Fleeing the Scene

For the next couple of weeks I will flee the DC area to return to my liberal home routes and recharge my mental batteries. If I can get off of the beach long enough to post, I may. In the meantime, the best to all of you and best of luck to all of us to survive whatever is coming down the road at us courtesy of Bush & Co.

There he goes again(2006 version)

The President went down to Alabama today to raise funds for like-minded Republican candidates. During the speech, he lamented that the party of Roosevelt and Truman, bona-fide warriors and winner, has become the party of "cut and run" in Iraq. So now we're back to the GWOT being the equivalent of World War II, the critics of Iraq playing the role of Neville Chamberlain and the cowardly appeasers who pre-emptively surrendered to Hitler KNOWING THERE WOULD BE A WORLD WAR, Iraq morphing into Germany and Japan after the horrors of war(aside: it's going to take time, but Iraq WILL BECOME Germany and/or Japan).

This comes on the heels of explosive new revelations by Bob Woodward, who maintains that the Bush administration and the Pentagon has been lying daily about the progress of the war, that they allege insurgent attacks have come down while they have in fact drastically increased. And that comes on top of the NIE, the consensus verdict that Iraq has not made us safer, but has left us more vulnerable and hated worldwide. And THAT comes in the wake of the Rajiv Chandrasekran book, which demonstrates how Bush and co. chose Iraq reconstruction workers--not on the basis of competence, but of loyalty and right-thinkingness and an active NO to Roe v. Wade. What that has to do with the price of sand in Najaf is apparently beside the point.

Can no one rid us of these horrible people(for those who know french, that's a real cri de coeur, folks)? They've completely distorted American and world history for their own ends, they are mendacious, they pursue disastrous policies recklessly and thoughtlessly and they have politicized every field of human endeavor. That's a pretty good start on a serious calling to account if the stars align correctly in November.

You can't even talk about this. You start sputtering, then cursing.

Will Rumsfeld Listen Now?

Rumsfeld ignored oommon sense warnings and advice before, during and after the Iraq invasion. So does anyone think he'll listen now? Well General Peter Schoomaker, Army Chief of Staff, is doing his best to make Rumsfeld listen. How? He held back the 2008 budget plan because he said that the service couldn't keep going like this without billions more dollars. No, not millions. Billions. You know, Pentagon levels of funding.

This is the sort of thing that just doesn't happen over there. When a report is due, it's there. Holding it back as a protest is, well, a pretty big thing within the Pentagon. Schoomaker is looking for $25 billion more than Rumsfeld asked for. A 41% increase over the current level.

Aside from funding issues, there is the strain on personnel. The Army's active duty force is 504,000. About 400,000 of them have done at least one tour of combat duty. Over 1/3 of them have been deployed TWICE.

Chavez Got it Wrong - Rumsfeld is the Devil

Bush is merely one of his tools.

The Senate Democratic Policy Committee is listening to retired military officers' opinions of Rumsfeld on the hill today. Too bad only the Democrats seem to be listening. These are generals we've heard from before on Rumsfeld's treachery. And they're worth listening to again.

Maj. Gen. John R. S. Batiste:
"I believe that Secretary Rumsfeld and others in the administration did not tell the American people the truth for fear of losing support for the war in Iraq."

Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton:
"Mr. Rumsfeld and his immediate team must be replaced or we will see two more years of extraordinarily bad decision-making."

Col. Paul X. Hammes:
[The United States] "did not ask our soldiers to invade France in 1944 with the same armor they trained on in 1941. Why are we asking our soldiers and Marines to use the same armor we found was insufficient in 2003?"

Eaton also calls Rumsfelds post-invasion plans "amateurish at best, incompetent a better descriptor."

Incompetent is one of the best descriptors I can think of for the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld horror show. The tens of thousands of dead and hundreds of thousands of injured because of it may have other terms.

Bin Laden Dead or Alive?

Reports are dancing around that he may be. Or that he may have died a month ago. Or that he's close to death now. So here I go out on a limb to say I honestly don't care.

The man is nothing but evil, and I wouldn't mind in the least seeing him dead as a doornail.

But will it matter for anything other than making us feel good? Will his death stop al-Qaida or other terrorists from moving ahead on any plans they've got? Or from drafting new plans against us and other? No. Will it do anything to halt terrorism? No.

