Saturday, December 31, 2005

Talk of Impeachment Gaining Legitimacy

Good editorial:
Nation magazine editor and publisher Katrina vanden Heuvel argues that, as 2005 gives way to 2006, the outrage level is rising. "The I-word," writes vanden Heuvel, "has moved from the marginal to the mainstream." Editor & Publisher magazine, the journal of the newspaper industry, agrees, pointing out that a "sudden outbreak of anger or candor has been sparked by the uproar over revelations of a White House-approved domestic spying program."

Indeed, the outbursts of anger and candor that once came only from the left are now coming from across the political spectrum from one of the nation's most respected academics, from a courageous former White House aide, from a conservative business journal, and from a growing number of Wisconsinites.

Molly Ivins

For those of you who have forgotten just what a stonewall paranoid Nixon was, the poor man used to stalk around the White House demanding that his political enemies be killed. Many still believe there was a certain Richard III grandeur to Nixon's collapse because he was also a man of notable talents.

There is neither grandeur nor tragedy in watching this president, the Testy Kid, violate his oath to uphold the laws and Constitution.

The Testy Kid wants to do what he wants to do when he wants to do it because he is the president, and he considers that sufficient justification for whatever he wants. He even finds lawyers like John Yoo who tell him that whatever he wants to do is legal.

The creepy part is the overlap. Damned if they aren't still here, after all these years, the old Nixon hands -- Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, the whole gang whose yearning for authoritarian government rose like a stink over the Nixon years. Imperial executive. Bring back those special White House guard uniforms. Cheney, like some malignancy that cannot be cured, back at the same old stand, pushing the same old agenda.

Friday, December 30, 2005

Top 10 Bushisms of 2005

The Dumbest Things President Bush Said in 2005

10) "It's totally wiped out. ... It's devastating, it's got to be doubly devastating on the ground." --turning to his aides while surveying Hurricane Katrina flood damage from Air Force One, Aug. 31, 2005

9) "I'm occasionally reading, I want you to know, in the second term." --Washington, D.C., March 16, 2005

8) "This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table." --Brussels, Belgium, Feb. 22, 2005

7) "I'm going to spend a lot of time on Social Security. I enjoy it. I enjoy taking on the issue. I guess, it's the mother in me." --Washington D.C., April 14, 2005

6) "Because the — all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate, for example, is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those — changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be — or closer delivered to what has been promised. Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled." --explaining his plan to save Social Security, Tampa, Fla., Feb. 4, 2005

5) "I think I may need a bathroom break. Is this possible?" --in a note to to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during a U.N. Security Council meeting, September 14, 2005

4) "We've got a lot of rebuilding to do. First, we're going to save lives and stabilize the situation. And then we're going to help these communities rebuild. The good news is -- and it's hard for some to see it now -- that out of this chaos is going to come a fantastic Gulf Coast, like it was before. Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." (Laughter) --touring hurricane damage, Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2, 2005

3) "See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." --Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005

2) "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." --to FEMA director Michael Brown, who resigned 10 days later amid criticism over his handling of the Hurricane Katrina debacle, Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2, 2005

1) "You work three jobs? … Uniquely American, isn't it? I mean, that is fantastic that you're doing that." --to a divorced mother of three, Omaha, Nebraska, Feb. 4, 2005

I think it is clear by now--

Bush and Cheney should be impeached, many times over.

Thursday, December 22, 2005

The Major Bush Scandals-- What Will It Take to Dislodge the Sum'bitch?

Quite a list of serious things:

Election 2000 Florida vote suppression

Failure to do anything anti-terror related before 9/11

9/11 attacks and the cover-up

Anthrax attacks and the cover-up

Abuse of terror warnings

Bullying journalists

Paying off journalists

Iraq WMD Lies

Horrible diplomacy

Torture/Abu Ghraib

War profiteering

Missing billions in Iraq

Paying for propaganda in Iraq

Election 2004 Vote Fraud (Ohio in particular)

Gannon-gate

Social Security solvency Lies

Bolton to UN (a disgrace)

Spying on US citizens without a warrant.



It's enough to make a reasonable person's head explode.

King George

HuffPo:
Bush's dismissal of the law, which he stood before the country to defend yesterday, is outrage enough. But even more outrageous is what it represents: the belief that the President, or more specifically, President Bush, is above the law; that authority emanates from him and him alone; that the Social Contract has only one signatory and he sits in the Oval office. Didn't we fight some kind of war about that some time in the late 18th century?

Apparently, a secret court that has never turned down a government request for a wiretap on American citizens is not enough to "connect the dots." Bush said he broke the law "to protect us," and then tried to get a little dirty by calling out the senators from "New York or Los Angeles or Las Vegas to go home and explain" why their opposition leaves those cities unsafe. (I guess it's easy to forget that Senators represent states and not cities when you believe you are the Royall Authoritie of the Lande.)

It would be one thing if we were safer. But our modern day Sun King cloaks his seizure of power in so much poll-tested national security language despite that he is not, in fact, protecting us at all. The residents of the three cities Bush cited voted overwhelmingly against him because they rightly sensed that Bush's reckless foreign adventures and lack of a real domestic security policy MAKES US ALL LESS SAFE. It doesn't take much critical analysis to figure out why. Here is a guy who, after September 11, failed to increase funding for nuclear non-proliferation, which the non-partisan commission the President himself appointed called the single greatest threat to our safety. Collecting the world's loose nukes was the first thing on my mind on September 12th, 2001, so I'm a little confused as why it's taken the President four years to catch on.

Bush’s Abuse of Power Deserves Impeachment

By Joe Conason, The New York Observer

Recklessly and audaciously, George W. Bush is driving the nation whose laws he swore to uphold into a constitutional crisis. He has claimed the powers of a medieval monarch and defied the other two branches of government to deny him. Eventually, despite his party’s monopoly of power, he may force the nation to choose between his continuing degradation of basic national values and the terrible remedy of impeachment.

Until Mr. Bush openly proclaimed as commander in chief that he can brush aside the law, cries for impeachment were heard only on the political fringe, although most Americans have long since realized that he misled America into war. Much as he is disliked and disdained by liberals, even they have shown little enthusiasm for impeachment. In addition to the obvious obstacle of a Republican-controlled Congress, there appeared to be no firm proof of an offense that justified such action. To mention the word was to be dismissed—even by people who believe that this President may well have committed "high crimes and misdemeanors."

impeachthesonofabitch.com/

Times don't get more serious than this; it is time for the most serious of measures.

Every American generation has a moment when it is called upon to do its part to preserve the freedom and higher values of our country. This is our moment.

In the coming weeks and months you will be asked to send e-mails and automatic letters to your Members of Congress to advance the impeachment of the President and Vice President. The resulting flood will not be very effective, compared to the one effective thing you CAN do:

Write a real letter to both of your U.S.Senators, and to the U.S. House Member representing your district.

Yes, actually obtain paper, envelope, stamps and a pen and do it, even if you have never done it before.

The Worst President Ever!!!!

Dedicated to the life and times of George W. Bush, the 43rd president of the United States, who is most certainly the worst president ever!

For more background, see this website.

For more recent stories about how bad Bush is, see here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here, just for starters.