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Politics : Impeach George W. Bush -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: American Spirit who wrote (45908)	10/26/2005 11:37:27 AM
From: tonto	Respond to of 93284

Puhleeeeaze...that was a staged act for his candidacy and does not represent his previous position, You are not THAT dumb are you?

To: American Spirit who wrote (45908)	10/26/2005 3:40:22 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 93284

Plamegate: Worse than Watergate by Arianna Huffington It's getting hard to keep track of all the lies we've been told. Here's a quick cheat sheet: We now know that Cheney lied to the American people about his involvement in the effort to smear Joe Wilson. Three months after reportedly receiving a briefing about Wilson's trip to Niger from George "Slam Dunk" Tenet, and then telling Scooter Libby that Plame may have helped arrange her husband's trip, the Vice President went on national TV and told Tim Russert he didn't have a clue about the situation: "I don't know Joe Wilson... I don't know who sent Joe Wilson... I have no idea who hired him and it never came up." We now know that Karl Rove lied about his involvement, too. Back in September 2003, when Rove was asked if he had "any knowledge" about the Plame leak, he answered with an unambiguous "No." Since then, we've learned that Rove was actually up to his Turd Blossom in Plamegate, discussing Plame and her role at the CIA with Matt Cooper and Bob Novak, and taking part in what a source familiar with his four visits to the grand jury characterized as "an aggressive campaign to discredit Wilson through the leaking and disseminating of derogatory information regarding him and his wife." We now know that Scooter Libby also lied about his involvement. Libby told Pat Fitzgerald that he first learned Plame's identity from Tim Russert. But his own notes show that it was actually his boss, Dick Cheney, who first clued him in about Plame. (Russert, of course, has said he learned of Plame's identity by reading Novak's column, but that's a conundrum for another blog!). And we now know that Rove and Libby also lied to Scott McClellan, who then -- knowingly or not -- lied to reporters about the two men's involvement. When pressed today about the fact that in October 2003 he had "categorically" assured reporters that Rove and Libby "were not involved" in the Plame leak, McClellan made it clear that he was just passing on "the assurances that I had received on that." In other words, I only lied to you because they lied to me. Potential Bonus Presidential Lie: In June 2004, when asked whether he stood by his promise to fire anyone found to have leaked Plame's identity, President Bush (taking a cue from Rove) answered with an unambiguous "Yes." But the New York Daily News reports that Bush knew that Rove was involved in the leak two years ago. So why, a year later, was he still acting like he had no idea who'd been involved? Let's put aside the legal arguments for a moment and just focus on this glut of lying. Clearly, these guys knew that what they were up to should be kept in the shadows. Hence Rove's desire to have his conversation with Cooper be kept on "double super secret background," his self-assessment that he'd "already said too much" to Cooper, and Libby's request that Judy Miller identify him as a "former Hill staffer" instead of the usual "senior administration official." Cheney, Rove, and Libby obviously felt that their actions had to be covered up. But what they were covering up was much more than the outing of Valerie Plame. They were covering up the way the White House had used lies and deception to lead us into a war that was reckless and unnecessary -- what Lt. Gen. William Odom, National Security Agency director under Reagan, has called "the greatest strategic disaster in United States history." The reason why Cheney, Rove, and Libby were so aggressive in attacking anyone who questioned their rationale for war is because, by the summer of 2003, it was becoming embarrassingly clear how wrong they had been about Iraq -- wrong about WMD, wrong about flowers thrown at our feet, wrong about the cost of the war. Had their incompetence not been so grotesquely manifest, there would have been no need for the attack on Wilson -- and the resulting coverup -- that has now landed them all in such legal hot water. If Rove and Libby are indeed indicted (adding Cheney to our Merry Fitz-mas gift list would just be getting greedy), I believe it will shake up our government in a way we haven't seen since Watergate. To borrow a phrase from that era, let me make myself perfectly clear: I'm not saying that Plamegate is the same as Watergate. I'm saying it's worse. Much, much worse. No one died as a result of Watergate, but 2,000 American soldiers have now been killed and thousands more wounded to rid the world of an imminent threat that wasn't. Could there be anything bigger? After getting a fumbling cipher like George W. Bush elected president, the powers-behind-the-throne must have believed they were untouchable and could get away with anything -- including lying about WMD, outing a CIA agent, and, perhaps, lying to a special prosecutor. Like Nixon, their mindset was "if you try to get in our way we'll destroy you." (See how quickly those keep-us-safe national security guys were willing to jeopardize an intelligence asset in the name of covering their asses.) And their hubris caused them to over-reach. Like my old Greek pal Icarus, they flew too close to the sun... and now it looks like they, and their multitude of lies, are about to come crashing down. © 2005 Huffington Post huffingtonpost.com

To: American Spirit who wrote (45908)	10/26/2005 3:45:16 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93284

