ALL-TIME LOW

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/30/AR2005083000302_pf.html
Rising gas prices and ongoing bloodshed in Iraq continue to take their toll on President Bush, whose standing with the public has sunk to an all-time low, according to the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll.

George Bush (“He Cares”) makes a big gesture of “cutting his vacation short” (by three days) to start dealing seriously with the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Since he will undoubtedly wring every drop of political symbolism out of this disaster, it is important to remember what he did that helped contribute to the scope of devastation. AmericaBlog is a good place to start: wall-to-wall coverage of his hypocrisy and opportunism. But let’s begin with the photo that should become the “My Pet Goat” of this disaster: goofing with a guitar for a photo op while the suffering and death toll mount



http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/31/1442/53877

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/012058.html




http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/heres-question-mr-president.html
[John] If your aides claim, and I'm sure they will, that you didn't need to come back to DC this past weekend to help coordinate hurricane relief. Why? Because they'll say that you have all of this state-of-the-art communications technology at your Crawford ranch, so being at Crawford is the SAME as being at the White House.

So, if all that's the case, then why is the White House now telling us that you're cutting your vacation short tomorrow to come back to Washington and deal with the hurricane? I thought you were dealing with it just fine while on vacation?

Either you can manage hurricane relief sufficiently while on vacation, and in that case there's no need for you to return to DC tomorrow, or you can't, and in that case where the hell have you been the past 5 days?

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/mr-president-come-home.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/too-little-too-late-mr-president.html

Maybe comments like this on CNN snarked him into action

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/cnn-says-bush-should-stop-vacationing.html
Cafferty: Where's President Bush? Is he still on vacation?

Blitzer: He's cut short his vacation he's coming back to Washington tomorrow.

Cafferty: Oh, that would be a good idea. He was out in San Diego I think at a Naval air station giving a speech on Japan and the war in Iraq today. Based on his approval rating, based on the latest polls, my guess is getting back to work might not be a terrible idea.

Good grief. Why the levees failed

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/wwl-mayor-reports-massive.html
The choppers that were rescuing people were supposed to attempt to sandbag one of the levy breaches. Somewhere along the way, it was never communicated, night has fallen, and within 12-14 hours the entire city will flood. . .

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125338
The Army Corps of Engineers is trying to plug the biggest levee break, but—there are conflicting reports—either the first attempt wasn't successful or there was a communications breakdown and authorities haven't tried. The mayor said if the holes aren't patched, the water will keep rising until this morning, at which point they'll be level with Lake Pontchartrain. . .

Photos: http://majikthise.typepad.com/majikthise_/2005/08/new_oreleans_le.html

Live blogging: http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/WWLBLOG.ac3fcea.html

Bush’s responsibility

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001051313
New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has been working with state and local officials in the region since the late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside.

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars.

Newhouse News Service, in an article posted late Tuesday night at The Times-Picayune web site, reported: "No one can say they didn't see it coming....Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation."

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/31/00/09/the-fallout/
[WP] With thousands of their citizen-soldiers away fighting in Iraq, states hit hard by Hurricane Katrina scrambled to muster forces for rescue and security missions yesterday. . .

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/the_art_of_poin.html
[NYT] As the levees of Lake Pontchartrain gave way, flooding New Orleans, it seemed pretty clear that in this case, government did not live up to the job. . .

More: http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/30/222957/803

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/30/212451/290

Heart-breaking: now the troops in Iraq have to fret and worry about their families and loved ones back home

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-natguard31aug31,1,1730703.story

The racial politics of Katrina

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_atrios_archive.html#112546225199746389
[NYT] People who think of that graceful city and the rest of the Mississippi Delta as tourist destinations must have been reminded, watching the rescue operations, that the real residents of this area are in the main poor and black.

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_atrios_archive.html#112546590923895775

Who's a "looter"? http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_atrios_archive.html#112545475089735235

Right wing pundits joke at Katrina’s expense. (I love Jonah Goldberg’s “apology” – when I made the joke we didn’t know yet what the death toll was – as if making the joke on the verge of a predictable catastrophe is any different)

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?pid=18079

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4045

How to help

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/28/231322/317

In other news. . .

Report that Plame indictments are coming soon

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4036

Homeland Security Dept still trying to dismantle the Federal civil service

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/27/AR2005082700975.html

Under the radar. . .

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125338
The Post got ahold of draft federal regulations that would, according to the WP, allow power plants to pollute more. The proposed position is the opposite of the one taken by federal lawyers in a series of current lawsuits originally initiated by the Clinton administration.

Poverty rate climbs for fourth straight year

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Census-Poverty.html

More: http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/30/122643/588

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/007003.php
[Kevin Drum] Question 1: what's the point of a strong economy if it produces higher poverty rates, declining private sector healthcare coverage, and stagnant incomes?

Question 2: Whenever there are any nuggets of good employment news, the explanation from various quarters is either (a) tax cuts or (b) welfare reform. Do these two things also get the credit when there's bad news?

What an ass. After saying we shouldn't play the blame game, Bush blames Clinton, Carter, even Reagan for previous failures that supposedly led to 9-11. Uh, isn’t there one President missing from that sequence?

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/30/bush-blames/

More: http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/31/05/49/flypaper-2/
[WP] Richard A. Clarke, the former head of counterterrorism in the White House under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, said yesterday that there were twice as many attacks outside Iraq in the three years after the 2001 attacks as in the three preceding years.

You knew this was coming: US still trying to rewrite that “magnificent” constitution in Iraq (as if our continued interference at this stage does anything more than undermine its already-meager legitimacy)

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/is-us-still-tinkering-with-iraqi.html
[AP] BAGHDAD, Iraq -- The U.S. ambassador suggested Tuesday there may be further changes to the draft constitution to win Sunni Arab approval, saying he believed a final edited draft had not been presented.

[NB: What a clown show. Not passed, not legal, not credible, and – now we are told – not finished]

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/zalmay-urges-further-revisions-of.html
Shiite politicians on the drafting committee disagreed vehemently with Khalilzad: "Influential Shiite lawmaker Khaled al-Attiyah, a member of the constitution drafting committee, insisted Tuesday that “no changes are allowed'' to the draft “except for minor edits for the language."

Spinning the pathetic results in Iraq as “victory”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/08/29/BL2005082900733.html

“Bush’s Islamic Republic”

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/18150

Bolton quickly (and predictably) becoming a bull in the china shop at the UN

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002441.html

Roberts hearings to begin next week and – guess what? – they have suddenly “discovered” some new missing documents

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-roberts31aug31,1,1207565.story

Another crooked Republican (ex) governor

http://www.courant.com/news/politics/hc-rowland0830.artaug30,0,5344279.story

“Love in Action” – a Christian anti-gay brainwashing technique – sounds like something out of Brave New World (well, I guess that’s what it is)

http://www.pamspaulding.com/weblog/2005/06/why-ex-gay-programs-like-love-in.html
This post will tell you exactly why we have to continue to fight the American Taliban, the Dominionists, that absolutely unhinged element that is trying to take over our culture and invade every aspect of our lives. Homosexuality isn't destroying the family, it's institutions like the "ex-gay" movement that want to emotionally and psychologically destroy gay people. These are gay people who are still trying to come to grips with their orientation; by crushing them with guilt and hellfire, the ex-gay movement represents the height of immorality.

A 16-year-old boy named Zach in Tennessee recently came out to his parents. It didn't go well. In fact, it resulted in him being sent to one of those "ex-gay" re-education holes. . .

http://www.la-mancha.net/archives/000928.html
1. All new Refuge clients will be placed into Safekeeping for the initial two to three days of their program. A client on safekeeping may not communicate verbally, or by using hand gestures or eye contact, with any other clients, staff members, or his/her parents or guardians. In case of a practical need, Safekeeping clients may write down their question or request and show it to another client, staff member, or their parent or guardian. Writing may only be used when absolutely necessary. . .

The full LIA manual: http://www.softral.de/reel/cache_blog_myspace_com_specialkid.pdf

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:55 AM

 
THE GALL

Some mornings you just want to grab some people and slap them around. . .

Governor of Kentucky, under investigation for corruption, GIVES AMNESTY to all his co-conspirators (and then refuses to testify himself). If the Dems can’t make Fletcher the poster boy of GOP arrogance and corruption, they really are in trouble

http://www.bluegrassreport.org/bluegrass_politics/2005/08/fletcher_issues.html
Just minutes ago, Governor Ernie Fletcher, in one of the more audacious displays of political grandstanding, in a setting full of cheering and clapping political supporters, announced that he was thumbing his nose at the Kentucky criminal justice system, announced he was issuing "blanket" pardons (calling it amnesty, but Section 77 of the state constitution does not contain the term 'amnesty', only 'pardon') to anyone who "might have violated" state's Merit System laws. Yes, he left it that open and vague.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/corrupt-arrogant-and-just-plain.html
Just when you think the GOP can't sink any lower or get any slimier they do.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_28.php#006359
I think this is what Republicans call decisive leadership.

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/corruption_in_washington_/2005/08/watergate_in_kentucky.php
Is issuing pardons to potential witnesses against oneself chargeable as obstruction of justice?

But here’s the punch line: Fletcher apparently doesn’t have the power to grant “amnesty” (PRE-trial and conviction) – only to pardon afterward

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_atrios_archive.html#112536939347693466
It's not entirely clear if "amnesty" is a pardon or if it's some double super secret thing not actually present in the Kentucky constitution. . .

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/30/02/20/pardon-me/
You can’t pardon somebody just because they’re indicted. There has to be a fine or a sentence to remit. You can’t nullify something that doesn’t yet exist.

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2005/08/amnesties_are_goodusually_then_theres_kentucky.html
This incident shows how the power of pre-conviction, and especially pre-indictment, amnesty can work harm (here, by removing a way for the public to get at the truth of the accusations).

Are voters catching on to what Republicans do once they seize power?

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/29/nearly_half_think_taft_should_quit.html
A majority of Ohio voters thinks Gov. Bob Taft (R) "is doing a poor job in office" and 46% say the governor "should should resign for his ethics violations," a Cleveland Plain Dealer Poll shows.

Rumsfeld tells troops to “go on the offense”

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/secdef_rumsfeld.html

[NB: Uh, so what HAVE they been doing?]

Iraq’s constitution: the reaction from women

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_digbysblog_archive.html#112536422457423549

Iraq’s constitution: the reaction from the rest of the Arab world

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/arab-world-concerned-about-iraqi.html

A Sunni/Sadrist coalition to block the constitution?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1860

Yeah, what he says

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1859
"The theme in this region is the reality of a foreign military power that comes in with great determination and overwhelming force, defeats people, subjugates a nation and then gets completely lost in the local maelstrom of interests and the irresistible force of indigenous identity -- religious, ethnic, sectarian, national. People act in a maniacal way when they assert these identities, which includes nurturing and protecting them," said Rami Khouri, a U.S.-educated Arab analyst and editor of Lebanon's Daily Star newspaper. . . "Every single foreign power that has been in this region since Alexander the Great -- through the Romans, Greeks, Ottomans, British, French and now Americans -- has learned the same lesson," Khouri said.

The Oil and Gas Administration goes against its own previous arguments to consider tapping into the strategic oil preserve, for no other reason than to shovel more profits into the coffers of the oil companies

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-might-tap-strategic-petroleum.html
The White House said Monday it was willing to use the government's emergency oil stockpile to help refiners hurt by Hurricane Katrina's rampage through the Gulf of Mexico, but that it was too early to decide if or how much crude should be released.

[Joe] Oh, how times have changed.

You may recall that in fall of 2000, the Bush campaign brutally attacked the Clinton administration for considering doing the same thing in order to lower what were then skyrocketing oil prices in order to help average Americans:

Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush's campaign criticized Gore's proposal, calling it an "election year political ploy" that could threaten national security.

Bush's communications director Karen Hughes told reporters in New York: "That reserve is intended for strategic and national security purposes, not for election year political purposes."

Amazing, but not surprising they can find a way to help the oil industry during a national crisis. And what a convenient way to address the truly skyrocketing oil prices which are damaging Bush and the GOP. Yeah, that's not politics.

UPDATE: AP reports that the oil industry didn't suffer serious damages:

Oil refiners said damage to their equipment in the Gulf region appeared to be minimal, and oil prices dropped back from the day's highs above $70 a barrel. But the refiners were still assessing the damage, and the Bush administration said it would consider releasing oil from the nation's emergency stockpile if necessary.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006997.php
The SPR is not meant to be used as a market stabilization mechanism or, even worse, as a blunt instrument for hammering down oil prices. It's meant to be used in emergencies.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/29/politics/29cnd-bush.html

You knew this was coming, didn’t you? Anti-war groups now classified as “terrorist” organizations

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/ACLU_reveals_FBI_labeled_peace_affirmative_action_group_terrori_0829.html

Fred Barnes, tool

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508290005
Weekly Standard executive editor and Fox News political contributor Fred Barnes said that "the press has created" anti-war protester Cindy Sheehan because "[t]hey hate Bush." Discussing Sheehan's ongoing protest outside President Bush's Crawford, Texas, ranch, Barnes said, "She is entirely the creation of the American mainstream press. She has no moral standing. She has no political standing. The press has created her. And why have they created her? It's August. They hate Bush. And they've used her as a mascot to get at Bush. It's as simple as that."

Free Judy! It’s all fine for the NYT to be defending one of its reporters, but how can they report on this without acknowledging that this is not an ordinary case of a reporter protecting her sources? It seems, in fact, a pretty clear co-conspiracy of mutual silence and protection – why else wouldn’t Lewis Libby release her from her promise, and why isn’t the NYT pressing him to do so (since supposedly all Bush admin people are supposed to “cooperate fully” with the investigation?)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/29/opinion/29mon2.html
The New York Times reporter Judith Miller has now been in jail longer for refusing to testify than any reporter working for a newspaper in America. It is a very long time for her, for her newspaper and for the media. And with each dismal milestone, it becomes more apparent that having her in jail is an embarrassment to a country that is supposed to be revered around the world for its freedoms, especially its First Amendment that provides freedom of the press.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/the-judy-tsunami-the-gro_b_6398.html
[Arianna] Reading the latest New York Times Judy Miller editorial is the journalistic equivalent of watching a bombing comic pull out all the stops in a frantic attempt to wring a reaction out of his audience. You can feel the flop sweat dripping off the page. . . Today’s impassioned defense -- -- No. 5 in an increasingly desperate series -- reads like it was written by someone in a rhetoric class forced to make a case for a cause they don’t really believe in. . .

Pat Roberts (R-KS) FINALLY decides to have his committee look into the Plame situation – but not to identify who outed her. I think this is an attempt to inoculate Rove et al. from any charges to come by making it look like the CIA didn’t do enough to protect its own agents’ cover

http://www.democrats.org/a/2005/08/day_45_sen_pat.php

How Bush made his money

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/_/2005/08/just_asking.php
How is it that the entire debate about the Kelo eminent-domain decision has run its course without anyone mentioning that the President of the United States made most of his huge fortune by arranging for exactly that sort of taking of private property for private use?

Imagine a Democratic President in the same situation, and imagine what Fox and Rush and Drudge would have made out of it. That's why it's fair to say that the country has, in effect, no liberal media in the sense that it has conservative media.

A lengthy examination of just how useless the WH press corps has become (with a great doctored photo)

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/08/27/briefing/
"This is the most complacent and complicit media I've ever seen," Helen Thomas, the most senior member of the White House press corps, told me in an interview at her office at Hearst. . .



Scott McClellan is the Undertaker of Information. With the gentle sterility of a mortician, McClellan puts a dark suit on every day and tells us, in a soothing voice, how comfortable our beloved information will be now that it is dead and resting in an attractive coffin. The press—outraged family members of the strangled Truth—wail, “But Scott, it wasn’t dead before you guys got your hands on it!” And the Undertaker, unruffled, sympathetic and appropriately somber, politely informs you that it is part of an ongoing investigation, and he believes he has already told you what the president’s comments were on that.

After a while, it is sickeningly passive-aggressive.

But the bottom line is, Scott is telling the truth: The truth is dead. And you’re never going to see it again. It’s in heaven now, with Chandra Levy and JonBenet Ramsey and Nicole Brown Simpson. . .

Sports columnist weighs in on Intelligent Design debate – which shows why she is a sports columnist

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/28/AR2005082800964.html

Bonus item: “Shrill, bombastic, and mean-spirited”

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/29.html#a4685

[NB: What, they just figured this out?]

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:52 AM

 
BIG STORM COMING

I have nothing to say here about Hurricane Katrina, except to wish the poor people of New Orleans and the surrounding region the least suffering possible under the circumstances.

Politically, of course, this couldn’t come at a better time for Bush, who will get to zoom down there with rolled-up sleeves and buckets of federal aid at just the time when he wants something else to talk about besides the mess he’s made in Iraq, Plame, oil prices, Republican scandals, and all the other things that the news won’t have time to cover as they obsessively document every conceivable angle of Katrina’s destructive impact

Still, it’s possible to point up even in the midst of natural disaster a reminder of human responsibility

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/28/17/35/feeling-safer-yet-13/
[New Orleans City Business] In fiscal year 2006, the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is bracing for a record $71.2 million reduction in federal funding.

It would be the largest single-year funding loss ever for the New Orleans district, Corps officials said.

“I’ve been here over 30 years and I’ve never seen this level of reduction,” said Al Naomi, project manager for the New Orleans district. “I think part of the problem is it’s not so much the reduction, it’s the drastic reduction in one fiscal year. It’s the immediacy of the reduction that I think is the hardest thing to adapt to.

“There is an economic ripple effect, too. The cuts mean major hurricane and flood protection projects will not be awarded to local engineering firms. Also, a study to determine ways to protect the region from a Category 5 hurricane has been shelved for now.”

I know most people have only heard that “Iraq passed a constitution. . . . or something” (rather in the same way that a person passes a kidney stone, I’d say). Here’s what isn’t being said about it. First, they haven’t “passed” anything, because it was never voted on by Parliament. And the opposition wasn’t just from a few Sunni dead-enders, but a large part, possibly all, of the Sunni delegation, including many who had been cooperative with the Bush project earlier. This struggle is nowhere near over, and probably will get a lot worse

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/28/AR2005082800351.html
[Bush] "Their example is an inspiration to all who share the universal values of freedom, democracy and the rule of law," Bush told reporters from a helicopter hangar at his Texas ranch. "This is a document of which the Iraqis and the rest of the world can be proud."

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125221
The papers give a little ink to the content of the draft, mostly focusing on the conflict surrounding it. . . The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) has the translation of Iraq's draft constitution online; TP had trouble finding the text on other papers' sites (the LAT does have a partial breakdown of provisions).

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-articles29aug29,0,156739.story
Article 2 establishes Islam as the official religion of the state and a basic source of legislation, guarantees the "Islamic identity" of the majority of the Iraqi people and requires that no law contradict the "undisputed" rules of Islam. At the same time, it requires that laws do not contradict democratic principles and basic freedoms. It also safeguards religious freedom for Iraq's Christians and other minority faiths. However, it does not explain how those sometimes-contradictory goals will be resolved. . .

Article 39 gives Iraqis the choice to define their "personal status" according to their own beliefs, supplementing Iraq's civil laws governing marriage, divorce and inheritance with the option to turn to religious clerics in matters of family law. Iraq's Islamists originally wanted to put all such laws under the jurisprudence of clerics. But secular Iraqis and many women demanded that Iraq's previous laws be kept. They fear that under this provision women in more restrictive environments still might be forced by husbands and fathers to accept religious rather than civil rulings. . .

Article 90 allows experts in Islamic as well as civil law to serve on the supreme federal court. Iraqi Shiites had originally wanted a separate court to vet laws according to Islamic criteria, but secular Iraqis and Sunnis were outraged, fearing an Iranian-style Guardian Council, which approves all laws in Tehran. . .

Article 137 reserves 25% of the seats in the future parliament for women, who scored a victory by pushing out a previous clause that put an eight-year time limit on the provision

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/28/iraq.constitution/index.html
Iraqi government spokesman Leith Kubba said some Sunnis did agree to the draft constitution. "Everybody knows you can't please all players. . . At the end of the day, this is the best the government can come up with, and we hope this vote will close the debate," he said.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,167251,00.html
The document, which included last-minute changes aimed at easing Sunni concerns, was read to lawmakers but was not put to a vote in the assembly, where the Shiite-Kurdish bloc has an overwhelming majority.

"The constitution is left to our people to approve or reject it," said Talabani, a Kurd. "I hope that our people will accept it despite some flaws."

Talabani acknowledged that the Sunni Arabs had objections to the draft "but everybody had reservations. This is part of democracy ... If the people do not approve it, we will draft another constitution."

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/some-sunnis-i-just-heard-bushs-audio.html
[Reuters] A Sunni Arab delegate on the drafting committee said all his colleagues on the panel objected to the draft presented to parliament. "We have not agreed on this constitution. We have objections which are the same as we had from day one," Hussein al-Falluji, the Sunni Arab delegate, told Reuters.

[Juan Cole] All of his colleagues. These "colleagues" are the Sunni Arabs who risked their lives to cooperate with the Americans and the new government by serving on the constitution drafting committee.

http://makeashorterlink.com/?K10F631BB
Sunni leaders have urged their community to defeat the charter in a nationwide referendum on Oct. 15, saying it had been rammed through the drafting committee by the dominant Shiite Arab and Kurdish alliance.

The absence of Sunni endorsement, after more than two months of intensive negotiations, raised fears of more violence and set the stage for a bitter political fight ahead of the referendum. A political battle threatened to sharpen communal divisions at a time when relations among the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds appear to be worsening. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/sunnis-reject-iraq-constitution.html
[John] I heard Bush earlier today saying that this was no big deal as several of the delegates to America's original constitutional congress rejected our constitution too. Of course, a little bit of information is a dangerous thing to an idiot. The sunnis are the sane ones in Iraq. They're also an enormous part of the country. If they're cut out, that means the shias control Iraq along with the kurds. The shias are tied to Iran and the kurds want to slice up Turkey and get their homeland back. Only an idiot would think that the sunnis being cut out of the constitution is anything but a recipe for civil war, at best. At worst, Iran de facto gets part of Iraq and Turkey invades in order to stop the kurds, or even worse, Turkey splits in two and all hell breaks out in a NATO ally.

More: http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitution-born-by-caesarian-section.html

“Just like Philadelphia in 1787” (this is a great piece, well worth reading in its entirety)

http://billmon.org/archives/002119.html
. . . That said, though, as a student of American history it's hard not to be contemptuous of anyone who would dare compare what the framers tried to do in Philadelphia to the deal that just went down in the Baghdad bazaar. Whatever you think of their politics -- or the utter hypocricy of slaveowners and slave merchants posing as champions of liberty -- the men of 1787 were giants.

The boys of 2005 (and their American sponsors), on the other hand, are just pygmies pretending to be giants. And the Iraqi people are going to be footing the bill for those pretensions -- in blood -- for a long time to come.

Congratulations, from Condi Rice

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1853

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002431.html

Meanwhile, behind the scenes, a touch of honesty

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/29/politics/29strategy.html
Several administration officials acknowledged deep regret and frustration that all their efforts had failed to produce a document that could not only establish human rights but also bring a huge disaffected element into the political process, as the Americans had hoped and predicted.

"We're disappointed that we don't have a document that has a complete consensus," said a weary senior State Department official, speaking anonymously because he did not want to be seen as criticizing the Iraqis publicly. "We think it's a good document in terms of basic rights and philosophy. How to proceed now is an issue for Iraqis to decide."

Lowering their sights, administration officials said Sunday that their task now was to keep the political process alive, even if the constitution was rejected in October, and thereby keep the disaffected Sunnis from helping to stoke more violence.

First Republican breaks ranks, openly calling for investigation into Downing Street memos, Bush’s pre-war lies (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/articleview/1719/1/32/

Another Republican questions Bush policies

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/29/politics/29congress.html
With lawmakers facing tough questions at home about the war in Iraq, Senator John W. Warner, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, says he intends to summon Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld quickly for a hearing when Congress returns next week.

Mr. Warner, a Virginia Republican who is one of the most important Congressional voices on military policy, said mounting numbers of dead and wounded Americans, the contentious process of drafting an Iraqi constitution and the economic cost of the war were adding up to new anxiety in Congress.

"The level of concern is, I think, gradually rising," Mr. Warner said in an interview on Friday. "Our nation has given so much to the Iraqi people, and what are they giving us in return?"

Mischief on the GOP’s fall congressional agenda

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/27/AR2005082700696_pf.html
The bills are mandated by a budget resolution that passed this spring, after acrimonious debate. The budget blueprint mandated $35 billion in entitlement savings over five years, along with $70 billion in tax cuts over that period. By parliamentary rules, the resolution ensures that both the spending and tax cut packages cannot be filibustered, and thus can pass the Senate with a simple majority of 51 votes.

Such rules were established by the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, specifically to facilitate passage of tough deficit-reduction measures. But since the GOP took control of Congress and the White House, the rules have been used instead to ease passage of President Bush's major tax cuts. This year, amid pledges of fiscal discipline, Republican lawmakers vowed to restore the budget act's original intent. Now, they have just weeks to turn the abstract pledges of the 2006 budget resolution into detailed legislation. . .

Medicaid will be the largest target. Even with the cuts, the program would grow from $184 billion this year to $250 billion, as Medicaid rosters swell with population growth and the working poor are dropped from employer-provided health plans. The budget resolution mandated that the Senate Finance Committee produce legislation that would carve $10 billion out of entitlement programs under its jurisdiction.

Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) had hoped to find all $10 billion from Medicaid, but committee and Senate leadership aides say divisions in the panel may force him to lower that Medicaid target. Instead, some savings will have to come from Medicare and welfare programs.

Record high gasoline prices should ease passage of legislation to open Alaska's Arctic wilderness to oil drilling, a move that environmentalists have thwarted for decades. . . "Timing's everything in this town," said a senior Senate GOP aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the proposals have not been finalized.

But timing will make other proposals far more difficult, aides conceded. Cuts in farm price supports would come as farmers in Illinois, Missouri and parts of Iowa cope with drought. Senate aides say they can find $7 billion in savings from federal student loans by squeezing the banks that act as middlemen. But with students just returning to school, the timing of the proposal will feed into Democratic attacks. . .

Democrats intend to make the Republicans squirm, especially since the sixth tax cut in five years will be moving simultaneously.

Down in Crawford, the competing Iraq protests come to blows, but not in the ways you might expect

http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2005/08/28/20050828wacarrests.html
Ken Robinson, of Richardson, Texas, who described himself as a Vietnam veteran, was carrying a sign at a “You Don't Speak for Me, Cindy!” rally. The sign read, “How to wreck your family in 30 days by ‘b**** in the ditch' Cindy Sheehan.”

Kristinn Taylor, an event organizer with FreeRepublic.com, heard about the sign and rushed up to Robinson.

“This is our rally and you can't do that here,” he said, only for Robinson to insist he was within his rights.

Camera crews rushed in and Taylor turned to face them.

“To all the media here, this sign is not representative of the crowd here today,” Taylor announced. Some of the crowd around Robinson came forward to shake his hand, while others chanted, “Idiot, go home.”

The two men then squared off and raised their voices.

“Just get outta here!” Robinson yelled, and aimed a kick at Taylor's midsection. Taylor called for security, and a young Woodway policeman quickly showed up.

“I have the right to freedom of speech,” Robinson said.

Robinson continued to protest loudly as police handcuffed him and led him away.

And. . .

http://tbogg.blogspot.com/2005/08/splitters-before-we-bring-up-oops.html
[TBogg] Before we bring up the "oops" moment in Crawford, we have a flashback moment from Life of Brian:

Reg: The only people we hate more than the Romans are the f-cking Judean People's Front.
Stan: Yeah, the Judean People's Front.
Reg: Yeah.
Stan: And the Popular Front of Judea.
Reg: Yeah.
Stan: And the People's Front of Judea.
Reg: Yea... what?
Stan: The People's Front of Judea.
Reg: We're the People's Front of Judea!
Stan: I thought we were the Popular Front.
Reg: People's Front!
Francis: What ever happened to the Popular Front?
Reg: He's over there. [points to a lone man]
Reg, Stan, Francis, Judith: SPLITTER!
. . .
Brian: Are you the Judean People's Front?
Reg: F-ck off! We're the People's Front of Judea.

Okay. Now that we've got that out of the way, we take you to Crawford, Texas where the inevitable happens when two groups. . . meet up and can't seem to figure out they're on the same side.

[MSNBC] Across town in Crawford, other parents of soldiers who are serving or have died in Iraq countered Sheehan with their own raucous rally that started with a prayer.

The pro-Bush caravan was coordinated by Move America Forward, a group led by former California Assemblyman Howard Kaloogian and Republican strategist Sal Russo.

Organizer Howard Kaloogian accused Sheehan of "giving hope and encouragement to our enemies."

The crowd, which organizers said topped 3,000 but appeared closer to 1,500, chanted "Cindy, Go Home" and compared her to Jane Fonda, whose visit to a North Vietnamese gun site in 1972 earned her the nickname "Hanoi Jane."

"Cindy-Hanoi Jane," read one of the signs at the rally.

In one heated moment, members of the pro-Bush crowd turned on what they mistakenly thought were a group of anti-war protesters, cursing them, threatening them and tearing down their signs. A police officer rushed the group to safety.

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_digbysblog_archive.html#112525128509951679

Pour yourself an extra cup of coffee and take a few minutes to read this Boston Globe attack on Karl Rove. You’ll be glad you did

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2005/08/28/roves_role

The law of omerta: long-time govt official questions corrupt no-bid Halliburton contracts, gets the boot

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bushs-bizarro-world-screw-up-and-you.html

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/corruption_in_washington_/2005/08/the_price_of_public_service.php

Bonus item: Let’s review the bidding, shall we?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1852
[Fubar] The evolving rationale for the Iraq adventure
• 9/11
• WMD
• Flypaper
• Liberate oppressed Iraqis
• Democracy in the Middle East
• So the deaths will not have been in vain

Dump it all in a blender. Throw against wall to see what sticks.

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2005/08/jim_morin_hits_a_home_run.html


***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:02 AM

 
BROKEN PROMISES

We never promised you a rose garden: Bush et al. frantically retrofitting expectations to accommodate the increasingly dire outcome in Iraq. Now we hear that sacrifice is necessary, now we hear that the struggle will be slow and progress marginal, now we hear that things aren’t as rosy as the same people were telling us they were just a few weeks ago

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200508/s1447619.htm
US President George W Bush, assailed by sagging poll numbers and criticism from anti-war protesters camped outside his ranch, has called for Americans to show resolve and brace for additional sacrifice in Iraq. . . In his weekly radio address, Mr Bush acknowledged the job for US soldiers was not yet done. . . "Our efforts in Iraq and the broader Middle East will require more time, more sacrifice and continued resolve," he said.

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1850
Also known as the Whatever It Is, I'm Against It excerpt of the day:

Bush’s argument for continuing the war to honor the (American) dead, it occurs to me, is rather like the classic definition of chutzpah, someone who kills his parents and asks for lenience because he is an orphan.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-iraq28aug28,0,7970359.story
After weeks of pressing Iraqis to finish the constitution quickly, President Bush, whose approval ratings have been falling, urged Americans on Saturday to have patience. . .

Is this all a hint that those troop withdrawals might not happen after all (especially if there’s an upsurge of Sunni violence over frustration with the constitution)?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1849

No, we never promised you a rose garden. . .

http://billmon.org/archives/002117.html
If you're suggesting, how would we feel about an Iranian-type government with a few clerics running everything in the country, the answer is: That isn't going to happen.

Donald Rumsfield
Interview with Associated Press
April 24, 2003

Not only does the Bush gang now reflexively respond “9-11” to any question about Iraq, they now apparently answer “9-11” to any question whatsoever

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/27/15503/4565
Ask about Cindy Sheehan. . .

MR. DUFFY: Well, first of all, the President has spoken continuously about the way he approaches this war, following September 11th, 2001. On September 14th, 2001, he stood at the National Cathedral and told all of America that this was going to be a very long and difficult war, and that there were going to be some very trying moments; but that because of what happened on 9/11, that we had to view the world in a different way.

The Washington Post calls out Bush

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/26/AR2005082601537_pf.html
[I]t is dispiriting, and damaging to the chances for success, that President Bush still refuses to speak honestly to the country about the challenges the United States now faces, or how he intends to address them. In two major speeches on national security this week, Mr. Bush simply repeated the misleading description of Iraq he offered during his national television address in June, conflating the war with the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and describing the enemy as terrorists akin to al Qaeda.

