The debate spiraled toward a rather messy conclusion, with John Edwards (and Barack Obama playing Tubbs to John's Crocket) giving Hillary Clinton a colonic on the issue of drivers licenses for illegal immigrants. I think by then I was too tired to care, but Chris Matthews and company are gleefully dissecting that final moment for its potential to take Hillary down. They're already writing the GOP talking points. Finally, something Chris can get excited about.
What's sad, is that whatever happened tonight, the media already was poised to write a headline about Hillary being hit on character and "doubletalk." Now, they'll have this final bit to feed on for a news cycle.
Chris is in hog heaven.
Oh, and Dennis Kucinich says yep, he did see a UFO.
Clinton, rivals spar as Democrats debate By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated
PHILADELPHIA - Democrats Barack Obama and John Edwards sharply challenged Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's candor, consistency and judgment Tuesday in a televised debate that underscored her front-runner status two months before the first presidential primary votes.
Obama, the Illinois senator, began immediately, saying Clinton has changed her positions on the North American Free Trade Agreement, torture policies and the Iraq war. Leadership, he said, does not mean "changing positions whenever it's politically convenient."
Edwards, the former North Carolina senator, was even sharper at times, saying Clinton "defends a broken system that's corrupt in Washington, D.C." He stood by his earlier claim that she has engaged in "doubletalk."
Clinton, standing between the two men, largely shrugged off the remarks and defended her positions. She has been the focus of Republican candidates' "conversations and consternation," she said, because she is leading in the polls.
...because it takes a lot of energy to attack the front-running political candidate more vigorously than any of her actual rivals.
What is wrong with Russert? He isn't even pretending to be a journalist anymore. He's in pure attack mode in tonight's debate. All that golfing with Roger Ailes is clearly affecting his judgment...
So far, the Democratic debate in Philly is three on one -- First Barack, then John Edwards, then Tim Russert going right at Hillary, on whether Barack plans to attack her (yawn), then on Social Security, on "double talk", and finally, on Iran.
So far, to no avail. She's a machine.
Now Russert is handing the hammer to Chris Dodd to give him a crack at Hillary on her Iran vote.
And now Biden is taking on the Iran vote, and he's doing the best job of arguing that Hillary's vote was "bad policy" that opens the door to Bush going to war. Best one liner so far: "actions have consequences; big nations can't bluff."
Now it's Barack's turn, and he's talking about talking to Iran and offering them "carrots." It's a bit boring, I have to say, but it's classic Barack.
Hillary's hit-back: "when you go to the negotiating table with a beligerent power like Iran, you need both carrots and sticks." She says she believes we should be engaged in active diplomacy with Iran now.
What's interesting is that Hillary seems to be running for the support of independents, and Democrats who want a tough president and who might be nervous about handing the reigns over to Democrats. Her strategy -- forget the boys in the room and run for the general. Smart strategy. She looks more and more centrist the more the others talk, and Kucinich and Gravel haven't even gotten started yet.
...and I thought this debate was going to be a snooze...
9:30 p.m. --
Barack just got off his best line so far, after Tim Russert asked a stupid question about whether the candidates will "pledge that Iran will not get nuclear weapons" on their watch. Said Barack: "we have been governed by fear for the last six years... " adding that the Republican candidates are continuing that process. He also said that, in moving away from the fearmongering of the right, "we have to stop acting like we're the weakest nation in the world, instead of the strongest nation in the world." Well done.
Biden just made a good point, that Pakistan has hundreds, even thousands of kilograms of enriched uranium, and that it makes no sense to go to war with Iran to stop them getting a few kilograms.
Bill Richardson is talking now, recounting his resume as a diplomat or something ... and ... well ... I'm not listening...
9:55 --
It's five minutes to ten, nearly a full hour into the debate, and Brian Williams has just asked the first question in this debate that wasn't an invitation to the other candidates to attack Hillary Clinton. Stunning. The question: "Senator Obama, what is your relevant experience to be president?" Barack is talking about his experience bringing people together. I have to tell you, I don't think that what the base is looking for is someone who can find common ground with Republicans. Just a thought.
Now, Bill Richardson is stepping up to the plate. He just said he's hearing this "holier than thou attitude towards Senator Clinton and its bothering be because its bordering on personal attacks that we don't need." He is pointing out that he has differences with Mrs. Clinton too, "but its important that we save the ammunition for the Republicans, if we continue I believe, harping on the past..." and on Clinton's electability ..." and not focusing on the future ... the reality on the electability issue is that the last senator to be elected president was John Kennedy, that's 40 years ago. " He added that the Dems need to stay positive, and that he "trust Senator Clinton, he just disagrees with her." Coming to Mrs. Clinton's defense makes him look quite chivalrous.
Now Dodd is stepping in, slapping down John Boy for condemning Hillary for taking defense industry money while he's forking it in from the trial lawyers. Meow! This thing is getting good!!! Hell, Chris Matthews was right -- attack politics is damned entertaining!!!
10:06 --
In the midst of the food fight over who is more of a take-money hypocrite, Joe Biden just got off THE line of the night. The set up is that Brian Williams quoted Rudy Giuliani pooh poohing Hillary's qualifications to be president -- that's what got the whole Richardson v. Edwards v. Dodd v. Clinton exchange rolling. Now, the payoff. Said Biden: "I'm not running against Hillary Clinton, I'm running to be the leader of the free world ... and the irony is Rudy Giuliani, probably the most underqualified man since George W. Bush to seek the presidency, is here talking about any of the people here. Rudy Giuliani -- I mean think about it -- there's only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, a verb and 9/11. ... there's nothing else. And I mean it sincerely, he is genuinely not qualified to be president. ..." This is why I love Biden. He really is the coolest mofo in the race. Hilarious!
