Matt Stoller has a disturbing introduction to a think piece with some fascinating information:

Interesting thesis. To the extent the conservative movement and their stranglehold on the American government is for sale to the highest bidder, who has more at stake than foreign governments? – Matt

Dave, writing over at “Seeing The Forest” has the details:

the 1980 election the Reagan campaign ran an intelligence operation that, among other things, infiltrated the Carter White House. They had agents sending our most sensitive military secrets to the campaign. At one point they even managed to steal the briefing book that Carter was using to prepare for his debates against Reagan. Use of the briefing book provided inside information that helped Reagan temporarily appear competent. (Side note, learn about the involvement of "journalist" George Will.)

You might remember the briefing book incident, which caused a minor storm at the time, which unfortunately didn’t blacken Reagan’s name enough to disable his viability as a candidate. Of course, the legend that it was just one rotten apple was carried by the MSM.

We should speculate. It would be wrong not to speculate.

To what extent is it possible that today's Republican Party scandals are not just about traditional corruption, but instead are the result of manipulation by foreign interests, masquerading as corruption and ideological cultism? China, Iran, ??? The neo-cons are persuaded by ideology and cooked-up intelligence to go to war in Iraq. Iran ends up with Shia Iraq as a client state, with its oil resources at its disposal, for sale to China. America weakened, its industries no longer competitive, it's infrastructure crumbling. Who benefits?

Think about the harm the neo-con "conservative movement" ideology has done to our country. We're left with massive debt, fractured institutions, a dangerously divided public, destruction of public infrastructure, outsourcing of our manufacturing and technological base, weakened public education system, -- the list just goes on and on. Was this just blind cultist ideology? Who benefits?
How much of the "conservative movement" was not American-grown? Look at the purchased influence of the Moonies - an internationally-funded cult sets up a newspaper in Washington and it becomes the news hub of the "conservative movement." The cult spreads billions of dollars around "conservative movement" circles and sets up front groups with patriotic-sounding names. The President's brother travels with the cult's leader. (Somehow not the biggest story in every news outlet.) Everyone KNOWs it is about buying influence but no one acknowledges they are buying influence! Who benefits?
And this, to get the comments popping: In the 90's the neo-cons kept us from using encrypted voice and data communications. Who funded that campaign? Who benefits?

Recent reports slithering around the Internets have underscored a third major concern of Bu$hCo: Iran. President Short Attention Span, having made a public relations “success” of Afghanistan, has reduced Iraq into enough chaos to enable American companies to seize the lucrative petroleum and minerals industries, Now he is casting his covetous eyes further afield, because he can feel the cold breath of the 2006 mid-term elections growing closer.

With the ongoing stink from multiple criminal and national security scandals growing stronger each day it’s obviously time to create a new international diversion. After all, there’s just nothing left in the US to occupy our attention, is there?

Recent reports in the German media suggest that the United States may be preparing its allies for an imminent military strike against facilities that are part of Iran's suspected clandestine nuclear weapons program.

It's hardly news that US President George Bush refuses to rule out possible military action against Iran if Tehran continues to pursue its controversial nuclear ambitions. But in Germany, speculation is mounting that Washington is preparing to carry out air strikes against suspected Iranian nuclear sites perhaps even as soon as early 2006.

The neocons and Bu$hCo are faced with two attractive strategic targets: Syria and Iran. The underlying philosophy is to subdue the fractious Muslim Middle East in order to ensure peace and safety for Israel under a sub rosa military partnership. The primary economic goal of course is American control of all that oil. And while that goal might be good for the short-term US economic interests, it creates the danger of increased strife both in that region and throughout the rest of the world, as world-wide Muslim populations will react badly to yet another American attack on a co-religionist country.

Today’s English language Der Spiegel has a teaser article about how and why Iran is in the cross-hairs. (Part quoted above.)

[A] German wire service also quotes a high-ranking German military official saying: "I would be very surprised if the Americans, in the mid-term, didn't take advantage of the opportunity delivered by Tehran. The Americans have to attack Iran before the country can develop nuclear weapons. After that would be too late."

While the military official (rumored to be the Chef des Heeresamt- Army Chief of Staff) is speaking behind his hand, he’s bringing out the most important point: Iran’s Air Force can’t hold off the American AF, but they have a standing Army of over 350,000, and it is expected that Army would once again be supported by hundreds of thousands of civilian “volunteer martyrs” as was seen in the protracted Iraq-Iran war of the 1980s.

Recent visits of high American officials to Turkey would seem to support this theory. The new CIA Director, Porter Goss, visited Ankara recently and it was reported that he visited with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and several Turkish military and intelligence leaders. It has also been reported in several papers that Goss gave the Turks several intelligence folders containing verification of Iran’s intent to produce nuclear weaponry in the very near future, willingness to use them.

Well, we’ve been here before. I’ve seen this movie.

Remember, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a religious firebrand, was recently quoted describing the Holocaust as a”myth,” and calling for it to be “wiped off the map.” That’s enough to get Israel’s attention, and to pull the strings of the PNAC crowd, whose unstated motto is that Israel must be defended to the last American.

There’s much more in the “Der Spiegel” article, which contains quite a few familiar clues. It’s worth a careful read.

Because “Bring It On” has become a 21st Century topical meme, I read this every day and today The Bastard suggested I follow a Psychotic Patriot’s musings.

I've come to realize something about America recently, and it's disturbing not just because it's out of the mainstream media, but because it by definition is caused by the mainstream media. I offer this dark scenario: If you read, the terrorists win. What I mean by this is that fewer and fewer people read, for any reason, and fewer CAN read, for any reason. So you have a continuous dumbing-down of the populace, and an equally continuous rise in wingnuttery and incredibly simplistic concepts offered as fact.

Over here on the left side of the bipedal spectrum, we oxygen breathers on Planet Earth tend to judge our winger brethren by their works: Fox News, Rush, Sean Hannity and his unfortunate sock puppet Alan Colmes, Ken Mehlman and the Magical Mystery Talking Points tour, The Free Republic – the list continues…..

We watched, astounded and flummoxed as the never-ending cascade of inanity and twisting logic and excuse inundates a populace that seems to sleepwalk through the End Times of America.

So the more I read, the more I disbelieve Bush and his minions. Wait. I didn't believe him before he became the resident. Anyway. The more I read the more I refuse to accept the glowing bullshit frothing from Iraq. Insert anything intellectual, or GASP! (Liberal) after "The more I read." So, in the parlance of conservative evangelical mindlessness: if I don't unquestioningly devour the smallest sound-bites of Hannitian and Limbaughistic logic, leaving any curiosity at the curb, I'm Osama's butt-buddy. It's just that simple.

It’s vital, from an intellectual point of view, to examine what you read or hear. It’s also a sort of survival skill because bad advice leads to bad results. Remember when your useless brother-in-law suggested you invest in that new company making mittens for dogs?

Now I'm talking about what is called "Critical Literacy." Not skimming the newspaper headlines, not squinting to see the scroll at the bottom of Fox News, but the kind of critical reading done in books, as well as thoughtful reading in any format done in pursuit of a serious intellectual or educational premise. If you've gotten this far, you know what I mean. The kind of reading which examines an issue deeply, and dredges up information to add to an informed mind, to expand said mind, to enhance it, or, perchance, to throw the issue the fuck out.

Sometimes I listen to talk radio. Here’s an interesting experiment: Take your antibiotics and spend an hour or two listening to Rush on the radio, and then listen to a progressive station, such as Air America Radio. If you don’t have an AAR outlet in your area, you can listen on the internets on that computer thingy. You’ll hear the same stuff from the callers, almost word for word, that you heard from Rush. If you listen to dittoheads call Randi Rhodes, you can listen to her demolish their frothings point by point. There’s no critical thinking on the other side. They just swallow the bullshit of the day without chewing and then later regurgitate.

The Psychotic goes on, discussing reading levels, several studies about reading, comprehension, and critical thought. He brings up divided and shortened attention spans, the stupidity of abbreviated and misspelled words in text messaging. and how they affect life in general. I’d write more but I think I’m losing interest.

MSNBC just announced that the Justice Department will launch an investigation on the NSA spying issue. Here we go again, the foxes investigating the break in of the hen house.

Hopefully, American's will recall that one of the lawyers who reviewed and approved the NSA's activities was none other than current Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Thanks to Eric Alterman for reminding me of the funniest blog post of the year and to The Editors for transcribing it.

Poker With Dick Cheney

Transcript of The Editors' regular Saturday-night poker game with Dick Cheney, 6/19/04. Start tape at 12:32 AM.

The Editors: We'll take three cards.

Dick Cheney: Give me one.

Sounds of cards being placed down, dealt, retrieved, and rearranged in hand. Non-commital noises, puffing of cigars.

TE: Fifty bucks.

DC: I'm in. Show 'em.

TE: Two pair, sevens and fives.

DC: Not good enough.

TE: What do you have?

DC: Better than that, that's for sure. Pay up.

TE: Can you show us your cards?

DC: Sure. One of them's a six.

TE: You need to show all your cards. That's the way the game is played.

Colin Powell: Ladies and gentlemen. We have accumulated overwhelming evidence that Mr. Cheney's poker hand is far, far better than two pair. Note this satellite photo, taken three minutes ago when The Editors went to get more chips. In it we clearly see the back sides of five playing cards, arranged in a poker hand. Defector reports have assured us that Mr. Cheney's hand was already well advanced at this stage. Later, Mr. Cheney drew only one card. Why only one card? Would a man without a strong hand choose only one card? We are absolutely convinced that Mr. Cheney has at least a full house.