Would it have, if we had continued to go after him in Afghanistan instead of wandering off into Iraq? I don't know. But I know that we had a chance to seriously disrupt al-Qaida and let it go. When capturing Saddam Hussein became more important to U.S. interests than capturing Bin Laden, we admited that our government really doesn't care about Bin Laden. That whatever might happen with him was not as important as what could happen with Hussein.

And that was not only stupid beyond all common belief, it was irresponsible and put the world, and this country at greater risk than we were at on 9/12/01.

2700

You'll probably see a notice about this on the news somewhere, since people always go for round numbers.

It's the number of U.S. service personnel killed in Iraq so far.

This is why I don't embrace the number of Bush supporters who now come to me and say, "he was wrong, the war was wrong."

I'm glad you figured it out. But at this point it's 2700 Americans too late.

Bush Who?

Can the Republicans up for election/ re-election in November run any faster from the leader of their party? You can't blame them. Most Americans have realized how toxic a presence Bush and cronies have become. But don't forget. Those Republicans who are running FROM Bush these days are the same ones who voted time and time again in support of his misadventures.

Unfortunately, Bush isn't up for reelection, but let's not let those who gave him carte blanche to do whatever he wanted get away with it by denying him in public. He's hosted a couple of fundraisers for folks, with only the faithful invited (kind of like those "public" town halls). He's still able to raise money for people because, let's face it, a lot of big money has spent a whole lot on the Republicans, and are scared of losing their influence.

Will Americans Vote the Way They Talk?

A recent CBS News/NYTimes poll found 77% of Americans believe that most members of Congress don't deserve to be reelected.

Come on voters, don't let us down. Don't just talk the talk, we need you to walk the walk. Look through the haze of the Republican smokescreen and think about whatever they're telling you about how they are the best bet.

Republicans control the White House
Republicans control the U.S. Senate
Republcians control the U.S. House of Representatives

How good has that bet been so far? What on earth is there about any one of them running for office right now that makes you think he or she will act differently if re-elected?

Oh Good Grief. Do We Really Scare That Easily?

The Republicans are pushing hard with the terrorism card. Apparently if the Democrats win, we will all be killed in our beds. The insane thing is that at least one poll is showing that it is working. Give me a %@^T$@ break! Can we really be such idiots that we are going to fall for this yet again?

You know what is making us less safe? The neo-con-led, utterly insane policy of this administration to push aside and ignore a real war on terror for a war against a guy who was mean to W's daddy.

Unfortunately (or fortunately? at least for my blood pressure), I am hip deep in work right now and can't really blog as much as I would like on this.

But before I leave, let me direct you to read Jonathan Alter's column in Newsweek from last week. The one that imagines a world that could have existed by now if Bush had a lick of sense. I just want to make thousands of copies of that page and paste them all over my walls and live in that world. A world that actually makes sense.

Bush's Press Conference

Is giving me a headache. One of the many headache-inducing lines was when he was, apparently, trying to say that nobody knows what history will say of them - and said that he knows he won't be around to see how his policies turn out.

Does he believe he's the walking dead? He can't look around right now and see how his policies have turned out so far? Or he honestly believes (and this is what gave me the headache) that his policies are on his "right track."

We are being led by a man who is deep in denial and delusions. And has his finger (as we used to say) on the nuclear trigger. My headache is getting worse.

What have you learned?

In spite of my personal boycott of the 9-11 anniversary—I wish people would ignore the cavemen, stop giving them free publicity and prestige—I find myself remembering Winston Churchill, or was it Harry Truman? One of those two declared, “There is no end to lessons.

Here’s what I have learned from today, five years ago:

Surprise! History did not come to an end with the crumbling of the Berlin Wall. We did not sail off into a golden age of border-free travel, seamless communication and worldwide exchange of culture and goods. What we got instead was another incarnation of utopian extremists, bent this time on, variously, the toppling of middle eastern governments, the downfall of the United States and its henchmen and/or the re-establishment of the Caliphate. Back to the 7th century, in other words. The Bolsheviks aren’t usually very high on my list, but at least they had a program that raised somewhat the living standards of masses of Russians. That you CAN say despite the 60 million victims of Communist ideology. I’m not sure what you can say about Al-Quaeda’s program except that it resembles a death cult.

