Bush-whacked?

Never Forget . . . . .

The Hypocrisy of "Justice for All"

(Via Truth-Out)

What Eschaton says . . . .

Via Eschaton

I know this is not news to people who read this blog, but the point is that people who claim to care the most about the deficit - and who our ridiculous media take at their word as being "deficit hawks" - don't care at all about the deficit. 90% of what they care about is cutting taxes on rich people, and 10% of what they care about is making poor and middle class people suffer as much as possible. Deficit hawks are narcissistic sadists who want tax cuts for themselves and suffering for everybody else.

The way to grow the middle class for Romney: up the income to include the one percent

(Via Alternet)

Another day, another out-of-touch statement from Mitt Romney. Speaking today on ABC’s Good Morning America program, Romney said the typical middle-income household in America earned a quarter of a million dollars a year. Wouldn’t it be nice if, for once, we all lived in Romney’s America?
The actual figure is one-fifth of his estimate, the Associated Press reported this week relying on U.S. Census data. The federal agency found median household income—or the midpoint for the nation—is just over $50,000. Back to paying the bills…

I don't know how you feel about this idiot's mental abilities, but he continually demonstrates just how out of touch he is with the realities of our country and our world. This guy makes Dubya look like a freakin' genius.

I don't think Romney has any empathy or awareness of the millions of people who aren't as rich as he is. And underlying it all is a streak of aristocratic cruelty of the Marie Antoinette "let them eat cake" variety that is really scary.

He deserves a good boot in the butt to send him back to wherever he calls home nowadays---i.e., wherever he gets the best tax break.

These Guys

Thanks to Steve S.

They hate us for our freedom

Oh, and also because of this kind of thing:

(Via Atrios)

Friday Random 10

Okay, posting has been pretty sparse lately, but I was visiting the step daughter and grand daughter over the weekend. Lemme make it up to you with a random selection of tunes picked by my iTunes DJ:

The Hollows/Matt Pond PA/Measure

billnick.11/Magnesium Cake/Recliner By the Side of the Road Album

Your Mouth/Frank Zappa/Waka Jawaka

Nature of Love (Cruelty Mix B)/Ministry/Twelve Inch Singles

My Tourniquet/Evanescence/Not for Your Ears

There's Something Very Wrong With Us So Let's Go Out Tonight/Electric Six/Switzerland

Take A Holiday/Mindy Smith/Stupid Love

Zone Doubt/Sebadoh/Harmacy

Prickly Thorn, But Sweetly Worn/The White Stripes/Icky Thump

Winter/The Dodos/Visiter

And here's an oldie from Ministry, back when Dubya was pretending to be President:

Those who would use fear to rule are the most fearful

(Via Crooks and Liars)

Larry Wilkinson, former chief of staff to Colin Powell, and Larry O'Donnell really let Karl Rove have it on Countdown last night for cheerleading torture from the safe distance of his office:

Wilkerson, former chief of staff to United States Secretary of State Colin Powell, interviewed by Lawrence O'Donnell tonight (12 March 2010) on the matter of Karl Rove's book and its attempts to justify the use of torture techniques during the Bush administration.

WILKERSON: "Let me say this, I saw - I had the highest clearance, Top Secret SCI - I saw almost everything Secretary Powell saw. I saw no proof of any of the things that Karl Rove indicated, and, as a matter of fact, no proof that any of the interrogation techniques, other than those used by the FBI, early on, had a real impact on actionable intelligence.

And I've got something else to say about Mr. Rove: No political counselor should have - he doesn't have the need-to-know. He shouldn't have access to that kind of classified information. He has NO BUSINESS having access, so if the White House allowed him to, THAT is a no-no. And I will guess that he's getting his information from Dick Cheney, because he did not have access to that kind of information."

"He's trying to sell his book."

On Rove's contention that waterboarding was not torture because doctors were present, Wilkerson said: "Slick it up with some doctors, and slick it up with some other medical personnel present. That sounds like the Nazis... Nuremburg cites the responsibilities of physicians in that regard and it isn't positive what they say about them..."

O'Donnell started the segment pointing out that Cheney and Rove and Mark Thiessen, the big fans/cheerleaders of torture, never served in the military.

O'DONNELL: "As a military man, what does that feel like to watch the cheerleaders safely positioned on the sidelines, their whole lives, try to tell you what is the most effective process and technique in war?"

WILKERSON: "Well, it says to me, and I'll make no bones about it, that they're all cowards. I mean, it's plain and simple, they're all cowards."

Wilkerson, who is no flaming liberal, has it exactly right. It's time we call these assholes what they are: COWARDS!!! Bush, Cheney, Rove and their cohorts committed war crimes out of fear and political expediency. They had no morality and were motivated by the same thing that kept them out of war when they had their chance to fight: they are pussies.

