BushCo. The Cause of More 9-11 Deaths

There was, of course, the well known PDB; "bin Laden determined to attack in the US." Something close to 3,000 deaths can be placed on their non-existent consciouses.

In the immediate aftermath there ware FEMA and EPA officials telling New Yorkers that the debris and fumes coming from ground zero were safe. Just like other decisions and non-decisions, this one has had its deadly effects.

The government's point man on Sept. 11 health programs said he is worried that an autopsy linking a retired detective's death to recovery work at ground zero may be a warning sign of other life-threatening cases.

Dr. John Howard also said it will take time to determine whether there is a scientific link between deaths and exposure to toxic dust. Some epidemiologists have said it will take 20 years or more to prove such a link.

More deaths linked directly to the incompetence of BushCo. and their cronies. More reasons not to trust them in anything they do.

Not that we needed more...

Signs of Erosion

On the hill behind my house, in a bare path of dark, moist earth, there are little gullies carved into the dirt. It's been raining here lately and the water, streaming down hill has carved these little signs, left this evidence of the slow erosion of the ridge my house sits on. Depending on how much it rains and on many other factors, my house might be safe for eons. Or it could be washed down into the valley below in an instant.

Our political landscape can sometimes be read just like the a real landscape. You need only know how to read the signs, how to interpret the evidence left behind. Policies and actions that are hurtful to the body politic can leave behind small signs like those in my back yard, or they can alter the political landscape like the landslides in Hawaii this week.

One such sign - among so many lately - is this:

Not a single doctor in South Dakota will perform an abortion, which is why Dr. Miriam McCreary has come out of retirement.

Once or twice a month, the 70-year-old grandmother takes a 45-minute flight from Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to perform abortions at the last clinic in the state willing to offer the procedure.

From close enough, following the laws of fractals, the small clefts in the dirt behind my house look like miniature Grand Canyons. It's only a matter of the amount of dirt and rock removed. And once started, such scars grow more rapidly with each new rainfall. Such is the possibility of the erosion of more rights should South Dakota's new and still-untested abortion ban survive its almost certain Supreme Court challenge. And if more states should try the Constitutional waters with their own bans, not only womens' rights will be at risk. Emboldened by any success - or even perceived success - conservatives and the religious fundamentalists who hang from them like leeches - will press for other so-called family friendly or religiously sanctioned inroads on all of our rights.

This is dangerous territory that South Dakota has set us all upon. What has started as a series of small rivulets in the landscape of American politics could be turned into a veritable Badlands of restrictive, fundamentalist and intrusive laws and the near permanent erosion of our valuable and vital civil rights.

Recharging

It's true that I've been really busy. It's true that I've been in a bit of a funk lately. It's true that there are too many things going on in my personal life - not enough of them good.

It's not, however, true that I'm giving up on blogging.

I just need to recharge, to find a little peace. I want to write, it's just that when I get home at the end of a long day I just don't have the energy right now. And my job has changed so that I no longer have much time to myself during the day. So while I try to find a little energy and time, it may be a while between posts - as it has been of a little while.

What hasn't changed is BushCo.'s ability to bring me out of a funk with outrage. So keep dropping by. And thanks for reading my stuff for so long...

So Few Patriots in the Senate

89 - 10.

Ninety-nine votes cast.

Ninety-nine senators voting on whether to let BushCo. continue to find new ways to violate our civil rights and the rights of foreigners who may or may not have done anything wrong.

And only ten of them could find the fortitude to stand up for those rights.

And the news outlets report it as though it were nothing different than the day before. When more people can identify the members of the Simpson family than know the five guarantees of the first amendment - I suppose it's no wonder.

Ninety-nine votes cast.

89 - 10.

Other Lessons

BushCo.'s adventure in Iraq has presented the US with many lessons to be learned; many of which are military, many are diplomatic. Many will be reviewed in military "after action reports." Some others will be reviewed by the striped pants set in State. Others however will not be so obvious; there are no formal mechanisms for learning societal lessons from disasters such as Iraq. We can only hope that they will be learned.

