Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

Veteran Vice President

Ron Brownstein suggest that Kerry needs to pick a VP with national security cred and I couldn’t agree more.

Conventional wisdom among Democratic strategists has been that sooner or later national security will recede as a concern and bread-and-butter domestic issues will decide the presidential election. One senior party operative recently offered what he called the Google theory of 2004: If an Internet search about the campaign the day after the election turns up more references to Iraq than to the economy, that probably means President Bush has won.

But the continuing violence in Iraq is shaking these assumptions. It’s no longer certain that domestic issues such as jobs and healthcare will displace Iraq as the central focus of public attention and the campaign debate. Nor is it certain that sustained attention on Iraq will benefit the president.

This transformed landscape will challenge both Bush and his Democratic opponent, Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts.

The dangers for Bush are most obvious. Iraq is his war.

[…]

CBS/New York Times survey released last week showed that approval of Bush’s handling of the war plummeted to 41%, dragging his overall approval rating below the 50% level that historically marks the dividing line between presidents who win reelection and those who don’t.

Those numbers are certain to fluctuate in the months ahead. Yet they underscore the threat to the president. The centerpiece in his case for reelection is that he has been a resolute and effective manager in the war on terrorism.

[…]

But that doesn’t mean Kerry will automatically benefit. Instead, he faces a paradox. The more Americans focus on Iraq, the more they seem to weigh credibility as commander in chief when choosing between the candidates.

And despite their anxieties about the occupation, far more Americans say they trust Bush rather than Kerry to safeguard the nation’s security.

[…]

Perhaps the most pressing challenge for Kerry is to find ways beyond his biography to reassure Americans that he can be trusted to protect their security.

One of Kerry’s best opportunities to send that message could come through his selection of a running mate. So far, though, there’s little evidence that the campaign is thinking in that direction. The rumors in Democratic circles are focused almost entirely on those who would help Kerry most on domestic issues: Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri and Gov. Tom Vilsack of Iowa.

Conspicuously missing from that list are candidates who could reinforce Kerry’s national security credentials.

[…]

Even more intriguing is a name that has attracted even less attention: former NATO Supreme Commander and 2004 Democratic presidential contender Wesley K. Clark. The irony is that Clark probably would be generating more buzz as a potential vice president if he hadn’t sought his party’s nomination. The consensus in Democratic circles is that the retired Army general dimmed his prospects through an uneven performance on the campaign trail.

Yet those experiences left Clark with more preparation for a vice presidential campaign than if he hadn’t run at all. And he has proven one of the Democrats’ most acute analysts and effective messengers on national security: His speeches on Iraq last fall, which called for broadening international participation in the occupation and warned against dismantling the entire Iraqi army, look prescient now.

Last week, Clark underscored the potential value of a running mate who once wore four stars on his shoulders and a Silver Star on his chest when he responded to recent Republican attacks on Kerry’s activities in and after Vietnam with a ringing challenge: “Those who didn’t serve, or didn’t show up for service,” he wrote, “should have the decency to respect those who did … ”

As a candidate, Clark demonstrated plenty of flaws. But few other Democrats could deliver a punch like that with such authority. And none could better symbolize Kerry’s determination to rebuild relations with traditional allies than the man who directed, in Kosovo, the one war NATO ever fought. In an election that could revolve more around guns than butter, Clark may pack more firepower than any of the other names on Kerry’s list of running mates.

Democratic conventional wisdom, it appears, is the same conventional wisdom that advised Kerry to vote for the war resolution and advised Democrats in 2002 to pretend that Bush wasn’t riding all over the country on a metaphorical white horse, swinging his terrible swift sword while they labored in town hall meetings debating the fine points of prescription drug coverage. As it was then, this conventional wisdom is wrong.

Rove is pulling out all his guns to neutralize Kerry’s war record because he knows it’s the national security issue that is the biggest threat to President Asterisk’s ascension to the ranks of legally elected presidents. The Scumbags For Truth is just the beginning. And, over the next 6 months, it is likely to take its toll.

