I told you so Part I : The American groundswell is here

If the events in Madison, Wisconsin, still unfolding as I write this, say anything, it's that you love being wrong. For years now, I've been saying that this was coming, that when the American middle-class really started feeling the love of shipping jobs overseas, the rollback of the right to collective bargaining, the obscene accumulation of wealth amidst growing poverty and millions of mortgage foreclosures, that people were going to rise up and protest.

This is the only thing that ever works in a democracy such as ours: to stand and be counted and to demand one's rights and better conditions. Nothing has been achieved for the average person in human history without demands, it's a law of politics, and therefore, part of the laws of nature. The last time I checked, the laws of physics were still holding.

The walkout of Democratic state representatives in Madison, Wisconsin, the state capital, wasn't the genuine beginning of all of this, it became real when the public came out in the tens-of-thousands. Politicians are rarely the solution in this nation and it has been the working-class who has saved the day more than a few times, even for the ones who did all the wrecking of civil society and the economy, again and again, until it was finally reined-in with the New Deal in the 1930s and the rise of labor.

No one knows where this train is heading, but the fact is, the groundswell has begun, some of its genesis is owed to Wikileaks, but more importantly, to misrule by both major political parties. Consider the walkout of the Democratic representatives in Wisconsin as, yes, an act (one-of -three, refer to your program) of political theater. When it comes down to it, they too will have to be forced by the public into pushing laws that allow for an expansion of collective bargaining and unions, generally.

I won't recount the lies emanating from the right, they're too wacky to even consider seriously.

What's been incredible about all of this is the stupidity of the Libertarian-leaning Republican Governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker. By following the GOP game-plan of going after state worker unions, he also set his sights on the Policeman's Union. He might have had the Wisconsin State Police in his pocket, using them as goons to physically force Democratic lawmakers to return to create a quorum (the minimum number of reps needed to proceed on a vote on a bill). This isn't just un-American, it's illegal and obviously unconstitutional under our system of law.

Governor Walker, then, is a criminal and should be told to resign. If he doesn't resign, he should be dragged before either a grand jury, or an investigating committee. This could be done at either the state or federal level. President Obama is expected to stay out of the battle altogether and cannot be counted on as a friend of labor, let alone the average person. And where is the First Lady?

Apparently, she's no Eleanor Roosevelt and more a Nancy Reagan or a Hillary Clinton, a ghost-bouffant bourgeois who might slip and tell us all to eat cake. Somehow, I think she's smarter than that and smarter than her husband.

There are people far less intelligent: the people who have been telling me for years that this day would never come. I told you so, I really did, and you wouldn't listen because you never will. You have sold your soul for so little that it's a mockery of human life--or even tube worms that swarm around the vents at the bottom of the Atlantic...

Whoremonger GOP Sen. David Vitter suggests bailing out BP oil while the "opposition" party offers nothing...

Louisiana--This steaming pile of excrement (both of them constituting one turd) really has no shame and supports the contention that most abortion opponents should in fact have been aborted. Don't get me wrong: Louisianans keep reelecting this piece-of-shit, so they deserve him and the mess in the Gulf of Mexico, and for many other reasons I don't even care to go into here since I'm not being paid for this shit...

The fact of the matter is, both major parties have been feeding at the trough of oil and energy company donations for decades, over a century. Today, Vitter's ostensible and also compromised political rival, Democratic House Rep. Charlie Melancon, got choked up over...his political future, but at least he's lashing-out at BP and Vitter.

Why should he worry? As profoundly stupid as voters in Louisiana are, this gusher in the Gulf could be a game changer on a fundamental level. Both candidates are incumbents. This happened on their watch too, and fool me several hundred times stops being charming in the face of an environmental catastrophe brought about by cronyism and corruption in the unseemly relationship between politics and business in America.

Like Vitter, Melancon's taken his share of contributions from Big Oil: according to Opensecrets.org, a site that tracks the campaign contributions of American politicians at the national level, Melancon received $65,000 in donations from "oil & gas" for the 2009-2010 election cycle alone, coming from "individuals" and "PACs." This makes his connections to Big Oil and the energy industries almost similar to Vitter's, but a closer look at the details makes it plain that Vitter is the largest recipient by many miles. Still, I'm not sure Melancon can be trusted either. The Republican's record speaks for itself, and it's monaural, but Louisianans are a backward lot, so he could still win, and his 78 might be a hit. Donations are currently easy to track, but there have been developments that will endanger this. Why do you think SCOTUS was dragged-in to repair the hemorrhaging of information that anyone with a pulse can obtain in just a few minutes? This is a bad political generation in crisis, a bad corporate order falling, and they're all scared.

But if you look at what Vitter and Melancon received for 2009-2010 from Big Oil and Energy, it's about the same proportionally. That's why we call it a political crisis. Other sources of money coming from Big Oil and Energy might be hidden within the individuals and PACs and with the recent Supreme Court ruling that allows corporations the same rights to privacy in political donations as a member of the public, we're going to see even more of this, albeit discovering the sources is going to be harder than ever, if not impossible in some cases. The courts might be the only way to obtain many of them in the future.

However, Vitter has raised significantly more than Melancon by at least $7 million, begging the question of whether one comes cheaper than the other; his success in raising so much begs the question of how significant Louisiana is to the GOP and corporate strategies. David says he's a populist, a wealthy man of the people who sides with giant corporations. Vitter had the poker-faced temerity to release this statement on April 30th of this year, just ten days after the Gulf gusher began, an unsurprising anti-government message he's known for, but he'll reverse himself in another context, rest assured:

U.S. Sen. David Vitter today inspected the damage caused by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and met with federal, state and local officials to discuss the ongoing cleanup efforts. Following his discussions, he urged Cabinet members and state and local officials in the meetings to streamline the cleanup efforts of BP and federal and state agencies.

“Based on the latest briefings and discussions with the federal and state parties involved, BP is spread too thin in trying to both cap the well and remediate the damage along the coastline, producing an inefficient and ineffective response,” said Vitter. “I urge all involved to allow BP to focus all of its efforts on building a dome and drilling a relief well at the source of the spill so that federal and state officials can focus their efforts on protecting and cleaning up the coast.”

Earlier today, Vitter took an aerial tour of the affected area in a U.S. Coast Guard aircraft with Homeland Security Sec. Janet Napolitano and other officials, and he later attended a meeting in Robert with Napolitano and Interior Sec. Ken Salazar, along with other federal, state and local officials and representatives from the Coast Guard. Vitter was also set to meet with representatives of the Louisiana fishing industry to discuss ways to mitigate the damage to Louisiana fisheries.

“Our prayers continue to go out to the families and co-workers of the victims of the explosion,” said Vitter. “We’re facing a very serious situation along the Gulf Coast.”

In his meetings with Sec. Napolitano and other officials, Vitter also urged them to do whatever is necessary to help those most directly affected, including Louisiana fishermen and oystermen. Vitter intends to offer them any support they need from the federal level and will continue monitoring the efforts to protect Louisiana’s coast and the state’s valuable fishing habitats. (vitter.senate.gove, 04.30.2010)

Louisiana Democrats are calling the bill a "bailout" for BP, which isn't far off, but they share the blame. Melancon has raised over $2 million so far, not exactly making him come off as a populist candidate either, but in fairness, he's gotten a majority of his donations from "individuals." Soon, many of those "individuals" are going to be corporations, and it's going to be under the table and out of view of a pesky and meddlesome public. Candidates like Vitter and an embattled GOP will need those "back doors" to save themselves as time grinds on.

As an aside, one of Melancon's single largest donors is Comcast, not exactly a liberal or socially responsible firm by any stretch of the imagination. I leave it to the reader to dig deeper into the respective voting records of both candidates, it ain't pretty.