I am continually amazed at the enduring popularity of fundamentalist and/or extremist positions. There is absolutely no one in the middle now, calling on warring parties to resolve their differences and/or find a third or fourth way. Everyone is in his corner, snarling, fists up, insisting on his maximum demands. President Bush can’t be talked out of military action to solve political problems, Hamas can’t be talked into recognizing Israel and joining the community of nations and the Iranian President can’t seem to refrain, even for one day, from calling for the annihilation of Israel, denying the Holocaust, or committing some other outrage. Has the world gone over to the true believers? I wish we could wrest it back from them somehow. But we would probably have to get violent to do so.

No one can doubt now that it’s virtually impossible to install western-style democracy in a fake state broken by military force--especially when the entity that broke it has a huge, Christian army marching(crusading?) through Muslim streets. I often ask myself how much I would appreciate “democracy” imposed down the barrel of a gun? There’s not too many options in that case. Maybe future administrations will take note, even though they clearly did not in view of Vietnam.

Everyone should beware the law of unintended consequences. Not only did the Bush administration fail to plan for a post-war insurgency in Iraq, even after being warned repeatedly that they would probably have to contend with just that, they unwittingly rekindled one of the oldest conflicts in the Middle East, the Shiite-Sunni rivalry(Don Rumsfeld: "Stuff happens."). In knocking down Saddam, Bush empowered the oppressed Shiite majority and their next-door co-religionists, the Iranians. He also disenfranchised the favored group, the Sunnis, who will likely never accept minority status in a Shiite state. Also, there’s the looming problem of the Kurds, who are all but independent now. Who will stop Turkey or Syria from trying to prevent an independent Kurdish state on their border? Is the Bush defense department ready to defend the Iraqi Kurds? See what a mess we weave when we are so naïve—and/or willfully ignorant. And when we choose war!!

On a less lofty note, hell no, I won’t go—back home for good and stop traveling. I am going to continue to forage far, proclaiming to the world, “don’t blame me, I didn’t vote for the current leadership,” and "I am a proud citizen from…somewhere on the American continent!”

Now, what have YOU learned??

9-11 redux: the twin evils of barbarism and ignorance

There have been many regrettable moments in our life since September ll, but one of the worst for me came this morning, when I opened the normally vapid Parade magazine that comes with the morning paper. I made my way through the celebrity gossip, on the way to summer recipes, when I noticed a story about a retired New York police officer who lost his only son in the World Trade Center on that terrible day. This kid was his father’s pride, a straight-shooter, smart, loyal, better circumstanced than the previous generation. Naturally, his father took the death hard. But what did he do in the aftermath? Did he endow a scholarship at his son’s school? Did he maybe reach out to other people who were suffering. Sadly, no. He fell into step with the war drums the President was beating on Iraq, declaring that the US “needed to kick some ass” there. Somebody had to pay, he reasoned, for his son—why not Iraq? So he dedicated much of the next few months to getting his son’s name placed on bombs to be dropped there, in the deluded belief that somehow this avenged his son’s death.

It sickens me to see people here with that kind of caveman sensibility, almost a bloodlust. Since when is it remotely useful, to say nothing of moral or charitable, to inflict that kind of punishment on people who did nothing whatsoever to Americans? Where do people get the idea that anyone or anything nearby can be used as a punching bag when Americans are frustrated or bereaved? I didn’t think our people were capable of that. I guess I need to think again.

The story doesn’t end badly. The retired police officer did finally rethink his campaign for revenge, turning it in a peaceful direction and working to get his son memorialized in his neighborhood. Even here, though, his reasoning left a lot to be desired. He was watching TV one day when President Bush made one of his rare admissions that Iraq had played no part in 9-11, that there weren’t even any verifiable ties between Saddam and Al- Quaeda. The officer sat straight up in his chair—President Bush had spoken on the matter, and so it was time to change direction. In the police officer’s universe, “the President walks on water, ” and should never be doubted.

It makes you shake your head. Given the number of instances of documented Presidential prevarication—er, lying—why don’t people demand proof when the President says, “we need to go to war with X,” or “we need to punish X people,” or whatever dubious adventure the President proposes. Why don’t we see even a little bit of skepticism when the President says we have to have a war? We didn’t see it when Lyndon Johnson said we needed more troops, more bombing. We didn’t see it when Richard Nixon said he had a secret plan to end Vietnam, then escalated the war. We didn’t see it when President Reagan “couldn’t remember” people running foreign policy out of the White House basement. And we don’t see it now. How is it that people remain so ignorant of the history of recent disasters in this country? How can people continue to see the President as an infallible being, in view of all that?

