Excellent post, Christy

Smackdown!

Siun, I just sent you an email.

The Republican talking point, used by Old 60 Grit’O recently is that Democrats get angry and unhinged when the Republicans point out the truth.

This talking point can be used about them too. They are angry and upset about Hugo Chavez calling Bush the Devil, because they know that he is the Devil.

“When I talk about war, what I really mean is peace”.

-George W. Bush

-GSD

Doesn’t matter. Listen to the call ins on C-Span. Half this country has lost it’s mind and it’s soul.

GSD –

“When I talk about war, what I really mean is peace.” — George Bush

Security means chaos
Torture means legal interrogation techniques
Progress means worsening conditions
Sanity means insanity
etc.
etc.

oh, and here’s more from “moderate” mccain:

Sen. John McCain on Sunday urged quick confirmation for John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, saying the nominee is needed to talk back to “two-bit dictators” such as Venezuela’s president.

klyde at 5 — the C-Span calls on the wingnut line have always been a orchestrated talking point tool. Don’t confuse the same twenty people who call in all the time for half the country. More like 37% of it.

Glenn Greenwald has another winner.

“Osama bin Laden died again — Vote Republican”

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.....html#links

Scarecrow at 1 — thanks, I’m a little peevish this morning (as if that isn’t obvious by now *g*).

There is a post over on Kos about torture bill, this part hit me.
Paul Krugman on Why Bush Wants to Torture

The central drive of the Bush administration — more fundamental than any particular policy — has been the effort to eliminate all limits on the president’s power. Torture, I believe, appeals to the president and the vice president precisely because it’s a violation of both law and tradition. By making an illegal and immoral practice a key element of U.S. policy, they’re asserting their right to do whatever they claim is necessary.

Christy Hardin Smith @ 10

Scarecrow at 1 — thanks, I’m a little peevish this morning (as if that isn’t obvious by now *g*).

christy,

your peevishness is equal to most people’s best behaviour.

sending hugs your way!

I took the torture postcard pdf and put 4 up on a page to save paper. Who can host it?

Christy Hardin Smith @ 8

klyde at 5 — the C-Span calls on the wingnut line have always been a orchestrated talking point tool. Don’t confuse the same twenty people who call in all the time for half the country. More like 37% of it.

I would like to believe that but I guess we won’t know until after the elections.

OT it appears that the author of one of my favorite comics comes down squarely in the stay the course camp. Very strange:
http://www.comics.com/comics/c.....60923.html

Great post! And thanks

shorter NIE:

Bush causes terror.

Twisted Martini @ 13

I took the torture postcard pdf and put 4 up on a page to save paper. Who can host it?

email me at speakeasy dot net

If you looked at all the resources of the U.S. government, we spent 85, 90 percent on current terrorists, not on how people are radicalized.”

Torture. That’s one thing that has been a radicalizing feature throughout the history of the radical Muslim and other extremist movements.

Almost everyone who seems to have studied Zawahiri points to his time being tortured in Egypt (and the torture in the same place of Qutb of the founder of some of the radical principles, including takfir)as the point where his fundamentalism hardened into radicalism and terrorism.

It’s not just coincidence that so many terrorists came from regimes like Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Then there’s the torture in Iran under the Shah that helped usher in the fundamentalists there.

Make that torture at the hands of an infidel invading and occupying force and you’ve got a dandy recipe for fighting terrorism. Kind of like taking some bacteria laden ground glass and rubbing into an open wound as a salve, Doctor Frist’s Miraculous Elephant Oil.

Christy Hardin Smith @ 10

Scarecrow at 1 — thanks, I’m a little peevish this morning (as if that isn’t obvious by now *g*).

Ironically, I’m glad to hear it. I’d be concerned about anyone who is not seriously upset by what’s happening to the country and how hard it’s going to be to fix it. You’re sane.

I have to remind myself that Chile went through a long dark night, but they eventually came out of it. And recently, their courts said that the amnesty legislation passed to absolve those responsible for the “disappeared” and torture, etc, was unlawful. So it’s okay to go back and try to hold those responsible for those crime accountable. There is a lesson there for the Bush regime and those who think the detainee bill is an “all in free” pass.

Here’s Elizabeth Holtzman on how the detainee bill is a sneak “pardon” that the Bush Administration thinks it is giving itself. It was posted a couple threads back, too.

http://www.suntimes.com/cgi-bi.....ef23b.html

The reasons for the Arab and Persian street hatred for the American government are not all that complicated. These reasons include the American penchant for imposing their moralistic and religious will on people of the Middle East. The occupation and proclivity for military destruction of Middle Eastern counties and total domination, manipulation and control of its peoples. And the theft by American ‘big oil’ of Mideast crude petroleum. And, of course the high-handed and one-sided treatment by the U.S. of the festering Israeli-Palestinian “question”. Naturally, most of us know this.

Selise, coming at ya!

