Profiteers

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp. posted a quarterly profit of $9.9 billion Thursday, the largest in U.S. corporate history, as it raked in a bonanza from soaring oil and gas prices.

Record profits for Big Oil at a time when consumers are paying sky-high prices for gasoline have brought calls for a windfall profits tax or other penalties on oil companies.

Link

Big bonuses for the boys at the top are sure to follow, as are big contributions (another word for kickbacks) to the Bush/Cheney gang who make it all possible.

The Chairman

Cheney wants to protect the right of the CIA to torture detainees, according to this NYT article,“White House Is Seeking Exception in Detainee Abuse Ban”.

Last weekend I read two reviews of a new Mao biography, Mao: The Unknown Story, one in the NYT book review and a far better one in The New York Review of Books, (You have to buy the issue or buy the article on line). Both reviews presented a Mao who had little real talents beyond a keen sense of which way the wind was blowing and how to change direction to go with it, and an ability to keep his head down and navigate upward through the bureaucracy. He also excelled at sadistic torture and had the willingness to slaughter rivals, real and imagined. The NYB reviewer cited his laziness (He traveled the Long March carried, comfortably reclining) and his apparent complete lack of empathy for others. He was willing to kill millions of his own people to advance his agenda.

While reading the reviews I was reminded of Cheney and to a lesser degree Bush and reminded also of how rare it is for gifted and compassionate individuals to gain political power. Mostly, we are stuck with twisted, Cheney like mediocrities who come to power by avoiding risk, by shuffling minutiae, by scheming in the shadows and by opportunistically attaching to the coattails of rising stars. Once arrived their bitterness (at choosing to eat so much shit to get there) and insecurity cause them to take offense at the smallest slights, and then to work single mindedly, not for the benefit of the governed, but instead to carry out vengeful schemes concocted in the darkness of long nights making lists of enemies. Election victory is about the opportunity to get even.

Damn right Cheney wants torture to be legal and not just for foreigners either.

Subtle curve

Josh Marshall suggests articles, such as the LA Times article I linked in an earlier post, might be part of an overall White House campaign to move Plame blame to Libby as the soldier designated to absorb most of the impact, sparing Rove and possibly Bush and Cheney the worst.

Marshall has a good eye for secret curves, so it’s wise to pay attention.

DeLay

If you're looking for coverage of the Delay trial, the place to go is Majikthis. She's on the scene with camera.

Suck up or else

In case you didn't know what a vindictive, small minded, obsessive, psycho nutcase operation, the office of the Vice President is, here's a sample from the LA Times, via Talk Left.

Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff was so angry about the public statements of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, a Bush administration critic married to an undercover CIA officer, that he monitored all of Wilson's television appearances and urged the White House to mount an aggressive public campaign against him, former aides say.

Link

The rest of the article gives even more details.

(It's exactly what we imagined it to be.)

Imperial delusions

It has always been clear that the long term Cheney plan was to gain control, by any means, of the world’s energy resources, not for your benefit, or mine, as they would have us believe, but solely for the benefit of the American elites.

As things unravel, details of their imperialistic, delusional schemes come tumbling out.

Here (Billmon) and here (Billmon's source).

Once you grasp the goal, the guiding principle that only they should control vital resources, all the pieces fit smoothly into place.

More Plame

Eric Alterman keeps his eye on the ball.

...don’t forget what this is really about: it’s about a conspiracy to defraud the American public into war and destroy the reputation of a public servant who tried to warn us—even at the cost of endangering the lives of loyal CIA agents. Everyone involved is guilty of that and it’s worse than anything of which Keller and Sulzberger can be even remotely accused....

link

To keep up with Plame events check The Raw Story

Plame background

This excellent post, "Why revealing a NOC matters" Gilliard's News Blog makes it very clear how serious the outing of Plame was.

Plame and whigs

There’s a lot going on now behind the well reported new grand jury appearances of Judy Miller and Rove. One story is about a rumored split in the White House between the Rove group and another headed by Andrew Card. There is also speculation that the investigation is leading to, or includes, activities of the White House Iraq Group (whig), which marketed the Iraq war to the media and public with a series of knowingly and carefully concocted lies. This group includes all the biggies that the those of us on the left would so like to see publicly disgraced.

Here’s some links to the good stuff: Digby, Josh Marshall and America Blog

And for a vicious portrait of Card go to Billmon. Here’s how it starts:

If Howard Fineman is right, and Andrew Card really is making a move to topple Karl Rove, then this country could be in a heap of trouble. Rove, at least, is smart, even if it is a feral, devious brand of intelligence. Card, on the other hand, is as dense as a truck load of gravel -- a half-full truck load of gravel.

Maybe the plutocrats in the superstar media will have an epiphany and the whole sordid tale will be hung out on the line for all to see. Maybe there will be some indictments of some of the major players. But I’m not counting on it. These guys will waltz it away like they did with Iran Contra and the same players will either return with new titles or continue to engineer things from the Cheney bunker.

You don’t need a History PhD to know that once in power fascists are difficult to dislodge. Neither indictments, nor unrecorded votes will get the job done.

It will take true desperation, lost homes, lost access to healthcare and the sick and dieing children that follow to piss off the working public enough to put enough squeeze on the cowardly Democrats (who will do anything to hang on to their privileges) to throw the Bush gang out; the same level of nothing to lose desperation that fed the early labor movements, for example.

We have a long way down to go and nothing is going to happen until we get there. It would have been a lot easier to deal with the coup in 2000 when the thugs on the ground were a pink cheeked, soft handed, squishy little mob of Delay recruited congressional aides sent down to stop the recount in Miami.

Go read Billmon

Caged

From "A Less Fasionable War"

"...Thirty years ago Gore Vidal noted that “roughly 80% of police work in the United States has to do with the regulation of our private morals…controlling what we drink, eat, smoke, put into our veins…with whom and how we have sex or gamble.” Then there were roughly 250,000 prisoners in the nation. Today there is more than 2 million, with another million in county jails awaiting trial or sentencing, and another roughly 3 million under “correctional supervision” on probation or parole. The total national cost of incarceration then was $4 billion annually; today it’s $64 billion, with another $20 billion in federal money and $22-24 billion in money from state governments earmarked for waging the so-called “War on Drugs.” Nationally, around 60% or more of these prisoners are drug criminals. Yet, throughout all this time and expense there has not been the slightest decrease in either drug use or supply.

And amidst all the talk of race as a factor in the Katrina disaster let us not forget a bigger disaster: One in every 20 black men over the age of 18 is in prison compared to 1 in 180 White men. Despite African Americans comprising only 12% of the total population, in five states, including Illinois, the ratio of Black to White prisoners is 13 to 1. The U.S. Department of Justice reports that Blacks comprise 56.7% of all drug offenders admitted to state prisons while Whites comprise only 23.3% (in my Illinois prison—one of 28 in the State—of the 1,076 inmates, 689 were Black, 251 were White, and 123 were Latino). Based upon these numbers, a full 30% of African-Americans will see time in prison during their life, compared with only 5% of White Americans, even though White drug users outnumber Blacks by a five-to-one margin....

Link

Via 3 Quarks Daily

Plame game

I’ve been quiet for a couple of days because I’ve been transfixed by the latest Plame Gate developments and feeling a little stirring of hope. If I did post, anything I would have to say would boil down to writing "I hope they nail these bastards" over and over again.

Josh Marshall and America Blog are offering the best coverage of the Fitzgerald investigation, in my opinion. Both, compared to me at least, are insiders receiving and passing on information otherwise not available to others. Kos is close behind. So, if you want to keep up with developments as they unfold visit their sites. On this subject, if it hasn’t been posted on their sites, it isn’t happening. When it comes to reliability, Marshall is especially cautious, or responsible and trustworthy, depending on how you look at it. The bolder America Blog might be a step or two ahead of everyone.

As for bird flu, I have joined the stampede and purchased and stashed Tamiflu and have urged my daughter to do the same. It's not a perfect solution, but it is a small edge. My wife got prescriptions for both of us from our family doctor.

Bird flu

Deadly 1918 Epidemic Linked to Bird Flu, Scientists Say

Published: October 5, 2005
Two teams of federal and university scientists announced today that they had resurrected the 1918 influenza virus, the cause of one of history's most deadly epidemics, and had found that unlike the viruses that caused more recent flu pandemics of 1957 and 1968, the 1918 virus was actually a bird flu that jumped directly to humans.

