American Realistan

This is America, the land of free speech - as long as it isn’t attempted on private property or intended to reach a disconnected public official. George W Bush likes to proclaim that America’s soldiers are fighting to protect our freedoms, and yet he and his administration officials are doing all that they can to limit or destroy these very rights. They are now again assaulting free speech rights.
Our nations soldiers do not surrender all of their citizenship rights when they enlist. They can still vote. They still have - with certain understandable and logical exceptions - most of their free speech rights. The Universal Code of Military Justice clearly defines the circumstances when their free speech rights don’t apply.

But that isn’t good enough for The Commander Guy. He has had one of his lackeys in the Pentagon - Robert L. Wilkie - issue “guidelines” restricting Congressional testimony to high-ranking officers and civilians appointed by President Bush.

The Pentagon has placed unprecedented restrictions on who can testify before Congress, reserving the right to bar lower-ranking officers, enlisted soldiers, and career bureaucrats from appearing before oversight committees or having their remarks transcribed, according to Defense Department documents.

He will fail in this attempt as he had every other in his life:

[V]eterans of the legislative process — who say they have never heard of such guidelines before — maintain that the Pentagon has no authority to set such ground rules. The guidelines would not affect congressional subpoenas, which can compel anyone to appear before lawmakers. As a result, several lawmakers have pledged privately to use that power if the Pentagon’s guidelines stymie their efforts to get information from specific sectors of the military.

His insane little world is falling apart.
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Earth to George the Commander Guy! There comes a time when that’s all you can stands, and you can’t stands no more! That time is now!

Just the other day, the US “Government” of Iraq was chided by the US “Government” of the US over plans to take two months off. “For the Iraqi parliament to take a two-month vacation in the middle of summer is impossible to understand,” said U.S. Ambassador in Iraq Ryan Crocker.

Let’s see - no power 99% of the time thanks to Shock & Awe, and summer in Baghdad being when it’s needed most as the temperatures reach 55 degrees Celcius (that’s 131 degress Fahrenheit for all of you Yellow Elephant Wimps-First-Class of the 101st Fighting Keyboards - hotter than Death Valley, Ca. ever got!) - now just WHY would a puppet deliberative body with many issues among themselves (and between them and their American petroleum Strombolis) decide that maybe it was time to seek a cooler clime? Have they forgotten that they have yet to finish passing that law which donates much of their known oil reserves to American companies? The nerve! How much higher do the oil companies need to raise the pump price of gas in the United States in order to stay in business long enough for those Baghdad Bagmen to see the light and do their duty for Texas and the Republican Party?

Sometimes the applied pressure proves to be excessive. Rather than give away their natural resources through legal chicanery before they took a break, the Iraqi Parliament instead passed a motion calling for the Yankees to go home.

It only took two years for the puppets to unstopper their ears and hear the voice of the Iraqi people!

Here’s what the Iraqi people had to say to their “government”:

For at least two years, poll after poll has shown that large majorities of Iraqis of all ethnicities and sects want the United States to set a timeline for withdrawal, even though (in the case of Baghdad residents), they expect the security situation to deteriorate in the short term as a result.

Maybe it’s time for George to cease nation building in Iraq and start nation rebuilding in the United States of America. But then rebuilding doesn’t appear to be in his plans. Immediately after releasing wanted-in-three-nations airplane bomber and hotel terror murderer Luis Posada Carriles (AKA “Terrorista Cubana”), Bush ordered federal agencies to plan for a surprise, “decapitating” attack.

Is the pressure from the Congressional investigations, and the increasing numbers of Republicans opposing his war plans, and many more openly calling for the impeachment decapitation of the Bush regime, finally getting to the Son King-ster?

Maybe! With 58% of Americans “personally wishing that George W. Bush’s presidency was over” and 39% of Americans wanting Bush and Cheney to be impeached, one cannot meekly submit to the will of those mere humans over which one rules triumphant! Better to give them a hot time in that quaint ol’ DC town and flash them out of His misery with a glorious atomic martyrdom!

Such an act of ‘terrism’ - decapitating the federal government by drowning it’s cradle in a bath of radioactive Hell - would give the Commander Guy all the justification he needs to stop pretending that he’s the leader of a democratic republic, and also would facilitate his transformation into the true world tyrant he was born to be. As was said in Blazing Saddles, he needs to demonstrate that “he’s just crazy enough to do it!” How else would anyone take his claim to solitary world rule seriously?

Besides - with even Latin American cocaine traffickers preferring the euro over the dollar, it’s time to grab total power and abandon plans of vast decadent wealth before the value of the buck stops lower than George’s approval rating.

Götterdämnitt!!!

NOTE: I didn’t create the post title. It comes from a song composed by Don Davis for the film The Matrix Revolutions. No connection between the song and my post is implied or intended. The song title just worked well for my post’s purposes.

“Nobody loves me but my mommie
- and she could be jivin’ me too!”

