse or risk positive strategy your former client has, what they do in terms of investigation, etc., etc.
In Comstock's case, she would have intimate insights into how investigators approached the Traitorgate case from the outset. And how the DoJ managed crisis issues internally. And how the communications went between DoJ and the WH in those early days. And...well, you get the picture. This just screams "appearance of impropriety," doesn't it?
One would think the
Virgina Bar Association might have something to say about this.
On the Ciro Rodriguez front,
Kos tells us the campaign is going to be doing some remote phone banking. If you can afford the time you can
sign up here. If you don't have the time but can afford the cash you can
give here (we've now raised $18,478 for Ciro on this site alone). It's a great cause and if Barbarella knew you were doing it I'm sure she'd be outraged.
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A former defense contractor for MZM pleaded guilty on Friday to paying bribes in excess of $1 million dollars to Duke Cunningham, according to
the LATimes. What interested me even more in the article was this segment:
He also hired the son of a defense official and got inside information that allowed him to land contracts for MZM.
In addition, Wade funneled $80,000 in contributions to two unnamed members of Congress by illegally reimbursing MZM employees for making the contributions. The lawmakers, officials said, were unaware of the scheme. Federal Elections Commission documents identify two members of Congress who received large-scale contributions from MZM employees as Rep. Virgil H. Goode Jr. (R-Va.) and Rep. Katherine Harris (R-Fla.).
Wonder Katherine Harris has been doing more than hitting the Lancome counter on "gift with purchase day?" Just which "officials" indicated that Harris was not aware of the scheme -- and when she was given all this cash from "employees" of MZM, was she asked to work on anything in return? Or was this just given with her understanding that it came from the goodness of their hearts?
And is anyone else wondering which defense official's son is involved in this "inside information" mess? And how much trouble this defense official might be in -- and whether he or she knew that the contract information was going to MZM, and whether this was some sort of quid pro quo means of passing the money directly to the defense official via the son?
I don't know about everyone else, but I'm beginning to need a program to keep track of which GOP official is involved in which corruption prosecution.
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Being generally inclined to be a bit lazy, any time I see the chance to hit three targets with one post -- in this case Holy Joe, the warmongers and the WaPo (in the form of the odious editorial page editor, Fred Hiatt) -- I'm going to take it, I really can't help myself.
Armando reminds us of
this Hiatt chestnut from November 14, 2005:
. . . Congress . . . pours most of its Iraq-related energy into allegations of manipulated intelligence before the war. "Those aren't irrelevant questions," says Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.). "But the more they dominate the public debate, the harder it is to sustain public support for the war."
What Lieberman doesn't say is that many Democrats would view such an outcome as an advantage. Their focus on 2002 is a way to further undercut President Bush, and Bush's war, without taking the risk of offering an alternative strategy -- to satisfy their withdraw-now constituents without being accountable for a withdraw-now position.
Many of them understand that dwindling public support could force the United States into a self-defeating position, and that defeat in Iraq would be disastrous for the United States as well as for Mahdi and his countrymen. But the taste of political blood as Bush weakens, combined with their embarrassment at having supported the war in the first place, seems to override that understanding.
Fred is one of Elton's favorite targets over at BusyBusyBusy. Elton gives us even fonder memories of
Fred:
The United States and this administration in particular continually assert the moral right to behave differently than other nations. We will not be bound by the International Criminal Court. We insist that other nations give up their nuclear weapons while we keep our own. We wage war without U.N. Security Council approval. We publish annual report cards on everyone else's human rights records.
The premise of this highhandedness is that the United States is, on balance, a force for good in the world -- a superpower that uses its might not to subjugate others but to allow them to live freely. This is a premise that The Post's editorial page on the whole accepts -- to the dismay of many readers.
You would think those Iraqis would be so grateful for our our highhandedness that they'd hop to that "live freely" business already.
Have a tin can, Fred.
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I'm certainly not above engaging in bitter recrimination against those whose sagacity led us into this war, but
as Glenn Greenwald notes, there are other reasons to consistently revisit this particular trail of blunders:
It is critical to focus on who was right about this war because this country, right now, has extremely difficult choices to make with regard to the disaster it has created in Iraq -- and the first choice is whose judgment and foreign policy wisdom ought to be listened to and accorded respect.
As Glenn notes, one of those people was Howard Dean, who was successfully ridiculed for being profoundly right at the time. From a
Dean speech in 2003:
We have been told little about what the risks will be if we do go to war.
If we go to war, I certainly hope the Administration's assumptions are realized, and the conflict is swift, successful and clean. I certainly hope our armed forces will be welcomed like heroes and liberators in the streets of Baghdad.
I certainly hope Iraq emerges from the war stable, united and democratic.
I certainly hope terrorists around the world conclude it is a mistake to defy America and cease, thereafter, to be terrorists.
It is possible, however, that events could go differently, . . . .
Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.
Anti-American feelings will surely be inflamed among the misguided who choose to see an assault on Iraq as an attack on Islam, or as a means of controlling Iraqi oil.
And last week's tape by Osama bin Laden tells us that our enemies will seek relentlessly to transform a war into a tool for inspiring and recruiting more terrorists.
There are other risks. Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.
As Teddy points out
in the comments, failure to politically decapitate people like Cheney and Rumsfeld at the appropriate time brought us to this current mess:
When all this neo-con farce is put to rest, we must ensure it's dead for good. Otherwise, the energetic and younger members of the current cabal will return in the third decade of this century with some "new" concept of Executive power and warmaking capability as well as some "new" paradigm for world domination. Yup, just like the youngest chief of staff in the White House (Cheney) and the youngest Defense Secretary (Rumsfeld) returned to visit this current hell upon us.
Not to mention the fact that these people will continue to be those charged with making decisions about the current debacle they have done so much to encourage. Redd linked to
Wolcott this morning, who notes that they continue to pour gasoline on the situation with their phony concern for "free speech" (as if) with regard to the Danish cartoons to distract attention from the mess that they've made, though arguably this mess is just what they wanted all along.
Wolcott goes on to quote Robert Dreyfuss:
In a paper for an Israeli think tank, the same think tank for which Wurmser, Richard Perle and Douglas Feith prepared the famous 'Clean Break' paper in 1996, Wurmser wrote in 1997 : 'The residual unity of the nation is an illusion projected by the extreme repression of the state.' After Saddam, Iraq would 'be ripped apart by the politics of warlords, tribes, clans, sects, and key families,' he wrote. 'Underneath facades of unity enforced by state repression, [Iraq's] politics is defined primarily by tribalism, sectarianism, and gang/clan-like competition.' Yet Wurmser explicitly urged the United States and Israel to 'expedite' such a collapse. 'The issue here is whether the West and Israel can construct a strategy for limiting and expediting the chaotic collapse that will ensue in order to move on to the task of creating a better circumstance.'
Such black neoconservative fantasies -- which view the Middle East as a chessboard on which they can move the pieces at will -- have now come home to roost. For the many hundreds of thousands who might die in an Iraqi civil war, the consequences are all too real.
Until someone can point out the inherent logic to me of the
John Dickerson's of the world who have concluded that we early opponents of the war were wrong to be right even as the warmongers were right in their wrongness, I think it's valid to keep harping on the scorecard. If not only to knock the struts out from underneath the GOP's plan to run on "national security" in 2006, then surely to figure out who should be listened to from here on in based on who has had a clear-eyed vision of this mess from the start, as distinct from those who most certainly have not.
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Tristero has a superb post up at Digby's that calls into serious question the reporting skills of those we rely upon in the major media outlets to inform us about what, exactly, is going on in Iraq, specifically with regard to a survey of opinions about what civil war in Iraq would look like done in the NYT by Kenneth Pollack:
Pollack's emphasis on Shia-Shia conflict seems an academic distortion, going for the unusual angle. But that's nothing compared to this unattributed whopper:Some experts, however, say Iran may understand the dangers of a war. Even President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's denunciation of the bombing of the Shiite shrine in Samarra last week, in which he blamed Zionists rather than Sunnis, could be seen as an act of restraint, these experts say -- an effort to play to Shiite anger without fanning flames between Iraq's Islamic communities.
Now this is such an unspeakably stupid analysis of what Iran is up to that it could only come from a high Bush administration official. I'm quite serious. Another clue it's from a Bushite is its sense of loony "accentuate the positive" thinking. And indeed, the context gives a pretty clear clue where this idiocy probably came from. Backing up one paragraph we read:While Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has proclaimed that the world has isolated Iran more than ever because of its nuclear ambitions, Iran has in fact tightened relationships with it local allies as events in Iraq have played out. In recent months, Iran has been deepening its alliance with Syria and the Shiite movement Hezbollah in Lebanon, and now it appears ready to strike up a friendship, backed by financing, with a Hamas-led Palestinian Authority.
Some experts, however, say Iran may understand the dangers of a war. Even President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's denunciation ...
Am I saying Condoleeza Rice is the moron who sees hope in Iran's anti-Zionism/semitism? No, not exactly. But anyone who is making the fundamental error Rice is making - focusing on Iran's "world" isolation while downplaying its strengthening of regional ties, including to Hamas - is quite capable of misconstruing Ahmadinejad's remarks to mean Iran is not doing whatever it can to grasp as much purchase within Iraq as possible. And if it came to a war that led to Iraq's total disintegration, it is unclear what Iran stands to lose.
The article also floats the idea of a negotiated breakup of Iraq into three states. Good luck. Who gets the oil regions, boys and girls? Who gets the desert? And who moves? And who sez Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Iran are just gonna twiddle their fingers and not interfere?
There is much more interesting speculation and detail about how truly incredibly complex the mess in Iraq is, and how few alternatives exist that won't quickly lead to disaster for the people of the region, and the people of the United States. Will Turkey invade to defend the Turkomen against oppression if Iraq's Kurds officially set up on their own? Will the Arab League step in to intervene? And looming above it all are nukes. Iranian nukes coming soon. Potential Sunni Arab nukes depending on how the situation worsens (calling Dr. A. Q. Khan!).
So, Mr. Tom Friedman, are you enjoying the real live political experiment now? So, Mr. George Packer, still think that those of us who absolutely knew Bush/Iraq would open the gates of hell have "second-rate minds?"
Hey, y'never know! Maybe Ahmadinejad really was sending a signal that Iran wasn't interested in an Iraq civil war when he blamed Zionists - Israel -for the attack. True, that could be because he wants to attack Israel first, but at least it's not supporting civil war in Iraq!
Yes, it's possible. And maybe there really is a Bigfoot. And maybe tomorrow, cold fusion will work and, as Woody Allen predicted in Sleeper, cigarette smoking will turn out to improve your health and longevity. You never know...
Meanwhile let's recall the snaggletoothed quote-unquote "experts" Matthews is dredging from the primordial ooze and
propping up on MSNBC:
CHRIS MATTHEWS:....Could this civil war, which we're on the edge of, perhaps, be foreseen?
RICHARD PERLE, FMR. ASST. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: Well first of all, I don't believe we are on the edge of a civil war. I think we need to stay calm, which is what we in the leadership in Iraq are urging, urging Iraqis to do.
MATTHEWS: Why is our nervousness about a civil war in any way a triggering mechanism for more civil war? What matters whether I'm nervous about this or not? Why do we have to remain calm?
PERLE: Well it doesn't matter in that sense, but I think there's a lot of hyperbole. I was just listening to Mr. Reagan.
MATTHEWS: One hundred and sixty eight mosques have been torched in the last 24 hours.
PERLE: I don't believe that serious damage was done to 168 mosques and I don't believe that we're on the verge of a civil war although it was certainly the intention of the people who blew up the mosque in Samarra.
The neocon monsters had an awful lot of help bringing the world to this awful place. They could not have done it without the help of compliant -- and one can only assume willfully ignorant -- journalists. May it be tied to their tails like a tin can for all eternity.
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Professor Juan Cole has
a bleak blog going today and yesterday. The reality on the ground all over the Middle East is tense -- especially in Iraq and Saudi Arabia.
Daragahi adds, 'Iraqi police today found at least 29 bodies scattered in Baghdad. Each corpse was handcuffed and had single gunshots to the head, in the style often attributed to Shiite death squads believed attached to the Ministry of Interior. '
Ed Wong of the NYT reports on the role of the militias in the recent violence in Iraq. The Shiites will certainly now insist on keeping them, after the bombing of the Askariyah shrine, but the Sunni Arabs fear them and are threatening to form their own.
I heard a report on NPR (on yesterday's All Things Considered) that militias are not only avoiding the curfews, but are flouting them with public calls for assembly at mosques for later protest marches, and that some local politicians and Iraqi police are aiding the more powerful militias in passing this information around to the populace or looking the other way in terms of conduct. NPR had another report on the subject today, and you can
listen to it here.
Similarly,
the NYTimes has an in-depth look at the strength of militias in Iraq -- and their increasing levels of power in the country and how that bodes ill for any hope of non-sectarian violence.
BBC News has more on this as well.
The WaPo covers the resurgence of sectarian violence in Iraq despite the curfews.
Fierce sectarian violence erupted anew Saturday despite an extraordinary daytime curfew, killing at least 20 people in a car bombing attack on a Shiite holy city, a raid on a Shiite home and a brazen attack on the funeral procession of an Iraqi television journalist in Baghdad....
Shiite and Sunni Arab political leaders have issued public pleas for calm, but each side accused the other of mounting revenge attacks since the bombing of the golden-domed Askariya shrine in Samarra four days ago. More than 150 people have been killed in the fighting since the shrine attack.
Iraqis are waiting on tenterhooks to see whether the recent violence will explode into an open full-scale civil war.
The WaPo is also reporting on conflicting reports on the readiness or lack thereof of Iraqi troops. It is tough to know what is real information and what is spin in this, since every time we see reports the numbers shift back and forth when substantive questions are raised.
The NYTimes has a frightening look at what a civil war in Iraq could look like -- and how close we are to seeing one at this point.
ReutersUK tells us that the Iraqi government is now warning of the possibility of civil war.
I don't know about all of you, but just reading through the bits and pieces we see in the media -- and knowing full well that this is only a small part of what soldiers, diplomats and intel folks are seeing in country -- well, I'm very frightened about the implications of all of this. And it's not just in Iraq that we are seeing this sort of unrest. Take a look at these headlines from Saudi Arabia:
--
Al Qaeda Threatens to Hit More Saudi Sites. (AP via WaPo)
--
Saudi Arabia on High Alert After Attempted Oil Plant Attack. (Bloomberg)
--
Saudi Attack Sends Oil Prices Soaring (The Age Aus.)
And in case you were thinking we'd at least finished the job in Afghanistan -- NATO's head says
we'll be there for years, because of continued violence and instability and continued threat from the Taliban.
I wish I had solutions for all of this. But at the moment, I'm just fearful for what all of this means for the days to come.
Wolcott adds this to the discussion, and it's worth some thought. I'm afraid it is too early for me to start having any "silver lining" thoughts about any of this. It's just looking so bleak at the moment, and I'm worried about what the next headline will bring. Here's hoping someone with far more expertise than me sees a way out of this debacle with some level of sanity attached to it.
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The "blame the journalists" defense tactic continues for Team Libby, in its defense against the perjury, false statements and obstruction charges that
Scooter Libby is facing (via the LATimes).
Lawyers for Libby say they have reason to question the accuracy of statements that journalists have made about him to special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald. They are also seeking to prove that information about Plame was widely known among reporters at the time, and that Libby therefore would have no incentive to lie about his knowledge of her.
Walton set an April 7 deadline for recipients of the subpoenas to respond to whether they intended to comply with them, and a date of April 21 for a hearing to consider objections.
I have to say, it's risky, in that if a jury finds that Team Libby is simply trying to throw up a screen of smoke and mirrors, then they are more likely to find Scooter guilty in the absence of any real "reasonable doubt." Jurors tend to be disgusted by obvious, smarmy tap dancing, at least in my trial experience in real-world criminal trials. (I'll try to have something more in depth about this soon, but I need to go back and review several pages of my notes on this.)
In this case, though, the first amendment arguments are going to be fairly robust from the news organizations involved, I'm sure, considering the high profile names involved. I'd guess that Team Libby is banking on this -- but I must say that Judge Walton's framework on subpoenas and motions is an aggressive one, and that bodes well for him not taking kindly to attempts to stonewall and delay. The deadline on this was set for April.
The most telling quote in
the LATimes story is this one from Wells:
"The very heart of our defense is about the family jewels," Wells said. "We need the notes and the PDBs to put together a story to make the jury believe that his defense is not concocted."
Yep, that about sums it up, doesn't it? When you have a client who dosn't give you a lot to work with in his defense, the job is not a fun one, no matter how high your pay scale. One has to wonder about the internal dynamic of Team Libby -- the constant tug-of-war between actually defending Scooter on one side and maintaining the firewall for the Veep (and perhaps others in the Administration) on the other side.
According to
the LATimes, Fitz will be keeping both the identity of the official who spoke with Woodward a secret, but also the second official who spoke with Novak. (Since Rove has already owned up to being the first source on this, we at least know one name, but indications are that the second name is not that of Scooter Libby.)
This was all requested by Team Libby and denied because of the ongoing nature of the investigation. btw, it seems that it was Jefress who indicated that the Woodward leaker didn't work in the White House, so take that statement with an enormous grain of salt for now. I sure am, because the LATimes article doesn't indicate whether Jeffress said this in court or outside of it to the press.
I wanted to take a moment to explain the whole judicial review issue of this information being kept from the defense for the moment. This is a process that happens frequently when there are questions or arguments about (1) whether the information requested is even material to the case at bar or (2) whether the information might tip the hand of the ongoing investigation or might be better kept as classified or sealed (depending on the type of information).
This process happens not only in cases where there is a classified information consideration in matters of national security, but also where you have a juvenile whose name and information needs to be kept from public disclosure (as in a child sexual abuse matter where protecting the victim is important) or where you have prior juvenile charges that need to be held in confidence (because that information is kept from public disclosure as well).
What happens is the judge gathers all relevant material, and he and his clerks will comb through it, looking at the information involved, as well as case law and court rules pertaining to what should and should not be disclosed. Then the judge will determine what is and is not disclosable, will issue a ruling, and any information to be disclosed will be ordered handed over to Team Libby. Information to be held in confidence will stay behind the non-disclosable wall. And arguments on the ruling will continue from there.
All this to say that this is not an unusual process -- but, in this case, the level of importance to national security that the large number of documents hold is unusual. PDBs aren't exactly a run-of-the-mill request. And Judge Walton made it clear to Team Libby that he was well aware of the potential "greymail" defense on this, and that he was skeptical of their request for information that Cheney has dubbed "the family jewels" of the Executive branch -- the PDBs. (And isn't that just asking for the late night comedians to have a field day? I mean, really?)
All of this will be under review, and Fitz will be providing information to the judge on his continuing investigation efforts to show why a lot of other information ought to be held close for now.
This cannot be a comfortable moment for Karl Rove or Dick Cheney or the other Administration officials involved in this: to know that Judge Walton and Patrick Fitzgerald have come to an understanding about the fact that this case is, in fact, moving forward and that his investigative team is looking much, much further into criminal conduct among them.
UPDATE: Meant to also say that
Forbes has an updated version of the AP story.
UPDATE #2:
The NYTimes story from this morning now appears to indicate that Fitz offered to stipulate the following:
Mr. Fitzgerald said Friday that he would readily agree that Mr. Libby had an important job and dealt with weighty matters. But he said that the presidential briefs would provide far more detail than Mr. Libby needed to make that argument.
Well, that sure gives the judge a huge out to refuse to order the PDBs turned over, doesn't it? We've all been thinking that Fitz would offer to stipulate on this -- looks like he thought it was a good move as well. This is the first reporting I've seen on this aspect of the hearing, and I'm hoping someone else will dig into this a little deeper, but we may have to wait until the transcript is available to know exactly what was said here.
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Scooter went a-fishin' for Marlins today and came back with a
pocketful of guppies.
Libby's lawyers asked for copies of the notes he took during an 11 month period from 2003-2004 and got them, but that was about it.
They also wanted to know the identitity of the "Senior Administration Official" who leaked to Bob Woodward in June of 2002 (although the fact that it was an SAO is per Woodward, someone who has felt free to fabricate to protect the identity of his "sources" and nothing I'm putting too much stock in), but Judge Walton said no go:
Libby’s lawyers and Fitzgerald disagreed over whether the unidentified government official — who does not work at the White House — was referring to Plame or her husband when he said, “Everyone knows,” during a taped interview with investigators.
The defense said the official meant that most reporters knew that Plame worked at the CIA, as Libby testified before a federal grand jury. But Fitzgerald said the reference was to Wilson, who was not identified in initial media reports about the trip to Niger.
That seems to be all they've got -- Libby's lawyers consistently misstate what he's charged with distort basic facts in his defense. While I realize a lot of this is just standard throw everything against the wall and see what sticks tactics, it's also an indication that they haven't got a whole lot. So it's likely they either know Libby's guilty as shit or they have a client who is unwilling to actually let them defend him.
Neither of which puts them in a particularly enviable position.
According to the AP, Walton indicated that since the SAO has not been charged they have the right to privacy. But on Countdown tonight David Schuster seemed to be saying that to reveal the identity of that individual was getting to the "overall strategy" of Fitzgerald's investigation.
Both Schuster and the AP say that the investigation is, indeed, ongoing. Libby's lawyers also tried to block Fitzgerald from filing any information only the judge can see, including "strategy memos and classified information that he wants withheld from Libby's legal team." Walton said no dice to that, too. What's he gonna say? "You're right, I'd really rather be operating in the dark on this one."
The specter of the White House is always looming in the bakcground. According to Schuster, Walton put off deciding whether Libby was entitled to have access to the PDBs he's requested until the CIA has had time to review them. But Walton did say he is concerned that the request by Libby could "sabotage" the case because the President would no doubt invoke executive privilege.
