How many members of the Bush administration does it take to change a light bulb?

• One to deny that the light bulb needs to be changed;
• One to attack the patriotism of anyone who says the light bulb needs to be changed;
• One to blame Clinton for burning out the light bulb;
• One to arrange the invasion of a country rumored to have a secret stockpile of light bulbs;
• One to give a billion dollar no-bid contract to Halliburton for the new light bulb;
• One to photograph Bush, dressed as a janitor, standing on a ladder under the banner: Light Bulb Change Accomplished;
• One administration insider to resign and write a book documenting in detail how Bush was literally in the dark;
• One to viciously smear #7;
• One to campaign on TV and at rallies on how George Bush has had a strong light-bulb-changing policy all along;
• One to confuse Americans about the difference between screwing a light bulb and screwing the country.
• And finally, one to explain that 9/11 changed everything, including the light bulb.

MoveOn Ad about Karl Rove

Yeah, MoveOn is partisan. Yeah, MoveOn attacks like a shark. But here, the White House is damned by it's own words and actions.

Click here to donate money to run this ad.

More Qualified Statements Worthy of Orwell

Once again our administration is carefully crafting it's words to look like it's saying one thing while saying another.

Previously, President Bush said anyone 'involved in leaking' Valerie Plame's identity would be fired. Sounded pretty good, pretty sweeping. Now we get a more qualified statement. Now Bush says anyone convicted of a crime will be fired. This comes on the heels of Rove saying "I never knew her name, never said her name," as if this somehow exonerates him. (I guess it all depends on what the meaning of 'is' is...)

The haziness of Rove's conversation with Matthew Cooper of Time may well prevent him from being convicted. The law against revealing the identity of covert government operatives is notoriously hard to prove. Still, the behavior of Rove is just another in a long string of political dirty tricks, backstabbing and behind-the-scenes slander that sadly is typical of this administration's tactics. Click on this Google search ("Karl Rove" "Dirty Tricks") to see for yourself.

Now what would you pay? But wait, there's more! Matthew Cooper now writes in a story in Time magazine that both Rove and Scooter Libby were involved in leaking the information, in direct contradiction to statements made by the White House in the past few years. Lies, lies, then more lies.

At least no one is fooling around with an intern.

See these great video clips from The Daily Show for a pretty good explanation of what this is all about.

• More Best Leak Ever
• Michael Isikoff

Holy C**p! A powerful rant

Here's a great post, laced with obscenities and good points. Not for the under-17, but interesting reading none the less.

Click here for a bracing blast of vitriol. Don't say I didn't warn you.

When WWIII Started?...

There's an email circulating about that can also be found on the internet. It's called "When WWIII Started: A must read historical account of Terrorism against the US." You can read it here..

There are any interesting facts here, and certainly a disturbing pattern of aggression. However, I take issue with the implied premise that America is the center of the universe, making attacks on us equivalent to World War III.

Sadly, the Muslims have been attacking the West since the death of Mohammed, before the USA even existed, and the West has been fighting back and attacking as well since then. Many heroic deeds were done and wrongs righted on both sides, and many suffered terribly and cruel injustices were done -- again, on both sides.

So much of this struggle has been centered around the battle for Europe, with a highlight on Israel. If this is in fact 'World War III' it started a long time ago. See Islamism and specifically History of Islamism on WikiPedia for more detail.

A far more important and troubling point to me is the centrally religious aspect to this struggle. As is oft quoted on the Internet and elsewhere, religious wars are essentially groups of people killing each other in an argument over who has the better imaginary friend. We have people, tribes, nations, cultures, entire religions, decimating each other over points of faith that can neither be proved nor disproved.

I would posit that if you were somehow able to remove religion from the human equation, the central justification for centuries of intractable war, hatred and slaughter the world over would disappear.

