Topic: George W. Bush Administration

Tell me again about how great the economy is doing...

From Associated Press (Fox News): Dollar Sinks to All-Time Low

The dollar sank to an all-time low against the euro Wednesday amid speculation that the Federal Reserve will soon cut interest rates by as much as half a percentage point.

The 13-nation euro rose as high as $1.3889 in afternoon European trading — breaking through its previous record of $1.3852, reached on July 24. That compared with the $1.3832 it bought in New York late Tuesday.[...]

The dollar, which has hovered within a few cents of its record low in recent weeks amid a crisis over U.S. mortgage lending, has come under new pressure since the U.S. Labor Department issued unexpectedly poor August jobs data Friday. [...]

The U.S. currency was lower against the Japanese yen, even as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced that he would resign, putting an end to his troubled year-old government. The dollar slid to 113.85 yen from 114.30 yen.

I rest my case. (Now just imagine if I had readership!)

From The Washington Post: New Book Details Cheney Lawyer's Efforts to Expand Executive Power

Now a professor at Harvard Law School, Goldsmith, 44, described himself in the book as "a conservative and a Republican" who became troubled by what he saw as imprudent overreaching by the White House with support from badly-reasoned OLC memos, including at least two written or drafted by friend and fellow conservative John C. Yoo. The book was described in an article posted online yesterday by the New York Times. The Washington Post also obtained a copy.

Goldsmith portrayed the senior officials with whom he regularly met as unremittingly fearful of another terrorist attack and determined "to act aggressively and preemptively." At the same time, he wrote, they feared that they could one day be prosecuted for engaging in tactics that pushed legal boundaries. The solution was for lawyers "to find some way to make what [Bush] did legal," Goldsmith wrote.

I imagine the presidents' reaction to this story as going something like this:

"Jesus Christ! You've got to be kidding me! The Nun's? The Frickin' Nuns?!?!?"

Now that's a bad day. 

Bruce Fein, a former associate deputy attorney general under the Reagan administration and a constitutional lawyer points out that we are using the wrong standard in the public discourse regarding impeachment of President Bush:

Detractors of an impeachment inquiry by the House judiciary committee into whether President George W. Bush has committed impeachable offenses contend that no questions should be asked until conclusive incriminating evidence is either volunteered up by the suspects themselves or appears before them by spontaneous combustion. In other words, they say, no inquiry should commence until proof of the president's guilt has been unearthed—proof which would, of course, make the inquiry superfluous! The Watergate investigation that dethroned President Richard M. Nixon would never have been launched under such an Alice in Wonderland standard of proof, because it began with nothing more than two obscure figures, E. Howard Hunt and Gordon Liddy, known to have both White House connections and associations with the Watergate burglars. [...]

The impeachment process thus envisions the House as operating like a sort of grand jury and the Senate like a trial jury. The House investigates to determine whether evidence can be marshaled to prove impeachable high crimes and misdemeanors. And if the answer to that question is affirmative, the House then decides whether to vote articles of impeachment. That judgment represents a collection of prudence, politics, and law akin to prosecutorial discretion. If articles are approved, a trial is held before the Senate with the chief justice of the United States presiding if the president is the accused.

Now your health and science are just tools of the political machine. Ever thought maybe you should get up off your couch and do something?

Yeah, I didn't think so.

From Reuters - E-mails show Surgeon-General pressured: Kennedy

E-mails from the White House demonstrate clear political pressure on former Surgeon-General Dr. Richard Carmona and suggest that other federal health agencies felt similar pressure, Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy said on Thursday. [...]

Kennedy made public several e-mails that he said were evidence that Carmona was indeed pressured, as the former surgeon general testified to Congress last July.

"For example, in an April 14, 2003 email to Regina Schofield (then Director of Intergovernmental Affairs at HHS), William Turenne, then Consultant to the Secretary, writes that Surgeon General Carmona 'needs to be the SG with specific speeches, to specific audiences, on specific topics addressing the Secretary's and the President's agenda -- which will become more political as the re-elect gets underway'," Kennedy wrote in his letter to Leavitt.

"Schofield responds later that day that officials in the Secretary's office are 'hammering (Surgeon General Carmona) everyday.'"

"Other documents reveal that the White House was directly involved in efforts to politicize the Surgeon General's office," Kennedy continues -- including pushing Carmona to attend a Republican Party fund-raiser. [...]

He said he had information showing that HHS officials had said the Bush administration planned to "censor, edit, or otherwise control statements by NIH scientists and researchers to ensure that those statements hewed to Administration ideology."

