Actually it's way past time for impeachment of the warmongering criminal neo-dictator.  He's admitted he's authorized warrantless spying on untold thousands of Americans.  He's imprisoned Americans without arrests warrant and without allowing them access to lawyers or the courts.  All of this is in direct violation of the Constitution and existing laws.   If this is not "high crimes" and grounds for impeachments, we might as well thrown the Constitution away as Bush has done.   He alleges that all of this is legal because 1) he's the "Commander In Chief" and 2) the congressional resolution authorizing military force in Iraq permits it.  This is utter and complete BS!   He may be the Commander In Chief of the military under the Constitution, but he's definitely not he Commander In Chief of the American people.  The resolution authorizing military force in Iraq certainly does not authorize any of his criminal acts.  What he is actually saying is that he is above the law and the very Constitution upon which our government was once based.    His actions also destroy the checks and balances in the Constitution.   This makes him a de facto dictator.

Past presidents have also run rough shod over the Constitution and violated the civil liberties of citizens- the most notorious being the imprisonment of citizens for criticizing the government during WW1 and imprisonment of Japanese Americans during WW2.   In all prior cases, the violations were confined to situations of limited duration and in both cases, the actions were ruled illegal after the wars ended.  This is not the case now.  The regime has stated that their "war on terror" will last for generations.

If the idiot's violations of the civil liberties of Americans are not stopped and, more importantly, if his BS about the violations being OK because he's the commander in chief is not squashed, where will his violations end?  If he can  imprison US citizens without an arrest warrants and without allowing access lawyers or the courts, he can also execute them- or YOU!  Since the Bush regime has greatly increased world-wide hatred of the US and the regime has been shown to be grossly incompentent in preventing terrorist attacks, another attack will occur.  When it does, what other civil liberties take away from us?

Finally, if Clinton was impeached for lying about a private matter in which no one got killed, Bush and Cheney certainly deserve impeachment, removal from office, conviction and punishment as war criminals for their illegal attack on Iraq, the resulting death of untold thousands, his torture of prisoner.

On 3/13/06, Senator Russ Feingold introduced a resolution to censure the idiot-in-chief for breaking the law by illegally wiretapping American citizens (his remarks).  At least it's a start....

Better yet, Rep. John Conyers has introduced HR 635 as the first step in impeaching the idiot in chief.  It calls for "a select committee to investigate the Administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and countenancing torture, retaliating against critics, and to make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment."   More below.

The Center for Constitutional Rights urges impeachment and removal from office in its book The Articles of Impeachment Against George W. Bush based on Bush's gross violation of our Constitution via his illegal wiretapping, torture,  rendition, detention and, last but not least, his Iraq war.   Their recommend top three articles of impeachment:
 

Article I is for the regime's warrant less wiretapping in violation of both the Fourth Amendment and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.  The idiot-in-chief even admits he's syping without warrants.  Violation of FISA is a criminal offense act that can get an ordinary citizens (much less elected officials)  five years in jail for each count.

Article II is for the lies that were used to justify the Iraq war.  Not only that, his "preemptive" war is contrary to both the U.N. charter and international law.  Both prohibit attacking another country unless it's in self-defense.   Last but not least,  the lying constitutes criminal fraud under federal law.  I'd add that the colluding by Bush and regime officials in their campaign of lies is a violation of the RICO law.

Article III if for Bush's use of torture, arbitrary long-term detentions, disappearances/kidnappings and kangaroo courts.  Each of these actions violate the Geneva Conventions which are  a part of our law.

Check out the following impeachment links for more info: http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/, http://www.ccr-ny.org/impeachment , http://www.votetoimpeach.org/, http://www.impeachbush.tv/, http://www.impeach-bush-now.org/, http://www.thefourreasons.org/, http://impeachbushcoalition.blogspot.com/, http://Topplebush.com

"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." - Shrub, lying 4 days after Katrina hit and New Orleans was flooded by breached levees.  More below

"If we don't hold a president accountable for lying to start a  war, we might as well throw out the Constitution of the United States." - Bob Fertik, a founder of the ImpeachPAC

"We're doing fine." -  Shrub on the economy.  "We" must mean the greedy rich.  More below

"Fuck Saddam. We're taking him out."  - Shrub, March '02  (a full year before the attack)

"Perhaps torture and murder are the values of this "Christian nation... Sadly, under the last 7-8 presidencies, Democrat and Republican alike, the United States government has evolved into the most powerful terrorist organization on the planet."  - Jason Miller in a great piece

"Um... uh... I... The answer is, I haven't really thought of it that way... The first I've heard of that, by the way. I guess I'm more of a practical fellow."  -  Bush's stuttering  response (with his deer-in-the-headlights expression) to a question about if he believes his Iraq quagmire and the rise of terrorism are signs of the apocalypse.  What a lying idiot!  Even I, a free thinker, have heard of it!

"The only people who want us in Iraq are Iran and al-Qaeda." - Congressman Jack Murtha on "Face the Nation"

"There is no doubt that George Bush and Condoleezza Rice have been lying through their teeth about extraordinary rendition for some time....  The United States, as a matter of policy, is willing to accept intelligence got by torture by foreign agencies.   I can give direct first hand evidence of that and back it up with documents."  - Craig Murray, British Ambassador to Uzbekistan from 2002 to 2004

"Bush proposes cutting $36 billion from Medicare over the next five years only ... wait for it ... he's not cutting the money, he's saving it!   A $36 billion Medicare savings."   - Molly Ivings on Bush's new-speak

"Lenin's fabled admonition that capitalists are so eager to make a buck they'll sell you the rope with which to hang them is in need of an update: they'll also lease you the ports through which terrorists can sneak the dirty bomb with which to blow them up."  - Arianna Huffington

There is not a lot of debate anymore about the fact that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is the loosest cannon
in the arsenal. - The Capital Times, WI
 

"It may seem impossible that a technologically advanced society could choose, in essence, to destroy itself, but that is what we are now in the process of doing." - Elizabeth Kolbert in her new book, "Field Notes From a Catastrophe: Man, Nature and Climate Change"

"The President decided that he was no longer running the country as a civilian President.   He  issued a military order giving himself the power to run the country as a general."  - Michael Ratner in the book Guantanamo: What the World Should Know in reference to Bush's Military Order No. 1 in which he claims the right to detain any non citizen as an international terrorist or enemy combatant and keep them imprisoned without due process or access to the courts or a lawyer.

