Using racist code words is built into the psyche of all conservative pols so when Mrs. Crazy spouts off that the USA could become "Zimbabwe," they understand that what she's really saying is Obama is not a citizen, but an African/Muslin hiding out in the White House and undermining our values like so many Russian cold war spies did in the 70's and 80's. That's according to many movement conservatives like the Abramoff run College Republicans of days gone bye.

Laura Ingraham says that Bachmann is not afraid to take on President Obama. What a stud, girl. Here come the black helicopters everybody. Phony 'One world' conspiracy theories have populated the Militia and Patriot movements for decades and have proven to be quite profitable actually for those that transmit these seriously unbalanced views.

Bachmann: Do we really want to tie our fortunes to Venezuela or Zimbabwe?

Ingraham: We're tied to China.

Bachmann: That's right, we are because they've been buying our debt.

Ingraham: We are in a global economy.

Bachmann: Of course, of course, but we don't want to become MORE dependent. That's really the point.

She could have said Greece or Iceland or Spain, but no...it's Zimbabwe. You get the imagery.

Matt Yglesias writes:

The reassuring thing about a lot of the nonsense you hear from the right is to think to yourself “well, these guys are liars.” Other times you see something like this transcript of Rep Michele Bachmann talking to radio host Scott Hennen and you come face to face with the realization that some key figures in the movement are dumber than Jonah Goldberg.

Bachmann: Well, President Obama is trying to bind the United States into a global economy where all of our nations come together in a global economy. I don’t want the United States to be in a global economy where, where our economic future is bound to that of Zimbabwe.

Of course the existence of a global economy in which events outside our borders impact us is not something Barack Obama dreamed up, and the idea that having world leaders gather for occasional meetings constitutes a “one world government” is insane. Is her idea that the President should never meet with anyone? Does that undermine our sovereignty?

Gawker writes:

A few thoughts:

• Zimbabwe isn't in the G20. It would take about G200 before Zimbabwe gets an invite.
• The entire post-Cold War economic landscape has been one of a "global economy."
• Everything else she said is stupid.
• That's all.

The MNProgerssive Project: Michele Bachmann's latest conspiracy theory: G20 Summit is to talk about a one world government

Blue America's Tarryl Clark is a great choice to take Michele on so please support her if you can. If you live in the district I'm sure they are looking for help. It won't be easy, but at least we have a good candidate in Bachmann-land.

Those were definitely words that we in the wilderness wanted to hear, after the secrecy and closed doors of the Bush administration. To be fair, I'm not sure how much control even the President has over how much transparency Congress is willing to allow, but that doesn't mean we're not going to remind him of his campaign promises:

My colleagues Igor Volsky and Matt Yglesias have eloquently argued on ThinkProgress that C-Span’s cameras should not be allowed to film the final negotiations between the House and Senate as they hammer out health care legislation that President Obama will soon sign into law. While I respect their arguments, I take a very different view. I have long believed that openness and transparency are essential bedrock measures for ensuring public accountability of our government. Letting C-Span cameras into health care conference meetings will keep negotiators honest, give the public an opportunity for input, and allow the process to be more collaborative.[..]

Critics have argued that the presence of cameras is likely to produce political posturing and grandstanding by politicians. And indeed, with the cameras rolling, Republicans have said health care reform is a bigger threat than terrorism, claimed that seniors would be told to “drop dead,” and even called the President a liar. But I’m glad cameras were there to capture those demeaning comments. They have helped all Americans gain a better understanding of the unwillingness of some on the right to engage in a rational debate.

The presence of cameras has also produced some beneficial outcomes. For instance, C-Span cameras exposed House GOP efforts to silence members of the Democratic Women’s Caucus when they tried to speak on the floor. The cameras also shamed Senate Republicans when they tried to filibuster the debate by forcing the reading of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ single-payer amendment.