But Vitter's behaviors are truly offensive. Just thirteen days after the April 30th statements, he and Alabama's Republican Senator Jeff Sessions introduced this bill at the behest of the oil corporations and the GOP leadership since they're the party piss-boys (Vitter was Karl Rove's errand boy during Katrina, ensuring that little aid reached the state over partisan grounds):

The Oil Spill Response and Assistance Act, introduced today by the two conservative Republicans, would create a new liability cap equal to the last four quarters of the responsible party's profits or double the current limit of $75 million, whichever is greater. In this case, according to the senators, the liability limit for BP would be $20 billion under their statute. The liability is in addition to the responsibility to pay for the cleanup of the spill.

The measure, sponsored by two longstanding supporters of offshore drilling, would place an even greater potential burden on BP than legislation sponsored by Sens. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and Frank Lautenberg, R-N.J, who are unsparing critics of offshore drilling, which would lift the cap to $10 billion. ...But Lautenberg said the floor of $150 million in the Vitter-Session bill is "too low." He said he is going to attempt to add his measure today as an amendment to the financial services bill being debated by the Senate. ("David Vitter, Jeff Sessions offer bill to raise liability cap after Gulf Oil spill," NOLA.com, 05.13.10)

Nice, but BP should pay for it all. Once again, we get a doublespeak presentation that's meant to create the appearance that they're actually raising the cap and doing something when they're clearly not. Were that the case, "cap" wouldn't be anywhere in the language. Antitrust laws exist on the books. If only Attorney General Eric Holder and the president would uphold some of them.

“Louisiana Senator David Vitter wants BP bailed out,” The Kentucky Democrat, 05.28.10: http://kydem.blogspot.com/2010/05/louisiana-senator-david-vitter-wants-bp.html

“REPRESENTATIVE (D-LA), Charlie Melancon,” Opensecrets.org, 2010 cycle: http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=n00026840

“SENATOR (R-LA), David Vitter,” Opensecrets.org, 2010 cycle: http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00009659&cycle=2010

"David Vitter, Jeff Sessions offer bill to raise liability cap after Gulf Oil spill," NOLA.com, 05.13.10: http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/vitter_sessions_offer_bill_to.html

Karl Rove, a pussy? Who woulda thunk? Me.

Word has it that Karl Rove's new book has a stunning admission: that he got his ass kicked by a girl as a kid! I know, hard to imagine considering he already looks like a muppet disguised as Heinrich Himmler (fuck you and the "law" you rode in on, Mr. Godwin), wrapped in an enigma, smothered in danish.

But look...OK, don't look, especially if you've eaten already, fuck me.

Is Karl Rove not the poster child for the squirming pathology that is most Republicans and the worst-of-the-worst in the corporate world? Yes, yes, rumor has it that Karl is gay, but does it really matter in the final analysis (and let's remember that "anal" is part of the word)? We all know that most of the last 30 years of Republican domination of the national dialog is hate-based, but it also has a weird revanchist quality underlying it (note that "lying" is a part of the word, made flesh). It's also not especially sexy and reeks of the socially-retarded dork.

Can this piece have more digressions? Yes. So, Rove gets his ass kicked-in decades ago by a little girl. Do you think he had it coming? First, let's recall that this was a little girl, they were both nine, and it fifty years ago. Could he be more of a pussy? Sure. Why would a little girl want to kick his ass in? Keep in mind that he horse-laughingly titled his Book of Lies (fuck you Crowley!) Courage and Consequence, which considering this "revelation," makes it more bizarre and funnier than Mein Kampf. "Revanchist"? Yes, he lost masculine territory to the liberal skirts, and so, he would "get even" with them and "liberal America" after that fated day in 1960 when she punched him in the nose, and rightly so. Yes, the die had been cast, the gauntlet thrown down, and life would never, and could ever, be the same. It was war. Never mind that he was dumb enough to support Nixon at nine, so we have to assume his parents did poor job rearing him...

New York Magazine writes:

At age 9--and already a political nerd--he became a spirited supporter of Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential smackdown against John F. Kennedy. So intense was his devotion that he landed a coveted Nixon bumper sticker and displayed it proudly on his bicycle basket -- until a little girl in his neighborhood who favored JFK beat the stuffing out of him, bloodying his nose and ego. "I've never liked losing a political fight since," Rove writes. ("Karl Rove Was Once Beaten Up By a Girl," New York Magazine, Daily Intel, 03.06.2010)

You gotta be fucking kidding me. If you're that into politics at nine, you're not just a "geek," but violently retarded. OK, I love women, and I would never admit to this in a million years, seriously, that a little girl kicked my ass. Yet, Rove queerly thinks that this little anecdote of his is normal and jokingly wears it as some kind of badge of courage as though it were some epic moment in his life...uh, erm, point taken, but now we know when his and his supporters' emotional development stopped.

I keep telling my friends this over and over again and have written the same here many times: scoundrels are perverse and they'll tell you everything lame, pathetic, and damning about themselves if you give it time and just watch and listen with the right eyes and ears. This is why monsters like Rove hide from the public eye so much and only appear groundhog-stylee at "friendly" venues with hand-picked audiences brimming with their allies. Fine, but the shoehorn fits. All that said, why in the hell would anyone outside of the acquisitions department of a library buy this worthless piece-of-crap book that's very little more than self-serving lies? What the hell is the point or reading it when it's almost nothing but bullshit?

I would imagine, though, that this one part of the book is its truest part, Karl Rove's "rosebud," the crowning rosette of his pathetic political epitaph. What a clown. He's just given historians the final blow, and he's already roundly hated by them and the rest of the world. Being forgotten would be a far better fate.

Horselaughs for all: Karl Rove Was Once Beaten Up By a Girl -- Daily Intel http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2010/03/karl_rove_was_once_beat_up_by.html#ixzz0hRE2evPn

The House Judiciary Committee releases the Rove/Miers interviews related to the U.S. Attorney firings (with some excerpts from the Miers testimony)

Washington D.C.--And so, we finally have a window, a real window, into what was going on at the DOJ during the time leading-up to the U.S. Attorney firings in that culminated in December 2006.

The House Judiciary Committee has today released what several scholars and pundits were saying would never see the light of day: the transcripts of the interviews with Bush II political operative and adviser Karl Rove and former Deputy Chief of Staff and White House Counsel (the president's legal adviser until early 2007), as well as emails and other documents and materials relating to what appears to be politically motivated firings of U.S. Attorneys, thus endangering their abilities to enforce the law correctly without undue or illegal political influence and/or obstruction through a general abuse of office.

Some highlights of the Miers testimony from June of this year:

(Beginning P.7) ...Q Yes, and also prior to that time. Let me -- why don't I start out asking you, before your work in the White House in any capacity, did you have any role in the selection of U.S. Attorneys or in the discharge of U.S. Attorneys?

A Not that I recall. (pg. 8) ...

(P.14) ...Q Now, there could be inappropriate reasons why a U.S. Attorney would be let go, as well, right?

A Yes.

Q If the Department of Justice were to recommend removal of the U.S. Attorney for a political partisan purpose, that would be an inappropriate basis for removal, right?

A I don't know what that term means. U.S. Attorneys are, by their nature, political.

Q Well, would you find it proper to remove a U.S. Attorney to stop him from prosecuting a friend of the President?

A I would not expect the Department to recommend removal for the U.S. Attorney doing his or her job. And if his or her job was investigating someone and there was an effort to cause that 15 person to step down because of that reason, I would view that as inappropriate.

Q So if the Department of Justice were recommending a U.S. Attorney be forced to resign because he was investigating a friend of the President, that would be an inappropriate reason for the Department to recommend his removal?

A If the reason was to interfere with a prosecutor's ongoing investigation of a particular matter, I would consider that inappropriate.

