Petraeus Report: 6 months of Surge or Pelosi Inaction?

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlarge Ever wonder how many lives would have been saved if we had YouTube for the Vietnam war? Or would the leaders of the day still deny the evident truth laying dead in the ditches and rivers of Baghdad? Would they still ignore the never ending stream of flag draped coffins coming in from the Middle East? My guess is yes, they would. To deny the facts on the ground in Baghdad, it takes a Herculean capacity for denial to look at the Iraq War as nothing more than a total and abject disaster of Greecian tragedy proportions. Or they could be lying to our face. That sums up our President and his underlings - liars. No one can be so deluded as to thinking Iraq is a success. (Ok, McCain excluded.) But what about Pelosi? How long is she going to go for the bullshit? How long will Reid back her up in letting Bush ruin the nation? So far, the Democrats have given us nothing but shame and embarrassment in the Congress. Instead of doing the job they were sent to do, they have achieved none of the major promises they gave us in the 2006 elections. I understand they also battle the Blue Dogs and there is the one vote majority in the Senate, but Pelosi and Reid haven't even tried. They have not lifted a finger. All they have done is take after Senator Craig and dropped their pants for Bush. They have willingly bent over and let Bush have his way with the war, FISA courts and on and on. If Pelosi and Reid roll over this time and accept another six months of continued bloodshed and violence, it is time to remove them from office. They will have proven themselves as traitors to We The People.

America, it’s the new French!

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing click to enlargeScandal after scandal heaped on top of more scandal and we still do not have the courage to impeach? At this point, anyone who is terrified of the impeachment process (unless you are IN the Bush Administration) should just admit you are not willing to fight for our democracy, and that includes Nancy Pelosi. What's the meme this week? We don't have enough votes? Big deal. I say we have the US House go through the evidence process (and NO, Gonzales ain't what I am talking about) and present the laundry list of BushCo's "high crimes and misdemeanors." Plus, hold those hearings during Prime Time and have Nancy do her job and oversee the proceedings. Let the Republicans spend all their time supporting Bush and defending his crimes. Let it go on for hours and hours. Let is stretch on into week. Hell, start this during the "recess," they got nothing else to do. Let the process continue just to remind everyone what all we have lost, where our money went, how it was really stolen. Then vote. Do you not prosecute a murderer just because he has a great lawyer? No, even though you might lose, you still prosecute the case. You do the right thing. And if we lose, we lose, but we will have tried Bush in Congress and in the Court of Public Opinion. Now let the GOP try to distance themselves from Bush for the 2008 elections. They will have publicly forgiven and sitting President of treason, war crimes and fraud just for their political gain. With Bush's 25% approval rating, you can't go wrong... unless you are French. ;-)

Quotes

"The President's decision to commute Mr. Libby's sentence is disgraceful. Libby's conviction was the one faint glimmer of accountability for White House efforts to manipulate intelligence and silence critics of the Iraq War. Now, even that small bit of justice has been undone. Judge Walton correctly determined that Libby deserved to be imprisoned for lying about a matter of national security. The Constitution gives President Bush the power to commute sentences, but history will judge him harshly for using that power to benefit his own Vice President's Chief of Staff who was convicted of such a serious violation of law." --Harry Reid "The President's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence does not serve justice, condones criminal conduct, and is a betrayal of trust of the American people. The President said he would hold accountable anyone involved in the Valerie Plame leak case. By his action today, the President shows his word is not to be believed. He has abandoned all sense of fairness when it comes to justice, he has failed to uphold the rule of law, and he has failed to hold his Administration accountable." --Nancy Pelosi "Only a president clinically incapable of understanding that mistakes have consequences could take the action he did today. President Bush has just sent exactly the wrong signal to the country and the world. In George Bush's America, it is apparently okay to misuse intelligence for political gain, mislead prosecutors and lie to the FBI. George Bush and his cronies think they are above the law and the rest of us live with the consequences. The cause of equal justice in America took a serious blow today." --John Edwards