"Let there be no doubt this administration is engaged in massive violations of the law.  Torture is an international crime. What [George Bush] has done is basically lay the plan for what has to be called a coup-d'état in America. [His Presidential Signing Statement attached to the McCain anti torture amendment] makes three points… First, speaking as the President, my authority as commander in chief allows me to do whatever I think is necessary in the war on terror including use torture. Second, the Commander in Chief cannot be checked by Congress. Third, the Commander in Chief cannot be checked by the courts. In other words… George Bush is the law." - Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights  More

A CBS News poll finds the idiot-in-chief's approval rating has dropped to an all-time low of 34%.  Only 32% approve of the way he's responded in helping Katrina victims.   51% even say he does not care much about people like themselves.   Just 30% approve of how he's handling his mess in  Iraq.  Cheney's approval ratings have dropped even more- to just 18%.  It's reported that only Paris Hilton's rating is lower.

The costs of Bush's illegal and unwarranted attack of Iraq, so far ...

• 30,000 Iraqi civilians killed (per Shrub) 100,000 according to reliable estimates
• over 2,250 U.S. military lives
• over 4,000 Iraqi police and military deaths
• over 16,500  U.S. troops wounded in combat
• $251 billion spent to date
• $1.3 trillion estimated long-term bill

The idiot-in-chief said that regime troops will be stuck in his Iraq quagmire through his rein.   Of course!  That's why he's spent billions building  permanent bases there.

Bush Katrina lies revealed:  AP videos of briefings given to Bush before Katrina struck show he was warned the levees around New Orleans might break.  Bush didn't ask a single question during the final briefing but he assured soon-to-be-battered state officials: "We are fully prepared."  What an utter idiot!    Mere days after they were breached, he lied about it by saying, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."   If Clinton was impeached for lying about sex, this idiot deserves both impeachment and removal from office for his lies and utter incompetence.   More below.

The New York Times reports that a Justice Department investigation of FBI surveillance activities revealed more than 100 "violations of [the FBI's] own wiretapping and other intelligence gathering procedures" within the past two years, including" wiretaps that were much broader in scope than approved by a court and others that were allowed to continue for weeks or sometimes months longer than was authorized."

In 2004, congress learned that Bush's troops were abusing, torturing and killing prisoners, and that the regime was kidnapping and illegally detaining folks around the world.  When the courts said the detention camps are not beyond the reach of US laws, the ripublicans in congress simply changed the laws.  Now, they are doing it again.  They are posed to retroactively legalize Bush's illegal NSA spying program.   A bill by Arlen Specter does just that as well as legalizing any other illegal spying we don't know about.  Worse yet, Mike DeWine's bill would remove all spying from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.  Meanwhile, Pat Roberts, chairman of the senate Intelligence Committee is refusing to even permit a vote on whether to investigate the spying scandal.  The ever evil Bill Frist threatened to restructure the Intelligence Committee to defeat Democrats calls for a real investigation of the illegal spying. More and yet more

You might be able to find out if if the Bush regime has been spying on you by filing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. www.FOIArequest.org has a form to help you.

The NSA could have legally monitored ordinarily confidential communications between doctors and patients or attorneys and their clients, according to the (ill named) "Justice" Department.  They also said that it sees no prohibition to using information collected under the NSA's program in court.  (more)

Gonzales lies, again....    He told the Senate Judiciary Committee last month that the regime's illegal NSA spying was the only spying that Bush has authorized.  That was yet another of his lies.  He has since sent a letter to the committee "clarifying" his Feb. 6 testimony saying, "I did not and could not address . . . any other classified intelligence activities"-  meaning there are other illegal spying programs.  Former NSA employee Russell D. Tice told the  committee on Feb. 14 that such a top-secret surveillance program existed, but he said he couldn't discuss the details without breaking classification laws and that the "special access" surveillance program may be violating the constitutional rights of millions of Americans.

Former ripublican congressidiot Randy "Duke" Cunningham was sentenced to 10 years for tax evasion and taking $2.4 million in bribes.  Undoubtedly, he'll be sent to one of the country club prisons.  With good behavior, he'll be out in 3 years.  That means he'll have reaped a "salary" of $800,000 / year for his jail time.  Not bad at all.  The evil and corrupt bastard should serve a life sentence at a real prison.

Federal investigators are looking into contracts awarded by the Pentagon's Counterintelligence Field Activity, which has spent more than $1 billion, mostly for outsourced services since 2002.  The review is an outgrowth of the continuing investigation that resulted in "Duke" Cunningham's conviction for taking bribes from contractors.  Cunningham set aside $6.3 million for contract work to be done for the agency.   The contract went to MZM Inc.- a corporation whose CEO pleaded guilty to bribing Cunningham.  The contract was for more than $6 million for a mass data storage system and included almost $5.4 million in profit for MZM and a subcontractor.  Even with that, the system was incompatible with CIFA's network system and was scrapped.

Alito has sent a cloying thank you note to religious zealot James C. Dobson for his help in getting on the Supreme Court.  The real pay-back will come when he votes the way the religious zealots want him to.

The regime's ambassador in Iraq says the toppling of Hussein opened a "Pandora's box" of volatile ethnic and sectarian tensions  that could engulf the region in all-out war and disrupt the global economy if America were to extricate itself from the country too soon.   Meanwhile, the idiot chairman of the regime's Joint Chiefs of Staff said things in Iraq are "going very, very well, from everything you look at."  A Washington Post/ABC poll reports that 80% of Americans believed fighting between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq would lead to civil war and 52% want the regime to remove it's troops.   More

The "coalition of the willing"  is further shrinking.  The Brit's most senior officer in Iraq said a gradual withdrawal needed to begin soon in order to reassure Iraqis that British troops would not become a resident force.  More

Hooray!  The chief rapist of our public lands, Interior Sect. Gale Norton is resigning.  Good riddance!  Under her watch, protection was removed from vast wilderness areas, forests were opened for logging, Yellowstone was reopened to to snowmobiles and federal land managers were ordered to speed up drilling for gas on public lands.  The bad news is that the idiot-in-chief has selected another of her ilk to replace her- Idaho's ripublican governor.

