I hardly want to believe this. These stories coming out of that prison in Iraq, but seemingly there is something to them. Article 32 investigations have begun, which is like the civilian equivalent of a Grand Jury. Six service men and women are already facing courts and a total of 17 are facing some charges including a Brigadier General.

Last month, the U.S. Army announced 17 soldiers in Iraq, including a brigadier general, had been removed from duty after charges of mistreating Iraqi prisoners.

But the details of what happened have been kept secret, until now.

It turns out photographs surfaced showing American soldiers abusing and humiliating Iraqis being held at a prison near Baghdad. The Army investigated, and issued a scathing report.

Now, an Army general and her command staff may face the end of long military careers. And six soldiers are facing court martial in Iraq -- and possible prison time.

If one "aw shit" wipes out 10,000 atta-boys, we're in the hole for 50 years now.

Joe Wilson, the husband of Valerie Plame...you remember her? Just released his book and points fingers at three "senior administration" officials. Crashcart's Chief of Staff, the ever-so-cutely appelationed "Scooter" Libby, Former Iran-Contra Superstar, Elliott Abrams and (here's a shocker) Unka Karl. Of course that fountain of integrity, Scott McClellan has told us it just can't be, cause see, he asked them all if they did it or not.

Last October, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said his conversations with Rove, Libby and Abrams have ruled out their involvement.

I never thought I'd actually miss Ari.

Leaving the Master Marionette Sessions today, Beloved Leader just could not help himself... he had to toss out a whopper.

"We are still vulnerable to attack," Bush told reporters. "And the reason why is al-Qaida still exists, al-Qaida's dangerous, al-Qaida hates us. And we have to be correct 100 percent of the time in defending America and they've got to be right once."

If Preznit 10-Watt actually believed that he was fightning a war on Terra™ we'd be tossing all the men and resources into getting Osama bin Laughin' since 9/11. But no, we're off getting Chimpy's War On all the while those who attacked us run free in Afghanistan. Virtually no one did not support operations in Afghanistan (domestically or internationally), except for some reason the 1600 Crew. Strange isn't it how men, money and materiel got moved ... and it was all Saddam's (and Iraqs) fault in the defective mind of the fratboy? What really happened, did Saddam 'forget' to pay some CheneyBurton invoice and get targeted instead? Seems his credit was OK in the 80's.

Ketchup is a vegetable. Wild salmon are the same as salmon bred in a hatchery. There is no Ozone, and the Earth is 6,000 years old and flat.

Amazingly enough there are folks in the 1600 Crew who believe all that stuff, the latest addition to the list above concerns salmon.

The Bush administration has decided to count hatchery-bred fish, which are pumped into West Coast rivers by the hundreds of millions yearly, when it decides whether stream-bred wild salmon are entitled to protection under the Endangered Species Act.

In the past 15 years, the federal government's effort to protect stream-bred wild salmon has forced costly changes in how forests are cut, housing developments are built, farms are cultivated and rivers are operated for hydroelectricity production. Farm, timber and power interests have complained for years about these costs and have sued to remove protections for some fish.

They are enthusiastic advocates of counting hatchery fish when assessing the survival chances of wild salmon. Unlike their wild cousins, hatchery fish can be bred without ecosystem-wide modifications to highways, farms and dams.

"Upon hearing this news, I am cautiously optimistic that the government may be complying with the law and ending its slippery salmon science," said Russell C. Brooks, a lawyer for the Pacific Legal Foundation, an industry-funded group that has challenged federal salmon-protection efforts in court.

via Blah3, all I have to say about this is: Awesome.

I've got a few words for George Bush and Dick Cheney, who keep telling me with a smirk and a scowl that "everything has changed" since 9-11. They say I need to show compassion and hug my neighbor -- to find somebody out there I can love like I'd like to be loved myself. We're at war, they say, so just shut up and support the troops.

Back off, chickenhawks. I've spent a lifetime supporting my troops -- my beloved field artillery -- hugging them, loving them like I'd like to be loved myself and being overwhelmed with the sheer magnitude of hugs and love I got in return. I was there, shaking my head in wonder as boys arriving for basic training clambered off buses -- long-haired, wide-eyed, apprehensive and dishevelled. And I was there, beaming with pride as proud men emerged ten weeks later -- trim, disciplined, confident and eager to serve their country.

Don't look for me to shut up any time soon. I've got battalions of dogs in this fight, and I take the loss of even one of them personally. There is nothing -- nothing -- more red-white-and-blue than American servicemen and women. In spite of what you two seem to think, American military are not trained to die, but to live. Like you, they have lives, families, plans for the future. But, unlike one of you who smirked as he abandoned his post in time of war, and the other who snarled that he had more important things to do than fight for his country, they don't flinch at the prospect of being wounded or even killed if that's what it takes to protect the rest of us.

Dead or alive, every single man or woman who wears the United States military uniform deserves nothing less than honor, support and -- from the top of Echo Mountain -- recognition. These are MY soldiers -- not yours. So don't toss me a yellow ribbon to tie around a tree. Don't hand me a sign to stick in my yard. And don't tell me to shut up.

Once again Andrew for all his maudlin drivel over the average serviceman ("The Proud, The Few, Pray for Them") really wants one thing. For more of his servants to die in combat so Commander Codpiece can keep his job. Dan Drezner in a TNR column points out that Preznit Sock-in-Crotch could benefit from a perception of "bold leadership" in Iraq even if the economy tanks while Iraq goes further down the road to hell.

...The latest Gallup poll shows a 54 percent disapproval rating on Bush's handling of the economy. Bush's best hope for reelection is for the electorate to focus on his leadership abilities--and one way for that to happen is for there to be trouble in Iraq.

Now, before conspiracy theorists start squealing with delight, this does not mean that it's in Bush's interest to purposely fail in Iraq. It's important to remember that Bush's best strategy for reelection remains to succeed both in Iraq and on the economy. That's still a possibility. But just as successes have unintended consequences, so do failures. And it seems more and more likely that one unintended consequence of a failure in Iraq could be a boost for Bush. If so, the conventional wisdom would end up being half right and dead wrong at the same time: Bush's chances for reelection might very well depend on the state of Iraq come November. Just not in the way everyone thinks.

Well, I guess Preznit Short-Pants got his crusade on. Looks like once again the Christians get to try and beseige the hapless (?) middle-eastern people at the Exhortation of their "Christian Leader", invoking the Almighty Hairy Thunderer as his justification no less. No wonder the Vatican-bound rodentia like him so much, he reminds them of a Pope O'Rome, ol' Urban II.

In the year 637 the armies of Islam lead by the Caliph Omar conquered the city of Jerusalem, the center of the Christian world and a magnet for Christian pilgrims. The city's Muslim masters exhibited a certain level of religious tolerance. No new churches were to be built and crosses could not be publicly displayed outside church buildings, but the pilgrims were allowed to continue their treks to the holiest shrines of Christendom (the pilgrims were charged a toll for access). The situation remained stable for over 400 years. Then, in the latter part of the 11th century, the Turks swarmed westward out of Central Asia overrunning all that lay in their path. Jerusalem fell to them in 1076. The atmosphere of tolerance practiced by the followers of Omar was replaced by vicious attacks on the Christian pilgrims and on their sacred shrines in the Holy City. Reports of robberies, beatings, killings, degradation of holy sites and the kidnapping for ransom of the city's patriarch made their way back to Europe. To the Europeans the Holy Land was now in the smothering grip of the Infidel and something must be done.

In response, Pope Urban II called a conference at the city of Clermont, France in 1095, concluding the eight days of deliberation with one of history's most influential speeches. Mounting a lofty scaffold, the Pope exhorted the assembled multitude to wrest the Holy Land from the hands of the Infidel and assured them that God would absolve them from any sin associated with the venture. His words fell on receptive ears as the crowd responded with cries of "It is the will of God!", "It is the will of God!". The Crusades had begun.

Perched atop sandbags and peering through powerful binoculars, Marine officers manning front-line positions around this tense city can see the problem clearly enough, even through the swirling dust that gives Fallujah the sepia hue of a Wild West town: Military-age men in white robes swagger about with impunity, they say, hardening their defenses and resupplying their encampments.

The Marines say the men are Sunni Muslim guerrillas who have taken over this Euphrates River city and transformed it into a stronghold of resistance to the American occupation of Iraq.

But neither here, nor in the Baghdad palace that serves as the headquarters of the U.S. occupation administration, nor in the corridors of official Washington, is the solution to the Fallujah problem clear. Although American officials and Iraq's U.S.-backed leaders agree that the insurgents should be captured or killed, preferably before the Americans hand over limited sovereignty on June 30, no good options exist to accomplish that goal, according to U.S. officials familiar with the issue.

A bit under the weather. Back tomorrow...sorry for the downtime. My maladies are "percaset" free, you'll be pleased to know. Sleep well, hope I can.

If there is not a great SNL skit that coming out from the Two Faux Patriots act in front of the 9/11 Commission, then the SNL folks ought to just hang it up.

President Bush's closed-door testimony to the Sept. 11 commission alongside Vice President Dick Cheney carries political risks for the White House. Leaning too much on Cheney could make Bush look weak, and inconsistencies with other officials could raise new questions.

Trying to head off criticism of Thursday's unusual side-by-side appearance, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Tuesday that he expects Bush rather than Cheney to handle most of the questions.

The two will meet in a private session with all 10 commission members at the White House Thursday morning, beginning at 9:30 a.m. Members will be allowed to take notes but there will not be a stenographer present. That contrasts with commission interviews with former President Clinton and former Vice President Al Gore, which a commission member said were recorded.

I guess that having C-SPAN there would make it too obvious that the Chimperor has not a stitch on, eh? Courage, indeed.

Run Away! Run Away!

I love this. Although it would probably get the paper in Sugar Land, Texas burned down if published there.

It is important in an election year for each American to understand just how to break the code. News media and political pundits are generally wary of the subject.

To help matters, here is a greatly abridged glossary of Republican code that voters can use to decipher the coming barrage of demagogic sound bites from the right wing.

Conservative - Despite the general understanding that a conservative would be one that "conserves," the right is not actually interested in con- serving anything. I've asked nearly every self-declared "Conservative" I've ever met just what it is that he or she wants to conserve, and I've yet to get a straight answer. However, from what I have observed, it seems to have something to do with being white and rich.
...
Family values or Christian values - Probably the most illusive of all Republican code, "family values" is often synonymous with its great grandfather, "conservative." But there are some new connotations too. For example, bigotry, or even outright hatred for homosexuals, is a "family value" in Republican code-speak.
...
Tax cuts - Perhaps the most clever and most effective of all Republican code, "tax cuts" is a cryptic way of saying to middleclass Republicans "We'll give you about $530." It is also a way of saying to a few hundred thousand of the richest Americans "We'll give you many thousands, pos- sibly even millions, of dollars."

When the republican histrionics over Kerry's records started, I was surprised to see that no one pointed out to the republicans this little gem:

When reporters Bill Morlin and Karen Dorn Steele asked the White House about their discovery, they were referred to the Pentagon, which now refuses to answer ANY questions about Bush's military records.

At the National Guard Bureau, now headed by a Bush appointee from Texas, officials last week said they were under orders not to answer questions.

The bureau's chief historian said he couldn't discuss questions about Bush's military service on orders from the Pentagon.

"If it has to do with George W. Bush, the Texas Air National Guard or the Vietnam War, I can't talk with you," said Charles Gross, chief historian for the National Guard Bureau in Washington, D.C.

Rose Bird, Freedom of Information Act officer for the bureau, said her office stopped taking records requests on Bush's military service in mid-February and is directing all inquiries to the Pentagon. She would not provide a reason.

Air Force and Texas Air National Guard officials did not respond to written questions about the issue.

James Hogan, a records coordinator at the Pentagon, said senior Defense Department officials had directed the National Guard Bureau not to respond to questions about Bush's military records.

As Preznit Always Runs Away parades around dropping chicken-feathers in his tailwinds, he shows that when you have no desire to answer a question the best course is to avoid it altogether.

Mr. Bush did not mention Mr. Kerry's name once. Nor did he address Mr. Kerry's reference to the questions about whether Mr. Bush showed up for some of his National Guard duties in the 1970's. The White House tried to put the questions to rest in February by releasing hundreds of pages of President Bush's National Guard records. But a number of men who served in Mr. Bush's Alabama National Guard unit in 1972 have said they did not recall seeing him there.

