Uncle

I feel exactly as I did in November 2004. My very first blog post is as relevant now as it was then. The feeling of impending doom is stronger now, as the end is that much closer. The Dark Ages I prophesied then are just about upon us.

Digby is among the many singing "Tomorrow." He even quotes stirring words from RFK who, need I remind you, was assassinated and didn't actually accomplish much as I recall. He has far-reaching influence and lots of readers; he is probably doing the responsible thing for a leader to do. I don't. I'm with one of his commenters:

It's over, folks. The democratic experiment is finished. The Democrats in Congress now are just trying to hold onto their jobs, and they see that the only way they can is to not get in the Republicans' faces too much. They don't want to call attention to themselves, they don't want to make trouble. They'll make a speech to the base every once in a while, "Yeah, ain't it awful what those bad Republicans are doing!?!", but once back in D.C., they keep out of the way. It's a paying job, with plenty of benefits, and they'll never have to face the people back home when they finally do leave congress. They don't go back to their home districts. They stay in D.C., become lobbyists or lawyers for lobbyists, or lobbying interests.

This isn't going to get repaired in D.C. by those in Congress. It's not going to get repaired at the ballot box come next election.

Are we really going to keep flapping our gums around here as if it's just a matter of getting more people to the polls to vote Republicans out? We did that already. At least twice.

Congress is taking the Patriot Act up again next week, and with the bounce that Bush is sure to get from the SOTU tomorrow and the high that Bush and the Repubs will be on from getting Alito through, new laws will be in place criminalizing all kinds of protest actions. Even what we're all doing here, "slandering" while not using our real names.

Once Alito is sworn in and the SC declares that a Pres can do anything at all in a time of war (self-declared, unending), we won't even be able march on the White House with torches. They'll be able to (they can do it now) pick American citizens up off the street, not inform anybody, not even our families, and ship us off to a black prison, no lawyer, no habeas corpus, no trial, just all torture, all the time. They've already done it; Padilla is an American.

I give up, at least for now. I need to take a few days to decide whether to keep fighting, folks. I look at the efficient evil that has taken over, and the incompetent, spineless and rudderless fools that I invested my hopes with, and I keep thinking of the old saying about wasting your time teaching pigs to sing. All these hours, all these words, all this passion. All for naught. And I feel dirty.

I was going to read Larry Diamond's "Squandered Victory" next, but it no longer seems important. At the top of my reading list now are more relevant texts -- "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" and "The Myth of Sisyphus."

I can barely choke back the bile right now. We are indisputably, irrevocably fucked. The final FUBAR, in fact -- Fucked Up Beyond All Redemption.

Arrogant wankers

There is a poll up on MSNBC here about media, political attitudes and such. I thought I'd give it a try and vote in favor of the newer media. Then I poppoed a gasket when I saw question #6:


6. Where do you generally get your news information?
-National print media
-Local print media
-National TV
-Cable TV
-Local TV
-Talk Radio
-National Public Radio

Cluelessness in a nutshell -- setting up a poll on the Interntet, at a purported news site, and ignoring the possibility that the respondents might actually get news ... perish the thought -- on the Internet!

Hate to break it to you, fools, but the only reason I ever watch TV news in general and your tripe in particular (Olbermann excepted) is to see how badly you fuck up the stories I already know more about than your reporters seem to.

Wankers.

Completely beside the point

Aravosis joins Obama and Biden in complaining that this is not a perfect scenario for a filibuster, that it might backfire, that we didn't do it right, etc.

You folks are totally missing the point. If Alito makes it onto the court, there won't be a next time. All of the progress you might think we are making in terms of turning public opinion against Bush will not matter. The scandals you think we will tie like tin cans to his bumper will not matter. The nation's disgust with the quagmire in Iraq will not matter. All that will matter is the dictatorship that will have been allowed to take over on our watch. Once that happens, whatever dry powder you still have will be confiscated, and you will not have to concern yourself about the outrages that follow.

Filibuster because it your last chance to fight back. Filibuster because it is better to go down swinging. Filibuster, Senators Obama and Biden, because you sound like Karl Rove's caricature of a Democrat when you take dull blades to your own nutsacks like that.

Speaking of coincidences

Caught parts of two nuclear-Armageddon-narrowly-avoided movies on TV this weekend. In the first George Clooney plays a very Republican man of action thwarting terrorists in "The Peacemaker." About the only thing interesting about this Hollywood blow- 'em-up (other than the movie's politics relative to Clooney's own) was the fact that a bit part was played by Goran Visnjic, who in effect became the new Doug Ross on "ER."

The other was "Crimson Tide," which though also a typical Hollywood thriller, at least suggests that men of conscience can stand up to power and stop the madness. There are a couple of now-famous actors who I did not recognize the first time I saw it -- James Gandolfini and Viggo Mortensen.

I do try to turn off my brain once in a while.....

Nope, no global warming here...

I'm sure it is a complete conicidence that my cherry tree is blooming. In January.

Complete the sentence

We don't negotiate with terrorists:

(a) except when we do.

(b) unless it is in our interest to do so.

(c) because it is sound policy never to negotiate against yourself.

What did you do to save the Republic today?

I created a simple fax:

"Don't let our three branches become one branch and two fig leaves: Filibuster!"

I tried faxing it to every Dem in the Senate. Got through to about 25 of 'em.

Futile? Doomed to failure? Pissing up a rope?

Sure, probably. If you have a better idea, I'm all ears.

Contempt of court

TalkLeft has a sterling example of the way the Bush cabal is now in full affrontal assault on the judiciary and the Constitution in a chilling twofer: in a terror-related case, they sought the disqualification of a judge who showed bias by writing an article stating that "it was the duty of judges to protect individual rights in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks."

What a quaint old anachronism, that Bill of Rights.

We get results

As the Poor Man once said. Two days ago I called Senator Feinstein a "stalwart milquetoast" for her unwillingness to filibuster Alito. Yesterday she announced she would support the move.

I won't take credit. I can't even claim my calls to her office did it: I never got through because the line was constantly busy, which suggests how much pressure we collectively brought to bear.

But just in case:

Blanche Lambert Lincoln (D- AR), 202-224-4843 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Joseph I. Lieberman (D- CT), 202-224-4041-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Thomas R. Carper (D- DE), 202-224-2441-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Daniel K. Inouye (D- HI), 202-224-3934-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Tom Harkin (D- IA), 202-224-3254-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Barack Obama (D- IL), 202-224-2854-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Evan Bayh (D- IN), 202-224-5623-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Barbara A. Mikulski (D- MD), 202-224-4654-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Paul S. Sarbanes (D- MD), 202-224-4524-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Carl Levin (D- MI), 202-224-6221-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Mark Dayton (D- MN), 202-224-3244-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Max Baucus (D- MT), 202-224-2651-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Frank Lautenberg (D- NJ), 202-224-3224-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Robert Menendez (D- NJ), 202-224-4744-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Jeff Bingaman (D- NM), 202-224-5521-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Jack Reed (D- RI), 202-224-4642-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Lincoln D. Chafee (R- RI), 202-224-2921-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Patrick J. Leahy (D- VT), 202-224-4242-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Maria Cantwell (D- WA), 202-224-3441-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Patty Murray (D- WA), 202-224-2621-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Herb Kohl (D- WI), 202-224-5653-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
John D. Rockefeller, IV (D- WV), 202-224-6472-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
James M. Jeffords (I- VT), 202-224-5141-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.

Filibuster Opponents - silent & scared

Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D- DE) , 202-224-5042 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Bill Nelson (D- FL), 202-224-5274 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Daniel K. Akaka (D- HI) 202-224-6361 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Mary Landrieu (D- LA) 202-224-5824-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Byron L. Dorgan (D- ND) 202-224-2551-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Olympia Snowe (R- ME) 202-224-5344-- you are a stalwart milquetoast.

Filibuster Opponents - loud & proud

Mark Pryor (D- AR), 202-224-2353 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Ken Salazar (D- CO) , 202-224-5852 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Kent Conrad (D- ND) (1,), 202-224-2043 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.

Alito Supporters

Ben Nelson (D-NE) 202-224-6551 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Tim Johnson (D- SD) , 202-224-5842 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Robert C. Byrd (D- WV) , 202-224-3954 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.
Ted Stevens (R- AK) , 202-224-3004 -- you are a stalwart milquetoast.

Ancient wisdom, revised

My fortune cookie tonight said something to the effect of "ignorance is never the answer to any problem."

Would that they were right. In Bushworld, ignorance is the answer to all problems.