Bush regime lawyers, fighting a claim of torture by a Guantanamo Bay detainee, argued that the new law signed by the idiot-in-chief that bans cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of detainees in US custody does not apply to people held at the military prison.   More

A UN report says the regimes troops in Iraq  may be violating international law by arbitrarily detaining thousands of people and chastised the regime for not releasing results of an investigation into allegations of torture as promised.  U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said the detainment of thousands of Iraqis. "constitutes de facto arbitrary detention. The reports states that, "The extent of such practices is not consistent with provisions of international law governing internment on imperative reasons of security."  That's a feeble start.  What's needed is to try the Bush regime as the war criminals they most assuredly are.

He's back- the Newt.  He has issued a strategy paper which advocates a theory and system for winning the "Long War"  with the "Irreconcilable Wing of Islam."   The newt says the war could last as long as 70 years.  I think the Newt should slither back under his rock. More

Governors of both parties said that the Bush regime was stripping the National Guard of equipment and personnel needed to respond to hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, forest fires and other emergencies.  Well DUH!!!  Nearly one third of the troops in Iraq are members of the Army National Guard.  All 50 governors signed a letter to the idiot-in-chief opposing  the National Guard cuts he'd proposed.

The ignorant US senate extended the ill named Patriot Act.   Sen. Feingold (the only Senator to vote against the original abortion) led a filibuster against the extension.  Only 10 Senators voted for the filibuster.   On the bright side, several of the more totalitarian provision weren't made permanent as the Bush regime had demanded and meager provisions to enhance civil liberties were added.

Stupid Ripublicans:   Indicted criminal Tom  DeLay won his party's nomination for another term in congress with 62% percent of the votes in a 4-way race.   The Democratic nominee, Nick Lampson, said DeLay "gets headlines for all the wrong reasons.  I'm looking forward to that headline on November 8th: 'No Further DeLay.'"

Regime Building Domestic Detention Centers- likely for us dissenters  The Army Corps of Engineers recently gave Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root a $385 million contract to construct "detention centers" in the US to deal with "an emergency influx of immigrants into the US, or to  support the rapid development of new programs."   Vietnam-era whistleblower/hero Daniel Ellsberg said, "Almost certainly this is preparation for a roundup after the next 9/11 for Mid Easterners, Muslims and possibly dissenters. They've already done this on a smaller scale, with the 'special registration' detentions of immigrant men from Muslim countries, and with Guantanamo."   Ever-evil Sen. Lindsey Graham suggested to Alberto Gonzales that the regime target disloyal "Fifth Column"Americans who sympathize and collaborate with the enemy saying, "The administration has not only the right, but the duty, in my opinion, to pursue Fifth Column movements."   "Senator," a smiling Gonzales responded, "the President already said we'd be happy to listen to your ideas."   More

The Bush regime approved an United Arab Emirates owned corporation to run US ports in spite of the fact that 2 of the 9/11 attackers came from the UAE.   Even the head of the 9/11 whitewash commission and ripublican members of congress have spoken out against the deal.  Bush said his folks would review the decision but that the results will be the same.  One reason for this is that the regime is hot for a "free trade" accord with the UAE.  Even if congress nixes the deal as they are threatening to do (and Bush is threatening to veto), the UAE will go to the WTO (which has the power to void US laws) and get the deal anyway.  US News & World reported in 12/05 Dubai was notorious for smuggling, money laundering and drug trafficking in support of terrorists and Dubai is believed to be the transfer port for the spread of nuclear technology by the Abdul Qadeer Khan network. The UAE is also one of only three countries that recognized the Taliban as the legitimate ruler of Afghanistan.   Most tellingly, the regime also did not require the corporation to keep copies of business records on US soil where they would be subject to court orders and did not require the corporation to designate an American citizen to accommodate US government requests.   Such requirements are SOP in such deals.   Finally, the free traders' evil is gradually coming back to haunt them.  Paul Krugman says the backlash against the deal is blow back from the Bush regime's  own "campaign of fear mongering and insinuation".  For more, check out: The Dirty Little Secret behind the UAE Port Security Scandal by David Sirota and It's the Corporation, Stupid by Molly Ivins

Mike Leavitt, Secretary of Health and Human Services, lied when he recently said more than 25 million people were receiving benefits under the regime's new Medicare drug program.  According to Medicare's own figures, the actual number of voluntary enrollees is only about five million. The program has one primary beneficiary- the big drug and insurance corporations. More

Top Bush advisor Claude Allen was arrested on felony theft charges.  A humorous  Borowitz Report "quotes" the idiot-in-chief as telling reporters, “If he wanted to rip people off, I could have gotten him a job at Halliburton.”  Indeed!

The Bush regime is having to pay an Egyptian $300,000.  He was among dozens of Muslims kidnapped by the regime in New York after 9/11 and was held held for months in a federal detention center in Brooklyn and deported after being cleared of links to terrorism.  He was beaten and tortured while being held in jail.   More

Rats Abandoning Sinking Ship  Arch neo-con Francis Fukuyama- a founders of the Project for
the New American Century,  has renounced his affiliations with Cheney, Rumsfeld and the pre-emption doctrine.   Per the reformed idiot,  "By invading Iraq, the Bush administration created a self-fulfilling prophecy: Iraq has now replaced
Afghanistan as a magnet, a training ground and an operational base for jihadist terrorists, with plenty of American targets to shoot at."  Of course Bush's policy is a direct out-growth of  Fukuyama neo-con bullshit.

As to be expected, House ripublicans rejected a demand by Democrats to require Bush to turn over detailed regime records on his illegal spying  operation.   They did agree to expand their investigation which I'm sure will be yet another whitewash of the regimes crimes.  More

Bush trotted off on overseas trip which includes India and Pakistan.  Over 100,000 Indians protested his visit in India.  Pakistan is probably where bin Laden is.  We know the idiot-in-chief won't be hunting bin Laden, but, the converse may be true!

Dick Cheney told pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC that Iran faces "meaningful consequences" if doesn't bend to his regime's demands.  What's he going to do with all of the troops stuck in the regime's Iraqi quagmire, shoot the Iranian president in the face with his shotgun?