And the white house computers seem to be recovering from the dreaded DC memory-sucking virus faster than their human counterparts:
The defense was told that the White House had recently located and turned over about 250 pages of e-mails from the vice president’s office. Fitzgerald, in a letter last month to the defense, had cautioned Libby’s lawyers that some e-mails might be missing because the White House’s archiving system had failed.
I seem to remember Judy Miller miraculously recovering some forgotten notes after her encounter with the Special Counsel. Fitzgerald's next gig will no doubt be a magic act with a couple of wild animals and a leggy bimbo in Vegas.
Redd had
a good post up about the patent dishonesty of the charge that Fitzgerald's appointment to the case was unconstitutional, and Walton seemed to think about as much of it as Redd did. From a legal angle I suppose it is to be expected, and I might accept such bullshit tactics as just that -- were it not the lockstep with which people like the fashion challenged Byron York and
CNN's Brian Todd were immediately parroting these canards that even a casual observer knew were false.
This seemed designed more for media consumption than success in court, a way to publicly call the legitimacy of both Fitzgerald and his investigation into question. Funny how it got smacked down immediately even at The Corner, and Andy McCarthy all but called Byron York a cheap hostile pimp.
Barbara Comstock must be desperate.
Update: How does the WaPo manage to print
an entire article on the topic without mentioning the 250 pages of newly released emails from the Veep's office? I don't know but by jingo they do.
Update 2: Suzanne brings up an interesting point in the comments -- were the emails turned over last week, during Dickfest? Odd timing for the White House to be handing a loaded gun (so to speak) to Fitzgerald to point straight at Cheney.
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Doug from
Dakota Today Blog weighs in on the state's decision to insure that rapists have their fetuses carried to term by the wanton women who were really just asking for it anyway (esp. if she happens to be your 12 year-old daughter, because all we know how
that goes):
Mike Rounds, Governor of SD, is pondering and thinking about the Rapist Rights Bill the SD Legislature just passed. The wingnut loons answered prayers are putting Mikey in a bind. Does he eat everything they shovel his way or not?
Well, He just has to find out if God raped the Virgin Mary. That will provide the theological basis for SD supporting Rapist Rights and treating women as nearly worthless chattle, good only as reproduction machines betting on hitting the Jesus bonus on the reproductive powerball lottery. Speaking of lotteries, how about that Million dollar bribe the anti-women's righters are promising to pony up to fight for their lunatic legislation? Ok, Mike, I wanta buy a vowel and a subsection of a new law. Umm . talk to the lawyers, they are looking for another lawyer's subsidy law. Hey, guess what? Wild Bill Janklow is back in the legal saddle. Whooopppeeee!
I like this guy and I'm liking the idea of supporting local blogs a lot right now so let's throw him some traffic.
Oh and you can tell the rest of those godless South Dakota fuckers what you think of
their Kingdom of Gilead beef, too.
(thanks to Valley Girl and TeddySanFran)
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During today's washingtonpost.com
online chat, the beleaguered
Dana Milbank defends his wearing of the Orange as a statement of solidarity with the Dutch Olympic team.
Which lead to this follow-up question:
Boston, Mass.: Interestingly, I read that Queen Beatrix issued the following statement in your support:
Ik stel erg op prijs de steun dat Dana Milbank voor onze olympisch ploeg toonde door het dragen van onze nationale kleuren. Samen met miljoenen Nederlanders, neem ik kwallig de kleinzieligheid van Deborah Howell, die vaker onder de schijnwerpers gekomen is wegens de inhoudelijke fouten van haar verslagen. Lang leve Dana Milbank, het rapporteren van de waarheid, en het Huis van Oranje!
Did her spokesmen clear this with you?
Dana Milbank: I could not have said it better.
Dannyboy gives us a translation in the comments:
"I heartily appreciate the support that Dana Milbank showed for our Olympic team by wearing the national colors. Together with millions of Dutchmen, I take offense at the mean-spiritedness of Debbie Howell, who has more than once been in the spotlight for the factual errors in her reporting. Long live Dana Milbank, reporting the truth, and the House of Orange!"
See, the truth
does have a home at the Washington Post. Just as long as it's written in a language completely incomprehensible to 99.9% of its readers.
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Today:
JACKI SCHECHNER, CNN INTERNET REPORTER: We want to give you a peek into how this local legislation is resonating nationally. There's not a lot of talk on the big, conservative political blogs, other than just linking to the news, but what little chatter we are seeing is about how this may be a sign of things to come.
It may be a sense that now that the Supreme Court is seeming to turn a little more conservative, this may be the start of lots of states challenging on this level.
We went to over to prolifeblogs -- this is one of the big blogs that was first and foremost in the fight for Terri Schiavo. And they say actually that the stipulation within this legislation that allows for an abortion in the case that the mother's life is at risk is actually a giant loophole. They'd like to see that go away.
That's right. You fuck you die. Your life thereafter as a woman is worth less than the embryo you carry. Your sole function is as human host, and should you fail in that task your death is appropriate punishment.
At least they're willing to come right out and say it.
There's also some reaction on the left that the stipulation that would punish doctors for with five years of imprisonment may be too much for moderate Republicans. And now there's also a call on the left to go after Joe Lieberman, saying that he helped to confirm Alito, this is all his fault. They want to support his [N]ed Lamont in the Senate race against Lieberman. So it's resonating. It's bubbling up, and then resonating out, Wolf.
That's right, it is all Lieberman's fault (that was FDL she was referring to, BTW). And it is resonating. It is bubbling up.
As long as we're on the subject, Ned Lamont reminded me of this
Lieberman golden oldie:
"You would have kept the tube in?" asked NBC's "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert.
Lieberman, a Demcoratic U.S. senator from Connecticut who ran as his party�s vice presidential nominee in 2000, replied, "I would have kept the tube in."
The exchange began when Russert mentioned Lieberman's Republican House colleague, Rep. Christopher Shays.
Shays said he believed the GOP would suffer "repercussions" from voting last week to try to get the brain-damaged Florida woman's feeding tube replaced.
"This Republican Party of Lincoln has become a party of theocracy. ... There are going to be repercussions from this vote [on Schiavo's constitutional rights]," Shays said. "There are a number of people who feel that the government is getting involved in their personal lives in a way that scares them."
Russert asked Lieberman if he "agreed" with that statement.
"I don't," Lieberman said. And though he said Shays' statement was "a very credible and respectable opinion, the fact is that, though I know a lot of people's attitude toward the Schiavo case and other matters is affected by their faith and their sense of what religion tells them about morality, ultimately as members of Congress, as judges, as members of the Florida state Legislature, this is a matter of law. And the law exists to express our values.
"I have been saying this in speeches to students about why getting involved in government is so important. I always say the law is where we define the beginning of life and the end of life, and that's exactly what was going on here," Lieberman continued.
"And I think as a matter of law, if you go - particularly to the 14th Amendment, [you] can't be denied due process, have your life or liberty taken without due process of law, that though the Congress' involvement here was awkward, unconventional, it was justified to give this woman, more than her parents or husband, the opportunity for one more chance before her life was terminated by an act which was sanctioned by a court, by the state."
Lieberman added, "These are very difficult decisions, but - of course, if you ask me what I would do if I was the Florida Legislature or any state legislature, I'd say that if somebody doesn't have a living will and the next of kin disagree on whether the person should be kept alive or that is whether food and water should be taken away and her life ended - that really the benefit of the doubt ought to be given to life."
In conclusion, Lieberman said, "The family member who wants to sustain her life ought to have that right because the judge really doesn't know, though he heard the facts, one judge, what Terri Schiavo wanted. He made a best guess based on the evidence before him. That's not enough when you're talking about aggressively removing food and water to end someone's life."
"You would have kept the tube in?" asked NBC's "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert.
Lieberman replied, "I would have kept the tube in."
That was on May 27, 2005, two days after a
three judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the parents of Terri Schiavo. Not to mention all the
other 20 judges involved in adjudicating the case over the previous decade.
Maybe it's Joe's noodly grasp of the facts that is causing people like Bill Buckley -- the man responsible for putting him office in the first place -- to jump ship from his
tough talking chickenhawk Iraq stance.
As Kos says, Lieberman's actions are those of a man
completely freaked out by
Ned Lamont.
And well he should be. Weasely little creep.
Update: I
'm on was on the
Young Turks talking about NARAL, South Dakota and Ned.
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This is one of the most hilarious things I've read in a
long, long time:
State Sen. Robert Hagan sent out e-mails to fellow lawmakers late Wednesday night, stating that he intends to "introduce legislation in the near future that would ban households with one or more Republican voters from adopting children or acting as foster parents." The e-mail ended with a request for co-sponsorship....
To further lampoon Hood's bill, Hagan wrote in his mock proposal that "credible research" shows that adopted children raised in Republican households are more at risk for developing "emotional problems, social stigmas, inflated egos, and alarming lack of tolerance for others they deem different than themselves and an air of overconfidence to mask their insecurities."
However, Hagan admitted that he has no scientific evidence to support the above claims.
Just as "Hood had no scientific evidence" to back his assertion that having gay parents was detrimental to children, Hagan said.
"It flies in the face of reason when we need to reform our education system, address health care and environmental issues that we put energy and wasted time (into) legislation (Hood's) like this," continued Hagan, who has been in the Ohio Senate nine years. Before the Senate, he served 19 years in the Ohio House.
Good on this state Senator in Ohio. Ridicule is an appropriate response on this, and one we ought to use more often.
My husband was listening to some comedian the other day who was riffing on the whole discrimination against gays obsession that the religious right has developed. The comedian said something to the effect that these folks seem to be playing some sort of weird child's game of telephone with God.
On the front end, God says, "Be good to each other." But what they hear is "don't let gays adopt children."
With
16 states considering banning gay adoptions in this country:
Where bills are being drafted or discussed: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, and West Virginia.
Yep, I'm ashamed to say someone is trying to put this forward in my own state and I had no idea. But I know now -- and I'm going to find out who is behind it, and let them know how I feel. Me and a few thousand of my friends.
It's time for those of us who find this to be a bigoted mindset to stand up and say so. I have very good friends who have provided loving, stable homes to children who would otherwise perhaps still be in an orphanage or in foster care.
What's next, regulations that only married people get to do in vitro fertilization? Erm...yeah, looks like they are
already working on that, too.
You think the line stops at abortion? Think again. It is time that all of us who disagree with an evangelical theocracy being imposed on the entire country stand up and be counted. Government ought not be in my bedroom, and I sure as hell don't want it telling me or anyone else who I get to love -- including telling me whether or not I get to love my child, or my friends get to love theirs.
Oh, and South Dakota's legislature just sent their abortion ban bill to the Governor, who is indicating that he will sign it. Put your
money where your values are -- and do some work for a candidate who supports your values in your area. The only way we protect our rights and our values is if we do the work. So, let's get to work.
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Church Lady Brady's got nothing on Loofah Bill when it comes to thin skin.
From his website:
February 22, 2006
Chairman Robert Wright
National Broadcasting Company
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, New York 10112
Dear Chairman Wright:
We, the undersigned, are becoming increasingly concerned about the well-being of MSNBC and, in particular, note the continuing ratings failure of the program currently airing weeknights on that network at 8:00 PM EST.
It is now apparent to everyone that a grave injustice has been done to the previous host for that time slot, Phil Donahue, whose ratings, at the time of his show's cancellation three years ago, were demonstrably stronger than those of the current host.
Therefore, in an effort to rescue MSNBC from the ratings basement and to restore the honor and dignity of Mr. Donahue, who was ignobly removed as host three years ago, we ask that you immediately bring Phil Donahue's show back at 8:00 PM EST before any more damage is done.
When you think of the towering achievements in the Falafosphere already chalked up by
Al Franken,
David Letterman and now Keith Olbermann, our "organized smear website funded by radical left-wing billionaires" seems
quite insignificant.And I was so proud.
Keith just turned into Must See TV tonight.
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There is a hearing today in the Libby matter, according to reporting
from the AP (via NYTimes).
Defense lawyers and Mr. Fitzgerald are to appear in Federal District Court here on Friday to argue defense requests for classified records and evidence gathered by the prosecution about reporters who learned about Ms. Wilson from officials other than Mr. Libby.
I haven't been able to confirm a time for the hearing, but as soon as I hear anything on this -- or results from whatever arguments occur today, I'll be sure and let everyone know.
Beyond that, Team Libby filed more motions yesterday, this time claiming that Patrick Fitzgerald was improperly appointed and that the indictment ought to be dismissed as a result. As I've said countless times here, the job of defense counsel is to protect their clients' interest, and that includes the filing of motions that may not have a snowball's chance in hell of actually winning -- but they must be filed, to make a record on every potential argument for appeal should Libby be convicted. If you don't make the record with a paper trail, or via oral argument in court on the record, then you lose the issue for appeal -- and no lawyer wants to do that, no matter how slim the margin for success might be.
I had actually prepared to do a lengthy post on the latest Libby filing (which can be
read here), but this morning I was alerted to a post from Andy McCarthy at the NRO Corner (h/t to reader moi in the comments for bringing this to my attention) which sums things up nicely, so I'm going to excerpt a couple of points here (sorry, I'm not linking, because the last time I did the return traffic brought with it hateful e-mail spam in my mailbox for three weeks (and one troll who still e-mails once a week), and I just don't have the time to spend hitting my delete button all day long and play with my child -- but it's the National Review Corner Online, in case you want to google it):
Libby’s premise is flawed. Fitzgerald is not a “principal officer” for purposes of the case; he is an “inferior officer.” The defense attempts to cast him as a principal officer by portraying his warrant as broader than that of Judge Starr, who was held an inferior officer as the Lewinsky independent counsel in Morrison v. Olson (1988). But this fails for at least three reasons.
First, Pat’s jurisdiction is comparable to Starr’s – it’s different in some respects, but it’s not materially broader, and its differences are, as I’ve previously suggested, less constitutionally strange than the construct prescribed in the lapsed independent counsel statute. Second, and more importantly, Libby is misreading Edmond v. United States (1997), which, like Morrison itself, makes quite clear that Starr’s jurisdiction in no way marked the outer limit of “inferior officer” terrain beyond which “principal officer” status (and its confirmation requirements under the Appointments Clause) is triggered....Finally, and relatedly, Fitzgerald’s authority fits well within the parameters of “inferior officer” under Edmond....
Suffice it to say that Libby is exaggerating the purported limitlessness of Pat’s powers. The delegation of authority to Pat could have been withdrawn at any time by the Attorney General....
Moreover, going back to first principles, for the first 80 years of the Republic, when there was no Justice Department, it was a commonplace for the Attorney General to delegate his authority to private attorneys. While, as Mark points out, there is now a statutory framework, and such an arrangement might not suffice under it, there was no constitutional defect in it.
I’m also constrained to observe that during the Lewinsky controversy, we looked with disdain on these hyper-technical legal maneuvers (like Clinton’s risible attempts to create new evidentiary privileges) whose unabashed purpose was to derail the prosecution. Back then, we used to say the important public interest was to resolve whether public officials had lied and obstructed justice. Now, such maneuvers somehow seem worthy, and we are apt to find the prosecutor, rather than the defendant, to be stonewalling (as in Byron’s column of yesterday, which, with due respect, is based on an elementary legal error which I hope to have more to say about today). I guess it all depends on whose ox is being gored.
I hope that Andy doesn't mind my pulling an extended excerpt, but this was very well argued and exactly on point with what I have been thinking and what my research was telling me. And, frankly, it's nice to see someone stand on principle and facts rather than just parroting the team talking points, and I find it nice to highlight that where I find it on all sides these days.
I've said this previously, but it is worth repeating: prosecutors and law enforcement investigators get incredibly annoyed with people who lie to them or otherwise obstruct their case -- precisely because the lying and obstruction is designed to derail a criminal investigation and thwart justice. We are a nation of laws, and no one should be exempt from accountability for breaking them. Period. Justice is blind for a reason -- and trying to cheat her is conduct for which one should pay a penalty.
Carol Leonnig hits some of the same notes as McCarthy in her
coverage in the WaPo, including:
Several legal experts said yesterday that the Libby defense team was making a valiant and appropriate effort to defend its client, but said they doubted that the central argument for dismissing the charges would gain traction with the court.
"I think it's a nice try, but I don't give it much chance of success," said Scott Fredericksen, an associate independent counsel during the Reagan administration who helped investigate scandals at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
She also reports this interesting nugget, which I thought was worthy of mention
here this morning:
Other documents released with their filings show that by August 2004, eight months after beginning his investigation, Fitzgerald had amassed a large amount of evidence suggesting that Libby was lying to investigators. Libby's accounts of conversations with administration officials and reporters about Plame conflicted with others offered by virtually every administration official and reporter questioned by Fitzgerald's investigators.
Thanks again, Team Libby, for bringing even more interesting information about your client, his lies, and the reasons therefor to our attention. Publicly. (See several of the exhibits attached
to the motion here.)
For even more information on the recent Libby filing,
SusanG had a great diary on this at dKos yesterday evening.
Keep in mind that there will likely be a whole lot more motions to follow in this pre-trial arguments process. It is common, and it is necessary for both sides to clarify a lot of complex legal arguments in this matter. But in some cases, it is building the official record on behalf of your sides' interests for appeal in case you lose -- which is exactly the thing that lawyers are supposed to do -- and to also argue on the merits those issues which you feel you must in order to protect your client's interests, be that client Scooter Libby or the citizens of the US.
There will hopefully be more news today as we get updates on the hearing, and we'll bring it to you when we hear it. There will be some public portion to the hearing (so we hear, anyway), but the bulk of the arguments will likely be closed-door if they get into the specifics on the classified materials. Also, be forewarned that judges don't always rule immediately from the bench on motions arguments but, instead, take time to do their own, independent review of the law (via their clerks' and their own research) and the facts, and then the judge issues a ruling at a later time. We may get some rulings from the bench today, and some delays while the judge does some legal review -- but whatever happens, I'll try to interpret for everyone as I get the information.
Also, Jeralyn has
more at TalkLeft. Looking forward to more of her thoughts on the memory issues, because it is a very complex, very difficult subject to do well -- and Libby, in my opinion, is going to be skating the razor's edge with this as his main defense.
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Today as part of our Roots project we're asking people from Kansas (or those with ties to Kansas) to write in to local papers regarding the Senate hearings into the illegal NSA wiretaps. Kansas is the home of both Pat Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Sam Brownback of the Judiciary Committee. As Meteor Blades pointed out, many places will just ignore letters that don't have a Kansas address so if you are a Kansas resident your participation is really important.
Glenn Greenwald has a great post up with some very clear and concise
talking points. It's important to put things in your own words, however, and not just "cut and paste" as those will probably wind up in the bin as well.
Kansas blogger Josh Roseneau who writes at
Thoughts From Kansas has an excellent post up on the subject from a local perspective along with an in-depth media contact list for many local regions. And Thersites from
Vichy Dems provides this quick national impact list:
The Kansas City Star
Letters
1729 Grand Blvd.
Kansas City, MO 64108
816-234-4636
Guidelines : Paper accepts LTEs, "Voices", "As I See It" columns and Op-Eds. LTEs max. 150 words; must include name, address, daytime phone.
How to submit :
Snail mail at above address, or
letters@kcstar.com
Alternate venue : "Reader's Representative: For concerns or questions regarding the fairness or accuracy of The Star's news coverage." readerrep@kcstar.com
The Lawrence Journal-World
609 New Hampshire
P.O Box 888
Lawrence, Kansas 66044
How to submit :
Paper asks for LTEs via Webform; not sure whether they accept by snail mail
Alternate venues : Editorial Page Editor Ann Gardner, 832-7153, agardner@ljworld.com
Online Editor Dave Toplikar, 832-7151, dtoplikar@ljworld.com
The Topeka Capital-Journal
616 SE Jefferson
Topeka KS 66607
Fax (785) 295-1230
How to submit :
Snail mail at above address, or
letters@cjonline.com
Alternate venue : Executive Editor Pete Goering, pete.goering@cjonline.com
The Wichita Eagle
Reader Views
P.O. Box 820
Wichita, Kan. 67201
Note : Editorial (from news service, not home-grown) theyÂre running today on topic. Consider writing a letter responding to it.
Guidelines : Max 200 words. Include name, address and telephone. Letters are signed with the writer's name and town.
How to submit :
Snail mail at above address, or
Fax: (316) 269-6799, or
Webform;
Alternate venues :
Editorial blog: http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/
Opinion Editor Phillip Brownlee pbrownlee@wichitaeagle.com
The Pitch (alternative paper, KC)
Guidelines : Must include full name (but can request they don't print it), email address OR telephone number; city; and "title of the article you are writing about."
How to submit : Webform;, or
feedback@pitch.com
The Olathe News
514 South Kansas Ave., Olathe, KS 66061
Phone (913) 764-2211 -- Fax (913) 764-3672
How to submit :
editor@theolathenews.com
Lee's Summit Journal
How to submit : Webform; (apparently same form is used for subscriptions and LTEs).
Alternate venue : Ann Scheer, Editor, ascheer@lsjournal.com
The Cass County (MO) Democrat-Missourian
301 South Lexington
P.O. Box 329
Harrisonville, MO 64701
How to submit :
Snail mail at the above address, or
Fax at (816) 380-7650, or
editorial@demo-mo.com
The Star-Herald (Northwest Cass County) (Weekly)
P.O. Box 379
Belton, MO 64012
Guidelines : Include name, hometown and daytime telephone number. "[O]ne page typed double-spaced or neatly printed is a good measure." "Letters endorsing or against political candidates will not be published."
How to submit :
Snail mail at the above address, or
news@thestar-herald.com
Update: Vichy Dems has a more complete, updated list.
If you are from Kansas or feel like you can write on behalf of family or friends there or have some other sort of tie to the state please take a moment to carefully craft your own thoughts, follow the specific submission guidelines and send a letter.