The Bill of Rights (revised, Bush ed.)

Jesus' General has the new and improved Constitutional Amendments 1-10. For example:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law without the expressed approval of the executive or his deputy chief of staff. respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Not too long ago, this might have been funny. Now it is merely accurate a little ahead of the curve.

More Alito Realpolitik

A Daily Kos diarist reports that Colorado Senator Ken Salazar has agreed not to support a filibuster to get James Dobson to stop calling him names.

Jack Abramoff may not have been an equal opportunity money machine, but it does seem that we have bedwetters on both sides of the aisle.

Ground Zero

Daily Kos: WV-Sen: Byrd supports Alito

88-year-old Senator Robert Byrd, a man who believes talked like he believed more deeply in the Senate as an institution than anyone alive, has announced he will support Alito's nomination.

And why?

A multimillionaire businessman entered the GOP race to challenge Sen. Robert C. Byrd on Wednesday, hoping to deny the 88-year-old incumbent Democrat a record ninth term.

John Raese, 55, said he would campaign on a platform touting free enterprise and reduced regulation, among other issues. "What I'm going to run on is a rebirth of capitalism," he said.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee heralded the filing by Raese, a former state GOP chairman who has sought office before.

Though four other Republicans are running in the party primary, the GOP committee called Raese "the first financially credible opponent Byrd has faced since 1982."

You could argue that the Republic was already dead man walking before Byrd's announcement. You could argue that the blood of our Constitution is on many hands. But for the "conscience of the Senate" to abandon all principle to preserve his office for a ninth term is perhaps the most symbolic betrayal -- the one that history will point to a hundred years from now after this new American Empire finally falls. And his venality will be known as ground zero in the end of our Republic.

Timing is everything

There is a great old joke that goes like this:

Dude1: What's the most important thing in comedy?

Dude2: I dunno. what is the most impor...

Dude1: Timing!

Over the weekend I was feeling very depressed about my own trivial impact on the course of politics, and generalized to the blogosphere's general lack of effect in the context of a really good Glenn Greenwald post that I said would have little effect.

Splendid time to throw a hissy fit Glenn's way.

Glenn's heroic piece on the NSA hypocrisy has broken through to the mainstream in a very big way, and they generally seem to be giving him credit.

I stand humbly corrected, and offer Glenn props for a job very well done.

Like I said....














Timing.

No tomorrow ... today

OK, it is still slightly bollixed up, but at you can at least get the flavor of my latest at The Raw Story.

$%#!!!$*

My latest editorial is up, sort of, at Raw. Sort of, because it currently appears without the last 500 words or so of the piece, for reasons opaque to me. Without its conclusion, you'll see no link from me. And my tongue shows increasingly painful evidence of my overbite.

I guess if I am lucky the second half of my column, called "No Tomorrow," will run ... tomorrow.

Self-negation: the Democratic way.

Well can we ask them about 9/11?

Senators: White House Stalls Katrina Probe - Yahoo! News

The White House is crippling a Senate inquiry into the government's sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina by barring administration officials from answering questions and failing to hand over documents, senators leading the investigation said Tuesday.

In some cases, staff at the White House and other federal agencies have refused to be interviewed by congressional investigators, said the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. In addition, agency officials won't answer seemingly innocuous questions about times and dates of meetings and telephone calls with the White House, the senators said.
...
"No one believes that the government responded adequately," said Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. "And we can't put that story together if people feel they're under a gag order from the White House."

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the committee's Republican chair, said she respects the White House's reluctance to reveal advice to President Bush from his top aides, which is generally covered by executive privilege.

Still, she criticized the dearth of information from agency officials about their contacts with the White House.

"We are entitled to know if someone from the Department of Homeland Security calls someone at the White House during this whole crisis period," Collins said. "So I think the White House has gone too far in restricting basic information about who called whom on what day."

She added, "It is completely inappropriate" for the White House to bar agency officials from talking to the Senate committee.

... Lieberman said the Justice and Health and Human Services departments "have essentially ignored our document requests for months" while HHS has refused to allow interviews of its staff. He described the Homeland Security response as "too little, too late."

I have this strange feeling I have seen this movie before.

Greenwald nails it again

The Administration's new FISA defense is factually false

In a fit of pique a few days ago I semi-dissed Glenn - -not for being wrong, which so far he hasn't been, but for wearing a white button-down to a mudfight in the sense that logic is a language neither the actors nor the audience understand.

Glenn politely commented on my tantrum, and responded to my email. And he keeps hammering away, bless his tireless heart.

This new post of his is so logically compelling and devastating in its marshalling of fact and law that it would effectively end the current circle jerk of a debate if only a couple of MSM meat puppets would copy and paste it into their teleprompters.

Read and disseminate.

Newspeak justice

susanhu @ Booman Tribune picks up on the yet another depressing juxtaposition in Bushworld: The military interrogator who tortured and killed an Iraqi prisoner gets no jail time, while the peace activist who injured no one in a protest at a recruiting station gets six months.

Our very own Geheime Staatspolizei

Patriot Act Renewal Includes Creation of a Federal Police Force - TalkLeft:
Here's what we can look forward to here in George's Reich:

"A permanent police force, to be known as the 'United States Secret Service Uniformed Division,'" empowered to "make arrests without warrant for any offense against the United States committed in their presence" ... "or for any felony cognizable under the laws of the United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such felony."

I wonder what the uniforms will look like....

A new 51st state?

I have been meaning to ask a question for a couple of days now. My understanding of international law is very limited, but I am pretty sure about this: one of the fundamental tenets is that when country A launches a military strike (soldiers, bombs, etc.) on the soil of country B, that attack constitutes an act of war. At any rate, that is sure how Fearless Leader has justified our War on Terrah in the aftermath of 9/11.

So why wasn't our January 13th aerial bombardment of Damadola, Pakistan which killed at least 18 Pakistani civilians, an act of war?

Here's the answer, from the Pakistan Daily Times, which claims to get it from Time:

Washington has an understanding with Islamabad that allows the US to strike within Pakistan’s border regions, providing the US has actionable intelligence and Pakistan cannot take firm action, according to a report in US weekly magazine Time.

The source of the report is a Peshawar-based Pakistani intelligence official. “Pakistan’s caveat (to the agreement) is that it would formally protest such strikes to deflect domestic criticism. Some ranking Pakistani officials deny such an agreement exists,” says the report headlined ‘Can Bin Laden be caught?’

This will not go down well with the man on the street in Pakistan. Pervez Musharraf was generally seen as far too cozy with the Great Satan even before we treated his country as another Vieques (only with people). So now that question #1 seems to have been answered, here's question #2: What did we promise Pakistan's weakening strongman to get him to make a mockery of his country's sovereignty?

No 'Wing,' no prayer

NBC Cancels 'West Wing' After 7 Seasons

The new president on "The West Wing" will be a real short-timer: NBC announced Sunday it was pulling the plug on the Emmy-winning political drama in May after seven seasons.

NBC, struggling to regain its footing after the worst season in its history, also outlined several midseason schedule changes — including the moves of popular dramas "Law & Order" and "Las Vegas."

"The West Wing" announcement wasn't much of a surprise. Although this season's story line with a presidential campaign involving a Democrat played by Jimmy Smits and Republican portrayed by Alan Alda has been strong critically, ratings have sunk with its move to Sunday nights.

West Wing was, when on its game, both the best writing on TV by a country mile and a reminder of the distance between what is and what could have been. I despise most network programming, but for several years West Wing was my only gotta see TV. Then the quality dropped off. It got better again recently, but for me the context had changed, and watching it was almost unbearably painful. There was a cruel, taunting quality to seeing the ghost of the precious thing that has been ripped from our grasp flicker across the screen.

Feh.

Glenn Greenwald scores major rhetorical points by pointing out the incoherence of the Osama-talks-like-Michael Moore tripe.

Feh.

The Bush storm troopers flunk Rhetoric 101. BFD. They continue to kick our sorry asses on the playground every lunch hour.

If the Murkun people had even a passing acquaintence with logic, we wouldn't be here. Unless and until the MSM sheeple call them on this, logic is irrelevant. And since the MSM sheeple continue to parrot such nonsense, it is absurd to expect them to call bullshit on their own sycophantic behavior.

Peak oil: done deal

From Reuters.com:

OPEC producer Kuwait's oil reserves are only half those officially stated, according to internal Kuwaiti records seen by industry newsletter Petroleum Intelligence Weekly (PIW).

