Thursday, September 13, 2007

Lets Give Credit, Where Credit is Due








George W Bush has many accomplishments under his wing. Unfortunately for Americans, those accomplishments have cost each one of us dearly. Nevertheless George W Bush is proud of his accomplishments. Therefore lets list some of these accomplishments, and Lets Give Credit, Where Credit Is Due.

•Bush spent the U.S. budget surplus and bankrupted the US Treasury, all in the name of conservatism.

•Bush broke the record for the biggest annual deficit in history.

•Bush set an economic record for the most personal bankruptcies filed in any 12 month period.

•Bush set all-time record for the biggest drop in the history of the stock market, and it is still falling.

•Bush set the all-time record for most days on vacation by any President in US history and this was in his first year in office.

•Bush presided over the worst security failure in US history. All this after taking the entire month of August off for vacation.

•Bush set the record for most campaign fund raising trips by any President in US history.

•Bush's first two years in office over 2 million Americans lost their jobs. That number has risen to 12 million and growing.

•Bush cut unemployment benefits for out-of-work Americans more than any other President in US history.

•Bush set the all-time record for most real estate foreclosures in a 12-month period. This record will be beaten again this year, due to Bush's economic mess.

•Bush presided over the biggest energy crises in US history and refused to intervene when corruption was revealed. Many of Bush's friends have faced indictment over this.

•Bush cut health care benefits for war veterans. Bush's lack of compassion for the veterans have resulted in 40% of all homeless males are veterans.

•Bush set the all-time record for most people worldwide to jointly take to the streets to protest his war and his policies (17 million people), shattering the record for protest against any person in the history.

•Bush dissolved more International treaties than any President in US history.

•Bush's Presidency is the most secretive and unaccountable of any in US history.

•Bush's cabinet members are the wealthiest of any administration in US history.

•Bush is the first President in US history to have all 50 states of the Union simultaneously face bankruptcy.

•Bush presided over the biggest corporate stock market fraud in any market in any country in the history of the world.

•Bush is the first President in US history to order a US attack and military occupation of a sovereign nation, and he did so against the will of the United Nations and the vast majority of the world.

•Bush created the largest government department bureaucracy in the history of the United States, called the "Bureau of Homeland Security

•Bush set the all-time record for biggest annual budget spending increases, more than any other President in US history.

•Bush is the first President in US history to compel the United Nations remove the US from the Human Rights Commission.

•Bush removed more checks and balances, and have the least amount of congressional oversight than any Presidential in US history.

•Bush called the entire United Nations irrelevant. Bush also withdrew from the World Court of Law.

•Bush refused to allow inspectors access to US prisoners of war and he no longer abides by the Geneva Conventions.

•Bush the first President in US history to refuse United Nations election inspectors access during the 2002 US elections.

•Bush holds the record for the most corporate campaign donations.

•Bush's largest all-time contributor was Ken Lay the embattled CEO of Enron.

•Bush is the first US President to establish a secret shadow government.

•Bush took the world's sympathy for the US after 9/11, and in less than a year made the US the most resented country in the world.

•Bush is the first US President in history to have a majority of the people of Europe (71%) view his Presidency as the biggest threat to world peace and stability.

•Bush changed US policy to allow convicted criminals to be awarded government contracts. Many are close political allies of Bush and his father.

•Bush has removed more freedoms and civil liberties for Americans than any other president in US history.

• Bush has at least one conviction for drunk driving in Maine.
(Texas driving record has been erased and is not available).

•Bush was AWOL from the National Guard and deserted the military during time of war.

•Bush refused to take a drug test or even answer any questions about drug use.

•Bush's records as Governor of Texas have been hidden in his father's library in a secret chamber.

•Bush's records of any SEC investigations into his insider trading or bankrupt companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

•The minutes of meetings of any public corporation for which Bush served on the board are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

•The records or minutes from meetings Bush and Cheney attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public review.

As America moves further into the pit of war, and into the twilight of economic despair, we should never forget where we once was as a nation, and we should not be afraid to look at where we are today.

The coming year will give opportunity to choose new leaders, and as we think of where we once was and where we are today, "Lets give credit, where credit is due."

******************
Listen in the archives to Lydia's interview with Charlie Savage, Pulitzer prize winning journalist from the Boston Globe, who broke the story on Bush's signing statements (usurping the Geneva Convention's torture ban, among other things.) Charlie’s new book is titled… "Takeover: The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy." NATIONAL REPORTING

Don't forget, Congressman and Democratic presidential contender DENNIS KUCINICH will be our guest on on Monday September 17!

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 a.m. Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern). All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at BASHAM & CORNELL SHOW

148 comments:

  1. Please listen today to Pulitzer Prize winner Charles Savage discuss the story he broke on Bush's signing statements.

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  2. Sorry if buffering stream wasn't working yesterday. The Elizabeth Edwards interview is up now and should be working.

    We are trying to get new equipment, but have to pay for it out of pocket.

    Thanks for listening. These are great guests.

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  3. Lydia,

    Excellent items in a series. May I post them at From the Left?

    It's so peculiar looking at these items in a series. How can Pelosi continue to insist "Bush isn't worth impeaching?"

    Oh well. Next stop: the Iran war and the battle over the next AG, Ted Olson.

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  4. YOu missed one, Lyd.

    - Bush: Worst. President. Ever.

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  5. The most prominent figure in a U.S.-backed revolt of Sunni sheiks against al-Qaida in Iraq was killed Thursday by a bomb planted near his home in Anbar province, 10 days after he met with President Bush, police and tribal leaders said.

    Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha was leader of the Anbar Salvation Council, also known as the Anbar Awakening -- an alliance of clans backing the Iraqi government and U.S. forces.

    I thought the "surge" was working!

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  6. Just yesterday on CNN, Wolf Blitzer asked John Boehner, the leader of the GOP in the House, this question (video on Horse's Mouth):

    "The loss in blood, the Americans who are killed every month, how much longer do you think this commitment, this military commitment is going to require?"

    And Mr. Boehner responded:

    "The investment that we're making today will be a small price if we're able to stop al Qaeda here, if we're able to stabilize the Middle East, it's not only going to be a small price for the near future, but think about the future for our kids and their kids."

    What a pathetic creep. Thousands of U.S and Iraqi's have been killed and this neocon says its a small price to pay.

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  7. AP:

    Oil prices briefly hit a record high and gasoline futures jumped Thursday as refiners reported production problems after Hurricane Humberto hit Texas.

    Oil first traded over $80 a barrel on Wednesday after the Energy Department reported declines in crude and gasoline inventories and refinery activity last week.

    It's because of the Bush economy!

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  8. WASHINGTON, Sep 12 (IPS) - In sharp contrast to the lionisation of Gen. David Petraeus by members of the U.S. Congress during his testimony this week, Petraeus's superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (CENTCOM), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.

    Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit" and added, "I hate people like that", the sources say. That remark reportedly came after Petraeus began the meeting by making remarks that Fallon interpreted as trying to ingratiate himself with a superior.

    That extraordinarily contentious start of Fallon's mission to Baghdad led to more meetings marked by acute tension between the two commanders. Fallon went on develop his own alternative to Petraeus's recommendation for continued high levels of U.S. troops in Iraq during the summer.

    The enmity between the two commanders became public knowledge when the Washington Post reported Sep. 9 on intense conflict within the administration over Iraq. The story quoted a senior official as saying that referring to "bad relations" between them is "the understatement of the century".

    Fallon's derision toward Petraeus reflected both the CENTCOM commander's personal distaste for Petraeus's style of operating and their fundamental policy differences over Iraq, according to the sources.

    The policy context of Fallon's extraordinarily abrasive treatment of his subordinate was Petraeus's agreement in February to serve as front man for the George W. Bush administration's effort to sell its policy of increasing U.S. troop strength in Iraq to Congress.

    Finally the truth.

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  9. - The number of laid off workers filing claims for unemployment benefits rose last week in another worrisome sign that the labor market is weakening.

    The Labor Department reported Thursday that new claims for unemployment benefits rose by 4,000 last week to 319,000. It marked the sixth increase in the past seven weeks and was a further sign that the economy is feeling the impact of a steep slump in housing and a spreading credit crisis.

    The government reported last week that employers cut 4,000 jobs from payrolls in August, the first monthly job decline in four years.

    It's because of the Bush economy!

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  10. Tonight, after President Bush makes yet another argument for continuing the war in Iraq, John Edwards will speak directly to the American people in a nationwide address on MSNBC.

    Our campaign has bought airtime on MSNBC immediately following the President’s address at 9 p.m., and John Edwards will challenge the President’s remarks with a strong call to the nation to end the war now.

    Please watch in that timeframe—and forward this e-mail to your friends, asking them to watch as well. Each of us has a responsibility to make sure that President Bush and Congress understand that the time for excuses has run out. John Edwards will deliver a strong message tonight on our behalf. It’s time to end this war and bring our troops home.

    Buying this kind of airtime is expensive. But we believe that President Bush’s address must be countered with a strong voice in opposition to the failed policies that have kept our troops in harm’s way for far too long. Tonight, John Edwards will continue to lead, and make the case to the nation that we cannot wait for an election to change course in Iraq—we as citizens must make Washington understand that the time to end this war is now.

    Don’t miss John’s address tonight on MSNBC, immediately following the President.

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  11. Christopher:

    Feel free to post the items in the post.

    We can't forget what Bush has done.

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  12. Damn Larry
    That is a heck of a list. I am stupified that the idiot gets away with it and he often says it's for our own good like we owe him thanks or something.
    What is worse is he has more time to damage us, the middle east, and the world, and he will.
    His worst work I am afraid is yet to come. If you don't mind I am going to copy that list so I can look at it again.

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  13. Larry what a great list.

    didn't Alberto Gonzales get Bush's drunk driving conviction erased?

