• A Plan to Send Bush to Mars!
• The New Pentagon papers  An ex-high ranking military officer, Karen Kwiatkowski, reveals how DOD extremists suppressed information and twisted the truth to drive the country to war.  (A saved version of the article)
• Evidence links Willaim Kristol to 9/11 attack

The facts  (Daily Mislead of 1/22/04   ):

1. Before the war, the liar-in-chief said there was "no doubt the Iraqi regime continues to possess the most lethal weapons ever devised," while Vice President Cheney said, "There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction...to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us."
2. Shrub, in his 1/04 State of Siege address stated Iraq had "weapons of mass destruction-related program activities."
3. When asked last month by CBS's Diane Sawyer about the shift from stating Iraq had WMDs, to Iraq  engaging in "WMD-related-program-activities," Bush replied,  "What's the difference?"

1. Shrub has lied and deceived in the past and, further, continues to lie and deceive.
2. Shrub is stupid.   He obviously cannot distinguish between possessing WMDs and  "weapons of mass destruction-related program activities"   and is stupid to even utter such nonsense.  While he was obviously trying to avoid  answering a most valid question, even a half-bright politician caught in a lie would have come up with something a bit more convincing.
3. Shrub is both shallow and arrogant.  This is illuminated by his flippant "What's the difference?" answer.

Alas, the outrage is not prevelant for several reasons, however, the prime reason is the astounding abundance of citizens every bit as as stupid and ill-informed as their president- i.e.,. the overwhelming majority of Ripublicans and more than a few Democrats.  "Democrats" like Wesley Clark who spoke at a Bush fund raiser and praised the idiot and those in Congress who voted for Shrub's invasion of Iraq    What will it take to wake these folks up to the fact that the Bush regime is run by a pack of chickhawk warmoungers and that their lies and stupid policies have had horrorific consequences?   Some proposals well worth a try:

1. Draft the sons and daughters of regime supporters and send them to Iraq.  Not a draft which allows for college deferments- much less one which allows the offsprings of rich war moungering politicians to escape via plum National Guard billets where one is allowed to go AWOL for over a year (like Shrub).  Some "enhancements" to ensure the lessons of pre-emptive and greed driven wars based on lies are learned well :  1) Tours of duty in Iraq are for the duration.  Based on the latest regime attempts to justify the war, that would keep 'em there until a democracy is established.  The regime's present puppet interim council and planned  puppet committee to draft a constitution do NOT count.  Neither does the method favored by the regime-  selection of the president by the Supreme Court.  2)  First drafted and sent to Iraq- Shrub's spoiled/rich kids and those of every Senator and member of Congress who voted for the war.  Here's links to how our alledged representative voted on the war-  House Joint Resolution 114   Senate vote on 10/11/02:    House vote on 10/10/02
2. Make regime supporters pay for the consequences of the lies.  So far, Shrub and his regime have squantered $167 billion.  That works out to $3.352.67 for each of the 49.82 million idiots who voted for the warmounger.   Of course, being greedy and devious like Shrub, they are not about to own up to their debt.

The spies who pushed for war
The Guardian  Thursday July 17, 2003
Julian Borger reports on the shadow rightwing intelligence network (the Office of Special Plans) set up in Washington to second-guess the CIA and deliver a justification for toppling Saddam Hussein by force.

The agency, called the Office of Special Plans (OSP), was set up by the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, to second-guess CIA information and operated under the patronage of hardline conservatives in the top rungs of the administration, the Pentagon and at the White House, including Vice-President Dick Cheney.  The ideologically driven network functioned like a shadow government, much of it off the official payroll and beyond congressional oversight. But it proved powerful enough to prevail in a struggle with the State Department and the CIA by establishing a justification for war.

The S factor explains Bush's popularity  By Neal Starkman
"S" is for "stupid"- both him and his supporters.

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Is Bush as stupid as everyone thinks?     from Indy Media UK   The basis thesis is Stupidity = Patriotic.

Is Bush as stupid as everyone thinks? Well, yes and no. The scary thing is that not everyone DOES think that Bush is stupid.

Historically, middle America has an inate distrust of 'smartass' intellectuals. The prevailing attitude of mainstream American Christian conservatism is that clever, articulate people are devious and somehow 'un-American'. The majority of Americans regard Bush as an example of an all-American home boy, with the same patriotic values and objectives as them. The fact that he's been cossetted by a wealthy family; never had to do a proper day's work in his life, and gained power through having the right connections rather than by his own efforts, seems, amazingly, not to have undermined the belief that George W. is a 'regular guy' just like everybody else.

The over 70% of Americans who think Bush is doing a good job are supported in their delusion by the mainstream media which, since the 2000 elections, has gone out of its way to portray Bush as being a good deal more shrewd than he appears; stressing that verbal inarticulacy and ignorance of international affairs is not necessarily indicative of lack of intelligence and questionable political acumen.

