As I wrote elsewhere this morning:
Two words: Deer. Headlights.
After all the hyper-analysis (like Matt Yglesias, I went to a basketball game instead), Atrios hits on the obvious truth — there wasn't any "strategy" behind Dubya's latest speech.
The ship has hit the iceberg already. Analyzing any announcement of course adjustments is probably not worth the effort.
But even I didn't expect the vapidity of Dubya's "new way forward" to be expressed as vividly as in this post by Steve Benen (quoting a New York Times article):
Of all the coverage of the president’s “new” policy in Iraq, this may be the most helpful in understanding Bush’s perspective.
As part of a campaign to market the new strategy, Mr. Bush’s aides insisted that the plan was largely created by the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki.
Yet Mr. Bush sounded less than certain of his support for the prime minister, who many in the White House and the military fear may be intending to extend Shiite power over the Sunnis, or could prove incapable of making good on his promises. “If the Iraqi government does not follow through on its promises, it will lose the support of the American people and it will lose the support of the Iraqi people,” Mr. Bush declared.
He put it far more bluntly when leaders of Congress visited the White House earlier on Wednesday. “I said to Maliki this has to work or you’re out,” the president told the Congressional leaders, according to two officials who were in the room. Pressed on why he thought this strategy would succeed where previous efforts had failed, Mr. Bush shot back: “Because it has to.”
“Because it has to” work. Of course. Why hadn’t we thought of that before? If we will something to happen, because we really truly think it should, then even the most far-fetched [plans] deserve to be taken seriously, right?
I guess this really is the McCain doctrine being put into effect.
Related posts:
- In Iraq, As in So Many Contexts, Withdrawal is Victory
- Torture: Obama Heeded Maliki on Abuse Photos, Says McClatchy; What That Says for Our Occupation
- FDL Book Salon Welcomes David Kessler, The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite
- Taking Out the Intelligence Laundry: McClatchy Avoids Policy Debate in Pro-Escalation Afghanistan Report
- Reining in Big Pharma: Taking Away the Marketing Tax Deduction
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Twolf!
Swopa!
Fitz!
MFT-magical fucking thinking.
Mr. Cleaver got a new bathroom scale…
“A New Weigh For Ward”
RBG!
Does he need a map? http://patriotboy.blogspot.com…..2691093424
cheneycheneycheneycheneych
bush? diversion
st. john mccain? diversion
cheney
deadeye and his minions (read digby and rawhide) i had an inkling on the last thread. i went to digby, as per usual and now i really believe it.
cheney
epiphany.
Here’s Salon’s Walter Shapiro’s take on Bush’s speech:
What I find truly hilarious in this is two things: first, how many times has Bush extolled the elections in Iraq and its government as examples of Iraqi sovereignty, but, then, if Bush the colonial viceroy doesn’t think the Iraqi government is doing enough for us, then he’ll just pitch al-Maliki out and find a new puppet.
No contradictions there, natch.
Second, of course, is what’s unspoken in the “because it has to.” If it doesn’t, Bush is lunch meat.
it’s like many who beleived fervently that the Democratic Party was an opposition party that could deliver impeachment and/or and end to the Iraq debacle, or the restoration of habeas corpus, you know, because they ‘had to.’
Because if they weren’t that vehicle, there was some cognitive dissonance on the plate…
I fear now is a time to be very worried.
Bush/CHeney/Liebster/AIPAC/PNAC now know that the gig is up. America is onto their bullshit. They are now “cornered”. Hillary knows it too, hence the statement from last night (of course AFTER watching Shrub bomb).
Knowing these dopes as I (think I) do, they will attempt to win via offense, and that isnt this silly little surge. Heaven help us.
http://www.stonecoyotes.com/music-46.html
“
montag @ 10
I think that was just posturing for his D.C. audience.
If Bush really could snap his fingers and get an Iraqi PM to his liking, it would have happened long before this.
