Take for instance, the intent of Congressman Henry Waxman, Chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that "the individual market demanded more scrutiny, especially of cancellation practices," as reported by Lisa Girion in the Los Angeles Times. The fact is, the carriers way carriers handled their rescission powers have hurt innocent members, undermined their own credibility and battered whatever good will they might have possessed.

What's ironic is that carriers rarely invoke their rescission rights. Consequently, whatever carriers gained in using it to fight fraud has been more than offset by the political damage they've taken.

Which brings us to Congressman Waxman's hearings. Congressman Waxman is one of the House's brightest members. He is passionate and committed to fighting injustice. His hearing will be thorough and, considering the political context of these things, fair. All sides will be heard and, with luck, some good might come of it. But it certainly will be a grilling causing strong insurance executives to sweat and weak ones to nervous breakdowns. Taking the oath before the Committee is not anything a CEO looks forward to: just ask those former tobacco CEOs Congressman Waxman humbled a few years ago.

The real danger, however, is not the reputations of a few CEOs, but to what "reforms" might emerge from the hearings. A lot of people simply don't like individual coverage. They believe the carriers have too great an advantage in the transaction. To them, baring a government takeover of the health insurance system, the only other option is having the government micro manage the market.

Yet government micromanagement will inevitably lead a blander market of vanilla coverage and reduced choice. That's what's happened when states have intervened to create purchasing pools for consumers. While the pools have generally failed to lower the the cost of coverage, they have succeeded in limiting consumer choice.

Yet it's the flexibility of the individual market that is one of its greatest strengths (along with its availability being independent of one's job). Choice in the individual market makes it easier to find a solution for consumers' unique needs. And those needs do differ. Ask a 22 year old fresh out-of-college and a recently retired 60 year old what they need from their health insurance. It will quickly become clear that needs differ. Health insurance is not a product where one size fits all.

Increased flexibility brings the potential to lower costs, making coverage more accessible for more consumers. In short, there's a lot of benefits to the individual market. It would be a shame if mistakes carriers made involving recessions results in over regulating the market. That's could happen soon in California. Along with several rescission bills, legislation to regulate the kind of plan designs carriers can offer is moving forward. SB 1522, authored by incoming President Pro Tem Senator Darrell Steinberg is currently on the Assembly Appropriation Committee's Suspense File. Which means it's ready to be passed if the Legislature ever resolves the budget impasse.

I've written previously about problems with the bill's specifics. Beyond those, the legislation also is symbolic of lawmakers' desire and willingness to insert themselves into the market at a very granular level. It's not a long leap from defining what policies must be offered to regulating their price, distribution and implementation.

So where's the silver lining in all this? Individual coverage rules and regulations vary widely from state-to-state. This means consumer protections vary widely across state boundaries. It also reduces competition in some states. Senator John McCain and others propose to address this by allowing policies approved in one state to be sold in any state. This approach, however, would result in a disastrous dash by carriers to file their products in the states with the most lenient rules and the laxest enforcement.

Congressman Waxman's hearings, however, could lead to a different solution: national standards establishing a credible structure to enable policies to be sold nationally. These structure would, ideally, bring increased credibility to the individual market without diminishing consumer choice.

OK, it's a long shot. And it may only replace the spectre of over-regulation by state lawmakers with the danger of over-regulation by federal lawmakers.

But, hey, I only claimed it was the lining. But sometimes that's all endangered species can hope for.

Raw Story
July 10, 2008

Update: Conyers gives Rove 5 days to comply before pursuing ’all available options’

Former White House adviser Karl Rove has ignored a subpoena from congressional Democrats to testify about allegations of political pressure at the Justice Department and his alleged role in the prosecution of a former governor of Alabama.

A House subcommittee voted 7-1 Thursday to reject Rove’s claim that executive privilege freed him from an obligation to testify, leaving open the possibility the Republican political guru will be held in contempt.

During the hearing, Rep. Chris Cannon (R-UT) revealed that Rove was out of the country. According to the liberal blog ThinkProgress, Rove’s lawyer’s confirmed that Rove was out of the country on a trip scheduled long before the subpoena was sent.

Karl Rove failed to appear before the House Judiciary subcommittee. His lawyer revealed that he was out of the country.

Read Full Article Here

From latimes.com, July 10, 2008:

The measure was in response to an uproar over e-mails found missing by recent Capitol Hill probes of Bush aides, including Rove, then the president's chief political strategist. Investigators have tried to determine whether Rove and others used Republican National Committee e-mail accounts to conduct government business in an attempt to circumvent the Presidential Records Act, a post-Watergate law designed to preserve White House records.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has said that White House e-mails transmitted over several hundred days between 2003 and 2005 also are unaccounted for, an assertion that the administration disputes.

"Some have said that this bill is about preserving history, and it is," said Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills). "But it also is about our constitutional responsibility for oversight and for holding this and any administration accountable."

read more | digg story

House Judiciary Panel Threatens Rove With Contempt

Think Progress
July 3, 2008

Yesterday, the House Judiciary Committee received a letter from Karl Rove’s attorney Robert Luskin, stating that his client refuses to testify before a House subcommittee, despite a congressional subpoena. He reiterated his offer to have Rove appear for an off-the-record interview, not under oath, about the prosecution of formerly Alabama governor Don Siegelman only. In a response to Luskin, Reps. John Conyers (D-MI) and Linda Sanchez (D-CA) reject the offer:

In addition to the Siegelman matter, the committee has also asked Rove to testify on the politicization of the Justice Department, including the U.S. attorney scandal.

In the early days of the Bush presidency, Vice President Dick Cheney came under attack for drafting a national energy policy in secret. Now, as the Bush presidency winds down, Cheney is again coming under attack for his behind-the-scenes efforts to play down the threats of global warming in order to thwart regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.

Original DVD cover.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who chairs the Senate Environment Committee, leveled the attack today, accusing the vice president and other administration officials of "recklessly" seeking to censor testimony about the dangers of global warming and working behind the scenes to block new regulation.

"This cover-up is being directed from the White House and the office of the vice president," she said.

WASHINGTON, July 8 (Reuters)[...]
At issue is a preliminary finding by the EPA last December that "greenhouse gases may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public welfare," according to Jason Burnett, the agency's former associate deputy administrator who appeared at a news conference with Boxer.

Such a finding would be an early step toward government regulation aimed at protecting public health.

Burnett, who resigned on June 9, told Boxer's committee the White House tried pressuring him to retract an e-mail om which he detailed the finding. Burnett said he refused.

Boxer said that unless EPA documents were released, it was likely that within the next two weeks her committee would try to subpoena the material. She did not know whether Republicans on the panel would block the effort.

...snip...