Democrats Will Not Help You

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane & My Left Wing click to enlarge This is my concern with the Democrats in Washington, they have totally separate agendas than America, their agenda doesn't even jive with what Democrats (the voters) want. The best candidate we had for 2004 was Howard Dean. But throw in some good old fashioned media bias, Dems buckled like ramen noodles in hot water and picked the safe candidate in the Iowa caucuses and we got John Kerry instead. In 2006, we put Dems in control of BOTH sides of Congress and placed Harry Reid and made Nancy Pelosi the first woman Speaker of the House and so far, we have gotten some investigations out of them and a whole lot of hand-wringing and capitulation. Yes, if they sent up another Iraq Funding Bill with Deadlines, Bush would have vetoed it. So what? That was the CORRECT and MORALE thing to do! Instead, they just wanted to have a bill Bush would say "yes" to and that is exactly what we got - a bill all but written by Bush and passed my the Democratic Congress. So who is now the front runner for the Democratic nomination in 2008? Hillary Clinton, the one single choice that will bring out the GOP to the polls just to vote against her. Yes, Blue Staters love here, but Red Staters hate her more and the hate will win out. Remember, if you want out of Iraq, the Dems in Congress will not help you. Just get used to disappointment.

Pelosi in trouble? Rating for Congress same as Bush.

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane & My Left Wing click to enlarge What about CHANGE does Pelosi and Reid NOT understand? Are we still in Iraq? Yep. Do we have earmarks coming out our, well, ears? Yep. Is the President still in office, unimpeached? Yeppers on that one too. And the spin meisters like Rush Limbaugh eat it up and spew it back out for everyone to hear.

“Unseat Reid and Pelosi” Says Olbermann

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane & My Left Wing click to enlarge Keith Olbermann's Special Comment last night pretty much summed up my feelings on the Democrats idiotic move to continue to fund the war. We worked our fingers to the bone to get Dems into Congress for one MAJOR thing - to bring our troops home. Immigration, the national debt, the spotted owl all took a back seat to this most pressing issue. The Dems held all the cards, the President they are facing is the WORST IN HISTORY and wildly unpopular. Plus the Dems had the support of the people - a huge swath of We The People in fact. So what do they do? Cave. The capitulated. They threw the troops under the bus. God knows, the Dems in Congress don't want to be made to feel uncomfortable.

Christian Fundamentalists Move To Embrace Hate Speech

click to enlarge Remember, this is part of Bush's base: A hate crimes bill passed by the House yesterday, extending coverage to people victimized because of sexual orientation, gender identity or disability, is attracting opposition from an unusual coalition of Christian leaders. Proponents say the bill - similar to one the Senate is expected to pass in the next few weeks - is a moral imperative. But some Christians are depicting it as a "thought crimes" bill attacking 1st Amendment freedoms of speech and religion. A coalition of evangelical, fundamentalist and black religious leaders is mounting a furious assault on the bill, airing television ads and mobilizing members to stop its progress. President Bush has said he might veto the measure. If the bill, approved 237-180, were to become law, they say, a pastor could be held liable for giving a sermon against homosexuality if a listener later attacked a gay individual . Maybe preachers should stop with the Gay bashing? Hate crime is not a Constitutional right. The bill's supporters say that such an assertion is nonsense, and that a sermon could never be considered an inducement to violence unless it explicitly advocated it. In addition to broadening the federal definition of a hate crime victim, the law provides funds so that local authorities can request federal assistance for prosecutions in the aftermath of a hate crime. I think White Fundamentalist Christians are just mad because they can't lynch Blacks anymore. Oh, and the clincher: "This legislation strikes at the heart of free speech and freedom of religious expression," said Andrea Lafferty, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition. When did murdering gays become religious expression?

Today's Talking Points

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Kerry on supporting Nancy Pelosi

From John Kerry's blog: We Democrats should’ve been unapologetic this week defending Speaker Pelosi because the truth was on our side: She had a right to go. And she was right to go. The coordinated attack on her trip to Syria was as inappropriate as it was irresponsible. And when that happens to a Democrat, we should all damn well stand up and be counted in our support, or else we hand partisan hacks on the other side a dangerous victory. They thrive on destroying our leaders -– we can’t let them. Especially when we’ve got the moral high ground. If someone asks you about Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Damascus, you might want to start by telling them how many Republicans have traveled to Syria. That Arlen Specter has gone 16 times since 1984. Yes, this Republican outrage is selective. I didn’t hear a whiff of criticism when a Republican Congressional delegation was in Damascus just last weekend. Calculated crocodile tears for political gain -– sad but not surprising. But, even more than that, we need to stand up to this effort to demonize diplomacy. We shouldn’t be surprised that an Administration that treats dialogue as a reward rather than a process would stoop to this. But, as Americans, we need to stand up and demand better from our elected leaders. Click here for more. I was never the biggest Kerry supporter, but was one of those people who voted for him because he "sucked less than Bush". But with politicians, as with kids, I think it's important to "catch them being good"--praising the behavior we'd like to see more of. So I'm going to try to do that.