The Bush regime has issued letters to employees at the CIA, FBI, Justice Department and other agencies prohibiting them from discussing even unclassified issues related to the regime's illegal NSA spying program.  It has also threatened reporters.   NY Times Executive Editor Bill Keller said,  "I don't know how far action will follow rhetoric, but some days it sounds like the administration is declaring war at home on the values it professes to be promoting abroad."  Yeah, they are a bunch of utter hypocrites.    More

The regime says it's going to keep paying Iraqi newspapers to publish unattributed pro-regime "news" articles.  Why not- they've done the same thing here.

Eleven members- including 5 children- of a family were murdered by Bush regime troops in a recent offensive in Iraq.  They were found with their hands bound behind their backs and bullets through their heads.  An Iraqi policeman reported the murders.  The Iraqi police are investigating it as a murder.  Maybe justice will be done for a change.

George Deutsch, the NASA PR idiot who tried to muzzle NASA's top top climate scientist James Hansen and edited scientific reports to suit  the regime's warped view of the climate, has resigned.  Seems he lied on his resume by claiming he had a college degree.  More

Earth's projected population is projected to increase of 50% in the next 50 years. The world population has doubled since 1960 and quadrupled since 1900.  Paul Ehrlich predicted  In his 1968 book The Population Bomb that, "mankind will breed itself into oblivion."   We're well on the way- 3 billion people, almost half of the world population, already suffers from malnutrition.    Meanwhile, Shrub is continuing to gut effective family planning programs- undoubtedly due to his bible's edit to be fruitful and multiply.

A report by the World Resources Institute based on analysis of scientific research published in journals including Science and Nature concludes that human fueled global warming has reached a tipping point- the warming would continue even if our greenhouse gas emissions were immediately halted.

About 150 high school students in Aurora Colo. walked out of class to protest a decision to put a teacher on leave while they investigate remarks he made about President Bush in class, including that some people compare Bush to Adolph Hitler.   Indeed, Bush is behaving much as Hitler did.

The Bush regime is giving Haliburton's KBR  almost the entire $250 million in disputed no-bid contract charges which the regime's own top auditors identified excessive or unjustified.  The auditors declared that KBR had charged, in some instances, "nearly triple what others were charging to do the same job."     Why?  An Army spokeswoman explained it:  "The contractor is not required to perform perfectly to be entitled to reimbursement."  Nope- they were paid because Cheney looks out for Halliburton's interests and not us taxpayers.

A new Zogby poll of the regime's troops stuck in their idiot-in-chief's Iraq quagmire shows a whopping 85% of them think the attack was retaliation for Saddam’s role in 9/11!  77% believe the main or a major reason for the war was “to stop Saddam from protecting al Qaeda in Iraq”.   This is utterly and completely astounding since there has long been ample evidence that Sadam had absolutely nothing to do with either al Qaeda or with 9/11.  Of course about the same percentage of the troops voted for Bush which provides more evidence of their utter stupidity.  I strongly believe each and every person who voted for the idiot should promptly volunteer for service on the front lines of THEIR quagmire.    In related news,  a report says more than one in three of the regime's troops who have returned from the Iraq quagmire have sought help for mental problems.   Maybe their conscience is eating at them.

Americans' savings rate has gone from around 10% in the 1970s to a minus .5 percent in 2005.

Condi Rice was grilled by Congress this month over the regime's alleged Iraq rebuilding program.  Water, sewer and electricity services are still (3 years after the attack) worse now than they were before the regime attacked Iraq in spite of the billions spent by the regime.  No doubt billions when directly into the pockets of no-bid corporate contractors and the folks they've bribed in the Bush regime.

In a 3/13/06 tirade, "Rev." Pat Robertson said of Muslims,  "These people are crazed fanatics and I want to say it now: I believe it's motivated by demonic power, it is satanic and it's time we recognize what we're dealing with..  The goal of Islam, ladies and gentlemen, whether you like it or not, is world domination....  Islam is not a religion of peace."   The same can be said of "christains" like Robertson who cheer the Bush's attack of Iraq and the resulting murder of thousands of Iraqis.  Yet another vivid reason not to be a christian....

Add another one to ever growing list of Bush lies:  In 2000, the serial liar promised to end the maintenance backlog in the national parks.   His proposed FY 07 budget cuts $100 million from park funding- most of it is cut from from maintenance.

Even worse than the above, the Bush regime is wants to sell 304,370 acres of our national forest lands to offset the astounding debt he's racked up with is wars and tax cuts for the greedy rich.  Per a Ashville Citizen-Times editorial,  "The idea of selling off land to help fund the act has been described in some corners as selling your house to pay off your credit cards."   See just how much the idiot wants to sell via Google Earth.  Email comments on this abortion by 3/30/06.   More

Already this year 24 miners have died in accidents.  No doubt it's due to the Bush regime's corporate friendly "voluntary" approach to compliance with mine safety standards.  As if that's not enough, his regime has decreased major fines for safety violations since 2001, and in nearly half the cases, it has not even bothered to collect the fines.  More

The Federal Reserve's latest triennial "Survey of Consumer Finances" report ways that average, after inflation, incomes fell 2.3% between 2001 and 2004.  That's in contrast to the Clinton record:  a 17.3% gain between 1998 and 2001 and 12.3% percent in 1995-98.  2005 was worse- real wages fell 0.9% - the lowest annual result on record.  Over 76% of households carry debt- up since 2001.  Of households in debt, the median amount of debt, $55,300, amounts to 128% of the median household  income.   America's wealthiest 10% saw their net worth rise by 6.1 percent to an average of $3.1 million while the bottom 10% saw theirs fall from zero in 2001 to minus $1,400 -  meaning they owed this much more than the value of all their assets.   America's Second Harvest reports that the number of Americans who need emergency food aid to survive had swollen  to more than 25 million even before hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck and that nearly 40% of those have at least one adult working in their household.  It all goes to prove Bush is was lying when he recently said in a  speech in Milwaukee. "We're doing fine," and described  the economy as "strong and gaining steam."   More likely, the "we" in "We're doing fine" are the rich.  For more depressing news, read this.