There are a couple of editorials in today’s wapo that are searing, here is part of one:

…..
Can’t the United States see that when we allow someone to be tortured by our agents, it is not only the victim and the perpetrator who are corrupted, not only the “intelligence” that is contaminated, but also everyone who looked away and said they did not know, everyone who consented tacitly to that outrage so they could sleep a little safer at night, all the citizens who did not march in the streets by the millions to demand the resignation of whoever suggested, even whispered, that torture is inevitable in our day and age, that we must embrace its darkness?

Are we so morally sick, so deaf and dumb and blind, that we do not understand this? Are we so fearful, so in love with our own security and steeped in our own pain, that we are really willing to let people be tortured in the name of America? Have we so lost our bearings that we do not realize that each of us could be that hapless Argentine who sat under the Santiago sun, so possessed by the evil done to him that he could not stop shivering?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....01303.html

By the way, I am going to use Hugo Chavez the way the Republicans use Coulter. Yes he says outrageous things in outrageous ways, but maybe there is some importance to the questions he is asking.

-GSD

selise @ 17

Twisted Martini @ 13

I took the torture postcard pdf and put 4 up on a page to save paper. Who can host it?

email me at speakeasy dot net

WOO HOO speakeasy!

btw, gang, I updated the talking head post below. It seems KLo got her pristine knickers in a twist this morning and I wanted to be certain that her insinuation did not go unchallenged. It would have been easier had she simply e-mailed me, but then she couldn’t have tried to manipulate her readership. SIGH

“PPS — Welcome to the folks that KLo sent scurrying over from the Corner. Just to clarify, I did something that I find useful in a contested fact situation — I went to the source and asked questions. The information provided above by the Clinton Press Secretary was provided at my asking. Unlike some folks, I neither take nor follow marching orders. Thanks.”

‘mornin’…

So, when do we attack Iran? Close to election day, to minimize time for voter blowback in the event things again go poorly and we get hit back hard? Or, right after the mid-terms that Rove will have managed to rig to retain control of Congress?

‘eh?
_

By the way, another overt sign of the fascist takeover. The dashing, but brown skinned member of the Chavez government was “roughed up” by US customs officials.

Notice despite all of the French bashing in the run up to the Iraq mess, there were never any roughings-up of French diplomats…

But Bush and his lackeys feel free to rough up a Latino….

Europeans taking care of Europeans.

-GSD

Smack em’ down Christy….You are the best. Klo as my grandma says Va FA!

here’s the beginning and ending of the other in the wapo:

MIAMI Afew years ago, as I worked on a documentary film about torture survivors in exile from my native Haiti, I met a young woman who under questioning by a military officer was slapped until she became deaf in one ear, was forced to chew and swallow a campaign poster, and was kicked so hard in the stomach by booted feet that she kept slipping in and out of consciousness in a pool of her own urine and blood. Another woman had an arm chopped off and her tongue sliced in two before she was dumped in a mass grave, miles from her home.

(snip)

After first reading it as a young girl newly escaped from Jean-Claude Duvalier’s dictatorship in Haiti, I recently rediscovered a poem called “The Colonel” by Carolyn Forch. The narrator describes dining with a dictator who, after the luxurious meal, empties a bag full of human ears on the table.

“I am tired of fooling around,” he tells his visitor. “As for the rights of anyone, tell your people they can go [expletive] themselves.”

He lifts his glass of wine, and with one sweep of his arm, brushes the ears to the floor.

When the ears hit the ground — like those of all my disappeared neighbors, I imagine — the narrator notices that some of them are pressed to the floor while others are catching “this scrap of his voice.” My fear is that when it is most needed, none of our ears will bother to catch any voices at all. Then will the tortured see any reason to live on? And if they live, whom will they tell?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....01304.html

This odious legislation will not make us safer; it endangers us even more.

wigwam pointed to a great WaPo article last night on the torture issues - a lot of good talking points to be found here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....00507.html

note this comment:
“It replaces the old broken” military trial system ruled illegal by the Supreme Court with “a new broken commission system,” said Marine Corps Col. Dwight Sullivan, the chief defense counsel for the Defense Department’s Office of Military Commissions. He said “it methodically strips rights” guaranteed by laws and treaties and appears to be unconstitutional.

I get sick of listening to people talk about GWB’s legendary warriorhood. The closest he came warriorhood was serving as a cheerleader in high school. According to Israeli military analyst Martin Van Creveld:

For misleading the American people, and launching the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 B.C sent his legions into Germany and lost them, Bush deserves to be impeached and, once he has been removed from office, put on trial along with the rest of the president’s men. If convicted, they’ll have plenty of time to mull over their sins.

In terms of realpolitik, Saddam Hussein was a U.S. asset, much like Pinochet, the Shah of Iran, and today Musharraf. Getting rid of him created a power vacuum that had been predicted by the CIA in 1990. Subsequent history had been predicted by the CIA, and State Department, and GWB’s own father, who wrote in 1998:

Trying to eliminate Saddam, extending the ground war into an occupation of Iraq, would have violated our guidelines about not changing objectives in midstream, engaging in ‘mission creep’, and would have incurred incalculable human and political costs… Would have have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Under those circumstances, there was no viable ‘exit strategy’ we could see, violating another of our principles… Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different — and perhaps barren — outcome.