While it is true that Islamic extremist movements have made Iraq a battleground, and failure to defeat them would be a catastrophe for U.S. security, the main challenge remains the nationalist and mostly secular Sunni insurgency, which is fighting for control of Iraq, not of Islam. Mr. Bush breezily praised the constitutional process as if it were the antithesis of the military conflict, rather than a political expression of the same Iraqi power struggle. He boasted that Iraq will have a constitution that "honors women's rights" and "the rights of minorities" even though the prevailing draft raises serious questions about both.

What lackey wrote this NYT headline?

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/27/18129/2591
"IRAQ DEAL: Bush call sets up constitution"

Believe it or not, they are now talking about more WEEKS of haggling in Iraq. (Talk about making it up as you go!)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/28/international/middleeast/28iraq.html
Sunni Arab political leaders, condemning a draft of Iraq's proposed constitution handed to them on Saturday, scrambled to arrange meetings to revise the document even as Shiite and Kurdish leaders insisted that it would be published without substantial changes. . . The latest draft includes only slightly revised language on two critical issues - proposals to create autonomous regions within Iraq, and the status of the Baath Party - that have infuriated many Sunnis. If this last chance for consensus is missed, some Sunni leaders say, the document could provoke even more sectarian violence.

The document reached Sunni Arab members of the constitution committee only after a series of delays in the negotiations. The Sunnis left the door open to further talks, saying they were continuing to meet among themselves, with Shiite and Kurdish counterparts, and with the American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad. Revisions to the constitution will be discussed at a meeting of the Iraqi National Assembly on Sunday, though similar meetings have been repeatedly canceled. . . Shiite leaders made clear on Saturday that the document would not undergo any major changes and that plans were being made to print and distribute five million copies of it to the Iraqi people in the coming week.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125217
"The chances of bringing Sunni Arabs to the political process are almost lost. . . Things will deteriorate in every aspect."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-iraq28aug28,0,7970359.story
Sunni Arabs across the political spectrum closed ranks Saturday, proposing a flurry of amendments to a draft constitution they have condemned, while some officials said negotiations could drag on until a nationwide referendum on the charter scheduled for the fall.

Despite announcements by several Shiite politicians that negotiations were complete and the draft constitution was finished, discussions continued feverishly Saturday and might keep going until, during and after a meeting of the National Assembly scheduled for today.

"There is no D-day," said Ali Dabagh of the United Iraqi Alliance, the Shiite coalition that dominates the transitional assembly and the Iraqi government. "Negotiations can continue until Oct. 15."

Early this morning, a Shiite negotiator said rifts also seemed to be emerging between Shiites and Kurds over language regarding Iraq's ties to the Arab world. "Until now, we have not reached a deal with the Sunnis," Jawad Maliki said. "And the Kurds have made new demands."

More: http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1855152005

[NB: So does this mean they ship out a draft for people to read and vote on, but keep modifying it up to the date of the vote itself? How is that supposed to work?]

As bad as you think it is on the ground in Iraq, it keeps getting worse – and as background, what reporters are and aren’t telling us about it

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/sullivan-and-tantalus-in-baghdad.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002118.html

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/sunni-counter-proposals-appear-to-fail.html
[Juan Cole] Rory Carroll & colleagues at the Guardian reveal that behind the rosy talk, British and American officials are asking "how do you know when you are on the brink of civil war?" and privately comparing the unfolding catastrophe in Iraq to the Lebanese Civil War.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,1557954,00.html
Saddam Hussein intended Baghdad's convention centre to be a showcase. A phalanx of pillars in the foyer, an expanse of marble, two staircases sweeping up to a vast hall, the building was a statement: this is Iraq.

The carpets are tattered now, the windows grubby and the toilets do not flush, but that did not stop the convention centre last week doing exactly what it was supposed to do. It exhibited a nation. . .

How ready are those Iraqi troops? Here’s how ready they are

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/28/weekinreview/28smith.html

This Cindy Sheehan business won’t turn into a million-person march on Washington any time soon, but it will be a steady, embarrassing reminder that “Bush lied and soldiers died.” And any time the Bush gang DOES announce withdrawals, it will be claimed by Sheehan et al. as a victory for them. The latest ploy is to compare her to “Hanoi Jane” Fonda – but that won’t work guys. Sheehan is just a sad, tired, ordinary mom who has lost a son to a war she no longer believes in. Every move they make to villainize her just makes them look smaller

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/cindy-sheehan-is-about-to-go-boom.html
[Rob] I just watched Cindy Sheehan on Bill Maher. When Maher asked her jokingly that if she didn't get satisfaction from George Bush, would she go over his head to Cheney or Rumsfeld, she replied:

"You know what Bill, I have gone over his head, I've gone to the American people. And we employ him, he's our employee."

She has found her voice, and I gotta say, she's got a great voice. She's quick, she's smart, and I think that she's going to be a great face for the American people's growing frustration with the war.

Seeing Cindy tonight, I saw an average American speak in her own voice, and having it heard. And it's resonating. I predict that we've seen just the beginning of Cindy Sheehan.

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/27/09/34/help-needed/
The “Bring Them Home Now” Crawford-to-Washington Tour leaves Crawford Aug. 31st and will be passing through different parts of the country. . . They’re looking for sponsors and hosts. Click here for more info.

An emerging phrase, Yellow Elephants: Republicans who enthusiastically support sending other people’s kids off to die, while scoffing at the idea that their kids would make suitable cannon fodder. Here’s the latest

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112517729702823047

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112517097147389573

General Karpinski has a book

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/entertainment/12491227.htm
The book, "One Woman's Army," published by Hyperion, sheds little new light on the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal. . . But it's her vignettes of an American army at war, of the hot, dusty and snafu-filled world in which her "patched-together, under-trained, overextended, poorly supported" brigade landed, that opens windows on the reality of Iraq. . .

The interview: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/082405Z.shtml

What Bolton is doing, and how the world is reacting to it

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006350
[Stygius, via TPM] Not only is Bolton trying to dilute or remove effective action against AIDS, global poverty, climate change, etc. he's trying to turn the meeting into a UN reform vehicle; more specifically, a John Bolton UN reform vehicle.

This next bit I want to make emphatically: My sense is that Bolton is not only hamstringing the development goals of the meeting, this is also an attempt by him to seize control of the US's UN reform project from others within the State Department (namely, the Secretary of State).

Bolton needs very badly to take over and be identified with any UN reform initiative, even if it fails on his account. This requires waging battle against his political adversaries within the administration.

Secretary Rice has ostracized Bolton from the major UN reform decision-making, in part by appointing Shirin Tahir-Kheli as her own UN Reform Special Adviser. Rice's worry is that, given Bolton's track record, Bolton would only screw up UN reform. A reasonable probability. Hence, Shirin Tahir-Kheli.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1557419,00.html
[Julian Borger] For any student of the Bush administration's foreign policy, the US version of the draft United Nations summit agreement, leaked earlier this week, is an essential text.

The hundreds of deletions and insertions represent a helpfully annotated map to Washington's disagreements with most of the rest of the world on just about every global issue imaginable. . .

The edited document: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/thenewswire/archive/boltondoc.pdf

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2005/08/27/1124563067628.html
AN INTERNATIONAL alliance will confront US President George Bush to salvage as much as possible of an ambitious plan to reshape the United Nations and tackle world poverty.

The head-to-head in New York tomorrow comes after the revelation that the US Administration is proposing wholesale changes to crucial parts of the biggest overhaul of the UN since it was founded more than 50 years ago.

A draft of that plan had included a review of progress on the UN's millennium development goals — poverty eradication targets set in 2000 for completion by 2015 — and the introduction of reforms aimed at repairing the damage done to the UN's reputation by Iraq, Rwanda and the Balkans.

But it was revealed this week that Mr Bush's new ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, was seeking 750 changes to the 36-page draft plan to be presented to a special summit in New York on September 14-16. Mr Bolton's amendments, if successful, would leave the plan in tatters.

The British Foreign Office confirmed yesterday that Britain was standing behind the original plan, putting it at odds with Mr Bush.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/leaked-document-exposes-b_b_6287.html
Any hopes that John Bolton, the new US ambassador to the United Nations, would have been chastened by the way he was elevated to his position have been dashed by the emergence of a leaked document detailing his negotiating demands for next month's UN summit. . .

Plame update (sort of)

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/valerie_plame_/2005/08/where_has_the_plame_story_disappeared_to.php

Bonus item: Bush has “jumped the couch”

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/27/opinion/27dowd.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:09 AM

 
THE END OF IRAQ

I think we’re witnessing the effective end of Iraq as a unified, sovereign country. This is an utter repudiation of this country’s postwar “mission,” and will cause untold suffering in the region for years to come. Nice job, guys

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/27/international/middleeast/27iraq.html
Shiite and Kurdish leaders drafting a new Iraqi constitution abandoned negotiations with a group of Sunni representatives on Friday, deciding to take the disputed charter directly to the Iraqi people.

With the American ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, standing by, Shiite and Kurdish representatives said they had run out of patience with the Sunni negotiators, a group that includes several former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party. The Shiites and Kurds said the Sunnis had refused to budge on a pair of crucial issues that were holding up completion of the constitution.

The Shiites and Kurds reached their decision in meetings that ran late into Friday night, disregarding the Sunnis' pleas for more time.

The Shiite and Kurdish representatives sought to play down the importance of leaving the Sunnis out, saying that with their Baathist links, they had never truly spoken for the broader Sunni population. The Iraqi leaders who drafted the constitution defended it as a document that would ensure the unity of the country and safeguard individual rights.

"The negotiation is finished, and we have a deal," said Ahmad Chalabi, the deputy prime minister and a member of the Shiite leadership. "No one has any more time. It cannot drag on any longer. Most of the Sunnis are satisfied. Everybody made sacrifices. It is an excellent document."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-usiraq27aug27,0,5243213.story
Deep divisions in Iraq over the country's draft constitution carry seeds that could destroy the Bush administration's beleaguered strategy for turning the strife-torn country into a unified and stable democracy. . .

Critics of the drafting process now include some Sunni Arabs the administration had been able to count on in the past, such as Ghazi Ajil Yawer, one of Iraq's two vice presidents. Respected Middle East specialists, including some who have advised the administration in Iraq, worry about the way events have unfolded.

"I see developments on the constitutional side as potentially disastrous," said Larry Diamond, a scholar at Stanford University and former senior advisor in the defunct Coalition Provisional Authority. "I think the Bush administration has miscalculated profoundly by trying to get this constitution done by Aug. 15 at any price."

On Friday, the deadlock continued, with Sunni negotiators unwilling to accept new wording proposed by Shiites, amid increasing indications that the Iraqi electorate will be asked, in a national referendum set for Oct. 15, to approve a document that has not been endorsed by Sunni leaders. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006986.php
What's the likely end state for Iraq? Heather Hurlburt argues that we're already there for the Kurds: they have no interest in a centrally governed Iraq, and they have both the economy and the militia to make their wishes stick. That sounds right to me, especially since it seems unlikely that either the Shiites or the Sunnis really have much interest in trying to oppose them.

In a related piece, Michael Kraig argues that a loose confederation is both the current and future best case for Iraq, and we might as well get used to it. Would it work? The risks are high, but he suggests we can make the best of the situation by actively engaging Iraq's neighbors, none of whom really want to see Iraq spin apart and export its jihadis to their countries. His suggestion: accept the reality of a loose confederation, concentrate on building a "firewall" around Iraq, and work closely with neighboring countries who all have a stake in making this work.

One last-ditch effort to get Sunni support

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GEO741611.htm
BAGHDAD, Aug 27 (Reuters) - Iraqi leaders must complete a final version of the country's new constitution and present it to the public for a referendum which must be held by Oct. 15.

Shi'ite Arabs and Kurds prepared a draft which was presented to parliament on Monday, but it has not yet been finalised because of objections by Sunni Arabs who have already begun mobilising their community against it.

Sunnis are a 20 percent minority, but they are the majority in central Iraq where the insurgency is strongest.

Here is a rough timetable of events. * On Sunday, Sunni politicians deliver their verdict on a modified draft document prepared by Shi'ites in an effort to assuage Sunni anger over provisions creating a decentralised, federal political system that would exclude members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party from public life. Sunnis dominated his regime.

Later on Sunday, parliament will convene for a report on the final wording of the document, which may or may not include the changes proposed by Shi'ites to please the Sunnis.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0508270048aug27,1,868017.story
A final bid by Shiite negotiators for a compromise to end the impasse with Sunni Arabs over Iraq's draft constitution failed late Friday, and it was becoming clear that the talks are hopelessly deadlocked. . . Government spokesman Laith Kubba told Al-Arabiya television that negotiations had reached a standstill. "This is the end of the road," he said. . .

A leading Sunni negotiator called the Shiites' latest offer unacceptable.

"There is no compromise--they are only playing with words," Saleh Mutlaq said. "They are very far from what we want."

Leaders with Iraq's Shiite-Kurdish alliance have not been able to reach a consensus with their Sunni Arab counterparts over key sticking points in the country's draft constitution, four days after the negotiators were legally bound to have the document finished. . . Shiite and Kurdish negotiators have drafted a constitution that decentralizes government power and creates autonomous regions in the Kurdish north and southern Shiite provinces, both oil-rich regions. Fearing a future in which they are cut off from Iraq's oil wealth, Sunni Arabs have fought vehemently against the inclusion of that provision. . .

The compromise put on the table Friday would set aside debate over implementation of federalism and a timeline for the purging of Baathists from government until December, when the country elects a new parliament, Shiite negotiators said. . . Mutlaq said the offer did not go far enough and doubted that a consensus with the Shiite-Kurdish alliance is possible at this stage.

"With the way they are working, I don't think we are going to reach any agreement," Mutlaq said. . . Though wrangling has continued on certain provisions of the constitution, Shiite and Kurd leaders have said they believe the draft they have in hand can pass legal muster because it was submitted to Iraq's parliament Monday, just minutes before the expiration of a deadline that would have forced the dissolution of parliament.

Sunni leaders say the draft was incomplete at the time and therefore legally invalid. They have threatened to take their claims to court. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/27/international/middleeast/27baghdad.html
With Iraq's new constitution still in limbo, thousands of Sunni Arabs rallied in central and northern Iraq on Friday to protest the proposed draft. . .

Sunni political leaders have refused to agree to the draft constitution in large part because a Shiite proposal would create a vast autonomous region in Iraq's oil-rich south. The Sunnis say that proposal - which would parallel the federal zone governed by the Kurds in northern Iraq - could cripple the Iraqi state and allow neighboring Iran to dominate the Shiite south.

"Kirkuk's Arabs refuse any constitution that would divide the country by different names, which is at odds with Islam and with the Arabic nation of Iraq," said Sheik Abdul Rahman Mished, the leader of Kirkuk's Arab Assembly. With its volatile ethnic mix of Kurds, Sunni Arabs and Turkmens, Kirkuk has been particularly vulnerable to fears of sectarian division.

Analysis: http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitutions-fate-unclear-al-jazeera.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002114.html

Not only the Sunnis are unhappy

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/100000-sadrists-march-against.html
Reuters reports that Muqtada al-Sadr's supporters rallied in 8 cities on Friday, totaling a hundred thousand demonstrators in all. They chanted against the new constitution, which they characterized as an American-authored document.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1846

One happy camper

http://billmon.org/archives/002115.html
Tehran, Iran, Aug. 26 – A senior Iranian cleric welcomed on Friday the establishment of an Islamic republic in Iraq and hailed the country’s new constitution as one based on “Islamic precepts.”

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, who heads the powerful ultra-conservative Guardian Council, told worshippers in Tehran’s Friday prayers, “Fortunately, after years of effort and expectations in Iraq, an Islamic state has come to power and the constitution has been established on the basis of Islamic precepts.”

“We must congratulate the Iraqi people and authorities for this victory,” he said. . .

Don’t blame us!

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/27/international/middleeast/27iraq.html
The decision to move forward was a heavy blow for the Bush administration, which had expended enormous energy and political capital to forge a constitution that included the Sunnis. On Thursday, in a last-ditch effort to get a deal, President Bush telephoned Abdul Aziz Hakim, a cleric and the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, to press him to offer a more palatable compromise to the Sunnis.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/26/international/middleeast/26iraq.html
Talks over the Iraqi constitution reached a breaking point on Thursday, with a parliamentary session to present the document being canceled and President Bush personally calling one of the country's most powerful Shiite leaders in an effort to broker a last-minute deal . . .

The concern that a deal on the constitution was falling apart appeared to have to prompted Mr. Bush to call Mr. Hakim to urge a compromise. One Iraqi official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said the Americans, who have already expressed their frustration with the Sunnis, have recently become irritated with what they regard as the stubbornness of the Shiites as well.

"The Americans are very angry that the Shia are not agreeing on this," the Iraqi official said. "They really want them to make these concessions to the Sunnis to keep them on board."

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4006
SECRETARY RICE: Well, I think that the United States has been very involved with the Iraqis every step of the way. But this is an Iraqi process; this is not an American process. And I know that Zal, as John Negroponte before him, tried to help in any way that they were asked to do. Sometimes they were asked to facilitate, to hold discussions, but I want to be very clear that this is an Iraqi process and I think you saw today that Iraqis are in control of this process. They decided that they were responsible officials who needed more time to look at the very difficult issues that were in the text. And so they took that time in accordance with a process that was set up. And so, yes, Zal has been active. Our people have been active. Others have been active in helping them, but this is by all means an Iraqi process.

http://billmon.org/archives/002113.html
It's not the U.S. position to be the play-by-play announcer. We support what they're doing. They are working together in -- in a non-violent fashion to achieve a very important objective here, which is to write a constitution that can be durable; that represents the views of the majority; that respects the minority rights; that has women's rights; and has everything that, you know, that the international community wants, and that Iraqis want. Again, this is an Iraqi process.

White House spokesman Trent Duffy
Remarks to Reporters
August 25, 2005

This is an Iraqi process, but the United States is doing everything it can to assist them in meeting their own obligations and deadlines.

White House spokesman Trent Duffy
Remarks to Reporters
August 26, 2005

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1845

Wesley Clark on Bush’s failure in Iraq

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/25/AR2005082501623.html

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112509138675758231

Liar!

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508260004
On the August 24 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, Rush Limbaugh claimed that the Iraq war "has always been portrayed as something that's gonna be hard" and that "the ease with which all this was gonna happen was never stated." In fact, several Bush administration officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, did predict a short and easy process of regime change in Iraq, ignoring warnings from the intelligence community that the aftermath to the initial battles in Iraq would pose numerous difficult challenges. . .

In fact, despite Limbaugh's denials, several top Bush administration officials have made specific predictions about the duration and difficulty of achieving regime change in Iraq:

• On the March 16, 2003, broadcast of CBS' Face the Nation, Cheney stated: "I think [the war will] go relatively quickly." When host Bob Schieffer pressed the vice president to offer a more precise estimate of how long the war would take, Cheney replied: "Weeks rather than months." On NBC's Meet the Press the same day, Cheney stated, "my belief is we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators [by the Iraqi people]."

• In a February 7, 2003, appearance at Aviano Air Base in Italy, Rumsfeld projected that the Iraq war "could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months."

• In a February 13, 2002, Washington Post op-ed, Ken Adelman, at the time a member of the Defense Policy Board, stated: "I believe demolishing Hussein's military power and liberating Iraq would be a cakewalk. Let me give simple, responsible reasons: (1) It was a cakewalk last time; (2) they've become much weaker; (3) we've become much stronger; and (4) now we're playing for keeps."

The lessons of Britain and the Boer war (thanks to Jan Pieterse for the link)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1555820,00.html

General Janice Karpinski speaks out on U.S. torture policies

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4008
MC: You wrote in an e-mail: "The techniques are a clear departure from what soldiers are taught and understand, the techniques that were directed by the highest level of this Administration." By that, you mean all the way up to the Oval Office?

JK: I mean all the way up to Cheney. I don't know the workings of how it gets up there. But I would think that, very similar to any other big corporation or the military, that if you have a deputy - or a Vice President, in this case - and he is making decisions or approvals, then maybe by default you will say, "If I didn't know, I should have known," or "I did know." Because he's your Vice President. Or he is the Vice President. Or he is the Secretary of Defense. I don't know what they are telling the President. And I don't care. He's the President, and he's supposed to know what's going on in this Administration, and honestly, sometimes it doesn't seem like he does.

Details of the CIA report on 9-11 intelligence failures start to leak out

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/26/politics/26intel.html

The future of oil (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.financialsense.com/transcriptions/Simmons.html

I think we’ve got a trend here, folks

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4011
ARG: 36%

Harris: 40%

Gallup: 40%

The return of Jim Crow?

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-voterid27aug27,1,6843667.story

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/12470252.htm

I’ve said this before, but I think when goons like Pat Robertson violate the tenets of Christianity, it is particularly important for Christians to repudiate them. One reliable source is Jim Wallis

http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=sojomail.display&issue=050825#3

More piling on: http://billmon.org/archives/002111.html

Christians lie, too: http://mediamatters.org/items/200508260010

John Roberts’ ethics problem

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/26/131133/526

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/26/17268/1324

The Duke is dead

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/25/AR2005082501755.html
Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.) "demanded and received" an inflated price for the sale of his home from a Washington defense contractor in 2003 in violation of the federal bribery statute, prosecutors in San Diego said yesterday.

The assertion that the congressman took the money "in return for being influenced in the performance of his official acts as a public official" was made public in the government's response to a civil court filing by Cunningham's attorneys. They are fighting a Justice Department effort to seize the congressman's new home in Rancho Santa Fe.

All I can say is: ha, ha, ha. Michigan Republicans in trouble for questionable donations to. . . Ralph Nader (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.mi-democrats.com/PR8-24-05Nader.htm

FDA still dicking around on approving morning-after pill

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-fda27aug27,1,7794478.story

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112514747350739463

The continuing WH effort to discipline and domesticate the WH press corps

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/26/party/index.html

[NB: Bought out with just a plate of fried catfish. . . ]

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:46 AM

 
FAILURE

Deadline #3 comes and goes, Iraq still without a constitution – and on the brink of chaos

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/25/international/middleeast/25cnd-iraq.html
Talks over the Iraqi constitution reached a breaking point today, with Shiites leaders saying they had lost patience with a group of Sunni Arab negotiators and had decided to send the document straight to the Iraqi voters for their approval.

The dire situation brought the direct intervention of American officials, who pressed senior Shiite clerical leaders to help them broker a last-minute compromise. The decision by the Shiite leadership to bypass the Sunni Arabs provoked threats from the Sunnis that they would call on their people to reject the constitution when it goes before the voters in October.

Negotiations among the three leading Iraqi factions continued toward midnight, with some leaders saying they would make a last-ditch effort to strike a deal on Friday. But after so many days of fruitless talks, some senior political leaders suggested that time had run out.

"There are still some negotiations, but if we don't have any compromise, then that's it," said Sheik Khalid al-Atiyya, a Shiite member of the constitutional committee. "We will go to the election to vote on it."

The Sunni Arabs continue to disagree with the Shiites and the Kurds over the question of federalism, which would essentially set up powerful local regions instead of a strong central government.

Barring some last-minute deal, the decision by the Shiites to move ahead without the Sunni Arabs would mark a huge blow to efforts by the Bush administration to bring the leaders of the Sunni community into the negotiations over the Iraqi constitution.

American officials here have expressed hope that bringing the Sunni Arabs into the talks on the constitution would help bring them into the political process and ultimately drain away support for the guerrilla insurgency.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125119
Sunni groups are saying they'll organize voters against the draft, which goes to a national referendum Oct. 15. The document goes six feet under if two-thirds of voters in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces vote against it. It's unclear if Sunnis have the numbers for that.

More: http://makeashorterlink.com/?I5BC23EAB

Here’s how crazy it’s become

http://makeashorterlink.com/?M2EA16EAB
Fearing constitution talks are deadlocked, Shiite negotiators planned to study new proposals from Sunni and Kurdish delegates after suggesting the draft should go forward to the voters in two months as is.

A Sunni negotiator, meanwhile, pointed the finger at the Kurds, accusing them of "intransigence" over the issue of federalism, which the Sunnis oppose. A meeting was expected later Friday, after the parliament speaker declared the talks would last at least another day after the third deadline was missed.

Several Shiite negotiators, expressing frustration with the continued delays, said Thursday there was no need for unanimity or a parliament vote and that the draft approved by them and the Kurds last Monday should go to voters in an Oct. 15 referendum without further changes. . . Parliament speaker Hajim al-Hassani, a Sunni who was elected on the mostly Sunni ticket headed by former President Ghazi al-Yawer, agreed that the law does not require a parliament vote.

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112499074925009458
[Atrios] On one hand they've postponed the vote on the constitution, but on the other hand we've got some people saying they don't need to actually vote on the constitution because they already approved it on Monday even though it wasn't complete. . . I don't know if that bit of Calvinball is there to just try to sneak the document through (sounds like rather a bad idea) or to prevent the assembly from being dissolved, which seems to be what's required by law. . .

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/25/constitution/index.html
[Tim Grieve] We can only wonder how the Bush administration will spin today's news. . . [T]here is no word as to when the National Assembly might meet again. And even if it does meet again, it's unclear whether the National Assembly would have any authority to act. Some Sunni opponents to the process argue that the interim constitution required the National Assembly either to adopt a constitution or dissolve by Aug. 15 or, at the latest, by Aug. 22, the date on which the first extended deadline ran.

Rule of law? A scathing attack from Billmon on the complete sham this “constitutional process” has become

http://billmon.org/archives/002112.html

Juan Cole gives the post mortem

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/iraqi-constitution-and-sunni-arabs-my.html
Disaster looms, and the Bush administration's blunders are largely to blame. . .

I’ve been waiting for this: here’s the constitutional issue that is going to cause the Bush policy trouble domestically. Not federalism – that’s only going to cause the Iraqi people trouble. Not women’s rights – that’s only going to cause Iraqi women trouble. No, the killer issue that has Republicans over here petrified once their constituents catch wind of it is the lack of religious freedom in Iraq

http://www.nysun.com/article/19143

As the process starts to collapse, damage control to prevent Bush from being blamed for the failure begins. Here’s a case in point. A story in CNN, today, points out that Bush called the Shiites WEDNESDAY to urge them to keep negotiating. What makes this “news”? Why is it running now?

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/26/iraq.main/index.html
In the midst of political wrangling over the delayed final draft of the Iraqi constitution, President Bush this week called a Shiite leader, encouraging him to keep the political process open during the often-difficult negotiations. . .

Always watch the little words

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/25/175017/249
[Armando] President Bush told thousands of National Guard members and their families on Wednesday that an immediate withdrawal of American troops from Iraq would only embolden terrorists and make America and its allies more vulnerable to attack. The president said withdrawing troops now - as Ms. Sheehan advocates - would "only embolden the terrorists and create a staging ground to launch more attacks against America and free nations."

Okay, doing it NOW emboldens the terrorists, but what about 3 months from now? 6 months? A year from now? 2 years? When will withdrawing the troops NOT embolden the terrorists Mr. President?. . .

By the way, how big an idiot is Bush? Look at this line:

Despite more violence on Wednesday in Iraq, Mr. Bush said, "What's important is that the Iraqis are resolving these issues through debate and discussion, not at the barrel of a gun."

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007504
[Garance Franke-Ruta] Is it possible that the president's adamant refusal to publicly consider withdrawal from Iraq is pure politics, rather than policy? Nothing but a domestic play in an environment where it's politically useful for the GOP to be able to paint Democrats and critics as weak-kneed appeasers unwilling to stand up to the terrorists? The increasing murmurs about withdrawal from Iraq that are coming from the leaders of our armed forces suggest as much, and that a plan for the drawing-down of troops may well be in the works at the same time that, for domestic political reasons (the need to project "resolve" and so on), such a plan or intention is being denied.

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007506
[Matt Yglesias] I think David Brooks' column today makes it clear that conservatives are about done with this venture, too, though they'd like to label it a success and I'd prefer to label it a failure. But that's half semantics and half politics.

What should the Democrats do about this? Digby poses the challenge

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112490885652988737

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112500183676297985

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/26/03656/5847

The National Review!

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/26/7569/22059
“You have to give Bush credit--he's the absolute opposite of Clinton. Clinton was in favor of small, popular things. Bush apparently likes to be in favor of big, unpopular things.”

Watch for some stealth moves by the Republicans next month to try to sneak through some version of “Social Security reform”

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/25/17/24/sneaky-bastards/
[Susan Madrak] They plan to maneuver one version through and then change it in committee, sidestepping the Democrats completely.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Plame scandal: a comprehensive overview of how we got here and what might happen next

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-leak25aug25,0,61238.story

Editor & Publisher reads the whole thing, all the way to the end, and finds this

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001021628
[E&P] But near its conclusion it raises an emerging issue, promoted by Michael Wolff of Vanity Fair, among others: If Time magazine had gone public about Rove's conversations with Cooper, it might have had some impact on the Bush-Kerry race for the White House last year. . . But. . . “Time editors were concerned about becoming part of such an explosive story in an election year.”

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/25/plame/index.html
[Tim Grieve] In a way, it may be even worse than that. By not seeking a waiver from Rove -- by not reporting what its reporter knew to be true -- Time allowed Americans to go the polls believing that which the magazine knew to be false. Until Time turned over Matthew Cooper's email messages to Patrick Fitzgerald this July, the White House was free to proclaim -- as it did, repeatedly and vociferously -- that Karl Rove had nothing whatsoever to do with the outing of Valerie Plame. That's the false story Americans had been told when they cast their votes for the presidency in November. Time knew better but didn't say.

And this little tidbit: Colin Powell (apparently) keeps dropping little crumbs of bread that lead reporters to. . . Karl Rove

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1838

What Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and the rise of torture policies tell us about the Bush gang’s wider philosophy of government (great post)

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112502004616706709

Duke Cunningham: bribery

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/25/AR2005082501755.html

Dirty GOP governor #4 (add to Ohio, California, and Kentucky)

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/25/14052/4717

Will John Roberts be tripped up by. . . Iran/Contra?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/012001.html

Of course we should have known that Bush’s program of “UN reform” was actually the BLOCKING of UN reform – and Bolton’s just the guy to do it

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/24/AR2005082402321_pf.html
Less than a month before world leaders arrive in New York for a world summit on poverty and U.N. reform, the Bush administration has thrown the proceedings in turmoil with a call for drastic renegotiation of a draft agreement to be signed by presidents and prime ministers attending the event.

The United States has only recently introduced more than 750 amendments that would eliminate new pledges of foreign aid to impoverished nations, scrap provisions that call for action to halt climate change and urge nuclear powers to make greater progress in dismantling their nuclear arms.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/25/16341/7770

Here’s a real scoop: Steve Clemons gets a copy of Bolton’s marked-up document, which shows his edits (oooh, someone on the “team” is already undermining the boss)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006345

Cliff’s Notes version: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1844

Here’s more good stuff from Clemons

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006346
[Steve Clemons] The Bolton Civil Wars in the State Department may have just re-started. . . For those who followed the Bolton battle from early March through August, one of the real issues with John Bolton is that he was constantly attempting to undermine Colin Powell, Richard Armitage and others but did so with Dick Cheney's blessing.

There is evidence bubbling to the surface -- not altogether clear -- but pointing to the possibility that Bolton has already stepped out of his holding pen and is undermining Condi Rice and Bob Zoellick -- again with Dick Cheney's blessing. . .

And one more example of Bolton’s diplomatic “style.” You might think – you MIGHT – that newly installed in his position, he’d be looking to mend fences and build up his legitimacy. But if you think that, you don’t know Mr. Thumb-In-Your-Eye (and remember that we paid for this partisan charade)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/ambassador-boltonas-ver_b_6232.html
[Arianna] So John Bolton had a reception at the U.N. ambassador's private residence in the penthouse at the Waldorf Astoria last night. The Washington Times, Fox News, and various other conservatives were invited, but some of the people who weren't included Colum Lynch from the Washington Post and Warren Hoge from the New York Times, both of whom cover the U.N. for their respective papers. If you thought the Bush administration’s cowardice about facing anyone not completely on board was confined to Crawford and the campaign trail, think again.

Lynch actually called the mission to the U.N. to confirm that he was not invited, and he was told that, indeed, he was not. A few hours before the reception I asked Warren Hoge about all this. "I'm not taking it personally. I've never met John Bolton," he told me, "and clearly this will continue through tonight."

Doug Feith has arguably done more direct damage than anyone in the Bush administration below the troika of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld. And most people still couldn’t pick him out of a police lineup (for a review, search “Feith” in the PBD archives)

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3998

Looks like Rumsfeld’s got a “tell”

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006978.php
How can you tell when Donald Rumsfeld is lying?. . .