This is bollocks of course. Bush is every bit as clueless, weak, narrow, ignorant and incompetent as he appears. And he's in good
company - the average IQs of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, et al, would make a group of lobotomised estate agents seem pretty sharp by comparison.

So, my response to the question "is Bush as stupid as everyone [sic] thinks he is?"... No, he's a lot more stupid than that. And stupidity and power is a dangerous combination.

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An editorial- Are Bush Supporters Stupid?  of 1/5/04 (certianly a rhetorical question!)

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Too Stupid to be President.com  Mostly humor- although much of it has a sharp edge of truth
Sniippets from  "Top 11 reasons to invade Mars":.

11. Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz believe our forces will be greeted with flowers when they arrive.
9.   Running out of places to not find bin Laden, Anthrax killer, CIA agent name-leaker, etc..
6.   If there was water on Mars, their might have been life. If there was life on Mars, then there must be dead things. If there are dead things, there might be fossil fuels.
5.   The invasion will pay for itself through the sale of Mars' ample reserves of Mars bars.
4.   Mars is the front line in the war on imaginary, interplanetary terror (Mars Attacks! (1996), Clinton failed to respond).
3.   As with Iraq, Halliburton pitched the invasion (see Salon.com).
2.   Mars itself is an intermediate goal, the ultimate prize is the natural gas of Uranus.

Poll Shows Americans Still Support Bush, Still Stupid    by Brent "The Duke" Johnson,

A Nation of Victims   by Renana Brooks, 6/12/03, in The Nation

Family concern- Profile of The Bush brothers  by Mark Steyn
 

Since another henchman of the plutocrats, Henry Kissinger, rejected Shrub's appointment to the 9/11 investigation commission rather than divulge his list of clients required for Senate confirmation for the slot,  Shrub's taking another approach with Baker.  Shrub is saying Baker was requested by the puppet govt. in Iraq to fix the debt.  Sure...

With Iraq owing the Saudi rulers billions (including $7 B for a Islamic bomb) and with the fixer on the Saudi's payroll, I seriously doubt the debt to the Saudi rulers will be erased.    Palast also notes in his article that the US World Bank is the proper agency for dealing with Iraqi's debt and notes it's official name is "International Bank for Reconstruction and Development".  The Bank's president wants the entire debt erased-  including the Saudi debt.  Given the World Bank's otherwise slavish adherence to the Plutocrat's agenda for global  economic domination, I have grave doubts....

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Saddam, version 2.0 - Chalabi
An excellent  piece by .Chris Floyd argues that those who believe the chickenhawks had no post-war plan for Iraq are wrong.   As exhibit A he points to a 9/00 report by the Project for the New American Century.  This is the chickenhawk/warmongering neocon think tank which wrote the script for the regime's policies of pre-emptive wars and global domination.  The thing admits the goals are revolutionary and would take time to acheived unless there is a "new Pearl Harbor"  that would "catalyze" the American public into supporting wide-ranging militarization at home and extensive "interventions" abroad.  It specifically lists Iraq as a target.  I further discusses the need to secure oil.   Details like what to do with conquered/ruined countries are not discussed.

The detailed plan for Iraq has not yet been published but portions of its outline are illuminated by the chicken hawks' drafting of Baker to "fix" the Iraq debt, huge unbid crony contracts and their annointing and attempting to install Ahmad Chalabi as the "chosen one". for Iraq.   Convicted of stealing millions in a financial scam in Jordan and confirmed as a chronic liar by the CIA (which severed support of him years ago), Chalabi is of the same cut of cloth as the greedy chicken hawks of the regime.  The good news was the Iraqis raised a huge stink about an international criminal who hasn't set foot in the country since 1956 being foisted upon them.  The bad news is that the leadership role in the Iraq puppet council is on a rotating basis and Chalabi is in the queue.  My guess is that when (not if) things in Iraq degenerate into civil war, the Bush regime will install  Chalabi as dictator- or, as .Chris Floyd brilliantly entitled his article "Sadam version 2.0"

The article further documents at least one of the payoffs.  The ongoing part is a $40 million security contract to a firm connected to Chalabi buds (and hence him) - Erinys Iraq.  The future part is control of the oil.  Floyd astudely writes,: "What matters is getting the strongman in place -- Saddam 2.0, a more obedient, more presentable, less quirky upgrade, who will "invite" a lasting American military presence and uphold Bush's arbitrary decrees granting foreign corporations a stranglehold on the Iraqi economy."

