Month: April 2006

Partisan Leaks

by digby

Can someone explain to me why it’s assumed that Mary McCarthy leaked information for partisan reasons (because she gave money to the Kerry campaign) while her boss Porter Goss, who was a Republican congressman until a year and a half ago, is not assumed to have fired her for partisan reasons?

Remember, when Goss was head of the house intelligence committee, he had this to say about the alleged leak of covert operative Valerie Plame’s name to Robert Novak:

“Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I’ll have an investigation”

yeah, yeah, I know. IOKIY… whatever.

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The Shake Up

by digby

So, aside from rearranging the deck chairs, Josh Bolton has a new plan:

Deploy Guns and Badges

This is an unabashed play to members of the conservative base who are worried about illegal immigration. Under the banner of homeland security, the White House plans to seek more funding for an extremely visible enforcement crackdown at the Mexican border, including a beefed-up force of agents patrolling on all-terrain vehicles (ATVs). “It’ll be more guys with guns and badges,” said a proponent of the plan. “Think of the visuals. The President can go down and meet with the new recruits. He can go down to the border and meet with a bunch of guys and go ride around on an atv.”

I wonder what costume he’ll put on for that photo-op. Chuck Norris is his favorite actor so I’m thinking Texas Ranger suit.

Hitch up those chaps, Junior.

Make Wall Street Happy

In an effort to curry favor with dispirited Bush backers in the investment world, the Administration will focus on two tax measures already in the legislative pipeline—extensions of the rate cuts for stock dividends and capital gains

What’ll they think of next?

Brag More

White House officials who track coverage of Bush in media markets around the country said he garnered his best publicity in months from a tour to promote enrollment in Medicare’s new prescription-drug plan. So they are planning a more focused and consistent effort to talk about the program’s successes after months of press reports on start-up difficulties. Bolten’s plan also calls for more happy talk about the economy.

Yeah, they’ve got a lot to brag about. And happy talk is a sure way to bring people around.

Court The Press

Bolten is extremely guarded around reporters, but he knows them and, unlike some of his colleagues, is not scared of them…His first move, working with counselor Dan Bartlett, was to offer the press secretary job to Tony Snow of Fox News radio and television, a former newspaper editorial writer and onetime host of Fox News Sunday who served George H.W. Bush as speechwriting director. Snow, a father of three and a sax player, is the bona fide outsider that Republican allies have long prescribed for Bushworld and would bring irreverence to a place that hasn’t seen a lot of fun lately

They finally seem to have realized that Bush’s biggest problem is the perception that the White House isn’t irreverent enough.

So, Bolton’s plan is to change marketing. Hey, maybe they can still sell this shit sandwich as a filet mignon, but I doubt it. There is one aspect of his little plan that is truly disturbing, however:

Reclaim Security Credibility

This is the riskiest, and potentially most consequential, element of the plan, keyed to the vow by Iran to continue its nuclear program despite the opposition of several major world powers. Presidential advisers believe that by putting pressure on Iran, Bush may be able to rehabilitate himself on national security, a core strength that has been compromised by a discouraging outlook in Iraq. “In the face of the Iranian menace, the Democrats will lose,” said a Republican frequently consulted by the White House.

So it’s confirmed that they view confrontatiin with Iran as a politicial winner.

Zbigniew Brzezinski points out the parallels with this marketing plan and the run-up to Iraq in this article in the LA Times today. After discussing the many disasterous consequences of a unilateral, pre-emptive attack on Iran, he also points out how counter-productive this moronic saber-rattling is:

Even if the United States is not planning an imminent military strike on Iran, persistent hints by official spokesmen that “the military option is on the table” impede the kind of negotiations that could make that option unnecessary. Such threats are likely to unite Iranian nationalists and Shiite fundamentalists because most Iranians are proud of their nuclear program.