Peaceful Solutions Seen In Middle East, BushCo Outraged.

click to enlarge Yes, Mr. Bush, there are tools other than guns... we call them words and they always seem to fail you. "The solution to Iraq -- an Iraq that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself -- is more than a military mission. Precisely the reason why I sent more troops into Baghdad." George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., April 3, 2007 There is nothing dishonorable in diplomacy, it is a very old form of statecraft where every word and meaning is carefully spliced together so the other party will understand exactly what you are saying. "I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." George W. Bush, Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000 Is there any wonder why you would suck at it? So please stay out of it and let the adults in the State Department (or maybe the Speaker of the House - because the Speaker SPEAKS) try to clean up the messes you've made. And if you really want to make an positive impact on the Middle East, just resign. Just quit. Chuck it all and go back to your brush in Crawford, Texas. Oh wait, you are there already... on vacation, again.

Diplomacy: A San Francisco Value

click to enlarge If BushCo refuses to participate in diplomacy, somebody should and that somebody is Speaker Pelosi. Of course, Bush is very upset that someone upstaged him in the Middle East (not hard to do) and made him look bad (he does that all by himself) by getting things done. From the San Francisco Chronicle: President Bush is nettled that Pelosi is playing at Mideast negotiator, if, indeed, her visit to Damascus goes that far. Yet, her scheduled meeting with Syrian President Bashar Assad, an established troublemaker in Lebanon, Iraq and Israel, is a useful counterweight to the White House's record of diplomatic neglect and malpractice in the region. She has paid the customary visit to Israel to pledge U.S. support and gone to a memorial in Lebanon to a leader believed assassinated with Syrian help. These are the usual stops for an American politician. But because she is third in line to the president in the U.S. government, a visit to outcast Syria carries risks. Pelosi is unimpressed with the White House posture of ignoring Assad until he comes begging. Far better, she indicates, to talk face-to-face about his support for Iraqi car-bombers or missiles for Hezbollah fighters on Israel's northern border. And guess who is providing diplomatic help with Britian in an attempt to gain freedom for the captured sailors and marines? Syria. More indications emerged today of the role Syria is playing in the diplomacy. The Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, told the newspaper Al-Anba that the situation needed "quiet diplomacy", which Syria was involved in. Syria has long been the Arab country closest to Iran, a non-Arab state.

Nancy Pelosi Hates The Economy

click to enlarge What is Nancy thinking? How dare she go against the Constitution and travel to Syria and Lebanon and try to disrupt the long-planned upcoming wars with those countries. She has even set us back in our attack on Iran. Thankfully, the Brits have helped us a bit with that Gulf of Tonkin maneuver. What is next on Nancy’s agenda? A peace plan with the Middle East? Can Congress even do such a thing? Will the democrats out-Rove Rove? If the Congress arranges for a peace treaty and more than 2/3rds of the Congress votes for it, does the President need to sign it for it to be ratified? Has that every been done in US history? What freak gave Congress that much power? This has the commie’s fingerprints all over it.

Fighting the Insurgents Here

click to enlarge Bush is between a rock and a hard place, actually he is between Iraq and the Constitution. I know the situation with the war is very serious but I can’t help but laugh as Bush lashes out at Congress for practicing oversight and following their Constitutional duties. Just like a petulant bully, Bush now is learning that he can’t get everything his way and he is even more frustrated by the general sentiment of the public not supporting him. Bush is also showing his general strategy for everything - get a bigger hammer. His way or the highway is all he knows. He shows the same unwillingness to talk with Congress as he did with Saddam before the war, with the UN (pick any day), North Korea and Iran. If you can bare to watch a Bush press conference, you know how hard it is to watch him talk - stuttering, stammering and repeating himself. Maybe that is why his only tool is war. Tantrums and bullets is all he knows. Death and deficits is all we get.

Dick Cheney Donates Bone Tissue

click to enlarge I always knew Pelosi was a fighter, she would never have been elected minority leader years ago if she weren’t. But for some reason the mainstream conservatives never saw it. I think the Neocon leadership did, that is why the belittled her for years. “San Francisco values” is all we heard up until the election this past November - over and over and over. And we still hear it today. But the mainstream conservatives, you know - humans working for a living with conservatives beliefs like balanced budgets, wise use of the military, etc. seem to be somewhat astonished at the backbone that Pelosi has shown. Did it come from someplace else? No. She had it all along. It is a San Francisco value.