Ignorance and barbarism—it’s hard to say which is more destructive. I guess I am reduced to hoping for less of both in the next five years of our “new normal.”

The Global Penalties for Oil Consumption Continue

No, this isn't a post about global warming. Nor about how the US feeds billions of dollars into the economies of nations it would tell to f*** off if it weren't for the addiction.

This is about our inability to stop guzzling gas. To stop buying & driving those hummers and suvs. Lester Brown has a good piece in the Washington Post Outlook section today that points out a very basic fact of global economics. The more food we turn into fuel to replace oil consumption, the less food is turned into . . . well, food, for global consumption. As Brown points out, "it is a battle between the world's 800 million automobile owners, who want to maintain their mobility, and the world's 2 billion poorest people, who simply want to survive." And just think of how that balance is going to be worsening as millions and millions of Chinese realize the dreams of car ownership for the first time. They won't be going back to their bikes.

Brown also notes that "the grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV gas tank with ethanol would feed one person for a full year."

Take a moment and think about that. The search for alternative fuels in agriculture isn't the holy grail to solve our problems. We must look long and hard at our fuel consumption. Stop telling yourself all those rationalizations for your gas-guzzling car. Think about yourselves, your family and the world. We're all in this together.

GOP Gets Muddy

What do you do when your party has been in control and your looking at 30% approval ratings with a general election on the horizon? Do you stand fast on your principles and beliefs, trusting that the people who have elected and reelected you again and again will do so one more time? Or do you panic, run as far as you can from the President & his failures, and spend your staff's time and supporters' funds in trying to find dirt on your opponents?

The first way takes time, energy and trust in the people who elected you to remember why they elected you and hope they didn't notice if you violated that trust.

The second time takes money and some true believers rummaging through local newspaper offices and gossip houses.

Surely it's a question that each candidate has to answer for his or her self. And surely your national leaders will guide you to trust in your electorate. Oh, wait, unless your national leaders have noticed that the public has figured out they've been royally screwed over by the folks they voted for and are not in much of a trusting mood right now. So what do the leaders of the GPO do?

"When you run in an adverse political environment, you try to localize and personalize the race as much as you can." according to Republican Rep. from Oklahoma, Tom Cole. Yup, exactly. You go down and dirty and start swinging the mud. It's called "we don't have any new ideas or original thoughts and need to distract you with bright, shiny, objects." Cole wants to head up the National Republican Campaign Committee (NRCC), and sent out a memo that recommended vulnerable incumbents spend $20K on a research package to find damaging material on their challengers and "define your opponent immediately and unrelentingly" using that material (since defining a challenger on merits of the political debate aren't turning out so well for Republicans these days).

So how desperate IS the NRCC to avoid a debate on political issues in local campaigns? Desperate enough to plan on spending "more than 90 percent of its $50 million-plus advertising budget on what officials described as negative ads," according to the Washington Post.

Voters better get their rain gear ready, according to John Geer, author of In Defense of Negativity: Attack Ads in Presidential Campaigns, thinks that 2006 will be "probably a more negative campaign than any in recent memory." Unfortunately, I think people have been saying that about each election for decades now, and they always seem to be right.

Don't let these would be puppeteers distract you from looking at their records. They have votes and they have stances. Hold them accountable for their actions. These people were supposed to be representing you, but ended up representing themselves and the money that feeds them.

When You've Only Got One Rep - Make it Count

I feel an empathy for folks in Montana. Aside from having enjoyed every visit I've made to that great state in my life, I feel for their representation in congress. As a DC resident, I get one rep, and she doesn't even get to vote. At least Montana's lone representative gets to vote. But what a record, ack Dennis Rehberg has. Hopefully folks will limit the damange Rehberg can do and kick him out.

