Keith put together a video time line that jumps back and forth between different days and shows the spin by Chertoff and others coupled with the reality on the ground.

Download | play -WMP

Download | play

As we all know, Bush's idiotic claim that nobody anticipated the levees would be breached is exposed immediately. Just think about it. How in God's name could our President say something so false that is so well documented on national TV?

Sweet Jesus, you just can't fix this level of stupid:

Did extremist Senate candidate Sharron Angle (R) really say Sharia law has "taken hold" in some U.S. cities? Pretty much.

One of the last questioners asked about "Muslims taking over the U.S.," including a question about Angle's stance on the proposed mosque near Ground Zero in New York.

"We're talking about a militant terrorist situation, which I believe isn't a widespread thing, but it is enough that we need to address, and we have been addressing it," Angle said.

"Dearborn, Michigan, and Frankford, Texas are on American soil, and under Constitutional law. Not Sharia law. And I don't know how that happened in the United States. It seems to me there is something fundamentally wrong with allowing a foreign system of law to even take hold in any municipality or government situation in our United States."

I'm not entirely sure exactly what Angle's even trying to say here. She said she doesn't know "how that happened in the United States." How what happened?

Both Dearborn, Michigan and Frankford, Texas both have predominantly Muslim populations, but the last time anyone with a reasonable grasp on reality checked, the cities had not given over their municipal laws for Sharia law. But apparently, the presence of Muslims in such a strong plurality apparently means to Angle that American law no longer applies.

Sigh. Like I said, you just can't fix that level of stupid.

Pam's House Blend: Q of the day: What do you think John McCain is doing to celebrate the repeal of DADT?

skippy the bush kangaroo: false remedies to fix a false economy

Mad Kane’s Political Madness: Intelligence Redesigned

The Big Picture: Dogma Versus Reality

Alas, a blog: We Wouldn't

BTC News: Life's Good! Shut Up!

BagNews: 9/11 did not discriminate...so why must we?

Facing South: The site where 7,000 coal miners battled police for five days in an effort to unionize back in 1921 is now at risk of being blasted to bits by coal companies after a controversial move by the National Park Service.

Eunomia: Obama, Anticolonial Hegemonist?

The Impolitic: It's Just Us

Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Google Instant

The Satirical Political Report: Poetic Justice: Ground Zero Mosque to Move Next to Terry Jones' Church!

Bill's Big Diamond Blog

In the midst of the all-Rove discussions this weekend, a little reality seeps through. Passing through the blogosphere, I stopped by Riverbend to see if she had weighed in recently from Baghdad. She had. Riverbend reported sadly that another blogger, Khalid Jarrar, author of Tell Me a Secret, had been abducted by “the new Iraqi mukhabarat.”

It’s one thing to read the numbers and the see the faceless stories from Iraq. It’s another to be touched by someone’s words and then to know they’ve been taken off, to God knows where, perhaps to rot in jail, perhaps to worse. You get a glimpse of what someone cares about and what their daily existence is like, then see they’ve offended the authorities your own government has set up. By doing what? By simply writing about their life, or turning the wrong corner at the wrong time on the wrong day. Who knows?

Khalid is a blogger I’ve read off and on. His brother Raed is a prolific blogger and both of them have been good sources of information about daily life in occupied Baghdad since the invasion. Khalid had most recently been in Amman, Jordan. He had finished exams at university in Baghdad and had reported about a mortar blowing up one of his fellow students this May (he had suffered from some student laziness and missed class that day). Before that, there was a car bomb 100 meters away from his family’s home. And before that…well, you get the picture. Go, read his blog.

Khalid had recently posted about using real names in his blog and about transparency, a post that makes me now worry for him. Naturally, he’s been critical of the madness around him.
He is now somewhere in an Iraqi prison. His family is thankful to know he isn’t dead. His brother Raed writes today, “my brother is spending his 6th night in jail. He's just one of the thousands of people in Iraq who disappeared and ended up in one of the many jails and prisons around the country without a clear reason.”

