In another example about how Republicans cannot be trusted to responsibly address national security (or domestic security) issues, Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Joe Lieberman (R-at Heart) are threatening the Defense Department with subpoenas if it does not release documents that they requested through the Senate's homeland security committee.

"The painful fact is that 13 Americans died in the Fort Hood massacre," Lieberman said. "We owe it to them and their survivors and everyone else in our country to determine whether our government could have prevented their deaths -- and if so, why it did not -- so that we can make sure it does the next time."

Collins faulted administration aides for "an inexplicable determination to stalemate and slow-walk our investigation."

Appropriately, SecDef Bob Gates has told the two to go pound sand, since there are, in fact, a few other pressing defense issues on his agenda, and there is no story here.

Gates, speaking to reporters after attending a Caribbean security conference in Barbados, said the US government had no interest in hiding information from Congress but the legal case against Major Nidal Malik Hasan had to take priority.

“Anything that does not have any impact on that prosecution, we are more than willing to share,” Gates said. “But what’s most important is this prosecution. And we will co-operate with the committee in every way - with that single caveat, that whatever we provide doesn’t compromise the prosecution.”

Of all the possible homeland security or military issues that one could address, keeping the Major Hassan story alive shouldn't be the top priority of this Senate's committee. Why these two want to keep this non-story alive is beyond me. Neither is up for re-election prior to 2012 - that's a long way off - so the only other explanation (because I don't buy the idea of misplaced concerns about DOD or DoJ practices and policies) is to embarrass the Obama administration at the cost of screwing the government officials who are correctly addressing the situation right now.

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It really is frustrating watching career political hacks like Rep. Peter King get as much media attention as they do. On GMA, he reiterated his attacks on President Obama over the failed attempt by the Christmas bomber. His solution of course is for the President to just say terror, terror, terror all day long.

New York Rep. Peter King, a leading Republican critic of the White House on terror policy, offered a piece of advice on Good Morning America today: Obama should speak the word "terrorism" more.

"You are saying someone should be held accountable. Name one other

specific recommendation the president could implement right now to fix

this," host George Stephanopolous said to King.

"I think one main thing would be to -- just himself to use the word

terrorism more often," said King, the ranking Republican on the

Homeland Security Committee.

I have an idea. Whenever a pundit asks about Peter King to anyone from the left, we use just one word to describe him. Asshole, Asshole, asshole.

And Eli responds to my post on Cokie with a very serious way for all Democrats to appear tough on National Security.

No, what really makes someone a Serious Qualified Expert on national security is a little voice in their head screaming “AAAAAHHHH!!! The scary brown people are coming to kill us we have to kill them first OMG OMG OMG!!!” 24 hours a day, and the ability to bedwet on command.

For whatever the Bush administration and most of the other Very Serious Republican National Security Experts may lack in military experience, they more than make up for in bloodthirst and paranoia. And that’s why they’re still eating the Democrats’ lunch despite being wrong about virtually everything it’s humanly possible to be wrong about.

So what’s the solution? Simple, really: If Obama can develop an appropriately irrational fear and hatred of Muslims, then no one will care that he’s never served in the military. I suggest that he pretend that all Muslims are, alternately, health industry CEOs and progressive bloggers – that should make him a respected national security expert in no time.

That would probably excite Cokie Roberts, for sure.

I wonder: Now that Howard Dean's been the first person to say it out loud, will the media lemmings follow? We'll see:

Former DNC Chair Howard Dean called on Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn) to resign as chair of Senate Homeland Security Committee if he can't bring himself to oppose a Republican filibuster of health care reform legislation.

Appearing on "The Joe Scarborough Show" on WABC, Dean stressed that he had no problem with Lieberman opposing the bill on its philosophical merits, or lack thereof. But he insisted that it was irresponsible and unprincipled to not allow the legislation to come to an up-or-down vote.

"I think that is a very complicated guy," said Dean. "He does because he says he's a principled guy but there's nothing principled about holding up a bill... If he was a principled guy he'd resign his chairmanship."

"If you are with a caucus you don't owe the leader any vote on any substance," Dean added. "I have no problem with him voting against the public option... You owe it to Harry Reid to allow him to run the Senate. And if you're not willing to do that the proper thing to do is to step aside."

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Blue America's Rep. Eric Massa went on the House floor and made an impassioned call to end the Afghanistan war.