• Voted NO on allowing human embryonic stem cell research. (May 2005)
• Voted YES on restricting interstate transport of minors to get abortions. (Apr 2005)
• Voted YES on forbidding human cloning for reproduction & medical research. (Feb 2003)
• Voted YES on funding for health providers who don't provide abortion info. (Sep 2002)
• Voted YES on banning Family Planning funding in US aid abroad. (May 2001)
• Voted YES on making the PATRIOT Act permanent. (Dec 2005)
• Voted YES on Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on protecting the Pledge of Allegiance. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on constitutional amendment prohibiting flag desecration. (Jun 2003)
• Supports anti-flag desecration amendment. (Mar 2001)
• Voted YES on passage of the Bush Administration national energy policy. (Jun 2004)
• Voted YES on implementing Bush-Cheney national energy policy. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on deauthorizing "critical habitat" for endangered species. (Sep 2005)
• Voted YES on speeding up approval of forest thinning projects. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on limited prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on continuing intelligence gathering without civil oversight. (Apr 2006)
• Voted YES on emergency $78B for war in Iraq & Afghanistan. (Apr 2003)
• Voted YES on declaring Iraq part of War on Terror with no exit date. (Jun 2006)

I look forward to seeing Monica Lindeen around town here in DC in the coming year. Because at some point, we've got to say no to the damage Rehberg and his buddies have been doing.

Taking out the Trash in Minnesota

So Minnesotians, is it finally time for Gil Gutknecht to say bye bye to his seat? Gil doesn't seem to be the sharpest knife in the drawer, good thing he's got such good friends in oil and other large industries. They've done a good job of looking out for each other so far. It's up to the people to put an end to Gil's days of feeding at the public trough and let the people of Minnesota's 1st have someone to represent them.

Gil's up against Tim Walz, who served in Europe with his battalion in support of American troops in Afghanistan (Operation enduring Freedom). Ouch. How do you go up against a Sergeant Major from the Army National Guard? Well, you dig for whatever you can find, even if it's a speeding ticket. Gil's guys have to work hard to try and distract voters from his policies and stands. So let's make them work a little harder by reminding everyone of Gil's congressional votes, shall we? (and those would be the ones he made while actually in DC and not off on one of his junkets. Gil's gathered up quite a bit of frequent flyer miles on those "fact finding" missions that always seem to go to places that others visit as tourists. Just a coincidence, no doubt! Ok, let's go to the voting record -

• Voted NO on allowing human embryonic stem cell research. (May 2005)
• Voted YES on restricting interstate transport of minors to get abortions. (Apr 2005)
• Voted YES on forbidding human cloning for reproduction & medical research. (Feb 2003)
• Voted YES on funding for health providers who don't provide abortion info. (Sep 2002)
• Voted YES on banning Family Planning funding in US aid abroad. (May 2001)
• Voted YES on making the PATRIOT Act permanent. (Dec 2005)
• Voted YES on Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on protecting the Pledge of Allegiance. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on constitutional amendment prohibiting flag desecration. (Jun 2003)
• Voted YES on banning gay adoptions in DC. (Jul 1999)
• Voted YES on ending preferential treatment by race in college admissions. (May 1998)
• Supports anti-flag desecration amendment. (Mar 2001)
• Voted YES on passage of the Bush Administration national energy policy. (Jun 2004)
• Voted YES on implementing Bush-Cheney national energy policy. (Nov 2003)
• Voted NO on raising CAFE standards; incentives for alternative fuels. (Aug 2001)
• Voted NO on prohibiting oil drilling & development in ANWR. (Aug 2001)
• Voted NO on $156M to IMF for 3rd-world debt reduction. (Jul 2000)
• Voted YES on denying non-emergency treatment for lack of Medicare co-pay. (Feb 2006)
• Voted NO on limited prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on continuing intelligence gathering without civil oversight. (Apr 2006)
• Voted YES on emergency $78B for war in Iraq & Afghanistan. (Apr 2003)
• Voted YES on zero-funding OSHA's Ergonomics Rules instead of $4.5B. (Mar 2001)
• Voted YES on declaring Iraq part of War on Terror with no exit date. (Jun 2006)
• Voted YES on authorizing military force in Iraq. (Oct 2002)

Go for it Tim Walz, I wish you the best - take down this idiot and take out this trash!

Is Michigan Ready to Stand up to Big Oil?

Big oil and the automotive industry have walked hand-in-hand for ages. How angry are Michigan's voters at the feed the rich, starve the rest corporate suck-up attitude that has been this administration and Republican congress' calling card? Ready to dump Thad McCotter and Joseph Knollenberg?