On 28 July he (Moshe Dayan, famed Israeli military leader and politician) went aboard the largest aircraft carrier then cruising off the Vietnamese coast, USS Constellation. He was a professional military man and had often read and heard about such ships; yet what he now saw made a “breath-taking impression” on him. The vessel constituted five acres of sovereign American territory that could go anywhere without having to worry about troublesome allies. Isolated at sea, the crew did not constitute a security problem and the lack of anything else to do made them work all the harder at their jobs. The ship was protected “from the air, the sea, the ground, outer space, and under water”; if Dayan was being ironic – after all, the enemy consisted of little men wearing straw hats – he did not say so. The product of this floating factory was firepower. Every ninety minutes, amidst a numbing outburst of fire and noise, flights of combat aircraft took off to strike at targets in Vietnam; but when it came to specifying the precise nature of those targets his hosts refused to answer his questions. As always, Dayan was impressed by the Americans’ pride in themselves, their nation, and their mission. He ended the day by noting that they were “not fighting against infiltration to South [Vietnam], or against guerrillas, or against North Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh, but against the entire world. Their real aim was to show everybody – including Britain, France, and the USSR – their power and determination so as to pass this message: wherever Americans go, they are irresistible.”
Why Iraq Will End as Vietnam Did
Martin Van Creveld
Hagel On Escalation: ‘The Most Dangerous Foreign Policy Blunder in this Country Since Vietnam’
And here’s Salon’s War Room on Rice’s appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:
Biodun @ 9
There are a hundred similar videos of Johnson looking exactly the same way as he said exactly the same things. The lesson wasn’t learned. I fear it will not be learned next time around, either.
The facade is crumbling…….
You can smell the desperation in the air.
The US has just insulted the Kurds….the fucking Kurds…..
Like sands through an hourglass…
-GSD
fahrender @ 8
nice epiphany
you forgot;
lieberman, diversion
pulled out my old eMac, looking for this letter. I wrote it to an ex-student who was doing graduate work in Berlin at the time. He was gung ho for going into Iraq. I wasn’t. Here’s what I wrote forty-six months ago:
Dear Ed,
You’re right that Saddam is despicable. So are other dictators and autocrats. I just finished a book by Scott Ritter, an ex-USMC Captain who has worked as an arms inspector in Iraq for the U.N. Bought it at Fred Meyers late last year. It is titled “The War Against Iraq. He claims, quite credibly, that Saddam has destroyed or made inoperable all or most of the dangerous stuff the U.N. sanctions ordered removed. I’ve been listening to Ritter vilified on all the rightwing talk radio as a traitor. Even NPR referred to him as “unstable” last week. Then “Morning Edition” cancelled a scheduled appearance by Ritter.
It looks like we’re going in though, which means I owe Peter a Thai dinner. But conquering the Iraqi Army will be easier than conquering the Ba’ath infrastructure. The Turks aren’t letting us through because they don’t think we know what we’re doing. They might be right. Bush and Cheney, Ed, are idiots. You seem to be inspired by Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense. Listening to him construct intricate answers to reporters’ questions, I detect his agenda is getting in the way of reality. I don’t know what the deal is with pushing Gen. Shinseki aside, but supposedly Shinseki thinks we need a lot more troops than Rumsfeld wants (or has).
This must be about oil. I wish we were more serious about stabilizing Afghanistan and stopping the underground financial structure of terrorism and less distracted by Saddam. After all is said and done, if we go in, we might find ourselves realizing that it takes a Saddam to hold an improbable polity like Iraq together.
Wolf got wolfed again. I guess posting last is EPU and posting first is WOLFING.
Wonder where Jeb is?
Today’s Hartford Courant:
http://www.courant.com/news/na…..lines-home
My contempt and disdain for this person is redoubled.
Courant has ‘Talk Back’ re: Bush sp33ch…
http://www.courant.com/news/na…..lines-home
Froomkin’s a delight this morning/afternoon, as his opening declares:
But what do you really think, Dan?