And with that, Tim Russert went right back to setting up attacks on Hillary, this time, on Social Security.
10:25 --
Now they're talking high energy prices. Chris Dodd, Joe Biden and even John Edwards managed to get through the answer without back-slapping Hillary. Edwards says we should conserve. Why does he irritate me so much this time around...?
So far, it looks like the media got its self fulfilling prophecy on the food fight. A few liveblog choces:
The cable chat media, led by Chris Matthews of MSNBC (backed by his seconds, Chuck Todd and Howard Fineman), and their friends in the print press, have a message for the non-Clinton Democratic candidates: "Bring me the head of that Clinton woman!"
Matthews and company are desperately casting around, offering beligerent free advice to Barack Obama: ATTACK HILLARY NOW! Why are they so certain that Barack must quit to professorial schtick and lop off Hil's head? Becauase John Edwards, for all his shrillness, isn't getting the job done. And for the mainstream media hit squad that tried with all its might, but failed to take down President Bill Clinton over that phony scandal with a chubby, horny intern, the job must get done.
Matthews in particular seems bent on justifying his near decade of obsession with the Clintons' sex life, and his spittle-mouthed, high horsed jihad against the former president back in the bad old days of 1998, when the right wing Congress and their bounty hunter, Ken "show me the panties" Starr, sought to undo the results of two elections by hounding a sitting president out of office for doing what just about every president before him has done: cheat on his wife. (Just a guess, they probably all lied about it, too.)
And now that Hillary Clinton seems to be running away with the Democratic nomination for president, she... must ... be ... stopped. And if the media can't do it themselves (too obvious) then Barack had damned well better start the shelling.
If he doesn't, the media bete noires say, he's toast. He can't beat her if he doesn't beat her. The desperation to see a bar room brawl is so thick that yesterday on "Hardball," Pat Buchanan, who usually holds it together a lot better on "the race thing," at least on TV, actually mused that Obama "sure doesn't come off like a Black guy from the south side of Chicago." Huh? What's he supposed to do to Mrs. Clinton? Smack that ass and call her a "ho?"
Meanwhile, on the other side of the political aisle, there's no competing narrative demanding why Mitt Romney doesn't mount a real, full throated attack against Rudy Giuliani, the front runner for the GOP nod. The assumption is that there is so much to attack with Hillary, but with Rudy? Not so much. I mean, he's "America's mayor" after all -- what's there to attack? The media insists that the only thing worth attacking Rudy for is his apostasy on social values issues -- gay marriage and abortion. Beyond that, Matthews and Co. can't imagine anything, by golly by gosh, that Mitt or Huck or Fred could possibly want to bash Mr. 9/11 for...
Honestly, with the exception of David Shuster and of course, Keith Olbermann, it's almost as if the powdered men of the MSM have formed a Jim Jones-like cult whose ritual chant is an incantation to burn Hillary in the fires of hell. ... and her cheating but still getting love from his wife, still more popular than any of the TV talking heads, and more manly to boot hubby, too. (Haters.)
Sigh.
Anyhoo, the Dems will attempt to live up to the Mathews brawl-o-meter tonight, if Barack and his team are that easily hypnotized (earth to Barack, look how well nasty attacks have worked for John Edwards!) The debate will be moderated by the almost rhythmically bland Brian Williams and the Roger Ailes golf buddy posing as an objective journalist, Tim Russert.
Canadian prof Francois Furstenberg writes a brilliant op-ed on the origins of terrorism, and the Jacobins of the French Revolution -- the progenitors of today's modern-day Jacobins, the neoconservatives. A few highlights:
The Jacobins shared a defining ideological feature. They divided the world between pro- and anti-Revolutionaries — the defenders of liberty versus its enemies. The French Revolution, as they understood it, was the great event that would determine whether liberty was to prevail on the planet or whether the world would fall back into tyranny and despotism.
The stakes could not be higher, and on these matters there could be no nuance or hesitation. One was either for the Revolution or for tyranny. ...
... Confronted by a monarchical Europe united in opposition to revolutionary France — old Europe, they might have called it — the Jacobins rooted out domestic political dissent. It was the beginning of the period that would become infamous as the Terror. ...
...Among the Jacobins’ greatest triumphs was their ability to appropriate the rhetoric of patriotism — Le Patriote Français was the title of Brissot’s newspaper — and to promote their political program through a tightly coordinated network of newspapers, political hacks, pamphleteers and political clubs. ...
... Insisting that their partisan views were identical to the national will, believing that only they could save France from apocalyptic destruction, Jacobins could not conceive of legitimate dissent. Political opponents were treasonous, stabbing France and the Revolution in the back.
To defend the nation from its enemies, Jacobins expanded the government’s police powers at the expense of civil liberties, endowing the state with the power to detain, interrogate and imprison suspects without due process. Policies like the mass warrantless searches undertaken in 1792 — “domicilary visits,” they were called — were justified, according to Georges Danton, the Jacobin leader, “when the homeland is in danger.” ... If the French Terror had a slogan, it was that attributed to the great orator Louis de Saint-Just: “No liberty for the enemies of liberty.” Saint-Just’s pithy phrase (like President Bush’s variant, “We must not let foreign enemies use the forums of liberty to destroy liberty itself”) could serve as the very antithesis of the Western liberal tradition.