“Cleared this base 15 May 1972” According to Lieutenant Colonel William Harris Jr. and Lieutenant Colonel Jerry Killian in Bush’s annual evaluation , Ellis Air Force Base, Houston. The report makes clear that Bush had “not been observed ” at his Texas unit “during the period of this report” – May 1972-April 1973.” [Boston Globe 5/23/00]

"LTJG Kerry is one of the finest young officers with whom I have served in a long naval career. His combat record prior to becoming my personal aide speaks for itself, and is testimony to his competance and courage at sea.
...
...The detachment of this officer will be a definite loss to the service. He is the dedicated type that we should retain and it is hoped that he will be of further perhaps earlier [sic] greater service to his country, which is his aim in life at this time."

Taking what blah3 and Josh Marshall have said to heart, Preznit Prances on Carriers needs to get out from behind Mommy Hughes skirts and face this one like a man. This is Crap of the first order:

"He only pretended to throw his," Hughes said in a CNN interview. "Now, I can understand if, out of conscience, you take a principled stand, and you would decide that you were so opposed to this that you would actually throw your medals. But to pretend to do so -- I think that's very revealing."

It's never going to be about the men and women of who have gone to Iraq and come home with combat injuries that require lifetime care. It's going to be whether or not the really, really rich have enough tax breaks, the crony corporatism continues unabated as flag-waving corporations take from you with one hand and send their net before-tax profits offshore with the other hand. So....? So this:

"We're just preparing for something a brain-injured person should not do two days out, which is travel to Germany," the neurologist said. He smiled grimly and started toward the UH-60 Black Hawk thwump-thwumping out on the helipad, waiting to spirit out of Iraq one more of the hundreds of Americans wounded here this month.

While attention remains riveted on the rising count of Americans killed in action -- more than 100 so far in April -- doctors at the main combat support hospital in Iraq are reeling from a stream of young soldiers with wounds so devastating that they probably would have been fatal in any previous war.

More and more in Iraq, combat surgeons say, the wounds involve severe damage to the head and eyes -- injuries that leave soldiers brain damaged or blind, or both, and the doctors who see them first struggling against despair.

The Bush Administration's 2004 budget proposed gutting Veterans Administration (VA) services, including health care funding. Proposed cuts included: denying at least 360,000 veterans access to health care; $250 annual premiums; increased pharmacy co-payments; a 30 percent increased primary care co-payments; and increased waiting time for a first medical appointment.
...
The Bush Administration's budget proposal would have under-funded the VA by more than $2 billion. Bush's proposal would have cut the number of employees available to process disability claims, yet veterans already wait more than six months for a review of disability applications. The Bush plan for dealing with the waiting lists at VA clinics and hospitals is to reduce the number of veterans treated by the VA.
...
Last March, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a budget that included a $28.8 billion 10-year reduction in funding for veterans. The Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion and Disabled American Veterans began a letter-writing campaign to protest the reduction, so a House-Senate conference committee reduced the cut to $6.2 billion. President Bush complained that Congress needed fiscal restraint.

An army of veterans twice the size of that involved in Operation Iraqi Freedom has lost health insurance benefits since Bush took office. As many as half a million vets are homeless. Seven VA hospitals are being closed as part of an effort to "restructure" the Department of Veterans Affairs. Meanwhile, veterans of the Iraq campaign can fall in line with over 250,000 veterans who are already waiting at least six months to see a doctor.

The General Accounting Office estimates that 20 percent of Army Reserve and National Guard personnel have no health insurance at all. Although Bush did not hesitate to send Reservists and National Guardsmen to face death in Iraq, he has consistently opposed any attempt to extend full benefits to them. (emphasis added)

One of the true guiding thoughts of this whole horrible mess in Iraq was from that NeoCon guiding light and big Chickenhawk:

I think the American people are going to have great tolerance for the war taking longer, and they are going to have great tolerance for more casualties.

William Kristol
AEI Breakfast
March 27, 2003

About fifty years ago didn't "Red" America mean something totally different? Or maybe with the PATRIOT Act, it really doesn't. How Tail-Gunner Joe. Really, now.

The republican version of Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) made famous by many entrepraneurs, none so well known for their aggressive marketing than our friends from Ada, Michigan, the De Vos family; die-hard republicans to the bitter end. It's no secret within the organization that being a 'true believer' will propel you to the upper reaches of the ziggurat of succes. And it's also no secret that the organiztion leans so far to the right that they are probably funding genetic research to breed babies with two right hands.

Amway Corporation has often been identified as supporting the US Republican Party and other right-wing causes, but this is not strictly accurate. Amway Corporation, as such, supports no political party. It is true that the co-founders, Rich de Vos and Jay van Andes, are strong supporters of the Republican Party, but this is a personal position, not a company position per se. Many of Amway's best-known distributors, including Dexter Yager, are also self-declared Republicans. Perhaps paradoxically for an organization so widely regarded as right-wing, Amway touts the environmental benefits of many of its products, and in June 1989 it was recognized by UNEP's Regional Office for North America for its contributions to the cause of the environment.

The notion of translating the MLM concept into politics is visionary -- and also a little disquieting. Pyramid-based companies have proved amazingly successful at raising up armies of enterprising Americans; Amway, the world's most successful MLM, has more than 3.6 million distributors. But some MLM's thrive by imposing their own strange and insular cultures on their recruits, and while they offer the illusion of self-employment, those at the top of the pyramid often demand a rigid kind of uniformity and loyalty. Amway has often been compared to a cult -- so often, in fact, that on its own Web site the company feels the need to answer such frequently asked questions as ''I've heard rumors that Amway is a cult; is this true?'' and ''Why do Amway meetings appear to some people like a cult?'' When I met with Ken Mehlman, Bush's campaign manager, in suburban Washington, and suggested that the Bush campaign could fairly be compared to Amway in its approach, he agreed without hesitation. ''Amway, no question,'' he said.

Well, here the 1600 Crew are the "uplines". No matter how shitty the product, they want their true believers to each recruit and be responsible for others down-stream. It's a brilliant concept, and one that better be countered, and quickly by the Democrats, because like my mom, the recruited "down-line" voters won't know that they have a basement full of cheap-ass toilet paper until the bills come due after the election. I think my mom is still paying off the toilet paper. We never discuss it anymore, after she lost all her friends trying to get them to become "distributors". Hey, republicans ... it could happen to you, they'll use you and leave you like a two-dollar hooker after payday!

Andy reports he's getting a "hernia fix", I guess an ego is a terrible thing to weigh. He also mentions he might be blogging on painkillers. And this will be different exactly how?

Update: Spelling must be the first thing to go, or the Duchess is taking a new drug, "percaset". And, your majesty, Rush was on OxyContin not that low-class stuff your physician stuck you with. Call Rush, he can probably give you some pointers on maintaining a permanent ... rush.

Remember those heady seconds when Amurkan believed that there was some fleeting truth to the 1600 Crew pronouncements on eduma-cashun? That in the great state of Tex-ass there had been unparalled successes in elevating the standards of edumacashun to stratospheric levels. Then the truth came out; book-cooking that would have made the Accountant of Enron green with envy and a cabinet-level post for the head chef.

Well, it seems that now that they have all that success, the Texas Lege wants to leave more kids behind. Yes in the The Tom Delay Texas Legislative Incubator and Back-Porch Policy Dumping Ground, Houston, they're proposing to leave 45% of the children behind? How? Well, cut off their funds and you get a whole generation of under-edumacted proles...who probably will never be voters, thuse securing a whole block of "safe" constituents and their non-voting offspring.

The way the state House proposes to fund education would leave 45 percent of the state's students behind, Texas A&M University economists said Saturday.

A majority of school districts would receive only 2 percent more in state money under proposed new funding formulas being considered by a House committee working to craft a new school finance system.

The funding levels are tied to a study that measured an "adequate" education as 55 percent of students passing math and reading tests. Lynn Moak, a school finance expert, testified that the funding levels also accept a 25 percent dropout rate and a 75 percent failure rate on high school science tests.

The study, conducted by economists at Texas A&M, found that it costs more to produce higher levels of educational outcomes. Moak said he hopes lawmakers "look seriously at funding a high level standard."

Watch this one, if they are successful, it's gonna happen elsewhere with the same talking points.

Wanna bet that the reading tests will not include anything from '1984'?

Nader who disingenuously denies being the spoiler in the last election, has started again. He feeds his ego by being the "outsider", and everyone seems to understand the foolishness of his destructive behaviour, except St. Ralph.

The perils for Kerry were revealed last week when Ralph Nader, who may have cost Al Gore the 2000 presidential election, described Kerry as "stuck in the Iraq quagmire the way Bush is."

Nader is no saint. His run for president this year destroys for many nearly all his well-earned credibility as a conscience of America.

But Nader now has a rationale for his campaign. While the antiwar wing is small, it is large enough, if it goes for Nader, to tip the vote Bush's way in a few swing states.

In an election widely seen as a dead heat between Bush and Kerry, any significant leakage of votes to Nader will probably mean defeat for the Democratic nominee.

It seems that the computer bugs that have been plaguing people have finally caught up with me. A malicious Virus? Absoulutely, it's called a Security Update from Microsoft for XP. If you have not installed it, don't. My primary PC is out of service for about the next 12 hours...I wish that the MT interface was a little better (had some of the features available in Windows), I'd never use my stupid PC again to blog.

Anyhow, I was working my way through the Kerry FITREPS I'd downloaded and had taken some notes on them. Sullywatch asked about the guy who says "it wasn't Kerry". I can't find anything in Kerry's FITREPS where LCDR Elliott objects to the awards, any of them. I also wonder who he thinks showed up for the sick call to get some shrapnel pulled out of their shoulder. Hmmmm.

Anyhow, it's all getting more fascinating as the 1600 Crew looks and looks and looks for someone, anyone who will call Kerry a Fraud, conveniently overlooking Fearful Leaders full-time dedication to remaining safely away from anything that looked or smelled like combat, as it would have interfered with pool volleyball, "ambitious secretaries", alcohol and cocaine.

Okay, so I plead ignorance of most of the subtleties of the whole Israel-Palestine situation, but this can not bode well for anyone:

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Friday that he was no longer bound by a promise to President Bush not to harm Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
...
"I told the president the following," Sharon said. "In our first meeting about three years ago, I accepted your request not to harm Arafat physically. I told him I understand the problems surrounding the situation, but I am released from that pledge."

Does this mean it's now T-10 to the Rapture and counting? Terrific.

The Japanese hostages released in Iraq are having a harder time in Japan than their kidnappers gave them.

The young Japanese civilians taken hostage in Iraq returned home this week, not to the warmth of a yellow-ribbon embrace but to a disapproving nation's cold stare.
...
"You got what you deserve!" read one hand-written sign at the airport where they landed. "You are Japan's shame," another wrote on the Web site of one of the former hostages. They had "caused trouble" for everybody. The government, not to be outdone, announced it would bill the former hostages $6,000 for air fare.

For a quick primer on the Navy FITREP system (as it was, and I'm sure still is): Fitness reports are subject to huge amounts of "inflation", depending on community (Air/Surface/Submarines (Nuke/Surface/Special Ops) and then every non-Line community ie supply, medical, legal etc.

The language of a FITREP is pretty much boilerplate, and anything truly unique will described that way. So when it says essentially that so-and-so is an articulate officer, that's nice, but meaningless. When it says the officer is a proven leader in combat, that's worth reading. The place to look on Navy FITRPS is in the ratings block, most important are the ones concerning promotion (early is best) and the ratings against their peers. These are used as a direct comparison of an officer against other officers doing exactly what they are doing, i.e. all the other swift boat commanders in the unit. Kerry always seems to be rated as one of top OIC's (Officers in Charge).

Also, unlike AF and Army fitness reports, a Navy Fitrep is written by the officers CO, none of the "rater/indorser" silliness. Also, Navy Fitreps are between the Officer and the CO, the only copies go to the officer, his CO and the Bureau of Naval Personnel; there are no 'local' file copies. A CO is expected to keep them forever (I still have all those I wrote on my officers).

I'm still reading the fitreps, if there's something else there besides the description of a guy I'd want covering my six, I'll blog it. But he seems to have been a pretty good guy. For a blackshoe :)

As Kerry gets to adding to the things to challenge the "National Security" administration on, he ought to start asking "why were the Saudi's and especially two bin Ladens" allowed to leave the country after 9/11 when we have two US citizens locked up in jails right now?