"PIW learns from sources that Kuwait's actual oil reserves, which are officially stated at around 99 billion barrels, or close to 10 percent of the global total, are a good deal lower, according to internal Kuwaiti records," the weekly PIW reported on Friday.

It said that according to data circulated in Kuwait Oil Co (KOC), the upstream arm of state Kuwait Petroleum Corp, Kuwait's remaining proven and non-proven oil reserves are about 48 billion barrels.

Officials from KOC were not immediately available for comment to Reuters.

I am just one of a large number of folks who have been talking about peak oil for some time. Until now, those apocalyptic visions have been countered in general circulation by the kind of mythology Kuwait was perpetrating, and no one wanted to pay attention.

But this process of restating reserves is now past trickle, and well on its way to torrent. Recall that Shell admitted in 2004 that its reserves were overstated by 20%. It is widely believed that Saudi Arabia has been deep fat frying its reserve numbers as well. The Saudis claim to have 25% of the world's reserves. If the fudge factor in their numbers is anything close to Kuwait's, we are in deep, deep doo-doo. We are screwed either way, of course, but the price shock will be inconceivably violent if Saudi Arabia is revealed to have half the oil we think they do.

So the good news is that when unleaded hits $6 a gallon you will be able to get a helluva deal on a Hummer. The bad news is that the economy will crash so hard you will have to put it up on blocks and live in it.

Well of course

Writer Claims HealthSouth CEO Scrushy Bought Favorable Press Coverage During Fraud Trial

Makes perfect sense to me. After a half-dozen columnists are exposed as having taken corporate or government, the boundaries of what newspaper folks think they can get away with are effectively moved. That means two things: (a) we'll find out about cash buying favorable "straight" news, and (b) some chutzpah-enhanced, ethically challenged presstitute will go after a john for welching.

E&P presents:

Throughout the six-month trial that led to Richard Scrushy's acquittal in the $2.7 billion fraud at HealthSouth Corp., a small, influential newspaper consistently printed articles sympathetic to the defense of the fired CEO.

Audry Lewis, the author of those stories in The Birmingham Times, the city's oldest black-owned paper, now says she was secretly working on behalf of Scrushy, who she says paid her $11,000 through a public relations firm and typically read her articles before publication.

Documents obtained by The Associated Press show The Lewis Group wrote a $5,000 check to Audry Lewis on April 29, 2005 -- the day Scrushy hired the company. The head of the company, Times founder Jesse J. Lewis Sr., is not related to Audry Lewis.

The firm wrote another $5,000 check that day to the Rev. Herman Henderson, who employs Audry Lewis at his Believers Temple Church and was among the black preachers supporting Scrushy who were present in the courtroom throughout.

Audry Lewis and Henderson now say Scrushy owes them $150,000 for the newspaper stories and other public relations work, including getting black pastors to attend the trial in a bid to sway the mostly black jury.

Damned blogger ethics....

The Grenada of Terror

ABC News: 11 Indicted in Eco-terror Arsons

Eleven people have been indicted in recent weeks in connection with a series of arson attacks, including the 1998 fire at the Vail Ski Resort in Colorado that has been linked to the radical environmental groups Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front.

The announcement of the indictments and the arrests of eight of the people charged was made today at a news conference with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, FBI Director Robert Mueller and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Director Carl Truscott.

Got that? The top two or three law enforcement officers in the country focusing all that energy on ecology extremists.

The FBI has called radical environmental groups the most serious domestic terrorism threat, and estimates the Earth Liberation Front's attacks alone are responsible for damages totaling more than $100 million since the mid-1990s. The fire at an expansion project at Vail caused $12 million in damages, and an August 2003 arson at a San Diego apartment construction project that Earth Liberation took responsibility for did $50 million worth of damage.

$100 million. Over the last ten years or so, that's about $10M a year. And, as far as I know, not a single death attributable thereto.

While we're talking about monetary losses, would you paragons of prosecutorial virtue care to comment on your efforts to go after the folks who walked off with the $8.8B of our taxpayer money that has disappeared in Iraq? Or perhaps the $1M per month overcharges by Halliburton for laundry services? Or the $1B in questionable Halliburton charges?

Or, if you are really feeling your oats, how about how telling us about how you are going to get the folks who actually killed thousands of people on 9/11?

Of course not. History must repeat.

Oh, that Tim Kaine

Digby points out how utterly ass-backwards the "Wingnut-lite" strategy prominently featued in a new TAP article is. He's right, of course. But here's something timely he didn't mention: The TAP article's exemplar of the winning Democratic message is Tim Kaine:

Incoming Democratic Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, a former Christian missionary in Latin America, learned the importance of cultural appeals early in his campaign. Kaine, Virginia’s first Catholic governor and one of the two major Democratic electoral success stories of 2005, had worked as a court-appointed attorney for inmates on death row while a young attorney. This, he knew, would be a major strike against him in his bid to run a state whose citizens overwhelmingly support the death penalty, and in a contest against the state’s attorney general, who would inevitably accuse him of being soft on crime and a bleeding-heart liberal.

In the spring of 2005 Kaine’s pollster, Peter Brodnitz, of the polling firm Benenson Strategy Group, decided that the campaign needed to develop a strategy to handle such charges. It convened a focus group of white, conservative, religious voters, and explored different ways Kaine could reach out to them. The result was startling. Brodnitz found that once Kaine started talking about his religious background and explaining that his opposition to the death penalty grew out of his Catholic faith, not only did charges that he was weak on crime fail to stick, but he became inoculated against a host of related charges that typically plague and undermine the campaigns of Democratic candidates. “Once people understood the values system that the position grew out of, they understood that’s he’s not a liberal,” says Brodnitz. “We couldn’t even convince them he was a liberal once we’d done that.”

And you know what? It turns out that he's the same Tim Kaine the Democratic leadershit has "tapped" to rebut Dubya's SOTU speech, as opposed to, say, designated spear catcher Jack Murtha. You know, the guy whose website is long on God and church and the NRA, but utterly devoid of any military or foreign policy cred. Which might matter if we were involved in, like, a war or something.

Small world.

Please don't beat me

Minority Leader Reid Apologizes to GOP

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on Thursday apologized to 33 Republican senators singled out for ethics criticism in a report from his office titled "Republican Abuse of Power."

"The document released by my office yesterday went too far and I want to convey to you my personal regrets," Reid said in a letter.

"I am writing to apologize for the tone of this document and the decision to single out individual senators for criticism in it."

Reid came under attack Wednesday over the report, which was issued by his staff on Senate letterhead, even as he and fellow Democrats released ethics overhaul proposals.

I'm all for a wide variety of support programs and legal protections for battered wives. I just wouldn't ask them to lead the battle to save our Constitution while so obviously traumatized by the experience.

Give 'emGo to hell, Harry. Maybe you can co-organize a group hug for your colleagues with Dick Durbin.

Jesus' General nails it

Not cynical, just prescient. Go look at Jesus' General's dead-on prediction of what next month's WaPo online will look like.

Speaking of "in" colors...

Orange seems to have made a dramatic exit from the Department of Homeland Security's palette since, oh, fall of 2004 or so. From the DHS website:

Threat Advisories, Bulletins, Memoranda (cleared for public release)

April 19, 2005 – Information Bulletin – Unauthorized Peer to Peer (P2P) Programs on Government Computers (PDF, 4 pages - 50 KB)

August 3, 2004 – Memorandum – Suspicious Activity Reporting Criteria for Infrastructure Owners and Operators (PDF, 3 pages – 252 KB)

August 1, 2004 - Advisory - HSAS Increased to Orange for Financial Institutions in Specific Geographic Areas (PDF, 2 pages - 49 KB)

July 30, 2004 - Information Bulletin - Potential Threat to Homeland Using Heavy Transport Vehicles (PDF, 7 pages - 89 KB)

July 22, 2003 - Information Bulletin - Potential Terrorist Use of Official Identification, Uniforms, or Vehicles

July 1, 2003 - Information Bulletin - July 4th General Awareness

March 17, 2003 - Advisory - National Threat Level Raised, Statement by Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge

May 30, 2003 - Advisory - Homeland Security Advisory System Lowered to National Level YELLOW

May 20, 2003 - Advisory - Homeland Security Advisory System Increase to National Level ORANGE

April 16, 2003 - Advisory - Homeland Security Advisory System Lowered to National Level YELLOW

Call me a cynic, but I suspect that the looming midterm elections will soon bring out prominent retro fashionistas again displaying large swaths of orange.

