Last night on Fox, Hannity & Colmes co-host Alan Colmes noted that CBS News chose not to air a portion of its interview with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in which McCain falsely claimed that President Bush’s “surge” policy in Iraq “began the Anbar Awakening.”
But former Bush aide turned Fox pundit Karl Rove would have none of it. Discussing the issue with Colmes, Rove tried to shift the subject to something he’s more comfortable with — attacking Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) — and pleaded, “Let’s not get into this”:
ROVE: Well, Alan, first of all, let’s not get into sort of nit-nat mistakes. After all, Barack Obama said we need more Arabic translators in Afghanistan. They don’t speak Arabic in Afghanistan. […]
COLMES: What about his time line being wrong on the Anbar awakening?
ROVE: Look, let’s not get into this.
After more pressing from Colmes, Rove finally agreed, “I’d be happy to respond if you like. Would you like me to respond?” Rove finally told Colmes, “you’re right” and admitted that McCain “had his timing wrong.” But again, Rove insisted: “But don’t make a big deal of it.” Watch it:
It seems even master spin-meister Karl Rove can’t explain away McCain’s blatant misunderstanding of history.
Last year, House investigators revealed that Vice President Cheney exempted his office from an executive order designed to safeguard classified national security information by claiming that the Office of the Vice President is not an [base ']Äúentity within the executive branch.[base ']Äù
Cheney[base ']Äôs chief of staff David Addington reaffirmed before Congress last month that the Vice President[base ']Äôs office is “attached” to the legislature:
[P]erhaps the best that can be said is that the vice president belongs neither to the executive nor to the legislative branch, but is attached by the constitution to the latter.
Testifying before the House Judiciary Committee yesterday, Attorney General Michael Mukasey had an entirely different take than Addington and Cheney on the matter:
It’s my own belief that the Vice President is a member of the executive branch. … The Vice President is obviously one of the closest advisers to the president, and he is a close adviser to the president within the executive branch. That in my view is where he sits.
Watch it:
The idea of ambiguously tying Cheney to the legislative branch seems to be grounded in political convenience rather than fact. Cheney himself has said (on camera) that [base ']Äúthe vice president[base ']Äôs become an important part of the administration of the executive branch.” Some other examples:
– In 2001, the White House argued that a probe into Cheney[base ']Äôs energy task force [base ']Äúwould unconstitutionally interfere with the functioning of the executive branch.[base ']Äù [Link]
– Cheney said that a probe concerned [base ']Äúmeetings in the Executive Branch between the Vice President and other individuals.[base ']Äù [Link]
– On April 9, 2003, Cheney lauded a recent court ruling, stating, [base ']ÄúI think it restored some of the legitimate authority of the executive branch, the president and the vice president, to be able to conduct their business.[base ']Äù [Link]
Rather than the Vice President title, Cheney apparently prefers to be tagged with the label “unique creature.”
Appearing on MSNBC this afternoon, Iraq surge architect Fred Kagan criticized direct talks with Iran and made his case for attacking Iran, claiming it is the only means to “force” the country to halt its nuclear program:
Well, there’s nothing we can do short of an attack to force Iran to give up its nuclear program. … At the end of the day, the only way that you can make for sure that [a nuclear arm’s race] doesn’t happen is with an attack. There are a variety of things you can do short of an attack and hope that they will work, but hope is not a method here.
Ret. Gen. John Abizaid, the former commander of the US Central Command from 2003-2007, told a meeting of the Pacific Council on Monday that if the people of Iraq want the U.S. to leave, the U.S. should leave. “We can’t be in Iraq more than the Iraqis want us to be there,” Abizaid said. Reportedly, Abizaid predicted that by January the Iraqis “will be close to getting their act together.” “The Iraqis have moved beyond the American political debate,” he added.
Shock jock Michael Savage clearly has an overblown sense of the extent of his “expertise” on a wide range of topics, but he overstepped his bounds by attempting armchair psychology about a sensitive subject last week—autism—and drew fire from angry parents and supporters.
The World Bank, the international global capitalist lending institution, was criticized by an independent report after a critical examination of development activities funded by the Bank. The report, released Tuesday, railed against the environmental degradation caused by many projects in poor countries that harm local communities in the name of “development”.
The World Bank and its partners need to do a far better job of considering the environmental effects of projects they finance in poor countries, its internal review group concludes in a new report.
The review, released Tuesday, examined some of the $400 billion in investments in nearly 7,000 projects from 1990 to 2007. It found that recent pledges for environmental sustainability by the bank and sister institutions, including the International Finance Corporation, were often not put into practice when dollars were turned into dams, pipelines, palm plantations and the like.