It’s hard for a Deciderer inside the Beltway these days, what with no one understanding why it was necessary to release wanted terrorist Luis Posada Carilles from custody after all those years of spouting voluminous aphorisms such as “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

As the book George claims to revere more than any other says, “Ye shall know them by their fruits” (Matt 7:16 )

And where is the respect for the Edjimikashun Predzidint? Not only is Kansas abandoning their rigid adherence to his treasured “Abstinence Is All You Need” program, but when George speaks in Latrobe, Pa. at the Benedictine-run Saint Vincent College, which is headed by his handmaiden, the former head of the White House Office of Faith-Based Initiatives program - Jim Towey - why, there will actually be a protest against George, the Commander Guy!

Has the National Guard forgotten how to deal with protesters? Oh, wait! They’re all in Iraq or Afghanistan, with the remaining few cleaning up Greensburg, Kansas right now. No time for predzidents!

And what of his ability to reach out to the American people for love and understanding? That seems not to be working too well right now either. Viewers are abandoning the “mainstream” media in droves, especially from the ill-considered Glenn Beck of Official Oval Office Offal Eater CNN. As a result, it’s so much harder to get the American people to see the necessity for the veto of the oil war funding bill, a vital act necessary for the White House to reverse the lie that his approval rating is emptier than a $4/gal. gas tank in a suburban Humvee.

But what of his inner circle of Bushies? They are True Red and loyal, aren’t they? Maybe not. At least 20 have abandoned him in the last six months worth of his hour of need. Few are banging on the front doors of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to apply for the many vacant positions for vacant partisan minds.

Will he be able to draw replacements from the business community from which most of them sprang? Not if the National Association of Manufacturers is any indication. David Sirota reports that the membership of said business group are tired of their leadership sucking Republican big toes like Dick Morris during a visit by the DC Madam’s girls, and want to pressure the Congress to cease “lobbyist-written trade policies” which are “hurting domestic manufacturers (aka. NAM members).” Money talks, and the Bushitter walks!

But is this not the group which contains the Havemores, George’s base? How could they be thinking of their own welfare at a time when their leader needs their assistance? It’s an outrage! It’s mutiny! Why, he should call out the Praetorian Guard, er, the military!

(Psssst! Don’t look now, George, but the retired generals are taking up the cause of those generals still on active duty, those who cannot act against you due to the oath they swore upon commission as officers. The retirees - Generals Wesley Clarke, John Batiste, and Paul Eaton - are buying media time for an ad campaign [Watch it!] intended to further erode public support for your failed oil war in order to save what remains of the American military. May the Freeway Blogger add this topic to his efforts to impeach George!!)

Don’t think George is completely without friends! There’s always the broad shoulder of Wealthy Texas to cry on. But as Jon Ponder of Pensito Review puts it, “There’s no hope George Bush will learn anything from his failed presidency.” Not even to rely upon crooked Texans like Tom DeLay, who will be too busy covering his own sorry hide to worry about George’s.

It’s a good thing George already knows how to pose with a guitar, for then we’ll all understand when he sings:

“Now you see why I act funny baby,
When I do the things I do”

Only we won’t be laughing.

[Abundant obsequious apologies to BB King for abusing his famous lyric for political purposes!]

I have a hard time listening to Republican blowhards who present themselves as the answer to all of our problems, so forcing myself to listen to the entire Republican debate took a lot of effort.One thing I have to note is that MSNBC sent up softball pitcher Chris Mathews over fireballer Brian Williams, who threw heat against the Democrats. If MSNBC had a real sense that presenting the news is much more important than making it, they would have the honesty to reverse the order and send up the softballer to moderate the Democrats and sic Williams on the Republicans. Then we might get a real sense of where the Republican candidatess stand on the issues.

As it stands, Brent Budowsky considered the debates “a waste”:

In neither debate did any of the candidates saying anything important, or memorable, or relevant to the outcome. What we heard, in the Democratic debate, and now the Republican debate, was a feast of gaseous emissions in a political discourse already too polluted. None of the Democrats were JFK; none of the Republicans were Reagan; none of this was a surprise; and none of it mattered either to the quality of our national discussion, the standings of the candidates, or the verdict of history, will which remember none of this.

We will not get that debate from a leadership class that is obsessed with the politics of its own advancement and lacks the courage, clarity and honor to make the hard decisions of life, death and blood that the situation urgently calls for, and our people urgently pray for.

I agree.

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A tisket, a tasket,
Impeachment if we ask it…

Two of my regular readers (they know who they are!) independently sent me certain details concerning Nancy Pelosi reversing her declaration that Impeachment was “off the table” due to the huge outcry to do so by the delegates to the California Democratic Convention.

This comes hard on the heels of Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s call for impeachment proceedings against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

Kucinich was supported by Mayors Rocky Anderson of Salt Lake City and John Shields of Nyack, NY; Washington State Senator Eric Oemig; Arcata [CA] City Councilman Dave Meserve; and former government officials, including Daniel Ellsberg; David MacMichael, a former analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency and a member of the steering committee of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity; and retired Army Colonel Ann Wright, a career diplomat who quit in protest the day the war began.