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011997.html

Fox News: more dangerous than a loaded weapon

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006979.php
[Kevin Drum] Just when you thought cable news couldn't sink any lower, cable news sinks lower. Two weeks ago, Fox News wrongly identified the house of Randy and Ronnell Vorick as a terrorist lair:

In what Fox News officials concede was a mistake, John Loftus, a former U.S. prosecutor, gave out the address Aug. 7, saying it was the home of a Middle Eastern man, Iyad K. Hilal, who was the leader of a terrorist group with ties to those responsible for the July 7 bombings in London. . . Hilal, whom Loftus identified by name during the broadcast, moved out of the house about three years ago. But the consequences were immediate for the Voricks.

. . . He gave out the address! On national TV! That's practically an invitation for local thugs to firebomb the house.

But now for the worst part. Not only has Fox not retracted this report, but here is Loftus' brain dead pseudo-excuse for broadcasting the Voricks' address to 20 million viewers in the first place:

"I thought it might help police in that area now that we have positively identified a terrorist living in [Orange County]," he said.

Note to Loftus: the next time you want to let police know about a terrorist living here in the OC, call the police.

http://makeashorterlink.com/?O34C21EAB
A couple whose home was wrongly identified on national television as belonging to an Islamic radical has faced harassment, and police are providing special protection.

How long will Jon Klein (Mr. Entertainment News) stay in charge of CNN? Why CNN is losing out big time to Fox (thanks to Atrios for the link)

http://dcmediagirl.com/index.php?entry=entry20050824-164504

Bonus item: GOP shill Tony Blankley tells an absurd lie

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508250004
In an August 24 op-ed, Washington Times editorial page editor Tony Blankley spun poll data on Iraq to argue -- contrary to the findings of every recent major poll on the topic -- that nearly two-thirds of the American people continue to support the war in Iraq.

How did Blankley manage this feat? He wrote:

. . . In a major USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll from three weeks ago 32 percent of the public said we can't win the war in Iraq. Another 43 percent predict victory, while -- critically -- 21 percent say "the United States could win the war, but they don't think it will.". . . If one adds that "could win, but don't think we will win" 21 percent to the 43 percent who predict victory -- one has a very solid 64 percent supporting the war.

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:35 AM

 
SAYING SOMETHING DOESN’T MAKE IT SO

Bush speaks in Idaho, and even more than in his VFW speech, his invocation of “9-11” is becoming a kind of verbal tic – a species of Tourette’s syndrome












http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3990
After our nation was attacked on September the 11th. . .

Since September the 11th. . .

The war reached our shores on September the 11th. . .

Before September the 11th. . .

On September the 11th, 2001. . .

Since September the 11th. . .

Since the morning of September the 11th. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006975.php
[Kevin Drum] Former White House speechwriter David Frum panned George Bush's latest Iraq speech yesterday, saying, "By now it should be clear that President Bush's words on the subject of Iraq have ceased connecting with the American public." His basic complaint: you can't announce a big speech and then say the same old thing over and over again. It ain't working.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112490628762300853
[Digby] Is Bush on drugs? He is more "animated" than I think I've ever seen him. He's all hunched over, swinging his arms wildly, screaming into the microphone. It's quite a performance. . . My favorite line so far is the patented "they can run but they can't hide." C'mon. You just have to sit back and admire the sheer audacity of continuing to say that after four long years.

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1835
[Swopa] How brazen a liar is the president of the United States? This brazen, says the Associated Press:

President Bush, answering critics who want the United States to leave Iraq, pledged Wednesday that as long as he is president "we will stay, we will fight and we will win the war on terrorism.". . . "We'll complete our work in Afghanistan and Iraq," Bush said. "An immediate withdrawal of our troops in Iraq, or the broader Middle East, as some have called for, would only embolden the terrorists and create a staging ground to launch more attacks against America and free nations."

Meanwhile, back on planet Earth, the Financial Times reports:

The US is expected to pull significant numbers of troops out of Iraq in the next 12 months in spite of the continuing violence, according to the general responsible for near-term planning in the country. . . . Maj Gen Douglas Lute, director of operations at US Central Command, on Wednesday said the reductions were part of a push by Gen John Abizaid, commander of all US troops in the region, to put the burden of defending Iraq on Iraqi forces. . . He said: “We believe at some point, in order to break this dependence on the . . . coalition, you simply have to back off and let the Iraqis step forward."

Gosh, that phrasing sounds familiar ... where have I read that before?! Oh, yes, in this post I wrote two months ago, where I quoted from a New York Times article by John Burns:

. . . a feeling is growing among senior officers in Baghdad and Washington that it is only a matter of time before the Pentagon sets a timetable of its own for withdrawal. . . "I think the drawdown will occur next year, whether the Iraqi security forces are ready or not," a senior Marine officer in Washington said last week. "Look for covering phrases like 'We need to start letting the Iraqis stand on their own feet, and that isn't going to happen until we start drawing down'."

It's only been two months, and we're already hearing those "covering phrases," even as the president lies ever more frantically to distract the public.

Things must really be desperate, both politically and militarily.

A refreshing sip of Maureen Dowd. Enjoy

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/opinion/24dowd.html

While it was expected (as added security is needed for the constitutional referendum and the subsequent election), this is not a very good time to be announcing that 1500 MORE U.S. troops are headed over to Iraq

http://makeashorterlink.com/?V39124DAB

And a nice quip from reader Bill McInerney

I particularly like the rationale Bush offered yesterday for why we have to stay in Iraq. Paraphrasing a little, but just a little: “Unless we have more of our soldiers die in Iraq, the ones that have already died will have died in vain.”

Oh, so lame

http://billmon.org/archives/002110.html
“The Bush administration’s rationale for the Iraq war has changed. Wars are like that.”

Dale McFeatters
Scripps Howard news writer
Bush late in defending war
August 24, 2005

How Bush and Rumsfeld made the U.S. a torture regime: a major Newsweek story

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4989481/
Today there is no telling where the scandal will bottom out. But it is growing harder for top Pentagon officials, including Rumsfeld himself, to absolve themselves of all responsibility. Evidence is growing that the Pentagon has not been forthright on exactly when it was first warned of the alleged abuses at Abu Ghraib. U.S. officials continued to say they didn't know until mid-January. But Red Cross officials had alerted the U.S. military command in Baghdad at the start of November. The Red Cross warned explicitly of MPs' conducting "acts of humiliation such as [detainees'] being made to stand naked... with women's underwear over the head, while being laughed at by guards, including female guards, and sometimes photographed in this position." Karpinski recounts that the military-intel officials there regarded this criticism as funny. She says: "The MI officers said, 'We warned the [commanding officer] about giving those detainees the Victoria's Secret catalog, but he wouldn't listen'." The Coalition commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, and his Iraq command didn't begin an investigation until two months later, when it was clear the pictures were about to leak.

Now more charges are coming. Intelligence officials have confirmed that the CIA inspector general is conducting an investigation into the death of at least one person at Abu Ghraib who had been subject to questioning by CIA interrogators. The Justice Department is likely to open full-scale criminal investigations into this CIA-related death and two other CIA interrogation-related fatalities. . .

I have generally tried to avoid using the “F” word here, but there are times when “fascism” is simply the only word that comes to mind.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/24/165411/706
[E&P] The American Legion, which has 2.7 million members, has declared war on antiwar protestors, and the media could be next. Speaking at its national convention in Honolulu, the group's national commander called for an end to all "public protests" and "media events" against the war, constitutional protections be damned.

"The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples". . . "We had hoped that the lessons learned from the Vietnam War would be clear to our fellow citizens. Public protests against the war here at home while our young men and women are in harm's way on the other side of the globe only provide aid and comfort to our enemies."

The delegates vowed to use whatever means necessary to "ensure the united backing of the American people to support our troops and the global war on terrorism."

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/american-legion-will-take-whatever.html

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508240011
On the August 23 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, Rush Limbaugh declared. . . "[I]t's time to stop dancing around this issue folks, to tell you the truth. It's time for somebody to tell the people on the left, you're damn right we're questioning your patriotism."

Oh, and by the way, want to know what the American Legion said to Bill Clinton in 1999? Gee, “supporting our troops” can mean so many things. . .

http://billmon.org/archives/002107.html
The American Legion, a wartime veterans organization of nearly three-million members, urges the immediate withdrawal of American troops participating in "Operation Allied Force.''

The National Executive Committee of The American Legion, meeting in Indianapolis today, adopted Resolution 44, titled "The American Legion's Statement on Yugoslavia.'' This resolution was debated and adopted unanimously.

Mr. President, the United States Armed Forces should never be committed to wartime operations unless the following conditions are fulfilled:

• That there be a clear statement by the President of why it is in our vital national interests to be engaged in hostilities;

• Guidelines be established for the mission, including a clear exit strategy;

• That there be support of the mission by the U.S. Congress and the American people. . .

Pat Robertson demonstrates once again that when you try to lie to excuse a mistake, you only make it worse. Here’s how bad it is: Fox News catches him at it!

Morning: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/first-pat-robertson-calls-for.html
[Fox] "I didn't say 'assassination,'" clarified Robertson during a broadcast of his "The 700 Club" Wednesday morning. "I said our special forces should go 'take him out,' and 'take him out' could be a number of things, including kidnapping."

He blamed The Associated Press for making him seem to advocate the assassination of a foreign leader.

"There are a number of ways to take out a dictator from power besides killing him," Robertson said. "I was misinterpreted by the AP, but that happens all the time."

However, during the original "700 Club" broadcast Monday night, Robertson clearly mentioned assassination.

"You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we are trying to assassinate him, we should go ahead and do it," Robertson said Monday.

[NB: As if everyone who has ever watched The Sopranos doesn’t know what “take him out” plainly means. Or are we supposed to think it might mean, oh I don’t know, like, “take him out for a cup of coffee”?]

Afternoon: http://mediamatters.org/items/200508240010
On the afternoon of August 24, Robertson issued a press release in which he claimed that his assassination comments were "adlibbed" out of frustration, suggesting they were not representative of his true thinking.

Evening: http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/24/robertson.chavez/index.html
After two days of criticism, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson apologized for his controversial suggestion that the United States should assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. . . . "Is it right to call for assassination? No, and I apologize for that statement," Robertson said. "I spoke in frustration. . .”

[NB: Well, this is the standard arc for public goofs: lay low and admit nothing, then deny you said or meant what you plainly meant, then say you were misinterpreted, then say it was a mistake, then when the heat gets too much to take, finally, “apologize.” Two things about such “apologies” – they mean NOTHING when they are so plainly the result of external pressure and damage control. Second, what does it actually mean to “apologize” for saying explicitly on national tv that someone should be killed? You apologize for saying it? You apologize for wanting them killed? You are apologizing TO THEM? Or to your listeners? Shouldn’t an avowed Christian hold himself to a higher standard?

It is, in fact, an apology that means nothing: like the infamous Falwell quote after 9-11 (also on the 700 Club), Robertson was saying EXACTLY what he meant:

http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/f/falwell-robertson-wtc.htm
Falwell said, "The ACLU has got to take a lot of blame for this. . . I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who try to secularize America...I point the thing in their face and say you helped this happen."
Robertson said, "I totally concur. . . “]

Pat’s past “misstatements”

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-robertson-past-remarks-glance,1,6404355.story

CNN’s shameful coverage (by the way, they pulled the story, but in their initial article on Robertson’s denial that he had ever used the word “assassinate,” CNN didn’t bother to tell its readers that he HAD in fact said it. Fox News, ironically, did point it out: how bad is it when Fox has more journalistic integrity than you do?)

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/24/14/10/media-whore/
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone. Glad to have you with us tonight.

Has controversial Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson finally gone too far or is he on to something?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112490726645738269
I don't know if I heard this right, but I think that one of the CNN anchorettes just asked a first amendment expert if Pat Robertson's statement should fall under freedom of religion since he was advocating "the idea of taking out one very bad individual to save thousands of others."

The most ridiculous and far-fetched excuse for Robertson

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007499
Robertson issued his denial during an interview with former ambassador-at-large for the Republic of Venezuela and outspoken Chavez critic Thor Halvorssen on the August 24 broadcast of Christian Broadcasting Network's The 700 Club ...

HALVORSSEN: Well, he in fact tried to use that. Chavez, in 1992, attempted to assassinate the democratically elected President Carlos Andrés Pérez and his family and he failed, and for that he went to jail. The person who began this, who started the concept of assassination for political reasons, was in fact Hugo Chavez, and his foreign minister is a former guerrilla terrorist. They basically have no standing to criticize anyone who made remarks that like -- you know, that were misinterpreted like the ones you made.

[NB: Nice catch there at the end. . .]

Why won’t Bush and the WH explicitly condemn Robertson’s outrageous comment?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/24/115659/534

Why Rush won’t comment on it at all (he understands the whole agitprop game)

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508240008

Should ABC drop his show?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112490477804917367

More on the theme of media integrity. A group prepares an ad criticizing the networks for ignoring the Darfur tragedy while spending obsessive hours on Michael Jackson, the Runaway Bride, etc, ad nauseum. Guess who is refusing to run the ad?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006340

So, Due Date #3 is upon us. How are those talks “to clear up a few minor details” in the Iraqi constitution coming along?

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=1838932005
Clashes mar Iraq constitution talks

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125071
[Eric Umansky] Considering Iraq's draft constitution, one Islamic scholar in the U.S. said, "It's not a workable document. They brushed their differences under the carpet and crafted language that they could vote for." He added Sudan tried something similar 20 years ago. What followed was a 20-year internal war.

Particularly considering that the draft's clauses on Islam are so fuzzy, TP wonders if the papers are making a mistake by giving so much play to religion and competitively little to the more concrete and actually explosive issue with the draft: federalism. It doesn't make for the sizzling headline that "impending theocracy" does and doesn't trigger our base anxieties. But it could spark a civil war.

"Rather than an inclusive document, it is more a recipe for separation based on Shiite and Kurdish privilege." one well-regarded analyst told the Post. "It may well be more of a prelude to civil war than a step forward." One super-star law prof and former administration advisor added, "A constitution that is a deal between the Shiites and Kurds is not a deal."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301374.html
In short, what some Shiite and Kurd leaders are calling federalism looks dangerously like a recipe for partition or civil war. Perhaps the intractable insurgency has convinced these Iraqis that they must amputate and starve the Sunni heartland. Yet as American soldiers do most of the fighting against the Sunni insurgents, that solution would be disastrous for the U.S. mission and Western security more generally.

http://www.nvc.vt.edu/toalg/Website/Publish/Papers/GalbraithInterviewPublished.pdf
Galbraith argues that the administration’s promotion of a unified majoritarian democratic state is itself a threat. The most important danger in Iraq is a looming civil war between Kurdish nationalism and Sunni majoritarianism. ‘Civil war and the breakup of Iraq are more likely outcomes than a successful transition to a pluralistic Western-style democracy’. . . The Bush administration’s plan conceives of constitution writing as a majoritarian exercise which is wrong. Any constitution has to be accepted by the Kurds and Sunni Arabs, as well as the Shiites.

The greatest hypocrisy of all: selling the women of Iraq down the river

http://billmon.org/archives/002106.html
The White House propaganda maestros used an Iraqi women's rights activist as a living prop at Shrub's state of the union address earlier this year. . . They also arranged for her to stand immediately in front of the mother of a Marine killed in action in Iraq -- setting the scene for a "spontaneous" hug that reduced a national television audience to quivering lumps of sentimental jello. . . Now, that very same activist is telling the world the Americans just sold her, and her Iraqi sisters, down the river to a bunch of medieval mullahs with Made-in-Tehran labels on the insides of their turbins. . . Will her betrayal simply be pushed down the media memory hole with yesterday's garbage?

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002105.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002102.html

Why what’s in the precise wording of the constitution is not the most crucial thing

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007490
[Matt Ygeslias] When contemplating the extent to which Iraq's new constitution will implement Shiite theocracy in the country, it's worth keeping in mind that which words appear on a piece of paper isn't necessarily the most important thing. . . Liberalism requires that liberal elements in civil society be stronger than illiberal ones. Iraq -- entirely predictably -- isn't like that and never was going to magically become like that no matter what American occupation authorities did.

Resolution is now complicated further by a growing split within the Shiite faction: the Sadrists could join with the Sunnis to defeat the constitution in the October 15 referendum

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/24/20145/8036

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1834

http://billmon.org/archives/002108.html

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/at-least-34-dead-dozens-wounded.html

Wallerstein: the U.S. has lost the Iraq war (thanks to Jan Pieterse for the link)

http://fbc.binghamton.edu/commentr.htm

Ha ha. Matt Yglesias takes on all those apologists who want to compare the Iraqi process with the birth pains of the American Republic. Okay, says clever Matt, what does that analogy actually portend?

http://yglesias.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/24/144939/485

“Why John Roberts’ affirmative action file is missing”

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/24/roberts-file/

Gas pains concern Republicans

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-gasoline25aug25,1,6453898.story

Ah-nuld: just another sleazy Republican

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007496

Bonus item: pull the other one, why don’t you?

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/24/vacation-denial/
Bush Denies He’s On Vacation
President Bush has faced intense criticism for his insensitivity in taking a leisurely, 5-week vacation while the country is locked in an increasingly violent war in Iraq. His initial response was to defensively defend his right to relax, stating indignantly, “I’ve got a life to live.”

That didn’t go over so well with the American public, so the White House spin machine game up with a new line: Despite what it looks like, President Bush isn’t actually on vacation.

According to the San Bernardino Sun, White House spokesperson David Almacy “said the reason that Bush is in Crawford, Texas, is due to the renovation of the West Wing of the White House.” Almacy stated:

He’s operating on a full schedule; he’s just doing it from the ranch instead of from the White House. The only week he had officially off was this last week.

Keep in mind, President Bush has spent the entire month of August at his ranch every year of his presidency. It’s time this White House stopped renovating the truth.

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:31 AM

 
DEEPER AND DEEPER

How stupid do they think we are? Eventually even those of us who are slow start to recognize the tricks. It's interesting how the old Rovean mantras just aren't working any more. Even worse, continually repeating them is making the Bush gang look increasingly out of touch, as if they just don't get it (or don't care)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/08/23/BL2005082300618.html
[Dan Froomkin] President Bush's visit to Utah yesterday offered a great example of the White House's version of highly stylized Japanese Kabuki theater.

Although the speech Bush gave was largely an amalgam of previous addresses, White House reporters were urged to note the extraordinary significance of the president -- for the first time anyone can remember -- actually acknowledging the number of soldiers who have died in Iraq.

Yes, after months of painstakingly avoiding specific mention of the extent of American casualties in the war, Bush somewhat startlingly had this to say yesterday:

"We have lost 1,864 members of our Armed Forces in Operation Iraqi Freedom, and 223 in Operation Enduring Freedom. Each of these men and women left grieving families and loved ones back home. Each of these heroes left a legacy that will allow generations of their fellow Americans to enjoy the blessings of liberty. And each of these Americans have brought the hope of freedom to millions who have not known it.". . .

Bush's tone was matter-of-fact. He didn't spend a lot of time expressing his sympathy for the dead or their families. His speech included no new plans to stem the loss. In fact, Bush went on to invoke the dead soldiers as reason to stay the course in Iraq -- a policy that will inevitably create many more of them:

"We owe them something. We will finish the task that they gave their lives for. We will honor their sacrifice by staying on the offensive against the terrorists, and building strong allies in Afghanistan and Iraq that will help us win and fight -- fight and win the war on terror."

Bush critics have never suggested that the president was literally not aware of the number of dead -- after all, it's in the paper every morning.

But in this era of meticulous, artful and deliberate crafting of each and every presidential pronouncement, the unprecedented insertion of hard numbers obviously was meant to signify something.

And indeed, after the speech, White House officials spun it as hugely significant evidence that -- in spite of his refusal to meet with grieving mother Cindy Sheehan -- the president is sensitive to the sacrifices imposed by his policies.

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-says-that-if-you-disagree-with.html
[E&P] Meeting briefly with reporters Monday aboard Air Force One, Trent Duffy, a White House spokesman subbing for Scott McClellan, said that President Bush believes that those who want the U.S. to begin to change course in Iraq do not want America to win the overall "war on terror."

Duffy spoke on a day when a surprisingly large antiwar protest met the president during his stay in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he addressed a Veterans of Foreign Wars convention.

Speaking to reporters, Duffy said that Bush "can understand that people don't share his view that we must win the war on terror, and we cannot retreat and cut and run from terrorists, but he just has a different view.”

[NB: That last sentence is a mystery to me. But the underlying message is clear: see, disagreements about the war are just matters of opinion. You have the opinion that Bush’s war was based on lies and deception, that it has been foolishly mismanaged, that it has no clear aim or direction, and that it has cost more in lives and dollars than anyone ever admitted, with no end in sight. The President has the opinion that you are supporting the terrorists. See? Just two different points of view.]

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1828
From the text of President Bush's speech at the VFW National Convention to bolster support for his Iraq policy (8/22/05):

The war came to our shores on the morning of September the 11th, 2001. . . After September the 11th, 2001, I made a pledge, America will not be -- will not wait to be attacked again . . We've more than tripled funding for homeland security since September the 11th, 2001. . . The lesson of September the 11th, 2001. . . Since the morning of September the 11th. . .

Bush on the link between 9/11 and Iraq (9/18/03):
We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the 11 September attacks.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/23/bush.iraq.ap/index.html
President Bush suggested Tuesday that anti-war protesters such as Cindy Sheehan, who want the troops brought home immediately, do not represent the views of most U.S. military families and are "advocating a policy that would weaken the United States."

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/23/13466/5622
[AP] "I've met with a lot of families," Bush said. "She doesn't represent the view of a lot of families I have met with."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/23/international/middleeast/23cnd-prexy.html
President Bush, seeking to put the positive stamp of the United States on a draft of a new Iraqi constitution, said today that the writing of the document was an "amazing event" and he asserted that it guaranteed women's rights and the freedom of religion in a country that up until now had known only dictatorship.

Mr. Bush made no mention of the skepticism that has greeted the constitution in Baghdad, and said he was optimistic even though the negotiator for Iraq's Sunni Arab minority threatened that Sunnis would rise up if the constitution was passed on Wednesday.

"You know, you're speaking about one voice," the president told a small group of reporters at the Tamarack resort near Donnelly, Idaho, about 70 miles north of the state capital, Boise. "There is more than one Sunni involved in the process. . . “

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/23/rumsfeld.iraq/
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Tuesday tried to dispel concern over the possibility that a civil war could erupt in Iraq between Sunni Arabs and Shiite Arabs.

"People have been moving together, talking, discussing things," Rumsfeld said. "You can always find someone who's going to try to be a dead-ender and say, 'If you don't do this, I won't do that.' But that's part of negotiation. We see that in the Congress and we see it in democratic systems all over the world.". . .

[NB: See? Iraq is just like the British Parliament – just a bit of a spat is all]

"And, regrettably, completing the constitution is not likely to end all the violence in Iraq or solve all of the country's problems," he added. . . Rumsfeld said that while the specter of civil war should draw attention and concern, "I haven't seen anything to indicate that the risk is greater today than it was yesterday or the day before."

[NB: See, Don, we’ve learned to decode Rumspeak now – you don’t know what the hell is going to happen next, though you know it could be awful. But thanks for the reassuring non sequiturs all the same]

And this: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006969.php
Rumsfeld said he did not know how to explain an increase in U.S. casualties in Iraq from roadside bombs, "other than the fact that they [insurgents] obviously are becoming more sophisticated in developing, in large measure, explosive devices which have greater lethality.". . . But he said that while some roadside bombs have been deadlier, the "overwhelming majority" of them — about 75 percent — "are not effective at all" and cause no casualties.

[NB: See, why doesn’t the press report the good news – only 25% of their bombs kill people!]

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002101.html

Trent Duffy’s press conference: the message of the day – “we’re hopeful”

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3966

Powerline: the reason for bad recruiting? The media (of course): they keep telling us bad news like all the soldiers getting blown up over there because they have inadequate body armor and equipment. What about telling us all the good news, like the thousands of soldiers who AREN’T getting blown up?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/23/152421/082

[NB: Armando makes a great point here. The military is being crippled by this war (literally and figuratively) – and it ISN’T because of media coverage or war protestors here at home. It’s because of the really stupid policies and stubbornness of Rumsfeld and other policy makers, who only recently have admitted that THEIR OWN decisions early in the war weren’t grounded in a grasp of its “realities”]

The kind of posting that needs more attention. The opposition to this war is increasingly coming, not from (as one reporter nicely put it) “PETA, hippies, and Naderites” http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/22.html#a4567 -- but from people who are pro-military, not pacifists, but who simply think THIS war has been a catastrophic mistake.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/23/154834/735
[Kos] I'm not anti-war. As I've said before, I'm a military hawk. I supported the Afghanistan War and I supported the Bosna and Kosovo interventions. I'm not one of these touchy-feely hippy types that thinks war is inherently bad. I laugh at people who think they can "visualize peace".

Unlike most people reading this, I grew up in a country at war. I've seen the effects first-hand. I also served in the Army. To me war isn't a video game or an abstract concept. It's real. Yet sometimes, many times, military force is a force for good. There are evil people in the world, doing evil things. And all the sanctions in the world, all the strongly worded denunciations, will never have the effect of a 1,000 pound bomb.

I oppose the Iraq War. . .

If you ever needed more evidence that Bubble Boy only hears (or only wants to hear) the happy talk from his own advisors, catch this

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112482704757547240
Q Does the administration's goal -- I'll ask you about the Iraqi constitution. You said you're confident that it will honor the rights of women.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

Q If it's rooted in Islam, as it seems it will be, is that still -- is there still the possibility of honoring the rights of women?

THE PRESIDENT: I talked to Condi, and there is not -- as I understand it, the way the constitution is written is that women have got rights. . .

[NB: Yes, one implication of this comment is that Bush himself hasn’t even looked at the “amazing” constitution he was praising]

Don’t bother me with the facts: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/international/middleeast/24iraq.html

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/23/women/index.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002102.html

The whole pathetic transcript: http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3972

People actually read the “constitution”

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124893/
[Fred Kaplan] Judging from the two translations of the text released so far, it's hard to see how Iraq's constitution could serve either as a document that unifies the new Iraqi nation or as a clear guide to governance. . . The charter is vague to the point of vacuousness in its most basic proclamations. Article 2 reads:

Islam is the official religion of state and a fundamental source for legislation. (a) No law may contravene the essential verities of Islamic law. (b) No law may contravene the principles of democracy. (c) No law may contravene the rights and basic liberties enumerated in this constitution.

Already, we have a contradiction that would befuddle the most probing judicial review (assuming the constitution provided such a thing, which it doesn't). For women especially, Islamic law itself contravenes the principles of democracy and basic liberties. So, which clause takes precedence?. . .

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007488
[Matt Yglesias] The other thing is that the text I've seen doesn't address, well, any of the topics you expect to see in a constitution. Which powers do the different branches of government have? You won't find out here. Will there be a judicial system? Who sets it up? Who knows.

http://billmon.org/archives/002100.html
[Billmon] I wrote last night that parts of the draft Iraqi constitution read like complete gibberish. It seems there's a good reason for that: The constitutional deal submitted (kinda, sorta) to Iraq's temporary parliament not only wasn't a deal, it wasn't even a draft. The Washington Post's Ellen Knickmeyer explains:

We're told today there isn't a proper draft put together yet -- that the version as it is now exists in people's heads and in copies annotated with handwritten notes. There are a couple of new drafts floating around today, but I think they may reflect the drafts that various sides are putting forward.

The text: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082201190_pf.html

What will the Sunnis do?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/23/121340/223

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1832

War protestor tasered. Why? Good question. There is something happening with the use of these weapons (which only cause intense pain, don’t “injure” you) in policing that needs to be thought about

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112481514621942873

More Pentagon “branding”

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007487
One would at least expect the Pentagon to stop its sloganeering when a soldier’s been killed. Not so. In a shift of long-standing policy, the Pentagon is now engraving the slogans it chose to increase public support of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan -- that is “Operation Iraqi Freedom” and “Operation Enduring Freedom,” respectively -- onto the tombstones of soldiers killed in action there. And it would seem they do this whether the family likes it or not. . .

What happens when you have lost international credibility for lying: U.S. now can’t get people to listen when they cry wolf over Iran’s nuclear intentions

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007476

The WH and the rest of the Republican party are running far away from Pat Robertson’s explicit call to assassinate Hugo Chavez (uh, the DEMOCRATICALLY ELECTED leader of Venezuela?). But there is a deeper truth here – these people just seem to LIKE to talk about killing folks

http://rockthrower.blogs.com/rockthrower/2005/08/pat_robertson_a.html
But before writing Pat Robertson off as some out to lunch nutball, the press and the public would do well to remember that he is a powerful Republican activist with close ties to the President and the Republican Congress. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/23/politics/23cnd-robertson.html
Mr. Rumsfeld dismissed Mr. Robertson's call for Mr. Chávez's assassination, saying to reporters: "Certainly it's against the law. Our department doesn't do that type of thing." He added, "Private citizens say all kinds of things all the time."

[NB: Hmmmm… Donald, which govt department DOES do that type of thing? (As if we don’t know)]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/23/robertson.chavez/index.html
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Tuesday that Robertson has the right of any private citizen to say whatever he wants, but added that the televangelist's remarks "do not represent the views of the United States."

[NB: Oooooh, that’s REALLY coming down hard on him]

More: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112481907262364256

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/24.html#a4601
It's so quiet you can hear a pin drop. . . Power Line, Michelle Malkin. . . Hugh Hewitt, Roger L. Simon, and many more are all silent on Pat Robertson's assassination statements so far.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2125004/
The NYT notes, "Leaders at the Traditional Values Coalition, the Family Research Council and the Christian Coalition [said] they were too busy to comment."

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112480647768183114
[Atrios] The amazing thing about what Robertson said isn't that he suggested assassinating a head of state would be a good idea. It's what the alleged infraction by this head of state which makes him deserving of execution is. Robertson isn't accusing him of being a tyrant, or of killing his own people, or of violations of human rights (the rights of Christian people in Pat's world), or genocide, or anything else which might normally inspire people to condemn a foreign leader to death. Nope, here is, to Pat Robertson, the capital crime of Hugo Chavez:

You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don't think any oil shipments will stop. . . [T]his is a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil. . .

He's got oil, and if he won't give it to us we'll just have to kill him. . . Refreshing honesty, in a way.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508230010
In 2003, CNBC host Lawrence Kudlow, host of CNBC's Kudlow & Company, advocated removing Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez from power using "300 of the best Special Ops forces we have."

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112483235337943976
Maybe I've missed it, but with all the hoohah on TV about Robertson putting out a hit on Hugo Chavez today, I haven't heard much in the coverage about him putting out hits on the supreme court and the State Department ("Maybe we need a very small nuke thrown off on Foggy Bottom to shake things up”) earlier this year.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/4/4/19239/09090
John Cornyn (R-TX):
I don’t know if there is a cause-and-effect connection but we have seen some recent episodes of courthouse violence in this country. . . I wonder whether there may be some connection between the perception in some quarters on some occasions where judges are making political decisions yet are unaccountable to the public, that it builds up and builds up and builds up to the point where some people engage in — engage in violence.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508230007
Fox News host Bill O'Reilly said that the Los Angeles Times editorial board wouldn't understand his objection to legal representation for detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, until terrorists kill editorial page editor Michael Kinsley. . .

Clear Channel radio host Glenn Beck said he was "thinking about killing [filmmaker] Michael Moore" and pondered whether "I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it.". . .

Syndicated columnist Ann Coulter argued that the national debate during the Monica Lewinsky controversy should not have focused on whether President Bill Clinton "did it," but rather "whether to impeach or assassinate" him.

[NB: This hardly even needs to be said, but is there a left-wing commentator in the country who has openly called for assassinating a political leader, and if they did, would they ever be able to appear in a national forum or news outlet again?]

House Ethics Committee to take up Abramoff/DeLay scandals this fall?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006331

“Secret” WH fundraiser for DeLay – featured guest, Dick Cheney

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006330

They may have made some of Roberts’ papers on affirmative action disappear, but there is enough evidence still out there to make for some disturbing indicators

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/23/173022/453

Another fascinating angle on the “Able Danger” debacle (thanks to Digby for the link)

http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/005251.php
[Steve Soto] [T]he military analyst who worked in Operation Able Danger, and who made the claims public, coordinated his allegations in advance with the House GOP leadership, and Steven Cambone at the Pentagon, as well as Fox News.

Really interesting piece on “franchising” democracy: the Right’s market-oriented approach to creating “movements” that often have very weak democratic roots, but are simply organized, funded, and directed toward specific political actions. Politics by Amway

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112481654393977059
There are times where I really wonder if there's any such thing as grassroots conservatism anymore. Conservatives seem to be intent on making any expression of conservative belief little more than the assembly of an out-of-the-box movement. You want to start a petition for intelligent design in your school district? Here's the talking points, magazines, a list of local experts and the e-mail for your very own Discovery Institute scientist. . .