Democrats have nothing to fear from an open debate. They are working to expand affordable coverage to 31 million uninsured Americans, lowering premiums, ending the insurance industry’s denial of pre-existing conditions, and ensuring women will no longer be charged much more for the same coverage as men. When the House and Senate meet in the coming weeks to discuss this historic legislation, I would humbly urge them to let the cameras roll. We can handle the truth.

I don't usually comment on a blog post that comments on another blog post, but I believe Matt Yglesias hits on an important issue in his observations on Andrew Exum's interview with Washington Post reporter and author Greg Jaffe.

Greg Jaffe, speaking to Andrew Exum, says “This whole conventional vs. irregular debate is stupid.”

War is war. And we waste far too much energy trying to categorize it. I think most lieutenants, captains and majors are beyond this false conventional vs. irregular frame that we try to impose on war. I wish I could say the same for the more senior people in the Pentagon.

I think there’s a lot of truth to that. At the same time, just because things look one way to “lieutenants, captains and majors” and another way to “senior people in the Pentagon” doesn’t mean we should take a dismissive view of the senior people’s outlook in a rush to celebrate the insights of the practical warfighter.

----------

And when you get down to the guts of defense budget politics, these high-level strategic concepts matter a great deal. Nobody, of course, is going to say that the U.S. should somehow completely abandon its ability to fight conventional wars. But the choice between a mindset that says “the main purpose of the military is to scare China & Russia” or a mindset that says “the main purpose of the military is to intervene effectively in third world backwaters” has very real implications for what kind of hardware purchases look cost effective.

There is no doubt in my mind that the issue of "hardware purchases" looms very large in the minds of senior military and civilian decision makers. Conventional warfare means lots of tanks, armored vehicles, stealthy jets, next generation bombers, submarines, destroyers, and aircraft carriers. And let's not even get into the care and feeding of that massive military machine. Counterinsurgency operations, or COIN, is completely the opposite, with a focus on maintaining security and diminishing the insurgent grasp on the population without destroying real estate. Also a no-brainer that the DOD budget is already too bloated, and that in managing two wars, protecting the homeland, and trying to modernize its equipment, there's going to be some in-fighting.

But more importantly, the issue is also in the theory and execution of national strategy. The basic idea of military doctrine is that small military units execute tactics on the ground that must support the overall plan of operations within a theater. The theater commander needs to ensure that he has adequate numbers of personnel, that operations continue toward a particular set of goals, and that the logistics support those operations - and his operations must support the overall national strategy for that region. If your tactics and operations don't align against the strategic goals and expected outcome, then you're doing something wrong - even if you're General McChrystal.

Now under the Bush administration, strategic goals and outcomes changed every Friedman unit (six months), which made it difficult to effectively plan operations or execute tactics. But one thing that was certainly clear was that conventional tactics that destroyed the Taliban in 2002 and that took the Iraqi army out in 2003 didn't support the post-conflict goals. You can't prosecute military operations with a conventional frame of mind when what one really needs is an approach to irregular warfare. That's why we failed in Lebanon in 1983.

Greg Jaffe is a good journalist, and I look forward to reading his book. On the other hand, making a statement like "War is war. And we waste far too much energy trying to categorize it" is a remarkably stupid statement. Nuclear war is not the same as conventional war. Conventional war is not the same as irregular war. Our military needs to be able to operate across a range of different operations, and needs to be equipped properly to execute its operations quickly and efficiently. But what we really need is national leadership that understands the nature of war, that knows how to develop a strategy that is executable, and that knows when it's time to go. From Sun Tzu:

All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved.

Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.

Thus ends the lesson.

Conservatives just can't help it when they act like misogynists. It's hard wired into their DNA much the same way it's hard wired into Richard Land's views about women. The National Republican Congressional Committee is attacking Nancy Pelosi and is really hoping that Gen. McChrystal will put her in her place in their latest fundraising press release.