One lesson in particular has to do with the role of religion in society.

So many people in the US think that more religion in the public sphere could only do our society good. As wrong as they may be in reality, they think that their particular set of rules would do us all good. In the abstract, and not tied to any particular sect, they could well be right. The problem, as always, is in the execution. Or, to use a more apt metaphor, the devil is in the details.

Those in the religious right in this country are notoriously unable to see beyond their next church gathering, but I can only hope that the sectarian violence in Iraq becomes an object lesson in the value of the separation of church and state. The disaster, the brewing civil war in Iraq is the future of our country should some sect or another be able to impose its will on the whole of America through the courts or the legislature.

We have to hope that lessons learned are spread far and wide through our country. Not only that it's impossible to spread democracy at the point of a sword, but that it's impossible to have a democracy at the foot of a cross or at the point of a crescent.

Bush "Unaware"

No shit.

But this is a stunning revelation:

President Bush was unaware of the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates until the deal already had been approved by his administration, the White House said Wednesday.

I can't for the life of me imagine what good that admission could do for Bush. He had to have known about this... Just check out all the administration connections to Dubai Ports World; more from the same MSNBC article:

Sen. John Kerry sent a letter to Treasury Secretary John Snow, seeking full disclosure on the deal with DP World.

"As you know, the CSX rail corporation, where you previously served as chief executive officer, sold its port operations to DP in 2004," wrote Kerry, D-Mass., in a letter. "Moreover, the presidentÂ’s nominee for administrator of the Maritime Administration, David Sanborn, was DPÂ’s head of operations for Latin America while this transaction was being reviewed ..."

While House spokesman Scott McClellan dismissed any connection between the deal and David Sanborn of Virginia, a former senior DP World executive whom the White House appointed last month to be the new administrator of the Maritime Administration of the Transportation Department. Sanborn worked as DP World's director of operations for Europe and Latin America.

And thankfully even Republican lawmakers are abandoning the administration ship on this. The most straighforward bitchslap at Bush being this:

Rep. Sue Myrick, R-N.C., expressed the anger of many lawmakers when she sent Bush a one-sentence letter that read:

Dear Mr. President:
In regards to selling American ports to the United Arab Emirates, not just NO - but HELL NO!

Please, oh please let this be the beginning of the end of the miserable, horrible little man with the miserable, horrible little mind now squatting in our Whitehouse. And to be hoist on his very own national security petard would be the most wonderful irony of all.

Speaking of the Former Soviet Union...

Since they've already pilloried at least one Dem for comparing our gulag with that of the Soviets... what the hell.

Had there ever been any "truth in Pravda" or "news in Izvestia" it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to imagine we might have read something like this (substitute KGB for CIA):

CIA chief sacked for opposing torture

The CIA's top counter-terrorism official was fired last week because he opposed detaining Al-Qaeda suspects in secret prisons abroad, sending them to other countries for interrogation and using forms of torture such as "water boarding", intelligence sources have claimed.

Thanks to Eric Alterman for pointing this out in The Times.

Oh, and a big "Thanks" to our domestic media for being such idiots that we have to go to a London paper to read about this.

Bush Held Hostage?

Well, what else was I to think - at first glance - of this photo/headline combination?



But of course, it was only an article on how Shrubby-boy thinks the US is being held hostage by "foreign oil." It was only the latest re-hash of his sudden revelation, revealed during during the State of the Union Address, that the US uses too much of that "foreign oil." Which is, of course, code (everything this administration says is in code - it's like watching the former Soviet Union) for Middle Eastern oil. Here's the first paragraph:

Saying the nation is on the verge of technological breakthroughs that would "startle" most Americans, President Bush on Monday outlined his energy proposals to help wean the country off foreign oil.