As my 4 regular readers know, I have long believed that this election was going to be about national security whether we like it or not. Events are taking us there as much as the machinations of the Bush campaign. They must run on Bush’s “gut” or lose. It is wishful thinking to believe that the election will be about jobs and health care, as much as we would like to believe that everybody is voting on those kitchen table issues and despite the fact that focus groups say that’s what they want to hear the candidates talk about. What they say they want and what they actually want are often far from the same thing.

From what I can tell, the zeitgeist suggests that what voters want this time is a masculine man of action. Karl Rove knows this, which is why he is resorting to South Carolina level dirty tricks this early in the campaign. His inarticulate little boy isn’t looking so good. Kerry’s war record must be put into play and it must be destroyed. And there are always willing Scumbags For Truth around to do that dirty work.

I like Clark and think he could be an effective counterweight to that charge as VP. They’ll attack his claim to heroism too, of course, but one wonders if they could really persuade the country that two silver star winners, one a 4 star General, are lacking in patriotism. I’m sure they’ll try, but at some point enough of the non-koolaid drinking public has to start asking themselves if it’s reasonable that every single Democratic war hero, from Kerry to Kerrey to Cleland to Clark are all traitors and cowards who got some sort of special treatment.

Regardless of whether it’s Clark or someone else, I think Kerry should pick a veteran for VP. I think it’s obvious that Iraq and the WOT are the central issues of our time. We must confront it head-on, without apology, and to do that credibly we must use the useful contrast of Republican chickenhawk incompetence as our foil.

Calling Karen Hughes

In U.S., Seeking To Limit Damage

The Bush administration is struggling to develop a damage-control strategy to counter the mounting global backlash against the United States after revelations that U.S. military and intelligence personnel abused Iraqi prisoners, according to U.S. officials.

The search for a strong response follows a review of international reaction by the State Department’s Intelligence and Research Department that revealed devastating fallout and criticism well beyond the Islamic world, from Brazil and Britain to Hong Kong, U.S. officials said.

“It’s very, very sobering,” said a State Department official briefed on the INR review. He requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject. “It’s like the song by the Who, ‘Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.’ That’s the widespread perception we have to deal with.

There is no problem that can’t be solved with a little bit of clever political spin, right? Karen’s usually the gal who comes up with all that wonderful, nonsensical alliteration — “Compassionate Conservative,” “Reformer With Results” etc.

How about “Torturers With Tolerance?”

“Masturbator Emancipators?”

“Sadists For Sovereignty?”

Surely, the Arab world can be as successfully spun as a bunch of dittoheads. All it takes is a snappy slogan and George W. Bush assuring everybody that he believes he’s been called by God to lead a crusade for freedom.

Liars For Bush Part CXXIII

Gen. Richard B. Myers called CBS anchor Dan Rather eight days before the report was to air, asking for extra time, said Jeff Fager, executive producer of the US network’s ’60 Minutes II’ program.

Myers cited the safety of American hostages and tension surrounding the Iraqi city of Fallujah, Fager said, adding that he held off as long as he believed possible given it was a competitive story.

I suppose it’s theoretically possible that Myers personally called Dan Rather three weeks before the broadcast aired and yet still hadn’t actually read the internal 57 page report that was delivered by General Taguba back in February by last Sunday.

It’s also theoretically possible that Trent Lott’s aquanet hair helmet wouldn’t spontaneously burst into flame in the presence of a butane lighter.

But I doubt it.

No Man’s Land

Slate posts today about another shining example of accountability and responsibility in the Bush administration — The CPA’s Multiple Personality Disorder

The Coalition Provisional Authority, Proconsul Paul Bremer’s outfit, is in charge, of course. But what, bureaucratically speaking, is the CPA? A new report by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, posted online by the good-government folks at the Federation of American Scientists says, “It is unclear whether CPA is a federal agency.” Noting that its “organizational status is uncertain,” the report speculates that the CPA may be a part of the Pentagon (the Army cuts Bremer’s checks), it may be a stand-alone executive agency, or it may be an international institution, like NATO.