Military threats also reinforce growing international suspicions that the U.S. might be deliberately encouraging greater Iranian intransigence. Sadly, one has to wonder whether, in fact, such suspicions may not be partly justified. How else to explain the current U.S. “negotiating” stance: refusing to participate in the ongoing negotiations with Iran and insisting on dealing only through proxies. (That stands in sharp contrast with the simultaneous U.S. negotiations with North Korea.)

The U.S. is already allocating funds for the destabilization of the Iranian regime and reportedly sending Special Forces teams into Iran to stir up non-Iranian ethnic minorities in order to fragment the Iranian state (in the name of democratization!). And there are clearly people in the Bush administration who do not wish for any negotiated solution, abetted by outside drum-beaters for military action and egged on by full-page ads hyping the Iranian threat.

There is unintended irony in a situation in which the outrageous language of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (whose powers are much more limited than his title implies) helps to justify threats by administration figures, which in turn help Ahmadinejad to exploit his intransigence further, gaining more fervent domestic support for himself as well as for the Iranian nuclear program.

It is therefore high time for the administration to sober up and think strategically, with a historic perspective and the U.S. national interest primarily in mind. It’s time to cool the rhetoric. The United States should not be guided by emotions or a sense of a religiously inspired mission. Nor should it lose sight of the fact that deterrence has worked in U.S.-Soviet relations, in U.S.-Chinese relations and in Indo-Pakistani relations.

Sober up? Why, here I thought the problem was that they aren’t irreverent enough. Cool the rhetoric? Sorry. It’s an election year. If Bush has to launch nuclear war to prevent being held acountable for what he’s done, that just how it has to be. Remember, they believe that “in the face of the Iranian menace, the Democrats will lose.”

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Gilligan Security

by digby

Mike Stark at Calling All Wingnuts had a chance to talk to Joe Klein and he asked him about why he believed that nuclear war should be on the table.He said:

Joe: Oh… Oh… OK. I said that it should be an option. And I do believe that it should be an option. But let me tell you what I actually believe about this. First of all, it should be an option and I think it doesn’t do us any harm for the Iranians, if they are going to go around saying crazy things, to think that we might act crazily as well.

Mike: So it’s not really an option…

Joe: No, but let me say this. It’s not really an option because I don’t believe that the Bush administration, given the disastrous foreign policy of the last five years, has the credibility or the wherewithall to act unilaterally attack Iraq (sic)…And as a matter of principle, throughout my entire career, my entire career I’ve believed that we can only use force when we do it in concert with out allies as we did in the first Gulf War, as we did in Kosove when it was NATO. So for you to say that I am in favor of nuking Iran, you sound like one of those left wing bloggers who are so routinely innaccurate in everything they write about.

I believe that Klein accurately represents the level of sophistication we see in many American political circles these days, which is this notion that if we act crazy we will scare the hell out of the wogs.

Tom Friedman said much the same thing after 9/11:

No, the axis-of-evil idea isn’t thought through – but that’s what I like about it. It says to these countries and their terrorist pals: “We know what you’re cooking in your bathtubs. We don’t know exactly what we’re going to do about it, but if you think we are going to just sit back and take another dose from you, you’re wrong. Meet Don Rumsfeld – he’s even crazier than you are.”

There is a lot about the Bush team’s foreign policy I don’t like, but their willingness to restore our deterrence, and to be as crazy as some of our enemies, is one thing they have right.

Suppose your local police department suddenly threw out all the rules and started acting “crazy” on the theory that the criminals would get scared and stay home. Would that actually make your town safer or more dangerous?

This is such a deeply immature view that I honestly don’t know these influential middle aged men are even allowed to drive much less be taken seriously on foreign policy. The United States is a superpower. We do not need to “act crazy.” Indeed, acting crazy is the last thing a superpower should ever do. It makes others miscalculate because they think we are unpredictable and dumb.

booga booga

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Insurance Policy

by digby

Do the American people know what they signed on to?