Yet another Top-Secret fubar from the 1600 Crew that needs to get pounded home. I guess that Saudis and especially bin Ladens do get special favors from the 1600 Crew. Or at least so it seems. Why?

I know that the guy, O'Neill or whatever, that the republicans have trotted out to say that John Kerry was a no-goodnik is in fact correct. See, I was attached to VA-46 10 years after John McCain was caught on film running away from a burning A-4D on the flight deck of the USS Forrestal. My service in the same squadron, and second-hand knowledge of then-LT McCains other actions on that day indisputably prove that he was obviously unfit for anything and certainly was never, ever in his career any kind of a "Hero". Damn Naval Academy graduating people like him anyway.

See, there's my rock-solid logic. Please, feel free to try your best to tear it apart.

Alex, I'll take conflation for One Thousand, please.

Please state your answer in the form of a question: "Which surprisingly reactionary right-wing, gay, catholic writer still wants to believe in the so-called 'flypaper' theory of the Iraqi War?"

The Answer is: "Andrew Sullivan?".

Unbelievably, Sullivan is still pushing that "better to fight them there than here" line, forgetting that there was no need to fight them at all in Iraq. One of the most telling things about Sullivan is his (unwitting?) telegraphy of the NeoCon positions on some issues that concern the middle east and Iraq is among the prime examples. Nowhere in his writings anymore do the rationales for invasion include the fabled WMD's. It's always "Bad Saddam" and freedom and democracy for the Iraqi middle-class. It's always the rosy optimism of the CPA briefings, and it's always how we are about to turn the corner, if only the terrorists could be made to understand that Peace, Freedom and the American Way are what they want. After all, Ronnie Ray-gun and Maggie told him so, and it's what he believes.

In the World According to Andrew, we can't lose the Iraqi Middle Class, you know the very folks that the CPA has been terrorizing. Never mind that his fellow republicans bemoan the lack of assasination in their toolbox for dealing with political opponents, which if course sounds suspiciously like what a certain cleric in Iraq stands accused of doing. How far apart are the two, really? Do we invade New Mexico next, because it sounds like that flypaper thing has some real practical application there? Let's see if we can convince them that a good, solid middle-class Jeffersonian Democracy might be just what the doctor ordered. If it doesn't work, let's redeploy any New Mexico National Guard units in the Middle East to Santa Fe, I'm sure they'll appreciate it.

Hey, maybe if Andy gets the revised 'flypaper memo' to Doug Feith, the Guard will be home for Christmas.

The side-by-side comparison of two Yalies of that certain time. See Attached.

Based on comments and from hopping around blogtopia reading things out there, it seems that the common thread that runs through the deaths of the soldiers in Iraq (and Afghanistan too, I'm sure) has been that: "they joined to get money for college".

Yeah. So let's add this: any draft/national service has to include something akin to the Old GI Bill educational benefits, not that contributory piece of shit foisted off on the "all-volunteer" military by successive Congresses and Administrations that wanted to cut benefits and do everything military on the cheap, especially for veterans.

Oh, and it's been even more interesting to see the total lack of comments on any 'major' right-wing blogs about the draft issue. I spent some time today hunting around and found zip, zilch, nada. Gee, wonder if the keyboard commandos are checking out their deferment possibilities like their heros?

Indeed.

So the word has now hit the mainstream. Draft. Only a matter of time, I guess before it came up. Charlie Rangel, a Korean-war vet brought it up long ago, but aside from some media-whore 'ha-ha', the echos of his speechs faded as the republicans clamored for their 'no-sacrifice war'. Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, a veteran and I believe a Bronze-star recipient has finally talked about seeing elephants in the room. As I have poked around blogtopia, I find that the consensus is mixed to neutral. Kos.

Unlike most people around these parts, I actually support a military draft (with the option of alternate service for conscientious objectors). I think the burdens of our Democracy should be shared by all. And as a side benefit, the more people serve, the more stake everyone will have in potential military conflicts. It's a lot easier to advocate for war if you don't know anyone who might suffer consequences. It's a lot harder to remain aloof if war may impact your friends, children, or grandchildren.

I have mixed feelings about the draft. Though, the farther away I get from prime draft age the less I actually like the idea. Those 18 year olds get younger every day, and while plenty of 18 year olds are serving and getting killed, there's a difference between those who choose to go and those who would be forced. Plenty of 18 year olds are just not equipped (nor 19 nor 30 for that matter). That's not the only reason, of course.

However, I definitely don't like the idea of what amounts to an emergency draft for a situation which frankly isn't an emergency. The reinstitution of mandatory conscription would fundamentally overhaul both our military and our society. Perhaps if the idiots in Congress and the Pentagon would increase pay and benefits, rather than funneling all that money into wonderful private security costing orders of magnitude more, we wouldn't have people like Chuck Hagel opining about the possible need for it.

I think the fact that the military has become all-volunteer makes it easy for the deaths in Iraq and elsewhere to be overlooked. We can at least partly rationalize away the deaths knowing that the troops supposedly chose to be there. If we were talking about 18 year olds being forced against their will to this country and being murdered, it would be a hell of a lot harder to go about our business. But just because these soldiers chose to serve their country does not make their lives any less valuable or their deaths any less tragic.

The branches of the military don't sell service in a realistic manner. I remember a few years ago, I was just out of high school (or maybe just finishing up high school) and was contacted by a rep for the Navy. I've never had any interest in being involved in the military in any way, so I don't know why I let myself get talked into going in and testing, but I did. I wasn't sure what to do with my life, and I think that uncertainty led me to at least consider the possibilities. I went into the local office and took the entry test. I scored in the 99th percentile and the recruitment officer was all over me. He promised me the world; some easy service followed by a $50,000 college scholarship and a guaranteed job in journalism when I got out of school--basically whatever I wanted. He made it sound like a cakewalk with huge rewards. It was a no-brainer.

You know, for a moment I considered. Then I thought, "What the fuck am I doing?" and came to my senses. I'm a liberal, I'm a vegetarian (how well does that work in the military), and I'd always had a dim view of the indoctrination I believed occurred in the military.
...
A draft scares me to death. I am 23 years old; I am draft age. My friends are draft age. I am terrified that our government will attempt to send us to die for a war that should never have been started. This isn't just fair, this is criminal. I shouldn't have to die for George Bush and my friends shouldn't have to die for George Bush. We shouldn't have to die for his mistakes while he makes his goddamn speeches and makes his goddamn attacks and engages in what he believes to be a holy war, all from the comfort of his perfectly safe life. This is a man who has never known sacrifice and never will know sacrifice.

This is a man who, with a draft, would force innocent Americans to go die in a war that he began with lies, and then wouldn't even bother to attend the funerals.

No. I will not go die for that man. My friends will not go die for that man. This cannot happen. It simply cannot happen.

As I said below, one of the reasons I support renewing the draft is because it would act as a deterrent against unnecessary wars of choice by the President. The Framers included such a deterrent in the Constitution by granting Congress alone (not the President) the power to declare war. The thinking was that this provision would force Congress - being the most accountable branch - to think long and hard about commiting to a war.

I understand the dilema which the author of Nightmares for Sale feels. It's natural for anyone to not want to be doing something they feel coerced into, and that's OK on a lot of levels. Offering them and others a viable, honorable alternative to serving in the Armed Forces might be a really good outcome for them, and for us as a country. Everyone has a part, and becomes important for their contribution; within a generation there would be no one who has not had to carry the burden at some level, and be responsible for someone. Hell, it could put the republicans out of business.

Military and national service with limited, limited deferments would not be the worst of things. After all, isn't it worth something to have a voice and make your mark?

But then, no matter how much I find myself in agreement with Kos and others, I find myself sick that I have to write about this at all.

1600 Crew Bastards.

VP Crashcart got to speak in China, where he 'demanded' to speak uncensored on TV. The Chinese government allowed him to do so, and as the NYTimes says "... but not one millimeter more." So is Fearless Leader's Press Secretariat practicing to paper-train the Press Poodles here?

But the broadcast received no advance promotion or even a listing in the Chinese news media and was not repeated. The authorities promptly provided leading Web sites with a "full text" of the vice president's remarks, including his answers to questions after the speech, that struck out references to political freedom, Taiwan, North Korea and other issues that propaganda officials considered sensitive.

I'm with Tom Harkin on this one. Any time a member of the 1600 Crew publically endorses and praises anything, it's usually a death-knell for that program or idea. It seems that the 1600 Crew is now reversing course on the overtime proposals that were brought to the fore by such friends of the working man as the US Chamber of Commerce and others.

The Labor Department will allow workers who earn up to $100,000 a year to be eligible for overtime pay, a substantial shift upward from an earlier proposal that Democrats had promised to make an issue in the presidential campaign.

More low-wage workers would become automatically eligible for overtime under the final rules, due to be released today, according to Labor Department documents describing the regulation. Police, firefighters, paramedics, emergency medical technicians and licensed practical nurses will also be assured of eligibility for overtime pay if they work more than 40 hours a week.
...
"The final rule accomplishes exactly what we intended from the start, which is to preserve and protect overtime rights for white-collar workers," Chao said in a statement last night. "We are pleased to see people recognize the significant gains to workers under our final rule. Now there can be no doubt that workers win.''
...
Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), a critic of the proposed rules, said in a statement last night: "The Bush Administration simply is not trustworthy on this issue, and I am beyond skeptical about these so-called revisions. This President has gone out of his way time and again to undercut working families' right to overtime pay for overtime work. . . . The Senate will soon have the opportunity to stand up and be counted on this issue, and I look forward to the debate."

No on likes to be lied to. Especially those who are about to (or have) sent their loved ones into danger. The 1600 Crew knowing that, made especially convincing lies and deals with countries and their leaders who were friendly to them, promising them money and maybe even nicknames if they would only join the Coalition of the Bought. Not counting on any actual democracy in action ever happening to rear its ugly head, one of the coalition members went had an election. And surprise, surprinse they're going to go home. Because their new leader promised them that he would do just that if elected.

Spain's new Socialist prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, keeping a firm campaign promise, announced Sunday that he was ordering Spanish troops to leave Iraq "as soon as possible."

Just 24 hours after he was sworn in, Mr. Zapatero said he had ordered Defense Minister José Bono to "do what is necessary" for the Spanish troops to return home in the shortest possible time.

The Duchess in a bid to secure her image as coming down on the side of bravery and forthrightness now pleads for McNarummy to apologize to Captain James Yee, the Muslim Chaplain locked up in isolation for 70 days in the Charleston Brig and then dragged around like a one-wheeled horsecart for months as the Army's case fell apart. Hey, I'm pleading for Preznit Convenient Symbol to resign...which of us will get our wish first?

Oh, and the Duchess has also printed the latest RNC blast fax summary...he has been told to be "optimistic" on Iraq. I'm pretty sure that there are some families here in the US who might have a little less optimistic assesment of the situation. Sullivan seeing the battle as all but played out, relys on that most cliche of measures to prove we are winning: the body count ratio.

The ratio of U.S. casualties to insurgent casualties was roughly one to ten. What should have been done very early in the invasion - the wiping out of the Baathist thugs and their Islamicist allies - was finally accomplished.

"When the fighting is over in Fallujah, I will sell everything I have, even my home," said a resistance fighter who gave his name as Abu Taif Mashhadani. He wept as he recalled his 8-year-old daughter, who he said was killed by a U.S. sniper in Fallujah a week ago. "I will send my brothers north to kill the Kurds, and I will go to America and target the civilians. Only the civilians. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. And the one who started it will be the one to be blamed."

Thanks to Roger Ailes for this pointer. Simply A-f****** -mazing. Don't even start me on the Religious Simian thing in the Post article. But this quote is one of the best to ever drop from the mouth of the Dunce.

Asked by Woodward how history would judge the war, Bush replied: "History. We don't know. We'll all be dead.

And I thought Roger was kidding. Sadly, No! (sorry, Seb).

So in late 2001 the 1600 Crew and Preznit Mal Feasance were already lying publically about the invasion of Iraq? From a general who has no real reason to publically dis Preznit Minimal Smarts, Tommy Franks confirms that they were asking him to redo plans to invade Iraq while the campaign in Afghanistan was still hot.