From the NYT, Link

What was so special about the 1918 flu epidemic? It killed between 20 and 40 million people.

It has been cited as the most devastating epidemic in recorded world history. More people died of influenza in a single year than in four-years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague from 1347 to 1351. Known as "Spanish Flu" or "La Grippe" the influenza of 1918-1919 was a global disaster.

For a complete introduction, go here Link

Fascist dream 2

From the AP: "Bush Considers Military Role in Flu Fight"

...Dr. Irwin Redlener, associate dean of Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and director of its National Center for Disaster Preparedness, called the president's suggestion an "extraordinarily draconian measure" that would be unnecessary if the nation had built the capability for rapid vaccine production, ensured a large supply of anti-virals like Tamiflu, and not allowed the degradation of the public health system.

"The translation of this is martial law in the United States," Redlener said. ...

AP Link

(Via AMERICABlog.com)

Soldiers everywhere. That's the answer.

A fascist dream

So, what is this shit bag's answer to the threat of avian flu? Is it increase vaccine and treatment reasearch? Is it a committment to do our best to ensure all Americans are protected? Nope. None of those. It's a U.S. military enforced quaratine of part of the country. Who do you think are going to be in the most protected part of the country and who are going to be left to handle their own sickness alone?

Avian bird flu.
Bush said he was considering whether the U.S. military should be used to help quarantine part of the country in the event of a pandemic of Avian bird flu. “I’m not predicting an outbreak,” he said. “I’m just suggesting to you that we need to be thinking about it. ... I think the president should have all ... assets on the table to deal with something this significant.”

From MSNBC, link here.

Not only is this scheme designed to save the rich plutocrats and let the poor die safely, alone somewhere on the other side of the concertina wire, but it is useful cover for other applications. Just think about this and while you are, ask yourself whether you would trust Bush to use this power judiciously and not, say, to make sure an election went the way he wanted it. A military enforced quarantine of Florida or Ohio in the last elections, during vote counting, would have made the process go so much more smoothly.

Not to mention how terrifying it would be to have U.S. troops standing between you and your children and keeping you from reaching them in a time of crisis.

The Bush/Cheney process is an inch by inch strangulation of freedom. This is just another inch.

Why Miers?

Digby's answer is that she is the "machine justice" in place to help ensure continuation of power for the Bush crime family machine and not necessarily to advance any conservative ideological agenda.

Digby's analysis makes perfect sense to me. My first thought was that she was nominated to make sure Bush never went to jail. I was close, but too simple. She's part of the grand neo-corporate-fascist scheme to control the country forever and gain complete control of the world's energy resources. She's a trusted soldier who will be a certain Bush vote on every issue that comes before the court.


Here's a paragraph from Digby:

Harriet Miers is the official machine justice, a made woman, the one whose only committment and loyalty will be to Karl Rove and George Bush. I'm sure they would have preferred Alberto Gonzales but he is too much of a known quantity to easily finesse the varying political requirements within the base. She will do just fine. She is their creature. Her purpose on the court is to assist the Republican party in any way necessary, not to advance conservatism.

So, while Democrats examine Miers's and Roberts's ideologies and are delighted to find they are not quite right wing wackos, it turns out they are looking in the wrong place for the wrong evidence and at the wrong issues. What really matters is that the two, Roberts and Miers are trusted Bush/Cheney insiders, placed on the court to protect the regime.

Bush doesn’t give a shit about ideology and when it suits him he changes positions. The issue is not ideology; it is how best to cement the coup that occurred in 2000.

Digby's got it right, I'm afraid. The only real joy for any of us lefties is in watching the slow dawn of awareness spread over the conservatives, awareness that they have been had, that Bush is not the figurehead of a conservative movement, but of a criminal gang. It's a small joy, but it is worth savoring for the moment.

Go read the rest from Digby here.

Billmon, Miers and the right

Billmon is putting up some entertaining posts on the Miers nomination, including some evidence that many on the right are not pleased.

Check it out here: link

Another Brownie

This quote from right winger David Frum may be all you need to know about Harriet Miers.

In the White House that hero worshipped the president, Miers was distinguished by the intensity of her zeal: She once told me that the president was the most brilliant man she had ever met.

From here, via Yglesias, via Josh Marshall

(Edit: Atrios reports in "Wanker of the Day" that sometime this morning Frum removed the paragaph from which the above was quoted.)

Workers' paradise

Average number of vacation days in France 39, Germany 27, Netherlands 25, Great Britain 23, Canada 20, U.S. 12. (According to MSN)

We live in a great country as long as we don't consider people who work for wages and the poor.

Bird Flu (there is a vaccine)

There's a lot of discussion this morning about Bird Flu. Sanofi Pasteur says it is producing a vaccine (not developing, but producing) in accord with a $100 million government contract. The contract also is for storing the vaccine.

Lyon, France and Swiftwater, PA (USA) – [September 15, 2005] – Sanofi pasteur, the vaccines business of the sanofi-aventis Group (NYSE: SNY), has entered into an agreement with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to produce doses of a vaccine to help protect against the H5N1 influenza virus strain, the so-called avian strain. Scientists believe the H5N1 strain could become the cause of a global influenza pandemic.

The contract is another major effort by sanofi pasteur to support efforts in both the U.S. and Europe to prepare the world for the possibility of an influenza pandemic.

The $100 million contract calls for sanofi pasteur to manufacture the vaccine in bulk concentrate form at its U.S. headquarters in Swiftwater, PA from early September through late October. The agreement provides for additional fees to be paid to sanofi pasteur for storage of the vaccine as well as for formulation and filling of the vaccine upon government request.

Here's a link to the complete press release

The real fun of a pandemic will begin when there is not enough vaccine for everyone, but an effective vaccine for the chosen few.

Natural gas

Brace yourself for the winter.

Soon another distinction between us and them will be who has warm houses and who doesn't. Prices for heat and gasoline are going to really hurt the many of us that live close to the margin. The paragraphs below are from The New York Times, "Natural Gas Prices Set Record, Pointing to Costly Winter" Linked here. Via Atrios

Natural gas prices set a new record today, presaging higher heating bills for a majority of Americans this winter as well as soaring costs for industrial manufacturers of such products as plastics and chemicals...

...Americans will pay an average of $400 more for their natural gas this winter than last year, with average bills jumping to $1,130, according to estimates by the Department of Energy. These estimates, however, might prove too low and are likely to get updated when the government issues its winter outlook next month.

Also, take a look at Shakespeare's Sister.

Snookered again

The only way the Democrats are going to find what it takes to resist Bush's nominees, both stealth and overt wingnuts, is if the nominee comes to the hearings in an SS uniform and is led in on a leash by Pat Robertson.

We are going to pay for this appointment for a long time.

Voted against Roberts (all Democrats)

Akaka, Hawaii
Bayh, Ind.
Biden, Del.
Boxer, Calif.
Cantwell, Wash.
Clinton, N.Y.
Corzine, N.J.
Dayton, Minn.
Durbin, Ill.
Feinstein, Calif.
Harkin, Iowa
Inouye, Hawaii
Kennedy, Mass.
Kerry, Mass.
Lautenberg, N.J.
Mikulski, Md.
Obama, Ill.
Reed, R.I.
Reid, Nev.
Sarbanes, Md.
Schumer, N.Y.
Stabenow, Mich.

Voted for Roberts (Democrats only, plus Jeffords)

Baucus, Mont.
Bingaman, N.M.
Byrd, W.Va.
Carper, Del.
Conrad, N.D.
Dodd, Conn.
Dorgan, N.D.
Feingold, Wis.
Johnson, S.D.
Kohl, Wis.
Landrieu, La.
Leahy, Vt.
Levin, Mich.
Lieberman, Conn.
Lincoln, Ark.
Murray, Wash.
Nelson, Fla.
Nelson, Neb.
Pryor, Ark.
Rockefeller, W.Va.
Salazar, Colo.
Wyden, Ore.
Independent: Jeffords, Vt.

