Collection of posts over the last couple of days...

jsamuel (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore

Fri Feb-17-06 12:48 PM Original message

There is so much happening to our country now... It's getting harder and harder to keep up with it.


Just on CBS eve news, WH asks congress for $65B more for iraq "war"

brings total for this year so far to 115 BILLION

Curt Weldon talking Able Danger on CNN

Weldon saying they could have prevented 9/11
Nobody's covering the hearings. CSPAN isn't covering it.
Lou Dobbs is one of the few giving it attn. according to Weldon.

Katrina Records Contain A Gap
Missing: Homeland Security Conference Call As Levees Failed

WASHINGTON -- The Department of Homeland Security has not been able to find any recording of a crucial conference call five hours after Hurricane Katrina made landfall - though it has transcripts of other key discussions recorded in the days before and after the storm struck.

Dick Gordon "The Story" on NPR

He interviewed a former IRA prisoner ('Jim') who had been tortured in much the same ways the US is now torturing prisoners in AbuGhraib and Gitmo. Then, he interviewed an 'interrogator' who was in the Army in the past year and who worked either at Gitmo or A-B (can't remember which). The interrogator said he KNEW they were committing war crimes. The story of 'Jim' (the IRA dude) was horrendous. To think that WE or our gov't is doing to people in Iraq what was done to this guy is just absolutely sickening. I literally got sick listening to it.

My GOD. Both men said we're only CREATING MORE TERRORISTS by torturing people (duh). 'Jim' said he wasn't in the IRA but joined AFTER he was tortured because he was so angry about what had been done to him (can you say 'insurgent')? The interrogator acknowledged that more than 90% of the detainees they tortured were innocent. People they just pulled off the street because they happened to be near a bomb, explosive, or guns.

Then, Dick had some airhead woman on who could not sufficiently answer the question as to where the lines ought to be drawn and would not admit that what is being done IS TORTURE - even though it is. She danced around his questions, obfuscated, avoided direct answers, of course. She kept saying that the Geneva Conventions and the 'rules' concerning treatment of war prisoners and detainees were too strict - she said it's OK to cross those lines but simultanously that she was NOT condoning torture. Yea. Right. I wanted to grab that beyotch and choke her. What she said made absolutely NO sense at all. She had to ack that it's finally up to the individual 'interrogator' whether to torture or not - because there are no clear rules against it (WTF are Geneva conventions?).

If you remember, Dick Gordon's new show is replacing The Connection on NPR and if you missed today's show, you missed a very important one - not only the first, but on a very timely subject - torture.

MSNBC: U.S. MUST release domestic spying documents

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11389667

Judge rules in favor of civil liberties group in Freedom of Information case
Updated: 2:53 p.m. ET Feb. 16, 2006
WASHINGTON - A federal judge Thursday ordered the Justice Department to respond within 20 days to requests by a civil liberties group for documents about President Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program.

The ruling was a victory for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which sued the department under the Freedom of Information Act in seeking the release of the documents.
U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy ruled that the department must finish processing the group’s requests and produce or identify all records within 20 days.


Records sought by the group include an audit of the program, a “checklist” guide used to determine whether an individual’s phone or e-mail messages could be monitored, documents showing how information gleaned through eavesdropping had been used, and other legal opinions about the program.

Finally Congress questions Bush approval of sell-off of U.S. ports to UAE

Lawmakers seek White House review of port deal with Arab company

2/16/2006, 12:38 p.m. ET
The Associated Press
http://www.silive.com/newsflash/metro/index.ssf?/base/n....

{snips}

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. lawmakers formally asked the Bush administration Thursday to reconsider its approval of a sale giving a company in the United Arab Emirates control over significant operations at six major American ports.

The lawmakers, including four senators and three House members, sharply criticized the UAE as inconsistent in its support of U.S. anti-terrorism efforts.

"Outsourcing the operations of our largest ports to a country with a dubious record on terrorism is a homeland security and commerce accident waiting to happen," said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. "The administration needs to take another look at this deal."

The Bush administration defended its approval of the sale. A spokesman for the White House National Security Council, Frederick Jones, said Thursday that security implications of the deal were "rigorously reviewed."

The Associated Press reported Saturday that government-owned Dubai Ports World had won approval for the $6.8 billion deal from a secretive U.S. panel that considers security risks of foreign companies buying or investing in American industry.

