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A leader, not a whiner

There’s something notoriously needy about presumptive dem candidate Kerry’s threat to postpone his “acceptance” of the nomination in order to rake in more chips. The fundraising emails ripped off from the Dean playbook signed by Hilla the Hun and the anointed one himself- like the rest of his messages- don't resonate. It’s ironic that--in spite of coming from older money and family ties than Kerry--Howard Dean projected leadership and a no-frills approach to governance that made ordinary Americans step up to the plate. If the media was giving Kerry the “Dean treatment” on the “postponement issue” the Dems would be looking for a new candidate by now.

As attorney general of Massachusetts when Whitey Bulger and the Patriarca family were running the rackets there you’d think Kerry would know something about playing the odds. The way the system works, for leaders, at least, is that, under the guise of the highest ethical standards, you have your people game the campaign contributions rules with enough finesse so as not to get caught. Such are the perquisites of power. Throw some sunshine on the Bush Ranger program for details. After all… it’s the right thing to do.

Here’s the richest guy in the senate with enough total family wealth to buy the election and he’s trying to micromanage the campaign system for less than $100 million bucks. Ronald Reagan slam-dunked Jimmy Carter in 1980 thanks to Goober’s penchant for micromanaging instead of “delegating.” This considered, maybe the brokers should suggest faux-patrician Kerry put his “acceptance” into perpetual postponement mode.

posted by Groom 4:00 PM

Theories of Relativity

If Bill Clinton were still president and it transpired that Al Gore was passing the highest level of state secrets to an associate who was sharing them with a member of the "Axis of Evil" do you suppose there would be more of an outcry?

posted by Jerry Bowles 2:58 PM

The Non-Convention

Well, at least the Washington Post editorial page agrees with me:

Mr. Kerry's choice to be seen manipulating the rules will have its own cost, of course -- but it won't be in cash. We do look forward to his non-acceptance speech.

posted by Jerry Bowles 10:46 AM

Cha-lobbyists Were Actually Iranian Front Group

So it turns out the "house Arabs" at BushCo were actually a front group for Iranian spies, feeding disinformation out, and sucking sensitive American intelligence in.

Finally, proof positive that the corruption and incompetence of the Keystone Crips rises to the level of treason. Can we please please please impeach these fuckwits, en masse, now?

posted by Michael 6:17 AM

Friday, May 21, 2004

Curiouser And Curiouser

No one on this blog seems to have commented yet on the dubious stories being put out on the short (un?)happy life of one Nicholas ("Ice") Berg, so I thought I'd toss in my dos centavos here: First, I've chosen to call him "Ice" Berg because nine-tenths of the truth about his life (and death?) still seems to be submerged.

Did or did not Nick Berg get detained by American authorities while in Iraq? What was he doing there (and are rumors that he worked for That Other Government Agency true)? What was his relationship with Iraqis back in the States? Was his email identity stolen (or used with his permission?) by Zacarias Moussaoui? Was he, in fact, killed by beheading? Did the guy who the US government tells us did the killing, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, actually regrow an amputated leg?

Those of us disinclined to swallow what the Bush administration puts out on this subject continue to wonder. Meanwhile, the prostrate, incurious American press continues to report -- contrary to yesterday's story -- that The Color Formerly Known As Black is now White, and The Condition Formerly Known As Slavery is now Freedom. Back to you, Dave.

posted by Michael 5:18 PM

Camilo ain't marchin anymore

The Phil Ochs tradition lives... Sgt. Camilo Mejia, found guilty of desertion in Iraq, is the son of noted Nicaraguan singer Carlos Mejia Godoy, whose songs made him an icon of the Sandinista revolution.

posted by Groom 4:41 PM

Dumbest Idea Yet

Excuse me but won't making an acceptance speech that says I'll get back to you later make our candidate seem a little...flip-floppy? Won't it confuse the message, kill the big "mo," throw a wet blanket on the party? What about the vice presidential nominee. Does he wait a month before saying "yes" also?

Can the DNC possibly think of anything else to make Kerry look like he doesn't want the job and doesn't know his ass from a hot rock?

posted by Jerry Bowles 3:40 PM

Some Ask Why, Some Ask Why Not?