It's awfully difficult to cut through the national media ice on this (or any other) subject and by using local media we may be able to have a much greater impact at a time when BushCo. is busy fighting other battles and won't see it coming.
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President Bush at a
cabinet meeting yesterday:
Bush at cabinet meeting: "And so people don't need to worry about security. This deal wouldn't go forward if we were concerned about the security for the United States of America."
And in this morning's newswire reports from the AP, the UAE/Dubai-owned port corporation has taken the face-saving
step for Bushie:
A United Arab Emirates company has volunteered to postpone its takeover of significant operations at six major U.S. seaports, giving the White House more time to convince skeptical lawmakers the deal poses no increased risks from terrorism.
The surprise concession late Thursday cools the standoff building between the Congress and President Bush over his administration's previous approval of the deal. In early reaction, lawmakers praised the temporary hold. But some critics pressed anew for an intensive examination of the deal's risks.
I'd like to think that this will be some sort of lesson learned by this White House, that they need to do their homework on things up front instead of after-the-fact, that transparency is always preferable to secrecy in matters which the American people have a substantial interest, that Congress has the obligation to provide some oversight rather than just be ignored or stonewalled.
But I'm sure not going to hold my breath that they've learned anything other than a petulant President is no fun.
At least he finally made good on his promise to be a uniter not a divider: Americans across the political spectrum are united in not trusting that the President actually did the work on this port deal. Perhaps because the WH is now insisting that the President didn't know anything about the deal at all until the press started asking about it. That
Clueless excuse is a political flop, isn't it?
And to all those conservatives who have asked questions about this deal, welcome to the "you are unpatriotic" club. How's it feel to know that your President thinks you ought to just keep your mouth shut and agree with him -- or have your patriotism and love of country questioned by your own government if you don't fall in their line?
Heckuva job, Bushie!
UPDATE:
Mark Kleiman raises an important question today that ought to have a clear answer, but apparently does not: who is actually running port security in this country? The fact that current and former Bush Administration officials aren't coming up with the same answer is more than a little troubling, don't you think?
You know, the more I look at the state of port security in this country, the more I'm glad that I don't live anywhere near a major port. Has any real work been done on this since 9/11? Any readers out there with experience in this issue -- please chime in, because I'm interested in some answers on this from people with on-the-ground observations and real world experience. I've had enough of the political talking heads, what I'd like is to hear from real people who have done some real work on this and talk about what has been and what still needs to be done.
UPDATE #2: Big kudos to
Prof. Juan Cole for his appearance on CNN this morning. Great stuff. If you haven't read
his blog, please take a moment to go over and take a peek. Some very scary stuff on Iraq this morning, but it is information we ought to all be paying attention to -- and contemplating -- regularly.
And while we're talking about the unrest in Iraq (and elsewhere, to be honest) I just wanted to take a moment to tell our readers in uniform to stay safe and keep your head down. I got an e-mail from a friend of mine currently stationed in Afghanistan, about some news of another mutual acquaintence currently in Baghdad, and I'm keeping them and everyone else in uniform in my prayers and thoughts today. It's a very volatile time, and some incredibly decent folks are in harms way (in and out of uniform, because our diplomatic staff and aide workers are just as much on the front lines as well). Just stay safe, folks -- wanted to let you know I'm thinking about all of you today.
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In a very non-gender specific way, of course. From
MyLeftNutmeg:
Daily Kos: CT-Sen: NOW gets it
by: Larkspur
February 23, 2006 at 19:18:16 EST
( - promoted by Matthew Gertz)
This diary by Markos got the phones ringing off the hook at CT NOW headquarters. I got a call from our Exec Director, Kathleen Sloan, a few hours ago and she said that she was getting calls from as far away as California about her Feb. 1 press release. And she's gotten an avalanche of emails thanking CT NOW for rebuking Lieberman for his vote on Alito.
She had sent the Press Release out after Lieberman's last Alito vote around Feb. 1. The only call CT NOW got back then was from Lieberman's office. They called to complain about the press release to CT NOW's political director. They said that Lieberman has always supported women's rights in the past and he didn't deserve the treatment he got in our Feb. 1 press release.
Kathleen asked me why all the sudden interest in a press release she sent out a few weeks ago. I checked DailyKos and sure enough Markos Moulitsas, the founder of DailyKos, had posted a diary about CT NOW's Feb. 1 press release and asked readers to call CT NOW thanking us for our stand. He posted this diary partly as a response to the new law banning abortions in South Dakota.
DailyKos diary by the founder of that blog Markos Moulitsas "CT-Sen: NOW gets it"
Kos links to blogger firedoglake diary "Ned Lamont and NOW" (you may have to do a find on the title to find it)
I had sent the Lamont campaign the CT NOW Feb. 1 press release and it was Ned Lamont who gave it to blogger firedoglake, who was impressed. Markos read firedoglakes blog and linked to it.
The power of the netroots!!!
I hear that NARAL is feeling the heat and is "irritated" by all the phone calls and emails they are getting. I'm also told that they "do not like you very much."
Well they can just sit over there and whimper with Church Lady Brady, Lil' Debbie Howell and Ole 60 Grit O'Beirne in the honorary FDL WATB chair. Being on their shit list is a badge of honor as far as I'm concerned.
(thanks to thirdparty for the catch)
Update: Well let's give them
something to bitch about.
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It seems quite clear that the new South Dakota legislation outlawing abortion is a means to test out the new Supreme Court now that Strip Search Sammy is on the job. How is a small state like South Dakota able to
afford such an expensive legal skirmish?
The hope of the bill's supporters, reports Jodi Schwan of CBS affiliate KELO-TV, is that the U.S. Supreme Court will be more receptive if the case gets that far.
"They feel with the changing makeup of the Supreme Court that it is perhaps a time to start challenging Roe v. Wade, and they think especially with the addition of Alito and Roberts to the court that those are justices who would vote in their favor," says Schwan.
Supporters of the ban have said an anonymous donor has pledged to provide South Dakota with $1 million to help defend the law in court.
If this "anonymous donor" thing seems wrong to you in more ways than you can count, remember that our strength is in numbers so please
give whatever you can afford, no matter how small to help break up the Gang of 14 who have committed themselves to the destruction of choice in this country (we've already raised over $4,000 in two days to help Ned Lamont -- YEA HAH!!).
Meanwhile that confirmed heterosexual breeder General J.C. Christian has found himself in the spotlight review again at Amazon. A telling nugget from his past gives us a peek into the enigma that is the General in a review entitled "
Close, but no falafels."
(BTW -- did I mention that Amazon will not delete reviews if they recommend other books instead? Apropos of nothing, of course.)
And John Amato from Crooks & Liars will be talking about blogging with Alan Colmes' radio show tonight at 8pm PST/11pm EST. You can listen
here.
(graphic by
Jesus' General)
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As a big pro-choice person, I have absolutely no doubt that
E.J. Dionne's contention -- namely that most forced childbirth forces actually "care" about "
the taking of innocent life" -- is a steaming load of nonsense. What they
care about is punishing women for having sex. Because you never see them picketing outside in vitro fertilization clincs do you? And yet the end result is the same -- creation of embryos that will only die. If life begins at conception, then in vitro fertilization is murder too. Period.
I
wrote this a while back (when I was getting 25 hits a day so I'm sure nobody's read it unless that's you, Mom) about a debate on the first episode of the Ron Reagan/Monica Crowley show on MSNBC (the spiffy dresser I now know was Byron York). I don't think I could say it any better now than I did then:
On the pro side they had Alta Charo, professor of bioethics at the University of Wisconsin, and on the con side they trotted out Some Dude whose name I can't remember, whose personal style is cribbed from a 1957 issue of Gent and whose contention is that life begins at the moment of conception when sperm meets egg and having been thus blessed by the Divine Hand of the Creator it is henceforth entitled to the same protections as an adult human. In fact, more protection than if the life happens to belong to some African American on death row, but now I'm off topic and I don't even want to get into that right now. The ultimate conclusion is that Embryonic Stem Cell Research Is Wrong.
So Alta brings up the conundrum that's always guaranteed to set wingnut heads a-spinning and green pea soup spewing from their mouths, which is basically a riff on "if a fire breaks out in a fertility clinic, who do you save -- a Petri dish with five blastula or the two year-old child?" Suddenly everyone's yelling, Monica's mouth starts doing that other thing it does which is not a smile, and the whole show devolves into a split-screen talking head orgy of indignation. Nobody ever answers the question, by the way.
Whenever I hear wingnuts arguing about stem cell research I always get the feeling that they are doing so under duress, like reluctant Visigoths who've been forced to carry the battle into a town they really don't care about sacking. But having made the argument that women should not have control over their own bodies and be entitled to an abortion because even the littlest zygote amongst us is sacred, and not because they hate and fear women and want to relegate them to the social role of biological functionaries, they have to naturally extend the argument and oppose embryonic stem cell research as well. You know, for consistency's sake and all.
This is going to surprise a lot of people, but I actually respect that argument. If you really believe that life begins at conception and that all life is sacred, and therefore the destruction of any life is unethical, I really can't argue with you. Because I can only say what I believe, which is obviously not that, but I can't claim to have some sort of ultimate dispensation of knowledge that will answer the question of when life begins. So if someone wants to claim that life begins at conception, and works diligently against any, and I mean ANY procedure that would result in the creation of a cluster of cells that might one day result in the development of a human being only to ultimately thwart that process with its destruction, I have to respect that as an honest position.
But here's where it starts to get prickly. Because Ron then proceeds to point out that during the in vitro fertilization process numerous embryos are created but only the first one to "take" will produce a child. Mr. Needs to Update His Personal Style then argues that this is actually okay, because the embryos that are not used are not destroyed; they are merely frozen for all eternity. And since I was consumed at that moment with peeling an orange and drinking half of a flat Coke from yesterday I didn't get it all down word for word, so I'll have to paraphrase, but in a nutshell Ms. Charo's response was that after a certain length of time the embryos are no longer viable anyway so who are you fuckin' trying to kid, Jack.
Well now I'm consumed by curiosity about how the wingers address this thorny issue so I cruise on over to the NRO to consult that self-professed Oracle of all things Right, K.J. Lopez, and I found an article by her on in vitro fertilization cleverly entitled Eggheads. It's filled with the usual NRO "ooh, Science scary" tocsins, as well as a dig at working women ("The demand side of the market comes mostly from career-minded baby-boomers, the frontierswomen of feminism, who thought they could have it all"). But then she goes on to note that 15% of all mothers in this country get a little help on the fertility front from science, and since that probably includes no small number of Iowa fundies looking to increase the flock of the faithful, she stops short of casting Joe and Sally Christian who just want to breed, breed breed into the fiery ovens of eternal damnation if they happen to brew up a few extra embryos they never intend to use along the way. A strange omission.
Or maybe not. I surfed around to various anti-choice websites, trying to find out if there was any kind of consistent voice on this front, and it took me to a lot of dillies, but I found that most of them simply sidestepped the issue altogether. Some didn't, several of the Catholic ones were vocally opposed to in vitro fertilization, and I tip my hat to them for the consistency of their argument. I can hardly claim to have made a comprehensive and exhaustive exploration of the subject, because, you know, I had to finish the rest of that Coke. But on the whole it seems to be a bit of a sticking point that the fundies would just rather not address.
But it does lead to this other question that nags at me. When John M. Opitz of the University of Utah testified before the President's council on Bioethics in 2003, he noted that between 60 and 80 percent of all naturally conceived embryos are simply flushed out in a woman's normal menstrual cycle in the first 7 days after fertilization, and that women never even know that conception has taken place.
(As a side note, at the same meeting, Harvard government professor Michael Sandel, also a member of the Bioethics council, noted that "If the embryo loss that accompanies natural procreation were the moral equivalent of infant death, then pregnancy would have to be regarded as a public health crisis of epidemic proportions: Alleviating natural embryo loss would be a more urgent moral cause than abortion, in vitro fertilization, and stem-cell research combined." Although I enjoy Dr. Sandel's sense of humor and appreciate the presence of a smartass on the Bioethics council, I really do, let's just chalk this one up to "God's will" for the moment and proceed with the question at hand.)
Now, I'm certain by most fundamentalist assessments that when I die, barring some sort of deathbed recant of the Lee Atwater variety, I am going to hell. (That last vote for John Kerry probably put me over the top.) But say by some fluke God has a soft spot for unrepentant preacher's kids who are good to their dogs, and I wind up in heaven. Is 60 to 80 percent of the population going to be filled out with people who never made it past dome stage blastula? I mean -- conversation is liable to be a bit thin, don't you think? What can you really say beyond "congratulations on winning the big swim?"
Abortion/in vitro fertilization. Abortion/in vitro fertilization. Two sides of the same coin. If you think one is moral and the other is not you are inherently dishonest.
(Update: Byron York emailed Atrios and asked him to tell me it was not him. I of course was off getting irresponsibly knocked up.)
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We knew the issue of choice would be the first thing that the evangelical right tried to hit out of the park after Justice Alito was elevated to the bench. It's one of the main reasons that Jane and I worked our tails off trying to stop the appointment -- and the prior appointment of Justice Roberts. It was a big part of why I hit the pavement and the phone banks and did everything I could for the Kerry campaign for months back in 2004.
Around the time of the Alito vote, I talked about my rationale for being pro-choice. I want to raise a couple of points I discussed then, so I'm going to re-print something I wrote
back on January 24th:
Above and beyond the issues of personal liberty and freedom (as though that isn't enough), there are also questions of privacy and choice. I've actually had to spend time with young teens who have been impregnated by family members (father, stepfather, brother) through rape and incest, and then had to make the decision as to whether or not to terminate the pregnancy or carry a child of incest to term for nine long months. I can tell you that it is heartbreaking for everyone involved, no matter what the decision. To try and criminalize someone who has already been victimized in that manner is horrendous -- but to use this issue as a dividing line through inflamatory speech and no compassion for the people facing this heart-rending choice is unconscionable.
That Alito is the number one selection for people like Tom Coburn based solely on whatever wink and a nod someone has given him in a back room that "Alito is one of us" is beyond infuriating.
I don't want people to have more abortions. If I could, I'd wave a wand and make all babies be born under ideal circumstances to parents who would love and care for them.
But I happen to live in the all-too-real world, where sexual abuse and violent rape and all those other nasty things happen, where children wake up and wonder if there will be any food for them to eat -- right here in the US of A -- and where other things that most people can never even imagine happen within families and neighborhoods and all over the place.
And I know enough to know this: I don't speak for God, and neither should anyone else. That's why it is an individual choice -- you make peace with your own soul, your own faith and your own family and friends based on your own, individual and hideous circumstances in each case -- and beyond that, it's no one's business. And I say this as someone who struggled with fertility issues for close to seven years and fully understands how very precious that life is. But I've seen enough horrible things in my life in the law to know that there are just some circumstances where you cannot know unless you happen to be walking in those particular shoes...those very dismal, very difficult shoes.
I want to let you all in on something that I don't talk about very often. I am a rape survivor. It happened when I was very young, and to my lifetime shame, I never reported the rape to law enforcement, because I was too ashamed and was afraid that I would be blamed for it.
As I said, I was young -- but despite how horribly brutal the rape was, I was lucky. I never had to face the choice of an abortion because I did not get pregnant. Thank God.
But every single time I hear someone talk about being pro-life without giving a thought to the woman involved, I cringe. Because I could have easily been impregnated against my will. Violently, viciously impregnated.
And now, some young girl in South Dakota who is raped and finds herself pregnant will be forced to carry the child of her rapist, feeling it grow and move, a daily reminder of the rape -- with the flashbacks, the terror, the nightmares, the gut-wrenching fear -- everything that you have to overcome after being raped, along with handling the emotions and the responsibilities that come along with a pregnancy.
Wealthy women will be able to travel to other states and obtain an abortion. But, as with so many other things, the poor will be disproportionately affected because they will not be able to pay to travel, stay overnight somewhere, have an abortion and then get the necessary adequate follow-up medical care, let alone the necessary counseling.
Poor women will face the unenviable choice of carrying the child of a rapist or a child conceived of incest (imagine the hell of being impregnated by your own father for a moment)...or perhaps the choice of a back-alley, unsafe abortion and then the resulting sterility or worse, an infection that leads to death, that caused abortion laws to be fought so hard for in the 1970s.
Being pro-life does not mean that you can only value the life of the fetus while it is in the womb. If you are pro-life, you have to value all life. You have to work to make life better for all living people. Not just the ones that live in your sterile, gated community or who attend your Laura Ashley-dressed church ladies society or who volunteer at the PTA.
Life is ugly, messy and unfair. Last time I read my Bible, Christ asked his followers to do for the least of his bretheren as they would do for the highest of them.
Last I checked, rape and incest victims didn't ask for the violent, terrifying, horrible action taken against them. But clearly someone in South Dakota disagrees.
Shame on them. And shame on every single "pro-choice" politician who voted for cloture on Alito. Every woman in this nation is about to reap what those politicians so cavilierly have sown. Shame, shame, shame.
I
agree with Jane -- put your money where your values are.
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South Dakota has now
passed a law banning abortion with no exception for rape or incest thanks to angry, cowardly men (and women) like the one pictured above, whom TBogg dubs "lildick."
TBogg has more on this fellow most women wouldn't fuck on a bet (and boy is he going to make us pay) who was instrumental in this law's passage.
As Digby says, enough already with this bullshit about how much they value life. I'll have more on that high hypocrisy and the mushy-headed tripe of people like EJ Dionne later, but for now
just read Digby.
The law was passed, in large, because the way is now clear to a Supreme Court who might actually uphold it. A supreme court whose balance was tilted to the right when Joe Lieberman and Lincoln Chafee voted for cloture on Samuel Alito. NARAL and Planned Parenthood are whimpering on the ground, sniveling even as they frolic in the huge mountain of cash they raised for the purpose of fighting Alito's confirmation. Which they did not show up for. What did they do with that hoarded pile of cash? Then they had the outrageous gall to send out emails to their membership asking them to write thank-you letters to Lieberman for his vote. Why do they not understand? Their comfortable shift to the "middle" and toward the GOP can only be interpreted one way: follow the cash and fuck choice.
They cannot be trusted to be the guardians of pro-choice in this country any more.
If you care about choice, cut 'em off. And let them know why you're doing it. Contact Nancy Keenan at
NARAL. Contact Cecile Richardson at
Planned Parenthood. Tell them -- not one more dime until they denounce Lincoln Chafee and Joe Lieberman and endorse Ned Lamont.
Give your money to Ned Lamont. Choice in this country will not survive another Bush nominee to the Supreme Court confirmed by this Senate. It may not survive the ones we've already got. There is no more important task right now before the supporters of pro-choice in this country than breaking up the Gang of 14 and making sure that pro-choice Senators take the seats of those who would return us to coathanger days, and yes that means you, Lieberman.
Please. I'm
begging you. Support Ned Lamont with
whatever you've got.
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Team Libby has helpfully put their
February 21st filing and affadavit online for everyone to peruse. (Hat tip to reader moi for the find.)
Some of my favorite bits:
-- On page 6 of the response, they argue that in any other criminal case, their request for 277 Presidential Daily Briefings would be routinely granted. My thought on that: Mwahahahahaha. Good one. We'll see what the Judge says on Friday.
-- Essentially all of their arguments on why Libby ought to have access to such a broad swath of highly classified material boils down to "we'd like to argue that he was a busy man, working on really important stuff, and we want to bolster our argument by inundating a jury with lots of scary things that the President deals with daily." Look for Fitz to simply agree to stipulate that Libby was busy and worked on a lot of important things -- and see if the judge will let it go at that stipulation.
It is Team Libby's argument to make that anything beyond that is material to the perjury, obstruction and false statements charges -- and, I would argue, that is an uphill battle for them.
-- On page 19, there is a fine legal distinction attempted on the George case. It's really more of an interest for the lawyers in the audience, but you can see how much of a hairsplitting argument will be made on both sides to the Judge on Friday -- and how so much of this is going to rest on arguments of materiality and relevance. Ought to be an intriguing hearing.
-- Begining on page 26, Team Libby makes the "since our client wasn't charged with IIPA or Espionage, then we get to argue Fitz didn't do his complete job as a defense," and are attempting to find some way (ANY way) to leverage the CIA against the USAtty's office -- which would be a fine idea, were it not for the fact that their client's lies and obstructive behavior has thrown a wrench into that very investigation.
There is a huge reason that obstruction, perjury and false statements are taken very seriously by law enforcement: one simply cannot allow a defendant to avoid criminal responsibility by lying his way around more serious charges. Period. And Scooter Libby is no exception to this rule. No amount of playing hide the ball obscures that fact, but they are trying to play this game anyway. We'll see if the Judge buys any of it.
-- The Wells affadavit on faulty memory defense is going to require some serious scientific evidence testimony to even get this through the door -- and it ought to be an amusing legal pretzel argument to watch. Especially given the reporting we've seen on the Scooter Libby Notebook on Joe Wilson and his obsessive discussion of Joe Wilson with anyone he could corner in the White House for weeks on end.
Also, there is the pesky fact that Scooter is a lawyer by initial training and education. A very highly paid lawyer, who would have known, up front, what the penalties for perjury and false statements would be to a grand jury, to a federal investigator and the penalties for deliberately obstructing a criminal investigation in a matter of national security.
It will be incredibly difficult for them to argue that Libby just misunderstood his responsibilities -- given his position in the government, his understanding of national security secrecy, his understanding of criminal penalties, and such, it will be very, very difficult indeed to go with the "he was just relly confused and tired" defense.
But hey, hope springs eternal, I suppose.
And speaking of the Scooter Libby defense fund folks, their website is up and running. You can
take a peek here. Note that on the front page, Team Libby has a photo of Scooter with Hamid Karzai. (Clearly not trying to exploit 9/11 as a means of raising money. Nope. Not them.)