Oh yes and I just love this whole attitude that keeps being expressed that the USA has TOLD the Iraqi government what they have to do…and if they do not, then we can wash our hands of the whole thing. And we dont seem to understand why everyone thinks that the Iraqi government is our puppet!
Everytime I think I’ve heard something from this administration that leaves me speechless, they find new ways to impress me with it’s immorality, pride and ignorance.
ccmask @ 21
Jeb’s dead, baby… oh wait, that’s Zed… never mind
“Because it has to”, indeed. He’s always got what he demanded, covered up what he messed up, lied about f*king up, and hired other people on the family checkbook to clean up the mess. He’s stuck in this one, but can’t conceive of a way out. So like a petulant king, he just demands the world change to fit his needs.
They’ve got nothing left except the power of the entire US military and Cheney’s neocon network. Doesn’t that just make you feel all warm and secure…
(Quick story: I was active duty when Nixon was ordered to turn over his papers. We went active alert for 24 hours or so—everyone I know in the military was advised we were on alert and be ready to report to our assigned stations. Then Nixon backed down and we went off alert. Scary.)
Swopa @ 13
Umm, possible. What I’m focusing on is the hypocrisy in the message and the clearly colonial attitudes.
Ed- I hope you re-send that email to your buddy with a reply. Nice letter. A homeless guy in Ft. Lauderdale who had been to Vietnam also called what would happen. Just goes to show you that guys with no roof over their heads can be a lot smarter than a rancher.
ccmask @
22
Maybe “stalking the wolf” needs to be added to the nomenclaketure…and Wolf…thanks for the freebie.
I wonder if there’s another government that statement could be applied to.
Here is my proposal:
The State of the Union is January 23rd.
Have every Dem/Repug who is against the war…
Stand up and boo/hiss/tongue lash/or whatever…
Our Imperial Wizard must go, and leave pronto…
Boycott his speech…
Jack
twolf & angie (from previous thread) -
Tks for the feedback. Angie – dial-up here; streaming, U-tube, etc. leave me “in the dust” ;-(
OFF TOPIC, but of interest to firepups, I am sure:
Hello Jacqrat,
We just wanted to let you know the Esten Maxwell’s CarePage was updated on:
January 11, 2007 at 10:47 AM EST
Please visit the CarePage to read the latest news.
NOTE: To register for Esten’s Care page alerts, just create an account and use the codename: “EstenMaxwell” for the patient you want to monitor.
ccmask @
29
I haven’t seen him for a couple of years, but his wife tells me he has come around. Like a lot of guys in their 20s, he was sucked in by all the TV coverage of jets, tanks, aircraft carriers….
Theoretically, here’s a video of the Rice heckler
doesn’t seem to be working for me in Safari though
Rice says U.S. must give Maliki “breathing space”
George Bush is like a compulsive gambler who doesn’t know the game he’s playing and knows he’s lost his shirt. His troop buildup with an eye to widening the war to include Iran and Syria is like a desperate scheme to start a riot in the casino before the pit-bosses sidle quietly up to him whispering “Sir, please come with us…….”
Suppose he gave a State of the Union speech, and no one showed up?
(Well, we know who would: the wingers, the DINOs, and JoeL, and they’d have him convinced that he was doing a great job because all those people showed up and clapped for him.)
“Because it has to!”
That’s the rationale the imbecile offers? And, obviously, it does not have to, because it won’t.
The Gary Hart quote from yesterday’s Huffpo article was something to the effect that He thinks he can effect a military solution to a 1300 year old regional problem that he, himself, blew the lid off of.
