A Spork in the Drawer

Entrails

Pierce:

...I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that the President of the United States is something of a political coward. The flip-flop on the Rumsfeld Porn Collection is just the most recent example. He's walked back much of what he said during the campaign on rendition and on the Military Commissions Act. Gitmo is still open. His Department of Justice is pleading state secrecy. He has lifted not an obvious finger to put pressure on anyone to get qualified people like Dawn Johnsen confirmed. (LBJ would have had Harry Reid hanging by his entrails in the Mural Room by now.) Even when his administration does something correctly, it turtles in the face of hissy-fits tossed by a discredited political movement adhered to by less than 30 percent of the public.

I think the source of the president's timorousness lies in the fact that, for all his new-politics bombast, he's pretty much decided that he's a critter of the respectable Beltway center. We should have seen that coming when he supported Weepin' Joe Lieberman over Ned Lamont or, at least, when he took that ungainly dive on FISA and the issue of telecom immunity. His financial team is straight out of the Retired Wall Street Hiring Hall, and his complete disinclination to call crimes what they are bespeaks an unseemly lust for a middle ground that lie somewhere between Oz and the Big Rock Candy Mountain.

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They Were Against Torture Before They Were For It

Dianne Feinstein and Ron Wyden go wobbly.

Behold the bravery of the Congressional Democrats!

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Same As It Ever Was

It looks as though later today the Senate Democratic Caucus is going to punish Joe Lieberman by...giving him everything he wants.

Change, indeed.

Oh, and not very smart, Mr. President-elect.

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Bedwetting

Welcome to America, foreign friends!:

A scare at Spotsylvania High School yesterday ended with three Slovakian men having to explain to federal agents why they were taking pictures of kids getting off the school buses.

As it turns out, they had never seen one of the massive yellow vehicles before and "were intrigued," said 1st Sgt. Liz Scott of the Spotsylvania Sheriff's Office.

[...]

Sheriff Howard Smith said the reason the men were flagged is because when they went through customs to get into the country Wednesday night, they split up to go through security, which can raise suspicions.

But by midafternoon, after the high school had been secured and K-9s brought in for a precautionary bomb search, authorities decided the three Slovakian men were, in fact, in the country for legitimate reasons.

[...]

Smith said extra deputies stayed at the school yesterday and monitored after-school activities just as a precautionary measure.

The FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers interviewed the men yesterday afternoon, but Smith said he expected all three men to be completely cleared.

Aside from overseas visitors learning about American freedoms, imagine the anxiety the schoolkids were feeling.

Paranoia breeds paranoia.

[Via War on Photography.]

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Not Even Brit Hume Or Chris Wallace Passes Ideological Muster

That Gov. Dances With Moose's next interview is going to be on Fox "News" shouldn't surprise anyone. You would, however, think that they would at least try to make it look like a real interview by having it conducted by one the networks' "straight" anchors.

But you'd be wrong.

Sean Hannity

Predicted first question: "Why do Democrats love Osama bin Laden but hate the Baby Jesus?"

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Get Thee To The Fainting Couch!

"Even the liberal" New Republic is clutching their collective pearls at the thought of an actual liberal having her own teevee show.

It will coarsen the debate! It will divide us further! Why can't we have sensible people like (neocon) Anne Applebaum or (establishment insider) Bill Keller?

Oh, oh woe!

Get me the smelling salts!

[faints]

[Via TPM Café.]

ADDED: As always, read Glenn:

In our political discourse, the only real way to lose one's objectivity -- one's Seriousness credentials -- is to fail to appreciate and praise all the Good Virtues of the Right (the crime of which Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow are guilty), or to be too disrespectful to the Bush administration (the sin committed by David Gregory, at least in Sacha Zimmerman's eyes). Liberalism is inherently shrill and unserious -- even when advocated by a smart and sober commentator like Maddow -- which is why the presence of an actual liberal or two on television sends shock and panic waves through The New Republic and Howie Kurtz's column, while the bulging stable of hard-core right-wing ideologues permeating news shows merits no concern; the virtual banishment of anti-war views from the establishment media barely provoked a single word of objection; and the loss of Tucker Carlson is deemed a matter of grave national mourning.

