California's special election made easy

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GOP Memo calls religious right "wackos"

This is why abortion won't be overturned: the GOP is using it to drive people to the polls. Unfortunately, Democrats often play this game with left wing cultural window dressing while screwing us on economic issues too.

KEY EXCERPTS:

Abramoff-Scanlon School of Sleaze

By Michael Scherer

....one memo highlighted in a Capitol Hill hearing Wednesday that Scanlon, a former aide to Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, sent the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana to describe his strategy for protecting the tribe's gambling business. In plain terms, Scanlon confessed the source code of recent Republican electoral victories: target religious conservatives, distract everyone else, and then railroad through complex initiatives.

"The wackos get their information through the Christian right, Christian radio, mail, the internet and telephone trees," Scanlon wrote in the memo, which was read into the public record at a hearing of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. "Simply put, we want to bring out the wackos to vote against something and make sure the rest of the public lets the whole thing slip past them." The brilliance of this strategy was twofold: Not only would most voters not know about an initiative to protect Coushatta gambling revenues, but religious "wackos" could be tricked into supporting gambling at the Coushatta casino even as they thought they were opposing it.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/11/03/abramoff/

It's time to get our head out of our asses. School prayer, the flag, the Ten Commandments, aren't going to put food on the table, or get your kid medical care when he's sick. When we decide who to put on the Supreme Court and in elected office, we should be spending more time looking at how they are going to deal with corporate America than those other issues that are used primarily to get our panties in knot.


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***Democrats FIGHT BACK!!!***

These are excerpts from Senate Minority leader Harry Reid's statement, when he demanded that his Republican colleagues exercise their oversight duties instead of serving as a rubber stamp for the most corrupt, incompetent, and destructive president in our history.

Reid then forced the Senate into a closed session to discuss investigating the lies that led to the Iraq War.

The only element missing from this that would make it perfect is demanding that they tell the American people WHY the Bush administration had such a hard on to invade Iraq, a discussion that would make future oil wars far more difficult.

But after five years of turning in D- work, I'm still going to celebrate this A- minus effort.

Take a minute to send Harry Reid a postcard (letters get slowed checking for bio terror crap), a fax, or email thanking him for trying to restart our democracy.

Reid, Harry- (D - NV)
528 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING
WASHINGTON DC 20510
(202) 224-3542
(202) 224-7327 FAX
Web Form: reid.senate.gov/email_form.cfm


KEY EXCERPTS:

REID: NATIONAL SECURITY MUST COME BEFORE POLITICS

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Washington, D.C. – Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid delivered the following statement on the floor of the U.S. Senate calling for a secret session of the Senate.

“This past weekend, we witnessed the indictment of I. Lewis Libby, the Vice President’s Chief of Staff and a senior Advisor to President Bush. Libby is the first sitting White House staffer to be indicted in 135 years.

“The Libby indictment provides a window into what this is really about: how the Administration manufactured and manipulated intelligence in order to sell the war in Iraq and attempted to destroy those who dared to challenge its actions.

“What has been the response of this Republican-controlled Congress to the Administration’s manipulation of intelligence that led to this protracted war in Iraq? Basically nothing. Did the Republican-controlled Congress carry out its constitutional obligations to conduct oversight? No. Did it support our troops and their families by providing them the answers to many important questions? No. Did it even attempt to force this Administration to answer the most basic questions about its behavior? No.

“Unfortunately the unwillingness of the Republican-controlled Congress to exercise its oversight responsibilities is not limited to just Iraq. We see it with respect to the prisoner abuse scandal. We see it with respect to Katrina. And we see it with respect to the cronyism and corruption that permeates this Administration.

“Time and time again, this Republican-controlled Congress has consistently chosen to put its political interests ahead of our national security. They have repeatedly chosen to protect the Republican Administration rather than get to the bottom of what happened and why.

“There is also another disturbing pattern here, namely about how the Administration responded to those who challenged its assertions. Time and again this Administration has actively sought to attack and undercut those who dared to raise questions about its preferred course.

“This behavior is unacceptable. The toll in Iraq is as staggering as it is solemn. More than 2,000 Americans have lost their lives. Over 90 Americans have paid the ultimate sacrifice this month alone – the fourth deadliest month since the war began. More than 15,000 have been wounded. More than 150,000 remain in harm’s way. Enormous sacrifices have been and continue to be made.

“The troops and the American people have a right to expect answers and accountability worthy of that sacrifice.


“They also deserve a searching and comprehensive investigation about how the Bush Administration brought this country to war. Key questions that need to be answered include:

* How did the Bush Administration assemble its case for war against Iraq?