In the Washington speech a month ago, Franks said he told the president at that Dec. 28 meeting that the existing contingency plan for Iraq had called for sending in a half-million troops, an operation so massive it would require a six-month buildup.

Franks said he told Bush that the long-standing plan needed to be redrawn and if the U.S. military did go in, ''We should go all the way to Baghdad.''
...
According to Woodward's book, Bush told Rumsfeld on Nov. 21, 2001 less than two months after U.S. forces attacked Afghanistan to prepare for possible war with Iraq, and kept some members of his closest circle in the dark.

The meeting with Franks on Dec. 28 was apparently the first briefing from him that the president had received since those instructions.
...
Among the plan's assumptions were that Iraq would launch missiles against Israel and other neighbors, and that allied troops would be hit with weapons of mass destruction, Franks said.

Well sitting out military service with a deferment can certainly give you a clear perspective on military operations and Combat. More from Woodwards book. From multiple-deferee Angina-boy, who absolutely, positively had higher priorities like getting a bun in Lynne's oven to get that last Daddy Deferment:

Powell felt Cheney and his allies -- his chief aide, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby; Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz; and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas J. Feith and what Powell called Feith's "Gestapo" office -- had established what amounted to a separate government. The vice president, for his part, believed Powell was mainly concerned with his own popularity and told friends at a dinner he hosted a year ago celebrating the outcome of the war that Powell was a problem and "always had major reservations about what we were trying to do."

Before the war with Iraq, Powell bluntly told Bush that if he sent U.S. troops there "you're going to be owning this place." Powell and his deputy and closest friend, Richard L. Armitage, used to refer to what they called "the Pottery Barn rule" on Iraq: "You break it, you own it," according to Woodward.

So in the run-up to the 9/11 attacks the 1600 Crew appears to have had more warning than what they have admitted to. Preznit 2Stupid2Believe has emphasized repeteadly that if only Osama had sent him a briefing paper with a summary of the attacks, he might have let Condi, Karl or Crashcart brief him on it between Nap and Vacation.

For most Americans, the disbelief was the same. The attacks of Sept. 11 seemed to come in a stunning burst from nowhere. But now, after three weeks of extraordinary public hearings and a dozen detailed reports, the lengthy documentary record makes clear that predictions of an attack by Al Qaeda had been communicated directly to the highest levels of the government.

The threat reports were more clear, urgent and persistent than was previously known. Some focused on Al Qaeda's plans to use commercial aircraft as weapons. Others stated that Osama bin Laden was intent on striking on United States soil. Many were passed to the Federal Aviation Administration.

While some of the intelligence went back years, other warnings — including one that Al Qaeda seemed interested in hijacking a plane inside this country — had been delivered to the president on Aug. 6, 2001, just a month before the attacks.

The new information produced by the commission so far has led 6 of its 10 members to say or suggest that the attacks could have been prevented, though there is no consensus on when, how or by whom. The commission's chairman, Thomas H. Kean, a Republican, has described failures at every level of government, any of which, if avoided, could have altered the outcome. Mr. Kerrey, a Democrat, said, "My conclusion is that it could have been prevented. That was not my conclusion when I went on the commission."

» Preventing Stem Cell research, gotta keep the Christo-Fascist Vote
» Vacation
» Stealing Money from Education
» Naptime
» Missile Defense and funding big defense contractors
» The Next Vacation
» Sending more money to the Taliban for their anti-Opium campaign
» Another Long Weekend
» Get Iraqi Invasion Plans worked out
» Head to Kennibunkport for Vacation

As you can see, they were very engaged. In other things. And of course, on September 11th, Preznit Cowardly Lion did the one thing he does so well and has done his whole life:

» Runnin' Away

A Bold Leader Indeed. [gag]

So Bob Woodward is telling tales out of school. Sounds like he may be keeping Helen Thomas company soon...Woodward who managed to make journalistic history twice, once for Watergate and again for the most egregious journalistic mouth-music ever on the Commanders Codpiece may be redeeming himself with the story about how Preznit Bring'em On got FrankenRummy to blow $700 MILLION mis-appropriated dollars on War Plans for Iraq in the days after 9/11. Of course when Richard Clarke said basically the same thing about the Iraqi Obsession, the rebublican spin machinery made sure that American public thought that Clarke was infected with Martian Brain Syphilis within minutes of his book being released. But now Woodward seems to be re-telling the story we have all known for a long, long time. President Bunnypants was obsessed with invading Iraq.

President Bush secretly ordered a war plan drawn up against Iraq less than two months after U.S. forces attacked Afghanistan and was so worried the decision would cause a furor he did not tell everyone on his national security team, says a new book on his Iraq policy.

Bush feared that if news got out about the Iraq plan as U.S. forces were fighting another conflict, people would think he was too eager for war, journalist Bob Woodward writes in “Plan of Attack,” a behind-the-scenes account of the 16 months leading to the Iraq invasion.
...
According to a report Friday by The Washington Post, Woodward also claims that:

Starting in late December 2001, Bush met repeatedly with Army Gen. Tommy Franks and his war cabinet to plan the U.S. attack on Iraq even as he insisted he was pursuing a diplomatic solution.
CIA Director George Tenet assured the president that it was a "slam dunk" case that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.
Some of Vice President Dick Cheney's colleagues felt he had a "fever" about removing Saddam Hussein by force.
Secretary of State Colin Powell felt Cheney and his allies — among them the undersecretary of defense for policy, Douglas Feith, and what Powell called Feith's "Gestapo" office — had established what amounted to a separate government.
Asked about the book Friday, the president said the subject of Iraq came up four days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks when he met his national security team at Camp David to discuss a response to the assault.

“I said let us focus on Afghanistan,” he said, taking questions after a meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Asked if he had told Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Nov. 21, 2001, to draft an Iraq war plan, the president stated: “I can’t remember exact dates that far back.”

Impeachement Anyone? Magic 8-Ball says: Yes.

Eleanor Clift, another MW who has been phoning it in for quite a while, notices that the Chimperor has no clothes either...at least she seems to have him down to his boxers...

We have a president who operates by belief, not reason, and who lives in a hermetically sealed alternate reality. How else to explain his performance before the press this week?
...
Bush also clings to the fiction that finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is still a prospect, citing the recent discovery of mustard gas buried on a turkey farm in Libya. Who is feeding Bush such claptrap? “A president is only as good as the information he is given,” says Jack Valenti, who was in the White House with Lyndon Johnson when Vietnam was raging. What Valenti remembers most from the meetings he attended is how wrong the military assessments turned out to be once they were filtered up from the field to Saigon to the Pentagon. By the time they reached LBJ, there was a light at the end of the tunnel.
...
...A Republican policymaker wonders if Bush has forgotten Iran is part of the axis of evil. “Did we invade Iraq to get a mini-Iran?” he exclaimed. “What’s next? The North Koreans do Fallujah?”
...
Bush wanted to bolster Sharon, who faces a plebiscite on his Gaza plan later this month along with a possible indictment on corruption charges. Sharon, a gruff, bullying figure, persuaded Bush that without his public endorsement, he might not survive. Is it worth the backlash in the Arab world to send a lifeline to Sharon? The answer is no from a geopolitical standpoint, but yes when Karl Rove’s November playbook is taken into account. If Bush can get his share of the Jewish vote up from one quarter to one third, that could mean the election. Bush may not be much of a conceptual thinker, but he knows how to count.

Well, the contributors are getting theirs again, I'm thinking. It seems that the program passed with all the yammering about having the welfare of our nations children at heart is just another corporate give-away, perhaps to the tune of $2 Billion dollars.

The No Child Left Behind law has kicked off one of the nation's largest experiments in educational capitalism by inviting private companies and other groups to offer tutoring in failing public schools and financing the effort with federal money previously spent on the schools themselves. The aim is to help struggling children perform in their regular classrooms, while invigorating public education with private competition. The initiative has set off a stampede, with 1,000 companies rushing to recruit armies of tutors and grab chunks of what experts say could be a $2 billion-plus tutoring market.

Andrew really sees nothing wrong with simultaneously talking out of both sides of his yap. He pounds on Oliver Stone for his perception of Stone's insensitivity towards Cuban prisoners. Every bit the self-righteous little asshat that we all know him to be. Which of course is immediately after he issues a mea maxima culpa for probably one of his most egregious blog-u-missions: the Blog Queen Justice System trial and conviction of Army Captain Jame Yee, Chaplain Corps by innuendo and slander. Well, it worked against Bill Clinton, and that Captain James Yee he is after all, a Muslim and all, so Andy figured, why not go for it?

I think that one it's one of the more self-serving screeds that the Duchess has written in a while. To cover for herself she babbles about the Oppressed Military Homosexual and their treatment in the Military Justice System. Nice try, yer majesty. This is one of those times when you can't put the words back in...you have proven that no matter how much you write, no matter how smart (you think) you are you're just as intolerant and bigoted as any good ol' boy who embraces all them "good fag-hatin' family val-ewes". Except you directed all that vitriol towards a defendant whose presumption of innocence was automatic, so tell us, who adores Tyranny again?

But wait, it's better than that...Roger Ailes has story that links (see link above) to a couple of Sullivan posts from last Sept (9/21) and December. The 9/21 post which looked like the most critical of Yee where Sullivan was jumping on the rightie-hate-the-traitor bandwagon is "disappeared", the December post, where he begins to rethink his accusations is still there...did I miss the 9/21 entry? Hmmmm. If I missed finding the original link in the Babbling Bitch archives, let me know...I will blog a correction.

ps..Why not join encourage some of your friends to go the mea culpa route too?

Our Soldiers. They're professionals in every sense of the word. They are "over there". 20,000 of them just got 'bohica'd" (Bend Over Here It Comes Again) by the 1600 Crew.

20,000 troops see Iraq duty extended 90 days
Move breaks earlier pledge to soldiers of one-year tour

The Pentagon formally announced Thursday that it had stopped the planned return from Iraq of some 20,000 American troops, giving commanders the extra firepower they believe necessary to confront an insurgency that is taking a mounting toll on the U.S.-led coalition.

The decision, announced by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld after first being reported Wednesday, breaks a promise to soldiers who were assured when they arrived in Iraq that they would stay no more than one year. By extending their tours of duty by three months, the Pentagon is acknowledging that the insurgency has ruined its plans to reduce the size of the U.S. military presence this spring.

The troops had expected to return home this month after completing 12 months in Iraq.

MoDo...pretty good too.

After the Bay of Pigs, President Kennedy spoke to newspaper publishers and said: "This administration intends to be candid about its errors. For as a wise man once said, `An error does not become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.' . . . Without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed — and no republic can survive."

Compare Kennedy with Mr. Bush, who conceded no errors and warned that any Vietnam analogy with Iraq — in this acid flashback moment when 64 U.S. troops were reported to have died last week and when McNarummy is forcing up to 20,000 troops to stay in Iraq — "sends the wrong message to our troops and sends the wrong message to the enemy."

He reiterated that his mission is dictated from above: "Freedom is the almighty's gift to every man and woman in this world."

Given the Saudi religious authority's fatwa against our troops, and given that our marines are surrounding a cleric in the holy city of Najaf, we really don't want to make Muslims think we're fighting a holy war. That would only further inflame the Arab world and endanger our overstretched military, so let's hope that Mr. Bush's reference to the almighty was to Dick Cheney.

Preznit Dumb Bass must have been wondering whether to use a spoon or a jig or whatever while filming his fishing segment for the "Outdoor Life Network" last weekend. So he could appeal to the fishin' and huntin' demographic. While it was the deadliest week in Iraq for Americans.

Although President Bush declared major combat over almost a year ago, last week was the deadliest yet for Americans in uniform. The Department of Defense identified 64 service members who died in the week that ended on Saturday. Until then, the highest toll had come many months ago, not long after the start of the war last March, in a week when 50 Americans died.

Harold Meyerson in the the WaPo

Republican strategists have argued that the president would run circles around Kerry on issues of foreign policy -- a challenge to which Kerry's ad nauseam response during the primaries was, "Bring it on!" Now events have indeed brought it on, and it's clear that Kerry's apprehensions about a unilateral war and occupation were well-grounded, even as Bush's cavalier hopes for an all-American nation-building project were the most dangerous of fantasies. It's also clear that Bush has been forced by events to move, kicking and screaming, toward Kerry's vision of the requirements for a successful occupation. On the centerpiece of that vision -- handing over control of the occupation to the United Nations -- Bush has remained, seeking instead to get maximum U.N. involvement without surrendering U.S. control. He hasn't acknowledged that it's precisely the U.S. control that makes the occupation so objectionable to millions of Iraqis. Still, Bush has been compelled to internationalize certain functions that he had assumed the United States would perform, and for the reasons that Kerry predicted.