Tim Russert: Wow. Colin Powell really hit a homerun for the Administration right there. A very powerful performance. My dad played a lot of poker in World War 2, and he taught me many things about life. Read my book.

TE: He's extremely good at Power Point. But we would like to see the cards, or else we can't really be sure he has anything to beat two pair. We don't think he would lie to us, but ... well, it is a very rich pot.

Jonah Goldberg: Liberal critics of Mr. Cheney's poker hand contend that "he doesn't have anything". Oh, really, liberal critics? Cheney has already showed them the six of clubs, and yet these liberals persist in saying he has "nothing". Why do liberals consider the six of clubs to be "nothing"? Is it because the six of clubs is black?

Matt Drudge: ****DRUDGE REPORT EXCLUSIVE****
*****MUST CREDIT THE DRUDGE REPORT*****
The Drudge Report has learned that Dick Cheney has a royal flush, hearts. Developing ...

TE: Perhaps if you could just show us a subset of your cards which beat 2 pair? Or tell us exactly what your hand is?

DC: We will show you our cards after we have collected the pot. It is important that things be done in this order, otherwise the foundation of our entire poker game will be destroyed.

TE: We aren't sure ...

DC: Very good. And here are my cards. A straight flush.

Judith Miller: Dick Cheney has revealed a straight flush, confirming his pre-collection claims about beating two pair.

TE: Those cards are of different suits. It's not a flush.

Mark Steyn: When will it end? Now liberal critics complain that Dick Cheney's cards are not all the same suit. Naturally, these are the same liberals who are always whining about a lack of diversity in higher education. It seems like segregation is OK with these liberals, as long as it damages Republicans.

MD: ****DRUDGE REPORT EXCLUSIVE****
*****MUST CREDIT THE DRUDGE REPORT*****
A witness has come forward claiming that The Editors engage in racial profiling in blog-linking. Developing ...

TE: Wait! It's not even a straight! You've got a eight and ten of hearts, a six of clubs, and the seven and five of diamonds. You have a ten high. That's nothing.

Sean Hannity: Well, well, well. In another sign of liberal desperation, liberals now complain that a ten high is "nothing". Does ten equal zero in liberal mathematics? That would explain a lot.

Robert Novak: It's a perfectly valid poker hand. Apparently, liberals have never heard of a "skip straight". It's a kind of straight, just with one card missing. But if you skip around the missing nine, it's a straight.

Alan Colmes: Mother says I mustn't play poker.

TE: There is no such thing as a "skip straight".

Brit Hume: It seems like some people are still playing poker like it's September 10th. Back then, you needed to have all your cards in order to claim a straight. But, as we learned on that day, sometimes you won't have perfect knowledge. Sometimes you have to learn to connect the dots, and see the patterns which are not visible to superficial analysis of the type favored by the CIA and the State Department. Dick Cheney's skip straight is a winning poker hand for the post-9/11 world.

Rush Limbaugh: Do The Editors have two pairs, or a pair of twos?
First they say one thing, then another. What are they hiding?

Andrew Sullivan: Dick Cheney never said he had a straight. He was very careful about this. His cards can form many different hands. None of these hands alone can beat a pair of twos; but, taken together, the combination of all possible hands presents a more compelling case for taking the pot than simply screaming "Pair of twos! Pair of twos!" as unprincipled liberal critics of the Vice President so often do.

MD: ****DRUDGE REPORT EXCLUSIVE****
*****MUST CREDIT THE DRUDGE REPORT*****
Did The Editors claim to have "a pair of Jews"? Are they anti-Semites as well as racists? Developing ...

Zell Miller: As a lifelong liberal Democrat, I believe Dick Cheney, and I hate liberals and Democrats.

William Safire: Why are liberals so obsessed by Dick Cheney's poker hand? The pot has been taken, the deal is done. If liberals are upset that we are no longer playing by the Marquis of Queensbury patty-cake poker rules, they clearly lack the stomach to play poker in the post-September 11th environment. And why do they never complain about Saddam Hussein's poker playing, which was a thousand times worse?

Christopher Hitchens: The Left won't be happy until the pot is divided up equally between Yassar Arafat, Osama bin Laden, and
Hitler. Orwell would have seen this.

Ann Coulter: Why do liberals object so strenuously to the idea of conservatives having a "straight"? Perhaps because it doesn't fit in with the radical homosexual/Islamist agenda they hold so dear?
Report of the Bipartisan Commission on Poker Hands: There is no such thing as a "skip straight".

DC: I have access to poker rules that the Commission doesn't, and so I know for a fact that the cards in my hand are all intimately connected.

George W. Bush: Dick Cheney is telling the truth. I'm a nice man who would drink a beer with you.

Vladimir Putin: I dealt Dick Cheney three aces and two kings.

DC: My deal.

Representative Henry Waxman has prepared a report detailing 237 specific deliberate misrepresentations about Iraq by Bu$hCo officials.

It contains statements that were misleading based on what was known to the Administration at the time the statements were made. It does not include statements that appear mistaken only in hindsight. If a statement was an accurate reflection of U.S. intelligence at the time it was made, it was excluded even if it now appears erroneous.

Here’s an explanation of the methodology about how the statements were selected.
Iraq on the Record is searchable by the the five Administration officials most responsible for providing public information and shaping public opinion on Iraq:

President George W. Bush
Vice President Dick Cheney
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
Then-Secretary of State Colin Powell
Then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice

It is also searchable by issue area:

Iraq's Nuclear Capabilities
Chemical and Biological Weapons
Iraq and Al-Qaeda
Iraq as an Urgent Threat

It is also searchable by keyword, such as "mushroom cloud", "uranium", or "bin Laden."

With regard to Representative Waxman I publicly retract my comment about “overpaid and overbribed underachievers”. He’s my kind of employee.

NOTE: The report is a .pdf file, so you have to have the Adobe Acrobat Reader, which means slow loading, but still satisfying reading.

Jeff Huber has been ALL over the FISA wiretap story at his blog, Pen and Sword. If you’re not reading Jeff, you’re missing some good information. There are too many to list. Because blogs place new stories on top, you have to go there, work down to Monday, December 26th and just read to catch up. He’s also cross-posted many of these articles at the ePluribus site.

Now, whenever someone in Bu$hCo shoots himself in his johnso err, foot, there is a large community of enablers, explainers, lackeys, running dogs and straight out paid explainers to massage the facts and spin the story to maintain the fiction of the God-King who is perfect in all ways.

I learned about one example, Michelle Malkin, who interestingly enough seems to believe that all foreigners (except her – she’s Filippina by birth) should be immediately interned in the interests of National Security, and kept there until – I dunno, until the starve to death, maybe. Ms Malkin has taken up sword and shield in defense of her liege lord, the God-King, and carefully established the interesting logic stream that this illegal FISA revelation is a terribly serious matter, lives are at stake here, because now Osama bin Forgotten knows we are listening, and it’s just like when Valerie Plame was outted by “someone” and why aren’t the left wing maniacs screaming for the blood of the person who endangered National Security by telling Osama we’re on to him? After all, those evil leftwing maniacs were so dead set on hanging whoever endangered National Security by revealing that Valerie Plame used to do something vaguely covert.

By the way, Ms Malkin, sadly, is a prime example of leading intellectualism in winger philosophy and blogging.

Over at firedoglake, Jane takes Ms Malkin to task and briefly explains the difference between a security leak (Plame) and whistleblowing (FISA searches). One is bad, one is good. Using some extremely forceful and relevant commentary by Judge Tatel in his decision to deny the petition from Matt Cooper and Judith Miller to quash Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s subpoena, he writes:

The leak of Plame's apparent employment, moreover, had marginal news value. To be sure, insofar as Plame's CIA relationship may have helped explain her husband's selection for the Niger trip, that information could bear on her husband's credibility, and thus contribute to public debate over the president's "sixteen words." Compared to the damage of undermining covert intelligence-gathering, however, this slight news value cannot, in my view, justify privileging the leaker's identity.

So, the revelation by the leaker of the subject’s name is not important, but the results of that leak are very serious.

In Snoopgate, the leak is vital, of course, since it reveals years of malfeasance and misfeasance by Mr Bush and his associated cabal. They broke numerous laws, ignored others, and generally trashed both the US Constitution and various parts of the US Code in order to do something that they could have done legally, but for some reason chose to do illegally. The identity is protected by the Federal whistleblower law, despite the right wingnts’ teeth gnashing rage to flay someone for exposing another scandal.

Let us speculate. Since they could legally wiretap ANY foreign telephone, cell phone, or computer overseas by charter and any communication emanating from said devices into the US and then have a 72 hour post facto approval from the FISA court, they were in the clear. They also had that 72 hour window to tap any communications from those putative telephones, cell phones and computers inside the US with the same 72 hour window. They had the time to do it right and deliberately chose not to. Why would they do that? Are they just so enamored of breaking the laws that they seize every opportunity to do so? Do they believe that because they have the White House, both chambers of Congress, so many voting machines in so many states, and so many alleged “journalists” on their payroll that they are impervious?

There’s been speculation that they were tapping the computers and telephones of journalists who had interviewing relationships with various overseas terror cells, writers who have actually produced news with their contacts. Like the Secretary of State, I am not a lawyer, but, also like her, I have a belief that this sort of target would most likely get a warrant from FISA.

