April 21, 2006
CIA Officer Didn't CYA
A CIA agent has been fired for leaking classified
information to the media:
CIA officials will not reveal the officer's name, assignment, or the information that was leaked. The firing is a highly unusual move, although there has been an ongoing investigation into leaks in the CIA.
One official called this a "damaging leak" that deals with operational information and said the fired officer "knowingly and willfully" leaked the information to the media and "was caught."
The CIA officer was not in the public affairs office, nor was he someone authorized to talk to the media. The investigation was launched in January by the CIA's security center. It was directed to look at employees who had been exposed to certain intelligence programs. In the course of the investigation, the fired officer admitted discussing classified information including information about classified operations.
The investigation is ongoing.
A Justice Department spokesman said "no comment" on the firing. The spokesman also would not say whether the agency was looking into any criminal action against the officer.
Gee... I wonder who it was?
In all seriousness, this is damaging for certain political factions within the CIA, and was almost certainly a shot across the proverbial bow by Porter Goss, the former agent hired by the President to clean up the Agency. It will be very interesting in the days to come to see if this was an isolated incident, or if this is simply the first in a series of house-cleaning moves long overdue.
Note: A.J. Strata concludes that the CIA was fired for leaks that led to the N.Y. Times publishing the original NSA wire-tapping story. The CIA does appear in the NY Times article, but this AP story ties the firing to the Washington Post's secret prison story from late last year.
Update: Rick Moran brings up the very interesting possibility that since no evidence that the secret prisons ever existed, that the operation that brought down CIA officer Mary McCarthy may have been a sophisticated "sting" to target leakers (h/t Captain Ed).
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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1
Fired? Is that all?
My employment could be terminated if I photocopy classified material on an unclassified photocopier.
I would think termination is a gimme.
Posted by: stprice at April 21, 2006 04:07 PM (U3CzV)
2
When I worked at the IRS with taxpayer information I was advised that disclosing information to anyone outside the agency could result in a prison term around ten years in length.
But, you know, this CIA stuff was just a national security matter, so I can see how they'd think just firing them would be sufficient.
Posted by: jmr at April 21, 2006 04:12 PM (yaOF3)
Posted by: Twok at April 21, 2006 04:17 PM (IJedl)
4
"Porter Goss, the former agent hired by the President to clean up the Agency." Don't you think that's a tad disingenuous? Porter Goss is a crony of the President, hired by Bush to purge the CIA of any elements that might resist its further politiciztion.
Posted by: Retief at April 21, 2006 04:24 PM (LPHyU)
5
We won't have to wait long to find out who it is. They will be on the TV this Sunday for the Sunday follies.
Posted by: davod at April 21, 2006 04:27 PM (hl0gq)
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Retief:
Your embellishments do not change the fact that Porter Goss was a former agent hired by the President. Oh! by the way. He was also a congressman who was in charge of one of the intelligence committees. I would say that gives him a reasonable background for the job.
Sorry. I understand now. He was from the party of Lincoln, a Republican, therefore he must be a crony. As opposed to someone from the Democrat Party, who would of course be an unbiased dyed-in-the wool patriot.
Posted by: davod at April 21, 2006 04:35 PM (hl0gq)
7
Ha,ha ha, Retief (and I get the reference having reads those books). Yeah sure buddy, be a good little anti war drone.
Robert Ludlum once remarked that CIA stands for "Caught in the Act". I preferred the other equaly apt phrase "Clowns in Action".
The CIA was already politicized and were shilling for their petty little political realist empire. The old go along get along, do not very much, blow up donkeys in the desert, sell out to whatever dictator was riding high at the time, type of ops. So a bunch of these idiots got caught in their little kingmaker schemes. Pardon me, but cry me a river for these little snots who put their personal interests ahead of their country.
Posted by: capt joe at April 21, 2006 04:42 PM (CnWaz)
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Captain, you have misunderstood Retief. He is not remotely interested in the actual events at the CIA. His concern is to blame Bush, using powerful motive-reading rays.
Posted by: Assistant Village Idiot at April 21, 2006 04:57 PM (bfKow)
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Davod: Sure, idiot Dems are fair game, but what this prez is doing and has done is heinously incompetent. I wouldn't sully Lincolns good name through comparison, even if it just party affiliation.
Posted by: Pogue at April 21, 2006 05:30 PM (mbbdk)
10
Pretty unpopular guy in his day, Lincoln. Hadn't of been for Gettysburg, he'd have lost the '64 nomination to McClellan. Who wanted to sue for peace with the south.
What's a little slavery between cousins?
Posted by: lex at April 21, 2006 05:59 PM (YAg62)
11
I'm sure this will go against the grain on this site, but I have to ask:
Is it illegal to blow the whistle on illegal actions by the government? If this is about Bush's illegal wire-tapping operation, they might not be too smart to bring it to trial because someone will have to answer that question ... on the record.
Posted by: Eclectic Floridian at April 21, 2006 06:06 PM (Hh8GZ)
12
Nice going, Pogue! Never fail to inject the "Bush is an idiot" theme into any post, even if it has nothing to do with him. It's clearly more important than anything people may be writing about.
Posted by: gil at April 21, 2006 06:08 PM (/Ge9v)
13
Is it illegal to blow the whistle on illegal actions by the government?
Leaving aside for the moment the question of whether spying on al Qaeda operatives during wartime is "illegal" - richly tempting though it may be - the answer is "It depends on how you 'blow the whistle'."
If you, being lawfully privy to classified information that you believe is evidence of illegal acts, decide to go to the lawful authority established to handle concerns about legality, then no, it's not illegal.
If you instead go to someone who isn't the said lawful authority but who is cleared for the information and would be minded to do something about it - like, say, a cleared Congresscritter - then it's not illegal.
If your method of whistleblowing is instead to go to the New York Times and cause classified information concerning an ongoing and critical intelligence operation to be splashed all over their front page, then yes, I'm afraid it is illegal. Even if your amateur con-law analysis happens to be correct and the operation *is* illegal.
Just speaking hypothetically, that is.
Posted by: jaed at April 21, 2006 06:34 PM (Wz8D0)
14
When I was in the military, you can bet your boots that anyone intentionally leaking classified information would be court-martialed. Which is equivalent to a Federal felony. The CIA personnel should be treated no differently.
Posted by: Rex at April 21, 2006 06:45 PM (zZ3LM)
15
When they go after these two, Wedia will be impressed:
http://wedia.blogspot.com/2006/04/men-who-outed-valerie-plame-revealed.html
Posted by: Wedia at April 21, 2006 06:54 PM (rGJsM)
16
The leaker was Mary McCarthy who worked for the unit in the CIA designated to investigate leaks. The leak was about the secret prisons, which Dana Millbank won a Pulitzer for this week, and the European press reported today could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
Nice going Dana
Posted by: Jane at April 21, 2006 07:12 PM (uGLhr)
17
Not Dana Milbank, Jane. It was
Dana Priest who wrote on the subject of the secret prisons - and she received a Pulitzer for her efforts.
Posted by: Retired Spy at April 21, 2006 07:46 PM (fMYGX)
18
It's Dana Priest not Dana Milbank. My apologies.
Posted by: Jane W at April 21, 2006 07:56 PM (uGLhr)
19
Lex,
I think you meant the capture of Atlanta in 1864 and the Presidental election, not the nomination.
Posted by: Eric Jablow at April 21, 2006 08:32 PM (JAGwM)
20
I wonder how much Saddam and DNC money passed hands to get this top secret information leaked to the press, after it was released to, who knows. More proof that the dim-wits cannot be trusted with the safety and security of America. They will get us all killed. They have killed half the soldiers and 90% of the Iraqi's that have died in the past two years for their own political agenda. That part is exactly like Vietnam and some of the democratic traitors are also the same. When will we say enough is enough and start shooting traitors like Hanoi John, Bagdad Jim, and Turbin Durbin? They are all traitors and have provided all the proof anyone should need streight from their own mouths.
Posted by: Scrapiron at April 21, 2006 09:28 PM (y6n8O)
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Clinton Admin Member & Kerry Supporter Fired by CIA
Well, if the MSM were even handed, that title would be what they would use...since if even janitors in this White House were to get into trouble, they would be referred to as a "member of the Bush Administration".
It appears she was a holdover from the Clinton administration. Yeah, that was a good choice, just like Richard Clarke.
While it may or may not have any relevance on the situation, it is telling what Miss McCarthy did with her money
when it came to political donations....
Posted by: Chuck Allen at April 21, 2006 10:51 PM (Lu0O4)
22
Here's a new twist: Now Condoleeza Rice is alleged to have leaked national defense information to a pro-Israel lobbyist.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/21/AR2006042101648_pf.html
Sauce for the gander?
Posted by: Nealjking at April 22, 2006 12:03 AM (0aO7w)
23
Is it treason or leaking?
Posted by: Rose Maco at April 22, 2006 08:44 AM (mprpJ)
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ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice leaked national defense information to a pro-Israel lobbyist in the same manner that landed a lower-level Pentagon official a 12-year prison sentence, the lobbyist's lawyer said Friday.
Prosecutors disputed the claim.
If the prosecuters dispute and it is a claim made by defense counsel you need to take it with a glacier sized grain of salt, nice strawman though.
Posted by: Oldcrow at April 22, 2006 11:16 PM (bF5Vk)
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Friday Nukes
I'll be in meetings most of the day today, but to tide you over, check out what Ray Robison has uncovered regarding documentation that seems to support the theory that Saddam Hussein was looking into nuclear weapons,
here,
here,
here and
here.
Robison, a current military operations research analyst and a former member of the Iraq Survey Group for the Defense Intelligence Agency, has been able to dig up newspaper articles, original Iraqi documentation, and satellite photos of the base where nuclear testing is rumored to have occurred.
Interesting stuff.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Typo - it's Robison, not Robinson. /editorial staff
Posted by: lawhawk at April 21, 2006 10:56 AM (eppTH)
2
Thanks for the info. con. yank. More ammo to battle my liberal friends.p.
Posted by: pete at April 21, 2006 03:05 PM (WjWZ+)
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April 20, 2006
Advantage: Patterico
When
Red America/
Washington Post blogger Ben Domenech was caught plagiarizing multiple articles, the
Washington Post allowed him to resign within the week.
Now that Golden State/L.A. Times blogger Michael Hiltzik has been caught plagiarizing multiple personalities, will the L.A. Times have the integrity to "allow" Hiltzik to resign as well?
Pre-publication Update: The answer appears to be yes.