The confusion—which, the report notes, raises questions about “whether, and to what extent, CPA might be held accountable for its programs, activities, decisions, and expenditures”—stems from the White House, which hasn’t released information delineating the CPA’s authority, structure, or place in government

[…]

The confusion goes back to the CPA’s birth, which the White House doesn’t appear to have announced: References to the CPA just started showing up in government documents. The congressional researchers write, ‘[N]o explicit, unambiguous, and authoritative statement has been provided that declares how the authority was established, under what authority, and by whom.’

The report posits ‘two alternative explanations for how the CPA was established.’ One is that Bush may have created the CPA via a presidential directive. The researchers caution, ‘This document, if it exists, has not been made available to the public.’ The other explanation, suggested by the Army and others, is that the CPA was created by a U.N. Security Council resolution. However, as the congressional sleuths point out, while the resolution does recognize the United States and Britain as ‘occupying powers,’ it ‘does not establish, or authorize the creation of, a specific organization to carry out this responsibility.’

All this ambiguity can have benefits. There’s the fig-leaf factor of coursetrying to put an international veneer on a U.S. enterprise. And there’s another consequence: By not clearly defining the CPA specifically as a federal agency the report notes that the administration repeatedly refers to the CPA as an ‘entity,’ ‘group,’ and ‘activities’ but not as an ‘agency’the CPA is not subject to the government’s accountability and disclosure rules.

By the way, when exactly did the Congress of the United States close up shop, anyway? Didn’t we need a constitutional amendment or something before we could dissolve one branch of government? Just asking.

Anyway, I don’t think it is fair to say that there is no accountability for the CPA. Our Dear Leader’s words and body language are clear on this issue:

I will continue to work for a culture which says that each of us is responsible for the decisions we make in life. See, I want to help to change the culture from one that has said, if it feels good, just go ahead and do it, and if you’ve got a problem, blame somebody else, to a culture in which each of us understands we’re responsible for what we do.

See, if you’re a mother or a father, you’re responsible for loving your child with all your heart. That’s your responsibility. It is your most solemn and important responsibility to love your children. If you — if you’re worried about the quality of the education in the community in which you live, you’re responsible for doing something about it. Just don’t hope that Washington, D.C. solves problems. Get involved with your schools here in Miami, Florida and insist upon quality of education for each — each child. Support your teachers. If you’re in corporate America, if you’re a CEO, you’re responsible for telling the truth to your shareholders and your employees. (Applause.)

But if you’re the President of the United States you should govern with as much opacity and confusion as possible so that nobody can ever be held responsible for anything, least of all you.

But, you can go all around the country condescendingly lecturing to people who are a hundred times smarter than you (and I’m talking about elementary schoolkids) about their morals and ethics and responsibilities.

That’s what leadership is all about.

Winning Formula

Oh my goodness. George Will seems to have rubbed the sleep from his eyes and awakened to the startling notion that the Bushies and the Blairites sound like a bunch of starry-eyed girl scouts singing Kumabaya lately. He says:

This administration be trusted to govern if it cannot be counted on to think and, having thought, to have second thoughts. Thinking is not the reiteration of bromides about how “all people yearn to live in freedom” (McClellan). And about how it is “cultural condescension” to doubt that some cultures have the requisite aptitudes for democracy (Bush). And about how it is a “myth” that “our attachment to freedom is a product of our culture” because “ours are not Western values; they are the universal values of the human spirit” (Tony Blair).

His point, of course, is that the Iraqis don’t have the capacity for democracy and that freedom is a product of western culture, which is debatable to say the least. However, the fact that the Bush administration “cannot be trusted to govern because it cannot be counted on to think” is indisputable.

But, George, shit flows downhill. If people of your obvious influence had bothered to protest the Republican Party foisting an obviously unqualified, substandard intellect upon the country instead of continuing to wank furiously over Bill Clinton’s foibles well into the new millenium, we might have been spared this embarrassment.