What sort of electronic eavesdropping would not be approved by a FISA court? A Court that has denied only 4 applications out of some 1900-odd in the last 4 years? Probably eavesdropping on political opponents, “unfriendly” journalists, e.g. those not on the payroll, and, of course known and suspected dissenters within the US. With some 58% of the polled population disapproving of Mr Bush and his actions in the White House, I’ll bet there are a lot of files.

There’s a new theme slowly beginning to appear in the American War of Political Lies. An article in the December 28 Wall Street Journal highlights the efforts of a group named Move America Forward which is producing a series of television ads in selected markets.

The television commercials are attention-grabbing: Newly found Iraqi documents show that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, including anthrax and mustard gas, and had "extensive ties" to al Qaeda. The discoveries are being covered up by those "willing to undermine support for the war on terrorism to selfishly advance their shameless political ambitions."

Somehow I thought we’d driven enough stakes through the heart of these lies that they couldn’t be resuscitated by the greatest medical teams in the world. The Germans said there were no WMDs and they were ignored – old Europe and all that. The French said there were no WMDs and they were mocked. Cheese-rating surrender monkeys. And oh yeah, Monsieur Froggy: your pommes de frites are hereby rendered irrelevant by the symbolic installation of “Freedom Fries” in the Congressional dining room, where overpaid and overbribed underachievers make themselves in fact irrelevant. The Italians were somehow involved in asserting something strange about yellowcake errands, so we still liked them, but that’s been proven to be all forgeries, and the Italian Government has officially declared it was all a lie and they had nothing to do with it.

Scott Ritter couldn’t find WMDs and said so. He was labeled a child molester. Hans Blix couldn’t find WMDs. I forget what filthy lies they spread about him. The UN said there were no WMDs and for their sin of rocking the cradle of neocon wetdreams they were punished by having to deal with the vicious spoiler John Bolton.

The hard-hitting spots are part of a recent public-relations barrage aimed at reversing a decline in public support for President Bush's handling of Iraq. But these advertisements aren't paid for by the Republican National Committee or other established White House allies. Instead, they are sponsored by Move America Forward, a media-savvy outside advocacy group that has become one of the loudest -- and most controversial -- voices in the Iraq debate.

While even Mr. Bush now publicly acknowledges the mistakes his administration made in judging the threat posed by Mr. Hussein, the organization is taking to the airwaves to insist that the White House was right all along.

And say, didn’t Mr Bush hisownself say there was no connection between Saddam and al Quaeda? What’s up here? Didn’t Move America BackwardForward get the memo?

So, now we are expected to go back to page one and start this nonsense all over again? Just because Mr Bush has been proven over and over again to be a serial liar and an admitted law breaker? Suddenly we need another diversion, something bright and shiny to confuse the masses, lest they start to think?

"The White House has really done a poor job of getting the message out, which is why we've had to step into the breach," says California-based Republican political strategist Sal Russo, one of the group's three founders. "They should do a better job of coordinating with those willing to get out and tell the story. We shouldn't be the only ones out here fighting."

The White House didn't return several calls seeking comment. A Republican National Committee spokesman declined to comment.

When they won’t comment, you KNOW they’re in it, up to their hairy armpits.

Every once in a while you strike gold. AMERICAblog nudges the story forward just a bit, starting with this quote from the WSJ article:

In addition to his Iraq political work in the U.S., Mr. Russo has an open-ended political-advertising contract with the Kurdish Regional Government in northern Iraq for whom he produces advertisements that run in the U.S. seeking investment in Kurdistan. Some critics accuse him of having a vested financial interest in prolonging the U.S. presence there.... And they say there is no conflict between the organization's advocacy work and Mr. Russo's financial ties to the Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq.

Hmmm... a guy who runs ads in the US for, and favorable to, the Kurdish government is suddenly running ads favorable to continuing the US war in Iraq, a war that benefits - who? - the Kurdish government (see below). A natural question to ask is whether the Kurds themselves are somehow involved in this pro-war ad campaign.

But why would the Kurds benefit from a continuance of Bush's war in Iraq war?
Kurdish leaders have inserted more than 10,000 of their militia members into Iraqi army divisions in northern Iraq to lay the groundwork to swarm south, seize the oil-rich city of Kirkuk and possibly half of Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city, and secure the borders of an independent Kurdistan....

The interviews with Kurdish troops, however, suggested that as the American military transfers more bases and areas of control to Iraqi units, it may be handing the nation to militias that are bent more on advancing ethnic and religious interests than on defeating the insurgency and preserving national unity.

One reason we're getting this, of course, is because Mr Russo has to make a living. As one of the primary movers behind Swift Boat Veterans, he's got an established track record as a liar, and he does like that special cash he earns lying for the Repubs. Additionally, another set of Republican operatives advance the Partei cause by practicing their lying and stealing skill sets. Gotta keep those skills sharp, ya know.

Peter S. Canelos of The Boston Globe brings us this perspective on Mister Bush's execution of his "war powers."

When President Bush sought to reassure the country that his authorization of spying on Americans without warrants was a reasonable exercise of his power, he emphasized that his orders were always reviewed by the attorney general and the White House counsel.

Continue reading "All the President's Lawyers"

The Senate has passed S. 1182 - the "Veterans Health Care Act of 2005." Provisions of this bill:

1) The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will now be allowed to hire Marriage and Family Therapists within VA to provide complete readjustment services and counseling to Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom veterans. (They will be allowed to. Back-channel communications will explain this is not a career-enhancing for VA department heads.

2) Require VA to expand the number of clinical care providers dedicated to the treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. (Busget will provide for hiring 4 more counsellors from the American Enterprise Institute, and 3 from the Heritage Foundation.)

3) Require VA to expand tele-health initiatives in rural areas. (It's much easier to tell a Vet suffering from PTSD to take two aspirins and suck it up, if you're using a phone.)

4) Require VA to expand mental health services in Community-based Outpatient Clinics. (Such programs are to be optimized for sub-contracting to faith-based agencies and churches.)

5) Require VA to expand the Global War on Terrorism Outreach Program, which places Iraq war and Afghanistan war veterans in Vet Centers and encourages them to reach out to returning National Guard and Reservists. (No fair saying, "Fer Gawd's sake don't come to the VA!"

6) Require the Secretary of the VA to establish a strategic plan for long-term care. (Undoubtedly the strategic plan will include a very aggressive publicity campaign, which will absorb 72% of the appropriated budget.)

7)) Increase the total funding for VA's programs to assist homeless veterans to $130 million. Rumors that the finding of this program's expansion to $72 Billion to accomodate Halliburton's participation could not be verified at press time.)

8) And the VA will now be allowed to provide up to 14 days of care for newborns of female veterans. (If said female vetrans are married to males.)

The bill now awaits action by the U.S. House of Representatives, (where such bills traditionally are allowed to die a meaningless death, because soldiers that aren't suppressing once-free Iraqis, and securing foreign oil are just useless drains on Halliburton's Treasury.)

Here’s a really frustrating and very disturbing report via Global Research. I can’t vouch for its accuracy and haven’t researched it at all. I just think reports like this should be pushed along, until they reach a level of transmission that creates a wave. Thanks to those fine folks at Today in Iraq for the tip.

Letter From A Military "Mom": Domestic Spying & Incident of Intimidation of Military Families

Written by: Robin Vaughan

I am sending this letter to you in hope of finding a source to hear my concerns. It is something that has bothered me since the occurrence, and I know it is not something that should have happened, and I worry for my family's safety as I step out to speak about this.

During my son's deployment to Iraq, February 2004-February 2005: I created a small group website on MSN, for families and friends of our soldiers’ deployed unit. It was a membership only site, and we were a tight group of mostly "Moms", from all over the United States, just trying to make it through each day. The support and help we gave one another is a singular experience of grace, I will never forget.

During the first few months of our site, the Army decided to call every single family on the site, informing them, that the site was not to be used by any of the families. The Department of Defense called families in the middle of the night to notify them to not use the web site. Most of the families were near tears, thinking they were getting "THE" call telling them their child or loved one had been killed or injured.

The information received via the phone call was to inform the families that the base did not condone the site, nor [did] the Army, and that it was not to be used; the gist was, families were not allowed to use the site, or they could get into "trouble". Some members reported their soldier calling from Iraq, telling them to be careful about using the site as the Army was monitoring it.

As Web Mistress of the site, I needed to respond and qualify this information, as well as to educate this commanding officer as to the rights and liberties of a private web site; which I did. I was told I would have to let a commanding officer on the site to monitor the messages; I did allow this, but I also informed the officer that this was a courtesy, as there is no such law, or right of the military to monitor, shut down or exclude our web site.

I believe we received this order, and treatment for a couple of reasons.

Occasionally we would voice our concerns publicly over what our government was failing to do to help our soldiers, or we would share or argue political opinion as well. The second reason may be: the armed services all have a group of their own family type support (FRG); as we were not local to the base our soldiers deployed from, the site was a means to provide that support, as best as we could.

The support group at our base, tried to force the site to be given over to them, which I refused. At this time I was told, I might want to be careful, as the government was monitoring the site as well. Soldiers in our unit, while in Iraq, were telling their parents to stay off of the site, or to be very careful of what they wrote. This came from a rear detachment officer in charge, and members on the site.