Big fishes

Here's a quote from the blog, Talk Left, that gives a little insight into how the insider's operate. Talk Left's Jeralyn Merritt, quoted below, is a TV lawyer and her blog is usually terrific. I visit it every day. But in this case, since her friend is defending Delay, she announces she's going to "stop slamming Delay" because his lawyer is her friend.

Dick (Houston's Dick DeGuerin) has also been a very good friend of mine for 20 years. You may remember him as David Koresh's lawyer in WACO, or Kay Bailey Hutchinson's lawyer, or the lawyer (along with Chip Lewis) who got Robert Durst acquitted of murder even though he admitted hacking up the body.

That means I'll be reporting the news on the case and analyzing it legally, but I won't be slamming DeLay any more. Sorry, folks, but loyalty is loyalty. Just thought I'd be up front about it.

Link to the Talk Left post

This is a completely clear expression of how things work up there in the stratosphere, where principles and a person’s record, even a despicable one, are subordinate to relationships. Take this a few steps farther and you understand what Congress is all about and you gain insight into a major reason why the mainstream media is so gentle on the nutbag righties. At the end of the day, when the TV talk show shouting matches and the Senate debates are over, they all go out for cocktails and back slaps together and eat little pastry fishes in the rich wood tinted gloom of the coolest bar in town.

We need to think long and hard about who “we” are and who “they” are.

Cost of gas

Hit by rising gasoline prices, a record percentage of credit-card accounts were delinquent in the second quarter, the American Bankers Association reported Wednesday.

The ABA found that the 4.81 percent of credit-card accounts had payments that were past due by 30 days or more between April and June. That's up from 4.76 percent in the first quarter, which was the previous record. The ABA started tracking delinquencies in 1973.

The ABA also noted an increase in delinquent payments on personal loans, auto loans, home equity loans and lines of credit.

Link, from CNN Money

This is just the first hint of a dust cloud on the horizon, not yet arrived, but we know it is coming.

Adjustable rate mortgages on the rise and higher fuel and heating costs put the vice grips to the working classes, many of whom commute long distances to work in areas where they could not afford to live. The insatiable right wing business leaders must have seen this coming when they, and their acquiescent Democratic allies, rammed through the bankruptcy bill to make sure they would be able to wring every last cent from catastrophically indebted families. Most of these people are worn to the bone already by long commutes and fear of losing their jobs through downsizing, refusing to sleep with the boss, being late because of one too many times caught in stalled traffic, exploding in the face of a vicious and unreasonable supervisor (also afraid for his/her job), and whatever and when you take their credit away and make imminent the threat of losing a home, who knows what can happen.

Take away all the small perks, the credit, the lifelines to security and the dreams of owning, keeping and retiring in a home, in short all the things that generate a vested interest in the status quo, in a stable society, and contrast this drastically reduced sense of well being with the well publicized, ever growing, extraordinary wealth of the bandit plutocrats and you begin to assemble the ingredients for chaos.

You would think these pricks could overcome their greed with a little foresight and recognize that more prosperous, more secure middle and working classes would ensure stability and the longevity of their own privileged positions. You'd think they'd let a little more trickle down so we all could keep a comfortable few steps ahead of the monthly bills.

Caption

"Encouraging dissent is a good way of finding out who the traitors are."

New Yorker cartoon caption, October 3, 2005 edition, page 75.

Stick up

The twit Michael Brown was not competent to be head of FEMA. But as a fall guy, he’s a star. There is no shit he will not eat for the boss. He delivers his end, first by resigning and taking some of the heat as the disaster unfolds, thus diverting attention from dysfunctional Bush and the distracted Cheney. Second, he delivers by going before Congress and pinning the failure on the local Democrats and is further rewarded with a consultant’s job. No amount of humiliation is too much for this toady to swallow. He steps right up there, lies and spits out the script as it was written for him.

This is corruption almost too blatant to be believed; almost too obviously stupid to think for a moment they could get away with it. It has the same lack of sophistication as most of Rove’s heavy handed schemes and that is why it works, not totally, but just enough for minimal cover. Rove’s success is largely due to his uncanny or fortuitous ability to never over estimate the idiocy of the American public or the effectiveness of the Democratic Senators by feeding them too complicated a scam. Brown's rebirth (and the NO corporate payoff) is no more complicated than a liquor store stick up.

What a fucking country.

Beat

I liked this quite a bit, from Now or Never

If I could un-ring certain bells and un-wind time I would, but can’t, so instead, I'll just ride this bucket of bones till the wheels fly off; till ball-joints grind and drop from sockets; till this xylophone of ribs riffs the music of the spheres; until my funny bone tells it's last joke; till my shoulder blades cleave the universe in two and find the nut within; until I'm hipper than both hips and happier; till I'm savvy at last, slicker than elbow grease, and mute as a smart metatarsal; until I'm wiser than a thought-stuffed skull; until I knee-cap my inner sonofabitch to stop his useless jawin' so I can hear one clear day resound off tiny anvils and ride the lyrical looped song of a backyard bird round Lew Welch's ring of bone. Instead…

I'll just splint what needs splinting right here at home.

N. Martancik, Poet/Orthopedist

And I followed the link in the above post and came to this poem by Lew Welch

Ring of Bone

I saw myself
a ring of bone
in the clear stream
of all of it

and vowed
always to be open to it
that all of it
might flow through

and then I heard
"ring of bone" where
ring is what a

bell does

Lew Welch, Ring of Bone, Collected Poems 1950-1971

If the shoe fits...

You can use other words, but when it comes to what's happening in the U.S. FASCISM works fine for me. Fascists have been here a long time, lurking just beneath the surface of public consciousness, building rage, resentments, taking names and writing lists. Of course fascists don't call themselves fascists. It's one of those names, like Shithead, that people don't give themselves. For many Americans this makes recognizing them difficult because it requires a little thought and application of some historical perspective. Some Americans, like some of the working class "sportsmen for bush" I see around here, don't even know they're wannabe brown shirt thugs, just itching to get even with someone for all their frustrations. For them to get it, you have to spell it out very slowly and even then most Bush fascists are so well programmed to respond to the hot key issues they wander off into anti something hate speech.


Below is a long quote from an article, "International Perspective, by Marshall Auerback" posted on The Prudent Bear that I found on Digby's Hullabaloo via The Sideshow. It clarifies fascism nicely. You can use the list as a crowbar to try and open some minds. You might want to copy the list and pass it around.

Without some guidance, true believers and collaborators, unfortunately, who read the list will likely think it describes a good thing.

The reconstruction of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama provides a fascinating picture of how the Bush administration actually works. His government represents an odd melding of corporatism and cronyism, more in tune with the workings of 1930s Italy or Spain. In fact, if one looks at fascist regimes of the 20th century, it is appears that the Bush administration draws more from these sources than traditional conservatism. Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining characteristics common to each:



1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.

2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.

3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.

4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.

5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.

6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.

7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.

8. Religion and Government are intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.

9. Corporate Power is protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.

10. Labor Power is suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.

12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.

13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

14. Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

(Source: The Fourteen Defining Characteristics of Fascism, Dr. Lawrence Britt, Spring 2003, Free Inquiry)

That list about says it, doesn't it? If you want to learn more about fascists in America you can follow the links above and you can visit David Neiwert's Orcinus. He's got the subject well covered.

Mercenaries

In case you were wondering where the Blackwater loyalties lie, loyalties beneath the guns for hire agenda, check out this article in the current issue of The Nation. A link is at the bottom.

Blackwater's success in procuring federal contracts could well be explained by major-league contributions and family connections to the GOP. According to election records, Blackwater's CEO and co-founder, billionaire Erik Prince, has given tens of thousands to Republicans, including more than $80,000 to the Republican National Committee the month before Bush's victory in 2000. This past June, he gave $2,100 to Senator Rick Santorum's re-election campaign. He has also given to House majority leader Tom DeLay and a slew of other Republican candidates, including Bush/Cheney in 2004. As a young man, Prince interned with President George H.W. Bush, though he complained at the time that he "saw a lot of things I didn't agree with--homosexual groups being invited in, the budget agreement, the Clean Air Act, those kind of bills. I think the Administration has been indifferent to a lot of conservative concerns."

Link

Mr. Prince is also described as a staunch, right-wing Christian.

