W O4 god's sake!

I saw a bumper sticker aping the Bush W-04 sticker with the letters "tf?" added in smaller but same colored font under the W. I laughed out loud.



And being a talentless, unimaginative lout, I thought of some others along the same lines:

What a Maroon!

I liked this so much, I stole it. Enjoy!

Forrest Gump's Evil Twin

By Stephen Pizzo, News for Real. Posted April 21, 2006.
How extraordinary. Something is happening here that has never happened in America's history. A consensus is sweeping the nation. Not that the war in Iraq is wrong, or that oil companies are screwing us blue, or that the climate is going to hell, or that good-paying jobs are being replaced by low-paying jobs, or that our national health care system is a disgrace, or that that the rich are getting a lot richer while the middle class gets poorer.

While all that's true, and more and more folks are getting it, that's not the consensus of which I speak. Nope. This one is bigger, enormous, huge!

Here it is: The president of the United States is a moron.

Yes, stupid, dumb as common road gravel. And not figuratively, but literally. George W. Bush, president of the world's last remaining superpower, is a moron. Forrest Gump's evil twin.
I broached this possibility one year ago in a post entitled, "Bush: The Worst President Ever?" I was a bit early with that one. But what a difference a year makes! The cover story of this week's Rolling Stone Magazine reads, "The Worst President in History?"

So the jury is in: Bush is a moron. If stupid is as stupid does, he's stupid. A botched war on terror, exploding debt, his "what me worry" response to Katrina -- and the ongoing mismanagement of the recovery, North Korea has the bomb and Iran is on its way to its own nuke. Think about that for a second because it is definitive proof Bush is a moron. First he identifies three nations as his "Axis of Evil" in the world: North Korea, Iran and Iraq. Then he as a chance to whack one of the three, and he picks the only one that had no WMD. The only way he could look worse is if it were only two countries -- a coin flip -- and he still got it wrong.
Yes, Virginia, the current occupant of the Oval Office is no longer a crook or an adulterer. He's a moron.

As if that were not bad enough, we still face two and half years with this man at the controls. NFR reader Philip Bourgeois suggested an intervention launched by former Presidents Clinton, Bush Sr. and Carter. Not a bad idea, Phil.

Poppa Bush must be beside himself watching his kid screw up decades of diplomacy in just five short years. He could take sonny into that Oval Office alcove where Monica used to dispense her favors and administer a few long overdue dope slaps.

Bill Clinton could sit the moron down and give him a short course on how to balance a checkbook, teach him the difference between capital investment and undisciplined spending, and the virtues of saving for a rainy day.

Jimmy Carter could teach Junior the actual meaning of the word "compassionate," and how to walk that walk. Carter could reveal to him that giving the already comfortably rich even more money is not compassion. Giving more money to the growing number of those who work 60 hours a week or more, and still can't get by, is "compassion." And he could figure out how to cover the nearly 50 million Americans who cannot afford health insurance.

But none of that is likely to happen. One of the trademarks of a moron is contempt for facts that challenge the simple but comfortable fictions that rule their daily routines. You can drag a moron to a library, but you can't force him to learn.

In fact morons get downright testy when someone challenges what they think they know. We saw this trait earlier this week when Bush was asked if he thought Don Rumsfeld should resign. The moron lashed out at the questioner, dashed into his imaginary phone booth and emerged as The Decider. "I'm the decider," he pronounced, with Mussolini-like swagger. You see, scratch a moron and beneath that smirking, ignorance-is-bliss exterior, you discover a fundamental truth: Beauty may be only skin deep, but moron goes right to the bone.

I'm staying close to home until this guy is gone. Keeping my head down, my nose clean, and watching what I say in emails for friends. And I have a piece of advice for the Iranians too -- this guy really is crazy enough to "decide" that bombing the shit out you is a good idea. Yes, Bush is exactly as stupid as he looks, sounds and acts.

Doubt that at your peril. Fifty-one percent of American voters doubted it. And now we're screwed.

Stephen Pizzo is the author of numerous books, including "Inside Job: The Looting of America's Savings and Loans," which was nominated for a Pulitzer.