For those asking "Why now?" regarding the resignation of Alberto Gonzales today, let me lay out what I think is happening:

On July 11th, Michael Chertoff, or as he is more commonly known, "Skeletor", suddenly raised the anxiety of Americans by talking about his "gut-feeling" that there might be a terrorist attack. This touched off a flurry of discussions about whether or not we were safer, if an attack was impending, etc. This allowed the administration and the NSA director, Mike McConnell, the opportunity to ratchet up the rhetoric about our "safety".

A little less than a month later, in a tragic week for American democracy and civil-liberties, both The Senate and The House allowed themselves to be checkmated over the issue of warrantless wiretaps. They were so clueless, most of them seemed stunned, shocked even, that they had somehow inadvertently given the President (and more inexplicably the embattled Attorney General), more power than asked for, taking the FISA court out of the equation. Take this excerpt from an editorial in the Washington Post (all emphasis mine):

Administration officials, backed up by their Republican enablers in Congress, argued that they were being dangerously hamstrung in their ability to collect foreign-to-foreign communications by suspected terrorists that happen to transit through the United States. The problem is that while no serious person objects to intercepting foreign-to-foreign communications, what the administration sought -- and what it managed to obtain -- allows much more than foreign-to-foreign contacts.

The government will now be free to intercept any communications believed to be from outside the United States (including from Americans overseas) that involve "foreign intelligence" -- not just terrorism. It will be able to monitor phone calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens or residents without warrants -- unless the subject is the "primary target" of the surveillance. Instead of having the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court ensure that surveillance is being done properly, with monitoring of Americans minimized, that job would be up to the attorney general and the director of national intelligence. The court's role is reduced to that of rubber stamp.

Now that this has passed, and this new power has been given to the Attorney General, all they have to do is substitute another willing and able Bush crony, a la Michael Chertoff, or long-time Bush friend Clay Johnson, or...?

I wouldn't be surprised if it's done as a recess appointment. This seems to be what some of all of this was about (leaving Rove and Gonzales in place though they were taking huge amounts of damage for doing so).

Keep a close watch on who they put in place. I don't think it's a coincidence that as soon as they got their warrantless wiretaps legalized by the spineless Democrats, Rove and Gonzales quietly skulked out of town.

Why, you ask? Simple: Mission Accomplished.

Hey Hey, Good-bye...

No hard feelings or anything, but don't let the door hit you where the good lord split you on the way out. 

When compared to the other issues with this administration, this is almost yawn worthy. Remember when ethics mattered? 

From USA Today: Executive agencies' trips paid by firms

At a time when Congress has moved to ban most lobbyist-funded travel, executive- branch officials are routinely accepting trips from companies and trade associations with a stake in their agencies' decisions, according to a USA TODAY review of public records.

In a recent 12-month period:

•A Department of Transportation aviation analyst went to a conference in Geneva at a cost of $1,900 courtesy of the National Business Aviation Association, which lobbies the department on private jet rules.

• Two Defense Department homeland defense officials attended a conference in Limerick, Ireland, that was sponsored by Rivada Networks, a defense contractor that picked up the $4,200 tab.

•The Consumer Electronics Association, a lobbying group, paid more than $34,000 to host 24 officials from various agencies at the five-star Wynn hotel at its Las Vegas trade show in January, spokesman Jason Oxman said.

Those trips and more than 100 others taken from April 2006 to March 2007 would be out of bounds for members of Congress under the recently passed ethics bill, because they lasted more than one day and were paid for by companies or groups that employ lobbyists. The travel restrictions in the ethics bill, which awaits President Bush's signature, don't apply to the other branches of government. [...]

USA TODAY reviewed more than 600 agency reports on file with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics. Most of the trips involved officials invited to speak at or attend conferences, often in warm-weather climes, and most were underwritten by universities, non-profit associations or foreign governments.

More than 200 trips during the 12-month period, however, were paid for by corporations or trade groups that are regulated by, or do business with, the department or agency.

For all his tough talk, the President is such a (slang-term for female genetalia) that he can't brook the mere sight  of someone who's opinion doesn't match his own. How weak must your faith in your own policies be if they can't stand up to scrutiny or dissent?

For god's sake. Do not tell the Emperor that he is wearing no clothes...

From  the Washington Post: White House Manual Details How to Deal With Protesters

A White House manual that came to light recently gives presidential advance staffers extensive instructions in the art of "deterring potential protestors" from President Bush's public appearances around the country. [...]

Among other things, any event must be open only to those with tickets tightly controlled by organizers. Those entering must be screened in case they are hiding secret signs. Any anti-Bush demonstrators who manage to get in anyway should be shouted down by "rally squads" stationed in strategic locations. And if that does not work, they should be thrown out.