David Ignatius on how Kerry-McCain just might save America.

posted by Jerry Bowles 12:48 PM

The Only Thing We Have to Fear

For most of us centrists, the fact that George Bush's approval ratings have fallen into the mid-40s is not suprising. The real shock is that so many Americans still believe he's doing a good job in the face of the enormous amount of objective evidence to the contrary. Clearly, there is something at work here that goes beyond reason and logic. Here's my theory. Americans have a bias for action and little patience for reflection. A large segment of the population will always pick the person who does something, even if it is the wrong thing, over the person who waits until all the facts are in and then acts. "At least, he's doing something" is perceived to be a virtue even if that "something" is ultimately disasterous. "Wouldn't be prudent" did Bush I in; Junior has bet the farm on doing the opposite. The only thing holding Shrub up at this point is his reckless adventurism and foolish consistency. The main thing holding Kerry back, even among those who will vote him, is the growing perception that he is afraid of his own shadow. The Republicans aren't defining Kerry; he's defining himself as gutless and souless by opting out of the tough debates. It may well cost him the election.

posted by Jerry Bowles 10:12 AM

Family Values

Bill Frist's 21-year-old son was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated in Princeton, New Jersey. William Harrison Frist, Jr., a Princeton University sophomore, was stopped early on Wednesday for passing a vehicle improperly and was found to be impaired after he failed a test for balance. via Reuters

posted by Jerry Bowles 9:42 AM

Conspiracy or coincidence…

It’s no secret that as early as 1998 Lord Rummy, Wolfie and others in their clique were pressing the Clinton administration to prosecute a war with Iraq and remove Saddam Hussein from power. In fact, their January 26, 1998 letter demanding a unilateral war with Iraq reached him at his weakest moment, the very day he told the American people, with Hilla the Hun at his side, that he did not have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky.

That same day, Monica was spilling her guts to Brother Starr, punching the Slickster’s ticket for impeachment. As a war president, however, Clinton would not have been impeached. The zaftig one’s fantasies of being Monica Mossad, Mata Hari or Washington’s greatest warslut on kneepads would have drifted out of the beltway with the rest of her wet dreams. We would never have had Shrubby as president.

The Clinton administration continued its strategy of “containing” Saddam and sat on its hands while far greater genocides unfolded in Africa. And the Slick One took the hit on impeachment.

Clinton’s ill-timed, self-serving book won't offer any linkage between special prosecutor Starr and the GOP chicken hawks. Nor will it throw any sunshine on why he named bonehead James Woolsey to run CIA, legitimizing the now discredited Dr. Ahmad Chalabi. It was Woolsey, a weak and ineffectual DCIA, who pimped Chalabi and brought him into the house.

posted by Groom 8:56 AM

The American Soul

The Washington Post continues to eat the New York Times' lunch on the Iraq abuse story, leading this morning with horrific details of fine young American cannibals making their own S&M movies with relucant Iraqi extras, as well as a new batch of photos that may cause you to toss your breakfast. Where are the good Christians on this? Where is the bi-partisan outrage? What does it take for the right to admit that the Bush administration has created a monster it can't control by demonizing all Arabs in its ruthless desire to control the planet by force? BushCo has not only made the world less safe for Americans, it has abandoned many of the principles that make our country worth saving in the first place. What does it take for John Kerry and the rest of the Democratic party to get involved in this life and death struggle for the soul--and survival--of our nation?

posted by Jerry Bowles 12:04 AM

Thursday, May 20, 2004

Spend like a Sheik, dive like a Stuka

What does Shrubby get for spending $126 million on campaign propganda designed to define John Kerry before Kerry defines himself? A 46% approval rating. Shrum, From and Cahill and the rest of the schlamiels should have a product line out there that makes Shrubby eat Kerry's dust... But as Josh and Jerry point out, there's no there there...are they busy watching that old "Three Stooges" rerun in which Moe says "wake up and go to sleep."

posted by Groom 5:24 PM

The Parable of Ahmad the Bank Robber

And there was a man among them whose name was Ahmad, of the family of Chalabi, who came upon a band of fearmongers wandering in the desert of Clinton, among them two whose names were Wolfowitz and Cheney and he said unto them: “Despair not for I bring news of thy arch enemy Saddam who conceals weapons of great strength with which he intends to scourge the earth. The oppressed people of Iraq have secretly given me their trust. Give me your bounty and I will provide you with that which you need to plan for the day when we will strike and remove the evil dictator and plant the seeds of democracy, etc., etc.”