Make Judy Talk    The Talent Show is a prolific blogger and both of them have been good sources of information about daily life in occupied Baghdad since the invasion. Khalid had most recently been in Amman, Jordan. He had finished exams at university in Baghdad and had reported about a mortar blowing up one of his fellow students this May (he had suffered from some student laziness and missed class that day). Before that, there was a car bomb 100 meters away from his family’s home. And before that…well, you get the picture. Go, read his blog.

Khalid had recently posted about using real names in his blog and about transparency, a post that makes me now worry for him. Naturally, he’s been critical of the madness around him.
He is now somewhere in an Iraqi prison. His family is thankful to know he isn’t dead. His brother Raed writes today, “my brother is spending his 6th night in jail. He's just one of the thousands of people in Iraq who disappeared and ended up in one of the many jails and prisons around the country without a clear reason.”

The Importance of Jack

I posted links to two long pieces on Republicans, ethics, and morality (remember, they're different!) last week, but never had a chance to go in depth. This closing passage from the piece in the New York Review of Books, "Selling Washington," presents an interesting and important perspective...

The effects of the new, higher level of corruption on the way the country is governed are profound. Not only is legislation increasingly skewed to benefit the richest interests, but Congress itself has been changed. The head of a public policy strategy group told me, "It's not about governing anymore. The Congress is now a transactional institution. They don't take risks. So when a great moral issue comes up— like war—they can't deal with it." The theory that ours is a system of one-person-one-vote, or even that it's a representative democracy, is challenged by the reality of power and who really wields it. Barney Frank argues that "the political system was supposed to overcome the financial advantage of the capitalists, but as money becomes more and more influential, it doesn't work that way."
Two House Democrats, Rahm Emanuel, of Illinois, and Martin Meehan, of Massachusetts, have introduced legislation to tighten the rules on privately funded travel, strengthen the lobbying disclosure rules, and slow down the revolving door by which former members of Congress take jobs with the trade associations and, after a year, can lobby their former colleagues. Some Republicans are talking about placing more restrictive rules on trips. But the record shows that new regulations can often be evaded.Stakeholder

I posted links to two long pieces on Republicans, ethics, and morality (remember, they're different!) last week, but never had a chance to go in depth. This closing passage from the piece in the New York Review of Books, "Selling Washington," presents an interesting and important perspective...

The effects of the new, higher level of corruption on the way the country is governed are profound. Not only is legislation increasingly skewed to benefit the richest interests, but Congress itself has been changed. The head of a public policy strategy group told me, "It's not about governing anymore. The Congress is now a transactional institution. They don't take risks. So when a great moral issue comes up— like war—they can't deal with it." The theory that ours is a system of one-person-one-vote, or even that it's a representative democracy, is challenged by the reality of power and who really wields it. Barney Frank argues that "the political system was supposed to overcome the financial advantage of the capitalists, but as money becomes more and more influential, it doesn't work that way."
Two House Democrats, Rahm Emanuel, of Illinois, and Martin Meehan, of Massachusetts, have introduced legislation to tighten the rules on privately funded travel, strengthen the lobbying disclosure rules, and slow down the revolving door by which former members of Congress take jobs with the trade associations and, after a year, can lobby their former colleagues. Some Republicans are talking about placing more restrictive rules on trips. But the record shows that new regulations can often be evaded.

Perhaps the greatest deterrent to ethical transgression is that members of Congress don't want to read unfavorable stories about themselves. A Republican lobbyist says that the biggest factor in the growth of corruption has been "the expectation that all this goes undetected and unenforced." He added, "If Jack Abramoff goes to jail, that will be a big message to this town." Since the scandal broke over Abramoff's payments on behalf of DeLay, members of Congress have been scrambling to amend their travel reports, in some cases listing previously unreported trips, or filling in missing details. Public outrage can also have an inhibiting effect: after the Republicans changed the ethics rules earlier this year to protect DeLay, the adverse reaction in the press and from constituents was strong enough to make the Republican leadership back down.

But the public can't become outraged about something that isn't brought to its attention. The press tends to pounce on the big scandals but usually fails to cover the more common ones that take place every day. Some of the politicians I talked to hoped that the scandal over DeLay and Abramoff might lead to real changes, including more prosecutions and stricter disclosure requirements. But even they admit that, like so many other scandals, it may simply blow over.