    And didn't Bush hire cronies like Mike Brown(ie) to pretend to help the people thru FEMA?

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  14. Jim:

    Feel free to use the list and add to it, there is so much more.

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  15. Thanks Lydia,

    You're right, those you have named and who knows how many more could fill a magazine.

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  16. Thanks, Larry.

    The Mofo from Midland is the gift that just keeps giving.

    Like drug-resistant syphilis.

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  17. Christopher:

    There are dozens more you could add to the list, Lydia named two right off.

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  18. Here's another ...

    Bush holds the record for the most successful and widespread 'pre-emptive strike' against another sovereign nation.

    2nd place goes to Japan for its pre-emptive strike against the United States in 1941.

    It took 2 atomic bombs to finally convince Japanese leaders to stop the war that followed its strike ... what will it take to convince our leaders?

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  19. "The American people long ago lost faith in the president's leadership of the war in Iraq because his rhetoric has never matched the reality on the ground," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. "The choice is between a Democratic plan for responsible redeployment and the president's plan for an endless war in Iraq."

    The American people have also lost faith in you Nancy Pelosi!

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  20. Reuters) - Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said he was late to see the storm gathering around mortgage lending practices and commended his successor Ben Bernanke's handling of the crisis, saying he would likely be responding in a similar fashion.

    Most of America knew this, so what good is Greenspan?

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  21. DUBAI - A group led by al-Qaida in Iraq said it would soon post a video about a "missing" U.S. military man, according to a statement posted on the Internet on Thursday.

    The posting from the media arm of Islamic State in Iraq showed what appeared to be the military identification of the man, next to a picture of a fighter plane, suggesting he was an airman.

    Oh the "surge" sure is working!

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  22. Republican Corruption News:

    Former VECO Corp. CEO Bill Allen testified in the federal trial of former Alaska House Speaker Pete Kott Thursday that he bribed three lawmakers, including the son of GOP Senator Ted Stevens, the Washington Post reports.

    Former state Senate president Ben Stevens, son of U.S. Senator Ted Stevens, was implicated along with Kott and state Rep. Vic Kohring.

    Allen and former VECO vice president Rick Smith have already entered guilty pleas and are awaiting sentencing.

    #

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  23. Thank you for printing something positive about George W. Bush. See, he does too have some accomplishments.

    Who Hijacked Our Country

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  24. Thanks Tom, Bush deserves credit for so much.

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  25. Mike, sorry the link wasn't working the other day.
    I think the stream was rebuffering and should be up now.

    But for some people it was working.

    Thanks Mike!

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  26. Great article Larry. I'm not sure about that one figure about days on vacation though. I know he just recently broke that record, beating Ronald Reagan, but he just did that, not his first year in office. What is that statistic based on? Just curious. But great article.

    Hey did anyone see John Edwards commercial on MSNBC tonight? He looked and sounded like he found his sea legs. For the first time I thought he looked and sounded presidential.

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  27. George W Bush is continuing in the long tradition of republicans starting something they can NOT finish.

    John Foster and Allen Dulles started interfering in Vietnam in 1954, blocking elections for democracy in 1956, and created SEATO before the end of Dwight W Eisenhower's administration so future presidents would be saddled with their illegal interference with a foreign country. They used the CIA to attack targets in Hanoi, and sent in Military advisers to set up a government and military in South Vietnam wholly created US enterprise against the will of 90% of the Vietnamese people which never accepted that illegitimate government from Washington. As time wore on each successive president ratcheted up the use of force and the military until the TET offensive showed NO amount of military power from the US short of complete colonization and subjugation of the Vietnamese people to the US would "win" that war.

    The Dulles brothers also used the CIA to over throw a democratically elected government in Tehran Iran to install the shah at the behest of the British and international oil corporations, so they could plunder the oil which by rights belonged to the Iranian people NOT any greedy American or British Oil corporation. This worked for the Oil Corps and US CIA until 1979 when the Iranian people ran the Shah out and reclaimed their country from the puppet of Washington.

    Thus the two greatest foreign policy disasters of the second quarter of the 20th century began with reichwingers in Eisenhower’s administration, which they handed to the American people to finish the mess they created. (And the idiot apologists of the reichwing claim they are better at foreign policy?)
    After the end of the Vietnam War people said never again, UNTIL Ronald Reagan became pResident, then he started running weapons to the Iranians even though he claimed they were mortal enemies of the US, and arming Saddam to attack Iran for the US. T the same time Reagan was arming the jihadists in Afghanistan to attack the soviets, including the future Taliban and Osama bin laden. (Nice of Reagan to set both of them up wasn’t it?)

    At the same time Ollie North was running weapons to Iran, he also was sending arms to the contras fighting a democratically elected government in Nicaragua, with the aid of Manuel Noriega. (Which George H W Bush had to overthrow because Noriega was running drugs with the CA and wouldn’t stop after they didn’t need him anymore… (Nice of Georgie’s daddy to clean up that mess wasn’t it), too bad he left Saddam as a problem for future generations after helping set him up in the 1980’s, instead of accepting the Dulles brothers screw up from the 1950’s.

    Well in the great tradition of reichwingers Georgie attacked Saddam and Iraq, made a complete fiasco of it, and wants to FORCE future generations and presidents to continue his fiasco by setting up the US in Iraq with permanent bases and military involvements instead of admitting He violated US law, UN charter and the Geneva Convention, and started a war of aggression against a sovereign country which neither attacked the US nor did they attack the US on 9-11 no matter how much GWB or Dead Eye lie about it.

    Seems the reichwing loves to start things they can’t handle or finish and leave it to the rest of us to clean up for them, too bad the democrats in congress are too gutless to stop Georgie this time, after all they have 50 years of reichwing screw ups to go by.

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  28. Thanks Bartlebee:

    The list needs updated and Bush probably has logged more time at Camp David than all the others, much less his chicken ranch in Texas.

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  29. Clif:

    Your article is exactly what Bush is doing in the Mideast.

    Leaving the mess for someone else.

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  30. Larry he is just doing what the reicgwingers in the republican party have done for decades.

    In some way he doesn't know how to do anthing but screw up and leave it to others to try and clean up.

    Afer all that is the republcan tradition, starting after WW2, and even before if you consider how poorly Hoover preformed during the worst economic disaster in the country's history, he left it to FDR to clean up.

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  31. Clif;

    If Bush doesn't stop, he will leave another World War to be cleaned up.

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  32. Larry condsidering the moves Russia, China and others are making both economicaly and militarily, he might have already done far too much on that front.

    The US is becoming a untrusted and unwanted outcast on the worlds stage, and with the broken miliary thanks to Georgie(and the sycophant reichwing),we can't shove too many coutries around anymore. (The Iranians have already figgered that one out).

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  33. Well you're not wrong about him taking more vacation time than any president in history. He has.

    Its just that was a milestone he just surpassed last month. Not his first year.

    Thats all I was saying.

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  34. Where did Bush get 38 countries helping in his war? He can't even get 3.

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  35. Bartlebee:

    Bush spent at least a month during Katrina on his chicken ranch, in fact his first term he war there as much as anywhere.

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  36. According to the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call, House Government Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) expects to receive emails and other documents from the White House regarding the Jack Abramoff bribery scandal in the next few days.

    Abramoff pled guilty to wire fraud, tax evasion and conspiracy to bribe public officials in January 2006. Those officials included Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH), an Ohio Congressman who is now serving 30 months in jail, and David Safavian, former erstwhile head of Bush's General Service Administration, a $300 billion agency which doles out government contracts.

    A month later, a photograph of Abramoff appearing with President Bush appeared in The New York Times. White House officials have long sought to distance themselves from Abramoff, despite a personal friendship between Rove and the onetime lobbyist that dates from their days as College Republicans.

    Another photograph of Bush and Abramoff (above) surfaced in January 2007.

    Waxman requested documents regarding Abramoff from the White House earlier this year. His staff declined to provide information about what exactly he is seeking.

    "The result of that document production is likely to determine the next steps for the Oversight Committee, said sources.

    Getting closer to Bush!

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  37. Hey Bartlebe, you sure your not interpretting this question wrong............the way I see it is that Bush took more vacation during his first year in office than any other president did in their first year...........i'm assuming your interpretting this as Bush took more vacation in his first year than ANY other president did in all their years..............which seems riddiculous particulary when you consider FDR was in office for 16 years, so unless FDR didnt take any vacation in 16 years or Bush was on vacation for allmost the entire year that is unlikely.

    But like I said Bush taking more vacation his first year than any other president did their first year is VERY likely.

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  38. Thanks Lydia, i'll go try to listen to the interview again.

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  39. You have to admit, Bush took more vacations than anyone in memory, and if Clinton would have took half that many they would have lynched him.

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  40. Capitol Hill Police "football tackled" Hip Hop Activist who was in line to enter hearing room for General Petreus' testimony on Capitol Hill

    Rev. Lennox Yearwood, Jr., president of the Hip Hop Caucus, was attacked by six capitol police today, when he was stopped from entering the Cannon Caucus Room on Capitol Hill, where General Petreaus gave testimony today to a joint hearing for the House Arms Services Committee and Foreign Relations Committee on the war in Iraq.

    After waiting in line throughout the morning for the hearing that was scheduled to start at 12:30pm, Rev. Yearwood was stopped from entering the room, while others behind him were allowed to enter. He told the officers blocking his ability to enter the room, that he was waiting in line with everyone else and had the right to enter as well. When they threatened him with arrest he responded with "I will not be arrested today." According to witnesses, six capitol police, without warning, "football tackled him. He was carried off in a wheel chair by DC Fire and Emergency to George Washington Hospital.

    Rev. Yearwood was examined for possible head and leg injuries then transferred to Central Processing. He has been charged with "assaulting a police officer."