Q And, along those lines, if a U.S. Attorney refused to prosecute a political opponent of the President, that would also be an inappropriate reason to remove them?

A If the reason for a recommendation to ask a person to step down or to take action against the person was to cause them to take action that was inappropriate, then, yes, I would consider that not something that should happen.

Q Well, I just wanted to be very clear on this. If a U.S. Attorney is asked to resign because he refused to prosecute an opponent of the President, that would be improper, wouldn't it?

A If it was to cause the U.S. Attorney to take some action that the U.S. Attorney and others believed to be appropriate -- or inappropriate, then I would consider that something that should not happen. ...

P.16) ...Q And if, by the same token, a prosecutor refuses to bring a meritless prosecution against an opponent to the President, that would be improper also, right?

A If someone is asked to step down because they weren't bringing something that they, in good faith, thought they shouldn't and the examination concluded that that was a legitimate 17 position, then I would not expect them to be asked to step down.

Q Let me ask you also about the timing of prosecutions. Would it be improper to remove a U.S. Attorney because that U.S. Attorney failed to bring a prosecution that would aid a candidate during election time?

A It would be inappropriate to interfere one way or the other, either by asking somebody to bring an action they shouldn't bring or to not bring an action that they should, in both instances it would be inappropriate.

Q And particularly so if it was done with a design to influence an election?

A If that was the purpose, then I would think it would be inappropriate to attempt to influence an election.

Q Are there circumstances in which it would be proper to remove a U.S. Attorney based on purely partisan political considerations? A I would have difficulty answering that question.

Q Would it be proper to remove a U.S. Attorney because he refused to use his office to assist Republican candidates for elective office?

A If the sole purpose of asking someone to leave or to step down is to influence an election or do something the individual thought shouldn't be done, and the examination indicates that is correct, or to not do something, I think any of those things would have been inappropriate. ...

(P. 18) ...Q Would it be appropriate to remove a U.S. Attorney simply because one of the President's political allies or supporters has asked that U.S. Attorney to be removed?

A That would depend on the circumstances.

Q If the sole reason that the President removes a U.S. Attorney is because a supporter asked, would that be appropriate?

A U.S. Attorneys are serving at the pleasure of the President. And so, if anything is presented to him, then he has the ability to remove that person. ...

(P.21) ...Q Under what circumstances do you think it would be appropriate for the origination of the idea to remove a U.S. Attorney to come from the White House?

A I would think that would be perfectly appropriate from any other source. ...

(P. 27) ...Q Well, let's say you had a U.S. Attorney who refused to bring meritless cases.

A Well, you can stop right there. No one is going to condone bringing meritless cases.

Q And so, removing them for the failure to bring meritless cases would be an inappropriate reason to remove them?

A I believe we have already covered that. And I said you should not ask someone to leave because they won't bring a meritless case. ...

(P.38) ...Q And what about the Office of Political Affairs' role in the decision to let U.S. Attorneys go. What role did they play in 39 the process?

A I would say providing information.

Q And what type of information would they provide?

A Whatever they had in any particular situation. And if they had any, I would think many times they would not, but if they had any they may well have let their views be known. And in fact, and I apologize for not thinking about this at the time, someone from that office frequently attended the Judicial Selection Committee. So they were always there to provide the political sense with respect to the environment in any particular state.

Q And who was it from the Office of Political Affairs that attended the JSC meetings?

A Sometimes Karl Rove himself participated, but he may have had on his deputy chief of staff hat. But the Office of Political Affairs reported to him, so he could have been there. I don't really have a recollection of Sara Taylor being there, but she would have been logical. I remember Scott Jennings being there.

Q Do you recall any of the JSC meetings where it was clear Mr. Rove attended for the specific purpose that a U.S. Attorney removal was the issue to be discussed?

A I don't have a recollection of that.

Q Do you recall any case where the suggestion for the removal of a particular U.S. Attorney originated in the Office of Political Affairs rather than the Department of Justice? 40

A I think that's a good question. And I know that, for example, with respect to Mr. Iglesias that there were comments made about him and his performance. And those comments certainly could have been made at a Judicial Selection Committee meeting, but I don't recall it.

Q And did you raise the case of Mr. Iglesias because the first suggestion that he be considered for removal came from the Office of Political Affairs rather than the Department of Justice?

A I don't know whether it did or not come from the Department of Justice or whether that was just one more voice if, in fact, it happened. But I don't really know who came up with the idea. But certainly there were comments about Mr. Iglesias coming from the political office, or the deputy chief of staff for that matter. ...

(P. 41) ...Q But it was a call that Mr. Rove originated, you didn't call him? A Well, unless I called him back. But, yeah, he instigated the call. 42

Q And tell us the best you can about what you recall what Mr. Rove had to say when he called?

A My best recollection is that he was very agitated about the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico. I don't know that I knew the gentleman's name at that time.

Q And what did he tell you about the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico?

A That he was getting barraged by a lot of complaints about the U.S. Attorney and his not doing his job.

Q And who were the complaints coming from?

A People that he was in contact with, which I assumed, of course, and he may have said, were political people that were active in New Mexico.

Q These are Republican Party activists?

A They were the people that he would have been interfacing with as political leadership of the State, is my assumption.

Q And who would that have been?

A I have no idea.

Q Would they have been Republican Party activists?

A All I can tell you is that Karl was reporting multiple people complaining about Mr. Iglesias.

Q And did he identify any of the people who were complaining to him about Mr. Iglesias?

A I don't recall that.

Q Did he tell you what they were complaining about? 43

A That he wasn't doing his job. I do recall that.

Q Do you recall what specifically the complaints were that he wasn't doing his job?

A I don't recall the specifics of what he was saying.

Q Did Mr. Rove raise with you complaints about voter fraud prosecutions?

A That's my best recollection, that he did.

Q And what did he say about that?

A I don't know what he said. I know it's my impression that he talked about the complaints that the guy wouldn't do his job. And I believe he mentioned voter fraud.

Q What else do you recall that Mr. Rove said about the complaints, if anything?

A I'm giving you all the information that I can about that call. That's my best recollection that that happened.

Q And you said Mr. Rove was agitated. What led you to believe that he was agitated?

A He was just upset. I remember his being upset.

Q Was it the language he used or was it the tone of his voice that told you he was upset?

A I can't tell you. It's my recollection that he was upset. And how that was conveyed to me I can't tell you.

Q Did Mr. Rove tell you that he wanted the U.S. Attorney gone?

A I don't have that specific recollection. And I'm under 44 oath and I'm not going to swear to something coming out of his mouth that I just can't remember. The clear import was that he was upset with how this individual was performing.

Q And was the clear import also that he wanted him removed from his position?

A He was getting complaints about the guy. And he wanted to express, I think, and this is my general sense about the New Mexico situation, that there were complaints about how he was performing.

Q Ms. Miers, wasn't the clear import of his conversation with you that he wanted the U.S. Attorney removed from office?

A I can't say with certainty that he ever used that language. He may well have. I don't recall it.

Q Well, I'm not asking about specific language, but you were able to tell us the clear import of part of his conversation was that the U.S. Attorney was not doing his job and he was getting an earful?

A That's correct.

Q If Mr. Rove communicated to you that he wanted a U.S. Attorney replaced, you would recall that, right?

A Not necessarily.

Q Well, in this case did Mr. Rove communicate to you in whatever language he used that he wanted this U.S. Attorney removed?

A I can't put those words in his mouth. 45

Q I'm not using any specific words. But when you hung up with the -- when you hung up the phone call with Mr. Rove, was it clear to you that he wanted this U.S. Attorney removed?

A It was clear to me that he felt like he had a serious problem and that he wanted something done about it. And whether he said, and the answer is ask the guy to be removed, I can't -- I don't recall that, I just don't recall it.