Thad McCotter who this year voted "present" on the Iraq war resolution. Present? As in, "oops, we really stepped in it this time, and I can't be seen by voters to be supporting an upopular president, but on the other hand, I can't be seen by the administration to be attacking them... how ever will I get out of this one?" Or was it that Thad thought the resolution didn't have enough "let's get them bastards" umph in it? Well whatever it is, the Chamber of Commerce still seems to love their boy Thad. Protector of the rich and mighty. Because they could always use a little more help.And Thad's voting record?

• Voted NO on allowing human embryonic stem cell research. (May 2005)
• Voted YES on restricting interstate transport of minors to get abortions. (Apr 2005)
• Voted YES on forbidding human cloning for reproduction & medical research. (Feb 2003
• Voted YES on making the PATRIOT Act permanent. (Dec 2005)
• Voted YES on Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on protecting the Pledge of Allegiance. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on constitutional amendment prohibiting flag desecration. (Jun 2003)
• Rated 100% by the US COC, indicating a pro-business voting record. (Dec 2003)
• Voted NO on $84 million in grants for Black and Hispanic colleges. (Mar 2006)
• Voted YES on deauthorizing "critical habitat" for endangered species. (Sep 2005)
• Voted YES on speeding up approval of forest thinning projects. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on continuing intelligence gathering without civil oversight. (Apr 2006)
• Voted YES on reporting illegal aliens who receive hospital treatment. (May 2004)

How about another Michigan Republican, Joseph Knollenberg? Well he's got $10,190 dollars in his pocket from his buddy Tom DeLay that's helped him out so far. But 10 grand doesn't go very far in politics, good thing Joe's got good friends in big business. You'd think with all those contacts in DC that King Bush and Prince Rove would take Knollenberg's calls when he rings. So what's the use of having a Republican representing you if he can't even get his partybosses to talk to him? Oh yeah, and his voting record:

• Voted NO on allowing human embryonic stem cell research. (May 2005)
• Voted YES on restricting interstate transport of minors to get abortions. (Apr 2005)
• Voted YES on forbidding human cloning for reproduction & medical research. (Feb 2003)
• Voted YES on making the PATRIOT Act permanent. (Dec 2005)
• Voted YES on Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on protecting the Pledge of Allegiance. (Sep 2004)
• Voted YES on constitutional amendment prohibiting flag desecration. (Jun 2003)
• Voted YES on passage of the Bush Administration national energy policy. (Jun 2004)
• Voted YES on implementing Bush-Cheney national energy policy. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on deauthorizing "critical habitat" for endangered species. (Sep 2005)
• Voted YES on speeding up approval of forest thinning projects. (Nov 2003)
• Voted YES on denying non-emergency treatment for lack of Medicare co-pay. (Feb 2006)
• Voted YES on limited prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients. (Nov 2003)
• Voted NO on allowing reimportation of prescription drugs. (Jul 2003)
• Voted YES on continuing intelligence gathering without civil oversight. (Apr 2006)
• Voted YES on emergency $78B for war in Iraq & Afghanistan. (Apr 2003)

Take a look a the two folks going up against the intrenched, same ol', same ol' in Michigan's 11th and 9th. In the 11th, take a look at Tony Trupiano. And in the 9th, dump Joe and consider voting for Nancy Skinner.

So How Will Rove Spin This?

I can hardly wait to hear Rove argue that this poll reflects that, oh, I don't know, perhaps that the American people are disturbed by the way Democrats might run the country if they were to win the election. Yeah, that will be it.

CNN released a recent poll that shows that when people were asked "How well are things going in the country today," 46% responded fairly or very well. 54% responded pretty or very badly.

When asked if people would say "things in this country are heading in the right direction, or are they off on the wrong track," 28% thought we're heading in the right direction. 64% on the wrong track. 5% were busy paying attention to something else apparently, and answered "neither" and 2% were "unsure" -- always wonder about those folks.

Newsweek asked a similar question in their poll and got a 28% satisfied with way things are going in the US and a 65% dissatisfied.

Is That Your Hand in My Pocket?

Or are you just stealing my tax dollars flat out?