As it is, George, you are an accomplice. What the hell did you think would happen when you put a man with the mind of 12 year old and the ego of a movie star in charge of the world?

Oh that’s right…

That was your winning formula…

Tricky Dick Would Be Proud

Joe Conason fills in the blanks on Smear Boat Veterans for Bush. The ties to the Bush campaign are right out there. The same miscreants who smeared McCain are involved in this one.

They’d better be careful or the Senator from Arizona will start campaigning with Kerry. Sullying the silver star is a very dicey tactic.

This Week’s Water Cooler Talking Point

Joe Wilson puts it very nicely:

Conason:What’s the difference in the GOP from when you were growing up?

Wilson:If you’re fiscally responsible, this is not your party. If you believe in a moderate foreign policy characterized by alliances, free trade and the ability to operate in an international environment, this is not your party. If you believe in limited federal government, this is not your party. If you believe that the government should stay out of your bedroom, this is very definitely not your party. In fact, I would argue that unless you believe in the American imperium, imposed on the world by force, or unless you believe in the literal interpretation of the Book of Revelations, this is not your party.

Boy Scout Leadership

The LA Times takes an interesting look at the recent Bush administration insider books from the perspective of what they say about the president’s leadership style:

President Bush styles himself as the first CEO president, applying the rigor and authority of his MBA education to the job of chief executive of the nation.

But that’s not the picture that emerges from three recent insider accounts of the workings of the Bush administration, experts in decision-making and presidential management say. On the contrary, they say, the president appears to have a highly personal working style, with little emphasis on systematic analysis of major decisions.

“There seems to be almost an absence of any analytical or deliberative process for mapping the problem or exploring alternatives or estimating consequences,” said Graham Allison, a professor of government at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

And Bush appears to give greater weight to his own instincts than to experts or other sources of advice and information. The president has a “bias for action,” said Roderick M. Kramer, a professor of organizational behavior at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. “I’ve been struck by [how] Bush’s sense of personal identity as a leader shapes his decisions,” he said.

[…]

Greenstein said that one striking thing about all three books was what they don’t show. There are few examples, for instance, of Bush presiding over meetings in which subordinates presented problems, weighed evidence and aired differing views.

“I think a lot of policy is made on the fly,” he said. “It isn’t a process in which people assemble and go back and forth in a rigorous way.”

Another thing largely missing from the books was any indication that documents or memos weighing policy alternatives are circulated and discussed. Harvard’s Allison said one of the few documents the administration did prepare in advance of the Iraq war — the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate that concluded that Iraq probably had weapons of mass destruction — was quickly compiled and not very well done.

“The more it’s examined, it seems quite sloppy,” he said. “At this point, if there had been some good analysis of the issues on paper, we would have seen some evidence of it.

“The contrast with the textbook conception of informed decision making is distressing,” he said.

[…]

Stanford’s Kramer said though Bush showed little interest in the kind of number-crunching analysis taught in business school, his style of management does conform to the popular image of chief executives as forceful and “decisive.” “There seems to be a lot of value attached to showing resolve and demonstrating resolve,” he said.

But Jay Lorsch, a professor at Harvard Business School and author of “Decision Making at the Top,” said the decision-making techniques taught at that school — from which Bush received an MBA — focus on understanding the nature of decisions, not simplifying them.

“What we teach around here is that you’ve got to understand the complexity of the territory you’re trying to affect,” he said. “You don’t make a decision until you’ve surveyed all the possible ramifications. The binary idea that you’re either right or wrong is just foolishness.”

[…]

“He doesn’t like long meetings. He likes truncated meetings. That means you’re not going to have the kinds of sessions … that are going to bring in lots of different kinds of information,” Kumar said.

[…]

“The decisiveness part is certainly there,” he said. “The imperviousness to facts and analysis is also there. So what we have is someone who is going on raw instinct.”

A corollary, Rockman said, is that though Bush likes making decisions, his organizational style is not very good at implementation or follow-up.