But that does not mean the White House is against dissent -- just so long as the president does not see it. In fact, the manual outlines a specific system for those who disagree with the president to voice their views. It directs the White House advance staff to ask local police "to designate a protest area where demonstrators can be placed, preferably not in the view of the event site or motorcade route." [...]

The lawsuit was filed by Jeffery and Nicole Rank, who attended the Charleston event wearing shirts with the word "Bush" crossed out on the front; the back of his shirt said "Regime Change Starts at Home," while hers said "Love America, Hate Bush." Members of the White House event staff told them to cover their shirts or leave, according to the lawsuit. They refused and were arrested, handcuffed and briefly jailed before local authorities dropped the charges and apologized. The federal government settled the First Amendment case last week for $80,000, but with no admission of wrongdoing.

If you consider that even with Rove's fat, pudding covered thumb on the scale, they still almost got beat in 2004, and got blown out by and large in 2006, there is a lot more support for the Democrats and their policies than is evident. Combine this attempt by Rove, with the Republican Apologist News Channel (FauX News), and its a miracle that dems have any power at all.

If the democrats had even a modicum of courage or conviction, they'd be emboldened to start delivering on the wave of "change" upon which they rode in to town.

From  The Washington Post: How Rove Directed Federal Assets for GOP Gains

...But Rove, who announced last week that he is resigning from the White House at the end of August, pursued the goal far more systematically than his predecessors, according to interviews and documents reviewed by The Washington Post, enlisting political appointees at every level of government in a permanent campaign that was an integral part of his strategy to establish Republican electoral dominance.

Under Rove's direction, this highly coordinated effort to leverage the government for political marketing started as soon as Bush took office in 2001 and continued through last year's congressional elections, when it played out in its most quintessential form in the coastal Connecticut district of Rep. Christopher Shays, an endangered Republican incumbent. Seven times, senior administration officials visited Shays's district in the six months before the election -- once for an announcement as minor as a single $23 government weather alert radio presented to an elementary school. On Election Day, Shays was the only Republican House member in New England to survive the Democratic victory. [...]

Investigators, however, said the scale of Rove's effort is far broader than previously revealed; they say that Rove's team gave more than 100 such briefings during the seven years of the Bush administration. The political sessions touched nearly all of the Cabinet departments and a handful of smaller agencies that often had major roles in providing grants, such as the White House office of drug policy and the State Department's Agency for International Development.

I hesitated when I posted this article, in which I predict that Bush and Cheney will use war powers, a new war with Iran, or threats of a terrorist attack to hold power past the 2008 Election.

I feel a little vindicated now that the far right wingnuttery has <a title="Neocon 'Philosopher' Urges Bush to Declare="Declare" Himself 'President for Life'" target="_blank" href="http://stewart-rhodes.blogspot.com/2007/08/neocon-philosopher-wants-bush-to.html">actually advocated just that, saying Bush should be 'President for Life'. 

I think that's called "a king", and the founding fathers were not fans of the concept.

Also from your far right wingnut-o-sphere, the solution to immigration from south of the border: the mass enslavement or execution of invaders, and a full-scale invasion of Mexico.

Makes sense to me, I mean What Would Jesus Do? (If you said mass enslavement, executions, and military invasions, you could be a wingnut.)

To answer my own rhetorical headline: over my dead and tortured body.

Simple question: Do people who live in the 'red states' know math? Just curious. 

From The New York Times: 2005 Incomes, on Average, Still Below 2000 Peak

While incomes have been on the rise since 2002, the average income in 2005 was $55,238, still nearly 1 percent less than the $55,714 in 2000, after adjusting for inflation, analysis of new tax statistics show.

The combined income of all Americans in 2005 was slightly larger than it was in 2000, but because more people were dividing up the national income pie, the average remained smaller. Total adjusted gross income in 2005 was $7.43 trillion, up 3.1 percent from 2000 and 5.8 percent from 2004.

Total income listed on tax returns grew every year after World War II, with a single one-year exception, until 2001, making the five-year period of lower average incomes and four years of lower total incomes a new experience for the majority of Americans born since 1945. [...]

The growth in total incomes was concentrated among those making more than $1 million. The number of such taxpayers grew by more than 26 percent, to 303,817 in 2005, from 239,685 in 2000.

These individuals, who constitute less than a quarter of 1 percent of all taxpayers, reaped almost 47 percent of the total income gains in 2005, compared with 2000.

People with incomes of more than a million dollars also received 62 percent of the savings from the reduced tax rates on long-term capital gains and dividends that President Bush signed into law in 2003, according to a separate analysis by Citizens for Tax Justice, a group that points out policies that it says favor the rich.

