Month: February 2007

Bush to Pelosi: Tell Me When Dick Says Mean Things

Jon Ponder

In an interview with CNN’s Larry King yesterday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that Pres. George Bush had asked her to call him when Vice Pres. Dick Cheney makes outrageous claims about Democrats:

Bush to Pelosi: Could you let me know if this happens?

Pelosi … blasted a comment made last week by Vice President Dick Cheney that legislative moves by Pelosi and other House Democrats to oppose Bush’s war policy would “validate” al Qaeda’s strategy.

“What the vice president said is beneath the dignity of his office and beneath the dignity of the sacrifice of our men and women in uniform,” Pelosi said…

The speaker confirmed she called Bush to complain about Cheney’s comments.

“The president had said to me … that he would not tolerate any undermining of anybody’s patriotism or our intention to protect the national security,” she said.

“He said, ‘Could you let me know if this happens?’ So I wanted to let him know that it happened.”

I’m so sure George took Dick to the woodshed over his mean remarks.

Report: Iran War Is Set to Start Now, But Resistance Has Given Bush ‘Weak Knees’

Jon Ponder

Apocalypse now: New reporting by Robert Parry on the behind-the-scenes battle between Pres. Bush and the U.S. military’s top generals picks up where the Seymour Hersh’s story in the New Yorker leaves off — painting a picture of a what amounts to a quiet military coup at the very top ranks of the Pentagon against the neocon cabal at the White House.

Resistance from the Pentagon, Blair and even Democrats in Congress appears to be having an effect on Bush’s decision-making. He had planned to launch an attack on Iran, possibly as early as this week, but was getting “weak knees.”

The nation’s top brass are convinced that attacking Iran would yield calamitous results, and yet the White House — under the sway of the neocons and Vice Pres. Cheney — is determined at any cost to escalate the sectarian war it has started in Iraq into a full-scale regional war between Sunni Arabs and Shiite Iran.

In an elaborate contest of wills, the generals, apparently including Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have leaked the broad strokes of Cheney’s secret war planning to the media. They have also let it be known that many of them would resign if Cheney and Bush take the country to war.

To counter this threat, Cheney has instructed the Pentagon to be ready to start bombing Iran within 24 hours after a signal from the White House — relying on the military’s “do or die” ethos to force the generals to stay at their posts until after the damage is done:

By creating such a tight time frame for action, Bush would negate the possibility for the Pentagon brass and Congress to mount any serious opposition to a presidential order on Iran, even if they are convinced Bush’s actions will be catastrophic.

The tradition of the U.S. military is to implement presidential orders regardless of doubts. Perhaps months later, a dissenting commander might quietly resign.

That practice and the 24-hour window may help explain why several U.S. generals are pondering now how to stop Bush from blindsiding them with a new war. One of their tactics appears to be leaking indications of their strong opposition to the press.

It was the order to set up the 24 hour trigger that prompted several top generals to signal to the Sunday Times of London this week that they would resign if the order to start the war is given. And, as unlikely as it may seem, it appears that the generals’ resistance may have been worked, at least in the short term:

[One] source told me that the resistance — from the Pentagon, Blair and even Democrats in Congress — appears to be having an effect on Bush’s decision-making. This source said he believed Bush had planned to launch an attack on Iran, possibly as early as this week, but was getting “weak knees.”

Nonetheless, based on the way Cheney and Bush drove the country to war against Iraq in 2002, the best assumption is that the new war against Iran could begin at any moment. It will come, according to Parry’s sources, with an attack by Israel on Iran, probably on its nuclear facilities. When Iran retaliates, the U.S. will come in full force to defend Israel, launching a bombardment of Iran’s infrastructure similar to the “shock and awe” bombing at the start of the war in Iraq.

What the generals want the American people to know is that this nightmare scenario is real, the planning is complete and ready to go — and that an attack could begin at any moment that would likely trigger a full-scale war in the Middle East.