It’s redundant to say that the man has no concept of reality–of course he doesn’t–but in this case, he is showing signs of sliding dangerously closer to insanity. I see an eerie (and somewhat sad) similarity between George and my father-in-law. I love my father-in-law and it has been exceedingly difficult to witness a once vibrant man, slide into the shadow of Alzheimer’s disease. At one point, he was talking a ‘cocktail’ of chemicals which essentially bought him a few years of lucidity and we all tried to take advantage of that. But the doctors said, going into the treatment, that the drugs would only work for so long — holding the inevitable at bay — and then the disease would catch up quickly and with terrible certainty. Well, that occurred and it just sucked, hard, for all parties concerned.
I apologize for stretching this analogy (and, in point of fact, my father-in-law deserves a far better juxtaposition); but, the similarities are there. George W. Bush looks, to me, to be like a man who has taken drugs for so long in order to have some semblance of lucidity and woken to find, in one terrible instant, that his borrowed time is over, he is insane, and he must pay the piper.
To continue to stretch a miserable metaphor, he can’t afford the piper. It is the young men and women in Iraq who are being asked to pick up the check.
montag @ 10
My thoughts exactly. So much for democracy; now, what was it we were fighting for again?
RBG @ 29
;) takin’ a break from posting first for a while
I heard someone say he was doing this to keep from impeachment
Well, my gooper coworker today was livid about the minimum wage increase. He says it will “cripple” small businesses” and that the Dems are at it already. He didn’t mention anything about the Billion$ for the war though. Unbelievable that I am cooped with goop all day.
Thanks, Swopa. Is the Iraq war still “off the books” (funded by supplemental spending measures, not part of the regular defense budget)? If so, and given that Bush refuses to set any timetables or workable definition of victory, it seems an effective strategy would be to stop with the emergency military spending bills and make Bush find room for Iraq in the regular defense budget. I don’t think there’s any sensible reason, given our open-ended involvement, to keep treating the expense as somehow extraordinary.
Ed*ard Teller @ 20
You receive top honors for prescience, Mr. Teller. Though, I suspect, that is cold comfort. I wonder, now, what your erstwhile student would say?
Do you agree with Bush’s new Iraq plan?
No. It’s just more of the same. Bring the troops home! – 4,869
Yes. It’s a sound strategy. We need to send more troops in. – 1,219
I don’t know. – 256
Total Vote: 6,344
ccmask @ 42
nor does your friend realize that industry, local bussiness thrive and taxes go down when there is living wage
he is a marriontte
CNN just read an email sent in response to their question ‘what would you like to hear from Bush in his speech’
email from Ernie said: “I resign”
johnSwifty @ 45
see #35
Stop me if you’ve heard this before –
Cheney gets a call from his “boss”, W.
“I’ve got a problem,” says W.
“What’s the matter?” asks Cheney.
“Well, you told me to keep busy in the Oval Office, so, I got a jigsaw puzzle, but it’s too hard. None of the pieces fit together and I can’t find any edges.”
“What’s it a picture of?” asks Cheney.
“A big rooster,” replies W.
“All right,” sighs Cheney, “I’ll come over and have a look.”
So he leaves his office and heads over to the Oval Office. W points at the jigsaw on his desk.
Cheney looks at the desk and then turns to W and says, “For crying out loud, Georgie – put the corn flakes back in the box.”
ccmask: have been gooped or goop-cooped?
ccmask
@ 43
One of my friends gets them this way:
If people are paid living wages they’ll buy stuff and businesses will make more money. She says it works every time, when it’s put that way. What they hate is the idea of hiring people and having to pay them: the ideal business for these guys is one with income and no expenses or employees.
CCmask,
Ask said Goop why the previous minimum wage increases were always followed by economic expansions and not downturns.
Then slap him him with a pie.
-GSD
From AP, preping to shift theater from Iraq to Iran:
P J Evans @ 36
Yes, I agree. Some kind of visible demonstration that the MSM can’ ignore.
RagingGurrl @ 48
lol
SOTU idea.
How about honoring the near-year anniversary of this:
Students stood w/back to Gonzo.