The WaPo did a little article on the Who's Who involved in this, with a lovely quote from our favorite gal, Babs.
"These are people who have been involved in political activities for a long while and know things can get pretty rough . . . who are willing to put their good names behind Scooter's good name," Barbara Comstock, Libby defense fund spokesperson, said.
You know, the good name that he used to manipulate the media, selectively leak information from the NIE that bolstered the Administration's case for war, and out a CIA NOC. Fabulous! Nothing like having a Republican shill as one of your peeps!
And speaking of those NIE leaks,
the LATimes has an article today about how Dick Cheney says some leaks are simply awful, while refusing to explain his role in authorizing in the selective NIE leaking from Scooter to reporters about town. Must suck when you are both the pot and the kettle.
In case you've missed it,
Eriposte has a fantastic investigative series going at the LeftCoaster on the Niger forgeries -- and has recently added some updates, based on newly discovered information. Great stuff!
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There is quite a bit of tap dancing from Team Libby -- and it has made for some interesting reading. I'm going to break this into two or maybe three posts today, because there is a lot of ground to cover between the news on the latest response filing and other courtroom matters, the actual filings themselves, the NIE revelations of "my superiors told me to do it" and the latest maneuvering from Dick Cheney to pass the responsibility buck, and the Scooter Libby defense fund bonanza.
Let's start with the latest news on the response filing.
Carol Leonnig in the WaPo goes over the Team Libby filing and pulls out a few bits -- most of which we
discussed yesterday here. In any case, Leonnig does get some new insights -- most likely from someone close to Team Libby (
Barbara Comstock, is that you?):
Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff was so consumed with pressing national security concerns in 2003 and 2004 that he undoubtedly forgot details of conversations he had about undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame, his defense lawyers argue in new court filings.
Attorneys for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby insist they need hundreds of pages of classified daily briefings prepared for President Bush to show that Libby did not intentionally lie about discussing Plame with reporters, as prosecutors allege. They contend that he was preoccupied with more serious matters when the conversations took place and when investigators questioned him months later.
While this is no doubt a lovely restatement of the filings by Team Libby, what Leonnig fails to inform the public of is that federal law enforcement officials and US Attorneys always (and I do mean ALWAYS) give the same litany to suspects who are being interviewed, deposed or subpoenaed for testimony.
It goes something like this: "You are only to tell us the truth as you know the facts. Do not speculate. Do not state your opinion. Only give us the facts as you know them to be true, and only the facts. If you do not know the answer to a question, please say 'I don't know.' Do not try to come up with an answer -- I would rather you tell me you don't know something if you truly do not know it. If you make a false statement, you can be charged with a crime. Do you understand?"
See
Matt Cooper's description of his testimony to the Grand Jury for more on how Fitz handles this with Cooper:
Fitzgerald counseled me that he wanted me to answer completely but didn't want to force any answers on me or have me act as if I remembered things more clearly than I did. "If I show you a picture of your kindergarten teacher and it really refreshes your memory, say so," he said. "If it doesn't, don't say yes just because I show you a photo of you and her sitting together."
Witnesses have an affirmative duty to be truthful in statements made to federal investigators and grand juries. And they are informed of this, before they ever open their mouths, by federal investigators, US Attorneys and their own defense counsel -- repeatedly. Often, if you have a witness on the stand before the Grand Jury who is hesitant in answering a question, the prosecutor will again remind them of this duty, prompt them that if they are not certain, that they should say so and not try to just come up with an answer -- I've done that an number of times with witnesses whose memory was just not rock solid. You want the truth, not some embellished story -- and witnesses are reminded of that fact repeatedly.
Anyone who has spent time doing criminal defense work or prosecutorial work (or even police work) has seen grand jury transcripts and interview transcript that are littered with "I don't recall." or "I'm sorry, but I just don't remember." or "I'm not certain about that, sorry." Which is exactly what you want as a law enforcement person -- better to be honest than wrong.
The fact that Libby chose to answer as he did with false information -- repeatedly -- speaks volumes to me, and no doubt to Fitz and
his entire team.
In announcing Libby's indictment last October, Fitzgerald accused Libby of displaying a detailed but selective memory with investigators. Libby told prosecutors he believed he learned that Plame worked at the CIA from NBC reporter Tim Russert in a telephone call in July 2003. But he forgot that Cheney had actually told him that information the previous month, and that three days before the Russert call, Libby passed it on to then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer.
Yep, sure sounds like his busy job made him do it, doesn't it? *snerk* Color me unconvinced.
Leonnig also throw in this bit
at the end:
Today, defense lawyers are also expected to file a motion asking U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton, who is presiding over the case, to dismiss all charges against Libby. On Friday, Fitzgerald and the defense attorneys are scheduled to argue at a court hearing whether Fitzgerald should have to provide Libby with classified material and information about reporters and administration officials questioned in the investigation.
Libby's trial is scheduled to start in January 2007, but many legal experts predict that legal battles over such questions could delay it.
A motion to dismiss charges is a standard defense motion -- you have to file it on behalf of your client at several points to protect their interest, to argue on their behalf any points that you think support this motion, and to preserve the motion on the record for the purposes of appeal, should your client be convicted.
At this stage, such a motion is rarely if ever granted -- especially with the amount of issues in controversy still to be decided with regard to factual arguments in this case -- so this is not something of concern for me. I thought the non-lawyers out there would appreciate some insight on this, though.
I will keep an ear to the ground regarding the hearing on Friday. Most likely what it will consist of is some argument on the motions and briefs filed thus far and, as a status conference, some detailing as to how disagreements over classified discovery will be resolved and how the judge will handle his own review process of the documents.
It's a standard sort of procedure to have the judge look at documents in dispute and determine relevency -- and, in this case, Judge Walton has requested additional staffing due to the sheer volume of documents that Team Libby is asking for that will have to be reviewed, so perhaps we'll find out if that staffing request has been granted or not on Friday.
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What a remarkable week of late nite poetry it's been. If the man who inspired
Dickfest was even half so clever as those he moved to poetic musing this week why there would be no call for such festivity, so for all his limitations we must thank him.
Because Meteor Blades suggested it, and because it damned near killed me to declare a winner, we are also announcing the runner ups.
The bronze medal goes to:
The Ballad of Swagger and Scowler
They came from Wyoming and Texas, addicted to
power and drink;
They bullied and lied, they tortured and spied till most folks
were too scared to blink;
But when Scowl shot a hunter he thought was a bird and
Swag let New Orleans drown,
Folks finally saw what these guys really were: a crusty old
coot and a clown.
by a littlemusicalityplease
In second place, and by only the smallest fraction (one vote), our silver medalist is:
An accident it must have been,
And not a planned attack
Because Dick shot him in the face
Instead of in the back.
by rageneau
And the gold goes to:
If epitaphs were polygraphs,
This, terse and edifying,
Would crown the veep in final sleep:
Here lies Big Time--still lying.
by 88
Thanks to everyone who entered. It was an exceptional contest. A whole lot of work but well worth it, very inspirational. Thanks also to everyone who took time to read all the entries and give such careful deliberation to their votes, and 88 please email me and I'll make sure
Bill Maher gets you your
book and poster.
I managed to mangle a couple via cut and paste and did not do them justice in the contest but I can't lay my hands on them right now so they will be featured in upcoming Late Nites as an extra bonus treat.
If you would like to show your appreciation to all the poets who participated, you can do so by contributing to
the tip jar for the preservation of Democracy.
(graphic by Monk at
Inflatable Dartboard)
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Regarding the mandatory investigation into the port matter, reader Sean writes:
The articles appear to be mistaken about the timing requirements under Exon-Florio. The statute calls for a mandatory investigation to begin within 30 days of notification and requires that the investigation cannot take more than 45 days. Such an investigation is mandatory: "in any instance in which an entity controlled by or acting on behalf of a foreign government seeks to engage in any merger, acquisition, or takeover which could result in control of a person engaged in interstate commerce in the United States that could affect the national security of the United States."
However, there's also this provision:(g) Report to the Congress
The President shall immediately transmit to the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House of Representatives a written report of the President’s determination of whether or not to take action under subsection (d), including a detailed explanation of the findings made under subsection (e) and the factors considered under subsection (f). Such report shall be consistent with the requirements of subsection (c) of this Act.
It seems pretty clear to me that the conditions for a mandatory investigation are satisfied in this case. So the question becomes: Did Bush file a report or, if not, who in the Administration determined that no investigation was required under Exon-Florio in this case?
Should be interesting to watch BushCo. limbo around this one.
(graphic by Dark Black)
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I had a great conversation with Ned Lamont this morning. Ned is the real deal. He's sharp, personable and extremely genuine. He's spending every afternoon traveling around to small towns and meeting with the people of Connecticut who haven't seen a US Senate candidate from their state in 18 years. His entrepreneurial background, firm grasp of the issues and deep-seated pragmatism make him the perfect antidote to Lieberman, whose close ties to George Bush as well as his position on so many issues are poised to alienate his constituents.
As
Kos has noted, the more people see of Lieberman the more they don't like him. I'll add a corollary to that: the more people see of Ned Lamont, the more they'll think he's the man for the job.
Ned is solidly pro-choice and says that an Alito cloture vote "wasn't even close." He then listened to me bitch and moan for a while about
NARAL and
Planned Parenthood, and how after having an eye blackened by Lieberman they got down on their knees and thanked him for not blackening the other one. Then Ned said, "well, there's NOW..."
Ned then quickly sent me an email from NOW that almost made me cry, and I'm not kidding. NARAL and Planned Parenthood may be thick as posts and working hard to kill choice in this country, but NOW gets it:
For Immediate Release
February 1, 2006
LIEBERMAN HAS TURNED HIS BACK ON WOMEN
Senator Lieberman turned his back on this country's women by refusing to support a filibuster against the confirmation of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. Judge Alito was confirmed yesterday by a vote of 58-42. While Connecticut NOW recognizes the 42 senators who voted against confirmation, the crucial vote happened the day before, when senators voted on whether or not to end debate on this nomination. Since the Republican leadership had enough votes to confirm Alito, a filibuster was the only way to prevent his confirmation.
Connecticut NOW applauds Senator Dodd for his support of the filibuster. Shamefully his colleague, Senator Lieberman, demonstrated a lack of respect and concern for the women and girls of Connecticut and the nation by his refusal to support the filibuster. Senator Lieberman pointed out that he had studied Samuel Alito's record carefully and so he was aware of the threat Alito poses to a woman's most basic constitutional right: to control her own body and decide whether or not to bear a child. As reported by The Hartford Courant, Senator Lieberman stated that he did not support a filibuster because Alito's confirmation vote did not meet the standard of "extraordinary circumstances" decreed by the Senate "Gang of 14." "This is a slap in the face to every woman of this state, no matter her political beliefs, economic status or race," stated Rosemary Dempsey, President of CT NOW. "What could be a more 'extraordinary circumstance' than when a woman's right to make her own reproductive health decisions is seriously threatened?"
The women of Connecticut expected that our senators, who call themselves pro-choice and claim to be supporters of women's rights, would use every measure available to prevent the confirmation of a judge who undermines and disregards them. Laudably, Senator Dodd did just that; regrettably, Senator Lieberman did not. Senator Lieberman's vote to shut down debate had the effect of anointing Judge Alito as a Supreme Court Justice. As Kathleen Sloan, Executive Director of CT NOW explained, Senator Lieberman's vote against Alito on Tuesday was "symbolism without substance". His failure to support women's rights at a time when they are most severely threatened by a Supreme Court Justice whose record is replete with contempt for same, makes it highly unlikely that CT NOW will support Lieberman in his bid for re-election.
I'm flabbergasted. And thrilled. I thought there was some sort of collective brain atrophy going on in the institutional "pro-choice" world that caused people's capacity for critical thought to disolve. What is it that Planned Parenthood and NARAL don't understand about this? Why are they both asking their memberships to thank Joe Lieberman for throwing them yet another beating?
Ned will be announcing his candidacy on March 11. I hope everyone will contact NOW, thank them for their brave stance and ask them to enthusiastically support Ned Lamont:
Connecticut National Organization for Women
135 Broad Street
Hartford, CT 06105
860.524.5978
860.524.1092 fax
www.ct-now.org
ct_now@yahoo.com
Kathleen Sloan, Executive Director
Rosemary Dempsey, President
Then contact
Planned Parenthood and
NARAL and ask them why they aren't.
The other thing I'd like to mention: both Ned and his campaign are more internet and netroots savvy than any campaign I've ever dealt with. They're right on top of it, have information at their fingertips and know how to operate at the speed the blogosphere runs. It's extremely impressive and gives me great hope that their alacrity and resourcefulness will be able to cut through the institutional mountain of bullshit Lieberman will no doubt bring to the campaign.
I think we've got a winner here, folks, so please
get on board with everything you can.
Update: The
South Dakota State Senate just passed a bill banning all forms of abortion except when the life of the mother is endangered. Thanks, Holy Joe. We owe you one.
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As
Digby notes, Senator Warner was just on CNN saying that the UAE deal was all about maintaining our military access there.
From Richard Clarke's
Against All Enemies, p. 111:
In May 1996, shortly before the Atlanta Olympics, word reached Washington of a remarkable discovery made by the Belgian authorities. They had intercepted a shipment en route to Germany. Inside what was labeled as "pickles" was a custom-designed weapon best described as the largest mortar ever seen. The weapon was designed to lob a large explosive charge a short distance, such as over the walls of an Israeli or US embassy compound. The shipment was traced to Iran.
The Defense Department agreed to our request to station an additional aircraft carrier battle group in the waters off Iran temporarily, as a deterrent signal to Tehran. The Navy was growing increasingly concerned with anti-ship missiles that Iran was placing on islands in the Persian Gulf and on its coastline, particularly at the narrow point in the Gulf leading to the Indian Ocean, the Straits of Hormuz. In early May, DOD announced that Iran had acquired long-range missiles from North Korea and was engaged in a program to protect its missiles in hardened bunkers.
The Navy relied on two ports in the Persian Gulf. Only one, in the United Arab Emirates, could handle an aircraft carrier. That port, near Dubai, saw more U.S. Navy ships anchored and more U.S. sailors ashore than any harbor outside the United States during the 1990s. It remained, however, a commercial facililty with no permanent U.S. Navy facility. The U.S. Navy base was a few hundred kilometers up the Gulf in the island nation of Bahrain. There, thousands of U.S. sailors lived and worked. After the Tanker War and then the first Gulf War, the little Navy base at Bahrain had mushroomed into a large and active facility. In 1996, DOD announced that the base would now be headquarters to a new entity, the Fifth Fleet. With the Soviet navy rusting at Siberian ports and the Iraqi Navy sitting on the bottom of the Persian Gulf and Shatt al-Arab, the Fifth Fleet had only one possible enemy: Iran.
This is, after all, the administration that reluctantly rushed through a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq
in only 20 days with no outside peer review that might have spotted all the bogus WMD claims. Why would they wait around for some pesky, arbitrary
legally mandated 45 day investigation into the Dubai World Ports transfer?
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This Friday we are going to take our first action in the
Roots Project targeting local media outlets in Kansas about the Senate investigations into the illegal NSA wiretaps.
Glenn Greenwald has a great piece up today that talks about how the port scandal dovetails nicely with what we're trying to do:
[T]his port controversy represents yet another instance where the Administration expressed its transparent contempt for the notion that Congress has any real role to play in our system of Government other than giving symbolic endorsement to the dictates of the President. Drenched yet again with the humiliation that comes from being ignored and misled, members of Congress -- including Republicans -- will be in no mood to play the role of meek little rugs which lay quietly on the floor and have no role other than to conceal the Administration's dirt. Helping the White House evade accountability for the NSA scandal by continuing to stonewall investigations would appear to be the very last thing this Congress -- desperate to demonstrate its institutional dignity and independence -- would be inclined right now to do.
In light of all of that, we want to being our laboratory experiment by first targeting Kansas -- because it has a Senator (Roberts) who is probably the single most important person right now in determining whether a Senate Intelligence Committee investigation will proceed; because it has another Senator (Brownback) who is on the Judiciary Committee and has expressed strong objections to the White House's NSA law-breaking; and because we have had a substantial number of Kansans who are very familiar with the political terrain in that state step forward to work with us.
We believe we can develop a potent strategy for generating as much pressure and persuasion as possible towards Roberts (and Brownback) to encourage a meaningful investigation into to the NSA scandal -- not because the Administration should per se be assumed to be guilty of high crimes, but because the NSA program has generated a very intense controversy and Americans ought to know what our Government has been doing with regard to its secret eavesdropping on American citizens.
Get your pencils sharpened, we're going to focus this first action on LTEs for Sunday publication. And go and read the rest of
Glenn's piece, he is -- as always -- quite eloquent.
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If you haven't read
Juan Cole's blog today, go and do so. Scary, scary stuff.
Tuesday was an apocalyptic day in Iraq. I am not normally exactly sanguine about the situation there. But the atmospherics are very, very bad, in a way that most Western observers will miss.
The day started out with a protest by ten thousand people in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, against the Danish caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. These days, Shiites are weeping, mourning and flagellating in commemoration of the martyrdom of the Prophet's grandson, Imam Husayn. So it is an emotional time in the ritual calendar. when feelings can easily be whipped up about issues like insults to the Prophet. An anti-Danish demonstration in Karbala is a surrogate for anti-American and anti-occupation sentiment. The US won't be able to stay in Iraq withiut increasing trouble of this sort.
Then guerrillas set off a huge bomb in a Shiite corner of the mostly Sunni Arab Dura quarter of Baghdad, killing 22 and wounding 28. Another 9 were killed in other violence around Iraq. These attacks are manifestations of an unconventional civil war.
Then real disaster struck. The guerrillas blew up the domed Askariyah shrine in Samarra. The shrine, sacred to Shiiites, honors 3 Imams or holy descendants of the Prophet. They are Ali al-Hadi, Hasan al-Askari, and his disappeared son Muhammad al-Mahdi. Thousands of Shiiites demonstrated in Samarra and in East Baghdad, against this desecration.
The WaPo has more
here and
here (in a frightening piece on the rising power of Sadr). The NYTimes has more
here, including the information that the bombers were dressed as Iraqi police.
Froomkin asks today how the Administration moves forward when the trust is gone. He asks this in the context of the port deal -- but it really transcends that issue to go to the heart of domestic and foreign policy for this President. With this level of civil unrest rising in Iraq, how can we possibly be any sort of honest broker when the trust is gone?
(Photo credit to
the AP, via the WaPo.)
UPDATE:
More from Forbes on the rising potential for civil war in Iraq.
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McClellan press briefing today: "this is a deal that is supposed to have been scrutinized" as a national security review process.
WTF? Was it scrutinized, or not? Did you do the work -- or NOT?
Let me get this straight: The president is threatening to veto any bill slowing down or limiting a deal that he knew nothing about until recently, and the Board which is legally mandated to scrutinize these sorts of deals is only "supposed to have done so" in this case.
And that the President checked with cabinet officials about this deal -- but, apparently, only AFTER public pressure started to build when the press and Congress got wind of the deal. Since, you know, the President didn't even know about the deal until after it had already been inked.
McClellan also says that they ought to have talked to Congress about this. Ya think?
Did you do the work -- or not? At what point should the American people expect the Bush Administration to get off their butts, know what is going on in a matter of national security and actually...you know...do their freaking jobs?
Press briefing is ongoing and being broadcast in full on
C-Span2.
UPDATE: McClellan just admitted that Bush learned about this port deal only after a stink started in the press. Because, you know, we have a whole freaking national security and maritime apparatus in the government that he just ignores on a daily basis -- but when Fox News barks, he decides to "git r done." Lovely.
UPDATE #2: OMG, Lester Kinsolving just raised the issue of the 9/11 Commission and others talking about hijackers using Dubai as a transit and financing base. I may fall out of my chair. If the WH has lost Lester Kinsolving on this, the wingnut base is seriously frothing.
And McClellan raised the question that those who have problems with the deal ought to explain what their problem is and that these objections have a tinge of racism (or at least implied it, and then backtracked from this). Scott is hoping no one will notice the difference in legal scrutiny standards for the transaction that are required for a state-owned business as opposed to a private company -- and that the Administration didn't follow the law for the state-owned UAE company.
Too bad we already noticed this, isn't it? Wish the reporters in the press briefing had, though, because there has been no follow-up on that thus far.
UPDATE #3: CNN is reporting that the UAE company involved in this has hired Bob Dole to lobby Congress to calm their outrage over the deal and get things to go through. Gee -- how is Liddy Dole going to deal with that conflict along with running the RSCC? Wonder what the folks back home will think?
UPDATE #4: For more on what Republicans in Congress have been doing the last few years to block Democratic initiatives on port security,
read here. Many of the loudest Republican voices currently getting airtime on the UAE port issue voted on multiple occasions against stronger port security measures.
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Shorter Bush:
"Like, omigod, you thought I should do some work or something? As if."
It's the Clueless defense.
The AP reports that the Bush Administration announced this morning that the President only found out about the ports deal after it had already been approved by his Administration. And that maybe they should have spoken with Congress about it and stuff.
Gosh, maybe
they ought to have followed the procedures that Congress put in place to safeguard national security concerns after 9/11, too...and maybe, like, you know, the White House should take their head out of their ass or something and do their jobs.
As if. (snark definitely intended)
See MyDD for more thoughts on the port deal and national security considerations.
(Hat tip to reader GSD for the heads up on the AP wire story. And mucho thanks to the people involved in the movie
Clueless -- so many application of the phrase "as if,' so little time.)
UPDATE: Kos has
more here.
