The State Of The Union: Never been worse... It sucks!

BANKRUPT
VIOLATED
SOLD TO CHINA
INCOMPETENT
CORRUPTED
BROKEN
DISCREDITED
(FAKE WAR)
DEFEATED
DEATH, LIES
DECEPTION
DESTRUCTION
FAILED...
(GAS PRICES)
EMBARRASSED...

Really a shame... -d.

Good job, Dipsh!t!
UPDATE!! LIVE BLOGG: (streaming!)
I swear to God Bush just admitted that he

"(sat) back and waited to be hit..."

He said he didn't wanna do that again...
Phew! (attaboy)
Safer? Roger that, Herb.

(HW/Posted from my cell-phone!)

ENRON AMERICA, by (Ken Lay) BUSH & (Jeff Skilling) CHENEY...

Click pic for better res., thanks apfn.org.

Fake Crier... Snake/Liar

'Nuff said, Herb.

RE: The "Alito 8" WEASELS... What Buzzflash Says / Asks

BUZZFLASH, in it's link to this story, asks:

Report: Are Just 8 Dems Holding Up a Filibuster of Alito? Surrender After Surrender, The Dems in the Senate Promised Us They Were Holding Their Fire Until Someone Like Alito Was Nominated -- And Then They Would Hold the Line. Did They Lie to Us? Or Are They Just Weasels?

WE HAVE THE ANSWER:WEASELS, APPARENTLY... The Republican Party has a monopoly on "LYING:" No Dems Allowed, just like the K-Street Project.

Congress & the Democrats:
Thanks for NOTHING, Herb.

THE PROSTITUTION OF THE WHITE HOUSE UNDER GEORGE W. BUSH (No interns involved.)

The Bush administration has been WHORING out the Presidency. To Jack'off's clients/corporate-johns. Surprised? [No!] There's PICTURES apparently, but Karl Rove has had the Secret Service working overtime to keep them from the public. "W" stands for "Whore..."You paid for the prostitution (we all did); you paid for the photographs; and you paid the Secret Service to hide them from you. There's so much deception, fraud, and corruption, it's hard to keep straight. Just like Iraq, and the rest. Disgusted, Herb.

LIES & DECEPTION, THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION NEVER CONDUCTED ILLEGAL WIRETAPS

ONCE, A SINGLE TIME(!), THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION CONDUCTED A SEARCH WITHOUT A WARRANT, BUT IT WAS LEGAL AT THE TIME... (AND IT WAS ALDRICH AMES!)
IT'S NOT LEGAL ANYMORE.

SO THE LAME "THEY DID IT TOO..." EXCUSE, WHICH A.G. GONZALES & W.H. SPOKESMAN-MCLELLAN WERE PEDDLING THAT ONE DAY, WAS NOT ONLY UNPERSUASIVE, BUT FALSE...
THEY WERE LYING:

(T)he Clinton administration made a warrantless physical search of suspected spy Aldrich Ames' home in 1993. At the time, the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act did not prohibit warrantless physical searches. In this case of one man whose espionage did extraordinary damage to U.S. security, Clinton authorized one.

Later, in her congressional testimony in 1994, Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick indeed made the point that FISA did not extend to such searches. But she made the point because the Clinton administration was supporting efforts to amend FISA so it would cover physical searches. Congress passed that amendment in 1995 and Clinton signed it.

So what you have is a legal, warrantless search of a single identified individual (Ames) who posed a serious threat to the nation, versus illegal, warrantless wiretaps on thousands of Americans who posed no threat whatsoever. The New York Times reported last week that in this illegal program, the National Security Agency sent the FBI a "flood" of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names that "required hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month." Of those, "virtually all led to dead ends or innocent Americans," officials told the Times. This entire operation resulted in hundreds of agents being pulled away from more promising investigations into terrorism.
(Edit: JUST LIKE WHITEWATER, JONES...)
:::
...Gore had it right when he implored Congress to also reassert its authority by holding comprehensive hearings into this issue. More is at stake than just illegal domestic wiretapping, as Gore rightly pointed out. According to Bush doctrine, there are no checks and balances in American government anymore. A president can do what he pleases in the name of national security, and neither Congress nor the judiciary can stop him. At the end of the day, that is the real threat to American democracy. Eventually, terrorism will fade as a threat. But if Bush succeeds with his overweening view of presidential authority, the United States may never recover the careful balance designed by the Constitution(.)