[…]

“Bush appears to rest his confidence in a few people whose judgment corresponds to his gut instincts” he said. “He seems to be obsessive about being decisive, but willing to make hard and fast decisions on the basis of ideology more than evidence.”

Summary: A spoiled 12 year old is running the world.

Torturing The Wurlitzer

David Brock’s new site Media Matters for America is great. I highly recommend that everyone read it regularly. For obvious reasons he has a flawless ear for the tunes of the Mighty Wurlitzer.

The best thing they’re doing, among many great things, is that finally, FINALLY, somebody is listening, transcribing and publishing the vomit inducing, delusional rants of Rush Limbaugh. This is such a beautiful thing that it brought tears to my eyes.

They listened to each show from March 15th to April 29th, a mere six weeks, and transcribed a long list of incendiary, divisive, racist, bigoted and mysogynistic remarks. Some of them are so depraved that not only can I completely understand why Stern is outraged at being picked out for obscenity, but I now understand where the wing-nuts in charge of prisons and POW’s in our culture get permission to exploit others with their sick little S&M fantasies.

Along with his usual puerile ranting about Femi-Nazi’s and revealing castration fantasies, it seems that Rush, like good Catholic Rick Santorum, is quite fascinated by the whole bestiality thing. In Rush’s case he takes in in a different direction, seeing the threat of girl-on-dog sex as the tittillating image he has to share with his feverishly wanking dittoheads:

11)Well, Rich Lowry has a column today, National Review Online, and Time magazine has just discovered that stay-at-home moms are women who have made legitimate choices to stay home and raise their young children — a cover story. Time magazine has headlined the case for staying home, and the magazine, according to Lowry, reports without sneering or condescension, the trend toward more new mothers leaving the workforce. Yes, it’s a trend. It started years ago when the feminist movement decided that their best friends were going to be German shepherds. You know. So that’s — well, it’s true. You go to the right airports and you can see it.

You see a lot of strange things when you’re on the nod. Pop enough little blue babies in the cab and you’re hallucinating hot Girl-on-Shepard action at airports.

His adorable characterization of Hillary’s “testicle lockbox” must surely make all those “decency advocates” who were shocked by Janet Jackson’s nipple sit up and take notice.

17) Now if Hillary does become Kerry’s VP, will she have to change her positions to be on the same page with Kerry or will Kerry have to change his? (laughter) Don’t forget that testicle lock box, folks. (laughter) Just as we haven’t talked about it in awhile does not mean (laughter) that it’s — that it’s been buried. [4/15/04]

18) If I were Bob Woodward, I would be on a lookout for Mrs. Clinton and her testicle lockbox, because she has just been snookered, like every other Liberal, by believing what Woodward says is in his book in these interviews, as opposed to what’s actually in these books, or this book, because it’s exactly what she claims she needs in an administration. [4/21/04]

That truly is what honor and dignity are all about. As I said, no wonder Howard Stern is pissed. (And no wonder Rush defended him.)

But, the really disturbing thing about Rush’s rants are the eliminationist rhetoric and charges of treason against the Democrats. This has been going on for more than TEN Years, day after day after day. It’s only a matter of time before somebody gets assassinated.

24) I’m going to tell you is what’s good for Al Qaeda is good for the Democratic Party in this country today. That’s how you boil this down. And it doesn’t have to be Al Qaeda. What’s good for terrorists is good for John Kerry. All you got to do is check the way they react. [3/15/04]

26) They [Democrats] celebrate privately this attack in Spain. [3/16/04]

27) I mean, if you wonder — if you want the terrorists running the show, then you will elect John Kerry, who is a bed brother with this guy who just won election in Spain. [3/18/04]

28) I’m telling you, we’re in the midst of a huge liberal crackup. They are so motivated by the quest for power. They are so motivated by rage and hatred, that they are not in power. And they focus that on Bush. That they have aligned themselves unwittingly — I’m going to grant them that — with those who intend harm on this country. [3/24/04]