By the standard of previous presidential candidates running amid wartime quagmires, Kerry has been unusually forthcoming in his critique and prescriptions for Iraq. All Eisenhower pledged while seeking the office during the Korean conflict was, "I will go to Korea." In 1968 Nixon said that he had "a secret plan" to end the Vietnam War. Kerry, by contrast, foresaw the perils of unilateralism and has consistently proposed a more workable occupation policy than Bush's. By its growing dependence on Brahimi and its increasingly plaintive calls for more nations to send troops, even the administration tacitly acknowledges that Kerry was right.

Yeah. And that's why Kerry deserves to be in the Oval Office and the whole 1600 Crew on the unemployment line.

Read this.

Can they come home now? Please?

At the Press Conference tonight:

BUSH: Well, first of all, that's up to General Abizaid, and he's clearly indicating that he may want more troops. It's coming up through the chain of command. And if that's what he wants, that's what he gets.

But Bush said he sees no need for more troops and characterized the violence in Iraq as the work of "a few people" and "violent gangs."

The 1600 Crew can't keep recycling the same Troops through Iraq perpetually...can you spell d-r-a-f-t? Sure, I knew you could.

Shorter Snake-Handler Johnny at the 9/11 Commission today: I blame the Clenis™ for all the Terrorists in the world, past, present and future, oh and if I could arrest that bitch Jamie Gorelick, I'd have the cuffs on her un-American ass yesterday. If those Terrorists ever start in the Porno Trade, we'll get'em and quick.

In what has to be the most stunning performance of Hubris perhaps in the annals of Western Civilization I have seen, Preznit Never Wrong Ever tonight said:

You've looked back before 9-11 for what mistakes might have been made. After 9-11, what would your biggest mistake be, would you say, and what lessons have learned from it?

BUSH: I wish you'd have given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it.

John, I'm sure historians will look back and say, gosh, he could've done it better this way or that way. You know, I just - I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with answer, but it hadn't yet.

And what's up with this:

See, I'm of the belief that we'll find out the truth on the weapons. That's why we sent up the independent commission. I look forward to hearing the truth as to exactly where they are. They could still be there. They could be hidden, like the 50 tons of mustard gas in a turkey farm.

Then there's this little gem:

That's why I'm pressing the Greater Middle East Reform Initiative to work to spread freedom, and we will continue on that. So long as I'm the president, I will press for freedom. I believe so strongly in the power of freedom.

You know why I do? Because I've seen freedom work right here in our own country. I also have this belief, strong belief, that freedom is not this country's gift to the world. Freedom is the Almighty's gift to every man and woman in this world.

Ah, and what do you make of this little lie?

One of my hardest parts of my job is to console the family members, who've lost their life. It's a chance to hug and weep and to console, and to remind the loved ones that the sacrifice of their loved one was done in the name of security for America and freedom for the world.

Overall, I was somewhat pleased to see the Media Whores do a little better job of trying to pin the tail on the Ass. They are so out of practice at doing their jobs that it's tough to get back into it when you've had such long paid vacations. Maybe they will wake up and smell the coffee. We can only hope, because the stench is overwhelming.

One of my favorite answers of the night:

BUSH: You know, that's, I guess, if you put it into a political context, that's the kind of thing the voters will decide next November. That's what elections are about. They'll take a look at me and my opponent and say, let's see, which one of them can better win the war on terror? Who best can see to it that Iraq emerges a free society?

And, Don, you know, if I tried to fine-tune my messages based upon polls, I think I'd be pretty ineffective. I know I would be disappointed in myself.

Then of course there's the big Conflation:

BUSH: Well, let me step back and review my thinking prior to going into Iraq.

First, the lesson of September the 11th is that when this nation sees a threat, a gathering threat, we got to deal with it. We can no longer hope that oceans protect us from harm. Every threat we must take seriously.

Saddam Hussein was a threat. He was a threat because he had used weapons of mass destruction on his own people. He was a threat because he coddled terrorists. He was a threat because he funded suiciders. He was a threat to the region. He was a threat to the United States.

What a performance, the only thing missing was Karl Rove's arm up his ass to move his lips. Pays no attention to the polls... ha ha ha ha ha...

ps. Pass it on, Dissent is Treason and we have always been at war ... with eastasia, the Preznit sez so.

Not one to be surprised, I am. The Duchess has again proved no rationalization too big for her to blog. As she ever-so-gently takes Preznit No Failures Here to task for not "getting it right" in Iraq, she offers that well, the Preznit might, you know in an oblique sort of way, have some eeensy-weeensy littlest bit of responsibilty for the situation in Iraq. You know, not too much after all he has narrow shoulders and suffers from low expectations and all. But the Duchess finds it in her heart to seemingly forgive Fearless Leader, being his first war and all.

677, Andrew.

Hmmmm, as if "Bring'em On" were not disasterous enough, it seems that after four Blackwater Consulting employees were murdered and mutilated Preznit 2Stoopid2Speak said this:

The situation in Falluja seems to have been greatly exacerbated by tough-guy posturing and wishful thinking. According to The Jerusalem Post, after the murder and mutilation of American contractors, Mr. Bush told officials that "I want heads to roll." Didn't someone warn him of the likely consequences of attempting to carry out a manhunt in a hostile, densely populated urban area? (emphasis added)

Anyhow, for the record. Krugman Rocks.

In an op-ed in the WaPo, John Kerry says a couple of things that make sense; first, that "...our use of force must be tied to a political objective more complete than the ouster of a regime", second, we need to get listen to the commanders in the field and respect their requests for manning levels and take them seriously and third that we need to get a third party (the UN) involved in a more meaningful way and have them get the Iraqis on board with a peace plan that will help rebuild and bring more stability to Iraq.

This morning, as we sit down to read newspapers in the comfort of our homes or offices, we have an obligation to think of our fighting men and women in Iraq who awake each morning to a shooting gallery in which it is exceedingly difficult to distinguish friend from foe, and the death of every innocent creates more enemies. We owe it to our soldiers and Marines to use absolutely every tool we can muster to help them succeed in their mission without exposing them to unnecessary risk. That is not a partisan proposal. It is a matter of national honor and trust.

Everyone pretty much supports the troops with the exception of the 1600 Crew. It's good to see Kerry verbalizing the support of the Democrats for the soldiers on the ground but opposing the Follies of Fearless Leader.

Well, here's another place to save money and pay for those tax-cuts. Cut federal dollars for Section 8. Yet another good "Compassionate Conservative" agenda item put forth at the expense of those the republicans can count on to either not vote or vote against them. Hence, no funding.

The Bush administration is proposing to transform a cornerstone of the nation's housing policy for the poor, replacing a federal program that provides rent vouchers to 2 million families with a system that would give broad new powers to local housing authorities.
...
Like the first one, the new proposal would extend to housing policy central ideas behind the welfare overhaul of the 1990s: reduced federal control and efforts to lessen low-income people's dependence on long-term public assistance. Like last year's, the proposal would replace a government guarantee of a specified number of rent vouchers -- currently 1.9 million -- regardless of cost with a specific sum of money for housing authorities to stretch as far as they can.
...
Liu said that, under current rules, housing authorities cannot give out more than their allotted number of vouchers, even if they have money left over. In addition, he said the program no longer would require federal rent standards for each community, giving housing authorities incentives to secure the lowest possible rents. And, he said, the government would create financial incentives for housing authorities that can move people quickly out of assisted housing or steer them toward homeownership, a major goal of Bush's housing policy.

The plan carries no requirement that housing authorities serve as many people as they do now; instead, HUD would create an acceptable range, perhaps 90 percent to 105 percent of their current number of clients, Liu said. In addition, the program no longer would be guaranteed to keep pace each year with increasing rents, but it would include a still-undefined inflation adjustment. And housing authorities could choose to focus mainly on working families with higher incomes than the typical Section 8 participant today.

It's unbelieveable that the 1600 Crew wants to remove every last social safety net offered by the Federal Government to continue to fund the richest folks in the country. When the country is utterly destroyed, what will the republicans say? They have no answers, just endless demagoguery and spin.

November can't get here fast enough.

I'm sure the 9/11 commission will be hearing about all the porno-viewing activities of the 9/11 Hijackers...it's probably going to be the focus all of the Snake-Handlers testimony. That and drinking malt beverages and eating pizza. He seems to have a real handle on all those activities.

On Aug. 9, 2001, three days after President Bush was given a memo outlining Osama bin Laden's intent to mount attacks on U.S. soil, the Justice Department completed a draft of its seven strategic goals and 36 main objectives for the next four years.

The internal document, which mirrored many of the priorities in previous memos and statements by Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, focused on drugs, violent crime and civil rights. Combating "terrorist activities" was mentioned once -- as the third objective under enforcement of criminal laws.

Aides characterize the list as a preliminary report never seen by Ashcroft and say it reflected the priorities of the previous attorney general, Janet Reno. But according to some members of the commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and others familiar with its findings, the memo reflects the low priority that Ashcroft placed on terrorism during his first seven months in office.

I do hope someone asks him how all the bin Ladens and other well-placed Saudis were "assisted" in fleeing the country within 96 hours of the attacks. By the FBI and other DoJ organizations who might have gotten useful information from them. Just a thought, that the average FBI agent would not have sent a potential material witness out of the country without pressure from the top. You know, someone like Jehovah Johnny himself.

Much has been written over the last four years about the way that the once-honorable press has forfeited their responsibilty to the American Public by becoming a house press organ for the 1600 Crew, to keep their nicknames, their access and their fat salaries. Maybe (because it's anonymous?) an op-ed in the Times shows a leeeetle bit of teeth.

It is time for the president to drop his political posture and reassure the country that his first and foremost concern is not his re-election but the safety of Americans at home and abroad. Instead of passively noting that it is the job of the 9/11 commission to figure out whether anything could or should have been done differently, he must demonstrate that he is asking those questions of himself. Instead of preparing — as the administration seems to be preparing — to blame the C.I.A. and F.B.I. for everything that went wrong, he needs to ask whether the structure of the Bush White House itself is part of the problem.
...
The "fact sheet" the White House released over the weekend along with the August 2001 briefing memo hardly shows any rethinking of the way Mr. Bush operates his government. It is instead an extraordinary exercise in bureaucratic excuse making and misdirection. It says that the notion that Osama bin Laden wanted to mount an attack on the United States was familiar information and "publicly well known." It said the presence of Qaeda agents in the United States was equally old news to the F.B.I. and the intelligence agencies. It makes it sound as if everyone knew about Osama bin Laden's danger to America except the inattentive president.

Maybe this is a sign that the media whores are going to get with it...but I doubt it. Unka Karl still assigns seats on the bus, and heaven forbid they miss out on the free food and drink on AF1.

Hey, guess what? Preznit "Bring-em On" sees no more need for any troops in Iraq, none. Guess he told you Abazaid, hey you must have Shinsekis number, call him up and see how that retirement thing is going. And all the violence, hey no biggie it's just a few renegade whacky Iraqis with RPG's and Assault Weapons.

Bush, on a trip from his ranch here to nearby Fort Hood, said he is praying daily for fewer casualties in Iraq, where nearly 50 Americans have been killed in an uprising over the past week. But Bush said he sees no need for more troops and characterized the violence in Iraq as the work of "a few people" and "violent gangs."

Funny, I can't seem to recall the date that Jenna and Barb were supposed to report to Basic. I guess that those arrest records make them "special" eh?

Apologies to well, you know. It has to be the 1600 Crews rock-solid belief that we are all as stupid as sheep. If events and their actions over the course of the last years (in and out of power) have not convinced you of that, well then, I'm sorry for your brain damage.

President Bush said yesterday that a memo he received a month before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks did not contain enough specific threat information to prevent the hijackings and "said nothing about an attack on America."

In his most extensive public remarks about a briefing he received Aug. 6, 2001, titled "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US," Bush also said that he "was satisfied that some of the matters were being looked into" by the FBI and the CIA that summer and that they would have reported any "actionable intelligence" to him.