If you want an image of what America’s long-term plans for Iraq look like, it’s right here at Balad. Tucked away in a rural no man’s land 43 miles north of Baghdad, this 15-square-mile mini-city of thousands of trailers and vehicle depots is one of four “superbases” where the Pentagon plans to consolidate U.S. forces, taking them gradually from the front lines of the Iraq war. (Two other bases are slated for the British and Iraqi military.) The shift is part of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s plan to draw down U.S. ground forces in Iraq significantly by the end of 2006. Pentagon planners hope that this partial withdrawal will, in turn, help take the edge off rising opposition to the war at home—long enough to secure Iraq’s nascent democracy.

But the vast base being built up at Balad is also hard evidence that, despite all the political debate in Washington about a quick U.S. pullout, the Pentagon is planning to stay in Iraq for a long time—at least a decade or so, according to military strategists. Sovereignty issues still need to be worked out by mutual, legal agreement. But even as Iraqi politicians settle on a new government after four months of stalemate—on Saturday, they agreed on a new prime minister, Jawad al-Maliki—they also are welcoming the long-term U.S. presence. Sectarian conflict here has worsened in recent months, outstripping the anti-American insurgency in significance, and many Iraqis know there is no alternative to U.S. troops for the foreseeable future. “I think the presence of the American forces can be seen as an insurance policy for the unity of Iraq,” says national-security adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie.

There is ample evidence elsewhere of America’s long-term plans. The new $592 million U.S. Embassy being built at the heart of Baghdad’s “international zone” is “massive … the largest embassy to date,” says Maj. Gen. Chuck Williams, head of the State Department’s Overseas Building Operations office. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, Williams called it the “most ambitious project” his office has undertaken in its history. Officials in both the executive branch and Congress say they are unaware of any serious planning, or even talk inside the national-security bureaucracy, about a full withdrawal. The Pentagon has one intel officer assigned to produce and update analyses regarding the consequences of a U.S. pullout. But the job is only a part-time assignment, according to a Pentagon source who asked for anonymity because of the sensitive subject matter. As President George W. Bush himself said in March, the final number of U.S. troops “will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq.”

We’ve known this for a long time, of course, although nobody ever discusses it. But nobody has yet factored in how our “superbases” and “super embassy” are going to fare in the middle of a civil war. What exactly does “the presence of the American forces can be seen as an insurance policy for the unity of Iraq” mean in light of events like this:

As the shooting died down Tuesday afternoon, the tired and frightened residents of Baghdad’s Adhamiyah neighborhood packed their cars and prepared to flee. After two days of street fighting that had kept them locked in their houses, they did not want to see what might come next.

The details of the unusual street battle that began Monday remained shrouded by the fog of war. U.S. and Iraqi soldiers thought they were shooting at insurgents who were trying to ambush them. Local men on neighborhood watch in the predominantly Sunni Arab area thought they were shooting at Shiites who were coming to kidnap and kill them. Residents hiding in their homes, simply praying for survival, could only guess who was fighting whom.

American troops aren’t ever going to be able to “insure” against this. They will end up withdrawing behind the walls of their military and diplomatic compounds. Yet our continued presence in the country will exacerbate the problems without solving anything. So what is going to be accomplished with these huge bases and embassy compounds?

And by the way, is it still politically incorrect to ask how much this is costing the American public? “Freedom” may be the Almighty’s gift to the world but the American taxpayer is paying the insurance premium.

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Gird Your Loins

by digby

The sublime Wolcott tries to prepare us for what’s coming:

Like so many of her fellow insufferables on the right, the Anchoress has to grip and wield her nun’s ruler of rectitude ever more fiercely now that the war in Iraq has gone so disastrously and Bush’s poll numbers are eating through the floorboards. The rhetoric will escalate into the higher rafters of hysteria as they find themselves more and more in the minority, finding it harder and harder to scrape up a lynch mob to go after such dastardly varmints as the Dixie Chicks. Or it will delve deeper into the mire, as the Anchoress leads them into noble battle against the Cult of Mendacity with a crucifix in one hand, a toilet plunger in the other.

