My Weblog

The Power of Nightmares

Politicians used to offer us dreams of possibilities and how THEY could help us achive that vision; Now they offer us nightmares and how they can protect us from them becoming real.

The nightmare of terrorists is the easiest one to create, sustain and protect us from.

The Power of Nightmares.

Good for the Clintons is Good for the Bushies

Valerie Plame's new lawyer plans to force Dick Cheney and Karl Rove to testify using a legal precedent that allowed Bill Clinton to be sued while in office. - New Plame Move on Cheney

Link from Mother Jones

Judge Rules Warrantless Surveillance is Unconstitutional

Judge Orders Halt to NSA Warrantless Spy Program. - Reuters News

Judge Anna Diggs Taylor said the controversial practice of warrantless wiretapping known as the "Terrorist Surveillance Program" violated free speech rights, protections against unreasonable searches and the constitutional check on the power of the presidency.

Is Bush Stupid?

Joe Scraborough posits that question in his blog.

It's a mistake to see Bush as stupid. He's a brilliant reader of people, a brilliant politician who knows when to push and what buttons to push.  Where he appears inarticulate is when he's discussing issues he has no interest in solving: Katrina's victims, Middle East peace, the War in Iraq, Energy policy, compassionate conservative issues, helping people.

Where he's passionate and articulate is when he's talking about war and death.

Rumsfeldian Language Skills

Learn how to speak Rumsfeldian. - Village Voice link.

Bush's Signing Statements Threaten Our Democracy

While Bush promotes his campaign to bring his version of democracy to other countries, he and his administration are undermining OUR democracy here in the US. One of the key tactics he's using is the signing statement.

Signing statements are these little executive addendums to any bill passed by Congress that stipulates what part of the bill Bush feels he can ignore.

That it violates articles in the Constitution matters not as no one in Congress seems up to the job to challenge his authority.

Blame Bush for the use of Signing Statements. Blame Congress for abdicating their role in holding him accountable for violating his oath of office.

Remember the War in Iraq?

Remember that war? The war in Iraq? The one with 135,000 US troops. (Psss: There's another one in Afghanistan, too.)

That war's receiving 60% less coverage on major news networks now as compared to 2003. Frank Rich in the NY Times writes today:

In contrast to the Israel-Hezbollah war, where the stakes for the combatants and American interests are clear, the war in Iraq has no rationale to keep it afloat on television or anywhere else. It’s a big, nightmarish story, all right, but one that lacks the thread of a coherent plot.

But it's not like nothing's happening. Over 100 people a day are dying in Iraq. That's on top of the 50,000 civilian deaths that we didn't count, cause we don't do body counts. According to the LA TIMES, Proportionately, it is as if 570,000 Americans were slain in three years.

Death and mayhem rule the network shows. So you'd think the networks would want to cover that action. Maybe there's no syndication revenues. But think again. Iran looms and so does Syria.

Some of it may have to do with what Frank Rich of the NY Times calls the apocalyptic nature of security in Baghdad. That's the capital. You know your war's going bad when you can't provide security in your country's capital or the capital of the country you occupy.

And as Bill O'reilly of Fox News says. It is depressing to pay attention to this war on terror. I mean, it's summertime. And that's from Bill O'Reilly, the administration's real press secretary. Imagine you're Bush, already challenged to focus attention on anything other than ESPN...

Even Laura Bush's high-tech children's hospital couldn't generate much interest other than about it's cost overruns.

Remember Zarqawi? His death was to have lowered the death tolls from insurgents....WRONG. It's only increased.

That the latest American plan for victory is to reposition our forces by putting more of them in the crossfire of Baghdad’s civil war is tantamount to treating our troops as if they were deck chairs on the Titanic. Even if the networks led with the story every night, what Americans would have the stomach to watch?

Who's a war criminal?

Israel or Hezbollah?

Well...it's a tossup.

ISRAEL: ...Israel is certainly committing a war crime by bombing civilian neighborhoods without any clear military targets. Moreover, Human Rights Watch has condemned Israel's use of cluster bombs, which are "unacceptably inaccurate," in civilian areas. Israeli military using cluster-bombs and white phosphorous in civilian areas is difficult to deny any more. Even if US media avoids the story.

HEZBOLLAH:...firing rockets into Israeli cities seems to be the chief war crime.

But then both are but proxies for their corporate patrons. Israel's patron is the US; The US keeps Israel supplied with literally tons of weapons. Hezbollah's patron is Iran.