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Saddam, version 1.0
Michael Moore wrote a nice piece subsequent to the capture of Saddam version 1.0 illuminating what a good friend of the plutocrats (especially Bush I) Saddam had been.  They even supplied him with feed stock for WMDs.  Of course the official spin is that they merely permitted US corporations to do the supplying.   And supply they did- nasty stuff such as anthrax, botulinum, and clostridium.

Corporate sponsors of the current and past right-wing regimes which aided Saddam are listed/detailed at  LA Weekly web site.  It's a very interesting list and site.  The site also reports on Rummy's  visit with Saddam1.0 in '83 seeking a pipeline deal for (surprise!) Bechtel.  A photo and video of Rummy shaking hands with their former buddy is here.  Additional details on Bechtel and the current regime are below.

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The capture of Saddam
The capture provided the Bush regime an oppurtunity to do more lying.  Most folks thought Bremer's: "Ladies and gentlemen: we got him".meant US troops had located and captured Saddam.  Not so according to news articles (12) few in the US saw.  The Kurds were responsible for the capture.  My guess is they swapped Sadam for promises from the regime for a bigger piece of the oil action and security from the Shities and Sunnis.

Howard Dean caught hell from the usual right-wingnuts for his observation that the capture of Saddan hasn't made us safer.  Shortly thereafter vivid proof was provided by none other than the Bush regime when they raised the terrorists threat level to orange.  I suspose what really upset the wingnuts was that Dean was spoiling their arrogant chest-thumping over the capture.

One knowledgable observer of the Iraq beleives that, instead of reducing attacks by insurgents in Iraq, the capture will ultimately  increase resistance to the regime's' occupation.  The reasoning is that Shite factions had not previously joined with Bathhist and Sunni factions for, in large part, fear of the return of Saddam.  With Saddam captured, a powerful alliance of the factions may likely form.  After all, the old saw,  "my enemy's enemy is my friend" orginated  in the Mid-East.

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"Bring 'em On" News - Corporate Looting
Most folks (me included) assumed the Chickhawk-in-Chief's arrogant  "bring 'em on" taut was in reference to Iraqis fighting the illegal invaders of their country since attacks on American troops was the context of Shrubs arrogant  taut.   But that assumption is based on the utterly false presumption that Shrub is able to think and speak for himself (i.e., without his pupeet-masters)  in complete paragraphs; much less in context.    Actually, he was encouraging his corporate sponsors to bring on the looting- of the US Trreasury.   Boy have they:

Halliburton was "awarded" (Ha!) yet another contract.  This one gives them looting rights on at least  $1.2 Billion of taxpayer money.  A AP article notes only three bids were considered.  They were most likely mere window dressing.

The 1/16/04 announcement of the "award" fits the ruling regime's pattern of wating until Fridays to announce news they want lost/minimized in the news cycle.  The timing of this one was better than most- the Friday was before a 3 day weekend.  One can understand why they want little coverage given the on-going probe into Halliburton's first attempt at overcharging millions via an existing no-bid, cost-plus contract.

The overcharging diversion must really stink since the Pentagon auditors bumped the investigation upstairs to the Pentagon inspector general only 3 days before the tainted award of the latest contract.   As a Guardian article politely puts it, "The call for investigation by the inspector general's office indicates DCAA auditors found indications of wrongdoing that go beyond accounting mistakes."   I can smell at least one stinking  rat- his name is Dick Cheney.  Cheney led Halliburton for 5 years and is still on their payroll.  But he lies about that also (see below).

Alas, Cheney's role in "awarding" contracts to his company likely won't be investigated according to this from an AP article:  "The investigation will center on actions by government workers, not the company, a senior defense official said Thursday on condition of anonymity".   Even an inspector general won't take direct the investigation towards Halliburton much less Cheney.   A Bostson Globe article reports that it's to be a criminal investigation and gives a good run down on the scam.  Here's a snippet:

From April 11 to Sept. 19, according to public documents, KBR (a Halliburton subsidary) charged the US government $1.17 per gallon of gasoline delivered from Kuwait to Iraq at a time when the average spot price was 71 cents. It charged an additional $1.21 per gallon in transport fees, far more than what Iraq's State Oil Marketing Organization charged for the same service. KBR also added a commission of 26 cents per gallon.

Bechtel continues to enjoy the privilege of looting the treasury.  Bechtel is, of course, a prime corporate sponsor (contributions) of the ruling regime.
Shrub awarded them yet another looting contract on 1/6/04 reportly worth $1.8 Billion .  This is on top of a 4/03 of a no-bid govt. contract which was alledged at the start worth up to  $680 million..  As of 1/04, it has actually cost us taxpayers about $1 Billion so far-  the contract doesn't expire until  the end of '04.  At the current rate, it will likely top out at several billion.  I've not found whether it's a cost-plus contract, but it sure appears to be  Then there's the 1/04 joint Bechtel/Parsons Corp  contract worth, allegedly, $800 Million.
Gee, these contracts all seem to be running way over the estimates provided by the regime at the time of their "award".   It sure appears to b more of the regime's lying.  Also, the reports on the contracts above are just the above-the-table looting rewards and bribes....

