Just a Reminder...

When Bush insists on stamping his feet, pouting, or otherwise throwing a tantrum after being told that no, he can't continue his Mesopotamian Nightmare of a War ad infinitum, remember, what he's actually saying is that he SUPPORTS this:


What he's actually saying is that he supports this:


He's also saying he supports a policy that's resulted in some 30,000 US soldiers being wounded, many seriously. He's saying he supports a policy that figuratively and literally rips families apart. He's saying he supports a policy that has ZERO chance of even remotely obtaining anything approaching "success," but is a policy that accepts more of the same: blood and death, obscene expenditures...just to salve his fragile ego.

Well, on that note, have a nice weekend. Hmmm...ok, to to lighten things up a tad, here's a picture of president Shrub's brain on drugs:


(actual size of egg/brain-- -- )

Schlag und Awe


Cursor reminds me that this week marks the 70th anniversary of the Nazis firebombing Guernica.

But as the world learned from then air force head Hermann Göring during the post-war Nuremberg Trials, the army's mission in Spain had also been to gain experience and to practice. There was an "opportunity to test under fire whether the materiel had been adequately developed," Göring said. In 2003, DER SPIEGEL published a document long thought to have been lost which proved that the primary reason the Germans were fighting on the Iberian Peninsula was to test out modern war materiel and tactics under realistic conditions.

The secret document was produced by Joachim von Richthofen, not related to his commander of the same name. He wrote a report for the Condor Legion as to the efficacy of German, Spanish and Italian bombs and provided suggestions as to how their performance could be enhanced. He described Guernica as a planned operation: "First came the incendiary bombs which set a number of roofs on fire." After that, he wrote, "followed the 250-kilogram heavy explosives" in order to "destroy water pipes thus hindering the extinguishing of the fires." He complained that the number of direct hits wasn't terribly high and could be improved. He said nothing, however, about the fact that numerous bridges and factories survived the raid unharmed.

Since then, it has been clear that the Germans saw the Spanish Civil War merely as a gigantic training camp. Some 19,000 soldiers -- officially all were volunteers -- were cycled through the war zone by the Nazis. "Two years of combat experience are more useful than 10 years of peacetime training," a German general summarized.

The commander of Condor Legion, Wolfram von Richthofen, eventually rose to the position of field marshal in Hitler's military machine. He died just weeks after the end of World War II. In his journal about the Spanish operation, he noted on April 28, 1937: "In the evening came the report that Guernica had been razed to the ground. No plans so far for tomorrow."

All Fixed


The Mississippi Miracle:

"We had our ninth ward in East Biloxi," Jaribu Hill, executive director of the Mississippi Workers Center for Human Rights explains, referring to the poor, mostly African American and Vietnamese coastal community that was leveled by Katrina. "The government has been slow to clean up, slow to provide resources, slow to respond. Even now, people have yet to receive aid. Not only is there widespread poverty, there is widespread displacement."

"There's no rebuilding being done except for casinos and condos," Vicky Cintra of the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance (MIRA) adds...

Cintra tells me that in areas like East Biloxi, former neighborhoods are overgrown and empty. "At first, you think its undeveloped land," she tells me. "But when you walk through the new underbrush you see the foundations of homes and realize this used to be a populated area. This is where peoples lives used to be."

That said, one big difference between Mississippi and Louisiana is that Haley Barbour just flat-out doesn't give a shit about poor people.

Um...What the Hell did You Expect?


So, George Tenet's belatedly realizing that Team Bush is just another way of saying "They'll throw you under the bus as soon as say hello," while he further charges--and let's all shout out "DUH!" loud enough for him to hear--that no "serious debate" occurred in the White House on whether or not Saddam Hussein posed a substantive threat to the United States.

Welcome to the reality-based world, Mr. Tenet. Hope your Kool-Aid withdrawal symptoms weren't too severe. Oh, and in case you're wondering, your Medal of Freedom® and a cell phone contract will get you...unlimited nights and weekends, depending on the plan you choose.

"Serious debate" and Team Bush make "military intelligence" look logical in comparison. I'll bet a good measure of this administration obsessive, paranoid secrecy is because if/when we finally see the documents, "Mayberry Machiavelli" will look overly generous, as would "barstool Bonaparte"...or "theoretical underpinning for the 101st Fighting Keyboarders." The failures are almost worthy of an anti-monument on the scale of Mt. Rushmore: Government of--and by--Dummies.

