Happy Halloween!!!!

Well, a weekend has past since Fitzmas began with the indictment of the vice president's chief of staff, scooter libby. Scooter was indicted on one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of perjury and two counts of making false statements. It is almost amusing, though more often infuriating, to watch red congress people talking about perjury like it was a "technicality" or red pundits, like bill safire, talking about the fact that no one was found guilty of breaking the law that was being investigated, the outing of a CIA operative. Perjury is a crime, some may have once said a "high crime". Obstruction of justice is a crime. Making false statements to a grand jury, especially one investigatinging a breach in NATIONAL SECURITY, is a crime. And Mr. Safire, where the hell were you when President William Jefferson Clinton was being asked if he had sexual relations with an intern during an investigation of a real estate deal from back when he was a governor that he and his family lost money on. Give me a Fucking break people!

The other thing I would like to say to people like red rep. hutchinson and red talking head, safire, is FITZMAS ISN'T OVER. This trial may actually see the vice president of the united states take the stand UNDER OATH, something I don't think he or junior have done, for anything, in the past five years.

Nominating justice sc-alito to the Supreme Court may change the conversation in certain spheres, but headlines from a trial pertaining to the lead up to bush's war of choice, into which we have pour hundreds of billions of dollars and the lives of over 2000 men and women, may just sell a few more newspapers than...

Surprise, suprise!! Little george has nominated an activist, red, judicial insider, member of the Federalist Society to the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, put the Ten Commandments on the White House lawn, and to make sure that the president, or vice president, never have to provide any documentation for anything.

Victory.

Yes it can be claimed, though mildly, on at least three fronts. The first, and most publicized, comes with the withdrawal of, unqualified crony, Harriet Miers from nomination to Our United States Supreme Court. As you’re cheering the end game of this bush blunder, keep in mind that his next nomination may have impeccable credentials and be so right that bush will seem centrist.

If that bombshell doesn’t do enough damage to the campaigner in chief's "political capital" for you, how about rummy's nuCLEar bunker buster program getting the boot. The "administration" and the Senate have dropped the program after a vigorous debate in the Senate. Sorry don. No Nukes!

Finally, and the sweetest to my populist side, is "stay the course" bush's recent "flip flop" on Davis-Bacon regulations in Louisiana. Immediately after Hurricane Katrina, bush suspended the regulations that required those contracted by the government to pay their labor the prevailing wage, which is usually close to the level set by local union contracts. Looks like junior's oil and construction buddies will have to pay legal workers a legal wage. Who knows, if they hire locals first this may really help some of those in need down there get back to their feet.

And let's face it, the oil companies that got "hit" by Katrina have been doing alright. They have set records with their spiking profits since the storm, while we pay spiking prices at the pump. And before you start telling me that the prices have been going down, don't you think that might have something to do with heating season coming?

"Fitzmas" is coming
The Trolley's off the Track
Please put your indictments in the White House's lap

And watch for the list of 4,500+ companies involved in the Iraqi oil for food scandal. What will the Wall Street journal Op-Ed page say if Halliburton or its subsidiaries are on it?

Could it really be.....FITZMAS EVE?!?!?!

By most reports coming out today, this part (that's right, this may not be the end) of the investigation is coming to the point so many of us have been waiting for...

The indictment of karl turd blossom rove and vice president DICK cheney's right hand man, scooter libby, among others.

For the confused, Arianna Huffington has a cheat sheet up on the lies of our "leaders" as they pertain to this case, with links to back it up.

The cheney connection, made in the past few days, has given rise to further speculation that this prosecutorial "pitbull", Fitzgerald, is not stopping at the outing of a covert CIA agent, done purely for "the politics of personal destruction". He may be delving into the forged Niger documents themselves. Where they came from, who they came from, and who knew about them. What if the "folks" who wanted this war and needed some solid evidence of WMDs helped to put the forgeries in Italian hands. Maybe we should investigate the forgeries that Dan Rather used in his infamous report for similarities.

First things first, let's get these "evil doers" for perjury, obstruction of justice, and for divulging the identity of a CIA agent in this "post 9/11" national security focused world. Then we can go after them for the White House Iraq Group, the torture of prisoners, Gannon/Guckert, the paying of journalists, the price of Medicare, the Energy Task Force, Florida's 2000 presidential election, Ohio's in 2004, and the list goes on. So many scandals, so little time.