Now, Pelosi is backpedaling on Afghanistan amidst increasing criticism from the radical left:

"I've also made it clear it's a very difficult vote to get from the members," she added. "Their constituents don't like an escalated war in Afghanistan. They'd like to see a different approach. But let's see what the president has to say." (Glenn Thrush, “Pelosi skeptical about Afghan surge, McChrystal,” Politico, 10/05/2009)

“General Pelosi has no problem sacrificing her own credibility as the Obama administration and liberals in Congress attempt to walk back a strategy they strongly advocated just months ago,” said NRCC Communications Director Ken Spain. “Nancy Pelosi continues to make party politics a higher priority than our national security. Rather than listening to a four-star general’s assessments on Afghanistan, General Pelosi somehow believes she is better suited to craft our country’s military policy.” If Nancy Pelosi’s failed economic policies are any indicator of the effect she may have on Afghanistan, taxpayers can only hope McChrystal is able to put her in her place.

Matt Yglesias says that the NRCC is trying to "deploy a touch of the old condescending sexism via the Speaker of the House of Representatives."

Nancy Pelosi responded to the NRCC like this:

"It's really sad they don't understand how inappropriate that is," Pelosi told reporters at her weekly press conference. " I'm in my place. I'm the Speaker of the House, the first woman Speaker of the House. And I'm in my place because the House voted me there. That language is something I hadn't heard in decades."

I always love how conservatives attack Democratic women and want them to stay home and watch the kids, but when it comes a conservative in politic they flip flop to try and appear as if they support women's rights. Here's Richard Land on MTP back in 2005 sharing his vision of women in America:

Russert: We can try to find common ground, but there are differences, and I want to see just how profound they are. The Southern Baptist Convention in 1998 passed this statement on the family: "...A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband... She...has the God-given responsibility to respect her husband and to serve as his helper in managing the household..."And, Reverend Land, you went on to explain it this way: "If a husband does not want his wife to work outside the home, then she should not work outside the home." Is that your vision of America?

DR. LAND: It's my vision for Christian families. I don't think that the law has anything to do with it.

And as usual Beck rules: Dear Mom, Beck has history of sexist comments

Teh stoopid, it hurts.

By all measures, Martin Luther King Jr. was a true leader. Barack Obama, on the other hand, is just another politician - one who has demonstrated far more regard for the interests of teacher unions than for the children they are paid to serve, far more regard for the pro-abortion lobby than for the future of the black community, and far less good sense than the average person has when it comes to picking a spiritual mentor.

The positions and values of Senator Obama stand mightily against those espoused, and what's more, practiced, by Martin Luther King Jr. Based on all these considerations, I think it is quite probable that King, were he alive today, would not vote for Barack Obama.

Oy. As Matt Yglesias says, perhaps the National Review should leave the divining of political leanings of slain civil rights leaders to conservative rags that weren't around in the 50s and 60s. You know, the kind that didn't write such racist tripe as Will Herberg's commentary on King's Nobel Peace Prize "'Civil Rights' and Violence: Who Are the Guilty Ones?" . I'm just sayin'...

On a related note, PFAW offers a look back at the way the GOP has tried to continually paint themselves as the non-racists by looking at their origins during the Civil War and ignoring their actions from the 60s forward.

Liberty Street: Georgetown has decided not to renew Douglas Feith's contract.

Majikthise: A coalition of New York legislators say the Sean Bell case not closed yet.

MyDD: More 'Straight Talk': John McCain breaks two pledges at once.

Happy Valley News Hour: Brush levels in Crawford becoming critical

What happened when Edward Teller tried to landscape Alaska with H-bombs. What happens when KGB agents and gangsters get their own country? What will happen when Matt Yglesias talks about his new book? All these questions are answered in The Opinion Mill's Sunday Bookchat.