On this principle, the Terror demonized its political opponents, imprisoned suspected enemies without trial and eventually sent thousands to the guillotine. All of these actions emerged from the Jacobin worldview that the enemies of liberty deserved no rights.
Though it has been a topic of much attention in recent years, the origin of the term “terrorist” has gone largely unnoticed by politicians and pundits alike. The word was an invention of the French Revolution, and it referred not to those who hate freedom, nor to non-state actors, nor of course to “Islamofascism.”
A terroriste was, in its original meaning, a Jacobin leader who ruled France during la Terreur.
Brilliantly done. One could draw many of the same parallels between todays angry wngers and the authoritarian Bolsheviks who founded the Soviet Union. ... Anyway, read the entire article here.
Condoleezza Rice used to be a Democrat. She even aided Gary Hart back in the day, though you're unlikely to get her to admit it today... but with her current boss fading into the dustbin of history, and likely taking her reputation down the chute with him, Condi appears to be going for one final kick -- she's talking to former presidents Clinton and Carter, and to her friend, Madeleine Albright, whose lefty dad taught Condi in Denver, to try and scrounge up the deal for Palestinian statehood that eluded the former presidents, the hardline Israelis, and the late Yasser Arafat.
And you know what? As much of a disappointment as Dr. Rice has been for this country -- her stewardship as National Security Advisor was abysmal, and she has been a lackluster secretary of state -- not to mention her failure to give her boss, the president, good, forceful advice on how to deal with Russia, about which she is supposedly and expert ... despite all of that, I'm rooting for her. Not for her sake, and defnitely not for the Bushies ... but for the people of Palestine and Israel alike, their respective governments notwithstanding.
Let's hope that for once, Condi gets one right.
Related: here's a good backgrounder on the conflict, including a discussion of the little known real roadblock to peace between the Palestinians and Israelis: water.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House scolded the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Friday for staging a phony news conference about assistance to victims of wildfires in southern California. The agency—much maligned for its sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina over two years ago—arranged to have FEMA employees play the part of independent reporters Tuesday and ask questions of Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the agency's deputy director.
The questions were predictably soft and gratuitous.
"I'm very happy with FEMA's response," Johnson said in reply to one query from an agency employee.
White House press secretary Dana Perino said it was not appropriate that the questions were posed by agency staffers instead of reporters. FEMA was responsible for the "error in judgment," she said, adding that the White House did not know about it beforehand and did not condone it. ...
Yeah, right...
"FEMA has issued an apology, saying that they had an error in judgment when they were attempting to get out a lot of information to reporters, who were asking for answers to a variety of questions in regard to the wildfires in California," Perino said. "It's not something I would have condoned. And they—I'm sure—will not do it again."
She said the agency was just trying to provide information to the public, through the press, because there were so many questions.
"I don't think that there was any mal-intent," Perino said "It was just a bad way to handle it, and they know that."
What do they have to pay this girl to get up in front of cameras and reporters every day looking as dim witted and in denial as Mrs. Larry Craig...? You're dying inside, a little bit every day, aren't you, Dana...?
FEMA gave real reporters only 15 minutes notice about Tuesday's news conference . But because there was so little advance notice, the agency made available an 800 number so reporters could call in. And many did, although it was a listen-only arrangement.
On Tuesday, FEMA employees had played the part of reporters. Johnson issued a statement Friday, saying that FEMA's goal was "to get information out as soon as possible, and in trying to do so we made an error in judgment."
"Our intent was to provide useful information and be responsive to the many questions we have received," he said. "We can and must do better."
Officials at the Homeland Security Department, which includes FEMA, expressed their concern.
"This is simply inexcusable and offensive to the secretary that such a mistake could be made," Homeland Security spokeswoman Laura Keehner said Friday, referring to DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff. "Stunts such as this will not be tolerated or repeated."
Keehner said senior leadership is considering whether a punishment is necessary.
IF punishment is necessary????
These clods are looking more and more like the old Soviet government every day -- the decrepit, dying one that tipped over, apparently at the mere behest of Ronald Reagan...
Is Karl Rove gone yet???
Cue Mary Landrieu of Louisiana (hellloooooo, Katrina!) who is now demanding an investigation, in her role as chairman of the Senate's Homeland Security and Government Affairs Subcommittee on Disaster Recovery.
The Georgia teen sentenced to a decade behind bars for a consensual sex act with a girl two years younger, is finally freed after the Georgia Supreme Court on Friday ruled that his sentence was grossly unfair, constituting cruel and unusual punishment. Thank God. This case was an embarrassment to the State of Georgia, and to the country. From the Atlanta Journal Constitution:
case, which sparked protest marches and demonstrations in Douglasville, where Wilson was prosecuted. Douglas County prosecutors, meanwhile, have vehemently denied race played a role, noting all the defendants and victims in the case are black.
The case stems from a drug- and alcohol-fueled New Year's Eve party Wilson attended at a Douglasville hotel in 2003. Wilson was charged with raping a 17-year-old girl at the party, but was acquitted. He was ultimately found guilty of felony aggravated child molestation for receiving oral sex from the 15-year-old girl, a crime that carried a minimum 10-year prison sentence under state law at the time.
Four other male youths at the party pleaded guilty to child molestation of the 15-year-old and sexual battery of the 17-year-old. A fifth pleaded guilty to false imprisonment. Their party was captured on a profanity-laden and sexually graphic video filmed by one of the male youths.