    Rev. Yearwood said as he was being released from the hospital to be taken to central booking, "The officers decided I was not going to get in Gen. Petreaus' hearing when they saw my button, which says 'I LOVE THE PEOPLE OF IRAQ.'"

    I thought Bush was fond of the "religious right?"

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  41. Excellent post, what a list!

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  42. Thanks Mauigirl:

    You could probably find 100 more.

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  43. That just shows how much of a police state we have become Larry.............Bush allows his brown shirt thugs to do as they please, he gives them the powerr they crave to intimidate others and they give him their loyalty and intimidate his opposition.

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  44. we should all donate money to this guy so he can afford to sue these brownshirt thugs.

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  45. Mike:

    This was a preacher who is against the war.

    I keep forgetting Bush only loves warmongers like Robertson and Hagee.

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  46. A Democratic Senator was calling the preacher names for protesting.

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  47. In some circles, I think this list would be considered a great accomplishment.

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  48. “That’s all I said in the unusual silence on Monday afternoon as first aid was being administered to Gen. David Petraeus’ microphone before he spoke before the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees.

    It had dawned on me that when House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) invited Gen. Petraeus to make his presentation, Skelton forgot to ask him to take the customary oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I had no idea that my suggestion would be enough to get me thrown out of the hearing.

    I had experienced a flashback to a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in early 2006, when Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) reminded chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) that Specter had forgotten to swear in the witness, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, and how Specter insisted that that would not be necessary.

    Now that may or may not be an invidious comparison. But Petraeus and Gonzales work for the same boss, who has a rather unusual relationship with the truth. How many of his senior staff could readily be convicted, as was the hapless-and-now-commuted Scooter Libby, of perjury?

    So I didn’t think twice about it. I really thought that Skelton perhaps forgot, and that the 10-minute interlude of silence while they fixed the microphone was a good chance to raise this seemingly innocent question.

    The more so since the ranking Republican representatives had been protesting too much. Practicing the obverse of “killing the messenger,” they had been canonizing the messenger with protective fire. Ranking Armed Services Committee member Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) began what amounted to a SWAT-team attack on the credibility of those who dared question the truthfulness of the sainted Petraeus, and issued a special press release decrying a full-page ad in today’s New York Times equating Petraeus with “Betray-us.”

    Hunter served notice on any potential doubters, insisting that Petraeus’ “capability, integrity, intelligence … are without question.” And Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, rang changes on the same theme, unwittingly choosing another infelicitous almost-homonym for the charges against Petraeus – “outrageous.”

    Indeed, Hunter’s prepared statement, which he circulated before the hearing, amounted to little more than a full-scale “duty-honor-country” panegyric for the general. On the chance we did not hear him the first time, Hunter kept repeating how “independent” Petraeus is, how candid and full of integrity, and compared him to famous generals who testified to Congress in the past – Eisenhower, MacArthur, and Schwarzkopf. Hunter was smart enough to avoid any mention of Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam, who fell tragically short on those traits.

    If memory serves, the aforementioned generals and Westmoreland were required to testify under oath. And this was one of the more embarrassing sticking points when CBS aired a program showing that Westmoreland had deliberately dissembled on the strength of Communist forces and U.S. “progress” in the war. When Westmoreland sued CBS for libel, several of his subordinates came clean, and Westmoreland quickly dropped the suit. The analogy with Westmoreland – justifying a White House death wish to persist in an unwinnable war – is the apt one here.

    If Petraeus is so honest and full of integrity, what possible objection could he have to being sworn in? I had not the slightest hesitation being sworn in when testifying before the committee assembled by John Conyers (D-Mich.) on June 16, 2005. Should generals be immune? Or did Petraeus’ masters wish to give him a little more assurance that he could play fast and loose with the truth without the consequences encountered by Scooter Libby?

    With the microphone finally fixed, much became quickly clear. Petraeus tried to square a circle in his very first two paragraphs. In the first, he thanks the committees for the opportunity to “discuss the recommendations I recently provided to my chain of command for the way forward.” Then he stretches credulity well beyond the breaking point – at least for me:

    “At the outset, I would like to note that this is my testimony. Although I have briefed my assessment and recommendations to my chain of command, I wrote this testimony myself. It has not been cleared by, nor shared with, anyone in the Pentagon, the White House, or Congress.”

    Is not the commander in chief in Petraeus’ chain of command?

    As Harry Truman (D-Mo.) would have said, “Does he think we were born yesterday?”

    Why didn't the force Petraeus to go under oath?

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  49. The US commander in Iraq Gen David Petraeus expressed long-term interest in running for the US presidency when he was stationed in Baghdad three years ago according to a senior Iraqi official who knew him at that time.

    Sabah Khadim, then a senior adviser and spokesman at the Iraqi Interior Ministry, says that Gen Petraeus discussed with him his long term ambition to be president when the general was head of training and recruitment of the Iraqi army in 2004-5.

    "I asked him if he was planning to run in 2008 and he said 'no, that would be too soon," said Mr Khadim who now lives in London.

    Gen Petraeus has a reputation in the US army for being a man of great ambition. If he succeeds in reversing America’s apparent failure in Iraq he would be a natural candidate for the White House in the presidential election in 2012 or beyond.

    That's all we need another lying neocon war lover in power.

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  50. Sept. 11 is a totemic date for the Bush administration. It justifies everything, explains everything, ends all argument. It is the crime that must be eternally punished, the wound that can never heal, the moral high ground that can never be taken…

    Democrats have effectively challenged the reign of nature and instinct in the domestic realm. But they cower when it comes to war. They are afraid to criticize the irrational, instinctive nature of Bush’s “war on terror” because they believe their political Achilles’ heel is the perception that they are “weak on national security.” They are afraid they’ll be seen as wimps. Beaten down by Republican propaganda that asserts that America’s only choice is between the GOP’s macho John Wayne and the Democrats’ dithering Hamlet, they pathetically don their cowboy hats and tank helmets, a tactic that actually reinforces the very image of weakness it is intended to dispel. Unchallenged by the Democrats, the right wing’s master narrative about American power and the need to carry a big stick has carried the day…

    The angry bigotry that drove the war rings out loud and clear in the right-wing battle cry: “They attacked us, so we had to attack them.” The recent TV ads run by war supporters repeat this theme: “They attacked us,” a narrator says as an image of the burning World Trade Center appears. “They won’t stop in Iraq.” The key word here, of course, is “they.” Just who is “they”? For Bush’s die-hard supporters, “they” simply means “Arabs and Muslims.” Cretinous rabble-rousers like Ann Coulter and Michael Savage play to this crowd, demanding that we nuke the evil ragheads. For the establishment, “they” is not quite so explicitly racist. “They” refers not to all Arabs and Muslims, but only to the “bad” ones. The “bad” guys include al-Qaida, Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and the militant Palestinians. And, of course, it used to include Iraq (and may again). Anyone who makes this list is eligible for attack by the U.S.

    The Republican party: Racists and anti poor.

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  51. Ever since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, many Americans have believed that the events of that horrible day changed the United States forever. Each year that has gone by has seen an increase in the number who believe those changes have not been good for the nation.

    Fifty-nine percent (59%) of Americans now believe that the events of six years ago changed America for the worse. That’s an increase from 54% a year ago. Just 21% believe that the nation has changed for the better because of that tragedy.

    The current results are almost the mirror image of the immediate reaction. Six weeks after the tragedy, 57% thought the nation had changed for the better. That number actually grew to 61% by January 2002. Now, half a decade later, just 21% of American adults hold that optimistic view. Fifty-four percent (54%) say the changes have been for the worse.

    A plurality of Republicans (45%) now say the nation has changed for the worse since 9/11. That view is shared by 71% of Democrats and 61% of those not affiliated with either major party.

    I think those numbers are low.

    ReplyDelete
  52. As of Thursday, Sept. 13, 2007, at least 3,777 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians. At least 3,086 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers.

    Bush just loves those numbers.

    ReplyDelete
  53. He's also the most delusional President in history, with a juvenile mentality.......make that an infant mentality.

    ReplyDelete
  54. Larry said...
    Bartlebee:

    Bush spent at least a month during Katrina on his chicken ranch, in fact his first term he war there as much as anywhere.


    I know.

    Listen to what I am saying Larry. I am NOT saying Bush has not taken more vacation than any US president in history.

    He has.

    But your article states that he crossed that milestone, in his FIRST year as president.

    That is incorrect.

    He only RECENTLY passed that milestone.

    He HAS taken more vacation than any president in US History. Just NOT during his first year. (although he took a lot of vacation his first year).

    ReplyDelete
  55. Mike said...
    Hey Bartlebe, you sure your not interpretting this question wrong............the way I see it is that Bush took more vacation during his first year in office than any other president did in their first year.........


    Well he didn't say that. If thats what he meant then ok, I could see that, but thats not how he wrote it.

    And if it is true, that is a statistic I am not familiar with, although I do believe it is certainly likely. I'd like to see a quote showing that.

    I am just pointing out one small thing that I think needs clarifying. Accuracy after all in a published article is pivotal to credibility.

    ReplyDelete
  56. The British polling agency ORB, has conducted several surveys in Iraq and has concluded that civilian deaths in Iraq may top 1 million.

    The military has said civilian deaths from sectarian violence have fallen more than 55% since President Bush sent an additional 28,500 troops to Iraq this year, but it does not provide specific numbers.

    According to the ORB poll, a survey of 1,461 adults suggested that the total number slain during more than four years of war was more than 1.2 million.

    ORB said it drew its conclusion from responses to the question about those living under one roof: “How many members of your household, if any, have died as a result of the conflict in Iraq since 2003?”

    Based on Iraq’s estimated number of households of 4,050,597, it said the 1.2 million figure was reasonable.

    ReplyDelete
  57. Christopher:

    I'm surprised the number wasn't near that already.

    ReplyDelete
  58. A senior U.S. nuclear official said Friday that North Koreans were in Syria and that Damascus may have had contacts with "secret suppliers" to obtain nuclear equipment.