The Nation article also introduces us to blacker water mercenary organizations also at work in New Orleans: Instinctive Shooting International (ISI), described as "veterans of Israeli special task forces", Body Guard and Tactical Security (BATS) and others.

Politics Test

Take the politics test.

http://www.okcupid.com/politics

I came out lower right in the lower right quadrant, a Socialist, to no one's surprise.

Though in charge, Rove splits

Senator Lautenberg is troubled by Rove, "White House Point Man" on the Katrina disaster, who will be giving a speech to Republicans in North Dakota when Rita is scheduled to hit. (Thanks to America Blog)

Quite a leader Mr. Chubby Bunnypants is, isn't he.

Dear President Bush:

The assignment of your Deputy Chief of Staff, Karl C. Rove, as the lead White House official for disaster coordination and recovery efforts raises troubling questions given his partisan political background.

As all know, Hurricane Rita is bearing down on the Gulf Coast even as the nation reels from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. It would be expected that Mr. Rove would be at his post "24/7" during this crisis.

However, as unlikely as it might seem, we have learned that Mr. Rove will be traveling to North Dakota to engage in political fundraising activities. When this fearsome hurricane makes landfall on Saturday, Mr. Rove will be delivering a political speech to the North Dakota Republican Party, and will be featured as a special guest at a fundraising dinner.

I respectfully urge you to remind Mr. Rove of his responsibilities as the coordinator of relief and recovery efforts, and direct him to keep his attention focused on this critical job. There will be plenty of time for fundraising, but for now, putting lives back together and rebuilding communities must take priority over building political war chests.

Sincerely,

Frank R. Lautenberg

Link From Senator Lautenberg's web site.

Bush still a drunk

The Sideshow today has this interesting catch from the National Enquirer that says Bush is drinking again. According to the article, Laura caught him throwing down a "Texas-sized shot" of booze to cope with the stress of Katrina.

Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. Any ex drunk would tell you he's probably been drinking all along. At least that's a more credible explantion than the goofy choked on a pretzel account and would also explain the bike accidents. He may be barely functional, which is probably a good thing.

Gore won, Carter says

Jimmy Carter said Gore won, according to The Raw Story.

We all know this already, except for Republicans and the mainstream media. But it's comforting to hear a real president say it.

Here's the first three paragraphs:

Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter delivered a shocker at an American University panel in Washington Monday: RAW STORY has learned he told the crowd he was certain Al Gore won the 2000 presidential election.

There is "no doubt in my mind that Gore won the election," the erstwhile President declared, saying the 2000 election process "failed abysmally."

He also snubbed the Supreme Court for getting involved, saying it was "highly partisan."

Link

Now, if Bill Clinton could tear himself away from his new pal, Bush the first, maybe he could put his two cents in as well.

Plame Bolton

Arianna Huffington says the Plamegate investigation may be moving closer to UN Ambassador Bolton. Arianna gives us a peek into the inner workings of the Cheney sect of administration insiders. She introduces a CIA agent who, wearing two hats, also works for Bolton. The agent, Fred Fleitz, is a direct conduit of information from the CIA to Bolton who, of course, uses it to discredit rivals, settle scores and advance the Cheney agenda. This is, of course, Cheney’s crew and a dirtier bunch you could not find.

Sometimes I wonder how Cheney and his thugs so confidently circumvent the rules, ethics and morality to advance their own crackpot agendas. Are they true believers? Are they simply cynical and greedy? Is the goal really to simply move all the money from the working and middle class to the privileged plutocrats and take control of the world's energy? But then I come to my senses. I stop wondering and start trying to focus on how funny they are this cadre of bitter men simply driven by meanness itself dressed up as a grand scheme.

Cheney is a flabby, squishy muscled veteran of years of shuffling papers and resentfully sucking up to the top. It’s his time now and it is easy to imagine him hidden away with a list of enemies and scores to settle. It is even funny to think that he confuses shooting hundreds of caged pheasants, released on command, with actual hunting and even funnier to imagine his Victorian style safaris, with pal Scalia, to the duck blind. Does someone carry Cheney? Or is he floated along on a little rubber barge?

The whole Cheney trip of telling secrets, undercutting rivals, ghoulishly hiding away in bunkers and blowing caged birds to kingdom come would all be an uproarious riot of pompous silliness if it didn’t involve real lives and the easily anticipated and avoided stumble into the disaster of war.

The goofiest thing is that after all these screw ups the myth of competence is still attached to Cheney and his crew. It must be the deep voice and that sinister hand rubbing thing he does. Or maybe it's the simpler truth: shit rises.

Maybe Fitzgerald will nail Bolton and the despicable Judith Miller and the world will begin to right itself.

Go read Arianna and trust your own suspicions of how close to the truth of the scene she really is.

Bird flu (again)

As if hurricanes and rising gas prices weren't enough Bird Flu is still simmering out there. Some say it is only a matter of time until it blossoms into a full epidemic.

Indonesia could soon face a bird flu epidemic, the health minister has warned, after the death of two young girls suspected of having the disease.

Link BBC World News (thanks to Kos)

Visit the flu wiki to stay informed about every aspect of Bird Flu. If there is a pandemic, this site may turn out to be the most useful on the internet. Getting acquainted with it now is a good move.

$5 a gallon?

Looks like we're being prepped for a big jump in gas prices following Rita's collision with Texas. The pattern seems to be: a giant price increase, attributed to disaster, followed by baby step decreases that are still much higher than the pre disaster rates. Now that we're comfortable with $3 a gallon, let's go for $5 and then drop back to $4.

Brace yourself.

Weather and energy experts say that as bad as Hurricane Katrina hit the nation's supply of gasoline, Hurricane Rita could be worse.

Katrina damage was focused on offshore oil platforms and ports. Now the greater risk is to oil-refinery capacity, especially if Rita slams into Houston, Galveston and Port Arthur, Texas.

"We could be looking at gasoline lines and $4 gas, maybe even $5 gas, if this thing does the worst it could do," said energy analyst Peter Beutel of Cameron Hanover. "This storm is in the wrong place. And it's absolutely at the wrong time," said Beutel.

Link (CNN Money)

Krugman

Here's a few paragraphs from yesterday's Krugman column, about Katrina and race, that caught my eye, followed by a link to the "unofficial" Krugman site. (Thanks to The Sideshow)

...But in a larger sense, the administration's lethally inept response to Hurricane Katrina had a lot to do with race. For race is the biggest reason the United States, uniquely among advanced countries, is ruled by a political movement that is hostile to the idea of helping citizens in need.

Race, after all, was central to the emergence of a Republican majority: essentially, the South switched sides after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Today, states that had slavery in 1860 are much more likely to vote Republican than states that didn't.

And who can honestly deny that race is a major reason America treats its poor more harshly than any other advanced country? To put it crudely: a middle-class European, thinking about the poor, says to himself, "There but for the grace of God go I." A middle-class American is all too likely to think, perhaps without admitting it to himself, "Why should I be taxed to support those people?"...


....Consider this: in the United States, unlike any other advanced country, many people fail to receive basic health care because they can't afford it. Lack of health insurance kills many more Americans each year than Katrina and 9/11 combined....

Link

Dead whistle blowers

Here's an interesting paragraph from Juan Cole's post on the 1 to 2 billion dollars recently discovered missing in Iraq.

...There is also the unsolved case of two US contractors who warned last fall of massive fraud in the ministry of defense. One wrote to Senator Rick Santorum about it, who in turn went to US SecDef Donald Rumsfeld. The contractors were driving near Taji when their car was rammed and then they were shot multiple times. Their personal effects were photographed and put up at a radical Salafi website. But then anyone can post to a website....

Link

These mercenaries are not the only people posing credible threats to the Cheney administration that have prematurely ended up dead. You can find a partial list at Bush Body Count.

Why there's no truth on TV

Here's a couple of paragraphs from a column about how and why big media echoes the Bush administration party line. The article details how the media shifted from blaming Bush for the Katrina mess to blaming local officials (except for Republican Governor Haley Barbour)as the White House spin machine regained control.

You know most of this already, but having it spelled out clearly will disgust you.