Nevertheless, in 2003, twelve years after Desert Storm, the second President Bush ignored his father’s advice and invaded Iraq, ostensibly to eliminate weapons of mass destruction. But President Clinton had already achieved that objective, with neither fanfare nor U.S. casualties:

What the ancients called a clever fighter is one who not only wins, but excels in winning with ease. But his victories bring him neither reputation for wisdom nor credit for courage. For inasmuch as they are gained over circumstnces that have not come to light, the world at large knows nothing of them, and he therfore wins no reputation for wisdom; and inasmuch as the hostile state submits before there has been any bloodshed, he receives no credit for courage. [Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 400BC]

So, I’m guessing Cheney hasn’t read the NIE yet…even if it has been out there for months. And I’m sure he figures that all of these agencies don’t have a clue what the real story is - Cheney knows, and I’m sure he’ll be out there telling more lies.

Bill Frist said he hadn’t read it - God, what a tool he is. Stephanopolous looked incredulous when Frist said he hadn’t seen it.

It’s a sad commentary on where things are that information like this has to be leaked, because those in power regard the truth as undermining their never-ending quest for ultimate power.

For God’s sake, we’ve been saying for YEARS that Iraq is only the central front in the war on teror because WE MADE IT the central front. The only thing people ever needed to reach that conclusion was garden-variety intelligence - you know, the part where you round up your brain cells and think?

The American people have ceded too much of the responsibility for thought to others who tell them what to think - it’s time we brought back thinking as the indispensible element of human function that it is.

Jeesus, these people make me sick.

selise @ 7

oh, and here’s more from “moderate” mccain:

Sen. John McCain on Sunday urged quick confirmation for John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, saying the nominee is needed to talk back to “two-bit dictators” such as Venezuela’s president.

I’m not a person filled with hate, but I’ll tell you this:

John McCain is a fat, old, chipmunk-cheeked, SOB who has absolutely no ethics and no balls. He is a has been, a fake, a man who lost his way, and there is no way in hell that he will be the prez of any country.

American people (in general) are fairly ignorant of observing what people say and what people do in the wonderful world of politics. McCain is a swiftboater’s dream. Dems can swiftboat too and he will be an easy candidate to go after.

And BTW, his is a right wing pig, not a moderate. Please call him what he is.

FUCK him and what he says and thinks.

Thanks for letting me get that out.

I have a question.

Under our new law, cannot Saddam Hussein be released?

OT - but not a lot. Re: the 1997 date, here’s my best shot in the dark. We’ve had rendition as a sidestep around extradition for a long time. With terrorists (and drug trade cartels who operate similary and sometimes have the same players) we’ve used it more.

In November of 1997 we had the Yousef trial and preceding that a lot of very disturbing things came out about the Bojinka plot. So there was a fear about what to do re: people that our intel agencies felt confident were involved in these kinds of extremist plots and yet for whom there was not really evidence of a crime to support the concept of “rendition to justice” in the form of a trial.

From this link, there is a discussion of “attacks” i.e., a program of trying to get perceived threats incarcerated somewhere, anywhere, to reduce the threat. This indicates a start date of 1997 and my guess is that this program is the concern to track back to Nov. 1997.

Forum on rendiion

Panelist Michael Scheuer was responsible for orchestrating the first CIA terrorist rendition program in 1996.
…

When the CIA’s primary focus became Bin Laden and al Qaeda in late 1996, the rendition program reached its pre-9/11 heights. “[The CIA was directed] to begin breaking up al Qaeda cells around the world [and to begin] taking al Qaeda fighters off the street,” said Scheuer. “We said, ‘Yes, sir, what do you want done with these people?’ They said, ‘Well, that’s up to you.’”

Between 1997 and 9/11, the CIA developed a list of senior al Qaeda leaders and their Egyptian allies to “attack.”
“Attack meant causing them to ‘be incarcerated somewhere,’” Scheuer noted.
The rendition program aimed to incarcerate those posing a danger to the United States and to obtain information that any prisoner might have at the time of his arrest, including papers and electronic documents. The CIA located states that were willing to arrest suspects and states where detainees could be taken, and a brokering situation developed between the two.

This “limited system” becomes even more important in a post-9/11 context. “After 9/11, the process didn’t change very much, but there was greatly increased pressure inside the government to pick up more people,” Scheuer said. “They wanted victories.”

emph added

You know, I’ve been really willing from the start of all of this to have some good, decent discussion of what we do and how we address things, given the myriad of issues that are on the table. But I’ve lost that. No one in this administration or Republican party - or chunks of the Democratic party - has acted with even a scintilla of integrity to enter into the conversation.