Q But you do recall he wanted something done about it? A Yes, sir. I think he was calling for that purpose.

Q And he may have asked you, or he may have told you that he wanted the U.S. Attorney removed?

A That's speculation. And I can't put those exact words in his mouth. I mean, he was complaining about the guy.

Q The clear import was that he wanted something done about it, right?

A Yes, sir. That was his purpose in calling me.

Q And at this point, you can't rule out whether he asked that he be removed from office?

A I can't swear that he did or did not say that. Q So he may have? A I can't swear one way or the other.

Q So he may have asked for him to be removed, you just can't recall?

A I don't recall his using words like I want him fired or words of similar import. I just don't have that recollection. 46

Could he have said that, I can't rule it out. I probably should say that he may have said can't we get rid of this guy or something like that.

Q And do you recall what your response would have been?

A I don't recall him saying even that, so I certainly don't recall my response.

Q But he may have said that?

A I can't rule it out.

Q If Mr. Rove wanted him removed, what would the next step have been?

A If he had said that he wanted us to consider removing the guy, then I would have relayed that along with whatever else I believe I called Paul McNulty about. Because my belief is that I called Paul McNulty and reported this situation.

Q So at some point after your conversation with Mr. Rove, you called Mr. McNulty at the Justice Department?

A That's my belief. That I took whatever information he gave me and I called Paul and gave it to him. ...

Not a pretty picture at all, and these are just excerpts. I'm assuming Rove's transcript has some relevant material but that it's generally a lot of skirting around his culpability/guilt in the affair. And yes, we can expect them to protect the president at all costs...unless, perhaps, it means that they're going to to go to prison.

Keep in mind that this woman was nominated for the Supreme Court. Now we know why she declined.

The House Judiciary Committe's Rove/Miers interviews and materials: http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/issues_WHInterviews.html

On the "torture flap" and all the waffling in DC: Bust Bush, Cheney, Gonzales, Rumsfeld, Rice, Miers, and the OLC attorneys

WWW--This is getting good. To say that I'm enjoying the shit storm created over the release of these torture memos, the narratives coming from former participants, and the formation of a coherent time line, would be an understatement. This could have a good effect on reining-in our intelligence community, and more. Reactionaries of every stripe are going to complain that this is "going to hamper the CIA, et. al.," which misses the point: actions defined as internationally illegal and barbaric behavior by them isn't necessarily going to make us any safer, quite the opposite.

But the the public has to be engaged in this, and so far, they are in a major way that's not showing any signs of cresting.

We could be seeing the radical reformulation of our foreign policy dialog inside and outside of the State Department and the executive branch. Why? Because the Bush II administration was so incompetent, so blustery in their criminality, that they didn't think that they had to cover their tracks much--not that they cared to most of the time, they thought the fix was on permanently. Who and what made them think that? Who gave them that blank check? Few buy the justifications these days. However, there still seems to be an increasingly isolated segment of the public that thinks George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, and the rest of the Bush II administration were somehow protecting us through methods that were proven useless in obtaining information centuries ago.

Torture doesn't work.

My advice to concerned members of the public who find the use of torture by our government unacceptable: sign any petition (once!), call your elected representatives, and make one hell of a lot of noise about your concern over this until we see some real action, some real justice. Until then, all bets are off, so keep hammering!

Why is the Obama administration waffling back-and-forth on this? Some of the torture memos came out because they knew a whistle-blower was going to leak them to the press and watchdog groups. Nonetheless, it was a brave move to release them in unredacted form, and I applaud it. But the Obama administration doesn't yet know what to do about it, and the reasons are simple and complicated: yes, they have qualms about how the Bush II administration implemented torture against individuals captured in the field (oftentimes just taken off of the streets of another nation), but I think they want to keep this gun in their pockets for a rainy day.

Does it matter? It might not. This whole scandal is broader than just one incident: it's an internationally sprawling and seemingly endless string of incidents that constituted official policy under Bush II, a secret one. Interestingly, the former president isn't taking any potshots at President Obama on torture...only the factions of Karl Rove and Richard Cheney are. This speaks volumes as to who was the genesis of the policy, it could be isolated primarily to the last vice president.

However, none of this matters. George W. Bush was our standing president, regardless of whether he abdicated his responsibilities to Vice President Cheney. For this reason, there must be accountability because we are a nation of laws and precedents. If the Bush II precedents stand on torture and numerous other matters, we're no longer a democracy. Motivation enough for you now?

One thing's certain: There's a war for the minds of Americans on this issue being fought by Rovian operatives within the mainstream media, and they and the Obama administration are losing control of the debate to the public. This can only be a good thing. The groundswell is here, now.

"Poor Old 'Joe the Plumber' " line being parroted by mainstream press

WWW--Yes, "poor" old Sam is getting his ass kicked all over the terra because he felt compelled to make inane comments towards Barack Obama, on taxes, lied about his occupation and name, and why he has such a stupid haircut. The abuse came, as it tends to, from the late night shows like David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, and the Tonight Show.

So what? You knew the cameras were around, and you knew your own past...or did you? Get over it. Grow-up. "Sam the plumber" deserves no defending whatsoever, and he decided to open his big mouth, chasing-down the candidate and the news crews with his predictably unimportant comments on the state of America. With luck, he and others like him will never vote again if they plan on it always being for the GOP.

Lesson: people with storied pasts should watch what they say regarding issues like taxation when they have their own questionable behaviors surrounding said issues. Wurzelbacher is a 34-year-old blowhard and a tax-cheat.

Nuff said, but even (even?!) CNN's Lou Dobbs is out there asking with unbelievable temerity: "Has Plumber Joe been treated unfairly by the media?" No. How about asking yourself, Lou? Stupid, just stupid. Quit embarrassing me, America. Nice try, GOP, it didn't work. Pathetic.

Joe (really Sam, but "Joe" sounds more iconic, so he ran with it) the plumber butt

" 'I’m kind of like Britney Spears having a headache. ...Everybody wants to know about it.' ” --Faux Ohio plumber Samuel Wurzelbacher shooting his mouth off again on Thursday. (AP)

Holland, Ohio--Poor Joe. He won't pay his taxes, he doesn't really have the legal right to work as a plumber in and around Toledo (making him an unqualified scab), and he couldn't stop and think about these facts when he opened his big mouth towards presidential candidate Barack Obama. This would all be due to the fact that he's clearly unintelligent, making him a Republican by-default.

The Obama campaign was doing door-to-door meetings with voters in Joe's neighborhood, and it was entirely coincidental--but very likely, it being Ohio--that they brushed-up against a very silly and stupid man named Samuel Wurzelbacher, who likes to go by the name of "Joe." Or was it a coincidence?

Wurzelbacher finally had his "chance" at his own fifteen minutes of fame, and now he wishes that he hadn't taken it. He's now ducking any and all media outlets. But all the lapdog press has been doing is balancing him with the reality of his statements about the candidate, his platform, and Wurzelbacher's claims about himself. Unsurprisingly, they don't match-up with objective reality, but since when has that ever stopped a wrong-headed American from shooting their mouth off in a way that can only hurt themselves? Ahem.

As we all know by now, Wurzelbacher questioned Obama's tax plan, echoing baseless GOP attacks that we're all--all of us--going to be taxed higher, even the rest of us who make under $250,000 a year, like "Joe." Except "Joe" doesn't make what the rest of us do, he makes significantly more, at least $100,000-a-year. Yes, I feel so sorry for everyone who makes that much a year, but they shouldn't be so afraid of Obama, he's got their tax-cheat backs more than they or Wurzelbacher might suspect. Even the late DC Madam paid her taxes properly.