You're damned right we'd be startled if anything remotely scientific or technological came out of this almospathologicallyly anti-science administration. And if it did anything to jeopardize their cozy relationship with the Arab states and big-oil the whole damned country would have a heart attack.

Then you wouldn't need any of that "foreign oil" you've come to so suddenly hate so much.

Lessons Not Learned

If Dick Cheney had not had "other priorities" he might have learned in Viet Nam that you don't leave a wounded buddy behind.

What Would Mohammed Do?

Now that Iran has called for cartoons "lampooning the holocaust," will we now see Jews around the world storming the embassies of Islamic countries? If they were to follow that up with cartoons of Jesus getting a little something on the side, would Christians fly into violent fits? Well, besides those in the South... And everyone slams atheists without fear of retribution from us.

I was going to stay away from this... it's just so stupid, but human stupidity never fails to amaze and enrage me. Who was it who said that you'd never go broke betting on the stupidity of your fellow man?



C'mon... it's a cartoon.

If the fundamentalist mullahs would allow some real education in their fellow citizens, if the governments would spend a little oil money on education and infrastructure and industry, the so-called protesters with nothing else to do but burn embassies and flags might actually have productive jobs. They might actually contribute to the betterment of their countries and the world.

A little perspective, a little common sense; is that too much to ask?

Dark Days Ahead?

If I'm honest with myself, these are dark days for liberals. Hell, if I'm brutally honest, these are dark days for anyone to the left of Genghis Khan.

The corporations - especially the oil companies and defense contractors - essentially run the lawmaking apparatus that supposedly represents we the people. The Republican controlled House passes a budget that cuts Medicaid and student loans, the court is packed with conservative Neanderthals intent on setting our rights back to the 13th century, especially for women, minorities and gays, and corporate bosses are essentially moving us back to feudalism. Conservatives have made sure that anything that might smack of "big government" is so underfunded or poorly managed that their results can only disappoint, providing even more ammunition for their argument that the private sector is the answer to everything from healthcare to halitosis.

Where does that leave us, those of us on the left, who hope for something better?

In dire straights. No doubt about it.

Returning Congress to something approaching balance, if not Democratic control seems an impossible task from out here in the hinterlands. The individual races are too hard to keep track of if you're not a professional blogger or somehow in the business. The aggregate of these races could make the difference between a new Medieval Age in America and a continuing Renaissance.

And if you think the choice is not that stark, you haven't been paying attention.

I have to admit I'm in a bit of a funk right now. Where do we go from here? Sometimes I think the answer is "Canada." And, although the conservatives just won themselves a government there, most Canadian conservatives would be considered quite liberal here. In my clearer moments I know that abandoning ship is not the answer, but those moments are fewer and fewer these days.

So there's my rant, there's my dilemma, there's my disgust. I'd welcome any and all advice, any consolation, any words of encouragement right now...

Somebody Tell Me When It's Over

I couldn't even watch...

Tomorrow's news will have to do. I couldn't stand the thought of watching Bush tonight. I know what the state of our union is; and he won't be saying a thing about it. Nothing that's true, that is.

It's like a bad nightmare.

Incompetence?

In the latest move that leaves me scratching my head wondering if BushCo. has a clue about what it's doing, they've released a key bin Laden lieutenant captured after the battle of Tora Bora without explanation.

For more than a decade, Osama bin Laden had few soldiers more devoted than Abdallah Tabarak. A former Moroccan transit worker, Tabarak served as a bodyguard for the al Qaeda leader, worked on his farm in Sudan and helped run a gemstone smuggling racket in Afghanistan, court records here show.

[snip]

Today, the al Qaeda loyalist known locally as the "emir" of Guantanamo walks the streets of his old neighborhood near Casablanca, more or less a free man. In a decision that neither the Pentagon nor Moroccan officials will explain publicly, Tabarak was transferred to Morocco in August 2004 and released from police custody four months later.

If they wanted to purposely screw up what they've called the War on Terror, they would have done most of what they've done already. So they are either maliciously prolonging this war or they are incompetent.