...If big media look like they’re propping up W’s presidency, they are. Because doing so is good for corporate coffers — in the form of government contracts, billion-dollar tax breaks, regulatory relaxations and security favors. At least that wily old codger Sumner Redstone, head of Viacom, parent company of CBS, has admitted what everyone already knows is true: that, while he personally may be a Democrat, “It happens that I vote for Viacom. Viacom is my life, and I do believe that a Republican administration is better for media companies than a Democratic one.”

When it comes to NBC’s parent company, GE’s No. 1 and No. 2, Jeffrey Immelt and Bob Wright, are avowed Republicans, as are Time Warner’s Dick Parsons (CNN) and News Corp.’s Rupert Murdoch (Fox News Channel). (Forget that Murdoch’s No. 2, Peter Chernin, and Redstone’s co–No. 2, Les Moonves, are avowed Democrats — it’s meaningless because Murdoch and Redstone are the owners.)...

Link

via Kos

Pensions, now you got one, now you don't

I'm opposed to capital punishment, but in this case, from today's NYT, it makes me wonder if I should be so certain. Here's Robert Miller, a corporate hero of the plutocracy who makes his living guiding companies to default on pension plans. Shed of it's huge pension obligations the troubled company now becomes an attractive acquisition target and is sold for huge windfalls for himself and other already rich fellow executives. Pockets stuffed with pension cash promised to retired workers, the insatiable, Grendel-like Mr. Miller moves on to another company to cancel pensions and cash in on the misery of loyal, long time employees.

Mr. Miller's actions should be a hanging offense.

Whoops! There Goes Another Pension Plan

ROBERT S. MILLER is a turnaround artist with a Dickensian twist. He unlocks hidden value in floundering Rust Belt companies by jettisoning their pension plans. His approach, copied by executives at airlines and other troubled companies, can make the people who rely on him very rich. But it may be creating a multibillion-dollar mess for taxpayers later.

As chief executive of Bethlehem Steel in 2002, Mr. Miller shut down the pension plan, leaving a federal program to meet the company's $3.7 billion in unfunded obligations to retirees. That turned the moribund company into a prime acquisition target. Wilbur L. Ross, a so-called vulture investor, snapped it up, combined it with four other dying steel makers he bought at about the same time, and sold the resulting company for $4.5 billion - a return of more than 1,000 percent in just three years on the $400 million he paid for all five companies.

The ghoulish Mr. Miller is still on the pension stealing job. Follow the link and see if your company is next in line.

Link

Zombies

The fiasco in the Gulf is causing many to see the true self of the naked emperor. Even the fascist staging of his silly speech in NO, the melodramatic but temporary lighting of the set and motorcade route, and the chicken strut across the lawn, turned goofy in the minds of any not yet brain dead long before they doused the lights, packed up the generators, returning NO to darkness, and flew away.

Except of course, for the ultra faithful. Billmon:

...The true Bush cultists are hanging in there, following every loop and corkscrew in the party line like a carload of zombies on a rollercoaster.

Link

Not much better are the sickenly ineffective Democrats who, handed a golden opportunity to mount a serious challenge, continue to act as if a critical whisper in the bathroom is real opposition and that compromises with the neo fascists are responsible government.

Just think about it. Karl Rove is in charge of rebuilding the Gulf coast with our money and we're standing for it quietly, acquiescent as zombies.

Gold rush 2

Atrios:

...Everything this admininstration touches turns to shit. $200 billion for the Gulf is going to be put in the hands of Karl Rove and a team of 22 year old Heritage foundation flunkies so they can proceed to hand it all over to powerful interests with no strings attached.

Link

Gold rush

Here’s how the Bush Gulf Coast recovery plan works.

First, push through a wage cut plan that lowers wages from the princely “prevailing rate” of $7 or $8 an hour to the federal minimum $5.15 per hour. Then, he makes sure his gluttonous corporate cronies, Halliburton, etc, get the lucrative contracts and, with the reduced labor expenses, they haul away obscene profits, all paid for by taxed Americans.

It's a gold rush, for Bush loyalists only.

The rebuilding of NO is turning into a fabulous scheme, looting by corporate plutocratic insiders on a mind bending, near mythic scale. It is unbelievable and so blatantly obscene, right in the faces of the cowardly Democrats that it seems the Bush crime family has abandoned any pretenses of propriety, legality, ethics, and morality. If we were not all paying for it and if innocent poor people were not suffering because of it, the Bush program of institutionalized looting would be a wonder to behold.

Bush/Cheney and their corporate coconspirators have simply accumulated so much power, so successfully intimidated and co-opted the media and the Democrats that they can operate as flagrantly as they please.

This is the new face of fascism, unmasked thuggery and raw greed arm in arm with crazy Christian fundamentalism, military adventurers and Blackwater mercenaries. Get used to it. They aren’t going anywhere and there is no effective opposition.

I’ll post more later (I have to work) but if you want to follow the gold rush closely, just go over to Josh Marshall.

More storms, less Florida

Storms with the power of Hurricane Katrina are becoming more common, in part because of global warming, according to a report from a team of researchers that will be published Friday.

Link New York Times

A record loss of sea ice in the Arctic this summer has convinced scientists that the northern hemisphere may have crossed a critical threshold beyond which the climate may never recover. ...

...The greatest fear is that the Arctic has reached a "tipping point" beyond which nothing can reverse the continual loss of sea ice and with it the massive land glaciers of Greenland, which will raise sea levels dramatically.

Link The Independent on line

Bird flu vaccine

Mass production of a new vaccine that promises to protect against bird flu is poised to begin, as the government on Thursday agreed to stockpile $100 million worth of inoculations.

The new contract with French vaccine maker Sanofi-Pasteur marks a major scale-up in U.S. preparation for the possibility that the worrisome virus could spark an influenza pandemic.

link

Some people, either with more foresight, or more paranoia than I have, are stockpiling Tamiflu purchased via websites, mostly in Canada.

We are overdue for a pandemic, which, given the population densities and global interactions, could spread more rapidly than ever before. The goverment clearly believes, $100 million worth, there is a real threat.

Eisenhower speech, 1961

Now's a good time to be reminded of Eisenhower's military industrial complex speech. I am old enough to remember when this speech was given, though not wise enough then to appreciate its importance. Too bad we seem to have forgotten it.

Here's a few paragraphs from Eisenhower.

...This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together....

The rest is here.

One more thing. Here's a quote from Bush, from Josh Marshall:

"It is now clear that a challenge on this scale requires greater federal authority and a broader role for the armed forces - the institution of our government most capable of massive logistical operations on a moment's notice."

(edit. The Bush quote is not in the New York Times transcript, likely released before the speech. It is in the MSNBC version which is probably a transcript of the actual speech as it was delivered. It is in the middle of the paragraph, six up from the bottom of page 4, that begins, hilariously, "I also want to know all the facts...")

It gets worse

Could Bush/Cheney have done anything more offensive than putting the despicable Karl Rove in charge of rebuilding NO? Well, yes he could. He is also awarding the reconstruction and recovery contracts to corporations run by his cronies in the plutocracy. As Josh Marshall says this evening:

Let's all be clear about one thing.

As we suggested last night, and as President Bush has now put us on notice, the Gulf Coast reconstruction effort is going to be run as a patronage and political operation.

That's not spin or hyperbole. They're saying it themselves.

BAGnewsNotes (a reiteration)

Earlier ("Anybody in charge?" two posts down) I posted a link to BAGnewsNotes. A while ago I went back to the site and wandered around. It's an interesting place, great images and analysis, and very much worth a visit.

Maher

I don't know where he found this but Eric Alterman attributes it to Bill Maher

Mr. President, this job can't be fun for you any more. There's no more money to spend--you used up all of that. You can't start another war because you used up the army. And now, darn the luck, the rest of your term has become the Bush family nightmare: helping poor people. Listen to your Mom. The cupboard's bare, the credit cards maxed out. No one's speaking to you. Mission accomplished.

Now it's time to do what you've always done best: lose interest and walk away. Like you did with your military service and the oil company and the baseball team. It's time. Time to move on and try the next fantasy job. How about cowboy or space man? Now I know what you're saying: there's so many other things that you as President could involve yourself in. Please don't. I know, I know. There's a lot left to do. There's a war with Venezuela. Eliminating the sales tax on yachts. Turning the space program over to the church. And Social Security to Fannie Mae. Giving embryos the vote.