* Who did Bush Administration officials listen to and who did they ignore?

* How did senior Administration officials manipulate or manufacture intelligence presented to the Congress and the American people?

* What was the role of the White House Iraq Group or WHIG, a group of senior White House officials tasked with marketing the war and taking down its critics?

* How did the Administration coordinate its efforts to attack individuals who dared to challenge the Administration’s assertions?

* Why has the Administration failed to provide Congress with the documents that will shed light on their misconduct and misstatements?

“We demand that the Intelligence Committee and other committees in this body with jurisdiction over these matters carry out a full and complete investigation immediately as called for by Democrats in the committee’s annual intelligence authorization report. Our troops and the American people have sacrificed too much. It is time this Republican-controlled Congress put the interests of the American people ahead of their own political interests.”

FULL TEXT:

http://reid.senate.gov/record2.cfm?id=248129


DEMOCRACY NOW story on Reid's defibrililation of democracy in the Senate





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POLL of TROOPS: Bush sucks

A university conducted the poll in North Carolina of military members and found 57% don't like the way he's running the Iraq War. Let's hope that slows down the invasions of Syria, Iran, and Venezuela, all of which are in the pipe.


EXCERPTS:

Military shares public's declining support for Bush, war

10/28/2005

Associated Press

More than half the North Carolina military members surveyed in the latest Elon University poll don't like the way President Bush is handling his job and the war in Iraq.

The survey results were released today.

Of the 539 adults surveyed, nearly 53 percent of military members said they strongly disapproved or disapproved of Bush's handling of his job. And 56 percent of that same group said they strongly disapproved or disapproved of his handling of the Iraq war.

Overall, slightly more than 53 percent of those surveyed did not approve of Bush's job performance, while 57 percent didn't approve of his handling of the Iraq war.

http://www.wcnc.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D8DH767G0.html




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Target of CIA leaks: Real crime was WHY they leaked agent's name

Ambassador Joe Wilson seemed to be the primary target of the leak of his CIA agent wife's name to the press. As he correctly notes here, the reason this case and the first of hopefully many indictments is so important is why he and his wife were targeted:

Wilson proved that the case for the war in Iraq was not just the result of mistaken intelligence, but intentional lies. He told the Bush administration that the documents saying Saddam tried to buy uranium from Niger were clumsy forgeries quickly disproven when he went to Niger, but the Bushies referred to the uranium claim as if it was true anyway.

The special prosecutor is also looking into who did those forgeries and has contacted the Italian government officials who investigated it since it originated there and NO similar investigation was started here.

One of the most aggravating things about the Bush administration is that they create problems either through incompetence or malice, then blame the government agency they ignored or coerced to cook the books, and use it as an excuse to give a Bush crony a new oversight position like Negroponte, or even create a whole new bureaucracy like the Department of Homeland Security. I hope the investigation goes this deep.

We'll see.



Related stories:

effect on Wilson/Plame & CIA
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/28/60minutes/main994753.shtml

Investigating who faked the documents
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/10/19/41429/846


KEY EXCERPTS:






Our 27 months of hell

By Joseph C. Wilson IV

The attacks on Valerie and me were upsetting, disruptive and vicious. They amounted to character assassination. Senior administration officials used the power of the White House to make our lives hell for the last 27 months.

But more important, they did it as part of a clear effort to cover up the lies and disinformation used to justify the invasion of Iraq. That is the ultimate crime.

The war in Iraq has claimed more than 17,000 dead and wounded American soldiers, many times more Iraqi casualties and close to $200 billion.

It has left our international reputation in tatters and our military broken. It has weakened the United States, increased hatred of us and made terrorist attacks against our interests more likely in the future.

It has been, as Gen. William Odom suggested, the greatest strategic blunder in the history of our country.

We anticipate no mea culpa from the president for what his senior aides have done to us. But he owes the nation both an explanation and an apology.


FULL TEXT:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-wilson29oct29,0,4988049.story?coll=la-news-comment-opinions






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VIDEO: Andy Dick as Bush speech coach

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99% of Iraqis vs. "elected" liars

One percent of Iraqis say occupation is making them safer in a recent British intel commissioned poll. That's probably less than the margin of error.

Past polls have shown similar overwhelming opposition to the occupation:
http://professorsmartass.blogspot.com/2005/07/if-were-teaching-iraqis-democracy-what.html

There are two depressing implications to this story.

One is that the elected prime minister of Iraq begs us to stay in the same in article, leading me to wonder how legitimate their democracy is when their leader can ignore numbers like this.