If Dems stood facing away during SOTU….
…and that’s Leahy’s alma mater.
P J Evans @ 52
and continue;
when bussiness pays them less then a living wage they have to use public support and that costs us money instead of the company that should be paying their own bills
retirin’ in five @ 55
Possible, but I want them there to NOT clap and to boo – as in the Mean Jean event.
P J Evans @ 51
The other one that does reasonably well is to say that the minimum wage was instituted in 1935, and has been raised multiple times since then. Every time a minimum wage hike is proposed, conservatives say the same thing–it will hurt business. If that were actually the case, the economy would have completely collapsed by now, don’t you think?
He sure is perris. He said his friend owns several McDonalds and has over 500 employees. He said last night that he would have to fire 100 of them. They really believe this stuff.
The McDonald’s guy has a xmas party which I was invited to. Women couldn’t wear heels because he just put in special floors.
I didn’t go because I thought that was ridiculous….and not because my feet are size 10 and I look dumb in flats.
I hereby humbly propose that the proper designation for Operation New Way Forward is in fact Operation CBA. CBA is of course derived from the term CYA, familiar to anyone who’s ever spent much time in any organization whatsoever. The term Operation Cover Bush’s Ass may not be White House-approved, but that’s all the more reason to consider it accurate.
Richmond at 57
Good point, and as someone said the other day, a standing ovation when “Madame Speaker” is announced. But for Gawd’s sake Dems, do something!
Afganistan morphed to Iraq morphed to Iran. sigh
RagingGurrl @ 50
707!
I guess a good answer as to why the minumum wage must be raised is ‘BECAUSE IT HAS TO”.
Biodun @ 53
Biodun,
You’re collecting a particularly nasty combination of reality based sources. Please stop and take it in smaller doses. You’re going to make yourself ill!
But that being stated (only partially tongue in cheek), I’m frankly surprised that we are not already in Iran. I would not have been surprised, had that been the October surprise. Part of me still wonders why it wasn’t; but then I guess the CheneyCo group would have had to have had a realistic worldview in order to know that the next few months would be exceedingly bad for them. In short, we are not already in Iran because the administration is just as pathetic in forecasting the future for their own evil designs as well as for attempting to fight a justified — justified in that it’s already under way — war.
Has anybody got a handle on how many slogans have been slapped on this war since it got started?
I don’t know but it is on the march.
You don’t think we are in Iran? Come on.
johnSwifty @ 67
lifting stem cell research restrictions vote going on now in the house – currently on C-SPAN
-bush had made every indication that he will veto it
ccmask @ 42
I explain it verrrry slowly using simple terms…. gee it is costing us(little us) and the American children 200 million a week for our little adventure in Iraq.
Gee… what could the state of AZ do for 200 million?
Build new schools?
Add more police and firefighters?
Build freeways and light rail?
Renovate one of the bridges that are 50 years old?
For 200 million dollars a week, every state could have a brand new bridge to nowhere, a new one for every week of the year!
Hey Goper…. “did you know that YOUR share of the Iraq war is $2500, so is your wife, each of your kids. Do you think your share is worth $10K? gonna put it on your credit card too, just like the president?”
ccmask @ 61
I love tall women in high heels…/waits for link to picture
Faith-based governance in action.
eeewwwww – lieberman live on cspan2
OT – 253-174, bill on stem cell research passes the House
Bustednuckles @
68
Danged if I know, but I thought Blub’s comment from yesteday was the most concise description of the escalation plan so far.
perris @
20
that was deliberate, perris. fucktard does not deserve the energy to type it’s name …….
This is ridiculous. “Surge”, “escalation”, whatever. This means that thousands of U.S. troops will surely get killed, while thousands more of innocent Iraqis will get caught in the middle. This madness – guess Bush figures, ‘what the heck, I’m going in less than two years, lets unleash hell’.
P J Evans @ 52
Republicans give business what they want.