She has been trying since last October to obtain related documents to show that planned congressional testimony on global warming by Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was censored by the Bush administration.

Boxer said Gerberding's testimony would have detailed the direct impact of rising global temperatures on human health, including mortality and the spread of disease.

...snip...

Burnett told the congressional committee the administration's Council on Environmental Quality "and the office of the vice president were seeking deletions to the CDC testimony." He refused to say who in Vice President Richard Cheney's office was involved.

...snip...

Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the Clean Air Act gives EPA the authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

Last October, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Gerberding's draft testimony to Congress "did not comport" with science contained in an International Panel on Climate Change report and that "a number of agencies had some concerns with the draft."

On Tuesday, Boxer said that Gerberding's planned testimony, which has since been detailed in media reports, and the IPCC report "matched identically."

Does all this have the ring of deja vu? From the Los Angeles Times, June 21, 2008:

"I don't think we've had a situation like this since Richard Nixon was president," Rep. Henry A. Waxman said yesterday after the Bush administration invoked executive privilege to refuse to turn over subpoenaed documents in an investigation of the Environmental Protection Agency's decision to deny California permission to implement its own vehicle emission standards.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) says his committee will vote next week to hold Attorney General Michael Mukasey in contempt if the Bush appointee continues to refuse to hand over transcripts of an FBI interview with Vice President Dick Cheney.

Waxman says the interview transcript is vital to the Oversight Committee's investigation of the outing of former CIA agent Valerie Plame. In a letter to Mukasey (.pdf), Waxman noted that Cheney's former aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby told the FBI it was "possible" that Cheney told him to expose Plame after her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, publicly undercut the administration's claim that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa.

"The arguments you have raised for withholding the interview report are not tenable," Waxman told Mukasey. "When the FBI interview with the Vice President was conducted, the Vice President knew that the information in the interview could be made public in a criminal trial and that there were no restrictions on Special Counsel Fitzgerald's use of the interview."

Mukasey has invoked executive privilege -- the Bush administration's go-to response to Congress's attempts at oversight -- in refusing to hand over transcripts of the interviews with the president and vice president. The interviews were conducted in relation to Patrick Fitzgerald's probe of Plame's outing. Libby was the only person convicted as a result of that inquiry, although it eventually revealed that Karl Rove and former State Department official Richard Armitage also had leaked Plame's name.

Read on

Mukasey has invoked executive privilege. Rove has invoked executive privilege. Pelosi has told the Judiciary NOT to hold Rove in Contempt of Congress. What is going on??

Is the Constitution, or the rule of law, no longer in effect in this country?

First off, Mukasey is supposed to be protecting the American people, not the president. He needs to be impeached over this. Now!

Pelosi needs to be booted out the door. She should NOT be Speaker. I am not even sure she is really a Democrat. She has forgotten who she represents, and that she has sworn to protect and defend the CONSTITUTION.

Rove needs to have a close encounter with the House Sergeant-at-arms, and then be dragged before Congress to testify, or be thrown in their jail in the basement of the House until he is ready to be sworn and tell the truth.

They have got to start doing their jobs..

photo: Fark.com

...

Via Huffington Post:

Taking Aim At The Next Karl Rove

The Hill reports that Democratic Congressman Henry Waxman is considering legislation that would prevent future administrations from having Karl-Rove type advisors:

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who has primary jurisdiction over the executive branch, is considering legislation to eliminate Karl Rove-type advisers in future administrations.
The chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hints broadly that such a bill could ban the use of federal funds to finance such a politically partisan office.

"Why should we be using taxpayer dollars to have a person solely in charge of politics in the White House?" Waxman said in an interview. "Can you imagine the reaction if each member of Congress had a campaign person paid for with taxpayer dollars?"

Waxman, one of President Bush's most dogged opponents, will decide in September whether to press ahead this year or wait until next in hope of having a Democratic president sign such a bill.

Waxman says the White House operates under looser political ethics rules than does Congress, where chiefs of staff and other high-ranking officials are prohibited from using government phones, computers and facilities for political purposes.

Rove focused on President Bush's reelection while working on a West Wing salary during the first four years of the Bush administration.

As Bush's senior adviser, Rove headed the Office of Political Affairs, which interacts with the party's political committees, and the Office of Public Liaison, which works with outside groups such as business, religious and advocacy organizations that want to communicate with the president.

Rove's political activity at the White House sparked fierce disputes with congressional Democrats.  Full article.

...

...

Rove has ignored a subpoena from Congress to testify under oath for the second time this year.

From The Crypt:

House Judiciary Committee subpoenas Karl Rove

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich) issued a subpoena to Karl Rove on Thursday as part of an investigation into improprieties at the Department of Justice.

According to a statement from Conyers, Rove's lawyer Robert Luskin informed the chairman that his client would not agree to testify voluntarily before the committee.

"It is unfortunate that Mr. Rove has failed to cooperate with our requests," Conyers said in a statement.

"Although he does not seem the least bit hesitant to discuss these very issues weekly on cable television and in the print news media, Mr. Rove and his attorney have apparently concluded that a public hearing room would not be appropriate. Unfortunately, I have no choice today but to compel his testimony on these very important matters."

The deadline for Rove to respond to the subpoena is July 10. (full article)

The fastest duo to surface is, of course, Dopey vs. Beelzebub. But that's too easy. I'm looking for something more nuanced. More apropos. Barbie vs. Cobra Commander? No.... Nemo vs. Ursula? No.... Luke Sykwalker vs. Jabba the Hutt? No! Not even close. John Edwards has no Force.

Gumby vs. Squealer from Animal Farm. That's it.

Yes, I remember that John Edwards is a former trial attorney, but the images of him getting smoked by Dick Cheney in 2004 are seared into my brain. And while Karl Rove may have the morality of a dung beetle, his ability to misrepresent facts with a straight face is supernatural and would require Edwards to acquire an encyclopedic knowledge of politically-related statistics and their sources to properly refute Rove's machinations. My not-so-amateur prediction is that John ain't got the stuff. And I'm being kind.

If the debate is televised, I will certainly perform the masochistic duty of viewing the event - with a fist firmly planted between my teeth. Naturally, I try to avoid having Rove's visage offend my home from the television and relegate my involvement with him by reading his erroneous comments online. Blech.

In the meantime, I'm going to entertain myself with paint.net and make fun graphics with hopeful themes.

From the Los Angeles Times:

WASHINGTON -- Escalating a fight with Democrats on Capitol Hill, the White House on Friday invoked executive privilege in refusing to turn over documents to a congressional committee investigating the Environmental Protection Agency's decision to deny California permission to implement its own vehicle emission standards.