"Since I left Halliburton to become George Bush's vice president, I've severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interest. I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't had, now, for over three years."

A 9/23/03 CNN piece reports that under federal ethics standards, Vice President Dick Cheney still has a financial interest in Halliburton but he and Shrub are exempt from conflict of interest ethic laws.  Just because it is not illegal doesn't make it right.   Federal employee ethics rules state that one is not only to avoid favortism and conflicts of interest, but, further, avoid even the appearance of them.  Given his unbribled arrogrance in other matters, I feel sure Cheney believes such ethics are only for the "little people"..

Here's how the regime is spinning Cheney's conflict of interest.  A 9/28/03 Star-Telegram  article  reports a regime mouth-piece as stating that an insurance policy was taken out to insure Cheney's income from Halliburton was ensured reguardless of what happened to Halliburton thereby thereby absolving Cheney of any conflict of interest.   Bullshit!  What the insurance does is reduce the downside risk to Cheneys future loot if Halliburton tanks.  Like say from really dumb things like Cheney's purchase of Dresser.  He pushed in spite of Dresser's widely recognized huge asbestos liability.  Which helps explain why Cheney so dearly loves "tort reform".

Finally, Sen. Lautenberg released a Congressional Research Service report concluding that Cheney still has a financial interest in Halliburton.

For more info on the Vice (an accurate adjective!) President, be sure to check out  Disinfopedia's excellent  report on Cheney and, better still, it's Halliburton report.  The former documents yet another lie of Cheney's:  "We know he's (Saddam Hussein) been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons, and we believe he has, in fact,  reconstituted nuclear weapons." -- VP Dick Cheney ­ Meet the Press 3/16/2003.

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A previous Cheney lie about Halliburton's not trading with Iraq was reported thusly::

In a July 30, 2000, interview on ABC-TV's "This Week," Cheney denied that Halliburton or its subsidiaries traded with Baghdad.  Three weeks later, on the same program, he modified his response after being informed that a Halliburton spokesman had said that Dresser Rand and Ingersoll Dresser Pump traded with Iraq.

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Citizen Works has a nice page on Halliburton/Cheney scams.  Some of the items covered which occurred under Cheney's rein are shady accounting which has resulted in an on-going SEC investigation, a huge increase in the number of subsidiaries in offshore tax havens, cost overruns on a Balkans contract  and  jumping from 73rd to 18th on the Pentagon's list of top contractors.  I don't suspose his previously being defense secretary under Bush I has anything to do with the later two items.  There's no susposing about the SEC investigation- it's been going on for nearly two years and the head of the SEC was appointed by the regime.  Like the "independent" committee Shrub appointed to investigate the intellegence failures I'm sure Any final report will be after the Nov. election.

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Good Propaganda or a Stupid Public?
The regime's propaganda has worked more than even cynical old me ever suspected.  An example is provided by the utterly shocking resutls of a 12/03  Harris poll(alt):

• 28% believe clear evidence of WMD have been found.
• 53% believe clear evidence of Iraq supporting of Al Qaeda has been found.
• 50% believe the Bush regime tried to accurately present their "information" about Iraq's alleged WMDs

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Shrub is a Lazy Imbecile
In distinct contrast to previous presidents, Shrub does not read a single newspaper.  Further revealing his stupidity, he reportly actually brags about it,  His story is that he relies on others to tell him what is going on.  Worse still, he's admitted he only wants to hear only the good news as reflected in the following from a 1/14/03 interview with British journalist Martin Newland:

"It's not to say I don't respect the press. I do respect the press. But sometimes it's hard to be an optimistic leader. A leader must project an optimistic view. It's hard to be optimistic if you read a bunch of stuff about yourself."

The only other plauible explanaition for the above lunacy is that he is laying the foundation for a "I didn't know" defense in forthcoming impeachment hearings, civil suits and maybe even a trial as a international war criminal.   (sources: USA Today article , another article, interview., related Kinsley article )

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Shrub is not Hitler (in one aspect...)
MoveOn was critized by the usual right-wingnuts for posting two ads comparing Bush to Hitler.   The ads were amoung hundreds of others which were submitted in a contest for an ad to run during Shrub's state of the union address.  (BTW, please contribute for that ad run as well as another during the super bowl)   Since neither ad make it into the final round of the contest, they were removed from the web site.  Curiously, the only place they can be found is a ripublican web site.

Anyway, Bill Maher said Bush is not Hitler- Hitler actually got more votes than his competitor in his election while Shrub lost by half a million votes!