29) You don’t hear the Democrats being critical of terrorists. In fact, you hear the Democrats saying, “We’ve got to find a way to get along with them.” [4/5/04]

30) Senator [Ted] Kennedy, a simple question. Does it please you to learn who your friends are? Does it excite you, Senator Kennedy, to learn that the militant, firebrand, murderer of American civilians and military personnel is on your side, Senator Kennedy? Does it encourage you? Does it invigorate you? Does it inspire you, Senator Kennedy, to know that a murdering Al Qaeda-related terrorist has taken up your argument for use against his enemy? How does that make you feel, Senator Kennedy? Does it embarrass you? Because it should. Or does it probably excite you and think you’re making headway now. You’ve got the enemy aligned with you. [4/8/04]

33) [Speaking about Democrats] I don’t know who they are, I don’t know what they believe, but I can’t relate. I can’t possibly understand somebody who hates this country, who was born and raised here. I don’t understand how you hate this Constitution. I don’t understand how you hate freedom. I don’t understand how you hate free markets, but that’s who elites are, because freedom and free markets challenge their power. It’s the only thing I can come up with. I know it’s much more insidious and hideous than that, but I still can’t relate to it. [3/16/04]

34) The Democrats believe that the presence of the US military is what makes the world dangerous. The Democrats, liberal Democrats in this country, believe, and have for a long time, that the U.S. military is the focus of evil, is the primary agent provocateur for all of this. That if we weren’t the way we are, the terrorists wouldn’t hate us. And if we weren’t as big as we are, if we weren’t as powerful as we are, if we weren’t as decadent — whatever. Well, they won’t say “decadent,” because they support that. [3/18/04]

35) [Daschle parody]: Hi and welcome back to the Tom Daschle Show… The country is suffering, and, ah — and we’re happy about that here at the Tom Daschle Show because it’s — while it’s bad for the country, it’s great for our party, and that’s what’s important. [4/5/04]

[…]

40) This is why, folks, you cannot, we cannot entrust liberals with the defense of this country. They will not do it. They will not defend the American military. They will cut and run every time. They will not defend freedom. They will not defend this country. [4/7/04]

41) The Liberals put their party and their quest for power above national interests. They wouldn’t join with Reagan during the Cold War. Defended the Soviets. Tried to make Gorbachev the hero of the world. Iraqi freedom, George W. Bush. Then we had the situation down with the Contras in Nicaragua. Democrats did everything they could to support the Contras and their client state, the Soviet Union. We’ve got Iraqi Freedom. [4/13/04]

42) These people have become the mainstream thought — thinkers, generators of the Democratic Party. It’s who they are. They hate this country. They hate the military of this country. [4/15/04]

Day after day after day millions of people listen to this stuff. I can’t do it for more than a few minutes before losing my cool. I doubt that Howie Kurtz and other Limbaugh apologists who consider him “mainstream” ever listen to him either. They just accept him as mainstream because people like the Vice President of the United States appear on his show as if it’s perfectly acceptable to be associated with him:

Kurtz: Has Tom Daschle lost a couple of screws? Did the normally mild-mannered senator accuse Rush Limbaugh of inciting violence? He came pretty darn close. There were cameras there. You can watch the replay.

We can understand that Daschle is down, just having lost his majority leader’s job and absorbed plenty of blame for this month’s Democratic debacle.

What we can’t understand is how the South Dakotan can suggest that a mainstream conservative with a huge radio following is somehow whipping up wackos to threaten Daschle and his family.

Has the senator listened to Rush lately? Sure, he aggressively pokes fun at Democrats and lionizes Republicans, but mainly about policy. He’s so mainstream that those right-wingers Tom Brokaw and Tim Russert had him on their Election Night coverage.

Somebody ought to ask old Tom and Tim about that, too. Have they listened to this tripe? I’m almost more afraid if they have than if they haven’t.

