Friday, July 27, 2007

Gonzales vs. the Truth

Most Americans would probably sooner trust Michael Vick with their dogs than trust Alberto Gonzales to tell the truth about his role in the administration’s illegal warrantless wiretap program and the firing of federal prosecutors for political purposes. Even leading Republicans recognize the nation’s chief law enforcement officer has perjured himself, but the hapless attorney general still retains the confidence of the President. In large measure this is because Gonzales is Bush’s firewall. After all, imagine what would happen if an impartial AG enforced Congressional contempt charges against administration insiders, Bush might have to pardon himself before getting impeached.

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Wednesday, July 18, 2007

New Slogan Needed for Iraq War

The Bush Administration, finding itself stymied by slow pace of progress in Iraq, has been conducting a top-secret search for a new slogan that will rally public support for the war. If you are one of the 25% of Americans that still support Bush/Cheney, then your help in selecting this new cliché is urgently needed. Please vote for the platitude you believe will resonate in the heartland and bolster support for Bush’s war in Iraq. Just think, which hackneyed phrase would you most like to hear from Bush ad naseum:

a) “Bring it on. We’re in Iraq to the last man.”
b) “If we don’t win in Iraq we’ll have to face Hillary at home”
c) “It’s the oil, stupid. If we don't win in Iraq, then gas will be $100 a gallon."
d) “The road to victory goes through Tehran.”

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Friday, July 06, 2007

Bush Multiple Choice Test II

Not content to rewrite history, the Bush Administration is busy devising tests that will be used by future school children to test their knowledge of American history fifty years from now, when George W. Bush is universally recognized as one of the greatest presidents ever!

1). Which military figure was vindicated by history?

a) Reichmarshall Herman Goring: He boasted that although WWII had ended badly for the Nazis, Germany would build him a monument within thirty years time.

b) General Armstrong Custer: He vastly misunderstimated Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse when he urged them to ‘bring it on.’ But the numerous Hollywood depictions of his courageous death lead many historians to hail him as a pioneer of the so-called “surge.”

c) George W. Bush: The public re-evaluates Bush, but only after an aging Tom Cruise plays the former president in the straight to video movie “Top Gun IV: Mission Accomplished.”

d) None of the above

2). In retrospect it’s pretty fortunate that “Scooter” Libby avoided jail time in a federal pen because:

a). Dick Cheney and George Bush admitted to putting “Scooter” Libby up to lying after the next president, Hillary Clinton personally dunked the duo.

b). Pulitzer prizewinning journalist Matt Drudge uncovers ironclad evidence that Saddam Hussein had in fact bid on a Nigerian uranium mine offered on e-bay, but was outbid at the last second by American counter terrorism officials working out of the vice-president’s office. Ambassador Joe Wilson’s Op-Ed in the NYT almost exposed the super-secret Cheney/Rumsfeld operation, which used the online auction site to snag would be terrorists bidding on everything from Pez dispensers to fissile material.

c). Dick Cheney’s secret plan to “liberate Libby” using Special Forces, had he been forced to implement the operation, might have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, particularly since the shotgun wielding VP was preparing to lead the assault himself.

3). Bush’s top-secret nickname for his friend Vladimir Putin was:

a) Mr. Soul
b) Count Vladymre
c) Poison Lips

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Tuesday, July 03, 2007

The Libby Verdict -- Scooter Gets Off Scot Free

“Our entire system of justice relies on people telling the truth. And if a person does not tell the truth, particularly if he serves in government and holds the public trust, he must be held accountable.” – George W. Bush

If hypocrisy if the tribute vice pays to virtue, then George Bush is lavishing double standards with as much gusto as a shopaholic who just won the lotto. Cheney’s “Cheney,” as Lewis “Scooter” Libby was known, was undoubtedly the fall guy for the vice-president. That’s the conclusion the jury reached when they reluctantly convicted Libby for perjury and obstruction of justice. It was clear they believed that Cheney, Rove, and Bush deserved to be in the prosecutor’s crosshairs.

Libby’s crime, as prosecutor Fitzgerald characterized it, was like throwing sand in an umpire’s face (a new twist, incidentally, on the notion that justice should be blind). Which is why Fitzgerald asserted, “there is a cloud hanging over the vice-president’s office.”

Actually, the sandstorm that is hanging over the entire White House is Iraq: how America was led to war under false pretenses, how the administration slimed its critics, and how the administration rigged the system to circumvent the Constitution.

The Libby case encapsulates the Bush Administration’s relationship to justice: it uses legalities to undermine the law. Cheney’s office, for instance, was responsible for crafting the dubious legal rationales that justified the use of torture against enemy combatants. These unprecedented interpretations of executive authority were fashioned, at least in part, to immunize leaders like Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Bush from being charged with war crimes. Of course, if there was any serious chance of Bush being held to account for violating the Geneva conventions you can be sure he’d find a way to preemptively pardon himself.

Eliminating the possibility that Libby might spend time behind bars ensures that he won’t cut a deal with Fitzgerald in exchange for leniency. Thus, the commutation makes certain that Cheney, Rove, and Bush will not be implicated in any further proceedings relating to the improper disclosure of a CIA agent’s identity. Bush’s commutation is a self-serving obstruction of justice that undermines the idea that all citizens are equal under the law.

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