Worse, is what it says about our democracy. I expect Republicans to support the war. That is what they are paid to do. But I do not expect Democrats to not only ignore the wishes of the American people about pulling out of Iraq, but also lie to us about the situation there as Sen. Carl Levin did yesterday in this LA Times story:

The Michigan senator, who is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee and a frequent visitor to Iraq, said that one of the few points on which the main Iraqi ethnic and sectarian political groups agree was that all want U.S. forces to remain in the country. The Bush administration should use that consensus to forge political compromise, Levin argued.

FULL TEXT OF LA TIMES ARTICLE

It is not enough to vote for Democrats and expect everything will be swell. While they will be better on civil rights and domestic policy, in foreign policy, the leaders of the party seem just as eager to use our tax dollars to steal and kill for corporate America, actions we do not profit from in any way.

KEY EXCERPTS:

Secret MoD poll: Iraqis support attacks on British troops
By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent
(Filed: 23/10/2005)

Millions of Iraqis believe that suicide attacks against British troops are justified, a secret military poll commissioned by senior officers has revealed.

• Forty-five per cent of Iraqis believe attacks against British and American troops are justified - rising to 65 per cent in the British-controlled Maysan province;

• 82 per cent are "strongly opposed" to the presence of coalition troops;

• less than one per cent of the population believes coalition forces are responsible for any improvement in security;

• 67 per cent of Iraqis feel less secure because of the occupation;

That appears to have failed, with the poll showing that 71 per cent of people rarely get safe clean water, 47 per cent never have enough electricity, 70 per cent say their sewerage system rarely works and 40 per cent of southern Iraqis are unemployed.

But Iraq's President Jalal Talabani pleaded last night for British troops to stay. "There would be chaos and perhaps civil war," he said. "We are now fighting a world war launched by terrorists against civilisation, against democracy, against progress, against all the values of humanity.

"If British troops withdrew, the terrorists would say, 'Look, we have imposed our will on the most accomplished armed forces in the world and terror is the way to oblige the Europeans to surrender to us'."

FULL TEXT

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Margaret Thatcher slams evidence for Iraq War

Thatcher was a conservative icon before Ronald Reagan was elected, and she ran the UK's last solo shooting war, the one with Argentina over the Falkland Islands.

She is hardly a pacifist, and she supported overthrowing Saddam.

This more likely shows that the financial elite have lost faith in the war and are going to cut Bush and Blair loose, and act shocked, SHOCKED! that they lied us into a war that isn't paying as great a dividend as they hoped.

KEY EXCERPTS:

Thatcher reveals her doubts over basis for Iraq war
By Andrew Grice
Published: 14 October 2005

Baroness Thatcher has criticised Tony Blair for taking Britain to war in Iraq on the basis of flawed evidence about Saddam Hussein's weapons. The former prime minister's embarrassing criticism emerged as Mr Blair was among the 670 guests who attended a party to mark her 80th birthday.

Although Lady Thatcher remains a strong supporter of the decision to topple Saddam by invading Iraq, it is the first time she has questioned the basis for the war. Yesterday's Washington Post reported that when asked whether she would have invaded Iraq given the intelligence at the time, Lady Thatcher replied: "I was a scientist before I was a politician. And as a scientist I know you need facts, evidence and proof - and then you check, recheck and check again."

She added: "The fact was that there were no facts, there was no evidence, and there was no proof. As a politician the most serious decision you can take is to commit your armed services to war from which they may not return."

FULL TEXT:

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article319542.ece


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Bush celebrates black approval rating

President Bush has done what no other Republican president has managed: he has reduced his job approval rating among blacks to LESS than the margin of error in the poll.

The decades long GOP Southern Strategy after LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ending Jim Crow relied on a certain amount of subtlty to avoid alienating law and order whites in the North who weren't necessarily racist and blacks who would agree with GOP ideology if they didn't see themselves as the scapegoat.

The Bush administration has consistently lacked this finesse. While their words are sometimes concilliatory, their is no mistaking their actions.

We are not at war with Islam--we are just killing Muslims.

We do not favor the rich--we just give them massive tax breaks and war profits.

We don't hate poor black folks--we just leave them to drown in their own sewage and be eaten by alligators, and when they try to leave, we let white sheriffs block the exits.

KEY EXCERPTS:

A Polling Free-Fall Among Blacks
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Thursday, October 13, 2005; 3:09 PM

In what may turn out to be one of the biggest free-falls in the history of presidential polling, President Bush's job-approval rating among African Americans has dropped to 2 percent, according to a new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll.

