Stupid Enough

When I first started this blog I gave an almost daily insult to our commander in chief. Lately I have left him alone, after all he is mailing in his last term just running out the clock.

However, there has been growing efforts to ratcheting up the rhetoric with Iran. Seymour Hirsh said a couple of years ago in his revealing New Yorker article, George Bush feels that it is his 'moral imperative' to act against Iran.

While I am not going to debate the merits of attacking Iran, I think you could have made a better argument in 2003 that we should have dealt with Iran vs Iraq (a better argument, but still very flawed). But it isn't 2003 anymore. In the current environment, there are bigger concerns than Iran.

Our economy and the world economy are more of a peril to our country than the possibility that in 3-5 years Iran could have a nuclear weapon. The ramifications of attacking Iran would be $7.00 a gallon gas prices, sky rocketing inflation, mass layoffs, weakening tax base for federal, state, cities and towns.

Just think about all of the above happening in conjunction with the banking crisis we are currently in and people mortgaged beyond the value of their homes.

Funding this war in Iraq has helped bring us to where we are today. Escalating to Iran would be a financial disaster beyond our darkest nightmares.

While you have to believe the administration knows all of this, I wonder what they believe is a bigger priority. You have to believe Dick Cheney is fully entrenched in the bomb Iran camp, but is President Bush stupid enough to risk it all for his moral imperative?

So?

RADDATZ: Let me go back to the Americans. Two-thirds of Americans say it's not worth fighting, and they're looking at the value gain versus the cost in American lives, certainly, and Iraqi lives.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: How do you feel about the lack of WMD found?
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: Could the 500 billion $'s be better spent at home.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: 4000 American soldiers have now lost their lives in this War.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: American credibility has taken a hit all over the world over the lies that were told leading us into war.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: The instability caused by the actions taken leading us into this war will threaten the United States for years to come.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

RADDATZ: By shifting military to Iraq, the chief architect of the greatest attack on the United States of America has gotten a pass for the last 7 years.
THE VICE PRESIDENT: So?

George and Dick laugh at us every day for being dumb enough to give them a second term. Just look at the contempt that Dick Cheney has for the American public and then tell me how this is less insulting and hateful than Jeremiah Wright.

As despicable as Dick Cheney is, can't you see John McCain making the same comments?

No more Republicans, we've had enough!

One Year and Counting

Lost amid the coverage of the Presidential election is that we hit a milestone this weekend. We now only have one year left of the worst President in history. When I look at the list of potential Presidents, I can't think of any (ok, maybe Huckabee) that would be worse than the current occupant.

This Presidency has been so incredibly bad, that Republicans no longer defend him.

I could list out the constant incompetence that they have displayed over 7 years but most of that is old news. Upon reelection in 2004, Bush stated that he won political capital and he intended to use it. During the last three years since he made those remarks, I can not think of one accomplishment that he can point to.

The next President is going to be faced with some extremely serious issues that will need to be addressed quickly. The new President will face a recession that could be the worst of my lifetime, an accelerated trend on global warming, a national debt that is spiraling out of control, a health care crisis of 50 million uninsured that is bound to grow during the recession, a looming Social Security/Medicare shortfall, a war that shows no signs of ending, and a continuing threat from extremists.

With all of the problems that face us we need a President that is sprinting to the finish line not one that is running out the clock. One year from now I hope we get someone that is going to work hard and address all the things that have been largely ignored for 8 years.

WHAAAAAHHHHH!

I am done whining after my post yesterday. I managed to get through some campaign analysis and some game recaps from the Celtics game. I managed to get through them without crying, which brings me to the subject of tonight's post.

Hillary Clinton won a surprising victory in New Hampshire after being well back in the polls to Obama. Much of the post election analysis points to her crying episode (video below) winning over people by showing her human side.

I do not dislike Hillary, in some respects I admire her. I do not doubt she has very good qualities as a person which we will never see. If you have any doubts of her qualities as a person, take one look at what a successful, poised, responsible adult her daughter Chelsea has become and think about the environment she grew up in. You can't get that way without strong loving parents.

As for the crying episode I can only conclude the following. Either it was as I believe an attempt to show her human side and endear her to the public or it was a melt down from the stress of campaigning.