Richard Viguerie’s Self-Fulfilling Poll Fulfilled Its Conservative Mandate

Buck Banks

Last Friday, I posted an article about a poll being conducted by Richard Viguerie, poster boy for the Goldwater school of conservatism, and ever so wisely predicted that he would rig the poll to support his far-right platform. See, Viguerie and his cronies feel betrayed and marginalized by the Bush neocons, so what better way to highlight that fact than to mount a rigged poll? Viguerie got what he was looking for, despite the noble efforts of me and Trish to skew the results toward sanity.

The poll was hosted on Viguerie’s Web site ConservativesBetrayed.com. It asked only one question: “Who was responsible for the Republicans’ disastrous defeats, including loss of control of the House and Senate, in the 2006 elections?” Readers were encouraged to select no more than 10 reasons from the 31 choices provided. Viguerie’s agenda is clear from his presentation of the results:

How could you look at what happened in the 2006 elections and not blame the Republican loss on George Bush?

Their number one culprit: “Conservative leaders who kept silent when the GOP became the party of Big Government.” Coming in sixth was “Conservative media that kept silent while the GOP became the party of Big Government.” More than 77.1 % of Republicans selected conservative leaders, with 47.8% selecting conservative media, as one of the reasons for the negative outcome of the election.

“While many conservative leaders and conservative media outlets kept quiet, or were even cheerleaders for the White House and Congress, the grassroots noticed very little of a conservative agenda but huge increases in federal spending,” Viguerie explained. “And because the Big Government Republican politicians were not receiving criticism from conservative leaders and conservative media, they felt free to indulge their tendencies to spend and spent in order to buy votes.”

“It is interesting to note that the #3 reason cited by Republicans was ‘legal corruption’ to ‘buy’ votes through the use of taxpayers money for special interest purposes. That strategy backfired with the voters,” Viguerie said.

What’s interesting to note, Richard, is that George W. Bush was listed in fifth place when most people would agree that the election was a referendum on his incompetence and failed policies. How could you look at what happened in the 2006 elections and not blame the Republican loss on George Bush? Should have been number-one, if you ask me, but Viguerie’s cohorts loaded the results with a focus on the media’s influence and dumb stuff like Ted Stevens of Alaska:

The Top 10 selections made by 850 self-identified Republicans were:

1. Conservative leaders who kept silent when the GOP became the party of Big Government
2. Illegal corruption, such as Mark Foley, Robert Ney, and Jack Abramoff
3. Legal corruption, such as spending on special interest groups to “buy” their votes, including earmarks
4. Mainstream media that may have influenced the voters to throw out the Republicans
5. President George W. Bush
6. Conservative media that kept silent while the GOP became the party of Big Government
7. Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), former President Pro Tempore of the Senate and promoter of the $223 million Bridge to Nowhere
8. Blunders and misstatements by Republican candidates
9. Former Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN)
10. Congressman Dennis Hastert (R-IL), former Speaker of the House

Viguerie delightedly noted that “There were only minor variations in the order of the list among self-identified Democrats, members of other political parties, and independents.” Well, duh, Dickie, there were like 20 times as many self-identified Republicans voting on your site, compared to a handful of those of us with the intestinal fortitude to stomach your site’s content long enough to vote.

Owners of Seattle Sonics and Seattle Storm Donated $1 Mil to Anti-Gay Fund

Jon Ponder

Another tale of rank homophobia in professional sports. Just two weeks after retired NBA player Tim Hardaway told an interviewer that he “hated” gay people, campaign finance forms from the 2004 election cycle reveal that Tom Ward and Aubrey McClendon, two of the owners of the NBA Seattle Sonics and the WNBA Seattle Storm, provided nearly 100 percent of the funding, over $1 million, for Americans United to Preserve Marriage a group run by professional homophobe Gary Bauer:

These same millionaires recently asked Washington’s left-leaning legislature for a $300 million tax break.

The campaign finance records I’ve reviewed show that Sonics/Storm co-owner Tom Ward has contributed $475,000 to Gary L. Bauer’s Americans United to Preserve Marriage.

And another Sonics/Storm co-owner, Aubrey McClendon, contributed $625,000.

Both men made their first contributions to the group, $250,000 apiece, on September 8, 2004 — the day after the group was formed.