    Andrew Semmel, acting deputy assistant secretary of state for nuclear nonproliferation policy, did not identify the suppliers, but said North Koreans were in the country and that he could not exclude that the network run by the disgraced Pakistan nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan may have been involved.

    Another Mideast country with virtually no military for Bush to invade.

    ReplyDelete
  59. SAN FRANCISCO — Since contracting polio at age 2, Yan Ling Ho has lived with pain for most of her 52 years. After she immigrated here from Hong Kong last year, the soreness in her back and joints proved too debilitating for her to work.

    That also meant she did not have health insurance. Not wanting to burden her daughter, who was already paying her living expenses, Ms. Ho delayed doctors’ visits and battled her misery with over-the-counter medications.

    “Sometimes the pain was so bad, I would just cry,” she said. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

    Last month, unable to bear her discomfort any longer, Ms. Ho went to North East Medical Services, a nonprofit community clinic on the edge of Chinatown, and discovered to her delight that she qualified for a new program that offers free or subsidized health care to all 82,000 San Francisco adults without insurance.

    The initiative, known as Healthy San Francisco, is the first effort by a locality to guarantee care to all of its uninsured, and it represents the latest attempt by state and local governments to patch a inadequate federal system.

    It is financed mostly by the city, which is gambling that it can provide universal and sensibly managed care to the uninsured for about the amount being spent on their treatment now, often in emergency rooms.

    Why can's all of America have this?

    ReplyDelete
  60. Reuters) - Las Vegas police questioned O.J. Simpson after a memorabilia dealer told them the former football star and murder defendant robbed him at gunpoint in a Las Vegas casino hotel room, police and other sources said on Friday.

    Simpson was not arrested or charged in the Thursday evening incident and was cooperating with the investigation, Las Vegas police said.

    Las Vegas Metro police received a call from a person saying he was the victim of an armed robbery at the Palace Station Hotel and Casino, said police Capt. James Dillon.

    "The victim stated that one of the suspects involved in the robbery was O.J. Simpson," Dillon said at a news conference. "The items taken were various sports-related products."

    Detectives had made contact with Simpson and were arranging to interview him again, Dillon said, adding that police were still looking for "additional subjects" who were with the former star athlete at the time of the incident.

    Won't this guy ever go away!

    ReplyDelete
  61. By the way Larry. Nice picture of Bush. Where'd you find it?

    ReplyDelete
  62. DENNIS KUCINICH will be our guest on Monday.

    Stay tuned at 8 A.M. KLAV 1230 Las Vegas
    or simulcast on the web at bashamandcornell.com
    "Listen Live"

    ReplyDelete
  63. Thanks Bartlebee I got it from another blog.

    ReplyDelete
  64. Four U.S soldiers were killed near Baghdad today.

    ReplyDelete
  65. Check this out, folks.

    I posted on a blog today that I took exception to Guiliani marrying his cousin.

    It just creeps me out. In this culture, in the 21st century, you don't marry family members.

    Anyway, the responses were 100% in defense of Guiliani marrying his cousin.

    As Guiliani may very well wind up being the next president, I'm curious what you folks think?

    ReplyDelete
  66. Christopher:

    You must have been on a right wing blog to get that response.

    In most circles that union of relatives is frowned on.

    ReplyDelete
  67. Larry,

    No. A supposed lefty blog in bed with Hillary!

    I like to think my politics are left of a Sandinista but incest is incest is incest.

    But hey, it's the 21st century. If things don't work out between Guiliani and Judy (wife #3) he can always marry his daughter, right?

    Incest is so very, hmmmm, 18th century? LOL!

    ReplyDelete
  68. Christopher:

    Maybe that'a why his kids hate him, they are afraid it is an inherited trait.

    ReplyDelete
  69. Maybe that'a why his kids hate him, they are afraid it is an inherited trait.

    ROFLMAO! Good one.

    ReplyDelete
  70. U.S. Passes $9 Trillion National Debt
    Responsible economic policy, should safeguard the financial status of Americans today, and their children tomorrow. If it meant only today, the Treasury could print money and hand out a million to every man, woman, and child. And for a day, everyone would be well off. Of course, in the ensuing days, America would plunge into a depression and inflation spiral worse than in the 1930’s.

    There are many portals through which one can view the economy, and depending on which portal, the economy may look robust or failing. If one looks at the number of hours of work it takes achieve middle class status, there is no question that our parents generation were much better off than we are today. In the 1960's one parent could work, the other stay home and raise kids, keep house, and entertain and network with neighbors. Today, it takes two parents working and nearly double the work hours to achieve middle class quality living for most American families.

    On the other hand, if one looks at the net asset wealth of Americans today as in homeownership, the economy looks like a windfall for Americans compared to the 1960's when homeownership was beyond the means of a much larger percentage of workers. Or, if one looks at the percentage of workers in the upper middle class and beyond today as compared to the 1960's, or the percentage of poverty, again it would appear America has grown wealthier, on average.

    But, as pointed out in the introductory paragraph, a responsible economy provides for its citizens in the present and future, insuring an ability to withstand market shocks, calamities, and emergencies while keeping the nation's workers and family providers employed, solvent, and able to continue providing for their families, overall.

    The past is no guarantor of the future.

    America learned this in the most painful and suffering kind of way in 1929, as capitalists tied up so much of the nation's money into so few hands, investing and speculating on the next great profit venture, that the worker - consumers who had supported the rise of the industrial barons of industry, were left out of the wealth distribution loop, and when the stock market crashed, the consumers living from paycheck to paycheck, could not continue purchasing and consuming, and suppliers collapsed, laying off workers, cutting production, and closing retail shops.

    By the time the worst had arrived in 1932, the Dow Jones Industrial market lost 89%, before bottoming out. Investors in mid-1929 who held onto their stocks, would not see their stocks recover the losses until 1954. Most would have been in their retirement years by then, only to have broken even on their stock investments in 1929.

    Just months before the 1929 crash, few would have said America's economy was not in great shape. But, it wasn't, regardless of popular opinion on Oct. 28, 1929, the day before Black Thursday. The 'roaring twenties' was a decade of celebration of technological innovation and production, from radio, to autos, to aviation, telephone, and expanding electrical power grids. Finding work was so easy, that a mass migration from rural farm communities was underway, ballooning once small towns and cities into major metropolitan areas like Chicago, Detroit and Dallas. And within 5 days, the celebration was over. The economy failed to insure its 'tomorrows', mesmerized by its gains 'today'. The past was no guarantor of the future.

    The Present

    Today, America has tools to fight what happened in 1929 and prevent it from happening again. The greatest of these tools are statistical forecasting and economic measurements. Trained and objective people armed with these weapons can peer into the future of our children and forecast their economic fate, and issue warnings when the statistics and measures begin painting dark clouds on the economic horizon. But, what if no one heeds the warnings?

    This is what is occurring today. The warnings have been issued repeatedly by economic forecasters for more than a decade, now. In fact, it is almost becoming a case similar to crying wolf, in the sense that politicians have begun to turn a deaf ear. In 1995, the Labor Department said it is worried that the retirement prospects for the huge baby boomer cohort could be grim. "Boomers are now between the ages of 30 and 50, and there are 60 million of them. They aren't saving enough for retirement and won't be able to rely on Social Security or traditional pension plans to bail them out", it said. That 60 million number is now 77 million.

    The results of the Bush economy!

    ReplyDelete
  71. Christopher:

    Maybe his kids are wondering if their mom is also their aunt.

    ReplyDelete
  72. Daily Kos:

    If you could vote again for U.S. Senate, would you vote for Ned Lamont, the Democrat, Alan Schlesinger, the Republican, or Joe Lieberman, an Independent?

    Lieberman Lamont Schlesinger
    All 40 48 10
    Dem 25 72 3
    Rep 69 7 24
    Ind 38 49 9



    Today, Lieberman's office refused to respond to the obvious discontent he faces.

    Dan Gerstein, a key figure in Lieberman's re-election campaign who remains a paid adviser to the senator, said today that after checking with Liberman's office he had decided to decline comment on the poll.

    Schlesinger, meanwhile, said today that he wasn't surprised by the results of the new poll. The apparent preference for Lamont over Lieberman, he said, was simply because of Iraq, which he said has left people "disgusted."

    Lapdog Lieberman is hated by his own state.

    ReplyDelete
  73. General Petraeus has spoken. So expires another line of evasion for our Coward-In-Chief.

    For months, whenever Mr. Bush has been asked to account for his bloody misadventure in Iraq, when asked for a comment on legislation to set timetables for withdrawal, on strategy, on the latest explosion killing civilians and soldiers, it’s been “wait for General Petraeus’s report.” Before that it was “wait for the surge.” And before that? “Wait ‘til Gates takes over.” So, what’s next? What will his next evasive line be while the violence he engendered inevitably spirals toward total catastrophe? How about, “Wait until we strike Iran?”

    -Jarrett Dapier
    Assistant Publisher
    In These Times

    ReplyDelete
  74. Larry,

    We've got "the gang" coming over tonight to watch the Yankees v. Red Sox and I'm going to ask all of the guys what they think.

    ReplyDelete
  75. What is it with the young re-pubies now a days?

    First their newly elected national president has to resign because he sexually assualted a sleeping man.

    And Now this;

    Michigan GOP activist gets 5 years for sex assault

    A Michigan lawyer who sexually attacked a 21-year-old woman at a Young Republicans convention here said Thursday that he disgraced himself, his family and his political party.

    Michael Flory, 33, of Jackson, Mich., told a Cuyahoga County Common Pleas judge that his humiliation and self-destruction should be pun ishment enough for his guilty plea to a sexual- battery charge.


    His crimes?