Tyson Foods sued for “whites only” bathroom

http://majikthise.typepad.com/majikthise_/2005/08/tyson_foods_sue_1.html

The growing war between the left blogosphere and the centrist DLC (Democratic Leadership Council). This is getting interesting. . .

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/22/41845/1251

Tony Blair to move to Carlyle Group after leaving office?

http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/news/fullnewsbottom/tm_objectid=15880889&method=full&siteid=106694-name_page.html

Bonus item: taking a vacation is “hard work”

http://billmon.org/archives/002098.html
BOISE, Idaho -- Officials are concluding preparations for President Bush's arrival today at Gowen Field for his first trip to Idaho, where he'll vacation in rural Valley County and deliver a speech on U.S. wars . . . From Boise, he'll fly north to Donnelly, where he's due to spend two nights at Tamarack Resort, a ski and golf resort that opened in December 2004.

[Billmon] Who else but President AWOL would take a vacation from his vacation?

Extra bonus item: This will make your day

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_atrios_archive.html#112483242892398922




***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:59 AM

 
DONE AND DONE

The evolution of a headline

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/22/international/middleeast/22cnd-iraq.html
Iraqi Leaders Reach Agreement on New Constitution
By DEXTER FILKINS

Iraqis Submit Constitution Draft, but Key Issues Remain
By DEXTER FILKINS
Iraqi leaders claimed tonight that they had met their deadline for drafting a constitution by submitting a partially completed document to the Iraqi National Assembly. But within minutes of adjourning their meeting, some of those leaders asserted that a number of fundamental issues remained in dispute.

In a legal sleight of hand, a small group of Iraq's senior political leaders handed in a draft of the constitution shortly before midnight, contending that by doing so they had met the deadline they had set for themselves.

"The constitution is finished," the deputy speaker for the National Assembly, Hussein Shahrastani, said.

But in fact, the constitution was unfinished, with a number of critical issues unsettled, and the Iraqis said they were giving themselves three additional days to finish their work.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/23/international/middleeast/23iraq.html
Iraq's Assembly Is Given Charter, Still Unfinished
By DEXTER FILKINS and JAMES GLANZ

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200101.html
Iraq Parliament Delays Constitution Vote
By Ellen Knickmeyer, Jonathan Finer and William Branigin

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0508230025aug23,1,3887261.story
Constitutional accord eludes Iraq delegates
By Liz Sly

Juan Cole explains the shadow game

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/coup-in-baghdad-unfinished.html
According to the interim constitution, the permanent constitution should have been presented to parliament and passed by August 15. There should have been two readings of it, two days apart, before the vote. Otherwise, parliament should have been dissolved and new elections called. Parliament avoided this fate with a last-minute amendment of the interim constitution, allowed if by 3/4 vote, though the nicety of two readings of the amendment two days apart was dispensed with (arguably, unconstitutionally, though it is a relatively minor affair). The amendment stipulated that the new constitution would by passed by August 22, with other conditions unchanged.

The new constitution, with blank passages, was presented to parliament just before midnight on August 22. But parliament did not vote on it, and a "three-day delay" was announced.

Announced?

The rule of law is no longer operating in Iraq, and no pretence of constitutional procedure is being striven for. In essence, the prime minister and president have made a sort of coup, simply disregarding the interim constitution.

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002096.html
[Billmon] Well, the hagglers in the backroom bazaar in Baghdad either did or did not submit a draft constitution to Iraq's provisional parliament on Monday, which either met or did not meet the deadline specified in the existing U.S.-imposed temporary constitution.

Most likely they didn't, which means, by rights, parliament should have been dissolved and new elections called. But, to no one's surprise, it wasn't and they weren't. It seems constitutional law in Iraq is already proving extremely responsive to changing social needs. So much for the doctrine of original intent.

What seems to have happened is that the draft hammered out by the Kurdish and Shi'a party leaders (over the howls of the Sunni party leaders) was submitted and then withdrawn, or tabled, or something. In any case, it won't be voted on for another three days, giving the negotiators one more chance to resolve their differences. If the gimmick works, nobody's going to sweat the unconstitutional details. If it doesn't work, it won't matter, because Iraq will be well on its way towards civil war.

Huge issues still remain

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1824
“I did see the draft, I wasn't allowed to touch it tho It looks like a hastily written document, not even good hand writing. It is hand written and with lots of things crossed out. Each page is signed by a member of the Shia coalition and a member of the Kurdish coalition.”

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124925/
There is a lot of uncertainty about exactly what is the draft, which is understandable since early reports said that neither journalists nor most politicians were allowed to see it. . . The NYT's account of how it all went down is priceless:

At about 11:45, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, in his front-row seat, scribbled something, possibly his signature, on a large sheet of paper and handed it to Hussain al-Shahristani, the deputy speaker, who was standing over him. Mr. Shahristani turned around and gave the paper to Hachem al-Hassani, the Assembly speaker, who was seated at the center of the podium in front of the Assembly.

Mr. Hassani took the paper, left the room for a few minutes and returned. At that point, contrary to all expectations, there was no vote of any kind.

"Today we received the draft of the constitution," Mr. Hassani said into his microphone at approximately 11:55. "But there are some undecided points."

"So these points will be dealt with in the forthcoming three days," he added.

Then the meeting hastily broke up. The Assembly members streamed out, nearly all of them without a copy of the constitution in hand.

. . . The U.S. ambassador to Iraq praised the draft as "very good." While there have been reports that the ambassador pushed an Islam-heavy draft and helped railroad Sunnis, the LAT and Christian Science Monitor both suggest the ambassador deserves more credit than that. "He's played a very good role slowing the other parties down," said one Sunni politician.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1820

The actual text, annotated (thanks to Michael Froomkin for the link)

http://rjwaldmann.blogspot.com/2005/08/incomplete-attempt-to-translate.html

The status of women’s rights

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/22/how-the-white-house-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-islamic-law/

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/22/07/10/a-law-unto-themselves/

Could this version fail in the October referendum?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/22/1232/76108

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3956
So if the draft constitution does not win 2/3s approval in three of the four Sunni-majority provinces it's back to the drawing board. Ironic, ain't it.

[WSWS] The three province veto clause was inserted into the political framework on the insistence of the Kurdish parties, with the backing of the US, so they could defeat any constitution that did not deliver autonomy. It now has the potential to rebound against them. At least four provinces have a clear Sunni majority.

http://makeashorterlink.com/?S25C529AB
"If it passes, there will be an uprising in the streets," Sunni negotiator Saleh al-Mutlak said after a 10-minute sitting at which Hassani declared the draft had been delivered on time.

"We will campaign ... to tell both Sunnis and Shi'ites to reject the constitution, which has elements that will lead to the break-up of Iraq and civil war," Soha Allawi, another Sunni Arab on the constitution-drafting committee, told Reuters.

Fareed Zakaria predicted the future (good piece)

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007458
Democracy without constitutional liberalism is not simply inadequate, but dangerous, bringing with it the erosion of liberty, the abuse of power, ethnic divisions, and even war.

Bush: Raising the bar out of reach

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200235.html
Bush said the only acceptable outcome is "total victory over the terrorists and their hateful ideology." He did not define what he meant by total victory.

More: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050822/pl_nm/bush_dc

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/23/34223/6772

CNN’s “Dead Wrong” – hope you saw it

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/22/231310/044
Although the information that came across in CNN's special, "Dead Wrong," on Sunday night was not new, it was surprising. Not the information so much as the fact that CNN aired it.

Those damn facts

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082201447.html
No Proof Found of Iran Arms Program
Traces of bomb-grade uranium found two years ago in Iran came from contaminated Pakistani equipment and are not evidence of a clandestine nuclear weapons program, a group of U.S. government experts and other international scientists has determined.

"The biggest smoking gun that everyone was waving is now eliminated with these conclusions," said a senior official. . .

John Bolton, stubborn and tactless bully, arrives at the UN and starts to act like. . . a stubborn and tactless bully. So much for “reform”

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3951
The United States has launched a last-minute drive to scrap much of a draft plan for comprehensive U.N. reform just weeks before it is to be adopted at a world summit, Western diplomats said on Wednesday.

One option put forward by Washington would be to return to square one and launch line-by-line negotiations on the document, the diplomats said, insisting on anonymity so as not to anger Washington.

The only interesting thing remaining in the increasingly silly Able Danger story is whether the Pentagon DID have information about Atta that they hid from the 9-11 committee. Chairman Kean from the 9-11 committee asked them to look into this, and with customary care and diligence, the DoD got right on it (uh-huh)

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006964.php
The Able Danger story is now officially FUBAR. Somebody is either brazenly lying or else bending the truth so far that it's no longer even recognizable.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200473.html
The Pentagon has been unable to validate claims that a secret intelligence unit identified Sept. 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta as a terrorist more than a year before the attacks, a Defense Department spokesman said Monday.

Larry Di Rita said that some research into the matter continues, but thus far there has been no evidence that the intelligence unit, called "Able Danger," came up with information as specific as an officer associated with the program has asserted.

"What we found are mostly general references to terrorist cells," Di Rita said, without providing detail. . . Di Rita said Pentagon researchers have found no evidence that Able Danger had Mohamed Atta's name. He said he was unsure whether the unit came up with the identities of the other three hijackers but then said that none of Shaffer's specific claims had been validated. . .

Cover-up? http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002404.html

God’s Death Squad. Pat Robertson, who recently asked Christians to pray for more “openings” (nudge nudge, hint hint) on the Supreme Court, now asks for a political assassination in Venezuela. You think I’m joking?

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508220006
“You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. . . We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.”

Theocracy watch, part 951

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-statesman23aug23,1,5053524.story
In the blue and gold elegance of the House speaker's private dining room, Jeremy Bouma bowed his head before eight young men and women who hope to one day lead the nation. He prayed that they might find wisdom in the Bible — and govern by its word.

"Holy Father, we thank you for providing us with guidance," said Bouma, who works for an influential televangelist. "Thank you, Lord, for these students. Build them up as your warriors and your ambassadors on Capitol Hill."

"Amen," the students murmured. Then they picked up their pens expectantly.

Nearly every Monday for six months, as many as a dozen congressional aides — many of them aspiring politicians — have gathered over takeout dinners to mine the Bible for ancient wisdom on modern policy debates about tax rates, foreign aid, education, cloning and the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

Through seminars taught by conservative college professors and devout members of Congress, the students learn that serving country means first and always serving Christ.

They learn to view every vote as a religious duty, and to consider compromise a sin.

That puts them at the vanguard of a bold effort by evangelical conservatives to mold a new generation of leaders who will answer not to voters, but to God. . .

Shocked, shocked!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082201230.html
The Bush administration yesterday suspended a federal grant to the Silver Ring Thing abstinence program, saying it appears to use tax money for religious activities. . .

Roberts on civil rights (thanks to Atrios for the link). Now I think we know why that affirmative action file is “missing”

http://lawandpolitics.blogspot.com/2005_08_01_lawandpolitics_archive.html#112465818845645075

Connecticut sues to block NCLB, calls it an “unfunded mandate”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200588.html
Experts expect that states could vote to join the lawsuit or file their own. . . The lawsuit argues that No Child Left Behind is illegal because it requires expensive standardized tests and other school programs that the government doesn't pay for.

This could still turn into something: Ohio investigation into 2004 election fraud continues

http://www.cleveland.com/search/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1124703332226220.xml?ncounty_cuyahoga&coll=2

Well, they said it couldn’t be done -- but darn it, once George Bush puts his mind to something, there’s no stopping him: breaks the 40% barrier, drops into the mid-30’s in approval

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/22/13239/6977
American Research Grop. 8/18-21. MoE 3% (July results)
Bush approval ratings

Approve 36
Disapprove 58

As Think Progress notes, these are lower numbers than Nixon during Watergate.

The tipping point? http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007460

[NB: Congratulations to Holden, over at First Draft, who has been hoping for this milestone (or millstone) for weeks: http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3959]

Sure, everyone deserves a day in court, but why is the GOP working so hard to provide defense funds to DeLay associates accused of money-laundering and illegal contributions?

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006326

Dept of Justice trying to get Abramoff to turn (maybe – they sure don’t seem to be in any hurry about it)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_21.php#006325

We know how it is, George

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3958
[LAT] According to the White House, one of three books Bush chose to read on his five-week vacation is "Salt: A World History" by Mark Kurlansky, who chronicled the rise and fall of what once was considered the world's most strategic commodity. . . The other two books he reportedly brought to Crawford are "Alexander II: The Last Great Tsar" by Edvard Radzinsky and "The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History" by John M. Barry. . . "The president enjoys reading and learning about history," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

[NYT] "I'm going to have lunch with Secretary of State Rice, talk a little business. . . take a little nap. I'm reading an Elmore Leonard book right now, knock off a little Elmore Leonard this afternoon. . . a light dinner and head to the ballgame. I get to bed about 9:30 p.m.”

Bonus item: Why do they hate the troops?

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3955



***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:54 AM

 
VEILED THREATS

We’ll know the final stakes soon, but it looks as if the U.S. is prepared to sell women’s rights down the river to get their precious Iraq deal. Anything you’d like to add, my sisters?

http://www.bigbrassblog.com/2005/08/so-after-all-lives-lost-in-iraq-us.html
[Ms. Julien] After talking for years about the evil of Saddam Hussein (and yes he was evil), and saying that the very REASON we were going to war, and then staying at war (even when the WMD lie was exposed) was to give the Iraqis a "Democracy". . . the US has just agreed to allow the clause in the constitution of Iraq that "Islam will be THE main source of law" in the country. . .

Women will:

1. Not be allowed an education (even writing or reading in most cases)
2. Not be allowed to drive
3. Not be allowed to be seen anywhere outside their homes without the shroud of a burka
4. If a woman is raped, she will be the criminal, not the man who raped her
5. Under Islamic law, if a women is even accused of adultery, she is killed - usually by a father or brother or uncle, and this is okay - women are not allowed into a court to defend themselves

All of these rules are very familiar in Saudi Arabia - the country where the majority of the 9/11 terrorists came from. . .

I am angry. I am a person betrayed by my country. And the people who sit day after day, complacent in their little lives (never having traveled or want to outside the US), who will see the filtered news saying that "Iraq has a constitution" and will say, see, what a wonderful thing Georgie did. . . these are the people for whom I hold the greatest contempt.

http://wilsonhellie.typepad.com/for_the_record/2005/08/iraqi_women_sol.html
[Jessica Wilson] Iraqi women sold down the river to a future of violent intimidation, gender enslavement, second-class citizenship, and ignorance, with the help of the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq. . .

And you WON’T BELIEVE the Bush loyalists’ response

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8926876/
[Meet the Press] MR. GREGORY: And we're back and joined by former Middle East specialist for the CIA, Reuel Marc Gerecht. . . The role of Islam, of course, is a critical issue. And Tim Russert, during an interview with President Bush, asked him about this in February of last year. Let's watch that.

(Videotape, February 8, 2004):

MR. TIM RUSSERT: If the Iraqis choose, however, an Islamic extremist regime, would you accept that, and would that be better for the United States than Saddam Hussein?

PRES. BUSH: They're not going to develop that. And the reason I can say that is because I am very aware of this basic law they're writing. They're not going to develop that, because right here in the Oval Office, I sat down with Mr. Pachachi and Chalabi and al-Hakim, people from different parts of the country that have made the firm commitment that they want a constitution eventually written that recognizes minority rights and freedom of religion.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: Fast forward to this morning. Gentlemen, we put this on the screen from The New York Times. "[American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay] Khalilzad had backed language [in the constitution] that would have given clerics sole authority in settling marriage and family disputes. That gave rise to concerns that women's rights, as they are annunciated in Iraq's existing laws, could be curtailed. ... [The] arrangement, coupled with the expansive language for Islam, prompted accusations from [a Kurdish leader] that the Americans were helping in the formation of an Islamic state.". . .

MR. GERECHT: Actually, I'm not terribly worried about this. I mean, one hopes that the Iraqis protect women's social rights as much as possible. It certainly seems clear that in protecting the political rights, there's no discussion of women not having the right to vote. I think it's important to remember that in the year 1900, for example, in the United States, it was a democracy then. In 1900, women did not have the right to vote. If Iraqis could develop a democracy that resembled America in the 1900s, I think we'd all be thrilled. I mean, women's social rights are not critical to the evolution of democracy. We hope they're there. I think they will be there. But I think we need to put this into perspective.

More: http://jameswolcott.com/archives/2005/08/the_shame_game.php

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_21_digbysblog_archive.html#112464812775510764
[Digby] But, of course, the war itself, from the very beginning, has furthered the goals of violent islamic fundamentalists. This is just frosting on the whole fetid cakewalk.

What this really does is put the coda to the last phony cassus belli --- that by bringing freedom and democracy to a country in the heart of the middle east we would plant the seeds for a thousand flowers to grow. Now, along with the other rationales, we can throw this one on the "no longer operative" pile.

I got an e-mail from someone I respect asking me why I made such a big deal out of women's rights being denied when there are so many other freedoms at stake. It's a legitimate question I suppose, but I think the question answers itself. The fact is that under Saddam, in their everyday lives, one half of the population had more real, tangible freedom than they have now and that they will have under some form of Shar'ia. The sheer numbers of people whose freedom are affected make it the most glaring and tragic symbol of our failed "noble cause."

Iraqi women have enjoyed secular, western-style equality for more than 40 years. Most females have no memory of living any other way. In order to meet an arbitrary deadline for domestic political reasons, we have capitulated to theocrats on the single most important constitutional issue facing the average Iraqi woman --- which means that we have now officially failed more than half of the Iraqis we supposedly came to help. We have "liberated" millions of people from rights they have had all their lives.

This is not to say that an Islamic theocracy is fine in every other way. It will, of course, curb religious freedom entirely. Too bad for the local Jews and Christians --- or secularists, of which there were many in Iraq. It will restrict personal freedom in an infinite number of ways. Theocracies require conformity in thought, word and deed. . .

Another extension may be “likely” – and even if something passes now, there could be a big fight to defeat it in the October referendum. Fascinating analysis

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/another-constitution-cliffhanger.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/22/international/middleeast/22iraq.html

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-fg-constitution22aug22,0,956992.story

Sunnis basically shut out of the process

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124861
Sunnis are hopping mad after having been "cut off" from the negotiations. . . Yesterday's Times said the apparent "American-Iraqi strategy" was to present a deal to Sunnis as a "take-it-or-leave-it proposition."

Sunnis, who called for another delay, are primarily opposed to Shiite and Kurdish pushes for autonomy. If autonomy happens, then there's a good chance oil revenue will stay in oil-field rich north and south while the oil-poor but Sunni-dominated center will be SOL. If those concerns are tossed aside, warned one Sunni politician, "We will start a revolution."

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/21/13253/9300

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iraq.html

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1819

The mess the Bush gang has made

http://billmon.org/archives/002091.html
Juan Cole, quoting the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat, reports that the constitutional negotiators in Baghdad have taken at least a half step towards the creation of an Iranian-style system of clerical rule. . .

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/21/132355/837
[Comment] Not only is it important that the final document both eventually "get done" and also "get done right", but also that the process "get done" in a way that is defensible from a legitimacy perspective, as we are discussing on another post. Remember that the Constitution still has to be ratified by the people of Iraq and any of the three major ethnic groups in that country effectively hold a veto power. I can not see how alienating huge pockets of the population now could help the final draft get ratified. Instead it seems more likely to lead to a civil war.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1817

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/prospect-of-islamic-law-in-iraq.html

http://www.pageoneq.com/news/2005/bush_caves_0821.html

“Reverse flypaper,” discussed here yesterday, is already beginning

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3946
[Holden] So, Iraq is exporting insurgent tactics to Afghanistan. . .

[WP] A roadside bomb killed four U.S. soldiers and wounded three Sunday as they were patrolling in southern Afghanistan, the deadliest attack on American forces here in nearly two months, the U.S. military said. . . Also Sunday, a roadside bomb exploded near a convoy of U.S. Embassy vehicles, wounding two American officials, an embassy spokesman said. Police officials said the blast occurred on the western outskirts of Kabul.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124861/
Four more American soldiers were killed by a bomb in Afghanistan. Two embassy employees were also lightly wounded when a bomb hit their armored SUV near Kabul. A pro-government cleric was also assassinated. The Post describes a "wave of near-daily attacks against" in the past week. As the NYT headlines, this has been the deadliest year so far for GIs in Afghanistan; at least 65 have been killed, 13 in August alone. With the elections next month, everybody expects attacks to increase.

An unnamed Afghan security official told the NYT that al-Qaida men have come back from Iraq and taught local fighters unspecified "new tactic they learned in Iraq." The Post says the bomb that killed the GIs destroyed an armored Humvee, which was "tossed into the air." Have insurgents in Afghanistan used such big bombs before?

Chuck Hagel (R-NE): Iraq is becoming another Vietnam (and he should know)

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/hagel-iraq-looking-like-vietnam-and.html
"Stay the course is not a policy," said Hagel, a possible White House contender in 2008. "By any standard, when you analyze 2 1/2 years in Iraq ... we're not winning.". . .

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/21/AR2005082100375.html

http://crookedtimber.org/2005/08/21/why-does-chuck-hagel-hate-america/
[Kieran Healy] Hagel was awarded two Purple Hearts for his service in Vietnam, so I’m sure that by Wednesday we’ll be hearing from Michelle Malkin that he might have shot himself in the leg to get them. In the meantime, here’s a proleptic taster of what might be in store, courtesy of the National Review’s Rich Lowry. Way back in August 2002, Hagel was talking about the risks of invading Iraq. The Corner spoke out in response:

Chuck Hagel is now deemed a foreign-policy sophisticate for mindlessly repeating over and over that there are “risks” to invading Iraq. Golly, Chuck, really? Hagel MUST have a Ph.D. in international relations or something to have developed such a nuanced view of American foreign policy. Who knows how many thousands of hours of study and thought it took Hagel to come to the conclusion that invading Iraq is “complicated” and “risky”? I bet Nebraska has never been blessed with such Metternich-ian savvy, possibly ever. So, it’s really too bad that Hagel debased his foreign-policy genius in the New York Times today by resorting to the most shamelessly stupid of peacenik arguments: “Maybe Mr. Perle would like to be in the first wave of those who go into Baghdad.” Ohhh, Chuck—your rhetorical powers are over-awing us here in The Corner. How long did it take you to think that one up?

[NB: Boy, the Right really loves to bash decorated war heroes (when they don't toe the proper ideological line), don't they? So much for "supporting the troops."]

Is Iran sending weapons into Iraq? Rumsfeld states it as a fact: but others aren’t so sure

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/more-on-iran-and-iraq-or-part-13-of.html

At the Pentagon, now that Wolfowitz and Feith are gone you’re hearing all this talk about a “new realism” – think these two events might be connected?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/21/AR2005082100800.html

So what SHOULD our position be in challenging the disastrous Bush non-plan? As usual, simple alternatives like “pull out now” versus “stay the course” frame the choices in ways that are not conducive to thoughtful analysis. Juan Cole helps

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/ten-things-congress-could-demand-from.html
Personally, I think "US out now" as a simple mantra neglects to consider the full range of possible disasters that could ensue. For one thing, there would be an Iraq civil war. . . And as I have argued before, an Iraq civil war will likely become a regional war, drawing in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Turkey. If a regional guerrilla war breaks out among Kurds, Turks, Shiites and Sunni Arabs, the guerrillas could well apply the technique of oil pipeline sabotage to Iran and Saudi Arabia, just as they do now to the Kirkuk pipeline in Iraq. If 20% of the world's petroleum production were taken off-line by such sabotage, the poor of the world would be badly hurt, and the whole world would risk another Great Depression. . . .

So here is what I would suggest as a responsible stance toward Iraq. Others, including Iraqi politicians, have already suggested most of these things, but I think the below hang together and could avert a tragedy while allowing us to get out. . .

“Able Danger – moving past the question of its dubious provenance, what interesting effects it is having!

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/the_whs_brushof.html
[T]he chairman of the defunct 9/11 commission has lashed out at the Bush Administration for failing to address publicly claims that the panel ignored a tip that Atta had been flagged in the U.S. as a terrorist well before he led the 2001 attacks.

Former chairman Tom Kean told TIME that the White House should confirm whether, right after 9/11, Congressman Curt Weldon handed then Deputy National Security Adviser Steven Hadley a 1999 Pentagon chart pegging Atta as a member of al-Qaeda. Weldon makes the allegation in a book he published this summer and claims the commission failed to scrutinize a Pentagon data-mining program called "Able Danger." "I'm offended, because people say, 'Well, why didn't you do anything?'" says Kean.

[Eric Umansky] As I've already mentioned, I spoke to an "administration official" who spoke on behalf on the White House and strongly suggested that the White House is simply not interested in ferreting out the facts. From my previous post:

Here's what an "administration official" told me: "The 9/11 commission has already responded to Congressman Weldon. On your particular question [about Weldon's puportedly handing the 'Atta Chart' to Hadley], I've got nothing for you on that."

I wish the "administration official" hadn't been so insistent on the vague I.D. ("an administration official"). Given the banal statement what would be the harm in not even a name but a more specific I.D.?

More importantly, I wish the administration hadn't decided to punt. Afterall, say the administration had no info about Weldon's purported chart hand-off, why not simply say that? Could it be--and I'm just guessing here--that not pissing off a sympatico congressman was deemed to be more important than giving citizens a glimpse of the truth?

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002398.html

Curt Weldon’s motives in trumpeting the successful “data mining” methods that supposedly identified Atta before 9-11?

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/21/09/12/coinky-dink-2/
Now, this explains quite a bit. I knew there had to be something in the whole Able Danger tale for Weldon. . .

[Multinational Monitor] And it has not just been contractors and procurement officials eager to feed at the homeland security budget trough. Representative Curt Weldon, R-Pennsylvania, is pushing the Bush administration and Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge to establish a National Operations and Analysis Hub (NOAH), a supercomputer-based Internet data mining system that would assist the military and intelligence community in pulling information of interest from the world wide web. For years, Weldon has maneuvered to win Congressional support for a supercomputer project led by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), a major defense and intelligence contractor. The project, called HUBS (Hospitals, Universities, Businesses and Schools), links computer systems in Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania. HUBS was the brainchild of Dr. Da Hsuan Feng, Weldon’s former technical adviser on the House Subcommittee on Military Research and Development, which Weldon chairs. Dr. Feng is now a vice president of SAIC at the firm’s King of Prussia facility , also situated in Weldon’s district. SAIC not only manages HUBS, which has received more than $25 million in federal financing, but stands to profit from NOAH, which Weldon proposes be headquartered in his district.

[Susan Madrak] In addition to data mining, it turns out SAIC’s a major supplier of surveillance technology to U.S. spy agencies. And Weldon’s consistently pushed for more spying on U.S. citizens, and is now claiming we could have stopped 9/11 … if only we’d done more data mining. Hmm.

Too bad: Joe Scarborough, perhaps the only candidate for the Florida Senate seat who could become a BIGGER embarrassment than Katherine Harris, declines to run against her

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/21/scarborough_declines_senate_bid.html

New children’s book: “Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed” (no kidding)

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/21/23/03/paranoia-strikes-deep-into-your-lives-it-will-creep/

Bonus item: Lott on Frist

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8926876/
MR. GREGORY: Let me ask you briefly about the man who replaced you as majority leader. . .

SEN. LOTT: Yeah.

MR. GREGORY: . . . Senator Frist. And he, of course, ascended to that position after you resigned. You write this in the book: "I considered [Sen. Bill] Frist's power grab a personal betrayal. When he entered the Senate in 1995, I had taken him under my wing. . . He was my protege, and I helped him get plum assignments and committee positions. . . .When I learned of his move, I felt, and still feel, that he was one of the main manipulators of the whole scenario. No other senior senator with stature would have run against me. . . . If Frist had not announced exactly when he did, as the fire was about to burn out, I would still be majority leader of the Senate today. But Bill Frist did not even have the courtesy to call and tell me personally that he was going to run."

According to reports, initially in the book, before its final publication, you had described Frist as an ingrate.

SEN. LOTT: That may have been in there way back, but it was not in any of the later revisions and certainly not in the final version. Again, obviously I did feel betrayed by that, but Senator Frist and I have talked that through. . . I don't think we should dwell on how he got where he is or where I got where I am. . .

MR. GREGORY: Without dwelling on that, you write about it in your book. Let me ask you this: Do you believe that Senator Frist has the character to be president?

SEN. LOTT: [Long pause] I think I'd have to think about that. I haven't made a decision on who I'm going to support for the nomination. There are a lot of good people out there. I probably would lean towards some of the others. Let me just put it that way.

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:59 AM

 
THROWN OVERBOARD

Well, we saw it coming. The Bush gang’s cynical exploitation of every issue for domestic political consumption and the complete abandonment of principle have finally settled into the Iraq endgame. Only one thing matters now: troops must begin coming home before the next election. For that to happen a constitution and minimally legitimate Iraqi government have to be in place – and it doesn’t matter any more what that government looks like or whether it can actually govern effectively. The insurgency and civil factionalism will continue, but it won’t be our fault any longer. Iraq (or at least part of it) will become an Islamist state with strong ties to Iran. Soon after that we’ll see the “reverse flypaper” principle: the terrorists drawn to Iraq to attack U.S. troops will begin to migrate elsewhere. Great job, guys!

Bush once again treats us to another episode of Groundhog Day

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/050820/dcsa003.html?.v=8
In a few weeks, our country will mark the four-year anniversary of the attacks of September the 11th, 2001. On that day, we learned that vast oceans and friendly neighbors no longer protect us from those who wish to harm our people. And since that day, we have taken the fight to the enemy.

We have combated terrorists on the home front by disrupting terror cells and their financial support networks. We're fighting the terrorists in Afghanistan, Iraq, and around the world, striking them in foreign lands before they can attack us here at home. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-is-in-full-spin-mode-on-iraq.html
[Joe] Same speech over and over. Scary that the only thing Bush has to can say to Americans about Iraq is: September the 11th. This time, most Americans don't seem to be falling for it.

Expect more of the same: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-08-20-bush-war_x.htm

Michael Scheuer: Iraq an “absolutely disastrous decision”

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/19.html#a4530
SCHEUER: The war in Iraq has broken the back of our counterterrorism effort. I‘m not an expert on the threat posed by Saddam Hussein, but the invasion of Iraq has made sure this war will last decades ahead and it has transferred bin Laden and al Qaeda from being man and an organization into being a philosophy and a movement. We‘ve really made sure that the war against us is going to be a long and very bloody one. Iraq was an absolutely disastrous decision.

Lovely

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-troops21aug21,1,7303556.story
The Army is planning for the possibility of keeping the current number of soldiers in Iraq for four more years, the Army's top general said Saturday.

Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker said the Army was prepared for the "worst case" in terms of the required level of troops in Iraq. . . "We are now into '07-'09 in our planning," Schoomaker told Associated Press.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006949.php
[Kevin Drum] A couple of days ago I proposed that we should publicly announce a firm plan for withdrawal from Iraq. One reason for this, I suggested, was that the open-ended presence of American troops was helping to fuel the very insurgency that we're trying to fight. Apparently I'm not alone in thinking this. . .

[NB: What happens when you put these two stories together?]

Wondering how the Iraqi constitutional process is going (since it has pretty much been ignored by the media all week, and will be until they give it breathless minute-by-minute coverage Monday to see if they will make the deadline)? Because “making the deadline” is a criterion of success that can fit into TV’s need for instant-analysis. The Shiites seem to be using the threat of the deadline, and the need to hold elections all over again, as leverage against the other parties – and because the U.S. can’t afford to see the constitutional process “fail,” they have started backing the key Shiite demands

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1815
The Washington Post chimes in, too, about Khalilzad supporting the Shiite line. The Kurds seem shocked -- I don't blame them -- and as Prof. Cole notes this morning, they're going to the U.S. media in a last-ditch effort to push back. But Cole also reports:

Shaikh Abdul Mahdi al-Karbala'i, the representative of Grand Ayatollah Sistani in Karbala, said in his Friday prayers sermon, "It is not important to finish the constitution on schedule. Rather, the important thing is to achieve the unity of Iraq, with regard to territory and people both now and in the future, and to avoid provoking a partition or breakup, and to preserve for us its Islamic identity." He added, "If the constitution does not bring these things in its train, then it will not be welcomed."

There's the power play in a nutshell -- calling the Sunni/Kurdish bluff about forcing the government to dissolve, Team Shiite said, "That's fine with us" and that there wouldn't be a constitution unless they got their way on Islamic law and limiting Kurdish independence. And apparently, that got the Americans to blink.

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/iraq_constituti.html
[Eric Umansky] If it's really true that a good portion of Sunni leaders are now pushing for Sunnis take part in the next vote--and in the process potentially making political participation the wedge issue among insurgents that every has been hoping for.... And if it's really true that the U.S. , desperate to get any constitutional deal, has acceded to and is indeed pushing for Shiite demands for the constitution, then, again, I'm left wondering: Would dumping this constitutional assembly and holding elections again would be a bad thing?