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Team Libby filed a response brief late Tuesday night to Fitz's latest filing (which
we covered in detail here). They are most displeased about the characterization of their unprecedented request for 277 PDBs and scores of other classified documents which have tangential connection to charges of perjury, false statements and obstruction at best, as a "greymail" tactic.
According to
Pete Yost of the AP, Team Libby says:
``Denying Mr. Libby's requests because they pertain to `extraordinarily sensitive' documents would have the effect of penalizing Mr. Libby for serving in a position that required him to address urgent national security matters every day,'' lawyers for the ex-White House aide wrote.
Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has accused Libby of attempting to engage in ``greymail,'' the practice of trying to derail prosecutions by seeking to expose national security secrets.
``The government's `greymail' accusation is not only false, but insulting,'' said Libby's lawyers, who assert that they are entitled to the classified material so that their client can get a fair trial.
Well, that is true that Team Libby would be entitled to classified material vital to Libby's defense -- but only if they can make a showing that the information requested is actually material to the charges which are alleged in the indictment. You don't just get whatever document you ask for without being able to say why it has a necessary relationship to your particular case -- the government doesn't just hand over national security documents without a very good reason. (And using them for political payback and silencing your critics doesn't count, just FYI, Dick Cheney...the NIE oughtn't be a political football. I'm just sayin'.)
Making the claim for all of these documents may be more difficult if the judge fails to buy Team Libby's novel "our client had a really busy job, and that made him repeatedly lie to federal investigators and the grand jury while under oath, so he shouldn't be held accountable for his conduct because he was a busy and important man" defense.
One of Libby's defenses is that if he made any incorrect statements to investigators, it was inadvertent.
``I tend to get between 100 and 200 pages of material a day that I'm supposed to read and understand and I - you know, I start at 6:00 in the morning and I go to 8 or 8:30 at night,'' Libby told the grand jury in testimony his lawyers released in their latest filing.
``I can't possibly recall all the stuff that I think is important, let alone other stuff that I don't think is as important ... I apologize if there's some stuff that I remember and some I don't,'' Libby added.
Shorter Libby: "Don't hate me because I'm busy and important, and don't hold me accountable for any lies I may tell you in the protection of my boss, Dick Cheney."
Team Libby had better hope they can refine that argument for the judge, because a DC jury is gonna laugh that one right out of the courtroom.
NOTE: I have a request for any reader who has access to the federal Pacer filing system. For some reason, I'm having difficulty getting in to pull this latest Libby response, so I need a hand.
The case information is U.S. vs. Libby, 05-394, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. If anyone can get in and pull the document off Pacer and send it to me, I will be most grateful. I'd rather see the response for myself than just rely on wire reports on what it says. Thanks in advance for anyone who can get this to me.
UPDATE: Wow, within fifteen minutes of posting this request, I've received 6 copies of the response brief. Have I mentioned how much I love our readers? Thanks everyone. I'll post an update after I get time to comb through the response and attachment.
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When even Bill Frist, Dennis Hastert and Fox News have abandoned him on the matter of the ports, Commander Codpiece knows that Joe Lieberman can always be counted upon for the public fluff.
From
the NYT:
One of the few legislators to come close to defending the transaction was Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, who is considered a security hawk among Democrats.
He told ABC News that he was "not yet" prepared to try to block the sale. He noted that many port terminals in the United States are foreign-owned.
"I worry more about the failure to invest in port security" - to improve the ability to detect smuggled weapons of mass destruction, for example - "than I worry right now about this sale," Mr. Lieberman said.
This despite the fact that -- as
Maureen Dowd notes -- the UAE does not recognize Israel and they have a history of being
quite anti-Semitic. I guess it's a matter of priorities. Lieberman has long claimed to be a big supporter of Israel, but -- much like pro-choice -- I guess that's only when Junior lets him off his leash.
Update: NYT editorial:
The issue is not, as Mr. Bush is now claiming, a question of bias against a Middle Eastern company. The United Arab Emirates is an ally, but its record in the war on terror is mixed. It is not irrational for the United States to resist putting port operations, perhaps the most vulnerable part of the security infrastructure, under that country's control. And there is nothing in the Homeland Security Department's record to make doubters feel confident in its assurances that all proper precautions will be taken.
Yeah I really don't think that "trust us on this one" meme is going to play.
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After six grueling nights of battle the Iron Chefs of irreverant lefty poetry have been boiled down to these, the finalists in Dickfest. The winner will be honored with Bill Maher's latest book
New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer and signed poster courtesy of
his series on HBO. And, of course, the title Poet Laureate of Dickfest 2006.
In the end we had over 500 entries. Winners all. On behalf of everyone here at FDL, our families, babies, and dogs we thank you for your participation and the honor of hosting this prestigious event. We hope the Vice President is aware of the honor bestowed upon him as the subject of all these splendid poetic musings, though he's probably just happy to be out of the headlines and grateful to Junior for fucking the ports in such a timely fashion.
Please vote by number and vote only once. It is a solemn task before you but I'm certain you will execute it with all the gravity and serious deliberation it demands. Without further ado, the finalists are:
The lovely landscape of Texas wealth,
The relaxed stalk of priveleged stealth,
Much time to quaff, no time to aim,
But eons to spin about who I maim (23)
Harry, Harry, Dignitary
Tell us your huntin' woes
'Bout farm-bred quails and frosty ales
And Dick's buckshot up your nose. (47)
The sun was low
The ground was red
The spin exploded
The facts all fled (83)
An accident it must have been,
And not a planned attack
Because Dick shot him in the face
Instead of in the back. (114)
When William Clinton was the president
To get a blow job was a big disgrace.
But times have changed, now it's OK
To shoot a load in some old geezer's face! (163)
The Loaded Shotgun shoots; and, having shot,
Moves on: nor all thy silence nor spin shall lure it back to cancel half a Wound,
Nor all thy lies undo the crime of it. (192)
They came from Wyoming and Texas, addicted to power and drink;
They bullied and lied, they tortured and spied till most folks were too scared to blink;
But when Scowl shot a hunter he thought was a bird and Swag let New Orleans drown,
Folks finally saw what these guys really were: a crusty old coot and a clown. (238)
There once was a Veep from Halliburton
Who knew that his poll numbers were hurtin
As he turned on the shooter,he thought he saw Scooter
And prayed Plamegate was buried for certain. (254)
The lawyer, though peppered, has the finest of care
The rich shooter's safe in his rarified air
A poor circus for fools who watch and ignore
The lives being lost in a cruel unjust war. (277)
If epitaphs were polygraphs,
This, terse and edifying,
Would crown the veep in final sleep:
Here lies Big Time--still lying. (334)
Two red faces: one bloody, peppered with shot,
The other just flushed due to drinking a lot.
"How best to fake sorrow? Wait! I know just the trick!
I'll go on Fox News and have Brit Hume suck my dick!" (365)
I'm Big Dick Cheney who the fuck are you
Satan wears a bracelet What Would Cheny Do (353)
To hunt with a man
whose gun and hubris know no
bounds is to lose face. (421)
Dick's friend? Shot in the head.
Iraqis? Around 100,000 dead.
Congress? Power's been bled.
Demoracy? She's been put to bed. (433)
Thanks to all the poets as well as those who took the time to read over all the entries and give them your thoughtful deliberation. Tomorrow night join us when we crown the winner and honor a few poems I managed to mangle in the cut & paste process.
(graphic by Dark Black)
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We knew it would happen sooner or later, and I guess it's
going to be sooner:
The Supreme Court, at full strength with Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. on the bench for the first time, opened the next chapter in its long-running confrontation with abortion today by agreeing to decide whether the first federal ban on a method of abortion is constitutional.
The court accepted, for argument next fall, the Bush administration's appeal of a decision invalidating the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.
Everybody who didn't seen this coming raise their hand. Oh, is that you,
Planned Parenthood?
"Today's actions by the court are a shining example of why elections matter. When judges far outside the mainstream are nominated and confirmed to public office by anti-choice politicians, women's health and safety are put in danger," said the organization's president, Cecile Richards, in a written statement.
Well, you might have fucking thought of that when you were encouraging people to thank Joe Lieberman for his cloture vote on Alito, sister:
From: "Public Affairs Staff"
Subject: What's Happening! PPC News
Date: Thu, 09 Feb 2006 23:43:40 GMT
60 Seconds with PPC keeps you updated about Planned Parenthood of Connecticut!
Our goal: help you stay informed and connected to our work in one minute or less. Ready? Set? Read!
SUPREME COURT WRAP UP
On Tuesday, January 31, 2006 the Senate voted to confirm Samuel Alito, Jr. 58-42 as the next U.S. Supreme Court Justice after failed efforts by Senate Democrats to filibuster his nomination. Take time to thank Senator Chris Dodd and Senator Joseph Lieberman for opposing Samuel Alito's nomination. We thank all our supporters and activists for their energy and effort to defeat this nomination.
Holy Joe is quick to dance around and parade his final (and meaningless) anti-Alito vote to prove his pro-choice bona fides, but in an email explaining his cloture vote, he said:
With respect to the filibuster vote, as you may know, I was a member of the Senate "Gang of 14" that last year worked together to save the right of Senators to filibuster judicial nominations. As part of that agreement, I agreed to filibuster only in extraordinary circumstances. To me, this situation did not meet this extraordinary circumstances standard.
I'm not going to waste any more time hammering on Planned Parenthood and NARAL except to say that
they do not get it. Pro-choice in this country is
going down, all because of people like Joe Lieberman. It
will not survive another vacancy on the Supreme Court filled by George Bush and confirmed by this Senate.
Redd and I are adding Ned Lamont to our
Act Blue page. Ned Lamont would
not have voted for cloture on Alito, and he is a solid pro-choice candidate (I will hopefully have more on this tomorrow). If you care about pro-choice in this country please give to Ned Lamont. Give til it hurts. It saddens me terribly to say this because I have been a big Planned Parenthood and NARAL supporter all my life but until they can show that they understand what is going on and the way this war is being waged they do not deserve your pro-choice dollars.
What's more, their endorsement could swing the election in a heavily pro-choice state, and they are under tremendous pressure to endorse Lieberman. Please contact both
NARAL and
Planned Parenthood and tell them to support Ned Lamont and prove that they understand that people like Joe Lieberman and Lincoln Chafee are pro-choice only when it doesn't count.
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I don't know if anyone remembers the
ABC news story from September, 2002 when they tested the security of American ports by attempting -- with frightening success -- to smuggle depleted uranium into the country via the port of New York. They did the same thing again, this time through the port of Los Angeles, in 2003.
One would
think that the response of a Homeland Security Department that actually
cared about protecting the country from the great fear they are always so quick invoke would be to take measures to make sure that the ports were strengthened such that
real terrorists who actually attempted this could not succeed.
What did the Bush administration do?
They began an investigation of ABC news for violation of felony smuggling laws. Intimidate the whistleblowers. It's the mafia's stock in trade, too.
I remember this very clearly because it really terrified me. One of the reasons I really came to admire John Kerry was due to the fact that he had an actual
plan (can you imagine) to
strengthen the big holes in the US port security system. Because contrary to what wingnuttia would have you believe, liberals don't want to hand over the US to the terrorists. We just want
real measures to be taken to secure the country, as opposed to the millions upon millions of dollars wasted in
meaningless measures that do nothing to protect national security while a lot of empty rhetoric masks the true intent their efforts: namely, funnel big bucks to your buddy. Then they stomp around and pretend like they actually did something.
Anyone who thinks that BushCo. has done more to make this country secure isn't "tough on terror." They're just a bunch of marks.
Now George Bush wants rake in the big bucks by outsourcing control of our ports to a country that has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran, North Korea and Lybia, and he's so accustomed to screaming "look fast, the boogyman's over there!" while he lifts your wallet he thinks nobody will notice this time either.
Is the the game finally over? Are the Bush cultists finally coming to realize what we've known all along -- that this bunch of crooks is all about making money and
only about making money, national security be damned?
Let's hope so, because the wingnuts have been the major impediment to
true national security for years. It's high time the scales fell off their eyes for all our sakes.
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Well, look who has made
a veto threat regarding the potential legislation to block the port deal? Hmmm...remind me again how many things President Bush has vetoed while in office? Yep, that's right -- zero, zip, zilch. (And that's the real zero, not like the Katherine Armstrong no one was drinking sorta zero.) Is it me, or do you sense some behind-the-scenes compromise already in the works on this to save face for the President and his party?
Well, here's a thought -- whatever deal may be in the works, it still doesn't fix the fact that our port security plans are nonexistent and that this Administration has fallen down on the job in this and other Homeland Security matters in the five years since 9/11.
Time Magazine has done a brief article on the UAE port company and the political furor that has risen up around this issue. (Hat tip to reader Stephen Parrish for the find.)
New York Republican Congressman Peter King has insisted the administration revisit its approval of the transfer of control of U.S. ports to "a company coming out of a country where al Qaeda has such a strong presence," and which could be easily infiltrated by the terrorist network. Democratic Senators Hillary Clinton of New York and Bob Menendez of New Jersey plan to hold hearings on the issue next week, and are seeking legislation banning companies controlled by foreign governments from buying U.S. port facilities. Menendez alleged that the UAE has a "serious and dubious history… as a transit point for terrorism." And in response to Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff's insistence that the administration made a rigorous check — without disclosing details — of the security implications of the deal, California Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer said "It's ridiculous to say you're taking secret steps to make sure that it's okay for a nation that has ties to 9/11 to take over part of our port operations."
When will this Administration learn that their obsession with secrecy and their penchent for back-door deals is what makes the rest of the nation so nervous?
And, as Time points out, the even more relevant question is: why aren't there sufficient security measures in place -- five years after 9/11 and counting -- to make any question of this UAE company's management of our ports just another business deal? At what point can we expect some real work to be done on a vital national security issue like...erm...port security? And maybe some public accountability from this Administration?
According to
Ruth Marcus writing in the WaPo today, not any time soon.
This White House prefers its own truth to the inconvenient facts. Layer onto that a chain of command mentality and a CEO-delegator president and, when reality hits -- whether in the form of a difficult war, a killer storm or a misfiring veep -- it's not terribly surprising that the White House has a hard time adjusting. The real chilling effect is the one that runs down the spine of anyone who learns too much about the way this White House operates.
You wonder why I don't trust the Bush Administration? Read through this article. And think about all the times they have bypassed what was required of them to help out their pals or ignore what was really needed to do the politically expedient thing of the moment.
Back-lit speech in New Orleans isn't really getting reconstruction done, is it? All those no-bid, back-door Halliburton contracts -- priceless. Actual work on important matters like port security or chemical plant security or infrastructure security or...well, pretty much any practical matter that needs to be addressed for proper homeland security? Outsource it to corporate cronies -- including those owned by foreign countries who don't get proper due diligence in the review of their contracts. Oversight? Who needs it.
By the way, if Rep. Peter King wants to really walk the walk, instead of just showboating for the constituents back home, he could actually
hold some hearings in the Homeland Security Committee he chairs on this port issue along with why we aren't doing a better job overall with port security.
You know, accountabililty, it's the new buzz among people who actually want a functioning government.
While we are talking accountability, if the company is owned by the UAE, and the UAE has a history of funding Al Qaeda, will the money going to this deal help to fund Al Qaeda? (Hat tip to
Praedor Atrebates from the comments. Interesting question for which I am finding no current answers from the Bush Administration. Maybe we're addicted to more than foreign oil. I'm just sayin'.)
What sort of Administration okays this sort of transaction, which will
cover 40% of all Army equipment and materials being shipped overseas to our troops, and doesn't even consult with the SecDef or the DoD?
ThinkProgress says the Bush Administration did just that -- in Rumsfeld's own words.
And, FWIW, how is it that Rumsfeld can be a part of the Board that "unanimously" approved this, and claim not to have heard about it until just this past weekend. Nice due diligence. Really.
Is this a dereliction of duty and an abrogation of the fiduciary obligation owed to the American public on this issue -- a pass on the required due diligence? I have no idea at this point, but there are sure as hell a lot of questions being raised as the facts and statements keep dribbling out, aren't there? Still think this doesn't have a funky smell to it?
It's the secrecy, stupid.
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(By popular demand -- Mike Stark has made a name for himself over at Kos for his successful calls into the heart of wingnuttia with the likes of Hannity and O'Reilly. As part of our Roots project, Mike has agreed to act as an advisor and to write about his tips for calling into local radio shows. You can find him documenting his adventures regularly at his blog Calling All Wingnuts and he will also be answering people's questions in the comments section here.)By guest poster Mike StarkBefore you call talk radio for the first time, it’s important to listen to the show. Get to know the host and identify their shtick. All of these folks have different ways of dealing with callers that challenge them, but there are some common MO’s… For instance, O’Reilly’s method is to keep you on a short leash and then bloviate - often distorting your initial statement… Hannity is more likely to engage you in debate, but he forces the debate onto his turf, i.e., “Is the world a better place without Saddam Hussein in power?”
Unfortunately, none of those MO’s includes the host saying, “Hmm, you’ve got a point there. You know what, you’re right, George Bush is an incompetent and dangerous megalomaniac.”
Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself, but the point is that you should study the terrain carefully before you join the battle.
Once you’ve decided that you know the host as well as you ever will, it’s time to take the plunge.
I divide the process of calling talk radio into three stages: talking point preparation, getting through, and the showdown.
Talking Point PreparationFirst, be sure you know what you want to say and that you are prepared for any challenges. Unless you are confident in your ability to think quickly on your feet while speaking publicly to thousands of people, the easiest way to prepare is to develop one talking point to hammer over and over again. Rehearse it. Make it short and snappy (I’ll return to this crucial piece of advice later), and don’t stray from it - no matter how hard you are pushed.
The best way I’ve found to go about preparing talking points is to steal them wholesale from the blogs I read. I’m too busy and/or lazy to do original research on every issue I call about - instead, I read as much as I can about what other people are saying and then decide what I think. You don’t want to be caught espousing a weak point of view that the (invariably wingnut) host can assail. For me, there is nothing worse than knowing I’ve been out-argued, so I do everything I can to make sure I can defend what I’m calling about. That means A LOT of blog reading.
Almost as important as knowing what you want to say is anticipating what the host is likely to come back at you with. If you are a political junkie, you probably watch enough “debate” programs on CNN, MSNBC or Fox to have a general idea of common winger retorts. Other good sources are wingnut blogs and administration talking points.
Finally, you never know when the host will cut you off, so, like I said earlier, it’s important to make your statement short. Don’t go beyond five or six sentences. The purpose of the statement is to set the call up on terms that are favorable to you - so try not to be deliberately incendiary or controversial. Instead frame your argument in such a way as to make even the wingiest of the wingnuts sound unreasonable if they disagree with you.
So let’s see what I can come up with regards to NSA wiretapping Americans…
First, I want to remember to keep things in a frame favorable to me. So this isn’t going to be about wiretapping the terrorists (although I’m sure that’s what the host will say). Instead, I want to make sure that I end up talking about tapping the phones of Americans… I also know from tracking the Patriot Act that the government has unprecedented powers to spy on my library reading habits, listen in on my conversations with my lawyers, and bug my home… And I also know that I grew up in a time that the “Evil Empire” was an itchy trigger-finger away from blowing us all to smithereens… I’m going to weave all of the aforementioned threads into my introductory statement. I’ll write it out - either in bullet points, or, as I prefer, completely:
You know, Paul, you’re about my age. We both grew up at a time when the prospect of all out nuclear war and the end of the world was a real fear… Today, we worry about terrorism - that some cave-dwellers might blow themselves up and take a few of us with him. In order to keep that from happening we’ve passed the Patriot Act which allows the government to spy on our library records, bug our homes and even listen in on our conversations with our lawyers… But that wasn’t good enough for the President… He’s decided he wants to illegally bug our telephone conversations also… Well, if we didn’t put up with that when we were fighting Soviet spies, why should we put up with it when we’re fighting goat herders?
When you call
DO NOT read your statement verbatim. People can tell. Instead, make sure you have it readily accessible in your short term memory… remember, we’ve kept it short, so you shouldn’t have any problem remembering your talking points. However… I know from experience that when you call, you can get nervous. Sometimes the anxiety causes a really bad case of mental diarrhea - everything in your mind just evacuates… If it happens to you, don’t get discouraged - just try again the next day. If you are worried it might happen to you, use a fake name - nobody will ever know.
Now that we’ve formulated our opening shot, we want to anticipate what the host might come back with. Like I said, if you are paying attention to politics, you will probably have a pretty good idea…
In this case, the host is likely to argue one of three points:
1. That the program is legal
2. That in a post 9/11 world…
3. If terrorists attack and the president hadn’t authorized such actions, we’d be asking for his head
I’m not going to go through each of the three points and rebut them because you can find all the info you need for that on blogs or news shows… But I will say this:
1. Be prepared - don’t get caught stammering because the host hit you with a talking point that you hadn’t seen or heard before. Wingers are on strict message control - they are automatons. It really isn’t that hard to know how they will go about defending whatever issue it is you are calling about
2. Remember your initial statement. An ideally crafted opening salvo will have your response contained within it…
Getting throughIf you are calling local radio, you most likely won’t have any trouble getting through. A screener will come on, ask your name and where you are calling from (feel free to lie) and what you want to talk about. Keep it pretty simple - don’t go into your whole statement… In this case, I’d say, “The NSA spying program”. Usually, that will be sufficient and you’ll be put on hold for anywhere between 0 to 30 minutes, depending on the number of callers in front of you. Other times, the screener may ask what your take is. I’d say, “I disagree with Paul - I don’t see why the program is necessary today when it wasn’t necessary when we were facing nuclear annihilation.” That should clinch it for you.
On the other hand, if you are calling national shows, there are some additional tips I can share. First of all, call early in the hour. The talk shows usually begin at eight minutes into the hour, so begin hitting the lines at about six after the top of the hour. You will probably get a busy signal at first - the screener has all the lines off the hook. You never know when he’ll start taking calls, so keep hitting redial. Usually by 10 to 15 past, the lines open up. Sometimes, especially if there is a guest, it takes a little longer. Be persistent.