An Amazing Speech by an Iraqi War Vet

Our real enemies are not those living in a distant land whose names or policies we don't understand; The real enemy is a system that wages war when it's profitable, the CEOs who lay us off our jobs when it's profitable, the Insurance Companies who deny us Health care when it's profitable, the Banks who take away our homes when it's profitable. Our enemies are not several hundred thousands away. They are right here in front of us - Mike Prysner

Watch it here:

Bobblespeak speaks on health care reform:

Via Bobblespeak:

Republicans want to keep the system the way it is, which has all the flaws they accuse health care reform of having.

Health insurance is not health care.

If Bush had submitted a 1,000 page bill in support of invasion, would we have gone to war in Iraq?

So much worse than we thought:

(Via GQ)

As bad as everything that was happening during the Bush administration seemed, it was so much worse than we knew. Here are actual covers from briefings issued by Donald Rumsfeld's office back in the day:

God, I am so grateful these insane creeps are out of there! This kind of shit rivals anything to come out of Nazi Germany.

The REAL reason for torture?

As I listen to all the brouhaha about torture (Was it legal? Was it effective? Were there other alternatives?), something occurs to me that hasn't been brought up. Is it possible that the principals in this situation (Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, etc.) tortured for the reason that they WANTED to do it? These guys were (and are) power hungry, and they felt they could do anything, so my thought is they are really sick, warped individuals who like having the power of life and death over people. They brought a sense of hierarchical entitlement from their years in the corporate business world, ordering employees under their command to do as they were told or hit the bricks, and here they were, at the pinnacle of power in our world.

In the medieval times, kings would have the people they captured in battle tortured for their amusement and gratification. These are men and women who seem to me to be about on that level. Maybe they didn't care if they got information. It's just so COOL to be able to make someone else water board someone. Add to this the fact that they never had the chance to prove their manhood on the battlefield, having, as Cheney has said, "other priorities," and you have a group of individuals who needed to show just how tough they are.

And as I watch and hear Dick Cheney in the media arrogantly beating his chest and saying "these things worked," my thought is that maybe he's not talking about stopping attacks really. Maybe he means he got his rocks off, and that's what it was all about.

It's got a good beat, and it's easy to drown to:

(H/T to Rachel):

Jonathan Mann (the guy who did the Paul Krugman song) takes the BushCo torture memos and puts them to music.

So apparently, "pain" and "suffering" are separate concepts in BushCo World? Just like truth and reality are, eh?

This circular reasoning makes me dizzy!

(Via The Washington Post)

Days after telling students at Stanford University that waterboarding was legal "by definition if it was authorized by the president," former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was pressed again on the subject yesterday by a fourth-grader at a Washington school.

(SNIP)

Then Misha Lerner, a student from Bethesda, asked: What did Rice think about the things President Obama's administration was saying about the methods the Bush administration had used to get information from detainees?

Rice took the question in stride. saying that she was reluctant to criticize Obama, then getting to the heart of the matter.

"Let me just say that President Bush was very clear that he wanted to do everything he could to protect the country. After September 11, we wanted to protect the country," she said. "But he was also very clear that we would do nothing, nothing, that was against the law or against our obligations internationally. So the president was only willing to authorize policies that were legal in order to protect the country."

She added: "I hope you understand that it was a very difficult time. We were all so terrified of another attack on the country. September 11 was the worst day of my life in government, watching 3,000 Americans die. . . . Even under those most difficult circumstances, the president was not prepared to do something illegal, and I hope people understand that we were trying to protect the country."

Misha's mother, Inna Lerner, said the question her son had initially come up with was even tougher: "If you would work for Obama's administration, would you push for torture?"

"They wanted him to soften it and take out the word 'torture.' But the essence of it was the same," Lerner said.

Even children understand the fallacy in the logic used to justify the methods the BushCo folks used in their desire to cover their own asses in the days after 9/11.

And here's the circular reasoning that echoes the 1984-speak these creeps use to justify their immoral actions: "The President wouldn't authorize anything illegal, and if the President authorized it, it was by definition not illegal."

Unless we have trials to take these people to task for their actions, this will go on, and on, and on . . . .

Between Iraq and a hard place

This is so true:

(Paul Krugman via Atrios)

One addendum to today’s column: the truth, which I think everyone in the political/media establishments knows in their hearts, is that the nine months or so between the summer of 2002 and the beginning of the Iraq insurgency were a great national moral test — a test that most people in influential positions failed.

The Bush administration was obviously — yes, obviously — telling tall tales in order to promote the war it wanted: the constant insinuations of an Iraq-9/11 link, the hyping of discredited claims about a nuclear program, etc.. And the question was, should you stand up against that? Not many did — and those who did were treated as if they were crazy.