Democrats give business what they need.
Or alternatively, Democrats balance what’s best for business with what’s best for everyone else; Republicans give business what’s best for them (in the short term) at the expense of what’s best for everyone else.
Maliki is playing the US like a fiddle…Repercussions for Maliki… None
Blank Kludge @ 23
Is there any argument for why it would be bad to leave Iraq that is not a better argument for why it was bad to go in the first place?
raven @ 70
Rumors are aplenty that US Special Forces have been “on the ground” (to borrow a hackneyed administration phrase) in Iran for months.
I simply meant shifting “the theater” for the American public.
if you’ve been watching c-span3 for the house armed service committee hearing, you already heard that gates wants an increase of more than 90,000 soldiers and marines.
from msnbc:
johnSwifty @ 39
Hope is not a plan.
gotcha!
Rumors are aplenty that US Special Forces have been “on the ground” (to borrow a hackneyed administration phrase) in Iran for months.
I simply meant shifting “the theater” for the American public.
Redshift @ 80
democrats give labor the footing they are supposed to have instead of being subject to the bully pulpit of their employer, labor is a commodity that should be valued for their value
labor needs to be given the opportunity to sell their wares, they can withhold for the price they require and they need that ability, that’s what a union does, it turns the labor force into a company that bargains for a fair price
labor should not be valued at what business decides to pay, they need to be valued at what they are worth for the business to survice
prices are not based on cost prices are based on the desire for the comodity, raisng the minimum wage does not affect prices in the least it affects the profit that goes to the ceo
that’s the only one that is affected by wages that reflect the actual value for the consumer of that labor product
Meanwhile, Lieberman has been basking in the the shout-out that Bush gave him last night. Look at that smirk on his face on cable and broadcast network all morning.
FDL was right on the money to focus on getting this guy out of the Senate. Too bad we failed. He’s gonna be a headache and a nuissance for the next two years.
Damn! Another reason to
dislikedespise Joe Lieberman. C-SPAN 2 was playing a really neat piece for brass quintet. I’ve never heard it before. Then Joe made some insipid procedural announcement, so they stopped the piece. Now he’s done and they’re playing one of Vivaldi’s least inspired trumpet concerti .Anybody know how to find out what their background music for the day has been at C-SPAN?
Screw it and off to work….
Swopa: I love what you did with the six stages of grief. In case anyone didn’t see it. Ps: I also clicked on all of your banner ads.
http://www.needlenose.com/6stages/action.htm
The minimum wage is total bullshit..
It’s only raised after 99% of employers are already paying more than the new minimum..
There are exceptions- of course- for farm workers- retuarant workers- etc (you know- the ones who actually are making less than the minimum.)
johnSwifty (if you’re still here):
Someone on a morning thread yesterday mentioned Frank Snepp’s book, you know, the CIA guy I told you about. I called your attention to it, but you probably already had left the thread.
Ed*ard Teller @ 21
Well, looks like you pretty much nailed it to the floor!
Biodun @ 88
Honestly, I know the Dems are certainly not without fault, but what, Lord, what did we do to deserve Joe Lieberman? I guess it was the abortion & gay marriage thing after all.
mandrake @ 94
I like your snark, but a more apt answer is integral links to AIP*C and corporate funds (remember the wife and big pharma?!
New Clusterfuck polls comin out of the woodwork- here’s one from Ipsos- JAR at 32% lowest in their history—nice job clabberhead!
Lieberman’s days have got to be numbered.
raven @
70
Point taken; but, I meant “in” like “shock and awe.”
ccmask @ 97
How, pray tell, except through his switching to Replicon
I did, it’s called “Decent Interval” Snepp
Biodun @ 92
The Judy Miller and General P connection…
http://www.nysun.com/article/46518
And then there’s this from Slate’s Fred Kaplan:
Lieberman has the courage of all newly elected senators who don’t have to run again for six long years.
raven @ 100:
Thanks. Frank Snepp was the boyfriend of a friend of mine in NYC in the early 1980s. I was telling johnSwifty about him just the day before your post!