The authors of the 181-page environmental report, the first by the bank’s Independent Evaluation Group since 2002, said it was crucial for the bank and its partners to intensify their focus on measurable environmental protection, given rising vulnerability to environmental risks and the increasing flow of financing for projects related to climate change.
Remember how Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki endorsed Obama’s plan for U.S. withdrawal from the country? And then remember how the endorsement suddenly became a question of “translation”? Well, it ends up that it wasn’t a botched translation at all, and that Maliki’s office personally reviewed the final interview before it was published.
Crooks and Liars:
We already knew that the Maliki “clarification” came only after pressure from the White House & CENTCOM, and that that “clarification” largely just reaffirmed his point that Obama’s time frame is more in line with the views of the Iraqi government. We also already knew that the original translation was done by Maliki’s official translator, not Der Spiegel. Well, now TNR is reporting that Maliki’s office personally reviewed the translation and signed off on it.
But it turns out that Maliki actually got a copy of the interview before it was printed and had the option to make any changes. A writer at Der Spiegel sent us this tidbit of info:
“The reason the magazine scores so many high level interviews is that the editors agree to allow the subjects to “authorize” the interviews before they go to press. It wasn’t just a slip of the tongue, in other words: Maliki not only endorsed Obama’s plans for withdrawing from Iraq, but his office then explicitly approved the endorsement before it was printed. The denials, then, were doubly facetious. Spiegel couldn’t say so, though, without revealing its embarrassing authorization policy.”
Marc Ambinder reports that John McCain's one press conference of the week has been abruptly canceled:
The one scheduled McCain press conference of the week has just been canceled, we are told. No word as to why. Grumble, grumble.
Why? Scheduling. Which is like answering "food" to "what did you eat for breakfast."
Ambinder offers a relatively innocuous explanation:
My bet is that the campaign much prefers local and regional interviews. Us national press folks will ask qualitatively different questions -- McCain v. the press, McCain v. history, McCain v. Obamania... The priority here in northern Pennsylvania's 10th Congressional district is on getting good local news coverage.
Despite the press crowd around Obama, McCain's avail today was the one with more promise to make news:
He hasn't explained what he meant by juggling the timeline on the surge and Awakening (though his staff did the best salvage job possible); whether he meant that Obama was deliberately selling out the country; whether he shares his campaign's grievance with the press; or what he thinks of his staff's genocide-themed attack.
CBS did air McCain's charge, also made earlier in the day, that Sen. Obama "would rather lose a war than lose a campaign," which, said Time's Joe Klein on CNN, "is the most scurrilous thing that I have heard a presidential candidate say in the nine elections I have covered." [Cursor.org]
10:08:18 AM comment []
Finally, at long last, I have something in common with Muhammad Ali.
No, I'm not the heavyweight champion of the world, and haven't been named spokesperson for Raid bug spray. Like "the Greatest" - not to mention far too many others -- I have been a target of state police surveillance for activities -- in my case against the death penalty -- that were legal, non-violent, and, so we assumed, constitutionally protected. In classified reports compiled by the Maryland State Police and the Department of Homeland Security, I am "Dave Z." This nickname was given by an undercover agent known to us as "Lucy." She sat in our meetings of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, smiling and engaged, taking copious notes about actions deemed threatening by the Governor of Maryland, Robert Ehrlich. Our seditious crimes, as Lucy reported, involved such acts as planning to set up a table at the local farmer's market and writing up a petition. Adding a dash of farce to this outrage, she was monitoring us in the liberal enclave of Takoma Park, Maryland, a place known more for vegans than violence, more for tie-dying than terrorism.
Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act and the ACLU, we now know that "Lucy" was only one part of a vast, insidious project. The Maryland State Police's Department of Homeland Security devoted near 300 hours and thousands of taxpayer dollars from 2005 and 2006 to harassing people whose only crime was dissenting on the question of the war in Iraq and Maryland's use of death row.
My dear friend Mike Stark, a board member of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty is at times referred to in "Lucy's" report as a "socialist" and an "anarchist." One can only assume this is the pathetic time honored tradition of reducing people to simple caricatures, all the better to garner Homeland Security grant money.
Veteran peace activist in Baltimore, Max Obuszewski, who initiated the suit, was as well consistently shadowed as he walked down the streets. His "primary crime" (their lingo) was entered into the homeland security database as "terrorism - anti govern(ment)." His "secondary crime" was listed as "terrorism -- anti-war protesters." The database is known as the Washington-Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, or
HIDTA. Yes, a respected peace organizer of many decades standing is checked as a terrorist, his actions listed as criminal, for doing nothing more than exercising his rights. It boggles the mind.
Former police superintendent Tim Hutchins defended these totalitarian practices by saying, "You do what you think is best to protect the general populace of the state." (The article mentioned that Hutchins is now a federal defense contractor. I guess The Global War on Terror is just the gift that keeps on giving for the Hutchins family.)
