Thank you, Mr. Rove

In the annals of modern political life in America, Karl Rove is second to none in terms of the impact he has had on our country. Here is someone who, through sheer political cunning and determination, was able to get a man elected President of the United States that had no business being elected.

What attracted Rove to George W. Bush? What was it exactly that grabbed a hold of him with such righteous conviction that his major accomplishment in life would be to lead W to the highest office in our land? Was it because he saw W as a great leader that would march our country forward into the nascent 21st century? Was it something about the way W thought through issues and complex problems that just didn't come across well in televised appearances? Was it the strength of W's convictions that made him dedicate all of his waking hours to making W president? Was there something inside this son of a former president that none of us saw, yet he did?

Unfortunately, I believe the answer to these questions is a resounding NO. What Karl Rove saw in W was a simple man, one who could easily be molded and influenced, told what was needed from him and to follow orders. Rove had in his hands a lumpy piece of clay from which he could literally create a candidate that he could get elected.

That HE could get elected.

That person's pesky ideals or convictions wouldn't get in the way with someone like W, Rove thought. I can turn him into whatever I want. Rove's goal wasn't to elect a man he believed the most fit to run our country. No, his goal was a simple political science experiment: To create a candidate with generic conservative principles that would appeal to a vastly untapped conservative base. And when necessary, shore up support by stoking the fires of partisanship through all out smear assaults on the opposition and emphasizing wedge-issues to energize that base.

Elections for Karl Rove were the end all and be all, the means as well as the end. In hindsight it is rather apparent that this was his finish line. Sure, running the country under conservative principles was good and all, but its importance paled in comparison to winning an election. The myopic psyche that permeates throughout this administration has its genesis in Rove. The only consideration and fundamental driving force was short-term political gain - i.e. winning elections.

And look now at the state of our Union. We are stuck in a seething hellhole that is Iraq. Coming upon the six anniversary of 9/11 and Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden not only are still alive in Afghanistan/Pakistan, but they are gaining in strength?!?! (Read that last sentence again. How can that even be possible?!) We literally lost one of our most beautiful southern cities, New Orleans. We have an Attorney General who, even after unimaginable incompetence and horrific bungling of his duties, still holds his senior level position. And what about the opinion the world holds of our country? I mean any one of these debacles would have left an indelible scar on any administration, but to have them all under one presidency - and there is still more than a year left!! - is an indescribable phenomenon. I believe most of the country has yet to wrap their heads around the all-encompassing failure that is this administration. At a time when our country sorely needed a true leader, from either side of the aisle, we were short-changed and hoodwinked by Mr. Rove, and our country is currently and will continue to pay a dear price for having had W as our president.

So thank you, Mr. Rove. Thank you for giving us a president that has failed so miserably at every important challenge he faced over the last 7 years (except winning elections). Thank you for using our moral high ground after 9/11 to polarize our country for the simple purpose of winning an election or two. Thank you for dividing our country to such an extent that sensible issues that all Americans care about, like solving Social Security and dealing with immigration, are too toxic for moderates from both sides to sit down and hammer out a deal that would benefit the vast majority of Americans.

Your purpose was never to do what was in the interest of the United States. The only thing you cared about was to wield unlimited power in the short time you and your president were in the White House, and you mortgaged the future of our country for your narrow ideological goals and your short-sighted political experiment.


Because of you sir, my generation will have to spend most of its time in the future cleaning up the mess you and the administration you helped usher into office have made.



Thanks.

No End In Sight Movie: Go watch this!

Does it get anymore pathetic than Alberto Gonzalez?

The emotions one runs through when thinking about the Alberto Gonzalez fiasco are many: First, you go through anger and a sense that yes! if he is guilty of gross incompetence at the least and criminal wrongdoing at the worst, then he should face the consequences! Then he gets on the witness stand and gives not only one, but a handful of performances that leaves anyone remotely alive watching him with a sense of shock that those words are actually coming out of his mouth. I mean, how does he not see himself as the ridiculous horse's arse that he has become? Has he no sense of decency or loyalty to the country (and no, loyalty to the president is toooootally different than loyalty to country) or office that he holds and that he should be a man of principle and step down?!




The emotional phase then moves over to the furious level, when you realize this nincumpoop is the number one law enforcement officer in the nation, one who has so demoralized and sabotaged our Justice Department that we almost cease to have a functioning arm of our government. And given all of the high crimes and misdemeanors committed around town lately, you would think it necessary and essential to have a functioning Justice Department, yeah? The worst part is that even if this clown were somewhat competent, his unflinching loyalty to W has no bounds, and he would go to the depths of hell and back before doing anything against this president. He never took up the torch of being America's top law officer - he never stopped being W's legal council. It is this innability to discern the difference between president and country that is Gonzalez's most egregious fault.


Slowly the emotion train pulls up into just plain sadness. I am just sad that we have such a pathetic and incompetent president. I am sad that we have a woefully terrible attorney general. Sad that our Congress does not have the moral courage to stand up as a co-equal branch of government and demand accountability for this administration's crimes. What are they afraid of? That blowhards on the Fox News Channel will insult them? That Rush Limbaugh will continue ranting and raving against them?