The Bush administration asserted executive privilege hours before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was to vote on whether to bring contempt-of-Congress proceedings against EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson and Susan Dudley, administrator of regulatory affairs in the White House Office of Management and Budget, for refusing to turn over subpoenaed documents.

Original DVD cover.

Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills) put off a vote on the contempt resolutions while he considers his options.

"I don't think we've had a situation like this since Richard Nixon was president," he said, appearing determined to press ahead, even if it leads to a court fight. "We don't know whether this privilege that's being asserted is valid or not."

...snip...

House and Senate committees have been investigating what role the White House played in EPA decisions preventing California and other states from enacting tougher emissions rules than the federal government and in the EPA's approval of new ozone pollution standards.

The administration's claim of executive privilege is the latest twist in the escalating legal and political battle over California's efforts to implement its own law combating global warming. Critics of the EPA decision contend that it was based on politics, not science or the law.

...snip...

In asserting executive privilege in the EPA inquiry, the administration made public a copy of a letter sent to the president by Atty. Gen. Michael B. Mukasey saying that releasing internal documents "could inhibit the candor of future deliberations among the president's staff."

By Jane Corbin, BBC News

A BBC investigation estimates that around $23bn (£11.75bn) may have been lost, stolen or just not properly accounted for in Iraq.

The BBC's Panorama programme has used US and Iraqi government sources to research how much some private contractors have profited from the conflict and rebuilding.

A US gagging order is preventing discussion of the allegations.

The order applies to 70 court cases against some of the top US companies.

War profiteering

Waxman: "It may well turn out to be the largest war profiteering in history."

While Presdient George W Bush remains in the White House, it is unlikely the gagging orders will be lifted.

To date, no major US contractor faces trial for fraud or mismanagement in Iraq.

The president's Democratic opponents are keeping up the pressure over war profiteering in Iraq.

Henry Waxman, who chairs the House committee on oversight and government reform, said: "The money that's gone into waste, fraud and abuse under these contracts is just so outrageous, it's egregious.

"It may well turn out to be the largest war profiteering in history."

In the run-up to the invasion, one of the most senior officials in charge of procurement in the Pentagon objected to a contract potentially worth $7bn that was given to Halliburton, a Texan company which used to be run by Dick Cheney before he became vice-president.

Unusually only Halliburton got to bid - and won.

Missing billions

The search for the missing billions also led the programme to a house in Acton in west London where Hazem Shalaan lived until he was appointed to the new Iraqi government as minister of defence in 2004.

He and his associates siphoned an estimated $1.2bn out of the ministry. They bought old military equipment from Poland but claimed for top-class weapons.

Meanwhile they diverted money into their own accounts.

Judge Radhi al-Radhi of Iraq's Commission for Public Integrity investigated.

Judge Radhi al Radhi: "I believe these people are criminals."

He said: "I believe these people are criminals.

"They failed to rebuild the Ministry of Defence, and as a result the violence and the bloodshed went on and on - the murder of Iraqis and foreigners continues and they bear responsibility."

Mr Shalaan was sentenced to two jail terms but he fled the country.

He said he was innocent and that it was all a plot against him by pro-Iranian MPs in the government.

There is an Interpol arrest warrant out for him but he is on the run - using a private jet to move around the globe.

He stills owns commercial properties in the Marble Arch area of London.

Panorama: Daylight Robbery will be on BBC One at 9pm on Tuesday 10 June 2008.
Published: 2008/06/10 17:25:48 GMT

McClellin: Bush Admits Authorizing Plame Leak

Democracy Now
May 30, 2008

June 9 (Bloomberg) -- Scott McClellan, the former presidential spokesman whose memoir says Vice President Dick Cheney may have misled him about the leak of a CIA agent's identity, has agreed to testify before the House Judiciary Committee.

Original DVD cover.

McClellan's book, ``What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception,'' says ``top White House officials'' and ``possibly'' Cheney assured him that President George W. Bush's top political aide, Karl Rove, hadn't leaked the name of covert operative Valerie Plame.

...snip...

McClellan also wrote that he publicly exonerated Rove and I. Lewis ``Scooter'' Libby after he was ``at best misled'' by them about their role in the leak of Plame's identity. Rove later acknowledged that he had discussed Plame with journalists. Libby was convicted of lying to investigators about his role in the leak. Bush commuted Libby's 2 1/2-year prison sentence.

Michigan Democrat John Conyers, the Judiciary panel's chairman, said in a statement that he has asked McClellan to testify on June 20.

...snip...

In a statement last month after the book was published, Conyers said he found ``particularly disturbing'' an assertion by McClellan that he had been directed by then-White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card to ``vouch'' for Libby after the start of a criminal investigation of the leak.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush's former spokesman, Scott McClellan, will testify before a House committee next week about whether Vice President Dick Cheney ordered him to make misleading public statements about the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity.

McClellan will testify publicly and under oath before the House Judiciary Committee on June 20 about the White House's role in the leak and its response, his attorneys, Michael and Jane Tigar, said on Monday.

...snip...

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., also is seeking more FBI documents about the leak in part because of McClellan's description of the way he was instructed to respond to questions on the matter.

At Libby's trial, witnesses testified that Cheney, Libby and other Bush administration officials mounted a campaign to counter criticism of the Iraq war by Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson. Cheney's spokeswoman, Cathie Martin, testified that Cheney personally wrote out statements and talking points for Libby and other aides to give to reporters to rebut Wilson's allegations.

Anyone else out there wish that sometimes life would turn into a musical? I'm thinking about My Fair Lady, with Henry Waxman as Henry Higgins, and John Conyers as Colonel Pickering. There sits Eliza Doolittle Scott McClellan as the orchestra plays The Rain in Spain.....

Scotty: I know your aim's to name who outed Plame

Henry: By Chimpy George, he's got it! By Chimpy George, he's got it!

John: Now, once again, who leaked her name?

Scotty: Rove's to blame! Rove's to blame!

Henry: Was Dick Cheney's part the same?

Scotty: For shame! It was his game!!!

All three: Our aim's to name who outed Val'rie Plame!
Our aim's to name who outed Val'rie Plame!

Okay, maybe I need to work on Scotty's outfit a little. Or at least do his hair!

Today's vocabulary word is straw man argument, and because it is something I encounter repeatedly, I figured we should all know what it means:

A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position. To "set up a straw man" or "set up a straw man argument" is to describe a position that superficially resembles an opponent's actual view but is easier to refute, then attribute that position to the opponent (for example, deliberately overstating the opponent's position). A straw man argument can be a successful rhetorical technique (that is, it may succeed in persuading people) but it carries little or no real evidential weight, because the opponent's actual argument has not been refuted.