    The woman, a Detroit college student, said she drank herself sick at a Warehouse District bar on July 8, 2006, during the National Federation of Young Republicans' convention. Flory, who led her state's delegation, offered to take her back to her room. There, she said, he forced her into sexual "atrocities" and called her degrading names.

    Seems he is just following the traditions of the party of pervert and pedophile protection, they keep covering for each other until things like this happen.

    How did this cretin criminal (and other reichwingers) act after he attacked a young woman?

    The woman and Assistant County Prosecutor Carol Skutnik said Flory and his friends later executed a campaign of Internet postings and whispers within the state GOP, accusing the victim of loose morals and character assassination.

    How typically republican of them attack and blame the victims for the crimes they commit, then beg for mercy based on family values,

    Flory's wife, Erin, sitting on the defendant's side of the courtroom, rolled her eyes, shook her head and then sobbed as Flory expressed "deep, profound remorse" for what he did and pleaded with Corrigan for probation for the sake of his 4-year-old son.

    "My son needs his father," Flory said.

    (and)

    As to Flory's claim that he wants to be a father to his son, Skutnik said Flory sullied that status when he "went jaunting from town to town having liaisons with young women" and committed sex crimes here.


    Oh and BTW other women have claimed he (Florey) attacked them also;

    [Assistant County Prosecutor Carol] Skutnik also said several other women called her to report that Flory sexually assaulted or harassed them, too.

    I guess the reichwingers never really learn do they?

    ReplyDelete
  76. Christopher:

    I would imagine they will feel the same as you.

    Very few in America condone the Guiliani way of life.

    ReplyDelete
  77. Chris,

    In fairness to Rudy, he didn't know until years after he was married that they were cousins. That happens sometimes in big Italian families.

    What's really icky is they have a daughter...

    ReplyDelete
  78. I can't resist, because ever since I first saw it yesterday, I've been laughing so hard I can't see straight --

    Can you believe that You Tube Britney fan Chris Crocker? "LEAVE BRITNEY ALOOOONE!"

    And there's one of George Bush crying about General Petraeus: "HE'S ONLY HUMAN....!!"

    ReplyDelete
  79. Both videos are hilarious and the Britney one is all over the airwaves.

    ReplyDelete
  80. Tonight on “Real Time with Bill Maher”, Bill will interview Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel and author of the new President Bush biography “Dead Certain”, Robert Draper. On the panel will be comedian and TV host Drew Carey, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Carl Bernstein, and Democratic Chief Deputy Whip in the U.S. House of Representatives Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky of Illinois.

    On Tuesday September 18, Bill Maher will appear on “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer” on CNN. Check your local listings for times.

    ReplyDelete
  81. An EXCELLENT roundup of the "accomplishments" of the moronic monkey.

    I may have to link to this ;)

    ReplyDelete
  82. Christopher:

    I would imagine they will feel the same as you.

    Very few in America condone the Guiliani way of life.


    Actually, among Chimpy's hardcore "base" Giuliani's first choice of wives is a celebrated tradition.

    ReplyDelete
  83. Yea, those were pretty funny Lydia. That girl was insane.

    ReplyDelete
  84. Rudy Guliani is the republican answer to putting a woman in the White House.

    ReplyDelete
  85. Jolly Roger:

    You may want to add a few dozen of your own.

    ReplyDelete
  86. We made so much noise in front of the White House last night there's no way the man could get to sleep until late. Obviously his conscious isn't keeping him awake.

    I'll have a complete report when I get back Sunday.

    ReplyDelete
  87. BARTLEBEE said...
    Yea, those were pretty funny Lydia. That girl was insane."

    Hey Bartlebe, I know this may be open to debate........but I believe Chris Crocker is a guy..........although like ann Coulter, we may never truly know!

    ReplyDelete
  88. Robert:

    I thought you may have gotten arrested by now.

    ReplyDelete
  89. A likewise large adams apple?

    ReplyDelete
  90. Check out this post by Newsguy with a point by point rebuttal of Bush's lying speech last night.

    Newsguy

    ReplyDelete
  91. Resigning Attorney General Alberto Gonzales left the scandal-scarred Justice Department on Friday, declaring himself hopeful about its mission of ferreting out crime and defending the truth. Gonzales quit after 2 1/2 years at the department amid investigations into whether he broke the law and lied to Congress. He has denied any wrongdoing.

    President Bush is expected to announce a nominee next week to replace his longtime friend and fellow Texan.

    In a Friday morning speech, Gonzales said his time at the Justice Department made him determined to fight terrorists and sexual predators and crack down on guns, drugs and gang violence plaguing the nation's neighborhoods.

    "Over the past two and a half years, I have seen tyranny, dishonesty, corruption and depravity of types I never thought possible," Gonzales said in prepared remarks at a Hispanic Heritage Month ceremony at Bolling Air Force Base. "I've seen things I didn't know man was capable of.

    "But I will tell you here and now that these things still leave me hopeful," he said. "Because every time I see a glimmer of the evil man can do, I see the defenders of liberty, truth and justice who stand ready to fight it."

    Of course Gonzales has seen tyranny, dishonesty and corruption. He is the one doing all those things.

    ReplyDelete
  92. Ex-Veco Corp. CEO Bill Allen admitted in court Friday that he had company employees work several months on a remodeling project at the Girdwood home of U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens.

    The former head of the oil field services company made the admission Friday while testifying in the federal corruption trial of a former state lawmaker.

    Allen and former Veco vice president Rick Smith in May pleaded guilty to extortion, conspiracy and bribery of legislators.

    Under cross-examination by defense attorney James Wendt, representing former state Rep. Pete Kott, Allen acknowledged that the more than $400,000 he admitted spending in the bribery charge was for other legislators - and for work done at the Girdwood home of Stevens, the longest-serving Republican in the U.S. Senate.

    Isn't Republican bribery a beautiful thing!

    ReplyDelete
  93. What a list. Yet there he sits in the oval office with that smirk we all hate, ordering the deaths of human beings that he could care less about and making millions doing it. And us? We're tackled, beaten, arrested, locked up, "tried" and fined for wearing a t-shirt that says anything negative about him.

    I ask you- what more was King George to the Continental army?

    We're way past revolution time in this lame shithole we're living in now.

    And yes. I'm pissed tonight.

    Its pretty bad when you think twice about speaking freely these days. And I guess its really bad when you do.

    I haven't posted an entry to my blog since night before last. Since that national address of his, I find myself wondering what else there is to say. If congress doesn't cut funding to that bloodbath...

    ReplyDelete
  94. Bush has also managed to get his Yale and Harvard college transcripts sealed. As a reporter, I once tried to get hold of those transcripts, believing that the American people had a right to know how he fared in his graduate and undergrad studies. They are locked up tight. Top Secret.

    ReplyDelete
  95. In a withering critique of his fellow Republicans, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan says in his memoir that the party to which he has belonged all his life deserved to lose power last year for forsaking its small-government principles.

    In "The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World," published by Penguin Press, Mr. Greenspan criticizes both congressional Republicans and President George W. Bush for abandoning fiscal discipline.

    The book is scheduled for public release Monday. The Wall Street Journal bought a copy at a bookstore in the New York area.


    Mr. Greenspan, who calls himself a "lifelong libertarian Republican," writes that he advised the White House to veto some bills to curb "out-of-control" spending while the Republicans controlled Congress. He says President Bush's failure to do so "was a major mistake." Republicans in Congress, he writes, "swapped principle for power. They ended up with neither. They deserved to lose."

    Now the big rats are turning on Bush!

    ReplyDelete
  96. A Texas oil company whose CEO is a longtime confidant of President Bush with access to the most closely held US intelligence has entered into an agreement to explore for oil in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.

    The agreement shows that Dallas-based Hunt Oil Co. and its chief executive Ray L. Hunt are "effectively betting against the survival of Iraq as a nation," argues New York Times columnist Paul Krugman.

    Hunt raised about $100,000 for Bush during the president's 2000 campaign, and he serves on the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which gives him access to some of the most exclusive data collected by US spy agencies.

    "What's interesting about this deal is the fact that Hunt, thanks to his policy position, is presumably as well-informed about the actual state of affairs in Iraq as anyone in the business world can be," Krugman observers. "By putting his money into a deal with the Kurds, despite Baghdad's disapproval, he's essentially betting that the Iraqi government -- which hasn't met a single one of the major benchmarks Bush laid out in January -- won't get it's act together."

    Bush's buddies make millions on his screwups as well.

    ReplyDelete
  97. US retail sales slowed last month as concerns mounted about the economic impact of the downturn in the housing sector and turbulence in financial markets.

    Purchases were weaker than expected as sales growth slowed to 0.3 per cent from 0.5 per cent, the commerce department said.

    The surprise slowdown in sales added to fears that US households will curtail spending as house prices weaken and borrowing conditions tighten.

    Stocks fell and bond yields slid as investors priced in a greater likelihood of aggressive interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve, starting next week. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury bond fell to 4.42 per cent from 4.47 per cent.

    “Recent financial distress and gradual slowing in the US economy are now limiting consumer resilience,” said Peter Kretzmer, an economist at Bank of ­America.

    The slowdown in purchases was felt most by building supply stores, clothing retailers and service stations, the department said. But carmakers appeared to attract buyers amid a price war.

    Another result of the Bush economy!

    ReplyDelete
  98. USA Today:

    Financial records at the Pentagon and Homeland Security Department are so disorganized and inconsistent that they cannot be audited fully, making them subject to waste, fraud and abuse.

    That’s the conclusion of an Associated Press review of the two departments’ files.

    In 1997 Congress ordered that outside auditors must examine federal agencies’ books. But neither Defense nor Homeland Security — created just four years ago — has met even basic accounting standards, the AP concludes.

    “It means we really can’t put any faith in the numbers they use,” said Ross Rubenstein, who teaches public administration at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School.

    Most of the 15 agencies examined pass their audits. But several — notably NASA, the Coast Guard and FEMA — have been cited for serious accounting errors.