And so they gave unto him great sums of taxpayer dollars and made plans to regain the government and overthrow the evil Saddam. Alas, there were those who spoke against this Chalabi and said he was a bank robber and con man but Wolfowitz and Cheney paid them no heed because the stories Chalabi told of the evil dictator so perfectly comported with their own informed perceptions. The evil dictator’s land was a veritable river of chemical and biological sludge. Convoys of mobile weapons laboratories clogged every dusty backroad and city thoroughfare. Nuclear clouds hovered even now over Cleveland and Tel Aviv. The poor Iraqi people desperately awaited liberation from the tyrant and sought nothing more than the return of Ahmad to lead them to promised land of a camel in every pot and a Starbucks on every corner.

And so it came to pass that the fearmongers did regain the government and they did smite the evil dictator and they airlifted the triumphant Ahmad and his armed gang to the country of his birth.

But, lo, they could find no vast stockpiles of hidden weapons and the mobile trucks were few and harmless and the wily Ahmad proved to have no standing with the people and vexed the fearmongers mightily with his efforts to distance himself from the very agenda he had sold them for more than a decade.

And the fearmongers Wolfowitz and Cheney were angry at Ahmad for betraying their trust and making them look foolish in the eyes of those who had spoke against him and they lashed out at him by first taking away his taxpayer-paid allowance and then sending armed men to search his home and offices. “Who will rid us of this meddlesome bank robber,” they wailed.

And, finally, the Lord said unto them: “Take this as a lesson, my misguided schmucks. Never trust a revolutionary wearing a Savile Row suit.”

posted by Jerry Bowles 12:56 PM

Why?

Why can’t Kerry say the following now?

1. When I am president the Geneva Conventions will be strictly enforced in all military conflicts.

2. When I am president I will fire the present head of the FBI and head of CIA. And if I get the kind of advice these executives have provided I will not hesitate to fire them as well. Loyalty in the defense of bad public service is not a virtue.

3. When I am president and my Secretary of Defense behaves like Donald Rumsfeld has, I will not hesitate to fire him.

4. When I am president and my Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tommy Tompson withholds information from Congress and misleads the American people with illegal videotapes that wrongly hype the Medicare bill, I will fire him or her.

5. When I am president and my Attorney General skirts the law in the defense of a narrow agenda of certain segments of the American people, I will not hesitate to replace him or her.

6. When I am president I will encourage every member of my cabinet to give me direct advice on major policy and not filter it through staff.

7. When I am president I will hold monthly press conferences and give the press direct access to my views at all times.

8. When I am president I will continue to read the major news papers of the country and their editorials as one way to continually stay in touch with what Americans are thinking and saying.

9. When I am president I will contribute weekly to a new blog, AmericanOnCourse.com and devote an hour of my time to reading the comments.

10. When I am president I will not hide behind secret energy industry sponsored policy meetings or any secret policy meetings sponsored by the White House or the office of the Vice President.

11. When I am president, the ends will never justify the means.

Why is Kerry so afraid to make a distinction with BushCo on such fundamental issues. No possible future scenarios could jeopardize Kerry making these declarations today and it would certainly encourage those of us who are wondering if there is a there there.

posted by Josh 9:49 AM

Dropping a dime on Chalabi

INC kleptocrat-in-residence Ahmad Chalabi has been stinking up the joint for over a decade at the expense of US taxpayers. Bad intelligence. Bad deals. Bad crew. Wanted for a $200 million bank fraud in Jordan... all too cozy with the Likudniks... Rebbe Poyle, Wolfie, Feith. Now, Washington is giving him the Arafat treatment. US forces have raided his home in Baghdad, removed documents and computer files. The Pentagon has taken his lunch money away (scroll down for story). Wolfie sez they've gone back to using conventional intelligence sources instead of relying on Ahmad's famous "network. The Iraq "expert" spent his entire life outside of his homland seems to be out, end of story. By severing all ties with Gauleiter Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority, Chalabi becomes a loose cannon... and a bigger target for his detractors. Makes you wonder if the Big A, who is watching his power and favor evaporate, was involved in the car bomb hit on governing council president Izzadine Sallem...

posted by Groom 8:59 AM

Where's the Good Doctor?