IMO, a lot of initial deference “let’s work together” kumbayah from Dems did stem from the fact that they knew there was a serious threat and it needed a frank, open discussion that dropped the political attacks and dove into the problems. But they are way past due for figuring out that instead of that we are getting lies, obfuscations, power grabs by those least competent to weild them, and a spiralling out of control mess.

I’ve lost my patience or concern with the crossfire and the underlying issues. We need to stop the madness and go for the throat. Allowing little Mr. Depraved Indifference to keep at it and making excuses for anyone and everyone participate in his lack of process and lies to America is finally more harmful than worrying about catching good people in the crossfire.

Too many of them have lost their claimcheck on having a soul worth saving.

victoria2dc @ 33

I’m not a person filled with hate, but I’ll tell you this:

John McCain is a fat, old, chipmunk-cheeked, SOB who has absolutely no ethics and no balls. He is a has been, a fake, a man who lost his way, and there is no way in hell that he will be the prez of any country.

American people (in general) are fairly ignorant of observing what people say and what people do in the wonderful world of politics. McCain is a swiftboater’s dream. Dems can swiftboat too and he will be an easy candidate to go after.

And BTW, his is a right wing pig, not a moderate. Please call him what he is.

FUCK him and what he says and thinks.

Thanks for letting me get that out.

Thank GOD someone else besides ME for saying it…

Since McCain is my Senator…. (never voted for him)
When I was driving up to Yearlykos listening to our local Air America station, one of the regular wingers who calls in and makes me pound my head on the steering wheel said something very profound and I want to keep tagging McCain with it….. this is a Rethug saying this!
“I will never vote for that MAGGOT McCain again”

He has lost his base in AZ….. that is profound

katymine @ 11

There is a post over on Kos about torture bill, this part hit me.
Paul Krugman on Why Bush Wants to Torture

The central drive of the Bush administration — more fundamental than any particular policy — has been the effort to eliminate all limits on the president’s power. Torture, I believe, appeals to the president and the vice president precisely because it’s a violation of both law and tradition. By making an illegal and immoral practice a key element of U.S. policy, they’re asserting their right to do whatever they claim is necessary.

That is a really startling insight. Follow it through to all it’s logical conclusions.

It’s like the mafia. If you want to be a “made” man you have to commit a crime, often a murder, so that you are “all in”, a guaranteed co defendant if the other mob guys rat you out.

He is making us all complicite in his crimes. Certainly the Rubber Stampers at the very least. I f they can swallow their own vomit and vote for this, they will have proven their absolute submission to him.

scarecrow @ 19

Christy Hardin Smith @ 10

Here’s Elizabeth Holtzman on how the detainee bill is a sneak “pardon” that the Bush Administration thinks it is giving itself. It was posted a couple threads back, too.

http://www.suntimes.com/cgi-bi.....ef23b.html

Thanks for this. It will make it easier for me to sleep next week. There is nothing more to say than oh my god. What in the hell will they do next?

Anne @32 - if they say they’ve seen it or been briefed on it - they have to admit to engaging in blatant lies and deception on the “making America safer” front.

Bush has done this already over and over - misstatements made that intel and folks like Hayden and Tenet know is flat out wrong - but which is “classified” and so can’t be challenged by anyone publically.

It’s such a challenge to decide who degrades their uniform more, Hayden or Graham.

Can someone please get Bush a room at a Holiday Inn Express?

-GSD

Perhaps it’s too late for peace in the Middle East. If so, then we are probably already in a sense, dead. The Bush Administration has tried it’s best to assure Armageddon. However, a Palestinian homeland, while no longer being a sufficient condition for peace, IS a necessary condition for tranquility in that region. And certain Democrats are equally complicit with the neo-cons in bringing the world to the brink of all-out and ultimate catastrophe, ignited by their inaction and irresponsibility in the Mideast.

Mary, I just want to take the opportunity to thank you for your insight, your passion and your dedication to those who have and are suffering from this administration’s complete lack of respect for the rule of law and for principles we hold so dear. I value your thoughts very, very much.

looseheadprop @ 37

katymine @ 11

There is a post over on Kos about torture bill, this part hit me.
Paul Krugman on Why Bush Wants to Torture

That is a really startling insight. Follow it through to all it’s logical conclusions.

It’s like the mafia. If you want to be a “made” man you have to commit a crime, often a murder, so that you are “all in”, a guaranteed co defendant if the other mob guys rat you out.

He is making us all complicite in his crimes. Certainly the Rubber Stampers at the very least. I f they can swallow their own vomit and vote for this, they will have proven their absolute submission to him.

The diarist points this out…

They’re torturing people because it’s one of the most evil things they can think of, in order to assert their right to do anything they want — without limit. It’s as if they are saying, “We’re so big and we’re so bad that we can even torture people and no one can do anything about it. So you’d better fear us and do what we want you to or we’ll come and torture you, too.” And the Bush regime is doing this in all of our names, not just in the names of the 30% that still supports Bush.
[..]
If the Founders were here today and asked to choose the greater threat to our democracy — terrorists or tyrants — to a man they would point to the tyrants. Domestic tyrants are just as much the enemy of patriots as are foreign terrorists. Maybe more so. Tyrants can take our freedom, terrorists can only take our lives.