Bush's Budget:  Cuts in help for needy while greedy rich will get richer.
Bush is using his proposed budget to:

• Sneak through his old $700 billion dollar plan to privatize/gut Social Security  and immediately slash benefits by $6.3 billion dollars.
• Slash Medicaid by $13.7 billion over 5 years, abandoning millions of young, elderly, poor and disabled Americans who depend on Medicaid as their health care option of last resort.
• Make the biggest Department of Education cut ever and completely eliminate the Perkins college loans which help the needy attend college.
• Kick 400,000 children out of child care  programs for low income working families.
• Give yet more tax breaks to the greedy rich and further run-up the debt by giving away over $900 billion to richest 1% of the population over 10 years.
• Give the rich the "mother of all tax shelters"- $10,500 HSAs which the GAO says will cost $156 billion over a 10 year period.

PlameGate  Although then White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales ordered, as per a subpoena he'd received, White House staffers to turn over all documents that contained any reference to Valerie and Joseph Wilson three years ago, 250 pages of emails from Cheney's office have only recently been turned over to Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald.   The release came only after he was told by the Justice Department  that it was launching an investigation to find out who leaked Plame Wilson's undercover CIA status in an attempt to discredit and silence her husband from speaking out against the regime's lies on the need to attack Iraq.  According to sources close to the investigation,  the emails are said to be implicate Cheney.  They also show that Karl Rove, Stephen Hadley, John Bolton and other top officials in the vice president's office also discussed ways to smear Wilson.  All of this is surprising given the time they've had to edit the emails...   More

The Bush regime is far more interested in punishing whistle blowers in PlameGate than in punishing those responsible for outing Plame.  Two top State Dept. officials appointed by Shrub, Frederick Fleitz and Robert Joseph. Fleitz, and who played an active role in leaking Plame's name have been working in secret with other Bush appointees to "revamp" the State Department by pushing out career weapons experts, many of whom have been interviewed by FBI investigators probing the leak and who disagree with the regime.  They are filling their positions with ditto heads. More and still more

A report from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction says that poor postwar planning for Iraq by the Bush regime resulted in not enough skilled workers to rebuild Iraq's economy and public works. More   I think the corporate crooks the regime gave billions to is a more important reason that Iraq's infrastructure is in much worse shape than when Bush attacked.

A 267,000 gallon oil spill was discovered on Alaska's North Slope just west of ANWR.  This is yet another reason not to drill in ANWR.  Alas the ripublicans are at it again- this time attaching a provision for rape of ANWR to a budget resolution.  It passed the Senate in a 51-49 vote.  The only democrat to vote for the measure was the idiot Mary Landrieu- the only ripublicans to vote against it were Chafee, Coleman, Collins and Dewine.    And that's not all-  the Bush regime's federal Mineral Management Service's new leasing plan will open vast formerly protected off-shore areas to drilling.

Finally some Christians are seeing the light. Representatives of the 34 US members of the World Council of Churches sharply denounced Bush's war in Iraq, accused the regime of "raining down terror" and apologized to other nations for, "the violence, degradation and poverty our nation has sown."  They added that, "We lament with special anguish the war in Iraq, launched in deception and violating global norms of justice and human rights... We mourn all who have died or been injured in this war. We acknowledge with shame abuses carried out in our name."  Also they also targeted the regime's "imperial projects that seek to dominate and control for the sake of national interests" and added that "Nations have been demonized and God has been enlisted in national agendas that are nothing short of idolatrous."

Of course the evangelicals idiots still support Bush.  Each and every last one of them should immediately go to Iraq to serve as cannon fodder / IED magnets in their idiot leader's quagmire.

One reason  the evangelicals idiots and other zealots support the idiot-in-chief is the $2.15 billion of our tax money he gave superstition based groups last fiscal year.  Next time you are hit up by superstition based "charities", churches, etc. for a donation, do as I do and tell 'em the idiot-in-chief has already given them too much the taxes you've paid.

Global warming (or "climate change" in Bush-speak) could cause temperatures to rise far higher than previously predicted, according to the UN's team of climate experts. Recent computer models shown increases as high as 11 degC.  It included a warning that the huge west Antarctic ice sheet may be starting to disintegrate, an event that would raise sea levels five meters.   A British report published in Feb. said about the same thing.  Bush's lap dog Tony Blair said the risks may be more serious than previously thought.   Still, the Bush regime denies the existence of global warming...   More

This winter has been Canada's hottest on record- 3.9 degF above normal.  Among other things, it's resulted in devastation of vast areas of forest in western Canada.  The winters have not been cold enough to keep the pine beetles in check and they are killing trees.

Venezuela's oil minister bluntly warned the Bush regime that it could steer oil exports away from the US and toward other markets.  Venezuela supplies more than 10% of our oil and doubling the amount it exports to China.  They are also threatening to start trading oil in Euros instead of US dollars.  That'll help further wreak our economy.  More

A report by Human Rights First charges that of the known 98 detainees who have died in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since August 2002, 34 are suspected or confirmed homicides, another 11 suggest that death was a result of physical abuse or harsh conditions, but only 12 deaths  have resulted in punishment of any kind for any US official- and all but one of those were for low level personnel.   Among the other charges:  Commanders have failed to report deaths of detainees in the custody of their command, reported the deaths only after a period of days and sometimes weeks, or actively interfered in efforts to pursue investigations; investigators have failed to interview key
witnesses, collect useable evidence, or maintain evidence that could be used for any subsequent prosecution; record keeping has been inadequate, further undermining chances for effective investigation or appropriate prosecution; overlapping criminal and administrative investigations have compromised chances for accountability; over-broad classification of information and other investigation restrictions have left CIA and Special Forces essentially immune from accountability; agencies have failed to disclose critical information, including the cause or circumstance of death, in close to half the cases examined; effective punishment has been too little and too late.

Black Box Voting reports that the internal logs of at least 40 Sequoia touch screen voting machines used in the '04 Florida presidential elections show that votes that were time and date stamped as cast two weeks before the election, sometimes in the middle of the night and contained approximately 100,000 errors.   Black Box Voting successfully sued notorious election supervisor Theresa LePore to get the records.   The report also substantiates reports from voters indicating the wrong candidate was selected when they tried to vote.   Several dozen voting machines with votes for the 11/2 election were indicated as cast on dates like 10/16, 10/19 and 10/28 and did not contain any votes date-stamped 11/2.  Evidence of tampering was found on more than 30 of the machines.