HOLY CRAP: Jeremiah Wright has always had far more theological depth and nuance than his detractors...What's worse than Mel Gibson's Passion ? A biography of Jesus by the director of Showgirls...Faith-based health failure...Media Roundup...Religious Right trying to hijack National Day of Prayer... Rod Dreher mistily reminiscing about David Koresh...Did you know that the human body is 90% Lego?...NC pastor - homo no mo'

In his State of the Union address last night, Bush boasted, “We are grateful that there has not been another attack on our soil since 9/11.”

Except, of course, that’s wrong. I’m not trying to play a cute semantics game; I know what conservatives mean when they talk about “terrorist attacks.” They’re describing devastating, cataclysmic events that kill a lot of people at once. I get it.

But about a month after 9/11, someone sent weaponized anthrax to two Democratic senators and several news outlets. Five Americans were killed and 17 more suffered serious illnesses. For reasons that I’ve never been able to explain, the incident — it’s entirely reasonable to call it an “attack” — is hardly ever mentioned. No one knows where the anthrax came from, who sent it, or why. It was a horrifying incident, immediately on the heels of another horrifying incident, but more than six years later, it’s almost as if the episode never happened.

After Yglesias noted that it seems as if the “whole episode has been officially erased from the historical record or something,” Atrios added:

And anthrax was what made things like “mobile chemical weapons labs” sound so scary. Not everyone agrees, but I think more than 9/11 the anthrax freaked the country out. 9/11 was horrible, but the anthrax made it seem like we’d reached a new era where some horrible creepy shit was going to happen every day.

And then it was all forgotten.

Quite right. Every time I hear someone talk about the absence of 9/11 attacks, I twitch, wondering why the anthrax incident has somehow been downgraded in the national memory.

Everyone in the political world saw all the polls over the last several days, and they all pointed to a big Barack Obama win in New Hampshire. Given Hillary Clinton’s narrow victory, this has prompted many to suggest polls shouldn’t be taken seriously anymore. I think that’s a little rash under the circumstances.

Josh Marshall reminded us overnight that, by and large, polls are usually right.

[B]y and large they have a very good record. It’s silly to think that we — whether ‘we’ is reporters or political junkies or ordinary voters — are going to ignore the information that’s right in front of us. And why should we?

It’s true I guess that in an abstracted reality we could simply listen to the candidates, ignore all probabilistic data available, go to the polls with no idea of the result and learn the outcome the following morning. But that’s not the world we live in nor do I think it’s one I’d want to live in.

Agreed. Pollsters put surveys in the field, and tell us the results. The numbers offer us hints of what’s to come. When all the polls agree on a likely outcome, far more often than not, that’s what’s going to happen. Yesterday was obviously the exception, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s time to trash the rule.

On a related note, Matt Yglesias offers an interesting observation (and accompanying chart) from one of his commenters: “No one is talking about how the polls actually nailed Obama’s number. Obama didn’t lose this election. He stayed steady and Hillary surged ahead.”

We know "24" is promoting torture among the troops and right wingers across the land.

Glenn Reynolds orders the hit squad out...

Mathew Yglesias has more...

As Matthew Yglesias begins to see the light, what the hell is this doing in the USA TODAY?

John Cole begins the debunking immediately: "It is utter specious bullshit, and has been debunked so many times it gets silly...read on

In John's piece, he quotes a wingnut extraordinare "Utah State Senator Chis Buttars": "Buttars doesn’t disregard evolution completely, rather he believes God is the creator, but His creations have evolved within their own species. “We get different types of dogs and different types of cats, but you have never seen a "dat."

First off we do already have DAT's: "digital tape recording of sound." That might be one of the stupidest things I've ever read from a Circus Clown.

Kevin Drum jumps in with this: "It's a mystery. Perhaps in the future, instead of reporting on actual science, USA Today will simply take a poll and publish one of its cute graphics telling us what the majority of the citizenry believes. Then we can teach that in our public schools instead of just parroting the politically correct line from the liberal elites in our scientific establishment. Happy days!"