Since Wilson's conviction, the former Republican state lawmaker who authored the state Child Protection Act in 1995 has repeatedly insisted it was never his intent to lock up teenagers involved in consensual sex acts. Last year, the Legislature changed the law to make similar acts a misdemeanor, punishable by up to 12 months in prison.
The Supreme Court noted that legal change in the 48-page opinion it issued in Wilson's case Friday morning: "For the law to punish Wilson as it would an adult, with the extraordinarily harsh punishment of ten years in prison without the possibility of probation or parole, appears to be grossly disproportionate to his crime," wrote Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears, who sided with the majority in the court's 4-3 decision in favor of freeing Wilson.
In ruling Friday, the Supreme Court upheld the June 11 decision of Monroe County Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson, who ordered Wilson freed from prison. Judge Wilson, no relation to Genarlow Wilson, also ordered his felony conviction reduced to a misdemeanor. But the Supreme Court said the judge erred in resentencing Wilson "for a misdemeanor crime that didn't exist when the conduct in question occurred." The court said Judge Wilson should instead set aside Wilson's sentence altogether. Judge Wilson did not respond to a message left at his office Friday.
Veda Cannon, the mother of the 15-year-old girl in Wilson's case, declined to comment. But in an interview in June, Cannon said Wilson should never have been criminally charged and imprisoned for receiving oral sex from her daughter. Cannon said the sex between her daughter, Wilson and the four other teens was consensual and regrets she didn't ask prosecutors not to charge them. Critics have pointed out, however, that the age of consent in Georgia is 16.
Good news for Genarlow and his family, but as the AJC points out in an article today, the Georgia legislature still has some work to do:
because he felt that he'd never be free if he were on the sex offender registry. "I just don't feel I'm a sexual predator," he said.
Those sweeping limits have stranded other young offenders with virtually no place to go. Also convicted at age 17 of having oral sex with a 15 -year-old, Jeffery York, 23, of Polk County has resorted to sleeping in a camper van in the woods to comply with the registry. When she was 17, Wendy Whitaker, 28, of Harlem had oral sex with a teen about to turn 16; her sodomy conviction landed her on the registry and forced her and her husband to move twice already.
Now that the Supreme Court has issued a common-sense ruling that sex between teens is not the equivalent of adults preying on children, it's the Legislature's turn to act on reason. Lawmakers must amend the sex offender registry law so that it distinguishes between two immature high school kids hooking up at a party to a pedophile molesting the toddler next door.
Teens convicted of consensual sex acts are not a risk to society, a fact that the General Assembly conceded when it changed the law under which Wilson went to prison. In February 2005, a Douglas County jury convicted Wilson of aggravated child molestation for having oral sex with a classmate about two years younger than him. The conviction hinged on one fact: the two-year age gap.
The gap allowed prosecutors to charge Wilson with aggravated child molestation, which, by a strange twist in Georgia law, carried a mandatory minimum 10-year sentence that could not be commuted by the parole board or the governor.
A year after Wilson's conviction, the Legislature admitted the unfairness of criminalizing sexual behavior between two consenting high school students and rewrote the law so that similar behavior is now a misdemeanor, punishable by no more than 12 months in jail. Yet, the Legislature did nothing to help the teens tripped up by the old law.
In the largest call-up of U.S. diplomats since the Vietnam War, the State Department is planning to order some of its personnel to serve at the American Embassy in Iraq because of a lack of volunteers. Those designated "prime candidates" - from 200 to 300 diplomats - will be notified Monday that they have been selected for one-year postings to fill the 40 to 50 vacancies expected next year.
A spokesman for the union that represents U.S. diplomats told The Associated Press on Saturday that "assigning unarmed civilians into a combat zone should be done on a voluntary basis."
They will have 10 days to accept or reject the position. If not enough say yes, some will be ordered to go to Iraq and face dismissal if they refuse, said Harry Thomas, director general of the Foreign Service.
Starting Nov. 12, "our assignments panel will assign people to Iraq," Thomas told reporters in a conference call Friday. "Under our system, we have all taken an oath to serve our country, we have all signed (up for) worldwide availability.
"If someone decides ... they do not want to go, we will then consider appropriate action," he said. "We have many options, including dismissal from the Foreign Service."
Only those with compelling reasons, such as a medical condition or extreme personal hardship, will be exempt from disciplinary action, Thomas said. He said the process of deciding who will go to Iraq should be complete by Thanksgiving.
Diplomats who are forced into service in Iraq will receive the same extra hardship pay, vacation time and choice of future assignments as those who have volunteered since Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice this past summer ordered Baghdad positions to be filled before all others around the world.
About 200 Foreign Service officers work in Iraq.
It is certain to be unpopular due to serious security concerns in Iraq and uncertainty over the status of the private contractors who protect U.S. diplomats there, particularly after a deadly Sept. 16 shooting in which guards from Blackwater USA protecting an embassy convoy were accused of killing 17 Iraqi civilians.
So why wouldn't our diplomats want to go to the neocon paradise we've created in Baghdad?
Iraq is an extremely dangerous hardship post with near daily insurgent mortar attacks on the fortified Green Zone where the embassy is located.
When you get to be a certain age, sometimes its best to leave the commentary to your memoirs. Memoirs, you can edit.
James Watson, who headed the U.S. part of the Human Genome Project, and who is credited with discovering the DNA double-helix, has retired.