In practice, these are the patterns the "straw man" argument follows:

1. Person A has position X.

2. Person B ignores X and instead presents position Y. Y is a distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:

1. Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent's position and then refuting it, thus giving the appearance that the opponent's actual position has been refuted.[1]
2. Quoting an opponent's words out of context -- i.e., choosing quotations that are not representative of the opponent's actual intentions (see contextomy and quote mining).[2]
3. Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender and then refuting that person's arguments, thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position, and thus the position itself, has been defeated.[1]
4. Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs that are criticized, such that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.
5. Oversimplifying an opponent's argument, then attacking the simplified version.

3. Person B attacks position Y.

4. Person B draws a conclusion that X is false/incorrect/flawed. This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious because attacking a distorted version of a position simply does not constitute an attack on the position itself.

Keep this phrase very close to your heart, chickadees, for an understanding of the straw man is absolutely essential to mining through the unadulterated crap that is media, politics, and especially public opinion in this country.

With that in mind, let's see what's going on in the world:

It's pretty sick that John McCain, a war hero, thinks that the 21st century GI Bill is somehow "too generous" for troops returning from the unjust occupation of Iraq. Try this on for cognitive dissonance, though: John McCain gets a 100% tax-free disability pension from the government, due to injuries sustained in Vietnam. Look, I'm all for the pension...that's fine, but it does raise a couple of questions:

1. Depending on the severity of the injuries/disability, these pensions are either partially or fully tax-exempt. John McCain is at the "fully" level. So, how healthy is he, really? When he released his medical records, he did so for approximately five minutes in a private location, rather than releasing them into the public domain in full disclosure. Americans of all political stripes DO deserve to know if the man they're voting for is mentally and physically fit to serve.

2. Why is it that John McCain, who is married to a beer heiress worth over $100,000,000 (who he may have married for financial gain, after he kicked his first wife to the curb when he came home from Vietnam to find that she, too, had been seriously disfigured in an accident), sees fit to take a $58,000 per year pension from the government for HIS heroic service, yet doesn't seem to feel that today's troops are worth it? This goes not only to his shameful refusal to support the updated GI Bill, but to his entire record on veterans. You think you support the troops? Then don't let duplicitous candidates snow you over with tales of their own heroism, when their records show that they're indeed prepared to throw their fellow servicemen and women under the bus when it's politically expedient.

Speaking of war heros, it seems that the strain of being sent back to Iraq, repeatedly, on tours longer than any mental health professional would recommend, is creating an epidemic of soldiers harming themselves in order to avoid going back, possibly worse than any conflict in the last century, including Vietnam.

But seriously, soccer-mom and business dad: The yellow-ribbon on the back of your SUV and your refusal to educate yourself about the issues are totally doing the trick.

Guess who really wants us out of Iraq? Okay, I'll tell you, it's Iraq! Iraq really wants us out of Iraq, like yesterday. Theoretically they're a sovereign country, I mean, don't you remember that dog-and-pony show a few years ago when Paul Bremer, then head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, "handed over sovereignty to the Iraqis"? Yeah, me too. That was great theatre. It was also bullshit. Well, now, the Bush administration is pushing a "secret plan" to extend the US occupation indefinitely, despite the Iraqis' best wishes:

A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November.

The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to The Independent, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq. Iraqi officials fear that the accord, under which US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity from Iraqi law, will destabilise Iraq’s position in the Middle East and lay the basis for unending conflict in their country.

Wow. ThinkProgress continues:

Perhaps reflecting growing concern over the new plan, Iraqi government officials have said that they will miss a July target for negotiating an agreement on future relations with the United States. Rep. Bill Delahunt (D-MA) has also released a letter from 31 Iraqi legislators saying that they oppose a long-term security agreement “if it does not include a specific timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. military troops.” Yesterday, Iraqi parliament member Nadeem al-Jaberi testified to the House that the U.S. occupation is highly unpopular with the public:

REP. RON PAUL (R-TX): What percent of the Iraqi people would agree with us leaving under those circumstances? […]

AL-JABERI: The majority of the people of Iraq are with the withdrawal. … Perhaps even about 70 percent. with approximately 70 percent of Iraqis favoring a withdrawal.

Are we starting to get it, America? This was never about what was good for the Iraqi people. Even more than ever, the Bush administration is showing its true colors, and it's illustrating for the world how, to them, a few hundred thousand dead brown people is just no big fucking deal. Got it?

Now, as if that weren't bad enough, the Bush administration appears to be none too happy with the Iraqis asserting their sovereignty, or asking to be treated like human beings, so the Bush administration is blackmailing the Iraqi government:

The US is holding hostage some $50bn (£25bn) of Iraq's money in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to pressure the Iraqi government into signing an agreement seen by many Iraqis as prolonging the US occupation indefinitely, according to information leaked to The Independent.

US negotiators are using the existence of $20bn in outstanding court judgments against Iraq in the US, to pressure their Iraqi counterparts into accepting the terms of the military deal, details of which were reported for the first time in this newspaper yesterday.

Iraq's foreign reserves are currently protected by a presidential order giving them immunity from judicial attachment but the US side in the talks has suggested that if the UN mandate, under which the money is held, lapses and is not replaced by the new agreement, then Iraq's funds would lose this immunity. The cost to Iraq of this happening would be the immediate loss of $20bn. The US is able to threaten Iraq with the loss of 40 per cent of its foreign exchange reserves because Iraq's independence is still limited by the legacy of UN sanctions and restrictions imposed on Iraq since Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in the 1990s. This means that Iraq is still considered a threat to international security and stability under Chapter Seven of the UN charter. The US negotiators say the price of Iraq escaping Chapter Seven is to sign up to a new "strategic alliance" with the United States.

The threat by the American side underlines the personal commitment of President George Bush to pushing the new pact through by 31 July. Although it is in reality a treaty between Iraq and the US, Mr Bush is describing it as an alliance so he does not have to submit it for approval to the US Senate.

I think I speak for all intelligent people when I say "Who the fuck does the president think he is, really?!?!?!?!" Makes an end run around the Iraqi government/people when they don't roll over like lap dogs, pulls out obscure UN sanctions from an entirely different regime to pressure them, blackmails them, and makes an end run around the US Senate (you know, one of the branches of US government that's theoretically supposed to be a check on the President's power) in order to achieve his goals unfettered by anything so mundane as laws. Juan Cole, who uses the term extortion to describe this situation, has more (via ThinkProgress.)

Seriously, damn him. January 2009 cannot come fast enough.

Speaking of ThinkProgress, here's something to make the coffee boil in your stomach:

A military defense lawyer today said that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay were instructed by the Pentagon “to destroy handwritten notes that might have exposed harsh or even illegal questioning methods.” According to Navy Lt. Commander Bill Kuebler, who is representing Canadian Omar Khadr, interrogators may have “routinely destroyed evidence” that could have been used to defend Khadr and other detainees.