Neither one is a great choice.

What Do You Call A Country Ruled By Corporations?

A corporatocracy?

How about a kleptocracy.

I wish I could be outraged at this, but when the ruling party is bought and paid for by corporate interests... it's not easy. What else, really, should we expect?

It's almost enough to make you laugh—bitterly, of course. Here was Ford Motor Co. announcing yesterday that it had cut 10,000 jobs last year and that it will cut up to 30,000 more. But shedding jobs at muscle-car acceleration rates didn't stop Ford from pocketing hundreds of millions of dollars courtesy of the American Jobs Creation Act.

>sigh<

Americans Deserve Neither

On this morning's ABC News American's were said to favor Bush's domestic spying program over protecting civil liberties by about 62%. If that's so, it may be time to call an end to our little experiment in democracy.

This afternoon, Bush says that his program is not only legal, but that it's approved by Congress, the Supreme Court and four out of five dentists. While no more true than anything he's ever said about, oh, say weapons of mass destruction or the nexus between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, the great unwashed masses apparently are willing to walk off a cliff with the liberties that make us who we are.

Again, I say it's time to call it quits and admit that most Americans are too stupid, lazy or both to deserve the freedoms guaranteed by our Constitution. When at least 62% of us have forgotten just how precious those freedoms are and are willing to give them up to a little tin-pot village idiot playing at despot, then perhaps it was just too early for democracy and freedom to take root here. This is one of those times that prove that there has not been a smarter man than Ben Franklin born in this land.

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Support the Troops, Part MXV

They've shown again and again what they really mean by "support the troops." But still the mouth-breathers believe them.

Troops and civilians at a U.S. military base in Iraq were exposed to contaminated water last year and employees for the responsible contractor, Halliburton, couldn’t get their company to inform camp residents, according to interviews and internal company documents.

Halliburton, the company formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, disputes the allegations about water problems at Camp Junction City, in Ramadi, even though they were made by its own employees and documented in company e-mails.

But remember, IOKIYAR.

Or, perhaps that's what they call faith-based troop caring.

Then again, who needs clean water if the body armor you're wearing gets you killed?

Google This: Bush Blows

There really is no depth to which this administration will sink in its endeavor to erase every civil liberty we hold dear in this country.

Mountain View-based Google has refused to comply with a White House subpoena first issued last summer, prompting U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales this week to ask a federal judge in San Jose for an order to hand over the requested records.

The government wants a list all requests entered into Google’s search engine during an unspecified single week — a breakdown that could conceivably span tens of millions of queries. In addition, it seeks 1 million randomly selected Web addresses from various Google databases.

Libraries, tax records, book stores, telephones and now your Google searches. This one, however is easier to spoof than the rest. What does it take to enter a bunch of ominous sounding search terms into a search engine?

A Failure of Leadership

Past EPA chiefs agree: "There's been a failure of leadership" under BushCo. to deal effectively and realistically with global warming.

And five of the six were Republicans.

The Bitchslap Heard 'Round the World

It's everywhere else, so it might as well be here. It's good, so if you've managed to avoid it so far, you might as well read it here.

I'm talking about this.

And although I'm sure it's been asked everywhere it's been posted or discussed or quoted, I might as well ask it again: Where the hell were Gore's balls during the campaign?

Incursions

What if Britain's intelligence agencies had discovered that one of the planners of the subway bombing had traveled from Britain to Canada to Manhattan? And what if they thought they knew exactly where he was going to be one Sunday evening? What if Britain decided to launch a submarine launched cruise missile to "take out" this terrorist and also took out an entire city block in the operation?

Just collateral damage in the war on terror, right?

Why would BushCo. think that such a blatant violation of an allies sovereignty as the recent strike against Ayman al-Zawahri would result in anything but what it has?

Why does it seem that everything he does in the prosecution of his so-called war on terror result in exactly the opposite of what a sane, rational person would want?

Why are there so many questions with no good answers?