By the way, Mr. Tenet, the next time you nurse your bruised...reputation...maybe you should consider just how lucky you actually are: thanks to you, and this administration, hundreds of thousands of people are either far more severely wounded, physiologically, or dead. You got off pretty easy in comparision.

Petty, Mean, Vindictive...and Stupid


Shrub petulantly digs his heels in over the 10 percent matching funds requirement, even though Katrina was NOT a natural disaster, but a case of federal government negligence. The dollar amount is roughly equivalent to three days spending for the Iraq war (although where the money actually goes is anyone's guess).

Priorities.

Shrub--the ultimate mama's boy.

Gas-Bag-Upon-Potomac

Lighter than air...dumber than dirt.

I can find Paul Begala grating at times, but at other times he really hits the nail on the head, as he does here in carving David Broder a new one:

Mr. Broder has been foaming at the mouth these days. A man generally given to soporific prose, Broder has been downright venomous lately. And what has put the Benzedrine in Mr. Broder's Ovaltine? Not the fact that President Bush continues to lie about "progress" in the war in Iraq. Or that Dick Cheney continues to lie about pre-invasion links between al Qaeda and Iraq. Or that the Bush Administration has neglected our wounded warriors, ignored the victims of Katrina, potentially obstructed justice by firing US Attorneys who were pursuing GOP wrongdoing. Not even that the Bush Administration lied to the families of Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch, cynically using their blood to distract from their own incompetence and dishonesty.

No, none of this raises Dean Broder's hackles.

He reserves his vitriol for Harry Reid.

Why Reid? Because Reid has been one of the few politicians with the courage to speak the plain, unvarnished truth to power, and the hallmark of Mr. Broder's career has been to suck up to power. Reid calls Bush a liar. Broder can't handle the truth.

Nothing But Blue Skies


So, car bombs don't count when it comes to measuring the degree of hellishness that defines George Bush's Iraq. That's interesting...because, you know, as vicious and as ugly as Saddam Hussein was--and I don't miss him for a second--I don't recall car bombs EVER being a problem in pre-invasion Mesopotamia...

But, if you're going to say car bombs don't count, why stop there? Why not say "IED's don't count," "ambushes don't count," "shaped charges don't count," "RPG's don't count," and so on. Hell, if you really want to let your inner delusions reign supreme, you can pretend that nothing counts, that we overthrew Hussein without a shot fired in anger ('cept for a bit of Shock 'n Awe©)...Mission Accomplished, at least from an altitude of five thousand feet and above.

And then we'd call you a Team Bush official.

D-E-V-O


Maybe their excuse is that it's hard to type up anything that makes sense when your hands hurt from all the knucklewalking...nonetheless, it's damn hard to decide who's more embarassing: Shrub himself, or nominal "journalists" Tim Russert and David Broder. It's as if they're in a contest that somehow deems "most idiotic and craven" as "the winning entry."

"Pot 2.0"


Well, I'll give 'em a toke's worth of credit for recycling the same, tired, lame-assed, time-worn nonsense I remember from back in the late 70's and early 80's re: Reefer Madness...that the "new" dope is "so much stronger" than the "old" dope of the "60's and 70's" that "it's not even the same drug," and that it's (at long last) "clearly addictive," blah blah blah...meanwhile, thousands of Americans are incarcerated for simple possession annually, availability is not affected in the slightest, criminal elements profit from sales...and, to cite Bill Hicks, "they say we're losing the war on drugs...that means people ON drugs are winning."

What nonsense...

Professional Courtesy


Osama's as inept as Team Bush when it comes to the top-level:

CAIRO, Egypt - A top Taliban commander said al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was behind the February attack outside the U.S. military base in Bagram, Afghanistan, during the visit there by Vice President Dick Cheney, according to an interview shown Wednesday by Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera...

The bombing killed about 20 Afghan civilians, a U.S. soldier, a U.S. contractor and a South Korean soldier outside Bagram while Cheney was meeting with officials inside the base — an attack the Taliban claimed was aimed at Cheney but which officials said posed no real threat to him.

Hey, just like Team Bush did. Kill plenty of others, which ensures more mutual hatred, but let the top-level folks slither away.

At this point, I'm cynical enough to think that Big Time's "secure, undisclosed location" and "Osama's hiding place" might be one and the same. And Dick's so goddamned inept he won't even shoot Osama in the face for us.

In the Name Of...


My train of thought was actually set in motion by this local story a friend sent.

Short version: Red Stick bans Sunday wine and liquor sales, except for bar-restaurants. There's a proposal to join the 20th if not the 21st century and repeal the ban.