If you have been wondering what Howard Dean has been up to, check out his op-ed on Tom Paine,or this New York Times story about his campaigning with and even becoming good buddies with John Kerry, or the Boston Globe coverage of the same trip. Look deep in the AP coverage of the joint appearance in Oregon, where you will find the following:

For the second straight day, Kerry appeared with former rival Howard Dean. His full-throated support for Kerry was a clear signal to any of his backers who might be tempted by the maverick campaign of Ralph Nader.

"The number of high-paying jobs is going down and the number of low-paying jobs is going up," Dean said. "I think jobs is the number one issue in the country today."

....Kerry received a rousing boost Monday night from Dean, who built a substantial following in Oregon during his failed bid for the nomination. Dean said he was confident that as commander in chief Kerry would send troops into harm's way only after "telling the truth to the American people about why they're going."

Dean can play an important role for Kerry in swing states like Oregon. Its seven electoral votes are considered up for grabs in this year's election.

Think about the fact that when the bat went up with the Good Doctor's call to contribute to the Kerry campaign, he pulled in $500,000 in less than 24 hours.

Makes me proud that, while I will campaign and vote for John Kerry, I will still be going to Boston as a super delegate pledged to Howard Dean, the first candidate in a long time that made me feel proud to be a Democrat.

posted by John 8:29 AM

Today's best lead paragraph

The award goes to Dahlia Lithwick, whose wonderful rant on the "Slippery Slope" argument against gay marriage in Slate begins

Anyone else bored to tears with the "slippery slope" arguments against gay marriage? Since few opponents of homosexual unions are brave enough to admit that gay weddings just freak them out, they hide behind the claim that it's an inexorable slide from legalizing gay marriage to having sex with penguins outside JC Penny's. The problem is it's virtually impossible to debate against a slippery slope. Before you know it you fall down, break your crown, and Rick Santorum comes tumbling after.

Gotta love those penguins!

posted by John 6:05 AM

Speaking from the Right

The Cato Institute's Christian libertarian policy analyst Doug Bandow continues to be one of the Bush administration's most incisive critics. What he writes in his op-ed piece The Conservative Case for Voting Democratic won't please everyone, but it does seem perfectly consistent to me with what the authors of The Federalist Papers had in mind in making their case for the Constitution.

Here is a sample.

Republicans have long claimed to be fiscal tightwads and railed against deficit spending. But this year big-spending George W. Bush and the GOP Congress turned a budget surplus into a $477 billion deficit. There are few programs at which they have not thrown money: massive farm subsidies, an expensive new Medicare drug benefit, thousands of pork-barrel projects, dubious homeland-security grants, expansion of Bill Clinton's AmeriCorps, even new foreign-aid programs. Brian Riedl of the Heritage Foundation reports that in 2003 "government spending exceeded $20,000 per household for the first time since World War II."

Complaints about Republican profligacy have led the White House to promise to mend its ways. But Bush's latest budget combines accounting flim-flam with unenforceable promises. So how do we put Uncle Sam on a sounder fiscal basis?

Vote Democratic.

Democrats obviously are no pikers when it comes to spending. But the biggest impetus for higher spending is partisan uniformity, not partisan identity. Give either party complete control of government, and the Treasury vaults are quickly emptied. Neither Congress nor the President wants to tell the other no. Both are desperate to prove they can "govern"—which means creating new programs and spending more money. But share power between parties, and out of principle or malice they check each other. Even if a President Kerry proposed more spending than would a President Bush, a GOP Congress would appropriate less. That's one reason the Founders believed in the separation of powers....