For me and many others that was a radicalizing experience; I’ll never trust “sensible” opinion again. But for those who stayed “sensible” through the test, it’s a moment they’d like to see forgotten. That, I believe, is the real reason so many want to let torture and everything else go down the memory hole.

Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.

This is a very basic fact of the whole Iraq war experience. If you were questioning the logic that led us into that debacle, you were accused of being un-American, a traitor, and supporting the terrorists. Of course, you were also right, as history shows us, but let's forget all that . . . .

The polarizing event of this nation's recent history was a pointless war that has left us broke, exhausted, and less safe. But it was a mistake that the "serious" elites wanted to make, so it must not have been a mistake, eh?

On to Afghanistan, bitches!!!

Republicans: "It's not waste when we're wasting it . . . ."

(Via Mark Morford)

This is, quite possibly, the most amusing thing I am hearing from the furious fringe: That Obama's plan will wreak hell on the deficit for generations to come. It's a bit like hearing a Catholic priest scold you on the perils of child abuse. I'm sorry, did you just say that it was fine and good to rape the Treasury for the past decade and worship Big Oil and waste two trillion on a failed and useless war, but redirecting those sums into science, health care, children and alternative energy is a terrible and costly idea?

And, via eschataton:

There really is a growing disconnect between the world portrayed on the teevee and reality. For most people getting booted out of their homes and losing their jobs, or just being underemployed, is a far bigger deal than a crashing stock market.

Both of these quotes touch on the real change going on here: a shift in priorities from the corporate and political interests that perpetuate nothing but their own power, and the people of America, who are SUPPOSEDLY the real America. The battle is being waged now to say which one is to prevail.

Flush Dimbulb: Rewriting the Constitution

(Via Huffington Post)

We believe that the preamble to the Constitution contains an inarguable truth that we are all endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life. [Applause] Liberty, Freedom. [Applause] And the pursuit of happiness. [Applause] Those of you watching at home may wonder why this is being applauded. We conservatives think all three are under assault.

Limbaugh, it seems, meant to say "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," which, of course, is in the Declaration of Independence.

(SNIP)

In the end, of course, Limbaugh's gaffe was just that: a rhetorical hiccup in an otherwise long (the speech went on for 90 minutes) and brash address. Still, in the process of accusing Obama for a lack of reverence of the Constitution, it would have undoubtedly served him better to have properly recognized the Constitution himself.

Yes, the supposed defenders of the Constitution don't even know what the document contains. Not so surprising coming from the Flush-boy, though. After all, his president, Dubya, referred to the Constitution as "a piece of paper." And with the current revelation about how the Bushies intended to undermine the rights protected in that piece of paper (is that hemp fiber?), it's hard to keep it all straight.

That Flush is the de facto leader of the Repug-lickin's is sooo appropriate. A man who never was elected to anything, who makes fun of Michael Fox and wants Obama to fail, and who ducked his own chance to serve due to "anal polyps" (code for head-up-his-ass?), is the embodiment of the mean spirited hypocrisy that is the GOP.

Top Ten Moments of the Bush Years

From David Letterman, via Crooks and Liars:

Ahhhh, it's like hitting yourself in the head with a hammer; it feels so friggin' good to stop!

Yay, Bernie!

(Via Talking Points Memo)

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has written to the Smithsonian raising questions about the caption that sits beneath its new portrait of George W. Bush. The current wording of the caption states that Bush's term was marked by "the attacks on September 11, 2001, that led to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq." Sanders, bless his heart, points out that the 9/11 attacks -- all together, now -- had nothing to do with the Iraq war.

From Sanders' letter to Martin Sullivan, director of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington:

When President Bush and Vice President Cheney misled our country into the war in Iraq, they certainly cited the attacks on September 11, along with the equally specious claim that Iraq possessed vast arsenals of weapons of mass destruction. The notion, however, that 9/11 and Iraq were linked, or that one "led to" the other, has been widely and authoritatively debunked ... Might I suggest that a reconsideration of the explanatory text next to the portrait of President Bush is in order[?]

This is amazing---that a supposedly non-political entity is making a basically political statement. Thanks, Bernie, for standing up to this utter bullshit.

By the way, doesn't the portrait shot make Bush look like he's taking a dump? now that's appropriate!

Lookin' for love in all the wrong places:

(Via Video Cafe)

As President Bush prepares to leave office, he had some words of caution for the Republican Party. Bush believes that Republicans should open-minded as they struggle to remake the party.

"It's very important for our party not to narrow its focus, not to become so inward looking that we drive people away from a philosophy that is compassionate and decent," said Bush.

This is so bizarre, on so many counts. It's kind of like having a vandal break your window, and then returning back as you survey the damage to tell you what kind of glass you should repair it with.

But, hey Republicans, you just keep right on taking this fool's advice!