The group’s calculations showed that 28 percent of the investment tax cut savings went to just 11,433 of the 134 million taxpayers, those who made $10 million or more, saving them almost $1.9 million each. Over all, this small number of wealthy Americans saved $21.7 billion in taxes on their investment income as a result of the tax-cut law.

The nearly 90 percent of Americans who make less than $100,000 a year saved on average $318 each on their investments. They collected 5.3 percent of the total savings from reduced tax rates on investment income.

Bradley Schlozman is out at the Department of justice. I'm of the opinion that he is one of a string of sacrificial lambs being offered up in the hopes that Rove, Cheney and Bush will be left alone, and that Gonzales will be left in place.

Schlozman is the 6th member of Justice to leave the DOJ since the investigation began (7th if you include Karl Rove, which I do, although he was not directly in the DOJ):

• Monica Goodling - White House Liason
• Kyle Sampson - Chief of Stafft
• William Mercer - Associate Attorney General 
• Paul McNulty - Deputy Attorney General
• Michael Elston. - Chief of Staff for Deputy Attorney General

Again, this begs the question, what are they hiding? They are willing to take extraordinary amounts of punishment over this issue, in order to keep Gonzales in place, in order to defy subpoena's to testify and withhold requests for evidence.

Whatever it is, rest assured it is nothing less than enough to bring down this administration. This is the hill they are willing to die on...

I think I may have indentified what's been wrong with American foreign policy. This guy makes John Bolton look like a pacifist.

Perhaps shit like this is 'why they hate us.' Just a thought.

From ABC News - The Blotter: Administration Fights Dem Plan to Boost School Aid for Vets

The Bush administration opposes a Democratic effort to restore full educational benefits for returning veterans, according to an official's comments last week.

Senate Democrats, led by Virginia's Jim Webb, want the government to pay every penny of veterans' educational costs, from tuition at a public university to books, housing and a monthly stipend.

Such a benefit was a major feature of the historic 1944 G.I. Bill, which put more than eight million U.S. soldiers through college and is now credited by historians as fueling the expansion of America's middle class in the post-war era. [...]

Patrick Campbell of the Iraq & Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) endorsed Webb's plan. Better educational benefits are essential for attracting talented, ambitious recruits, he asserted.

"If the Department of Defense said, 'If you serve your country, we'll pay for school no questions asked,' ...[that] would increase the quality of our recruits," said Campbell, "instead of what we're doing now, which is lowering our standards."

 
Click Here for more of the myriad ways George W. Bush 'Supports Our Troops'.

The Carpet Bagger Report points out that today is the anniversary of an event that could have, should have, gone much differently:

It hasn’t received much recognition in previous years, but today, Aug. 6, is a noteworthy anniversary as well — six years ago today, the president, on vacation in Crawford, was handed an intelligence briefing document. It was titled, “Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US.”

In 2004, Larry Johnson, a former CIA officer and the State Department’s counterterrorism chief, explained that a Presidential Daily Briefing like that one should have sent Bush back to the Oval Office. Johnson, who’d written dozens of PDBs during Bush 41’s presidency, said the documents are usually brief and dispassionate. The one on Aug. 6, 2001, was a page and a half, with a title meant to capture the president’s attention. “That’s the intelligence-community equivalent of writing War and Peace,” Johnson said.

Johnson added that when he read the declassified document, “I said, ‘Holy smoke!’ This is such a dead-on ‘Mr. President, you’ve got to do something!’ ”

He didn’t.

[A]n unnamed CIA briefer who flew to Bush’s Texas ranch during the scary summer of 2001, amid a flurry of reports of a pending al-Qaeda attack, to call the president’s attention personally to the now-famous Aug. 6, 2001, memo titled “Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in US.” Bush reportedly heard the briefer out and replied: “All right. You’ve covered your ass, now.”

With 543 days left in office, George W. Bush has beefed up security at the White House so much, he's now enlisted the services of one of the most dreaded forces in the Western world -- the Fashion Police!

Despite approval ratings at record lows, the ongoing war in Iraq and a health care system in dire straits, Dubya has decided to take on the very serious issue of -- tour group attire! The terror alert has been raised to: Fanny Pack! Signs have reportedly been put up around White House entrances to remind visitors of the dress code: no jeans, sneakers, shorts, mini-skirts, t-shirts, tank tops, and most importantly, NO FLIP FLOPS! Paging the Northwestern women's lacrosse team!

With the new policy, the White House now has a more stringent dress code than the Vatican! Further proof that Bushie wants only conservatives in his White House. The Pontiff merely asks for covered shoulders, no shorts or skirts above the knee. Holy chic!