Notice from the Editors
The Times has suspended Michael Hiltzik's Golden State blog on latimes.com. Hiltzik admitted Thursday that he posted items on the paper's website, and on other websites, under names other than his own. That is a violation of The Times ethics policy, which requires editors and reporters to identify themselves when dealing with the public. The policy applies to both the print and online editions of the newspaper. The Times is investigating the postings.
Interestingly enough, when Domenech was caught plagiarizing, quite a few conservative bloggers let him have it. Why aren't any liberal bloggers condemning the dishonesty of Hiltzik?
Further Update: Hiltzik's Golden State Blog has suddenly ceased to exist.
Is this a temporary condition, or how the L.A. Times decided to solve the problem?
Yet Another Further Update: The blog is back, but Michael Hiltzik is still suspended.
Oy...
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Click. Print. Bang.
Greg Mitchell, editor of
Editor & Publisher, asks the media do what it can to
overthrow the Bush Administration. Within legal bounds,
of course:
No matter which party they generally favor or political stripes they wear, newspapers and other media outlets need to confront the fact that America faces a crisis almost without equal in recent decades.
Our president, in a time of war, terrorism and nuclear intrigue, will likely remain in office for another 33 months, with crushingly low approval ratings that are still inching lower. Facing a similar problem, voters had a chance to quickly toss Jimmy Carter out of office, and did so. With a similar lengthy period left on his White House lease, Richard Nixon quit, facing impeachment. Neither outcome is at hand this time.
Lacking an impending election, or a real impeachable scandal, what does Mitchell plead?
The alarm should be bi-partisan. Many Republicans fear their president's image as a bumbler will hurt their party for years. The rest may fret about the almost certain paralysis within the administration, or a reversal of certain favorite policies. A Gallup poll this week revealed that 44% of Republicans want some or all troops brought home from Iraq. Do they really believe that their president will do that any time soon, if ever?
Democrats, meanwhile, cross their fingers that Bush doesn't do something really stupid -- i.e. nuke Iran -- while they try to win control of at least one house in Congress by doing nothing yet somehow earning (they hope) the anti-Bush vote.
Meanwhile, a severely weakened president retains, and has shown he is willing to use, all of his commander-in-chief authority, and then some.
What are you asking for, Mr. Mitchell? Are you asking you friends in the professional media to gin up outrage and hysteria, in hopes that in a nation of 300 million... no, you couldn't be.
It seems possible:
I don't have a solution myself now, although all pleas for serious probes, journalistic or official, of the many alleged White House misdeeds should be heeded. But my point here is simply to start the discussion, and urge that the media, first, recognize that the crisis—or, if you want to say, impending crisis -- exists, and begin to explore the ways to confront it.
Start the discussion. Urge the media. Confront Bush. And thenÂ…
Right?
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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1
I guess if you try really hard to not believe in Iran, it will just go away?
Posted by: Retired Navy at April 20, 2006 01:17 PM (Mv/2X)
2
I just love how it's been the MSM and liberals that have generated this "image of a bad presidency" over the last few years... only to now act surprised and demand action be taken on this "image of a bad presidency".
Strawman, anyone?
Posted by: TexasRainmaker at April 20, 2006 01:19 PM (TwSjW)
3
Even Fox News agrees:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,192468,00.html
Posted by: Ed at April 20, 2006 02:20 PM (V/JOf)
4
Interestingly, Bush's poll #s track closely with gas prices.
Not sure how he's "severely weakened," though. Sounds more like someone at E&P is severely delusional and paranoid.
I do believe it is much more likely than most people think that Bush will be assassinated. The media pretty much ignored the unsuccessful attempt on his life in the republic of Georgia, which failed only because the grenade thrown at him was a dud.
Posted by: TallDave at April 20, 2006 02:22 PM (t55h2)
5
Interestingly, Bush's poll #s track closely with gas prices.
Not sure how he's "severely weakened," though. Sounds more like someone at E&P is severely delusional and paranoid.
I do believe it is much more likely than most people think that Bush will be assassinated. The media pretty much ignored the unsuccessful attempt on his life in the republic of Georgia, which failed only because the grenade thrown at him was a dud.
Posted by: TallDave at April 20, 2006 02:25 PM (t55h2)
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Yankee, who do you hate more? G-dless Liberals or the Terrorists?
Posted by: Shambles at April 20, 2006 02:28 PM (r77Gr)
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Mitchell's the south end of a northbound horse. He basically wants the media to start wringing their hands and say "The sky is falling!" Like they haven't been doing that for the last five years.
Posted by: Brainster at April 20, 2006 03:47 PM (hEScd)
8
"urge the media to gin up outrage and hysteria"
Tell me, how is that different from what they, the media, already do? One of the media's main problems is that they have cried 'wolf' falsely so many times that in a real crisis, many will not listen to them.
Posted by: docdave at April 20, 2006 04:10 PM (0HeoE)
9
Does anyone remember the nut-case that crashed a small plane on the White House lawn, killing himself while the Clintons weren't home? Any POTUS knows that there is a Hinckley in every hedge, and if it were not for the Secret Service, the Capitol Police, FBI, our votes wouldn't matter, as a loony could destroy any democracy that we have.
Posted by: Tom TB at April 20, 2006 05:46 PM (Ffvoi)
10
Mitchell should be careful what he asks for...considering the "dark lord" Cheney is VP.
3 years of Cheney as prez would be acceptable to me.
Posted by: Purple Avenger at April 20, 2006 05:49 PM (4MB5o)
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I Question the Timing
Like others, I noticed with a quite a bit of cynicism the report of immigration raids
conducted yesterday with what appears to political timing. Michelle Malkin
not only notes this occurrence, she provides a GAO document showing just how shoddy immigration enforcement has been during the Bush Administration, which makes the timing of the raid even more suspect.
It could been far worse, however.
Some politically-timed government raids have ended with a tragic loss of life, like the April 19, 1993 raid on the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, TX (timeline via PBS), just as the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms was coming up for a funding review in Congress. 80 people died in an inferno after an 80-day standoff that started with a botched raid that left 4 federal agents and six Davidians killed.
Interestingly enough, on the same day the immigrations raids were announced, CNN also carried a story noting that six of the seven Davidians imprisoned after the standoff will be freed from prison in the next two months.
I guess we can at least be thankful that these latest politically-timed raids didn't end in a loss of life.
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This Ain't Avon Calling
I wrote
once before about a group of UC Santa Cruz students calling themselves Students Against War (SAW), who apparently
committed felonies by blocking military recruiters from the U.S. Army and National Guard attempting to participate in a job fair on campus.
Three of SAW's leaders, Sam Aranke, Janine Carmona, and David Zlutnick, placed their phone numbers and email addresses on press release
fficial">disseminated widely across the internet, in apparent hopes of using this contact information to help organize even larger felonious acts.
Blogger Michelle Malkin posted these publicly available and
fficial">still easily found contact numbers, which apparently led to some ill-advised and indefensible threats being made against these student criminals.
In retaliation against Malkin, some radical left wing web sites and blogs have taken the extraordinary step of posting not only Malkin's phone number and already publicly accessible email address, but satellite pictures of her house, her physical home address, and descriptions of her family. Malkin is unbowed. Goldstein is calling for a "very public condemnation and ostracizing" of those responsible for targeting Malkin's family.
I'm a little more direct.
This is the link to the FBI Tips and Public Leads form, which I have used to report several of these sites for possible hate crimes investigations based upon specific language used in some of those pages. Those of you who are guilty of these hate crimes undoubtedly know who you are.
I'd advise sleeping light.
That knock at the door ain't Avon calling, and answering it promptly might save you repair work after the warrant is served.
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I don't know what the law is where Michelle lives, but this seems a lot like stalking or making threats. These jugheads should be put under a peace bond at the very least, but I'd prefer that they got a criminal record out of this.
The kind of beyond-the-pale rhetoric of the left was bound to create something like this among the weaker-minded of our "students," which is why there needs to be some accountability for speech that crosses the line from expression into criminality.
Posted by: AST at April 20, 2006 01:06 AM (cIrqr)
2
You liken Malkin to real soldiers? Uh...okay.
Posted by: Alexander Wolfe at April 20, 2006 03:37 PM (018Z+)
3
The liberal trolls over at Goldstein's blog seem unable to grasp two crucial distinctions:
#1) that of posting contact information, where the worst threat is unpleasant messages and one can always change one's number, versus posting maps and photos of someone's house and personal information about their family with deliberate incitement to punish them and
#2) that between re-posting contact information that the organizers have already made easily available through a press release, versus investigating and posting private information that no one authorized the disclosure of.
They are trying to argue it is the same thing, and either that she got what she was asking for or "two wrongs don't make a right." Liberals can draw moral equivalents between anything.
Posted by: Amber at April 20, 2006 04:02 PM (YUrMR)
4
Ah, the FBI Tip Line...I see you've been attending the WB School of payback. Yes, at times I have found solace in the arms of the FBI. They work wonders when it comes to hammering lowlife scum.
Posted by: WB at April 20, 2006 05:05 PM (8pZRi)
5
I will tap dance on the windpipe of anyone that tries to harm Michelle Malkin or her family.
All she has to do is say the word and an Army of folks like me will come runnin to her neighborhood.
We will protect her the same way the Bikers protect the military families.
GO 'HEAD, MAKE MY DAY.
Richard Davis
Philadelphia, PA
USN Ret
Posted by: Richard Davis at April 20, 2006 08:23 PM (1gtZh)
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I very much admire the spunk of you guys. Thanks to Michelle for elevating the situation at colleges into the spotlight, and EXTRA BIG THANKS to you for reporting these creeps.
Michelle is a tough and spunky gal, but sometimes, the authorities need to do their job, which is to help the law-abiding citizens sleep well at night.
I love the way you guys watch eachother's backs, as I've seen on so many different occassions with a wide variety of issues. Ya'll are good folks!
Posted by: Rose at April 22, 2006 07:34 PM (Ryq5R)
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April 19, 2006
Bush Blamed for Landslides
Well, perhaps not
yet, but you
know it's coming:
New Orleans is at the top end of what looks like a gigantic, slow-moving landslide, according to geologists who have been carefully studying the ground movements in the area...
"Not only is southern Louisiana sinking, it's sliding," said geologist Roy Dokka of Louisiana State University.
Like a smaller landslide on the side of a hill, the huge Southern Louisiana landslide has a "headwall" where the slide is breaking away and a "toe" out in the Gulf where the debris from the slide is piling up, Dokka explained. The only difference from a traditional landslide is that this one is far, far larger and it's buried under lots of wet sediments, so it requires very accurate survey measurements to detect it.