But, Sir, none of that is going to happen now. Why? Because you govern like Billy Joel drives. You've performed so poorly I'm surprised that you haven't given yourself a medal. You're a catastrophe that walks like a man. Herbert Hoover was a shitty president, but even he never conceded an entire city to rising water and snakes.

On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon and the City of New Orleans. Maybe you're just not lucky. I'm not saying you don't love this country. I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side.

So, yes, God does speak to you. What he is saying is: 'Take a hint.'

Anybody in charge?

Go to Bagnewsnotes and check out the photos and accompanying analysis. You might as well get some sardonic amusement out of your halfwit, psychopathic president.

The "out takes" (by which I mean, the wire photos that didn't circulate widely because they weren't as "fit" as Mannie's) suggest even more, however. Bush's expression in this home run photo by AP's Susan Walsh might turn out to be one of the more revealing portraits of the Bush presidency. Sadly, it is reminiscent of the "My Pet Goat" photo taken on the morning of 9/11. In this case, however, the "Oh my God" is replaced with a look of "What the hell do you expect me to do about it?" Clearly, its a rare glimpse of Bush without the mask, or the script, or the teleprompter, or the Rove or Cheney, or the transmitter -- and he knows it. ...

...On the other hand, it is much harder to take the President's posturing at face value when you can see evidence of the stage and the actor, one pose after another. At that point, you can see that this is simply a photo shoot, and the President, rather than being somebody at this critical moment, is trying to look like someone instead.

Thanks to Digby

No surprise

Senate kills bid for Katrina commission

Senate Republicans on Wednesday scuttled an attempt by Sen. Hillary Clinton to establish an independent, bipartisan panel patterned after the 9/11 Commission to investigate what went wrong with federal, state and local governments' response to Hurricane Katrina.

Cheney again

Here's a story, "Power crews diverted Restoring pipeline came first", from the Hattiesburg American.

Shortly after Hurricane Katrina roared through South Mississippi knocking out electricity and communication systems, the White House ordered power restored to a pipeline that sends fuel to the Northeast.
That order - to restart two power substations in Collins that serve Colonial Pipeline Co. - delayed efforts by at least 24 hours to restore power to two rural hospitals and a number of water systems in the Pine Belt....
"We were led to believe a national emergency was created when the pipelines were shut down," Compton said.

...White House call

Dan Jordan, manager of Southern Pines Electric Power Association, said Vice President Dick Cheney's office called and left voice mails twice shortly after the storm struck, saying the Collins substations needed power restored immediately.

Jordan dated the first call the night of Aug. 30 and the second call the morning of Aug. 31. Southern Pines supplies electricity to the substation that powers the Colonial pipeline....

Article found via Josh Marshall, Talking Points Memo.

There are so many fascinating implications suggested by this call from Cheney; Josh Marshall covers many. If true, Cheney clearly was monitoring the storm and its aftermath and chose to intervene where it suited him and to ignore any other situations (like a drowning city) that didn't. It suggests what we all know anyway, that Cheney is the real power ("President Cheney" as Billmon insists) and he is constantly keeping his eye on what matters to his branch of the plutocracy, and so on. I'm sure your imagination on this one is as good as mine.

More on NO mercenaries

Why do we need combat ready mercenaries in a disaster area? Is it appropriate for the government to use them to counter civil unrest in the U.S.?

In general the growth of the mercenary industry is unsettling, perhaps ominous, especially for a boderline paranoid like me who believes the current government, that does not appear to have any respect for the Constitution, will do anything to preserve their power. When it becomes clear that they stole the last elections and will steal the next and people get very pissed off when they realize it, will it be Republican hired mercenaries that squash unrest and protect the process of election fraud?

Heavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for their work in Iraq, are openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans. Some of the mercenaries say they have been "deputized" by the Louisiana governor; indeed some are wearing gold Louisiana state law enforcement badges on their chests and Blackwater photo identification cards on their arms. They say they are on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and have been given the authority to use lethal force....

Two men we spoke with said they plan on returning to Iraq in October. But, as one mercenary said, they've been told they could be in New Orleans for up to 6 months. "This is a trend," he told us. "You're going to see a lot more guys like us in these situations." ...

complete article from here, via the Side Show

Intimidation

If you criticize these guys they always make sure you become a public example of what happens if you do. Dr. Ben Marble, after saying “Fuck you Mr. Cheney,” was handcuffed and detained for a short time. And,

A state agency lawyer quoted in a nationally-circulated news story as questioning Karl Rove's eligibility to vote in Kerr County is out of a job and feeling twice burned.

Elizabeth Reyes said she was fired Tuesday as an attorney in the elections division of the Texas secretary of state's office because she appeared in a Washington Post story Saturday about the presidential adviser....

from here via Whatever already.

Where's Dick? (2)

Speculation has not ended about the whereabouts of Cheney at the start of the Katrina mess. Why wasn't he put in front of the cameras earlier? Are he and Bush no longer pals? Nora Ephron poses the questions and provides some answers.

And in case you need to be reminded about how important Cheney is, (from the same Ephron post)

It’s always been clear to me that five years ago, when all those Republican guys got together and realized that George Bush could be elected president – and that he wasn’t remotely capable – they came to an understanding: they would walk him through it. I’m sure it seemed like a swell idea, especially because it meant that they’d be in a perfect position to convince him to do all sorts of exciting things they had always wanted to do.

Cheney was the point man. Cheney was the guy they put on Meet the Press. Cheney was the person who seemed always to be the first responder. Cheney was the official they put into the bunker last May when a plane flew too close to the White House; Bush, who was bicycling in Maryland, wasn’t even told about the episode until forty minutes after it was over. Even Laura Bush, who was in the bunker with Cheney, publicly questioned the decision to keep the President in the dark.

But if you look at the chart in Sunday's New York Times, which tells you who was where when Katrina struck, Cheney doesn’t even get a listing. It’s Bush, Chertoff, Brown. Bush I and Bill Clinton were summoned to help. But Cheney didn’t even turn up back in Washington until last week, when he was sent off for a day of spouting platitudes while touring the flood zone.

Via Talk Left

Ethnic cleansing

While residents are having their guns seized 150 or more armed Blackwater mercenaries are on the job in NO. You can be sure they are not there to protect the poor or rescue impoverished victims. They are there to protect individuals wealthy enough to afford them, to protect corporate assets and probably to protect the private, Bush crony and Halliburton affiliated companies selected by Cheney, Inc. for lucrative cleanup and reconstruction contracts.

How is it that Blackwater operatives get to have guns and citizens don't?

Blackwater’s presence disturbs me. Few presences would frighten me more than 150 armed mercenaries operating in my neighborhood who answer only to Republican paymasters. In fact, I don’t know whether I would be more frightened by efficient Blackwater mercenaries or mobs of disorganized looters.

Come to think of it, with the Abu Ghraib tortures in mind and a government that flagrantly holds people indefinitely, without charges, without trials, in Guantanamo, I don’t think I’d be too happy to see combat armed U.S. troops marching down my road either. I don’t trust them anymore.

In NO it seems people are being removed from their homes, reportedly sometimes at gun point and shipped out without being told where they are going. Think of it. You’re yanked from your house in NO (which may even be on dry land) and put on a plane and when you land, you find out you’re in Utah without money and with no way to reach relatives who might have been deported to Texas. You have no idea how the hell you’re going to get home or if home itself will be there when you get back. In a strange place, with no money, are you really free to leave the "shelter"? Or, are you a prisoner?

Personally, unless my house was under water, I think I'd prefer to stay home and risk disease, looters, fire and whatever, than entrust my well being and the security of my property to mercenaries and the feds. If my house was under water, I would prefer to take my chances getting out alone. I'd rather rely on the kindness of strangers than the good will of the authorities that are responsible for this mess. I would not willingly leave my dogs behind.

Once NO is emptied of residents, who is going to look out for the interests of the poor, now concentrated in distant camps? Who will object if part of the reconstruction by the Bush favored companies is to bulldoze the poor neighborhoods while restoring the business base and the neighborhoods of the wealthy?

If the impoverished, largely black population of NO is removed and conditions created that make it impossible for them to return, is that Ethnic Cleansing?

Link to Blackwater article.