I reminded the Army I am a private citizen, not on base, with a private site making no claims to have any affiliation with any branch of service, but clearly stating we were families and friends of our unit in support of one another. We were treated to power by intimidation. It isn't hard to make that work, when you have someone's child in a war zone.

We were a group of 77 families from all over the country, at the time of the call. Every single family was phoned and told not to use the site; and I believe some 150 other families were phoned as well, as it was an official order from a commanding officer.

I have waited to speak of this situation until my son was home safe and sound, and also after his transfer to another base. Yes, I was afraid of repercussions that could have harmed him, one way or another. I called my local senator's office, 4 months ago, following up every 10 days to 2 weeks, and still have no answers or support.

I admit I am not comfortable writing this, as required to, as I am still concerned for my son and the other soldiers and families involved on the site. We didn't endanger them by means of displaying their photos with their names, giving up information about their location and actions. We were very careful to not breach Intel protocol, learning Ops protocol, as well as respecting and complying with it. We simply were at times, vocal about our displeasure with our president and government for how our military was being treated, or how the presidential election was being handled.

There are literally hundreds of military family, private support groups on the Internet. I truly believe we were singled out because of my refusal to hand the site over to the local F.R.G., as well as [my] outspoken political beliefs.

It's simply amazing that my son and others risk their lives for ”Freedom" in Iraq, when his own mother's civil liberties are threatened, and families are intimidated into silence, by the very same Army he is serving. I am hoping after reading this you may direct me as to where I can at least have this concern heard. Basically, are the following common practice, and legal?

**The Armed services can order families from communicating in a private forum?
**The Armed services can threaten private citizens’ first amendment rights?

I want to make sure this is not happening to other service member's families. We live in a hell everyday during the deployment of our loved ones; we don't need the added bullying or stripping away our means of helping one another.

Any idea or direction you can point me in would be greatly appreciated. Also, this problem can be corroborated by other families if need be.

Why did it take so long for me to step forward?

Originally I contacted my Senators office, with no reply for six months, and have also spoken with the A.C.L.U; (with little hope of action due to the length of time that has passed) but until now was not willing to come forward in a public way. It took until September for my son to be safely stationed at another base, and other family's service members to either be out of the service all together, or be transferred as well.

We were afraid for their safety, our own, our relationships with them and their future in the service, all of these things could have been affected, and we couldn’t chance one more problem or pressure being added to the already heavy load the families and soldiers live with. The intimidation worked. Is this just something silly I should let go?

It doesn't seems trivial to me, but I am learning unless it happens to someone personally, no one seems to care.

Thank you, for your time
Robin Vaughan

Is there no end to the lust for money generated by the Iraq war?

I got this e-mail early Tuesday morning.

Dear Fellow Veteran,

It is my privilege to announce the results of the Webb & Associates
Chaplaincy Consulting, operational-combat stress prevention (OCSP) pilot program, implemented with the 2nd Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division from January 2004 to June 2005. These 632 Marines deployed to Iraq for 7 months performing 1200 missions and driving nearly 1,000,000
miles.

An unprecedented 95% reduction in PTSD was achieved.

Really? How did Webb and Associates come up with that number, and how did they determine that it is "unprecedented?"

This represents an ANNUAL savings of $921 Million for all troops currently deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, considering only VA treatment and compensation costs. These savings will help ensure our obligations to current veterans are maintained. Help us prevent stress in our newest veterans by supporting our OCSP standard.

If we throw tax dollars at Webb and Associates, we'll save VA dollars at the other end?

I don't think so. But Webb and Associates would like me to believe otherwise.

Please click on this link (purposely not included) and register to send a letter to Congressman Duncan Hunter, House Chairman of the Armed Services Committee. Your letter will urge the funding and implementation of the Webb & Associates Operational-Combat Stress Prevention model within the entire U.S. Armed Forces.

As a Veteran myself, you have my sincerest thanks for your generous efforts to support our military service members, past, present and future.

God Bless,
Tom Webb
President
Webb & Associates Chaplaincy Consulting
A Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business

#

I've sent Tom Webb an e-mail at prayerboss@earthlink.net, the address provided on the Webb and Associates web site.

Dear Tom Webb:

Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) here. I too am a disabled veteran, and recently received your e-mail promoting your "chaplaincy" organization and your efforts on behalf of veterans suffering from PTSD.

Let me tell you up front that I strongly suspect you are trying to exploit our returning veterans for monetary gain, and that you found my e-mail address through legally questionable data mining techniques.

In the spirit of fairness, let me tell you up front that I strongly suspect you are trying to exploit our returning veterans for monetary gain, and that you found my e-mail address through legally questionable data mining techniques.

I've posted my doubts about your motives and methods here, here and elsewhere.

At your convenience, please send me any materials or references that might allay my doubts about you and your organization, and I will make aggressive efforts to support you, your company, and your past, present, and future activities.

God bless,

Jeff Huber

If you are interested in the American Revolution, and the social and political activities in Boston that preceeded the Revolution, or if you have an interest in Paul Revere, Sam Adams, et al, then by all means hasten thee hence to Digby's where there's a fascinating post about how it all began, and it is a great metaphor for blogging, and the influence blogs have had, should have, and will have, in relation to the political scene today.

As an aside, I heard Lewis H. Lapham, the editor of Harper's Magazine on National Corporate Radio this morning. He said that people who don't know their history can't change things.

Over at Firedoglake, Jane breathes some fire on the allegedly independent news pundit Howard Kurtz. The fact that Kurtz comes home every evening and says, “Hello, my love” to a paid GOP political operative is apparently not significant in judging the way he does his job.

Some liberals, meanwhile, attacked the paper for holding the story for more than a year after earlier meetings with administration officials.

(snip)

Some liberals criticized The Post for withholding the location of the prisons at the administration's request.

Jane doth sooth:

And in one fell swoop the whole matter of illegal wiretaps is now reduced to a partisan squabble instead of a justifiable concern about government overreach, invasion of privacy and complete disregard for the Constitution.

Bob Barr was a fervent wingnut when he was a Congresscritter until he lost his seat in an election. Surely we all remember the fire with which he excoriated the last honestly elected President in the US. He was outraged that a grown man would carry on a sexual relationship with an adult, not his own wife. Now, of course, Mr Barr never bothered to inquire what sort of relationship Mr Clinton had with his wife. To this day we’re not completely clear whether Mrs Clinton had a history of closing her eyes to this sort of behavior, but that was immaterial. Sex was politics, and as a loyal Republican apparatchik, Mr Barr had a White House to win for the Party.

Now an outsider, Mr Barr has a different tone to his voice. Suspiciously different.

What's wrong with it is several-fold. One, it's bad policy for our government to be spying on American citizens through the National Security Agency. Secondly, it's bad to be spying on Americans without court oversight. And thirdly, it's bad to be spying on Americans apparently in violation of federal laws against doing it without court order.

There is none so outraged as the discarded.

There’s more. It seems Jane got a new machete for Christmas, and it’s sharp.

It’s not just vets that blog. Men, women, kiddies, old grampaws and grammaws and even that crazy spinster Auntie Jane that everyone whispers about at family get togethers. It’s certainly no surprise in our electronic culture that troopies are blogging from Iraq, Korea, everywhere the trumpets blare, and banners wave proudly on the bastions of Democracy, or something like that.

The Department of Defense, however, does have certain rules regarding active duty personnel writing too much about what’s going on in whatever corner of the world the troop bloggers are assigned. And those of you who understand how hierarchical organizations like the military are set up, realize said rules are elastic. This, it seems that most milblogs seem to be vaguely…… uniform. Yeah, that’s the word. “We’re doing great stuff, we’re fighting for you over here, so you don’t have to fight them over there” – you get the point. It will be interesting to see what develops in Blogtopia (y!sctp!) after all the stop-loss nonsense is over and troops hand in their cammies and get back into soft clothes again. We might get a slightly different view of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Sites like Mudville Gazette, Blackfive, My War, (OK, he’s out now. But check out the older posts, and take the time to read his book,) all seem to be seriously intentioned as far as our time in Iraq is concerned. Maybe they’re less cynical than we are, or maybe this war is different from ours. How many of us saw Viet Namese truly happy we were there?

What brought all this stream of consciousness on was reading American Short-timer, most especially this:

Some law student emailed me while back with some questions, and after it was all said and done she told me she supported the troops. And I know a lot of people share that sentiment and it's all really warm and fuzzy and whatnot, but honestly, I just rather you run out, sign up and catch the early-bird charter to Kuwait and get your ass over here ASAP so one of us can go home. Maybe we can arrange something, you know, by ones and twos and so on, pretty sure we could get all us over-extended types outta here in no time.

We got, by estimates, close to forty-thousand plus Joes involuntarily extended, stop lossed they call it now, cause dropping INVOLUNTARILY extended day after day after day I suppose places too much emphasis on the fact that a whole buncha us got stuck in the shit INVOLUNTARILY... cause, for all you non-incarcerated types, the usual nomenclature for being stuck in the service beyond your time is--used to be--INVOLUNTARY extension. Cept they had to twist the rules all outta whack and shit to keep the machine all lubed and oiled and chugging and belching and churning out the mayhem, and somehow, rather mysteriously it seems to me at least, with all that good ol' troop lovin' shit goin' on back home they couldna find the 40K + dudes and dudettes to get us squared away and outta this mess. Thanks for the love yo.

That’s when I realized those in uniform now might give us a slightly different view once they’re safely out of reach in soft clothes.