But, it also seems to me that there is fear on the Right that they aren’t cracking “the mainstream” effectively enough. Perhaps it’s because the product they are shilling for is so incredibly defective that they are unable to completely co-opt even the corporate media. Just this last week, Dick Cheney exhorted a bunch of Republicans to watch FOXNews because it is more “accurate.” Ralph Reed said this week-end:

Twenty-five years ago, most people got their news from ABC, CBS or NBC,” Reed said in a speech Friday night to the Nevada Republican Party’s state convention. “Fortunately, that is no longer the case. The gatekeepers of dominant media have lost their monopoly on information.”

Reed told the crowd of about 250 Republicans that he has not watched a newscast of a major network in years.

“I get in the car in the morning and listen to Rush Limbaugh. On the way home, I listen to Sean Hannity. At night I watch Fox News,” he said.

That explains a lot. Of course, it’s nonsense. But it will be key to them getting out their brainwashed base. Otherwise, some Christian fundamentalists might see disturbing pictures of Americans doing icky sexual things to naked Arabs or the sight of flag draped coffins would make patriots start to question whether the cost is worth the gain in this vague “WOT” in Iraq.

In that sense, Rush Limbaugh is as mainstream in America as Hitler was mainstream in Germany, circa 1932. He’s the voice of a huge constituency of the Republican Party — the Party that holds all three branches of government right now —the Party that is bankrupting the country and fighting unnecessary wars for reasons they cannot explain to the American people.

But, his ugly talk still operates just a little bit under the radar in terms of specificity. I imagine the majority of people think they know what he is saying, but they don’t. Until you see it written down, you really don’t get just how vicious and crude it really is. His radio voice serves to make him sound somewhat friendly and funny. People think he is exaggerating for effect. Still, the message gets out, day after day. “Democrats are not real Americans like you.” This treasonous, unamerican picture of liberalism has seeped into the body politic so thoroughly that even liberals themselves have internalized this distorted version of themselves.

More than a decade of pounding away at our integrity has made many of us eschew the label of liberal, Democrat, feminist, civil libertarian etc. They may not have turned many of us into Republicans, but they’ve managed to turn a lot of us into Greens or independents by making the designation of “Democrat” shameful. We spend more time calling each other pussies and cowards than he does now. We are obsessed with changing ourselves instead of fighting them. We meekly take the blame for the nightmare that has descended on this country under Republican rule. They have already won half the battle by making us hate ourselves as much as we hate them.

I still maintain, however, that he and his ilk haven’t been able to eliminate the one thing we still have — reason. The faith based simpletons and cynics, whether it be Jerry Fallwell or Rush Limbaugh or Richard Perle can only count on reality being held at bay for so long. Death, terrorism, wars, joblessness, lack of healthcare, impoverished retirement — these things are real. You can tell people to watch the happy horseshit news on FOX and you can implore them to only listen to wingnut propaganda, but reality intrudes eventually. Unfortunately so much damage will have been done that we will probably never be the same.

And they are completely wrong about one thing. Rush says:

… these are the people that want to oust Bush. The people who remain skeptical of the fact that there is any difference between right and wrong, or good and evil. [3/17/04]

I am a liberal and a Democrat and I have no problem seeing the difference between right and wrong and good and evil. Bin laden is evil. Saddam was evil. Rush Limbaugh is evil.

See? Not a problem.

Update: A reader reminds me to give credit where credit is due to Orcinus for leading on this issue. Also, I should note that Joe Conason and Gene Lyons have been indispensible in exposing the right wing media machine along with many articles in Salon over the last few years. Still, it’s a big step forward to see a web site dedicated to exposing specific instances of Wurlitzer distortion on a daily basis, particularly Limbaugh. It will add tremendously to the debate.

Sunburned Partisans

A new group called Scumbags for Truth is going to issue a letter at a press conference tomorrow:

Hundreds of former commanders and military colleagues of presumptive Democratic nominee John Kerry are set to declare in a signed letter that he is “unfit to be commander-in-chief.” They will do so at a press conference in Washington on Tuesday.