Dr. Watson, who shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for describing the double-helix structure of DNA, and later headed the American government’s part in the international Human Genome Project, was quoted in The Times of London last week as suggesting that, overall, people of African descent are not as intelligent as people of European descent. In the ensuing uproar, he issued a statement apologizing “unreservedly” for the comments, adding “there is no scientific basis for such a belief.”
But Dr. Watson, who has a reputation for making sometimes incendiary off-the-cuff remarks, did not say he had been misquoted.
Editing, old fellow ... editing... Watson's statement upon his retirement. His flight from Britain is documented here.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Some Democratic lawmakers questioned on Wednesday whether a new Bush administration request for $88 million to fit "bunker-busting" bombs to B-2 stealth bombers was part of preparations for an attack on Iran.
The proposal was included as part of a nearly $200 billion request for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that the Bush administration sent to Capitol Hill on Monday.
The request included $87.8 million for further development of the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP, a conventional bomb designed to destroy hardened or deeply buried targets.
Many of Iran's nuclear development facilities are believed to be underground. The United States accuses Iran of trying to develop a nuclear bomb while Tehran insists its nuclear program is only for power generation.
A Bush administration summary said the request was needed for "development of a Massive Ordnance Penetrator for the B-2 aircraft in response to an urgent operational need from theater commanders," but gave no details.
"My assumption is that it is Iran, because you wouldn't use them in Iraq, and I don't know where you would use them in Afghanistan, it doesn't have any weapons facilities underground that we know of," said Rep. Jim Moran, a Virginia Democrat who is on the House defense spending committee and intends to argue against the request.
"I suppose you could try to bomb out a cave (in Afghanistan), but that seems like taking a sledgehammer to a tack. A little excessive," Moran said in a phone interview.
Another Democrat, Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington, said the bunker-buster request worried him because of the rising tide of criticism of Iran coming from the Bush administration. Last week, Bush warned that a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to World War Three.
"The drumbeats of war are beating again, this time against Iran and we have to step in while there is still time," McDermott said through a spokesman.
But will the Dems step in before Bush uses their prior votes -- Hillary's included -- as an excuse to pull the trigger? Signs point to no. The Dems clearly lack the political will to confront the administration, even in its weakened state, and they have proved to be woefully inadequate at countering the political gamesmanship (and Stepford-like loyalty to the president) of their Republican counterparts. The neocons and their robotic operatives on Capitol Hill are still carrying the day, and beating the Dems at every punch. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid should be ashamed of the way they have conducted themselves thus far.
The optimist in me (which at this stage is a very junior operative) still holds out hopd for some show of sanity -- perhaps from within the military itself, or maybe even from Bob Gates -- to stop this train before it leaves the station, and a president with nothing left to lose decides to lose one more for his dwindling, war-crazed, paronoid delusional base.
And then there's this: the noises out of Russia are nearly as bellicose as those coming out of Dick Cheney's pharyngeal motor cortex. From the Asia Times:
... The barely reported highlight of Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit to Tehran for the Caspian Sea summit last week was a key face-to-face meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
A high-level diplomatic source in Tehran tells Asia Times Online that essentially Putin and the Supreme Leader have agreed on a plan to nullify the George W Bush administration's relentless drive towards launching a preemptive attack, perhaps a tactical nuclear strike, against Iran. An American attack on Iran will be viewed by Moscow as an attack on Russia. ...
There's also news in that same report that Putin may be working on a plan to temporarily have Tehran halt its nuclear program in exchange for a Russian push to kill U.N. sanctions, eventually allowing Iran's program to resume. That would be good news. But my sinking feeling is that Washington is hurtling toward war, because Cheney and his neocons fear that the next president cannot be trusted to do it (unless they can guarantee a Giuliani win, in which case the same neocons will continue to be in charge.) If that happens, Russia is in something of a "heads we win, tails you lose" position. An attack would drive up oil prices, as Uri Kasparov explained on "60 Minutes," enriching oil-soaked Russia. And an attack would dirve Iran deeper into the embrace of the KGB-led Russian government, strengthening Putin's hand in the now Iran-centric Middle East.
If on the other hand, Russia is able to forestall an attack, Iran's debt to Moscow grows deep, and Putin's influence grows anyway. Either way, it's unlikely that the Bushies have much of a clue as to what they will unleash with even an air attack on Iran.
After all, foreward planning isn't their strong suit. Their strong suit is bombing Muslims.
Back to the planning. TIME reports that the real target of the new U.S. sanctions against Iran might be the European businesses and governments that continue to have deep economic ties with Tehran, and that:
the new measures may actually signal a splintering of the international consensus pressuring Tehran to curb its nuclear program.
Further:
The teeth in the new measures derives from the fact that they target anyone who is doing business with those Iranian institutions and individuals. And that means doing business with Iran at all, because as Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson put it, the IRGC "is so deeply entrenched in Iran's economy and commercial enterprises, it is increasingly likely that if you are doing business with Iran, you are doing business with [the Guard]." Administration officials told the New York Times that a key purpose of the new measures was "to persuade foreign governments and financial institutions to cut ties with Iranian businesses and individuals."