A good list of milblogs can be found here: http://milblogging.com/

I caught this over at Josh's corner of the universe.

Today is supposed to be a day dedicated to celebration of the hope of mankind, love, peace. Many of us do that in America, in fact, many of us do that every day. While the basis of Christmas may be "Christian" the spirit of the day is open to celebration by all of man. Hope, love and peace are non-sectarian.

But this is just bizarre:

The commander of American-run prisons in Iraq says the military will not turn over any detainees or detention centers to Iraqi jailers until American officials are satisfied that the Iraqis are meeting United States standards for the care and custody of detainees.

The Bush malAdministration is utterly shameless in its cynicism and lust for totalitarian power, but still, does anyone really believe that anyone in power, poltical or military, gives a hairy rat's south end about these Iraqis that we have indelibly traumatized as a nation? While you, and I. and even the grunts, may care about these people as human beings, to those in power, the nomenklatura, they are just playing pieces on the Parcheesi board of climbing to the summit.

The irony of a Power operating untold numbers of Abu Ghraibs, Gitmos, and "interrogation" centers in Eastern Europe, Northern Africa, and the bleak and isolated Pacific Rim that are all so secret they are known as numbers, unnamed......

Too bizarre to discuss on a day dedicated to the hope of man's future, right?

This delightfully Orwellian thread started with Cedwyn writing at Dem Bloggers about some remarkable similarities:

But damn...it really is as though shrubya is using 1984 as a "Dictatorship for Dummies" guide to high office. The similarities are almost cliché, as though the administration was living a Roger Corman adaptation of the story. How else to you end up with "I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace" in a speech about home ownership?

Following the installed link we find an exhaustive number of links between IngSoc and Bu$hCo. Just go following all the threads, spend 10 or 15 minutes. If you’re familiar with the seminal work, you’ll be astounded. If you aren’t, shame on you. You can get better educated about today’s Republican Party here. It’s not a long read, but it’s chilling; don’t read it in a dark room, mm-kay? You can also enjoy his other well-known work here.

Remember though: what is “truth” and “history” today might turn out to be just a figment of your imagination tomorrow:

"There's no question that Saddam Hussein had al-Qaida ties," the president said.

Do you remember Mr Bush saying this? If you do, then you understand why we had to attack Iraq.

"We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with September the 11th."

Do you remember Mr Bush saying this? If you do, but think you remember the quote above, and feel confused, then you are guilty of thoughtcrime.

"If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say this or that even, it never happened—that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death." —pg 32

Oh, - one more quote from 1984:

"In Oceania at the present day, Science, in the old sense, has almost ceased to exist. In Newspeak there is no word for 'Science.' The empirical method of thought, on which all the scientific achievements of the past were founded, is opposed to the most fundamental principles of Ingsoc." —pg 159

Bear that in mind as the assault on evolution continues, now that the War on Christmas is over.

Until next year.

Until final victory.

We have always been at war with science.

Way back over there we wrote about UMass student who got a visit from some of St Nick's elves at the Department of Homeland Security when he requested an Interlibrary loan of Mao Tse-Tung's "Little Red Book". As reported by Kos's most excellent blogonline magazine, that story is no longer operational, as they say in the Bush malAdministration.

We stand by the rest of the story, however. Just not the part about the student, and the DHS agents, and the interview, and maybe the part about Mao's little red book, and maybe the part about DHS monitoring Interlibrary loans. The rest is all gold. Honest.

It is rumored that this is not the first time a veteran has been fooled by somone who lied.

More later.

Via SFBay.com we learn some aspects of the disgraceful treatment of Gulf War vets poisoned by their own munitions:

Preventive Psychiatry E-Newsletter charged Monday that the reason Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi stepped down earlier this month was the growing scandal surrounding the use of uranium munitions in the Iraq War.

When Principi resigned, there was a lot some nary a frickin peep in the MSM, other than the bare bones announcement. Those who have grown gray-haired and cynical observing the incredible scandals associated with the Bush regime chortled to themselves, expecting to hear that Principi elected to “spend more time with his family” which is the standard statement to indicate “man overboard – throw him an anvil.”

Writing in Preventive Psychiatry E-Newsletter No. 169, Arthur N. Bernklau, executive director of Veterans for Constitutional Law in New York, stated, “The real reason for Mr. Principi’s departure was really never given, however a special report published by eminent scientist Leuren Moret naming depleted uranium as the definitive cause of the ‘Gulf War Syndrome’ has fed a growing scandal about the continued use of uranium munitions by the US Military.” Bernklau continued, “This malady (from uranium munitions), that thousands of our military have suffered and died from, has finally been identified as the cause of this sickness, eliminating the guessing. The terrible truth is now being revealed.”

This would be the malady that Defense Secretary Rumsfeld decried as nonsense. Bernklau again:

He added, “Out of the 580,400 soldiers who served in GW1 (the first Gulf War), of them, 11,000 are now dead! By the year 2000, there were 325,000 on Permanent Medical Disability. This astounding number of ‘Disabled Vets’ means that a decade later, 56% of those soldiers who served have some form of permanent medical problems!” The disability rate for the wars of the last century was 5 percent; it was higher, 10 percent, in Viet Nam. “The VA Secretary (Principi) was aware of this fact as far back as 2000,” wrote Bernklau. “He, and the Bush administration have been hiding these facts, but now, thanks to Moret’s report, (it) ... is far too big to hide or to cover up!

In response to the facts being publicized, Principi walked off the set. Bu$hCo, naturally, continues to live in denial, and. Of course, veterans suffer.

And die.

America’s Army – dying the death of a thousand cuts.

Hat tip to the Iguana for the start.

Here's an interesting story that hasn't hit the mainstream press yet.

Official Wire reports that Russ Tice, a former National Security Agency analyst has sent two letters to the Chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees.

Mr. Tice intends to report to Congress probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts conducted while he was an intelligence officer with the National Security Agency (NSA) and with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). These acts involved the Director of the National Security Agency, the Deputies Chief of Staff for Air and Space Operations, and the U.S. Secretary of Defense, and were conducted via very highly sensitive intelligence programs and operations known as Special Access Programs (SAP). SAP programs and operations are more commonly referred to as “black world” programs and operations. Mr. Tice was a technical intelligence specialist dealing almost exclusively with SAP programs and operations at both NSA and DIA.

Mr. Tice stated: “As a Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) officer it is continually drilled into us that the very first law chiseled in the SIGINT equivalent of the Ten Commandments (USSID-18) is that Thou shall not spy on American persons without a court order from FISA. This law is continually drilled into each NSA intelligence officer throughout his or her career. The very people that lead the National Security Agency have violated this holy edict of SIGINT."

[…]

It is with my oath as a US intelligence officer weighing heavy on my mind that I wish to report to congress acts that I believe are unlawful and unconstitutional. The freedom of the American people cannot be protected when our constitutional liberties are ignored and our nation has decayed into a police state.”

This could play large in the Snoopgate scandal, perhaps in a bizarre way. Mr. Tice has a stormy history with his former employer.

In May 2005, FEDERALTIMES ran a story on Tice's departure from the NSA.

Russ Tice, who spent nearly 20 years analyzing intelligence for the Air Force, Navy, Defense Intelligence Agency and NSA, will be fired May 16, said the nonprofit, nonpartisan group Project on Government Oversight. In 2001, Tice, who was then working at DIA, reported his suspicions that a co-worker might have been a Chinese spy, POGO said. Two years later, after Tice had transferred to NSA, an FBI investigation into the DIA co-worker prompted Tice to raise his concerns again.

POGO said that led to a series of retaliatory actions against Tice, such as a psychiatric evaluation that led to his security clearance being revoked. Tice was also assigned to unload furniture from trucks at a warehouse, which led to a back injury, and worked in the NSA motor pool for eight months chauffeuring agency officials and checking fluids, vacuuming and cleaning vehicles. This “unusually abusive retaliation” was an attempt to force Tice to resign, POGO said.

And in another retaliatory action, POGO said, NSA withdrew an award Tice received for his intelligence work during the Iraq war after he lost his security clearance.

Given the Bush administration's track record with whistle blowers, there's every reason to believe that Tice was a victim of unfair and "abusive" retaliation. But just now, there's no way of proving it. What's more, Tice appears to be especially vulnerable to the kind of personal smear campaign this administration has become so well known for.

The Pulse Journal also ran a story on the Tice firing that gave further details on the nature of the retaliatory measures taken against him.

In April 2003, Tice sent an e-mail to the DIA agent handling his suspicions about a co-worker being a Chinese spy. He was prompted to do so by a news report about two FBI agents who were arrested for giving classified information to a Chinese double agent.

"At the time, I sent an e-mail to Mr. James (the person at DIA handling his complaint) questioning the competence of counterintelligence at FBI," Tice wrote in a document submitted to the Inspector General. In the e-mail, he mentioned that he suspected that he was the subject of electronic monitoring.

Shortly after sending the e-mail, an NSA security officer ordered [Tice] to report for "a psychological evaluation" even though he had just gone through one nine months earlier. Tice believes James called NSA to ask them "to go after him" on their behalf.

When Tice called Mr. James to confront him about calling the NSA security official, he told Tice that "there was reason to be concerned" about his suspicion about his former co-worker.

The Defense Department psychologist concluded that Tice suffered from psychotic paranoia, according to Tice. "He did this even though he admitted that I did not show any of the normal indications of someone suffering from paranoia," Tice wrote in a statement to the inspector general.