It’s going to be bad, no matter what. Do you remember what it was like before Bush was president? The blond shrieking harpies with aneurysms the size of tennis balls pulsing wildly on their throats and temples? It’s all going to come back, only worse. This time they really, truly believed they had embarked on a thousand year Reich.

Art by Rebekah Naomi Cox
Computer Wallpaper can be purchased at Conlan Press

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Hooyah!

by digby

Click here for the latest adventures of the Keyboard Kommandos and Battle-Action Bush: Treasonous Generals edition.

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The Unpopular Twins

by digby

California’s not very fond of Republicans right now. When the two most famous failed Republican leaders get together it’s not pretty:

Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, said Mr. Bush’s visit to Stanford was interrupted by protesters, who blocked the only road leading to the Hoover Institution, where Mr. Bush was to meet with fellows before dining with Mr. Shultz.

As a result of the protest, the meeting was switched to Mr. Shultz’s house, and the dinner followed.

The get-togethers with Mr. Schwarzenegger and Mr. Shultz were the most significant events so far in Mr. Bush’s visit.

For Mr. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, Mr. Bush’s visit presented a dilemma: The governor, who is facing a tough re-election fight, did not want to appear too often or too cozy with Mr. Bush, whose approval rating in this largely Democratic state is 32 percent, according to a Field Poll last week. That is even lower than Mr. Schwarzenegger’s, 36 percent in the poll.

America seems to be waking up to the fact that stolen elections, bogus recalls, movie stars and guys you want to have a beer with don’t actually add up to leadership. If they can be wised up to the fact that tax cuts for billionaires don’t actually benefit them, then we might be getting someplace.

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In Our Blood

by digby

I was musing yesterday about the habitual misjudgment on the part of the Bush administration and why it all felt so familiar to me. The unique combination of hubris, emotionalism, and confident assumptions that through little effort the US would “win” by dint of its superiority in both goodness and courage. And that’s when it came to me where I’d heard it before:

From a speech given at the centennial of the civil war by historian Stephen Z. Starr:

Granting the existence of cultural differences between the North and South, can we assume that they would necessarily lead to a Civil War? Obviously not. Such differences lead to animosity and war only if one side develops a national inferiority complex, begins to blame all its shortcomings on the other side, enforces a rigid conformity on its own people, and tries to make up for its own sins of omission and commission by name-calling, by nursing an exaggerated pride and sensitiveness, and by cultivating a reckless aggressiveness as a substitute for reason.

And this was the refuge of the South. For ten years before secession, Northerners were commonly referred to as “mongrels and hirelings.” The North was described as “a conglomeration of greasy mechanics filthy operatives, small-fisted farmers, and moonstruck theorists … hardly fit for association with a southern gentleman’s body servant.” And, most fatal delusion of all, Southerners began to credit themselves with fighting ability equal to that of nine, five, or more conservatively, three Northerners.

Once a nation or a section begins to speak and think in such terms, reason has gone out the window and emotion has taken over. This is precisely what happened in the South, and this is why the Cotton States seceded before Lincoln was even inaugurated and before his administration had committed, or had a chance to commit, any act of egression against them. Such behavior is fundamentally irrational, and cannot be explained in rational terms.

We seem to have a little glitch in our national psyche that won’t go away. It isn’t just southern anymore. The misadventure of the last five years has been run by a southern dominant political party, but its architects were elite, cosmopolitan intellectuals. This is an American problem and we are going to have to get rid of it if this country is going to survive.

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Every Wingnut For Himself

by digby

Uh Oh. The Republicans are starting to fight over the mouldering corpse of Ronald Reagan. The end is nigh.

The elites in the GOP have never understood conservatives or Reagan; they’ve found both to be a bit tacky. They have always found the populists’ commitment to values unsettling. To them, adherence to conservative principles was always less important than wealth and power.