And without patron support would either party, Israel or Hezbollah, be in a position to engage in attacks on each other's civilians? No. So, then who's the real war criminals?

It's about the oil, stupid

As Bush today announced that the war between Lebanon and Israel is about something far greater, a wider conflict...Greg Palast reminds us what the issue is about: oil.

From a recent post by Greg Palast:

Why haven't what we laughably call "leaders" of the USA, Iran and Saudi Arabia called back their delinquent spawn, cut off their allowances and grounded them for six months?

Maybe because mayhem and murder in the Middle East are very, very profitable to the sponsors of these characters with bombs and rockets. America, Iran and Saudi Arabia share one thing in common: they are run by oil regimes. The higher the price of crude, the higher the profits and the happier the presidents and princelings of these petroleum republics.

This Thursday, Exxon is expected to report the highest second-quarter earnings of any corporation since the days of the Pharaoh, $9.9 billion in pure profit collected in just three months -- courtesy of an oil shortage caused by pipelines on fire in Iraq, warlord attacks in Nigeria, the lingering effects of the sabotage of Venezuela's oil system by a 2002 strike... the list could go on.

Exxon's brobdingnagian profits simply reflect the cold axiom that oil companies and oil states don't make their loot by finding oil but by finding trouble. Finding oil increases supply. Increased supply means decreased price. Whereas finding trouble -- wars, coup d'etats, hurricanes, whatever can disrupt supply -- raises the price of oil.

And there you have it.

Going after the true citizens

A former NSA employee  was recently issued a subpoena to appear before a grand jury to discuss what he knew about leaking details of the NSA's warrantless search program to the NY Times.

What's not clear is why he's being issued a subpoena since the White House had spoken with the NY Times about this program of warrantless searches over 2 years prior to their being disclosed by the NY Times.  Wouldn't then the NY Times be guilty of conspiracy or obstruction if they DIDN'T reveal an ongoing federal felony crime. Maybe that's why the White House discussed that program with the NY Times, make them complicit in its perpetuation by the act of their silence.

What's also not clear is why Bush isn't being subpoena'd as his Attorney General revealed last week it was Bush who obstructed the investigation into the warrantless surveillance program.

So, you trumpet to the world that you block an investigation into a felony crime and you subpoena those who report the same felony crime. War is peace; guilt is innocence. George Orwell we have finally caught up with you.

Iran bans foreign words; America requires English

It's not comforting to see Iran and America moving in lock-step towards controlling the conversation within their respective borders.

IRAN. Iranian President Bans Usage of Foreign Words. 

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered government and cultural bodies to use modified Persian words to replace foreign words that have crept into the language, such as ''pizzas'' which will now be known as ''elastic loaves,'' state media reported Saturday.

America: 4 years ago, legislators on the national and state level pre-empted Iran with measures to designate that English be the official language of the US.

3 years ago the US House of Representatives, in a bold leadership move, required their cafeteria to change the name on their menus for french fries to freedom fries.

French fries to freedom fries; Pizza to elastic loaves.

And there's America leading the way to xenophobia, pre-empting Iran's language-control efforts by 4 years.

Now the banking system fails in Iraq

Violence in Iraq is Now Creating Chaos in the Banking System. (blog-friendly link from NY Times.)

Praised by the United States as a success story as recently as a few months ago, that system has quickly become a wild landscape of clandestine cash runs, huge hauls by robbers dressed as police officers and soldiers, kidnappings of bank executives with ransoms as high as $6 million, American allegations of tie-ins with insurgent financiers, and legitimate customers turned away when they go to pick up their savings and flee the country.

“It is a crisis,” said Wisam K. Jamil, managing director of Iraq’s oldest private bank, the Bank of Baghdad, which lost $1.5 million in a literal case of highway robbery by men wearing police uniforms last December.

God, I hope Michelle Malkin doesn't blame the NY Times for letting Americans know what all Iraqis know daily. Last week she blamed the NY Times for letting everyone in America know what anyone in the Mid-east could know just by looking up: America was resupplying the Israelis with arms via air shipments. All they had to do was look up in the sky and see the military transport planes landing. I guess for Michelle that was a bit of a revelation that you don't need her or the NY Times to know that military transport planes deliver military supplies. And anyone in the neighborhoods of the airports, departing or arriving, could see them landing or taking off.