Have we truly lost all sense of justice in this country? Has America, indeed, abandoned the ideals upon which she was founded? I hope not. Years from now, I hope we can look back with embarrassment at 2000-2008 as merely a dark stain in our history.

White House lawyers are freaking out about the revelations in Scott McClellan's new book, especially those which pertain to the roles of Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and George W. Bush in the Valerie Plame leak scandal, considering the fact that mean old Henry Waxman (D-CA) is starting to ask questions again. And oh, what's this?

Additionally, White House lawyers are likely “concerned” that CIA leak special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald indicated this week that he would be willing to testify before Congress about alleged efforts to push him off of politically sensitive cases like the leak scandal.

OH, wow. What an absolutely wonderful time for all of these revelations to be coming out. Of course, the crazy left-wing bloggers, you know, the ones your pundits tell you are mean and hate America, have been saying all this shit for years now. It is truly hard being vindicated time and time again on all of these issues. Honestly. I'd much rather the country figure it out when it's happening.

McCain's running on the platform that he's "not Bush," but his best gay friend Lindsey Graham seems to disagree.

For the first time, the average price of petrol is over $4 per gallon. The Today show just reported that experts are predicting an average of $5 per gallon by July 4. Ouch. Perhaps we should send the oil companies packing (and that includes the President and Vice President, and almost everybody they've ever met in their entire lives) and actually vow to get OFF this sauce. George always acts surprised when he hears about high gas prices, too.

Stupid dick.

Mean old John Conyers (D-MI) and 56 House Democrats are calling for the Justice Dept. to "appoint a special counsel to examine whether top Bush administration officials may have committed crimes in authorizing the use of harsh interrogation tactics against suspected terrorists."

I say GET 'EM!

Bloggers is CRAZY! And also starting to replace the traditional Fourth Estate, which wasn't really being used away, so whatever.

GOP insiders: LOL SRSLY WE R SO SCREWED.

Newsweek: The economy is so much worse than you think.

As they do every week, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Brendan DeMelle "unearth" the news of the week that the mainstream media somehow forgot to report. Highlights: The US is totally winging it in Iraq and Afghanistan; NASA confirms that the Bush administration deliberately manipulates climate data and other naughty scientific things for political reasons; in fact, the current anti-science climate in the US has caused the nation to lose its place on the forefront of scientific research; and US Marines and Fundamentalist Christian groups are violating everything this nation stands for in attempting to convert Muslims to Christianity (yeah, I know, I'm sick of this shit, too).

Thank you, also, to Fundamentalist Christians for their wrong-headed focus on abstinence-only sex education. It seems that, while the rate of teenagers having risky sex (as in, without condoms) declined throughout the 90's (Teh Clinton Years), that trend has fully reversed itself and more and more teens are engaging in unsafe sex. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that "Christian" abstinence-only sex ed programmes teach that condoms don't work. Somehow, for the "pro-life" movement, it's kind of okay if you get AIDS, as long as you don't have an abortion. I've got your sex ed right here, kids: It's best not to run around fucking everything that walks, but some of you are going to do it anyway, due to your hormones, so WRAP IT UP, for God's sake.

Ridiculously hot Rafael Nadal beat the pants off (I wish) of equally hot Roger Federer this weekend in his fourth straight French Open win. On to Wimbledon, the week where I stay home and watch tennis.

And lastly, "Controversial Court Ruling Upholds Homosexual's Right To Prance Around Demanding Attention And Being A Drama Queen."

Lots of other things are happening. Click the links on the right, my chickadees. True patriotism does indeed involve knowing what's going on.

US Paying Sunni Insurgents Not to Kill Troops

Antiwar
February 19, 2008

It is impossible to keep up with all the Bush regime’s lies. There are simply too many. Among the recent crop, one of the biggest is that the "surge" is working.

Launched last year, the "surge" was the extra 20,000-30,000 U.S. troops sent to Iraq. These few extra troops, Americans were told, would finally supply the necessary forces to pacify Iraq.

This claim never made any sense. The extra troops didn’t raise the total number of U.S. soldiers to more than one-third the number every expert has said is necessary in order to successfully occupy Iraq.

The real purpose of the "surge" was to hide another deception. The Bush regime is paying Sunni insurgents $800,000 a day not to attack U.S. forces. That’s right, 80,000 members of an "Awakening group," the "Sons of Iraq," a newly formed "U.S.-allied security force" consisting of Sunni insurgents, are being paid $10 a day each not to attack U.S. troops. Allegedly, the Sons of Iraq are now at work fighting al-Qaeda.

This is a much cheaper way to fight a war. We can only wonder why Bush didn’t figure it out sooner.

The "surge" was also timed to take account of the near completion of neighborhood cleansing. Most of the violence in Iraq during the past five years has resulted from Sunnis and Shi’ites driving each other out of mixed neighborhoods. Had the two groups been capable of uniting against the U.S. troops, the U.S. would have been driven out of Iraq long ago. Instead, the Iraqis slaughtered each other and fought the Americans in their spare time.

In other words, the "surge" has had nothing to do with any decline in violence.

With the Sunni insurgents now on Uncle Sam’s payroll, with neighborhoods segregated, and with Sadr’s militia standing down, it is unclear who is still responsible for ongoing violence other than U.S. troops themselves. Somebody must still be fighting, however, because the U.S. is still conducting air strikes and is still unable to tell friend from foe.

On Feb. 16, the Los Angeles Times reported that a U.S. air strike managed to kill nine Iraqi civilians and three Sons of Iraq.

The Sunnis are abandoning their posts in protest, demanding an end to "errant" U.S. air strikes. Obviously, the Sunnis see an opportunity to increase their daily pay for not attacking Americans. Soon they will have consultants advising them how much they can demand in bribes before it pays the Americans to begin fighting the war under the old terms. If Sunnis are smart, they will split the gains. Currently, the Sunnis are getting shafted. They are only collecting $800,000 of the $275,000,000 it costs the U.S. to fight the war for one day. That’s only about three-tenths of one percent, too much of a one-sided deal for the Americans.

If the Sunnis negotiate their cut to between one-quarter and one-half of the daily cost to the U.S. of the war, the Sunnis won’t need to share in the oil revenues, thus helping the three factions to get back together as a country. Even 20 percent of the daily cost of the war would be a good deal for the Sunnis. A long-term contract in this range would be expensive for Uncle Sam, but a great deal cheaper than John McCain’s commitment to a 100-year Iraqi war.

If Bush’s war turns out to be as big a boon for the Sunnis as it has for Tony Blair, we might have a modern-day version of The Mouse That Roared – a movie about an impoverished country that attacked the U.S. in order to be defeated and receive foreign aid – only this time the money comes as a payoff for not fighting the occupiers.