For the time being, I'm perfectly willing to take Tice's story at face value. The notion of this administration using an ordered psychological investigation to discredit a whistle blower carries merit. Unfortunately, the very fact of a DOD psychologist diagnosing Tice as a psychotic paranoid damages his credibility. Congressional leaders and the mainstream press will likely balk at giving his claims credence unless a number of other NSA officials come forward to confirm his story.

And given the history of what's happened to whistle blowers during the Bush administration's tenure, how likely is that to happen?

With many thanks to The Left Coast
Who never fails with words of anger
To make Righties into toast
And warn US of danger.

‘Twas the night before Christmas and through all the land
Not a cell phone was private; dissent was all banned.
Constitutions were burning like logs in a fire
My head was inflamed with a lust for Empire.
Laura wore vestments, and I a King’s gown.
We’d just settled down to watch L’Affaire Thomas Crown.
When out on Penn Ave there arose such commotion
To the West Wing I stumbled, in drunk locomotion.
Away to Dick Cheney I flew like a flash,
To grab at his coattails, throw up on his sash.
Even the Moonies who publish Wa-Times
Were urging Impeachment with clamorous chimes.
Then what to my black beady eyes did appear?
But Patrick Fitzgerald, with indictments I fear.
The grand jury had acted so lively and quick I knew in a moment the charges would stick.
More rapid than Rumsfeldian lies did they come
While Fitzgerald growled and called me a bum.
“Now, Shrubbie! Now, Bushie! You’re worse than Dick Nixon!
“Go, Georgie! Quit, Chimp-face! You'll soon be a con.
“To the floor you should drop, now assume the position!
I’m here to arrest you and that is my mission.”
As FEMA men sleep while wild hurricanes roar,
And as fast as my tax cuts made deficits soar,
Bechtel and Halliburton, now and anon,
Will be looting the Treasury ‘til everything's gone.
But now, in a twinkling, handcuffs snapped in place
(Wiping that silly smirk off my face).
And I heard something stirring in Capitol halls:
Someone in Congress had finally grown balls.
Specter was holding a Judicial hearing.
Both sides of the aisle were fervently cheering.
Snowe pointed her finger, "So where is Ossama?"
Whimpering softly, I asked for my Mama.
“You betrayed our Forefathers,” Russ Feingold accused,
“And subverted our freedoms. We won’t be abused.”
My eyes – how they narrowed! My tongue grew so dry.
I blinked back the tears and wanted to cry.
“Give me a lawyer!” I said. “It's my right.”
Whispered Condi, “You canceled that, George, t'other night.”
“Now, wait just a minute,” I pleaded again.
“Remember who runs things if I’m in the pen.
Dick Cheney, that’s who. There’s no scarier thought.
Like it or not, I’m the best that you’ve got.”
They spoke not a word, but performed their good works,
Impeaching us both because we’re such jerks.
We were sentenced to replace all the troops in Iraq
'Cause Cheney and I’d been the Chickenhawk claque.
As the prison plane taxied 'fore leaving D.C. A band started playing ‘Hail Chief, Hillary.’
Inside of my head, I can still hear the singers:
"Happy Holidays to all – except for Right Wingers.”

Quoted complete, for this Christmas Holiday Eve,
Fair Use still exists, Hooray for our side!
Let’s get all the wingnuts, and give ‘em a heave!
A glorious new Congress, where all can abide.

MSGOP brings us news of how well things are going in Iraq:

It was a tough Thursday in newly democratic Iraq. Lots of sectarian strife, religious rivalry, deaths, IEDs gun attacks against civilians, Iraqi Army units, Iraqi Police units, and assorted contractors, translators, go-to-guys, and even US troops. Just another fairly typical day in Freedom-on-the-marchutopia. I guess. But this bit of the story is particularly meaningful:

[G]unmen Friday attacked an Iraqi army checkpoint in the city of Adhaim, in religiously and ethnically mixed Diyala province, killing eight soldiers and wounding seventeen, an Iraqi army officer said on condition he not be identified for fear of reprisal.
“There were too many to count,” said Akid, a 20-year-old soldier from Diwanayah being treated for gunshot wounds to both thighs. “They tried to kill everybody.”
Akid, who would only give his first name for fear of reprisal, said his battalion of about 600 men had already suffered over 250 desertions after a Dec. 3 ambush in Adhaim killed 19 Iraqi soldiers.
“They gave up,” he said. “They said, 'The hell with this.’”

Bu$hCo has bragged how the Iraqi Army is gaining strength and skills, and becoming far more proficient through their training, and OJT work with US troops. Not more than 6 weeks ago, we were told of three battalions able to stand on their own feet, and then a week or so later, that number was reduced to one (1) Class 1 unit. It seems the actual Generals on the ground in Iraq have a different view of things than they rosy-glassed political generals back in the Pentagon.

Some anomalies:

On November 30, Mr Bush, speaking at one of his patented puff speeches in front of a captive, guaranteed friendly audience, (Annapolis this time) stated that "only one Iraqi battalion has achieved complete independence from the coalition.”
The very next day, GOP political operative Mary Matalin was claiming that “roughly one-third” of the approximately 120 Iraqi battalions was operating without US support.
How did the competency grown from one battalion to 40 battalions literally overnight?

And on November 30th, GEN Peter Pace, Chairman of the JCS proclaimed the characterization of operations carried out by “[a]lmost 30 battalions” as “independent operations, so to speak.”
So, it looks like we’ve got 1, or 3, or 40, or 30 battalions of Iraqis out there doing what we were doing.

According to “Akid” quoted above in the MSGOP article above these battalions have been reduced by about 42%.
Mr Bush is famous for saying, “As the Iraqis stand up, our troops can stand down.”

Can we now bring home some battalions? How many? 1? 3? 40? 30?
Or do we bring home only 42% of the above US battalions?

Tom Tomorrow details some of the week's sensations.

Let's see:
NSA putting their ears where they shouldn't.

The Pentagon is afraid of Quakers and gay kids in gollege.

Chairman Mao may be dead but his thoughts live on, and the FBI fears them.

NYCPD has a new hobby.

The Reich Wing is all happy about 24/7 cameras in the UK. How will they feel when we have it here?
(Hint: they'll be busy with their hands in thir pockets, whisting as they study the clouds.)

WAKE UP EVERYONE!!!! Christmas shopping is over!!

Thomas Daschle, ex-Senator from South Dakota, and ex-Leader of the Democratic Party in the Senate, writes about the AUMF, in today’s WaPo:

In the face of mounting questions about news stories saying that President Bush approved a program to wiretap American citizens without getting warrants, the White House argues that Congress granted it authority for such surveillance in the 2001 legislation authorizing the use of force against al Qaeda. On Tuesday, Vice President Cheney said the president "was granted authority by the Congress to use all means necessary to take on the terrorists, and that's what we've done."

Dick Cheney has long been a fan of one-man rule. As long as he is the man, or the shadow behind the man. I doubt there is a thinking American who doesn’t understand who is really driving Bu$hCo.

On the evening of Sept. 12, 2001, the White House proposed that Congress authorize the use of military force to "deter and pre-empt any future acts of terrorism or aggression against the United States." Believing the scope of this language was too broad and ill defined, Congress chose instead, on Sept. 14, to authorize "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines planned, authorized, committed or aided" the attacks of Sept. 11. With this language, Congress denied the president the more expansive authority he sought and insisted that his authority be used specifically against Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.

Jeff Huber has done a very exhaustive search on the AUMF and his work should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in the history of how we came to this point. You can find it here. And don’t miss his very illuminating article about why Mr Bush can’t legally do what he’s been doing.

Just before the Senate acted on this compromise resolution, the White House sought one last change. Literally minutes before the Senate cast its vote, the administration sought to add the words "in the United States and" after "appropriate force" in the agreed-upon text. This last-minute change would have given the president broad authority to exercise expansive powers not just overseas -- where we all understood he wanted authority to act -- but right here in the United States, potentially against American citizens. I could see no justification for Congress to accede to this extraordinary request for additional authority. I refused.

This is a key point; here we have a public statement from a participant. Daschle was there, in the Senate during this frightening, hectic days of shock and terrified reaction to the horrific events of September 11th. To my knowledge this is one of the first, if not the first “insider’s” report, except for the revelations of Richard Clarke, known today for his candor. (“We failed you. I failed you.”) Daschle’s revelation that Bu$hCo tried to slip in a key phrase at the last moment that would have created in 2001 what they’re been fantasizing they’ve had ever since: unlimited, unchecked, executive power.

Think about that, for a moment. While we as a nation reeled in anguish at the horrendous events, Bu$hCo was not only coldly planning to blame the attack on a helpless enemy of opportunity, but the were also planning to establish their dictatorship in one fell swoop, by asking for the right to wage war on any country, any group, any person, anywhere in the world, including inside the US.

The Congress decided to delete the phrase “in the United States”, apparently believing this was a step too far. It is ironic in one sense: Daschle was Majority Leader at the time. The Democratic Party held a slim lead over the Republicans for the moment, and that is what both saved the Nation and precipitated the present crisis over Mr Bush’s latest arrogant demands for an Imperial Presidency.