One opponent of rescinding the ban is actually trying to expand the proposal, in hopes that a broader measure will light a fire under the Jeeesus freaks and "galvanize opposition."

Typical. And it got me thinking about how ironic it is that the biggest liars, crooks, charlatans, and assorted scum in American public life seem to ALWAYS affix themselves to Jeeesus with a bond that's tighter than SuperGlue. Of course, their proclamations of piety are in inverse ratio to their behavior. As if words alone were some sort of magic "Get Out of Hell Free" card.

(side note: Team Bush is particularly unique in this regard--they possess a compulsion to lie about even the smallest matters. It's like they can't help themselves).

Or maybe they just don't believe any of it anyway, and simply use the rhetoric as a cover while they rip us off at astonishing levels...including the ultimate price for several thousand American soldiers (and, lest we forget, Team Bush Christianity places NO value on Iraqi life--zero).

You know, I wish some genuine Christians--that is, those who don't just proclaim their faith, but act it as well--would come out and say in no uncertain terms that just because people like Shrub, Tom DeLay, Ralph Reed, and so on claim to be Christians, it doesn't mean that they are.

Charles Manson claimed he was innocent. I don't believe him either.

Don't Forget What THEIR Iraq Policy Is

"Thank you for your sacrifice...hey, I wonder if there's a ballgame on..."

Just a reminder--whenever you hear reports or read stories that feature Dick or the Chimperor complaining about Democratic efforts to end the war, remember that they've got NO plan, except more of the same. That means dead soldiers, dead Iraqis, continued violence and chaos...and an increasingly unstable Middle East.

This colossus of all fuck ups has been ongoing for four years...and no amount of deck-chair rearrangement will affect the outcome.

Meanwhile, First Lady Laura-Brought-To-You-By-Xanax® insists, no really, that the tears of the Bush Family of Clowns are real, even those of certified crocodile Bar. THEY'RE the ones suffering, not some working-poor family who lost an only child.

Like a Wounded, Cornered, Rabid Skunk


Big Time's hoping to weasel out a few final hurrahs as he desperately tries to run out the clock.

But what do you expect from someone dumb and inept enough to shoot his hunting partner in the face?

Twin Towers of Moran-itude


Meet Dick and Tom.

Clown Chimp

What's next?

I try--no, really I do--to use profanity sparingly...but my reaction to seeing this at Dependable Renegade was: you've gotta be shitting me.

Bill and Georgia Thomas reported they were elated Monday when they met in the Oval Office with President George W. Bush to present him with a Purple Heart.

"We were just absolutely bowled over. Without reservation, it was one of the highlights of our life. He was such a gracious host," Thomas said. "It was just an incredible, incredible experience."

The couple was able to meet with President Bush for about 20 minutes to present him with one of three Purple Hearts that Bill Thomas received during his service in Vietnam.

We used to make fun of leaders who accepted medals they didn't deserve.

Separated at Birth?

Pete Rose and Rich Little

One claims to not be a crook...the other impersonates someone who claimed to not be a crook.

All Aboard!


Well, maybe the American people have enough sense to avoid the sinking SS Shrub...but David Broder can't take his seat fast enough.

Turd Blossom's Tantrum


I'm sure you've seen the story already, but each time I've mentioned it today I keep thinking more and more: what...a...little...baby/brat.

If he EVER somehow got sent to Iraq in a military capacity, I think the over/under on when he'd soil himself would be measured in nanoseconds.

"It's Too Complicated"


Really?

We Call it a Train Wreck--They Call it "Making Progress"


I'm beginning to comprehend, if not understand, how Smirk-Chimp can defend Abu and even praise his embarassing performance in sworn testimony to the United States Senate...

It's the same mentality that considers blast walls in Baghdad both a sign of progress and a testament to victory...as if it's entirely normal for a "victorious" army to literally wall of certain sections of the capital city of the country they've declared victory over.

It's the same mentality that insists victory in Afghanistan is a done deal, even as another suicide bomber makes a mockery of any such declaration...even as across the border, our "ally" Pakistan makes it clear that friend or foe is definitely a relative term...a far cry from the halcyon days of "you're either with us, or..." nonsense.

It's the same mentality that causes professional dimwits like David Broder to insist that treating the American public like adults--as opposed to spoiled little prepubescent teenage Karl Roves--is somehow inappropriate.

To them, it's business as usual. To the rest of us, it's called delusion.