Massa: Enough is enough. It is time to bring our troops home. More than any other issue that I have studied, sought counsel on and drawn from my own life's experience for my own guidance since becoming a member of the United State's Congress, the expansion of the war in Afghanistan has drawn my late night focus. There in the quiet of the office, I have arrived at the inevitable conclusion that the deployment of additional troops in Afghanistan and the continuation of this conflict is not in the best interests of our nation and is in fact in on a par with the potential error of the size of our initial invasion in Iraq.

Eric Massa writes:

Last night, November 4th, I spoke on the floor of the House of Representatives to mark the 2,950th day of the war in Afghanistan and formalized my call to draw this conflict to a conclusion. As a freshman member of Congress that served in the United States Navy for 24 years, it has been my honor to serve on the House Armed Services Committee and the House Homeland Security Committee, and because of my background and experience, I think it's my duty to speak out on this issue.

To date, according to the non-partisan Congressional Research Service, the American taxpayer has spent or committed $300,000,000,000 to fund this war. That breaks down to:

• $101,694,915.25 per day for 2,950 days;

• $986.84 per person since our population is roughly 304 million;

• $3,947.36 for each American family of four.

And the greatest cost of this war is of course the 912 American troops killed, and 4,198 wounded. This of course does not include the thousands of internal wounds that our troops must bear for the rest of their lives.

My fellow Americans, the time to bring this war to a conclusion is now and we must stand with a clear voice and demand it. The war in Afghanistan has lasted five times longer than World War I and twice as long as World War II. When 1/3 of Hamid Karzai's ballots were thrown out for voting fraud and Abdullah Abdullah declined the runoff election due to the rampant corruption in the system, the world saw what we already knew - it is simply impossible to impose a democracy on a nation that does not want it.

If you can---please donate a few bucks to Blue America's "No Means No!" act blue page where you will find Eric Massa's name added to the list of those that are standing up to end the occupation in Afghanistan.

We're proposing that netroots donors consider rewarding this good behavior by donating to the re-election campaigns of these members who have already done something very politically difficult by breaking with their own president on a national security issue.

If terrorist threats to our Nation reemerge from Afghanistan, we will strike, but we are not an occupying force

.

If America wasn't bogged down in the two misguided George Bush wars, all the money that we've spent there could easily pay for health insurance reform for all Americans each year. Afghanistan is a country that has never had a central government, and to try and force one down their throats is never going to work.

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[H/t to Gordon Skene at Newstalgia for the archival footage]

Yesterday was one of those anniversaries many of us try to put out of our minds. Conservatives these days seem to be trying especially hard.

But for some of us, those memories still burn:

It was 14 years ago when Doris Battle's parents were killed in the Oklahoma City bombing, just two of the 168 people who died during the nation's worst domestic terrorist attack.

Battle was among 400 people who gathered Sunday to observe the 14th anniversary of the bombing of the nine-story Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, an attack that also injured hundreds of people. The explosion of a truck loaded with 4,000 pounds (1,800 kilograms) of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil tore the face off the building and caused millions of dollars in damage to other downtown structures.

"I can't go home and see him anymore," Battle said of her father, Calvin Battle, who died with her mother Peola when the Oklahoma City federal building was bombed on April 19, 1995. And Battle said the passage of time has not diminished the loss she still feels.

And yet, erasing the very memory of the worst act of homegrown terrorism ever committed on American soil -- and until 9/11, the worst such act ever -- seems to be what movement conservatives have been doing all week.

Ever since word emerged earlier this week about the Department of Homeland Security's internal-assessment bulletin about domestic terrorism, the mainstream right has been wallowing in paranoia about the possibility the report might have meant them.

Moreover, no amount of rebuttal -- even from the DHS secretary herself -- is good enough for them.

Yet if you read the report, it couldn't be clearer that it is concerned almost exclusively with far-right extremists: neo-Nazis, skinheads, anti-abortion bombers, and their assorted fellow travelers. What the teeth-gnashing from the right suggests is that they recognize themselves, and their influence, all too readily in the thugs and terrorists who take their beliefs and twist them into something violent.

Guilty conscience, much?

Prime example: There was Bill Bennett, that right-wing moral icon, telling John King's "State of the Union" panel yesterday on CNN that DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano's clear explanation wasn't good enough.

It's bad enough that he can't even get his facts straight. What's especially noteworthy is the way he airbrushes out the very real existence of actual domestic right-wing terrorist groups:

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KING: Bill, she says they have intelligence and active investigations of this possibility. Do you take her at her word?

BENNETT: She wouldn't give you one bit of evidence. You asked her for the names of any groups, any organizations. You pressed her on it -- nothing.