But "protect the general populace" from what? The surveillance continued even after it was determined that we were planning nothing more dangerous that carrying clipboards in a public place. Hutchins and the Ehrlich administration have undertaken an ugly violation of our civil rights, manipulating fears of terrorism to stamp out dissent.
This is COINTELPRO pure and simple. Like the infamous counter-intelligence program whose heyday many assume was a relic the 1950s and 1960s, it's an effort to harass the innocent and breed paranoia, all for daring to question power.
Governor Ehrlich and Tim Hutchins stand in the legacy of those who hounded Martin Luther King, and facilitated the death of Malcolm X. They stand in the tradition of those who drove the great actor, college football superstar, and activist Paul Robeson toward The mental breakdown that claimed his life. When Robeson's files were opened under the Freedom of Information Act, the results were terrifying.
As his son, Paul Robeson Jr. has written, "From the files I received, it was obvious that there were agents who did nothing but follow every public event of my father, or even of me.... It took on a life of its own.... Over time, even for someone as powerful and with as many resources as my
dad had...the attrition got to him."
Now Robeson is on a postage stamp. The moral midgets who destroyed him went unpunished. That's what has to change. The ACLU, to their credit, is going on the offensive.
As ACLU lawyer David Rocah said at a news conference in Baltimore on Thursday, "To invest this many hours investigating the most all-American of activities without any scintilla of evidence there is anything criminal going on is shocking. It's Kafkaesque."
Unfortunately for people like Gov. Ehrlich, it is also "the most All
American of activities" to take the constitution and use it as their personal hand wipe.
As the great political philosopher Ice T wrote, "Freedom of Speech.... just watch what you say." Well, now is exactly the time not to watch what we say. I'm angry. I'm angry for my friends, who trusted "Lucy" and others. I'm angry that my tax dollars went to paying the salaries of people who spy and intimidate those exercising their rights. I'm angry that Barack Obama just voted to increase the power of the Federal government to disrupt people's lives. And I'm angry enough that I'm joining a lawsuit initiated by the ACLU. "Homeland Security" picked on the wrong sports writer. They also picked on the wrong group of activists. We will not be silenced.
[People who want to express their outrage can contact the office of the current Governor Martin O'Malley. We should demand a full investigation of the MSP, public release of all documents obtained through this illegal activity, and a specific commitment that the
anti-death penalty and anti-war movement will not be targeted. Call the office of the governor at 1-800-811-8336, or submit a comment online at http://www.governor.maryland.gov/mail/]
Verbs are important. The Bush Administration has gone from saying we "know" something--as in, "we know Saddam has nuclear weapons"--to we "believe" something. Which is fair warning, for a faith-based foreign policy. (No longer a Feith-based one)
Nonetheless, Sunday morning on Fox News Sunday, Joint Chief of Staff Chairman Mike Mullen said he "believes" Iran is moving towards acquiring nuclear weapons. Interrogator Chris Wallace didn't ask him upon what that belief was based. Nor did he ask Mullen whether that belief represented a disagreement with the publicly expressed consensus view of the intelligence community, released last December in a National Intelligence Estimate, that Iran had halted such a program four years ago.
As I recall, the 2002 NIE, the public version of which (minus the privately expressed caviats and dissents) was used to support the push for war in Iraq, was often brandished by media questioners and war supporters to silence those who opposed the invasion. It's no surprise this latest NIE has fallen down the Administration's memory hole, but what excuse do those in the media have for sipping the amnesia juice?
A few hours into his journey to the two key lands occupied by American troops, Barack Obama is feeling the love. Indeed, it seems as if leaders in both Iraq and Afghanistan are looking for some change they can believe in.
As I reported for The Media Consortium, on the eve of Obama's senatorial fact-finding mission to Afghanistan and Iraq, the Afghan ambassador to the U.S. issued a plea for more U.S. troops in his country. Ambassador Said Jawad's request, delivered with a sense of urgency in a Washington, D.C., forum, vindicated Obama's long-held contention that the U.S. invasion of Iraq served only to divert attention and resources from the true front lines in the fight against terrorism, which the Democratic presidential candidate locates in Afghanistan. Last week, Obama published an op-ed in the New York Times advocating the redeployment of troops from Iraq to Afghanistan.
The current capacity of U.S. forces is inadequate, Jawad asserted, noting the recent attack by the Taliban on a U.S. Army outpost that left nine Americans dead. As for our European allies, Jawad said, "The NATO forces are not fighting as hard as they should."
The concern of most Afghans, Jawad said, was not that the U.S. was on their land, but whether the U.S. would stay long enough for the nation to build institutions capable of serving and protecting the people. Implicit in his statement was the belief of many Afghans that the U.S. will abandon their nation once again at our earliest convenience, just as we did after the Afghans effectively fought -- and won -- the final battle of the Cold War.