The move comes amid U.S. frustration at its failure to elicit sufficient support for new U.N. Security Council sanctions aimed at forcing Iran to suspend uranium enrichment, and at the slow progress of efforts to persuade European countries and institutions that do business with Iran to voluntarily desist. Some of Iran's biggest European trading partners, such as Italy and Germany, oppose unilateral sanctions, warning that if their companies were to withdraw from Iran, they would simply be replaced by competitors from Russia and China. But to the extent that the latest U.S. moves are used to pressure third-country governments, banks and corporations doing business with Iran, they will be perceived as Washington using its muscle in the international financial system to impose its own Iran policy on others. And resentment may not be the only consequence. China, for example, would be unlikely to accept any U.S. effort to stop any of its corporations from doing important business with Iran, and could threaten economic countermeasures to deter such action. ...
Again, failure to foresee the consequences.
While the U.S. call to ratchet up economic pressure on Iran is strongly backed by Britain and France, Russia and China have both warned against taking unilateral measures outside of the U.N. Italy and Germany, Iran's largest European trading partners, have also opposed moves to pressure Iran outside of the U.N. Security Council. The move suggests the U.S. may be reverting to a "coalition of the willing" model for dealing with Iran. Yet the case Washington makes for escalating sanctions — the claim that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, and that shutting down its uranium-enrichment program is a matter of urgency to prevent it attaining the know-how to build a bomb — is not the international consensus. Russia's President Vladimir Putin last week visited Tehran, and made clear that Russia sees no evidence that Iran is actually pursuing nuclear weapons — contradicting the U.S. charge that the civilian nuclear technologies Iran seeks will give it the means eventually to build such weapons.
Meanwhile, Bush is pressing forward knowing that Congress doesn't have the cojones to stand in his way, should he and his neocons choose war to grab the resources ... I mean "alter the behavior" of Iran.
Earth to 27 percent of Republicans: Rudy Giuliani is lying to you. And I mean, like, daily...
He wants you to believe that he was the REAL hero of 9/11 ... single-handedly doing what no other mayor could: talking to the press! Walking around with a mask on! Brushing dust off his suit shoulders, and uniting a city ... and a nation... ! Cue the angelic choir...!!!
Ahem.
Aside from a belabored p.r. strategy, and continual boasts about his supposed sage foreknowledge of 9/11 (knowledge he apparently didn't feel compelled to share with anyone who could have done anything about it, including the Clinton administration with whom he was working so closely (and exchanging mushy-gushy letters) on things like the assault weapons ban and the COPS program ...) boasts that are at this stage, even more irritating than John Edwards' "son of a millworker" schtick, what is Rudy Giuliani, really? Who is he, to those of us who know him best -- namely, New Yorkers?
Let's review:
He's not the crime-fighting super sleuth whom the Gotti boys targeted for a rub-out. That's only interesting to Rudy's high-fiving, snarky little press aides. For the rest of us, it's "talk to me when you get something more interesting than Rudy nearly getting whacked. Hell, Curtis Sliwa got shot in the butt by a made guy. Want him to be your president, too?"
He's not the beloved mayor of Gotham City. New Yorkers hate his guts (and not just the firefighters. We civilians despise him, too.) Remember when he floated the idea of staying on past his lawful mayoral term in the wake of 9/11 to ... um ... keep the leadership coming ... possibly in a Hugo Chavez-like version of forever? Not! He got shot down like ... well ... Curtis Sliwa's butt... Ouch!
He's not the only man with the foresight to see 9/11 coming, as he likes to tell Republican voter-bots during his incipid "love me, I'm 9/11" speeches. In fact, sealed testimony to the 9/11 Commission -- an entity Rudy quit after just a few months because attending the meetings was cutting into his 9/11 profiteering time -- which wasn't supposed to see the light of day until after the 2008 election, but obtained by the Village Voice's Wayne Barrett reveals the following:
A 15-page "memorandum for the record," prepared by a commission counsel and dated April 20, 2004, quotes Giuliani conceding that it wasn't until "after 9/11" that "we brought in people to brief us on al Qaeda." According to the memorandum, Giuliani told two commission members and five staffers: "But we had nothing like this pre 9/11, which was a mistake, because if experts share a lot of info," there would be a "better chance of someone making heads and tails" of the "situation." (Such memoranda are not verbatim transcripts of the confidential commission interviews, but are described on the cover page as "100 percent accurate" notes taken by staffers, stamped "commission sensitive/unclassified" on the top of each page.)
Asked about the “flow of information about al Qaeda threats from 1998-2001,” Giuliani said: “At the time, I wasn’t told it was al Qaeda, but now that I look back at it, I think it was al Qaeda.” He also said that as part of one of his post-9/11 briefings, “we had in Bodansky, who had written a book on bin Laden.” Giuliani was referring to Yossef Bodanksy, the author of Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America, which was published in 1999 and predicted “spectacular terrorist strikes in Washington and/or New York.” Giuliani wrote in his own book, Leadership, that Judi Nathan got him a copy of Bodansky’s prophetic work “shortly after 9/11,” and that he covered it in “highlighter and notes,” citing his study of it as an example of how he “mastered a subject.” Apparently, he also invited Bodansky to address key members of his staff.
Giuliani attributed his pre-9/11 shortcomings in part to the FBI, which was run by his close friend (and current endorser) Louis Freeh, and to the Joint Terrorism Task Force, an FBI-directed partnership with the NYPD. "We already had JTTF, and got flow information no one else got," he explained. "But did we get the flow of information we wanted? No. We would be told about a threat, but not about the underlying nature of the threat. I wanted all the same information the FBI had, and we didn't get that until after 9/11. Immediately after 9/11, we were made a complete partner." He added: "Without 9/11, I never would have been able to send an adviser to FBI briefings."