The city and an adjoining section of Mississippi are collapsing into the Gulf of Mexico at an ever-increasing rate of speed.
Gulf Coast resident and Hurricane Katrina survivor Seawitch reveals this and other research showing a geologic disaster occurring along the Michoud Fault that runs under New Orleans, including the specific points where the levees were breached during Hurricane Katrina.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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So the question is, will it fall into the sea, or will global warming cause the sea to swamp it first? I'm taking bets.
Posted by: Alexander Wolfe at April 20, 2006 03:39 PM (018Z+)
2
There's a reason that the area is called a Delta!
It is a foolish man that builds his house upon the sand!
Posted by: Ray at April 20, 2006 03:53 PM (MDYDk)
3
This has been known since the 1930's! The Corps of Engineers built the Atchalafaya Lock on the Mississippi River to prevent the river from changing course to the western end of the delta via the Atchafalaya River (really just a branch of the Mississippi). Delta sunsidence has been a well understood phenomenon. Ask the Dutch, or the Egyptians.
chsw10605
Posted by: chsw10605 at April 20, 2006 04:26 PM (WdHqZ)
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Carl Bernstein: Kicking and Screaming
Carl Bernstein longs to be relevant again.
His recent piece in Vanity Fair will not provide that relevance, painting him instead as a man whose drive for past glory has reduced him to parroting almost shriek-for-shriek tenants of the far left long proven false or misleading. He has grown intellectually lazy and lethargic, producing a column unworthy of a front page diary at the Daily Kos—or perhaps worse, provides a column that is specifically what one would expect at Kos or the rabid message boards of the Democratic Underground.
It begins:
Worse than Watergate? High crimes and misdemeanors justifying the impeachment of George W. Bush, as increasing numbers of Democrats in Washington hope, and, sotto voce, increasing numbers of Republicans—including some of the president's top lieutenants—now fear? Leaders of both parties are acutely aware of the vehemence of anti-Bush sentiment in the country, expressed especially in the increasing number of Americans—nearing 50 percent in some polls—who say they would favor impeachment if the president were proved to have deliberately lied to justify going to war in Iraq.
John Dean, the Watergate conspirator who ultimately shattered the Watergate conspiracy, rendered his precipitous (or perhaps prescient) impeachment verdict on Bush two years ago in the affirmative, without so much as a question mark in choosing the title of his book Worse than Watergate. On March 31, some three decades after he testified at the seminal hearings of the Senate Watergate Committee, Dean reiterated his dark view of Bush's presidency in a congressional hearing that shed more noise than light, and more partisan rancor than genuine inquiry. The ostensible subject: whether Bush should be censured for unconstitutional conduct in ordering electronic surveillance of Americans without a warrant.
Raising the worse-than-Watergate question and demanding unequivocally that Congress seek to answer it is, in fact, overdue and more than justified by ample evidence stacked up from Baghdad back to New Orleans and, of increasing relevance, inside a special prosecutor's office in downtown Washington.
In terms of imminent, meaningful action by the Congress, however, the question of whether the president should be impeached (or, less severely, censured) remains premature. More important, it is essential that the Senate vote—hopefully before the November elections, and with overwhelming support from both parties—to undertake a full investigation of the conduct of the presidency of George W. Bush, along the lines of the Senate Watergate Committee's investigation during the presidency of Richard M. Nixon.
Ignoring the incoherent first sentence that never should have made it past an editor's desk, Bernstein calls for a Bush Administration investigation based upon polling data and the words of a convicted felon shilling a book, and his call for an vague, wide-ranging inquisition "of the conduct of the presidency" is a hopeful wail from a partisan hoping for a witch hunt, based upon... well what, exactly?
How much evidence is there to justify such action?
Certainly enough to form a consensus around a national imperative: to learn what this president and his vice president knew and when they knew it; to determine what the Bush administration has done under the guise of national security; and to find out who did what, whether legal or illegal, unconstitutional or merely under the wire, in ignorance or incompetence or with good reason, while the administration barricaded itself behind the most Draconian secrecy and disingenuous information policies of the modern presidential era.
"We ought to get to the bottom of it so it can be evaluated, again, by the American people," said Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, on April 9. "The President of the United States owes a specific explanation to the American people Â… about exactly what he did." Specter was speaking specifically about a special prosecutor's assertion that Bush selectively declassified information (of dubious accuracy) and instructed the vice president to leak it to reporters to undermine criticism of the decision to go to war in Iraq. But the senator's comments would be even more appropriately directed at far more pervasive and darker questions that must be answered if the American political system is to acquit itself in the Bush era, as it did in Nixon's.
Oh, the tiredness of it all! Dredging up the one-hit wonder of "what they knew and when they knew it," Bernstein in no way attempts to apply that broad charge to a specific, credible allegation that the law requires. Instead, he hangs it out there, as untended gill net, furtively hoping to ensnare anything and everything that drifts past.
Bernstein, unable or unwilling to bring into focus charges of his own, attempts to make Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter his whipping boy, selectively quoting and rearranging the order Specter's to make it appear that Bush did something illegal and not within his power. But what did Specter say, and how did he say it?
Via the transcript of Fox News Sunday, the actual conversation between host Brit Hume and Senator Specter:
HUME: ...Is it your view that what the president and the vice president, as well, did in that matter constituted a leak?
SPECTER: I don't know, because all of the facts aren't out, and I think that it is necessary for the president and the vice president to tell the American people exactly what happened.
Brit, I think too often we jump to conclusions before we know what all of the facts are, and I'm not about to condemn or criticize anybody, but I do say that there's been enough of a showing here with what's been filed of record in court that the president of the United States owes a specific explanation to the American people.
HUME: About the release of this information or what?
SPECTER: Well, about exactly what he did. The president has the authority to declassify information. So in a technical sense, if he looked at it, he could say this is declassified, and make a disclosure of it.
There have been a number of reports, most recently — I heard just this morning — that the president didn't tell the vice president specifically what to do but just said get it out. And we don't know precisely what the vice president did.
And as usual, Brit, the devil is in the details. And I think that there has to be a detailed explanation precisely as to what Vice President Cheney did, what the president said to him, and an explanation from the president as to what he said so that it can be evaluated.
The president may be entirely in the clear, and it may turn out that he had the authority to make the disclosures which were made, but that it was not the right way to go about it, because we ought not to have leaks in government. We ought not to have them.
And the president has justifiably criticized the Congress for leaking and, of course, the White House has leaked. But we ought to get to the bottom of it so it can be evaluated, again, by the American people.
[bold mine - ed]
Bernstein reorders and selectively quotes Specter's statements, conveniently leaving out that while Specter would like to know the details of the inner workings of the White House (wouldn't we all?), Specter acknowledges that Bush does have the specific authority to declassify information. Furthermore, on March 25, 2003 Bush amended President Bill Clinton's Executive Order 12958 to extend that power to the office of the vice president when acting "in the performance of executive duties." How forgetful of Mr. Bernstein to omit these inconvenient details.
Long on generalities and short on facts, Bernstein attempts to press an already weak attack:
Perhaps there are facts or mitigating circumstances, given the extraordinary nature of conceiving and fighting a war on terror, that justify some of the more questionable policies and conduct of this presidency, even those that turned a natural disaster in New Orleans into a catastrophe of incompetence and neglect. But the truth is we have no trustworthy official record of what has occurred in almost any aspect of this administration, how decisions were reached, and even what the actual policies promulgated and approved by the president are. Nor will we, until the subpoena powers of the Congress are used (as in Watergate) to find out the facts—not just about the war in Iraq, almost every aspect of it, beginning with the road to war, but other essential elements of Bush's presidency, particularly the routine disregard for truthfulness in the dissemination of information to the American people and Congress.
The first fundamental question that needs to be answered by and about the president, the vice president, and their political and national-security aides, from Donald Rumsfeld to Condoleezza Rice, to Karl Rove, to Michael Chertoff, to Colin Powell, to George Tenet, to Paul Wolfowitz, to Andrew Card (and a dozen others), is whether lying, disinformation, misinformation, and manipulation of information have been a basic matter of policy—used to overwhelm dissent; to hide troublesome truths and inconvenient data from the press, public, and Congress; and to defend the president and his actions when he and they have gone awry or utterly failed.
Once again, the formerly great writer calls for a congressional inquisition into every aspect of the Bush Presidency, but cannot provide a single, specific reason why it should occur. Citing everything from warfighting to domestic disaster response, Bernstein asks for the unprecedented: an apparent play-by-play stenographic record of every decision ever made in an attempt to second-guess and undermine a sitting President, ostensibly expanding congressional and media powers with an impossibly broad investigative self-mandate to usurp those powers afforded to the Executive Branch by the Constitution. It is a coward's call for insurrection that no American President in this nation's history has ever had to endure.
From this fevered cry, Bernstein plunges headlong into a litany of charges made up of theories long debunked and ideas half-baked, made by the anonymous and the vengeful:
Most of what we have learned about the reality of this administration—and the disconcerting mind-set and decision-making process of President Bush himself—has come not from the White House or the Pentagon or the Department of Homeland Security or the Treasury Department, but from insider accounts by disaffected members of the administration after their departure, and from distinguished journalists, and, in the case of a skeletal but hugely significant body of information, from a special prosecutor. And also, of late, from an aide-de-camp to the British prime minister. Almost invariably, their accounts have revealed what the president and those serving him have deliberately concealed—torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo, and its apparent authorization by presidential fiat; wholesale N.S.A. domestic wiretapping in contravention of specific prohibitive law; brutal interrogations of prisoners shipped secretly by the C.I.A. and U.S. military to Third World gulags; the nonexistence of W.M.D. in Iraq; the role of Karl Rove and Dick Cheney's chief of staff in divulging the name of an undercover C.I.A. employee; the non-role of Saddam Hussein and Iraq in the events of 9/11; the death by friendly fire of Pat Tillman (whose mother, Mary Tillman, told journalist Robert Scheer, "The administration tried to attach themselves to his virtue and then they wiped their feet with him"); the lack of a coherent post-invasion strategy for Iraq, with all its consequent tragedy and loss and destabilizing global implications; the failure to coordinate economic policies for America's long-term financial health (including the misguided tax cuts) with funding a war that will drive the national debt above a trillion dollars; the assurance of Wolfowitz (since rewarded by Bush with the presidency of the World Bank) that Iraq's oil reserves would pay for the war within two to three years after the invasion; and Bush's like-minded confidence, expressed to Blair, that serious internecine strife in Iraq would be unlikely after the invasion.