Not ever wanting to look into someone's background, as in the case of VP candidate Sarah Palin, John McCain's campaign grabbed for any straw man they could. McCain went on to mention that he was fighting for "the Joes out there" during the final presidential debate, the name being a kind of catch-all for the "everyman," the working man.

The problem is, it's not 1951 anymore, and by that point the ladies were part of the workforce anyway. Women don't figure highly in the McCain campaign's rhetoric, Palin aside, and the implications that they favor a male-dominated nuclear family as a social model are obvious. "Joe" (Sam) personifies this ossified model of wrong-headed patriarchal pacification of the rest of us. Hasn't it worked wonders for the economy and our rights these last eight years? How about the breadth of our history?

Never mind all that, Joe doesn't want to pay taxes, and he told Obama this squarely: “Do you believe in the American dream? I'm being taxed more and more for fulfilling the American dream. ...I’m getting ready to buy a company that makes $250,000 to $280,000 a year. ...Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn’t it?” [emphasis added] Yes, it's hard to feel sorry for someone ostensibly poised to make a quarter million a year who doesn't want to pay their share of taxes. These were just some of the loaded questions in which Wurzelbacher neglected to provide the full-context of who he is and where he's been--he's practically a partner in the "firm" he works for with one Al Newell, and that's for starters. Do both of them split the money evenly? We don't know. I don't believe in the American Dream, that's a myth, it's crap.

Even if they did split their business's income previously, Obama's tax plan wouldn't cause a rise in their taxes, and Wurzelbacher knew this when he hit the candidate with the question. It gets worse regarding taxes for Sam.

... And Mr. Wurzelbacher has provided only vague information on his and the company’s finances since talking to Mr. Obama. But if the plumbing business remained a two-person company and the net proceeds — after deductions for business expenses — were shared by the two men, both incomes would most likely fall well below the top tax brackets on which Mr. Obama wants to raise rates, as would the company itself.

... According to public records, Mr. Wurzelbacher has been subject to two liens, each over $1,100 [Ed.--According to Ohio state websites, his state income tax lien is $1, 182.98.]. One, with a hospital, has been settled, but a tax lien with the State of Ohio is still outstanding. ("Real Deal on 'Joe the Plumber' Reveals New Slant," The New York Times, 10.16.2008)

Why would Mr. Newell and Wurzelbacher be so coy about their financial arrangements? Questions directed at candidate Obama were by "Joe" were skewed and loaded regarding his own actual situation, which begs numerous others.

Even if the faux-plumber buys-out Newell's share of the plumbing firm it's unlikely that he'll be paying more taxes under the Obama plan, and he probably understood this when he confronted the presidential candidate. Perhaps he just had a lot to hide? There are other facts regarding the business he works for that he wasn't exactly upfront about, though it's becoming clear that he has problems with mathematics (don't we all?) in many areas.

According to an analysis by Dun & Bradstreet on Wurzelbacher's employer, A. W. Newell Corp., the plumbing and heating contractor has annual sales of $510,000.

If Wurzelbacher bought the company, by the time he took proper business deductions, Bankler said, he'd be left with between $150,000 and $200,000 in taxable income and wouldn't be affected by Obama's proposed increase in the top rates. (" 'Joe the Plumber,' Obama Tax-Plan Critic Owes Taxes (Update 2)," Bloomberg, 10.16.2008)

And so, either Mr. Newell isn't being forthcoming with his "employee," Wurtzelbacher is simply poor at math, or one or both of them isn't being very honest. To be sure, we'll all be finding out very soon who he really is and what their company is really up to.

Then, there are other troubling possibilities, such as the fact that Wurzelbacher lived at 1960 W. Keating Dr., Mesa, Arizona, part of a sprawling apartment subdivision (Dobson Ranch) constructed during the 1970s by the Savings and Loan corruption scandal figure of almost twenty-years-ago. Keating is connected to McCain from that time, and even earlier, and Wurzelbacher's connections to the former perp could be quite intimate.

Maybe these are just coincidences, but one fact is particularly bizarre: it appears that Wurzelbacher purchased his current residence in August of this year. It's either one of an incredible series of coincidences, or it isn't, yet it has all the markings of a Karl Rove job, including possible past break-ins and/or infiltration of the Obama campaign by various GOP operatives. It's possible that Mr. Wurzelbacher is one himself.

At the very least, his 13-year-old kid, his ex-wife, former in-laws, and every person he's ever snubbed or offended now have a new stick to hit Wurzelbacher with for the rest of his natural life. When Obama suggested he wanted to "spread the wealth," Wurzelbacher retorted the standard line of "That's Socialism." Why yes, it is, and it's coming, Sammie. Not tomorrow, but today, now, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. That's how history works sometimes.

" 'Joe the Plumber,' Obama Tax-Plan Critic Owes Taxes (Update 2)," Bloomberg, 10.16.2008: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aC4j3T5.s_eQ&refer=home

"Real Deal on 'Joe the Plumber' Reveals New Slant," The New York Times, 10.16.2008: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/17/us/politics/17joe.html

More on (moron) Sam J. Wurzelbacher (might need to be pasted): http://www.privateeye.com/Search/SearchResults.aspx?vw=people&input=name&fn=Samuel&mn=&ln=Wurzelbacher&city=&state=OH&criteria=Samuel;;;;Wurzelbacher;;;;OH;;;;;;

Wurzelbacher's August 2008 purchase of his current residence: http://apps.co.lucas.oh.us/areissummary/report.aspx?Parcel=6562411

The ACORN "scandal"

Indiana--We don't even know what really happened, yet Fox News (as far as anyone can tell, the first source of the story) has been crowing about it louder than any other news outlet, even making easily debunked speculations on a variety of issues. Does the story look like a coordinated media campaign from the outside? Yes. Do we truly know yet what happened? No.

A modest proposal (no, not eating Irish babies, silly): create an independent inquiry from outside the United States to investigate the ACORN allegations and the all of the polling problems that plagued the 2000-2006 national elections, and hold to the recommendations regardless of the outcome. But the conclusions must be based on solid evidence, not hearsay, and so far that's all we're getting.

How do we even know the registration forms are real and not bogus evidence that was planted? What was the chain-of-evidence? Why the timing? Why does it once again benefit the GOP? How do we know ACORN wasn't infiltrated by provocateurs? It's happened in our political history. In other words--don't think we didn't notice this is being treated differently from those questionable activities by GOP operatives in past elections, because we do. Let the chips fall where they may, it works for me.

Or, is it that ACORN also went after predatory mortgage lenders and that we're also seeing some payback? You tell me. You had better be right. You had better not be lying, because we're going to find-out soon. This has all the markings of a Karl Rove job. We might ask where he and Tim Griffin have been these days.

AP: "Bush says government role essential to ease crisis," as the death of extremist conservatism forces Norquist into hiding

"We are trying to change the tones in the state capitals-and turn them toward bitter nastiness and partisanship."--Grover Norquist, stating a political modus operandi that's lost its effectiveness among rednecks.

Washington D.C.--Mission accomplished. Yet the GOP slithered into the White House and Congress saying (yep, especially when Newt Gingrich was Speaker of the House): "Government is bad. Government isn't the answer to our problems--it is the problem. " Except that it isn't, the business community is the real problem.

Then, there's this extremist wacko named Grover Norquist, who said we should shrink government "to the size that we [the business and financial sectors] can drown it in the bathtub," and that tax cuts are an absolute, even if it means we cannot fund things. Congratulations, Mr. Norquist, the mess you always wanted to create is here, and it's about to bite you and your ilk in-the-ass.

The market is crashing thanks to runaway financial deregulation that the GOP and her backers wanted and there was nary a Democrat in Congress to effectively oppose it. You're correct--GOP--this shouldn't be a partisan issue since both major parties are to blame for the current mess:

"This is a pivotal moment for America's economy," Bush said in his most extensive remarks this week on the crisis. He said that a financial contagion that began with low-quality home mortgages had "spread throughout our financial system" and frozen many financial transactions.