    Those Bush cronies just can't steal enough!

    ReplyDelete
  99. In eastern Diyala province, meanwhile, a bomb exploded near a U.S. military vehicle on Friday, killing four American soldiers in, the U.S. command said. They were the first American deaths reported in Iraq since Monday.

    Late Friday, an al-Qaida front in Iraq claimed responsibility for assassinating Adbul-Sattar Abu Risha. A statement posted on the Internet by the Islamic State of Iraq called Abu Risha “one of the dogs of Bush” and described Thursday’s killing as a “heroic operation that took over a month to prepare.”

    Al-Qaida earlier had killed four of the sheik’s brothers and six other relatives for working with the U.S. military.

    Bush must be pleased over this!

    ReplyDelete
  100. Even with cutbacks promised by President Bush, the United States may wind up with thousands more troops in Iraq next summer than before the buildup of forces he ordered in January.

    Bush approved the redeployment of five Army combat brigades and three Marine contingents between now and July 2008, but that does not account for thousands of support forces — including military police and an Army combat aviation brigade — that were sent as "enablers" and that apparently will stay longer.

    For example, the headquarters staff of the 3rd Infantry Division, commanded by Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, was sent in April to establish a new operational command area south and southeast of Baghdad. They were not counted among the original "surge" forces, and it's not clear how long they will remain.

    Another Bush war lie!

    ReplyDelete
  101. Larry,

    Well, the votes are in: we enjoyed the company of 7 friends last night to watch the Yankees rally in the 8th inning.

    I brought the subject of incest, kissin' cousins, marrying family members up. Now, 4 of these guys are openly gay, liberal and real lefty types. The other 3 are straight and moderate Democrats.

    Not one of them thought marrying a family member is acceptable.

    When I said, "But the rightwing equates gay marriage with incest, what say you?" I was pleased to hear all 7 of these guys say some variation of "that's not the same thing."

    While I know I'm lucky to have good friends, I am still astonished that people are defending Guiliani marrying his cousin.

    ReplyDelete
  102. US Dollar Vulnerable To Interest Rate Cut,
    China Dumping US Bonds

    Bill Bonner

    As the dollar falls, so does the wealth of dollar holders - particularly Americans. We checked this morning and found the dollar had dropped to over US$1.38 per euro. Last week, we paid US$5 for a cup of coffee in London. And the price keeps going up.
    Why is the dollar falling?

    Speculators, investors, and central bankers have figured out that the US government and the Bernanke Fed will not protect the dollar - not when millions of Americans are having trouble making their mortgage payments. The US money supply is increasing - nearly five times faster than GDP growth. And now, fearing a Japan-style deflation, the Fed is likely to cut rates later this month.

    The Chinese have one of the largest dollar piles in the world.

    "Is China quietly dumping US Treasuries?" asks Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in the English press.

    "A sharp drop in foreign holdings of US Treasury bonds over the last five weeks has raised concerns that China is quietly withdrawing its funds from the United States, leaving the dollar increasingly vulnerable."

    The report continues:

    "Data released by the New York Federal Reserve shows that foreign central banks have cut their stash of US Treasuries by $48bn since late July, with falls of $32bn in the last two weeks alone.

    "'This comes as a big surprise and it is definitely worrying,' said Hans Redeker, currency chief at BNP Paribas. 'We won't know if China is behind this until the Treasury releases its TIC data in November, but what it does show is that world central banks are in a hurry to get out of the US. They don't seem to be switching into other currencies, so it is possible they are moving into gold instead. Gold is now gaining momentum across all currencies and has broken through resistance at 500 euros,' he said.

    "Two top advisers to the Chinese government gave strong hints in August that Beijing should use its estimated $900bn holdings of US Treasuries and agency bonds as a 'bargaining chip', words taken as an implicit threat to trigger as US bond crash if provoked."

    The Chinese have denied it, of course. But betting against the U.S. dollar has been one of the surest gambles you could make over the last 35 years. Now, it is probably still a good bet.


    Bill Bonner
    The Daily Reckoning
    www.dailyreckoning.com

    13 Septmber 2007

    Editor's Note: Bill Bonner is the founder and editor of The Daily Reckoning. He is also the author, with Addison Wiggin, of The Wall Street Journal best seller Financial Reckoning Day: Surviving the Soft Depression of the 21st Century (John Wiley & Sons).

    In Bonner and Wiggin's follow-up book, Empire of Debt: The Rise of an Epic Financial Crisis, they wield their sardonic brand of humor to expose the nation for what it really is - an empire built on delusions.

    ReplyDelete
  103. Christopher:

    If Guiliani took the same question around the room at a family reunion, they no doubt would say "isn't that normal."

    ReplyDelete
  104. Reuters:

    Iraqi lawmakers said on Saturday that Washington should take responsibility for the turmoil in Iraq and stop blaming Baghdad, Iran and Syria.

    Frustrated by criticism from the United States over their slow progress towards political goals meant to foster national reconciliation, Iraqi leaders said Washington would be better served by examining its own progress in the unpopular war.

    I couldn't agree more.

    ReplyDelete
  105. Associated Press

    Thousands of opponents and supporters of the U.S. presence in Iraq will converge Saturday in the nation's capital for a day of demonstrations.

    The anti-war ANSWER Coalition is planning a rally at Lafayette Square, followed by a march to the Capitol and "die-in," where thousands plan to risk arrest by entering areas where they're not supposed to go.

    Robert Rouse is there.

    ReplyDelete
  106. Excellent article, Larry. That must be what Bush means by return on success/

    ReplyDelete
  107. Thanks Tomcat, you could add a few dozen yourself.

    ReplyDelete
  108. The US military will be tied down in Iraq with 100,000 troops at least through the presidency of George W. Bush, and a modest size residual force will be there for years to come.

    Another Bush lie revealed!

    ReplyDelete
  109. Religious freedom conditions have worsened in insurgency-wracked Iraq as well as Egypt, while communist China has embarked on a crackdown on foreign missionaries ahead of the Olympics, the US government warned in a report Friday.

    The State Department's annual report on religious freedoms around the world also noted "continued deterioration of the extremely poor status of respect for religious freedom" in Iran and highlighted "serious problems" in Pakistan.

    Religious freedom is "integral to our efforts to combat the ideology of hatred and religious intolerance that fuels global terrorism," said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as she launched the 800-page report in Washington.

    Amid intra-sectarian Muslim violence, religious worship conditions "deteriorated" over the past year in Iraq with the ongoing insurgency "significantly" harming the ability of people to practice their faith, the report said.

    "Many individuals from various religious groups were targeted because of their religious identity or their secular leanings," it said of the situation in Iraq where US troops are facing an uphill battle to restore order.

    I thought Bush supposedly brought freedom to Iraqi's.

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  110. ....A British polling company recently surveyed 1,461 adults in Iraq and asked each one, "How many members of your household, if any, have died as a result of the conflict in Iraq since 2003?" Based on the results, they say that 1.2 million Iraqis have died violent deaths in the past four years.

    The methodology here is nowhere near as detailed as that of last year's Lancet study, which produced a figure of about 650,000 war-related deaths in three years (and probably would have produced a number of about 1 million if it had been extended into 2007), but at first glance it certainly seems to support the notion that the violence rate has been far higher than usually reported. However, here's a second glance:
    According to its findings, nearly one in two households in Baghdad had lost at least one member to war- related violence, and 22% of households nationwide had suffered at least one death. It said 48% of the victims were shot to death and 20% died as a result of car bombs, with other explosions and military bombardments blamed for most of the other fatalities.
    Hold on. 20% of the deaths were from car bombs? That's 240,000 deaths. Since the average car bomb kills about 7-8 people, this poll is suggesting there have been nearly 32,000 car bomb attacks in Iraq since 2003.

    Roughly speaking, that's 20 car bombs per day, compared to official estimates of 2-3 car bombs per day. And while overall death counts are necessarily fuzzy, car bombs are big public events that usually get reported fairly reliably in the media.

    And Bush says things are great in Iraq!

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  111. Hi Lydia - How cool to have the incredible Elizabeth Edwards on! I'll be listening on Monday for Kucinich.

    Bush really is a piece of work. Who knew in 2000 that he had that world-shaking, record-breaking mojo? I thought he'd be a sort of stupider Gerry Ford - in and out, hardly noticed.

    Goes to show how wrong you can be.

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  112. Now that President Bush and Gen. David H. Petraeus have charted their course for the Iraq war, Democrats in the Senate say one of their proposals aimed at shifting the president’s strategy is finally close to winning enough Republican support for a real chance at being approved. It would require that troops spend as much time at home as on their most recent tours overseas before being redeployed.

    The proposal, by Senator Jim Webb, Democrat of Virginia, has strong support from top Democrats, who say that the practical effect would be to add time between deployments and force General Petraeus to withdraw troops on a substantially swifter timeline than the one he laid out before Congress this week, and that it would protect troops from serving protracted and debilitating deployments.

    Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democrat of Delaware and a candidate for president, called the proposal the “easiest way” for his Republican colleagues to change the war strategy on the same day that the Bush administration released a mixed report on the Iraqi government’s progress toward various goals.

    If you would bring them home like you were elected to do, this showpiece wouldn't be needed.

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  113. Savers at a leading UK mortgage bank lined up for a second day to empty their accounts Saturday, a day after the lender was bailed out by the Bank of England after heavily slashing profit forecasts.

    Long lines formed before counters opened at the Northern Rock building society, one of the UK’s top five lenders, as worried customers ignored reassurances from the bank and the government.

    Customers are believed to have already withdrawn about £1 billion ($2 billion) since the bank’s woes were revealed, prompting speculation that the global credit crunch made raising funds through commercial borrowing difficult.

    Shares in Northern Rock dropped up to 30 percent in Friday trading, with problems spilling over the European banking sector.