Has the Congress so pathetically lost its ability to hold another branch of government in check?

A President Besieged and Isolated, Yet at Ease!!!

Waking up this morning with my morning coffee and Washington Post, I almost spat out said coffee on said newspaper. One of the headlines read, "A President Besieged and Isolated, Yet at Ease" (emphasis mine). Now if there ever was a sentence that succinctly summed up this president, by God we have found it!

The article highlights the major failures of this administration since his re-election (Social Security, Hurricane Katrina, the Harriet Miers SCOTUS nomination, the Dubai Ports World fiasco, Cheney shooting a man in the face, the "Three Stooges" a.k.a Abramoff, Delay and Foley, the 2006 midterm elections, "Scooter", Gonzales, Wolfowitz and now last week's immigration bill collapse - breath!) and how they have led a steady drumbeat march down to the current poll levels W faces. Yet the president seems relatively unfazed by all of these crushing defeats.

"For all the setbacks, he remains unflinching, rarely expressing doubt in his direction, yet trying to understand how he got off course."

So W recognizes the various setbacks, but remains unflinching, and is trying to understand how his previous actions got him and our country in the proverbial crapper and off course, yet refuses to change that course. That is just great, and is actually the definition of insanity: When you do the same thing over and over again and expect different results.

The best part is a reference to the books W has been reading. A few on our first President, the Algerian war for independence and a new book out on Churchill, who W so happens to admire greatly - and to whom he compares himself!! The author of this book, "Troublesome Young Men," also wrote an op-ed in yesterday's Outlook section where she takes a rather, um, different view from W's. To those who do not want to click on the link and read the article, she basically says that W's actions are more close to Neville Chamberlain's than to Churchill's. A pretty damning, and if you read her arguments, accurate assessment if you ask me.

So here we have a president who apparently does feel the attacks and criticisms against him and is said to truly care about the consequences of our actions in Iraq, but who, in the words of a British historian who recently met with the president, said W "was very friendly, very relaxed. My God, he looked well. He looked like he came off a cruise in the Caribbean. He looked like he hadn't a care in the world. It was amazing."

Indubitably my jolly ol' chap from o'er yonder. It is amazing.

Cheney: The Defenition of Compassionate Conservatism

The Final Chapter of the Cheney story in Wednesday's Washington Post discusses his true concern: saving the planet and its species from destruction...oh wait, by 'saving' I meant 'complete disregard for' and by 'from' I meant ' and assuring their'. Sorry, sometimes I get a little confused after reading something so shocking and frigthening that I actually forget the meaning of words...I will quote only parts of the article that pertain to one case - known as the Klamath case in Oregon. It must be read to be believed...

"In Oregon, a battleground state that the Bush-Cheney ticket had lost by less than half of 1 percent, drought-stricken farmers and ranchers were about to be cut off from the irrigation water that kept their cropland and pastures green. Federal biologists said the Endangered Species Act left the government no choice: The survival of two imperiled species of fish was at stake.

"Law and science seemed to be on the side of the fish. Then the vice president stepped in. First Cheney looked for a way around the law, aides said. Next he set in motion a process to challenge the science protecting the fish, according to a former Oregon congressman who lobbied for the farmers."

"Because of Cheney's intervention, the government reversed itself and let the water flow in time to save the 2002 growing season, declaring that there was no threat to the fish. What followed was the largest fish kill the West had ever seen, with tens of thousands of salmon rotting on the banks of the Klamath River."

"Characteristically, Cheney left no tracks...(this case) is one of many in which the vice president took on a decisive role to undercut long-standing environmental regulations for the benefit of business. "

"When the lead biologist for the National Marine Fisheries Service team critiqued the science academy's report in a draft opinion objecting to the plan, the critique was edited out by superiors and his objections were overruled, he said. The biologist, Michael Kelly, who has since quit the federal agency, said in a whistle-blower claim that it was clear to him that "someone at a higher level" had ordered his agency to endorse the proposal regardless of the consequences to the fish."

"Last summer, the federal government declared a "commercial fishery failure" on the West Coast after several years of poor chinook returns virtually shut down the industry, opening the way for Congress to approve more than $60 million in disaster aid to help fishermen recover their losses. That came on top of the $15 million that the government has paid Klamath farmers since 2002 not to farm, in order to reduce demand."

So let me get this straight: Cheney gets the restrictions on water use lifted to benefit farmers for political gain and to the detriment of the fish population in the region. Next, the commercial fishery failure in Oregon is linked to this move, forcing the government to dole out $60 million to the fishermen AND $15 million to those same farmers to NOT grow their crops in order to reduce demand. This, my friends, is what is known as a complete circle of disaster, where the results are thousands of dead fish and $75 million of taxpayer money spent to keep one industry on life support and another to NOT do what they do. Wow.

Exploring the Cheney Vault, Continued...

Highlights from today's Washington Post story on the Cheney Vice-Presidency:


"Cheney has changed history more than once, earning his reputation as the nation's most powerful vice president. His impact has been on public display in the arenas of foreign policy and homeland security, and in a long-running battle to broaden presidential authority. But he has also been the unseen hand behind some of the president's major domestic initiatives."