Nice try, fellas! Liars..., Herb.

Maureen Dowd: Hand-typed excerpts from news-stand copy.

Another bullseye from The New York Times's inimitable great, MAUREEN DOWD...
[Picture(s) & emphasis added]:

I don’t like the thought of Dick Cheney ogling my Googling.Because what I’m Googling, of course, is Dick Cheney. I have to constantly monitor how Vice Voyeur is pushing the federal government to constantly monitor millions of ordinary Americans’ phone calls, e-mail notes and Internet searches.
:::
It was hard to know which story yesterday was scarier:
Osama bin Laden, still alive and taunting the U.S., or the Justice Department’s trying to force Google to turn over a suspiciously broad array of information on millions of users’ searches and Web addresses, supposedly to investigate online crime involving pornography.
:::
None of the Bushies’ actions in defiance of law and convention, none of the money or blood spilled in Iraq, have helped these so-called tough guys get the one guy they really need to get. That is truly galling.:::
Cheney was torturing logic again in a speech to a conservative think tank in New York. “Some have suggested that by liberating Iraq from Saddam Hussein, we simply stirred up a hornets’ nest,” he said. “They overlook a fundamental fact: we were not in Iraq on Sept. 11, 2001, and the terrorists hit us anyway.”

Yeah, Dick, because they weren’t in Iraq, either.
:::
Even F.B.I. agents feel as if they have been wasting their time rummaging through library cards and tracing numbers that turn out to be Pizza Huts.
:::
The White House has always seemed less compelled to capture Osama than to use him as a pretext for invading Iraq and as a political selling point.Karl Rove, coming out of his “please don’t indict me” crouch, tried to chase away the taint of the Abramoff scandal with a new round of terror-mongering for 2006: “We need a commander in chief and a Congress who understand the nature of the threat and the gravity of this moment. President Bush and the Republican Party do. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for many Democrats.”

Jesus Christ Almighty! --Oh sorry, I was praying: If they wanna go off a cliff, maybe somehow the bus they're driving- won't!

Oh, and thanks anyways, Karl(traitor, liar, douche'bag), for your
worthless & WRONG advice on SECURITY. You're a self-serving liar, political-hack, and incompetent FAILURE! ...Later, Herb.

The (Un)Civil Union of Osama Matthews...

Chris Matthews was talking (spitting) on his show the other day -- when the latest BinLaden audio tapes were emabarrassingly played, taunting the U.S. and President Cheney (Bush) -- and Matthews made some drunken-comment about how Osama sounded like Michael Moore. Mr. Moore responded that the taunting-terrorist LOOKED a lot like Chris Matthews.

Moore dug through some archives
and responds further, [HERE]:Son of a... Looks like Matthews is damaged-goods, maybe msnbc altogether. Newsmedians -- they all suck, herb.

DOES THE END JUSTIFY THE MEANS?

Not with the Bush administration!

"Exitus acta probat" is LATIN, for:
The End Justifies The Means...Some of the things they have done (the "means"), supposedly to make us safer (the "ends").

For shame... Why? And, oops! I liked the picture; nothin' else, Herb.

James Risen's book... A+++

From "comments" (We had one, damn-it!):

...pretty good book: "The State of War". These neo-cons are freaks! According to this book Bushy was planning on going to war in Iraq the 1st day he was elected. 9/11 only slowed down the progress towards an invasion. Pretty heavy stuff.... Have I just been flagged?

Yes, that'll get a file (& wiretap) started on you (+ friends/family) at the NSA! Thanks, Herb.

What Buzzflash Says on Alito... (International Herald Tribune) [Supreme Court, No fillabuster?]