When you do finally get through, you are only half-way home. These screeners are more likely to test you - to make sure you aren’t too nervous to maintain coherence and to make sure you have a decent, relevant argument. Just stay calm and talk…
Still, there is no guarantee. Just this morning, I called Laura Ingraham to talk about the Fightin’ Dems and the fact that so many Iraq/Afghanistan vets are running as Dems. The screener told me it was a “Good point” and hung up on me. That’s OK… next time I’ll get mine by pretending to be a sycophant…
The ShowdownYou’d think that when you call talk radio, you might end up in a discussion, right? Ha. No way, kimosabi (or as my Chinese wife once put it, “Kawasaki”), this isn’t Kansas. Instead, you’ll - if you’re lucky - get through your statement and then find yourself standing in the middle of Bizarro World. As much as you’ve crafted your statement to be agreeable as sunshine, your wingnut host will find a way to disagree.
Relax. It’s, as you already knew from listening, part and parcel for the medium. Just remember these do’s and don’ts:
Do’s. Do stick to your topic: don’t let them change the subject on you. Whether or not you hate George Bush has got nothing to do with the rule of law. So blow the question off by asking your own: “Are we a nation of laws?”
. Do restate your most powerful premise as often as you can - and use right-wing frames as often as possible. For example: “Paul, I’m surprised at you. I thought you wanted limited government - I can’t think of a more powerful government than one headed by a president who thinks he can flout any law he wants and listen in on my personal phone conversations. Reagan didn’t do it, why is it OK for Bush?”
. Be prepared to be:. Hung up on or muted - (short & snappy is important)
. Being herded into arguing an entirely different matter - (always return to the purpose of your call - one of my favorite statements is, “Paul, I’m a guest on your show and you took my call so that we could talk about XXX… can we get back to that?”)
. Attacked personally - (don’t take it personally, but stand up for yourself)
. Filibustered - (not much you can do - they control your mic and your connection - short and snappy is important)
Don’ts. Don’t lose your cool. Think of this as a debate - the minute you begin to sweat, the other guy has won. Keep your voice calm and be ready to chuckle at the more ridiculous things the host is about to say. I’ve heard that if you force a smile while you are on the phone, there is a perceivable change in the tone of your voice - for the better. Try it.
This might be hard at first - the host does this job several hours a day… you are just getting started… So it’s only natural for a certain amount of nervousness to leak into your voice at first. Don’t worry, you get used to the platform and in no time at all, you’ll be laughing at the wingnuts because you know you’re scoring points. It’s a confidence game.
There is one exception to this rule: if the host calls you a liar or otherwise insults you, it is OK - even desirable - to stand up for yourself. There’s nothing worse than a squishy liberal.
. Don’t ever give an inch - don’t go week-kneed in an attempt to curry favor. If you are the type of person that would do this, do not call.
SummaryWhen all is said and done, make sure you have fun. Remember, you are calling a wingnut that has everything except the truth on their side. They control your volume, how long you can talk for and even how long you remain connected. They invariably get the last word. It’s a platform on which you really cannot expect to win - but somehow, with the miracle of truth on your side, you can sometimes change minds.
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I asked this in the comments for
my "UAE port outsourcing end-run of the legal process" post below, but the more I think about it, the more I'm wondering if there truly is
an answer:
[T]here's a long history of privatization in port running in this country -- but there is also a review process that is to be followed in the contracting of this. And in this case, Bush appears to have a review board that rubber stamped the deal rather than following the law. Sound familiar? It would be one thing if I were confident that the Bush Administration actually did the due diligence on all of this and that they vetted all the potential down sides -- but, frankly, when have they ever really done that on any major issue of national security? I'm wracking my brain for a good example and I haven't been able to come up with a good one this morning. Anyone else have a triumph of good government over expedient cronyism and full-steam-ahead-despite-the-true-facts story to share for these morons? Because I'm honestly having trouble coming up with one good one.
From pulling out early from Afghanistan to enter Iraq, based on ginned-up evidence of an unnecessary war of choice, to failing to do the adequate planning for post-war Iraq because we banked on the "candy and flowers" scenario, to Katrina, to this end-run of the legal review process for a foreign nation controlled company running our ports...I honestly have not been able to come up with one really good example of this Administration making a good, solid, well-researched decision on a matter of national security where the due diligence required by the magnitude of the problem was actually and fully done.
Can anyone come up with one? If so, please let me know in the comments.
The bottom line for me on this: I don't trust this Administration to do the work, to do adequate due diligence, to consider all the worst-case scenario questions that need to be asked -- because thus far, I haven't been able to come up with a good example of a case when they actually did this. I don't trust George Bush and whatever cronies were in on this deal to adequately consider its ramifications for the rest of us above and beyond whatever profit margin concern they had for themselves. And that's the truth of it. How sad is that?
The kicker for me is the failure to follow the legally mandated longer review process. One more short cut for George Bush -- and the nation has to, once again, live with the consequences.
And how bad is this decision when
even Bill Frist is demanding that the President do adequate review or face Congressional action? What bizarro world have we stumbled into on this today?
UPDATE: As
Redshift asks in the comments, someone explain how privatization of our port security is advanced by outsourcing it to a state-owned company? (Albeit one that is owned not by the United States, but by the UAE. You know, a whole n'other state than our own.)
I think it is possible that there are no serious security concerns, but the Administration owes to the public (through our Congressional representatives) enough transparency to convince us that they have had it checked out. "Trust us" won't cut it.
We're talking about a state-owned company in a country that was cited for non-cooperation by the 9/11 Commission.
If the deal is killed, it won't be for "political" considerations, it will be for national security concerns. I find it difficult to imagine that would run afoul of the WTO.
(And yes, I would be even more concerned if it were a company owned by the government of Pakistan, and would frankly think it would be insane not to be concerned in that case. Indonesia would require just as much scrutiny as the UAE. And just to undercut the implication of anti-Muslim bigotry in your examples -- forgive me if that was not intended -- I would advocate the same thing for a Chinese company.)
I'm just sayin'.
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In case you missed it, George Bush's Administration has
outsourced control of several major city ports to a company wholly owned by the United Arab Emirates, including the following areas: New York, New Jersey, Miami, Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans, Beaumont and Corpus Christi.
Yes, that's correct -- the Bush Administration has handed over control of major city ports to a company owned by a nation with a history of financing Al Qaeda activity, including financing the hijackers who attacked our nation on 9/11.
You hadn't heard about this yet? Well, that's because there wasn't any real opportunity for public comment on this back-door deal with some
big money Bush cronies.
"We wouldn't turn over our customs service or our border patrol to a foreign government," Menendez, a Democrat, said during a news conference. "We shouldn't turn over the ports of the United States, either."...
But Menendez and other critics have cited the UAE's history as an operational and financial base for the hijackers who carried out the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. In addition, they contend the UAE was an important transfer point for shipments of smuggled nuclear components sent to Iran, North Korea and Libya by a Pakistani scientist.
"God, if you have a country that is not doing internally what it should be to prevent the transfer of nuclear parts, we're going to give that country operation of the major ports of this nation?" Menendez asked. "I think not."...
"It's unbelievably tone deaf politically at this point in our history," Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., said on "Fox News Sunday." "Most Americans are scratching their heads, wondering why this company from this region now."...
"With all due respect to Mr. Chertoff," O'Malley said. "He was also the Homeland Security secretary who went to sleep after he was informed the levees had broken in New Orleans."
CNN has even more
on the issue here. Just based on the level of Congressional outrage, I think members of Congress may have been cut out of any oversight on this as well.
How typical for an Administration which has perfected the art of thumbing its nose at its Constitutional obligations -- the hell with checks and balances and any meaningful oversight, my cronies have an opportunity for more profit. Close the damn deal!
ThinkProgress put together a handy fact sheet on the UAE, including:
– The UAE was one of three countries in the world to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.
– The UAE has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran, North Korea and Lybia.
– According to the FBI, money was transferred to the 9/11 hijackers through the UAE banking system.
– After 9/11, the Treasury Department reported that the UAE was not cooperating in efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden’s bank accounts.
Just the sort of nation we want controlling every piece of cargo and shipping apparatus that goes in and out of this nation's largest ports, right? Because there would be no room for someone working for them who was, say, sympathetic to Al Qaeda to slip dirty bomb componants or biological agents or even new terrorist cell members onto a ship.
Is it me, or does President Bush only hire incredibly incompetent cronies for all the most important jobs dealing with citizen safety and accountability?
Oh, and just so you are fully informed of the inanity of this decision, two of the ports the UAE would now control are responsible for shipping
almost 40% of all Army equipment used overseas, in Iraq and elsewhere. (Great catch by ThinkProgress on that.) Yep, that's right -- a foreign company would control the shipment rate of 40% of the US Army's equipment. Sounds like a well-thought-out plan to me, how about you? (sarcasm intended)
Sean-Paul has a thoughtful post on why this is not a racial issue -- despite the Bush Administration trying to paint any criticism as racist as they run for cover now that this outsourcing decision has been exposed to the public. How ironic is it that this Administration would whine about false racism when the facts so clearly point to their incompetence and lack of any real consideration of the risks involved in this back-door outsourcing deal, and their overriding need, again and again, to promote profit and cronyism and the quickie, secret deal for their pals over the safety of the American public?
Here's the bottom line: at what point did this Administration decide that profit for their pals was more important than maintaining the safety of Americans? Was American safety and security ever really the top priority -- or have they just been selling the public one big snow job, to allow them to raise the profits of every corporation they owed for buying their way into the White House?
Seems to me that the lessons of 9/11 were completely lost on the Bush Administration. Their non-existent and incompetent response during Katrina looks more and more like their day-to-day existence, doesn't it? Appalling doesn't even begin to describe this.
UPDATE: Forgot to include a link to
this NYDailyNews story on the profits for Bush cronies in this deal. (Hat tip to Just Asking for the reminder. Clearly I need more coffee...)
One is Treasury Secretary John Snow, whose agency heads the federal panel that signed off on the $6.8 billion sale of an English company to government-owned Dubai Ports World - giving it control of Manhattan's cruise ship terminal and Newark's container port.
Snow was chairman of the CSX rail firm that sold its own international port operations to DP World for $1.15 billion in 2004, the year after Snow left for President Bush's cabinet.
The other connection is David Sanborn, who runs DP World's European and Latin American operations and was tapped by Bush last month to head the U.S. Maritime Administration.
And it looks like the Bush Administration bypassed the legally mandated longer review process for port control "when the company is owned by a foreign government and the purchase "could result in control of a person engaged in interstate commerce in the U.S. that could affect the national security of the U.S."" This whole thing looks worse and worse the more I look into it.
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We are now at the end of our five night round of semifinals in
Dickfest. What a truly
amazing display of talent. I thoroughly enjoyed reading them all and there's no way that they can all be honored as they should -- with BIG cash and prizes -- but they certainly are deserving of it, one and all.
Since we only have 38 entries tonight only one will advance to the final round, so choose carefully. The participants are vying for a copy of the
latest book by Bill Maher, and his
generous series on HBO is also donating a poster signed by said Bill.
If in the very likely event you wrote an eligible 4-line poem (many were disqualified for being over the limit, though their quality was exceptional) and I somehow didn't include it or otherwise bungled it, please email me and let me know, we'll find some way to deal with it.
If a blowjob was an issue
then the shooting is an issue! (401)
Big-time-dick Cheney is sitting on
news that he just shot Mr. Whittington.
"It's none of their business! Let 'em talk to the eyewitness"
As always, it's us that he's shitting on. (402)
God and Moon were witnesses
with Secret Service buddies standing 'round:
O serve us with your secrets, faceless
bodyguards: guard the blasted body on the ground. (403)
There once was a man named Dick Cheney,
Who wanted to prove that he wasn't a weenie;
He had some beer with his lunch, his finger went crunch,
And instead of the quail he shot Harry. (404)
Stay away from whiskey and wild, wild women. . .
. . . or beer and ambassadors to Switzerland. (405)
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The Cheney cannot hear the Whittington;
Things fall apart; the trigger he cannot hold;
More buckshot is loosed upon the world (406)
Cheney's got a gun
Cheney's got a gun
His whole world's come undone
From lookin' straight at the sun (407)
A tale of Dick & his peppered Whittington;
A few too many does not mix, Shotgun!
And apparitions of Dick all around;
From Burr to Cheney a 200 year arc of sun! (408)
Apparition: Cheney shoots Whittington's friendly face;
Big Lies from a Dick unhinged! (409)
so much depends
upon Dick Cheney
covered in taint standing
beside the impotent Bush. (410)
There once was a fellow named Dick
Whom most people knew as a prick
He fired his gun into the sun
Now birdshot in Harry will stick (411)
Credibility shot
Open Season in Texas
wounded lawyer collateral damage
lapse a blessing for hunter's safety (412)
The power of faith-based hunting,
Has never been known to fail,
Whiskey is not what they're drunk on,
When discov'ring those Whittington quail. (413)
CHENEYWORLD
No fact is insurmountable.
I won't be held accountable. (414)
Dick 1
Harry 0 (415)
Get drunk. Stupid
Shoot a man. Pathetic
Walk away scott free! Priceless (416)
"Go f*** yourself."
-- V.P. Dick Cheney (417)
Spinning around 180
Jack Daniels yelling to pull the trigger
Scattershot into face and chest
Now he is heartless too. (418)
Old Harry in trauma
They say its Dick’s karma
The president’s chief
Lurks behind all the drama (419)
Cheney bags lawyer
What will we tell our children?
I'm clutching my pearls (420)
To hunt with a man
whose gun and hubris know no
bounds is to lose face. (421)
Quail combatant
down and Dick with one regret:
No time for torture. (422)
First Scooter, now Shooter,
Oh what can we do?
Since the system's now broken,
We can't even sue. (423)
who smarter, harry or dick?
both real stupid in this sad tale.
let's pick, not harry or dick.
let's pick the plucky darn quail. (424)
Gunshot wounds excused.
To what do we owe this wrong?
Is it Dick’s high coup? (425)
i dream you're behind chainlink in the klink
thinkin about the loss of your hair
and pondering too all that you do
to foul our nation so fair (426)
There once was a VP named Dick
Who was morally, quite sick
While “hunting,” we doubt, he blew off the snout
Of another immoral old prick (427)
The quail hunters pose and, still unspeaking, stand
Against the burning sunset of their hired, pioneer land
And the aged quarry shot by Dick's unsteady hand
Lies unblinking in his bed, thinking - even the manhunt was canned (428)
Kat brushed off a swarm of gnats
with one spicy word
"peppered" (429)
Whether to drink or to hunt he said both.
as they all wore their bright orange coats
bullets started to fly, Cheney had blood in his eyes
Next time sign the damn oath (430)
Fun with Dick and Don and their man Paul
They demolished the towers to scare us all
Like victims are told don't believe what you see
Truth and Justice and Democracy Fall (431)
“Accidentally” shot by Cheney they all had to add
Even though official investigations were yet to be had
Stay the course, be patriotic, never question Vice
Were it any old Dick Tommy-gunning Harry, just “shot” would suffice (432)
Dick's friend? Shot in the head.
Iraqis? Around 100,000 dead.
Congress? Power's been bled.
Demoracy? She's been put to bed. (433)
There was an ole sumbitch named Dick
Went hunting with a fellow called Whit
After too many brews, aimed at a covey that flew
Let a fart and shot Whit in the heart (435)
Not an old man, too good
for hari kiri on a dick. (436)
The Vice Presidential geezer took a little trip,
Down to southern Texas and had himself a little nip,
He chomped some prescription meds and grinnin' like a cat,
Then he picked up his scattergun and shot a lawyer flat. (437)
Whitey, tightie
Must indict, he (438)
For those who have been wondering where the odious
Barbara Comstock has been, she's taking a backseat to Dickfest for the moment, but we have much fine opposition research being done on her as we speek. She's a long term project who will soon reappear on our fine stage, rest asured.
In other news, Ned Lamont has made a
$1000 donation to Ciro Rodriguez. I thought that was a pretty classy thing to do. As Kos says, getting money to Ciro early in the game is critical to his campaign, so if you're feeling moved by the muse tonight to help sweep the DINO's like Cuellar out of the Democratic party, you can give
here.
(graphic by Dark Black)
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The unwilling taxpayers regularly spend a quarter of a million dollars to orchestrate one of Commander Codpiece's military image photos; likewise Dick Cheney has been weirdly cast as the big bwana hunter, father figure of the clan. Simple but absurd archetypes when you consider the individuals involved, but the GOP spares no expense (ours) to perpetuate them.
I understand that big, fat drunken tame bird shooting sissy boy Dick Cheney took a real whipping in the image department when he spun around and shot an old man in the face, but you have to wonder what they are thinking when they send out hydra-headed hags like Lucianne Goldberg,
Kate O'Beirne and Mary Matalin to prop up his image (if precious little else) in the media.
Do you
really want Ole 60 Grit giving testimony to your manhood? What exactly does it say when a shriveled old fishwife as house-hauntingly ugly as
Lucianne Goldberg swoons about kissing you?
And Mary Matalin -- Jeebus. All she needed was a Chesterfield clenched between her teeth and some cheap, rocky coke dangling from her nosehairs to really complete the effect on Meet the Press yesterday.
Frankly I am willing to concede that yes, these women do lust after Dick Cheney. The question is -- why would he want anyone to know?
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On the Tweety Show today, Matthews earned himself a star. In speaking with Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley, Matthews started the conversation by asking Brinkley if he thought the Vice President would be remembered for his tenure in the Ford and Reagan Administrations and the current Bush Administration or for being the "Vice President that shot a man in the face."
You tell me that meme isn't catching on.
Brinkley almost choked when Tweety said it, because Matthews tone was so snarky. But he agreed with Chris that Cheney's legacy will be one of secrecy and of shooting a man in the face. That this will be the thing for which he'll be remembered, because of the poor way he handled the whole situation.
Following this segment, Tweety interviewed Paul Pillar -- of the Foreign Affairs article referenced
earlier here -- regarding the fact that the Administration cherry-picked its way through the intelligence to bolster its public case for war.
It was an effective segment, especially given the fact that Matthews played clip after clip of Cheney overstating the intelligence information on Iraq, or just plain saying things that were false, and then allowed Pillar to give the facts as to Cheney lying to the public.
All of the clips were from Meet the Press. Wonder how many calls from David Addington Timmeh will get this evening? Bet they have already been on the phone.
After one, Matthews pointed out to the audience that despite Cheney's appearance being on tape and broadcast nationwide (regarding the alleged meeting between Atta and an Iraqi agent, which has been widely discredited, btw), that Cheney has denied ever saying it.
Don't know if this is a new Tweety or what, but the man earned a star this evening. Fact-based journalism -- what a refreshing change of pace.
I'm so pleased to see Pillar getting press, especially after the Administration dodged his article all of last week -- and it looks like Cheney may be the Administration's cement shoes on this issue as well. I'm guessing whatever internal staff feud heated up last week, it won't be cooling off any time soon if this keeps going. Mary Matalin had better keep her foil flower polished and at the ready.
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Digby, on the stinging editorial in the Wichita Eagle about Pat Roberts and the investigation into the illegal NSA wiretaps:
It's also a sign that Rovism may have run its course. His MO, after all, is to entirely dominate the party from the top down, something that only works if the "top" can wield the whip. The Cheney episode was a window into the inner workings of the white house in this respect and it's quite clear that Rove does not have the clout he once did. He couldn't control Cheney. It's going to be harder and harder for him to control this nervous congress. All lame ducks have a hard time retaining control -- a lame duck at 39% is an albatross around his party's neck.
Of course, Rove is probably a little bit distracted by certain personal matters too. And that's one very good reason to keep the pressure on. Even if we can't advance our own agenda, we can certainly help make it difficult for them to advance theirs. That's just as important to successful politics as anything else.
Thanks to everyone who has left word in the comments of
the previous post or emailed me, there seems to be a lot of enthusiasm for taking advantage of the wounds of BushCo. right now. If you live in (or are simply familiar) with the
regional media markets in Kansas, Pennsylvania, Maine, Nebraska, South Carolina or Ohio and would like to get involved and haven't already left a comment or sent and email to that effect, please do so. I'll be contacting everyone soon.
Mike Stark will be doing a guest post tomorrow on how to effectively call in to local radio talk shows.
There's also a great media guide over at
Congress.org that lists regional outlets by zip code. I figure it's as good a starting point as any for furthering this conversation.
Update: John Amato of Crooks & Liars will be on
Majority Report with Sam Sedar at 7:30pm ET/4:30pm PT, talking about Lady McCheney (Mary Matalin) and others.
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Taylor Marsh did a post recently that really stuck with me and I've been meaning to do something on it for a while. It was about local radio, and how the Republicans have such an excellent network of people they can rely on to get their message out. There is nothing like it that exists on the left:
Every day across this country Rove's "precinct captains" are at work. By precinct captains I mean local radio hosts. Their job cannot be underestimated. Air America is a wonderful new outlet for progressives, but their audience is miniscule compared to Rush, Sean, Fox radio, Christian broadcast and local radio programs. It will take a long time to get even. When trying to make the case against illegal wiretapping local radio can make the difference.
Local radio works the roots.
Local radio is an audio hand shake.
Local radio is also the grass roots whispering campaign of the Republican Party.
Local radio is where real change occurs, because the host is a member of the community. Nothing offers an opportunity for people to get to know the political parties on a more personal basis, which is what wins hearts and minds.
That's why radio is working so well for Republicans, because it seduces the listener into believing he or she actually knows the host. When you know someone your trust level rises, as does the respect for the opinions he or she is delivering. The extension of this local radio whispering campaign is that if you know someone, you're more likely to work for him/her or the person for whom they say to vote. The listener is also more likely to believe the host when he or she delivers the "truth" about something like Bush's illegal wiretapping.