“What is going to happen on Tuesday is an event that is really historical in dimension,” John O’Neill, a Vietnam veteran who served in the Navy as a PCF (Patrol Craft Fast) boat commander, told CNSNews.com . The event, which is expected to draw about 25 of the letter-signers, is being organized by a newly formed group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

“We have 19 of 23 officers who served with [Kerry]. We have every commanding officer he ever had in Vietnam. They all signed a letter that says he is unfit to be commander-in-chief,” O’Neill said.

John O’Neill, of course, is the Nixon stooge who’s been paid to come out of character assassination retirement to destroy Kerry’s military record. Here’s a picture of him with his mentor the convicted felon Chuck Colson and his hero the disgraced and pardoned Dick Nixon:

Haldeman: — crew cut, real sharp looking guy who is more articulate than Kerry. He’s not as eloquent; he isn’t the ham that Kerry is. But he’s more believable. [edit]

Haldeman: This guy now, is gonna, he’s gonna move on Kerry.

The White House encouraged O’Neill to challenge Kerry to a debate. Kerry agreed and before the event, President Nixon called O’Neill into the Oval Office for a pep talk. “It’s a great service to the country,?”declared the president.

Nixon: Give it to him, give it to him. And you can do it, because you have a pleasant manner, too, because you’ve got and I think it’s a great service to the country. [edit]

Nixon: You fellows have been out there. You’ve got to know, seeing the barbarians that we’re up against, you’ve got to know what we?re doing in that horrible swamp that North Vietnam is. You’ve got to know from all our faults of what we have in this country that, that what we’re doing is right. You’ve got to know too, people are critics. Critics of the war, critics of [unint], run America down. [edit] You’ve gotta know that you’re on the winning sthat, that you’re on the right side.

Two weeks later, the veterans squared off on the popular Dick Cavett show:

O’Neill: Mr. Kerry is the type of person who lives and survives only on the war weariness and fears of the American people. This is the same little man who on nationwide television in April spoke of, quote, crimes committed on a day to day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.

Kerry: We believe as veterans who took part in this war we have nothing to gain by coming back here and talking about those things that have happened except to try and point the way to America, to try and say, here is where we went wrong, and we’ve got to change.

(Amazing isn’t it? Same bullshit, different war. After the events of the last week, it looks as if we have merely refined our methods. The sadistic sexual humiliation techniques are truly a step forward.)

As for the Scumbags For Truth, (aka SoFT) John O’Neill proudly consorted with felons and liars to smear John Kerry then and is doing the bidding of their heirs still today. One would hope that his picture and the Nixon tapes would feature heavily in any rebuttal. They haven’t quite managed to finish the full Uncle Joe Stalin historical airbrush on Tricky Dick just yet. Their hands are full for the moment with keeping Bozo from going off the reservation and turning Dizzy Ron into a saint.

I hear a lot of complaining that Kerry talks too much about Vietnam and that it’s all in the past and we should move on and deal with more pertinent issues. I can understand that sentiment, particularly among those who are too young to have a stake in the argument. (It’s the way I used to feel about “who lost China” arguments.) But, as you can tell from the strangely familiar arguments above, Vietnam is just a proxy for a particular worldview that continues to be debated even 30 years later.

Progress is slow when viewed from the perspective of one life. Sometimes it’s one step forward, two steps back. A lot of things have changed since O’Neill and Kerry first squared off 33 years ago, but the argument about blind patriotism, government transparency and what constitutes a just and unjust war rages on.

I would suggest, however, that with 20/20 hindsight we know that John Kerry was not the one who was the liar in those conversations recorded so long ago. And we know who ended up as convicted felons and who did not. And we also know that unlike Kerry, in the 33 years since that confrontation on Dick Cavett that Nixon’s house boy John O’Neill has done nothing of note. Indeed, his only claim to fame in his entire life is as a GOP Swift Boat Stooge against Kerry.

It seems pretty obvious who holds the high ground on this one. I am betting this thing is going to backfire.