When they put out a report on certain left-wing organizations back in January, there were some specifics. There are no specifics here, except they target veterans. They say look out for veterans being recruited and look out for people who are opposed to abortion and immigration.

Of course, as we explained recently:

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I often wonder what these guys are thinking -- or whether they're even thinking at all.

New York Rep. Peter King, a prominent House Republican, said there are “too many mosques in this country” in a recent interview with Politico.

“There are too many people sympathetic to radical Islam,” King said. “We should be looking at them more carefully and finding out how we can infiltrate them.”

He now claims his comments were taken out of context, but there’s a YouTube clip.

The DNC has denounced King for his bizarre remarks: "This type of bigoted language has no place in public discourse, especially from the Republican's top lawmaker on the House Homeland Security Committee," said Democratic National Committee Press Secretary Stacie Paxton.

And let's not forget -- King is listed as Rudy Giuliani's homeland security adviser. Maybe someone can ask him what he thinks about this?

Well, this probably won't help dispel the conspiracy theories.

If the Bush administration wanted to fuel conspiracy theories about its classified plan for maintaining governmental control in the wake of an apocalyptic terror attack, it could not have come up with a better strategy than refusing to let Congressman Peter DeFazio examine it.

The Oregon Democrat recently requested permission to enter a secure "bubbleroom" in the Capitol and examine the secret White House plan. As a member of the Homeland Security Committee, DeFazio has the requisite security clearance - and a compelling rationale for reviewing the documents.

Last Wednesday, DeFazio received word that his request had been denied. Through Homeland Security Committee staffers, he learned the White House had initially granted his request, but that it later was rejected. There was no explanation of why - and no word about who made the final decision.

There is no more certain way to feed conspiracy theorists than this kind of secrecy. As DeFazio put it: "Maybe the people who think there's a conspiracy out there are right."

In a related story to my post on Maher Arar , Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass) condemns Congress for what he terms "capitulation, not compromise" to the Bush administration on torture:

"For the Bush Administration, the air is too thin on the moral high ground," Rep. Markey said. "While the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress may be breathing a little easier today, our troops abroad may be in jeopardy because of this serious erosion of the protections in the Geneva Conventions."

[..]"By using legal mumbo-jumbo to obscure the fact that the CIA will continue to be allowed to use torture and will actually be insulated from legal liability for previous acts of torture, President Bush is proceeding ever further down the slippery slope that Colin Powel(l) warned us will endanger American troops in the field by encouraging other countries to reinterpret the Geneva Conventions."

I think the thing that upset me most yesterday when McCain, Warner and Graham announced that they had reached an agreement with the White House, was the complete silence on the Democratic side of the aisle.

To his credit, Rep. Markey--who is the senior Democratic member of the House Homeland Security Committee--has been very vocal about his condemnation. If only the mainstream media would actually cover it.

So I put it to you, the C&L readers: will you get your elected officials to commit? Are they in favor of torturing people, knowing full well that information gathered is suspect at best, and that those rendered to countries we condemn as fascist may very well be completely innocent? That they're proud to be a member of the Congress and country that decided they don't have to abide by the Geneva Conventions any longer

The media is not asking them these hard questions, but they work for you. Get them to tell you that they support President Bush's actions.

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...initiatives that go nowhere....sometimes buying off columnists to write how good a job they're doing instead of doing any job at all.I wish I could say that this was the only instance in which the majority party has sought to politicize the events of Sept. 11th, but that would not be accurate...

Full transcript:

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Frank Rich clearly defines what I've been posting about all week. The scapegoating of the media for political purposes..

NY Times (reg req):

Only a terrorist who couldn't shoot straight would assume that Swift was not part of the American effort to stalk terrorist transactions; that's tantamount to assuming that cops would track down license plate numbers without enlisting the Department of Motor Vehicles. But, unfortunately for us, terrorists are not so stupid: it's been reported as far back as 2003 (in The Washington Post) and as recently as this month (in Ron Suskind's must-read best seller, "The One Percent Doctrine") that our enemies long ago took Mr. Bush at his word and abandoned banks for couriers, money brokers, front companies and suitcases stuffed with cash and gold. Tom Brokaw summarized the consensus of terrorism experts last week when he told Chris Matthews of MSNBC: "I don't know anyone who believes that the terrorist network said, 'Oh my God, they're tracing our financial transactions? What a surprise.' Of course, they knew that they were doing that."

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