Unfortunately, the GOP has lost its motivating ideals. The revolution of 1994 has been killed not by zeal but by a loss of faith in its own principles. The tragedy is not that we are faced with another fight for the soul of the Republican Party but that we have missed an opportunity to bring a new generation of Americans over to our point of view.

Ah yes. But, remember, it’s because these greedy elites like William Kristol aren’t really conservatives, after all. The real conservatives are putting their tiny little feet down.

It was the populists under Reagan, and later under Newt Gingrich, who energized the party, gave voice to a maturing conservative ideology and swept Republicans into power. We would be imprudent and forgetful to disregard this. But it may be too late, because conservatives don’t want to be part of the looming train wreck. They know that this is no longer Ronald Reagan’s party.

Rats deserting the sinking ship of state. What a bunch of chickenshits.

Update: TBOGG finds some serious right wing doom and gloom over at The Corner.

Thanks to JM
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Taboos

by digby

Reading this interesting article in Forward about the potential consequences of bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities (presuming we even know where they are) I am struck once again by the right’s willingness to violate important taboos. (Some of you may not find this surprising considering their rather shocking public obsession with bestiality, but this goes beyond their usual bedroom hypocrisy.)

They talk a lot about the decline of western civilization and worry incessantly about gay marriage and changing gender roles, but they quite casually violate some of the most important taboos of the last half century or more. Big honking important taboos at that.

First, they declare that the taboo against wars of agression, formed in the blood of more than 70 million dead people in the 20th century’s two world wars, is out. Not even a second glance at that taboo. They simply repackage it as “pre-emptive” war, changing the previous definition of troops gathering on the border to somebody some day might want to attack us so we must attack them first.

Then there’s torture. This society used to teach its children that there is no excuse for torture. Indeed, until recently, people who torture were considered to be either evil or sick. We didn’t make exceptions for “except when you suspect the person is a really bad person.” We said torture is wrong. Now we have sent a message far and wide that torture is necessary and even good if the person who is committing it is doing it for the right reasons. Those right reasons are usually that we “know” that the victim has information but is refusing to tell us what it is. How we “know” this is never spelled out. All we know is that if the person is on our side they are “good” and the ones who are refusing to tell are “evil” and that should be good enough for anybody.

Finally, we seem to have crossed the rubicon with respect to nukes. We are openly discussing using them on television, much as otherwise decent people tossed around the idea of torture after 9/11. People like Joe Klein think it’s not only ok for George W. Bush to say nukes are on the table — but it’s desirable becaue then people will think we are crazy and run like hell when we say boo. However, just as with torture, once you start talking about how it might be ok in certain circumstances, then you have begun to break down the taboo against it.

Much of our safety in the post-Hiroshima world has relied on the fact that nuclear war is too horrible to contemplate. It’s not just the horror of the explosions themselves, it’s the visions of radiation sickness and cancer and deformities and half lives of thousands of years. It’s apocalyptic (which may be why the Left Behind faction thinks this is such a great idea.) For the sane among us, letting the nuclear genie out of the bottle is simply unthinkable. It’s not and never can be “on the table” because once you start talking about it as if it’s just another form of warfare somebody is going to do it.

I’m trying hard to think if there are any taboos left after endorsing launching pre-emptive nuclear war and I don’t think there are. The only thing left is actually exploding a “tactical” nuke and considering this administration’s determination to break as many civilized norms as possible we would be fools not to take them seriously.

Hat tip to Gene Lyons for the Forward article. Here’s his excellent piece on this subject. I think this is particularly good:

Once again Bush has denied hostile intent, just as he did for many months after secretly ordering the Pentagon to draft detailed war plans against Iraq. Writing in The New Yorker, Seymour Hersh suggests that all systems are go at the White House, including possible use of tactical nuclear weapons. He hints that the neo-conservative ideologues around Dick Cheney have deluded themselves that bombing Iran would lead to internal rebellion and the overthrow of the nation’s Islamic regime.

Yeah, sure it would. Ever noticed how much the neo-cons’ ignorance of basic human psychology rivals only Osama bin Laden’s ?

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