Month: June 2007

I have long maintained that Bush is stark raving mad. Now Think Progress has a report that says “In Meeting, `Wild-Eyed’ Bush Thumped Chest While Repeating `I Am The President!’” During a recent meeting, Bush lost control of his sanity(or what there was of it), and even shocked some of his friends from Texas. Think Progress quotes an article from the Dallas Morning News in which Bush is clearly in his maniac mode.

But by all reports, President Bush is more convinced than ever of his righteousness.

Friends of his from Texas were shocked recently to find him nearly wild-eyed, thumping himself on the chest three times while he repeated “I am the president!” He also made it clear he was setting Iraq up so his successor could not get out of “our country’s destiny.”

It goes on to tell an account that happened earlier this month. Think Progress reported on Chris Nelson of the Nelson Report, telling about a “similar account earlier this month:”

[S]ome big money players up from Texas recently paid a visit to their friend in the White House. The story goes that they got out exactly one question, and the rest of the meeting consisted of The President in an extended whine, a rant, actually, about no one understands him, the critics are all messed up, if only people would see what he’s doing things would be OK…etc., etc. This is called a “bunker mentality” and it’s not attractive when a friend does it. When the friend is the President of the United States, it can be downright dangerous. Apparently the Texas friends were suitably appalled, hence the story now in circulation.

If there was any doubts as to how far gone the President really is, this should make even the wingnuts Nervous. The man is MAD! Not in the angry sense either! As He-Man goes around thumping his chest like King Kong, we no longer have fear itself to fear. We have a mad king hell bent on doing what he very well wants to do. We have the makings of a dictator like the very one he was determined to take out in Iraq.

Some of those 28% misinformed Americans better take a closer look before it’s too late. The image given is more than one needs to imagine what the man is willing to do, and how far he will go to do it. That dog is over due for his rabies shot!

Cross Posted from The Katrinacrat Blog

Immediately after the 9/11 attacks of 2001, President Bush sat down to play poker with the biggest stack of chips at the table, the odds-on favorite to win one of the highest-stakes games ever played. This huge initial chip advantage was built from a unified and supportive citizenry at home, a mainstream media that rarely questioned his judgment or intentions, an international community prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, and a military machine bigger than the next couple dozen countries combined. But since those early heady days, Bush and his close advisers and neocon allies have made one horrendous decision after another. The great tragedy, of course, is that the president has not been playing with his own chips. Rather, in this game his poor play has cost the lives of our courageous soldiers and many Iraqi civilians, our country’s stature in the world, and our national resources much needed for other purposes, domestic and international.
Realizing how poorly they’ve been playing, many gamblers would recognize that they don’t belong at the table–or conclude that they had entered the wrong game. Not so with the president. Rather, all signs suggest that this stubborn poker player will never learn any constructive lessons from his abysmal performance. There are at least five reasons why this is so. First, although a relative novice at the game, he has refused to prepare adequately, hasn’t mastered the probabilities of various outcomes, and seemingly hasn’t even tried to understand his opponents and their style of play. Second, he has cultivated and embraced an Old West saloon mentality where a loaded six-shooter and a quick draw can suddenly turn losing hands into winners. Third, he has a personal history of being bailed out whenever he has come up short in the past, whether through family connections or the highest reaches of our judicial system. Fourth, he has convinced himself that God is personally by his side, presumably carrying an unlimited supply of aces. And fifth, he is now deeply concerned about his legacy, and likely suspects that only a miraculously successful reshaping of Iraq and the Middle East can save him from being a frequent answer in “worst president ever” debates in the decades ahead.

My list is undoubtedly incomplete, but it is daunting. It suggests that President Bush will ultimately be driven to go “all in” regardless of any wiser counsel he might receive. And at the very least, “all in” means continuing to play the losing Iraq hands as he has done thus far–or perhaps with even greater recklessness and abandon. More frightening still, “all in” may mean saving his very last stack of chips for Iran. The key question today is whether Congress, acting on behalf of the American people, can muster the fortitude to pull him away from the table before it is (again) too late.

As an addendum, I’ve put together a short YouTube video entitled Resisting the Drums of War that describes the Bush administration’s warmongering appeals and how to counter them. It’s available for viewing HERE.