Mark Twain said history does not repeat itself but it often rhymes.   I can sure detect rhymes in the working of the regimes of Shrub and Hitler.  Arrogance, belief that might makes right, lying, self-righteousness, willful distain of world opinion, donning the cloak of christainity, invasion of other countries, hypeing of enemies, suspending and violating civil liberties ... ad nauseum.

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Colon Powell is not Goebbels
Regime lackey Colin Powell responded to a question about the lack of evidence supporting the regime's claim of a dangerous Saddam/al Qaeda connection in a 1/8/04 press conference with this:

"There is not--you know, I have not seen smoking-gun concrete evidence about the connection, but I think the possibility of such connections did exist and it was prudent to consider them at the time that we did."  (source)

I can't resist using Powell's technique with the following.  (I've deleted Powell's obvious blunder of starting with "There is not" since being that unequivocal is umbecoming of a good propagandist! ):

"I have not seen smoking-gun, concrete evidence about Bush being a crack snorting, drunk driving, draft dodging, lying, AWOL spoiled rich kid, but I think the possibility of such did exist and it is prudent to consider that when we vote in November."

Solid rocket engines provide the largest bang (often literally) for the buck and hence are the optimal means of propulsion.   0-ring used to seal the casings on such engines have leaked, therefore, we'll dispense with both of them.   Due to Shrub's tax cuts for the greedy rich and his stupid invasion of Iraq, there's not much money available so, the mission must be done on the cheap.  Finally, the plan must provide a means of satisfying Shrub's predilection for showboating (e.g. the aircraft carrier and Thanksgiving turkey stunts).

Given the above parameters, the solution is rather obvious- loft an Asstronut.  Simply cram a whole bunch of solid rocket propellant right up Shrub's ass,  point him in the general direction of Mars and ignite the propellant.

The mission can turn a profit by selling seats, live TV and video rights and naming rights to the spectacle.  I know I'd most glady pay alot to see Shrub "blast" off to Mars.  The profits would  help defray the costs of the erstwhile asstronut's tax cuts and wars.

Shrub (obviously tighly scripted) responded to the charge with, "No, the stated policy of my administration towards Saddam Hussein was very clear. Like the previous administration, we were for regime change."  (source).   Maybe Clinton's policy was regime change, but it was primarily via sanctions- not a full scale attack based on  fabricated evidence, hype, and outright lies.

A 1/18/04 David Broder piece reports that O'Neill and Greenspan argued that Shrub's first tax cut for the rich must be contingent on the huge surpluses the regime had forecasted (obviously now in error)..  Broder also notes that a provision to do just that narrowly failed in the Senate in '00.

A news article reports hundreds of booing protesters.  They were not fooled at what was going down- one sign read "It's not a photo-op George."  In typical fashion, the SS had them hidden from presidential view behind busses.  That is much like his only wanting to be told of good news (see above).

An AP article: reported the president of an association of black elected officials as saying  Bush's policies on the Iraq war, affirmative action and social service funding have been "in direct contradiction to the King legacy.".   I might add civil liberties, social and economic justice and taxes.

Other related  info:  A news article, an interesting alterNet article which sheds light on the debt ripublicans owe King and coverage in Aljazeera.

The 1/17/04 local paper reported Israel was planning the assissination of a Hamas spirtual leader.  The Shitte religious leader in Iraq who is demanding direct elections of the Iraq govt. had better take note.   No wonder the regime is so closely aligned with Israel- arrogant zealots and  thugs tend to stick together.  All of this surely further inflames Muslin hatred of the US- and rightly so.
 

Leading linguist and commentator Noam Chomsky has said President George Bush will have to "manufacture" another threat to American security to win re-election in 2004 after US failure in occupying Iraq....

"They have a card that they can play... terrify the population with some invented threat, and that is not very hard to do," he said.

Disinfopedia - The Encyclopedia of Propaganda, a project of PR Watch, is a fantastic site.  It provides a huge footnoted/links database of information on regime members and more.  For example, the "Military Background" at Disinfopedia page for GW Bush page: has this entry:

"Here's the story as generally agreed upon: In January 1968, with the Vietnam war in full swing, Bush was due to graduate from Yale:   Knowing he'd soon be eligible for the draft, he took an air force officers' test hoping to secure a billet with the Texas Air National Guard, which would allow him to do his military service at home. Bush didn't do particularly well on the test--on the pilot aptitude section, he scored in the 25th percentile, the lowest possible passing grade. But Bush's father, George H.W., was then a U.S. congressman from Houston, and strings were pulled. The younger Bush vaulted to the head of a long waiting list--a year and a half long, by some estimates--and in May of '68 he was inducted into the guard."[7]