Christy Hardin Smith @
25

btw, gang, I updated the talking head post below. It seems KLo got her pristine knickers in a twist this morning and I wanted to be certain that her insinuation did not go unchallenged. It would have been easier had she simply e-mailed me, but then she couldn’t have tried to manipulate her readership. SIGH

“PPS — Welcome to the folks that KLo sent scurrying over from the Corner. Just to clarify, I did something that I find useful in a contested fact situation — I went to the source and asked questions. The information provided above by the Clinton Press Secretary was provided at my asking. Unlike some folks, I neither take nor follow marching orders. Thanks.”

She’s so stupid, she can’t even spell “Interview” (Title below copied directly from The Corner)

The Left Blogosphere Response to Clinton’s Interiew with Wallace

Twisted Martini
Could you send it to me at cleter AT gmail DOT com? Thanks. BTW–sent you an email last night.

Anybody see frist on This Week this morning?

Oh. Mah. Dawg.

When George S. asked about the nie and the article in the nyt, frist said he hadn’t ssen it.

Hadn’t seen a document that was issued in april, didn’t know what it said, couldn’t comment on it, and yeah, he’s the majority leader?

I was screaming at the tv, People are dying ya POS!!!

And then there’s torture….

Frist is truly a contemptable human being.

angie @34 - here’s a halfway serious response.

If Hussein had put the same laws into place, it’s not so much that he wouldn’t have to be released; just that he couldn’t be tried. ;)

See at least McCain and Co. are careful to say that while you can do things like the Dilawar beatings, to a wholly innocent person, bc they don’t cause wounds and it’s just the fact that the guy wouldn’t stand up that resulted in his death, no one really “killed” him, you can’t rape. But if you do, your rape victim can’t have access to courts or protection of any kind against you and can continue to be held with no charges for years and years and years to be victimized over and over and over again - all with no recourse, ever.

But we did say it was bad and people shouldn’t do it. It’s just we added on that part that if you do it, your victim has no rights to object, resist or ever receive justice.

I feel sick and slimed.

cleter @ 45

Twisted Martini
Could you send it to me at cleter AT gmail DOT com? Thanks. BTW–sent you an email last night.

Inbound! Used the BW image as you’ll see. Thanks for your help!

Twisted Martini @ 21

Selise, coming at ya!

tw - hasn’t arrive yet… still watching for it. will upload immediately and post url for download…

Well, I just listened to the Wallace interview and it hit me…Instead of Bush looking for Bin Laden those first 8 months of his misadministration, he was looking for those missing “w’s” from the White House Keyboards. After all, _ow can you _age a _ar _ithout the letter W?

selise @ 49

Twisted Martini @ 21

Selise, coming at ya!

tw - hasn’t arrive yet… still watching for it. will upload immediately and post url for download…

I’m resending it, it should have got there by now.

victoria2dc @ 33

selise @ 7

oh, and here’s more from “moderate” mccain:

Sen. John McCain on Sunday urged quick confirmation for John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, saying the nominee is needed to talk back to “two-bit dictators” such as Venezuela’s president.

I’m not a person filled with hate, but I’ll tell you this:

John McCain is a fat, old, chipmunk-cheeked, SOB who has absolutely no ethics and no balls. He is a has been, a fake, a man who lost his way, and there is no way in hell that he will be the prez of any country.

American people (in general) are fairly ignorant of observing what people say and what people do in the wonderful world of politics. McCain is a swiftboater’s dream. Dems can swiftboat too and he will be an easy candidate to go after.

And BTW, his is a right wing pig, not a moderate. Please call him what he is.

FUCK him and what he says and thinks.

Thanks for letting me get that out.

i think your comment is exceedingly accurate and thoughtful. you’d have to go over-the-top to really call it a rant…. ;-)

Twisted Martini @ 51

selise @ 49

Twisted Martini @ 21

tw - hasn’t arrive yet… still watching for it. will upload immediately and post url for download…

I’m resending it, it should have got there by now.

maybe i wasn’t clear about my email addy?

that would be:

selise at speakeasy dot net

Christy Hardin Smith @
25

btw, gang, I updated the talking head post below. It seems KLo got her pristine knickers in a twist this morning and I wanted to be certain that her insinuation did not go unchallenged. It would have been easier had she simply e-mailed me, but then she couldn’t have tried to manipulate her readership. SIGH

“PPS — Welcome to the folks that KLo sent scurrying over from the Corner. Just to clarify, I did something that I find useful in a contested fact situation — I went to the source and asked questions. The information provided above by the Clinton Press Secretary was provided at my asking. Unlike some folks, I neither take nor follow marching orders. Thanks.”

You mean noted Duran Duran scholar Katherine Jean Lopez?

I’ve had that post in the back of my mind for a while (*sigh*). Sometimes the universe just sends you one slow and over the plate.

OMFG!!!