Jawad and his wife, Shamim, are of the same generation of Obama and his wife, Michelle, and strike me as a couple possessing certain affinities with the Obamas. They're cross-cultural, keenly intelligent, lean and attractive. In an Obama administration, the public diplomacy as regards Afghanistan promises something photogenic.
Although John McCain has, of late, jumped onto the Afghaniband-wagon, my HuffPo colleague Jon Stolz unearthed some 2003 video of McCain speaking rather dismissively of Afghanistan, essentially saying it would fine for the U.S. to "muddle through" there.
Today's big news was the apparent endorsement of Iraq PresidentNouri al-Maliki for Obama's 16-month draw-down plan. Somebody must have just reminded the Iraqi leader that Obama isn't yet president; just hours after they were reported, Maliki's spokesperson began back-pedaling his comments.
All this before Obama has met with either Maliki or Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai.
BAGHDAD — After intense U.S. assaults, al-Qaida may be considering shifting focus to its original home base in Afghanistan, where American casualties are running higher than in Iraq, the top U.S. commander in Iraq said Saturday.
"We do think that there is some assessment ongoing as to the continued viability of al-Qaida's fight in Iraq," Gen. David Petraeus told The Associated Press in an interview at his office at the U.S. Embassy.
Whatever the result, Petraeus said no one should expect al-Qaida to give up entirely in Iraq.
"They're not going to abandon Iraq. They're not going to write it off. None of that," he said. "But what they certainly may do is start to provide some of those resources that would have come to Iraq to Pakistan, possibly Afghanistan."
He said there are signs that foreign fighters recruited by al-Qaida to do battle in Iraq are being diverted to the largely ungoverned areas in Pakistan from which the fighters can cross into Afghanistan. U.S. officials have pressed Pakistan for more than a year to halt the cross-border infiltration. It remains a major worry not only for the war in Afghanistan but also for Pakistan's stability.
Discussing al-Qaida in cautious terms, Petraeus said he is not certain of the reliability of the intelligence information about the terrorist network's latest thinking. He was adamant, however, that until now al-Qaida has seen Iraq as its best opportunity for establishing a militant Islamic state closer to the Persian Gulf.
"That could be under review," Petraeus said. "We do think they are considering what should be the main effort."
He offered a mostly upbeat assessment of conditions in Iraq just weeks before he is to make a recommendation on whether to further reduce U.S. troop levels. Petraeus said the country is showing fresh signs of promise not only on the security front, where insurgent attacks are down sharply, but also politically.
He applauded the latest evidence of movement toward reconciliation by Sunnis and Shiites _ the announcement Saturday that Iraq's largest Sunni Arab political bloc had ended a nearly yearlong boycott of the Shiite-led government.
"It's a very important step forward," Petraeus said after an aide interrupted the AP interview to deliver the news. The general flashed a wide smile and instructed the aide to pass along his congratulations to top government officials, who have come under enormous pressure from U.S. officials to reconcile.
Petraeus declined to say what he might recommend to President Bush regarding further U.S. troops reductions. The assessment, he said, is based on a range of factors, including the prospects for Iraqi government approval of legislation required before provincial elections can be held this fall.
He would not talk about specific troop levels later this year. But the enthusiasm of Petraeus's description of security, political and even economic progress in 2008 gave the impression he may be inclined to tell Bush that fewer than the current 15 combat brigades will be needed by year's end.
Petraeus said he was encouraged at the possibility of al-Qaida reconsidering Iraq as its highest priority war front.
"There is some intelligence that has picked this up," he said, adding, "It's not solid gold intelligence.
This information, while unconfirmed, parallels reports that fewer foreign fighters are joining the insurgency in Iraq.
"We do know the foreign fighter flow into Iraq has been reduced very substantially," he said. From a peak of 80 to 100 foreign fighters entering Iraq each month, the total has dropped as low as 20 per month, he said.
He attributed the decline to a combination of factors. They include the intense U.S. and Iraqi military operations against al-Qaida in Baghdad, Mosul and elsewhere, and stronger actions by neighboring countries to prevent militants from crossing into Iraqi territory. He mentioned Saudi Arabia as an example.
The other main source of violence in Iraq over the past year _ Shiite militia extremists _ also has been curbed. Petraeus said that whether leaders of those Shiite groups, who fled in many cases to Iran, end up returning to fight for control of such Baghdad sections as Sadr City will be a critical bellwether.
"This will be very important because it will be an indicator of whether Iran intends to start a new chapter in its relationship with Iraq, or not," he said.
Petraeus said Iraq's prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, got an encouraging response when he traveled recently to Tehran to express concern about the role of Iranian-supported Shiite extremists in Iraq.
