Frank Rich: The Coup at Home

Frank Rich has done it again.

AS Gen. Pervez Musharraf arrested judges, lawyers and human-rights activists in Pakistan last week, our Senate was busy demonstrating its own civic mettle. Chuck Schumer and Dianne Feinstein, liberal Democrats from America’s two most highly populated blue states, gave the thumbs up to Michael B. Mukasey, ensuring his confirmation as attorney general.

How long until Bush rounds up and disappears the likes of Frank Rich?

Norman Mailer, January 31, 1923 - November 10, 2007

R.I.P.

America is a hurricane, and the only people who do not hear the sound are those fortunate if incredibly stupid and smug White Protestants who live in the center, in the serene eye of the big wind.

Each day a few more lies eat into the seed with which we are born, little institutional lies from the print of newspapers, the shock waves of television, and the sentimental cheats of the movie screen.

In America all too few blows are struck into flesh. We kill the spirit here, we are experts at that. We use psychic bullets and kill each other cell by cell.

The final purpose of art is to intensify, even, if necessary, to exacerbate, the moral consciousness of people.

Ultimately a hero is a man who would argue with the gods, and so awakens devils to contest his vision. The more a man can achieve, the more he may be certain that the devil will inhabit a part of his creation.

Ron Paul Says Federal Reserve 'Robbed' Americans of their Wealth

Texas congressman takes shots at the Federal Reserve during Chairman Bernanke's testimony.
Jeff Poor
Business and Media Institute

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke appeared before the Congressional Joint Economic Committee on November 8, but had to face criticism from Republican presidential candidate and Texas congressman Ron Paul.

Paul made accusations the Federal Reserve was stealing people’s money.

“There is a dollar crisis out there and people’s money is being stolen,” Paul said. “People who have saved, they’re being robbed. I mean, if you have a devaluation of the dollar at 10 percent, people have been robbed of 10 percent.”

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke attempted to dispel the notion people were being “robbed” of their money by explaining the relativity of the dollar in a local economy.

“If somebody has their wealth in dollars and they’re going to buy consumer goods in dollars, then as a typical American … then the decline in the dollar – the only effect it has on their buying power is that it makes imported goods more expensive,” Bernanke replied.

Looks Like Impeachment Is On The Table

You Tube
Cap News

Ok. If you can stand to watch this 27 minute long video (which you should), you won't be disappointed. Dennis Kucinich throws down in Congress by introducing a motion to impeach Vice President Richard Cheney.

It takes 27 minutes....but...if you listen closely you can hear the sound of a politician's balls slowing growing with each bulletpoint. I have to hand it to Kucinich for this one. He is the ONLY member of Congress who is able to call this administration out when it comes to the actual consequences of their Constitutional violations.

Anyone voting in the democratic primary that truly wants accountability from this vile administration and an end to the war should vote for this man. If you like another candidate then force them to get on board in some way or another with Congressman Kucinich and hold them to that. You are the ones that are supposed to have the fucking power, so use it. Way to go Dennis. You'd better ice those things down for awhile.

Rudy, 9/11, Rudy, 9/11, 9/11, Rudy (9/11)

Remember Bernard "Bernie" Kerick, the man George W. Bush nominated to succeed Tom Ridge as Secretary of Homeland Security? Rudy worked tirelessly to help arrange that nomination. Rudy vouched for him. Michael Powell laid out the long and sordid history, which got buried in the Saturday edition of the NYT.

Well, Bernie's back in the news, just in time to take a little shine off of that endorsement Rudy got from Pat Robertson (you remember Pat, don't you? He's the guy who "totally concurred" with Jerry Falwell's assessment that 9/11 was God's punishment for all the "pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle..."). Rudy might be spared having answer questions about Robertson's 9/11 theories for a while in order to start answering questions about Bernie Kerik's forthcoming indictment.

Can we review for a minute? Being President of the United States should mean exercising sound judgment. Rudy's litany of poor decisions includes multiple wives and multiple divorces, and 'notorious adultery', continued support of Kerik, the endorsement of a hate-monger, the continued support and employment of an accused child molester, a coke-head campaign chair (I've got no problem with the coke...it's the hypocrisy), and he's so out of touch that he probably doesn't even realize that if it wasn't for the government provided healthcare to which he's entitled as a former NY Mayor, he would not be covered under the healthcare plan he's proposed for the country, because under his plan he'd be left uninsured because of his prexisting condition of prostate cancer.

9/11.