 

 

How to deal with a bully

Perhaps the greatest deterrent to ethical transgression is that members of Congress don't want to read unfavorable stories about themselves. A Republican lobbyist says that the biggest factor in the growth of corruption has been "the expectation that all this goes undetected and unenforced." He added, "If Jack Abramoff goes to jail, that will be a big message to this town." Since the scandal broke over Abramoff's payments on behalf of DeLay, members of Congress have been scrambling to amend their travel reports, in some cases listing previously unreported trips, or filling in missing details. Public outrage can also have an inhibiting effect: after the Republicans changed the ethics rules earlier this year to protect DeLay, the adverse reaction in the press and from constituents was strong enough to make the Republican leadership back down.

But the public can't become outraged about something that isn't brought to its attention. The press tends to pounce on the big scandals but usually fails to cover the more common ones that take place every day. Some of the politicians I talked to hoped that the scandal over DeLay and Abramoff might lead to real changes, including more prosecutions and stricter disclosure requirements. But even they admit that, like so many other scandals, it may simply blow over.

Talking Points Memo

The key passage in the Wehner Memo (the leaked memo written by Karl Rove's deputy, Peter H. Wehner and reported this evening in various news outlets).

Let me tell you first what our plans are in terms of sequencing and political strategy. We will focus on Social Security immediately in this new year. Our strategy will probably include speeches early this month to establish an important premise: the current system is heading for an iceberg. The notion that younger workers will receive anything like the benefits they have been promised is fiction, unless significant reforms are undertaken. We need to establish in the public mind a key fiscal fact: right now we are on an unsustainable course. That reality needs to be seared into the public consciousness; it is the pre-condition to authentic reform.

Remind you of anything?

Also included is a nice encapsulated history lesson: "For the first time in six decades, the Social Security   battle is one we can win -- and in doing so, we can help transform the political and philosophical landscape of the country."

In other words, this isn't about the fiscal soundness of Social Security or the babyboomers moving toward retirement or anything else. As Wehner himself says, this is the best chance the opponents of Social Security have had in six decades of trying to phase-out the program.

And this allows us to see the whole matter clearly. Social Security has been around for seventy years. How many people do you know who really don't like Social Security? Back when I was younger I'd go spend part of my summer at the subsidized retirement community where my grandparents lived. And I don't remember many people who lived there bad-mouthing Social Security. And those folks had lived under the program for pretty much all of their adults lives.

Let me tell you first what our plans are in terms of sequencing and political strategy. We will focus on Social Security immediately in this new year. Our strategy will probably include speeches early this month to establish an important premise: the current system is heading for an iceberg. The notion that younger workers will receive anything like the benefits they have been promised is fiction, unless significant reforms are undertaken. We need to establish in the public mind a key fiscal fact: right now we are on an unsustainable course. That reality needs to be seared into the public consciousness; it is the pre-condition to authentic reform.

Remind you of anything?

Also included is a nice encapsulated history lesson: "For the first time in six decades, the Social Security battle is one we can win -- and in doing so, we can help transform the political and philosophical landscape of the country."

In other words, this isn't about the fiscal soundness of Social Security or the babyboomers moving toward retirement or anything else. As Wehner himself says, this is the best chance the opponents of Social Security have had in six decades of trying to phase-out the program.

Mandate Indeed

Geez. The way these conservatives talk, you'd think they won by 30 points instead of 3.

Even Bush himself has been telling the press that he has "the people at my back" (or is that backside?) -- in the process of making clear to everyone considering crossing those bridges they say they're building what the reality is: It's "my way or the highway."

But the entire press corps has bought into the myth of Bush's "mandate." Indeed, it's all any of them can seem to talk about.

Now, just as an experiment, I went back and checked, because I thought I remembered that Bill Clinton cleaned Bob Dole's clock in 1996 by a substanitally wider margin. Sure enough, the final figures were:

Bill Clinton 47,402,357 49%
Bob Dole 39,198,755 41%

Ross Perot 8,085,402 8%

In other words, Clinton won by a margin of of 8 percent of the popular vote -- 8.2 million.
Did the "liberal media" declare that Clinton had a clear mandate from the people?