Al-Maliki "received assurances from the highest levels that Tehran wants nothing but constructive relations."
Petraeus is due to leave his post in Baghdad in September to head U.S. Central Command, with responsibility for U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan as well as Iraq. He is to be replaced in Baghdad by Gen. Raymond Odierno, who until February had served as the No. 2 commander in Iraq.
As reported in these pages, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has endorsed Barack Obama's 16-month withdrawal timetable.
The McCain Campaign is effectively over.
McCain had two rationales for his candidacy. The first is that he is a selfless war hero, who placed duty over self in the Hanoi Hilton. That image is partially tarnished by his kowtowing to people he called "agents of intolerance" (Pat Robertson, the late-Jerry Falwell, Pastor Hagee), his embrace of George W Bush and his policies, and the constant stream of sleazebags who he has called 'honorable', but who have had to exit his campaign. That is not to say that his heroism during his imprisonment will ever go away, but rather that he just does not seem to be the same man today as he was then, or even in 2000.
The second rationale is that he, somehow, was the man to pursue the Islamic terrorists. Barack Obama seized the bin Laden/Taliban national security mantra way back in the early days of the Democratic Primary debates, took a lot of criticism from his Democratic rivals and the Bush Administration for it, stuck by his position, and now has McCain following suit. Victory: Obama.
All McCain had then was Iraq, amazingly quoting bin Laden (without recognizing bin Laden's vested interest in disinformation to focus attention away from himself--and McCain is supposed to be the experienced one!!) that Iraq was the central theatre of the "war on terrorism" to prove that the US could not leave because of chaos, genocide and Islamic terrorism. That image, too, was tarnished by McCain's lack of clear understanding just who the enemy was, but he still staked claim to maintaining the "gains" made by the surge that, depending on the day, he either invented or supported or both.
With al-Maliki's statement, what is McCain to do now? Is he going to say that the US will stay even if the Iraqi government does not want us? If not, then is he willing to allow the descent into chaos and genocide he has been predicting?
About all McCain could say is that al-Maliki's statement would not have been possible without the surge. That is highly debatable. Obama could more rightly say that al-Maliki's statement would not have been possible if it were not for his candidacy--knowing that an Obama Presidency would mean the withdrawal of US troops, the Iraqis now have the incentive that Obama, John Kerry, Russ Feingold, and others have been promoting for years as the major change in policy necessary for Iraqis to begin resolving their differences.
Or not. But, not to allow the US to remain hostage to the decisions of Iraqi politicians.
Most important, however, is that the American people want the US involvement ended. Obama is far more trusted to end it than McCain. McCain's controversy over the wisdom of doing so has been rendered moot by al-Maliki.
Al-Maliki has moved the campaign discussion to "post-surge" policies.
Obama can say, "the only 3 people who remain wedded to a perpetual US engagement in Iraq are John McCain, George Bush and Dick Cheney, and, fortunately, the time for 2 of them to direct US policy is rapidly coming to an end".
What does McCain have left?
A gas-tax holiday that destroys infrastructure jobs and does nothing for gas prices? Continuing obstructionism on providing universal healthcare? Another set of taxcuts for the wealthy?
Watch for the man who claimed he wanted a "respectful campaign" to descend into a continuous barrage of mudslinging, and nothing more.
It is all he has left. And, when he does do it, his legacy will be forever tarnished.
Health Care For America Now, which is a "national grassroots campaign organizing millions of Americans to win a guarantee of quality, affordable health care for all" has been joined in their fight by Public Service Administration - the satirists who last made news when they explored the colorful depths of John McCain's vocabulary. The result of their collaboration? "Insurance Company Rules," which re-imagines what the world would be like if we all lived our lives the way health insurance companies do. As you might imagine, that world would be indescribably hilarious if it weren't so awful.
Their video debuted at Netroot Nations this afternoon, and now, you can catch it here!
Barack Obama kicked off his overseas trip this week with a visit to Camp Arifjan in Kuwait before heading to Afghanistan to meet with U.S. troops and Afghan officials. Here are photos and video from Obama's first two stops:
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., poses with SPC Lakeisha Willingham, 311th Sustainment Command (Expeditionary), after a shoot-around game of basketball at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, 2008, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., shakes hands with service members at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, 2008, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., speaks at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) meets with troops in Kuwait, in this frame grab taken on July 18, 2008 and released on July 19. After leaving Kuwait, Obama met the commander of U.S. troops in eastern Afghanistan Saturday to talk about the war he says is not getting enough attention from the Bush administration.