Still Winning Hearts And Minds

From WaPo:

Let's just sweep these bodies under this rug here and then not let anyone look at them.
Erik Prince's private army, ready for a new Crusade, mistreats or kills innocent Iraqi Muslims on a frequent basis. Not surprisingly, other Iraqis retaliate, but it's U.S. soldiers, who likely suffer for it. Yet another top notch plan brought to you by the Bush Administration. They don't care though because they are right there with Prince's insane world view.

Loose Change Final Cut Trailer (High Quality)

you tube

A Nice Comparison - UPDATE

Heard this story on NPR this morning and was really struck by what it said about Clinton and Obama’s candidacies. Clinton did the tried and true diner visit, where she took no questions, but did manage to swipe a waitresses’ story of hardship to use in her Iowa stump speech from then on. She took her photos and left., without leaving a fucking tip! What? The woman says that Clinton does not understand her situation and has had her life change for the worse due to the chance encounter, yet she says she still might vote for Clinton. Another... what? To summarize. Clinton got her photos and smiles and stump speech item and left no tip and likely learned nothing. Get used to that if she becomes president. Although, we should be used to it already, as Lord Bush is great at it.

Obama on the other hand, held a “town hall” meeting where people were actually allowed to ask questions or tell their story, which one lady heartbreakingly did. Obama comes off as a caring human, which from what I have seen, he really is. Now, I am not sure if this story entered Obama’s stump speech and it very well may have and he didn’t write the note he alluded to, but this woman understood Obama because he makes it easy too.

Just wish everyone who is going to vote in 2008 could hear this story. While not down and dirty policy stuff, it truly is a look into how these two candidates may carry themselves as president.

***UPDATE***
Clinton did leave a tip, as noted on the same NPR page now. Not sure why the waitress did not see any of it though.

Pakistan, The U.S. and the Myth of Democracy

On my drive home from work yesterday I heard this interview on NPR with Ahmed Raza Kasuri, an advisor to Pervez Musharraf. They were talking about Musharraf suspending the Constitution and postponing elections. There's no transcript up yet, so I've transcribed as best I could the portion that was, for me, the "Amen" moment--the moment that makes so painfully clear how deeply corrupt and dishonest the Bush Administration is when they talk about the importance of and their commitment to "Democracy." And how if American's are aghast at what's going on in Pakistan, they shouldn't be, because they're in much the same position right here in the good old U.S. of A.

MICHELLE NORRIS: Now, there's Rule of Law, but there's also Respect, which authority really relies on holding onto the respect of the people, and are you concerned that this will undermine his authority in the long run?

KASURI: You know he is very, very, very, very strong; he has been elected for a second term. Elections will take place, he has got a very powerful party. Kindly see, you have in your country a very powerful history of a democratic tradition of values, after 9/11 what have you done? You see, you have also introduced [unintelligible] so you can pick up anybody--detentions, where the court's part is totally stripped off--well, these are the some of the measures that you have to adopt in order to maintain stability of the country, the prime consideration is integrity and the stability of the country. I mean, there are a lot of fingers raised on you when you talk of 'Rule of Law' and what you call it 'Due Process of Law.' There are so many fingers on you that you are running a [unintelligible] where the Supreme Court of the United States does not have access, you see. If we have become unpopular, we have become unpopular following your agenda against terrorism.

It was, of course, only after no WMDs were found in Iraq that this whole "Adventure in Democracy" was promoted as the rationale for war. But anyone who's awake in this country knows that this administration had planned to invade Iraq from day one, long before 9/11. And when it comes to respect for the Rule of Law and the Constitution, we know from example after example after example after example after example just how much this Administration thinks of those cornerstones of American Democracy.

But of course, every violation of law, every instance of disregard for the constitution and the ideals on which this country was based are done in the name of protecting the very ideals and freedoms they betray. And as we've learned, painfully, they have no shame. There is no hypocrisy of which they are not capable. And yesterday gave us yet another of the glaring disconnect between what George W. Bush says, and what he does.

Here's the White House Transcript:

Q: Mr. President, you came down so hard on Burma and other nations for their crackdowns on pro-democracy demonstrators. Yet you seem to be giving Musharraf a pass. So the question is why are you going so soft on Musharraf? Is there a double standard?

PRESIDENT BUSH: I spoke to President Musharraf right before I came over here to visit with President Sarkozy. And my message was that we believe strongly in elections, and that you ought to have elections soon, and you need to take off your uniform. You can't be the President and the head of the military at the same time. So I had a very frank discussion with him.

Got that? "You can't be the President and the head of the military at the same time."

Alrighty then.