Should we be Worried?

According to Seymour Hersh's article in the New Yorker this month, administration officials consider Iran's President the equivalent of Adolph Hitler in 1935 and have moved beyond contingency planning for military strikes on Iran to operational planning, which is more detailed and serious. Also disclosed, one of the contingencies planned for was using tactical nukes to penetrate and destroy enrichment facilities 70 feet under bedrock. The pentagon got nervous and wanted to take that option off the table as plans went forward, but the administration refused. Bush just said today, that option is on the table:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060418/wl_nm/nuclear_iran_dc;_ylt=Au.n.N734K9JYzjYAEYKy8tbbBAF;_ylu=X3oDMTA4NTMzazIyBHNlYwMxNjk2

Meanwhile Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the aforementioned Iranian president has not backed down an inch and basically said, "Bring it on," to Bush. (He really said he'd "cut the hand" of any aggressor, but same idea, right?)

I just watched an awesome documentary series from the BBC called: Nazis: A Warning from History that is still fresh in my mind as the Bush administration calls Ahmadinejad Hitler in 1935. After all, both are leaders of a humiliated nation that considers it's treatment at the hand of stronger nations as crimes. Both want to annihilate the Jews. (1935 was the year of the Nuremberg laws that stripped Jews of citizenship and banned intermarriage and so forth.) So the question arises, with Bush's stated policy of pre-emption, should we be worried?

If the UN doesn't act and/or Iran does not moderate or compromise, will dubya be the first President to nuke since Truman? Will he nuke to make the world safe from nukes? Do we really have anything to worry about?

Our intelligence about Iran's program and plans are no better and possibly worse than that we had on Iraq, prewar. And some believe Ahmadinejad is super-radical and would use nukes against Israel, to wipe it off the map. Others don't believe Ahmadinejad has any real power and that the mullahs, who do have the power, are more pragmatic. Still, it only matters what Bush thinks, doesn't it, since he's already proven he'll ignore info that doesn't fit his beliefs.

So, yeah. We should be worried.

Crazy

The interview on Fresh Air today touched a nerve. The guest was a ex-Washington Post Reporter name Early who's book, Crazy: A Father's Search Through America's Mental health Madness, is just out. It is his account of his harrowing experience trying to get help for his psychotic son's illness when doctor's hospitals and insurance company's wouldn't because of the "imminent threat" test for coercive treatment. We've gone from commitments to large state mental hospitals that were often horrific places to a policy that makes treating a mentally ill person almost impossible if they don't want treatment.

It reminded me of my two-month long endeavor to get guardianship for my mother, whose dementia and psychosis have made it impossible for her to pay her bills, manage her money and take care of herself. I finally did get guardianship Thursday the 13th, but the hoops we had to jump through were numerous and frustrating.

Hundreds of thousands of homeless and prison inmates could be treated and kept in the general population if only we had mandatory outpatient commitment. That is, a court ordering that the patient could stay free as long as they consent to medical treatment. The time has come, I think.

More on the lying liar front

Remember those Iraqi helium trucks Bush and the Pentagon tried to tell us were mobile bio-weapon labs that noted liar Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress told us Saddam had? Turns out Bush and the Pentagon wasn't just mistaken when they told us that. Newly declassified documents indicate that they knew what the trucks were even while telling us what they weren't. For almost a year. Read it and weep for our democracy:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060412/pl_afp/usiraqweaponstrailer_060412153540;_ylt=Asdet3EywOteZX3raP5zym1X6GMA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl

Can we believe anything that comes from this administration? We should check their birth certificates to see if they are giving us their real names.

Fantasy Land.

This from the AP:

"Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday he would not engage in "fantasy land" speculation about a possible U.S. attack on
Iran' name=c1> SEARCHNews News Photos Images Web' name=c3> Iran, though he said the Bush administration is concerned about Tehran's nuclear ambitions. "

This is wise. One should be involved in only one fantasy land at a time, and right now, that is an Iraq in which there is no civil war and in which we are making progress. In this magical place, lots of factions that hate each other will form a national unity government, and then the democracy fairies will sprinkle a special dust that will make the Mahdi Army, the Badr Brigades, Zarqawi and the former Bathists all put down their weapons and engage in civil national debate.