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., waves as he leaves the gym after talking to service members at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
Obama In Afghanistan
U.S. Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama (L) stands with Gul Agha Shirzai, the governor of Nangarhar province, in the city of Jalalabad east of Kabul July 19, 2008. U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama met the commander of U.S. troops in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday to talk about the war he says is not getting enough attention from the Bush administration
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., gets help from service members wishing U.S. ARCENT a happy 90th birthday at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama (3rd R) poses for a photo at Bagram airbase in Afghanistan July 19, 2008. U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama met the commander of U.S. troops in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday to talk about the war he says is not getting enough attention from the Bush administration.
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., listens as Maj. Gen. Charles A Anderson, deputy commanding general, U.S. Army Central Command explains the differences between Humvee's at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, during a Congressional Delegation
In this photo released Saturday, July 19, 2008, by the the U.S. Army, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., signs memorabilia for service members at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait, Friday, July 18, during a Congressional Delegation visit.
This is not a joke. How many Air Force generals does it take to choose upholstery?
At least four. At least that many ranking generals had a hand in choosing the decor of deluxe ''comfort capsules'' for themselves and their peers aboard military transport planes, so the brass don't have to suffer with the enlisted hoi polloi.
The story in today's LA Times describes private jet-like touches -- sofas, beds, leather swivel chairs, flat-screen monitors with stereo -- and also cites a price of $16.2 million for all this, out of the War on Terror budget. That was for the original ten luxury capsules; the number's been dropped to three, and some chairs, which cuts the cost to a mere $7.6 million -- a consolation, no doubt, to men and women who have served their country and then can't get the post-war care they need.
When Air Force brass changed their minds about color and wanted Air Force blue leather seats instead of brown, and a seat pocket, that added $68,240 to the tab.
The description sounds like a brochure for a Gulfstream 5, and the promo job was all about waving the flag. It's patriotic to encase high-ranking butts in luxury that ''the people of the United States would be proud of.'' When, pray, would the people of the United States be seeing this deluxe set-up? And I don't think ''proud'' would describe the sentiments of the enlisted people who got an eyeful of the first-class section they aren't allowed to occupy.
I'm proud that we know how to win one war, slam-dunk -- the war on generals' hemorrhoids.
Ashcroft Defends Waterboarding In Front of House Judiciary Committee. WASHINGTON - Former Attorney General John Ashcroft said Thursday “it was not a hard decision” to withdraw Justice Department legal opinions that approved the use of harsh interrogation methods which critics say amount to torture.
Ashcroft, testifying in front of the House Judiciary Committee, said he did not necessarily disagree with the conclusions of the two [...] [CommonDreams.org » Headlines07]
11:31:04 AM comment []
Warming Is Major Threat To Humans, EPA Warns. WASHINGTON - Climate change will pose “substantial” threats to human health in the coming decades, the Environmental Protection Agency said yesterday — issuing its warnings about heat waves, hurricanes and pathogens just days after the agency declined to regulate the pollutants blamed for warming.
In a new report, the EPA said “it is very likely” that [...] [CommonDreams.org » Headlines07]
11:25:52 AM comment []
New Uranium Leak Discovered at French Nuclear Site. PARIS - French nuclear safety authorities said Friday that a broken pipe at a nuclear fuel plant in southeast France had caused a radioactive leak but no damage to the environment.
The latest uranium spill at the plant run by nuclear giant Areva in Romans-sur-Isere came amid much public concern over a leak at another facility [...] [CommonDreams.org » Headlines07]
11:18:22 AM comment []
Army to Shoot Live Pigs for Medical Drill. HONOLULU — The Army says it’s critical to saving the lives of wounded soldiers. Animal-rights activists call the training cruel and outdated.
Despite opposition by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the Army is moving forward with its plan to shoot live pigs and treat their gunshot wounds in a medical trauma exercise Friday [...] [CommonDreams.org » Headlines07]
11:17:40 AM comment []
President Bush had hoped to shape America’s military presence in Iraq for years after his departure from the White House by negotiating a long-term Status of Forces Agreement, but a number of sticking points have forced a much more temporary understanding. U.S. negotiators have agreed to a kind of timetable for withdrawal, as demanded by Iraqis, but are holding out over legal immunity for American forces.
The chief argument for staying in Iraq is that the country will fall apart if the U.S. withdraws, so it’s instructive that Iraqis themselves seem to look forward to that day. One U.S. official told the Washington Post that Iraqi politicians were adamant that some kind of withdrawal timetable be included. Otherwise they would not be able to sell the agreement to the people. Imagine that.
Washington Post:
The failure of months of negotiations over the more detailed accord—blamed on both the Iraqi refusal to accept U.S. terms and the complexity of the task—deals a blow to the Bush administration’s plans to leave in place a formal military architecture in Iraq that could last for years.
Although President Bush has repeatedly rejected calls for a troop withdrawal timeline, “we are talking about dates,” acknowledged one U.S. official close to the negotiations. Iraqi political leaders “are all telling us the same thing. They need something like this in there. . . . Iraqis want to know that foreign troops are not going to be here forever.”