Duane Gibson, a lobbyist for the mining corporations and who is being investigated in the Abramoff scandal, helped raise money for a ripublican congress-idiot Richard Pombo.  Pombo then attached an amendment to a budget bill - without hearings or floor debate - to open national forests and other public land to the mining corporations.  Even ripublican state senators and governors have complained it would endanger vast portions of federal land.   Seems as though the dirty dealing by Pombo was pay-back for a $1,000-a-head fundraiser for him organized by Gibson.  As one may surmise, the event was well attended by the mining corporations. More  More on Pombo below.

A VA nurse was interviewed recently on Democracy Now.  She'd written a letter to the editor of her local newspaper which was critical of the Bush regime.  She was subsequently accused by the VA of sedition and had her computer confiscated.  The ACLU is helping her.   So much for free speech under the Bush regime...
 

Peter Hoekstra, the republican chairman of the House intelligence (that's a laugh!) committee has persuaded the Bush regime to release some of the 2 million documents it says it has captured in Iraq.  He's hoping they'll prove Saddam had WMDs.    When will these idiots give up?   David Kay and Charles Duelfer (pro-war guys BTW...) headed the postwar search for WMDs and found none.  Neither did the UN's team in the run-up to the war.  With Bush's poll numbers and public support for his Iraq quagmire in nose dives, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the regime wrote some documents since they likely did so in the case of the bogus "Niger yellow cake" document.

Ripublican Jack Kemp was on Met the Press pushing the Dubai ports deal.  Of course he would- the UAE has given millions to Free Market Global, an energy trading corporation which Kemp chairs.  Ditto for Gen. Tommy Franks who is on the advisory board of the corporation.  Ditto also for Bill Clinton who has received millions in speaking fees and donations to his presidential library from Dubai.

The regime's Bureau of Land Management is helping the big oil corporations and others who want to rape federal lands by keeping the few  biologist it has tied up doing paperwork on new drilling permits and diverting agency money intended for wildlife conservation to energy programs.   The push to expand the rape has even angered a former senior energy exec who lives near Pinedale- one of the areas affected.  He said, "There is no well-thought-out, overall development plan for this field....   The BLM has been approving plans ad hoc."   More

"72% of U.S. troops in Iraq want America to pull out of the war within a year or less, bringing Giblets to only one conclusion: America's troops are undermining America's troops!  The only solution is for the army to detain itself for providing aid and comfort to the enemy".  http://fafblog.blogspot.com/

Monsanto promised in 1999 not to commercialize their "terminator technology" which prevents farmers from saving seeds.  It's now reneged and says it'll deploy the "suicide seeds."   In 2000, the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) adopted a de facto moratorium on sterile seed technologies.  But, at the March meeting of the CBD, Monsanto and other biotech corporations will push to undermine the moratorium.  Over 300 organizations have declared their support for a global ban on terminator technology saying that sterile seeds threaten biodiversity and will destroy the livelihoods and cultures of the 1.4 billion people who depend on farm-saved seed.

In other Monsanto news,  a coalition of farmers, consumers and environmental activists have sued the Bush regime over its approval of a Monsanto herbicide resistant alfalfa seed that will spell havoc for farmers and the environment.   They say the regime's Department of Agriculture failed to analyze the public health, environmental, and economic consequences of the action.  As with other such seeds, the genetically modified alfalfa will contaminate conventional alfalfa at a fast pace and force farmers to pay for Monsanto's patented gene. More

South Dakota has banned nearly all abortions- even those resulting from rape or incest.  Maybe if the wives and daughters of each legislator who voted for this and the governor got pregnant via rape, they'd think differently.   They are already being sued.   Bless the Sioux- they are going to allow Planned Parenthood to open a clinic on their reservation since it is not subject to the state's law.  No doubt the Bush regime will try its best to squash this...

A great source of environmental info is the Sierra Club's email newsletters.  Sign up for them here.  They have also produced a series of "Sierra Club Chronicles" documentaries (they are shown on Dish Network).  To mark the 17th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the March one investigates the state of affairs in the town of Cordova which was devastated by the spill.  They have yet to be compensated by Exon-Mobil although the greedy oil corp. recently announced record profits running in the many billions.

Senator Maria Cantwell introduced the Road less Area Conservation Act of 2006.   This bill would block the Bush regime's opening of 58 million acres of pristine, road less forest to logging, road building and other mayhem. (more)

Old news I missed covering in previous rants:   The idiot-in-chief said in his state of the union address that he wanted to cut oil imports from the Middle East by 75% by 2025.   This was yet another lie by the serial liar.  The next day, his energy secretary and National Economic Council director said the idiot didn't mean it.

The corrupt John Boehner has replaced the corrupt Tom DeLay as ripublican majority leader.  He's the idiot that that had the audacity to hand out tobacco lobby checks (i.e. bribes) on the floor of the US House.  So much for the ripublican's cleaning up their act...

The GAO reports that the Bush regime has spent about $1.6 billion of our tax money on PR and advertising contracts in the past 30 months .  I wonder how much was to pay-off columnists and for planting planting news stories?

The regime's intelligence agencies have been secretly removing thousands of historical documents from public access at the National Archives.  The documents had been available for years.  It's unknown the extent of the program since it is being done under a classified memo that prohibits the National Archives even from saying which agencies are involved.  In fact, it continued in secret notice just December.  More

The regime's latest target are state food safety laws.  The house is gearing up to void the laws in what will be the biggest ever rollback of food safety protection.  Seems as tho' the corporations object to the state laws and want them preempted by the weaker federal laws and regulations- which the  Bush regime is also busy gutting.  So much for the conservatives often touted concern for states rights.   I sincerely hope each and every US representative who votes for this rollback gets deathly sick from tainted food which would have been prevented via state laws.  More

The ripublicans, led by Rep. Pombo, a rancher from California and chair-idiot of the house Natural Resources Committee is trying mightily to gut the Endangered Species Act.   The house has already passed his bill (H.R. 3824) which removes requirements to designate critical habitat to protect endangered and threatened species and requires payments to landowners when the law impedes them from developing their land.  Unsurprisingly, the bill is pushed by the greedy  corporate crooks.  Since over 75% of Americans want to protect the environment, they have established phony environmental groups.  A prime example is the deceptively named (on purpose...) Save Our Species Alliance which has launched a PR campaign to gut the law.