What I don't understand is how after seeing this, it swayed people to vote for her. Let's say it was genuine. I understand that these are 17 hour days, every day and the road can get very grueling but the campaign is the easy part. The job is the hard part. Why does every President age 20 years over an 8 year period? (Except Bush, who just doesn't care enough to be stressed) If you can't handle the campaign, you can't handle the job. It is one thing to cry over a death or loss, it is another for a President to show weakness due to stress and fatigue. Crying on the campaign should not be an endearing trait for a President.

On the other hand it was more likely staged. This would also not be an endearing trait. Given it's success though, I would expect waterworks from Slick Mitt.

How Osama Bin Laden Beat George W Bush

Of all the terrorism "experts" that get trotted out on the news, Peter Bergen is one of the best. Richard Clarke is the best, but Peter is a close second. His book Holy War Inc is probably the most informative book on Al Qaeda written. He has written a very insightful article which sheds some light to some disastrous policy decisions that Bush has made that has strengthened Al Qaeda.

I've only excerpted a small portion of a large article, but the whole articles is very informative and worth the read. Some of the information is kind of old news (Tora Bora) but Peter provides a lot of background information that gives new insights.

How Osama Bin Laden Beat George W. Bush

Omar bin Laden, the fourth son of the Al Qaeda leader, cuts a striking figure. In one photo, he stares out from beneath an Adidas baseball cap, his beard closely trimmed--an entirely different look from his father's seventh-century aesthetic. He wears jeans and sits next to his much older wife, a pale-faced British woman with pig tails, whom he divorced a mere five months into their marriage. While his father would not approve of his lifestyle choices, few men know the terrorist mastermind so well. When the Sudanese government exiled bin Laden in 1996, Omar was part of the small contingent that flew in a jet to Al Qaeda's Afghan sanctuary. He spent nearly five years living in the notorious training camps that bin Laden assembled.

But, between his departure from Sudan and his marriage, something happened to Omar: He turned against his father. I caught a small glimpse of his anger when I spoke with Huthaifa Azzam, the son of Palestinian cleric Abdullah Azzam, one of Osama bin Laden's most important mentors. In 2003, Huthaifa had accompanied Omar on a Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, where they spent four days together living in the same tent, performing religious observances, and talking about life in Afghanistan. Omar heaped abuse on his father for attacking the United States. "It's craziness. ... Those guys are dummies," he said. "They have destroyed everything, and for nothing. What did we get from September 11?" In fact, these attacks had driven a permanent wedge between father and son. Soon after planes struck New York and Washington, Omar left Afghanistan in disgust. And, in the years since, he appears to have had no contact with his father.

When Omar fled the Al Qaeda training camps, the organization was in disarray. A 2002 letter written by an Al Qaeda member--and addressed to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the operational commander of the September 11 attacks--gives a sense of just how demoralized the group was:

Consider all the fatal and successive disasters that have afflicted us during a period of no more than six months. Those observing our affairs wonder what has happened to us. Today we are experiencing one setback after another and have gone from misfortune to disaster. ... I say today we must completely halt all external actions until we sit down and consider the disaster we caused. The East Asia, Europe, America, Horn of Africa, Yemen, Gulf, and Morocco [terrorist] groups have fallen, and Pakistan has almost been drowned in one push.

Al Qaeda's cadres were right to be dispirited. The United States appeared to have soundly defeated the terrorist organization. As Bruce Hoffman, a Georgetown professor and one of the world's leading authorities on terrorism, told me, "It's difficult to recall the extent to which it was believed that a decisive corner had been turned in 2002 as a result of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. We believed not simply that Al Qaeda was on the run, but that it had been smashed to bits."

But that was five very long years ago--five years during which Al Qaeda has not only survived but also managed to rebuild at an astonishing clip. The group's leadership has reconstituted itself and now operates rather comfortably along the largely lawless Afghan-Pakistan border. Last year, it came close to downing ten U.S. airplanes using liquid explosives--an attack that would have rivaled September 11 in magnitude. Al Qaeda has continually massacred Iraqi civilians over the past three years and has managed to keep the country locked in the grip of sectarian violence. Swathes of Afghanistan are in danger of reverting to Islamist control. The largest Algerian terrorist group announced last year that it was putting itself under Al Qaeda's umbrella--and has subsequently launched a series of attacks in North Africa against Western targets. Britain's domestic intelligence chief said last November that 30 terrorist plots were underway in her country--some of which would involve "mass-casualty suicide attacks"--and that Al Qaeda's Pakistan-based leadership was giving direction to its British followers "on an extensive and growing scale." Last month, Al Qaedalinked militants who had trained at camps in Pakistan were arrested in Germany, where a prosecutor said they had acquired enough chemicals for what would have been "massive bomb attacks" targeting Americans in the country. In a small but telling sign of its restored confidence, Al Qaeda's production arm has cranked out a record number of videos and audiotapes this year. To top things off, according to Hoffman, the group's "determination to strike the United States from abroad again remains undiminished." And it may be getting closer to doing just that: A recent National Intelligence Estimate noted that Al Qaeda "has protected or regenerated key elements of its Homeland attack capability."

America's most formidable foe--once practically dead-- is back. This is one of the most historically significant legacies of President Bush. At nearly every turn, he has made the wrong strategic choices in battling Al Qaeda. To understand the terror network's resurgence--and its continued ability to harm us--we need to reexamine all the ways in which the administration has failed to crush it.


http://www.tnr.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20071022&s=bergen102207

I Told You So

Back in 2000, I was very pro Gore. Nothing will ever convince me otherwise that nothing short of deceptive illegal voter intimidation and fraud cost him the election. To date President Bush has turned out to be the worst President of my lifetime (including Nixon). This morning Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize.

While it would be tempting for the 50,996,116 of us that voted for Al Gore to say "I told you so" to the 50,456,169 people who voted for Bush. However, that just isn't true. I would much rather have seen GWB succeed. I would rather have a President who I could have respected.

On the day Al Gore took the spotlight again I feel compelled to ask:
Where would we be on Stem Cell research with President Gore?
Would we have gone into Iraq?
If we go into Iraq, would it have been managed so incompetently?
Would we have finished to job in Afghanistan, including making it more stable and less prone to terror?
Would he have kept the budget deficit from rising to near crisis levels?
Would he have made us less dependent on foreign oil?
Would he have dropped the ball on all the signs leading up to 9/11?

I can't help but think that on every one of these issues, President Gore would have succeeded where President Bush failed miserably. When I do think of how much better things could have been I can only say "I told you so".

Why now?

After watching Bush's speeh the other night, I couldn't help but ask why we should believe them now given their track record.

"Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent.”

State of the Union Address – 1/28/2003

"Evidence from intelligence sources, secret communications and statements by people
now in custody reveal that
Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of Al Qaida."

State of the Union Address – 1/28/2003

"Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at [past nuclear] sites."

Bush speech to the nation – 10/7/2002

Joe Wilson's favorite:
"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

State of the Union Address – 1/28/2003

"We know he's been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons, and we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons."

VP Dick Cheney – “Meet the Press” 3/16/2003

"The Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons."
-- George Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in a speech in Cincinnati.

"We know where [Iraq's WMD] are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south, and north somewhat."
-- Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, March 30, 2003, in statements to the press.

"Our conservative estimate is that Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets."
-- Secretary of State Colin Powell, Feb. 5 2003, in remarks to the UN Security Council.

It's on Folks

Last week in a post about Fox's coverage of Iran I noted the following:

The administration is very good in getting the PR ahead of the action. Fox News this week will be followed by stories on Drudge next week.

It's on folks, brace yourselves!

Let's take a look at Drudge Report today....










We are even disparaging the French right on schedule.

Next step is the Administration send out Chertoff, Gates, and Rice on the Sunday morning talk shows to scare the public.

Where have I seen this movie before?

Bush Bashing

I have refrained a bit from totally bashing the Administration. There are a million blogs that specialize in that and do a much better job at it than I do. Tonight two stories really annoyed me. One article in which the admistration manual on quieting dissenters is revealed and another article blaming George Tenet for 9/11 really iritated me. I go into both in more detail in the next two posts.

I know Bush's approval rating reflects numbers that contain positives from barely more than his immediate friends and family (and Barney), but why is it that nothing sticks to these guys.

Not accountability for errors leading up to 9/11 or failing to hold those responsible accountable or breaking laws on wire tapping or silencing critics or a failed Social Security plan or (how could I forget) misleading us to war or (almost as bad) having a bad war plan or leaving Afganistan a mess or failing to staff FEMA with experienced professionals able to help in emergency situations or failure to show leadership in fighting climate change.

I'm not one that thinks that the Administration should be impeached even though it deserves it, but what are the other options? Ultimately we get the government we deserve (although Gore won in 2000). We collectively knew they were incompetant when we (not me) voted for them again in 2004. Why do we do this to ourselves?

AAGGGGGHHHH!!!!!


I feel better. 517 days and counting (I feel worse again).