Biodun @
92
I caught it later in the day, thanks (I was working — we can’t all be freelance authors :)
Now you’ve given me yet another book I’ll have to add to my stack.
With the addition of your own and Robert Fisk’s The Great War for Civilisation: the Conquest of the Middle East, on Siun’s recommendation, my stack is becoming Pisaesque!
GOP: Bush would veto Medicare reforms
Redshift @
85
Magical thinking, yes. I like the label Enron thinking: Hold on to that stock, yeah! Heck, buy more, you saps, while the boys in the back room bail.
The thing is, “it” doesn’t have to work. They’ve already got what they want, in the bag.
“U.S. forces in Iraq raided Iran’s consulate in the northern city of Arbil and detained five staff members, a state-run Iranian news service said.
The U.S. soldiers disarmed guards and broke open the consulate’s gate before seizing documents and computers during the operation…”
from Bloomberg
if done to us, wouldn’t U.S consider this an act of war?
and RGB- i saw a complete list of slogans yesterday- i’ll try to find it for you.
Bay State Librul @ 101
Its up on Raw. Another case of U.S. spooks supporting each other! Don’t you feel more secure now?
CNN – W. Palm beach courthouse – 5 people decontaminated after powder spills from envelope. caller to CNN says substance is tellurium
brkily– here’s a very similar question today in the wapo chat with Dana Priest…check out her answer. I understood the first sentence she wrote and then she blathered more than a bit…imho.
(bold mine!)
Cool, I like him from when I first saw him in the10,000 Day War. He got to Vietnam just as I was leaving but his recount of the end of the war helped fill in some spaces for me.
Biodun @ 104
angie @ 111
Dana Priest is now getting a reputation for being incoherent live. She certainly was that on Hardball several weeks ago. Her writing is better.
Anybody know who Ron Paul (R-TX) is? I just heard him on C-Span give one of the most impressive anti-shrub speeches I’ve heard, addressing the facts of the failure of US policy in Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan and everywhere else, and warning that he believes there is a risk that shrub has contrived a “Gulf of Tonkin” situation to attack Iran. Who is this republican?
I used to think the two words to describe Bush were “Miserable Failure”. Now that I have had a chance to digest his speech and the Glorious New Way Forward, I think the two words that best describe him are “Batshit Crazy”. The man’s a loon. He has to go.
Congress! Where is my Congress! Where are the Goldwaters of yesteryear?*
*It is said that Nixon finally decided to resign when he lost the support of Barry Goldwater.
Blub @
114
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Paul
DBK @ 115
One does not preclude the other!
My impression on Dana Priest (based only on today’s chat) is that she’s been somehow co-opted or gotten to.
NSA leak investigation on her reporting about the ‘black sites’ etc.
Or worse – like a threat of danger.
edit: or she KNOWS that Iran is next, but has to go the route Hal took in 2001. Conceal the truth at all cost.
Blank Kludge @ 118
I’m convinced that alot of this spying on US citizens is about finding stuff on them to hold over them to do their bidding (shades of early FBI).
Recent history might be repeating itself. Once again, Bush is sending too few soldiers — enough to put off admitting he’s failed, but not enough to change things for the better. Not the Congress, not the generals, not the troops can stop him.
(Margaret Carlson, author of “Anyone Can Grow Up: How George Bush and I Made It to the White House” and former White House correspondent for Time magazine, is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are her own.)
DBK @ 115
Here’s a Devil’s Advocate proposition: What if this is a Rovian ploy to draw the administration’s opposition out in the open with absolute articles of impeachment. That would, necessarily, solidify the Republican base.