Buzzflash, on Alito's... Supreme Court obfuscation-confirmation vote in the Senate:

"...The White House Gives the Democrats Rope and They Hang Themselves by Not Filibustering A MAN WHO WOULD MAKE CONGRESS IRRELEVANT."
[Int'l Herald Tribune link.]

That's right sister... What I said.
Thank you! Goodnight, Herb.
"OBSOLETE," ...Latin(?) for "IRRELEVANT?"

What is UP with MSNBC's Norah O'Donnel?

I don't remember msnbc's Norah O'Donnel always being such a creepy water-carrying GOP witch...

But lately, the only difference between her and CNN's Daryn Kagan is Kagan's FAT, junkee-drug-addict, HYPOCRITE-LIAR, idiot boyfriend (Rush Limbaugh).

Who pays these people to tell us stuff on TV? And why? Damn media(ns)! Shy-ite, Herb.

"CHENEY CONCEDES FAILURE..."

Probably not gonna see many headlines beginning with, "Cheney Concedes Failure..." but U.S News & World Report has one online currently (link below). Unfortunately he didn't admit that the war in Iraq was a failure. Or that he, Bush and Rumsfeld failed in executing the war every step of the way. He didn't concede failing to supply the troops with armor, or failing to have enough troops to occupy Iraq.
Dick Cheney thinks they FAILED to EXPLAIN it to the country better. (Not enough speeches!)
I AM NOT JOKING:

"Cheney Concedes Failure to Boost Backing for War" U.S. News... By Kenneth T. Walsh, 1/14/06

Vice President Cheney admits the administration fell behind the curve in the debate over Iraq last year, allowing its adversaries to attack current policy without an adequate response and focusing on other issues.

Neither Cheney nor President Bush plans to make that mistake again. In an interview with U.S. News, Cheney said, "You do have to keep a sustained campaign going. There's no question about it. Last fall, obviously, there were a lot of other items on the agenda. We went through the whole exercise with Katrina and the hurricanes and disaster relief and so forth that was, I suppose, a bit of a distraction. But it is important to try to maintain public support for what we're doing out there."On the road stumping for the administration's Iraq policy, the veep says he gets a good reaction almost wherever he goes. "I find when I get out around the country and talk with people about it, that most of the ones I interact with are very understanding and very supportive..."

"...most of the ones I interact with," pretty much says it all there, eh? Dick lives in a bubble, just like Junior.

And he wants to tell us more "stories" about Iraq [The ever-changing excuses, rationales, justifications, and explanations], LIKE WE WEREN'T ALL PAYING ATTENTION WHEN THEY GOT CAUGHT-LYING TIME AFTER TIME... President Cheney:
Deluded & insane; or pathological-lying-sack-of-sh!t? Take your pick, Herb.

The CORRUPT REPUBLICAN House of Representatives

-- Matthew Yglesias, subbing @ TPM SAYS
1)RE: HOUSE/REPRESENTATIVES LEADERSHIP:

(The) root-source of the problem is... the tension between rightwing dogma and reality. The tax-cut jihad the Club for the Growth has done so much to foster is a serviceable basis for electioneering, but as a basis for governance it has some serious flaws. In particular, it implies very large cuts in federal spending. But actually implementing cuts on the necessary level would be politically untenable. The result is a governing majority that lacks the capacity to govern and instead invests its energy in spinning all sorts of mumbo-jumbo to cover its tracks and a kind of inertia where the majority's perpetuation in power becomes the primary goal...

2) RE: SPEAKER, DENNIS HASTERT:

...as the House tries to "clean house," how come Hastert's head isn't on the table? Admittedly, he's not implicated in criminal activity the way Tom DeLay is, but in theory he's in charge of the House Republican leadership operation. (He hasn't done very well) these past several years in rooting out corruption not just inside his own caucus but inside his own leadership team. The tendency has been for him to get a free pass on all the antics that go down on the Hill because he's universally regarded as an empty suit. But if he's so inconsequential that he doesn't deserve a share of the blame for the dirty deals that have gone down under his purview, then it's hard to see why he deserves to sit in the Speaker's chair. If he doesn't matter because, as is widely assumed, he's just a DeLay puppet, then how can you justify ditching the Hammer without also dumping (Hastert as well)?