"So it's official - George W. Bush has now spent more time wearing military attire during his presidency than he ever did when he was supposedly in the military." Bush's Campaign Ads - Bring 'Em On, But Keep Up Your Guard by Matt Peiken, Common Dreams,

To me their lists of lies should be compiled and printed with the header  "Articles of Impeachment" and acted on by congress.  Nay- they are mostly a of bunch of contemptible hypocrites- i.e. impeaching Clinton for lying about sex while now aiding if not abetting and encouraging the lies from the regime in the White House.   To me, any one of Bush's lies is more of a "high crime and misdemeanor" than Clinton lying about blow jobs.   A MoveOn pin I saw recently and a Bill Maher quote sum it up quite well:  "HE LIED - THEY DIED"  and "NO ONE DIED FROM BILL'S LIE ABOUT SEX".   It's utterly and completely disgusting....
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9/03 Democracy Now piece dissecting Cheney's lies in a TV interview

Cheney Justifies Invasion Of Iraq In First Televised Interview in Six Months
In attempting to sell the reasons for the war against Baghdad, Vice President Dick Cheney repeats many allegations about Iraq that  have been proven false over the past two years. We spend the hour dissecting some of Cheney’s statements in his interview with Tim Russert on NBC’s “Meet he Press.”

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FLASH!  Evidence links Willaim Kristol to 9/11 attack
There's a fair amount of evidence that Kristol (cheif idiot at the Weakly Standard)  has had very close associations with Osama bin Laden in the past and alot of evidence that he had associations with the previous effort to destroy the World Trade Center in 1993.

I'm only fabricating a statement/lie in the exact same manner as the infamous war monger William Kristol used to hype an attack on Iraq immediately after 9/11.  Here's what the chicken hawk is reported as saying on the evening of 9/11 on NPR:

 That same evening, Kristol echoed Woolsey on National Public Radio. ”I think Iraq is, actually, the big, unspoken sort of elephant in the room today. There's a fair amount of evidence that Iraq has had very close associations with Osama bin Laden in the past, a lot of evidence that it had associations with the previous effort to destroy the World Trade Center (in 1993)

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Cheney still has Halliburton ties
Congressional report finds Vice President still has financial interest in his old company.
CNN 9/25/03                  September 25, 2003: 4:28 PM EDT
Well Duh!   The greedy bastard is very likely going to get even richer from the invasion of Iraq.   433,000 stock options, geez....

IThe Disinfopedia web page on the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) is great.
The PNAC is the organization which drafted the blueprint for the regime's warmongering fight for global military domination.  It's in the PNAC's policy documents, e.g. "Rebuilding America's Defences" of 9/00.  A Sunday Herald 9/15/02 article gives a good run down on it and concludes with a quote by a Labor MP

'This is garbage from right-wing think-tanks stuffed with chicken-hawks -- men who have never seen the horror of war but are in love with the  idea of war. Men like Cheney, who were draft-dodgers in the Vietnam war.  This is a blueprint for US world domination - a new world order of their making. These are the thought processes of fantasist  Americans who want to control the world."

Found these at Disinfopedia also  :
7/15/03 Analysis by Jim Lobe- "Key Officials Used 9/11 As Pretext for Iraq War".  It cites the regime laying the ground work for the attack on Iraq very shortly after 9/11.  It was so obvious, even Wesley Clark was asked to hype the regime's propaganda:

A hint of a deliberate campaign to connect Iraq with the 9/11 attacks and al Qaeda surfaced last month in a June televised interview of Gen. Wesley Clark on the popular public-affairs programme, 'Meet the Press.' In answer to a question, Clark asserted, ”There was a concerted effort during the fall of 2001, starting immediately after 9/11, to pin 9/11 and the terrorism problem on Saddam Hussein”. ”It came from the White House, it came from other people around the White House. It came from all over. I got a call on 9/11. I was on  CNN, and I got a call at my home saying, 'You got to say this is connected. This is state-sponsored terrorism. This has to be connected to Saddam Hussein'.”

This article documents one of the many past examples of right-wingers' geo-political meddling, greed and hypocricy.  In it, Kissinger is reported to have encouraged, aided and abetted  the brutal right-wing regime in Argentina to murder and "disappear" 30,000 people.   Billions were loaned to the generals (of which alot "disappeared" into their Swiss bank accounts).  Further, "Argentina's external debt ballooned from $7.7bn in 1975 to $46 bn in 1982.  Ever since, the country has been caught in an escalating crisis, borrowing billions to pay interest on that original, illegitimate debt, which today, at $141bn, is only slightly higher than that held by Iraq's creditors."

Now the US wants the rest of the world to forgive Iraq's debt because, according to regime mouthpiece Scott McClellan, "the Iraqi people "should not be saddled with the debt of a brutal regime".  The concurent demand Argentina pay in full reveals the Bush regime's utter hypocricy- and greed.  The greedy bastards' further weakening Argentina makes it easy for the vultures (i.e., the Bush regime's corporate sponsors  and the IMF/World Bank) to pick the bones.