From the Sierra Club:  During the administration of the first President Bush, on average, 58 species per year were protected under the Endangered Species Act. The Clinton administration averaged 65 per year. And the administration of George W. Bush? Eight species per year -- and most of those only after the courts compelled it to take action.

This evening, the Associated Press released secret transcripts and video footage showing President Bush being personally briefed the day before Hurricane Katrina hit land. The predictions he heard were shockingly precise and accurate - including the failure of the levees. He knew exactly what was coming.

The article is a smoking gun on Bush's unpardonable failure to keep us safe. In just a few hours, the White House will be filling the airwaves with spin, so it's important to reach out right now to pass on the straight story to family and friends. If each of us acts, we can directly reach millions of people before morning.

At the August 28th briefing, the president was told exactly what to expect:

• The chief scientist of the National Hurricane Center warned that a  m levee breach was "obviously a very, very grave concern." Bush  lied to the entire nation about this point just 5 days later.
• Michael Brown told the president that if New Orleans flooded the  Superdome emergency shelter would likely be under water and short on  supplies, creating a "catastrophe within a catastrophe."
• Experts and officials implored the President to prepare for, as the AP  described it, "devastation of historic proportions."

President Bush didn't ask a single question during the briefing. In the next two days he campaigned, attended birthday parties and played guitar while the worst natural disaster in American history killed over 1,300 people and displaced hundreds of thousands.

There can now be no mistake: President Bush had a chance to lead, and he failed to keep us safe.

In the next few days, we'll be tracking this story carefully and coordinating our response with partners in New Orleans and around the nation.

The survivors of Katrina deserve to know why the president left them to suffer the storm. And the people of the United States deserve leadership we can trust to keep our families safe. We'll work hard together until we have both.

What's really telling is that the idiot said after the flooding, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."  This was yet another of his bald face LIES.  The video clearly shows he was warned days before the storm hit by the National Hurricane Center's briefer that, "I don't think any model can tell you with any confidence right now whether the levees will be topped or not but that is obviously a very, very grave concern."

In brief, we have found that there is substantial evidence the President, the Vice President and other high ranking members of the Bush Administration misled Congress and the American people regarding the decision to go to war with Iraq; misstated and manipulated intelligence information regarding the justification for such war; countenanced torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and other legal violations in Iraq; and permitted inappropriate  retaliation against critics of their Administration.

There is a prima facie case that these actions by the President, Vice President and other members of the Bush Administration violated a number of federal laws, including

(1) Committing a Fraud against the United States;
(2) Making False Statements to Congress;
(3) The War Powers Resolution;
(4) Misuse of Government Funds;
(5) federal laws and international treaties prohibiting torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment;
(6) federal laws  concerning retaliating against witnesses and other individuals; and
(7) federal laws and regulations concerning leaking and other misuse of intelligence.

While these charges clearly rise to the level of impeachable misconduct, because the Bush Administration and the Republican-controlled Congress have blocked the ability of Members to obtain information directly from the Administration concerning these matters, more investigatory authority is needed before recommendations can be made regarding specific Articles of Impeachment. As a result, we recommend that Congress establish a select committee with subpoena authority to investigate the misconduct of the Bush Administration with regard to the Iraq war detailed in this Report and report to the Committee on the Judiciary on possible impeachable offenses.
. . .
It is tragic that our Nation has invaded another sovereign nation because "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy", as stated in the Downing Street Minutes. It is equally tragic that the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress have been unwilling to examine these facts or take action to prevent this scenario from occurring again. Since they appear unwilling to act, it is incumbent on individual Members of Congress as well as the American public to act to protect our constitutional form of government.

• Sound recording industries - 97%
• Commodity contracts dealing and brokerage - 79%
• Motion picture and sound recording industries - 75%
• Metal ore mining - 65%
• Motion picture and video industries - 64%
• Wineries and distilleries - 64%
• Database, directory, and other publishers - 63%
• Book publishers - 63%
• Cement, concrete, lime, and gypsum product - 62%
• Engine, turbine and power transmission equipment - 57%
• Rubber product - 53%
• Nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing - 53%
• Plastics and rubber products manufacturing - 52%
• Plastics product - 51%
• Other insurance related activities - 51%
• Boiler, tank, and shipping container - 50%
• Glass and glass product - 48%

At the first meeting of the new National Security Council on January 30, 2001, most of the people in the room discuss the possibility of preemptive blitzkrieg against Baghdad.  In March the Pentagon circulates a document entitled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oil Field Contracts"; the supporting maps indicate the properties of interest to various European governments and American corporations. Six months later, early in the afternoon of September 11, the smoke still rising from the Pentagon's western facade, Secretary Rumsfeld tells his staff to fetch intelligence briefings (the "best info fast...go massive; sweep it all up; things related and not") that will justify an attack on Iraq. By chance the next day in the White House basement, Richard A. Clarke, national coordinator for security and counter terrorism, encounters President Bush, who tells him to "see if Saddam did this."  Nine days later, at a private dinner upstairs in the White House, the President informs his guest, the British prime minister, Tony Blair, that "when we have dealt with  Afghanistan, we must come back to Iraq."

By November 13, 2001, the Taliban have been rousted out of Kabul in Afghanistan, but our intelligence agencies have yet to discover proofs of Saddam Hussein's acquaintance with Al Qaeda.  President Bush isn't convinced. On November 21, at the end of a  National Security Council meeting, he says to Secretary Rumsfeld, "What have you got in terms of plans for Iraq?...  I want you to get on it. I want you to keep it secret."
. . .
We have before us in the White House a thief who steals the country's good name and reputation for his private interest and personal use; a liar who seeks to instill in the American people a state of fear; a televangelist who engages the United States in a  never-ending crusade against all the world's evil, a wastrel who squanders a vast sum of the nation's wealth on what turns out to be a recruiting drive certain to multiply the host of our enemies. In a word, a criminal - known to be armed and shown to be dangerous. Under the three-strike rule available to the courts in California, judges sentence people to life in jail for having stolen from Walmart a set of golf clubs or a child's tricycle. Who then calls strikes on President Bush, and how many more does he get before being sent down on  waivers to one of the Texas Prison Leagues?

