O'Reilly calls for U.S. to Cut and Run

On his Feb 20th broadcast, GOP spokesperson and Fox pundit Bill O'Reilly said that the United States should:

"hand over everything to the Iraqis as fast as humanly possible" because "[t]here are so many nuts in the country -- so many crazies -- that we can't control them."

As Media Matters for America has documented, during a November 30, 2005, appearance on NBC's Today, O'Reilly called those advocating immediate withdrawal from Iraq "pinheads" and compared them to Hitler appeasers.

So not only is Mr. O'Reilly, by his own definition, a "pinhead" and a "Hitler appeaser", but he is also a Flip Flopper.

Loud Dobbs Slams Bush on Ports

The other night Lou Dobbs slammed Bush on the deal to hand control of U.S. ports over to a middleastern nation.

President Bush has put forth a challenge tonight that I simply can't ignore. The president yesterday said he wanted those who are critical and questioning of this port deal to "step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a Great British company."

Well, first of all, Mr. President, to equate any country to your principal partner in the coalition ignores that special relationship this country's enjoyed with the United Kingdom for decades and decades. This also is not just a British company and an Arab company, as I think you well know.

Peninsula and Oriental Steam Navigation is a British privately owned company. Dubai Ports World is a UAE government controlled and owned company. You see the difference, of course.

And furthermore, the money used to fund the 9/11 attacks, most of it, in fact, was sent to the hijackers through the UAE banking system. In fact, two of the hijackers were originally from the UAE.

The UAE stonewalled U.S. efforts to track al Qaeda bank accounts after 9/11. In addition, the Emirates does not recognize Israel as a sovereign state. And the UAE was a transfer point for shipments of nuclear technology to Iran, North Korea and Libya.

And if those aren't good enough reasons, I would just suggest I'm at a complete loss to offer what might be considered good reasons.

Interesting Poll - 98% Believe Bush Puts Commercial Interests Over National Interests

Do you believe the Bush administration puts commercial interest ahead of the national interest as a matter of general policy?

Yes 98% 14650 votes
No 2% 361 votes

Pretty overwhelming what the viewers of Lour Dobbs thinks about George Bush's policies. Personally I agree with them.

Cheney was "clearly inebriated" - Secret Service

Doug Thompson from Capitol Hill Blue revealed that Secret Service agents who were protecting Vice President Cheney during his ill-fated hunting trip where he shot his friend in the face, filed a report saying that they observed:

"several members of the hunting party, including the Vice President, consuming alcohol before and during the hunting expedition".

According to inside sources at the Whitehouse, one of the Secret Service agents in question requested reassignment this week and another was put on administrative leave. I can understand why they would no longer want Mr. Cheney's detail. They expect they might have to take a bullet FOR the Vice President but they should never have to worry about taking a bullet FROM him.

This in particular is why this is such an important issue:

Cheney has a long history of alcohol abuse, including two convictions of driving under the influence when he was younger. Doctors tell me that someone like Cheney, who is taking blood thinners because of his history of heart attacks, could get legally drunk now after consuming just one drink.

If Cheney was legally drunk at the time of the shooting, he could be guilty of a felony under Texas law and the shooting, ruled an accident by a compliant Kenedy County Sheriff, would be a prosecutable offense.

But we will never know for sure because the owners of the Armstrong Ranch, where the shooting occurred, barred the sheriff's department from the property on the day of the shooting and Kenedy County Sheriff Ramon Salinas III agreed to wait until the next day to send deputies in to talk to those involved.

As I pointed out when this story broke, something about it stinks. Mr. Cheney was obviously getting special treatment that no other American citizen could ever expect.

Now that the details are coming out we are finding that it was worse then we imagined.

Allawi says: "this is the start of civil war"

The sectarian violence in Iraq is increasing. It isn't suprising to anybody who is familiar with Iraq's history that the tensions between the various sects did not dissipate with the arrival of the Americans. These people have been in conflict with each other for centuries.

How could the people planning this war not expect that they would go back to fighting each other after Saddam was brought down? Did they seriously think that "Democracy" would magically fix centuries of fighting and tensions?

These people did not become the "State of Iraq" by their own design! They were created by the British and French in 1920 when they carved up the old Ottoman Empire. Americans came together on purpose to form a new nation, the Iraqis did not.

I cannot decide if the Neocon's mistake was arrogance or ignorance in this. Their entire plan for this post-war conflict seems to have consisted of "Eh, it will work itself out".

GOP Violates Constitution... Again

This is a good post I found on the yahoo message boards:

A bill has to pass BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS, IN THE SAME FORM, before the President can sign it into law. Two different versions of the deficit bill were passed, but they were not consolitated before President Bush signed the version he liked better into law. And the GOP leadership of the House wants to hide that fact.

Pelosi Wants Ethics Probe of Deficit Bill

WASHINGTON - House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi demanded an ethics investigation Thursday into the passage of deficit-reduction legislation that President Bush recently signed, a new twist in an episode of Capitol intrigue that blends election-year politics and questions of constitutional law.

"Republican leaders chose to ignore House rules, precedent and even the Constitution itself" in sending the politically charged measure to the White House, said Pelosi, D-Calif.

