Hi Bald Eagle,
Re: I was talking about the one that crashed, wasn't that supposed to be headed for the White House.
Do you believe everything you read in the paper? <g>
Here's a hypothetical for you. Let's just suppose that the Bush team lies on occasion. Far fetched I know. But, it is beyond the realm of possibility?
Here's an example, trivial though it may be:
As you recall, when the Bush team came into the White House, they got at least a couple of days of media attention trashing the Clinton staff in the media for purported vandalism to the White House offices. Even I found it plausible that some prankster would remove a bunch of "W" keys from computer keyboards. Guess what? Office Max made an offer to the Bushies to replace any damaged keyboard, gratis, before the matter was spread across every news wire! Why did the Bush team never mention the Office Max offer? Politics. Here's a comment from a source that knows a lot more about this than me:
mediawhoresonline.com
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GAO AFFIRMS BUSHIES, MW'S LIED ABOUT "TRASHGATE"
$1150 In Cleaning Costs: Big Deal!
A.P., Salon Hype Reverse Story, Puff Bob Barr
The General Accounting Office today issued a report that affirmed the Bush White House lied outrageously about vandalism by outgoing Clinton aides in January 2001.
Except that the A.P. and Salon -- and how many others, as we write? -- have twisted the report inside out to say just the opposite!
Recall that, in January and February 2001, Bush officials and supporters (and not a few Media Whores) reported massive theft and destruction by outgoing Clinton staff, both inside the White House and on Air Force One.
"$200,000 in furniture taken out," said Fox's Sean Hannity. "The price tag right now is about $200,000," said Bill O'Reilly.
Clinton staffers admitted to having pulled some minor pranks -- like removing the "W" keys from some computer keyboards -- but said that the rest of the charges were either false or overblown.
And now the GAO has backed them up.
According to the new report, Bush aides make their reckless charges without keeping any record of damages.
In truth, the GAO report shows that the total cost of "professional clean up" at the White House came to $1150 -- a TINY sum, when you think of moving out an entire presidential staff from where it had worked for eight years.
The GAO also reported evidence about vandalism by Bush I staffers when they left in January 1993, including furniture piled up in hallways, words carved into desks (including an obscenity), broken chairs, broken computers and missing hard drives, telephone lines pulled out of walls, leftover food, prank notes, political cartoons in a copy machine and missing office supplies.
The then-incoming Clintonites were simply too gracious (and too busy doing the people's business) to raise a stink -- unlike the Bush people, who are ever ready to blow up a fake scandal. The only "mess" the Clinton Administration set about taking care of was the tremendous fiscal mess left over from years of deficit spending.
In addition to the modest thousand dollar bill for cleaning expenses, the GAO reported that about $8200 was spent on repairing or replacing keyboards, cellular phones, and other hard-used office materials, including two chairs and one sofa.
But it remains unclear how much of this came as a result of pranks or of normal wear and tear.
In fact, the investigation, which came at the request of a notoriously unstable Republican member of the House, and with the full cooperation of the White House, cost taxpayers far more than what was being investigated.
Nor did the GAO report any theft or damage on Air Force One -- another allegation spread around like manure by the G.O.P. and its Media toadies back in 2001.
The A.P./Salon report gave ultra-rightwing Congressman Bob Barr the chance to pontificate about the Clinton staff's disrespect for the nation. (The thrice-married moralist Barr, accessory to abortion of his own child, was the one who requested this study, an untold waste of time and the taxpayers' money.)
Hooey!!
Does anyone have a total for the pranks and cleaning costs when the Bush I staff left?
If not, where's the beef here?
There is none. The White House and the Republics and the media got caught out in a lie; they're still smarting, months later; and so, with the help of Bob Barr and certain Media Whores, they'redetermined to put the lies back in the headlines.
More points to bear in mind from the GAO report:
-- The civil servant who was responsible for overseeing the custodial staff in the EEOB during the 2001 transition and was involved in the cleanup during the 1993 transition said, according to the GAO, "that she believed more trash was left in the building during the 1993 transition than the 2001 transition. She said that she found papers 'all over the floor' and the remnants of a party during the 1993 transition."
-- Even taking a conservative estimate, the GAO concluded that "we were unable to conclude whether the 2001 transition was worse than previous ones."
-- ABOVE ALL: THE BUSH WHITE HOUSE GAVE ITS FULL COOPERATION TO THE BARR-INSPIRED STUDY, MAKING 78 OFFICIALS AVAILABLE FOR QUESTIONING AND HANDING OVER REAMS OF INCONCLUSIVE DOCUMENTS, IN YET ANOTHER PHONY EFFORT TO TARNISH THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION. YET THE BUSH WHITE HOUSE CONTINUES TO STONEWALL OVER THE GAO'S COURT-ORDERED DEMAND FOR DOCUMENTS ON ENRON, AND STONEWALLS THE AMERICAN PEOPLE OVER DOCUMENTS RELATED TO THE PRELUDE TO SEPTEMBER 11.
Oh yes: the GAO report included a 70 page "rebuttal" -- uncorroborated -- by the Bushies. One-third of the entire document!
And there's no mention anywhere, it appears, of how the CEO of Office Max, in an effort to keep the Bushies from blowing a fake gasket, offered to replace any damaged computer keyboards back in 2001. (See Buzzflash)
The real scandal here is how much time and money the White House and the G.O.P. wasted -- during a time of war -- in a failed effort to trash the Clinton Administration.
But who will get what straight?
Will the Whores take the time to look up the old lies from way back last year?
Or will they twist things around the way Bob Barr demands they do?
We'll be watching....
Meantime, we accuse the Associated Press of running a false wire story -- and Salon of picking it up -- without having actually read the GAO report and understood it.
Email the Associated Press (or call at 212-621-1500) and email Salon, asking that they run a full clarification of their misleading story on the new GAO report about alleged vandalism by outgoing Clinton staff members in 2001.
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Is it just possible that a claim that the jet was heading toward the White House is a convenient and fabricated piece of deliberate propaganda, designed to further intimidate and terrorize an already traumatized population? Are there cynical media manipulators within the White House?
Well, it turns out there are:
tnr.com
Re: I'm all for an investigation if there are unanswered questions.
Please write your Congressman and Senators. We have very little leverage to get the truth out to the American public. But we should do what we can. That's why I'm here posting obvious discrepancies in the thicket of lies and deceptions that the Bush team is weaving into an impenetrable secret government.
Salaams, Ray |