Insider accounts from which disaffected members of the administration, and which distinguished journalists? Bernstein can't be troubled to provide those essential details, and instead dives into a sea of conspiracies unprovable or disproven.
Bernstein will not say that the "aide-de-camp to the British prime minister" he ostensibly cites in reference to the so-called "Downing Street Memos" were composed almost exclusively of high-level summaries composed by British diplomats of conversations had by British intelligence officers and diplomats who were relating what they remembered of conversations they had with their American counterparts about what the Americans thought about what they thought the President said. Why didn't Bernstein go the final step, and connect them all to Kevin Bacon?
Not a single credible witness has come forward to tie the Administration to abuse at Abu Graib, and those who did commit the abuses there were tried and convicted in a court of law. Charges leveled against Marines performing their duties at Guantanamo Bay have turned out to be baseless, and in many cases were made by those who had never set foot on the island.
Bernstein goes as far as to blatantly lie to his readers, stating that the Administration engaged in "wholesale N.S.A. domestic wiretapping in contravention of specific prohibitive law," when not a single credible person connected to the program in any way has ever provided the first shred of evidence that this program was anything other than the specific, targeted intercepts of international communications affiliated with suspected terrorists. I charge Bernstein to provide any evidence of this charge. He cannot, relying instead upon insinuation, hyperbole, and unsubstantiated claims, which not coincidentally, make up the overwhelming majority of his spurious, politically motivated charges.
Carl Bernstein, once a journalist credited with taking down a clearly corrupt President for specific criminal charges, has pissed away his credibility and goodwill American citizens may retain for him in an article that could have been scripted by Hugo Chavez and Michael Moore. It is sad to see a once great man futility tilting at windmills, trying to regain glories and respect long past, but it is even more repulsive when Carl Bernstein would undermine our very system of government with an open-ended inquisition of one branch by another in his pursuit of past glories.
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it's a bleeting sheep shame you incorrigible right wing hawk writers put your politics above your duty to your country..what has george w bush done to improve the complexion of this country on any front?..you can bully-pulpit free speech all you like, but you and your ilk are losing the war on credibility, daily..i say hooray for guys like bernstein to speak up, that is the media's job, afterall..the right wing hates criticism because it's too painful to consider the facts..this president has this country in serious trouble, and it's time americans exercise their right to dissent, a noble ideal, that obviously escapes you..
Posted by: billy c bowden at April 24, 2006 04:33 PM (+tf/D)
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What has Bush done for this country?
Lemme see... he presided over historically low interest rates, enabling one of the larger housing booms ever, and he sits on top of a stellar economy with a phenominally low unemployment rate and a booming stock market, while cutting taxes for the middle class and those of us with families, even while fighting two wars that are seeing 100%+ reenlistment rates among veteran combat soldiers.
But hey, I covered more than one front... is that unfair?
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at April 24, 2006 10:20 PM (0fZB6)
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presiding over low rates is not a policy..the low rate interest environment was created to overcome a mean bear market..and that is artificially controlled, anyway..that's good, bush presides over low interest rates, same as what happened in Japan during their crash, laughable, since you completely ignore the out of control deficit, a bill, that will come due for future generations..
Posted by: billy c bowden at April 25, 2006 10:14 AM (Jdc5P)
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You mean the deficit that
fell last year because of tax revenues spurred by Bush's economic plans?
The deficit as measured as a percentage of the GDP, is lower now than it was during the 1980s boom.
Come on, Billy Boy, you're going to have to do better than that...
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at April 25, 2006 10:25 AM (g5Nba)
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one thing about you, you never let the facts interfere with your "stories"..i admire your naivete, it must be fun to wake up every morning wrapped in ignorant, uninformed, bliss..you can just click your heels, and tell yourself you're not in kansas anymore, katrina clean-up is real, plamegate is a non-event, the housing bubble's last act is unwritten, though foreclosures are rising precipitously..we are winning the war in iraq at a clip of 10 billion a month..bin laden is sitting in a jailcell in guantanamo..jack abrahoff is just a harmless influence peddler..tom delay simply retired, to pursue other interests..and bush cut the deficit, though snow had to rush emerency relief bills through congres or the fed gov't ment shut down/blacked out..because we hit spending record ceilings..on and on..while nero fiddles!
Posted by: billy c bowden at April 25, 2006 11:30 AM (Jdc5P)
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In other words, you have no
actual rebuttal.
I didn't think so.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at April 25, 2006 11:44 AM (g5Nba)
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i like the way you censor your critics, much the same they do it in other fascist regimes..that way you absolutely guarantee, you get the last word, those it is intellectually dishonest..are you really that afraid of dialogue, are you that unsure of your self?..
Posted by: billy c bowden at May 09, 2006 04:57 PM (qLNCn)
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April 18, 2006
Railroaded
Glenn Reynolds has a Porkbuster's post up
hammering Mississippi Senator Trent Lott for wanting to spend $700 million to relocate a rail line already rebuilt after Hurricane Katrina at a cost of $250 million dollars.
Lawhawk has a post up defending the relocation of the rail line (Reynolds has related thoughts here).
Read both entries and draw your own conclusions.
My church sent mission teams originally to Gretna, Louisiana, and has sent repeated mission teams to Waveland, Mississippi to help Gulf Coast residents recover from the storm. As they drove in and out of the area affected by Hurricane Katrina, they shot hundreds of photos showing immense devastation on a scale few can fathom.
This photo is probably that of the rail line in question. It was shot in coastal Mississippi or Louisiana (it was hard for outsiders to tell which, with all landmarks and road signs destroyed) directly after Hurricane Katrina. The massive damage to the rail bed is obvious.
I don't think that I have a problem with eventually rerouting the railroad to a safer inland path, but I have to ask: why couldn't they have done this before spending the first $250 million dollars?
No matter how you slice it, hundreds of millions of dollars were wasted.
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Purdue BDS
Vikram Buddhi, you've got some
'splaining to do (h/t Drudge):
Buddhi told investigators he posted the message, along with other derogatory messages aimed at the president, but Martin said Buddhi's actions should be covered by the First Amendment since Buddhi would have never actually carried out his threats.
In the various messages posted, Buddhi urged the Web site's readers to bomb the United States and for them to rape American and British women and mutilate them, according to court documents. Other messages called for the killing of all Republicans.
"What was allegedly said certainly is derogatory and may be inflammatory," Martin said. "But there's no real serious threat more than it was chat on the Web."
Martin, of course is citing the First Amendment clause which grants an exception to those who advocate Killing George Bush, Laura Bush, Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, and the rape and mutilation of western women.
In the wake of these charges, Buddhi was immediately offered teaching assistant positions by Karachi State University and Yale, which offered Buddhi a John Hinkley Jr. FellowshipÂ…
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told investigators he is not suffering from any mental illnesses nor is he taking any illegal or prescription drugs.
Not only is he a vile moonbat - he's a retarded vile moonbat. A diminished capacity defense may be the only thing that would keep him out of the slam.
Posted by: Purple Avenger at April 18, 2006 03:40 PM (wWBWw)
2
Whether or not Buddhi would have carried out his threats, can he be sure that none of the readers he was inciting to violence would? American/British women travelling in many parts of the world are already vulnerable enough without encouraging sick violence towards them.
Posted by: Amber at April 18, 2006 04:56 PM (5ruWe)
3
"Buddhi was arrested Friday and told investigators he is not suffering from any mental illnesses nor is he taking any illegal or prescription drugs."
Hmm...maybe he SHOULD be taking some prescription drugs, on advice from psychiatric counsel...
Posted by: BobG at April 18, 2006 05:35 PM (fPODz)
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And maybe he should just be locked up at Gitmo as a POW. Seems good to me....
Posted by: Specter at April 19, 2006 08:26 AM (ybfXM)
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I don't know about this case.
Have anyone of you tried reading the yahoo message boards? They are all filled with vile, slanderous (sp?), racist, bigoted speach. People are constantly making threats against each other. Everyone figures it's anonymous, so they can pretty much say whatever they want.
Perhaps someone wrote something that inflamed this guy, and he lost it and fought back. I'm not saying that's right, but it happens. I see it happen all the time on the yahoo message boards. Why single this guy out? Because his threats were directed at the President? Doesn't seem very fair to me.
Posted by: Ball at April 27, 2006 04:47 PM (tgU6r)
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Salting Slugs
Slimy and spineless, subsisting on a steady diet of debris and feces and preferring to hide in dark, dank places, it seems that the University of California at Santa Cruz chose their mascot of a banana slug wisely.
One week ago, today a group of UC Santa Cruz students calling themselves Students Against War (SAW) committed felonies by blocking military recruiters from the U.S. Army and National Guard attempting to participate in a job fair on campus. According to the exact letter of the law as it is written in Title 18, Part I, chapter 115 Section 2388 (a):
Whoever, when the United States is at war, willfully makes or conveys false reports or false statements with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the military or naval forces of the United States or to promote the success of its enemies; or Whoever, when the United States is at war, willfully causes or attempts to cause insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, or refusal of duty, in the military or naval forces of the United States, or willfully obstructs the recruiting or enlistment service of the United States, to the injury of the service or the United States, or attempts to do so -
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
[emphasis mine - ed.]
Clearly, by willfully obstructing the recruiting efforts, these students committed felonies covered by federal treason and sedition laws, but that has not inflamed public sensitivities. No, what has inflamed the Left is the simple act of conservative Michelle Malkin, who posted the contact information of the organizers from the SAW press release (names since removed) on her blog.
As a result of posting this contact information, the three student activists who led this illegal act - Sam Aranke, Janine Carmona, and David Zlutnick - have been inundated with irate phone calls and emails. Some, perhaps many of them were threatening. The students have since asked Malkin to remove their contact information even though it has been used (and is still being used) by other fringe group web sites to help in their recruiting efforts.
Not surprisingly, the left wants to have it both ways. They want to be able to recruit on their own without objection or impassioned criticism, while they at the same time object to military recruiting by committing felonious acts of treason and sedition, and hope to get away with it without any response.
Blogger Ezra Klein, not surprisingly a Slug himself, wants to generate sympathy for these criminals, calling them:
...young, idealistic kids determined to save the world, feeling their way through uncertain thickets of ideology and unfamiliar collections of ideas, and naive about the dangers of direct political action outside a university's protected confines.
Klein would excuse a felonious act with a good intention, and would make college a place where laws do not apply. In his fantasy world that may be the case, but as Duke university lacrosse team members found out at 5:00 AM this morning, college enrollment is no excuse for committing one or more felonies.
