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February 19, 2008

It's not a war, it's a jobs program

This doesn't really need comment.  Bush was interviewed on NBC's Today show yesterday morning.  The interviewer, Ann Curry, asked him about the economy and the war:

Ann Curry: “You don’t agree with that? It has nothing do with the economy, the war — spending on the war?”

President Bush: “I don’t think so. I think actually the spending in the war might help with jobs…because we’re buying equipment, and people are working. I think this economy is down because we built too many houses and the economy’s adjusting.”

February 11, 2008

Check in the sock drawer

The Army has been sitting on a report from the RAND Corporation that heaps scorn on just about everyone connected to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.  The report is now over two years old and has never been allowed to see the light of day.

The Army is acting like a schoolchild who has gotten a bad report card and attempts to keep it from the parents by hiding the report in a sock drawer.

The New York Times got hold of an earlier draft version of the report and covers the story on the front page today.  Army Buried Study Faulting Iraq Planning, NY Times, 2/11/08

Among the more damning findings of the study, which was solicited by the Army to help them improve their actions "the next time", were:

A review of the lengthy report — a draft of which was obtained by The New York Times — shows that it identified problems with nearly every organization that had a role in planning the war.

The study chided President Bush — and by implication Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who served as national security adviser when the war was planned — as having failed to resolve differences among rival agencies. “Throughout the planning process, tensions between the Defense Department and the State Department were never mediated by the president or his staff,” it said.

Gen. Tommy R. Franks, whose Central Command oversaw the military operation in Iraq, had a “fundamental misunderstanding” of what the military needed to do to secure postwar Iraq, the study said.

The Times story quotes from the report about the selling of the war.

“Building public support for any pre-emptive or preventative war is inherently challenging, since by definition, action is being taken before the threat has fully manifested itself,” it said. “Any serious discussion of the costs and challenges of reconstruction might undermine efforts to build that support.”

Got that right.  And that's the same reasoning behind the Army's deep-sixing of this report.  The report was released in November 2005, just as Bush was trying to sell the public on his so-called surge plan.  So the decision was made to keep yet more information from the American people.  We're not to be involved in any serious discussion, especially life-or-death decisions such as the decision to send the country to war.

What, you thought we lived in a democracy or something?  Sorry, the Bush mob has hidden democracy away in the sock drawer.  Who knows what we'll find in there when they finally move out of their room.

January 28, 2008

George's last SOTU

It's a very good thing that George Bush is giving his last State of the Union speech tonight.  At the rate he's been going, there won't be anything to report on in the very near future.

Advance notice of tonight's speech tells us that George will try to reassure Americans about the economy.  Here's what he had to say just one year ago during the SOTU:

    A future of hope and opportunity begins with a growing economy -- and that is what we have.

What a difference a year can make, eh? That's very reassuring.

I'll tune and watch, of course.  Maybe I'll even rant along in real time.

January 21, 2008

It's the war economy, stupid

The war in Iraq has dropped from the top of the issues list in the presidential campaign.  It has also disappeared from the front pages of newspapers.  The hot topic now is the economic mess we find ourselves in, thanks to Bush's reckless driving.  He has crashed the economy into a light pole.

Focusing on the economy is perfectly understandable, given the current state of financial affairs.  What isn't understandable to me is why the candidates--the Democratic candidates, in particular--aren't tying the two issues together.  The economic stimulus packages that the various candidates are touting all run up tabs of about $140 billion.  That is almost exactly how much we're going to spend in Iraq this year alone.

The total cost of the war to date is over half a trillion dollars.  That works out to over $4,000 per household.  How much more economic stimulus could the candidates want?

Let's take it beyond Iraq.  The House recently passed a so-called "defense" spending measure (on a consensus vote of 369 - 46) that sends $649 billion to the Pentagon.  Total military spending represents over half of the entire U.S. budget.  Even worse, our "defense" spending comes to more money than the rest of the world combined.  Just what or whom are we defending against?

Is there a candidate out there who is willing to talk about the incredibly backwards state of our national priorities?  Apparently not.

January 20, 2008

Start the countdown

One year from today, one year from right now, George Bush will no longer be in the White House.  That's the good news.

The bad news is that it may be a very long year.

September 13, 2007

It’s an emergency, all right

Did you know that we’re in a state of national emergency?  Neither did I, but that’s apparently been the case since September 14, 2001.

This notice appeared on the White House website yesterday:

Notice: Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to Certain Terrorist Attacks

Consistent with section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing for 1 year the national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001 . . .

Because the terrorist threat continues, the national emergency declared on September 14, 2001, last extended on September 5, 2006, and the powers and authorities adopted to deal with that emergency, must continue in effect beyond September 14, 2007. Therefore, I am continuing in effect for an additional year the national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001, with respect to the terrorist threat.

This notice shall be published in the Federal Register and transmitted to the Congress.

GEORGE W. BUSH

The real emergency, of course, arises from ”the powers and authorities adopted” (arrogated) by this President.

September 06, 2007

Kick this ass out of Washington

Just in case this doesn’t get major attention in the corporate media, according to the Sydney Morning Herald today, Bush gave a really upbeat assessment of where things stand in Iraq:

We’re kicking ass,” he told Mark Vaile on the tarmac after the Deputy Prime Minister inquired politely of the President’s stopover in Iraq en route to Sydney. [article]

According to Iraq Body Count, we’ve kicked the asses of about 75,000 Iraqi civilians.  Heckuva job, Decider.