The testimony reveals that, far from being an expert, Rudy was exactly what those of us who've lived under his regime knew him to be -- an itinerant mayor who spent more time trying to shut down raunchy art exhibits than examining possible threats to his city, or some other useful, mayoral-type passtime like ... oh, I don't know ... getting decent radios for his firefighters instead of handing out sweetheart, no-bid contracts to Motorola or NOT LOCATING THE CITY'S COUNTER-TERROSIM RESPONSE CENTER IN THE SAME WORLD TRADE CENTER THAT WAS HIT IN 1993!!!!!!
Ahem ...
Oh, and did I mention that he's a foreign policy novice under the sway of a claque of neoconservative advisors who are itching to go to war in the Middle East near the Tigris and Euphrates rivers? Sound familiar, guys? Huh???
In fact, the only good thing about Rudy is his original position on gun control, which is amply documented here. Of course, the new, flip-flopping Rudy is totally, and I mean totally, against gun control ... sort of ... depending on who he's talking to ... Bo-Sox, Yankees, my God, so much to decide...!
Anyhoo, I guess the bottom line is that Rudy Giuliani is whoever he thinks he has to be that day, in order to get to be your president. Here's hoping he's doing all that huffing and puffing in vain. At least some conservatives are finally growing suspicious of the slippery character who changes positions faster than he changes wives ... and dresses.
Wake up, the rest of you Rudyphiles. The last thing you want in the White House is somebody about whom the one true thing you can say, is that you're certain that you really don't know who he is. When that happens, you have two choices: lift up his skirt and see if there are any jumblies under there, or ask those of us who do.
I think I liked you better when you were being a jerk
I liked California Rep. Pete Stark for about a day and a half ... He got on my good side when he issued this nasty little bromide, directed at the 'publicans and their president:
Well, then, in typical Democrat fashion, Stark not only caved (after the leadership of his own party tisk tisked him like a bunch of fairy godmothers, and then helped him out by killing a vote on yet another stupid, bitchy "sense of the GOP and their shaky legged, lacky Democrat followers" reprimand on the House floor) ... he promptly, and tearfully, apologized...
What a wussie. I'll bet if you were a member of the GOP you wouldn't apologize, Starky. You'd make like Glenn Beck and justify that nasty wildfire comment about victims who've been burned out of their homes hating America, or act like El Rushbo and deny that what you said on tape which is recorded and disseminated online was what you said at all, and then blame the "drive by media" for misquoting you. It's all about definitiveness, Stark. And snarky delivery.
Someday, my pitifully well-behaved (and thus thoroughly ineffective) Democrats will learn to play the game.
This must have sounded so much better in speech rehearsals...
ROCHESTER, N.H. -- Republican presidential candidate John McCain told workers of small weapons factory that he not only wants to catch Osama Bin Laden if elected, but said he "will shoot him with your products".
"I will follow Osama Bin Laden to the gates of hell and I will shoot him with your products," McCain said.
Jeez, John, good thing you weren't speaking at a condom factory ...
And then ... he made it worse...
McCain told reporters afterward he was joking when he made the comment at Thompson Center Arms in Rochester.
"I certainly didn't mean I would actually shoot him. I am certainly angry at him, but I was only speaking in a way that was trying to emphasize my point," McCain said. "I would not shoot him myself."
Nearly one million Californians -- the largest movement of Americans inside the United States since the civil war -- have fled the massive fires raging across southern California. This is no joke, Glenn Beck, you idiot, it's a national disaster and tragedy -- a "super Katrina" (thank God the officials running Qualcomm Stadium and several other refuges have their act together).
Updates:
Officials now say they cannot stop the wildfires, which are being spread by the ferocious Santa Ana winds...
Unless the shrieking Santa Ana winds subside, and that’s not expected for at least another day, fire crews say they can do little more than try to wait it out and react — tamping out spot fires and chasing ribbons of airborne embers to keep new fires from flaring.
“If it’s this big and blowing with as much wind as it’s got, it’ll go all the way to the ocean before it stops,” said San Diego Fire Capt. Kirk Humphries. “We can save some stuff but we can’t stop it.”
Meanwhile, the opening headline of this story says it all, when it comes to George W. Bush:
Sharply criticised for his slow response to the 2005 Hurricane Katrina disaster, President George Bush moved on Wednesday to assert a leading role in efforts to combat wildfires in California.
So much for being competitive in New York... Rudy's gambit, of course, is to pander to BoSox fans in nearby New Hampshire, ahead of a certain primary election. But any true Yankee fan (and I am one, baby) knows that the Red Sox are the Evil Empire, the uber enemy, and you cannot be with them, and also with the Yanks.
...unless of course you're a shape-shifting, gone with the wind, spineless pol, like Rudy... expect him to be dressing in drag again soon, too.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 22 — President Bush asked Congress on Monday to approve $196 billion to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other national security programs, setting the stage for a new confrontation with Democrats over the administration’s handling of Iraq.
Mr. Bush’s request increased the amount of the proposed spending by $46 billion over the $150 billion already requested this year. Much of the added spending would pay for new armored vehicles designed to withstand attacks by mines and roadside bombs, and a rise in operational costs because of the increase in the force in Iraq, now at more than 160,000 troops.
The spending request — declared an emergency under spending rules, even though the need for the money was never in question — comes in the middle of the White House’s fight with Congress over a series of spending bills for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. None of those bills has been completed so far.