What do you want for Fitzmas?

Withdraw the Harriet Miers nomination.

As we wait for "Fitzmas" to come with gifts of indictments for those who've exposed, lied, and conspired, the rumor mill churns out of control. Rumors of cheney, rove and the unrelated rummy leaving Our White House certainly are fun to think about, but perhaps they are a little premature. Prosecutor/"pit bull" Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation has been amazingly tight lipped, which helps speculators run wild with ideas of the fall of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG), the expulsion of "the brain", and dare I say it, little bush being forced to say something along the lines of "I do not recall", "it depends on what the definition of is is." or better yet "I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow."

You can get an idea of what this administration would look like without "Turd Blossom" (the president's term not mine) from the blunder known as the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court of the United States of America. A nomination that should be withdrawn. But don't take my word for it. Check out david brooks's (red) column on miers's published, cliche-ridden, article in the Texas Bar Journal. Or how about bork's (red) words of anger towards the nomination. David frum (red) is out raising money for ads against miers. Wacko name callers like coulter (red) and krauthammer (red) are voicing their disbelief at the nomination of a woman, who answered a question on her recent Senate questionnaire concerning her experience with the law with an anecdote about rushing to a man's death bed to make sure his will was in order. The Senate's questionnaire was actually returned to Ms. miers as "insufficient", "inadequate" and in the words of one senator "insulting".

It is not that she has never been a judge. Justice Rehnquist wasn't a judge, but he was considered by many a brilliant legal thinker and an able scholar. His opinions were concisely argued. His bachelor's and three master's degrees from Standford and Harvard clearly show that he was on a path acceptable for the Supreme Court. I say all of this while biting my tongue about my opinion of most of his.

It is not because she is an evangelical christian. Anyone can observe any religion they choose or none at all. There's is a problem, however, with a person's religion being a qualifier for being a Supreme Court justice or any other governmental position for that matter. It establishes one religion as preferred by the United States of America. Some may say that's down right unconstitutional. Not to mention the back door conference calls with conservative groups ensuring them that she will not change back to the way she was before she saw the light.

The Supreme Court of the United States of America is the highest court in the land. It is the pinnacle of achievement for those in the legal profession. It is the crown jewel of one of Our three branches of Government, though it has become far too political in recent history. It is a place where the best legal and constitutional scholars and experts should sit in judgement on the important cases deserving of its chambers.

Nominating a personal friend and lawyer, based at least partially on her religion, is an insult to all those who study, research and opine on subjects facing Our Constitution and Our Nation. Being the president of the Texas Bar does not demonstrate a lawyer's legal expertise, knowledge, or philosophy as much as it does his/her political ambition. There is a litmus test for this nomination. It is one part she's my friend and one part she'll overturn Roe v. Wade.

This nomintaion is another disgrace perpetrated by this administration, and perhaps bush's lack of "brain" is to blame.


"He [the President] would be both ashamed and afraid to bring forward, for the most distinguished or lucrative stations, candidates who had no other merit than that of coming from the same State to which he particularly belonged, or of being in some way or other personally allied to him, or of possessing the necessary insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure."
From Federalist #76: Alexander Hamilton in the New York Packet April 1, 1788
(other excerpts of the Federalist papers concerning the nominating and appointing of Supreme Court Justices)

Politics and Terror

Nobody could be that fiendish. Bush's re-address on the "war on terror" and the evils of the terrorists happens and then a few hours later there's the specific threat on New York City Subways causing the heightened alert. The alert is later found to be quite possibly "made up". And there must be a reason for New York officials to hold on to this information, for several days, before releasing it on the day of the Harlem Mayoral debate that mayor bloomberg refused to be a part of. To speak fear is abhorrent enough, but to cause it for political gain, spin, or distraction? What Red Blooded, Patriotic, American, in their "right" mind, could possibly do such a thing?

On a recent Countdown, Keith Olbermann listed 10 times the terror alert level was raised at a time when the bush administration was in need of a distraction from the news or support for a speech. Coincidences? You decide. You're probably going to have to, I can't see anyone having the cojones to investigate the sick idea of fear mongering for real.

The full list of thirteen is up at Bloggermann.