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane & My Left Wing

click to enlarge
I have been wanting to do a strip on the volatile nature of the 08 version of John McCain for some time, but I didn’t know exactly how to draw the  character. When he started explaining his foreign policies by singing filked versions of golden oldie tunes, it came to me.

The whole press conference where he was singing “Bomb Iran” wasn’t Presidential unless you include Bush on that scale, then the curve bottoms out.

I believe cooler heads will need to prevail in the 08 election so we can exit Iraq. We have had enough of indiscriminate bombings in the Middle East, we don’t need McCain to make the situation worse with his show tunes. Gak, an image just came to my mind of Rudy dancing the chorus line while McCain sings. That might have just ruined Broadway for me forever!

But we do need McCain to stay in the race, for nothing more than to push Fred Thompson’s buttons. I quiver with excitement!

I originally wrote this post in reply to boran2’s Henry Kissinger: Still Delusional After All These Years. I do not mean to cast aspersions on boran2, but I think that the post I reference underestimates Henry Kissinger’s…and by extension, the entire Permanent Government’s…real craft and success.

We have had over 50 YEARS of this “delusion”, friends. When are we going to realize that the only delusion is on the side of the consistent losers?

Us.

Well-meaning, indeed. And losing almost every time.

New-realitied into near non-existence.

Always playing the same role as did the hapless Washington Generals, perennial losers to the Harlem Globetrotters. (What irony abounds in the choice of THOSE two names!!!)

It seems as if every time I see the PermaGov team and the so-called opposition come out on the floor of the public media I can hear that goddamned whistling version of Sweet Georgia Brown that was the theme song of the fixed Globetrotters/Generals games for forty years or more.

Same fix, different venue.

But we keep buying tickets!!!

And we dare to call the owners and promoters of the GAME deluded?

Give me a break.

Read on for more.
Henry Kissinger?

Delusional?

Not really.

I don’t believe it.

On the evidence.

Look at where we are.

Fighting the Realpolitik fight. All over the world.

Just as Henry wanted, 40+ years ago.

Henry Kissinger.

The ORIGINAL Neo-Con.

This sounds completely wrong-headed. But it is NOT. It is the flat-out truth of the matter. ESPECIALLY the ” both political parties” part, as our lovely set of DemocRat legislators has once again recently proven to us.

We foolish plebes misconstrue what the real movers and shakers in the PermaGov mean by “national interest”.

It is in “the national interest” to consistently focus as much force as it is possible for the economy and society of this country to bear on every client state in every client area that has the temerity to oppose our hegemony in that area.

Right up to…but not past…the absolute limits of:

1-The cohesion of U.S. society.

2-The ability of the U.S. economy to fund such efforts without total societal breakdown.

and

3-The eventual armed resistance of forces that can effectively oppose said efforts past U.S. ability to resist without unleashing Pandora the Nuclear Princess.

The “I will FUCK YOU UP!!!” approach to international relations.

Crazy Joey Gallo Goes To Washington.

This is a tightrope walk. I work in circus bands sometimes, and one observation that I have made repeatedly  is that even the riskiest performer…no net, daring tricks 100 feet above the sawdust…is in reality a cold, calculating son of a bitch at heart.

Or…he/she is a dead tightrope walker. May I point out here that Mr. K. is neither dead nor in jail?  He walks a pretty good tightrope, folks. Yes he does.

They talk and act a good game…

“OHHHHHHHH!!!” goes the crowd.

8 or 10 shows a week, 40+ weeks a year, for years.

The good ones.

But they only take it so far and no further.

Ditto the U.S. economic imperialists and their brain trusts.

Once the going gets TOO tough…to the point where they will lose sufficient support at home to keep getting re-elected, to the point that the economy is threatening to totally tank, to the point where the armed forces themselves are beginning to rebel…then it’s always the same conversation in some leather-lined office in DC.

They are ALWAYS right.

On the money.

That’s why opposition to their policies has been almost a total failure since the Korean War.

They have the money.

And we get the shaft.

WHY do we get the shaft?