Torture: the new black

New evidence demonstrated in 2005 that torture and mistreatment have been a deliberate part of the Bush administration’s counterterrorism strategy, undermining the global defense of human rights, Human Rights Watch said today in releasing its World Report 2006.

The evidence showed that abusive interrogation cannot be reduced to the misdeeds of a few low-ranking soldiers, but was a conscious policy choice by senior U.S. government officials.

Human Rights Watch World Report 2006 (Human Rights Watch, 18-1-2006)

Your arrogant scribe, November:

Thus the new calculus: the insurgents become suicide bombers; we level cities the insurgents have already abandoned. The insurgents behead; we waterboard and crucify. The insurgents plant roadside bombs; we incinerate civilians with white phosphorus. For every indiscriminate, random horror they perpetrate, we offer our own in response.

This hypothesis is horrifying in its implications, and it is only a hypothesis. But it is a hypothesis that solves a lot of mysteries about our leaders. It explains why they are undaunted by the consensus that torture will not yield useful information – they don’t expect to get any. It explains why they are so insistent on holding tens of thousands of prisoners whether or not there is a reasonable basis for their incarceration – they are not making any attempt to separate combatants from the bystanders. It explains the horror of white phosphorus unleashed on civilians, and aerial bombardment of our supposedly democratic client – tactical military concerns are secondary at best. The randomness of the violence, abuse and destruction is not an unavoidable byproduct of an otherwise sane policy; the randomness is itself the very object of the policy.

And of course, our descent into such unspeakable tactics explains another, shameful mystery: why the evil we fight has become so difficult to distinguish from the evil we have become.

Today's history lesson

This authorization is a vital tool in our war against the terrorists. It is critical to saving American lives. The American people expect me to do everything in my power under our laws and Constitution to protect them and their civil liberties. And that is exactly what I will continue to do, so long as I'm the President of the United States.

...

"...(T)his program is conscious of people's civil liberties, as am I. This is a limited program designed to prevent attacks on the United States of America -- and I repeat: limited."

American chief executive, December 17, 2005 and January 1, 2006, urging support of warrantless domestic spying, vesting de facto legislative and judicial power in the executive.

"The government will make use of these powers only insofar as they are essential for carrying out vitally necessary measures...The number of cases in which an internal necessity exists for having recourse to such a law is in itself a limited one."

German chief executive, March 23, 1933, urging passage of the "Enabling Act," which vested all power in the executive.

Capital "L" loyal; small "o" opposition

Senate Democrat backs Alito

Ben Nelson of Nebraska on Tuesday became the first Senate Democrat to announce his support of conservative Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, who is expected to be confirmed later this month by the full Republican-led Senate.

"I have decided to vote in favor of Judge Samuel Alito," Nelson, a moderate, said in a statement issued by his office.

"I came to this decision after careful consideration of his impeccable judicial credentials, the American Bar Association's strong recommendation and his pledge that he would not bring a political agenda to the court," Nelson said.

I hereby submit the following recommendation: as part of the reform movement now sweeping Washington, the name of the Democratic Party should be changed to more accurately reflect reality: I suggest the "Gullible Party." In the alternative, the "Palace Eunuchs" would also be acceptable.

Thanks again, Ralph

As I wallow in the imminent disaster of the Alito confirmation, and the 287th Democratic meltdown of the last 12 months, and contemplate abandoning these sorry-assed losers, Eric Alterman reminds us that the man who just offered that stirring speech yesterday would have been President but for Ralph Fucking Nader.

Now what?

Fair and balanced

Shakespeare's Sister points out that the number of Americans who support impeaching the Chimp (52%) is exactly double the number of people who favored Clinton's impeachment.

Not that that matters.

Whaaaaaaa?

The ACLU is suing the Bush junta over domestic spying -- no surprise there. Larry DIamond of the Hoover Institute, who trashed the administration for its failures in Iraq, is a named plaintiff -- no surprise there either. But get this, from the Times via Americablog:

Also named as plaintiffs in the A.C.L.U. lawsuit are the journalist Christopher Hitchens...

That's right -- one of the leaders of the bedwetter brigade is biting the hand that diapers him.

No friggin' idea what this means, but it seems inconsistent with all known natural laws.

Maybe if I assume Digby is right

... I won't be as bitterly disappointed when it comes to pass just as he says:

Here's what's going to happen. The Republicans will carefully plan and coordinate their strategy. Guys like Jeff Sessions will be in charge of fear-mongering and ad hominem attacks on dissent. Huckleberry Graham will express grave concerns about liberty only to be convinced by the end of the hearing that the gravest threat to the nation is Democratic rudeness. Gonzales will then say this is nothing but a high tech illegal deportation across the Rio Grande. Sam Brownback will offer objections to abuse of presidential power but will concede that it is necessary since godless abortionist terrorists are trying to kill us all in our sleep. His wife will inexplicably start crying and run out of the room. Everyone will agree that Alberto Gonzales has been remarkably forthcoming. Arlen will concede that the constitution does indeed provide for a King.

The Democrats, meanwhile, will take a much needed week long vacation before the hearings. They'll meet up in the mens room just before they begin, to discuss a strategy. (Dianne will watch the door.) Kennedy will suggest that he attack Gonzales on presidential power and Shumer will snap that he's sick of Kennedy getting all the good attacks and insists that Kennedy takes that boring Unitary Executive bullshit this time. Biden will request that he lead the questioning which will make Pat Leahy tell him to go fuck himself. Joe will remind the whole group that he once had a phone call overheard in college so he's been the victim of warrantless wiretapping and can bring the personal touch to the hearings. Feinstein will ask, "what are these hearings about again?" In the end the Democrats will strongly object to Arlen's conclusions that the constitution provides for a King.

Then we can move on to fulfilling Atrios' prophesy.

So what

I read Al Gore's speech. I watched the clips on the web. I was moved.

But if a formerly wooden politician makes an important speech, and the press isn't there to hear it, does he make an effective sound?

Sadly, no. I don't know what it takes to have an impact today on the old media, but this is ridiculous.

Mission Accomplished

The States Step In As Medicare Falters

Two weeks into the new Medicare prescription drug program, many of the nation's sickest and poorest elderly and disabled people are being turned away or overcharged at pharmacies, prompting more than a dozen states to declare health emergencies and pay for their life-saving medicines.

Computer glitches, overloaded telephone lines and poorly trained pharmacists are being blamed for mix-ups that have resulted in the worst of unintended consequences: As many as 6.4 million low-income seniors, who until Dec. 31 received their medications free, suddenly find themselves navigating an insurance maze of large deductibles, co-payments and outright denial of coverage.

Yesterday, Ohio and Wisconsin announced that they will cover the drug costs of low-income seniors who would otherwise go without, joining every state in New England as well as California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota and New Jersey.

"This new prescription drug plan was supposed to be a voluntary program to help people who didn't have coverage," said Jeanne Finberg, a lawyer for the National Senior Citizens Law Center. "All this is doing is harming the people who had coverage -- America's most vulnerable citizens."

Heckuva job, Georgie.

Senator Chamberlain to the rescue

Feinstein Warns Against Alito Filibuster

A Democrat who plans to vote against Samuel Alito sided on Sunday with a Republican colleague on the Senate Judiciary Committee in cautioning against a filibuster of the Supreme Court nominee.

"I do not see a likelihood of a filibuster," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. "This might be a man I disagree with, but it doesn't mean he shouldn't be on the court."

She said she will not vote to confirm the appeals court judge, based on his conservative record. But she acknowledged that nothing emerged during last week's hearings to justify any organized action by Democrats to stall the nomination.

"If there's a filibuster of this man based on his qualifications, there would be a huge backlash in this country," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. He is one of 14 centrist senators who defused the Senate's showdown over judicial filibusters last year, saying such a tactic is justified only under extraordinary circumstances.
...
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., would not rule out a filibuster, saying committee Democrats were still going through the hearing transcripts and awaiting answers to written questions.

"It's premature to say anything till we fully assess the record," said Schumer, who appeared with Graham on "Fox News Sunday."

But Feinstein, who said she was concerned about Alito's conservative record on abortion rights and deference to executive power, acknowledged the 15-year appellate judge had the legal credentials to serve on the Supreme Court.

"I was impressed with his ability to maintain a very even demeanor," she said on CBS' "Face the Nation."

The utter, fatal wrongheadedness on display here leaves me virtually speechless with rage.

Even demeanor? At least the men who will inter our Constitution will sound nice.

Not extraordinary? Sure, just the end of our form of government.