CBS evening news shared part of its investigation into earmarks and the Congress folk who use them to make money for themselves. No surprise, is there anyone out there who trusts the pigs who have been feeding from the public trough too long? CBS reporters looked into just one bill, the infamous pork-filled transportation bill. An easy place to start.

The two they start with are certainly well worth looking at. California Republican Ken Calvert made himself a profit of $435,000 after selling land that increased dramatically in value. Why did it increase in value? Well, it seems Kenny boy ushered through $8 million of our money for an earmark to "streamline access to a local military base." Where was that base located? Yup, right next to the land Calvert owned. I say since Kenny used some of our money to make his profit, he owes us all a taste. How 'bout that Kenny? I take checks.

Calfiornia seems to be a good place to start. Calif. Republican Gary Miller used our tax dollars to improve an exit ramp that was . . . what a coincidence . . . near land he owned. Not only did Miller spend our money to improve the cost of his land, but he borrowed $1.5 million from a campaign donor to purchase the land from the same donor. How's THAT for a fun runaround. But apparently a local newspaper got wind of the deal and Miller sold the property. He says at a loss, but he refuses to release the price he got for selling the property he borrowed money to buy in the first place.

Don't forget you can do something about this. Calvert's opponent this year is Louis Vandenberg. And Gary Miller's opponent is Mark Hull-Richter.

Don't Forget - Bush is More Scared of You Than of Terrorists

Keep one thing in mind over the next couple of months. The person who scares Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove & Co. more than anyone else right now isn't a terrorist with a water bottle bomb. It's an American voter tired of Bush & Company.

Bush has been sitting on his low 30s approval rating for so long now the administration doesn't know where to turn to win support. It's got midterm elections coming up and a nation full of people tired of Bush, tired of war, tired of Republicans, tired of being lied to and spied on.

With nowhere to go, Rove & friends are hoping their same old strategy of lie and attack will work to help the Republicans keep control of the House & Senate.

You've got one chance to prove them wrong - use that voting both to do it.

Bush's Civil War

Apparently afraid that the world already considers him to be an idiot of unprecedented proportions, Bush claimed today that he was only listening to his people. "Our commanders and diplomats on the ground believe that Iraq has not descended into a civil war" King Bush claimed in his radio address today.

See, it's not that I think there isn't a Civil War, it's what my experts tell me.

So suddenly NOW he's listening to his commanders? Before "Mission Accomplished" the commanders who wanted more boots on the ground for the mission were ignored. Now that Bush needs cover to keep up this no civil war fiction, he brings out his "commanders" and "diplomats on the ground."

Georgie boy, you may want to check to see if those folks ever leave the Green zone. First we get the amazing assertion that there isn't a Civil War in Iraq because there are areas of that nation that are peaceful (apparently Bush & crew think that places like Minnesota or Maine were among the killing fields during the US Civil War). Now we've got the civil war denial because "they say so."

Everytime something like this pops out my first reaction is always "can these people grew any stupider?"

I've got to stop asking that question, because I think they're taking it as a personal challenge.

I Dream of a Day

When the world (and I) feel less threatened by the U.S. government than I do by terrorists. And I live in DC. I was at work 3 blocks from the US Capitol building on 9/11. I ride the metro to work and back daily. Is it possible I could be killed riding on that metro by a terrorist. Yup, sure it is. But is it more likely that thousands of innocent men, women and children will be killed by my government? Of course it is, it's already happening. Is it more likely that the men & women in uniform I see riding the metro will be killed serving the interests of King Bush & his morose men than I will by a terrorist? Of course it is, it's already happening.

So when we learn that the Miami, Florida terrorists - you remember them, they wanted to blow up the Sears tower back in May - weren't anywhere near being able to do anything but dream of destruction until the U.S. government in the form of the FBI helped them along with their plans, it makes my head spin.

Is our goal now to help out terrorists to the point of providing them with video cameras for surveillance, cellphones, and even suggesting a first target (Miami's FBI office in this case)? Then loudly arrest them so the administration can claim a victory on terrorism at home?

How many more young men and women will die in US military service in Iraq in support of this nonsense? And how many more men and women will look at what we're doing in Iraq and dream of taking up arms to stop the oppressor? Instead of sticking to the goal and staying in Afghanistan, Bush & crew continue to help create more terrorists in their brain-dead mission to eliminate them.