Unlike the status-of-forces agreements between the United States and countries such as South Korea and Japan, where large numbers of U.S. troops have been based for decades, the document now under discussion with Iraq is likely to cover only 2009. Negotiators expect it to include a “time horizon,” with specific goals for U.S. troop withdrawal from Baghdad and other cities and installations such as the former Saddam Hussein palace that now houses the U.S. Embassy.
The International Criminal Court is on the verge of issuing an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar el-Bashir for crimes against humanity. According to my sources, at this very moment, China is preparing to introduce a United Nations resolution to suspend ICC jurisdiction over Sudan. The Chinese backed resolution proposes stripping the ICC of its power to investigate or prosecute Sudanese authorities for 12 months. Under Article 16 of the Rome statute the UN Security Council has that authority, renewable at six monthly intervals. If the UN Security Council invokes such a suspension they will be held accountable by the people of the world. I think the resolution will be vetoed, hopefully by the US, almost certainly by the UK and France who have been clear supporters of the ICC. It will be an interesting time to see the P5 (US, UK, France, Russia and China) forced to put their cards on the table. Who will they stand for? The perpetrators or the victims?
This move by Beijing further casts China in the role of Sudan's enabler and defender and secures their position in the Darfur genocide as the second most culpable nation in the world.
Normally outsiders have a hard time grasping the technical issues at Yucca, but this latest recklessness is simplicity itself. Yucca lies near earthquake faults and is expected to experience quakes of up to 6.5 on the Richter scale. DOE rejected Holtec's proposal that the nuclear waste casks undergoing the four-year "cool down" period before being storied permanently should be tied down with seismic anchors. Now in San Francisco, where I live, gargoyles on office building are seismically anchored. It seems abundantly clear that nuclear waste casks should be as well. But DOE wants to save money and, as Holtec said, in an earthquake "pigs will fly before the casks will stay put." Again, this is not the opinion of Greenpeace -- it's a company that stores nuclear waste as a business.
So how does this play out politically? Nevada is a Presidential battleground state, and has a closely contested Congressional seat as well.
Sixty percent of Nevadans continue to oppose Yucca. More than half say that a Presidential candidate's stance on Yucca will influence their vote in November. John McCain supports Yucca. Barack Obama opposes it. More troubling for Nevadans, McCain favors an investment of hundreds of billions of dollars in constructing at least 45 new nuclear power plants, and perhaps as many as 145. These new plants if built will need storage -- and Yucca, as presently designed, will be full. But the pressure will be enormous to just ship the added waste to Nevada, on the grounds that it is already at risk.
As Clark County Commissioner Rory Reid put it during McCain's most recent visit to Las Vegas, McCain "believes Nevada is a wasteland."
Commissioner Reid also drew a sharp contrast between the two candidates: "While Sen. McCain wants to bury the most toxic substance known to man in our state, Sen. Obama wants to spend billions of dollars to invest in new technologies that will create 5 million new jobs across the country."
McCain's response to Nevada was scornful. From the seemingly safe distance of California, he rejected the notion that there could be anything wrong with the Yucca site, saying "It's not a technological breakthrough that needs to be taken; it's a NIMBY problem." However, it appears that NIMBY is a relative concept, depending on whose backyard we're talking about. Because when asked earlier what he thought about the safety of just shipping radioactive waste through Arizona to get to Yucca, McCain, as this YouTube clip shows, made it clear he didn't like the idea at all.
But about a half million Nevadans have moved into the state since DOE last seriously tried to move the Yucca Mountain project along. Our challenge is going to be educating those new residents about the federal plan to use junk science and rushed permits to make their state the designated sacrifice zone to revive the financial fortunes of America's nuclear power complex.
Phil Gramm should get a commendation for honesty for "pulling a David Stockman". The Obama campaign should seize on this as a "teaching moment" for the American people. To use it properly, they need to repeat the moment and use it relentlessly until November--and thereafter. If they do, this election will be a blow-out. One way to do this: give out Gramm-y awards.
Not since Budget Director Stockman revealed that the real goal of Ronald Reagan's massive tax cuts was to bankrupt the treasury so that no program investing in people or providing increased entitlements could even be considered has a Republican so openly conveyed their Party's true attitude toward the 95% of the country who suffer when gas prices go up, or high-wage jobs get transferred overseas, or have a child that gets sick.
Stockman was "taken to the woodshed" and that was the end of that. The clueless Democrats did not use it as a moment of enlightenment.
For nearly 4 decades the Republicans have attacked government as the cause of peoples' difficult lot in life, creating a electoral schizophrenia--people still want, and need, a robust safety net, but have had it drummed into their heads that government is "too big and spends too much money" to do it.