Democrats on Capitol Hill, having failed last week to override Mr. Bush’s veto of an expansion of a children’s health insurance program costing $35 billion, reacted with dismay and anger that reflected a broader frustration over the war in Iraq. They also said they believed that Mr. Bush delayed his formal request to avoid unfavorable comparisons between his veto and the spending on the war.
House and Senate leaders have warned they would not take up the president’s request until they resolve differences in the spending bills that Mr. Bush has vowed to veto. Those differences amount to $22 billion, a fraction of the spending for Iraq and Afghanistan.
They'll weep and gnash their teeth and quietly fume over "more money for war and nothing for the poor..."
...and then they'll cave.
Unfortunately, that's what Democrats do.
Meanwhile, Turkey may pull a GWBush and invade Iraq. This time, the cassus belli is the same one Turkey has threatened to react to before -- to stop the Kurdish militant group, the PKK, from conducting terror activity in northern Iraq and Turkey. Turkey is now putting the pressure on Washington (and the Maliki government in Iraq) to clamp down on the supposedly placid Kurdish territories. Look for Washington to comply.
That, after all, is what the Bushies have to do at this stage.
Radio One has gotten out of the talk business, and so our station, WTPS, has come to the end of the road. We're in the middle of our final program on "Wake Up South Florida" right now. Sad ending to an experiment that really didn't get enough time to germinate. I still think the talk format can work in the urban context, given enough time, attention and consistency. It had its flaws, but it was needed, especially in this market here in South Florida.
We'll let you know where Andre and I, as well as Eddie Frederick, EWF, A.C., Ricky Norris Sports Guru and the rest of the gang are going next. Andre can be found at talktoandre.com. You can also keep up with us at jebapresents.com.
Unless of course, she wasn't assaulted by the right...
Now, Randi Rhodes' attorney says she wasn't mugged by the right, though he's not saying what did happen on that Park Avenue sidewalk...
A police source said Rhodes never filed a report and never claimed to be the victim of a mugging. Cops from Manhattan's 17th Precinct called her attorney, who told them Rhodes was not a victim of a crime, the source said.
Rhodes' lawyer told the Daily News she was injured in a fall while walking her dog. He said she's not sure what happened, and only knows that she fell down and is in a lot of pain. The lawyer said Rhodes expects to be back on the air Thursday. He stressed there is no indication she was targeted or that she was the victim of a "hate crime."
Rhodes started with the Air America when it launched in 2004. Her show airs from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays.
The network released a statement that said Rhodes "experienced an unfortunate incident."
"The reports of a presumed hate crime are unfounded," the statement read by a receptionist at the network's New York offices said. "Ms. Rhodes is looking forward to being back on the air on Thursday."
The situation gets even murkier from there, as the Miami Herald reports:
In a phone interview Tuesday afternoon, her attorney, Robert V. Gaulin, said that Rhodes ``was disoriented after she hit the ground and sustained facial injuries...We have no reason to believe she was a target...She's at the doctor.''
He wouldn't elaborate on her injuries but said she was in pain. He said that onlookers helped.
``She was assisted and went on her way. She did not at the time file a police report.''
Gaulin noted that ''some people get hit from behind. She did not walk into anything,'' but he wouldn't say if Rhodes believes she was hit from behind.
Simon the Yorkshire terrier, he said, ``was not involved.''
He called the situation ''a mess,'' adding that Elliott ``didn't talk to us and didn't get any information from us.''
Late Tuesday Elliott issued a statement saying, ``I shouldn't have speculated based on hearsay that Randi Rhodes had been mugged and that it may have been an attack from a right-wing hate machine. I apologize for jumping to conclusions based on an emotional reaction.
``I wish Randi nothing but the best and look forward to a speedy recovery.''
DU is jumping with the news, so far unreported on the MSM, that Air America's Randi Rhodes was mugged and assaulted outside her Park Avenue apartment:
Randi Rhodes was mugged on Sunday night on 39th Street and Park Ave, nearby her Manhattan apartment, while she was walking her dog Simon.
According to Air America Radio late night host Jon Elliott, Rhodes was beaten up pretty badly, losing several teeth and will probably be off the air for at least the rest of the week. At of late Monday night we have not able to locate any press accounts of the attack and nothing has been posted on the AAR website.
snip
Elliott was extremely agitated when he reported on the incident. He opened his show by saying "it is with sadness that tonight I inform you that my Air America colleague Randi Rhodes was assaulted last night while walking her dog near her New York City home." Pointing out that Rhodes was wearing a jogging suit and displayed no purse or jewelry, Elliott speculated that "this does not appear to me to be a standard grab the money and run mugging."
"Is this an attempt by the right wing hate machine to silence one of our own," he asked. "Are we threatening them. Are they afraid that we're winning. Are they trying to silence intimidate us." Some of blog posters also expressed concerns that the attack on Rhodes was hate crime. Other posters warned that we need more facts before any judgements are made.
More on the attack -- which seems especially suspicious -- from Talking Radio:
Attacks on liberal talk radio stations and their hosts are not a new thing. About a month ago a gunman fired a shot through a window at the studios of KPFT, Houston’s, Pacifica station narrowly missing a DJ who was hosting music show at the time. There is currently a $10,000 reward offered to anyone who identifies the shooter.
This is not the first politically motivated attack on KPFT. More than 35 years ago, the Ku Klux Klan blew up the station's transmitters twice within the Houston station's first year on the air.
Also, according to a blogger on Democratic Underground, Thom Hartmann said on his Friday show that his auto repairman, after replacing his windshield, pointed out to him that he had three bullet holes in his car.
Updates:
