And What Do Addicts Do When They Don’t Get Their Fix?
by tristero
Steal, lie, rob their grandparents (or grandchildren). They become irrationally violent. Uncontrollable.
In short, Bush just put the world on notice. For the next 20 years or so, America’s official policy is “Anything for Oil.”
Doing His Part
by digby
In a system of two parties, two chambers, and two elected branches, there will always be differences and debate. But even tough debates can be conducted in a civil tone, and our differences cannot be allowed to harden into anger. To confront the great issues before us, we must act in a spirit of good will and respect for one another – and I will do my part.
Uh huh.
The [Democratic controlled] Senate is more interested in special interests in Washington and not interested in the security of the American people.”
Of course, that was a long time ago. He’s changed since then. He’s working hard to do his part now.
“I ask all Americans to hold their elected leaders to account and demand a debate that brings credit to our democracy not comfort to our adversaries,” Bush said.
Oh. And “second guessing” is not a strategy.
.
State Of The Strawman Preview
by digby
Good news. On Fox, “Stretch” Cameron just said the president is going to reject the approach of “some” that says we should surrender to terrorism.
He’s going to say:
“In a time of testing, we cannot find security by abandoning our commitments and retreating within our borders. If we were to leave these vicious attackers alone, they would not leave us alone. They would simply move the battlefield to our own shores.”
Boy that’s telling all those people who are anxious to “leave the vicious attackers alone.” All four of them.
I also understand that he is going to announce a bold new program to allow people to pay for their own health insurance so that employers can keep more of their money. (After all, it’s their profits!) I do hope that he is going to put the same people in charge of designing it that he put in charge of the prescription drug program (if there are any who aren’t working for Big Pharma now.) That’s worked out awfully well.
He’s going to say that we are all addicted to foreign oil, which is an excellent point. We should have weaned ourselves long ago. But he may not be the best evangelist for the cause. After all, his good friends in the energy industry have just overdosed on windfall profits and are lying face down in a pool of oily tax-payer subsidies. (But hey, it’s their profits!)
And then there is the expected soaring rhetoric:
“Abroad, our Nation is committed to an historic, long-term goal – we seek the end of tyranny in our world. The future security of America depends on it.”
And just as soon as we end tyranny in our world we will turn our attention to restoring the Bill of Rights to the Constitution.
No word on how the manned mission to Mars or the crusade against steroids are going. And one can assume that the bold plan to privatize social security has been a rousing success too. Strangely, nobody is talking about it.
.
Master Debaters Redux
by tristero
I was very interested to read the comments to my query: How on earth could Liberty beat Harvard in debate? Most commentators made points like no one cares about college debate, debating contests are esoteric and not real world, Liberty spends a lot of money on debate and Harvard doesn’t, the rankings are misleading, and so on. All of this I have no doubt is true but it sidesteps a crucial fact that reverberates far beyond the trivialities of college debating:
There are no circumstances in which a contest between Harvard University debaters and a team from Liberty should even be close.
I’m not saying that Harvard has the smartest and most knowledgeable kids in the country, but I’ll be damned if it doesn’t have many of them. Conversely, I’m not saying that Liberty has the dumbest, most ignorant kids in the country, but it sure has a helluva lot more than Harvard. (For the record, I did not go to Harvard. Or Liberty.)
In short, Harvard should cream Liberty. Hell, nearly every school in the country should cream Liberty. But apparently they don’t. And I’d like to know exactly how and why. We should all be interested in the answer.
Assuming it really is the case that Liberty can beat Harvard -and it seems to be* -, then it is one more example of how seriously undervalued the study of rhetoric – the art of persuasion – has become within the reality-based community. It’s also illustrates how seriously important rhetoric is considered among the wingnuts. Once again, they are systematically training, with no expense spared, the next generation of rightwingers. Training them to roll America back to the halcyon years of Cotton Mather. And convince the majority of the country that that’s a Good Idea.
Yes, the corruption of the media is a dreadful problem in getting out the truth about these nuts. Yes, the crazies can and do outspend us. Yes, they will lie, distort, and defraud elections, scientific data, and their opponents’ positions. Yes, the Democratic infrastructure is cowardly (notable exceptions duly noted).
But from where I sit, that doesn’t fully explain the serial failures by Democrats and liberals to make their case, a case which is so obviously sensible, especially when compared to the arguments of the winners on the right. What’s left out of the explanation of failure can easily be symbolized – if not actually demonstrated – in this seemingly trivial, unimportant debate contest.
If we care about a world where religious lunatics aren’t telling the rest of us what we can and cannot do, we damn well better figure out how to beat clowns like Liberty every time, no matter how trivial college debating might seem to some of us.
*One hightly knowledgeable commentator said the rankings were just pr and that Liberty was known as a joke among the varsity. That may have been true in 199x, but according to the article
Liberty is competitive at all three levels—varsity, JV and novice. “They’re tough. [But] we’re not afraid to debate Liberty,” says Harvard coach Dallas Perkins Jr., whose varsity team was beaten by Falwell’s last month.
[UPDATE] A very good discussion of why the ranking of Liberty as #1 is somewhat misleading. Perhaps most importantly, Liberty focuses on novice debaters and since it enters so many contests, its program, not its debaters or their teams, is ranked one. As Ed says in his reply to the fellow from Liberty, the Newsweek article reads as if the best debating teams in the country are at Liberty. Hat tip to TW in comments.
Even so, that doesn’t get at the heart of the matter for me, which is why Liberty *still* does so well, apparently even beating Harvard.
Tweety And Tom
by digby
Atrios wonders why Matthews is so easy on Tom DeLay, which is to say, given his normal proclivities, incredibly easy. Suspiciously easy.
Maybe it’s this:
Matthews implicated in Abramoff scandal
[…]
Now there are two big issues here — one is the fact that Matthews has cavorted with Abramoff in the past, to the point of helping out with one of his sham charities.
Then there’s the ethical issues with this so-called journalist hanging out in (and helping with) such a blatantly partisan event. It’s again obvious that his schmoozing with the rich and powerful have hampered his ability to commentate on those issues properly detached and rational. He’s been co-opted by the DeLay/Abramoff machine.
I hate to jump to conclusions, here. Matthews loves all Republicans, especially big powerful ones who have awesome masculine nicknames like “the hammer.” He gets all tingly merely being in their presence. But his “interview” with Delay last night was adoring and worshipful even for him. He looked like Nancy Reagan staring at the gipper during his inauguration speech. (He even actively coached him at times, just like Nancy in the later days.) There’s more to this than your normal Tweety Codpiece envy.
GEARY
I passed out.
[He stands up and moves over the bed where we see a bloody dead girl.]
I — I’ll fix it.
[He unties the girl’s hand from the bed post.]
Just a game.
[He takes a towel and begins to wipe up the blood that is all over her. He looks at the towel and wipes off his hands.]
Jesus, Jesus.
[He begins to cry. As he does, TOM looks over at NERI who is wiping his hands in the bathroom.]
Jesus, God — Oh, God. I don’t know — and I can’t understand — why I can’t remember.
TOM
You don’t have to remember — just do as I say. We’re putting a call into your office — explain that you’ll be there tomorrow afternoon — you decided to spend the night at Michael Corleone’s house in Tahoe — as his guest.
GEARY
I do remember that she was laughing…we’d done it before — and I know that I couldn’t’ve hurt — that girl
TOM
This girl has no family — nobody knows that she worked here. It’ll be as if she never existed. All that’s left is our friendship.
If you wonder what is going on between Tweety and Tom, you can ask him, here.
.
Freedom Roast
by digby
All you latte-swilling, wi-fi worshipping, NY Times reading, muffin scarfing liberals should head over to Dave Johnson’s new blog, “Smelling the coffee” He’s talking about the iconic symbol of everything we godless Democrats hold dear.
(I’m drinking a cup of french press medium roast Kona as we speak. Mmmmmm. After I finish it I’m heading for the beach to protest the war and sing kumbaya in a drum circle.)
.
Hey Beavis
by digby
The Editors found many good wankers this week, but this one’s a keeper:
The Pillsbury Pantload sums up pretty neatly why Bushbots will never catch Osama:
OSAMA’S TRUCE [Jonah Goldberg]
What if Bush offered/accepted one and then, under the flag of truce, had Osama killed and his minions rounded up?
It’s amusing to imagine what some of Bush’s biggest critics might say.
No, “amusing” is imagining Jonah Goldberg’s first day at Marine boot camp. “Retarded” is fantasy schadenfreude about what would happen if Osama fell for some crap shananigans you saw on The A-Team. I think killing Osama is going to require a different brand of cunning than the sort required to get B.A. on an airplane. Although: you’ve given me a great idea! What if Bush and Cheney went to Osama’s hideout dressed like trouble-shooters from the power company, and told Osama that his neighbors were having some work done and then, when he let them in to check the fusebox, they killed him and all the terrorists in the world gave up? It’s a foolproof plan, and I bet that would shut Paul Krugman up but good. Or, how about this one:
What if Osama pulled off the biggest terrorist attack in human history in the United States, killing 3,000 people, and, five years later, Bush still hadn’t caught him? He lowered taxes a bunch of times, invaded a country for no outstanding reason, and proposed some nonsense about going to Mars, but, doggonit, never quite got around to getting that Osama feller. Can you imagine?