The EPA's blind eye

As the federal government and mayor of New Orleans urge gulf coast residents to return to their homes, some are reminded of the air quality issues that were ignored shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Has the "toxic soup" left behind by Hurricane Katrina been adequately dealt with? Is the drinking water in the soon to be re-populated areas clean enough? Or will this just be the subject of yet another after the fact commission in the future?

This is My America.

A rant inspired by Lewis Lapham’s satirical Notebook piece in the Oct. 2005 edition of Harper’s in which he asks “in a major rather than minor key” “Can we make America the best damned fascist state the world has ever seen?”

The U.S. House of Representatives Majority Leader, already reprimanded three times by his peers on the House Ethics Committee, has been indicted not once but twice. The U.S. Senate Majority Leader is under investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for insider trading. The administration's top federal procurement official has been arrested by the FBI for making false statements about golf trips paid for by a lobbyist who seems to be everybody’s friend. The Deputy Secretary of State (the top political advisor to the president), the Vice President’s Chief of Staff, and quite possibly the Vice President, himself, have been implicated in the treasonous and careless act of publicly identifying a CIA agent in an attempt to discredit a former ambassador’s opposing view to one of the administration’s “weapons of mass destruction” claims. The "weapons of mass destruction" claims given as reasons for Our invasion of Iraq remain unfounded. The inexperienced crony appointed to head the "post 9-11" Federal Emergency Management Agency resigned without accepting any blame for a Federal response to a hurricane and levy breach that took five days to commence (for more appropriate disaster preparation and response see the work of former FEMA director James Lee Witt or, more recently, the days leading up to Hurricane Rita). Instead the president sheepishly said “I am responsible” as if words are enough. The nepotism continues with the president’s latest nominee to the Supreme Court, the apex of the United States Judicial system. The nominee’s experience, for the most part, comes from her job as personal counsel and cover to her appointer since his days as governor. This is My America. The America left to me and my generation.

This is an America where the number of millionaires and billionaires continues to rise at a rate almost equal to the rise in the number of poor. In this America, allegiance is pledged not to Country, but to brand name. This is an America where the bottom line is the only line, where defense spending is never questioned, and where the executive branch rules the legislative branch. Gone are the days of “The buck stops here” unless you are on the bottom of the governmental or military ladder. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself” has morphed into the only thing we have is fear. Fear is how elections are won, liberties are lost and dissent is squashed. Our culture of spin and deception has made dissent anti-American, torture justifiable, and tens of thousands of Americans left, on their homeland, without food, water, sewerage, and electricity for five days “their own fault”.

In the terms recently given to us by the U.S. Congress General Accounting Office, the “covert propaganda” being perpetrated by our government and its hired journalists warrants punishment, but there is barely a reaction. Simply more fodder for the disgusting and disheartening joke that’s referred to as public discourse in this America. Fake reporters propped up by the administration to ask “talking points” questions that turn out to be of the few that receive the closest to answers. This is the America I have inherited. For the rich, screw the poor! Mass produced, overly processed, poisoned food sold cheap to continue to feed the machine.

And of course there is the war of aggression, the war of choice, the War in Iraq. Iraq, where the liberated are starting to ask the question: When will we be better off then we were? Iraq, built on the success of Afghanistan, where elections have been fixed and opium production is at an all time high. Iraq, where we have turned the corner three times so far and are do to do so again on October 15. But who will fight and die for this new constitution? In America, there are those who fight that our Constitution stand as the framers framed it as they fight to add to it intolerant discriminatory amendments in order to define religious terms and give government the power of sanctification currently bestowed upon churches and temples. People fight for more unwanted pregnancies (unborn children) while they fight the welfare system that provides for many of the born. A tax cut and spend America that thinks putting corporate profit before clean air and water makes sense and the idea that bombing will not stopping bombings is the talk of “wackos”.

What would the founding fathers think of This America? A nation with eyes glazed over by celebrity, ambition revolving around money with little or no concern for the greatness, or even goodness, ones deeds. What would they think of a “misunderestimated” president misspeaking at podiums from which a nation was once inspired? What would the creators of America think of towns with character sanitized by the Everytown Starbucks society and jobs long since left for the cheaper unregulated labor of foreign countries?

The vacuum of real leaders can go unfilled only as long as the frustration can hold. President Bush, I would love to just “Get on with my life”. I would love to, as the Dalai Lama says, “Internally disarm”. I just don’t feel right about letting this all go with out yelling from the top of my virtual mole hill.