Bush agreed with a reporter who characterized the memo as containing "ongoing" and "current threat information." But he added that if the FBI or CIA "found something, they would have reported it to me. . . . We were doing precisely what the American people expects us to do: run down every lead, look at every scintilla of intelligence and follow up on it."
...
One Democratic commission member also said yesterday that the release of the August 2001 document will renew a push by some members to gain access to scores of other similar intelligence memos provided to Bush and Clinton over the past six years, including about 40 others from the Bush administration that mention al Qaeda or bin Laden. Because of restrictions set by the White House, only three of the panel's members were able to read any PDBs directly, while the rest of the members have had to rely on a 17-page summary screened by the White House.

Wasn't the most recent spin line that there was no intelligence at all? It's always easy to remember the truth, but getting lie after lie straight is just soo much work, I guess Fearless Leader needs another vacation. Let's give him one in November, starting next January...sounds good to me.

Well if it's not outright lying, the 1600 Crew just distorts the truth, bending it until it breaks or at least is so fractured it's not recognizable. Seems the White House Science Advisor, John Marburg has a got a little problem with the truth, and it's not exactly what you might think. Seems he as an "appointed" deputy who gets to issue opinions in his name because he's a 1600 Crew functionary charged with ensuring "correct" output.

The president's science adviser issued a report last week meant to rebut accusations that the Bush administration has systematically distorted or suppressed scientific information that would conflict with its policy preferences. On several issues of real import, this detailed but ultimately unpersuasive document was little more than an attempt to put a positive spin on some flagrant examples of tailoring science to fit politics.
...
...Although the critics complained that a former Congressional staffer without professional training had been made Dr. Marburger's deputy, surely Dr. Marburger has the right to appoint a deputy he deems well qualified to improve coordination with Congress and other agencies.
...
That same ploy — taking refuge in the need for further research — was trotted out on the important issue of global warming. Dr. Marburger justified elimination of material that linked climate change to human activities from an Environmental Protection Agency report last year by asserting that the E.P.A. had not adequately addressed the complexities and that a far more expansive exposition was soon to be published as part of the administration's climate change plan. That pat explanation glided past the fact that the E.P.A. document was apt to attract attention, whereas the administration's plan calls for a lot more research in lieu of prompt action.

Capitan Von "T" Balls has just managed to top himself by printing on his quiet little corner of the world perhaps the biggest lie he's managed to pen yet. To wit: war just spontaneously "broke out" in Iraq.

That's the most outrageous thing I think I have seen him write since calling American Servicemen and Women his servants. The quote

What is there to say? We have a frigging war on and the major networks all run this? I have nothing to add. Except to say: we have a war on. We used to win them before we engaged in elaborate blame-games as to who was asleep at the wheel when they broke out.

What a tool. I'm speechless.

When they lie about the little things, it's almost a given that they'll lie about the important things as a matter of course, isn't it. If it's the 1600 Crew, take it to the bank, baby...

President Bush was told more than a month before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, that supporters of Osama bin Laden planned an attack within the United States with explosives and wanted to hijack airplanes, a government official said Friday.
...
The disclosure appears to contradict the White House's repeated assertions that the briefing the president received about the Qaeda threat was "historical" in nature and that the White House had little reason to suspect a Qaeda attack within American borders.

I guess they must be feeling a bit betrayed that they were lied to. Ya Think?

Maybe some media whores might start asking questions about oh, say, Harken Energy or the TANG again, or the land deal for the stadium in Arlington...any one of a dozen Fearless Leader Lies might be revealed as pure falsehoods. Now they have a reason to look...let the sun shine in. How about it?

So are we surprised that Preznit Cowardly Drunk is hiding out at the "ranch" with the big-game hunting lobbyists as more soldiers die to make sure he gets a shot at re-selection? He's probably dreaming about getting out the 12-gauge and blasting some birdies with Fat Tony and Friends. Anything to seem Mas Macho, because well he can't talk about whazzup in Eye-Rack.

Explosive violence in Iraq and persistent questions about the administration's handling of terrorist threats before Sept. 11, 2001, have plunged President Bush into one of the most difficult moments of his presidency, as he seeks to maintain public confidence in his leadership while facing what experts say are mostly unattractive options to put U.S. policy on track.

In the face of these challenges, Bush has yielded the stage, remaining largely out of sight at his Texas ranch as others in his administration explain his policies. Bush's silence in the face of mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq and concerns about the administration's timetable for transferring power to the Iraqis has brought criticism from Democrats and Republicans alike.

I'm betting the Easter Sunday Piety Quotient is up there about 1 Zillion Percent tomorrow. [retch]

In the 1600 Crews rush to prove that they were all-Taliban and all Al-Qaeda hating all time from the inauguration onward they have forgotten (Condi-Liar take note, please) that records of their lies exist, like this:

Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. terrorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you. All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously.

That's the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today. The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that "rogue regime" for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. So, too, by the Taliban's estimation, are most human activities, but it's the ban on drugs that catches this administration's attention.

Never mind that Osama bin Laden still operates the leading anti-American terror operation from his base in Afghanistan, from which, among other crimes, he launched two bloody attacks on American embassies in Africa in 1998.

During the April 2001 trip, however – just months before the 9-11 attacks - Rohrabacher met privately with Taliban Foreign Minister Mullah Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil. Wakil on the fringes of the conference, which Norquist and Saffuri also attended.

Wakil reportedly asked Rohrabacher to lobby the Bush administration for an increase in foreign aid to Afghanistan, apparently in exchange for a Taliban pledge to allow U.S. oil company UNOCAL to build a pipeline to bring oil from land-locked Central Asia to Pakistan and India. The pipeline project, as well as political support for the Taliban, were earlier championed by the Clinton administration.

Preznit Running Away has to be defended by everyone else but ... himself. Well it's a characteristic of the weak and shallow-minded I guess.

With much at stake for the president, Rice appeared composed and unruffled even as members challenged her responses and accused her of filibustering with long answers. Rice carried the responsibility of defending Bush's credibility on the issue he has made the cornerstone of his re-election campaign. (emphasis added)

I wonder how much pressure is emanating from the Crawfish of Crawford to stop the Japanese Prime Minister, Koizumi from pulling the Japanese contingent out of Iraq. This can't be playing well in the Land of the Rising Sun.

TV pictures aired in the Middle East by the Al-Jazeera satellite network and rebroadcast during prime time in Japan showed the three Japanese hostages two aid workers and a journalist wide-eyed and moaning in terror as their black-clad captors held knives to their throats, shouting God is Great in Arabic.

The Japanese government called the abductions ''unforgivable'' but said they did not justify withdrawal of its 530 troops doing reconstruction work in the south. It was not clear when the three were captured.

I also wonder if Koizumi will survive politcally if these three don't get out alive.

In the midst of all the bullshit and stench from Pilate on the Potomac, we forget to stop and check out the best things...like the ever-awesome Dave Niewart at Orcinus. He has a piece up today on the 10 year-anniversary of the death of Kurt Cobain, but it's really more. It's a great piece on Cobain and Rock and Roll. It ought to be in Rolling Stone. But I'm glad he put it on his site, 'cause I don't read RS anymore (I remember what it looked like in SF, when it was good in the 60's ...yeah, I'm a geezer).

Go check it out, and FWIW, I agree with him about Wild, Innocent and the "E" Street Shuffle.

The Duchess:

...The president needs to tell the people this. His failure to communicate what is actually going on, why we're there, what we're doing, and what the stakes are is the prime current fault of the administration. We need a real speech and a thorough explanation of what is going on. We need an honest, candid, clear war-president. Where is he?

So is it surprising that the 1600 Crew hubris extends even to the 9/11 commission hearings? No. If this is the Condi act in public, can you imagine what the Private Puppet Show will look like?

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice is not expected to apologize to victims' families today as she defends President Bush's handling of the al-Qaeda threat in sworn testimony before the Sept. 11 commission.
...
Two weeks ago, former counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke made a dramatic apology, saying he and the government ``failed'' the families. But in her two hours before the independent commission, Rice will insist Bush and his administration took the terror threat seriously and had plans in place to fight al-Qaeda.

It's just ruining Preznit Long Vacation's week. After retreating to Crawford to work in setting the presidential record for most vacation time in a US presidency, it looks like Commander Codpiece might make an appearance or two to tell some more lies about Iraq and his mythical support for the War on Terra™, I wonder if that "Mission Accomplished" banner is stored in Crawford, or has now been classified?.

A week of escalating violence in Iraq, accompanied by growing numbers of U.S. casualties and gruesome images on television and in newspapers, threatens to erode public confidence in President Bush and redraw the political calculus of the impact of the war on terrorism in the presidential election.
...
"There's a lot of reasons this is not Vietnam," he added. "There are so many inaccurate analogies being drawn, but the one that has the most resonance to contemporary events is the credibility gap between what a president says and what is happening."
...
The president stayed out of sight at his ranch in Crawford, Tex., but events have played havoc with his schedule. Originally, Bush planned to remain out of view until he attends Easter services on Sunday, but aides acknowledged that was untenable at such a momentous time. Now they are planning an Easter Sunday speech at nearby Fort Hood, according to aides, and a possible appearance Friday.
...
John Mueller, a professor at Ohio State University and an authority on war and public opinion, said the uprising in Iraq is "potentially a debacle and a disaster" in terms of domestic support for the war. "We've heard about five times that we've turned the corner," he said. "We've continued to get this spin, which is fine if it's more or less true. Presidents frequently try to boost support for things by talking, but people don't necessarily buy it" without seeing improvements.

I wonder how some of those folks even look themselves in the mirror everyday. I guess that lack of conscience or pure ambition might factor into it. Too bad good young Americans are dying for their questionable characters.

The way that the Generals are talking at the Five O'Clock Follies at Centcom, in Baghdad, and politicians are running off at the gob in DC you'd think that all the events of the 60's were some kind of historical fiction. Phrases like

"We must win," said Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore. "We must not have the will of the American people broken by the naysayers."

Myers said the fighting came in two broad categories. West of Baghdad in cities such as Ramadi and Fallujah, the main opposition is "former regime loyalists," including supporters of former president Saddam Hussein, and anti-American foreign fighters loyal to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
...
It's unclear whether al-Sadr's militia is the only group fighting in those areas, Myers said.

While those attacking U.S. and coalition forces share al-Sadr's anti-American philosophy, there's no evidence of nationwide coordination of the fighting, Myers said.

"It's not a Shiite uprising. Sadr has a very small following," Myers said.

It doesn't, unless you are either lying through your teeth, or just making it up as you go along...behaviour we have certainly seen before from the 1600 Crew and Fearless Leader. Good on-the-ground intelligence has been at premium in Iraq for years...what makes it any different now? Nothing; the Neocons just trot out the Magic 8-Ball, shake it and toss away the lives of Americans...after all, it's not them in Iraq, is it?

Sullivan takes it on himself to help us decide if Commander Codpiece is too religious. I'm guessing that he must have just gotten the transcript of the debate where the Half-wit in Chief was shilling for Jesus. I'm also just guessing, but I might suppose that Preznit No Turkee is pretty much in the christo-fascist fundie category Andrew. But hey, thanks for playing. All that money on them fancy schoolbooks, what a waste.

So to paraphrase the end of Sullivan's "money quote" today: If you're Andrew Sullivan, we're pretty sure you're nuts.

Thanks, I'll be here all week...try the Chilean Sea Bass and tip your waitress.

This is really disturbing. The war on the noun can't be helped much by this.

"The government says al Qaeda is over there, but that is only because of American pressure," declared Zakim Khan, an elder of the Kabarkhel clan, surrounded by armed men as he spoke. "There is no al Qaeda. There are no foreign terrorists. The army is bombing the homes and families of anyone who has a beard. If they keep doing these attacks, the entire tribal belt will rise up in resistance."
...
"Everyone wants sharia to be implemented here. We have no problem with this so-called al Qaeda," he added. "We know America is against Islam, and we need someone to defend us."

The tribal traditions of these folks are going to long outlast any Pakistani government, all the way forward to the 12th Century with assault rifles this time around.

So it's the 10% solution. The runner-up on "The Apprentice" will get a one-week gig from KFC. Will they get the secret herbs and spices recipe too?