She said the legislation was defective because it had cleared the two houses in different forms, and added that Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., "knew full well this was an invalid bill."

Republicans, citing an 1894 court precedent, say the measure is valid because top House and Senate leaders put their own signatures on the bill before it was sent to the White House.

On a party-line vote, Republicans shelved the call for an investigation, and Hastert's office did not respond directly to Pelosi's charges.

Obama again shows Class regarding McCain

When asked by Time Magazine if he had made up with Senator John McCain, Senator Obama said:

John gets excited sometimes. John's been in the Senate for close to 20 years, he's a war hero, if he wants to vent once in a while, that's not a problem. I think he has good intentions, and both of us want to see a good bill (on lobbying and ethics reform) ... (After his Grammy win), I did tell someone I'm going for an Emmy next. It's going to be for "Best Actor in a Drama Involving John McCain."

Senator Obama continues to show old school Democrats a better way to handle the issues and problems of the Republicans and their policies. He continues to show more class than most people in Washington.

Cheney Shooting Incident is the Perfect Metaphor

This is a great piece from over at Dailykos. It describes why the Dick Cheney shooting incident is the perfect metaphor for the foreign and domestic policies of the Bush Administation, especially in regards to Iraq and Katrina.

In this case, Cheney and friends were killing innocent creatures who were trapped in a pen with no hope of escape.

Overeager, Cheney hunted with a shoot first, ask questions later mentality, and managed to strike his own partner, and send his friend to intensive care.

It later appears that Bush and his situation room (or so they said) had no idea what was going on on the ground there. They waited an entire day to even report the story, even though they obviously knew what happened. Hell, someone else had to force them to report the story, because they sure weren't going to unless they had to.

The official story then has Cheney blaming the victim, saying it was the victim's fault he got in Cheney's way.

That is funny.

It would be really funny if it also wasn't so sad.

Cheney Shoots Lawyer in Face

And the lawyer wasn't even prosecuting him.

There are so many jokes to be made out of this... I know the nitetime talk shows are already prepping their material.

The one thing that stuck out to me was how fast the Rabid Right was to blame the victim. Typical... so in that sense, unsuprising.

I wonder if Mr. Whittington will be donating to the GOP after they blamed him for being shot?

If they were left to write their material, I bet the White House would be claiming Mr. Whittington "Raced to put himself in front of Mr. Cheney's buckshot. Thus, interfereing with the Vice President's perfectly legal and otherwise accurate shot at a really big quail."

Howard Dean - READ THIS BOOK!!

This is one book that Howard Dean and the entire DNC needs to read if they ever want to win an election again in their lifetimes.

The Democrats have the best ideas on most issues but they have allowed the Republicans to control the debate in the public eye and limit it to a very small list of select pocket issues.

They need to grow some balls and take their party back or progressives are going to look elsewhere and they are going to end up like the Bull Moose party.

Reform, Republican Style

Rep. Tom Delay, who had to step down from his position as house majority leader because he was indicted on corruption and money laundering chagres was given given a position at the head of the House Subcommitee overseeing the Justice Department, which is investigating the lobbyist Jack Abramhoff and his dealings with lawmakers, including Delay.

Delay was also given a much-coveted position in the Appropriations Committee.

DeLay was able to rejoin the powerful Appropriations panel — he was a member until becoming majority leader in 2003 — because of a vacancy created after the resignation of Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif. Cunningham pleaded guilty in November to charges relating to accepting $2.4 million in bribes for government business and other favors.

This is like putting Bernie Ebbers in charge of the SEC.

McCain Engages in Partisan Hackery

There was an exchange of letters between Senators John McCain and Barak Obama.
McCain *claimed* that he wanted to have a bipartisan effort towards ethics reform, but when Obama made the suggestion that they include ideas from Senator Reid's Honest Leadership Act, McCain responded in a decidedly immature manner, accusing Obama of "withdrawing from our bipartisan discussions".

McCain is clearly telling Obama that new ideas will not be tolerated in his so-called "discussion".

If you read all three letters, it is clear that McCain greatly overreacted. Obama responsed to his attack with Class and Tact.

It is too bad, because I used to have some respect for McCain, but he has fallen quite far downhill since he lost the GOP nomination in 2000. I think that Bush's "Vietnam Veterans against McCain" smear campaign damaged more than just his image. McCain seems to have decided that since bullying worked against him, that he is going to adopt that style himself.

How Republicans Handle Disagreements

Murderer says victims "appalled" him.

Edward Wycoff began planning in September how he would approach his sister and brother-in-law and kill them, he said in a jail interview Friday.

“What I wanted to do was get rid of them, leave no evidence, and get out,” said the 37-year-old Citrus Heights man. “And then raise the kids later on…”

Speaking coherently and politely, Wycoff said Friday that he was upset with the “liberal” political views of his sister and her husband, and also concerned about how his sister was managing their father’s estate and how she was treating an aunt…

The Sheriff’s Department is housing him in a module for inmates who need medical or mental attention. He insists that he does not hear voices and that he has never killed anyone before.

“I don’t think of myself as a murderer. Yes, I killed some people. I was supposed to make the world a better place,” he said. “If people out there think I’m a bad guy, I might just let them execute me.”