KLo took the Duran Duran comment off her Wikipedia page!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K.....Lopezfox-a

If anyone can find it in a Google cache, lemme know. I swear I’ve linked to it before.

Some W keys were discovered “taped on top of the doorways,” while others were broken.

The report was more cute than cutting, with Grove quoting former Al Gore spokesman Chris Lehane, who quipped: “I think the missing W’s can be explained by the vast left-wing conspiracy now at work.”

But within two days, Grove’s playful item had morphed into one more full-blown Clinton scandal. Suddenly newspapers and TV news shows were featuring extensive reports of Clinton administration “vandalism,” stretching from the EOB offices of former Vice President Gore to the West Wing. Reports alleged expletive-ridden graffiti, sliced computer and telephone wires, file cabinets glued shut, presidential seals steamed off doors, stolen pictures and so-called porn bombs, which were never exactly described.

The technological problems the vandals wrought were so severe that, according to a report in the New York Daily News, “a telecommunications staffer with more than a quarter-century of service was seen sobbing.”

“Phone lines cut, drawers filled with glue, door locks jimmied so that arriving Bush staff got locked inside their new offices,” a disapproving Andrea Mitchell reported on NBC News. The message seemed clear: The trailer-trash Clintons and their staff had enjoyed one last bacchanal at taxpayer expense.

Now it seems those closely detailed stories were largely bunk. Last week it was revealed that a formal review by the General Accounting Office, Congress’ investigative agency, “had found no damage to the offices of the White House’s East or West Wings or EOB” and that Bush’s own representatives had reported “there is no record of damage that may have been deliberately caused by the employees of the Clinton administration.”

Selise: Just resent. If it doesn’t come in, ping me at dan at twistedmartini DOT com and i’ll reply.

KLo took a break from her fundy fandango to go after you, Christy?

Jeebus.

Musta just finished the prayer service and rushed to share her “religion”.

http://www.frcaction.org/index.cfm?i=WX06C06

OfT:

I have written to both my Senators this morning and asked that they oppose the “war crimes compromise” with a filibuster or a hold. If Congress really wants to go home to campaign at the end of the week, it shouldn’t take too many long-talkers or secret-holders to get us across the finish line. Isn’t Spectre holding hearings on the bill tomorrow, not liking so much the retro and habeas parts of the Rebellious GOP Cave-In?

There are enough Democratic Senators who are coasting to re-election (Hillary and Dianne, I’m talking to you!) who should make an effort on this.

I also like the idea of proposing amendments to specify banned and not-banned acts of torture, but imagine Fristy won’t allow floor time for anything so juicy. Can’t have the Cat-Killer sporting wood over real torture talk on the Senate floor, y’know….

========
Had Enough?
========

TeddySanFran @ 60

OfT:

I also like the idea of proposing amendments to specify banned and not-banned acts of torture, but imagine Fristy won’t allow floor time for anything so juicy. Can’t have the Cat-Killer sporting wood over real torture talk on the Senate floor, y’know….

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Had Enough?
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Oh Lord. I’m going to have to scrub my brain now.

Made the mistake of watching a little Faux this morning. I missed the big interview, but did catch some of the mess after, with analysis by the one and only, Byron York, (aka Barbara Comstock’s lackey, Scooter Libby’s bootlicker, etc…) doing his usual spin and lie show. Blech.

God, these people are idiots.

Twisted Martini @
58

Selise: Just resent. If it doesn’t come in, ping me at dan at twistedmartini DOT com and i’ll reply.

got it! you (and all your friends) can download it from:
http://www.netrootsmass.net/ex.....stcard.pdf

Well, a part of the discussion needs to be flat out asking: 1. What is ok to do to innocent civilians? 2. How does an innocent civilian that ends up at GITMO and who is not charged, because there is nothing to charge them with, ever get released when they have no access to court, and how do they ever escape the abuse of detention away from their families, who may not even know they are alive, and ‘harsh treatment’ or is it just ok to kidnap and torture without ever releasing innocent civilians?

OOHH RAAHH Selise!

People against the war don’t say enough about the Iraqis being murdered and maimed. I’m sickened when I see parents grief-stricken by the latest attack which killed or maimed their children and vice versa. They did not invite Bush into their country but are paying the consequences of his folly. Have we no mercy for these lost souls?

I e-mailed my Republican senators and told them they should resign if they approve of torture since torture has never been a part of the Government they are supposed to represent. It’s the first time I bothered with Cornyn and found his e-mail site to be a hoot. All the twists and turns didn’t keep me out, though.

I keep telling myself the Democrats are ready to spring a surprise tomorrow on the torturers. Hope springs eternal.

this one Jane?

Lopez: On a completely non-religious note: I get grief for standing firmly by the fact that Duran Duran is the greatest. Period. Are you in agreement or should we end this conversation now? I’ll Save a Prayer for you either way.

http://www.nationalreview.com/.....171248.asp

And, Christy, thank you for this highlight of the atrocities being done to fellow human beings in Iraq because of our war-mongers and war-profiteers and because of an insane administration that can’t admit a grievous mistake.