Federalism in Iraq: is there any way to resolve this dispute?

http://yglesias.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/20/144613/550

This is a major development – major not because it leads to a “successful” resolution of the constitutional process, but major because it shows the complete abrogation of principle by the Bush gang, any principle but creating enough of an appearance of legitimacy to allow them to declare success and start pulling out troops. It looks like the Shiites will have their way on nearly every major issue. The Kurds and Sunnis we enticed into the process get screwed. And guess who will pay the biggest price for this?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112458143800175958
[Reuters] Islam will be "the main source" of Iraq's law and parliament will observe religious principles, negotiators said on Saturday after what some called a major turn in talks on the constitution and a shift in the U.S. position.

If agreed by Monday's parliamentary deadline, it would appear to be a major concession to Islamist leaders from the Shi'ite Muslim majority and sit uneasily with U.S. insistence on the primacy of democracy and human rights in the new Iraq. . . .

[Digby] Well, we're not really talking about human rights now are we? We're talking about women's rights, which are always negotiable. . . .

How about you Condi? Are you proud of what you've done? You just "freed" 13 million women into second class citizenship -- probably into hell. Tough luck ladies. Don't worry, though, your granddaughters might get their rights back in their lifetimes. You can't stop progress, you know.

And what about you, George you misbegotten cretin. Is this what you were talking about in all these windy speeches about freedom being the gift of the almighty and all that other flatulent twaddle you peddle to the silly rubes who confuse leadership with frat boy swagger? Did you free the Iraqis so they could live under Ayatollahs?

More: http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/the_war_in_iraq_/2005/08/the_us_pushes_for_a_theocratic_iraq.php

Khalilzad’s capitulation

http://billmon.org/archives/002089.html

The Sunnis aren’t happy

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/this_doesnt_see.html
[NYT] Sunni leaders complained Saturday that they were being left out of the negotiations. Indeed, it appeared that an American-Iraqi strategy was to strike a deal between the Shiites and the Kurds first, and then present it to the Sunnis as a take-it-or-leave-it proposition.

[Eric Umansky] Let's hope the Times report is overdone. Because if it's true, that "strategy "is a helluva way to draw Sunnis into the process. . . And I'm honestly a bit perplexed. Is it really as simple as the administration wanting some "good news" in Iraq--a constitution--even it means doing just the opposite of what's most likely to undercut the insurgency? I hope not and I fear so.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1816

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/headline/world/3318992

The Kurds aren’t very happy either

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1815

The Shiites are very happy

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/islamic-law-primary-in-iraqi.html
Al-Hayat writes, "Also, an agreement was reached that Islam is the religion of state, and that no law shall be enacted that contradicts the agreed-upon essential verities of Islam. Likewise, the inviolability of the highest [Shiite] religious authorities in the land is safeguarded, without any allusion to a detailed description. The paragraph governing these matters will specify that Islam is 'the fundamental basis' for legislation, though there will be an allusion to the protection of democratic values, human rights, and social and national values. A Higher Council will be formed to review new legislation to ensure it does not contravene the essential verities of the Islamic religion." Personal status law, concerning marriage, divorce, alimony, inheritance, and so forth, will be adjudicated by religious courts in accordance with the religion or sect to which the individual belongs.

The brink of open civil war (maybe this is ALREADY civil war)

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124854/
The paramilitary wings of Kurdish and Shiite political parties in northern and southern Iraq have spun webs of corruption and violence that may undermine any attempts to bring those regions under a federal Iraqi state, the WP reports. Kidnappings, assassinations, and other violent crimes run rampant around primarily Shiite Basra in the south and Kurdish-controlled Mosul in the north, with each group trying to stamp out their opposition. The crimes are often committed by coalition-trained security forces, whose true allegiance lies with ethnic or religious political parties, not any sort of central Iraqi authority. The WP writes that the local groups seem more intent on dominating their respective territories than participating in a unified Iraqi government, enforcing their authority with the kind of swift brutality that seems only too familiar.

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/20/AR2005082001317.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002090.html

Another instance where the Bush gang reveals its shaky commitment to democracy (when it doesn’t produce the results that they want). Hey, guys, there’s a difference between Venezuela and Cuba!

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/rumsfeld-in-south-america-what-gall.html

The U.S.’s damaged image abroad: Bush gang treats it as a PR problem

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/21/politics/21diplo.html
For years, President Bush has called on Karen P. Hughes, his confidante from Texas, to help devise replies to attacks from political foes. Now Ms. Hughes, installed at the State Department, plans to set up "rapid response" teams to counter bad news and defend administration policies around the globe.

The teams, to be set up in the Middle East and elsewhere, are one of several initiatives being prepared by Ms. Hughes, who took office this week as under secretary of public diplomacy. The initiatives are part of what Bush administration officials say will be an aggressive drive to repair America's poor image abroad, particularly in Muslim countries.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in an interview this week that the units would "work to deal with misinformation and misinterpretation." During the war in Afghanistan, Ms. Rice said, the administration discovered that it had to rebut "all kinds of lies about what we were doing.". . .

[NB: Hey guys, the problem isn’t with the LIES – the problem is with the FACTS]

Bye bye Doug Feith

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/village-voice-on-feith-us-foreign.html
[Juan Cole] US foreign policy supports the withdrawal of Israeli colonizers from the Palestinian Gaza Strip. But the outgoing number 3 man at the Pentagon, the son of a founder of the proto-fascist Likud Party, has his own foreign policy and fanatically favors the aggressive expansion of Israel and further expropriation of Palestinian property. It is shameful that he is only now resigning, since he has all along opposed the roadmap to peace of the Bush administration. And while others might have had complex motives for taking out Saddam, the reams of disinformation that issued from Feith's "Office of Special Plans" are easily explained. He saw the Baath regime as a brake on his hopes for a "Greater Israel." As number 3 in the US Department of Defense, moroever, it is hard to see how he could have been insulated from the decisions that led to the torture of Arab prisoners.

If France appointed Jean-Marie LePen as its number 3 in the Ministry of Defense, there would be howls of outrage from the international community. But Feith's commitment to colonizing Palestinians is just as racist a project as any of LePen's programs. If any other American bureaucrat had dared to maintain that it is perfectly all right for one country to colonize another, he would have been considered poison in Washington. But the Likudniks have made themselves respectable in ways that are mysterious to those of us outside the beltway.

More: http://villagevoice.com/blogs/bushbeat/archive/001182.php

Pope tells Muslims how to interpret their religion

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/21/international/europe/21pope.html

VERRRY inneresting. . .

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011934.html
[Globe and Mail – OF COURSE a non-US paper] And always, he [Patrick Fitzgerald] has methodically, inexorably pursued his investigations to target the man at the top of the organizational pyramid. . . People who have watched Mr. Fitzgerald operate in Chicago, and before that as assistant U.S. Attorney in New York City, are not surprised by his zeal in pursuing the journalists. But don't expect him to stop there. . . That's how he operates: Apply maximum pressure to reluctant witnesses in order to build an air-tight case against the most senior member of a criminal conspiracy.

“Able Danger”: Until further notice, or significant new evidence, I think this topic is no longer credible enough to spend time on

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006945.php
[Fox] August 19: "Shaffer conceded that during his own personal briefing of Sept. 11 commission staffers in Afghanistan in Oct. 2003, he didn't specifically name the terrorists. Instead, he detailed how Able Danger had uncovered information about three terror cells with the use of then-advanced data-mining techniques."

[Kevin Drum] Shaffer has been making the same claim for nearly two weeks, a claim that he repeated even after the 9/11 Commission had denied it. Today he had a change of heart.

Fine. But doesn't this also throw into doubt Shaffer's claim that Able Danger identified Atta prior to 9/11? After all, if Able Danger really did ID Atta — complete with a picture and his position in the al-Qaeda organization — it's awfully hard to believe that Shaffer wouldn't have mentioned that when he briefed the 9/11 Commission, isn't it?

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006946.php
Shaffer's most explosive charge is that he tried to set up meetings with the FBI to tell them about Mohamed Atta a year before 9/11. Now, however, he says he didn't even know Able Danger had identified Atta until other team members told him about it after 9/11. Needless to say, something doesn't add up here. For the record, here are two different versions of his story. . .

More: http://corner.nationalreview.com/05_08_14_corner-archive.asp#073732

http://corner.nationalreview.com/05_08_14_corner-archive.asp#073750

Frank Rich: “The Swift Boating of Cindy Sheehan”

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/21/opinion/21rich.html
Character assassination is the Karl Rove tactic of choice, eagerly mimicked by his media surrogates, whenever the White House is confronted by a critic who challenges it on matters of war. The Swift Boating is especially vicious if the critic has more battle scars than a president who connived to serve stateside and a vice president who had "other priorities" during Vietnam.

The most prominent smear victims have been Bush political opponents with heroic Vietnam résumés: John McCain, Max Cleland, John Kerry. But the list of past targets stretches from the former counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke to Specialist Thomas Wilson, the grunt who publicly challenged Donald Rumsfeld about inadequately armored vehicles last December. The assault on the whistle-blower Joseph Wilson - the diplomat described by the first President Bush as "courageous" and "a true American hero" for confronting Saddam to save American hostages in 1991 - was so toxic it may yet send its perpetrators to jail.

True to form, the attack on Cindy Sheehan surfaced early on Fox News, where she was immediately labeled a "crackpot" by Fred Barnes. The right-wing blogosphere quickly spread tales of her divorce, her angry Republican in-laws, her supposed political flip-flops, her incendiary sloganeering and her association with known ticket-stub-carrying attendees of "Fahrenheit 9/11." Rush Limbaugh went so far as to declare that Ms. Sheehan's "story is nothing more than forged documents - there's nothing about it that's real."

But this time the Swift Boating failed, utterly, and that failure is yet another revealing historical marker in this summer's collapse of political support for the Iraq war. . . [read on]

Interesting analysis: Bush has done to conservatism what Clinton did to liberalism

http://www.professorbainbridge.com/2005/08/what_might_have.html
[Stephen Bainbridge] It's time for us conservatives to face facts. George W. Bush has pissed away the conservative moment by pursuing a war of choice via policies that border on the criminally incompetent. We control the White House, the Senate, the House of Representatives, and (more-or-less) the judiciary for one of the few times in my nearly 5 decades, but what have we really accomplished? Is government smaller? Have we hacked away at the nanny state? Are the unborn any more protected? Have we really set the stage for a durable conservative majority?. . . Meanwhile, Bush continues to insult our intelligence with tripe like this. . .

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006950.php
[Kevin Drum] Needless to say, I don't share Steve's dismay that George Bush has pissed away the conservative movement, but I think he may well be right that this will turn out to be Bush's legacy. In fact, I think Bush has pissed away the neocon movement too, since the most likely outcome of the Iraq war is an American populace that turns even more strongly against foreign adventurism than it did after Vietnam.

Still, perhaps Steve should take heart. After all, Democrats might fail to take advantage of Bush's folly. Hard to believe, I know. . .

You know, Florida is a pretty big state. You would think the GOP could come up with a better alternative to Katherine Harris than Joe Scarborough

http://correspondent-x.blogspot.com/2005/08/noted-with-interest.html

More: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Joe_Scarborough

Ohio’s crooked GOP governor

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/19/AR2005081900500.html
Gov. Bob Taft, a lame duck leader and now a convicted criminal for state ethics violations, said there is still important work for him to do and he will not resign.

Taft said he can remain an effective governor despite his plea of no contest Thursday to charges that he failed to report numerous golf outings since taking office in 1999. He's barred by law from seeking a third term next year. . . .

"I will work just as hard as I know how to improve this state and to advance this great state of Ohio," Taft said Thursday. "I hope that the people of Ohio will understand that this mistake, although serious, was unintentional. . . As governor I have made it clear that I expect all state workers to comply and follow both the spirit and the letter of Ohio's ethics laws, and I have demanded no less of myself," Taft said.

[Huh?]

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20050818-1640-governorcharged.html
Three former directors under Taft have resigned following accusations that they accepted golf outings and other gifts from companies that did business with their agencies.

State law requires officeholders to report all gifts worth more than $75 if the donor wasn't reimbursed, and a May 2001 Ohio Ethics Commission memo specified that golf rounds should be reported as gifts.

Taft drew a distinction between what those employees did and his own behavior.

"There is no connection between golf for contributions and state contracts in our administration," Taft said. "If you look at the Inspector General reports on those particular individuals, you will see that their issues went beyond financial disclosure."

Taft's golf partners included John Snow, then the head of transportation company CSX Corp. and now the U.S. Treasury secretary; and Tony Alexander, president and chief executive of Akron-based FirstEnergy Corp. Some have said Taft paid for the golf; others have said they picked up the tab.

An Ohio Ethics Commission report into Taft's golf outings found no evidence that Taft traded golf for political access. "Further, attendees at these events largely indicated that the purpose and discussions were social in nature," said the report, released Thursday.

Kentucky’s crooked GOP governor

http://www.wcpo.com/news/2005/local/08/13/fletcher.html
Kentucky Governor Ernie Fletcher has been subpoenaed to appear before a special grand jury investigating personnel practices within his administration. . . .Thus far, nine current or former members of Fletcher's administration have been indicted on a series of misdemeanor charges alleging violations of the Merit System personnel law.

More: http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/20/flechter_under_fire_for_hiring_practices.html

San Diego’s ultra-crooked GOP congressman

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/18/AR2005081801665.html
The U.S. attorney in San Diego is trying to seize Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham's California home, asserting in a sealed civil suit that it was purchased with proceeds from a violation of the bribery statute. . .

An interesting theme for 2006: Do you like what Bush is doing? Re-elect a Congress that will give him anything he wants!

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/20/182048/254

A big shout out to Salt Lake City!

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/20/16/02/a-salty-kinda-guy/
[Salt Lake Tribune] Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson called for “the biggest demonstration this state has ever seen” to protest President Bush’s appearance Monday before a national veterans convention.

“This administration has been disastrous to the country,” Anderson said Friday. “If people could organize and speak out in an effective manner from the reddest state in the country, that would garner a lot of attention.” . . .

“Patriotism,” the mayor said, “demands that people speak out when we see our government officials acting in such anti-democratic and deceitful ways to the people of our country.”

He also said: “I don’t understand people simply blindly going along with the sort of deceit and utter cruelty of this administration. It’s not just we have the right to speak out, but we have the obligation to speak out when we see misconduct on the part of the government. The most patriotic thing we can do is stand up against the misuse of governmental power.”

On the other hand, it IS still Salt Lake City

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-peacead21aug21,1,444074.story
[AP] A Utah television station is refusing to air an antiwar ad featuring Cindy Sheehan, whose son's death in Iraq prompted her vigil outside President Bush's Texas ranch.

The ad began airing on other area stations Saturday, the first day of the national convention here of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, which Bush has been invited to address.

But a national sales representative for ABC affiliate KTVX rejected the ad in an e-mail to media buyers, calling it an "inappropriate commercial advertisement for Salt Lake City."

The Christian Right’s cognitive dissonance over John Roberts

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112456940822319869
[The Nation] The position of Justice Sunday II's organizers consisted of halfhearted apologia through gritted teeth. "The Romer case was perhaps one of the most egregious decisions ever handed down by the Supreme Court. . . and to have Roberts be part of that in any way was troubling," Dobson said during an August 8 appearance on Fox News's Hannity & Colmes. But, Dobson assured the audience, "he had a very minor role." When host Sean Hannity peppered him with questions about Roberts's role on Romer, Dobson was forced to concede that "the Republican senators need to vet him [Roberts] also." It was a stunning role reversal, considering that Dobson and his allies had spent the past month attacking Democratic senators who vowed to question Roberts's views on social issues.

“The way life should be”

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112457736819719392

Another conservative blogger with a pretty low tolerance for disagreement and criticism (thanks to Atrios for the link)

http://www.pandagon.net/archives/2005/08/i_purposefully.html

Bonus item: “Intelligent Falling” (thanks to Josh Marshall for the link)

http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4133&n=2
KANSAS CITY, KS—As the debate over the teaching of evolution in public schools continues, a new controversy over the science curriculum arose Monday in this embattled Midwestern state. Scientists from the Evangelical Center For Faith-Based Reasoning are now asserting that the long-held "theory of gravity" is flawed, and they have responded to it with a new theory of Intelligent Falling.

"Things fall not because they are acted upon by some gravitational force, but because a higher intelligence, 'God' if you will, is pushing them down," said Gabriel Burdett, who holds degrees in education, applied Scripture, and physics from Oral Roberts University. . .

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:04 AM

 
LOW POINTS

CIA Director Porter Goss, having watered down the conclusions of the CIA report on 9-11, is now sitting on the final version

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/19/AR2005081901526.html

Powell aide: UN speech “the lowest point in my life”

http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/19/powell.un/index.html
A former top aide to Colin Powell says his involvement in the former secretary of state's presentation to the United Nations on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was "the lowest point" in his life.

"I wish I had not been involved in it," says Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, a longtime Powell adviser who served as his chief of staff from 2002 through 2005. "I look back on it, and I still say it was the lowest point in my life."

Wilkerson is one of several insiders interviewed for the CNN Presents documentary "Dead Wrong -- Inside an Intelligence Meltdown." The program, which airs Sunday at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. (ET)

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1814

[NB: Set your VCRs and TIVOs – looks like it will be very good]

What Cheney said, didn’t say

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/08/19/BL2005081900835.html
[Dan Froomkin] It was not, in a nutshell, a detailed, reasoned response to the increasingly forceful call for troop withdrawal.

Cheney, for instance, didn't discuss the administration's current military strategy, or the lessons learned since the invasion. He didn't describe in any detail either the current tactical situation or the mission objective. He certainly didn't discuss the merits and drawbacks of alternative approaches, or acknowledge the desire of many Americans to start bringing the troops home now.

What he did -- very much in keeping with previous White House strategy -- was try to marginalize any opposition to the war as being deeply unpatriotic. . .

A wonderful, fascinating, and disturbing resource: Rose Aguilar interviews Bush supporters – here’s a sample

http://storiesinamerica.blogspot.com/2005/08/conversations-at-gas-pump.html

The Taliban: still alive and kicking in Afghanistan (and how our “friend” Pakistan is helping them)

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002395.html

The Bush gang’s new “realism” (uh-huh)

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002393.html

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/18/opinion/18rose.html

“A darkening cloud”

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050819/pl_afp/usiraq

How the Bush gang has tried to construct “democracy” in Iraq, without actually wanting it

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/bush-administration-and-democracratic.html

So how IS that constitutional process coming along? Kirkuk, as everyone predicted, remains a major roadblock

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/sistani-opposes-ceding-kirkuk-to.html

And this will blow your mind. . . (I guess this is part of that “new realism”)

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1815
[AP] The United States is pressuring Kurds to accept demands of majority Shiites and Sunnis on the role of Islam in government in order to reach agreement on a draft constitution, a Kurdish official taking part in the negotiations said early Saturday.

Those demands would give the Muslim religion a bigger role in Iraqi society at the expense of women's rights and civil liberties, said the official, who refused to allow his name to be used because of the sensitivity of the issue.

He told The Associated Press that Kurdish leaders who support more secular policies are bowing to American pressure. . .

[NB: Yes, you read that right -- the US is pressuring the Kurds to accept more Islamist and less secular policies! And, as Swopa points out, part of the massive irony here is that the Kurds have been the Bush gang’s most loyal proxies. Feeling used, are they?]

More annals in the Bush assault on multilateralism

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011927.html

More: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007454

Paul Krugman utters the unspeakable words: the GOP stole the 2000 and 2004 elections, and they will do it again

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/19/opinion/19krugman.htm

Ted Kennedy comes out tough on John Roberts nomination

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/ted-kennedy-comes-out-swinging-on.html

Who is John Roberts?

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/19/101354/694

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/19/173136/082

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124852
The WP's Dana Milbank reports that journalists have unearthed four 1980s-era memos from John Roberts, Supreme Court nominee and precocious fussbudget, to colleagues in the White House, attacking. . . Michael Jackson. Roberts was concerned that Ronald Reagan, a man who once costarred with a chimpanzee, would compromise his dignity by appearing in public with Jackson. . .

Bill Frist, ostensibly a science-based physician, always has a tough time dealing with the anti-science religious right. We saw it with his gutless opportunism over Terri Schiavo and his hilarious interview about whether sweat could cause AIDS. In the latest chapter, he comes out in favor of “Intelligent Design,” the latest effort to re-brand creationism

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/dr-frist-teach-intelligent-design.html

How the “Intelligent Design” debate represents progress in the creationism debate (sort of). Thanks to AG Rud for the link

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/articles/050822ta_talk_hertzberg

The media’s shameful performance on Cindy Sheehan

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/why-are-the-media-having-_b_5884.html

Rush slimes Cindy Sheehan, lies about it, gets caught

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2005/08/his_lips_are_moving.html

The proof: http://mediamatters.org/items/200508180002

E.L. Doctorow, from a year ago: even more relevant post-Sheehan (thanks to AG Rud for the link)

http://www.easthamptonstar.com/20040909/col5.htm
I fault this president for not knowing what death is. He does not suffer the death of our 21-year-olds who wanted to be what they could be. On the eve of D-Day in 1944 General Eisenhower prayed to God for the lives of the young soldiers he knew were going to die. He knew what death was. Even in a justifiable war, a war not of choice but of necessity, a war of survival, the cost was almost more than Eisenhower could bear.

But this president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind for it. You see him joking with the press, peering under the table for the weapons of mass destruction he can't seem to find, you see him at rallies strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving, triumphal, a he-man.

He does not mourn. He doesn't understand why he should mourn. He is satisfied during the course of a speech written for him to look solemn for a moment and speak of the brave young Americans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

But you study him, you look into his eyes and know he dissembles an emotion which he does not feel in the depths of his being because he has no capacity for it. He does not feel a personal responsibility for the 1,000 dead young men and women who wanted to be what they could be. . .

[NB: Now almost 2000. . . ]

John McDonald: I need a drink

http://rockthrower.blogs.com/rockthrower/2005/08/cindy_sheehan.html

“Able Danger: A Big Game of Telephone?”

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/able_danger_all.html
We're getting a better sense of just how little Super Source Anthony Shaffer actually knows. . .

More: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006942.php
Over at The Corner, Andy McCarthy says: "Fox News reported this morning that the Defense Department is going to deny the central Able Danger allegation that Mohammed Atta (and, presumably, the three other hijackers who have been linked to this controversy) were identified prior to the 9/11 attacks." If this is true, I sure hope they offer some evidence for this. I'm not sure anyone is willing to just take their word for it.

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002396.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006945.php

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/shifting_shaffe.html

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112449261199792893

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011920.html

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/08/19/podhertz-liar/

Brilliant title: “What is the sound of one hand clapping?”

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/19/141927/950
[Ellen Miller] Yesterday the Federal Election Commission made public its final action on the illegal contributions from Westar Energy, Inc., two of its former executives and a lobbyist to Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) and Reps. Billy Tauzin (R-La.) and Joe Barton (R-Texas). . . But the FEC finding is only half of the story. If the normally toothless FEC finds a clear violation of the law on the part of the corporation and its executives, shouldn't the lawmakers on the other side of the equation -- who were so aggressive in seeking the contributions -- be subject to an investigation?

More: http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/19/delay/index.html

Woo-hoo! We’re number one!

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/19/132855/161
Its taken just over four years for Bush to break the vacation record it took Reagan eight years to establish. . . 336 days.

Bonus item: service records of leading Democrats, Republicans (thanks to John McDonald for the link)

DEMOCRATS

* Richard Gephardt: Air National Guard, 1965-71.
* David Bonior: Staff Sgt., Air Force 1968-72.
* Tom Daschle: 1st Lt., Air Force SAC 1969-72.
* Al Gore: enlisted Aug. 1969; sent to Vietnam Jan. 1971 as an army journalist in 20th Engineer Brigade.
* Bob Kerrey: Lt. j.g. Navy 1966-69; Medal of Honor, Vietnam.
* Daniel Inouye: Army 1943-47; Medal of Honor, WWII.
* John Kerry: Lt., Navy 1966-70; Silver Star, Bronze Star with Combat V, Purple Hearts.
* Charles Rangel: Staff Sgt., Army 1948-52; Bronze Star, Korea.
* Max Cleland: Captain, Army 1965-68; Silver Star & Bronze Star, Vietnam.
* Ted Kennedy: Army, 1951-53.
* Tom Harkin: Lt., Navy, 1962-67; Naval Reserve, 1968-74.
* Jack Reed: Army Ranger, 1971-1979; Captain, Army Reserve 1979-91.
* Fritz Hollings: Army officer in WWII; Bronze Star and seven campaign ribbons.
* Leonard Boswell: Lt. Col., Army 1956-76; Vietnam, DFCs, Bronze Stars, and Soldier's Medal.
* Pete Peterson: Air Force Captain, POW. Purple Heart, Silver Star and Legion of Merit.
* Mike Thompson: Staff sergeant, 173rd Airborne, Purple Heart.
* Bill McBride: Candidate for Fla. Governor. Marine in Vietnam; Bronze Star with Combat V.
* Gray Davis: Army Captain in Vietnam, Bronze Star.
* Pete Stark: Air Force 1955-57
* Chuck Robb: Vietnam
* Howell Heflin: Silver Star
* George McGovern: Silver Star & DFC during WWII.
* Bill Clinton: Did not serve. Student deferments. Entered draft but received #311.
* Jimmy Carter: Served seven years in the US Navy.
* Walter Mondale: Army 1951-1953
* John Glenn: WWII and Korea; six DFCs and Air Medal with 18 Clusters.
* Tom Lantos: Served in Hungarian underground in WWII. Saved by Raoul Wallenberg.


REPUBLICANS

* Dick Cheney: did not serve. Several deferments, the last by marriage.
* Dennis Hastert: did not serve.
* Tom Delay: did not serve.
* Roy Blunt: did not serve.
* Bill Frist: did not serve.
* Mitch McConnell: did not serve.
* Rick Santorum: did not serve.
* Trent Lott: did not serve.
* John Ashcroft: did not serve. Seven deferments to teach business.
* Jeb Bush: did not serve.
* Karl Rove: did not serve.
* Saxby Chambliss: did not serve. "Bad knee." The man who attacked Max Cleland's patriotism.
* Paul Wolfowitz: did not serve.
* Vin Weber: did not serve.
* Richard Perle: did not serve.
* Douglas Feith: did not serve.
* Eliot Abrams: did not serve.
* Richard Shelby: did not serve.
* Jon Kyl: did not serve.
* Tim Hutchison: did not serve.
* Christopher Cox: did not serve.
* Newt Gingrich: did not serve.
* Donald Rumsfeld: served in Navy (1954-57) as flight instructor.

* George W. Bush: failed to complete his six-year National Guard; got assigned to Alabama so he could campaign for family friend running for U.S. Senate; failed to show up for required medical exam, disappeared from duty.

* Ronald Reagan: due to poor eyesight, served in a non-combat role making movies.
* B-1 Bob Dornan: Consciously enlisted after fighting was over in Korea.
* Phil Gramm: did not serve.
* John McCain: POW; Silver Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross.
* Dana Rohrabacher: did not serve.
* John M. McHugh: did not serve.
* JC Watts: did not serve.
* Jack Kemp: did not serve. "Knee problem," although continued in NFL for 8 years.
* Dan Quayle: Journalism unit of the Indiana National Guard.
* Rudy Giuliani: did not serve.
* George Pataki: did not serve.
* Spencer Abraham: did not serve.
* John Engler: did not serve.
* Lindsey Graham: National Guard lawyer.
* Arnold Schwarzenegger: AWOL from Austrian army base.

MEDIA PUNDITS, SUPREME COURT JUSTICES, & PREACHERS
* Sean Hannity: did not serve.
* Rush Limbaugh: did not serve (4-F with a 'pilonidal cyst.')
* Bill O'Reilly: did not serve.
* Michael Savage: did not serve.
* George Will: did not serve.
* Chris Matthews: did not serve.
* Paul Gigot: did not serve.
* Bill Bennett: did not serve.
* Pat Buchanan: did not serve.
* John Wayne: did not serve.
* Bill Kristol: did not serve.
* Kenneth Starr: did not serve.
* Antonin Scalia: did not serve.
* Clarence Thomas: did not serve.
* Ralph Reed: did not serve.
* Michael Medved: did not serve.
* Charlie Daniels: did not serve.
* Ted Nugent: did not serve. (He only shoots at things that don't shoot back.)

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:02 AM

 
CHICKENS COMING HOME TO ROOST

Dick Cheney shows that Cowboy Thinking is alive and well in the Bush administration

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/18/AR2005081801644.html
Vice President Cheney declared yesterday that the United States "will not relent" in the war in Iraq and will hunt down insurgents there "one at a time if necessary," implicitly rebutting escalating pressure on the Bush administration to bring U.S. troops home.

[NB: This shows decisively how little serious rethinking has gone on at the top in light of the Iraq debacle. They keep thinking the issue is one about THEIR “resolve and determination,” as if persistence itself was the solution to this issue. But persisting in a behavior that is counterproductive constitutes a kind of mental illness. If events since 9-11 have shown anything, it’s that you CAN’T hunt down terrorists “one at a time” – any more than you can hunt cockroaches that way. It isn’t a question of persistence or effort, it’s that the effort is going into a “solution” that cannot possibly solve the problem. Periodic captures of individual terrorists make for good headlines back home, but do nothing to thwart the ongoing growth – GROWTH – of the terrorist movement. It is truly frightening that they don’t seem to have learned this basic fact yet]

The Man With No Missteps is looking a bit wobbly lately

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/18/223349/031
[A]nticipating a presidential interview with Spanish Today, he wrote. "I think this audience would be pleased that we are trying to grant legal status to their illegal amigos."

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/18/221821/134
Some might question whether encouraging homemakers to become lawyers contributes to the common good, but I suppose that is for the judges to decide.

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/18/AR2005081802041.html

http://www.discourse.net/archives/2005/08/first_blood_against_roberts.html

Dems see an opening – partly because of Roberts’ stance on many issues the RIGHT doesn’t trust him on

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/19/democrats_may_change_tactics_on_roberts.html

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/08/19/roberts_as_reagan_aide_backed_national_id_card/
One internal memo could be of particular interest during Roberts's upcoming hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee next month. In it, he ridiculed an anticrime proposal by Senator Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican who is the current chairman of the judiciary committee.

As a younger senator in 1983, the memo showed, Specter had proposed the federal government help fight violent crime by allocating an additional $8 billion a year to federal law enforcement agencies. In an advisory memo, Roberts said it was unlikely Specter's proposal ''will receive any serious consideration" because the plan is ''the epitome of the 'throw money at the problem' approach" that the Reagan administration had repeatedly rejected.

The missing affirmative action file: given the topic, does ANYONE believe this is an accident?

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011904.html
In July, members of the Bush administration reviewed files at the National Archives concerning Judge Roberts' writings on affirmative action. Now, when Senate Democrats want to review the files, they've gone missing. The National Archives staff is taking the heat for the "clerical error," and claim they can reconstruct the file, but a suspicious mind might wonder why documents concerning a contentious issue disappeared after the administration reviewed them.

Governor of Ohio guilty of ethics violation, receives handslap

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/18/national/18cnd-taft.html
Visibly upset and fighting back tears, Gov. Bob Taft of Ohio admitted in court today that he had failed to report nearly $6,000 in gifts and apologized four times as a judge ordered him to pay $4,000 in fines and write a letter to the people of Ohio acknowledging his mistakes.

"I am here today to publicly apologize to the people of the State of Ohio for my failure to provide complete financial disclosure statements to the Ohio Ethics Commission as mandated by law," Mr. Taft told Judge Mark S. Froehlich of the Franklin County Municipal Court in a hearing on the charges. "I accept total responsibility for my mistake, and I'm sorry."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-governor-charged,1,3495793.story

Comment: http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/_/2005/08/discount.php
[Mark Kleiman] Gov. Bob Taft took $5800 in undisclosed gifts, and will have to pay $4000 in fines.

I guess that's called "economy in government."

Update on Duke Cunningham

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006309

More on the “Future of Iraq Project”: war planning began in October 2001

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1808

“Able Danger”: Shaffer’s credibility being batted back and forth between the NY Times and the Washington Post like a ping-pong ball

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/18/AR2005081801751.html
The former intelligence officer who says that a Defense Department program identified Mohamed Atta and three other hijackers before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks said yesterday that many of his allegations are not based on his memory but on the recollections of others. . . [Shaffer] said in a telephone interview that a Navy officer and a civilian official affiliated with the Able Danger program told him after the attacks that Atta and other hijackers had been included on a chart more than a year earlier.