Link to Military dictatorship article

More Cafferty

Here's some more from CNN's Jack Cafferty. I lifted the lengthy quote entirely from Atrios's Eschaton blog.

Somewhere along the way FEMA became a dumping ground for the president's political cronies with little experience in disaster relief. The agency's first director was Joe Albaugh. He was president Bush's 2000 campaign chairman. Albaugh brought in the current failure Michael Brown. His previous work was with Arabian horses. The number two guy, Brown's top deputy at FEMA, is a fellow named Patrick Rhode. He worked for the 2000 election campaign. The number 3 guy at FEMA is Brooks Altshuler. He used to work in the White House. His job was planning presidential trips. FEMA's long term recovery director is a guy named Scott Morris. He produced television and radio commercials for the Bush campaign. The federal agency charged with handling national emergencies is staffed at the very top by a bunch of political hacks with virtually no experience that qualifies them to respond to something like Katrina. But I digress.

...

Where are the qualifications of these people? None of these guys is qualified based on the stuff I'm reading, to head up an emergency management agency. One of these guys worked with Arabian horses, The rest are all off the campaign trial. Planned presidential trips. Produced TV commercials. Don't you need somebody at the top running the organization who has some semblance of an idea of what the hell is required when there's an emergency?

Katrina truth

Here’s a link to an account of an extraordinary Katrina odyssey that vividly conveys the truth of the NO mess. Do not miss reading this. It is the complete account, linked by Billmon, and referred to in the previous post.

Paramedics'journey: "Hurricane Katrina-Our Experiences"

on edit, here's a new link the one above no longer works. And if this one doesn't work, this site is also carrying the story: The Socialist Worker on line

Go fuck yourself Mr. Cheney

Crooks and Liars has the "go fuck yourself Mr. Cheney" tape.

Billmon, at The Whiskey Bar, has some informative comments and quotes about working class "heroes and sheroes" and the racial divide in NO.

Repression

The feds, with too much too late, are now occupying nearly every inch of NO and are tightly controlling the media, prohibiting, for example, photos of dead bodies. This is a typical move of a repressive government. Even the traditionally responsible Josh Marshall says so

Take a moment to note what's happening here: these are the marks of repressive government, which mixes inefficiency with authoritarianism. The crew that couldn't get key aid on the scene last week is coming in in force now and taking as one of its key missions cutting public information about what's happening in the city.

This is a domestic, natural disaster. Absent specific cases where members of the press would interfere or get in the way of some particular clean up operation or perhaps demolition work there is simply no reason why credentialed members of the press should not be able to cover everything that is happening in that city.

Think about it.

Talking Points Memo

Mother

Here's what Barbara Bush said, while touring the Astrodome.

What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overhwlemed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this (chuckle)--this is working very well for them.

From Atrios. If you read the entire post, there is also the transcript of an editorial (rant) from Olbermann

Hacks

FEMA Director Michael Brown got his job as a political patronage position, with no relevant experience and the last item on his resume getting fired from a job as a manager of horse shows. Last year he was caught giving out FEMA money as political pork with an eye to the 2004 elections. But that shouldn't surprise since people who get hired as part of patronage operations do their jobs as part of the patronage operation. That's the idea.

from this post by Josh Marshall

Front of the line

At one point Friday, the evacuation was interrupted briefly when school buses pulled up so some 700 guests and employees from the Hyatt Hotel could move to the head of the evacuation line — much to the amazement of those who had been crammed in the Superdome since last Sunday.

"How does this work? They (are) clean, they are dry, they get out ahead of us?" exclaimed Howard Blue, 22, who tried to get in their line. The National Guard blocked him as other guardsmen helped the well-dressed guests with their luggage.

AP via Yahoo News

Cheney

Cheney continues to be on vacation in Wyoming.

New Orleans blogger

Here's a link to a live blogger in New Orleans. To get a sense of it, it is a good idea to go to the bottom of the page and hit "previous" until you get to the first entry, right before the storm hits, and read through to this morning's entry.

Who can we invade?

The Bush administration has only one gear when it comes to disaster response: create a target, attach blame and attack.

With Katrina, no target could be blamed, thus no action.

Bad news, good coverage

Steve Gilliard, The News Blog, is providing a good roundup of news coverage of New Orleans. (scroll down)

Barber adds more wind

Professional blowhard, political hack and, unfortunately for Mississippi, Governor Haley Barber on CNN this morning said people had ample warning to evacuate New Orleans, and elsewhere, but chose to stay, thus completely ignoring the obvious fact that many people, the poorest people, and the sickest, had no means to evacuate.

Barber also said the Feds were doing a great job. Like most of today’s Republicans, when the facts are uncomfortable Barber resorts to lies.

At least, for once, a CNN interviewer (Miles O’Brien) pressed him.

Atrios asks, this morning, if anyone in the administration is competent enough to run even a lemonade stand and links to this, from Gilliard

My touchstone for this disaster is last winter’s ice storm that left me powerless for four miserable days. No heat. Flushed the toilets with stream water hauled up in buckets. Filled the small generator that kept the sump pumps running in two houses every three hours. No running water. It was miserable and cold and I felt very helpless. I can’t imagine sitting on a roof for days in hot sun and nights without water, night and day with mosquitoes, hoping for help, trying to decide whether to risk wading out or staying.

The feds lack of effective response is unforgivable. Before Bush took the helm I thought if it had to, the U.S military could move mountains on very short notice. All those fast little shallow draft boats for landing on beaches, squadrons of helicopters, huge trucks, big supply and hospital ships, bulldozers, giant airplanes stuffed with supplies, instant wireless communications networks…. I thought handling a disaster like this would be a cinch. Instead, we find ourselves doing no better than much poorer countries when faced with the tsunami.

Our helplessness should be an important wake up call. All we take for granted is on very fragile foundations and these foundations themselves are being left to rot or are willfully being whittled away by the nutcases in the White House.

Here’s a link to a Washington Post column, via Josh Marshall, that discusses the Bush gang’s trashing of FEMA, beginning in 2001.

Check out this story, "No one can say they didn't see it coming" by Sidney Blumenthal in Salon.

Everything Bush touches turns to shit.

I do not believe he gives a damn about what happens to the people of New Orleans.

We know where the National Guard is, but just what does Homeland Security do anyway?

I take instant access to information for granted. I sit here obsessively flipping from coverage to coverage, avoiding Bush, dodging the worst of hard hearted Paula and boot lick Wolf, and from time to time I have to remind myself that the people in New Orleans, with no TV’s, no phones, few radios, have no sense of the big picture of this disaster. Not that it would be a comfort, but I can’t help but think knowing water is everywhere and is going to be there for weeks would help people make good decisions about how best to survive. A cheap portable radio would be priceless.

I think there are an awful lot of people that are unaccounted for.

If families are separated, there is no way to find out who is alive, who is safe or where anyone is. Think of the heartache of that.

Get ready for the fuel crisis.

Haves leave. Have nots stay

When they give evacuation orders what do you suppose people do who don’t own automobiles or have enough money to buy tickets on public transportation?

Seems to me recent evacuations assume most people have cars or somehow can buy their way out. Looking at the videos from New Orleans it looks like there’s a lot of poor people that were stuck there. I guess the alternative for the largely invisible and rarely considered poor was walk to the Superdome.

Haves leave. Have nots stay.

Their ought to be a better way.

The Whisky Bar

Maybe it's the late hour, maybe it's too much time spent listening to blather, but tonight I read four of five posts at Billmon's The Whiskey Bar and was blown out of my socks by the insights and the skillful way they were presented. Go there, be amazed and be grateful Billmon's on our side.

Some lose, some win

Weapons labs, defense firms, and pundits who also have financial stakes in war-related venture funds and investments like James Woolsey clean up in times of low-trust and high-fear. If things go back to normal, these players lose. There is a zero-sum game underway where return to stability and normality is something that many in the Washington establishment will vigorously, though in nuanced and subtle ways, fight.

From Talking Points Memo (but not Marshall, from sub Clemons)

Secret truth you always knew

It is finally dawning on the Panglosses on the more centrist left that things are not what they seem. We do, in fact, live in a plutocracy; that the nuevo aristocrats in the media and government, Democrats and Republicans, are all in the same bed and conspiring to keep truth, wealth and power from you and me. It's for the good of the country, they tell themselves, when it is really for their own selfish interests. Hopefully this new realism showing up in posts by some of the super star leftist bloggers signals an awakening and raises some interesting questions. Is it at last a viable time for a third party to emerge? Should we oppose any and all insider candidates, Hillary and Biden, for example, and any other Democratic senators for that matter?

