Bush opened his mouth today before the Israeli Knesset, and said this little gem:
Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: “Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.” We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history. Read more
The last post I wrote on this site took us through the backdoor sliders that Rove and Atwater plunked on Democrats in the Republicans’ last successful bids. At first, I was going to examine how some of the previous backdoor sliders were being used today(The Dean Scream morphing into The Hillary Cackle, for example), but recent events have pushed that one to the far burner.
While it looks like the Rezko situation, which I first believed was going to be the Backdoor Slider that makes Obama freeze at the plate for Strike Three, and would give McCain the White House at that point, I’ve come to realize that Rezko will be the frontal assault – or the High-Inside Fastball that Rove and company will throw at him. McCain, thanks to the Read more
Wow. Goeglein was fired from his job at the White House too. Oh, excuse me, he “resigned” but we all know what really happened, don’t we?
I think it’s been a rather bad day for him. As you’d expect, I wholeheartedly agree that plagiarism should have serious consequences. I just didn’t realize that the Bush White House would actually levy them against someone serving in Bush’s office.
Heck, Goeglein’s already suffered as much in consequences at the White House as Scooter did — for committing treason in the Plame case I might add.
That title is probably too clever by half, and I’m sure LB will yell at me for it, but he’s busy elsewhere today so don’t tell him, k? I submit this in full for those who’ve been too busy bashing Dems to notice the Republican frontrunner exploding in the room. It’s been suggested to me that McCain running out of matching funds money practically guarantees Mittster as Veep, I’m not sure if I’m convinced but we’ll see. Meanwhile, does the above play into the McCain/Iseman fun and games? Gotta love the Brit snark, “another pencil-thin blonde.” Heh. Anyway, pass this one on to your Republican friends bitching about the “lying, librul JooYork Times.” This is what blogs do best, and GOS is still a nice place to go for that. Remember, it’s “what he did for her afterwards, not what he did to/under/with her in their as-yet undefined private time before.” Read more
Delahunt: You said if an opinion was rendered, that would insulate him from any consequences.
[Mike Mukasey, Attorney General of the United States, before the House Judiciary Committee today]: We could not investigate or prosecute somebody for acting in reliance on a justice department opinion.
…
Delahunt: If that opinion was inaccurate and in fact violated a section of US Criminal Code, that reliance is in effect an immunity from any criminal culpability.
MM: Immunity connoted culpability. [Well, is anyone culpable? -scar]
…
Delahunt: I find that a new legal doctrine. The law is the law. Read more
Illegal immigration is a problem for this country.
There, I’ve said it. But it’s not quite the problem some make it out to be:
According to a New York Times article on April 5, 2005, “…the estimated seven million or so illegal immigrant workers in the United States are now providing the system with a subsidy of as much as $7 billion a year….Moreover, the money paid by illegal immigrants and their employers is factored into all the Social Security Administration’s projections.”
However, since illegal immigrant workers are here illegally, and ostensibly presented fake ID to the US employer, they will never collect Social Security benefits. “For illegal immigrants, Social Security numbers are simply a tool needed to work on this side of the border. Retirement does not enter the picture,” reports the New York Times.
The Social Security Administration remains solvent in large part due to deductions taken from the paychecks of illegal immigrant workers, yet Social Security will never pay benefits to those workers. The workers pay in, but they never receive back.
Wouldn’t the federal government detect fake Social Security numbers? According to that April 6, 2005 New York Times article, “Starting in the late 1980s, the social Security Administration received a flood of W-2 earnings reports with incorrect—-sometimes simply fictitious—-Social Security numbers. It stashed them in what it calls the ’earnings suspense file’ in the hope that someday it would figure out whom they belonged to.
The file has been mushrooming ever since: $189 billion worth of wages ended up recorded in the suspense file over the 1990s, two and a half times the amount of the 1980s.
But that’s not important right now. Look, a government run solely by business interests will never, ever, do anything to control immigration. Want proof of this, as well as proof of Republican hypocrisy? Here it is: Read more
He claimed a pocket veto, while technically Bush vetoed the bill under the Constitution. In the president’s Memorandum of Disapproval, he gave one main reason: his objection to Section 1083 of the legislation.
Call me crazy (or just plain realistic), but I’m reluctant to take our dear president’s word as to his actual motive(s) for such a strange method of vetoing the bill.
I’m not sure what Mormons drink (Joseph Juice?), but it’s potent stuff.
Mitt watched his father, George, throw the winning pass to Martin Luther King, Jr., leading the New England Patriot Sox to a World Series win. Or something like that.
The head of the federal agency investigating Karl Rove’s White House political operation is facing allegations that he improperly deleted computer files during another probe, using a private computer-help company, Geeks on Call.
Scott Bloch runs the Office of Special Counsel, an agency charged with protecting government whistleblowers and enforcing a ban on federal employees engaging in partisan political activity. Mr. Bloch’s agency is looking into whether Mr. Rove and other White House officials used government agencies to help re-elect Republicans in 2006.
At the same time, Mr. Bloch has himself been under investigation since 2005. At the direction of the White House, the federal Office of Personnel Management’s inspector general is looking into claims that Mr. Bloch improperly retaliated against employees and dismissed whistleblower cases without adequate examination.
Recently, investigators learned that Mr. Bloch erased all the files on his office personal computer late last year. They are now trying to determine whether the deletions were improper or part of a cover-up, lawyers close to the case said.
So, to recap: Karl Rove is accused of retaliating against employees and then illegally deleting the evidence. The man in charge of investigating him is accused of retaliating against employees and then deleting evidence.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A GOP leader Sunday denied a double standard in pushing Sen. Larry Craig to resign after a sex sting guilty plea, while remaining silent over GOP Sen. David Vitter’s involvement with an escort service.