Meanwhile in the real Iraq, Shiite hit squads kill Sunnis and each other to the tune of 50 to 60 freshly executed corpses a day. Don't even mentions those killed by Sunni insurgents. Individual neighborhoods in Baghdad have armed their own militias and will fire upon Iraqi police if they try to come into neighborhoods without US or Iraqi Army escort. The leading trade in Iraq? Guns, ammo and RPGs.

Allawi, the former interim PM, whose ticket won 9 percent of the vote says his secular party in a minority government is the only hope for a united Iraq. Guess he isn't invited to fantasy land any more.

GW Bush Library

Yeah, I've read all the Bush library jokes. All two of them, Coloring books, yada yada yada.

The interesting thing to me is where it goes. Apparently 3 Texas universities want it. This for a guy who went to Yale and Harvard (who don't want it, by the way). Since he was never much into academics, why should it be at a university at all, or college, or juco or community college? Why not put it in a site already notorious for its association with dubya? Some suggestions:

Abu Gharaib. I really liked this choice, but then the US said they were abandoning it. Dang. Gotta find something more permanent.

Gitmo! There you go! What an awesome interrogation technique they be able to use on the grandchildren of the guys in there now. "Tell us what you know or we'll make you tour it again!"
Aiiieeeeeeee!!!

Ft. Leavenworth. Make it adjacent to the Federal Prison so that tourist can see live exhibits of former administration staff and the lobbyists who loved them.

How about the polar ice cap? Oh yeah, permanence problem again.

Anywhere but here. I like that one best.

Love your Neighbor. No. Love Thy Neighbor.

Driving home from SA Saturday, I had the SA NPR station on (89.1) and was listening to This American Life. The show's theme was Neighbors, and the opening was about a woman who ran a charity called Love Your Neighbor that helped homeless and poor folk. Turns out another good Samaritan was doing the same kind of work under the name Love Thy Neighbor. Apparently, the first lady was concerned that people who wanted to give to her charity would get confused and donate instead to the other charity--that did the exact same kind of work.

Being an American, she sued. The other guy was incredulous, having had to shell out $13000 in legal fees to fend off A Charity! that was suing his. He said he could provide a meal for 38 cents, so somewhat more than 30,000 meals to folks who needed it went to lawyers' pockets instead. The lady wouldn't appear on the show and provided her lawyer instead. Ira Glass, the host, asked her if she didn't get the irony of a charity of that name suing another for the naming rights. Of course, she didn't. The lady had the right to sue. Ira asks but was it right? Was it being a good neighbor? The lawyer said the other charity was the one infringing on the name and thus not neighborly. In the end they had to agree not to agree.

Overthrow

Interesting new book by former Times editor Stephen Kinzer traces the 14 regime changes the US had a direct hand in from 1893 to now. His thesis is that they succeed initially but eventually result in negative results for the good ol' US of A. Here's a link to an excerpt:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5325069

You'd think after 110 years, we'd learn. Of course when you President doesn't read, how is that gonna happen?

I can't contain my glee!

Ding dong the Dick is dead
Which old Dick?
The wicked Dick
Ding dong the wicked Dick is dead!

I broke out in spontaneous song, march around like one of the newly liberated guards when I heard Tom Delay will resign. What will I do when he's marched off to jail? Who wants to have celebratory drink?

Lies and the Lying Liars

Remember the mantra of the Bush administration and his lackeys in Congress that they didn't misrepresent intelligence because everyone had the same intelligence and thought the same thing because of it?

One journalist with the National Journal is putting the lie to that with his reporting. Check this article:

http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2006/0330nj1.htm

Not only did they heat dissenting viewpoints from intelligence officials, they conspired to keep the facts secret until after the 2004 election. Stephen Hadley and Rove were the masterminds of this cover up. The real question is why isn't the mainstream press all over this? Damn liberal bias... Oh wait.