I do not make this statement in any attempt to prove or disprove any religion or to attack or defend anyone's faith -- or lack thereof. As I stated above, such matters can neither be proven nor disproven. Whether one chooses to have faith in such matters or not is an entirely personal choice, one with which no other person should ever interfere. But to use it as a rationale to send entire cultures to war -- that's a bit much.

I agree we must defend ourselves and fight back when attacked. I utterly supported our war on the Taliban in Afghanistan. I wish we were devoting significantly more resources to securing and rebuilding that troubled nation.

I vehemently disagree that we should pre-emptively attack unless it is a proven fact that an attack on us is imminent or actually underway. This standard of proof is (and should be) tremendously high; we fell far short of those standards when we attacked Iraq. The Japanese pre-emptively attacked us at Pearl Harbor; the Germans pre-emptively attacked Poland, the Soviet Union, well, just about all it's neighbors -- in Europe. The list goes on and on, but the sad fact is that such pre-emptive attacks are rarely justified nor defensible.

I do not support President Bush, I did not "doze off in history class" and I most certainly am not sleeping now.

____________________________________________________________

PS: Another interesting response to this posting on the Net can be found here; although it's a bit partisan it makes some good points. For those who don't want to follow the hyperlinks, here are the salient points:

• "The guy mentions all the attacks against the United States in the 1980's and then blames Clinton for them. That's comical. Clinton was Governor of Arkansas back then. The president who was asleep at the wheel was their beloved Ronald Reagan."
• "He later says all we did about the Africa embassy bombings was a couple of cruise missiles. That was a couple of cruise missiles too much according to the Republicans at the time, who skewered Clinton for those attacks. They said it was just an attempt to distract from the real issue in the country -- Monica Lewinsky."
• "The Republican priorities have been backwards throughout nearly all of this and it continues today. Out of all the attacks mentioned in this message, how many of them were carried out by Iraq? Zero! So, why in the world did we attack a country that didn't carry out any of these attacks against us?"
• "Our real enemy is Muslim fundamentalism (coupled with Christian and Jewish fundamentalism that leads us into endless conflicts with each other). But we continue to skate around that issue, as two of our strongest allies in the region -- Saudi Arabia and Pakistan -- continue to spread Muslim fundamentalism throughout the region."
• "Just because you want to fight a war doesn't mean you should blunder into countries unrelated to the war. Just because Japan bombed us in Pearl Harbor, doesn't mean we should have invaded China."

Supreme Court Nomination: What you can do

Here are some Action Items from Daily KOS. Do 'em.

Whatever happens with the Supreme Court nomination battle that is about to ensue, it's going to happen fast. Here are some things you can do right now:

• If you have a cell phone, sign up for People at the American Way's Mass Immediate Response site. This way, you'll be able to receive text message action items instantly as events break. (If you signed up during the nuclear option fight, you'll need to re-sign up.)

• Also sign up with the Save the Court, another PFAW website devoted specifically to this issue.

• Recruit friends and family members to the cause.

• Write to the President, telling him he should choose a consensus candidate to replace O'Connor.

• Contact your Senators to tell them the same thing.
  
  
• Sign MoveOn's "Protect Our Rights" petition.

• Contact members of the media and tell them you think Bush should nominate a consensus candidate. PLEASE be polite, be brief (200 words or less), and don't do copy-and-paste jobs - put things in your own words.

Big Contributions = Big Payback

Why is this not surprising? In this article in USA Today, Jim Drinkard outlines how big corporate donors to the GOP are getting the rule changes they want. Bigger profits, fewer lawsuits, less regulation.

"Just six months into a new term for President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress, some of their heaviest donors are scoring victories on the legislative and regulatory fronts.

"From rewrites of the laws governing bankruptcy and class-action lawsuits to relief for oil, timber and tobacco interests, GOP supporters who gave millions of dollars last year are reaping decisions worth billions from a Congress with more Republicans."

How many more clues do the red-staters need that this president and the Republican Party are not in fact on the side of the little guy?