Well, no.

The mainstream press instead proclaimed that Clinton had been given "a message, not a mandate".

Ah yes, do we have issues still The American Street

WASHINGTON — In the weeks after the fall of Baghdad, Iraqi looters loaded powerful explosives into pickup trucks and drove the material off the Al Qaqaa ammunition site, according to a group of U.S. Army reservists and National Guardsmen who said they witnessed the looting.

The soldiers said about a dozen U.S. troops guarding the sprawling facility could not prevent the theft because they were outnumbered by looters. Soldiers from one unit — the 317th Support Center based in Wiesbaden, Germany — said they sent a message to commanders in Baghdad requesting help to secure the site but received no reply.

Despite the protective shield of limited morality that the Fifty-One-Percenters used to maintain their denial of reality on Election Day, the truth will keep thwapping them in the head for weeks to come.

I’m looking forward to:

1) More details of the lousy troop support from the CiC.

2) More photos and statistics of the country we’re destroying to save it for a semblance of patriarchal strong-man democracy.

3) An end to the 15 month coverup of the Valerie Plame outing.

4) The rest of the Abu Ghraib picture show that’s being hidden.

5) Oil at $62-$63/bbl, within 7 months.

6) More intel insiders exposing the stuff Porter Goss is now covering up.

7) Any evidence at all that our hundred billion dollar Homeland Security Agency can deliver anything useful besides their stupid Crayola Alerts.

I’m not looking forward to:

8) The denial that will come when global terrorists attack again, that Bush bears any responsibility for at least two coordinated attacks on American soil. The other 42 presidents don’t bear that on their records. But I believe Bush will. And I believe the Fifty-One percenters will deceive themselves and say “God did this because some terrified teenager refused to carry her baby to term. God bless George Bush.”

Then they’ll demand that we nuke half the world as payback agains all the heathens.

I never would have dreamed that last one up on my own. God spoke to me and told me this was coming. He said: “Beware the False Prophet Number Forty Three; he shall surely lead the sheep to their slaughter.”

I know it's not big news, but it's still nice to see that Larry Elder is off my LA radio dial.

Tune in to conservative talk radio in California, and the insults quickly fly. Capturing the angry mood of listeners the other day, a popular host in Los Angeles called Republican lawmakers who voted to raise state taxes "a bunch of weak slobs."

With their trademark ferocity, radio stars who helped engineer Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's rise in the 2003 recall have turned on him over the new tax increases. On stations up and down the state, they are chattering away in hopes of igniting a taxpayers' revolt to kill his budget measures on the May 19 ballot.

But for all the anti-tax swagger and the occasional stunts by personalities like KFI's John and Ken, the reality is that conservative talk radio in California is on the wane. The economy's downturn has depressed ad revenue at stations across the state, thinning the ranks of conservative broadcasters.

For that and other reasons, stations have dropped the shows of at least half a dozen radio personalities and scaled back others, in some cases replacing them with cheaper nationally syndicated programs.

Casualties include Mark Larson in San Diego, Larry Elder and John Ziegler in Los Angeles, Melanie Morgan in San Francisco, and Phil Cowen and Mark Williams in Sacramento.

What these lunatics don't seem to understand is that California is facing a huge economic crisis.

The immediate question facing the state's conservative radio hosts is whether they can wield enough clout to block Schwarzenegger's ballot measures in May. They portray them as reckless proposals that would hasten California's economic decline. The worst, they say, is Proposition 1A, which would extend billions of dollars in tax increases for an extra two years, even while it imposes a spending cap long sought by conservatives.

In a special election likely to draw a dismal turnout, they hope that those most upset by the $12.5 billion in new taxes will be the ones most strongly motivated to cast ballots. Their inspiration is Proposition 13, the 1978 ballot measure that capped property-tax increases.

I'm not sure where they think revenues are going to come from, but protesting the Octomom is pretty pathetic even for them.