Apt choice of words, Dr. Bloor, but I will not talk you back into this fold. I now officially include myself out of the most costly and important fold since Chamberlain signed the Munich Agreement.

RIP, American republic
1788-2006

Gonna take away their their web access, too?

via Raw Story: New York Times 'disconnects' public e-mail addresses for its columnists

Months after moving its Op-Ed columnists behind a "paywall," the New York Times will now 'disconnect' columnists' public e-mail addresses, RAW STORY has learned.

The Times has advised papers which receive their news content to remove any old e-mail addresses which they may have published alongside Op-Ed columns.

"The New York Times no longer provides public e-mail addresses for its Op-Ed columnists," a memo obtained by RAW STORY asserts. "With the advent of the paper's online program TimesSelect, subscribers are invited to contact columnists from within The Times' Web site, nytimes.com."

I'm beginnning to think that we should stop referring to the world of fishwrap journalism as "mainstream media" and start calling them "ostrich media." The WaPo old guard seem to resent their own Froomkin's web cred; the Times seems to be intent on responding to the threat bloggers pose by doing their best to pretend we don't exist.

Times Selective goes a long way toward accomplishing "speak no evil": by moving his columnists behind the wall, Pinch Sulzberger has essential purchased the electronic silence of MoDo, the Shrill One, Bob Herbert and and Frank Rich, whose work now is only rarely commented on in the blogosphere. (Bobo the Clown, being the token conservative, seems to have little difficulty scoring serious TV face time.) Now the "hear no evil" component is in place as well. Only a matter of time before Pinch and Bill Keller order them to stop looking at the Internet as well.

Yo, Pinch-- why don't you just cut to the chase , do what the LA Times did with Robert Scheer and fire their asses? It'll make your East Hampton dinners with the Queen of Iraq so much more pleasant, and maybe the Preznit will stop calling you on the carpet for your apostacy.

Atrios puts on his Carnac hat

...and makes some chilling predictions about how the Adminstration will pull the bedwetter lever about Iran to tilt the midterms. I don't even feel the urge to argue against his cynicism -- it really could, and probably will, go down this way.

I think they need to tweak their eavesdropping software

A Protest, a Spy Program and a Campus in an Uproar - New York Times

The Pentagon has been spying on student protestors at the University of California at Santa Cruz, calling a protest there a "credible threat." I guess it serves those militant youngsters right -- after all, no good could come from a school whose mascot is the fearsome banana slug.

Note to the guys programming the telephone keyword scanning in the Pentagon IT department: you need to increase the resolution on the voice recognition software a bit. The mistake was understandable, but do you really want to go through this every time somebody talks about having a "bong"?

Sneak preview: 2006 Iraq war strategy

Pakistan on Saturday condemned a purported CIA airstrike on a border village that officials said unsuccessfully targeted al-Qaida's second-in-command, and said it was protesting to the U.S. Embassy over the attack that killed at least 17 people.

Thousands of local tribesmen, chanting 'God is Great,' demonstrated against the attack, claiming the victims were local villagers without terrorist links and had never hosted Ayman al-Zawahri.

Two senior Pakistani officials told The Associated Press that the CIA acted on incorrect information in launching the attack early Friday in the northwestern village of Damadola, near the Afghan border.

Citing unidentified American intelligence officials, U.S. news networks reported that CIA-operated Predator drone aircraft carried out the missile strike because al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, was thought to be at a compound in the village or about to arrive.

'Their information was wrong, and our investigations conclude that they acted on a false information,' said a senior Pakistani intelligence official with direct knowledge of Pakistan's investigations into the attack."

Remember Sy Hersch's prediction that as our ground forces buckle under the stress of over-commitment in Iraq, we would (a) shift to aerial bombardment as the tool of choice and (b) thereby become vulnerable to the mistakes and divergent motives of those on the ground who become our spotters?

This story will give you a good sense of how well that is going to work out for us.

Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose.

Separated at birth?

It seems many crime family bosses take a hands-on approach to managing their troops.



And yes, the goomba doing faking the Vulcan mind meld on the right is Dubya.

(Update: as reader Fred points out, it takes two minds to do a meld.)

Enough already

If I hear one more conservative talk about how Alito deserves to be a Supreme because "he keeps an open mind and decides cases based on the facts and the law," I am going to go kick somebody's puppy.

It is very rare that a case reaches an appellate court unless both sides can marshall superfically compelling arguments that weave together fact and law. What the judge has to do is decide which law and which facts to treat as the more important ones. And where one set of considerations favor individual rights and the other favor the government, Alito consistently supports the government.

So Alito doesn't have to foam at the mouth or babble like a Michelle Malkin to be dangerous. He can sound as reasonable and level-headed as you please. All he has to do is choose to accept the legal theories advanced by the police state he will slowly ensconce into the space our Constitution once covered.

Pentagon to families: Go ahead, laugh

When the stress of the war in Iraq becomes too severe, the Pentagon has a suggestion for military families: Learn how to laugh.

With help from the Pentagon's chief laughter instructor, families of National Guard members are learning to walk like a penguin, laugh like a lion and blurt "ha, ha, hee, hee and ho, ho."

No joke.

"I laugh every chance I get," says the instructor, retired Army colonel James "Scotty" Scott. "That's why I'm blessed to be at the Pentagon, where we definitely need a lot of laughter in our lives."

What do we need the Onion and the Daily Show for? Assclown Central does all the heavy lifting for them.

I wonder how many flak jackets the Army could buy with what it pays Colonel Scott.

Personally, I think there is far too much laughter in the White House and the Pentagon these days. What is missing is any sense that they take their jobs seriously.

Ugh.

MoDo

Since the advent of Times Selective, the opinion pieces from Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich, Paul Krugman and Bob Herbert have largely vanished from the blogosphere. (Great job, Pinch. Now the spotlight is squarely on the stellar job you have been doing with the news. How is that working out for you?)

But every once in a while, some brave soul mirrors something from The Shrill One, or from the Queen of Snark, and I get to remember the good old days. So it was nice to see MoDo get her licks in on Hangin' Sammy, as reproduced by topplebush.com.

Makes me nostagic for the days when logic and consistency counted for something.

Because we value individual rights

Ex-Gitmo chief takes military 5th on abuse

The former commander of the Guantanamo Bay detention center, who has been tied to the prisoner abuse scandal, is declining to answer questions in two courts-martial cases involving the use of dogs during interrogations.

Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller invoked the military's version of the Fifth Amendment right to not incriminate himself, a move that was defended Thursday by the military's top commander.

Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Pentagon reporters that while he expects military leaders to do the right thing, that does not mean they should lose their constitutional rights.

Pace said officers should "tell the truth as they know it." He added, "We expect our leaders to lead by example. But we do not expect them to give up their individual rights as people."

Yes indeedy. Because defending individual rights is what Gitmo and Abu Ghraib and the military and King George are all about.

Army to begin officially astroturfing blogs

From William M. Arkin - washingtonpost.com via da Poorman:

Word comes from RL that the Army has hired PR firm Hass MS&L of Detroit to offer "exclusive editorial content" to blogs willing to run government propaganda.

"The Army believes that military blogs are a valuable medium for reaching out," account executive Charlie Kondek has written to a number of pro-military blogs in a January 6 Email.

"To that end, the Army plans to offer you and selected bloggers exclusive editorial content on a few issues you’re likely to be interested in," Kondek says. The Email has been mentioned in Black Five, One Hand Clapping and Fuzzilicious Thinking.

I guess we now know where the folks who until recently were propagandizing in Iraq all ended up.

Are they calling the operation Pajamas Media?

Good to see that Armstrong WIlliams has landed on his feet.

Thank you, thank you very much. I'll be here all week.

The Crying Game

Wolcott is among the many looking askance at Mrs. Alito's tearful exit from the hearing room yesterday. I join the pooh-pooh parade, though I think trying to hang the blame on Lindsay Graham is pyschologically unsound -- it is sometimes when a sympathetic friend offers a shoulder that we cry, not during the trauma itself.

The thing I have not seen anyone comment on is the fact that just before Mrs. Alito dashed, the young woman to her left leaned over and said something to her. Who is that woman? I can't find her name anywhere -- but I am quite sure she is the same woman I saw interviewed on Monday or Tuesday. She is part of the Adminstration's team of Alito handlers and spinmeisters. Which raises the question: what did she say? Did she tell the Missus to walk out? It sure looked like cause and effect from here.....

Update: Eagle-eyed reader Adam informs us that the apparent acting coach is Rachel Brand, from the Attorney General's office. Wonkette has the 411.