But because he was not intimately familiar with the names and photographs of suspected terrorists, he did not realize that hijackers were listed until it was alleged to him after the attacks, Shaffer said. All of the charts that could support his claims have disappeared, he said.

"I did see the charts and I did handle the charts, but my understanding of them was like a layman," Shaffer said. "We had identified them as terrorists. . . . But even now I do not remember all the names."

The comments add to the uncertainty surrounding assertions by Shaffer and Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), who have said the Able Danger group identified Atta and other hijackers as early as 1999 but was stymied by Defense Department lawyers from sharing information with the FBI. . .

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002390.html

AIPAC scandal reaches to Baghdad

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/fear-stalks-iraq-as-truce-ends-us.html
The second highest ranking US diplomat in Iraq, David Satterfield, has been implicated in the AIPAC spy case. . .

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/18/politics/18inquire.html

http://billmon.org/archives/002088.html
[Billmon] Now if you read the indictment filed against Rosen, his AIPAC colleague Keith Weissman, and Pentagon analyst Larry Franklin, you'll see that "USGO-2" [Satterfield] is just one of a rather large cast of uncredited actors who appear in this movie. Others include:

• "USGO-1," which the Jewish Telegraphic Agency has suggested is someone "recently appointed to a senior Bush administration post."

• DoD employees "A and B," who accompanied Franklin on some of his clandestine meetings with AIPAC's dynamic duo.

• "A senior fellow at a Washington D.C. think tank."

• FO (foreign officials) 1, 2 and 3 -- all alleged diplomats at the Israeli embassy in Washington. FO-3 has been positively identified as Naor Gilon, former head of the embassy's political department, and a guy who, for a political officer, took an awfully keen interest in intelligence matters.

• "A person previously associated with an Israeli intelligence agency, now running a think tank in Israel." This individual has also been identified as ex-Mossad official Uzi Arad.

[NB: Who is USGO 1?]

No accountability in the White House

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-official-in-scandal-promote-him.html
[Michael] Yep, yet another Bush appointee fails in his job and is rewarded with a promotion. The latest is Pentagon official Michael Wynne, who was involved in a scandal that has put two people behind bars. (Wynne himself lied to the White House budget office.) Bush wants Wynne to head the Air Force, which needs a new head because the LAST nominee had his own string of scandals and couldn't get confirmed. My favorite detail about the scandal, which involved leasing jets from Boeing for refueling:

The former Air Force official, Darleen Druyun, is serving a nine-month term at a federal prison in Florida. She admitted inflating the lease price as a "parting gift" to Boeing before leaving the Pentagon for a job at the aircraft giant in 2002.

A "parting gift?" What is this, "The Price Is Right?" How about creating a new reality show where someone tries to get fired by Bush? It could run for years, obviously, since even harming national security and outing a covert agent during war is fine by Bush.

The people, on the other hand, seem ready for some price-paying

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/18/9733/09850
Excerpts of letters in response to Time and Newsweek's simultaneous cover stories on Karl Rove...

"The President's right-hand man is at best a rat and at worst a traitor."

"Rove should be fired immediately, but it will be hard for the President to oust his most trusted adviser."

"It's time for Bush to demonstrate true character and leadership and do as he promised, without parsing the relative legality of Rove's actions, which were at the very least arrogant and unethical. That sort of behavior should not be tolerated by either the President or the American people.". . . [read on!]

More on Plame: http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011916.html

More evidence that the NY Times’ defense of Miller is really the NY Times’ defense of. . . the NY Times

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/howell-raines-redux_b_5822.html
Directly contradicting this position is a former Timesman with impeccable journalistic credentials. Bill Kovach, the former Times Washington bureau chief, former curator of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard, and founding director of the Committee of Concerned Journalists, has publicly voiced what many in and around the paper are saying privately.

“When I was chief of the bureau in Washington,” he told Sidney Blumenthal, “we laid down a rule to the reporters that when they wanted to establish anonymity they had to lay out ground rules that if anything the source said was damaging, false or damaged the credibility of the newspaper we would identify them. If a man damages your credibility, why not lay the blame where it belongs? Whoever was leaking that information to Novak, Cooper or Judy Miller was doing it with malice aforethought, trying to set up a deceptive circumstance. That would invalidate any promise of confidentiality. You wouldn't protect a source for telling lies or using you to mislead your audience. That changes everything. Any reporter that puts themselves or a news organization in that position is making a big mistake.”

Apparently, Sulzberger is furious with Kovach for these remarks. . .

Trent Lott settles a few scores

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/18/trent_lott/index.html

Five Senators in trouble in 2006, and four of them are Repubs: but I want to know how Lincoln Chafee’s (R-RI) popularity has gone up in a heavily anti-Bush state?

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/18/100_senators_ranked.html

Man, the GOP *REALLY* doesn’t want Katherine Harris as their candidate in Florida

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/18/scarborough_being_wooed_for_senate_bid.html

Exhibit A in the decline of American journalism. How can any self-respecting reporter or “commentator” accept this?

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_atrios_archive.html#112437510872977151
[MSNBC] MATTHEWS: Let me go, Paul, before you start. What I keep doing here is asking people on and off camera who come on this program, high-ranking officers, enlisted, former officers. I get sometimes, not all the time, two different versions, the version they give me on the air and the version they give me the minute when we‘re off the air.

The version they give me when we‘re on the air is gung-ho, we‘re doing the right thing, everything is moving along. The version they give me off the air is, Rumsfeld is crazy. There aren‘t enough troops over there. We‘re not taking this seriously enough, or, we shouldn‘t be there, sometimes.

Bonus item: Our President

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/valerie_plame_/2005/08/bush_and_plame.php
[Salon] In 1986, veteran reporter Al Hunt predicted that Jack Kemp would receive the 1988 Republican presidential nomination instead of George H.W. Bush. When George W. saw Hunt dining with his wife and 4-year-old son at a Mexican restaurant in Dallas, he went up to their table and said, "You fucking son of bitch. I won't forget what you said and you're going to pay a fucking price for it." Bush didn't apologize until 13 years later, when the incident resurfaced in the context of his own presidential campaign.

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:40 AM

 
THE CURSE OF MEMORY

The pundits who forgot that the first obligation of the Fourth Estate is skepticism, not cheerleading

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=10113
[Harold Meyerson] In the information age, wars are not made by governments alone. This is especially true of wars of choice. When America has been attacked -- at Pearl Harbor, or as on September 11 -- the government needed merely to tell the people that it was our duty to respond, and the people rightly conferred their authority. But a war of choice is a different matter entirely. In that circumstance, the people will ask why. The people will need to be convinced that their sons and daughters and husbands and wives should go halfway around the world to fight a nemesis that they didn’t really know was a nemesis.

That’s why a war of choice is different. A war like the Iraq War, whose public support before the idea was seriously discussed started out well below 50 percent, needs to be sold -- “marketed,” as White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card once put it -- needs, well, marketers.

And, in the information age, an administration can’t, and doesn’t, market alone. It takes an army of salespeople -- it takes a village, you might say -- to accentuate the positive. And when an administration spreads demonstrable lies and falsehoods, or offers “evidence” that can’t be wholly refuted but for which there is nevertheless no existing proof, it takes that same army to stand up and say: “Yes! These assertions are true! Those who deny them are unpatriotic, or simpletons, or both!” And finally, when the war goes terribly, terribly wrong, that same army is called to the ramparts one last time, to say, in a fashion that approaches Soviet-style devotion: “Things are in fact going well! The insurgency is dying! Abu Ghraib is not a scandal! Saddam Hussein did have ties to al-Qaeda; you just don’t know it yet!” And so on.

For its war in Iraq, the Bush administration relied on and benefited from the cheerleading of a group of pundits and public intellectuals who, at every crucial moment, subordinated the facts on the ground to their own ideological preferences and those of their allies within the administration. They refused to hold the administration’s conduct of the war and the occupation to the ideals that they themselves professed, or simply to the standard of common sense. They abdicated their responsibilities as political intellectuals -- and, more elementally, as reliable empiricists. . .

Proof – I say, proof – that Iraq war planning started almost immediately after 9/11 (thanks to Atrios for the link)

http://allspinzone.com/blog/index.php?itemid=1149

Well, “planning”

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/18/state.dept.iraq/
Little more than a month before the start of the Iraq war, State Department officials said they warned U.S. military planners about possible "serious planning gaps" for the post-war period, according to newly declassified documents obtained by George Washington University.

More: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB163/index.htm

And the dumbest, most Orwellian rationale yet for the war in Iraq

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112432577406828977
In case anyone is wondering what is the latest rationale for the war in Iraq, Nicole Devenish, whitehouse spokesperson just said that we are "laying the foundation for peace."

[NB: Well, sure: AS SOON AS THE WAR WE STARTED IS OVER]

Here’s a simple question no one has asked: What happens if the Iraqi Constitution ISN’T settled within the week? What if they can’t settle it at all? What next for our involvement?

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/17/105938/290

Would the failure of the Constitution be such a bad thing for Iraq? (though it would be a disaster for Bush)

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/an_iraqi_consti.html
[Mickey Kaus] [W]ould it really be so terrible if the Iraqis failed to come up with a new constitution and the National Assembly were dissolved and new elections held? Just asking! Presumably more Sunnis would participate in elections the next time around, resulting in a more representative constitution-drafting group--and a constitution more likely to placate Sunni dissidents (and embolden Sunnis who may be willing to risk supporting the new state). . .

Like father, like shrub

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/17/opinion/17dowd.html
[Maureen Dowd] How could President Bush be cavorting around on a long vacation with American troops struggling with a spiraling crisis in Iraq?

Wasn't he worried that his vacation activities might send a frivolous signal at a time when he had put so many young Americans in harm's way?

"I'm determined that life goes on," Mr. Bush said stubbornly.

That wasn't the son, believe it or not. It was the father - 15 years ago. I was in Kennebunkport then to cover the first President Bush's frenetic attempts to relax while reporters were pressing him about how he could be taking a month to play around when he had started sending American troops to the Persian Gulf only three days before.

On Saturday, the current President Bush was pressed about how he could be taking five weeks to ride bikes and nap and fish and clear brush even though his occupation of Iraq had become a fiasco. "I think it's also important for me to go on with my life," W. said, "to keep a balanced life."

Pressed about how he could ride his bike while refusing to see a grieving mom of a dead soldier who's camped outside his ranch, he added: "So I'm mindful of what goes on around me. On the other hand, I'm also mindful that I've got a life to live and will do so.". . .

Another trip down memory lane. . .

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/17/144732/740
[Kos] Quotes from when Clinton committed troops to Bosnia:

"You can support the troops but not the president."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
--Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."
--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."
--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)

Funny thing is, we won that war without a single killed in action.

[One more from Digby: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112432858386241976
[John McCain] We didn’t have to get into Kosovo. Once we stumbled into it, we had to win it. This administration has conducted a feckless photo-op foreign policy for which we will pay a very heavy price in American blood and treasure]

“State Dept. Says It Warned About bin Laden in 1996” screams the New York Times – just one little difference there: Clinton actually did something about it

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/17/international/asia/17osama.html

http://www.seeingtheforest.com/archives/2005/08/oops.htm
[U.K. Telegraph, August 21, 1998] THE United States launched cruise missile strikes in Afghanistan and Sudan yesterday against centres allegedly linked with the terrorist bombings of two American embassies. . . Clinton and his national security team linked both sites to Osama bin Laden, the exiled Saudi millionaire tied by U.S. intelligence to the twin bombings on Aug. 7 in Kenya and Tanzania. . .

[Dave Johnson] Oops, the Times accidentally left that part out. . . [Update] Never forget that the Republicans reacted to Clinton attacking bin Laden by accusing him of doing it for political "wag the dog" reasons.

Tony Shaffer’s testimony on Able Danger is very dramatic, but as several people point out, on key points he’s a little. . . vague

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/the_detailed_in.html

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002382.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006928.php
[Kevin Drum] Why is it that Able Danger, the team that supposedly ID'd Mohamed Atta and his Brooklyn al-Qaeda cell a year before 9/11, was prevented from sharing this information with the FBI? Last night I noticed that the explanation offered by Tony Shaffer, an intelligence officer who worked with the program, has shifted subtly over the past week.

Here's the first New York Times piece about Able Danger:

The information was not shared, [Shaffer and Curt Weldon] said, apparently at least in part because Mr. Atta, and the others were in the United States on valid entry visas. Under American law, United States citizens and green-card holders may not be singled out in intelligence-collection operations by the military or intelligence agencies. That protection does not extend to visa holders, but Mr. Weldon and the former intelligence official said it might have reinforced a sense of discomfort common before Sept. 11 about sharing intelligence information with a law enforcement agency.

Here is Tuesday's New York Times article:

[Shaffer] said he learned later that lawyers associated with the Defense Department's Special Operations Command had canceled the F.B.I. meetings because they feared controversy if Able Danger was portrayed as a military operation that had violated the privacy of civilians who were legally in the United States.

Finally, here is Gil Spencer's story in the Delaware County Daily Times today:

Yet when he tried to share this information with the FBI, [Shaffer] said he was blocked from doing so by Department of Defense. Part of the reason was recent history and the lack of trust that existed between the federal agencies.

The Branch Davidian debacle in Waco that left 70 people dead was still in the memory banks of all those who had been involved in it, including the U.S. Army Delta Force that advised the siege team.

When it came to al-Qaida, Shaffer believes the mindset of the military was "if we pass the information on to the FBI and they do something with it and if something goes wrong (we’re) going to get the blame for it."

The explanation has gone from (a) legal concerns to (b) PR concerns rooted in legal issues to (c) PR concerns rooted in memories of the Waco debacle.

So what was the real reason? As it happens, Waco was mentioned in passing in the very first Able Danger story in Government Security News, but it never resurfaced after that. Until now, the story has been pretty consistently rooted in the actions of timid military lawyers.

I'm not sure what to make of this, but wanted to pass it along for the record. The reason it makes a difference is that it speaks to how solid the Able Danger material really was. Was it rock solid, but lawyers wouldn't let them share it with the FBI? Or was it vague and iffy material, and higher-ups didn't want it to blow up in their face if it turned out to be wrong? There's a big difference between the two.

More: if Shaffer’s right, it may make some Clintonistas look bad, and it may make the 9-11 Commission look bad, but the real damage will come if it turns out that the current Defense Dept covered up information by not giving it to the Commission

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006924.php

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002388.html

Why is the NYT backing Judith Miller so unambiguously, when so many of her own colleagues at the paper have doubts about her actions and motives? (And why does Arianna Huffington care so much?)

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001016586

The questions Bush doesn’t want to be asked about the Plame scandal

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2005/08/17/bush_plame/
[Judd Legum and Faiz Shakir] Ever since the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson in 2003, the media has focused on whether President Bush would fire any people in his administration who were involved. Recent coverage has focused on the role, and fate, of deputy chief of staff Karl Rove. On July 31, Knight Ridder reporter Ron Hutcheson -- in an article that typifies the frame the media has imposed on the story -- speculated that "the president soon could face a painful choice between protecting his trusted aide or forcing his resignation to limit political damage."

Last week, Associated Press reporter Pete Yost wrote a relatively aggressive article about potential conversations between Rove and Bush about Valerie Wilson. But Yost's piece considers only the possibility that Rove lied about his involvement in the leak to Bush after the fact. Yost writes, "Whether Rove shaded the truth with Bush two years ago is a potential political problem."

Yet, strangely, even the most probing report has refused to raise the possibility that George W. Bush had any advance knowledge of or direct involvement in the leak. It's an irresponsible choice, considering Bush has more experience as a political operative than as president of the United States. . .

But the media refuses to ask two questions that President Bush could not delay answering until he "finds out the facts": Mr. President, prior to July 14, 2003 (the day Robert Novak's column appeared), were you aware that Valerie Wilson was a CIA agent? And did you discuss her role with any other member of your administration?

The media is so far sticking with the idea that President Bush was an innocent bystander. Fitzgerald doesn't seem to share its perspective. Bush was interviewed by the special prosecutor for more than an hour. Floyd Abrams, an attorney who represented Time magazine in the case, said, "It's hard to believe the special prosecutor would be burdening the president with an interview unless they had testimony to the effect that the president had information."

No one outside the White House knows for certain the extent of President Bush's involvement. But one thing is clear: The press's assumption of ignorance is misguided, especially in light of George W.'s long history as a political operative. Allan Lichtman, a noted presidential historian, says the "presumption in presidential politics" should be "that the president always knows." It's not too late for responsible reporters to ask the right questions.

Rove’s troubles

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011901.html

Brilliant! Twenty questions for Roberts – ALL of which have been answered by other recent SC nominees (thanks to People for the American Way)

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/17/15379/7439

Roberts was hearing a crucial case on Bush’s Guantanamo tribunals at the same time that he was being interviewed for the SC nomination. Experts are divided on the propriety of this, but it’s sure to come up in the hearings

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/16/AR2005081601561.html

This STINKS

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/16/AR2005081601457.html
A file folder containing papers from Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr.'s work on affirmative action more than 20 years ago disappeared from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library after its review by two lawyers from the White House and the Justice Department in July, according to officials at the library and the National Archives and Records Administration.

Archivists said the lawyers returned the file but it now cannot be located. No duplicates of the folder's contents were made before the lawyers' review. . .

It is rare for the Archives to lose documents in its care and the agency has requested an investigation by its inspector general, said Sharon Fawcett, the assistant archivist for presidential libraries. . .

Terrible story from the LA Times, once again comparing the Ruth Bader Ginsburg nomination and consensus vote with the Roberts nomination. This story manages to repeat what several other stories have said, without adding anything new. It does, however, manage to leave one very important fact out: Orrin Hatch, the ranking MINORITY member of the Judiciary committee at the time SUGGESTED Ginsburg to Clinton (along with Breyer), instead of the person Clinton had in mind (Bruce Babbit). Clinton wasn’t even considering Ginsburg at that time. Can anyone imagine Bush doing the same thing?

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-ginsburg18aug18,1,1529515.story

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/07/01/how-clinton-treated-hatch/

Time to throw out the entire GOP in Ohio, starting with the Governor

http://loganselm.blogspot.com/2005/08/more-on-taft-charges.html
[T]he Ethics Commission identified 52 violations. In explaining why there are only 4 charges, the prosecutors said that since the Governor's financial reports are filed on an annual basis, they separate violations were grouped by year in the years 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005.

More: http://www.growohio.org/story/2005/8/17/1436/51553

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/corruption_in_washington_/2005/08/taft_goes_down.php

Useful poll of Bush’s (un)popularity by state, matched onto open Senate races. Time for the Dems to nationalize the 2006 elections and make them a referendum on (a) Bush policies and (b) GOP arrogance and corruption. Newt wrote the blueprint in 1994

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/17/1277/35081

http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/18/0957/04835

The GOP knows it: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/18/politics/18repubs.html
A stream of bad news out of Iraq - echoed at home by polls that show growing impatience with the war and rising disapproval of President Bush's Iraq policies - is stirring political concern in Republican circles, party officials said Wednesday.

Some said that the perception that the war was faltering was providing a rallying point for dispirited Democrats and could pose problems for Republicans in the Congressional elections next year.

Republicans said a convergence of events - including the protests inspired by the mother of a slain American soldier outside Mr. Bush's ranch in Texas, the missed deadline to draft an Iraqi Constitution and the spike in casualties among reservists - was creating what they said could be a significant and lasting shift in public attitude against the war. . .

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/17/23614/9389

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006930.php

The Duke CunningScam diagram (thanks to Josh Marshall for the link and the pun)

http://www.jaxxattaxx.com/usd/syn/duke.htm

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006303

How do we know they want to kill (not save) Social Security? Because they say so!

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508170003

I probably should do more here on labor issues, but this is one of the best sources: Nathan Newman

http://www.nathannewman.org/laborblog/archive/003285.shtml
Want to know why unions have so much troubling organizing new workers? . . . Because they have been stripped of free speech rights in ways most progressive people don't even understand. . .

Rush Limbaugh: no kidding

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/17/03041/4042
[Rush] Frankly, I'm also fed up -- not fed up. I retract that. I'm weary, ladies and gentlemen, of even having to express sympathy. "Oh, she lost her son!" Yes, yes, yes, but (sigh) we all lose things.

[NB: “Look at me, I lost weight. A lot of weight. Am I asking for sympathy? No! Last week I lost my lucky rabbit’s foot key chain. Am I hanging around George Bush, expecting him to explain to me how it happened? Of course not! Life goes on!”]

The Defense Department isn’t just asking for participants in their Freedom Walk to register in advance: it plans to screen people before the walk. Like the stage-managed Bush “meet the people” events and the “public” speeches that keep protestors blocks away, you can’t mess up a good photo op by letting things like free speech and democratic debate get in the way (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://simplyappalling.blogspot.com/#112430929252863757

And in the same spirit, Bill O’Reilly, journalist of integrity and no b.s., is committed to getting to the unvarnished facts and ready to go toe-to-toe with any guest. . . except. . . uh. . . well. . . when he turns their microphones off

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508170010

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 5:44 AM

 
20/20 HINDSIGHT

U.S. “help” (i.e. pressure and interference) in the Iraqi constitutional process has become part of the problem: we say we will be happy with whatever they come up with themselves, but that’s clearly not true

http://makeashorterlink.com/?A13B240AB

The Bush Co. obsession with “deadlines”

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112420389089536445

Will an additional week make any difference?

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/16/iraq/index.html

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1798

Correction: the Iraq vote to extend the deadline was not “illegal,” as claimed here yesterday: by a three quarters vote they could set aside their own rules, and that was what they did

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_atrios_archive.html#112419784574596047

[NB: Well, it kinda was: http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/20-dead-in-wednesday-bombings.html]

An old quote, but worth repeating today

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112424613341155359
While we hoped that popular revolt or coup would topple Saddam, neither the U.S. nor the countries of the region wished to see the breakup of the Iraqi state. We were concerned about the long-term balance of power at the head of the Gulf. . . We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting it in anger and other allies pulling out as well. . . Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the U.N.'s mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the U.S. could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different--and perhaps barren--outcome.

-- "Why We Didn't Remove Saddam" George Bush [Sr.] and Brent Scowcroft Time (2 March 1998)

Curioser and curioser. So, on this key point at least, it appears that Curt Weldon (and the NY Times) may have been right

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/17/politics/17intel.html
A military intelligence team repeatedly contacted the F.B.I. in 2000 to warn about the existence of an American-based terrorist cell that included the ringleader of the Sept. 11 attacks, according to a veteran Army intelligence officer who said he had now decided to risk his career by discussing the information publicly. The officer, Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, said military lawyers later blocked the team from sharing any of its information with the bureau.

Colonel Shaffer said in an interview on Monday night that the small, highly classified intelligence program, known as Able Danger, had identified the terrorist ringleader, Mohamed Atta, and three other future hijackers by name by mid-2000, and tried to arrange a meeting that summer with agents of the Washington field office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to share its information.

But he said military lawyers forced members of the intelligence program to cancel three scheduled meetings with the F.B.I. at the last minute, which left the bureau without information that Colonel Shaffer said might have led to Mr. Atta and the other terrorists while the Sept. 11 attacks were still being planned.

"I was at the point of near insubordination over the fact that this was something important, that this was something that should have been pursued," Colonel Shaffer said of his efforts to get the evidence from the intelligence program to the F.B.I. in 2000 and early 2001.

He said he learned later that lawyers associated with the Special Operations Command of the Defense Department had canceled the F.B.I. meetings because they feared controversy if Able Danger was portrayed as a military operation that had violated the privacy of civilians who were legally in the United States. . .

A commission spokesman did not return repeated phone calls on Tuesday for comment. A Democratic member of the commission, Richard Ben-Veniste, the former Watergate prosecutor, said in an interview on Tuesday that while he could not judge the credibility of the information from Colonel Shaffer and others, the Pentagon needed to "provide a clear and comprehensive explanation regarding what information it had in its possession regarding Mr. Atta."

"And if these assertions are credible," Mr. Ben-Veniste continued, "the Pentagon would need to explain why it was that the 9/11 commissioners were not provided this information despite requests for all information regarding Able Danger."

Colonel Shaffer said he had provided information about Able Danger and its identification of Mr. Atta in a private meeting in October 2003 with members of the Sept. 11 commission staff when they visited Afghanistan, where he was then serving. Commission members have disputed that, saying that they do not recall hearing Mr. Atta's name during the briefing and that the name did not appear in documents about Able Danger that were later turned over by the Pentagon.

Why the Right gets so excited about this story: for them it “proves” that 9-11 was. . . CLINTON’S fault

http://corner.nationalreview.com/
[John Podhoretz] The Able Danger papers shown to the 9/11 Commission at the Pentagon after the Afghanistan meeting did not feature anything mentioning Atta. So the 9/11 Commission says. So either the Commission staff is lying. Or no paper mentioned Atta and Shaffer is just wrong. Or the Defense Department misplaced the paperwork mentioning Atta. Or somebody at the Defense Department deliberately didn't give the Commission the material.

In the first case, if the 9/11 commission staff is lying, the hell to be paid is going to be colossal. Among other things, it could shake the current State Department to its foundations, since the 9/11 commission staff director, Philip Zelicow, is one of Condi Rice's most trusted aides.

In the second case, if the Defense Department withheld critical information on this matter, it's almost impossible to imagine the intensity of the bloodletting that will follow.

With nothing more to go on than Shaffer's name and his statement, I think it's appropriate to remain skeptical. Since we have heard that the list Shaffer tried to forward to the FBI contained 60 names, it is legitimate to question whether his memory and the memory perhaps of other Able Danger folks has been enhanced by knowledge learned later on -- whether the otherwise obscure name of "Mohammed Atta" might have become part of their recollections after the fact because it became so famous.

Which is to say, Shaffer isn't lying, and he isn't a scoundrel. He's someone who ran afoul of the hyperlegal mindset that kept the intelligence "wall" growing ever higher until it became a hiding place for Al Qaeda.

And that, once again, brings us back to...Jamie Gorelick. 9/11 Commissioner. And the architect of the growing "wall" -- the same "wall" that the 9/11 Commission all but ignored, surely in deference to its walking-conflict-of-interest commissioner Gorelick.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124546/

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464677/posts

But then why are THIS White House and Defense Dept refusing to clear up the issue?

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/whs_response_to.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006924.php

CIA, Defense Intelligence Agency, and all that money and turf-fighting. Guess who had the goods on Bin Laden ten years ago, and should have been listened to? (Or is this more proof that 9-11 was Clinton’s fault too?)

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006927.php

Do we have to review again what Richard Clarke told us about the warnings the Clinton admin gave to Bush during the transition, that something needed to be done about Bin Laden?

http://slate.msn.com/id/2097685/

http://slate.msn.com/id/2097803

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22231-2004Mar24.html

Charlie Cook (from his email report) predicts big trouble ahead for the GOP

Opposition to and skepticism about the war in Iraq has reached its highest level. . . Given the centrality of the Iraq War to the Bush presidency and re-election, a cave-in of support for the president on the war would be devastating to his second-term credibility and influence.

With the first of what is expected to be many indictments against influential Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff handed down last week, the GOP is holding its breath to see where and how far this goes. While House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, and to a lesser extent, House Administration Committee Chairman Bob Ney, R-Ohio, and even Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., have Abramoff-related problems, the danger is that it begins to reflect upon the entire Republican Party. This feeds into Democratic themes (stolen from House Republicans vintage 1994) that the majority party has become arrogant, corrupt and out of touch with the American people. The key question is whether DeLay will be indicted or whether he will be a key witness in upcoming high-profile corruption trials. . .

Despite efforts on Capitol Hill to resuscitate Social Security reform, Bush's top priority for the first half of this year, it is clearly dead for the time being. . . Tax reform is said to be the president's priority for the second half of the year, but prospects there don't look much better. . .

For a month or two, there has been a theory circulating among those that watch polls that the American public can be broken down into four distinct groups: those that have always been against the war; those who were for it but now believe we've blown it and should pull out; those who supported the war, believe the invasion was successful but think that the aftermath has been completely blown, yet would hate to see us withdraw immediately and lose all we've invested; and those that have always been for the war.

Pollsters say that the first group -- always against -- makes up about 30 percent of the electorate, while the second group -- those that started off in favor of the war but now see it as a lost cause -- includes about 20 percent. These two categories total half of all voters in opposition.

The third group -- those that are conflicted because they see the effort as doomed and casualties increasing, yet still hate to see us 'cut and run' -- makes up another 25 percent. . .

Clearly events in Iraq are out of the president's control, yet an occasional speech before the troops in North Carolina or this past weekend's radio address is not going salvage what has become a public relations and policy debacle. . . Don't be surprised if the president shows up in Iraq in the next month or two, demonstrating his commitment to the effort. . .

Arguably, some of the problems previously discussed can be lumped together in a category of "chickens coming home to roost." Luckily for Bush and the GOP, they were successful in keeping these chickens from roosting before last year's presidential election. But these problems are mounting and Republicans may have to take their lumps in the midterm elections instead. It can also be argued that while the president's previously strong ratings on the war, terrorism and national security provided something of a safety net for Republican candidates in the last two elections, it ironically could be a liability this time.

Having said all of this, the Nov. 8, 2006, midterm elections are still more than 14 months away, and things may get better or worse for Bush. But for now, the situation is bad and appears to be worsening.

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002086.html

Iraq becoming Bush’s tar-baby

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/08/16/deceptive_talk_about_iraq/

Now, here comes Abu Ghraib II

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3901

The emerging theme of GOP corruption: right there for the taking, if the Dems can figure out a way to do it. Abramoff case ready to explode

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8941526/site/newsweek/
Another possible reason for the Feds' stance: to pressure Abramoff to cooperate in a broader, D.C.-based probe that could touch members of Congress and Bush administration officials. . .

http://markschmitt.typepad.com/decembrist/2005/08/abramoff_and_th.html
[Mark Schmitt] Now this is beginning to seem like the uber-scandal, the thing that brings many of the grotesque threads of the last five years together. . .

Follow the money: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006298

The Abramoff 6: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/16/143026/809
Tom DeLay (TX), Bob Ney (OH-18) Conrad Burns (R-MT), Dave Vitter (R-LA), Tom Feeney (FL-24), and Dan Rohrabacher (CA-46)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006300
[Josh Marshall] You know how Jack Abramoff was hired to protect sweatshop owners in Saipan from having to comply with American labor laws. And you remember how he helped Indian gambling interests get out of paying taxes. But did you know that right after 9/11 he was hired by a Saudi petro-billionaire to help him deal with US government claims that his banks handled money for and funded various terrorist groups including al Qaida?

Can the Dems take advantage? WILL they?

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007396

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/12/AR2005081201596.html

Very bad news for Judith Miller

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011879.html
[Jeralyn Merritt] Has Abrams been told Fitzgerald is ready to file criminal contempt charges against Miller now if she doesn't change her mind and cooperate? If Miller were to accept Fitzgerald's offer now, he would still have time to evaluate her information and call more witnesses if necessary. If he waited until the final days of the grand jury to make Miller his final offer, there might not be time enough remaining to tie it all together and present indictments to the grand jury.

Next question: Fitzgerald has previously said that Judith Miller was single-handedly derailing the investigation. Is it possible that if Judith Miller turns down his final overture, she will be the only one indicted by Fitzgerald and he will say that without her testimony, there was insufficient evidence to indict anyone else - even for perjury or making a false statement? Does he need her testimony that she was not the source for Rove or Libby to put the final nail in the coffin of Rove's claim that he learned of Valerie Plame's covert status from a journalist? All the other journalists have already talked and denied being Rove's source prior to the time he allegedly told Matthew Cooper, "Yeah, I heard that too." Miller may be the only one left who could have told Rove (or Libby) and if she is ruled out, then Fitzgerald may have his case that Rove lied to federal investigators and/or the grand jury.

And, if as Arianna puts it, Miller was the "catcher not the pitcher," is she the only one who can make the case for Fitzgerald that Rove or Libby leaked the contents of the classified June memo that reached Colin Powell on Air Force One the day the plane took off for Africa?

Or, is she the only one who can establish there was a plan to out and discredit Plame, because multiple sources within the Administration told her about the "boondoggle," as Walter Pincus called it.

Fitzgerald has said he knows the identity of Miller's source. The subpoenas directed to her asked for information from a specific White House official - Lewis Libby. She has said she doesn't want to talk because she believes, based on what Fitzgerald did to Matt Cooper, that Fitzgerald will then insist on asking her about other sources. Who are these other sources, what did they show her or tell her, and how high up the (presumably Cheney) chain of command do they go?