UPDATE: Jeff's Smoke and Mirrors article also appears here. A fine site for folks who want to learn more about participatory democracy.

by Jeff Huber
originally posted at ePluribus Media

Future generations may look back on December 2005 as a watershed period in the evolution of the United States of America. The actions taken and decisions made during and subsequent to that month may determine the nature of the separation of powers among the legislative, executive and judicial branches of our federal government for decades — and centuries — to come.

On December 15th The New York Times revealed that President Bush had, in support of the Global War on Terror, secretly authorized the National Security Agency to spy without prior judicial approval on Americans inside the United States. The next day, many members of Congress expressed outrage at the revelation, and 47 members of the Senate staged a filibuster to block passage of a new Patriot Act.

On Saturday, the 17th, Mr. Bush made a live televised speech in which he admitted to having ordered the National Security Agency to conduct domestic surveillance. In justifying his actions, he cited the “…constitutional authority vested in me as commander-in-chief” and powers granted him by Congress in the Patriot Act and in the Authority for Use of Military Force (AUMF) enacted on September 18, 2001.

In light of these events, the body politic must seek the answers to three vital questions:

* Has Mr. Bush exceeded his constitutional authority as commander-in-chief;
* Did Congress exceed its constitutional authority by granting Mr. Bush outside-the-box powers with the Patriot Act and the AUMF; and
* Did the judicial branch fail in its duty to keep the legislative and executive branches inside the bounds of their constitutional authorities?

Continue reading "The Ides of December: Smoke, Mirrors and War Powers"

Court rejects request to transfer Padilla custody
White House sought to shift terror suspect held by military to civilian court

WASHINGTON - In a sharp rebuke, a federal appeals court denied Wednesday a Bush administration request to transfer terrorism suspect Jose Padilla from military to civilian law enforcement custody.
The three-judge panel of the Richmond-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said bringing criminal charges against Padilla in Florida after he had been held by the U.S. military for more than three years as an enemy combatant created the appearance the government may be attempting to avoid high court review of the controversial case.
The judges also refused the administration’s request to void a September ruling that gave President Bush wide authority to detain “enemy combatants” indefinitely without charges on U.S. soil. Wiping out that ruling would have made it virtually impossible for the Supreme Court to review the case.

So, three years and change after this poor guy, apparently from the confused news reports a confused dishwasher, was arrested and popped into the Charlestown brig incommunicado, Bu$hCo can’t get the guy convicted in front of a military tribunal, and you just know one of those would have an open phone line to the WH while the hearing was going on, to get instructions. The Department of Justice (heh!) tried to off-load the guy into the Federal civilian court system, and that didn’t work.

The decision, written by Judge Michael Luttig, questioned why the administration used one set of facts before the court for 3½ years to justify holding Padilla without charges but used another set to convince a grand jury in Florida to indict him last month. In bringing the original criminal charges against Padilla, the Justice Department said Padilla had plotted with al-Qaida to set off a radioactive "dirty bomb" in the United States and schemed to blow up apartment buildings. But Padilla was charged last month in Miami with being part of a terrorism cell that raised money and recruited fighters to wage jihad outside the United States. The government made no mention of its previous allegations against him in the latest indictment.

Shifting rationales for war….shifting claims of criminality….shifting justifications for Mr Here’s-my-demand-of-the-moment. Ask any Florida builder: you can’t build a house on shifting sands.

[Judge Michael] Luttig said the administration has risked its “credibility before the courts” by appearing to use the indictment of Padilla to thwart an appeal of the appeals court’s decision that gave the president wide berth in holding enemy combatants. A Department of Justice statement said DOJ was "disappointed" in the court's decision not to allow Padilla's transfer. "The President’s authority to detain enemy combatants, which the Fourth Circuit has upheld, should not be viewed as an obstacle to an exercise of the government’s undoubted authority to prosecute federal crimes, including those related to terrorism," DOJ added, in the statement delivered by director of public affairs, Tasua Scolinos.

It seems like it was only a few months ago I heard WH apparatchiki loudly deriding President Clinton’s plan to fight terrorism as a criminal, and not a military problem.

Meanwhile, in the REAL War on Terror – you know – the Taliban? The guys bankrolled by Saudi Arabia? Osama bin Forgotten’s merry play pals? Afghanistan? Via The Agonist, we find WaPo telling us:

Afghan Assembly Picks Opponent of President as Leader
The lower house of Afghanistan's new parliament elected a leading opposition figure as its speaker Wednesday, raising the prospect of a divided government just two days after the country inaugurated its first legislature in more than three decades.
Yonus Qanooni, who finished second to Hamid Karzai in last year's presidential race, won the speakership over factional commander Abdurrab Rasul Sayyaf on a razor-close 122 to 117 vote. Now, after four years of governing without a legislature, Karzai will face the challenge of sharing power with his chief rival for national leadership.

This is really disheartening, of course, because Karzai was the lead man for Unocal in the trans-asia-trans Caucasus pipeline deal. This was the original plan to get our oil out of Iraq, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, and all-the-other-stans, and into the Black Sea.

Things are not looking good on the Imperial frontlines.

Howell Raines, writing for Australia’s "The Age", one the world’s great newspapers:

The Bush generations have enriched themselves while impoverishing the presidency.

AT THIS point, the policy legacy of George Bush seems pretty well defined by three disparate disasters: Iraq in foreign affairs, Katrina in social welfare, corporate influence over tax, budget and regulatory decisions. As a short-term political consequence, we may avoid another dim-witted Bush in the White House. But what the Bush dynasty has done to presidential campaign science — the protocols by which Americans elect presidents in the modern era — amounts to a political legacy that can haunt the Republic for years to come.

His little tiff with the Princess of Provincetown and that little speed bump of poor judgment with Jayson Blair notwithstanding, Howell Raines does have some fairly solid reportorial credentials. He started writing in 1964, in the deep red South, and stayed there, eventually making his name at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. That was before the Cox sisters bought up a supposedly genteel paper with a reputation for eye-gouging reporters who took no crap from politicians or District Attorneys. He did the tour, reporting and editing at various desks and papers until being graced with a Pulitzer in 1993, followed by meteoric advancement through the NY Times, being appointed Executive Editor in 2001. Despite Jayson Blair, the man knows his way around a typewriter.

We are now enduring the third generation of Bushes who have taken the playbook of the "ruthless" Kennedys and amplified it into a consistent code of amorality in both campaign tactics and governance.

……….

[T]here was also a solid foundation of knowledge and purpose undergirding John Kennedy's sophisticated internationalism, his Medicare initiative, his late-blooming devotion to racial justice, and Robert Kennedy's opposition to corporate and union gangsterism.

Scoundrels come in all sizes, colors, denominations, and political persuasions. Some we have grown to admire, such as the Kennedys, who Raines seems to feel were a plus for America. Others leave us with a neutral feeling, and while Raines doesn’t discuss this middle of the road in admirability, I’d suggest he would feel T. Roosevelt, N. Rockefeller, and D. Eisenhower fit that mold. Still other scoundrels seem to Raines to be patently self-identifying.

Behind George W, there are four generations of Bushes and Walkers devoted first to using political networks to pile up and protect personal fortunes and, latterly, to using absolutely any means to gain office, not because they want to do good, but because they are what passes in American for hereditary aristocrats. In sum, George Bush stands at the apex of a pyramid of privilege whose history and social significance that, given his animosity to scholarly thought, he almost certainly does not understand.

Citing Kevin Phillps’s “American Dynasty” Raines takes us on a brief tour of the Bush/Walker raison d’etre: personal wealth, and personal selfishness.

They had ties to the richest families of the industrial age: Rockefeller, Harriman, Brookings. Yet they never adopted the charitable, public-service ethic that developed in those families.

Both Raines’s article and Phillips’s book turn a spotlight on a family America may grow to hate in the future.

Whether or not Presidents Carter and Clinton violated the FISA act on their watches is, at the end of the day, irrelevant. Two wrongs don't make a right, nor do three ,or four, or a thousand. All that really matters right now is whether Mister Bush committed a wrong, and determining that will take smashing the mirrors and clearing the smoke.

#

Mister Bush committed a wrong if he authorized non-court approved surveillance on U.S. persons in violation of the FISA law, which resides in a series of subsections of U.S. Code. In working our way through that maze, we may as well start at the beginning.

Subsection 1801 defines a number of descriptions of groups, individuals and activities including "foreign power," "agent of a foreign power," "international terrorism," "sabotage" and "electronic surveillance."

But the most important definition in this section is the one that describes a "United States person," which states:

“United States person” means a citizen of the United States, an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence (as defined in section 1101 (a)(20) of title 8), an unincorporated association a substantial number of members of which are citizens of the United States or aliens lawfully admitted for permanent residence, or a corporation which is incorporated in the United States, but does not include a corporation or an association which is a foreign power, as defined in subsection (a)(1), (2), or (3) of this section.

It's a fair assumption that the plain English abstraction of this legalese is that if you're a citizen or legal resident of the United States, you're a United States person.

Let's move ahead to Subsection 1802, which authorizes electronic surveillance without court order under certain conditions. It says that…

Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General certifies in writing under oath that…

[Among other things]

…there is no substantial likelihood that the surveillance will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party[.]

This appears to protect any United States person from unwarranted surveillance.

The last part of this subsection says:

Applications for a court order under this subchapter are authorized if the President has, by written authorization, empowered the Attorney General to approve applications to the court having jurisdiction under section 1803 of this title, and a judge to whom an application is made may, notwithstanding any other law, grant an order, in conformity with section 1805 of this title, approving electronic surveillance of a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power for the purpose of obtaining foreign intelligence information, except that the court shall not have jurisdiction to grant any order approving electronic surveillance directed solely as described in paragraph (1)(A) of subsection (a) of this section unless such surveillance may involve the acquisition of communications of any United States person.