Update #2: Yes, commenter Jeff. Using the nice lady's emotions for political gain would indeed be a reprehensible thing.



Oh, and I hope that the "Organization for the Bettement of Student Life" starts with remedial spelling, which would make life "bette" for all of us. (OTOH, props for avoiding anonymous trolling.)

Borkalito

Glenn Greenwald nails it again about the Alito hearings: though his style is less confrontational (and thus less honest) than Bork's was, there is little doubt that his philosophy and likely positions once he gets to the Court will be indistinguishable from his.

1910, here we come.

Fighting for the little guy

IRS Froze Refunds for Lower Income Taxpayers

Criminal investigators at the Internal Revenue Service froze more than 120,000 taxpayers' refunds last year on suspicion of fraud without notifying the taxpayers or giving them a chance to respond, the national taxpayer advocate said in a report released yesterday.

The advocate's office, which is part of the IRS, looked at a sample of taxpayers who complained that they never received their refunds. In two-thirds of those cases, there was no evidence of fraud. Many of the returns were filed by low-income workers, including some who claimed the earned-income tax credit, which sometimes entitles filers to a cash payment on top of their refunds.

The median adjusted gross income of taxpayers who were found to have committed "no fraud" was $13,330, and the median income of those who claimed the earned-income tax credit was $11,956. The median refund received was $3,685, which represented significant income for the taxpayers involved, said Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson in her annual report to lawmakers on problem areas in tax administration.

Based on data from fiscal 2004, the Taxpayer Advocate Service estimated that as many as 1.6 million refunds have been frozen by the IRS's Criminal Investigation (CI) division over five years.

"At a minimum, this procedure constitutes an extraordinary violation of fundamental taxpayer rights and fairness. In our view, it may also constitute a violation of due process of law," said Olson of the IRS's freezing of refunds without giving taxpayers notice or the opportunity to defend themselves.

So to all the salt of the earth types who still think you'd like to have a beer with Dubya -- best hope he pays for your Budweiser, and try not to think about whose money he's using.

Ask the right *&!%% questions!

I watched/listened to a bunch of the Alito charade today. And I suspect that by the end of the process I will be so frustrated with the inability of the Democrats to get answers to the right questions that I will be ready to be fitted for a white jacket with extra-long sleeves.

Russ Feingold asked a fun question about who had been involved in prepping Alito for the hearings, but never followed up after Alito danced around it without answering. Here is a bit of advice, folks: be a bit more persistent. If the witness bobs and babbles, say "OK, but that wasn't my question. My question is ..." Repeat as needed.

Several Dems asked if he would agree that the Preznit is not above the law. He agreed, but the Senators seemed oblivious to the position now taken by the monarchists -- that the President can ignore statutory law and still follow their absurd, monarchist interpretation of Constitutional law. In other words, he (and they) define "the President is not above the law" as a tautology: in their view, it is impossible by definition for the President to break the law.

So, don't ask if the President is above the law: ask if the President is ever free to ignore or violate statutes passed by Congress. Ask for specific examples of ways in which a President would violate the the law as he defines it in the way he conducts a hypothetical war. If he answers a different question, ask again. If he dances and weaves, ask again. And keep asking until he friggin' answers.

A rare bit of candor

I was listening to the Alito hearings this afternoon and heard this from Lindsay Graham as a segue into his questioning and in apparent reference to Alito's convenient lapses of memory (not a perfect quote, but close):

"And I hope that if any of us come before you in the future and say we don't remember Abramoff, they you will also give us the benefit of the doubt."

He broke the place up. I give him double bonus points for honest gallows humor about his party's thievery, and the quid pro quo charade being run before our eyes.

More details here.

Not that it matters or anything, but...

A dKos contributor reported a few days ago on an interview with the Florida State prof who recently published a book about the 2000 debacle in that state. And guess what: Gore won Florida by 30,000 votes.

There were 175,000 votes overall that were so-called "spoiled ballots." About two-thirds of the spoiled ballots were over-votes; many or most of them would have been write-in over-votes, where people had punched and written in a candidate's name. And nobody looked at this, not even the Florida Supreme Court in the last decision it made requiring a statewide recount...The write-in over-votes have really not gotten much attention.
...
Those votes are not ambiguous. When you see Gore picked and then Gore written in, there's not a question in your mind who this person was voting for. When you go through those, they're unambiguous: Bush got some of those votes, but they were overwhelmingly for Gore. For example, in an analysis of the 2.7 million votes that had been cast in Florida's eight largest counties, The Washington Post found that Gore's name was punched on 46,000 of the over-vote ballots it, while Bush's name was marked on only 17,000.
...
One of the things I found that hadn't been reported anywhere is, if you look at where those votes occurred, they were in predominantly black precincts. And (when you look at) the history of black voting in Florida, these are people that have been disenfranchised, intimidated. In the history of the early 20th century, black votes would be thrown out on technicalities, like they would use an X instead of a check mark.

So you can understand why African Americans would be so careful, checking off Gore's name on the list of candidates and also writing Gore's name in the space for write-in votes. But because of the way the vote-counting machines work, this had the opposite effect: the machines threw out their ballots.

Bastards.

Heading for the exits

China Set To Reduce Exposure To Dollar

China has resolved to shift some of its foreign exchange reserves -- now in excess of $800 billion -- away from the U.S. dollar and into other world currencies in a move likely to push down the value of the greenback, a high-level state economist who advises the nation's economic policymakers said in an interview Monday.

As China's manufacturing industries flood the world with cheap goods, the Chinese central bank has invested roughly three-fourths of its growing foreign currency reserves in U.S. Treasury bills and other dollar-denominated assets. The new policy reflects China's fears that too much of its savings is tied up in the dollar, a currency widely expected to drop in value as the U.S. trade and fiscal deficits climb.

China now boasts the world's second-largest cache of foreign exchange -- behind only Japan -- and is on pace to see its reserves climb past $1 trillion later this year. Even a slight diminishing of the dollar as a percentage of those holdings could exert significant pressure on the U.S. currency, many economists assert.

In recent years, the value of the dollar has been buoyed by major purchases of U.S. Treasury bills by Japan, China and oil-exporting countries -- a flow of capital that has kept interests rates relatively low in the United States and allowed Americans to keep spending even as debts mount. Some economists have long warned that if foreigners lose their appetite for American debt, the dollar would fall, interest rates would rise and the housing boom could burst, sending real estate prices lower.

I saw this reported a few days ago, but never got around to blogging it.

There is a sense in which China and the U.S. are scorpions in a jar -- a huge percentage of China's GDP heads to the big PX, but we in effect have been buying it with a credit card issued by the merchant -- that is, by China. By moving their reserves into Euros and Yen, China is sending a strong "no confidence" message in their biggest customer. They know full well that dumping dollars could have the effect of tanking our economy, which will ripple back to hurt their own economy. So they must be pretty convinced that the end is near to be willing to endanger the open bar that has kept the party going for so long.

How's this for an analogy?

Mark Schmitt @ TPMCafe points out that the rush by Republicans to reform lobbying is a very convenient bit of misdirection:

That's the other side's frame. This is not a lobbying scandal. It's a betrayal-of-public-trust scandal. Lobbyists have no power, no influence, until a public servant gives them power. That's what DeLay and the K Street Project was all about. What they did was to set up a system by which lobbyists who proved their loyalty in various ways, such as taking DeLay and Ney on golf trips to Scotland, could be transformed from supplicants to full partners in government.

Abramoff did lots of terrible things and should go to jail, but never forget that every single criminal and unethical act of his was made possible by a public official. On his own, Abramoff had no power. At another time -- say, 1993 -- he would have been a joke.

But every time we say "lobbying reform," we reinforce the idea that it is only the lobbyist who is the wrongdoer.

Indeed. If you react to the purchase of Congressmen by going after the folks who buy them, why attack the original form of prostitution by arresting the hookers?

SCOTUS kabuki

The entracte for the final phase of the Alito confirmation process took place today. The Judiciary Committee blowhards wasted an entire day pontificating, rather than asking questions. Yet all of them asserted the importance of what has become a total charade. Senator Schumer got on the tube afterwards and claimed that how Alito answers question this week is the key to whether he will be confirmed.

Bullshit.

After Robert Bork was rejected for telling the truth, the standard for conservative Supreme Court nominees has been somewhere between soft-shoe obfuscation and full-bore bullshitting. Alito is going to face some tough questions, all of which have been telegraphed well in advance. And the chances that Alito will answer them honestly approach zero.