Instead, they implied, the remedy is a good brisk walk and a strong slap-on-the-back for individuals, and a hefty slice of largesse for the heavy hitters, aka, "socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor". Gramm is an officer with the United Bank of Switzerland (UBS). He's doing just fine, so what is everyone whining about?
The Republicans have played this created schizophrenia brilliantly, hiding from the people that their attacks on government are really attacks on them. They introduced legislation with such names as "Saving Medicare", "Strengthening Social Security", and "Healthy Forests". They still pretend that the real fight was not over which party was more dedicated to these programs but which one could make them better by shrinking the role of government, a triumph of prestidigitation if there ever was one as it was to occur with burgeoning clientele. [FDR recognized this lie in 1940, saying mockingly: "Just give them control of them (New Deal programs), they plead, and they will take so much better care of them, honest-to-goodness they will".].
Gramm has revealed their true colors. The radical righties believe that it is fundamentally illegitimate for people even to want such programs and policies. That is what Gramm was saying.
What is government, after all? It should be an expression of the peoples' wills through their elected officials. Thus, when the Republicans attack government, they have really been attacking the American people. It is not just that government is, by its nature, inefficient--providing food stamps to the poor is inherently less profitable than selling quiche in the suburbs. It is that there is something wrong with you, they say, if having government provide services such as universal healthcare and old-age pensions is what you want.
There was a revealing moment in American politics about a year ago. Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar signed a bill increasing the minimum wage in California. Told that Rush Limbaugh was highly critical of him, Schwarzeneggar replied, "Rush Limbaugh is irrelevant".
Limbaugh panicked. So as not to cut his Republican ties, Schwarzeneggar appeared immediately on the Limbaugh show during which the dialogue went something like this...RL: "but the minimum wage is not a conservative position". AS: "it's what the people want". It was probably the only time that Limbaugh just shut up, because continuing the dialogue would have forced him to say what Gramm has just said, "who cares what the people want, they are whiners".
If the Democrats are not so stupid (as they usually are) to let it drop in a news cycle or two, Phil Gramm's comments about whining and recessions occurring in peoples' minds can become the moment of enlightenment for the American people. They need to make Gramm's comments the defining difference between the parties.
The Obama campaign has begun correctly. They have pointed out that the recession is not mental, but real. That is good.
But, they need to keep it up. They should have ads with Gramm's comments juxtaposed with real citizens working 2 or 3 jobs, and struggling to make ends meet. Obama should have at least one citizen at each stop with their own story.
They must ignore McCain's attempt to distance himself from Gramm's comments. Just ignore it. Keep up the drumbeat. Give out "Gramm-y" awards to Republicans who voted against the GI-bill; against expanding the Children's Health program; against a Windfall Profits Tax to recycle big-oils' profits to help lower income people cope with increased gas prices and to provide resources for alternative energy; against a new voting system for unionization...and so on.
Hand out "Gramm-y" awards to McCain on a whole legion of issues starting with healthcare, education, mortgage crisis, high energy prices.
During the 2004 campaign, Bush/Cheney whined it was because of multiple crises that they had not been able to create jobs. I provided Kerry/Edwards a response that went all the way back to FDR, showing how other Presidents, without exception, created jobs despite major crises. The campaign used it, and it was effective in one sense: the Bush/Cheney campaign never again used that excuse. I then urged them to keep using it over-and-over-and-over-and-over again. The DC consultants advising the Kerry/Edwards campaign's reaction: "we won this one".
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. When the other side shuts up, the protagonist has scored heavily and it should be a signal to repeat it constantly. The strategy was totally useless unless Kerry/Edwards had repeated it throughout the rest of the campaign. Repeating it would have scored heavily in the depressed Midwest, such as Ohio. It would have forced the Bush/Cheney people out of their Fox(news)holes to invent a different response, and they could not have.
Ignoring McCain's attempts to distance himself from the true Republican mantras will have another effect--to the extent McCain then says, to the effect, "no, I believe in collective action through government as well", he will have lost his conservative base and his conservative credentials.
Let us watch for the next Republican whose vote or statement or position earns them the Gramm-y award. It will not take long.
In an article for Mother Jones, Laura Rozen reports that there are “significant factors weighing against prospective Israeli military action on Iran before the Bush term ends.” “My sense is the Pentagon would be worried or opposed to an Israeli attack,” says David Wurmser, former Middle East adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney. But, according to Wurmser, an Israeli attack against Iran is still more likely than not:
“Even beyond the question of whether McCain or Obama wins, the Israelis are afraid that no new administration is really going to be able to get its act together quickly to be able to mobilize a plan and do something,” Wurmser said.
Wurmser put the odds of Israel striking Iran before Bush leaves office at “slightly, slightly above 50-50.”