The president said the federal government should interfere in the marketplace "only when necessary," and that this is one of those times. "Given the precarious state of today's financial markets, and their vital importance to the daily lives of the American people, government intervention is not only warranted, it is essential," he said. ("Bush says government role essential to ease crisis," AP, 09.19.2008)

You want fries with that? Now he and the rest of the parrots in the GOP are going to start backtracking by saying, "We only meant there are a few cases where government intervention in the economy is necessary," which is just going to exacerbate the public's anger at them. This is because everyone knows that it's their fault, their mess, and we're bailing them out of it. It's the death of conservatism.

Who got bailed-out? Why, the crooked financial institutions and major shareholders, that's who. Not homeowners, not the unemployed--not anywhere that it's going to create a long-term fix of the economy, to stabilize it and to make it sustainable. All they've done in Washington D.C. and the right wing think-tanks is to buy some more time before the elections. Too late. But sustaining the situation until the elections are over is exactly what both parties have in mind.

Talk, talk, talk, and almost no walk for the public at all. That was always part of the plan for the so-called "neoconservatives" and the rest of the holders of "conventional wisdom" regarding the economy--a group more closely-related to extremist Libertarianism than anybody wants to admit. Their goal has been to keep the government from providing any social services or relief to the working-class, relegating it to servicing defense contractors, the corporations and the banks, and little else. John McCain tows this line, and regardless of what he might contend, he will have to raise taxes. He's also not going to be ending Roe v. Wade anytime soon either, but that's another fish to fry for another time.

It's a twilight moment for the followers of the Mystery Cult of Grover (sexy name, no?) Norquist: they've gotten what they wanted all along, but now the political-costs are mounting in ways they never imagined. Their only way out of their current catastrophe of objective-reality colliding with their Alice in Wonderland economic, antisocial, and political philosophies which have hit that wall that was always waiting for them at the end is to lie and to hide.

You see, here's the problem for anyone who would give Norquist and his "leave us alone" coalition any credence: if you want social services after a natural disaster, if you want bail-outs of your financial institutions run on hokum and paradox, your wars, money for schools, municipal-spending, roads, airports, highways, drinkable water, breathable air, police, a National Guard, a competetive workforce, a future and an actual society--you have to pay taxes, and taxes naturally rise over time. There is no solution to this problem except progressive taxation, namely taxing the wealthiest and making them pay their share as part of social responsibility in a civilized nation.

This peculiarly American idea that "you don't have to pay taxes" is utterly wacko in its scope and conviction, and is not only self-serving rubbish, but has no objective merit whatsoever. This is why we're seeing the bailouts under one of its greatest presidential-adherents. If it was true at all, we wouldn't see these bailouts.

Oh yes, John McCain is going to keep saying "we shouldn't be doing this," and most Americans will agree, though they actually mean it.

But what do you suggest as an alternative? Norquist doesn't have one, though some Keynesian Democrats are already suggesting New Deal style progressive taxation of the rich. Conversely, Norquist and his ilk still want to defund all government at all levels, and while he's getting his wish, it's clear that he and the other adherents of their ridiculous pseudo-ideology intuitively understand that the fallout from a public that expects government services isn't going to tolerate the kind of world they want. Ugly confrontations are coming soon.

If you go to Norquist's site, "Americans for Tax Relief," you'll see that there isn't one article, link, or comment directly addressing the recent bailouts of IndyMac, AIG, the demise of Lehman Brothers and JP Morgan's buyout of Bear Stearns, the nationalization (that's Socialism, folks, the kind that Libertarians and so-called "conservatives" think is alright) of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Bank of America buyout of Merrill-Lynch, or any of the other lending institutions that were allowed to take things this far over the cliff. If Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have proven anything at all it's that privatization doesn't work, especially when it's unregulated by government agencies with real oversight powers.

But that's what regulations are for, so we won't mention the obvious fact that they--neoconservatives and wackos like Grover Norquist--birthed this unprecedented crash by creating the proper preconditions for it, actually demanding it for years. It couldn't have happened without incredibly powerful backers, however.

In 1997, Reason magazine fawned over Norquist in an interview that makes plain his Libertarian credentials:

... Reason: You have worked with the Libertarian Party in the past. When and why?

Norquist: In the 1978, '79, and '80 races I ran a group called the Tax Action Coalition. Ed Clark [the 1980 L.P. presidential nominee] was the chairman. I've found that Libertarian Party activists make the best tax activists because they never get involved in the silly questions about which tax is preferable. They understand that the total tax burden is the total amount of freedom taken away from you, and it needs to be reduced as quickly and as completely as is humanly possible.... ("Happy Warrior: Republican AgitatorGrover Norquist on building a 'leave-us-alone' coalition," Reason, Feb., 1997)

No questions here, but the Libertarians have to be loving the presidency and Congress of George W. Bush right now, since he's hitting all of their notes. But hey, they want to legalize pot...and vigilantism, more runaway deregulation where corporations can poison and exploit you with impunity (and not pay taxes at all), where children shoot their parents with easily-available assault rifles, and where we're left with a nation where basically no law and order exists anymore. Sounds great, right? I didn't think so either.

Segments of the public will swallow some of this out of fear and stupidity, but in the end, the New Deal programs and protections are holding-strong. But what's Norquist's reaction to all of these bailouts? We don't know. As expected, he's going to have to do a lot of back-peddling, flip-flopping, and being cagey, common traits of this era of the elevation of the little man coming to power politics (and the predictable abuse of the term "genius" when the economy is running "strong").

Grover Norquist was the designer and architect of the Bush tax-cuts that came in 2001, a rollback of the New Deal's progressive taxation that kept our economy reasonably stable for over five decades--the same amout of time that the GOP couldn't achieve concurrent majorities in Congress.

That should tell you something: as the WWII generation has died-off, the lessons that they learned over 70 years ago have been going with them. "Victory" leaves Norquist in a strange place that he never expected--what to do next.

As anyone could have predicted, wacked-out little men like Grover Norquist will have to take their brand of snake oil to the state and local levels where the tax-crunch is being felt the strongest. Their chances at making any real inroads are very poor. The public also expects social services at these levels, yet another byproduct of the New Deal policies that continued their expansion into the Johnson years. The expectation of social services being provided by the federal goverment have become engrained into the public mind and aren't going-away.

But it's always 1928 to the GOP and her allies on the far-right, and that's saying something in one of the more right wing nations of the developed world, the red-haired stepchild called America. And so Norquist and others have decided to keep below the radar down at the state level as their handiwork explodes at the national level.

Isn't it great to agree with oneself? Yes it is, so the Big business-backed right wing has created the Caesar Rodney Institute in Delaware.

Norquist was their for the birth:

"What we're really stressing is policies that give people the ability to exercise individual initiative and to take personal responsibility for it," said Bergh, a Brandywine Hundred mathematician and economist, who is an information technology consultant. "Those are the kind of things that will lead a government that is very open and appropriately limited. We want government to be outcome-focused."

He said the organization wants to build bridges between the political parties.

Norquist said Delaware was in need of an independent research and education think tank like the Pioneer Institute in Boston, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Mich., and the Goldwater Institute in Phoenix, Ariz. Mackinac pushes individual choice and free markets, said Michael Jahr, spokesman for Mackinac.

"Ideas communicated with other people that are dramatized and explained can change the world. That's why the Caesar Rodney Institute is important," Norquist said. "You can change the world from Delaware." ("Free-market advocates open for business," Delaware Online, 09.17.2008)

We'll be sure to keep it isolated to places like Delaware, but thanks for the warning. Their rhetoric all sounds reasonable until you realize that they don't actually mean it when they speak about accountability for all. If they did, they'd be out defending their past-arguments on how the economy should be run (no regulation by the "mean old government" with their inconvenient "laws" and "regulations").