If you've been puzzled by the acquiescence of the Democratic Senators and the media, these two posts, Digby's (linked in the previous post) and The Tiny Revolution's will answer your questions, but not with answers you might wish to receive.

Here's a couple of paragraphs from A Tiny Revolution

...I grew up in the Washington area and went to school with lots of children of government and media types. Then I went to Yale, which is also full of such offspring. What I saw was that the corporate media—places like the New York Times, Washington Post, the networks, etc.—and government figures are blatantly, brazenly in bed with each other. And not just metaphorically; it's often literally true. There's Andrea Mitchell & Alan Greenspan; James Rubin & Christiane Amanpour; Judith Miller & a cast of thousands; and so on.

In any case, whoever they're shtupping, they share a mindset: the government and corporate media self-consciously see themselves as a governing elite that runs things hand in hand. That's why Nicholas Kristof is anxious that if the hoi polloi keep calling George Bush a liar, it may make America "increasingly difficult to govern."

From near the end of The Tiny Revolution's post:

...If you're not part of their little charmed circle, believe me, all your worst suspicions about them are true. They do think you're stupid. They do lie to you. They do hate and fear you. Most importantly, they think you can't be trusted with the things they know—because if you did know them, you'd go nuts and break America. ...

That would be their America. The America many of us live in is already broken.

Digby

Digby has a clear vision of what Washington and the press are all about. You should read it all.

Poetry

Sometimes you come across something that is just too good to let go by. Here's a post by someone looking at Van Gogh looking at the world. Pretty fine stuff.

A Hole in Vincent's Head

A special post.

Gas from coal

Here's something that might give pause to even the darkest views of the most hardened pessimists.

Montana's governor wants to solve America's rising energy costs using a technology discovered in Germany 80 years ago that converts coal into gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel.

The Fischer-Tropsch technology, discovered by German researchers in 1923 and later used by the Nazis to convert coal into wartime fuels, was not economical as long as oil cost less than $30 a barrel....

...Montana is "sitting on more energy than they have in the Middle East," Schweitzer told Reuters in an interview this week.

"I am leading this country in this desire and demand to convert coal into gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel. We can do it in Montana for $1 per gallon," he said.

"We can do it cheaper than importing oil from the sheiks, dictators, rats and crooks that we're bringing it from right now."

The governor estimated the cost of producing a barrel of oil through the Fischer-Tropsch method at $32, and said that with its 120 billion tons of coal -- a little less than a third of the U.S total -- Montana could supply the entire United States with its aviation, gas and diesel fuel for 40 years without creating environmental damage.

From here via Kos

American Legion

If you missed the American Legion's fascist like call for suppression of dissent you can go to Billmon and catch an interesting juxtaposition of their position today and their position when Clinton was facing the mess in Yugoslavia.

Needless to say, it's a 180 degree change of direction.

What's a blog?

One more point -- people fundamentally misunderstand this medium. Blog writing isn't like any other kind of writing. There are no drafts, no editors, no time buffers that allow for more careful consideration of the words used. So people latch on to posts and say, "oh, if only these three words weren't used, then this post would've been fine". That's not how this medium works. It's raw. It's immediate. And sometimes, that one "offending" word gets in. It's an occupational hazard, and one I'm comfortable with.

And ultimately, it's a package deal. You get the good and the bad.

from Kos

Nutcase mullah revealed to be lying weasel

Not only is Robertson a nutcase, blood thirsty fanatic, he also reveals himself to be a lying weasel.

"I didn't say 'assassination.' I said our special forces should 'take him out.' And 'take him out' can be a number of things, including kidnapping; there are a number of ways to take out a dictator from power besides killing him. I was misinterpreted by the AP [Associated Press], but that happens all the time," Robertson said on "The 700 Club" program.

Here's what Robertson said Monday:

"If he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think we really ought to go ahead and do it," said Robertson on Monday's program. "It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war."

Both quotes from CNN

Dumb

Digby (Hullabloo) sums it all up very nicely and indirectly helps me understand the phenomenon of "Sportsmen for Bush." Armed with Digby's analysis and given what I know about Americans, I won't be surprised if they win it all next time without even having to fix the election.

From the Digby link:

I keep hearing that the beltway insiders have their money on George Allen to be the Republican nominee in 2008. I assume it is because he is just as stupid as George W. Bush....

...The Republicans have determined that they do better with nominees who make their constituents believe they are smart enough to be president. It's the right's version of the self-esteem movement.

George Allen is an extremely dumb guy. Really dumb. Awesomely dumb.

Who do we have that's dumb enough to beat him?

I've been trying to think of a way to make this simple little point for quite a while. Maybe I'm dumb enough to win some votes from people pleased to discover they are as smart as I am.

Christianity, right wing style

Here's an illuminating quote from Pat Robertson made today on the 700 Club broadcast, from Media Matters via Atrios.

You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he (Chavez, President of Venezuela) thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don't think any oil shipments will stop. But this man is a terrific danger and the United ... This is in our sphere of influence, so we can't let this happen. We have the Monroe Doctrine, we have other doctrines that we have announced. And without question, this is a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil, that could hurt us very badly. We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.

You good Christians might want to let us know where assassination fits into the gospels.

Y2K

Computerized voting machines and other instruments of voting for funsies are in place, or are about to be, even here in Pennsylvania.

Many Democrats continue to believe those presently running our country can be voted out of power. These Democrats will soon be energetically whirling around gathering votes and contributions as if votes will be fairly cast and honestly counted and we will all get sucked into particpating in the charade. Unfortunately, fair elections are not going to happen again. The Republican extremists have been in power long enough to perfect their vote fraud techniques and they do not intend to let go of control.

Maybe the reason Democrats choose not to face election theft issues is because they have no answers. Pretending there are no problems makes the issue go away for awhile. And, for those of us with no power whatsoever, but nonetheless looking eagerly forward to the next election, what fun it is to take polls with our blogs, have serious discussions about positions and imagine fantasy candidates cruising to victory, or to losses by respectable, better than anticipated margins, and oh what unbridled joy it is to pretend the loony nitwit Santorum is humbled in defeat and the freshly discovered Hackett celebrates a Senate victory in Ohio....

We better wake up.

Election 2000 was stolen, more coup than election. Election 2004 was also stolen, though more smoothly. The plain truth is: once in power fascists are difficult to dislodge.

Read Krugman.

Sweet dreams.

Bush supports Islamic Republic of Iraq.

It really doesn't get much nuttier than this, from Talk Left and, via link there, to Juan Cole.

In Iraq, the U.S. is now supporting formation of a fundamentalist Islamic state, like Iran and similar in function (though not in sect) to Taliban Afghanistan. This is not good news for Iraqi women, nor for secular Iraqis. Thanks to us, many Iraqis will be worse off without Saddam than they were with him.

Support for Bush has become support for a crazy Sharia governed state. I wonder how many Senators would have voted for the war if they were told it was being fought to establish a fundamentalist Islamic republic.

Bush will take anything that lets him get out of Iraq; anything that provides enough cover for him to call Iraq a democracy and say "mission accomplished". No doubt many Americans will admire these new clothes our naked emperor will wear, including many of our "centrist" Democrats. The Right will claim victory. Centrist Democrats will say "it's not a complete victory, but Saddam no longer threatens us and that is at least a small victory." And the decks will be cleared of Iraq and we will be off to more manageable invasions. Cuba for example, or better yet Venezuela, because it has oil and because Chavez pisses Cheney off.

If you are interested in keeping track of events in Iraq, the great Juan Cole is the best. After checking out Juan Cole, read a few of the also great Billmon's recent posts. Following these two bloggers keeps you on an easy path to being an expert. For informed takes on breaking news before it breaks, stick to Atios, Kos and Talk Left (see right margin). To gain wisdom while being entertained, go to Noutopia.

If you prefer to be a fool or simply well versed in the administration's positions, watch and believe CNN, FOX and the New York Times. That course will keep you brain dead.