So he will be asked if he would vote to overturn Roe, and he will stonewall. He will be asked if he believes there are limits to executive power, and he will prevaricate. He will be asked about the agenda obvious in his writings, and he will claim he no longer has one. Because he is a made man, a monarchist, and a throwback to the Lochner era -- all of which would disqualify him if he said so -- he will put on face paint and ill-fitting raiments and pretend to be the judge most Americans want.

In short, for this elaborately scripted stage show, Alito will present himself as a judge of a species utterly unrecognizeable based on all that has come before, and all that will come after. He will tell stories that would send him to the same scrap heap where Harriet Meiers now lives if the religious right believed them. But the religious right knows that the Alito being paraded before the cameras is not the real Alito. They know that the bait-and-switch is how conservatives make it to the Show.

The whole confirmation process is based upon a fundamental premise: that the nominee will tell the truth. That's why they are sworn in. But that premise no longer holds. Lying and misleading are now the rule rather than the exception. And the disembowling of the Constitution will be the result.

That's why

Birds of a feather

The article is chock full of White House spin ("Tom who?), but TIME.com helpfully includes a wonderful picture to the contrary:



This one should be in heavy rotation from now until November.

Short DeLay fuse?

Booman Tribune collects a few of the shivs in Tom DeLay's back for easy reference. And there are so many -- maybe comparisons to Il Duce swinging on the meathook sixty years ago are more appropriate.

All of which has me thinking about the Newtonian mechanics here. Physics tells us that when you push against an object, the object pushes back. Will DeLay go quietly into that good night, or will there be an equal and opposite reaction to the trashing he is now taking?

Right now DeLay seems to be in a no man's land between singing star Abramoff, whose new best friends all have offices at the DOJ, and the former friends now trying to shove him into the trunk of the Republican Party's Cadillac. The Republican dons largely held their tongues after Scooter took the fall, and they seem to have found him a nice cushy think-tank couch to sleep on while they count on him to keep his yap shut. If they don't find a similar way to take care of DeLay, he could take all of Washington down with him.

And wouldn't that be a crying shame?

Remaindered

A revived No More Mister Nice Blog enjoys a bit of schadenfreude over the slow sales of the "Bush Family Cookbook."

No one should be surprised that a cookbook based on such exotic ingrediants moves slowly. I mean, how many of us have access to a supply of stuff like Colin Powell's testicles? And I'd love to cook up some of their famous intelligence puree', but I can't afford a Doug Feith Intelligence Proccessor.

What were they thinking?

A disturbance in the Force

When I lived in Orange County, California, the amount of energy required to push back against the pervasive and appalling me-first, fuck-the-poor conservatism was considerable. It was like a psychological equivalent of the physical burdens that make New York so challenging. Sure, the sun shines (through a patina of smog, to be sure) upon an endless sea of red tile roofs, but the sense of entitlement and lack of empathy seemed other-worldly to me. In the coastal areas where I lived, the last time a Democrat won at any level was, well, never.

The official stenographer to the landed gentry there was the Orange County Register. So imagine my surprise at this, from the access-restricted Register via The Smirking Chimp:

Lawyers for the estate of George Orwell have announced their intention to sue President Bush for plagiarism.

"We have long believed that this administration has stolen much of its policy from Mr. Orwell's writings," said attorney Will Bilyalotz. "Expressly, '1984' and 'Animal Farm.' In some cases, like the illegal surveillance of its own citizens, this administration has lifted the passages word for word from '1984.' Just changing the year doesn't protect the president from copyright laws."

White House spokesman Scott McClellan, while refusing to comment directly because of the "ongoing investigation," reminded reporters that the Patriot Act had given the president the power to suspend copyright laws and, anyway, "No one can own words."

Legal experts believe proving copyright infringement will not be easy. "Even if he is guilty, the president's propensity for adapting Mr. Orwell's '1984' newspeak is so effortless, as if he made up the words himself," said law professor Sue Yu Atdropohat. "Illegal borrowing of words or even fictional characters from published works has a high threshold of proof. The producers of the film 'Being There' have had their lawsuit against the Bush campaign tied up in court since 2000. After all, one man's outright theft of ideas is another man's malapropos."

"Personally, I think this so-called intelligentsia is just jealous," said Newt Gingrich. "Orwell could have only dreamed of great terms like 'defeatist' and 'evil-doer.'"

Bilyalotz differs. "The president's comments like, 'This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table,' is plain and simple, Mr. Orwell's 'doublethink' (the power to hold two completely contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously and accept both of them)."

The president has regularly pointed out that he will do whatever it takes to defeat terrorism, and that those who want to hamstring his ability to steal written material are only aiding the enemy. "9/11 has made us look at our plagiarism in a different way," said the president. "As long as I am president or king, the American people expect me to do everything in my power under our laws and Constitution to protect them and their civil liberties. And if that takes dissolving the Constitution, then so be it."

"It was Mr. Orwell in '1984' who first came up with 'Victory Mansions' and industrial-grade 'Victory Gin.' Now the president calls his book, a 'National Strategy for Victory in Iraq.' The president doesn't go 10 seconds without using the word 'victory.' One doesn't have to be a math whiz to put two and two together. Our greatest concern is not that the president uses Mr. Orwell's words," Bilyalotz said, "but that he's actually using '1984' as a governmental guidebook, and I'm afraid the president hasn't read how it ends."

I wouldn't blink at this coming from Maureen Dowd. But its appearance in the OC Register suggests there has been a fundament rift torn in the space-time continuum.

Read the whole thing.

I know how to fix this one...

Your phone records are for sale

The Chicago Police Department is warning officers their cell phone records are available to anyone -- for a price. Dozens of online services are selling lists of cell phone calls, raising security concerns among law enforcement and privacy experts.

Criminals can use such records to expose a government informant who regularly calls a law enforcement official.

Suspicious spouses can see if their husband or wife is calling a certain someone a bit too often.

And employers can check whether a worker is regularly calling a psychologist -- or a competing company.
...
To test the service, the FBI paid Locatecell.com $160 to buy the records for an agent's cell phone and received the list within three hours, the police bulletin said.

John @ Americablog tried it, and it works just as advertised.

How to we put a stop to this? Piece o' cake. Anybody have Karl Rove's cell number? Alberto Gonzales'? Condi's?

Sure looks like progress to me

As IEDs in Iraq become more effective, a new arms race is taking place. The Pentagon is now starting to deploy the "Cougar" from a company called Force Protection, Inc. Take a gander:


That smart, post-modern look just says "progress and democracy," doesn't it? And check out these impressive specs:

Weight: 37,000 pounds
Horsepower: 330

Those numbers should allow it to do a scorching 0-60 of approximately "never." The Cougar is essentially a slow-moving bunker. The only thing a vehicle that heavy can do is resist being hit. It will likely be doing a lot of that, since it will be unable to drive its way out of very many problems. To give a sense of scale, here it is compared to the Hummer you may have seen clogging up the freeway at the hands of some manhood-challenged wanker:



The Hummer is a mere 7000 pounds in civilian guise, perhaps 11,000 in up-armored trim. This new rolling Green Zone may protect its payload against IEDs, but in an urban context I predict it will be worse than useless. They will end up trapped in narrow alleys, crippled with blown-out tires, waiting for rescue by what -- another Cougar?

We are responding to the asymmetry of urban guerilla warfare by becoming less mobile.

I guess we measure progress by the measures needed to allow our troops to survive. At this rate, Iraq will soon be as safe as the moon.

Oh, and the design isn't new -- South Africa used very similar trucks to enforce Apartheid way back when. Some of the engineers who designed them now work for Force Protection, Inc., the U.S. contractor building these. How Werner von Braun-ish.

Our strange bedfellows

According to this online Poll (which certainly could have been freeped), 58% of the folks over at the John Birch Society want Shrub impeached. (via Buzzflash.)

A story that needs to be told

from BBC NEWS, of course -- the My Lai hero you never heard about.

Hugh Thompson Jnr, a former US military helicopter pilot who helped stop one of the most infamous massacres of the Vietnam War has died, aged 62.
Mr Thompson and his crew came upon US troops killing civilians at the village of My Lai on 16 March 1968.

He put his helicopter down between the soldiers and villagers, ordering his men to shoot their fellow Americans if they attacked the civilians.

"There was no way I could turn my back on them," he later said of the victims.

Mr Thompson, a warrant officer at the time, called in support from other US helicopters, and together they airlifted at least nine Vietnamese civilians - including a wounded boy - to safety.