It’s amusing to imagine what some of NRO’s doughiest wankers might say.
I can only add: Jonah Goldberg has a regular op-ed column in the Los Angeles Times. That symbolizes everything that is wrong with this world.
.
The Lighter Side of Self Loathing
by digby
by Michael Kinsley.
It seems to be time once again to play Kick the Democrats. Everyone can play, including Democrats. The rules are simple. When Republicans lose elections, it is because they didn’t get enough votes. When Democrats lose elections, it is because they have lost their principles and lost their way. Or they have kept their principles, which is an even worse mistake.
Democrats represent no one who is not actually waiting in line for a latte at a Starbucks within 150 yards of the east or west coastline. They are mired in trivial lifestyle issues like, oh, abortion and gay rights and Americans killing and dying in Iraq, while the Republicans serve up meat and potatoes for real Americans, like privatizing Social Security and making damned sure the government knows who is Googling whom in this great country. Just repeat these formulas until a Democrat has been sent into frenzies of self-flagellation, or reduced to tears.
There is always a pick-up game of Kick the Democrats going on somewhere. But something about the Alito confirmation—the pathetic and apparently surprising inability of 45 Democratic senators to stop 55 Republicans from approving anyone they want—seems to have made the game suddenly a lot more popular.
How dire is it for the Democrats? George Will noted on TV the other day that they have lost five of the past seven presidential elections. This baseball-like statistic—”Democrats have lost X of the past Y elections”—has been one of Will’s favorite tropes over the generations. But why now five out of seven? Two out of the past four would be equally accurate, and not nearly as grim. If you take a longer view, things get grimmer again. In fact, you can measure back from the present to any of the past 20 elections (which takes you back to 1928) and only once (starting in 1932) do the Democrats come out ahead. But this hardly supports Will’s contention—and everyone else’s—that things went to hell in the 1960s. If this exercise has any meaning, they’ve been in hell continuously since 1936.
Sounds right.
.
10 Questions
by digby
As we absorb our latest loss — it sucks being in the minority, you hardly ever win — we need to keep our eye on the ball and remember that we have hearings coming up on the illegal NSA wiretaps. Glenn Greenwald has been the go-to guy in this and he’s compiled ten questions that he’d like the Judiciary Committee to ask Alberto Gonzales. Glenn says:
I believe the paramount objective with these hearings is to force out into the open the theories of Presidential power which the Administration has embraced in order to justify its transgressions of FISA — not just as applied to eavesdropping but with respect to all decisions broadly relating to the question of how this country will respond to the threat of terrorism. Thus, the questions posed to Attorney General Gonzales should absolutely not be confined strictly to the question of the NSA eavesdropping program, but must explore how the Administration’s theories of its own power apply generally.
The Committee, with its questioning, must make clear to the public that this scandal is not about whether we should be eavesdropping on Al Qaeda, because everyone agrees that we should and must do that. That is why we have a law — FISA — which specifically authorizes eavesdropping on terrorists. Nobody opposes eavesdropping. The scandal is about — and these hearings must therefore emphasize — the scope of the President’s claimed powers, and specifically his claimed power to act without what the Administration calls “interference” from the Congress or the courts, even including — literally — engaging in actions which are expressly prohibited by the criminal law.
Read the entire post and look at the questions. Glenn is looking for feedback on this. He received some major media attention this past week from Knight Ridder, the NY Times and The Washington Post for his outstanding catch of the administration’s 2002 objection to loosening the FISA laws. He is in a position now to advance this another step.
Update: TalkLeft has a post up that says Russ Feingold is openly accusing Gonzales of lying in his confirmation hearings. It sure looks like he did.
Sen. Feingold: And I also would like you to answer this: does the president, in your opinion, have the authority acting as commander in chief to authorize warrantless searches of Americans’ homes and wiretaps of their conversations in violation of the criminal and foreign intelligence surveillance statutes of this country?
MR. GONZALES: Senator, the August 30th memo has been withdrawn. It has been rejected, including that section regarding the commander in chief authority to ignore the criminal statutes. So it’s been rejected by the executive branch. I categorically reject it. And in addition to that, as I’ve said repeatedly today, this administration does not engage in torture and will not condone torture. And so, what you really are — what we’re really discussing is a hypothetical situation that —
.