    The Bush economy is spreading.

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  114. BAGHDAD - A car bomb struck a bakery crowded with customers lining up for bread, killing at least 11 people on Saturday as they ended their daytime Ramadan fast, officials said.

    An al-Qaida front group, meanwhile, warned it will hunt down and kill Sunni Arab tribal leaders who cooperate with the U.S. and its Iraqi partners, saying the assassination of the leader of the revolt against the terror movement was just a beginning.

    Hospital officials said the 11 killed in the Baghdad explosion included two children. The blast damaged five stores and three houses and burned five cars, according to police.

    Looks like the safe harbor of the Bush "surge."

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  115. Thousands of protesters marched Saturday from the White House to the Capitol to demand an end to the Iraq war, leading to the arrests of at least 150 people.

    Many of the protesters were arrested without a struggle after they jumped over a barricade near the base of the Capitol. But some grew angry as police attempted to push them back using large black shields and a chemical spray. Protesters responded by throwing signs and chanting: “Shame on you.”

    Before arriving at the Capitol lawn, the demonstrators marched on Pennsylvania Avenue holding banners and signs and saying, “What do we want? Troops out. When do we want it? Now.”

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  116. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) had a very clever response to all of this.

    Democratic Presidential candidate Governor Bill Richardson, campaigning today in Iowa, issued the following statement regarding the recent “spying” incident involving the National Football League’s New England Patriots:

    “The President has been allowed to spy on Americans without a warrant, and our U.S. Senate is letting it continue. You know something is wrong when the New England Patriots face stiffer penalties for spying on innocent Americans than Dick Cheney and George Bush.”

    Telling it like it is.

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  117. GREENSPAN CLAIMS IRAQ WAR WAS REALLY FOR OIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Oops the truth slips out of a person that gets listened to;

    Alan Greenspan claims Iraq war was really for oil

    AMERICA’s elder statesman of finance, Alan Greenspan, has shaken the White House by declaring that the prime motive for the war in Iraq was oil.

    In his long-awaited memoir, to be published tomorrow, Greenspan, a Republican whose 18-year tenure as head of the US Federal Reserve was widely admired, will also deliver a stinging critique of President George W Bush’s economic policies.

    However, it is his view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy. “I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil,” he says.

    Greenspan, 81, is understood to believe that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East.


    and
    Greenspan Is Critical Of Bush in Memoir

    Former Fed Chairman Has Praise for Clinton

    Alan Greenspan, who served as Federal Reserve chairman for 18 years and was the leading Republican economist for the past three decades, levels unusually harsh criticism at President Bush and the Republican Party in his new book, arguing that Bush abandoned the central conservative principle of fiscal restraint.

    While condemning Democrats, too, for rampant federal spending, he offers Bill Clinton an exemption. The former president emerges as the political hero of "The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World," Greenspan's 531-page memoir, which is being published Monday.

    Greenspan, who had an eight-year alliance with Clinton and Democratic Treasury secretaries in the 1990s, praises Clinton's mind and his tough anti-deficit policies, calling the former president's 1993 economic plan "an act of political courage."

    But he expresses deep disappointment with Bush. "My biggest frustration remained the president's unwillingness to wield his veto against out-of-control spending," Greenspan writes. "Not exercising the veto power became a hallmark of the Bush presidency. . . . To my mind, Bush's collaborate-don't-confront approach was a major mistake."

    Greenspan accuses the Republicans who presided over the party's majority in the House until last year of being too eager to tolerate excessive federal spending in exchange for political opportunity. The Republicans, he says, deserved to lose control of the Senate and House in last year's elections. "The Republicans in Congress lost their way," Greenspan writes. "They swapped principle for power. They ended up with neither."

    He singles out J. Dennis Hastert, the Illinois Republican who was House speaker until January, and Tom DeLay, the Texan who was majority leader until he resigned after being indicted for violating campaign finance laws in his home state.

    "House Speaker Hastert and House majority leader Tom DeLay seemed readily inclined to loosen the federal purse strings any time it might help add a few more seats to the Republican majority," he writes.

    He adds three pages later: "I don't think the Democrats won. It was the Republicans who lost. The Democrats came to power in the Congress because they were the only party left standing."

    Greenspan, 81, indirectly criticizes his friend and colleague from the Ford administration, Vice President Cheney. Former Bush Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill has quoted Cheney as once saying, "Reagan proved deficits don't matter."

    Greenspan says, " 'Deficits don't matter,' to my chagrin became part of the Republicans' rhetoric."

    He argues that "deficits must matter" and that uncontrolled government spending and borrowing can produce high inflation "and economic devastation."

    When Bush and Cheney won the 2000 election, Greenspan writes, "I thought we had a golden opportunity to advance the ideals of effective, fiscally conservative government and free markets. . . . I was soon to see my old friends veer off to unexpected directions."

    He says, "Little value was placed on rigorous economic policy debate or the weighing of long-term consequences." The large, anticipated federal budget surpluses that were the basis for Bush's initial $1.35 trillion tax cut "were gone six to nine months after George W. Bush took office." So Bush's goals "were no longer entirely appropriate. He continued to pursue his presidential campaign promises nonetheless."

    Greenspan was intensely criticized for endorsing a large tax cut in 2001 in congressional testimony during the first weeks of the Bush administration. He notes that he was recommending any tax cut, even a smaller one proposed by some Democrats. But he acknowledges that those who had warned him about the perception he was backing Bush's plan were right. "The tax-cut testimony proved to be politically explosive," he writes.

    Yet, he adds: "While politics had not been my intent, I'd misjudged the emotions of the moment. . . . Yet I'd have given the same testimony if Al Gore had been president."

    By the end of last year, Greenspan writes with some bitterness, Washington was "harboring a dysfunctional government. . . . Governance has become dangerously dysfunctional."

    However, he calls Clinton a "risk taker" who had shown a "preference for dealing in facts," and presents Clinton and himself almost as soul mates. "Here was a fellow information hound. . . . We both read books and were curious and thoughtful about the world. . . . I never ceased to be surprised by his fascination with economic detail: the effect of Canadian lumber on housing prices and inflation. . . . He had an eye for the big picture too."

    During Clinton's first weeks as president, Greenspan went to the Oval Office and explained the danger of not confronting the federal deficit. Unless the deficits were cut, there could be "a financial crisis," Greenspan told the president. "The hard truth was that Reagan had borrowed from Clinton, and Clinton was having to pay it back. I was impressed that he did not seem to be trying to fudge reality to the extent politicians ordinarily do. He was forcing himself to live in the real world."

    Dealing with a budget surplus in his second term, Clinton proposed devoting the extra money to "save Social Security first." Greenspan writes, "I played no role in finding the answer, but I had to admire the one Clinton and his policymakers came up with."

    Greenspan interviewed Clinton for the book and clearly admires him. "President Clinton's old-fashioned attitude toward debt might have had a more lasting effect on the nation's priorities. Instead, his influence was diluted by the uproar about Monica Lewinsky." When he first heard and read details of the Clinton-Lewinsky encounters, Greenspan writes, "I was incredulous. 'There is no way these stories could be correct,' I told my friends. 'No way.' " Later, when it was verified, Greenspan says, "I wondered how the president could take such a risk. It seemed so alien to the Bill Clinton I knew, and made me feel disappointed and sad."

    Known for his restrained if not incomprehensible public statements over the past several decades, Greenspan's direct criticism of Bush and his economic policies comes as the economy is emerging as an issue in the 2008 presidential race. And the man Greenspan praises so highly for fiscal probity is married to the current front-runner for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

    The politically charged observations are scattered through the first half of the book, in which Greenspan offers a standard memoir covering his birth in the Washington Heights neighborhood of New York City in 1926 through his years as Fed chairman, from when he was appointed in 1987 by President Ronald Reagan to his retirement in 2006. His theme is the unequaled power of free-market capitalism; Greenspan calls himself a "libertarian Republican."

    The second half offers a graduate education in global economics that is at times lucid and at times dense. Greenspan occasionally slips into his notoriously complicated Fedspeak, touring the world with detailed analysis of the global economy and the prospects in Japan, Britain, France, China, Russia, India and just about everywhere else.

    He clearly considers China the big economic question of the future. "I have no doubt that the Communist Party of China can maintain an authoritarian, quasi-capitalist, relatively prosperous regime for a time. But without the political safety valve of the democratic process, I doubt the long-term success of such a regime," he writes.

    "The Age of Turbulence" is likely to be mined word by word on Wall Street, where the Masters of the Universe will seek clues to how to make billions. Greenspan dives deep into his economic data, his experiences, his philosophy and meetings with world political and economic leaders.

    He explains how an advanced economy hinges on property rights, the rule of law, a culture of trust, contracts, debt, reputation, self-interest and "creative destruction" -- the scrapping of old technologies and processes.

    He argues, for example, that the loss of manufacturing jobs in the United States -- from the steel, automobile and textile industries to computers and telecommunications -- "is a plus, not a minus, to the American standard of living." He maintains that immigration reform, "by opening up the United States to the world's very large and growing pool of skilled workers," will help reduce the inequality of incomes.

    Without elaborating, he writes, "I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil."

    Looking ahead to 2030, he predicts that the U.S. gross domestic product will be 75 percent larger than it is now. His most dire forecast is that if the Federal Reserve is prevented from constraining inflation, the 10-year Treasury note would be "flirting with a double-digit yield sometime before 2030, compared with under 5 percent in 2006."

    Greenspan has nothing but praise for hedge funds, which he describes as "a vibrant trillion-dollar industry dominated by U.S. firms." He claims that hedge funds help eliminate inefficiency in the markets. "They are essentially free of government regulation, and I hope they will remain so." He scoffs at proposals to regulate them, declaring, "Why do we wish to inhibit the pollinating bees of Wall Street?"