Sam Aranke, Janine Carmona, and David Zlutnick proudly conspired to commit a felonious act against the United States. A few empty emailed death threats are a mild penalty compared to the jail time that they and their treasonous compatriots so richly deserve.
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Jailing these nuts is not necessary. If the 'employers' of the country can't judge by what they saw while there, they are in trouble. Why would any reputable company hire a graduate from that or any other left wing liberal college. You're only setting your company up for real problems in the future. The racism and anti-america rants implanted in their brain by the leftie professors won't leave them when they graduate.
Every member of a minority in the country should read the remarks sent to Malkin's site. If they need further proof of where the racist are hiding they they are already in deep trouble.
Every thing the lefties try to project onto the Republicans is only proof that they themselves are the ones harboring those vile feeling and it's shows in their actions.
Posted by: Scrapiron at April 18, 2006 11:00 AM (y6n8O)
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I disagree,
I think Jail time is not only warrented, but necessary. Free speech is one thing (I fully believe in it until you cross the line), they crossed the line. Just as more and more people are doing today.
Don't agree with the war, Fine, protest within the confines of the law.
Don't agree with the President, Fine, Protest within the confines of the law.
Break the law to the detriment of all (as impeding the military does) it is against the law, PAY the PRICE.
Posted by: Retired Navy at April 18, 2006 01:40 PM (cqZXM)
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I feel pretty strongly in the right of the young to be stupid and impetuous. Being stupid is part of what it means to be young. They have no sense of proportion and little sense of history. No "big picture" ability. So I'm not that upset with them.
BUT, that doesn't mean consequences don't apply. When kids drive recklessly, sometimes they wrap their car around a tree. Physics grants no quarter. And when they go over the edge in their "student radical" fantasies, sometimes they get arrested and sometimes they do real time.
Without the consequences, where's the cache? How are they going to get sorority girls to sleep with them because they're so dangerous and edgy if there aren't risks and sometimes punishments?
Posted by: tim maguire at April 18, 2006 02:17 PM (G0SZ1)
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Jailing these nuts is not necessary.
No, but it would be a civics lesson for them that will last a lifetime...and it will make me feel good.
Posted by: Purple Avenger at April 18, 2006 03:44 PM (wWBWw)
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#1- "Why would any reputable company hire a graduate from that or any other left wing liberal college. You're only setting your company up for real problems in the future. The racism and anti-america rants implanted in their brain by the leftie professors won't leave them when they graduate."
Alright, I understand where that is coming from, but I have to protest on behalf of conservative students at predominately liberal colleges/grad schools, which unfortunately include most of the top schools in the country.
Posted by: Amber at April 18, 2006 05:17 PM (5ruWe)
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War has not been declared. The "War on Terror" does not constitute an official state of war, any more than does the "War on Drugs." Nor does the conflict in Iraq constitute an official state of war, any more than did the invasion of Panama, or Grenada. To think otherwise would mean that the U.S. would be in a perpetual state of war, based on the President's rhetorical flourishes or any use of military force. But perhaps you would like that. Anyway, these kids may have been guilty of blocking access to a public facility, disturbing the peace, or some other similar misdemeanor, but not the felony you cite. As usual, a right-wing blogger conflates non-violent civil protest, or any manifest opposition to the war or, as in this case, opposition to recruitment into the military that serves in that war, with treasonous behavior. I suppose you would like to see everyone who disagrees with this Administration and its mis-managed war, and who is active in expressing that dissent, locked up or mistreated in some way. But fortunately, we still live in a country where people can express their dissent.
"People should not be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people."
Posted by: Liberal Troll at April 18, 2006 06:08 PM (6qFsa)
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Interesting attempt to dodge responsibility, Liberal Troll, but your understanding of the law is incorrect. There is nothing in the Federal law requiring an official declaration of war by Congress. It is written as "when the United States is at war." We are clearly engaged in warfare in not one, but two nations, and attempting to recruit soldiers to fight in each.
Clearly, among all but the most unbalanced, this was an unlawful act.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at April 18, 2006 07:44 PM (0fZB6)
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Mr. Klein is indulgent toward the hooligans, who wanted to play a big boy's game without suffering the big boy consequences that the invaluable Michelle Malkin dished out to them. I love your analysis. Right on!
It's what makes your blog invaluable, too.
BTW, Klein was on CSPAN last Sunday and gave the typical progressive caricature of Charles Murray's Bell Curve: it's how blacks are genetically inferior to whites. Rather, the book looks at National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and finds a very strong correlation between IQ and subsequent success in the meritocracy. Of people of both sexes, all races. There is a chapter of blacks--the shortest in the book--which was a courageous decision, if foolhardy. It gives Klein, who probably hasn't read the book, the "ammunition" to dismiss it.
As he does here to the great Charles Murray (sub. rec'q.): http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20060410&s=klein041006
Posted by: a superfluous man at April 19, 2006 02:30 AM (7XqQ6)
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Liberal Troll,
I have a question for you. Since these kids are doing no harm as you say, why not protest in the proper way? What I mean is this, the Military people are just there to do a job. That job is to look after the U.S. and do what those that are FREELY elected into congress and the White House say. It is not up to the soldier or sailor to set forth policy other than to vote or protest on their own time. While in Uniform, they abide by the laws and do what they must to protect this nation, even if they don't agree with it.
Why not block congress from getting in their offices? Or better yet, block them from getting out so they actually have to deal with passing some laws?
Protest during elections for those that shouldn't be in office.
Stop picking on the young men and women that just want to protect and serve ALL of the U.S.
Posted by: Retired Navy at April 19, 2006 05:13 AM (a/5fw)
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Great name - Liberal Troll - All you have to do is read the name and know that you don't have to bother reading the post.
Posted by: Specter at April 19, 2006 10:59 AM (ybfXM)
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What exactly is going on in Iraq then, Liberal Troll, if not war? As liberals would be the first to remind us, it's not exactly a tea party. Besides, the wars in both
Iraq and
Afghanistan were authorized by Congress. The War Powers Resolution (1973), requires the President to obtain either a declaration of war OR a resolution authorizing the use of force from Congress within 60 days of initiating hostilities.
Posted by: Amber at April 19, 2006 01:59 PM (YUrMR)
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April 17, 2006
The Sheepdog's War
I've been thinking a lot about sheepdogs lately, if only in the back of my mind. Not the physical kind, of course, but the metaphorical, philosophical beast described by LTC Dave Grossman (Retired), that I was first exposed to in Bill Whittle's excellent "
Tribes" some month's ago. Because of Whittle's essay, I've also been doing a lot of soul-searching about what it means to be Grey, and how it all relates to the budding war with Iran.
LTC Grossman's essay "On sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs" was forwarded to me this morning in an email by another retired sheepdog and I present it to you in its entirety:
more...
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The left will not allow America to engage Iran in a fight. They have prepared every possible method of preventing this country from going to any war under any circumstance.
The fifth-column left has succeeded in destroying America.
Posted by: Boomshakalaka at April 17, 2006 01:51 PM (IJedl)
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If you doubt that there are some Americans that are actively siding with *anyone* who hates American,
think again.
We have no chance of disarmign Iran under the current political climate in the US. We have the left to thank for that.
Posted by: Bhiptis at April 17, 2006 01:53 PM (IJedl)
3
It seems unlikely there will be any kind of international support to go to war with Iran's mullahs, unless they do something really crazy like openly invade Israel or Iraq.
Absent that support, it's hard to see how Bush could remove the mullahs without making the U.S. extremely unpopular, to the point we really are isolated. Even with the far worse record of Hussein, removing him was extremely controversial.
OTOH, it's possible Bush doesn't care what anyone thinks and will do what he believes is necessary to make America safe regardless of the consequences.
If not, this and the last decade will be remembered as the brief window of time in modern history where Americans didn't live with the constant threat of nuclear annihilation.
Remember, repressive regimes fall for only one reason: the failure of will to crush revolutionaries. Don't bet on the mullahs to experience a moral revelation or a weakening of resolve.
Posted by: TallDave at April 17, 2006 02:05 PM (nHHeX)
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Well said...
Bleating hearts... until their throats are ripped out...
Posted by: USAF-Ret at April 17, 2006 02:17 PM (GzvlQ)
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What do we do with the sheep who prevent us from defending other sheep from the wolves?
These are evil sheep who side with the wolves. They do everything they can to prevent protection of other sheep, but they do not strike the killing blow themselves. Perhaps some are wolves in sheep clothing? Perhaps others are evil cowardly sheep whose only defense is to point to other bigger sheep for the wolves to feast upon.
Either way, we may need to start considering the elimination of the evil sheep who help the wolves.
If anything leads to USA Civil War II, it will be a result of needing to deal with those evil sheep.
Posted by: Shorse at April 17, 2006 02:20 PM (E9o/E)
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"OTOH Bush doesn't care...."
Hopefully, he still has his convictions to do the right thing. What does he have to worry about? His enemies will hate him no matter what he does (they would hate him if he even replaced Cheney with Ted Kennedy as VP, and then resigned as Prez, elevating Teddy to Prez!) So, what does Bush really have to lose?
If he does not act against Iran, his legacy is toast. With 2.5 years left in his term, and Iran flouting that they have nukes and will use them, if Bush does NOT take the nukes away from Iran, then history will rightly judge that Bush wimped out...punted the Nuclear Iran problem to the next guy, knowing full well that the next guy may well be a liberal pacifist gal, who will have to deal with Iran 3 yrs after they first claimed to have nukes.
Bush has no options. Bush should have very little fear....what?...that people might not like him for his actions? Get real! He should only be guided by his convictions, not even a political worry about a 2nd term. Bush was born for such a time as this.
Posted by: Harry at April 17, 2006 02:20 PM (eWNM6)
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Shorse,
We have treason and sedition laws to take care of the "evil sheep," and neither cowardice nor denial justifys a civil war. This elimination you speak of sounds very close to summary executions, and that wil not be tolerated on this site.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at April 17, 2006 02:28 PM (g5Nba)
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Sheepdogs work to disarm sheep, and then claim "See, you need us to protect you."
How often do sheepdogs (the real kind, not the metaphorical kind)
kill innocent sheep? And how often do the shepards (the real kind, not the bureacratic government kind) tolerate that kind of behavior?
Posted by: Not A Sheep at April 17, 2006 02:58 PM (Ulj9x)
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"We have treason and sedition laws to take care of the "evil sheep"
..and the last time those laws were prosecuted was?
Posted by: Steve at April 17, 2006 02:58 PM (yAZR8)
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Thought-provoking articles. I fancy myself as a sheepdog but am afraid I'm at sheep at heart. Not happy about that self-appraisal, either. Maybe I can train to be more sheepdog and less sheep.