Fried-chicken giant KFC thinks that the runner-up on NBC's The Apprentice would make a perfect fast-food employee, Zap2it.com reports.

But rather than just giving the loser a chance to ask, "Do you want mashed potatoes and gravy with that?" the company is offering him or her a limited-time high-profile gig.

The final firee among Bill, Kwame, Amy and Nick will get the chance to spend a week as the chief sales officer for KFC, with the chance to help the chain roll out its new oven-roasted chicken line.

Spending a week as CSO will be worth a $25,000 salary and a year's supply of KFC products.

The winner on The Apprentice will get a yearlong gig heading one of Donald Trump's companies.

Update: Never mind. When I read that again as "firee" as in one who gets fired, I should have caught it. After all, it happens all the time in the 1600 Crew economy...just a weird way with words, I guess.

Well color me just amazed. The 1600 Crew making politics into policy:

Democrat presidential candidate John Kerry suggested Tuesday that President Bush may have set the June 30 deadline for turning over control of Iraq to interim government for political reasons.
...
"If all we do is make war against the Iraqi people and continue an American occupation fundamentally without a clarity to who and how sovereignty is being turned over, we have a very serious problem from the long run here and I think this administration is just walking dead center down into that trap," Kerry said.

"This is another example of John Kerry playing politics with the war on terror," Schmidt said. "The president has made clear that he will not cut and run from Iraq."

And on a more interesting note, when Kerry spoke, here was a reaction in the crowd:

In the Republican stronghold of Cincinnati, Kerry touted his pledge to create 10 million new jobs if elected. His rally was interrupted by about a dozen people near the front of the crowd who shouted and clapped flip-flops above their heads — a reference to Republican claims that Kerry has changed his position on Iraq, taxes and other issues.

As his supporters shouted at the protesters to go home, Kerry said they were "rude" and sought to turn the flip-flopper label back onto Bush. He said Bush had broken promises to create jobs and fund education and had changed his position on whether national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) should testify before the Sept. 11 commission.

"I can run through the long list of broken promises of this president," Kerry said. "I mean, you want to talk about flips and flops."

There is after all, Democracy, then there's the 1600 Crew. Please do not make the error of equating them.

Well guys that Mission is Accomplished, but then y'all knew that right? We only lost another 12 Americans today. Preznit No Vacation too Long is either out fund-raising or turning in early; it's hard to tell anymore which is which. Neither have much to do with Leadership. Our Dear Old Auntie Donnie had her muzzle removed long enough to say this:

If violence in Iraq gets worse, U.S. military commanders will get the troops they need to deal with it, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, I just saw on the news tons of school children will be left behind here in Columbus, because the school district has a $65 Million dollar shortfall. They will be laying off 150 teachers, 120 instructional assistants, 50 custodians and closing and consolidating three elementary school and are still $12 million dollars short of the "cuts" they need to make.

Osama bin Laden is still free and opium production is spiking in Afghanistan.

On the bright side, major combat operations are over and the Shi'ia and Sunni factions are united for the first time in recent years; in their desire to see the US leave their country.

Oh, and did I mention that Preznit Turn in Early will be spending all of that $87 Billion and asking for more to not have any major combat operations in Iraq? Why did we invade a sovereign country again? Oh, because Fearless Leader's Daddys face was a mosaic on a hotel floor. Yeee-up.

I hope all my younger readers have space in their wallets for a draft card. I understand that the Chickenhawk Brigade is frowning on deferments this time around...they already got theirs.

Remind me again why anyone would vote for those who, ummm, take their money?

When Rep. Henry Bonilla (R-Tex.) took charge of an independent political fund called American Dream PAC in 1999, he made clear that its mission was "to give significant, direct financial assistance to first-rate minority GOP candidates."

Since then, only $48,750 -- or 8.9 percent -- of the $547,000 the southwest Texas congressman has raised for his political action committee has gone to minority office-seekers while more than $100,000 has been routed to Republican Party organizations or causes, including a GOP redistricting effort in Texas, a legal defense fund for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (Tex.) and Bonilla's reelection campaign. Most of the remainder of the money went to legal fees, fundraisers in Miami and other cities, airline tickets, hotels, catering services, consultants and salaries.
...
"The fact that this [American Dream] PAC had a mission statement and that it appeared the funds didn't follow that purpose to a degree raises the question of whether donors may have been misled," said Kent Cooper, co-founder of the campaign watchdog group PoliticalMoneyLine.

Bonilla, one of four Hispanic American Republicans in Congress, defends his PAC's record of assisting minority candidates, saying, "We did the best we could." In all, 27 minority office-seekers, predominantly Hispanic American, received money, mostly small donations. But Bonilla said it was sometimes difficult to find "good, solid minority candidates to expend the funds on."

I guess Rep. Bonilla is his own best candidate. I'm sure that there is at least one other person out of 260 or so million Americans who might share his views and like to make $150k/year and be a congressman. Too bad they won't get any DREAMPAC assistance to do it.

DesertJo over at Thousand Yard Glare has the best phrase of the year. God-inebriated. Damn, I wish I had thought of that. Thanks, DJ.

Go check it out!

I never ceased to be amazed how administration after administration seems to embrace the ideals of democracy for me and not for thee overseas. The 1600 Crew is no different, preferring the Totalitarian Generals of Pakistan to the Democracy of India.

When Secretary of State Colin Powell arrived here last month, it seemed there were no limits to the blossoming new relationship between the U.S. and India.

Hailing the "strategic partnership" recently formed between the two countries, Powell declared that the United States and India are "enjoying perhaps the best relationship that has existed between our two great democracies in many, many years--if not in history."

But then, barely 48 hours later, Powell flew to Islamabad and announced that the U.S. planned to designate India's archrival Pakistan a "major non-NATO ally."

The news hit New Delhi with the force of a bombshell.
...
Compounding the insult, the officials say, Powell didn't inform India of his intention to upgrade America's relationship with India's bitterest foe. If India is a "strategic partner" of the United States, they said, it would have been courteous to let India know about the Pakistan move.
...
India now feels the United States can't be trusted as an honest broker because the U.S. let it be known that Pakistan is the favored ally, said C. Raja Mohan, professor of South Asian studies at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University.

"For the first time, the U.S. had the trust of both sides, and there was a chance of really achieving something," he said. "But with the U.S. saying that Pakistan is a special ally, its leverage goes down."

I guess such deep thinking has escaped American Politicians for so long, they just continue to play "support the dictator" out of tradition or something. Idiots.

In a run-up to the lie-fest with VP Angina's hand up his ass in front of the 9/11 commission, Preznit All Lies No Cattle is going to claim he never knew about ... anything.

President Bush said Monday he will tell the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks that his administration lacked the information needed to prevent the terrorists from striking.

All it takes is the opening of the beer-hole and the lies fall out like ... puke.

President Bush on Monday defended his record on the economy and the war in Iraq, appearing at a North Carolina college where he praised a partnership between local business leaders and the academic community.

"Terrorists can't stand freedom," said Bush, declaring that he will "stay the course" and bring democracy to Iraq. "We're still being challenged in Iraq and the reason why is a free Iraq will be a major defeat in the cause of terror."

The president said that in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, "I had a choice to make after Saddam Hussein once again refused to disarm," adding that "I will defend America every time."

President George Bush first asked Tony Blair to support the removal of Saddam Hussein from power at a private White House dinner nine days after the terror attacks of 11 September, 2001.
According to Sir Christopher Meyer, the former British Ambassador to Washington, who was at the dinner when Blair became the first foreign leader to visit America after 11 September, Blair told Bush he should not get distracted from the war on terror's initial goal - dealing with the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

Bush, claims Meyer, replied by saying: 'I agree with you, Tony. We must deal with this first. But when we have dealt with Afghanistan, we must come back to Iraq.' Regime change was already US policy.

A word to the Princess who wants to catch the Iraqi cleric who just does not seem to like us and has been poking the Hornets Nest with a sharp stick. Your proposal that we just arrest him bears the naivete of a six year-old. If in almost three years we can't come up with Osama bin Laden, and it took over six months to smoke out Saddam, do you really we are going to come up with a highly popular young man without either a true quisling or blind luck? I could be wrong your highness, but I doubt it. You're talking about the Gang who can't shoot straight; Fearless Leader and Co. Losers til the bitter end...as events are proving daily. Is "T"-ball a different game in P-Town? I think it affects your brain..."T"ruly.

Until the other day most Americans had never heard of Blackwater Consulting. Then four of their employees were brutally murdered by a mob of Iraqis in Fallujah. The company has successfully operated below the perceptual radar of 99.99% of the American public for years, no doubt how they want it to be, and I don't blame them. All of a sudden, here they are again, in a front-page piece in the Washington Post, being not only visible but postively heroic in an almost cartoonish sense:

An attack by hundreds of Iraqi militia members on the U.S. government's headquarters in Najaf on Sunday was repulsed not by the U.S. military, but by eight commandos from a private security firm, according to sources familiar with the incident.

Before U.S. reinforcements could arrive, the firm, Blackwater Security Consulting, sent in its own helicopters amid an intense firefight to resupply its commandos with ammunition and to ferry out a wounded Marine, the sources said.

The role of Blackwater's commandos in Sunday's fighting in Najaf illuminates the gray zone between their formal role as bodyguards and the realities of operating in an active war zone. Thousands of armed private security contractors are operating in Iraq in a wide variety of missions and exchanging fire with Iraqis every day, according to informal after-action reports from several companies.

In Sunday's fighting, Shiite militia forces barraged the Blackwater commandos, four MPs and a Marine gunner with rocket-propelled grenades and AK-47 fire for hours before U.S. Special Forces troops arrived. A sniper on a nearby roof apparently wounded three men. U.S. troops faced heavy fighting in several Iraqi cities that day.

A great summary of the 1600 Crew Tax Policy:

...If Bush gets what he wants, the income tax will become a misnomer—it will really be a salary tax.
...
By drastically favoring investment income over salary, fees and other "earned income," Bush would make it harder for people who start out with nothing to earn their way up the economic ladder, because they'd pay full taxes on almost everything they make, but he'd shower rewards on people who have already made it to the top rungs.

Andrew should never be allowed near any documents that resemble foreign policy. Either he's just making stuff up as usual, or making it up to cover for what he did or didn't say on Hardball (sorry, I missed it).

Sullivan, of course bought into the whole Invade-for-any-reason casus belli(s) that were proposed by his bold hero, and flogs one at least daily, including the "intent to think about WMD-PRA" as complete justifications for the conduct of military operations. Well all that and his favorite; 9/11. His sang his early praises for the fabulous bold operational stance after the invasion as he re-typed the NeoCon blastfaxes. Laying waste to the professional military and asserting the Divine Right of Rummy to conduct "shock and awe" which would cause the acquiensce and extended grovelling of the Iraqi People as first, Viceroy Jay Garner and then Jerry Bremer came marching into Baghdad. It's instructive to remember that other than homosexuality, a will to empire is practically built in those DNA-sequences possesed by the Duchess. Even had his mouth been saying no, his mind would have been going "yessssss, Empire at last (again) and I'm a part of it!".

So he now believes that there might not be sufficient troops to get control with in the timframe demanded by out "instant-fix" society (and election-year politics) . He doesn't mention how the truly stealthy (but a most important part) of the handover - bringing the more provincial players onto the stage will be accomplished, you know the ones who want to begin their negotiation for a place in the "peace talks" by starting with "all sharia, all the time" and not moving much from there. I doubt anyone who is a player on either side wants to piss off these hardliners, just to begin a civil war over head-scarves and liquor sales. But they might.

So Andy, you have 90 days to boldly go where Fearless Leader has never gone before, admitting there were bad problems with the invasion, turning to the UN for assistance on their terms, which might at least begin dialogs closed til now. Thus offering a stunning dose of humility to the 1600 Crew, and they loves their piety and humility in a pew on Sunday.

Oh, yeah and a good start, what about sending Chalabi & Co to Leavanworth for some R&R? Lot's of Iraqis might take that act as a show of good faith alone.

I may not agree with what Kos said in his diary comment, but then I am appalled by the loss of any human life, even folks who choose the jobs offered by the "privatization" of the US Military. I can't speak for Kos, but I think he is too, his comment summed up and represented his view of the world; it was his viewpoint, and I don't have to agree with it, but I will respect it. This waste being perpetrated by the 1600 Crew in furtherance and cover-up of the lies told to invade Iraq are way over-the-top. Kos made a remark he apologized for, in his way and with words he chose to use. It's more than many on the right have chosen to do after making offensive, stupid utterances. Here are some of those:

... "My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."