Oedipus Tyrannus Wrecked __________________________________________ by Jane Hamsher It looks like Cheney is bloodied if not out of the game entirely. Dubya sits on the sidelines like a dispirited waterboy watching one fallen warrior after another carried off the field. But are we really to believe that he is nothing more than a thick-witted victim of his compatriots' malfeasance? What are the odds? Pretty friggin' low, if you ask me. This week saw the nick-of-time release of the New Yorker article where Bush the Elder's best friend, Brent Scowcroft, rushes in to save Junior by hanging all his cronies out to dry. "Poor Dubya, he just doesn't know how to pick his friends." But Scowcroft is a player in a much larger and much more telling drama with regard to Junior that is only hinted at in the New Yorker piece. As Digby writes: The underlying narrative... is the subconscious rivalry between the father and the son, Scowcroft becoming the stand-in for 43's resentment toward 41. You wonder how many of the tragic blunders of the last five years are the result of crafty neocons playing into Junior's desire to gainsay his father. Although the Bush family junta will pull together when it's time to collect their checks from the Carslyle Group and preserve family hegemony, I think Digby is right in observing that there is a keen competition going on between the ne'er-do-well son and his patriarchal father that is positively Shakespearean. Which has everything to do with why I'll never be convinced that Junior was not in on the attempt to smear Joe Wilson from the get-go, despite the desperate efforts of GOP playmakers to keep the focus away from him even as they offer up the head of the much-hated Cheney on a plate. But let's dial it back a bit. Bush's rush to war was a clear indictment of everything his father stood for. Where Bush 41's war with Iraq was a carefully measured campaign that sought to build alliances, internationally share the responsibility and expense and carefully court the world of public opinion, Bush 43's war resembled a pack of drunken cowboys riding into town and recklessly shooting up the saloon. Junior's war was a mockery of his father's efforts, and he didn't want to waste time on things like National Intelligence Estimates, an analysis of all the pre-war intelligence regarding Iraq which might have caught many of the specious claims that were waved through by partisan yahoos playing spy. Dick Durbin had to make a special request for an NIE to even be done prior to a declaration of war (p. 12 of the SSCI PDF). National Intelligence Officers say that "ideally they would like about three months to produce an NIE;" this one was produced in less than twenty days, and its findings were never sent out for peer review or to a panel of outside experts because BushCo. said there wasn't time. (p. 13, SSCI) Ergo, Curveball. And 2000 dead Americans. I remember when Bubba Clinton and Bush Sr. were doing their tsunami tour and good son Bubba slept on the floor so Poppy could have the bed. Ouch. That had to rankle Junior. Then Poppy invited Bubba up to Kennebunkport (site of Junior's DUI) to stay at his leisure. When I read that, my back went straight up. There is no way that a loadie like Junior didn't take that as an implicit criticism of everything he was and everything he'd done. Wingnutia may want to impugn Wilson shamelessly, but Poppy called him a "true American hero" and promoted him to the rank of Ambassador for the skillful way he handled himself in the midst of a very delicate and dangerous situation during the first Iraq war. Moreover -- Scowcroft loved him. Scowcroft and Wilson were chummy. They both sat on the American Turkish Council. As Wilson said in his book: We fell into an easy relationship and would banter back and forth about the new administration and its predecessors. After board meetings or other events, we'd often Metro back across town together. As the obsession with Iraq overtook many influential members of the Bush administration, our conversations turned frequently to the emerging debate on Iraq and the merits of the approach being advanced by the prowar crowd. Hallo! Wilson would pal around with Poppy's best friend and trash Junior. Then Scowcroft publicly called Junior out: Brent Scowcroft was becoming increasingly concerned that perhaps his earlier optimism had been misplaced. No longer certain that the administration would shun the neoconservative path, he wrote a piece that appeared in the Wall Street Journal. on August 15, 2002. He warned of potential disaster if we tried to deal with Saddam militarily. Before Wilson published his October 13, 2002 article for the San Jose Mercury News in which he was openly critical of BushCo.'s ramp up to war, he sent it to Scowcroft and Baker for review, as well as Poppy. Catch this: Brent called me when he received the article. He kindly asked if he could "take it over to the White House," only about two blocks from his downtown office. He said that he thought senior officials ought to read the views of somebody who actually had experience in Iraq and with Saddam's government. (my emphasis) So Poppys best friend Scowcroft (who's already on record for publicly calling Junior a buffoon) carries Wilson's article down to the White House and swats Junior over the head with it like a dog that had peed on the rug. Acting as a stand-in for his war veteran dad, holding Wilson up as a model of patriotism and bravery while laughing at Nintendo boy for launching a foolish war from the comfort of his BarcaLounger. Jesus tapdancing Christ. You think THAT didn't raise every hair on the back of Junior's neck? The day after Joe Wilson's July 6, 2003 op-ed piece in the NYT was published, Dubya and his entourage were on their way to what they hoped would be a historic tour of Africa. Dubya was hoping to trump Bubba by arranging for a longer and more extensive trip to Africa than any American president had thus far undertaken. Yet from the moment the plane took off, all Ari Fleischer seemed to want to talk about was Joe Wilson. I mentioned it yesterday, but I'll quote it here again, from Wilson's book: Within a day, Fleischer was putting a different spin on the situation and downplaying the importance of my report. At one briefing after another, he had something to say about me, and by doing so gave the journalists another news cycle to talk about the sixteen words rather than about the president's trip. Instead of containing the burgeoning press frenzy, Fleischer kept giving the story legs, so much so that it soon overwhelmed the president's agenda in Africa. If Bush wasn't in on the "smear Wilson" campaign and didn't care about it, I have to believe he would've told Ari to put a sock in it and focus instead on all the great photo ops this current trip was affording him. It was his big chance to con Tony Blair into believing he actually gave a toss about Africa, and pretend his medieval policies on contraception weren't responsible for wiping out large swaths of the population. Why would he allow Joe Wilson to have the limelight and fling dung all over his big PR campaign? 'Cos Wilson was Poppy's guy, that's why. Dubya is his mama's boy -- as Arianna noted, he's a guy born on third base who thinks he's hit a triple. He can't talk back to Poppy. Hell, he can't even talk back to Scowcroft. But he sure could grind Joe Wilson into the ground with a faux-cowboy boot heel. As the Patrick Fitzgerald juggernaut proceeds apace, they've tried to argue that this was all Cheney's doing, but I don't buy it. This wasn't the kind of thing Rove needed to "protect" Junior from. It's the kind of dirty, junior high politics that former "loyalty enforcer" Dubya delights in. Looks like it's come back to haunt him. huffingtonpost.com