CNN Dobbs: WH Refuses Congressional Request for Review of UAE Port Control

He just announced.

Coulter:"Boy, you tent merchants sure are touchy. Grow up, would you?"

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_di....



Coulter added: "Perhaps we could put aside our national, ongoing, post-9/11 Muslim butt-kissing contest and get on with the business at hand: Bombing Syria back to the stone age and then permanently disarming Iran."

Echoing a comment in her speech of last Friday, Coulter also wrote: "I believe our motto should be after 9/11: Jihad monkey talks tough; jihad monkey takes the consequences. Sorry, I realize that's offensive. How about 'camel jockey'? What? Now what'd I say? Boy, you tent merchants sure are touchy. Grow up, would you?"

And, in her last paragraph, Coulter wondered if "the conventions of civilized behavior, personal hygiene, and grooming inapplicable when Muslims are involved."

Cheney: "When the VP orders that a CIA op be outed, that means that the

information isn't classified anymore." (he didn't actually say this, but according to the thread below, that is what he is saying)

what an ASS!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph....


Reminds me of the "When the President does it, that means it's legal" - Nixon

Resolution to send Iran to UN Security Council passes House

…

A Bad Deal - Patriot Act Update

As many of you already know, the White House struck a deal with Republicans on the Patriot Act late yesterday, and it looks like they are on their way to pushing their bad deal through Congress. Unfortunately, the few minor changes to which the White House agreed simply do not address the major problems with the Act.

As I mentioned earlier this week, I will strongly oppose this one-sided deal, and I will use every option at my disposal to stop it or any reauthorization of the Patriot Act that does not protect the rights and freedoms of law-abiding Americans. People ask if that means a filibuster -- it sure does. But, with the Republicans who were on our side and even some Democrats jumping ship, a filibuster will be more difficult. The other side needs 60 votes to cut off debate, they had 53 in December, so there is a good chance they will now be able to get them.

The White House refused to make some of the reasonable changes that the entire Senate accepted last summer so that it could try to turn this into a partisan issue and gain some political advantage for doing so. They shouldn't be playing partisan politics and I'm disappointed that some of my Democratic colleagues are ready to fold so easily. The President's efforts to intimidate our side seem to be working.

Something everyone can do is contact the Senate Democrats, every single one of them, and explain how this deal doesn't come close to protecting our rights and freedoms. I understand the pressure that Senators were under -- I've been there before. But this deal comes nowhere near the significant, although very reasonable, changes in the law for which we were fighting and which every Senator supported earlier last year. Using this fig leaf of a deal as an excuse to back down is unacceptable.

As Democrats, if we can't stand up for basic values like liberty and freedom, what do we stand for? We cannot fold in the face of fear and intimidation by the White House. (Especially if we hope to have any chance of winning future elections.) Rolling over now is not the answer.

Sen. Roberts: White House Deal To Avoid Investigation Made

Senator Roberts conspires to screw over the American people:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Intelligence Chairman Pat Roberts said he has worked out an agreement with the White House to change U.S. law regarding the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program and provide more information about it to Congress.

``We are trying to get some movement, and we have a clear indication of that movement,'' Roberts, R-Kan., said.

Without offering specifics, Roberts said the agreement with the White House provides ``a fix'' to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and offers more briefings to the Senate Intelligence Committee.

A "fix" to FISA? A FIX??? A FIX to the law the administration has repeatedly testified doesn't need fixing? Oh, and Roberts was kind enough to broker "more briefings" as part of the deal? More briefings like the hollow circus that occured when Gonzales took the stand?

I'd say Roberts should feel ashamed of himself, but that parasitic creature feels no shame. He's an apathetic, amoral minion of this administration, and the American people continue to suffer for it.

Cheney drank before shooting his pal

E&P:

In an exclusive interview with Fox News' Brit Hume this afternoon, Vice President Dick Cheney took full responsibility for shooting his hunting companion, who has until now been pictured as the guilty party. The interview will not aired in full until 6 p.m. but according to Hume, in summarizing the contents, the vice president remained "totally unapologetic" about the long lag in reporting the shooting to the public-- and also said that he had consumed one beer at lunch that day.