As the world now knows, Blair’s "dodgy dossier" about the threat allegedly posed by Iraq was a contrivance that allowed Blair to put British troops at the service of Bush’s aggression in the Middle East. Now that Blair is out of his prime minister job, he has been rewarded with millions of dollars in sinecures from financial firms such as JP Morgan and millions more in speaking engagements. As part of the payoff, the Bush Republicans have even put Mrs. Blair on the lucrative lecture circuit.

Ask yourself, do you really think Blair knows enough high finance to be of any value as an adviser to JP Morgan, or enough about climate change to advise Zurich Financial on the subject? Do you really believe that after hearing all the vacuous speeches Blair has delivered in those many years in office anyone now wants to pay him huge fees to hear him give a speech? Even when it was free, people were sick of it.

Blair is simply collecting his payoff for selling out his country and sending British troops to die for American hegemony.

The Sunnis seem inclined to do the same thing if Bush will pay them enough.

Is the next phase of the Iraq war going to be a U.S.-Sunni alliance against the Shi’ites?

Dear Mr. Attorney General:

On December 3,2007, I wrote to request that you arrange for the production of documents relating to Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation into the leak of the covert identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson, including copies of FBI interview reports of White House officials. I appreciate that you have since made redacted versions of the interview reports of Karl Rove, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and other senior White House officials available to the Committee.

I am writing now to renew the Committee's request for the interview reports with President Bush and Vice President Cheney and to request unredacted versions of the interviews with Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Condoleezza Rice, Scott McClellan, and Cathie Martin. I also request that the Department provide all other responsive documents that were approved for release to the Committee by Mr. Fitzgerald.

In his interview with the FBI, Mr. Libby stated that it was "possible" that Vice President Cheney instructed him to disseminate information about Ambassador Wilson's wife to the press. This is a significant revelation and, if true, a serious matter. It cannot be responsibly investigated without access to the Vice President's FBI interview.

The interviews with senior White House officials also raise other questions about the involvement of the Vice President. It appears from the interview reports that Vice President Cheney personally may have been the source of the information that Ms. Wilson worked for the CIA. Mr. Libby specifically identified the Vice President as the source of his information about Ms. Wilson. None of the other White House officials could remember how they learned this information.

New revelations by fonner(sic) White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan raise additional questions about the actions of the President and the Vice President. Mr. McClellan has stated that "[t]he President and Vice President directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby." He has also asserted that "the top White House officials who knew the truth including Rove, Libby, and possibly Vice President Cheney - allowed me, even encouraged me, to repeat a lie." It would be a major breach of trust if the Vice President personally directed Mr. McClellan to mislead the public.

In his FBI interview, Mr. McClellan told the FBI about discussions he had with the President and the Vice President. These passages, however, wer~(sic) redacted from the copies made available to the Committee. Similar passages were also redacted from other interviews. There are no sound reasons for you to withhold the interviews with the President and the Vice President from the Committee or to redact passages like Mr. McClellan's discussions with the President and the Vice President. Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation is closed and he has indicated that it would be appropriate to share these records with the Committee. There has been no assertion of executive privilege.

Moreover, withholding these documents would create an unfortunate double standard. During the Clinton Administration, the Committee requested the records of FBI interviews with President Clinton and Vice President Gore in 1997 and 1998 as part of the Committee's Campaign finance investigation. These records were turned over to the Committee by the Justice Department without any consultation with the White House.

The Committee is conducting an important investigation to answer questions that Mr. Fitzgerald's criminal inquiry did not address. As I explained at the Committee's hearing last year, the purpose of the Committee's investigation is to examine:

(1) How did such a serious violation of our national security occur?
(2) Did the White House take appropriate investigative and disciplinary steps after the breach occurred?
And (3) what changes in White House security procedures are necessary to prevent future violations of our national security from occurring?

The infonnation(sic) that you are withholding may hold answers to these questions. The FBI interview reports that you have shared with the Committee raise the possibility that Vice President Cheney may be implicated in the release of Ms. Wilson's identity. Mr. McClellan's recent disclosures indicate that both President Bush and Vice President Cheney played a role in directing the White House response. The Committee cannot complete its inquiry into these matters without receiving the reports of their FBI interviews.

I therefore urge you to follow Justice Department precedents and provide the records of the FBI interviews with President Bush and Vice President Cheney to the Committee by June 10. I also ask that you provide to the Committee, at the same time, the unredacted interviews with Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Condoleezza Rice, Scott McClellan, and Cathie Martin, as well as the other responsive records requested by the Committee.

1 FBI 302 Report of Interview of Scooter Libby (Nov. 26, 2003).
2The Today Show, NBC (May 28,2008).
3 In Ex-Spokesman 's Book, Harsh Words for Bush, New York Times (May 28, 2008).
4 House Committee on Oversight and Government Refonn(sic), Hearing on White House Procedures for Safeguarding Classified Information (Mar. 16,2007).

Issa issa bout to get his ass kicked out of the hearing.

They should jail Stephen Johnson.

Rep. Henry Waxman lacerated the Pentagon's workers' compensation program for civilian workers in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying it was a "flagrant abuse" of taxpayer dollars. He directed his wrath toward AIG and three other carriers not named in this CNN report.

From a business perspective only, and not speaking as an American citizen, if I had been an AIG underwriter I would have priced this program high in the first couple of years. From an underwriting perspective, they were going into a high-risk work zone with a lot of unknowns and no historical data. But according to the report, the carriers had been achieving 40% profits on these civilian employees for over five years. This, in an industry whose revenues declined last year and whose profit margins at home are shaky at best.

It's fine to rip the carriers for not adjusting their rates to reflect experience. But there number of other questions should be asked, too, like: Who was minding the store? Were these costs a straight pass-through from Blackwater, Halliburton, et al.? That removes the incentive from these companies to push back on pricing. After all, the more irresponsible their purchasing practices, the more money they make.

And what about the government's own civilian employees? Where were the Procurement Officers who are supposed to act as risk managers in this sort of situation? It seems to me a lot of people dropped the ball on this one, since it went on year after year.

Sounds like this was a classic seller's market, and yet another story of government mismanagement. The carriers may not have been admirable corporate citizens, to say the least. But, at least in economic terms, they were 'acting rationally.' Too bad we can't say the same thing about the people who were paying them. Our troops in harm's way deserve better than to have the military budget managed so irresponsibly.

Additionally, the United Steelworkers Union threw their support to Senator Obama.

1. If known, what are the median and overall rates of central line-associated bloodstream
infections in the intensive care units in hospitals in your state, using standard definitions
of CLABSIs as provided by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and prevention for
the purpose of tñe National Healthcare Safety Network?