Besides the fact that we have no power over massive finances such as those controlled by the dominant corporate interests in the world?

BECAUSE WE THINK THAT THEY ARE DELUSIONAL.

They are not “delusional”.

They are master liars.

Master producers of “new realities”.

Bet on it.

And Kissinger is the best of the best in these matters.

He wrote the book.

If the true rot that comprises the base of this whole system ever comes to light, ol’ Henry’s prints will be ALL OVER IT.

He is nothing less than a genius of what could quite literally be considered from the standpoint of human morality and the overall survival of the human race evil.

THAT kind of evil.

But “deluded”?

I think not.

Do not underestimate these people or turn them into cartoon figures.

They prop UP cartoon figures to take the brunt of our hatred.

But ol’ Henry The K?

Yup.

Still in there cogitating after all these years.

Give him his props, folks.

Know thine enemy.

Or…get thine ass royally kicked.

45 years since Eisenhower first publicly warned us of the military-industrial complex?

Have we even had ONE President or legislature that was not almost totally owned by those corporate interests?

With the possible partial exceptions of JFK and Carter? And look where that position got THEM!!!

Delusional?

Doesn’t look like it to me.

Not by a LONG shot.

Later….

AG

9/11 happened om George Bush’s watch. Who can forget those seven minutes of stunned silence. while he listened to the reading of “My Pet Goat.” But then he moved into action. Spoke with a bullhorn atop a mound of rubble at the site of the World Trade Center to rally America. Told us to go shopping to fight terrorism. Told the rest of the world “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

And ordered the EPA to lie to the World Trade Center volunteers, firefighters, police, other workers and residents in and around the massive clean-up site that the toxic stew of air to which they were exposed was perfectly safe to breathe.

Now those same, trusting, heroic people are getting cancer as a result of that lie. By the boatload:

(cont.)

NEW YORK – The head of the largest program tracking the health of World Trade Center site workers said several have developed rare blood cell cancers, raising fears that cancer will become a “third wave” of illnesses among those exposed to toxic dust after Sept. 11.

Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of the World Trade Center Medical Monitoring Program at Mount Sinai Medical Center, said researchers who have screened 20,000 of the estimated 40,000 ground zero workers are “most concerned” about lymphatic and blood cancer cases. […]

“The kind of thing that worries us is that we know we have a handful of cases of multiple myeloma in very young individuals, and multiple myeloma is a condition that … almost always presents later in life,” she added. “That’s the kind of odd, unusual and troubling finding that we’re seeing already.”

Mount Sinai published research last year that said about 70 percent of the workers they screened had developed various respiratory illnesses. […]

An attorney representing thousands of workers and residents said that more than 100 of his clients have blood cell cancers. About eight have multiple myeloma, David Worby said. Most of his clients are in their 30s or 40s, and the youngest is 29, he said.

More than half of all cases of multiple myeloma, a plasma cell cancer that spreads throughout bone marrow, occur in people over 70, and about 1 percent of cases occur in people under 40, according to the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation in Norwalk, Conn. […]

Said Worby: “It’s not a great threat to the general public, but to people who are already sick and have these blood cell cancers and who gave up their lives … it’s a great threat to them because a lot of them are going to die.”

Yes, I know the terrorists flew planes into those buildings and created all that toxic air. But that doesn’t excuse President Bush from lying to the brave Americans who risked their lives to save others, and to salvage the site of the worst foreign attack on American soil regarding the risks they were taking with their health.

To him, and to others in his administration, it was more important to quickly erase the evidence of this attack, then it was to protect the health of the American people who responded to his call for help, or who did so simply because it was , like the firefighters, simply their job. Actions could have been taken to protect those people from the toxic effects of all that “bad air” but Bush decided expediency was more important than the lives of the people who trusted his judgment, and the judgment of his administration.

Under the criminal law, when someone takes an action that it he or she knows is likely to harm or kill another human being, we call that “a depraved indifference to human life” and such people can be prosecuted for premeditated murder in most states. That is what George Bush and/or others in his administration did when they lied to the 9/11 workers and the people who resided in lower Manhattan. They understood that the toxins released into the air by the attack on the Two Towers on 9/11/2001 were likely to cause respiratory illnesses and cancers among those living and working in the effected area, yet they still deliberately ordered th EPA to lie about these serious health hazards to human life. If that doesn’t qualify as “depraved indifference” I don’t know what does.