"The president is 'the decider,' as Bush puts it, but the vice president often serves up his menu of choices."


"'Dick's major concern, one of them was, and I agree, that there needs to be a greater and more effective role for the vice president,' Marsh, a longtime Cheney friend, said in an interview. 'He holds the view, as do I, that the vice president should be the chief of staff in effect, that everything should run through his office.'"

"In Bush, Cheney found the perfect partner. The president's willingness to delegate left plenty of room for his more detail-oriented vice president."


"Cheney's influence is manifested not just in crisis but also through his extraordinary involvement in the daily machinery of the White House."


"It is well known that Cheney is usually the last to speak to the president before Bush makes a decision. Less so is his role, to a degree unmatched by his predecessors, in steering debate by weighing in at the lower-level meetings where proposals are born and die."


"Perhaps more important than Cheney's influence in pushing policies is his power to stop them before they reach the Oval Office."



There can be no doubt now as to the immense influence this Vice-President carries within the W administration. His fingers are in most of the policy pies cooked up in the White House, and it is no wonder that each one fed to the American public has a rather odd taste...


What I take issue with, however, is not the fact that he wields this much power. In my opinion the VP post has always been under-utilized - you just basically wait for the top guy to keel over - and I see no problem with the person in this position trying to accomplish the policy goals of his president in a more forceful manner (they were, after all, on the same ticket!). What really disturbs me is the VP's utter contempt for the other branches of government and disdain for accountability. The VP's argument that his office is not part of the executive branch because he is the president of the Senate - and is therefore not required to disclose his handling of classified information as directed by the president - is a semantic stretch that would have raised many an eyebrow at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia some 200 odd years ago. It is an audacious claim whose only purpose is to circumvent accountability. It would appear that this VP office would especially need some form of accountability and oversight, given their notorious and conspicuous bouts of classified information leaking (see Scooter Libby).


It all comes down to this: The founders crafted the Constitution and our government with specific safeguards against the abusive use of power. In other words, they made three co-equal branches of government that would be able to check and balance each other. And put in even another way, no single branch can act without being responsible for its actions: ACCOUNTABILITY! Tyranny is born from unchecked power, and the Founding Fathers, having dealt with tyranny first-hand, knew the dangers of an unaccountable government.


Vice-President Dick Cheney appears to be under the impression that he does not need to be held accountable for his actions. He has the freedom to push his agenda without any consequences. And even if you agree that he is not accountable because his office is not technically part of the executive branch, he has to be accountable somehow!!! If not the executive, then the legislative or even the judicial!! And if under neither, he is then a rogue entity within our government.


This VP has seriously undermined two hundred years of checks and balances on government power, and I shutter to think what lies at the end of this path if it is not properly and forcefully addressed.

Simply Disturbing...

The Washington Post has just come out with an incredible expose on the inner-workings of the W administration - with a specific focus on Vice-President Dick Cheney:

Angler: The Cheney Vice-Presidency

While most of the information reported has been speculated on and circulated around the blog-o-sphere for quite some time, it is very disturbing to see it in the WaPo with this attention to detail and siting of sources. If you haven't had a chance to check it out, please do yourself a favor and read it. This will become vital reading for anyone who actually cares about what is going on in our country...I am still in relative shock and will need to digest it a bit before commenting further. Here are, however, some highlights:

"Cheney expresses indifference, in public and private, to any verdict but history's, and those close to him say he means it."

"Before the president casts the only vote that counts, the final words of counsel nearly always come from Cheney."

"Across the board, the vice president's office goes to unusual lengths to avoid transparency. Cheney declines to disclose the names or even the size of his staff, generally releases no public calendar and ordered the Secret Service to destroy his visitor logs. His general counsel has asserted that "the vice presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch," and is therefore exempt from rules governing either. Cheney is refusing to observe an executive order on the handling of national security secrets, and he proposed to abolish a federal office that insisted on auditing his compliance."

"The vice president's lawyer advocated what was considered the (what is known as the torture memo)'s most radical claim: that the president may authorize any interrogation method, even if it crosses the line into torture. U.S. and treaty laws forbidding any person to "commit torture," that passage stated, "do not apply" to the commander in chief, because Congress "may no more regulate the President's ability to detain and interrogate enemy combatants than it may regulate his ability to direct troop movements on the battlefield."

"The irony with the Cheney crowd pushing the envelope on presidential power is that the president has now ended up with lesser powers than he would have had if they had made less extravagant, monarchical claims," said Bruce Fein, an associate deputy attorney general under President Ronald Reagan."

"The only person in Washington who cares less about his public image than David Addington is Dick Cheney," said a former White House ally. "What both of them miss is that ..... in times of war, a prerequisite for success is people having confidence in their leadership. This is the great failure of the administration -- a complete and total indifference to public opinion."

There were too many nuggets to post above. Read the article in its entirety. This is just the tip of this Titanic-killing iceberg. WaPo has two more episodes of this series coming out tomorrow and Wednesday. Tighten your seat belts, as I predict it will be bumpy with a slight chance of catastrophe for the W admin in the days and weeks ahead...