(
Note: I should make it clear that what we're talking about here initially is organizing people to call in to local radio talk shows.)
Also, further to Glenn Greenwald's
piece this morning, it was notable that a local (and heavily Republican)
Wichita Eagle came out yesterday extremely critical of Pat Roberts and his groveling before BushCo. with regard to the illegal NSA wiretaps. No wonder the Bush junta is so frightened about these investigations proceeding.
And as
I mentioned on Saturday, Cheney (and by extension) BushCo. are heavily damaged after Cheney got away with shooting an old man in the face, they could not hold their people in place last week and their attempts to strongarm while weak quite possibly backfired, at least on the Chuck Hagel and Olympia Snowe fronts (and she, in particular, had announced as of Tuesday that she would probably vote
against any inquiry -- her
change of heart is therefore quite notable.)
Anyway, the upshot -- several GOP are in critical positions with regard to these investigations, and they are also extremely susceptible to pressure in their own back yards right now. Since GOP Senators tend to be from small or even single-market states it is much easier to target them through, say, LTEs and local radio talk shows than it would be with someone from a state with a much larger population. What we'd like to do is organize people from these states who know the media outlets in their areas the best (as well as local blogs, as both
Kos and
Atrios noted this morning) and work with them to put pressure on these people over specific issues since blogs like FDL,
Crooks & Liars, Glenn Greenwald and others can drive traffic and make these efforts more impactful.
These are the markets we'd like to target for right now (looking towards expanding as we move into other issues):
1. Kansas
2. Pennsylvania
3. Maine
4. Nebraska
5. South Carolina
6. Ohio
DeWine (Ohio) is acting as a total Bush shill over the illegal NSA wiretaps even as being tied to Bush in his state won't win him any love. Snowe (ME) is a critical vote on the Intelligence Committee, as are Hagel (NB) and Graham(SC) on the Judiciary. Arlen Specter (PA) is head of the Judiciary Committee. Pat Roberts and Sam Brownback of Kansas also hold positions on both the Intelligence and Judiciary Committees
If you live in any of these states and would like to help organize these efforts, or simply take part in them, please either email me or leave word in the comments section. We'll start to put together a network of local media that can be quickly and effectively targeted within these markets, putting in place an infrastructure to work with Glenn Greenwald to apply selective pressure on critical Senators as the investigations into the illegal NSA wiretap investigations go forward.
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I spent my spare time this weekend reading through
Paul Pillar's Foreign Affairs article, and I have to say, it was worth every moment that I spent on it and them some. Pillar's assessment of the mistakes leading up to the Iraq War and the Administration's subsequent missteps in post-war planning and operations -- including to today -- are essential reading for those of us who have been trying to make sense of the mess we see in the headlines.
The Bush administration's use of intelligence on Iraq did not just blur this distinction; it turned the entire model upside down. The administration used intelligence not to inform decision-making, but to justify a decision already made. It went to war without requesting -- and evidently without being influenced by -- any strategic-level intelligence assessments on any aspect of Iraq. (The military made extensive use of intelligence in its war planning, although much of it was of a more tactical nature.) Congress, not the administration, asked for the now-infamous October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq's unconventional weapons programs, although few members of Congress actually read it. (According to several congressional aides responsible for safeguarding the classified material, no more than six senators and only a handful of House members got beyond the five-page executive summary.) As the national intelligence officer for the Middle East, I was in charge of coordinating all of the intelligence community's assessments regarding Iraq; the first request I received from any administration policymaker for any such assessment was not until a year into the war. (emphasis mine)
I highlight this specific passage because it is a theme that we have seen time and again with the Bush Administration. From
Paul O'Neill to
Richard Clark to
Lawrence Wilkerson and now to Pillar: the Administration had a desired outcome -- war with Saddam Hussein -- and was willing to bend whatever rules, information, and planning that was necessary to achieve that outcome. Ends justifies the means.
There has been a substantial amount of discussion in the last week regarding this Administration's lack of support for candor -- and the President and his staff's repudiation of criticism, even from within their circle of supporters. (The most recent article on the subject was raised by none other than GOP mouthpiece Bob Novak,
highlighted here last night.) Without some mechanism for internal criticism, some check and balance on the inside of the process wherein important decisions are made, how is it that mistaken decisions are to be refined or poor judgments to be called for what they are?
Glenn Greenwald has a couple of superb posts up regarding
the Administration's illegal NSA domestic spying and
foreign policy concerns that deserve a read and some thought on the Democratic end of things.
If I have any quibble with Glenn it is this: on the NSA domestic spying issue, the reason that Republicans keep bringing up having a new law when there is a perfecvtly good one on the books is that, logically, if they admit that FISA is workable as it is, then they must admit that the Administration has been breaking the law all along. The thought that a new law is necessary to fix things is the red herring that the Administration apologists in Congress must keep bringing up -- otherwise, they must admit, both to themselves and publicly, that the President has repeatedly broken the law. Which brings up an entire mess of legal and impeachment issues that none of them want to touch -- it's the third rail for them -- and thus the straw man of a need for a new law to fix the non-broken system.
What I want to emphasize, though, is the importance of continuing pressure on your members in both the House and Senate on this issue.
Laura Rozen caught an interesting piece in Pat Roberts' hometown newspaper that may explain, more than anything else, his shifting public statements about oversight or not from the Senate Intelligence Committee. And Olympia Snowe's and Chuck Hegel's and a whole mess of other shifting perspectives over the weekend.
Republican politicos have perfected the art of base mobilization on message in hometown newspapers and on small town talk radio. Progressives need to use this more and more -- to point out that not only is there a counter-argument, but that these sentiments are alive and well in every home town in America. Why not take the apparatus they've set up and use it against them?
That feeling of community that each of us gets from coming to this blog or to other progressive blogs, that feeling that "you are not alone" is a temporary fix -- but the fact of the matter is that you are NOT alone, that there are more of us out there than the media ever lets on, and that if we all stood up and spoke our minds, there would be a sea change in the local opinion pages and on the talk radio shows in all our towns.
Just imagine it. And contemplate the pressure we could all, individually and collectively, bring to bear on issues like:
-- Pat Roberts' doing the President's dirty work by once again blocking any investigation of illegal activity by the Administration. (
NYTimes)
-- White House effectively bribing members of COngress not to investigate their illegal domestic spying programs. (
WaPo)
-- White House hasn't bothered to staff the commission established to safeguard inidividual rights and liberties because they don't acre enough about them to even make the effort. (
LATimes)
-- Senior military officials warned that Administration policies would lead to torture and worse, and the Pentagon and WH ignored their assessments. (
WaPo and
NYTimes)
And those are only a few examples in the foreign policy arena. Imagine how effective this could be on a whole host of economic, domestic and other issues across the broad spectrum of Adminsitration incompetence and lies and Orwellian spin? If everyone who reads here every day was responsible for one letter every couple of weeks -- that is reaching a whole host of people in a whole lot of towns all across America.
Most people I know here in my town don't read the major national newspapers. They read our local paper. And every day in that paper, some wingnut writes in a nonsensical rant. Isn't it about time we start pushing back? One letter, one phone call, one day at a time. Talking about things from our own perspective, how poor decisions from this Administration have badly impacted our own lives, in our own towns. Hitting people where they live, with facts and information they can understand...and discuss around the watercooler or in the break room.
They wanted a war -- well, let's give them one.
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C-Span is currently broadcasting a great discussion on separation of powers issues dealing with the NSA domestic spying, national security matters, privacy considerations and the imperial presidency. The discussion includes Mary DeRosa, Lawrence Tribe, John Dean, Jim Harper, Anthony Romero, and Marvin Kalb, and is truly fascinating stuff.
I'm working on a longer post on the NSA issue and other foreign policy concerns that have been raised, but I wanted to spotlight this discussion for those who care to watch it. If you can't watch today, try and catch it in re-run -- it's that good.
(Cartoon via the
Cincinnati Post. Hat tip to reader angie for the heads up on this.)
UPDATE: C-Span's programming schedule indicates that this Town Hall will be re-broadcast this evening at 9 pm ET on C-Span1. If and when they post a transcript, I'll put a link on this post. It was a great discussion, some good give and take among the participants and some excellent audience questions as well. Best line: Lawrence Tribe's "the Bush Administration is collecting more dots, but they aren't connecting them" (or something to that effect) in relation to the NSA domestic spying program.
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Yesterday, there was a fantastic discussion in the comments of the
Rules Do Apply post about the branding of the political parties. I wanted to highlight some of that this morning because it really provides a great foundation for building further -- for the Democratic party, and for progressive organizations around the country. And the different perspectives from the various folks who participated were what made it even more interesting.
Jane and I often say that we are really blessed with the best commenters on the web. It truly amazes me how often that gets proved to us -- and this particular comment thread really proves that point.
From
Pachacutec:
Political parties are like brands in business.
Nike has a brand, a "personality:" winning. It's also young and a little edgy in its self-conscious presentation.
Of course this is absurd. A corporation is not a personality, though corporations and organizations do have cultures. There are ugly dark sides to Nike's culture, and I won't get into them here (it's a tangent).
People buy brands as a way of buying an identity, or at least, buying into one and declaring it by way of the brand's label. Think of all those Apple people who rebel, as an identity, from Microsoft.
Political parties are brands.
The Republican brand as it has developed over the last 30 years is aggressive, masculine and "moral." They have built this branding image by promoting personalities and "policies" designed to be products that position the brand. These policies are not focused on governing but on brand placement, and as a way to wedge the competing brand.
In a two party system, you can only force dominance of your brand by rebranding your opposition in the worst possible light. They've been doing that for 30 years too.
So, essential to their attempt to brand themselves as strong, masculine, aggressive and "moral," they have done all they can to define Dems as wimps, charlatans, profligates and pansies. Add a heavy dose of racist code language, stir and repeat repeat repeat, and you have the history of the last 30 years.
For us to turn the tide, many have rightly pointed out that the Republicans could not have succeeded without cowing the media into submission. Notice that the 80's were saturated with books and arguments about the liberal media.
That chestnut does not get the saturation it once did, since the media war has been won by their side. We're just beginning to fight back now through citizen voices. The Internet has allowed for the wide dissemination of voices not controlled by corporate editors.
The Dem establishment has grown up in this last 30 years, and they don't know the game. They've become veal on farms.
To rebrand, we must accept some things. One is mentioned above, that personality in a media age precedes policy. Policy is only meaningful insofar as it betokens personality.
To rebrand the party, we must
1 - fight, fight, fight
2 - be coordinated when we fight, because that's the only way to connote strength
3 - play to personality before policy (Senators are bad at this. The Senate tends to bleach out passion, though Feingold is against the grain)
4 - Slash, burn and discredit their brand. We need as much of what I call "honest calumny" as we can get. Be brutal. We do it on this sight. It's true the top carrier of our brand should be more sunny and affable in his or her personality, but he or she needs to be backed up by brutal attack dogs like us.
We can rebrand them as corrupt, aristocratic, incompetent, cowardly and dangerous (elements, for example, that all exist in the shooting story on some level). In fact, we must do this, if we are to win and change the 30 year tide.
We must rebrand ourselves as honest, public spirited, accountable, aggressive and tough. We can revive elements of the FDR brand but we can't replay it without updates, in my opinion.
If we can do this, then the branding war will have turned around. In the long term, if we want to make policy matter more, then we must promote education. But the dumbing down of America has served the Republicans (don't think they don't know it), and it will take some time to redevelop the nation's brain cells.
Then this from
ck:
Excellent narrative analysis of the Branding issue. The problem for the Democrats is that narrative is useless, except in support of the ballistic soundbite.
Short version: anything longer than Nike's "Just Do It" doesn't cut it.
The other thing about politics, is that destroying the credibility of your opponent's brand has much greater importance than it does it corporate marketeering. In politics and war, destroying the opposition is central to winning.
To that end, we need to use the lines of attack the GOP has handed us:
Republican Culture of Corruption = Legalized Bribery.
Republican Politicians = Institutionalized Incompetence.
And from
cathy:
Why can't we just say over and over the "corrupt republicans" every time we refer to them. And also write the "scandal ridden GOP" every time they are referred to in writing. Say and write those words together every time they are mentioned so that it sounds odd when they are not said or written together.
Then this from
rwcole, which rang very true for me from my home in a very blue collar state like West Virginia:
Several years ago I heard a radio discussion of a study on "working men" that was quite interesting. I don't remember who did it- and never actually read the thing- but it suggests that:
Working guys value competence- they think of themselves as able to "fix things" and look down their noses at people who can't.
Working guys do not envy the wealthy- in many cases they think of em as lucky idiots who can't even take care of their own houses, cars, and families.
Working guys value friends and families first- and other working guys. Many go to church- but church is not what drives them.
They worry about their kids if they have young kids and how to keep em from ending up in jail or the poorhouse.
They are ingenious- and can solve problems in a matter of minutes- they know that their bosses can't..They are pretty proud of their COMPETENCE.
There is so much more discussion in the comments thread -- and I wanted to continue the dialogue on this today, because it comes at a time when candidates are gearing up for the mid-term elections and for local elections around the country. And I'm interested in where we could take this -- for the party and for the nation. I articulated some of this in my
A Question of Doing What's Right post back in January, and I've been stewing on a lot of this for the last month, trying to refine my own thoughts.
Maybe a good Monday morning brainstorm can shake something loose for all of us.
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We're working our way through the splendid entries in Dickfest, the poetic musing of our readers about the honor of our Vice President. The choices are hard so please deliberate carefully, the winner will be awarded a copy of
Bill Maher's new book -- many thanks to
Bill for donating it. Remember to vote only once and please cast your vote by number:
Ah! maybe not a hunt so great
Poor Harry's face got shot!
Oh! 'twas my Italian .28
That may put him yet to rot. (301)
Hey Dick where're you goin with that gun in your hand?
To dinner of course I own this land
But Harry needs help he lies there bleeding
No there is spying to be done and the case needs pleading (302)
come on law enforcement
pick up your shoes
you captured poor Martha
now go get Dick too (303)
Will I forget the man I shot,
Whose time with me now looks like the plot
The Dems had to put me on the block?
No, I need to pray for me, for him: the problem's that I cannot. (304)
Quail Hunt Filets
Dipped in an Unseasoned Batter
But When friends come a calling
I go heavy on the Pepper (305)
if you take a hard look
at Harry the male
he bears a resemblance
to the cute little quail (306)
Quayle quakes in winter
Whittington suffers Dick's wrath
Stupid quail escape (307)
28 gauge pepper gun
Peppered the old man's face
Later, over cocktails,
Rummy tells me "Hunting is messy" (308)
small bird and old man
got peppered and knocked silly
still need ICU (309)
Dick just what were you thinking?
Could it be that you've been drinking?
Just one now please pick up the pace
I can't sumbitch you shot my face! (310)
Gotta get down to it
Cheney is gunning us down
Should have been done long ago (311)
Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, the VP shot me down (312)
I HAD A BEER
I HAVE A GUN
LYNNE'S NOT HERE
YOU'D BETTER RUN. (314)
DON'T LIKE LIBERALS
DON'T LIKE HAIKU
DON'T MIND SHOOTING
'CAUSE I DON'T LIKE YOU. (315)
I DRANK, I SHOT
I MISSED THE BIRD
WAS WITH SOME BABE (316)
I DRANK, I FIRED
I MISSED THE QUAIL
IF YOU SHOT A MAN
YOU'D BE IN JAIL. (317)
Shotgun's hungry mouth is prest
Against his friend's sweet flowing breast
I think that I shall never see
A blast the like of Dick Cheney's (318)
This is my shotgun
This is my gun
This one's a double action
And this one gets none. (319)
Oh, get a search warrant
to find us Al Gore and
send the abhorrent
Cheney away (320)
Ol' Massa Cheney now dat man's insane he gets blood lust so bad he goes half mad
to kill faster and quicker and then there's the liquor on top of the pills that old man swills
he should be in the ground but he's walkin' around makin' Big Time deals all the money he steals won't be there in his grave why he's just a slave to all Seven Sins yet he thinks he wins (321)
I'm a little veep-pot
Short and stout
Step to me
and I'll shoot your lights out. (323)
Dick Cheney the Veep let an errant shot fly
To the face of his friend, we may never know why.
Some say he was careless, some say it was booze,
But its We the People who ultimately lose. (324)
drop your socks and grab your gun
the little birds are on the run
drink till your aim and your mood improves
then go out and shoot anything that moves (325)
He spun his tale on Fox with Hume
Employed his famous Voice of Doom
But no apology was heard
“Sorry” seems to be the hardest word (326)
Big Dick fired his gun out of "terra."
You might ask what was he afraid off?
Twas the beer and the meds, they put visions in his head
And he mistook his friend for al qaeda. (327)
For Cheney, dear Cheney
There is no disgrace
Not even for shooting
A friend in the face. (328)
his is my girlfriend, this is my gun
There's blood on the ground, this is so fun
There's blood in the desert, there's oil in the sand
I have always wanted to kill a man. (329)
There's a pattern here, that much is clear
Truth is always a casualty of ambition, as Cheney advances his legal fictions
First it was the disputed Florida vote in the 2000 election, then it was the mendacious Iraqi intel selection
The issue is negligence in the instant case, as Cheney's decision to mix drinking and hunting resulted in him shooting an old man in the face (330)
Meds and booze, my head's a swirl
Old "Quail-Face Harry" ate my shot
His bad
To the bunker! To the bunker! (331)
A man in need of liposuction
Went after the quail of mass destruction
A man in need of a hospital guerney
Shot some birds, and one attorney. (332)
dick
bush
gun
blood (333)
If epitaphs were polygraphs,
This, terse and edifying,
Would crown the veep in final sleep:
Here lies Big Time--still lying. (334)
"Don't blame me, I was drunk." (335)
There once was a man from Wyoming
Who liked a few shots in the morning
But when he got drunk, he went into a funk
And shot his old pal without warning. (336)
Dick's thirst for blood was overwhelming
He was tired bombers doing all the shelling
So he grabbed a gun and drank beer from a can
And then shot in the face, a 78 year old man (337)
Dick was tired and needed a break
So he went down to Texas for some human steak
Shooting caged quail seemed kind of lame
Because Dick prefers The Most Dangerous Game (338)
Dick lowered the gun,
The barrel still warm.
"Now that's what I call,
Tort reform." (339)
OMG I've been shot
And Deadeye Dick dunnit.
But its all my fault
Is the way that they spun it. (340)
Winged companion falls
Spray like plumes of cardinal
Quails fly free at dusk (341)
So I shot a guy and he might die,
I wasnt drinking; I wouldnt lie
I didnt mean it so you have to quit it
Stop calling this Cheney-Quiddick! (342)
No beer here
Just straight shootin'
Real high falutin'
Oops - that was Whittington! (343)
When a heart meets birdshot,
It loses the tussle.
So do what Dick did,
And remove that muscle. (344)
Boom!!!
Silence …
More silence …
Echo!! (345)
Birdshot and lawyers never do mix
Add a little booze and you're in an awful fix.
Gotta tell the press, nah let em wait
Might as well just have a drink and let em speculate. (346)
shotgun blast like a coulter ovation
then flee dick did, to undisclosed location
surrogates spun faster than a tasmanian devil -
while he flushed (as with truth) that blood aclohol level (347)
I shot the mouthpiece. 'Cause he was standing where I could not see.
I shot the mouthpiece. And I did not tell the deputy.
I shot the mouthpiece. Now he may die because of my BB.
I shot the mouthpiece. I'll just go cop a plea on Fox TV. (348)
I'm the Big Bad Dick and I got street cred
cause I shot my homey right in the head
I had a few beers but I ain't no Rush
a dick in the hand is worth two in the tush (349)
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I, Big Dick, am one bad-ass veep,
And have old men to shoot and leave in a heap,
Then piles of pork chops before I sleep. (350)
Tame ducks and quail slaughtered
Like a plague at the zoo
Shotguns don't shoot people
Vice President's do (351)
Dick had an outdoor adventure,
Like Huck Finn or Tom Sawyer.
"The quail weren't biting,
But I bagged me a lawyer!" (352)
"I'm Big Dick Cheney who the fuck are you
Satan wears a bracelet What Would Cheny Do" (353)
They needed a diversion
From the Plame affair
Dick pulled the trigger
He didn't hit air (354)
There once was a vice president
Whose moral compass was bent
With beer in hand
He shot an old man
Then slept off the whole incident (355)
Come from behind him,
he'll pepper and spray.
Give him a bottle,
he'll spin it away. (356)
Dick’s medicated
To the gills, hunts anyway.
Then claims, “shot happens.” (357)
Tragedy befalls Elmer
Bewitched by Bugs Bunny in Drag (358)
Say with absolute
certainty, something sinful
brews in time-lapse spin (359)
I'd win this contest,
I don't doubt in the least.
If only they'd listen,
And rename it Dickfeast. (360)
Cheney, Cheney, pants on fire,
you shouldn't have had that beer.
We're asking for you to retire,
your shotgun and your sneer. (361)
Shooting Under the Influence
is not something to do.
For Cheney that's a nuisance
as he comes after you. (362)
Shooter Cheney had some beer
and shot old Harry down.
He said don't tell them with a sneer...
I'm the one wearing the crown. (363)
Canned quail. Too quickly
the bush stills, with guns so hot.
Flashback. Pull trigger. (364)
Two red faces: one bloody, peppered with shot,
The other just flushed due to drinking a lot.
"How best to fake sorrow? Wait! I know just the trick!
I'll go on Fox News and have Brit Hume suck my dick!" (365)
Big Time?
Big Crime! (366)
See Dick drink
See Dick shoot
See friend fall
See Dick scoot (367)
Big Time, Packin' Heat.