Freaks like Norquist aren't doing any defending, and it's a telling admission of defeat--not that any journalists are going to be confronting them on it anytime soon, just another byproduct of a dying pseudo-ideology and economy.

The fixes aren't going to have a long-lasting impact without--say it--greater regulation of the financial and business sectors of the economy, and more laws to do so if required. Taxes are also going to be raised, especially for the wealthiest. It's coming. Without this logical rise in tax- revenues, the entire American--and "global"--economy will go into total insolvency. Some pundits and supporters of Norquist have crowed over the years that this is exactly what the plan was: bankrupt the government to get them off-the-backs of the average American, namely wealthy businessmen and bankers. Toronto writer Jeff Berg notes:

Another winner in this battle of ideas over very big money are those like Grover Norquist whose self-professed goal over the last two decades has been to “shrink it down to a size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” It being the U.S. government. The only way to do this of course is to bankrupt it first. Reagan had a good go at it but his “legacy” has been left in shade by the outsized profligacy and recklessness of Bush and Cheney. As he has so very often Gore Vidal turned the most memorable phrase about this tickets unerring abilities: “Everything Bush touches turns to poo like King Midas in reverse.” ("the Banks Get Their Presidential Pardon-You and I Bail Out Wall Street," GNN.tv, 09.18.2008)

The problem with Berg's argument is that all of this undescores the failures of the current conservative ideology and its application. What next? Where's all the crowing over their "great victory"? There is none, because there is no "great victory," only an underscoring that their so-called "ideology" doesn't work in the real world. What they want and have gotten only leads us towards another crash, another bank failing and having to be bailed-out--then what? What next?

Then the banks and business and tech sectors have everything...and the global economy collapses, and all of that capital they've hoarded is now worthless. Perhaps we can assume they advocate a police state after that, since it's the only thing that would save them and the remnants of their wealth and power. "Conspiracy"? Hardly, this was all a mainstream deal, policy.

Granted that there is no other choice in nationalizing these private lenders and brokers, but remember that the bailouts and the resultant debts and social spending will all have to be serviced through a pronounced progressive taxation and a solvent government. These extremist elements aren't going to get their way in this area, and many of them don't genuinely want to. Without those preconditions, none of the current economic order works or is possible at all, what with its predictable and cyclical excesses.

Of course, there will be a lot of grumbling over the inevitable rise in taxes. None of it will matter.

But what could we expect if taxes weren't raised on the wealthy? A crash that would eclipse 1987's, and would likely compete with 1929. Nobody knows, ultimately, but it won't be good. And so now you know why extremists on the right want to pretend it's 1928 forever: They're nuts. They have no clue, and neither do those who stupidly believe a word they write or say.

Most of this mindless insanity begins with the Reagan administration (under which Norquist served as an adviser), but its cultural and political-roots go far back to the asinine resistance to the New Deal back in the 1930s. Soon, very soon, people will begin a decades-long cursing of Norquist, Rove, Bush, and all the rest, just as they did with the impotent and inactive Herbert Hoover. Frankly, I'm enjoying the show and all of the scrambling--and I haven't even mentioned the mounting-debt from the wars in the Middle East.

"Free-market advocates open for business," Delaware Online, 09.17.2008: http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080917/BUSINESS/809170353/1003

"Happy Warrior: Republican AgitatorGrover Norquist on building a 'leave-us-alone' coalition," Reason, February, 1997: http://www.reason.com/news/show/30147.html

The utterly wacko Fifth columnist "Americans for Tax Reform": http://www.atr.org/

"Bush says government role essential to ease crisis," AP, 09.19.2008: http://enews.earthlink.net/article/top?guid=20080919/48d323c0_3ca6_15526200809191995788214

Independent congressional candidate Cindy Sheehan being surveilled at Denver DNC convention?

Denver, Colorado--This is being reported primarily at OpEd News (OEN). Cindy Sheehan is claiming to have confronted an individual who claimed to be repairing the phone in her Hotel room. True? I doubt she's lying. Considering that the new FISA revisions recently passed make domestic surveillance of American citizens legal, it wouldn't be much of a surprise.

But would they--whoever "they" are--even need to come into her room to do this? Perhaps we have a case of bugging a room for information gathering purposes. If true, who was he working for? Mrs. Sheehan has been sending this account our in mass-e-mailings:

"As I walked toward my room, I noticed that the door was opened with the security bolt blocking the complete closing of the door. I knew immediately that I had not left the door open, and I double checked to make sure it was the right room because, as a frequent traveler, I have been known to forget my room number, but it was the right room.

I was upset at first thinking that housekeeping had made a mistake and left my room open and I was worried that something might be missing. So I walked into my room and bigger than life, there was a man standing by my desk holding the room phone with a screwdriver in his hand!

I immediately said; "What the hell are you doing? Are you putting a bug on my phone?" He looked like he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar and stammered out: "N--no, we are having problems with the phone." I told him to get out of my room because my phone was fine and I called the front desk and the person at the front desk stammered something out about "problems" with some of the phones.

This room was reserved soon after we got to Denver last night because the room we had was inadequate for 3 people. The room was reserved under my campaign manager's name with a CFC debit card. By the time we left for the march, it could have very well been ascertained that I was the one in this room, and the room we did reserve could be bugged, also. I am confident that that's what was happening when I walked in on the "maintenance" man" (Cindy Sheehan Bugged in Denver," OEN, 08.25.2008)

Whatever was really happening, it raises some serious questions. There is the possibility that the GOP's hand is in this cookie jar, potentially to smear the Democratic Party as being behind it. Candidate Sheehan should file a police report at the very least.

Sheehan is currently running against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in her own congressional district. Considering all of the political campaign office break-ins last summer, Sheehan's assertions could be correct and troubling.

OEN (read the thread): http://www.opednews.com/articles/Cindy-Sheehan-Bugged-in-De-by-Rob-Kall-080825-412.html

President Jonah claims another victim: Robert Novak

"Who knows what other disasters are in store for us thanks to the curse he is under? As the sailors fed the original Jonah to a whale, thus lifting the storm that was about to drown them, perhaps we the people can persuade President Jonah to retire to his other Eden in Crawford, Texas, taking his jinx with him. We deserve a rest. Plainly, so does he. Look at Nixon's radiant features after his resignation!" --Gore Vidal, "President Jonah," 01.25.2006

Washington D.C.--Just a few years ago, the legendary Gore Vidal observed that the Bush administration was cursed, and that George W. Bush and those surrounding him couldn't do anything right and that they were a plague upon wherever they went and whatever they touched. Of course, if you touch people you've kidnapped from another country too hard, it's a war crime and a human rights violation.

Today, we have the news that partisan journalist--usually referred to as a "columnist"--Robert Novak has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. If only this were some indication that we live in a meaningful and just universe, but it isn't, and we don't. Has Novak served the Fourth Estate or a "Fifth Column"? History is likely to record the latter as his master.

For a long time, Novak has written a blustery column of business-politico propaganda for The Chicago Sun-Times (and in syndication), echoing the glory days of the barking apparatchik in the Soviet Union. From 1980-2005, Novak was a co-host of CNN's "Crossfire." He was the argument for the right-wing on a decidedly right-wing news network, contrary to the assertions of Ted Turner and his admirers...all three of them.

Novak's leaving for Fox News as a sometime contributor wasn't much of a change. But it does raise suspicions that he was part of a propaganda campaign to promote the war, and one that was very mainstream. He has hardly been alone in his tacit support and bias for the war on terrorism, the invasion of Iraq, and essentially the entire GOP/Bush agenda. So why call him a "journalist" at all? Why call stenographers to power "journalists" at all? To serve the fix, the boys currently holding power illegitimately.