    For all his wonkish ways, Greenspan writes with delight about his marriage to journalist Andrea Mitchell and their travels, friends and mutual love of classical music. He knows how to enjoy a good Vivaldi cello concerto in Venice.

    Though cautious about the coming decades, Greenspan ultimately shows a flash of hope at the end of his memoir. "Adaptation is in our nature," he writes, "a fact that leads me to be deeply optimistic about our future."


    another4 reichwinger admtting he was WRONG afer he is gone and can't do anything productive to correct the problems he heled create.

    How typical....

    At least he gets rich on the truth for once and all the misery he helped create.

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  118. Truer words never spoken...and right on!

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  119. Why the hell don't these reichwingers tell the truth when it counts?

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  120. Washington Post:

    The Bush administration's aggressive drive to promote oil and gas drilling on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains has sparked growing anger here among traditional Republican constituents who say that the stepped-up push for energy development is sullying some of the country's most majestic landscape.

    The emerging backlash from ranchers and sportsmen, which is occurring despite an economic boom driven by drilling, is threatening GOP primacy in at least one corner of what has been a solidly Republican West.

    George W Bush: Give me oil, the hell with what people think!

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  121. Alan Greenspan will be on 60 Minutes talking about his book and the revelations in Clif's article.

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  122. Check out this new site and lets act upon it:

    Shut it Down

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  123. Yes Der Fuhrer Adolph Bush has set many records and he will continue to do so until he's found guilty of War Crimes in the Hague and hung for them.

    God Bless.

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  124. O.J. Simpson was arrested Sunday and faces multiple felony charges in an alleged armed robbery of collectors involving the former football great's sports memorabilia, authorities said.

    Simpson was arrested shortly after 11 a.m., Capt. James Dillon said.

    The charges against Simpson will include robbery with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery and burglary with a firearm, all felonies, Dillon said. More charges could be brought against him, he said.

    Simpson was being held at Las Vegas police offices pending the arrival of his lawyer, who was expected later Sunday, Dillon said.

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  125. A rally on Saturday to protest the war in Iraq, which began with a peaceful march of several thousand people to the Capitol, ended with dozens of arrests in a raucous demonstration that evoked the angry spirit of the Vietnam era protests of more than three decades ago.

    The Bush Nazi hardily at work.

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  126. BAGHDAD — Dozens of suspected Sunni insurgents raided Shiite villages north of Baghdad, killing at least 15 people and setting homes ablaze on Sunday, police said. A bicycle bomb struck a cafe serving tea and food during the Ramadan fast in northern Iraq.

    The surge of bloodshed _ 54 people killed or found dead nationwide _ occurred a day after al-Qaida in Iraq announced a new campaign during the Islamic holy month aimed at countering U.S. and Iraqi claims that the terror movement is reeling after the U.S.-led offensives around the Iraqi capital.

    Wow that "surge" is working!

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  127. Every month in Iraq hundreds of victims are struck down by sectarian violence or massive bombing campaigns, and a small band of volunteers has taken it upon themselves to give the unclaimed dead a proper burial.

    "We've been doing this for 20 years, under Saddam, but the numbers have increased, as have the difficulties," Sheik Jamal al-Sudani, who leads the volunteers, tells CNN correspondent Michael Ware. "Because now it is as if the streets are flowing with blood."

    Before the US invasion of Iraq deposed dictator Saddam Hussein, the volunteers buried up to 40 people every month. In the war's worst months, that figure increased 50-fold as volunteers buried an average of more than 2,000 anonymous war victims, Ware reports.

    As the war stretches through its fifth year, several hundred bodies remain unclaimed every month. The unidentified bodies of men, women and children are found on Iraqi streets and sewers as well as in bombing ruins; some are "so mangled and charred, they're unidentifiable," CNN says, while others are Sunni victims whose families are too fearful from their own lives to visit Iraq's Health Ministry morgue, which is controlled by Muqtada al-Sadr's hard-line Shiite followers.

    Does this mean Bush's "surge" is working?

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  128. Check out this post by Anon-Paranoid:

    America Weeps

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  129. (Reuters) - Militants stepped up attacks across Iraq on Sunday, killing at least 30 people in a spate of bombings and shootings that followed a threat by al Qaeda to launch a new phase of violence.


    More dead bodies and the Bush "surge" keeps causing more deaths.

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  130. Another Neocon Power-Grabber:

    AP | DEB RIECHMANN | September 16, 2007 06:18 PM

    President Bush has settled on Michael B. Mukasey, a retired federal judge from New York, to replace Alberto Gonzales as attorney general and will announce his selection Monday, a source familiar with the president's decision said Sunday evening.

    Mukasey, who has handled terrorist cases in the U.S. legal system for more than a decade, would become the nation's top law enforcement officer.

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  131. Check out Jolly Roger's latest post:


    Reconstitution

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  132. Hey guys I see O J Simpson is under arrest and president bush is walking free and still making wars

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  133. Heck of a list.

    I dont know that every thing is the result of Bush's actions, but certainly he has been President during the time periods in question. Do I think he specifically caused the foreclosure rates? No, I think new lending programs based on unrealistic criteria (zero percent down? Come on! ARMS? Baloon loans?) are mostly to blame, and the assumption that the market would keep going through the roof.

    I don't know the background of this either-

    "Bush cut unemployment benefits for out-of-work Americans more than any other President in US history."

    I think we can safely say that the majority of the items are pretty fair to say, and I think that what troubles me the most about it is that these things are obvious and yet there still aren't votes for impeachment, nothing happens, the public cannot even persuade their representatives to try to take action.


    Why on earth cant we get anything done?

    This list is full of things that they ALL know. So? Why is it so hard?

    It took years of work to even get people to ask questions about an obviously illegal war.

    Isnt it just frustrating as hell?

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  134. This is an interesting series of coincidences....

    August 14 - Rim Kyong Man, the North Korean foreign trade minister, was in Syria to sign a protocol on “cooperation in trade and science and technology”.

    August 15 - Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah warns Israel of a region changing "Great Surprise" if Israel attacks Lebanon.

    Aug 30
    B52 'accidentally' carrying nuclear warheads event. Weapons unaccounted for 10 hrs. Flight time should be 3 hours.(1)

    Sept 3
    ship arrived Sept. 3 in the Syrian port of Tartus,emerging consensus in Israel was that it delivered nuclear equipment. (2)

    Sept. 4 - Israel repositions their Satellite and verifies target location

    Sept 5 - Israel inserts forward observers with laser targeting system who deploy at target position

    Sept 6
    Israel bombs facility in Syria, though neither side discussed it

    Sept 9
    Story of armed B52 'mistake' reported in the Military Times (not the Pentagon's shill) (1)

    Sept 15
    evolving story of Israeli bombing refers now to nuclear (2)

    (1)
    (2)

    As Artie Johnson would say, "Verrry interesting ... "

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  135. Those look like self created coincidences Clif, which are the worst kind.

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  136. Well Larry we have not gotten a clear indication of HOW many nukes went traveling across the US;

    5 or 6,

    Could that trip have been a set up in case a "nuke" suddenly attacked Israel?

    Makes sense to me, that we would have had 5 or 6 nukes waiting in the wings if Washington knew about what was happening in Syria, and would not have hesitated to attack both Damascus and Tehran if Israel had been struck, which would have started a total meltdown in the middle east.

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  137. Makes sense Clif, and it adds up to the real reason the warheads were being carried there.

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  138. And the reichwing calls us "moonbats" for worrying about dead eye and his stupid side kick .....

    With NO openness aka the cuban missile crisis, they played a nuclear card.

    They really do think they can do as they damn well please and have to answer to no one.

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  139. Notice how quiet the latest Israel strike on Syria was, and how quickly the warhead story faded without explanation.

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  140. Larry the real gem in the Israeli story was the fact they could shut off anti-aircraft systems in Syria, since both Syria and Iran use very similar systems, that unfortunately will emboldened the fooles to try Iran next.

    Too bad Iran isn't gonna role over and play dead like Iraq did on April 9th 2003......

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  141. I'm assuming part of the reason Bush put lapdog Blair in as Mideast "peace envoy" was to be the go between in instigating Israel to attack Iran.

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  142. Could very well be Larry, after all that poodle did what ever bush told him to up to this point.

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  143. Many think Iran will be attacked before Christmas, and the Democrats are falling right in line with Bush's Iran propaganda.

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  144. Another Bush lover gone astray:

    Former Sen. Lincoln Chafee said he has left the Republican Party because the national GOP has drifted too far from him on critical issues, including the war in Iraq, the economy and the environment.

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  145. Today on BASHAM AND CORNELL TALK RADIO we have a former political prisoner on to discuss the "The Homeowners and Bank Protection Act of 2007: Model Resolution for State and City Councils," which will address the onrushing financial crisis engulfing home mortgages, debt instruments of all types, and the banking system of the United States.

    And then on Friday, as it stands now… and I should know for sure by later today. Democratic presidential contender Mike Gravel will make his 2nd appearance here on the show.

    We will soon have BARACK OBAMA!!

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  146. Thanks for the list. It makes me sick to think he was reelected.


    www.pafundi.com
    ===================================
    Number of Operations Iraq Freedom and Enduring Freedom casualties
    as confirmed by U.S. Central Command: 4213

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  147. Sorry folks; haven't been around much and haven't read all of the comments here.

    Let's add another one to the infamous list of Criminal Bush's credentials, shall we?

    First president to STEAL (yes) an election from its rightful winner, Al Gore. In the meantime, all of us who are on the bandwagon of this good man are still waiting to see if he will run again in '08.

    Everything else said about Bush is right on the money. His presidency has cost me not one, not two but three jobs. I got one of them back recently, but still, the man is a disgrace to this country and to himself.

    As Ronald Reagan once said, are you better off now than you were (eight years) ago?

    I'm sure all of you know the answer to that question.

    God bless to all.

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