Digby was watching a little Faux too …

And in case anyone’s wondering about the vaunted integrity of Huckleberry Graham, after he went on at length on Fox news this morning about protecting the soldiers and the rule ‘o law, he let this slip:

I want one of these guys tried in my lifetime and I’m tired of the supreme court throwing this back. It wasn’t my idea to give em Geneva Convention protections, it was the supreme court. Once the supreme court rules that the Geneva Convention applies we have an obligation to make it work.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com.....2123226065

Sally 66 - I’m glad you did contact them. On some issues, it’s about the winning or losing or strategy and it’s not worth the call.

This issue is different. I linked to the NYT story last year that said Members of Congress got “negligible” calls and emails over Abu Ghraib. Now we are going to institutionalize those practices and embrace them. It’s one thing to live in a place where there are guns to the head and to have the population give in to that kind of government; but how do you ever sleep at night having a free population give in to this with almost no one picking up the phone and calling?

I don’t even care if someone is in Canada or overseas, go ahead and call. And tell them you aren’t a constituent, but let them know they are not operating in the dark, behind the rhetoric of “getting tough on terrorists.” That America has never before been about kidnapping innocent people and holding the for years in secret or torturing them in secret and it is shameful, evil and wrong.

It doesn’t matter how they are going to vote - it does matter that someone says it and that they know the voices are out there.

Toll Free Switchboard: 866-808-0065

House of Representatives Contact info: http://www.house.gov/house/Mem.....tate.shtml

Senators Contact info: http://www.senate.gov/general/.....rs_cfm.cfm

**********
angie - I feel the same way about you and everything I learn from you. Thanks.

Thanks Selise!
Thanks Twisted Martini!

GSD @
23

By the way, I am going to use Hugo Chavez the way the Republicans use Coulter. Yes he says outrageous things in outrageous ways, but maybe there is some importance to the questions he is asking.

-GSD

there’s a BIG difference between Hugo Chavez and Ann Coulter:
Coulter picks on 9/11 widows and Chavez flips Fuckwad the bird.

I want one of these guys tried in my lifetime and I’m tired of the supreme court throwing this back. It wasn’t my idea to give em Geneva Convention protections, it was the supreme court. Once the supreme court rules that the Geneva Convention applies we have an obligation to make it work.

BULL! If you had wanted them tried, they would have been brought in for trial, Civilian court criminal or UCMJ Military.

You want them convicted and tortured without a trial and you want to make sure all the damn incompetent mistakes never see the light of day.

I am using the rightwing argument. I am not equating Chavez to Coulter on substance.

-GSD

Rayne @ 93 on the talking head thread, (Sorry OT)

“DON’T GIVE UP, PEOPLE. THEY WANT US TO RESCUE THEM FROM THEMSELVES AND THEY ARE WILLING TO PAY FOR US TO DO SO.”—Rayne

Yes! That’s my experience too. The other day, in another forum, some conservative guy asked how I’d fund health care (like Canada has) and I said, “Put the tax system back at 1940 levels. Widen the pool, and the less everyone has to pay.” He said it sounded good to him.

I mean, if I say the sky is blue, this dude has to go look. I was shocked.

Oh yeah, the Republicans are flipping out because the belleweather of Ohio is turning toxically against them.

-GSD

fahrender @ 73

GSD @
23

By the way, I am going to use Hugo Chavez the way the Republicans use Coulter. Yes he says outrageous things in outrageous ways, but maybe there is some importance to the questions he is asking.

-GSD

there’s a BIG difference between Hugo Chavez and Ann Coulter:
Coulter picks on 9/11 widows and Chavez flips Fuckwad the bird.

one thing that REALLY pisses me off is how many people (including rangle) jump in to defend bush (who hardly needs defending - he’s CIC of the biggest military on the planet)…. and how fewer people jump in such passionate defense of a bunch of civilians (who lost loved ones and could use the support). we’ve got to get over this worship of and identificaation with authority figures. it’s infecting all of us.

angie @
34

I have a question.

Under our new law, cannot Saddam Hussein be released?

Excellent! Keep asking that question!

TeddySanFran @
60

OfT:
I also like the idea of proposing amendments to specify banned and not-banned acts of torture, but imagine Fristy won’t allow floor time for anything so juicy. Can’t have the Cat-Killer sporting wood over real torture talk on the Senate floor, y’know….

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Had Enough?
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Oh, ouchie.
(BTW, I saw your Gavin Newsom comment!)

Wait, wait! Front page Sunday, New York Times; ‘As Children Suffer Parents Rethink Use of Spinach.’ Shopper next to me in the checkout agrees to it’s importance in social engineering. She use to write bylines for the LA Times. I mean, what of the children of Iraq? Choices? I don’t know, I got to finish my first coffee

Mary, you have clarified and highlighted several issues here today that have been confusing in this nightmare mindgame. The whole one-minute-to-midnight strategy makes it so much worse. Thank you so much for bringing your incredible wealth of knowledge and experience to us.