I hope the U.S. doesn't shackle Israel as I believe they will be the likely first attackers of Iran. We also need to consider what will happen to our military personnel in Iraq if we attack Iran with conventional weaponry. And what about China and Russia--they both like Iranian business and oil, but get considerable foreign aid & business from U.S.
Posted by: Michelle at April 17, 2006 03:01 PM (FBbZZ)
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Perhaps if the Left had more power in the USA, they coudl get over the Right, and start to focus on the true enemy? It's about the only cure for BDS I can think of.
I guess the 2 choices are: 1)Sheepdogs take care of things, with the sheep fighting them every inch of the way, or 2)we somehow engage the sheep.
Posted by: slick at April 17, 2006 03:05 PM (O7Kh5)
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Free, gratis, I present you this image taken yesterday of a sheepdog guarding its flock
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dirtydingus/130327711/
Posted by: Francis at April 17, 2006 03:07 PM (2MfHO)
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I read the "sheepdogs, wolves, sheep" essay some while ago and my only quibble is that the essay lumps all the sheep together. As one person above noted, some sheep are so in denial they actually on the side of the wolves (or else they are wolves). However, some of us who aren't military or police *aren't* in denial and *do* know we need to be protected. We are happy to pay taxes to support those who defend us and to honor them with parades, special burials, GI education grants, etc.
I'm afraid I'm in the same camp as Boomshakalaka - there is a fifth column, at least some of it among the elite and powerful, and it is acting to sell us out -- one MidEast war at a time, one cartoon of Mohammed at a time.
Posted by: Judith at April 17, 2006 03:10 PM (BJYNn)
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I am not a sheepdog. I do not have teeth nor do I have claws. I am not trained as a warrior or protector. I am a sheep.
But I am a sheep with my eyes open. My father was a sheepdog for over 20 years and I have always been able to tell the difference between sheepdogs and wolves. As a sheep with my eyes open, I honor and respect the sheepdogs and I always have.
I don't want the wolves to come, but I know that they are out there and that they will come and that the sheepdogs are all that stand between me and my family and the wolves.
I think you need another classification for people like me.
Posted by: Phil at April 17, 2006 03:28 PM (XCqS+)
15
Something tells me that Bush doesn't want his legacy to be remembered in the same light as Carter, with Iran being allowed to get away with flaunting the US on the world stage. There is, however, by all appearances, time yet to deal with Iran. I look forward to see how the administration uses that time.
Posted by: Final Historian at April 17, 2006 03:40 PM (Xu8s2)
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Wait tell after Nov. 7. The question is can we wait 7 months?
I am a sheep that helps train sheepdogs, figure that one out.
Posted by: David at April 17, 2006 03:51 PM (CYS4h)
17
Great post. In truth, I'd have to put myself on the sheep-sheepdog divide, due to two things:
1) I prefer peace(I know, who doesn't)
2) I love my family and friends more than I love peace
I do not tolerate any direct threat to my extended family members. Anyone or anything that poses an imminent threat to them will be stopped. Permanently.
Posted by: physics geek at April 17, 2006 04:01 PM (Xvrs7)
18
I am a sheep that helps train sheepdogs.
If we can wait 7 months perhaps we will. Nov. 8 or so will be telling.
Posted by: David at April 17, 2006 04:05 PM (CYS4h)
19
I have always been able to tell the difference between sheepdogs and wolves.
While wolves never behave like sheepdogs, sometimes sheepdogs act like wolves.
Compare
Francic's picture to
this picture.
Posted by: Cranky Yankee at April 17, 2006 04:06 PM (Ulj9x)
20
The sheep generally do not like the sheepdog. He looks a lot like the wolf. He has fangs and the capacity for violence. The difference, though, is that the sheepdog must not, cannot and will not ever harm the sheep. Any sheep dog who intentionally harms the lowliest little lamb will be punished and removed.
That part made me laugh, because it is not true. A sheepdog who harms a sheep will be placed on paid leave (vacation) while the shepards whitewash the incident.
Posted by: Disgruntled Sheep at April 17, 2006 04:11 PM (Ulj9x)
21
Cranky,
Yes, this does look like an obvious screw up. But you say that wolves never behave like sheepdogs?
So you never heard of somebody dressing up like a policeman, using a vehicle that looks like an unmarked police car, to pull over women, pretending to cite them for speeding, and then rape them? That sounds like a wolve in sheep(dogs) clothing to me. Also, suicide bombers wearing a uniform to get closer to army or police in order to maximize their number of people killed. The list goes on...
Posted by: Harry at April 17, 2006 04:18 PM (eWNM6)
22
On Sheep, etc.
Unfortunatley, in a moment of fear, we, the sheep, have let our sheepdogs become wolves. It is time for the sheep to rise up and restrain the new wolves.
Let's vote out the current administration and reestablish control over these new wolves.
Charlie Mills
Posted by: cmills at April 17, 2006 04:18 PM (XNhZr)
23
and what is a sheepdog that is afraid of the sheep? I would suggest we call that mongrel GW Bush.
Posted by: wrk at April 17, 2006 04:19 PM (iFwoc)
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those who work with the wolves are not sheep
they are judas goats
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judas_goat
ie - traitors
Posted by: The Duck at April 17, 2006 04:33 PM (vSSt8)
25
What "left" won't "allow" us to fight as we need to? The powerless pansies of the Democratic Party?
The President has all the authority he needs to act decisively, and all the power he needs, TODAY, to knock the Iranian program back several years, and also to damage the mullahcracy's ability to hold down the population.
The President is a poker player, however, and we don't see his cards, nor most of the Iranians. He'll raise as he sees fit, call when he is ready, and clean out the mullahcracy of their chips.
Having said that, foreign affairs would be a lot easier if the "hate America first" left were less influential amongst the Dems.
MG
Posted by: MG at April 17, 2006 04:46 PM (KYouj)
26
It's early, we don't need to bomb Iran yet. Let them get that long string of centrifuges into operation, then whack the whole operation. What they'd like is to provoke us into striking prematurely, so that they could easily rebuild while we were suffering the blowback from the initial strike. Nope, we're more patient than that. Quiet down, and threaten them quietly, so as not to inflame anybody. It's been good to bring this out in the open, so the world pays attention, but there is no absolute need for military action right now.
Posted by: bomb their ass and take their gas at April 17, 2006 06:06 PM (Uo/FJ)
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There's always an excuse for inaction. Yeah, threats, that's the answer. Iran has been at war with us since the embassy takeover.
But the "international community" wouldn't like us if we defend ourselves, so "there is absolutely no need for military action right now."
Denial.
Posted by: MarkD at April 17, 2006 06:53 PM (X9njN)
28
Sometimes,the wolves steal sheep from their midst so that they can claim to be sheepdogs too. Unfortunately, many in America buy into that claim and call for the impeachment of the leader of the sheepdogs if any sheepdogs harm the other sheep in their zeal to kill the wolves that enslave them or even harm the wolves masquerading as sheepdogs over their enslaved sheep.
Phil
Posted by: Phil at April 17, 2006 07:04 PM (SEOa8)
Posted by: chris Muir at April 17, 2006 07:53 PM (RklOC)
30
This whole sheep/sheepdog/wolf analogy is getting old. I know the cops and service guys like it, and it's cute and everything, if you don't think about it too much. But there are no sheep. And there are no wolves. There are only dogs. Bad dogs. Good dogs. Mean dogs. Stupid dogs. Guard dogs. Dogs who do tricks. Feral dogs. Some of us are Rottwielers, and some of us are Poodles. And some of us are Dingos. The question is, what kind of dog are you?
Anyway, there are some dogs over there who don't like you dogs, and wanna kick your dog asses and take your dog stuff. Screw your bitches, and eat your food and sleep in your spot. So who among us is gonna stop 'em? In the end, it will be the dogs that can that will do. The rest will watch. And wait. And yapp. And try to make the best of it. Like always.
Posted by: John at April 17, 2006 08:12 PM (ooIUw)
31
It's the American Left and the world against middle America. Never bet against America.
Posted by: PacRim Jim at April 17, 2006 09:26 PM (EII5U)
32
Those first strikes will have to be overwhelming in every way destroying their means to retaliate effectively. Israel should concentrate on destroying Hizbollah's and Hamas' means of attacking them and retaliating on Iran's behalf. There are far more sheep harboring sheepdog desires than appear in these forums. Why do the military planners not include the total destruction of the evil mullahs as well? Surely there are better targets than just the nuclear sites? Make Iran so hot their Revolutionary Guards have no country to return to if they make the mistake of invading Iraq and targeting our forces there.
Posted by: JimboNC at April 17, 2006 10:07 PM (uCPya)
33
Those of you who think we need to "eliminate" al Qaeda first need to understand one thing.
There is no Al Qaeda.
There is only radical islamic fundamentalism or to put it another way..
traditional islam.
Posted by: Steve at April 17, 2006 10:08 PM (/DPHG)
34
this is a redneck site isn't it? I gather from the overwhelming display of flag waving jingoism here.
don't worry boys, Im on your side. no secular leftie am I.
chew on this.
Bush is no Charles Martel. We have a long road of setbacks ahead of us, decades, before someone of that quality comes around again.
Posted by: Steve at April 17, 2006 10:12 PM (/DPHG)
35
I am just in awe at the courage and performance of US military. In Iraq and Afghanistan and in the war on terror they have done things that others said were impossible. This is the result of years of work going back to the rebuilding after Vietnam. We all know the weaknesses, the CIA and FBI lapses, the failures of our supposed allies and peace organizations, the confusion from being attacked by our own press, but courage of the men and women in our military has made this all good. We are winning in Iraq, in Afghanistan and against Al Qaeda. Our leadership is good. There is no one I would change, even Chaney. The flaky and weak are not in command in this time of crisis. Look at Europe and then look away. We are very lucky.
Posted by: Rob at April 17, 2006 10:19 PM (YYSLV)
36
Somtimes, in an attempt to save the community, individuals are lost. There is no rejoicing in that fact, only a sad acknowledgement. Sheep, at home and abroad, are often victims because they walk in dangerous paths and graze unaware in the company of wolves.
Do sheepdogs ever become overzealous? Yes. And then they are put down. (Just ask Pvt. Lindy of Abu Ghraib notoriety.)
And yet, it is still better that one man should perish than that a nation should fall into the hands of a freedom fearing enemy.
Posted by: Cate at April 17, 2006 10:20 PM (k1L/G)
37
Lots of yippin' and a yappin' going on here.