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His Petulancy Strikes Again

From this morning's presser:

Q Can I just add to that, a couple weeks ago —

THE PRESIDENT: No, you can’t. This is the second follow-up. You usually get one follow-up, and I was nice enough to give you one. I didn’t give anybody on this side a follow-up, and now you are trying to take a second follow-up.

Q Can I just say —

THE PRESIDENT: They just cut off your mic. You can’t, no.

Q A couple weeks ago you said —

THE PRESIDENT: Now she’s going to go without the mic. This is awesome.

"This is awesome"!?

265 days.

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Why Does St. John Hate The Troops?

There's a proposal in Congress to enact an updated GI Bill (the original, enacted after WWII, went a long way to building the American Middle Class - the backbone of the country). One would think that Mr. Integrity would see this as a great way to help troops returning from the battlefields. One would think:

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, seemed to give a thumbs down to bipartisan legislation that would greatly expand educational benefits for members of the military returning from Iraq and Afghanistan under the GI Bill.

Both Hillary and Obama - along with 53 other Senators - have signed on as co-sponsors.

In fairness, St. John says that he will introduce his own proposal. We'll see.

Both the White House and the Pentagon oppose the bill because, as Wes Clark and John Soltz noted last week, "...if returning troops are offered a good education, they will choose college over extending their service." Apparently, the future of our military lies with mercenaries and indentured servants.

Hell of a way to run a republic.

It's also worth noting that an uneducated populace is less likely to ask questions.

(For more information visit GIBill2008.org or click the button on the upper left of your screen.)

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Your President

Honestly, what can one say?

U.S. President George W. Bush got an earful on Thursday about problems and progress in Afghanistan where a war has dragged on for more than six years but been largely eclipsed by Iraq.

[...]

"I must say, I'm a little envious," Bush said. "If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed."

"It must be exciting for you ... in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You're really making history, and thanks," Bush said.

Would it be churlish to point out that when George was younger and not gainfully employed he did have a chance to help a young "democracy" succeed? To experience the romance of confronting danger? Y'know, a little place called "Vietnam"?

After 7+ years I'm still occasionally surprised by Little Boots' complete lack of self-awareness.

[Via Steve Benen.]

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Oh Yeah...

I suppose I should mention that alleged Democrats Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Evan Bayh (D-IN), Daniel Inouye (D-HI), Tim Johnson (D-SD), Herb Kohl (D-WI), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Mark Pryor (D-AR), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ken Salazar (D-CO), Tom Carper (D-DE), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Jim Webb (D-VA), Ben Nelson (D-NE), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Kent Conrad (D-ND), and Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) this afternoon stripped us of our rights to benefit Bush, Cheney, and the telecommunications industry.

I hope they spend their thirty pieces of silver wisely.

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Brutal

La Belle Dahlia on on the Democrats and PAA:

The cliche holds that we are always fighting the last war. I disagree. For the last seven years, congressional Democrats have been fighting the next one: the war perennially set to erupt if they don't deliver whatever the president asks of them immediately. Time and again, they've been rendered so terrified by White House threats about imminent terrorist attacks that they have caved on issues ranging from detainee rights to secret surveillance to torture. And every time they've caved, it's under the threat that if they withhold from the president extra powers (ones that he's often already seized in secret), terrorists will mass against us instantaneously, and they will be blamed.

I've no doubt that when the 15-day "snooze" expires Harry and Nancy and the rest of the invertebrates of Congress will give George and Dick everything they want - including immunity for crimes committed by the Telcos.

Future historians are going to look on this period with awe and disgust.

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Senate Dems Cave Again

Here.

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Buyer's Remorse

I gave money to Jason Altmire in his race against Missy Hart.

That's a mistake I won't be repeating.

A true Bush Dog.

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Words For The Democratic Congress

"When voters are given a choice between voting for a Republican, or a Democrat who acts like a Republican, they'll vote for the Republican every time."

- President Harry S Truman

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