What we're seeing isn't the rise of a fairly broad class of knowledge workers. Instead, we're seeing the rise of a narrow oligarchy: income and wealth are becoming increasingly concentrated in the hands of a small, privileged elite.

The 2006 Economic Report of the President tells us that the real earnings of college graduates actually fell more than 5 percent between 2000 and 2004. Over the longer stretch from 1975 to 2004 the average earnings of college graduates rose, but by less than 1 percent per year.

Between 1972 and 2001 the wage and salary income of Americans at the 90th percentile of the income distribution rose only 34 percent, or about 1 percent per year. So being in the top 10 percent of the income distribution, like being a college graduate, wasn't a ticket to big income gains.

But income at the 99th percentile rose 87 percent; income at the 99.9th percentile rose 181 percent; and income at the 99.99th percentile rose 497 percent.

The despoilment of the Appalachians is typical of the President's bankrupt environmental policies

Eastern Kentucky is a long way from Britain. What do we care if another million acres of the Appalachian mountain range are lost to strip mining? If the habitat of the flying squirrel and the cerulean warbler is blown up and bulldozed? If one of the oldest temperate forests in the world with some 80 species of trees is destroyed by the greed of a few coal companies? Why should it matter to us?

I'll tell you why. First, because this story exposes the pathological destructiveness of the Republican political and religious elite. Not content with the ruin it has caused in Iraq, George W Bush's administration lays waste the great American wilderness in a way that tests your faith in the reason of man.

Second, this campaign against nature is being plotted, sanctioned and carried out by men - it is exclusively men - who are on their knees in little, white churches every Sunday praying to a god whom they believe created this earth. The same people who reject Darwin and promote the idea that life on earth is too complex and varied to have been created by evolution, a theory known as intelligent design, are the ones who show such contempt for God's creation.

...a lawsuit by The Associated Press has now demonstrated the truth in shameful detail. The suit compelled the release of
records from hearings for some of the 760 or so men who have been imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay. (About 490 are still there.) Far too many show no signs of being a threat to American national security. Some, it appears, did nothing at all. And they have no way to get a fair hearing because Gitmo was created outside the law.

Take the case of Abdur Sayed Rahman, as recounted in Monday's Times. The transcripts quote Mr. Rahman as saying he was arrested in his Pakistani village in January 2002, flown to Afghanistan, accused of being the Taliban's deputy foreign minister and then thrown into a cell in Guantánamo Bay. "I am only a chicken farmer in Pakistan," he said, adding that the Taliban official was named Abdur Zahid Rahman.

Other cases included prisoners who owned a particular kind of cheap watch supposedly favored by Al Qaeda.

An Afghan was accused of being the former Taliban governor of a province and subjected to a pretzel logic that would make Joseph Heller cringe. He said he was a different person entirely and asked the tribunal to contact the current governor and verify his story. The presiding officer refused, saying it was up to the prisoner to produce the evidence. The incarcerated Afghan then pointed out that he was being held virtually incommunicado in a United States prison in a remote corner of Cuba and not allowed to make calls. The presiding officer assured the prisoner that he would have plenty of time to write a letter - during the year of continued detention before his case might be reviewed again.

• Alternative Energy Sources n. New locations to drill for gas and oil.
• Class Warfare n. Any attempt to raise the minimum wage.
• Climate Change n. The day when the blue states are swallowed by  the oceans.
• Compassionate Conservatism n. Poignant concern for the very wealthy.
• Free Markets n. Halliburton no-bid contracts at taxpayer expense.
• Girly Men n. Males who do not grope women inappropriately.
• Growth n. 1. The justification for tax cuts for the rich.  2. What happens to the national debt when Republicans cut taxes on the  rich.
• Habeas Corpus n. Archaic. (Lat.) Legal term no longer in use (See  Patriot Act).
• Pro-Life adj. Valuing human life until birth.
• Voter Fraud n. A significant minority turnout.

CHERTOFF LOCKS HIMSELF OUT OF HOMELAND SECURITY HEADQUARTERS
Forgets Security Code, Secret Question

Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff suffered another embarrassment today when he accidentally locked himself out of the Homeland Security Department's headquarters in Washington, D.C.

After security guards entrusted with protecting the Homeland Security building complained that the building itself was not secure, Secretary Chertoff ordered that the headquarters be outfitted with a new security system, but then forgot the security code necessary to gain entry.

"Unfortunately, Chertoff is the only one who knew the security code, and he forgot it," one source said.  "He also had a secret question which could be used to retrieve the security code, but he forgot that, too."

As of late this afternoon, Mr. Chertoff was still standing outside the building waiting to gain entry after a locksmith who was called turned out to be from Dubai and had to be sent away.

Mr. Chertoff also declined Vice President Dick Cheney's offer to shoot off the lock on the building for fear that Mr. Cheney might hit the Department of Agriculture building across the street.

On Capitol Hill, news that the nation's highest ranking homeland security official had locked himself out of his own building drew criticism from Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del): "Michael Chertoff's secret question should be, 'How the hell did I get this job?'"

For his part, Mr. Chertoff tried to put the best face on the situation, telling the reporters that the nation "might actually be safer" with him outside the Department of Homeland Security than inside.

Elsewhere, President Bush scrapped plans to send Americans to Mars after NASA's Mars probe failed to find signs of oil.

Vice President Dick Cheney made his case for warrant less wiretaps today, telling reporters, “Everything else we've done for the past five years has been completely unwarranted.”

President Bush acknowledged today that the U.S. had not yet found Osama bin Laden, but added, “On the positive side, we continue to arrest Cindy Sheehan.”

President Bush said he was saddened by the arrest of former adviser Claude Allen on felony theft charges, telling reporters, “If he wanted to rip people off, I could have gotten him a job at Halliburton.”

Televangelist Pat Robertson said today that Muslims are “motivated by demonic power,” thus making himself the latest cartoon character to enrage the Muslim world.

In an ominous sign that Iraq may be sliding into civil war, Ken Burns and his camera crew turned up in Baghdad today.