Must be a bunch a poodles sniffin' each others doggie dicks.
Posted by: Walter at April 17, 2006 11:09 PM (eWNM6)
38
Gee Walter -- nice of you to drop by. Just had to get a snide remark in. Must be one of those wolves in sheep's clothing.
Posted by: Ga Deb at April 18, 2006 08:44 AM (CCv92)
39
Interesting analogy.
There are some discrepancies,as a sheep farmer who uses both sheepdogs and LIVESTOCK GUARD dogs and not having any wolf packs but coyotes and neighbouring pesky pet dogs who are out to play and molest sheep,my analogy would be little different.
Sheepdogs,aka,Border Collies are the law and order for flock's overall well being. Sheep are notorious about turning against them since the dog is there to lay down and enforce the law. Very similar to the law makers and law officers.
Sheepdogs will bite sheep noses if they are challenged or hit by sheep and get them back in line. Those same sheep who challenges the well trained sheepdogs are the ones who usually get taken out by coyotes if guard dogs aren't present since they are born with a chip on their shoulders and are looking for a place to die.
Guard dogs are a different beasts. Pass certain part of Europe (Gr.Pyrr.)where they only guard the ones they bond with and leave the rest of the flock high and dry to fend for themselves,rest of the guard dogs are exteremely territorial which includes the legal residents of known territories. They are on guard 24/7 always on the look out for possible dangers lurking about,barking to warn off any trespassers within their sites and ready to die if threat becomes imminent.They never,ever harm what falls within their territory,sheep often ignores these regal beasts until they are faced with the threat and they bunch up behind the guard dog for protection. Of course there are some sheep gladly tries to maul the guard dogs for fun, they lay on their backs and take all the blows without holding it against them.
These regal beasts are our military,always there on full guard without holding any grudge yet ready to die to defend the sheep who mauled him moments ago and ran to hide behind him in the face of the threat.
People are lot like sheep though,they fight each other for food even if they are full,they'll kill their own lambs for a little grain,during mating both gender will fight for breeding rights,they always think the grass is greener beyond the 10,000 wolts of electric fence yet they try their luck every single day without learning much and are extremely greedy creatures.
Only difference I see,sheep provides the tastiest lamb chops.......
Posted by: Fly at April 18, 2006 10:27 AM (i54ji)
40
"Still, the sheepdog disturbs the sheep. He is a constant reminder that there are wolves in the land."
Kipling said it better:
For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"
But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot.
Posted by: Carl O. Witz at April 18, 2006 04:35 PM (c/DXY)
41
Dave Grossman is as always right on target. There is nothing to be read in all the posted comments that add to or detract from an excellent parody.
Semper Fi and Hoo Yah.
Posted by: Ken at April 18, 2006 05:56 PM (OCqA7)
42
Wow, lot's of comments. Some good, some very perceptive, and some very thoughtless stuff, too. It is very hard for me to accept the thoughtless stuff because they are in denial. How can you respond to someone in denial?
Those who self-evaulated themselves as sheep are the friends and supporters of the sheepdogs. Those who critized are the dangerous ones who would gang up upon the sheepdogs purely for spite. They certainly do not grasp the seriousness of our national situation in regards to Iran and radical Islam. We must deal with it today or our grandchildren will be dealing with it through their death. This is not the time to ridicule the sheepdogs, but to muster support for them and understand the magnitude of what we face.
As usual, CY, a great post!
Posted by: Old Soldier at April 18, 2006 08:03 PM (owAN1)
43
Walter,
Riddle me this batman - why is it that the left always descends into vulgarisms to attempt to make a point? Is it that you have no mastery over the English language (well...maybe not quite the point because so many of us don't speak
good...lol)? Or is it that vulgarity is a way to shout? Or maybe it is the last gasp of a dying POV....
Posted by: Specter at April 19, 2006 08:22 AM (ybfXM)
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April 16, 2006
And You Should See The Peeps
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1
Lol!
"...and you should see the Peeps!"
Yes, you should.
Happy Easter!
Posted by: Amber at April 16, 2006 09:29 AM (5ruWe)
2
That's the funniest thing I've seen in a while! Have a blessed Easter.
Posted by: Nephos at April 16, 2006 02:08 PM (wZLWV)
3
Thank you CY and Happy Easter to you and yours. Great post
Posted by: Specter at April 16, 2006 08:10 PM (ybfXM)
4
Dick loose again the shotgun eh?
Posted by: Loco at April 18, 2006 08:21 AM (UWhwf)
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April 15, 2006
Your Choice
Pretend that you are a political "undecided" or a moderate, and you read the
Washington Post. You don't follow politics much (you life is too busy for that) and you've run across the following stories.
Who would you rather associate with, the blogger profiled in this Q&A several months ago, or this one revealed today?
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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1
Wow, I guess spewing hate on the internet is cheaper than therapy. Maryscott has some serious issues!
Posted by: MCPO Airdale at April 15, 2006 02:03 PM (WOQ34)
2
Good Lord, makes one want to buy stock in ulcer medication.
Posted by: Amber at April 15, 2006 02:44 PM (5ruWe)
3
Now ya'll know that liberals don't have the ability to hate. That is something conservatives do.
Uh oh! Scratch the above. Now this gal has got a hatefest going on her blog. Hate. Hate. Hate.
Report her to the police for her hate crimes.
Posted by: jesusland joe at April 15, 2006 02:47 PM (rUyw4)
4
She's pathetic, I called her just plain sad. What a wasted life.
Posted by: Gaius Arbo at April 15, 2006 04:11 PM (Eg3nf)
5
Maryscott == completely unhinged
Seriously -- she needs to get a life...somewhere...anywhere.
Posted by: Purple Avenger at April 15, 2006 07:21 PM (l6Jdw)
6
One would be tempted to read her blog just for the humor of it. The more impotent outrage there is in the liberal left, the happier I get. If it makes them that mad I wish we could keep the current administration for another four or eight years.
Posted by: Fish at April 15, 2006 10:34 PM (KpjA/)
7
I think Maryscott should quit the tobacco, and go back to drinking REAL beer. I admit that I am entertained when I can raise a leftie's blood pressure just by saying "Bush won both elections fair and square".
Posted by: Tom TB at April 16, 2006 02:50 AM (Ffvoi)
Posted by: Specter at April 16, 2006 08:12 PM (ybfXM)
9
What I can't believe is the interview with Bob was well done. At least I didn't see the obligatory "extreme right-wing" label or the "out of touch with the mainstream" insinuation. Wow, Bob looked like a tie-died, flower wearing, hippie compared to that MaryScott psycho! LOL
Posted by: Ray Robison at April 17, 2006 10:36 AM (CdK5b)
10
""Bush won both elections fair and square".
I try to keep things simple
"Bush won both elections".
has the same effect. ;-)
Posted by: Dan Kauffman at April 17, 2006 10:22 PM (hxRR8)
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"who would you rather associate with"
Hey, I'm here aren't I - answer your question? Besides I meet enough crazy people in real life and have no interest reading the rants of deranged bloggers.
Posted by: docdave at April 20, 2006 04:25 PM (f/3Fq)
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April 14, 2006
Google's Good Friday Miracle
A few months ago, I sought a picture of the baby Jesus for a simple post I wanted to put up on Christmas Eve, which eventually came to be
this post.
However, an innocuous search for “baby jesus “on Google turned up a disgusting, shocking result.
My post on the subject was mocked by some, and it even earned the coveted Worst Post of the Year: 2005 from Crooks & Liars. Considering the source, I took it all in stride, and held my ground. After all, I was a SEO consultant back in 1997, working search engine results for companies before most of those folks put up their first web pages.
I then forgot about that post and the derisive uproar on the left as other things came into view, until I ran across these posts on The Corner this morning, and it reminded me of the search that I made Christmas Eve. On a lark, I Googled "baby jesus" again:
What's missing from this picture? You guessed it: a certain offensive web site result. In my original post I spent a lot of time arguing:
Google's algorithms are man-made, coded by human programmers, as are any exclusionary protocols. These people ultimately decide if search results are relevant.
Of course, I was wrong... wasn't I?
Therefore this new search result, which has dropped the offensive site from at least the top 50 search results for the words baby jesus, couldn't have been the result of an algorithm change or an exclusionary protocol.
It must be a Good Friday Miracle on Google.
Right?
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April 13, 2006
Spin. Cut. Run.
To hear
Editor & Publisher tell it, you would think that
Washington Post reporter Joby Warrick was standing firmly behind his
page A1 story from yesterday, where his opening paragraphs strongly asserted that the Bush Administration ignored the "unanimous findings" of a team of weapons experts to purposefully present the American people with false information.
The Post's agenda-driven journalism was destroyed before the first copy of the print edition hit the street.
Warrick's article was a perfect example of modern yellow journalism. He following an increasingly common technique of making a strong assertion in the lede (opening paragraphs)of a story, only providing any balancing coverage much further down in the story, while typically being dismissive of it or giving it little rhetorical weight (Jeff Goldstein provides and excellent look at the phenomena as applied to this story at Protein Wisdom).
Is Warrick really standing firm behind his article? Hardly.
Warricks's new article, hiding on page A18, has backed away from the "unanimous findings" claim that was proven factually inaccurate in his scurrilous lede. A June 7, 2003 NY Times article found by Seixon found that far from presenting "unanimous findings," this third team of experts was "divided sharply" in their opinion of what the trailer represented. Warrick's sources—all anonymous—seem to be contradicting each other, bringing into doubt their credibility.
In addition to the credibility of Warrick's anonymous sources and the discrepanies about the report they issued, all mention of the two teams of military experts that thought that the trailers were mobile bio-weapon labs have been removed from the follow-up story. Unable to address the fact that their existence proves he was presenting a minority view (even one that turned out to be accurate), Warrick seems intent on deleting all references to these contradictory teams mentioned in earlier article. The "smoking gun" has turned out to be what Seixan noted as a "minority report about a minority report."
Is Joby Warrick standing by his story, or is he guilty of spinning, cutting, and running?
I report. You deride.
Update: Blue Crab Boulevard says, "What's 'unclear' here is if Mr. Warrick was aware that he was writing a hit piece or just that bad a writer."
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What's 'unclear' here is if Mr. Warrick was aware that he was writing a hit piece or just that bad a writer."
ONCE = Chance
TWICE = Coincidence
THIRD TIME = Enemy Action.
Posted by: SWO at April 13, 2006 03:35 PM (Mv/2X)
2
I find it also strange that there would be any need for an anonymous source on a story about an event that was reported on several years ago. Perhaps they wanted to be anonymous because they did not want their friends and associates to know they were passing on bogus information.