So it must be time for the NYT to rush to her defense again (or, as is becoming increasingly evident, rushing to THEIR OWN defense for backing her)

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112420971890218537

And Arianna has a few things to say to the NYT about it

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/arianna-huffington/preemptive-pr-the-times-_5703.html
The editorial continued the paper of record's attempt to cast Judy as journalistic Joan of Arc, describing her as serving time to "protect privileged information" and "unwavering in her mission to safeguard the freedom of the press to do its job effectively." The encomium ended by linking Judy's cause to America's, saying of Miller's 41 days in jail: "That is far too long, for her, for us and especially for a country that prides itself on exporting its belief in a free press to the rest of the world."

Note to the editors (1): No matter how many times you say it, covering for an illegal government leaker out to smear someone's reputation for political reasons, is NOT the kind of "free press" we are trying to export to "the rest of the world."

Note to the editors (2): You may want to tell your public editor not to quote the Times editor he quotes in Sunday's paper, laying out one of the Times' ethical guidelines: "The Times's policy does not permit the granting of anonymity to confidential news sources 'as cover for a personal or partisan attack.'" So which is it, Times editors? Let's give Judy the benefit of the doubt for a minute and accept that she was a catcher, not a pitcher. Then, according to her own paper's ethical standards, if the person pitching to her is doing it for partisan reasons -- and is anybody doubting that? -- then there is no "granting of anonymity".

And another reminder. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/michael-wolff-is-absolutely-right.html
[E&P] Wolff, whose column in the September issue of Vanity Fair sharply hit the role of journalists in the Plame story, pushed his argument even further this morning. . . He posited that if Time magazine had run the Matt Cooper story -- i.e. Rove as the leaker and master puppeteer -- a year ago, President Bush may not be in office serving a second term. . . Wolff called this the "biggest story of our age."

Do you hear a bell tolling? Dems call for investigation of John Ashcroft

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011883.html

Another of the “good guys”: pick-up driving goober mows down memorial crosses at Sheehan protest site. Good news – he was arrested. Unsurprising news: all those right-wing fanatics who could be reliably expected to go crazy about someone from the left defiling (a) a tribute to fallen soldiers and (b) the holy symbol of Christianity are deafeningly silent. Not news at all: Bush is conspicuously MIA

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/16.html#a4481

Who is Larry Northern? http://www.liquidlist.com/archives/2005/08/politics_larry.html

Photos: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/15/233811/409

Bush: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/08/20050816.html
Q Does the President have any plans at all to meet with Cindy Sheehan? And what did you think about the latest, you know, thing where the crosses were destroyed along the road?

MS. PERINO: The President said in his -- last Thursday, when he spoke to you all after the defense meeting, that he sympathizes with her, he has met with her before. He said that one of the most cherished rights in America is the right to free speech and that she has a right to express her views. He does not agree with her views, but he says he respects her right to peacefully protest. But, other than that, I have nothing more to add.

Shotguns? Pickups? This could get seriously out of hand

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011877.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/08/16/politics/main780687.shtml

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/16/sheehan/index.html

And, just in case you have the stomach for it, here’s how the Freepers are rationalizing the whole story away – including a wacky conspiracy theory that Sheehan et al destroyed the crosses themselves!

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464124/posts?page=204#204
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464472/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464124/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464392/posts

[NB: To be fair, several posters say that whatever Northern’s motives, what he did dishonored the troops and was wrong. But they get shouted down of course: the consensus is, antiwar groups never really support the troops and so have no right to hold tribute to them (I guess this includes the soldiers’ OWN PARENTS)]

And finally http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1464712/posts
Just wanted to let Freepers know that Larry Northern, the man that knocked down the crosses outside the Bush ranch, is a Purple Heart winner from Vietnam. He was wounded by shrapnel that hit his jugular vein.

[NB: Gee, a Purple Heart Viet Nam vet wounded by shrapnel. . . just like. . . just like. . .]

Some nice news out of Texas

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/some-actual-texas-hospitality-for.html
[Reuters] Antiwar protester Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, is moving her camp closer to President George W. Bush's Texas ranch.

The piece of private property was offered by a relative of a man who had a fired shotgun in frustration over the protests, a source in the Sheehan camp said. The property owner is also a veteran.

"A neighbour of President Bush's has offered us his land," the source said. "It's got plenty of acreage for us, it's private land, we would have legal permission to be on it, it's much closer to the ranch -- in fact it's across the street from his (Bush's) church."

More: http://billmon.org/archives/002087.html

Here’s what we can never forget about Rush, Rove, Coulter, and their ilk. They don’t want to defeat liberalism in a contest of ideas – they want to eliminate liberalism as a competing ideology entirely. This is the ethos of ethnic cleansing and pogroms: in nonviolent forms (so far) but deriving from the same underlying motives of hatred, intolerance, and totalitarianism

http://mediamatters.org/items/200508120005
[Rush] "Wouldn't it be great if anybody who speaks out against this country, to kick them out of the country? Anybody that threatens this country, kick 'em out. We'd get rid of Michael Moore, we'd get rid of half the Democratic Party if we would just import that law. That would be fabulous. The Supreme Court ought to look into this. Absolutely brilliant idea out there.”

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112421833478532135

Here’s an issue you don’t hear much about

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007408
Medicaid stands, at the moment, as perhaps the underreported domestic policy issue of any real political salience. As George W. Bush’s handpicked (and predictably slanted) Medicaid Commission prepares to issue a report next month with recommendations for cutting $10 billion from the federal portion of the program over the next five years, the president has already circulated a draft proposal to Congress with the administration’s own suggestions, which focus largely on hindering state accounting maneuvers that help to bring in more federal financing.

The program, meanwhile, faces more dramatic threats from the states. . . The general thrust of recent waiver reforms in the states -- increased cost-sharing with recipients and reduced services -- has been straightforward, and the results have been predictable: reductions in coverage and care. . . The National Governors Association (NGA) is now calling for (PDF) a series of national Medicaid policy changes along these same punitive lines.

And yet the worst in state reforms is likely still to come. National Journal has an important new article out describing the next wave of Medicaid reform proposals, whose overall bent is sharply ideological and almost perversely wrongheaded. . .

Harry Reid responds to the WP story that the Dems have already decided not to put up a fight against Roberts

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/16/175157/344
"All this talk about whether Democrats will support the Roberts nomination is laughably premature. The hearings have not even begun. The White House has so far refused to produce relevant documents, and the documents we have seen raise questions about the nominee's commitment to progress on civil rights. . . John Roberts must still persuade the Senate and the American people that he is a worthy replacement for Justice O'Connor and the jury is still out on that."

More: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/16/185110/604

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/16/AR2005081601919_pf.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/will-roberts-leave-you-alone.html
USA Today says it's concerned about Supreme Court nominee John Roberts. It also says a right to privacy -- the right to be left alone, as Justice Brandeis put it -- is a fundamental American right deeply rooted in our nation's history and a deal-breaker. . .

Ai Caramba! Fox puts Roger Ailes in charge of all programming at Fox TV

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050816/media_nm/media_fox_ailes_dc_1

[NB: What will this mean for The Simpsons?]

How conservative journalists think (hint: they always know whose side they’re on)

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112424028207752060
[Eric Pfeiffer, National Review] As far as my heavily GOP sources go, I do write for the biggest U.S. conservative publication. No claims of fairness or objectivity here! :)

Bonus item: Dog Bites Man Dept (maybe this should become a regular feature: utterly unsurprising news)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/16/business/16fuel.html
The Bush administration is expected to abandon a proposal to extend fuel economy regulations to include Hummer H2's and other huge sport utility vehicles, auto industry and other officials say.

[NB: Because global warming, soaring gas prices, and overdependence on foreign sources of oil are SUCH hypothetical risks at this point]

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:59 AM

 
SQUARING THE CIRCLE

In Iraq, no surprise – they couldn’t get the constitution done in time, and they need another week. Two problems: one, the issues don’t seem compromisable, and they’ll likely be right back here a week from now; two, the vote to delay just happens to be a little bit ILLEGAL (by their own fledgling laws)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/15/international/middleeast/15cnd-iraq.html
After meeting for several hours inside the protected Green Zone here, a group of senior Iraqi leaders told the National Assembly that they were unable to resolve a number of critical issues, including the role of Islam, the rights of women, the sharing of the country's vast oil wealth and whether to grant the majority Shiites their own semi-independent region in the south. . .

Before the extension vote, a National Assembly member, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, said today that specific solutions to difficult issues, including federalism and the status of the city of Kirkuk, would be put off for another day. . .

The negotiations were stalled on a number of issues, including the role of Islam in the state, the rights of women and the distribution of power between central and regional governments. Issues that had seemed to have been settled, like the sharing of oil revenue, also unraveled. . .

The principal unresolved issue is whether to grant to the country's Shiite majority an autonomous region in the south. Shiite leaders are demanding that nine provinces in southern Iraq - half of the provinces in the country - be allowed to form a largely self-governing region akin to the Kurdish autonomous region in the north.

The leaders of Iraq's Sunni population staunchly oppose the Shiite demands, contending that if the Shiites and the Kurds were both granted wide powers of self-rule, there would be little left of the Iraqi state. The issue of Shiite autonomy is especially significant because the richest oil fields are situated in the extreme south of the country.

http://billmon.org/archives/002084.html
Iraq, in other words, seems to be well down the road towards a Lebanon-style political system, in which cabinet posts, military commands and control over national resources -- the entire machinery of the state, in other words -- are carefully apportioned along ethnic or communal lines. Such systems tend to be fragile and unstable, since the demographic and economic balance of power they rest upon is constantly changing. They also tend to concentrate power in the hands of powerful political chiefs, since only they have the authority and prestige to broker the backroom deals needed to lubricate the system. . . For Iraq, fragile and unstable is almost certainly the best case scenario. . .

What's almost entirely missing from the picture, of course, is any sign of the secular, liberal brand of democracy (pro-Western, pro-modernization, anti-fundamentalist) that our neocon nation builders vowed to implant in the Iraqi body politic.

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/one-week-postponement-iraqi-parliament.html
[Juan Cole] The one-week extension is clever, since it avoids the dissolution of parliament and it keeps the pressure on the various parties to agree. . . It is not clear, however, what difference a week will make. . . Anyway, one cliff-hanger is over, and now yet another one begins.

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_atrios_archive.html#112414328513390756
They could've legally asked for an extension before August 1, but the Bushies pressured them not to. So, for the sake of domestic politics the Iraqi government is now apparently having to break the law.

More: http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/now-theyre-moving-goalpost-every.html

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/no-constitution-in-iraq-for-now-anyway.html

The future rights of women in Iraq: in the right hands

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1794

Bush plays cheerleader

http://slate.msn.com/id/2124535
President Bush applauded the "substantial progress" and "heroic effort." Behind the oh-so-happy talk, the papers suggest the U.S. really wanted to a deal. The Wall Street Journal—which puts it in the starkest language—says the administration "pressured Iraqis" to agree on a draft "even for appearance's sake so the political process seemed on track." The Post says the U.S.'s ambassador "sat in" on the final days of talks. One well-regarded analyst told the Post that the U.S.'s deadline über-alles approach amounted to "constitutional malpractice."

The last word

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1795
[AFP] "We'll be pleased with whatever they come up with," said one State Department official, who asked not to be named.

[Swopa] Yes, friends, that's what more than 1,800 Americans (and counting) have given their lives for: . . . “whatever they come up with."

What could Bush say if he did meet with Cindy Sheehan? (thanks to Buzzflash for the link)

http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/columnists/trudy_rubin/12376862.htm

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/08/15/BL2005081500542.html

Bush: the contrast with LBJ

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2005/08/15/bush_lbj/
[Robert Bryce] As the Iraq war becomes ever more futile, the similarities -- and more important, the differences -- between George W. Bush and Lyndon B. Johnson become more pronounced. . .

Bush doesn't go to funerals for our dead soldiers. Until last week, his administration had refused to release photos of the flag-draped caskets coming back to the United States. . . When it comes to the second Iraq war, Bush displays no doubt, no anguish. . . Johnson felt the ruin that came with the deaths of American soldiers in Vietnam. And he was devastated by it.

If true, this is a stunner: John Bolton goes to visit Judith Miller in the slammer? What more proof do we need that she is protecting someone who badly needs protection (not Bolton, I assume, but someone else in the Cheney camp for whom Bolton is a proxy)?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/arianna-huffington/the-judy-file-millera_5687.html

[Old LL? http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/ny-times-editorial-free-judy.html]

Social Security at 70: despite Bush’s best efforts, the most effective social welfare program ever still persists (thanks to Colleen Vojak for the link)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/15/opinion/15krugman.html
[Paul Krugman] I'd like to revisit Social Security for a moment, because it's important to remember what Mr. Bush tried to get away with.

Many pundits and editorial boards still give Mr. Bush credit for trying to "reform" Social Security. In fact, Mr. Bush came to bury Social Security, not to save it. Over time, the Bush plan would have transformed Social Security from a social insurance program into a mutual fund, with nothing except a name in common with the system F.D.R. created.

In addition to misrepresenting his goals, Mr. Bush repeatedly lied about the current system. Oh, I'm sorry - was that a rude thing to say? Still, the fact is that Mr. Bush repeatedly said things that were demonstrably false and that his staff must have known were false. The falsehoods ranged from his claim that Social Security is unfair to African-Americans to his claim that "waiting just one year adds $600 billion to the cost of fixing Social Security."

Meanwhile, the administration politicized the Social Security Administration and used taxpayer money to promote a partisan agenda. Social Security officials participated in what were in effect taxpayer- financed political rallies, from which skeptical members of the public were excluded.

I'm writing about this in the past tense, but some of it is still going on. . .

More: http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007382

Another big Bush failure: unable to demolish federal civil service rules (yet)

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007385

Savings to be gained by closing military bases vastly exaggerated by Pentagon

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/politics/14bases.html

The big “Able Danger” story is turning into a big joke

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/thousands_of_fa.html
“I understand from others at the Pentagon that one of the problems here is that Able Danger came up with names not just of Atta and three others, it came up with a tremendous number of names of very decent American citizens.”

More: http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002375.html

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006912.php

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006910.php

Eric Umansky’s interview with Curt Weldon

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/interview_with_.html

Weldon: liar or fool?

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007390

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006914.php
[Kevin Drum] So Weldon's story is that (a) he's an idiot who in late September 2001 didn't notice the name and picture of a man whose name and picture had by then been plastered on TV nonstop for two weeks, (b) he gave away his only copy of the chart to Hadley, (c) the chart he's been showing off recently is a recreation from memory, and (d) he's been lying about this all along. And that's his alibi!

This is ridiculous. The Pentagon needs to step forward and tell us whether or not Able Danger ID'd Mohamed Atta in 2000. There's no excuse for not providing a definitive statement on this.

I think that should be: LIAR! http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002377.html

How the NY Times got took

http://www.btcnews.com/btcnews/1071

http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/15/13229/7427

Showdown on Abu Ghraib photos, videos

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3885
[Holden] Judge Hellerstein had ordered the Bush assministration to remove identifying traits from the images and turn them over to him by July 22 when assministration lawyers came up with the novel idea that the images should be withheld because they might incite violence and hatred of America. Funny, the assministration never thought of that when they ordered the military and the CIA to torture Iraqi detainees.

http://billmon.org/archives/002085.html
But if Judge Hellerstein opts for disclosure, I might at least have the satisfaction of hearing Rush Limbaugh try to explain how raping little boys is really not that much different than your average frat house initiation ritual.

More evidence of the loss of civil liberties post 9-11

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/15/21/18/the-rule-of-whim/
[AP] The Justice Department’s inspector general said Monday a federal prison center in Brooklyn, N.Y., failed to turn over hundreds of videotapes to investigators probing the treatment of detainees taken into custody after the Sept. 11 attacks. . . Lawyers for the Legal Aid Society are suing detention center officers for secretly videotaping their conversations at the center. The lawyers say they were assured by the prison that the attorneys’ conversations with their clients were not being taped, despite the video cameras on the walls of the facility.

John Roberts, the Early Years (Part One): against equal pay decision

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0508160183aug16,1,7688358.story

John Roberts, the Early Years (Part Two): “the abortion tragedy”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/15/AR2005081501603.html

John Roberts, the Early Years (Part Three): pro-school prayer

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/15/AR2005081500539.html
As a young government attorney, John Roberts advised the White House to support congressional efforts to allow school prayer, arguing that a Supreme Court ruling striking down the practice "seems indefensible."

[And this. . . ]

That material was part of nearly 50,000 pages of records related to Roberts when he served in the White House counsel's office. Before their release, the documents were reviewed by the National Archives staff to protect material deemed sensitive for national security, privacy and law enforcement reasons.

In all, 5,393 pages were released, covering the years Roberts served in the White House from 1982 to 1986. The Archives said Monday it had withheld another 478 pages, citing privacy concerns. It also did not release one folder involving "affirmative action correspondence," apparently because librarians had misplaced it.

[And this: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/15/175250/105]

And, with impeccable timing, the Dems say. . .

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/wash-post-dems-wont-fight-roberts.html
[WP] Democrats have decided that unless there is an unexpected development in the weeks ahead, they will not launch a major fight to block the Supreme Court nomination of John G. Roberts Jr. . .

Oooh, bad. DeLay won’t be indicted in Texas

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/15/13723/4767

Not that he’s out of the woods on federal issues. . .

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/15/131134/779

Josh Marshall cleans up on DeLay’s lie about severing relations with Abramoff

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006291

Abramoff’s defense? “I’m a victim.” (They’re all such tough guys ‘til they get in trouble, aren’t they?)

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011869.html

Where things stand with the Plame investigation, post-Waas blockbuster

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1791
[LAT] Although some prosecutors use grand juries to rubber stamp charges based on testimony from government witnesses, such as FBI agents, Fitzgerald views the grand jury process as a wide-ranging search for facts, an effect of which is to reveal people who have been less than truthful. The Plame investigation has involved dozens of witnesses.

"Pat definitely uses it as an inquisitorial body," said Joshua Berman, a former federal prosecutor who worked with Fitzgerald. . . "He uses the grand jury as an apparatus to seek the truth. When people are not truthful … he believes those people should be punished."

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/4977.html
"He is an aggressive prosecutor," said Joshua Dratel, a New York lawyer who represented El-Hage. "If he feels someone is lying to him, he takes it personally."

[NB: I think we now know the answer to the question, for whom the bell tolls. . . ]

No toll for Ashcroft yet, but the bellringer is spitting on his hands

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/valerie_plame_/2005/08/obstruction_of_justice_by_ashcroft.php
[Mark Kleiman] So John Ashcroft, as Attorney General, insisted on being personally briefed on the Valerie Plame investigation as it developed. Once it became clear that Ashcroft's old campaign consultant, Karl Rove, was a likely target -- having been less than frank with investigators in his initial interviews -- Ashcroft was forced to recuse himself.*

But before he recused himself was he sharing information provided to him by the the investigators with Rove? An excellent question, and I hope it's one to which Mr. Fitzgerald is demanding answers. . . If there was obstruction of justice by the Attorney General, we're back in Watergate/Iran-Contra territory.

Pentagon’s 9-11 “Freedom Walk” a warm-up to a nationwide event in 2006 (just before the fall elections)? – maybe, but now they’ve revised the web site to “tweak” the message (thanks to Atrios for the link)

http://dcdl.org/2005/08/15/freedom-walk-description-changes
No more mention of next year, and it’s been rewritten to make it seem to be purely a memorial event for those who died at the Pentagon (plus a bit about those in the military in general). Not sure how the Clint Black celebration fits in there. . .

[NB: What – no more “I Raq and Roll”? http://www.clintblack.com/songlyrics.html]

2006: two easy Senate pick-ups?

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/2006-races-repub-senators-in-blue.html

2008: will Joe Biden emerge as the main “stop Hillary” alternative?

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/archives/2005/08/index.html#007388

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_atrios_archive.html#112412357543709128

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1796

More evidence of 2004 vote fraud (no, I’m not over it yet)

http://www.projectcensored.org/newsflash/voter_fraud.html

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0813-29.htm

http://sideshow.me.uk/saug05.htm#151633

More: http://www.harpers.org/ExcerptNoneDare.html

More on the question: can Bush’s popularity fall below 40%?

http://www.first-draft.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3883

http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/15/1829/98485

CHB is not the most reliable source, but this is sure fun to read

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7218.shtml
Buy beleaguered, overworked White House aides enough drinks and they tell a sordid tale of an administration under siege, beset by bitter staff infighting and led by a man whose mood swings suggest paranoia bordering on schizophrenia.

They describe a President whose public persona masks an angry, obscenity-spouting man who berates staff, unleashes tirades against those who disagree with him and ends meetings in the Oval Office with “get out of here!”

In fact, George W. Bush’s mood swings have become so drastic that White House emails often contain “weather reports” to warn of the President’s demeanor. “Calm seas” means Bush is calm while “tornado alert” is a warning that he is pissed at the world.

Decreasing job approval ratings and increased criticism within his own party drives the President’s paranoia even higher. Bush, in a meeting with senior advisors, called Senator Majority Leader Bill Frist a “god-damned traitor” for opposing him on stem-cell research.

“There’s real concern in the West Wing that the President is losing it,” a high-level aide told me recently. . .

Woosh! That was fast

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,165048,00.html
[August 8] Jeanine Pirro, a high-profile prosecutor from the New York City area, said Monday she will seek the Republican nomination to challenge Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. . . Pirro has won praise for her Internet stings of would-be child molesters, her work with battered women and her battle against underage drinking. She had often been seen on national television as a commentator on high-profile crimes. In 1997, she made People magazine's "most beautiful people" list.

She has been a supporter of abortion rights. . .

Some top Republicans, including state GOP Chairman Stephen Minarik, had been pressing for Pirro to run against Clinton on the theory that even if she lost the race, the district attorney could bloody the former first lady as she prepares for a possible run for president in 2008.

http://www.newshounds.us/2005/08/11/sean_hannity_and_dick_morris_try_to_explain_why_hillary_clintons_22point_lead_means_shes_in_trouble.php
[August 11] Colmes opened the segment with guest Dick Morris by announcing the statistics of a new Marist Poll showing Hillary Clinton ahead of her just-announced rival, Jeanine Pirro, 50% to 28% respectively. . . Morris, oozing enthusiasm, asked Colmes, "Did you see that poll?" as if it was the best news ever. . . "The stronger Hillary is, the weaker she is. The more she seems like a likely presidential winner, the more difficult the senate race becomes in New York. It's perfect.". . .

Colmes, however, obviously couldn't take it seriously and looked as though he was trying to keep from laughing. . .

Hannity took his turn then and told Morris he was "right on" about the 13 points. Hannity added that "56% of people don't even know who Jeanine is yet - which helps her - which is why she's only at 28% right now." (Comment: But it's a safe bet that FNC will do their part in getting her name in front of the public by having Pirro on the air quite a bit between now and November.). . .

Morris giggled with anticipation of victory as he continued, "If, in addition to that, (Pirro) says 'I'm pro-choice, I'm for affirmative action, I'm for gun control, the only difference is I'll be there and you won't.' How does Hillary oppose that?"

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/15/174051/553
[August 15] JEANINE PIRRO'S gaffe-marred announcement and her emphasis on liberal social positions has led to new unrest in some quarters of the state GOP, party insiders said yesterday. . . "A lot of people were unhappy with her boatload of mistakes, and they're starting to take another look at Ed Cox as a result". . .

Interesting review of the amazingly few people in the Washington pundit corps who have actually served in the military: and most of them are liberals!

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/15/151720/724
William F. Buckley, Dan Rather, Jim Lehrer, William Safire, and, er, me [Kos]. . . Randi Rhodes and Mark Shields are also vets.

Bonus item: I knew Michael Barone was pretty dumb, but I never realized he was this dumb

http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2005/08/why_oh_why_cant_5.html
Michael Barone: [P]olls show that Americans think their chances of moving up are better than a generation ago. Statistics tell a different story: There is a higher correlation today between parents' and children's income than in the 1980s, and the income gap between college graduates and non-graduated doubled between 1979 and 1997.

"America," concludes Parker, "is becoming a stratified society based on education: a meritocracy." . . . [This] is exactly what Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray predicted for America in their controversial book The Bell Curve, published 11 years ago. Herrnstein and Murray noted that intelligence is both measurable and in some large but unquantifiable part hereditary, an unexceptionable finding for experimental psychologists but maddening to social engineers. As college education becomes open to all with the requisite intelligence, graduates will tend to marry graduates and produce children with similar intelligence, while others will tend to produce children without it.

"Unchecked, these trends," Herrnstein and Murray wrote, "will lead the U.S. toward something resembling a caste society, with the underclass mired ever more firmly at the bottom and the cognitive elite ever more firmly anchored at the top." . . . Are we there yet? . . . [M]aybe so.

Yet should we be so gloomy? . . . Not everyone has an emotional need to be on top: How many people, if they thought seriously about it, would really want the burdens of a CEO, however lavish the pay? . . . As Murray has written, all you need to do to avoid poverty in this country is to graduate from high school, get and stay married, and take any job. The intelligence needed to get a place in the cognitive elite may become more concentrated in a fair meritocratic society, but the personal behaviors needed to find a valued place in society are available to everyone. Meritocracy may mean less mobility, but that is bearable if, as Brooks says, "America is becoming more virtuous.". . .

[NB: Let’s see, greater social stratification, less mobility, greater concentration of wealth, and a larger disparity of income between college grads (who tend to marry other college grads and produce future college grads) and non-college grads. What conclusions to draw from all of this? The meritocracy is working! Genetically-determined intelligence is rising to the top! OK, Mr. Barone, you are obviously a beneficiary of this meritocratic system: can you give us any alternative explanations that would explain the same patterns?]

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 6:58 AM

 
GOOD GUYS AND BAD GUYS

As you have heard me complain here before, George Bush is extraordinarily self-centered: it’s always all about him. My Iraq policy may be collapsing, but I must maintain resolute. My colleagues may be liars and cheats, but that’s okay because I believe them. No one wants my Social Security plan, but private accounts must remain part of any proposal because I have committed myself to them. And on and on. Well, now I’ve heard everything

http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/wire.ssf?/base/news/1124011285247770.xml&coll=2
President Bush, noting that lots of people want to talk to the president and "it's also important for me to go on with my life," on Saturday defended his decision not to meet with the grieving mom of a soldier killed in Iraq.

[NB: It’s easy for him to talk about getting on with his life: HE hasn’t lost a child to someone else’s foolish and pointless war]


Foolish and pointless?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/weekinreview/14filkins.html
In 28 months of war and occupation here, Iraq has always contained two parallel worlds: the world of the Green Zone and the constitution and the rule of law; and the anarchical, unpredictable world outside.

Never have the two worlds seemed so far apart.

From the beginning, the hope here has been that the Iraq outside the Green Zone would grow to resemble the safe and tidy world inside it; that the success of democracy would begin to drain away the anger that pushes the insurgency forward. This may have been what Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was referring to when, in an interview published in Time magazine this month, she said that the insurgency was "losing steam" and that "rather quiet political progress" was transforming the country.

But in this third summer of war, the American project in Iraq has never seemed so wilted and sapped of life. It's not just the guerrillas, who are churning away at their relentless pace, attacking American forces about 65 times a day. It is most everything else, too.

Baghdad seems a city transported from the Middle Ages: a scattering of high-walled fortresses, each protected by a group of armed men. The area between the forts is a lawless no man's land, menaced by bandits and brigands. With the daytime temperatures here hovering at around 115 degrees, the electricity in much of the city flows for only about four hours a day. . .

[NB: Otherwise, things are going just great, thanks]

Growing doubts about the new constitution

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/08/14/iraq.constitution.ap/index.html
One lawmaker raised the possibility that Monday's deadline may have to be postponed. However, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said the document was on track to be finished on time.

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1790
[WP] Several key issues remained unresolved on the eve of a deadline for a draft of Iraq's new constitution, politicians involved in the discussion said Sunday, increasing the prospect that the document will not be completed on time.

Leaders of the country's dominant Shiite political party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), skipped a late-night meeting with Kurdish officials at the headquarters of Shiite Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari, rendering the meeting little more than an informal get-together, according to Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of the committee charged with writing the constitution.

"Because they were not there it was basically just a quick chat. By what I saw today I don't think this can be achieved tomorrow," said Othman Sunday night.

[AP] "It looks like all the agreements are being made only by the Kurds and the Shiites without even asking our opinion," Sunni Arab official Saleh al-Mutlaq said Sunday. "I believe the draft is going to be presented tomorrow even if it is not finished, with or without our approval."

http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/aug152005/foreign1651582005814.asp
[Reuters] Senior leaders from Iraq’s various ethnic and sectarian communities met on Sunday looking for a breakthrough, but the talks are likely to go past the Monday deadline.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/15/international/middleeast/15iraq.html
With several questions unresolved, Shiite leaders said Sunday that they were considering asking the National Assembly to approve the document without the agreement of the country's Sunni leaders. Such a move would probably provoke the Sunnis, whose participation in the political process is seen as crucial in the effort to marginalize the Sunni-dominated guerrilla insurgency.

Shiite and Kurdish leaders said they were also considering giving themselves more time to reach a deal, though it was by no means certain that they could without amending the interim constitution, the law currently in force. That would require a three-fourths majority of the 275-member National Assembly.

If the deadline is not met nor the interim constitution successfully amended, the law appears to require dissolving the National Assembly and holding new elections. Shiite and Kurdish leaders said late Sunday that they were discussing that possibility, but said that they hoped to avoid it.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006909.php
[Kevin Drum] The fact that Iraqi leaders are having trouble meeting their deadline to finish a draft constitution isn't surprising. In the past, they've missed pretty much every deadline they've had, but then eventually come to some sort of agreement a few days late. However, if the New York Times is correct, it looks like they might be genuinely deadlocked this time

More: http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitution-likely-not-achieved-30.html

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/guest-editorial-transitional-permanent.html

Okay, so the shape of things is emerging: the U.S. has served notice that they are pulling out troops in the next few months, whatever the state of the insurgency and whatever the state of the Iraqi defense forces. What happens if things go to hell as soon as we leave? Well, the right wing is already rehearsing the blame game. . .

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/011349.php
[John Hinderaker, Powerline] In the medium and long term, what happens in Iraq is up to the Iraqis. It is certainly possible that they might forfeit what the Bush administration and America's armed forces have given them: a chance at freedom and the opportunity to live in peace with their neighbors. But if the Iraqis fail, it won't be because liberals stampeded the United States into abandoning them.

Comments: http://blogenlust.typepad.com/blogenlust/2005/08/

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112403676259198795

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/14/132953/641

U.S. still seems to be planning for permanent bases in Iraq

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-outlook15aug15,1,6314788.column
"Intense opposition to U.S. plans to establish long-term military bases in Iraq is one of the most passionate motivations behind the insurgency," Diamond wrote last week on the liberal website TPMCafe.com. "Neutralizing this anti-imperial passion — by clearly stating that we do not intend to remain in Iraq indefinitely — is essential to winding down the insurgency.". . .

So far the administration has downplayed the possibility of permanent bases without excluding it. In Senate testimony in February, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said flatly: "We have no intention at the present time of putting permanent bases in Iraq." Pentagon officials echo that insistence today.

But Rumsfeld last winter said he could not rule out the idea because the United States and the permanent Iraqi government would make the final decision.

Bush took a similar line in January in an interview with Arabic television. "That's going to be up to the Iraqi government," the president said. "[It] will be making the decisions as to how best to secure their country, what kind of help they need."

Leaks from the Pentagon have deepened the uncertainty. In May, the Washington Post reported that military planning did not envision permanent bases in Iraq but rather stationing troops in nearby Kuwait. But the report noted that the Pentagon was also planning to consolidate U.S. troops in Iraq into four large fortified bases.

On the theory that concrete speaks louder than words, critics see such work as a sign the administration is planning to stay longer than it has acknowledged. . .

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112404980095545201

Outsourcing our national defense: U.S. mercenaries and “consultants” (perhaps as many as 100,000 or so) likely to stay in Iraq after official troops leave

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/magazine/14PRIVATI.html
[Daniel Bergner] The word "mercenaries" is despised. The phrase "private military company" is heatedly dismissed as inaccurate. "Private security company" (or P.S.C.) is the term of art. . .

"Sure, they are performing a military role," [General Jay] Garner said of the companies. Then, while noting that he wasn't criticizing the Department of Defense, he added, "The gut problem is the force" -- that is, the U.S. fighting force - "is too small" . . . The Department of Defense is reluctant to discuss the role of security companies in Iraq and precisely how it got so big. . .

He didn't specify his salary, but Americans and other Westerners in the business tend to make between $400 and $700 a day, sometimes a good deal more. (The non-Westerners earn far less. Triple Canopy's Fijians and Chileans make between $40 and $150 dollars each week and sleep in crowded barracks at the Baghdad base, while the Americans sleep in their own dorm rooms. The company explained the difference in salaries in terms of the Americans' far superior military backgrounds and their higher-risk assignments.) . . . Depending on how much time they spend in the States over the course of a year, most of their income can be tax-free. . .