Update: The Victory disease is spreading!

The "bottom-up" victory scenario concocted by the Bush Administration and the Iraqi Prime minister is beginning to take hold in the Conservative blogosphere. Hew Hewitt today wondered if the "Democrats and their allies in the mainstream media" would actually start reporting the "reality" in Iraq even though it went counter to their anti-war rhetoric. Not only does this illustrate Greenwald's assertion that Republican lapdog bloggers like Hewitt shill for the administration and their revisionist history, but also that Republican leadership is looking for a way out, a way to save face, and a way to dump withdrawal and the imminent blood bath that will follow on the doorstep of a new Democratic White House and Congressional majority.

Like The Weekly Standard, Hewitt is a stenographer for the Bush Administration and bolsters the newest set of goals the administration has dreamed up as "victory" in Iraq. No longer are political progress, benchmarks, and national reconciliation goals of the surge. Now, as long as Iraqis are able to "drink tea with their brothers", success has been achieved. Contrary to what the The Standard and Hewitt suggest, I don't believe that Iraqis need to be hand-in-hand singing kumbaya for the mission to be a success. However, this lowering of the bar in the U.S. stated goals in Iraq is a blatant disregard for what Bush Co. deemed success even as early as two months ago in September while pumping the Holy Grail of Iraq progress reports ala The Petraeus Report.

To be continued...

***** Update Update: Lieberman is now toeing the line *****

Joe Lieberman is now toeing the victory line in Iraq.

Let me make one thing clear: Anti-war folks want victory in Iraq as much as any hawkish loyal Bushie. We are not "searching for negatives" as many would suggest. The fact is that we are forced to read between the lines because the administration is not straight with us about the reality. This is another one of those instances where the administration, it's media arms, and it's puppet regime in Iraq are declaring a "tide turning", when there is little real evidence to prove this fact. War boosters continue to jump the gun portraying Bagdhad as a "summer market in Indiana," an insurgency in it's "death throes", mission accomplished, tides turning, victory, etc. based on scant evidence and minimal trends. Yes, this has been a good month for U.S. and Iraqi soldiers and civilians, as the numbers of killed dropped dramatically in October. Despite a good month, 2007 is still on track to be the deadliest year in Iraq, Parliament is still gridlocked with the PM Makilki declaring no need to create a national political reconciliation, infrastructure is devastated in spite of the HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS of dollars we have poured into energy, roads, schools, sanitation, and health care, and warring factions become further fueled by outside forces the more tenuous the U.S. military's grip becomes.

So here we go: once Bush Co. inseminates the press, the blogosphere, and his shills in gov't with "The Story", they fluff it, sugar it, smear the detractors, and prepare the public for the man himself to announce Victory, again. It would be great if Victory actually meant the same thing every time... that is "staying the course." However, we are expected to "stay" whatever the current definition of "course" happens to make the administration look best at that particular moment.

More to come... Dust of your barf bags.

Blog Candy: Abu Ardvark

Was just introduced to Abu Ardvark via Foreign Policy Watch:

Abu Aardvark started in 2002 as a pseudonymous blog about Middle East politics, especially Iraq and the Arab media. In 2005, it was revealed to be the work of Marc Lynch, now a professor of political science at George Washington University and author of Voices of the New Arab Public (Columbia University Press). Now everybody who matters reads it. - Abu Ardvark - About

Lynch's entry from 11.4 entitled Maliki: enough about reconciliation is a truly frightening look at the Iraqi PM's new "bottom-up" approach to stability in Iraq, and guess what? Mission accomplished, folks! Now the PM's believes ultimate stability in Iraq has already come and will continue to come at the community level, in neighborhoods where Sunnis and Shiites live side by side. Malaki's lowering of the bar, by changing the definition of the mission is the keystone of the Bush administration that, lo and behold, supports the administration's self-delusional goals for the surge in Iraq:

As the violence recedes, leaders in all the contending Iraqi communities will naturally seek to address their internal differences. Our interest in the outcome is limited: As long as the Iraqis are committed to the principle of resolving their differences through a political process rather than violence, and as long as any settlement they reach is sufficiently fair so as not to reignite the violence, then our interests will have been secured. - The Weekly Standard

This reshaping of the administration's and the Iraqi's ultimate goals paints the national political deadlock in Iraq as a circumnavigable obstacle in a long-term "bottom-up" strategy. This despite the pre-surge ideas that "local security progress would create a political space allowing the national politicians to make a deal" (Lynch) and "that the Sunnis have decided to switch from a logic of armed resistance to a logic of political participation" (Lynch) have failed to materialize nationally.