I concur. Next, Herb.

Spoiled BRAT Bush doesn't like OVERSIGHT... Or LAWS... Or rules, or ethics, or authority...

...Or REALITY!
Fact: BUSH has been a complete FAILURE as President... (from his bankrupting tax-cuts, to his occupation of Iraq--ruining the military, to the increase of terrorism, to the Katrina FEMA-failures, etc.) Bush and his Cabinet are consistently INCOMPETENT! He's ETHICALLY CHALLENGED, to say the least; He has a propensity to LIE to EVERYONE about EVERYTHING; and he's not too bright.
How about EXTRA OVERSIGHT, not LESS!
Congress--worthless, Herb.

JUDGE ALITO - BORING! ...His Senate Obfuscation Hearings - WORTHLESS!

Sam Alito, hasn't revealed much at his confirmation hearings. When he talks, he doesn't say anything.
Stares.

Senators who vote FOR Alito, will be voting THEMSELVES (Congress) into OBSOLESCENCE; And pushing us toward a MONARCHY [more...]. Alito's a liar - ashamed of his past; he's an Executive whore; and a coward - for hiding "behind" his wife and daughter during those WORTHLESS hearings.
Nay, Herb.

Why would BUSH (& CHENEY) wanna LISTEN to YOUR phone CALLS?

They don't even know WHO or WHAT they're "fighting." (doing) Saddamists? "Bad guys," mean people... (They thought Joe Wilson was a "bad guy." Because he caught them lying, right?) And we're supposed to TRUST that they'll only listen to "international" calls involving bad-guys?

They're "protecting us?"
Don't laugh! Bad people wanna do-harm to us!
WE - ARE - SO - SAFE...
Do you feel it?

DAMN!



Do you think it's possible Bush/Rove didn't mis-use the secret-domestic-spying program during the 2004 Presidential election? Just a little bit? Elections are a threat to the Country, sometimes.

Maybe a little EAVESDROPPING on CBS News (60 Minutes), once they'd learned Dan Rather was doing a Bush-AWOL story? "Security" threat? Terrorist "connections?" You bet, Herb.

REPUBLICAN SCANDALS (Rove - White House; Delay - Congress; Abramoff - K-street Laundromat)

(Norquist was in charge of, churches, media, fake-grassroots, or something?)
Josh, @ talkingpointsmemo.com describes the current Republican-government mess pretty well:

"...a network of criminal activity stretching from the House of Representatives (and, to a lesser degree, the Senate) to K Street and then into the Executive Branch -- a network of bribery, money-laundering and fraud all aimed at selling public policy and official actions not in exchange for political contributions but money rewards to members of Congress, administration officials and their families..."

I say EXTORTION & ABUSE OF AUTHORITY too, Herb.

GUARDIAN UK - BUSH wanted to BOMB Arab BROADCASTER... Powel & Blair intervened! (...Tranquilizers?)

LONDON CALLING!

Guardian UK, HERE, REPORTS:

...(During) a meeting
in Washington DC between
Bush and Blair... There had been a proposal to take military action against al-Jazeera at their headquarters in Qatar. "This was defused by Colin Powell, US secretary of state, and Tony Blair, thank goodness..."Mr Latham was appalled. "I thought that President Bush must be in the early stages of paranoia." But it was decided not to write to US newspapers...

Old story, new details from London...
Cheers, Herb.

Do YOU trust the BUSH ADMINISTRATION to SECRETLY LISTEN to YOUR phone-calls? Does it make YOU feel SAFER?

Me neither, Herb...

Howard Dean Makes Wolf Blitzer Eat his Socks (video-link)

CNN's Wolf Blitzer was interviewing Howard Dean, when ol' Wolfie tried to slip a turd into the pudding:
He regurgitated the REPUBLICAN SPIN that the
Jack Abramoff Republican Corruption Scandal(tm) involved "a bunch of Democrats..." Dean corrected him...