Much more on the flip side.

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The night after Bill Moyers’ hard-hitting expose of the compliant American mass media serving as the Ministry of Truth for the Promotion of Oil War, GOP-assets Brian Williams and MSNBC had the audacity to present a “debate” of the announced Democratic presidential candidates. The transcript of the debate is an interesting read, but one really should see the debate to appreciate the poor delivery styles of all concerned.

In my opinion, such a political “American Idol” at this stage of the 2008 campaign is a distraction and not beneficial. With all of the major issues facing the American people at this time, this isn’t the time to get distracted by a popularity contest. And yet, maybe that contest will eventually prove to have been a benefit in exposing the sorry sad sacks that both parties are offering up as the Solution to All of Our Problems. Not a single candidate helped themselves last night. Not one. When MSNBC presents the Republican offerings next week, they will fare no better.

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One definition of “conversation” is “the discussion of great and small topics by people who practice mutual tolerance for opposing viewpoints”. The key phrase is “mutual tolerance”.

Recently, blogger Kathy Sierra had to cancel a speaking engagement due to death threats she had received at her website and other blogs. I haven’t looked into just why her comments riled the hateful to such vile action, but for the purposes of my post, that is not especially important.

What is important, however, is to point out that our nation is facing a situation similar to that just experienced by two Texas fathers and their sons. They managed somehow to avoid death when their boat went over a dam. Our nation is drifting toward the edge of a precipice, and those of us who attempt to point this out to the rest get doused with abuse and calumny.

I guess it’s considered gauche to point out
that the party needs to come to an end
when the End is why there’s a Garishly Opulent Party occurring.

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I’ve been a little off my game lately due to a very active schedule and little rest. Today, it is all catching up with me, but I feel a need to say something.

Current events are seeming very familiar to me in a way I haven’t felt since 1974. I actually have a sense that a corner has been turned, that a cliff has been averted, and that positive progress is again possible. It may be that it is only the impression of an exhausted mind, but it appears that everything once clearly defined - especially in the political realm - is all jumbled and in disarray.

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Fred Fiedler & Martin Chemers, in Improving Leadership Effectiveness, declared that “The quality of leadership, more than any other single factor, determines the success or failure of an organization.”

As an example of the validity of this statement, we will avoid the most recent achievement of our proposed paragon in order to focus on the more important point introduced by this quote which his past success raises:

When [U.S. attorney Patrick] Fitzgerald went to Kenya in 1998 to investigate the bombing of the U.S. Embassy there, he and his team decided to follow both American and Kenyan law until they decided which country they would file charges in. “If there were two ways of doing it, we would do it the harder way so it would stand up in court in either place,” he said.

That meant that instead of letting a witness sit behind a one-way mirror and point out a suspect from a lineup of six people, as U.S. law requires, witnesses had to come face-to-face with a lineup of nine people, then walk up and place their hand on the shoulder of the suspect they identified, as required under Kenyan law.

Kenya does not guarantee suspects the right to an attorney, and the New York judge who tried the case was not satisfied Fitzgerald’s team had satisfied their obligation under American law to educate the suspect of his right to an attorney and so dismissed some parts of the man’s confession.

But both suspects were convicted anyway.

Considering that the field of international criminal prosecution was still very new when this case was tried, this result was far more than anyone should have expected. In addition, it’s magnitudes of scale larger than all of the leadership “accomplishments” of George W. Bush in his entire life.

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One of the reasons the people of Earth hold religious beliefs is to help them deal with monstrous evil, providing hope that something much bigger and more powerful than ourselves will assess judgement on those who have wronged us. There has been a fair amount of religious petitioning this week, and not all of it Christian.

Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist, wonders if Mayan priests can purify their sacred land after a visit by George W. Bush, can we do so to our own nation?

George W. Bush — famed warmonger, despoiler of lands, despiser of gays and women and science and earthly resource, hapless fascist-wannabe — it seems George just visited Guatemala, where he happily trod upon a holy Mayan site or two… [T]he first thing Guatemala’s holy guardians of the sacred did as soon as Air Force One’s wheels lifted off the ground was, of course, to purify the hallowed ground our president’s shockingly low, nefarious energy had infected.

[I]t is becoming increasingly evident that a great national purifying ritual is just about exactly what we need. Yes, we need a grand American ritual. We are, after all, far more deeply infected than that Mayan site. Does it not seem entirely appropriate? Does it not make perfect sense? Of course it does.

We shall purify and rinse and cleanse the nation of this horrific and banal poison, once and for all, and it shall be Good. And those Mayan priests? Why, they’ll simply look over and nod, smile knowingly. They understand completely.

Unlike the Mayan priests, however, we will be using much different methods of cleansing our land.

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