If other countries forgive the Iraq debt as Bush has demanded, it further ensures he and his corporate sponsors/pupteers suceed in accomplishing the real objective of their Iraq invasion- revenue from Iraq oil for themselves.  This is because Iraq oil revenues will flow into the pockets of the regimes sponsors rather than to Iraqi people, much less the countries which are owed the debt.

The article concludes with:

The entire reconstruction project defies more neo-con tenets, sending this year's US deficit to a cartoonish $500 bn, with plenty handed out in no-bid contracts, creating the kind of monopoly that allowed Halliburton to overcharge by an estimated $61 m for importing gasoline into Iraq.

Those looking for ideology in the White House should consider this: for the men who rule our world, rules are for other people. The powerful feed ideology to the masses like fast food while they dine on that most rarefied delicacy: impunity.

Peter Krobath, chief editor for the Austrian movie magazine Skip, was seized and held overnight in a cold room with 45 others who landed without visas. Is he an Osama follower? A disguised fedayeen from Saddam's clan? No. He is guilty of flying to the U.S. to interview Ben Affleck.

Thomas Sjoerup, a photographer for the Danish paper Ekstra Bladet, had to give the American authorities fingerprints, a mug shot, and a DNA sample, and he was promptly sent back home anyway.

European Defence: 'We Don't Need US Permission to Go to the Bathroom'   documents the EU's desire for a EU military force which would likely supplant NATO and hence remove one way in which the US meddles in their affairs.  Of course, the regime has weighted in by dispatching Rummy and Colon "Oreo" Powell to threaten them.   Interestingly, Europe is seeking to develop a high-tech satellite positioning system called Galileo to compete with the US military's GPS.

"Bleeding Strategy' Comes Home,12/23/03 by Nicholas Berry (director of ForeignPolicyForum.com) notes that neo-cons attributed the fall of the USSR to trying to keep up with Reagan's military spending and the right-wingers  past geo-political meedling and use/abuse of other countries as proxy warriors- e.g. Iraq (supporting Sadam against USSR backed Iran) and Afganistan (support of the Taliban and Osama himself).  Now, that "bleeding strategy" may blowing-back on them via the quagmire in Iraq.   It also helps provide an explaination of why Europe's response to the regime's newer/more expensive verision of Reagan's "Star Wars" program was rather muted.

Of course, it is we the "little folks" (not the greedy rich who are much richer via the regime's tax cuts) who are being bleed the most.   Not only in the billions of tax money to liberate Iraq oil for the rich/greedy but also in cuts to domestic programs (another goal of the regime).  Of course the majority of Americans are so utterly stupid that they do not realize what is happening.   The economic blow-back may ultimately hurt the political arm of the regime-  e.g. the falling/failing US dollar (from the huge debt Bush is loading upon our children and grandchildren) may cause collapse of the Bush economic juggernaut and finally awaken the  stupid American majority to what Bush and crew is doing.

Personally, I think that, should their support with these idiots (NASCAR dads, religious zealots, gun nuts... ad nauseum) slip, they will win them back via methods that have worked so well in the past.  First, by more Bush strutting aboard aircraft carriers and arrogant "bring 'em on"  boasting.  Should the crass, hypocritical red meat fail to work as well as it has in the past and the regime becomes politically vunerable at the polls in Nov., it will escalate with things like planting and then "finding" Sadam's WMDs and the "capure" of some poor tall, skinny and bearded Arab who looks like Osama.  Should re-election (or "re-selection " like in '00) become in doubt, things like having their corporate buddies- the manufacturers' of electronic voting machines- "upgrade" the software will be undertaken.  Finally, if things become really tight, they will provoke an attack- by say, North Korea.  (recall that the first Bush dispatched April Gillesespe tell Sadam is was OK to invade Iraq).  Even abetting, encouraging or even staging a terrorist attack is not beneath the morals of the regime.  Either will give the regime a big bounce - ala the post-9-11 one.  There's also another even more sinister option- declare martial law and call off the elections.  Subsequent actions by the regime to stay in power will make their even the "Patriot Act II" they are currently pushing pale in comparision.  As a data-point: retired General Tommy Franks (a former regime member) stated that if there is one more attack like 9-11, the Constitution is history.