2. If the rates are unknown or if the median rate is above zero, do you have plans to
replicate the Michigan Hospital Association program in your state? If so, when do you
anticipate initiating the program?

3. What other activities are your member hospitals taking to address healthcare-associated
infections? Which infections are you targeting? What is your evidence of success?

But what is missing is any request to provide information about the provision of professional nursing care by baccalaureate educated (or above) nurses as they correlate to those infection rates and patient outcomes.

Patients who are cared for by nurses who themselves have reasonable patient case loads, who are educated at a baccalaureate level or above, and who have professional practice autonomy and support have better outcomes. They suffer lesser numbers of complications, and they have significantly better survival rates. And this applies to patients receiving care across healthcare settings.

But because nursing is not accorded a seat at the health policy table, because it is buried in reimbursement schemes, often included as part of the room and board charge for crying out loud, and is not afforded any healthcare reportage, of course Chairman Waxman doesn't even know to ask these questions.

Safety

What we should know is what the nurse to patient ratios are on a shift by shift and day by day basis. Do they fluctuate from days (usually most heavily staffed) to nights (leanest staffing) and from weekday (heavy) to weekend (skeletal). Are nurses being asked or mandated to work over 12 hours at a stretch (preventable errors rise significantly). Do they have en effective means of practicing under a self (not shared) governance model (satisfaction rises, and retention of competent and expert nurses increases)?

Quality

Are nurses represented on the quality and performance improvement key decision-making teams? Are nurses involved with devising infection reduction procedures, since it is nurses who provide the assurance of sterility during catheter insertion, who provide care for the catheter and connected components, and who usually remove the catheter and dress the site. Are nurses credentialed appropriately, and do they have the necessary clinical competence and expertise to adequately and safely care for their assigned patients?

I'd like to see a graph correlating the statistics about nursing with healthcare-acquired infections.

I hope that Chairman Waxman eventually learns about the critical role that nursing plays in this issue and calls for the appropriate nursing experts to provide that information.

As you know by now, GSA chief Lurita Doan has resigned. She said she did so at the request of the White House, but no one has been able to answer the question: Why now?

After all, both she and the White House stood firm in the face of intense criticism for almost a year, since the Office of Special Counsel urged the president to discipline her "to the fullest extent" for alleged violations of the Hatch Act. She has kept her head low for the most part in recent months.

Original DVD cover.

From The Washington Independent:

The White House had any number of reasons to demand that General Services Administration Administrator Lurita Doan resign, which she did yesterday evening. Top of the list was probably when the independent Office of Special Counsel found last May that she was in violation of the Hatch Act, the law that's supposed to keep partisan politics out of the federal bureaucracy.

But it would appear that Doan is finished not merely because of political maneuvering that backfired. While Doan's violation of the Hatch Act has attracted the most national attention, it is her constant battles with employees at the GSA's office of inspector general that have most marked her two-year tenure. The fact that she again blasted the people who audit GSA contracts may be the real reason for her dismissal.

Since becoming head of GSA, Doan has been in near-constant struggle with agency Inspector General Brian Miller. Doan has equated Miller with a terrorist for doing his job of auditing government contracts awarded by GSA. When Miller said that Doan was harassing and intimidating office of inspector general employees, Doan turned the tables and said it was Miller committing the harassment.

...snip...

Vincent Mulloy, counsel to the inspector general at the Corporation for National and Community Service, found the charges against Miller groundless. Last March, Mulloy dismissed the harassment charges as "personnel management" concerns. "The complaint should be considered without merit, and closed, to end the distraction of GSA office of inspector general personnel from their duties," Mulloy wrote.

In response to the National and Community Services findings, Sen. Charles Grassley, (R-Ia.) wrote a letter dated April 15 to Doan, telling her to consider the harassment matter closed.

...snip...

Grassley's words were not heeded. Friday, Doan told Government Executive that her pursuit of Miller would not be dropped.

...snip...

Doan's email exchange with Government Executive's Robert Brodsky looked like a full-blown return to her flamboyant past, when she was publicly unapologetic about possible Hatch Act violations, as well as charges of threatening employees and rewarding no-bid contracts to friends. Doan vowed to Brodsky that she will stay on the harassment issue "like a dog on a bone."

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino declined to comment at a press conference today about whether Doan's continued pursuit of Miller was the straw that broke the camel's back. Employees at the GSA's Inspector General office described the mood as one of surprise and relief this morning.

...snip...

Rep. Henry A. Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, had called on Doan to resign in June due to the Hatch Act allegations, employee intimidation charges and possibly committing perjury in testimony before the committee.

...snip...

That Doan managed to stay in office after the independent Office of Special Counsel recommended she step down last May for Hatch Act Violations and employee intimidation was remarkable. It would seem that any further slip might force the White House to dismiss her, something that lawmakers and newspaper editorial boards widely called for and expected.

Here's a little history on how Lurita got the job at the GSA, from wiki:

Between 1999 and 2006, Doan and her husband, Douglas, a former military intelligence officer and business liaison official at the Department of Homeland Security, donated nearly $226,000 to Republican campaigns and causes.[6]

Doan, a Republican Party member, was cited by Vice President Dick Cheney in a speech at the Small Business Administration in 2003.[10] She met with President George W. Bush as a woman small business owner in 2004.[11] In 2004, she addressed the Republican National Convention.[12]

Being rich and donating to Rethugs seems to be the only qualification needed to get a job from Chimpy:

On April 6, 2006, Doan was nominated by President George W. Bush to head the General Services Administration. She was confirmed by unanimous consent in the U.S. Senate on May 26 and was sworn in as the 18th administrator of GSA on May 31.

From Government Executive , May 23, 2007:

A report from the federal agency that investigates allegations of illegal political activity in the government has concluded that Lurita Doan, the head of the General Services Administration, violated the Hatch Act.

The 21-page report from Scott Bloch, the head of the Office of Special Counsel, has not been made public, but the independent agency sent Doan a copy for her review on Friday, according to sources with knowledge of the investigation who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The facts gathered by OSC investigators "establish that Administrator Doan violated the Hatch Act," by inducing "her subordinates to engage in the type of political brainstorming session that is prohibited from occurring while the political appointees are on duty or in a federal workplace," the May 18 report, obtained by Government Executive Wednesday, stated.

...snip...

The Hatch Act limits political activity in government agencies. OSC's investigation focused on Doan's role in a Jan. 26 meeting at GSA headquarters where Scott Jennings, special assistant to the president and a deputy of Karl Rove, showed a 28-slide PowerPoint presentation to more than 30 GSA political appointees that analyzed the results of the 2006 midterm election.