Big Heat.
Packin' Time. (368)
Cheney hides while Harry pays,
The Lord works in mysterious ways.
But Dick explained this big misstepper
The Lord never said Thou Shalt Not Pepper. (369)
Once a vp from wyoming
Went out shooting birds in the gloaming
Twas his friend that was shot and more likely than not
Twas the beer, not Dick's mouth, that was foaming (371)
Cheney's handy with a Gun,
To bad no one told Harry to Run.
Cheney's sure to manage the story,
Now why would you ever worry? (372)
The wily Dick is too clever,
To leave a tell-tale genetic trace.
So take care when hunting,
not to catch his load full in the face. (373)
Birds and pellets fly
an old man, the sun, go down
darkness spreads like blood (374)
A hunting we will go,
sipping a red bordeaux.
Oops I shot 'im...Not a problem.
Dickie runs the show. (375)
Once upon a hunt for quail
A guy named Dick had too much ale.
He shot ol' Harry in the hide
And said, "Poor stiff. That's classified." (376)
pack the tweezers
if bird hunting with geezers (377)
All death and no death makes Dick a dull boy.
All death and no death makes Dick a dull boy.
All death and no death makes Dick a dull boy.
All death and no death makes Dick a dull boy. (378)
There once was a Veep named Cheney,
Who fancied himself quite brainy,
He fell down a lot
and now they call him Cheney-a-quid-dick. (379)
Snarl, Sneer, Sneak, Leak
Spin, Spy, Lie, Cheat
Drink, Shoot, Maim, Smirk
Seethe, Kill, Yawn, Profit (380)
For the final time
No more lesbian daughter jokes.
Can you hear me now? (381)
What’s such a big deal?
Birdshot, merely a flesh wound.
Heart attack? Oh hell. (382)
Whether Senate floor
Or private ranch stocked with game
Go F yourself, punks (383)
Booze hound, age thirty?
My prez. Booze hound, age sixty?
No longer Vice-Prez. (384)
What was I thinking?
How can I dodge the blame now?
I miss you Scooter. (385)
I shot the Lawyer
Then ignored the Deputy
I got that Lawyer
Laid him out for all to see (386)
wove he
the rovian spin of the day
woe to all those who
get into his way (387)
Bwana Cheney,
cocked his gun.
and blew the face,
off Whittingon. (388)
When all-powerful dick
needs puff his colorful bag --
choosing caged birds and Alta Kuka --
shows him a Dickless Hag. (389)
Whose field this is, of course we know,
She's sitting in the Hummer though.
She did not see me drop my beer
Or shoot him when I stubbed my toe. (390)
And you thought, regarding Ms. Valerie Plame,
It was Rove who first used the expression "Fair game"? (391)
It wasn't the booze, it wasn't the meds,
It wasn't pure hatred that messed with his head.
To keep Harry from squealing, their "Brokeback" revealing,
Big Dick saw no choice but to shoot him instead. (392)
There once was a Dick from Wyoming,
Whose foul mouth was constantly foaming,
He gunned down a friend, so this is the end,
Of Dick's extramarital roaming. (393)
Lager, whisky, gin, vermouth,
Republicans at play with truth;
Nothing says "I'm worth your vote"
Quite like a pellet in the throat. (394)
Maybe The Rapture or maybe a raptor
will take Dick away.
I hope for the bird 'cause The Rapture's absurd.
Now, fly Dick, fly Dick, fly Dick,today. (395)
shot in the face
And you're to blame
Harry, you give Dick a bad name. (396)
Roses are red
Violets are blue
I shot my buddy
I can also shoot you. (397)
I picked his pocket, over beers, at lunch
A few beats my bum ticker skipped
Declared Old Harry's license:
"Organ Donor" (398)
Beer, women and guns were in the mix,
As 'ol Dicky got his kicks.
He took a shot, and downed a man,
And, then, just like from 'Nam, he ran. (399)
"Duck!" cried Dick,
"As quick as you can!"
"Duck?" said Harry,
"I thought..." -- BLAM! (400)
And remember you can always donate to Ciro Rodriguez
here(graphic by
AvengingAngel.org)
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Jonathon Alter takes on the Imperial (Vice) Presidency
in Newsweek online.
The shooting could hardly be a better metaphor for Cheney. It neatly packages his faulty judgment, insularity and arrogance in a story that is not cataclysmic on its own terms but will prove hard to forget. That's too bad for Cheney, and certainly for Harry Whittington. But it is a blessing for anyone hoping to restore some accountability to a government that increasingly believes it is a law unto itself.
We're seeing an awful lot of smacks at Cheney lately -- blatant ones that would have been much more muted and subtle only two weeks ago. Should it be news now that the Washington cocktail party set is no longer fearful of Darth Cheney? Maybe they have all laid in a fresh supply of garlic...or maybe they are hearing a lot more chatter than we are that
Peggy Noonan has an inside line.
ThinkProgress points out the fact that Crazy Mary wouldn't answer a simple question on beer math today. And whatever you do, don't miss
Arianna's Russert Watch today. Mwahahaha.
Speaking of Trigger Happy Dick, hunters don't like it when the shooter tries to
blame his victim. And they really don't like it when the shot endangers not only your hunting buddies but also your hunting dogs --
that's a big no-no.
I'll tell you, in real life, you get peppered with birdshot, anywhere, and you are in no mood to quip if you are lucky enough to be in any mood at all.
A review of the accident and incident report of the shooting filed by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department indicates just how close this came to being a grave incident. Had Whittington taken the full brunt of the load a little more to the left and down, at his neck and upper torso -- a matter of just a few inches -- he could have been a goner....
But I must say, as a supposed ardent hunter and role model for hunting and a stellar light of the National Rifle Association, he has barely saved himself from being a major embarrassment and dismal failure....
As a postscript to the gravity of the Cheney shooting incident, consider this: I don't know of a single gentleman's hunting club up here in the effete Northeast, no matter how Republican, that would let Cheney in to shoot after this incident. He'd be confined to the bar and pool tables.
What we have here is the original zero-tolerance event as far as the hunting community is concerned. That's how seriously we take it.
I've received e-mails and links to other hunting blogs that echo these sentiments all week long. The NRA's silence on such a teachable moment for hunters nationwide speaks more to their current position of GOP shill than gun safety advocates, and they ought to be ashamed of themselves.
Clarance Page shares his take on the Cheney penchent for secrecy and machinations, the NSA domestic spying, executive overreach, and Scooter Libby. Interesting stuff.
Speaking of machinations, in
today's LATimes, there is a phenominal piece on the Bush Administration's efforts to limit exposure for industries by undercutting litigation and other safeguards. It's an eye-opener, in terms of how much of this has been done the last couple of years via administration regulations, as an effective end-run of Congress. That whole unitary executive theory isn't looking so out-there these days, is it?
Larry Johnson has a great article up today on the Administration's inability to be honest about terrorism stats because they are more interested in covering their own asses than protecting the nation. Again, eye-opening.
Over at Lawyers, Guns and Money, Scott Lemieux pulls a two-fer: great posts
here and
here.
TBogg is troubled by the President actually reading -- well, really it's his attempt at comprehension that causes some difficulties.
Steve Soto at LeftCoaster asks why the Administration is outsourcing our port security to a company from a nation that gave us two of the 9/11 hijackers and that provided a lot of back-door financing to Al Qaeda. Good question.
And gosh, doesn't it seem like things are going so much better in Iraq? No, not really. See
here,
here, and
here, just for starters.
In case you were in a coma last week, scarecrow sums up
the news that's fit to discuss: (WARNING: Beverage spew warning.)
1. Cheney shot a man in the face and heart, but he looks pretty good on the other side.
2. Pat Roberts found a copy of the Constitution and showed it to Bush. They are both studying it.
3. The Anti-Patriot Act will become law, because it doesn't matter what the law says anymore.
4. Cheney thinks he has the authority to declassify something that the President classifies. But the the number of conflicts this has created is still classified.
4. Libby wants Fitz to get Bush to disclose classified all the intelligence information Bush never read, to prove he (Libby) was also confused, but Cheney may not agree.
5. And Condi thinks she can promote democracy in Iran by buying dissidents, which will make them popular; Rumsy will keep them informed by spending more on DoD propaganda.
Everything's under control, because Dana Milbank has been sent to the woodshed by Ms. Howell for wearing an orange ski cap.
All of this is true.
PS -- Scarecrow, a little tea spew warning next time pal, okay?
And finally,
Mark Kleiman helps to translate the latest in political truthiness.
(This photo was sent to me by a friend who visited here while travelling on vacation. This is Pointe au Pere in Quebec, Canada.)
LITTLE NOTE: We're now over 5 million visitors. Yay, us!
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Just finished reading the latest
Bob Novak column extravaganza, and it struck me that we are due for another round of:
Whose mouthpiece is Bob Novak today?
A. Karl Rove
B. Andy Card
C. Poppy Bush and Pals
D. Republicans in Congress worried about the 2006 mid-terms and searching for any scapegoat but themselves
E. _________________ (Pick your own source.)
It's a tough choice today. Read carefully and see if you can pick through all the clues, from Vin Weber to Phil Gramm to the backhanded pokes at Cheney as "independent power center." Extra points if you can find an argument to make this a piece from Team Cheney -- with the power center bit as a backhanded slap at Karl.
And for extra bonus fun,
spot the lies of Mary Matalin via Josh. Whew, this is turning out to be quite a Sunday, isn't it?
(Graphics love to
Gonzography. Hat tip to John Casper for the article link -- most amusing.)
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Remember those heady days after Republican Representative
Duke Cunningham plead guilty to bribery and corruption charges (and apparently had a menu of bribery options...how efficient), and Republican lobbyist and politico
Jack Abramoff plead guilty to bribery and tax evasion charges and Republican Representative
Tom DeLay was indicted in Texas? And Republicans were running from all sides to denounce poor ethics behavior and push reforms into Congress at top speed? A veritable stampede of ethical goodness, right?
Well,
not so much.
Sucks when you have to actually DO the reform instead of just pretending to be for it, doesn't it? Actions speak louder than words and in this case, Republican action on ethics can be summed up thusly:
**crickets chirping**
For a party that controls both houses of Congress and the White House, inaction is speaking very loudly indeed.
Want reform? Elect a Democrat.
(Photo credit to
Jonathan Ernst -- Reuters.)
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Just when you thought
Lil' Debbie had reached her nadir, the crusty old bird who raised her fist to the sky and shrieked "I'll never be hungry again!" finds new professional substratum to probe.
She has now turned the ombudsman's column of the Washington Post into Lucky Magazine. She says of Dana Milbank, "I think his appearance on MSNBC last week was a mistake in judgment," and assures everyone that he has been "taken to the woodshed" for what she perceives as a wardrobe malfunction on a television show.
First of all -- Jesus tapdancing Christ, does Deborah Howell even
know she is supposed to be the "reader's representative," and that she's not writing a fucking opinion column? Well
I think the reporters of the WaPo need fashion tips from Deborah Howell like I need lectures on bad language from that
foul-mouthed old Lone Star battleaxe.
Secondly -- is she even on the ball enough to know that
Jeb Bush and Scott McClellan did virtually the same thing? Where is all the tut-tutting about the President's brother's orange badge or
Scott McClellan's orange tie and their lame jokes? Why do those not draw down her dithering opprobrium as well? Shouldn't she just, you know, stick to what is
actually printed in the pages of the Post and not worry about some off-duty fashion gaff? Is that really what she thinks her role is?
Debbie acknowledges that this came because right-wing blogs (specifically Malkin and the Power Tools) directed their readers to her. Earlier in the week Rocket Boy gave off licking his privates for a moment to express his outrage at Milbank's attire and said that Lil' Debbie would be addressing it in this week's column. Snap his fingers, Lil' Debbie hops to like a Texas toad.
(So much for the claim of the Power Tools that
they aspire to be "commenters" and don't encourage their readers to action like bloggers on the left. We would employ the word "hypocrite" but it has far too many syllables and would likely just confuse the them further. Suffice to say had their precious Bush junta not been downplaying Whittington's injuries from the get with words like "peppered" none of this probably would've happened.)
On the other hand, it has now been five, count 'em five weeks to the day since Lil' Debbie first printed her column saying that Abramoff gave money to both Democrats and Republicans. Although she herself finally (grudgingly) acknowledged that this was wrong,
no correction has been appended to her original column; this despite the fact that such "deranged leftists" as
Bradford J. DeLong, economics professor at UC Berkeley and former Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy, as well as many others have asked her on the newly reopened
post.blog to do so.
Does someone actually need to
tell her that making such a correction is standard operating procedure for any news organization that actually holds itself to some sort of standard with regard to factual reporting? One might think an ombudsman of all people would be aware of this obscure technicality.
Debbie now thinks that Milbank,
like Froomkin before him, should be punished for showing bias against the GOP (as if) and thus be permanently banished to the opinion page. (Because Steno Sue, you know, never does anything like that. The
Jessica Lynch story, her anonymous source "coverage" of Monicagate and the faceloads she regularly delivers to the Democrats are just good, solid reporting.)
Is there really any doubt that this clueless crone is completely out of touch, has no idea what her job is and remains firmly in the tank for the GOP?
I should also mention that we have now learned what words are so obscene, so vile, so foul that they cannot be tolerated by the language filter at the post.blog --
Steno Sue. So if you decide to
stop by and make any commentary, here's a word to the wise -- don't use the words "Steno Sue" to refer to the woman who
stole the work of a dead man she refuses to acknowledge and whose fact-free reporting was the source of Howell's egregious error to begin with. The comments -- like several from last night (which I took care to preserve in
our comments, knowing they would soon be gone) -- will be deleted (more
here.) I'm partial to the term "Tachyographer Schmidt" which some have been using in its stead.
Update: Paul Lukasiak has more on what the Post finds offensive.
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Crooks and Liars has video up of today's Crazy Mary appearance on Timmeh's show. If you missed it, it's quite the bravura performance, complete with wacky foil flower badge and everything.
Wolcott
sums things up.
And I think our
reader Prairie Sunshine cuts nicely through the crap:
Watching MTP in Real Time and have these observations: Matalin's spinning so hard she's about to explode.
"the frequency of such accidents..." BULLSHIT. Hunting accidents are noteworthy for their INFREQUENCY.
Gregory apologizes for telling Scott McClellan he was being a jerk [off camera] when McClellan was--HELLO...--being a jerk.
In the Real World, it is about the average American says Matalin. Well, Mary Matalin DOES NOT SPEAK for me. I've hunted, and this south Texas Republican BWANA hunting is not real hunting.
And the shooting, the coverup and the blame the vic, blame the press [who are the only ones with a modicum of opportunity to serve as my proxy in getting information out of this WH] tactics should have the bright light of day shown on them until all questions are answered.
Here's hoping for some serious-ass sunshine. I can't think of a crew who needs it more than the folks in this Administration.
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If I were some Shakespearean wannabe, I'd wax poetic about the parallels between Dick Cheney's shooting a man in the face and the entire history of the Bush Administration point to a comedy of errors heading toward tragedy. It turns out that I don't have to do so, because
Newsweek beat me to the punch this morning.
The Newsweek story has it all: money, power, the story of a President who couldn't even be bothered to be curious enough to call his own Vice President to see if he was doing alright after shooting a man, and a Veep whose long history of press averse behavior rubbed the Washington establishment the wrong way...again...to churn up a continuing news cycle of innuendo, and day after day of failure to take responsibility until forced to do so by either Karl Rove or Mary Matalin, depending on which side of things you hear today.
Plus, Mrs. Cheney is apparently
a diva (see page 3). (She's gonna hate that in print.) Lady MacBeth, eat your heart out.
There has been an undertone in every article coming out of DC on this shooting that really needs more discussion: just how much control, if any, does the President have over this Vice President?
According to
the Newsweek article, the only way the White House got the skinny on what happened in Texas was when Rove called his long-time pal Katherine Armstrong late the night of the shooting. (Although the Veep did, apparently speak with David Addington, his Number 2, the President was relegated to the Junior Soprano nominally in charge role for the evening and not called at all.)
When Cheney's team called the Situation Room to notify them of a shooting, the little details like the Veep pulled the trigger, that he wasn't the one shot, or that a man had to be taken to the hospital as a result just weren't divulged. How bizarre is that? (Although
O'Beirne seems to think this is a normal reaction, I think we can all agree that is just plain odd.)
Was this the Veep thumbing his nose at the WH -- or did he just not think that they would even care about the details? What kind of President doesn't even find out if his VP was shot or not until the next morning?
Hello?!? That's just plain crazy. And what sort of Veep withholds that sort of information from the President? These people aren't on the same team -- either that, or there is some sort of weird, detached, passive aggressive thing going on that I don't even want to know. Maybe someone with more of a psych background can explain this to me, but this whole miscommunication narrative is bizarre.
Newsweek raises the issue of the order to shoot down Flight 93 over Pennsylvania on 9/11 -- and how, apparently, the staffers of the 9/11 Commission and the Commissioners themselves still
do not believe Cheney's version of events:
But a source close to the commission, who declined to be identified revealing sensitive information, says that none of the staffers who worked on this aspect of the investigation believed Cheney's version of events.
A draft of the report conveyed their skepticism. But when top White House officials, including chief of staff Andy Card and the then White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, reviewed the draft, they became extremely agitated. After a prolonged battle, the report was toned down. The factual narrative, closely read, offers no evidence that Cheney sought initial authorization from the president. The point is not a small one. Legally, Cheney was required to get permission from his commander in chief, who was traveling (but reachable) at the time. If the public ever found out that Cheney gave the order on his own, it would have strongly fed the view that he was the real power behind the throne.
With this shooting, that raw nerve has once again been exposed -- by Cheney, himself, this time in his "damage control" interview with Brit Hume, wherein Cheney claimed to have inherent declassification authority. If true, this would be a sea change of Vice Presidential power -- this authority has rested solely with the President, period -- and if true, this change has occurred in the absence of any public discussion or notification, which also runs contrary to American sensibilities on sensitive national security issues. (For a great review of this, listen to
this NPR interview.)
Is this an accurate assessment of how things stand in the Bush Administration? Or is this another example of Dick Cheney grabbing the reins with both hands while thumbing his nose at "the boss?"
My gut tells me that the ripples of "Who is really in charge?" are going to keep making some waves.
The Newsweek article has a few telling jabs -- but I'm not able to tell if they are coming from Rove or Andy Card in a couple of places. Either way, though, those jabs wouldn't be there if there weren't some concern that the President comes off looking less than in charge and less than engaged -- which pretty much sums up exactly how he comes across when you look into how incurious he was about the shooting. (Heaven forbid someone should wake the man up to give him news -- even important news like "your Veep just shot a man.")
And while we are at it, the portrait of Dick Cheney as so mean his own press people can't even ask him questions is lovely, isn't it?
Take a peek at this bit on how the President doesn't need Cheney for advice, that he's his own big boy now, and tell me if you aren't feeling the friction
between the camps:
Cheney unquestionably exerted enormous influence on Bush in those early days. But Bush's aides say that the president has become less dependent on Cheney for advice, particularly in foreign affairs. The two men still have private lunches, but no longer every week. There are signs now that Bush listens to more-moderate voices on national security. On a range of foreign-policy crises, from Iran to North Korea, Cheney's forward-leaning posture has given way to the mainstream, multilateralist approach advocated now by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Mrrrrowr. Karl? Condi? Is that you? Or is this Bush himself, picking up the phone to plant a small dagger publicly, just to put Dead-eye Dick in his place? We are living interesting times...which may explain Mary Matalin's red claws and spin extravaganza on Timmeh's show this morning.
But it's going to take a lot more spin than she's shoveling out to put this genie back in the bottle. Who is in charge? I'm not even sure the President knows at this point.
The TimesUK has a good summary piece on the whole issue, raising some of the questions we've all had over the course of the week.
(Photo credit to
Paul Iverson/AP. Hat tip to reader Stephen Parrish on the story link.)
UPDATE: Some days, you just have to say it out loud:
I love Wolcott.
UPDATE #2:
The Sunday Times comes up with Condoleeza Rice and maybe two beers, among the list of unanswered possibilities.
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FOX NEWS SUNDAY (WTTG), 9 a.m.: Sens. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.); Ford's Theatre director Paul Tetreault and former senator Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.).
THIS WEEK (ABC, WJLA), 9 a.m.: Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff , Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.) and Miami Heat player Shaquille O'Neal .
MEET THE PRESS (NBC, WRC), 9 a.m. : Chertoff .
FACE THE NATION (CBS, WUSA), 10:30 a.m.: Sens. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.).
LATE EDITION (CNN), 11 a.m.: Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), British Ambassador David Manning , German Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger , French Ambassador Jean-David Levitte , retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton , who was commander of Iraqi troop training, and Chertoff.
(Via
the WaPo.)
It's cold as all get out here this morning -- our poor dachshund looked at me like I was torturing her for the morning visit to the yard -- and all the birdies on our feeder are fluffed out and pudgy, trying to stay warm. We're starting the day with Shark Tale and a fresh pot of coffee, and hopefully some banana bread if I can muster the energy to bake.
Although, I have to say, just seeing the name Saxby Chambliss in print kinda curdles my stomach. Blergh. Oh, and look -- it's Lieberman. Again. Shocker. Sure looks like Michael Chertoff is going to have a busy morning, what with that House report calling his Katrina Response a "failure of leadership" and all. Oh, wait, they meant that to imply President Bush -- guess he was too busy sleeping in and eating breakfast this morning to take any responsibility for his own personal failures and responsibility, eh?
Yep, the "not my problem" Administration keeps on going. Too bad the folks in the Gulf Coast have to live with the consequences -- who wants to bet if George Bush lost his house, Brownie and Chertoff would have figured out a better way to communicate. Post haste. Nice to know the regular folks in America only get the half-assed treatment.
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