The pay-to-play government
corruption scandal involves
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY;
...All G.O.P.!

"NOT ONE SINGLE DEMOCRAT."

Tom Delay, Karl Rove & Grover Norquist and co. didn't exactly "hang out" with the Democrats (evil-liberals.) ...They might have had the Democrats' wives "roughed up - no marks," but they didn't let them in on their private, lucrative lobby-laundry extortion-racket gravy-train!

They're gonna keep trying to confuse the issues, mislead, and distract both the public and the press, so it's good that Wolf Blitzer was smacked-down by Dean. Hopefully, Wolf will start doing research, and leave his talking-points @ home.

It's a REPUBLICAN-CORRUPTION SCANDAL...
So, Howard Dean LEVELED Wolf Blitzer, who could only stammer, stutter & mumble (as he picked himself up off the floor) and ran for the nearest-commercial! -- -- See HERE AT pastpeak.com, for the must-see video LINK;
Otherwise, here's the transcript:

BLITZER: Should Democrats who took money from Jack Abramoff, who's now
pleaded guilty to bribery charges among other charges, a Republican lobbyist in Washington — should the Democrats who took money from him give that money to charity or give it back?

DEAN: There are no Democrats who took money from Jack Abramoff. Not
one. Not one single Democrat. Every person named in this scandal is a Republican, every person under investigation is a Republican, every person indicted is a Republican. This is a Republican finance scandal. There is no evidence that Jack Abramoff ever gave any Democrat any money, and we've looked through all those FEC reports to make sure that's true.

BLITZER: [Stammering] But through various Abramoff-related organizations, and
outfits, a bunch of Democrats did take money that presumably originated with Jack Abramoff.

DEAN: That's not true either. There's no evidence for that either, there's no evidence...

BLITZER: What about Senator, what about, what about, what about Senator Byron
Dorgan?

DEAN: Senator Byron Dorgan and some others took money from Indian tribes.
They're not agents of Jack Abramoff. There's no evidence that I've seen that Jack Abramoff directed any contributions to Democrats. I know the Republican National Committee would like to get the Democrats involved in this. They're scared. They should be scared. They haven't told the truth, and they have misled the American people, and now it appears they're stealing from Indian tribes. The Democrats are not involved in this.

BLITZER: [Long pause, apparently getting direction in his earpiece] [Sigh]
Unfortunately, we, uh, Mr. Chairman, we've got to leave it right there...

[pastpeak.com commentary] ...I love how Blitzer says that money donated by Indian tribes "presumably originated with Jack Abramoff," with absolutely no evidence or basis in fact. Objective journalism at its finest.

'Nuff said, Herb.

Cheney's New Neighbors: HATE HIM! He expects the TOWN to STOP (& BOW!) when he passes!

The Cheney's moved recently to a mansion on the East Shore, a ritzy Maryland area, 90 minutes(drive) from the Capitol. (DICK doesn't drive like those f**king peasants, though.)
THE NEIGHBORS HATE HIM!They're sick of the Secret Service, late-night helicopters, and their STOP-EVERYTHING motorcades. Dick Cheney thinks he's friggin' ROYALTY, and everybody else, PEASANTS:

[THE CHENEY'S ARE DETESTED BY THE LOCALS FOR] ...stopping traffic, keeping neighbors barricaded in their homes while the motorcade passes by, and disrupting sleepers' REM cycles with low-flying Chinook helicopters.
:::
"I've had great big helicopters fly over my house at 3 o'clock in the morning and at 1 in the morning. I can tell you I'm not happy. They're very noisy. The dogs start barking, and we can't get back to sleep."
:::
"The Secret Service clears Church Neck Road and prevents people from leaving their property. When they drive into town, people are actually told to stay inside their houses until the Cheneys go by...And I hear that two weeks ago, they told the DNR Police to keep their boats away from Cheney's house because it was ruining his view..."

Seems a little bit like (Haliburton's &) his approach to foreign-policy.
Respectfully, Herb.