He returned to headquarters, angrily telling his commanders what he had seen. They ordered soldiers in the area to stop shooting.

But Mr Thompson was shunned for years by fellow soldiers, received death threats, and was once told by a congressman that he was the only American who should be punished over My Lai.

The killing machine can be stopped. When good men stand up, call evil by its name, and say "no more," they eventually have an effect.

Thompson's story needs to told, especially now.

Like a damned fiddle

Zawahiri tells Bush to admit Iraq defeat

"Al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri called on US President George W. Bush to 'admit defeat' in Iraq, saying any future US troop withdrawal would be a 'victory' for Islam, in a video broadcast by Al-Jazeera.

'Bush, you must admit that you have been defeated in Iraq and that you are being defeated in Afghanistan and that you will soon be defeated in Palestine, with the help and strength of God,' said Zawahiri, sitting with an assault rifle at his side.

'Today I congratulate and bless the Islamic nation for the victory of Islam in Iraq,' he said. 'You remember, my Muslim brothers, saying to you more than a year ago that the departure of Americans from Iraq was only a matter of time.'"

If Al Qaeda actually wanted to change the status quo -- the one in which they are kicking our ass, tying us up in knots, recruiting with ease, and finding lots of Iraqis who might not like them, but like us even less -- do you really think they would be stupid enough to flap their red capes in front of our bull-stupid Preznit? Of course not. They want us to stay, and they know that this kind of provocation is tailor-made to push Lord Numbnuts to go that way.

As I argued some time ago, we are the ones caught in the flypaper now, and Al Qaeda enjoys our predicament very much.

But if I were a teensy bit more of a conspiracy theory type, I would try to argue that Dubya dialed up his friend in Tora Bora and said, "O-Ben, good buddy, I'm havin' trouble keeping folks scaird enough lately. If them Cindy Sheehan-types force us to hightail it out of Iraq, we both lose. So howsabout you help me whip up a good 'ol shitstorm here, and we can keep this square dance goin' another coupla years?"

Attack of the 60-foot bedwetters

How are the rabid monarchist fearmongers reacting to the recent disclosures about illegal domestic spying? Glenn Greenwald ventured into the belly of the beast, and witnessed some ugly hissy fits.

Dean Ismay charges treason, and just to make sure it isn't interpreted as a mere rhetorical flourish:

When I say "treason" I don't mean it in an insulting or hyperbolic way. I mean in a literal way: we need to find these 21st century Julius Rosenbergs, these modern day reincarnations of Alger Hiss, put them on trial before a jury of their peers, with defense counsel. When they are found guilty, we should then hang them by the neck until the are dead, dead, dead.

No sympathy. No mercy. Am I angry? You bet I am. But not in an explosive way. Just in the same seething way I was angry on 9/11.

These people have endangered American lives and American security. They need to be found, tried, and executed.

Sounds like somebody needs a new nappy.

You go, Mrs. Limbaugh

A few minutes ago, Daran Kagan interrupted the wall-to-wall West Virginia miner health coverage to tell us about the latest in the Jose Padilla case. Only she pronounced his name -- twice -- to rhyme with gorilla.

Do you think her gaffe was a Rush-esque racist put-down, or that she really is that desperately clueless?

Confirmation

New column up @ Raw Story, despite my AWOL muse.

And it counts!

This Modern World

Big Brother reaches out

Next time some monarchist stooge repeats the nonsense about how Fearless Leader is only on the trail of Al Queda and similar Bad Men, remember this: the fuckers put the author of "Bush's Brain" on the no-fly list.

And remember the Niemöller poem.

Pretty soon you're talking real money

via TPMCafe: The Cost of The War:

A new study by two leading academic experts suggests that the costs of the Iraq war will be substantially higher than previously reckoned. In a paper presented to this week’s Allied Social Sciences Association annual meeting in Boston MA., Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes and Columbia University Professor and Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz calculate that the war is likely to cost the United States a minimum of nearly one trillion dollars and potentially over $2 trillion.
...
“Shortly before the war, when Administration economist Larry Lindsey suggested that the costs might range between $100 and $200 billion, Administration spokesmen quickly distanced themselves from those numbers,” points out Professor Stiglitz. “But in retrospect, it appears that Lindsey’s numbers represented a gross underestimate of the actual costs.”

What's an order of magnitude among friends, eh?

Got a feeling I've been here before
Watching as you cross the killing floor
You know you'll have to pay it all
You'll pay today or pay tomorrow
You fasten up your beaded gown
Then you try to tie me down
Do you work it out one by one
Or played in combination
You throw out your gold teeth
Do you see how they roll

(Note cost of war counter added to right sidebar)

Greenwald nails it

Guest blogging on Hullabaloo, Glen G. rises to the challenge, and makes the hypocrisy of the monarchists inescapable.

What we really have from these paragons of Judicial Restraint trying to defend George Bush is everything except plain language and original intent – the very tools of construction which these "conservatives," when not concocting legal defenses for the President, claim that they believe in. That’s because the plain language of the law is crystal clear ("A person is guilty of an offense if he intentionally— (1) engages in electronic surveillance under color of law except as authorized by statute") and leaves no doubt that George Bush broke it.

The clarity of this law is why the Administration is reduced to peddling legal theories which, no matter how they are sliced, amount to a claim that George Bush has the right to break the law. And to argue that he has that right, they are employing on George Bush's behalf the very legal theories which advocates of "judicial restraint" have spent the last two decades ridiculing and attacking.

Remember when hypocrisy was still a bad thing?

The new front in the real war

Not that I expect it to make much difference, but I sure hope somebody on the Judiciary Committee presses Alito on this travesty:

As a young Justice Department lawyer, Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. tried to help tip the balance of power between Congress and the White House a little more in favor of the executive branch.

In the 1980s, the Reagan administration, like other White Houses before and after, chafed at the reality that Congress's reach on the meaning of laws extends beyond the words of statutes passed on Capitol Hill. Judges may turn to the trail of statements lawmakers left behind in the Congressional Record when trying to glean the intent behind a law. The White House left no comparable record.

In a Feb. 5, 1986, draft memo, Alito, then deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel, outlined a strategy for changing that. It laid out a case for having the president routinely issue statements about the meaning of statutes when he signs them into law.
...
President Bush has been especially fond of them, issuing at least 108 in his first term, according to presidential scholar Phillip J. Cooper of Portland State University in Oregon. Many of Bush's statements rejected provisions in bills that the White House regarded as interfering with its powers in national security, intelligence policy and law enforcement, Cooper wrote recently in the academic journal Presidential Studies Quarterly.

The Bush administration "has very effectively expanded the scope and character of the signing statement not only to address specific provisions of legislation that the White House wishes to nullify, but also in an effort to significantly reposition and strengthen the powers of the presidency relative to the Congress," Cooper wrote in the September issue. "This tour d' force has been carried out in such a systematic and careful fashion that few in Congress, the media, or the scholarly community are aware that anything has happened at all."

I went to law school. I took a course specifically about analyzing statutory law. We talked at length about "legislative intent," but I don't recall spending any time discussing executive intent. (We did talk about the scope of administrative power to interpret in the writing of regulations that implement the law, but that power is unambiguously secondary to Congressional intent.) Laws are written and passed by Congress, and the President's decision tree when a bill hits his desk is binary: sign or veto. Beyond that, what he thinks the law means simply does not figure into its interpretation when somebody challenges the law in court.

That is how it has worked since Justice Marshall penned Marbury v. Madison more than 200 years ago: Congress makes 'em, courts interpret 'em (with some deference to congressional intent), and the executive enforces 'em. The NSA domestic spying scandal exposes the overthrow of the judiciary by this Administration. Bush's naked attempt to eviscerate the ban on torture is a takeover of the legislative function. Nobody -- not even Nixon -- had the stones to assert the right to usurp both of those powers to the executive until now.

What Bush wants, and Alito is happy to deliver, is an absolute monarchy -- exactly what the Founding Fathers fought hardest against. What these duplicitous evil men do sub rosa is completely at odds with the form of government Jefferson, Madison and Hamilton created to prevent such accumulation of power. And these traitors to the very causes they espouse are happy to write legal fiction on a truly astounding scale in order to get it.

This mindboggling sophistry is part of the real war now being fought: Caesar is marching on Rome, and the republic is under seige. If Alito is confirmed, the emperor-in-waiting will have a another monarchist dismantling the "least political branch" from within, and the coffin of our democracy will want for one less nail.