He said.
A senior Democrat said a double standard by Republican leaders is exactly what occurred.
When Senator Larry Craig announced his innocence (“I do believe in ghosts, I do believe in ghosts…not gay, not gay…”) after having pled guilty while under oath, did he understand that he was admitting he had committed perjury? Did he understand that is what he was saying? Back in those heady June days in Minnesota, he pled guilty while under oath in front of a judge—the oath being that he was to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth—that old, hoary oath thing. Poor guy, probably doesn’t understand english or had eaten some twinkies or a large black man frightened him or…
Will Senator Larry Craig, a Republican from Idaho, issue a clarifying statement that will refute his denial of his admission? Lay down the ass gaskets: its going to be a bumpy crapfest.
Yesterday, less than 14,000 Iowa Republicans cast their votes in the Ames Iowa Straw Poll. In the last Ames Straw Poll that mattered, 1999, 23,685 votes were cast. Why the drop of over 40%? Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, the top-two finishers had their spin on the Sunday morning talk shows. Read more
As the Party of Satan descends further into the pits of Hell, we have the announcement that Glenn Murphy Jr., newly elected President of the Young Republican National Federation, has resigned coincident with becoming the focus of yet another investigation into yet another sex crime. Read more
Ruth Marcus has at it regarding the on-going saga of our Attorney-General, and if I tell you that she carves out a idiosyncratic place for herself from the rocky heights of beltway profundity, (using a tooth pick because this is the only experience of tool-using folks like Marcus ever get), you could probably come pretty close to sketching out the column without ever reading it.
Here’s her opening:
I find myself in an unaccustomed and unexpected position: defending Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
Gonzales fans, if there are Gonzales fans left, except for the only fan who counts: Don’t take any comfort from my assessment.
Unaccustomed and unexpected only because she doesn’t remember any of her previous columns; that’s part of the curriculum in that secret class, “How to Become A Consumate Media Asshole,” I am now convinced has to exist out there somewhere.
Her caution to Gonzales fans is given because Marcus is willing to concede the undeniable; that Gonzales is a fool and a knave, a deceiver and a dissembler in his sworn testimony before the Senate, and he deserved the brutal treatment he got from both sides of the aisle.
However, ah, yes, the inevitable “however,” the inescapable “but,”…you knew it was coming, but can you guess what “the but” is? Read more
Senator Arlen Specter
711 Hart Building
Washington, DC 20510
RE: The Credibility of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales
Dear Senator Specter:
I was quite heartened by your comments during the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. In particular, you said:
The Chairman has already said the Committee is going to review your testimony very carefully to see if [- ah if - ah –] your credibility has been [– ah –] breached to the point of [– ah -] being actionable.
When I heard you say the word “actionable,” my first thought was about legally actionable. At the very least, I hoped something would be done – some action would be taken regarding the stonewalling, obfuscation and (yet to be proven) outright lying to the Congress by the Attorney General, under oath. Read more
The genius of Gordon McLendon and Todd Storz, creators of Top 40 radio, has not been lost on the likes of Karl Rove, Tony “Dick Clark” Snow, literally, anyone in the Bush White House. Say something enough times and the masses will love it.
“Iraq was involved with the 9/11 attacks” – quite a toe-tapper.
“When they stand up, we’ll stand down” – oh – sing it to me!
“Al-Qaeda is responsible for the violence in Iraq.” – how melodic.
“If we don’t fight them there, they’ll follow us home.” – has a good beat, but hard to dance to.
Via 21st Century payola, we have the likes of Fox News and conservative talk radio as outlets that play Bush’s greatest hits again, and again and again. Lemmings hum the Bush lines like mantras.
Allow me to present some suggested new “Top 40” songs that should get unlimited and repeated airtime. Read more
[Welcome National Review readers. The password is still “specimen jar.” Oh, you won’t be returning here to apologize? That’s okay, we didn’t expect you to.]
So, it turns out, according to billing records from the lobby shop he worked for, Fred Thompson did do lobbying work for that pro-choice organization in the early nineties, just as Judith DeSarno claimed he had, complete with minutes of an executive board meeting discussing his work, and her memeories of a lunch at which “Fred” amusingly acted out a death scene from his latest film, which DeSarno remembered having involved cowboys. Read more
President Bush said Tuesday he welcomes a Justice Department investigation into who revealed the classified identity of a CIA operative.
“If there’s a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is,” Bush told reporters at an impromptu news conference during a fund-raising stop in Chicago, Illinois. “If the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of.
“I want to know the truth,” the president continued. “Leaks of classified information are bad things.” Read more
Meanwhile, Siegelman’s sentencing hearing goes on. The judge (a specially-chosen hard-line and loyal Republican) has now said he will sentence Siegelman to 15 to 19 years. This in a court that sentenced a Republican governor who had personally stolen $200,000 to only probation. Read more
Lots of folks are getting interested in this case now. Here’s a story from the New York Times about it. G. Robert Blakey, the guy who helped to draft the RICO statute and tried many cases using it, really slapped the prosecution around in the article:
“It’s a joke,” Professor Blakey said. “A guy walks in, gives a contribution, and gets an appointment? Until Congress reforms this, this is the system we live under. They are criminalizing this contribution.”
Furthermore, Mr. Blakey derided the prosecutors’ racketeering case against Mr. Siegelman. “It’s the worst-drafted RICO I’ve ever seen,” said the professor, whose career at the Justice Department began in 1960. “You find as much trash as you can, then you dump it in.”