Mull it over; people like you and I see insanity and the only legitimate recourse is to remove the cancer before it can destroy the whole system — hence, impeachment is called for, and quickly. But, what if that’s Rove’s intent; to mire the country in at least two years of wheel spinning on impeachment proceedings and — literally, back at the ranch — Rove, Cheney and the boys continue to plan world domination.
twolf1 @ 16
We need to get over the long-standing frame that says warfare is foreign policy. There is a good reason why the Department of Defense is separate from the Department of State.
JohnSwifty wrt:
Impeachment might corner the bastard to declare martial law.
but, the bright side is, we’d finally see ‘teh truth’…
edit:; just saw Priest’s sign off…she has a ‘minder’ (she uses ‘co-editor/mod’ or some term)…who is Chris Hopkins?
Richmond @ 59
I’d prefer not to be mistaken for the Thugs. Remaining seated in stony silence would more than do the job.
The Rude Pundit: A Few Randomly Rude Thoughts About Last Night’s Big Speechification
new thread – free fitz
This is all political. The administration privately recognizes that the Iraq occupation is doomed to failure, so this is an effort to shift as much blame as possible to the Democrats.
Option 1: Democrats block troop increases, Iraq fails. This gives wingnuts cover to say “Hey, things could have gone great if we followed the plan, but the Democrats messed it all up.”
Option 2: Democrats don’t block troop increases, Iraq fails. Now the wingnuts can point to the Democratic congress and say “Look, this escalation is their fault! You never saw Iraq get this bad when Republicans were in control.”
And this has also allowed them to shift the entire debate about Iraq. Before it was about whether or not to withdraw, now it’s about whether or not to escalate.
brkily @ 108
Attacking a diplomatic compound is an act of war (nothing “technical” about it). What Priest was trying to say, I think, is that not all acts of war lead to actual wars; “act of war” being a legal term.
Apparently, the US military is claiming that this building was not an Iranian diplomatic consulate. I’ve no idea the truth of the matter.
I’m sure Joe will be up there to take up the cheerleading slack.
EvilDrPuma @ 124
Blank Kludge @ 123
Professor Foland @ 128
Folks,We are seeing the start of ww3 I belive.He will use info gathered from the embassy raids in Iraq to justifie esclation to the point of drawing the chinese and russ into this disaster.We are soooo screwed{how is your y2k preps?}
twolf1 @ 123
An absolutely priceless line: “And he sounded like Stephen Hawking without the emotion.”
Can’t. Stop. Laughing. (And that’s not being mean to Stephen Hawking….)
Okay, so Fred Barnes and Rep. Duncan Hunter on CSPAN this morning are both comparing Bush to Lincoln??
mandrake @ 132
Someone might want to ask them if they really want to use that comparison, given what happened to Abe. (I mean no harm, NSA guy!)
Thats why i live in the country these days…..
That’s right, watch it! That is, of course, unless you are threatening to assassinate a Congressman or something.
EvilDrPuma @
124
Yes, and all dressed in dead black, formal mourning garb. Maybe a picture or two of dead soldiers from their constituencies on their desks.
Truly Equal @
79
After a day of paintballing we’d all pile into ‘the canyon’ and shoo off all our leftover paintballs. No sides, just a free-for-all, shoot anybody. It ws fun. Trouble is, this guy’s got nukes.
PROFESSOR!
LOVE your gas prices sign!
twolf1 @ 76
Not enough. Chimpy will veto the bill, and unless Nancy can really twist some arms our goddam house will sustain the veto.
BC
montag @ 131
God, that was awesome!
Please, someone WAY more knowledgeable than I.
Cover Lehrer interview 1/11/2007 with Zbigniew Brzezinski
and another guy (sorry to be inept!?!)
Apologies if someone’s already alerted the blog. I just can’t stay around & do more now, dang.
Whole PBS program tonight had good highlights, as did others I dipped into. But Brzenzinski, WOW! and at his age (apologies, but I’m mid60 meself, & he’s makin’ more sense than the face-shooter-in-charge plus the tripleflip…)