posted by John 2:49 AM

Wednesday, May 19, 2004

Why They Call Him Fritz

Senator Hollings has stuck his fallujah into a hornet's nest with his opinion piece charging that the Bush administration went to war with Iraq mainly to guarantee Israel's future security. Israel is a taboo subject in American politics but given the number of senior Bush advisors who have clear and demonstrable conflicts of interest in this matter, it's a legitimate question. Of course, he will be beaten down by the usual screams of anti-semitism but he's not wrong about some things. For example, the Mossad knows whenever an ant farts in the Middle East. They could have told us anytime there were no significant stockpiles of WMDs in Iraq but they didn't.

posted by Jerry Bowles 7:27 PM

Kill An Arab for Christ

General Sanchez said today that Abu Ghraib is to be renamed Camp Redemption. via NYTimes

And Baghdad will henceforth be called Bethlehem and Karbala will be re-named Minneapolis.

posted by Jerry Bowles 4:56 PM

Dying in the chapel

Attacking a wedding celebration near the Iraq-Syria border, a US helicopter killed at least 40 civilians earlier today. Was the chopper crew listening to Elvis or the grid coordinates? In the Texas Ranger logic of the White House they were probably all working for the Al-Qaeda network, getting cash payments from the Assad family and part of the "cadre" that connected Saddam Hussein to 9/11/, heathen, unchurched fugitives from American justice The Pentagon now says that those killed were "anti-coalition fighters."

posted by Groom 4:19 PM

In India, the fat lady Singhs...

In a nation of one billion with a Hindu majority and a Muslim minority of 100 million, Roman Catholic Sonia Gandhi led her party to victory by carving out a market niche that captured the best attributes of Mother Teresa and Evita Peron. The Hindustan Times reports that Manmohan Singh will form a new government as prime minister and that Sonia will stay on as chairperson and president of the Congress Party. One would think that Baba Wawa would be jetting over to get an "exclusive" with the most powerful woman in the world... don't hold your breath...she's being canned by ABC.

posted by Groom 12:44 PM

You Know Things Are Bad When...

You know things are bad when the even the Red Cross is afraid to visit a prison for fear of its representatives getting killed on the way. But, as one lovable old buffoon once said: Democracy is messy.

posted by Jerry Bowles 12:27 PM

Pop quiz...Sunni, Shia, simpling down the split

Exam time? Studying for your Islam 101 test? This link offers a basic, but not unbiased explanation of the machinations that brought on the split between the two major components of Islam. Read this and you'll know about 93% more than what the top policy makers in the West Wing and the Pentagon care to know.

posted by Groom 9:25 AM

Chutzpah

Donald Rumsfeld is complaining that investigations of the Abu Ghraib scandal are cutting into the time he can spend perpetrating war crimes.

posted by Jerry Bowles 9:23 AM

Always Looking Out For Number One

So now we have it, straight from his lawyer's word processor -- the most likely explanation why Bush cast aside a half-century's observance of the Geneva Convention (and why our captive soldiers are certain to be tortured or executed by enemies in the future):

He's trying to save his own ass from being prosecuted by future administrations for violating the War Crimes Act of 1996.

Anyone surprised?

posted by Michael 12:54 AM

Tuesday, May 18, 2004

Not Your Father's Army

Martin Sieff, a senior news analyst for UPI, offers support for the notion that I wrote about this morning and below--to wit, the kind of abuse we're seeing in Iraq reflects a demoralized Army leadership structure that has lost control of its troops to civilian ideologues at the Pentagon, competing intelligence agencies and outsourced political provocateurs:

Abuse and even torture of prisoners happens in almost every war on every side. But well-run professional armies, and the U.S. Army has always been one, take great pains to guard against it and limit it as much as possible. Even in cases where torture excesses are regarded as essential to extract tactical information and save lives, commanders in most modern armies have taken care to limit such "dirty work" to very small units, usually from special forces, and to keep it as secret as possible.

For senior Army professionals know that allowing patterns of abuse and torture to metastasize in any army is annihilating to its morale and tactical effectiveness. Torturers usually make lousy combat soldiers, which is why combat soldiers in every major army hold them in contempt.

Therefore, several U.S. military officers told UPI, the idea of using regular Army soldiers, including some even just from the Army Reserve or National Guard, and encouraging them to inflict such abuses ran contrary to received military wisdom and to the ingrained standards and traditions of the U.S. Army.

posted by Jerry Bowles 8:02 PM