So let's recap, particularly for those mindless, conservative minions who continue to swallow this administration's offerings without even tasting, let alone chewing. over 450 American soldiers dead; thousands of innocent Iraqis dead; new reports of upwards of 11,000 wounded U.S. soldiers and medical evacuations from Iraq; troops suicide rate alarmingly high, even for wartime; oil wells given the "protect first" priority; Cheneyburton overcharging the American taxpayers and yet still serving our soldiers dirty food from even dirtier preparing facilities; reports of soldiers not being paid for weeks and being refused medical care; UPI's Mark Benjamin's illuminating articles on how poorly returning soldiers are being treated at Fort Stewart and Fort Knox; soldiers not being properly equipped and families having to purchase equipment here in America and ship it overseas; Bush banning the media from covering dead soldiers return to the country they died serving (apparently, funerals don't meet the "free speech zone" requirement); Bush's refusal to attend even one of their funerals; his "form letters" of condolence to the dead soldiers families; the story of the seventeen 1991 Gulf War POW's who were tortured in Iraq, and eventually won a settlement against the government of Saddam Hussein - Bush trying to overturn their settlement, claiming he needs the money to rebuild Iraq. and all this for what? FOR WHAT?!
.....
I wouldn't be surprised if der Bushler got a bump in approval ratings after this latest terror alert raising. Why? Because he's doing so much to "protect der homeland." Welcome to George W. Bush's America. Sickening. Welcome to GOP Nation. Sick.

You have an opportunity to throw these filthy, lying, dangerous usurpers out into the streets on their worthless asses in 2004. For the sake of your nation and what it used to be and still can be... I suggest you do just that - while you still can.

As the death toll of American soldiers rises daily in Iraq, Democratic presidential contenders are attacking President Bush's policy of unilateral preemption and urging him to share post-war responsibilities with the international community. But the Bush administration appears reluctant to relinquish control. Instead, while aggrandizing American superiority and pursuing a policy of global intimidation, it has been displaying contempt for international collaboration and trumpeting its isolationism. Under the Bush presidency, could it be that the face of America has begun to look like a narcissistic personality disorder?

The traits of this syndrome as covered in the article (how the regime embodies these are also in the article):

A display of grandiosity and superiority

A profound distrust and avoidance of dependency often accompanied by contempt for others

A conviction that it is "a dog eat dog world," one can only trust one's self, and a predilection for "splendid isolation"

A dominating, exploitative use of others, and an inclination to use or ignore the law as it suits one's own purposes

A reliance upon revenge in retaliation for injuries to self-esteem

The article notes the prime ammo for attacking the regime's hacking of Medicare with:  1) The law prohibits the government from negotiating directly with drug makers for lower prices,  and 2) it essentially refuses to legalize the purchase of U.S.-made drugs from Canada.

"Public-opinion polls indicate that as many as half of U.S. adults are dissatisfied with the voluntary Medicare drug benefit."

Methinks most of the other 1/2 don't understand the program and the remainder are drug and insurance corporation executives/directors and greedy stockholders.

The article covers CBS's initial refusal to run the regime's ads hyping their new Medicare program changes.  (Most likely due to MoveOn members deluging CBS with calls demanding the ads not be run since they are advocacy ads and that was the spin CBS used to "justify" their refusal to run MoveOn's ad during the $uper Bowl.   Of course their broadcasting a  bare breast trumpted this as an issue in the mainstream press.

Basically, I think the drug plan is merely another typical ripublican ploy to further enrich their insurance and HMO supporters by enticing seniors into private plans.  The new plan prohibits anyone foolish enough to choose the new plan from going back to traditional Medicare later.   Of course the plan is carefully cratfed to prohibit the converse, although you won't learn this from the regimes' taxpayer funded PR bullshit.  My guess is that the cost of the initial private plans will be low-balled for a year or so to encourage dumb senoirs to abandon traditional Medicare.  After enough switch, watch for the private drug plan premiums to sky-rocket.  Of course the real puppet masters of the ripublicans and more than a few democrats, the greedy rich and powerful will escape unscathed- their profits and plunder from their insurance and drug corporations will offset their added drug costs.  Besides, an annual drug bill of thousands of dollars is pocket change for these greed heads.

The scum-bag, right-wing zealot Scalia goes on a 3 day hunting expedition with Cheney and we're to believe that  Cheney's appeal to the Supreme Court of an order requiring him to disclose members of an energy task force wan't discussed.  BULLSHIT!  One need only consider Cheney's background as a CEO for a corrupt corporation (Halliburton) coupled with his devious nature to conclude otherwise- tis merely "doing business" to him.

In a question from The Los Angeles Times for an article on Jan. 17, Scalia said, "I do not think my impartiality could reasonably be questioned."   Again  BULLSHIT!    Given his successful twisting of the 14th admendment (which he otherwise despises) to award the 2000 election to Bush, this idiot should be kicked off the court.

Also, federal employees are prohibited from even giving the mere appearance of partiality.  High govt. officials, and especially Supreme Court justices should at the very least be held to the same standards.  This is yet another example indicating how utterly hypocritical the current regime is.