This seems to be quintuple negative lawyer speak that says the courts don't have jurisdiction over electronic surveillance unless there's a United States person who "may be" involved.

Let's skip ahead now to Subsection 1181, "Authorization during time of war," which in its entirety reads:

Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence information for a period not to exceed fifteen calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress.

One can reasonably assume this means that the prohibition from electronically spying on U.S. persons is waived fifteen days from a Congressional declaration of war.

Did the congressional Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs) of September 2001 and September 2002 constitute declarations of war by virtue of "specific statutory authority?"

Lamentably, they probably did.

So unless Congress and its lawyers can prove beyond doubt that electronic surveillance was targeted against non-U.S. persons outside of the 15-day window that the FISA act describes, Messrs. Bush and Gonzalez will skate away from this scandal on the thin ice of a new day.

#

I'm watching MSNBC's Mrs. FED Chairman interviewing Joe Biden on this issue. Neither of them seem to have a clue about the real legal and constitutional issues on this subject.

As Perry White, Superman's boss on the Daily Planet used to say:

"Great Caesar's ghost!"

#

By the way, if you haven't read much Shakespeare, you might want to start with his Tragedy of Julius Caesar. It may give you historical perspective on our contemporary situation.

Over on The Left Coast, the pessimist fulfills his pre-ordained function:

Rank Has Its Privelege ...
... and Bu$hCo is more rank than anything! How else to explain this blatant favoritism?
Army allows Reserve officers to leave rather than go to war
Faced with growing unrest among soldiers called back to active duty, almost two-thirds of the Army officers in the Individual Ready Reserve program have been allowed to resign rather than go to war, the Army has disclosed. The 265 officers are among 410 reservists who had orders that likely would have sent them to Iraq or Afghanistan.
That option has not been granted to enlisted soldiers who also have been called back to duty from the Ready Reserve.

Eighty remain in open defiance of orders to appear.

Including many single parents.

Sgt. Ricci Moore is stationed at an Army training camp in cold, windy Ft. McCoy, Wis., 535 miles from her 9-year-old son, Joey, and dozens of other relatives in Detroit. Joey is being cared for by his aunt. Moore is one of thousands of military parents who have or will leave their children in the care of someone else while they serve their country far from home. She's also one of a smaller, but growing, number of single military parents who have no other parent to leave a child with during their absence.

And this lovely bit of personal sacrifice for Exxon’s profits:

As Christmas nears, Patricia Arndt, 43, is trying to sell the Medford home she says she will not be able to keep on an Army salary of approximately $60,000 a year, and is searching for someone to care for her 13-year-old son, Shane. Her return to active duty will leave her teenage son without a parent for 18 months, she said, and cost her more than $100,000 in income during that time. "People have no idea what this is doing to families." She said her son's emotional well-being worries her the most. "He says, 'My father's not here, you're not here, why should I be here?'" Arndt said. "His life as he knows it is gone."

But it’s cool because the US Army has determined that all’s fair in parenting and war.

U.S. Army officials said Arndt is not being treated unfairly. "Single parents are treated no differently than any other soldier, and are expected to have a family care plan at all times," said Army spokeswoman Lt. Col. Pamela Hart. Almost 8 percent of all current Army personnel -- and 13.8 percent of female soldiers -- are single parents, the officials said.

Later on the Pessimist, remaining true to his nom de guerre, gets down on the Bushes, mere, pere, et fils mixtes :

The war only exists to perpetuate the anarchistic state of war and further the Bush family's designs on permanently controlling America, turning it into a fascistic, religious state over which they preside, as the Saudi rulers preside over their nation.

But, it's not all bad, because Fredom is on the march. I'm just not clear on why Reserve Officers are freer than Reserve EM. Maybe it's a Bush entitlement thing.

The Rude Pundit lays out one of the alternatives for us.

Don't miss it. It's been approved by the Republican Party, RNC, Focus On The Family, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Liberty University, the Federalist Society, The Aryan Brotherhood, and the Klan.

Non-Christians need not apply.

Over at ePluribus, we've put together quite a bit of info pertinent to the NSA spying scandal in "Smoke, Mirrors and War Powers."

The piece pretty much covers everything you're going to hear in the news in the weeks and months to come.

Many of you are probably aware that a student up at Dartmouth was writing a paper about totalitarianism and fascism and requested an interlibrary loan of Mao Tse-Tung’s Little Red Book. Imagine his surprise when two agents from the Department of Homeland Security showed up at his dorm to question him.

Who knew DHS monitored interlibrary loans?

Professor Cole discusses the subject, as well as Sir Thomas More’s view on law and Satan:

More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast - man's laws, not God's - and if you cut them down - and you're just the man to do it - d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake."

[Y]ou can't get at al-Qaeda by having an auto-da-fe for the US Constitution, and even if you could, it would be a hollow victory, because it is the values of the Bill of Rights that al-Qaeda would like to see subverted.

Those same FBI and DHS agents who are heroes when they take on al-Qaeda directly are in danger of becoming double agents for Bin Laden when they are tempted by all the new prerogatives offered them by King George III (isn't he our third George?) to sidestep the Bill of Rights, due process and the rule of law.

Sense and devotion to the law are two of the reasons why Sir Thomas More became Saint Thomas More.

Tom gives a 21st century approach to the Declaration of Independence.

This is my followup MetroPulse column I wrote in response to some of the response I got for the one previously posted.  I suggest that you read the one below this post first, but in any case, read both.  Once that happens, flame away if you are so inclined.  But consider this fair warning, I have facts and logic and I'm not afraid to use them.  As always, I am posting the full text as submitted to the editor. There are some differences but, the intent and message are not changed.  Feel free to click on the link and compare the two.

CAFKIA

There is an old joke that I was reminded of this morning.  A sadist and a masochist meet at a party. The masochist says “Beat me beat me!”  The sadist looks at the masochist coldly and says “NO!”

 

If you can't understand that joke, there may be no reason to read farther.  At least get someone to explain it to you.  It is relevant to my thinking for my recent column about the national response to  IX/XI.  This time, I shall attempt to make things more clear than I apparently did last time.

 

First, some facts that I find hugely important.

1. On 9/11 we were not attacked by a nation.

2. On 9/11 we were not attacked by a
   religion.

   
   

3. On 9/11 we were not attacked by an
   ethnicity.

   
   

4. On 9/11 we were attacked by a
   self-selected group whose membership was multi-national.

   
   

5. According to official U.S. government reports, of the 19 known hijackers, 15 of them were citizens of Saudi Arabia, 2 were citizens of the Union of Arab Emirates (UAE), 1 was Egyptian, and 1 was Lebanese.

6. The hijackers received much of
   their training to handle aircraft in the air in flight schools in
   the USA.
   

   
   

 

No doubt you have by now noticed the lack of Afganistan and Iraq in the list. No doubt that you have noticed the large presence of Saudi citizens on the list.  Other things I might point out, though you doubtless know already, the hijackers knew what they were getting ready to do.  They planned their own violent deaths months in advance.

 

Ok, so much for the background information.  No on to the meat of the matter.  As I indicated in my previous column, I was pissed off about the attacks and I wanted the perps to pay.  What I wasn't, was wildly and irrationally angry at an entire genre of people, most of whom had no more to do with the planning or execution of the attacks than did I.  It took a while for the thought to form in a way that I could explain it but, I knew that for us, this represented a new kind of threat.  Something that would have to be handled in a relatively new and novel way. 

 

Planning to fight your next battle as though it were going to be a repeat of the battle you just fought is one of the more frequent mistakes made by military commanders throughout history.  It has happened once more.  We responded to that attack as though it were a nation that had attacked us.(I still hear comparisons to Pearl Harbor)  We even picked a nation and made them the whipping boy and when that wasn't satisfactory enough, we picked another.  We simultaneously said that we were going to treat a concept, a military tactic, terror, as though it were a nation and declare war on it.  As anyone could have predicted, those things were politically very popular initially.  The kneejerk response of “hurt somebody” or, “do something, even if it is wrong” was prevalent throughout the nation.   However, it wasn't MY response.

 

I got very calm and cold and rational. I wanted a series, however many it took, of surgical strikes and operations that would absolutely remove the cancer that caused the deaths of my countrymen and, I wanted it to be done in such a way that allowed for two things; plausible (if unconvincing) deniability that we had done anything other than the previously mentioned food and clothing drop and, I wanted it to instill terror in the hearts of any of those who might have been sympathetic to the cause and were potential future operatives against us.  Not just Arabs, not just Muslims but, anyone who might plan a non-national attack on the USA was who we should have been impressing.  Instead, we showed them that if they simply train in a country other than theirs and receive funding from citizens of a variety of nations, then their friends, relatives and countrymen will have nothing to worry about should the USA retaliatate for an act of a self-selecting terror group.

 

One critique I heard struck me as very valid.  I have no idea of such operations as the CIA may have carried out.  I am not cleared to know and indeed, have no need to know. However, if such operations have been carried out, they failed to meet the second of my criteria stated above.  As our government claims that there are still active terror threats out there that are being interdicted(unless they are lying to us about those recent successes).

 

Still, the basic idea remains v