The drop among blacks drove Bush's overall job approval ratings to an all-time low of 39 percent in this poll. By comparison, 45 percent of whites and 36 percent of Hispanics approve of the job Bush is doing.

the rest of the Washington Post article

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Chavez more honest about OIL CRISIS than US pols

It's sad that the president of a Latin American country is more honest about our energy situation than our own elected officials. If you don't trust Hugo Chavez, National Geographic, Scientific American, and gas and oil journals have been making the same point for a while.

National Geographic: "End of Cheap Oil"

Scientific American: "the End of Cheap Oil"

Collection newspaper, magazine and technical articles on peak oil

I'm faxing this to all our senators and telling them to start telling us the truth about our energy situation and how it's driving our foreign policy. Maybe if they let us in on the debate, we'd choose to do something other than occupy oil producing countries until the oil companies suck every last drop out of the ground and leave us with the debt of hatred and emnity of those countries this earned.

Oil companies practice a nearly perfect example of one corporate mantra: "Socialize risk and privatize profits." We risk our tax dollars, our good reputation abroad, and our soldiers lives, and oil companies reap the profits.

KEY EXCERPTS:

Chavez: World Faces Major Energy Crisis

By CIARAN GILES, Associated Press Writer 21 minutes ago

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Saturday that the world faces an energy crisis but there is little chance of his country and other OPEC members increasing production because they are already pumping near "their capacity."

"We're at the doorway of major energy crisis worldwide," Chavez said. "We'll have to develop other resources such as wind, solar and nuclear energy — naturally for peaceful purposes." He said Venezuela was in talks with Argentina and Brazil regarding nuclear power.

"The United States for example, with scarcely five percent of the world's population, uses almost 25 percent of the petroleum and combustion fuels produced in the world," he said.

FULL TEXT:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051015/ap_on_bi_ge/spain_chavez_oil









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Impeachment polls: Bush vs. Clinton

The republicans and even most democrats think the American people are pretty damn stupid, and with proper marketing could be sold a hat full of shit.

This is one of those things that prove them wrong.

After all the hounding and media attention given to Bill Clinton's personal failings and the conservative drumbeat to impeach him, only 36% of Americans wanted him to be impeached. People were being herded toward supporting something stupid and petty, and they didn't buy it.

With virtually NO discussion of the issue in mainstream media and very little even from Democrats, 50% think Bush should be impeached if he lied about the causes for war, which the Downing Street Minutes and statements already on the record by former administration officials clearly prove.

The other great thing about this poll is that it was grassroots funded. Despite Bush's low job approval numbers, no mainstream polling organization was asking about impeachment, so Afterdowningstreet.org collected the money and commissioned one.


KEY EXCERPTS:

According to a poll by the Zogby organization, just released by the group Afterdowningstreet.org, 50 percent of the American public now would like to see the House impeach Bush if it were found that he had lied about the reasons for going to war in Iraq (if?).

Compare that to December 17, 1998, only days before Clinton's impeachment by the House of Representatives, when an AP poll found that only 36 percent of the American public wanted to see the president impeached.

Clearly Americans view the flawed invasion of Iraq and other actions by the Bush administration, like the placing of business cronies in high places, the bankrupting of the federal government, and the failure to come to the rescue of an American city as far more serious than Clinton's sex romp and the lying about it that followed. And there's plenty more bad news to come for Bush, beginning with likely indictments in the Plame outing affair.

FULL TEXT:

http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff10122005.html







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Bush teleconference with troops tightly scripted

What is news about this is not that it happened, Bush has rarely taken "real" questions, and his press conferences are so scripted that once he accidentally answered a question before the reporter asked, and a couple of weeks ago he kept calling on a reporter who wasn't even there, probably because she had been prepped with a friendly question.

What is news is that it was covered--including the rehearsal. Let's hope this is part of trend of pulling back the curtain on the propaganda machine that has to work full tilt to make Bush look even minimally competent and engaged.


KEY EXCERPTS:

Yahoo! News

Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged

By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press WriterThu Oct 13, 4:35 PM ET

"OK, so let's just walk through this," Barber said. "Captain Kennedy, you answer the first question and you hand the mike to whom?"

"Captain Smith," Kennedy said.

"Captain. Smith? You take the mike and you hand it to whom?" she asked.

"Captain Kennedy," the soldier replied.

And so it went.

"If the question comes up about partnering — how often do we train with the Iraqi military — who does he go to?" Barber asked.

"That's going to go to Captain Pratt," one of the soldiers said.

FULL TEXT:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051013/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_iraq_8




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