Read the article and visit Abu Ardvark via Crinchy Internets or the feed in the right frame.

From the Belly of the Beast: Dems Snatch Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

***** Note: This will be the first in a (hopefully) weekly series I'm entitling "From the Belly of the Beast" and will discuss specific articles and ideas from the conservative side of the blogosphere. *****

Conservative blogger Ed Morrissey of Captain's Quarters describes the Democrat's ineptitude with playing politics to their advantage. I admit he has a point. Yet, it seems to me that his point resonates deeper when one considers that GOP idealism rarely gets in the way of their political goals the way a fight for the ethical treatment of prisoners has for the Dems in this case. Even now that they are in the minority in both houses, Republicans are still able to bully and steer the Congress at their will.

The crux is that Democrats have yet to create a united front against the President and his shills in Congress, let alone peel off enough Republicans who will stand up against the status-quo. This seems obvious if not for the fact that even an embattled minority like the GOP is still able to amass enough noise and intimidation to keep something as "given" as S-CHIP from a two-thirds veto-proof majority. What are the Dems missing? Why do their ventures into idealist territory fall flat, or worse, explode in their face?

I never thought I'd say this, but the Dems need a Tom Delay. They need a no-bones meat grinder of a legislator who will pound the round pegs into the square holes in the left and create a united Democratic Party behind a (soon-to-be) Democratic President. Delay isn't the best example, considering his pilfering, fraud, and general disregard for ethical behavior, and I am no fan of the man. Having said that, he was an astonishingly successful legislator who intimidated both sides of the aisle and whose most important contribution might be creating a GOP culture united against the world. Even when the world had tipped in favor of the GOP, they refused to remove the rage from their legislation, or their rhetoric. Granted, constantly throwing haymakers in the House and Senate did not do much for intra-aisle relationships, but that's of little consequence. THIS is what the Dems need to succeed: a strong leader, a united front, and some sheer RAGE.

Last time I called for Harry Reid's head, a fellow Crinch Pinner enlightened me to the Nevada Senator's subtle power play with war funding and the Holy Petreaus Report. Well, we're still going nowhere fast with no end in sight. If I lick my thumb and test the air, I can tell that soon this war will be not only the problem of a Democratic Congress with a slim majority, but the problem of a Democratic administration and a Democratic Congress with a vast majority. We need a plan for withdrawal, we need a strong leader, we need a united front against the president and the Republican MINORITY, and we need some motherfucking RAGE.

Let the hate mail begin.

Obama Scared of Colbert?

That's what this report is saying:

A member of the executive council of South Carolina’s Democratic party told CNN that he felt pressure to oppose comedian Stephen Colbert’s bid to join the Democratic primary in his home state by prominent supporters of Barack Obama’s campaign. It has been acknowledged by at least two prominent supporters of the Senator’s bid that they made calls to the State Party pleading with them to exclude Colbert’s name from the ballot.

Edwards in Iowa

Jonathan Stein reporting in Mother Jones on John Edwards campaigning in Iowa. Think what you will of Edwards, to my ear, he's the only Democrat in the field telling it like it is: "The Government is Corrupt." The traditional media dismiss such anti-establishment statements from candidates like Paul as mere 'fringe' politics, but when it's coming from a candidate who was the Democratic nominee for VP in 2004, and who is now considered a 'top-tier' candidate, the traditional media can't dismiss it, so they ignore it and focus on the less substantive, but more easily palatable criticisms of whether or not Hillary tries to have it both ways, and whether she played the gender card. Choice quote from the Stein piece:

In his second appearance of the day at the town civic center in Waverly (pop. 8,968; flag count: one giant and two large American flags), Edwards offered this, "The presidential candidate who has raised the most money from Washington lobbyists is not a Republican. It's a Democrat. The candidate who has raised the most money from the health industry—insurance companies and drug companies—is not a Republican. It is a Democrat…. And the candidate who has raised the most money from the defense industry, is not a Republican. It is a Democrat. And all those descriptions fit the same candidate. They're all Senator Clinton."

Amen.

Ron Paul's 4.2 Million -- Updated

Here's the AP article on Ron Paul's November 5th fundraising.

Paul's total deposed Mitt Romney as the single-day fundraising record holder in the Republican presidential field. When it comes to sums amassed in one day, Paul now ranks only behind Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton, who raised nearly $6.2 million on June 30, and Barack Obama.

***UPDATE***

Here's Glenn Greenwald on the Ron Paul fundraising phenomenon