Cheney must consume a virtual cocktail of drugs every day because of his heart condition. I wonder what kind of reaction throwing alcohol into the mix might have.

Any doctors in the house?

Update: Here's video of Hume talking about his interview with Cheney. You see, according to Cheney, they drank beer but no one drank beer:

HUME: He said he had a beer at lunch and that had been many hours earlier. And it was dusk, around 5:00 p.m., when this incident happened. And he said that, you know, they had lunch out in the field, a barbecue, and he had a beer. But you said you don’t hunt with people who have been drinking. He said no one was drinking. He said they went back to the ranch afterwards, took a break after that, and went out about 3:00 and so you’re four or five hours distanced from the last alcohol that he consumed. And he said no one was drinking, not he nor anyone else.

Republicans Blister White House and DHS Response to Katrina

A House Investigative Committee composed entirely of Republicans will officially issue their findings as early as today on the Federal preparedness and response during Hurricane Katrina. The stinging five-hundred plus page document characterizes the poorly planned and badly coordinated Department of Homeland Security, FEMA, and White House response to the disaster as "dismal".

President Bush: "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." Good Morning America on 9/1/05 (Video at Crooks and Liars).

Even the House GOP committee gagged on that one, saying in part:

<[a title="http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/14/katrina.response/" href="http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/14/katrina.response/">CNN] "It remains difficult to understand how government could respond so ineffectively to a disaster that was anticipated for years, and for which specific dire warnings had been issued for days. This crisis was not only predictable, it was predicted," the committee said.

Remember that DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff said on Meet the Press (And with a straight face mind you):

<[a title="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9179790/" href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9179790/">MTP Transcript 9/4/05] "I remember on Tuesday morning picking up newspapers and I saw headlines, 'New Orleans Dodged The Bullet.'"

Leaving aside the disturbing implication that the head of the DHS was relying on newspapers to get his information about a national emergency. Ignoring that out of 400 headlines that ran that Tuesday morning, all of them said the exact opposite. What makes that dodge so particularly outrageous, is that his own department reportedly predicted the flooding a few days beforehand and then, according to Brownie under oath, confirmed it the day the storm hit:

<[a title="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/23/AR2006012301711.html" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/23/AR2006012301711.html">Wapo] In the 48 hours before Hurricane Katrina hit, the White House received detailed warnings about the storm's likely impact, including eerily prescient predictions of breached levees, massive flooding, and major losses of life and property, documents show.

<[a title="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060210/ap_on_go_co/katrina_congress" href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060210/ap_on_go_co/katrina_congress">YAHOO NEWS] Senator Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., asking about Brown's conversation with Hagin on the evening of Aug. 29. "Did you tell Mr. Hagin in that phone call that New Orleans was flooding?" ... Brown answered: "I think I told him that we were realizing our worst nightmare, that everything we had planned about, worried about, that FEMA, frankly, had worried about for 10 years was coming true."

A few more highlights and conclusions:

"Katrina was a national failure, an abdication of the most solemn obligation to provide for the common welfare," the report states. <...> The federal government's response was marked "fecklessness, flailing and organisational paralysis". <...> "Our investigation revealed that Katrina was a national failure, an abdication of the most solemn obligation to provide for the common welfare," said a summary of the scathing report.

Feel safer yet? There are so many instances of what can only be interpreted as paranoid behavior, incompetence, misinformation, scandals in various states of legal and journalistic illumination, or blatant lying, now plaguing this White House, that just trying to keep up with them all is bewildering. But from Loose-lips Libby to Heckuva-job Brownie to Dead-eye Dick, perhaps a useful unifying framework to keep it all sorted out is the apparent Bush and Company gub'mint playbook:

• Step 1: Screw-up
• Step 2: Evade, spin, and Cover-up
• Step 3: When it's too late Show-up
• Step 4: Quietly Lawyer-up
• Step 5: Finally, promise to cooperate and then Clam-up

Maybe the powers that be lost the next page out of the playbook, or they would know Step 5 is traditionally followed by Step 6 in which voters demonstrate at the polls that they're fed-up. Or Step 6a; after which the guilty and the complicit are locked-up.

Ksec (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore

Fri Feb-17-06 12:56 PM Response to Original message

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jsamuel (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore

Fri Feb-17-06 01:07 PM Response to Reply #3

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