Tom Delay QUITS as House Majority "LEADER." (good riddance)

It's kinda like when you know your days are numbered at work... But instead of letting them fire you, you QUIT as a "preemptive strike." Then, of course, you gotta find a new job, but you showed them!

Jan. 7, 2006 — It's been quite a fall for Tom DeLay, R-Texas, the House majority leader who formally stepped down today as he awaits trial on charges of conspiracy and money laundering. He retains his seat in Congress but reliquishes his leadership role...

QUITTER! Hammer that, Herb.

Who is Jack Abramoff, a.k.a. "Jack'off"?

DARKMAN! Thanks AMERICAblog [Cliff], Herb.

President Bush is a WHORE... Abramoff, Norquist, and Rove his PIMPS!

The Texas Observer on Jack Abramoff:

He was a friend of Bush advisor Karl Rove. He was a Bush “Pioneer,” delivering at least $100,000 in bundled contributions to the 2000 campaign. He had just concluded his work on the Bush Transition Team as an advisor to the Department of the Interior. He had sent his personal assistant Susan Ralston to the White House to work as Rove’s personal assistant. He was a close friend, advisor, and high-dollar fundraiser for the most powerful man in Congress, Tom DeLay. Abramoff was so closely tied to the Bush Administration that he could, and did, charge two of his clients $25,000 for a White House lunch date and a meeting with the President. From the same two clients he took to the White House in May 2001, Abramoff also obtained $2.5 million in contributions for a non-profit foundation he and his wife operated.
:::
Abramoff advised tribal leaders that the contributions were the cost of doing business in Washington, where he could protect them from other tribes trying to open casinos to compete with those that already had them.
:::
Norquist has not responded to inquiries about using the White House as a fundraiser. It is, however, a regular ATR practice to invite state legislators and tribal leaders who have supported ATR anti-tax initiatives to the White House for a personal thank-you from the President. A source at ATR said no money is ever accepted from participants in these events. The $25,000 check from the Coushattas suggests that, at least in this instance, Norquist’s organization made an exception. The $75,000 collected from the Mississippi Choctaws and two corporate sponsors mentioned in Abramoff’s e-mail suggests there were other exceptions. Norquist recently wrote to the tribes who paid to attend White House meetings. His story regarding that event is also evolving. The contributions, he told tribal leaders in letters that went out in May, were in no way related to any White House event. That doesn’t square with the paper trail Abramoff and Norquist left behind, which makes it evident that they were selling access to the President...

"...for a personal thank-you from the President," INDEED! So, that's what the kids are callin' it these days, huh?

Whatever Bill Clinton's indiscretions as President, at least he didn't charge "that girl, Ms. Lewinsky," $25,000.00 to visit the White House... (Bill Clinton didn't have a team of PIMPS, either.) But that's what President Bush's team of pimps charged for "playtime" with him.
Bloody disgraceful! Where's the outrage?
Holdin' my breath (still), Herb.

INCOMPETENTS' INCOMPETENCE [Bush Recess-Appoints Dozens]

AP story: The Recess-president, Bush Jr;
Since GRADE SCHOOL, President George W. Bush has always LIKED HIS "RECESS." That's when he's been able to BULLY others around and BREAK RULES.In this case, he's not even on "recess," Congress is. But... the President doesn't know that (or care). The almost TWENTY people he appointed to IMPORTANT GOVERNMENT POSITIONS today, individually and collectively, have ABSOLUTELY NO CREDENTIALS OR EXPERIENCE WHATSOEVER. Watch out, FEMA! They wouldn't have been confirmed, even by a Congress controlled entirely by Bush's own political party!

I wonder what these Rove/Bush political HACKS
will be doing at their new jobs... Because, like Heck-of-a-job Brownie, they've NEVER DONE IT before...

Re-post: It Depends What Your Definition of "EQUAL" is.

THREE COEQUAL BRANCHES,
OF THE U.S. GOVERNMENT.

The founding fathers, whose brilliant design for the federal government was based on three coequal branches, would be HORRIFIED (LATELY...)

King George, continues his reign, Herb.