Ann Coulter

"I tell people don't kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus - living fossils - so we will never forget what these people stood for."

Rush Limbaugh, Denver Post, 12-29-95

I suppose it would be considered lacking in nuance to nuke the Sunni Triangle.

But so goes the unanimous vote around my household - and I'm betting millions of others - in the aftermath of what forevermore will be remembered simply as "Fallujah."

Wouldn't it be lovely were justice so available and so simple? If we were but creatures like those zoo animals we witnessed gleefully jumping up and down after stomping, dragging, dismembering and hanging the charred remains of American civilians whose only crime was to try to help them.

These are the times that try Americans' souls.

Kathleen Parker

Then of course there's one of my favorites from Sullivan, which Atrios just happens to have posted today, and I blogged a while back as part of post on a Sully commenter:

I'm sorry but I pay for those soldiers to fight in a volunteer army. They are servants of people like me who will never fight. Yes, servants of civil masters. And they will do what they are told by people who would never go to war. That's called a democracy.

The Duchess of Dupont

Chirp.

I would not normally applaud the former Governor of Virginia for much, but it seems that he left a legacy that Preznit Big Fool will find hard to wriggle away from...

In May of 2001, one of the very few public figures who genuinely raised a warning about the threat al-Qaida and other terrorist groups pose to America won an audience with the new vice president, Dick Cheney. The public figure was a Republican stalwart, former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore, head of an obscure commission that had just issued a report six months earlier, “Toward a National Strategy for Combating Terrorism.”

In its executive summary, released in December 2000, Gilmore wrote: “The potential for terrorist attacks inside the borders of the United States is a serious emerging threat. … Because the stakes are so high, our nation’s leaders must take seriously the possibility of an escalation of terrorist violence against the homeland.”

Gilmore’s panel studied the problem for two years before the attacks, but he felt the threat was being ignored. “The political and media people had nothing but Chandra and Monica on their minds,” he told me. “Our hearings were open, public events. Not once in two years did a major media outlet cover them.”
...
One of the Republican members of the commission, John Lehman, who served as Reagan’s secretary of the Navy, told the American Spectator that “you can trace it back as far as the Reagan administration, but it really gained steam in the [first] Bush administration — the increasing dominance of decision-making by lawyers,” he said.
...
Did the sudden changing of the guard — from Clinton/Gore to Bush/Cheney — change this attitude?

“That’s not my sense at all,” says Gilmore. “It wasn’t seen as directly threatening to the United States and other foreign policy matters that were urgent.

The report, for instance, criticizes the administration for making the intelligence problem worse by creating new agencies with overlapping jurisdictions — the Terrorist Threat Integration Center (TTIC) and the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection (IAIP) office.

“The very fact of the TTIC’s creation has caused confusion within the federal government and among state and local governments about the respective roles of TTIC and DHS,” the report says. “Moreover, neither the TTIC nor the DHS has gotten very far in putting in place the necessary staff or framework for analyzing information and sharing it broadly among the relevant federal, state and local agencies.”

You all know the one I'm talking about. How long before SCLM is portrayed as "pessimistic" by the 1600 Crew and it's propagandists? Remember, that somewhere in Iraq a school was opened or at least repainted by the lowest bidder (if anyone bid for the job at all).

Supporters of an anti-American cleric rioted in four Iraqi cities Sunday, battling coalition troops in the worst unrest since the spasm of looting and arson immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites). At least 22 Iraqis, eight U.S. troops and one Salvadoran soldier died.

Sunday's violence — along with the unrelated killings of two Marines in Anbar province — pushed the U.S. death toll to at least 610.
...
Protesters, some dressed all in black or waving green banners, raced toward the fighting in Najaf as heavy gunfire echoed through the city. One man stood on a bridge, a rocket-propelled grenade launcher at the ready.

The riots were ignited by the arrest on Saturday of an aide to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, known to his reverent followers as `al-Sayed,' or master.

"I am happy to die for al-Sayed," 21-year-old Ali Hussein said after being shot in the arm during fighting with troops in Najaf. "Take me to see my mother first then let me die."

As long as the CPA and it's stateside masters the 1600 Crew continue to portray this in the black and white terms of C-Plus Augustus irrational worldview, we lose, and everyday is just another step on the road to the construction of another Wall on the Mall.

Well, Preznit No Credibility always jokes he's not running for Preznit of any other country...ha ha. Good thing I guess, here's a little sample of how well respected he is with one of our closest allies.

More than three-quarters of German business and political leaders favour Democrat John Kerry for U.S. president over George W. Bush, according to a survey by a leading business magazine.

The survey published on Wednesday of 508 business and political leaders by Capital magazine found that only 12 percent prefer Bush while 76 percent want to see the Democrat challenger win the November election.

So the 1600 Crew Prude Patrol is on the march again. It seems that the FCC aka Kulture Central is now going to "take on" those naughty bits in the daytime "stories" (or soaps to the less-edumacted out there).

Daytime soap operas, long a haven of scantily clad bodies in steamy sex situations, could pick up some new viewers - members of the FCC.

FCC Commissioner Michael Copps hinted yesterday that the agency would expand its efforts to clean up the airwaves to cover the racy TV daytime dramas, TV Week reported on its Web site yesterday.

Copps, a leading advocate of the recent crackdown on indecency, told reporters he had stumbled onto some daytime soaps and was surprised by the content.

"It was pretty steamy for the middle of the afternoon," Copps said.

I'm pretty sure that the Soaps are pretty big money-makers for the networks...I doubt that they are going to be too thrilled with the 1600 Crew sticking their fingers into their checkbooks and picking their collective pockets here.

I'm reminded that the Nazis made a point to remove "decadent influences" from the popular culture of Germany in the 30's as they solidified their grip on the German people...I leave it to you to judge whether history is trying for a mulligan. These people are dangerous...in ways this country has never seen before.

Even in political season, some things transgress the pale and Preznit Desertion crosses the line pretty blithely. Which for a coward is pretty easy to do. Witness:

Hours after the gruesome pictures of an Iraqi mob mauling the charred corpses of four American contract workers sped around the world, President Bush swept into a huge ballroom in one of Washington's most affluent neighborhoods.

It was his final big fund-raiser, and hundreds of his supporters were gathered around $2,000-a-seat tables, picking at salads and catching up on Washington gossip.

Mr. Bush seemed all smiles. He did speak about Iraq, but not of the day's events. The White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, had denounced them on Mr. Bush's behalf as "horrific, despicable attacks."

Yet Mr. Bush's first reference to the country was a laugh line about his opponent, Senator John Kerry.

"Someone asked Senator Kerry why he had voted against the $87 billion funding bill to help our troops in Iraq," Mr. Bush said, repeating a routine that is now a highlight of his campaign stump speech.

"And here's what he said: `I actually did vote for the $87 billion — before I voted against it.' "

Laughter swept through the room. Mr. Bush paused and said, "Clears things up, doesn't it?"

There was once an old joke about Richard Nixon...that the best part of him was running down his mommy's leg...in the case of Fearless Leader, it's really, really true...he's about a half a spoon o'sperm short of being a decent a human being.

Dead soldiers..well, they're not our kind of people
Missing Weapons of Mass Destruction...ha ha
Stock Portfolio going in the Dumper...Quick Invade!!
A Bad Man insulted my daddy...WAR!!!

This 1600 Crew foreign policy summary brought to you for free.

Gas tax or no gas tax? For a guy who does not drive, he sure has a lot of opinions. And he sure is into self-inflicting wounds. His latest screed is really kind of amusing in that nuthouse kind of way that appeals to others of the same mindset. His quotation of Gregory Gregorovich Mankiw, that well-known socialist economist of the 1600 Crew has to leave you wondering WTF, over? Mankiw has now gone on record apparently favoring a gas-tax hike (how long before Rove shit-cans him?) and Sully agrees. Not seeing that this again leaves him open to exactly what he accuses Kerry of doing: being on both sides of an issue. Not that that's a new one; but it again underscores his dogmatic belief in Fearless Leader & Co, right or wrong...even when they contradict themselves he makes excuses for them. But then that's what makes him consistant isn't it, irrational discourse and pixie-dust possibilities.

It's funny that even when Sullivan is close to right, he's out in left field...and remaining there without any idea what position he's playing.

From the Asia Times:

In Vietnam, Washington faced a similar predicament. There was an increasingly organized and brash guerrilla force preventing the United States from bringing stability to South Vietnam. Due to the massive technology gap, Vietnamese guerrillas and the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) stood little chance of defeating the US militarily. Just the same, however, Washington stood little chance of defeating the Vietnamese guerrilla movement militarily. While US forces killed and maimed large numbers of the Viet Cong, they never addressed the fundamental land and wealth inequality that led to the popularity of the Viet Cong and the National Liberation Front in the countryside.

The effective guerrilla tactics of the Viet Cong and the NVA were a military strategy in and of themselves, aimed at sapping the political will from the US public. This was well known at the time and was often articulated in the speeches of president John F Kennedy. Always aware of US public opinion, Vietnamese military and guerrilla leaders worked to undermine Washington. When they launched the massive Tet Offensive in more than 100 different cities of South Vietnam on January 31, 1968 - successfully storming and occupying the US Embassy in Saigon - the attack was orchestrated shortly after US military leaders and politicians claimed that the war in Vietnam was almost over.

Wanna make a buck? Vote republican, if you can afford it. The hyper-patriots of the republican party are screwing us all...check it out:

With sales up 5 percent last year, Merck & Co. was not satisfied: To hold down costs, the pharmaceutical giant shed 3,200 jobs as 2003 drew to a close, and announced that an additional 1,200 positions would go this year.

But Merck's picture abroad was quite different. It made 1,300 new hires in 2003 outside the United States, on top of the 900 brought on the year before. Company documents indicate that Merck had a cumulative $18 billion in foreign earnings untaxed by the end of last year, $3 billion more than in 2002. And the company said it had no intention of ever paying U.S. taxes on that burgeoning sum.

Now that's a Cash-and-Carry Government, it just lets you carry your cash right on out of the country.

I remember reading about these cards, and being told by a USMC Major who had recently returned from VN in 1972 about them. Here's one. How long before they start issuing these to the MAC-I?

In an era when one of the major disappointments is the treatment of Veterans by the Chickenhawk Adminstration this is an incredible story.

Army Pvt. Jacob Brown's leg was mangled, his wrist mashed and his spleen crushed.
And Brown is one lucky young man.
That's because he is still alive, he has a lovely new wife and he's from Danville.
Brown, 22, returned home three weeks ago to a city that has helped him
find a job and a home filled with new furniture. If city leaders have their way, every Danville veteran will enjoy the same homecoming through what is believed to be the first program of its kind in the nation.
"I never imagined that people back home would care so much about my problems," said Brown, who was injured two years ago during combat training in Germany. "Never in my wildest dreams did I think people would pitch together and help me out so much."

And thanks to Jillian for emailing me the article.

Here's the text of the 1600 Crew blackmail order to the 9/11 commission. What a bunch of asshats.

"The Commission must agree in writing that it will not request additional public testimony from any White House official, including Dr. Rice. The National Security Advisor is uniquely situated to provide the Commission with information necessary to fulfill its statutory mandate. Indeed, it is for this reason that Dr. Rice privately met with the Commission for more than four hours on February 7, fully answered every question posed to her, and offered additional private meetings if necessary. Despite the fact that the Commission will therefore have access to all information of which Dr. Rice is aware, the Commission has nevertheless urged that public confidence in the work of the Commission would be enhanced by Dr. Rice appearing publicly before the Commission. Other White House officials with information relevant to the Commission's inquiry do not come within the scope of the Commission's rationale for seeking public testimony from Dr. Rice. These officials will continue to provide the Commission with information through private meetings, briefings, and documents, consistent with our previous practice."

Asshats.

1. [retch]
   
2. More Plame
   
3. Ah. Yeah. Right.
   
4. Bad Science Central...located at the corner of Dollarsign and Lobby St
   
5. Right ON!
   
6. Sully's Servants
   
7. Urban Decay?
   
8. ah, sorry
   
9. Snark-a-liscious
   
10. republican-speak for the new millenium