So glad I canceled my satellite TV. I would rather have a sharp stick in my eye than watch one second of the MSM “creating hate ‘n ignorance 24/7″ spew, let alone fucking pay for it.

Now I just keep my fave videos going - V for V, Big Lebowski, and anything with girls kissing.

FDL and you people are the news, period.

And yes, I do think Big Dog breathing the same air as Jane and Christy had something to do with his finally taking Rove seriously.

meta @ 82

Mary, you have clarified and highlighted several issues here today that have been confusing in this nightmare mindgame. The whole one-minute-to-midnight strategy makes it so much worse. Thank you so much for bringing your incredible wealth of knowledge and experience to us.

meta speaks for me!

I want one of these guys tried in my lifetime and I’m tired of the supreme court throwing this back. It wasn’t my idea to give em Geneva Convention protections, it was the supreme court. Once the supreme court rules that the Geneva Convention applies we have an obligation to make it work.

What on earth is Huckleberry trying to say? How did Hamden get in his righteous way? Is he saying he’s in favor of the GC or not, and what version of them is he talking about? My head is about to twist off my neck.

victoria2dc @
33

selise @ 7

oh, and here’s more from “moderate” mccain:

Sen. John McCain on Sunday urged quick confirmation for John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, saying the nominee is needed to talk back to “two-bit dictators” such as Venezuela’s president.

I’m not a person filled with hate, but I’ll tell you this:

John McCain is a fat, old, chipmunk-cheeked, SOB who has absolutely no ethics and no balls. He is a has been, a fake, a man who lost his way, and there is no way in hell that he will be the prez of any country.

American people (in general) are fairly ignorant of observing what people say and what people do in the wonderful world of politics. McCain is a swiftboater’s dream. Dems can swiftboat too and he will be an easy candidate to go after.

And BTW, his is a right wing pig, not a moderate. Please call him what he is.

FUCK him and what he says and thinks.

Thanks for letting me get that out.

You are talking about Saint John McCain, the leading candidate to be the next president of the United States.

Jane Hamsher @ 55

Christy Hardin Smith @
25

btw, gang, I updated the talking head post below. It seems KLo got her pristine knickers in a twist this morning and I wanted to be certain that her insinuation did not go unchallenged. It would have been easier had she simply e-mailed me, but then she couldn’t have tried to manipulate her readership. SIGH

“PPS — Welcome to the folks that KLo sent scurrying over from the Corner. Just to clarify, I did something that I find useful in a contested fact situation — I went to the source and asked questions. The information provided above by the Clinton Press Secretary was provided at my asking. Unlike some folks, I neither take nor follow marching orders. Thanks.”

You mean noted Duran Duran scholar Katherine Jean Lopez?

I’ve had that post in the back of my mind for a while (*sigh*). Sometimes the universe just sends you one slow and over the plate.

Funny how often those slow, fat pitches come from the Blogostomy™! I’m so happy to be from Blogtopia.

Wesley Clark has an article in the upcoming Newsweek (cover titled
“Losing Afghanistan”)

“What We Must Do Now
Success is possible. But make no mistake. We are not winning.”

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/14973488/site/newsweek/

Wes was against the invasion of Iraq and strongly stated this before the HASC. Everything that Wes said would occur from the administration’s invasion of Iraq has happened. He did support the war against Afghanistan, but not the way it has been handled.

Chavez speech replaying on cspan 1 now.

There was a lot that people might want to hear. The info is powerful, imho.

Our leaders ignored history.
We American citizens ignored history.
The history of unintended consequences.
Bin Laden came out of the Islamic warriors WE financed in Afganistan in the 1980s.
We won.
We congratulated ourselves.
We won.
Or did we?
We showed BinLaden how to fight, how to lead.
We showed him with American taxpayer money.
We showed him with our CIA operation.
All to defeat the Russians in Afganistan.
To fight the cold war.
To keep the Russians away from “our” oil.
We celebrated by driving around in big and bigger gas-guzzlers.

We are now creating a new generation of Islamic Warriors.
They will come out of Iraq knowing how to fight, knowing how to lead.
How many BinLadens are we creating this time?

Sally @ 67

People against the war don’t say enough about the Iraqis being murdered and maimed. I’m sickened when I see parents grief-stricken by the latest attack which killed or maimed their children and vice versa. They did not invite Bush into their country but are paying the consequences of his folly. Have we no mercy for these lost souls?

I e-mailed my Republican senators and told them they should resign if they approve of torture since torture has never been a part of the Government they are supposed to represent. It’s the first time I bothered with Cornyn and found his e-mail site to be a hoot. All the twists and turns didn’t keep me out, though.

I keep telling myself the Democrats are ready to spring a surprise tomorrow on the torturers. Hope springs eternal.

Hi, Sally, glad to know someone else is emailing Cornyn. I literally hound is office (and Hutchison’s too) with emails and phone calls