No one knows how many times gunfire from a private security team has wounded a bystander or killed an innocent driver who ventured too close to a convoy, not realizing that mere proximity would be taken for a threat. When they fire their weapons in defense or warning, the teams rarely concern themselves with checking for casualties -- it would be too dangerous; they are in the middle of a war. Besides, no one in power is watching too closely. . .

Back in October of last year, a Congressional bill demanded that the Department of Defense come up with a plan to manage the security companies -- to investigate individual backgrounds and inculcate rules of engagement and enforce compliance. . . Congress gave the department six months to produce its plan. Nine months have passed. The Pentagon has now promised the document any day. . .

When I asked the Pentagon official about who would enforce the rules in Iraq, I was told that the country's new sovereignty would be "the context." It was hard not to think that the infant government of Iraq would be left mostly on its own to control the thousands of private gunmen that the American-led occupation has introduced to the country. It was hard not to think that the companies would be left to govern themselves. . .

To wonder what will happen when the private work in Iraq finally winds down is a more concrete concern. What will happen to these companies, these men, without these thousands of jobs? Some will get contracts protecting U.S. departments and agencies around the world. Some will do the same for other governments. Doug Brooks, whose Washington industry organization, the International Peace Operations Association, represents several of the largest firms, says he believes the United Nations will soon hire the companies to guard refugee camps in war zones. But some of the firms and some of the men will no doubt be offered work by dictators or terrible insurgencies -- or by the kind of oil speculators who reportedly backed a recent mercenary-led coup plot in Equatorial Guinea (a plot involving former members of Executive Outcomes), in an attempt to install a ruler to facilitate their enterprise. And with so many newly created private soldiers unemployed when the market of Iraq finally crashes, aren't some of them likely to accept such jobs -- the work of mercenaries in the chaotic territories of the earth?. . .

So what does it all mean?

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/14/101232/528
[Reed Hundt] It takes a post modern theater critic to deconstruct the Administration's Iraq policy. Frank Rich's take is that the Pentagon will withdraw most troops before November 08. Some will stay on well-guarded air bases, forever. Is this the right policy? It would be helpful if it were debated in the open, but if anyone were to try to do that, the Administration would accuse them of not supporting the troops, aiding the enemy, showing cowardice. The language used for these accusations would be phrases like "cut and run" versus "stay the course" and "give in to those who hate freedom" versus "win the war on terror." Those in politics who know what's what are discouraged by the verbal attacks from discussing openly the plan for Iraq. It takes a theater critic to lay it out plainly.

U.S. trying to maintain an economic foothold in the “new” Iraq

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-juhasz14aug14,0,11886.story
But what hasn't been on the table is at least as important to the formation of a new Iraq: the country's economic structure. The Bush administration has succeeded in maintaining a stranglehold on issues such as public versus private ownership of resources, foreign access to Iraqi oil and U.S. control of the reconstruction effort — all of which are still governed by administration policies put into place immediately after the invasion. The Bush economic agenda favors foreign interests — American interests — over Iraqi self-determination.

Will Iran have more influence over Iraq in the future than the U.S. has?

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1093747,00.html

U.K. tells U.S., if you wanna go after Iran, uh, you’re on your own this time pal

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1734191,00.html

Killing the Peace Corps program to shore up sickly military recruiting figures (thanks to Mark Dressman for the link)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080101310.html

Lovely

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/011334.php
I just returned from Crawford where I met some people from Israel yesterday as they fueled their motor home. They were there to drive out to the ranch as a tribute to President Bush and as an expression of gratitude for his support of Israel. . . This town of 800 is crawling with visitors who can be divided into four general categories—two good, two bad.

THE GOOD:
(1) People on a pilgrimage to see President Bush’s ranch and “downtown” Crawford;
(2) Police, more specifically, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals, Texas Rangers and County Sheriff’s Deputies;

THE BAD:
(3) Protestors; and
(4) Press covering the protestors only.

The good guys fill with gas and diesel and dine on cheeseburgers at the Coffee Station where the walls are adorned with enlarged snapshots of President Bush working the crowd and dining on a Coffee Station burger. That won’t happen this year, and perhaps never again because of the bad guys.

The bad guys hang at the Crawford Peace House, a dump of a house that looks like Hippie Central with dozens of cars, vans, SUVs and campers parked on the grass. Add portable toilets for ambience and you get the picture. This is the staging center for protests at the ranch nine miles up Prairie Chapel Road.

Let’s see some photos of the good guys: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_digbysblog_archive.html#112405130413526971

Another "good guy": http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/15/bush.neighbor/index.html
Anti-war protesters outside President Bush's ranch here were startled Sunday by gunshots fired by a Texas rancher frustrated by the group's presence. . . "Well, I'm getting ready for dove season," Larry Mattlage, 62, told reporters. . . Asked if there was an underlying message to the shots, which he fired harmlessly into the air, Mattlage told a reporter, "Figure it out for yourself."

Bush’s dog days

http://billmon.org/archives/002082.html

Cindy Sheehan is coming to DC. Who else is going there with her?

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/14/162451/020
[Armando] I think that is right and I think it raises an interesting question - what happens if Cindy Sheehan follows Bush when he returns to Washington, D.C? We have all watched as the country has turned against the Iraq Debacle. And this has happened without the emergence of a visible anti-war movement in the classic sense. And as atrios conjectured a few months ago, maybe because of the absence of a visible Vietnam-style anti-war movement.

But Jeff hits on something here, and raises a different type of possibility -- a visible anti-war movement centered around a broad-based unassailable concern, a mother's concern for her children. If Cindy Sheehan travels to Washington, D.C., maintains her focus on the family costs of the Debacle, and to the Common Good of the country, it will have a great chance of resonating in a way a more traditional anti-war movement might not.

Couple this with the clear evidence that we are in deep deep trouble in Iraq, and Cindy Sheehan may be the key to the first real tangible breakthrough into the "heartland" of a strong, broad based anti-war movement. Of course this is all speculation on my part, but I think it merits thought. . .

Newspapers around the country covering more anti-war stories (thanks to Susan Madrak for the link)

http://209.11.49.220/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001014529&imw=Y

Howard Dean on “Face the Nation” – pretty good on attacking Bush, not so good on saying how the Dems could do better

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_14_atrios_archive.html#112404189169021335

http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/face_81405.pdf
SCHIEFFER: But what do Democrats propose to do about it?
Dr. HOWARD DEAN: . . . First thing we need to do have a plan for leaving. And the second thing we need to do is to make sure that to the best of our ability we can influence the writing of the constitution. It looks like today, and this could change--as of today, it looks like women will be worse off in Iraq than they were when Saddam Hussein was president of Iraq. That's a pretty sad commentary on this administration's ability to do anything right.
SCHIEFFER: Well, when you say, `We need to have a plan,' you mean a plan to leave?
Dr. DEAN: We do.
SCHIEFFER: A plan to get out?
Dr. DEAN: We need to have a plan to leave.
SCHIEFFER: Should we leave now?
Dr. DEAN: I think that's going to be very problematic. I mean, I think we've gotten in there, we've made a huge mess in there, we've created a terrorist danger for the United States where one did not exist before. But to pull out before they even have a chance to write their constitution I think is wrong. But I do think that time is coming very quickly. And if it turns out that this constitution really does take away the rights that women have enjoyed in Iraq before, then I can't imagine why we're there. . .
SCHIEFFER: . . . I mean, saying we need a plan. I mean, sure, you need a plan, but do you have a plan? Is anybody working on a plan? What would you propose?
Dr. DEAN: Well, Bob, the president of the United States is commander in chief. It is up to him to come up for a plan. You can't expect a congressman and senators who don't have the same access to intelligence as the president does to come up with a plan to withdraw our troops from Iraq. We look--the president got us into Iraq 'cause people were willing to trust the president, even some Democrats were willing to trust the president in assuming he knew what he was doing. The problem is now that there's ample evidence to say that they didn't understand what they were getting into and they still don't know what we're doing there. They changed their goals. The troops are still not properly equipped. The constitution looks like it may take away freedom from the Iraq people, at least half of them, instead of added to them. What we need is a plan from the president of the United States. You can't expect a particular senator or particular congressman to have a plan. Only the president can do that.

Why Bush basically can’t fall below 40% popularity (no matter how badly he screws up) -- but also why scores below 40% on certain issues (his handling of Iraq, his Social Security plan, etc) are really significant: they show that even his hard-core base is abandoning him

http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/8/14/221042/359

Curt Weldon (R-PA) and “Able Danger”: looks like the whole story was based on a lie. And even some on the right are saying “we’ve been had”

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006907.php

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006908.php

http://www.ericumansky.com/2005/08/able_danger_att.html

Trent Lott goes after Bill Frist (juicy!)

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/15/lott_dishes_dirt.html

The “myth” of global warming is just about to bite us all in the ass: and for this we can thank a succession of Republican administrations who said they didn’t believe in it even after scientists told them it was real

http://susiemadrak.com/2005/08/14/11/59/global-thaw/

Fascinating story of how the decision to appoint a special prosecutor in the Plame case got made early on: (1) they already suspected Rove was lying to them and (2) no one trusted Ashcroft

http://villagevoice.com/news/0533,waasweb1,66861,2.html

http://whateveralready.blogspot.com/2005/08/more-fitzgerald-rove-and-plame-news.html

“Legal urban legends” and their role in driving tort reform policy

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tortmyths14aug14,0,2326040.story
These fables have also been widely disseminated by columnists and pundits who, in their haste to expose the gullibility of juries, did not verify the stories and were taken in themselves.

Although the origins of the tales are unknown, some observers, including George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley, say their wide acceptance has helped to rally public opinion behind business-led campaigns to overhaul the civil justice system by restricting some types of lawsuits and capping damage awards.

"I am astonished how successful these urban legends have been in influencing policy," Turley said. "The people that created these stories did so with remarkable skill."

So, Tom DeLay claims he severed relations with Jack Abramoff in early 2001, and as Josh Marshall asked, how long would it be before evidence to the contrary started rolling in? Not long

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006289
[May, 2002] As long as we're helping the Washington Post research team find examples of the DeLay friendship after February 2001, I almost forgot about his free-mealing privileges at Signatures. We don't know if DeLay was a Signatures-Free-Mealer at Rep. Dana Rohrabacher's clip. But in May 2002 DeLay did ask Abramoff to set him, his wife and four pals up for a special table and a free meal.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006288
[April 3, 2002] Mr. Norquist, who is friendly with both men, said of Mr. Abramoff, "He walks in to see DeLay and DeLay knows that he is representing clients whose views are in sync with DeLay's views."

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006287
[June 12, 2002] Another reader pointed us to a June 12th 2002 piece in Roll Call about DeLay's daughter baby shower at which Abramoff and then-associate Tony Rudy were guests.

And of course there's Abramoff's continuing maxed-out donations to DeLay and his PACs after that date.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_14.php#006287
[February 11, 2004] At a dinner hosted by GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff a few blocks from the Capitol at Signatures - a Republican hot spot that features a drink called "The Lobbyist" - DeLay chewed over the topic with a group of lobbyists. . .

Justice Sunday II: about what you’d expect

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bashing-judges-and-gays-at-justice.html

“Don’t pass the President”

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2005/08/14/the_bikerinchief.html
President Bush took a group of journalists on a mountain bike ride, USA Today reports. "But the truth about the Biker-in-Chief is that the man can really ride. Over the course of a two-hour Tour de Crawford, Bush humbled every rider in Peloton One with a strong and steady pace over scorching hot paved roads, muddy creek crossings, energy-sapping tall grass and steep climbs on loose and crumbling rock."

"But there is one rule: don't pass the president."

Meanwhile, the AP notes that next weekend Bush "gets to hit the trails with seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong."

More: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2005/08/14/national/w132555D22.DTL

Someone please wake me: I must be dreaming

http://makeashorterlink.com/?N13143D9B
The federal agency in charge of aviation security is considering major changes in how it screens airline passengers, including proposals that an official said would lift the ban on carrying razorblades and small knives as well as limit patdown searches. . . Any of the changes proposed by the staff, which also would allow scissors, ice picks and bows and arrows on flights, would require Hawley's approval, this official said, requesting anonymity because there has been no final decision.

"The process is designed to stimulate creative thinking and challenge conventional beliefs," said Mark Hatfield, TSA's spokesman. . .

[NB: Yes, “conventional beliefs” like WHO THE HELL NEEDS AN ICE PICK OR A BOW AND ARROW ON AN AIRPLANE??!!]

Bonus item: Christopher Walken for President site a hoax? Alas, maybe so

http://thetechnologist.blogspot.com/2005/08/christopher-walken-2008-is-hoax.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 7:45 AM

 
REALITY BITES

Mark your calendar: August 14 2005 – the day the Bush administration finally admitted the pointless waste of lives and money their war in Iraq has turned out to be (and by the way, this is one more sign that they have already decided to pull out troops, whatever the “conditions on the ground” are)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/13/AR2005081300853.html
The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad.

The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.

"What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning.". . .

The ferocious debate over a new constitution has particularly driven home the gap between the original U.S. goals and the realities after almost 28 months. The U.S. decision to invade Iraq was justified in part by the goal of establishing a secular and modern Iraq that honors human rights and unites disparate ethnic and religious communities.

But whatever the outcome on specific disputes, the document on which Iraq's future is to be built will require laws to be compliant with Islam. Kurds and Shiites are expecting de facto long-term political privileges. And women's rights will not be as firmly entrenched as Washington has tried to insist, U.S. officials and Iraq analysts say.

"We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic," said another U.S. official familiar with policymaking from the beginning, who like some others interviewed would speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. "That process is being repeated all over."

U.S. officials now acknowledge that they misread the strength of the sentiment among Kurds and Shiites to create a special status. The Shiites' request this month for autonomy to be guaranteed in the constitution stunned the Bush administration, even after more than two years of intense intervention in Iraq's political process, they said. . .

Washington now does not expect to fully defeat the insurgency before departing, but instead to diminish it, officials and analysts said. There is also growing talk of turning over security responsibilities to the Iraqi forces even if they are not fully up to original U.S. expectations. . . "We've said we won't leave a day before it's necessary. But necessary is the key word -- necessary for them or for us? When we finally depart, it will probably be for us," a U.S. official said. . .

[NB: Read on – an amazing article. People should be furious. The point is that ALL of this was being pointed out to them when they began this misadventure. They chose to ignore it, just as they chose to ignore any intelligence that didn’t support their determination to go to war. At one point the article says, “Gee, we didn’t realize that water would be so hard to find in the desert.” WTF!@?]

More: http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/how-low-can-expectations-in-iraq-go.html

Who is the main source for this story? Dr. Tom More says it’s clearly The Donald (thanks to Digby for the link). Are we finally seeing a major falling out between President Stay the Course and his military people, who see that given inadequate enlistment, extended tours of duty, and growing disaffection among the troops, a further commitment simply isn’t extendable? Or is this just another carefully choreographed good cop/bad cop performance, Bush getting to stay resolute and firm while his underlings have to break the bad news? (I say, the latter)

http://moquol.squarespace.com/journal/2005/8/13/i-know-whos-talking-to-the-washington-post.html

See also this story from yesterday: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-message13aug13,1,7962354.story

More: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_07_digbysblog_archive.html#112398855846148725

Followed up by a drop-dead column from Frank Rich

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/opinion/14rich.html
LIKE the Japanese soldier marooned on an island for years after V-J Day, President Bush may be the last person in the country to learn that for Americans, if not Iraqis, the war in Iraq is over. "We will stay the course," he insistently tells us from his Texas ranch. What do you mean we, white man?. . . [read on!]

More: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/14/0555/84809

What I wanted to say

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006905.php
[Kevin Drum] Summer 2002, a senior Bush official to Ron Suskind: "[Establishment liberals] believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality. That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality."

Summer 2005, a senior Bush official to Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer: "What we expected to achieve [in Iraq] was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground. We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning."

This is one of those days when everyone else takes the words right out of my mouth: so I’ll just quote some more examples

Example #2: U.S. troops STILL being sent into battle with inadequate armor

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/international/middleeast/14armor.html
For the second time since the Iraq war began, the Pentagon is struggling to replace body armor that is failing to protect American troops from the most lethal attacks by insurgents.

The ceramic plates in vests worn by most personnel cannot withstand certain munitions the insurgents use. But more than a year after military officials initiated an effort to replace the armor with thicker, more resistant plates, tens of thousands of soldiers are still without the stronger protection because of a string of delays in the Pentagon's procurement system.

What I wanted to say

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/deadly-deja-vu-in-iraq-troops-still.html
[John Aravosis] Imagine the uproar in Congress if a Democratic President let troops stay in a war zone without the proper equipment. They'd be talking impeachment. . .

[NB: This is yet another object of proof that despite Bush’s rhetoric, this is not a country that feels itself to be at war and pulling together to achieve it. Various companies are bellied up to the payment trough, government bureaucrats are safeguarding turf, Congress is using military funding to shovel pork, and no one is knocking heads together to make things happen NOW. With a military composed of volunteers and shanghaied Reserve and National Guard troops, most of the country feels lazy and apathetic about this endeavor, stirred only intermittently to heights of commitment, then quickly reverting to complacency. And a President who likes five-week vacations symbolizes the country’s own refusal to accept sacrifice: except of course the friends, families, and loved ones of those killed and wounded in action]

Example #3: Bush forms seven working groups to oversee Iraq reconstruction

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8917944
At his meeting with his war cabinet yesterday, Bush reviewed the latest developments but reported no new direction. The administration has set up seven interagency groups focused on its main priorities in Iraq. These are providing security and training Iraqi forces, building national political institutions, restoring energy and other services, tackling economic problems, establishing rule of law, enlisting international help, and improving strategic communications.

What I wanted to say

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/the_war_in_iraq_/2005/08/about_fcking_time_dept.php
[Mark Kleiman] Now they're figuring out what the priority areas are and setting up groups to work on them? Now?

Maybe if they'd been doing that back in the summer of 2003 -- when Rummy was dismissing the looting as no biggie and telling his subordinates he didn't care whether Iraqi civil servants got paid or not -- instead of making "Mission Accomplished" banners for the President to stand in front of, we might have actually accomplished the mission.

Of course, that would have required giving the need to make peace work in Iraq precedence over patronage and crony capitalism in the management of the occupation.

Example #4: Bush still dropping hints that Iran could be next

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/bush-says-hed-use-force-against-iran.html

What I wanted to say

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_07.php#006284
[Josh Marshall] My literary powers failed me when I tried to come up with a joke suitably humorous and grim to fully capture the ridiculousness of President Bush's continued insistence that he is willing to use force but only as a last resort.

In Iraq, the constitution is being treated like a pork-laden piece of U.S. congressional legislation: rushed through a vote before people actually have a chance to read it

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitution-and-bum-rush-perceptive.html

That is, IF they get a constitution to vote on at all. These aren’t picky little details they’re squabbling over, but constitutionally fundamental (and still unresolved) questions. Now they’re saying, “Pass it, and we’ll amend it later”

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-constitution14aug14,0,6887451.story

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitution-cliffhanger-6-us-troops.html

And still the Dems can’t get their brains wrapped around an anti-war position

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/08/14/democrats_embrace_tough_military_stance/

Pro-Bush counter-demonstrators come down to Crawford, but they don’t seem to quite have their hearts in it (bused in, bused out, on the scene for a half hour). Their main anti-Cindy Sheehan chant? “We don’t care, we don’t care. . .” Brilliant!

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_07_digbysblog_archive.html#112396671686028803

Live report: http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/08/13.html#a4442

Photos: http://cryptome.org/brp/bush-ranch2.htm

News blogging from the site: http://www.upbeatdefiance.com/xoops/modules/news/

More: http://www.discourse.net/archives/2005/08/pictures_of_camp_casey.html

Leading to this point to ponder: why are we seeing so much anti-military sentiment from the Right?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2005_08_07_digbysblog_archive.html#112397669655412143

From Bush: another privacy-compromising piece of legislation to create even bigger and more tightly integrated medical databases. And of course it’s all about helping YOU

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011852.html
President Bush signed into law a bill to create electronic monitoring programs to prevent the abuse of prescription drugs in all 50 states.

The new law creates a grant program for states to create databases and enhance existing ones in hopes of ending the practice of "doctor shopping" by drug abusers seeking multiple prescriptions.

[NB: Too late to stop Rush Limbaugh, apparently]

Despite Bush efforts, judge rules that Department of Homeland Security employees have the same rights as any other government employee

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/national/nationalspecial3/14secure.html

More on David Margolis, the career prosecutor appointed to oversee the Fitzgerald investigation. He sounds like a very, very serious customer – take it from someone who knows him

http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/valerie_plame_/2005/08/career_prosecutor_to_supervise_plame_probe.php
[Mark Kleiman] On his way out the door, Deputy Attorney General James Comey, who chose junkyard dog Patrick Fitzgerald to run the Plame scandal investigation, has chosen senior junkyard dog David Margolis to supervise Fitzgerald once Comey leaves.

This is truly bad news for the bad guys. . .

[NB: And this!]

So the risk that Bush would put a Bones buddy in to put a lid on Fitzgerald turns out to have been chimerical. In any case, the Bonesman in question, Timothy Flanigan, doesn't seem likely to take office soon, if ever. Turns out there's a little matter of Flanigan's having hired Jack Abramoff as a lobbyist.

More: http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1787

DeLay’s new excuse: I broke off relations with Abramoff in early 2001 (how long will it take to disprove that ridiculous lie?)

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_08_07.php#006285

Abramoff: flight risk

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011858.html

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0508130072aug13,1,4149405.story

John Bolton’s charm offensive

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/000896.html
From yesterday's media stakeout of United Nations Ambassador John R. Bolton:

Reporter: "A question on Iran?"

Bolton: "No."

[NB: Or perhaps that should just be plain “offensive”]

Here comes Justice Sunday II: and with it, your Sunday sermon (thanks to TChris at Talk Left for the link)

http://www.hrc.org/Template.cfm?Section=Press_Room&CONTENTID=28414
[Harry Knox] As a Christian, I believe our faith is most evident in action we take to protect the elderly, to heal the sick and house the poor, to promote peace, and to protect and extend liberties and freedoms, including the freedom of religion.

It would never occur to me to propose that one particular religion be law of the land. That would silence my sisters and brothers of other faiths from whom I have learned so much that has stretched my own understanding. It’s through these faiths that I’ve been able to see even more revealed of the awesome, limitless nature of the Creator.

This In-Justice Sunday, Majority Leader Tom Delay, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council and others will say that God wants America to look, act, and talk just like they do – to be a country that reflects only their narrow view of morality.

How Christian is it to say poor people deserve their state, gay people should be fired from their jobs, wars should be prosecuted based on might over right and women should have no say over what happens to their own bodies? It is not very Christian at all. . .

So what will you be doing Sunday night while the far right wingers are calling for a theocracy? I plan to be worshiping, praying, singing, and, yes, even preaching at a service of worship sponsored by the volunteers of the Human Rights Campaign’s Nashville Religious Project.

Wherever you might be, if you are a person of faith, do your own preaching and teaching this week. Tell others that no matter what they see or hear of this injustice crowd this Sunday, many more of us believe that faith and fairness are inextricably tied.

Bonus item: Christopher Walken, running for President!

http://talkleft.com/new_archives/011855.html

***If you enjoy PBD and support what we are doing, you can help by forwarding a copy of this issue to your friends (using the envelope link below) or by sending them a copy of its URL (http://pbd.blogspot.com).

I don't get anything personally out of this project, except the satisfaction of doing it (I don't run ads, etc). The credit really all goes to the people whose material I copy and redistribute. But if I do have a "mission," it is to get this information into the hands of as many people as I can.***
- posted by Nick Burbules @ 8:23 AM

 
“ABLE DANGER”

Not a great day for media integrity

NYT admits Atta story might have been a crock: this is what they get for listening to Curt Weldon. But an interesting choice of headlines, don’t you think?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/13/politics/13intel.html
9/11 Panel Explains Move on Intelligence Unit

[NB: I believe that headline should read “We Got Used”]

By way of contrast

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/12/AR2005081201655.html
No Evidence Pentagon Knew of Atta, Panel Says
Investigators for the Sept. 11 commission have found no evidence to support allegations by a House Republican that lead hijacker Mohamed Atta was identified by a classified Pentagon program before the 2001 attacks, according to a commission statement issued last night.

The full story, as best we know it

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002364.html
[From the 9-11 Commission, c/o Laura Rozen] On October 21, 2003, Philip Zelikow, the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, two senior Commission staff members, and a representative of the executive branch, met at Bagram Base, Afghanistan, with three individuals doing intelligence work for the Department of Defense. One of the men, in recounting information about al Qaeda’s activities in Afghanistan before 9/11, referred to a DOD program known as ABLE DANGER. . . As with their other meetings, Commission staff promptly prepared a memorandum for the record. That memorandum, prepared at the time, does not record any mention of Mohamed Atta or any of the other future hijackers, or any suggestion that their identities were known to anyone at DOD before 9/11. Nor do any of the three Commission staffers who participated in the interview, or the executive branch lawyer, recall hearing any such allegation.

While still in Afghanistan, Dr. Zelikow called back to the Commission headquarters in Washington and requested that staff immediately draft a document request seeking information from DOD on ABLE DANGER. The staff had also heard about ABLE DANGER in another context, related to broader military planning involving possible operations against al Qaeda before 9/11.

In November 2003, shortly after the staff delegation had returned to the United States, two document requests related to ABLE DANGER were finalized and sent to DOD. One, sent on November 6, asked, among other things, for any planning order or analogous documents about military operations related to al Qaeda and Afghanistan. . . The records discuss a set of plans, beginning in 1999, for ABLE DANGER, which involved expanding knowledge about the al Qaeda network. Some documents include diagrams of terrorist networks. None of the documents turned over to the Commission mention Mohamed Atta or any of the other future hijackers. Nor do any of the staff notes on documents reviewed in the DOD reading room indicate that Mohamed Atta or any of the other future hijackers were mentioned in any of those documents.

A senior staff member also made verbal inquiries to the HPSCI and CIA staff for any information regarding the ABLE DANGER operation. Neither organization produced any documents about the operation, or displayed any knowledge of it.

In 2004, Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA) and his staff contacted the Commission to call the Commission’s attention to the Congressman’s critique of the U.S. intelligence community. No mention was made in these conversations of a claim that Mohamed Atta or any of the other future hijackers had been identified by DOD employees before 9/11.

In early July 2004, the Commission’s point of contact at DOD called the Commission’s attention to the existence of a U.S. Navy officer employed at DOD who was seeking to be interviewed by Commission staff in connection with a data mining project on which he had worked. The DOD point of contact indicated that the prospective witness was claiming that the project had linked Atta to an al Qaeda cell located in New York in the 1999-2000 time frame. Shortly after receiving this information, the Commission staff’s front office assigned two staff members with knowledge of the 9/11 plot and the ABLE DANGER operation to interview the witness at one of the Commission’s Washington, D.C. offices.

On July 12, 2004, as the drafting and editing process for the Report was coming to an end (the Report was released on July 22, and editing continued to occur through July 17), a senior staff member, Dieter Snell, accompanied by another staff member, met with the officer at one of the Commission’s Washington, D.C. offices. A representative of the DOD also attended the interview.

According to the memorandum for the record on this meeting, prepared the next day by Mr. Snell, the officer said that ABLE DANGER included work on “link analysis,” mapping links among various people involved in terrorist networks. According to this record, the officer recalled seeing the name and photo of Mohamed Atta on an “analyst notebook chart” assembled by another officer (who he said had retired and was now working as a DOD contractor).

The officer being interviewed said he saw this material only briefly, that the relevant material dated from February through April 2000, and that it showed Mohamed Atta to be a member of an al Qaeda cell located in Brooklyn. The officer complained that this information and information about other alleged members of a Brooklyn cell had been soon afterward deleted from the document (“redacted”) because DOD lawyers were concerned about the propriety of DOD intelligence efforts that might be focused inside the United States. The officer referred to these as “posse comitatus” restrictions. Believing the law was being wrongly interpreted, he said he had complained about these restrictions up his chain of command in the U.S. Special Operations Command, to no avail. . .

The interviewee had no documentary evidence and said he had only seen the document briefly some years earlier. He could not describe what information had led to this supposed Atta identification. Nor could the interviewee recall, when questioned, any details about how he thought a link to Atta could have been made by this DOD program in 2000 or any time before 9/11. The Department of Defense documents had mentioned nothing about Atta, nor had anyone come forward between September 2001 and July 2004 with any similar information. Weighing this with the information about Atta’s actual activities, the negligible information available about Atta to other U.S. government agencies and the German government before 9/11, and the interviewer’s assessment of the interviewee’s knowledge and credibility, the Commission staff concluded that the officer’s account was not sufficiently reliable to warrant revision of the report or further investigation.

We have seen press accounts alleging that a DOD link analysis had tied Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi (who had arrived in the U.S. shortly before Atta on May 29) to two other future hijackers, Hazmi al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, in 1999-2000. No such claim was made to the Commission by any witness. Moreover, all evidence that was available to the Commission indicates that Hazmi and Mihdhar were never on the East coast until 2001 and that these two pairs of future hijackers had no direct contact with each other until June 2001.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2005_08/006899.php
[Kevin Drum] The Able Danger program was classified, of course, so we may never know exactly what it was and what it found out — especially since if the Pentagon was aware of Atta in 2000 it's not likely to want to admit it in any case. However, I'm going to stick with my original guess: it produced some general information about al-Qaeda, but nothing specifically about Atta or the other 9/11 hijackers. That's why no one ever mentioned Atta in the original reports. Later on, frustrated because their story wasn't getting enough attention, Weldon and his source embellished it to suggest that Able Danger had specifically uncovered actionable intelligence about an al-Qaeda cell in Brooklyn headed by Atta. The 9/11 Commission, which was days away from finishing its report, didn't believe this suddenly revised story and chose not to include it in its report.

Don’t worry, the Washington Post comes in for its share of criticism too

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/8/13/0287/29969
[WP] In a certain sense, this death threat should bring comfort to Americans fighting in Iraq and to the Iraqis struggling to finish their delayed constitution, which is supposed to be ready on Monday. Had al Qaeda set out to prove to a growing number of doubters that the war in Iraq really is about democracy -- and not about oil, hubris or imperialism -- its leaders couldn't have done so more clearly.

[Armando] Are you effing kidding me? I mean, I am truly speechless. Repeat after me WaPo, Al Qaida was NOT in Iraq. They were supported by the Taliban and Pakistan! Democracy? Not "mushroom clouds?!" You liars. An arm of the BushCo liars is all you are now.

Vanity Fair exposes the complicity of Time magazine and the New York Times in covering up what they knew about Rove’s involvement in the Plame scandal

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001013806

How long will Rush’s paramour Daryn Kagan remain an anchor at CNN?

http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/cnn/are_daryns_days_numbered_at_cnn_24617.asp

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_07_atrios_archive.html#112388325775970282
Update: 5:16pm: "I'm a CNNer and I can tell you that when she anchors her show, during commercial breaks, she AOL IM's with Rush from the set," a tipster says. "It's HIGHLY inappropriate, and I, for one, won't be sad to see her leave."

I know this is a dog bites man story, but here goes. Guess who is helping the Iraqis write “their” constitution?

http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1784

And here is a related story that will sound oh-so-familiar

http://www.juancole.com/2005/08/constitution-negotiations-reach-last.html
[Juan Cole] Meetings are still being held on the final issues bedeviling the finalization of the Iraqi constitution. Iraqi government spokesmen keep saying that 16 or 17 issues are outstanding and all should be resolved by August 15. In fact, most of these issues are intractable (Should Iraq be a centralized state, a federal state, or a very loose federal state? Should religious law be applied to personal status issues like marriage, divorce, inheritance and alimony? Should the Shiite grand ayatollahs and the holy city of Najaf be formally recognized in some way? etc. etc.)

What now seems likely according to comments made to al-Hayat is that many of these hard issues will just be kicked down the road in order to meet the August 15 deadline. . .

[NB: The U.S. says the constitution will be “finished” by the 15th, and so it has to be “finished” by the 15th, even if it is nowhere near “finished”]

The WH’s conflicting messages on Iraq troop withdrawals: disarray, or deliberately confusing the issue to give themselves flexibility to pull them (or not pull them) down the road?

But whatever you say, NEVER accuse the Bush gang of creating a “timetable” (even though that’s exactly what they have), because timetables are for liberals and Democrats and wusses who don’t support the troops. Any timetable talk is just “speculation” (speculation that came straight from the mouths of his own generals)

http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/08/pres-bush-vs-rumsfeld-vs-generals.html

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/index.html?blog=/politics/war_room/2005/08/12/iraq2/index.html

Or is it really disarray?

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-message13aug13,1,7962354.story
Are the president and the Pentagon on the same page over the war in Iraq?

That que