Several of the political appointees who attended the meeting testified that during a question-and-answer period following the presentation, Doan asked how the agency could help Republican candidates. The exact words Doan used differ among the witnesses according to the OSC report, but the investigators said in the report that this did not prevent them from determining her intent.

"One can imagine no greater violation of the Hatch Act than to invoke the machinery of an agency, with all its contracts and buildings, in the service of a partisan campaign to retake Congress and the governors' mansions," the report stated.

Doan has said she does not remember making the statement in question.

Ahhh, the Chimpy-employee self-induced amnesia strikes again!

I was frankly horrified to listen to Clinton's hard-nosed views about Iran. And, for a candidate to take that line when we already have two wars NOT going well at all, tells me this candidate cannot be trusted to run the government. She may be doing great as Senator of New York, but it is obvious she hasn't clue one about running the country. Logic dictates you don't continue failed policy just because that's how it has always been. If it is FAILED, that should be clue one to change your tactics.

So reading this article in IPSNews.net was very frustrating. There were some things mention I'd never heard of, but then, now that I'm blogging, I pay much stricter attention too. For instance, I didn't know that Iran had made a peace proposal to the US in 2003, soundly rejected by bush of course, without any consideration. You can read that HERE:

I still reject any of the top three candidates as being worthy of the Oval Office. They all have terrible pasts and secrets to be hidden, none has the experience necessary for a competent presidency, and I don't think any of them deserve that most desirable of offices. Steve Cochran from WGN in Chicago said on CNN's Lou Dobbs last night:

COCHRAN: I don't think they have a proposal for anything and here's my great question for all three of them and I know we're a little far down the road on this but with Congress approval ratings sitting at about 30, 35 percent, that means the company we call Congress has six to seven customers (out of 10) who think they're doing a terrible job and now these three, all from the Senate,(congress), want to run the whole company!

I'm not exactly sure where the question is there, but I sure like the comment. I thought that was so perfectly on target! Just imagine if a company was run that way. How many stockholders do you think would stay if they disapproved of the company's policies??? But I digress! The IPS news article was really incredible. It talks about the different options we have to deal with Iran.

It seems that not everyone in Congress is an idiot! Thank the God/dess for that! Apparently Peter Hoekstra from the House Select Committee on Intelligence, (ya, I know, I cringe any more when I hear government and intelligence of any kind together in a sentence), seems to think that "engaging in a full-court diplomatic press with Iran is a good thing to begin the process" of reaching out to Tehran." I've been saying this from the git go!

For one thing, unless we start breeding like rabbits, eventually our army will be gone. Let's face it, you can't keep having your men and women killed off without replacing them. And US policy in war is a losing policy. By changing the rules we could win, but so far no one is interested in winning.... Also, considering our policies towards veterans, who the HELL would want to join up?

Second, Iran has not shown any aggression towards the USA, but is standing its ground. I can't blame them, they are a sovereign power. They should be met as equals in ANY situation. And they should be treated as equals. I don't care what US policy has been to date, it is WRONG! A two year old could tell you that!

Third, by what right do we, (the USA), have to hold other nations to standards we do not hold ourselves??? This is extremely applicable to the bush administration. With the criminal activity going on in the bush administration, WHY would any other nation want to have dealings with us at this time? We need to straighten up our own house before we walk into someone else's and demand they clean up theirs.

Fourth, name calling doesn't make the names true. You know, sticks and stones and all that jazz. A statement from bush is a perfect example when he CLAIMS that Iran is one of the "two greatest threats to the United States". I'm guessing he means himself for the first one! Breaking every one of our laws and then saying he isn't subject to them is a pretty big threat to US if you ask me!

According to IPSNews.net:

The U.S.'s options could even include a new review of Iran's 2003 "grand bargain" proposal, which was at the time rejected by Washington.

"A democratic administration would go back and try to open that possibility up for discussions of a grand bargain of one sort or another... Democrats would certainly have seen that as a missed opportunity," Congressman Henry Waxman, chair of the House Oversight Committee, told IPS, adding that military option would always be on the table.

I just don't agree with the military options part. However, no one is asking me... Go figure... ~sigh~ Sometimes I think l'il old me has better sense than the entire Congress, and I'm not even going to talk about bush here...

So far the bush administration is only offering talks with Iran if they capitulate with US demands. Now, if I was Iran's leaders, I'd tell the US government to stick it where the sun don't shine, permanently... This isn't your kid brother we're talking about here. You can't just push or order them around. They are a distinct nation, worthy of respect and equal footing in any discussion. You can't treat other countries like they don't have equal rights. And just because your nose is out of joint doesn't mean they should apologize!!!

Patrick Clawson, the deputy director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank established by the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee, thinks that Washington's objective is to bring to bear a variety of pressures -- financial, trade, security, political and military -- on Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran's Supreme Leader. The aim would be to show Khamenei that Iran's nuclear programme is going to cost it very dearly, and that therefore it's not worth it.

Umm, been there, done that, didn't work. How about we change the record and try a different tune for a change??? Someone please talk some damn sense into these morons! I mean, this has been US AND UN policy for how many years now??? Give me a break people. Posturing is not effective, just like torture isn't effective. Did these people wake up and take stupid pills every day of their lives? Or is this that "Government Intelligence" oxymoron again??? Geesh!

Yes, I do get a bit frustrated with nincompoops! How they ever got where they are at is far beyond my ken! Like I said, Congress needs to be drug tested, Lobbyists need to go, then maybe, just maybe, order and sense will return.

"Those quiet discussions will not take place between the Swiss ambassador and an Iranian deputy foreign minister who's been fired from his job a few months before for unauthorized contact, unauthorized proposals to Americans," Clawson added, mocking the way the Iranians delivered their "grand bargain" proposal in 2003.

He said such conversations should be initiated through intelligence channels. "The CIA has every authority to talk to people from MOIS [Iran's intelligence service], and I assume MOIS has every authority to talk to people from the CIA ... That's the tradition."

~rolling my eyes here~ < heavy sarc >Oh, by all MEANS let's keep tradition alive. It's work SO well so far!< /heavy sarc > NOT! Pardon me but the pompous meter just ripped off the top of the thermometer. Do these dumb asses ever hear themselves speaking?

The article goes on to say that no one wants to talk to Ahmadinejad before the elections in Iran are over. They say in late 2009 but I don't consider March to be late in the year. And I just wonder what they are hoping for. Ahmadinejad is one very popular President. His people seem to love him and his policies. So like him or not, they really should consider working with the man regardless of personal feelings...

I think the Declaration of Independence best sums up what I'm trying to say here:

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —

Remember who you are America. Do not let tyrants and those who follow tyrants dictate to you what government policies you will follow.