Take it from someone involved in the DC Madam story: when you're part of a story you're not necessarily a journalist. You're a participant-of-sorts, a chronicler, but not a journalist.

Thankfully, this isn't the end of the world for anyone, especially considering the profession of journalism is about as popular as Congress at this particular historical moment. On July 14th, 2003, Novak illegally revealed the identity of an acting CIA officer Valerie Plame in a Washington Post piece:

[Former US ambassador Joseph C.] Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me that Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report. The CIA says its counterproliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him. "I will not answer any question about my wife," Wilson told me. ("Mission to Niger," The Washington Post, 07.14.2003)

That's not acting as a journalist, however, but as a mercenary for the White House, a Republican one. By writing these lines in the Post, Novak was aiding and abetting the Bush administration by exposing the covert identity of the former US ambassador who went to Niger to examine the evidence of whether Saddam Hussein had been attempting to procure uranium-ore from the African nation for a nuclear program. His sources were not "whistle-blowers," but the kind of politicians who often beg to be exposed for their abuse of office. Et tu, Judith Miller.

Like all of the experts on nuclear proliferation were saying back in 2002-2003, former ambassador Wilson didn't find any credible evidence of Iraqi attempts at a nuclear program. This didn't support the already eroding pretext for invading Iraq--namely WMDs pointed at the United States--and Wilson suddenly became a target of the Imperial Vice President's office. Novak was very consciously helping the White House in discrediting Wilson's very credible conclusions that Iraq had never attempted seriously to obtain the "yellow-cake" from Niger. This was done to salvage the pretext for the war in Iraq and punish and silence critics of the invasion .

There are worse things than being a journalist these days, and Novak embodies it, just as the late Tim Russert. However, it's even money that Novak is going to be enshrined as "one of the greats" of journalism soon. He's not.

Knowingly disclosing the identity of an undercover intelligence agent can bring a federal prison term of up to 10 years under the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.

Novak wrote Tuesday that none of his sources have been indicted.

The Libby indictment stated that Rove, identified as "Official A," had discussed Plame's identity with Novak. But Rove's lawyer Robert Luskin said in June that Rove had been informed that he would not face charges in connection with the probe.

Novak said a third source, CIA spokesman Bill Harlow, confirmed Plame's identity.

Harlow was not available for public comment on Novak's latest account. But a former intelligence official said Harlow did not know what Plame's position at the CIA was at first and that he tried to talk Novak out of publishing her name when he did find out, making it clear the disclosure could be damaging. ("Novak: Rove confirmed Plame's identity," CNN.com, 07.11.2006)

They broke the law, and Robert Novak kept his mouth shut for them until he knew there would be no convictions and that he was in-the-clear. This is because he was compromised early-on by his illegal participation in the propaganda campaign. He furthered this compromise by publishing Plame's identity as an acting CIA officer. Yet, despite this fact, an increasingly irrelevant mainstream media is going to prop-up Robert Novak just as they did Tim Russert. That's OK, the internet is now here to counter the lies.

Like Congress, political creatures like Novak compromised themselves to the Bush administration and are still her captives--enter former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, the other option. While McClellan served the Bush administration back when the candidate was still the governor of Texas and it was merely a campaign, he was never completely an "insider"--not nearly as much as the GOP's commissar Novak who was told much more and involved in much more. Success has its price.

An October 1, 2003 press conference on the then-expanding Plame investigation underscores how in-the-dark the White House press secretary was being kept:

Q Scott, this is not hypothetical at all. You say the issue is leaking classified information. So my question is did Karl Rove or any others in the White House talk with reporters, not leak classified information, but talk with reporters about Mr. Wilson's wife and her CIA status after the initial report by Robert Novak?

MR. McCLELLAN: After his initial report? Again, you're -- now the issue is changing. The issue was --

Q No --

MR. McCLELLAN: The issue is, did someone leak classified information. That's a serious matter.

Q Right. But if someone --

MR. McCLELLAN: That's being investigated. Do people talk about what's in the news? That's a whole a different -- that's on a different --

Q There is talk about a woman who's still undercover.

MR. McCLELLAN: And I just made clear --

Q I believe --

MR. McCLELLAN: I just made clear that -- well, was it reported that, one, was that what was reported in the article?

Q I'm just asking, did --

MR. McCLELLAN: Was that what was reported in the article?

Q She was an undercover operative.

MR. McCLELLAN: In the original article?

Q Yes.

Q Yes.

MR. McCLELLAN: I think it was reported "operative" in the Novak column.

Q Operative by definition --

MR. McCLELLAN: I think it was reported -- and he said, you shouldn't use the word "operative." I think the word was "operative." So, I don't know that it said -- I don't --

Q My question is pretty straightforward. Did Karl Rove or others have conversations with reporters about Mrs. Wilson?

MR. McCLELLAN: In what way?

Q And her CIA status.

MR. McCLELLAN: There's an investigation going on in asking everybody to preserve any information they would have related to some of the issues you bring up. I'm not -- there's been no information brought to our attention to suggest that anyone leaked classified information [Ed. My emphasis.], and the President certainly doesn't condone the leaking, or the tactics you're suggesting.

Q You seem to be suggesting that perhaps they had conversations, but weren't leaking classified information.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, there's an investigation going on to pull together all the information. But the issue is, did someone leak classified information? That's a serious issue. And I just made it -- I made it clear early, you brought up Karl's name. Let's be very clear. I thought -- I said it was a ridiculous suggestion, I said it's simply not true that he was involved in leaking classified information, and -- nor, did he condone that kind of activity. This has been answered, and now we're trying to get in a whole bunch of issues, separate and apart from that. ("Press briefing by Scott McClellan," Whitehouse.gov, 10.01.2003)

But Rove lied to the Press Secretary, as did "Scooter" Libby, the Vice President's Chief of Staff and right-hand man. McClellan was a Sphinx (and still is)--you had to be paying very close attention to his wording. He was telling us all-along that all he could tell the public is what he was being told. That's bad. His employers were keeping him in the dark too, but he was covering his own posterior. That was wise, but it doesn't make him a hero. But compared to the Robert Novaks or the Judith Millers, he is one.

According to pundits in the GOP, the mainstream media (including the unethically biased Novak himself), McClellan is simply "bitter," but this doesn't wash: When individuals like Novak stand down and recuse themselves of checking power, you know a fix is on and that the game is rigged. When they chime in that some former associate is "bitter," it's best to see where the strings coming out their backs lead to. That's right, follow the money.

These kinds of American "apparatchiki" aren't a new phenomena at all, they've been with us the entire, short, run of our history. Why do these creatures yearn to be slaves so badly? Foolishness and delusions of adequacy. If you have any sense at all, you don't miss people like this when they're gone, let alone admire them. Without a blanket rollback of Bush policies and precedents, the war on terror's curse will hold long after Jonah has left us.

Candidate Obama is already showing troubling signs that he's going to play the same game as this administration. It isn't about George W. Bush in the end, and never was, but the mess we're allowing our world to become. There's a cancer on the presidency...and the press, and the public.

Robert Novak is diagnosed with a brain tumor:http://enews.earthlink.net/article/ent?guid=20080728/488d4440_3426_1335020080728-1071750391

"Mission to Niger," The Washington Post, 07.14.2003: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/20/AR2005102000874.html

"Novak: Rove confirmed Plame's identity," CNN.com, 07.11.2006: http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/07/11/cia.leak/index.html

"Press briefing by Scott McClellan," Whitehouse.gov, 10.01.2003: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/10/20031001-6.html

"President Jonah," by Gore Vidal, 01.25. 2006: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060206/vidal