Last I heard, I President responsible for murdering innocent US civilians would have committed a “high crime and misdemeanor” justifying his impeachment. So why aren’t we proceeding with an impeachment investigation, or a murder investigation? Someone at the White House gave this order, and I suspect only the President of the United States had the authority to override the decisions of Christie Todd Whitman, head of the EPA and one of the members of his Cabinet. So I ask once more: Why isn’t the House of Representatives investigating this lie, which has killed, and will kill more, innocent Americans as possible grounds for impeaching President Bush?

I guess IOKIYAR* also applies to the intentional murder of Americans.

* IOKIYAR is an acronym for the phrase “It’s okay if your a Republican.”

George W. Bush

Cancer

9/11

Impeachment

Peace Train by Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens)

copyright © 2007 Betsy L. Angert.  BeThink.org

It is official; America is not a nation at peace.  We are not tranquil people.  There is violence in our streets and we war wherever and whenever we can.  According to the Global Peace Index, the United States ranks ninety-sixth [96] out of one hundred and twenty one [121] countries studied.  This “superpower” is slightly more serene than Iran; yet less calm than Yemen.  
Interestingly, Iraq is considered the most violent of all countries.  The Index, created by The Economist Intelligence Unit does not presume a possible correlation between Iraq and the United States.  However, it might be said that what occurs in that particular Middle Eastern region is directly related to American politics.  If we were to truly assess the doings in that sovereign State, we could easily accept that Iraq is merely an extension of the United States, a colony of sorts.  Perhaps that is only my perception.  Nonetheless, the two countries are unmistakably coupled.

These two territories are separate from the tranquil land of Norway, which is listed as the most peaceful country in the world.  Germany, with its notorious history was declared the twelfth among serene States.  Even Cuba is calm in contrast to America.  This small island nation is not nearly as violent as its Northern neighbor.  Cuba was assessed to be fifty-ninth [59] among all countries.

We might muse that one country is profoundly peaceful while another civilization is cruel; however, until now there was no way of authentically measuring such an estimation.

“The objective of the Global Peace Index was to go beyond a crude measure of wars by systemically exploring the texture of peace,” said Global Peace Index President Clyde McConaghy.

He said the inaugural effort proves “peace can and has and will continue to be measured.”

The index was compiled based on 24 indicators measuring peace inside and outside of a country.  They included the number of wars a country was involved in the past five years, how many soldiers were killed overseas, and how much money was made in arms sales.

Domestic indicators included the level of violent crimes, relations with neighboring countries and level of distrust in other citizens.

The results were then reviewed by a panel of international experts.

“We were trying to find out what positive qualities lead to peace,” said Leo Abruzzese, the North American editorial director of the intelligence unit that is part of The Economist Group that publishes the well known magazine.

It seems a Democratic system did not necessarily destine a nation for peace.

“Democracy didn’t actually correlate with peace, but a well-functioning democracy did.  Efficient, accountable government seems to be the leading determinant of peace.  Beyond that, income helps.”

Imagine that money may not buy happiness.  Competence counts.  Might we muse that if the two exist together in one nation, much can be done to promote peace.  

Social Scientist would not be surprised.  Abraham Maslow speaks of a hierarchy of needs.  When we feel safe, secure, and trust that our life is stable, we are able to self-actualize, achieve fulfillment.  When an individual is free to be, life for that person is good.  When a group of people are capable of performing to their potential, peace is possible, perhaps an inevitable.

The prospect for peace may be found in satisfying personal and public needs effectively.  Empathy integrated into economic policy may create calm.

Fifteen of the top 20 most peaceful nations are in Western Europe, and countries with higher income appeared to lead to higher levels of peace, he [Abruzzese] said.

It is an interesting study.  I invite you to share your own theories and conclusions.  I offer the numbers as published by the Economist Intelligence Unit.  Peruse with pleasure.  As you do, watch your back.  If you are an American, the streets are not safe.

References for your review . . .