Posted by: Merv Benson at April 13, 2006 03:37 PM (QoBZt)
3
bio trailers retread + yellowcake retread = what?
my guess is an attempt to mitigate new info.
Posted by: rawsnacks at April 13, 2006 04:40 PM (uxmxp)
4
Perhaps they wanted to be anonymous because they did not want their friends and associates to know they were passing on bogus information.
Or, they are involved with some rank partisan organization and their expose would only pave the way to being discredited.
Posted by: mishu at April 13, 2006 05:12 PM (njCo0)
5
My understanding of the military teams were that they merely confirmed that the trailers had the pieces of equipment in them that "Curveball" and other engineers described. At least, that's what the CIA's website suggets.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/reports/iraqi_mobile_plants/index.html
And I just read that NY Times story that Judith Miller wrote, and I found the language a touch confusing. Was it the third group that was sharply divided internally, or sharply divided from the other two groups.
And it also seems that while this third group was taking more of a scientific approach to determining it because they were senior analysts, the others may not have been as skilled and jumped the gun. Check this sentence out, "Some doubters noted that the intelligence community was still scrambling to analyze the trailers, suggesting that the white paper may have been premature."
I don't think Warrick's reporting was very good, but I still think there are questions that need to be answered before you all put him through the partisan wringer.
In other words, much like his story was more of a
"Ready. Fire. Aim." story, so too is the blogosphere drubbing of him. I guess I just wish somebody could take it apart free from the partisan rhetoric. That would be a welcome change.
Posted by: Justin Gardner at April 13, 2006 05:13 PM (raYpr)
6
bio trailers retread + yellowcake retread = what?
my guess is an attempt to mitigate new info.
They are losing on so many fronts that they have to retread stuff to keep the "bush lie" theme alive. What is really funny is these are the same conspiracy theorists that claim Bush comes up with a new OBL tape every time his ratings go down...
Posted by: Specter at April 13, 2006 05:47 PM (ybfXM)
7
Justin -
I think the problem is that the MSM usually gets the first shot at the patisan rhetoric. What they tend to do is simplify information, generally in a way that supports thier views. What the blogosphere does - at least the conservative part of it - is point out the bias. Is that putting the MSM through the partisan wringer? I don't think so. I actually think its providing the needed balance go on to wish for.
Mike
Posted by: Mike at April 13, 2006 05:50 PM (yqeX1)
8
Oops - there should be a "you" after "balance". Should have hit preview.
Mike
Posted by: Mike at April 13, 2006 05:52 PM (yqeX1)
9
I sometimes wonder at our yellow journalism charge. I have read the articles which debunk Lincoln before his election. Yellow journalism is the rule, not the exception. I do wish people would look historically at this.
Pat
Posted by: Pat Davis at April 13, 2006 06:54 PM (rbGqm)
10
This is no worse than the NYT hit piece using the mistake (lie which Fitzgearld released on Friday so it would run the weekend barf news cycle such as meet the depressed) of Mr Fitgerald as a front page 'massive story' and printing the correction days later on page a17. Do they wonder why their profit's are taking a nose dive. You can find more correct, honest 'news' in any supermarket tabloid at a much cheaper price. Not one of them would dare print a lie as the NYT does daily for fear of lawsuits.
Posted by: Scrapiron at April 13, 2006 08:08 PM (Ffvoi)
11
Justin,
Believe it or not, my post that was linked above is not partisan. It's actually a hit on crappy reporting. I like to think I will take the exact same stance on some article doing a hit on someone I personally detested. I may or may not live up to that standard in the future, but I like to think I'm honest enough not to tolerate a rather obvious hit piece on anyone.
Gaius
Posted by: Gaius Arbo at April 13, 2006 10:24 PM (aCiZ2)
12
YES - this is all about the "Bus Lied" meme, popularized by Michael Moore in 2004.
Back then, the Dems believed their own press, and the election was decided in August when the Swift Boat critics emerged and the media advised them "ignore them." They did, and the election results matched poll numbers back in August. (This is unprecedented in my lifetime: presidential elections are always decided after Labor Day. But not last time.)
Now the press is believing their own Bush lies and recycling them to the people. Just as the NYTimes has become the Dems cheerleader, so the WaPo has become the "conscience" of the White house press corps. This item reflects that goup-think.
The elite media is corrupt beyond repair - that is the lesson we had better all learn this spring.
Posted by: Orson Olson at April 13, 2006 10:25 PM (uu4yl)
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Productivity
Via
ABC News:
A senior Egyptian al Qaeda member was killed along with other militants during a Pakistani military raid of a hideout in the northern part of Pakistan, sources have told ABC News.
Multiple intelligence sources in Pakistan confirmed to ABC News that they believed Abu Mohsin Musa, also known as Abdul Rahman, had died in the overnight raid.
Rahman was one of the FBI's most wanted men with a $5 million bounty on his head. He was indicted in absentia in a New York court for his alleged involvement in the bombings of the United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; and Nairobi, Kenya, on Aug. 7, 1998.
Some folks still like to suggest that we're losing the War on Terror, but they tend to miss the simple logistics of the equation. It takes nine months to gestate a potential terrorist, a minimum of 10–15 years before they're ready to carry out even a suicide bombing (that seems to be the Palestinian age floor, at least), and even moderately capable operatives take at least 15-20 years of life to develop. The rare mastermind-quality terrorists don't seem to hit their stride for another five to ten years after that, and they have been constantly decreasing in number since the start of the War on Terror.
While there are critics quick to point out that our actions in various theaters can sometimes prod people to turn to terrorism, I think it safe to say that the majority who choose to engage in terrorist acts were already predisposed to do so because of prior conditioning. If we did not trigger them now, something would likely trigger them at another point.
It take just seconds to make bullet, hours or days to build a bomb or missile, but lifetimes for terrorists to reach level of proficiency. If we see this as a war of production, like World War II, it is obvious that on this level, we are assured of victory. Effective terrorists simply cannot be made and trained faster than we manufacture weapons to destroy them, and ineffective terrorists are simply targets.
Abu Mohsin Musa became just another statistic, his years of experience lost to a weapon that took hours or days to manufacture. The Islamofascists are slowly, painfully learning the same thing the Germans did in World War II. You cannot defeat the United States in a war of production.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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When you put it that way it really makes it hard to justify a complaint.
Posted by: Everett at April 13, 2006 09:57 AM (ZFg33)
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You don't hear much from UBL, do you? I honestly think the SOB is either injured or ill due to his kidney ailment. Either way CY your correct in your opinion. What the public has to understand is that we cannot go into Wizirastan, they are all tribal folks and do not trust or like outsiders. Let the Pakistani's work with us and let the chips fall. We will get him, just takes time but, we will get him.... Their on the run.
Posted by: Faithful Patriot at April 13, 2006 10:52 AM (cqZXM)
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I never bought into the whole "hunting terrorists creates terrorists" concept. I'm glad to see folks making fun of that. Imagine a world where people are actually responsible for what they do. Sort of a pleasant fiction. Until then we just have to help them perish at a cyclic rate.
Posted by: brando at April 13, 2006 11:41 AM (GTNT6)
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"You cannot defeat the United States in a war of production."
Just in a war of will, where the media is complicit. Only unlike Vietnam, we have new media like you pesky bloggers fighting back.
Posted by: Amber at April 13, 2006 10:47 PM (9uWiP)
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Hasselhoff Has Germany...
...and apparently, I'm doing okay in Fargo.
I'll be doing my first talk radio segment (ever) on "Hot Talk with Scott Hennen" on WDAY at 11:30 AM (Eastern). We'll be talking about the WaPo "trailers of mass destraction" story I debunked yesterday.
You should be able to listen through the Listen to Hot Talk link.
The Hot Talk blog is here.
Update: I just got off the air. For a first-timer I don't think I did that bad, talking with the host for a few minutes and taking a call from a liberal. I'll update with a link to the MP3 as soon as I have the audio.
Update 2: We have audio (6802K MP3). Rush Limbaugh won't feel threatened.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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April 12, 2006
Cut and Run Republicans
We've been "Fristed" again in the illegal immigration debate, and this time House leader Dennis Hastert has joined the
chorus of cowardice:
House Republicans rushed through legislation just before Christmas that would build hundreds of miles of fence along the U.S.-Mexico border, require that businesses verify the legality of all employees' status through a national database, fortify border patrols, and declare illegal immigrants and those who help them to be felons. After more lenient legislation failed in the Senate last week, the House-passed version burst into the public consciousness this week, as hundreds of thousands of protesters across the country turned out to denounce the bill.
Yesterday, House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) issued a joint statement seeking to deflect blame for the harshest provisions of the House bill toward the Democrats, who they said showed a lack of compassion. "It remains our intent to produce a strong border security bill that will not make unlawful presence in the United States a felony," Hastert and Frist said.
Once again Republican leaders show they are not worthy of leading even their own parties, much less America. Bill Frist, who would like to become President, proves once again why he does not have the spine for the office he seeks. He will not garner my vote under any circumstance.
Increasingly, a third party vote for a truly conservative candidate coming out of either party seems palatable. As Dan Riehl notes:
I hope there's a leader somewhere in that crumbling party, which today appears to be a shadow of itself, full of political whores intent on abandoning principle so as to pimp themselves for votes. If Republicans remain on this co-dependent Democrat path they are on, look for significant third party challenges from the Right. From what I am seeing today, I would strongly consider voting for one now.
The Democrats still can't win elections, but the GOP seem intent on losing them. as they run the party into the ground.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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I am very glad Frist is history in 07! The way the Dems made a fool out of him from 2/05 to 7/05 on the Bolton nomination convinced me he had neither brains nor spine. The latest move shows that he may be dumb, but with the GOP he has clout; unfortunately for America.
Posted by: Rod Stanton at April 12, 2006 11:57 AM (JujRs)
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Neither party is going to make these people felons. Felons CAN'T VOTE.
Posted by: Cindi at April 12, 2006 05:24 PM (asVsU)
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Both these parties had better get their heads out of their respective arses as a flood of illegal aliens from Mexico is now crossing or about to cross the border. Regardless of whether you are Democrat or Republican, it should be pretty obvious that if economic conditions south of the border were to get really bad, there might be 100 million potential illegal aliens headed our way. Even the Democrats should be smart enough to know that there is no way for the US to handle such an invasion short of military action. I predict just that if this problem is not handled very soon in some meaningful way.
Posted by: jesusland joe at April 12, 2006 09:52 PM (rUyw4)
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