As I said, the controversial group doled out $1,056,962 in the 2004 election cycle, which means Storm owners Ward and McClendon basically bankrolled the whole thing. Indeed, records show that between the 2004 and 2006 cycles the group spent $1.3 million total while Ward and McClendon’s donations total $1.1 million.

These same millionaires recently sought a huge tax break from the Washington state legislature:

The millionaires who’ve turned to this state’s left-leaning Legislature to authorize a $300 million tax subsidy for a new basketball arena have been playing right-wing politics. Two members of the new Sonics ownership group are heavyweight financiers of a national political group dedicated to banning gay marriage.

A spokesman for the teams’ owners said the two men have a right to their opinions:

“People are entitled to have their views, they are not views that I happen to agree with … but they are not trying to impose them on anyone out here,” [Jim] Kneeland said.

“I won’t argue that some of the owners may have more conservative political views than the norm out here; one of the things that they agreed to when they bought the team is that they would leave their politics at the state line,” Kneeland said. “They have done that. They were not involved in the election cycle out here last year and have no intention of doing so.”

It is a fact of life that gay women are among the biggest fans of women’s sports, so on a marketing level, at the very least, you’d think these bubbas would have more sense than to fund a group the sole purpose of which is to deny rights to gay people.

I doubt you’ll see too many gay women at future Storm games — in fact, the team is likely facing a boycott. As the man said, everyone has a right to their views.

Rightwing Crack-Up: Minuteman Board Says $400k Is Missing – Fires Founder Jim Gilchrist

Jon Ponder

Earlier this month, the board of directors of the Minuteman anti-illegal immigrant group forcibly removed founder Jim Gilchrist as president, saying it found over $400,000 missing from the organization’s bank accounts.

“[When] we talk about the rule of law as an organization fighting illegal immigration, we too as an organization must be in compliance with the rule of law,” Stewart said. “When we allow these things to occur with any organization, we send a message to the public.”

Gilchrist took the matter to court yesterday, asking a judge to reinstate him, and leveling counter-charges at his former allies:

Gilchrist said all money raised by his organization was accounted for and that his critics had leveled false allegations to gain control of the organization. In court papers, he accused his opponents of hacking into the Minuteman website, stealing money from Minuteman bank accounts, diverting other money to funds they control and stealing 20,000 pieces of letterhead and envelopes.

And Guy Mailly, Gilchrist’s attorney, argued in court that the three members on the seven-member board who ousted Gilchrist had no voting power and, if they had, they voted him out without a required quorum.

Minuteman board members say that:

[A] direct mail company helped raise $750,000 for the group in 2006, but that she believes the Minuteman campaign received only $311,000. [New treasurer Deborah] Courtney said she and others had been unable to trace the rest of the money…

Gilchrist’s opponents also allege in interviews that he used Minuteman funds to promote the book he co-wrote — “Minutemen: The Battle to Secure America’s Borders” — but kept the royalties.

They also said he should not have used $13,000 in Minuteman funds to defend himself in court against their allegations. He said the group must pay to defend itself against “rogues.”

Rev. Marvin Stewart, the group’s new president says that Gilchrist’s charisma drew him into the group, but an organization set up to fight something illegal ought to be rigorous about obeying the law. “[When] we talk about the rule of law as an organization fighting illegal immigration, we too as an organization must be in compliance with the rule of law,” Stewart said. “When we allow these things to occur with any organization, we send a message to the public.”

Are you sure you’re a Republican, Rev. Stewart?

Poll: Disapproval of War May Have Hit Tipping Point

Jon Ponder

Your fellow Americans are slowly awakening to the horror Bush has inflicted on the nation:

Sixty-four percent now say the war in Iraq was not worth fighting, up six points from last month to a new numerical high.

A record number of Americans disapprove of the war in Iraq, and a clear majority now favors the eventual withdrawal of U.S. forces, even if civil order has not been restored there — potentially a tipping point in public attitudes on the war.

While solutions remain vexing, for the first time ABC News/Washington Post polls show a narrow majority of Americans support setting a deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. forces. Two-thirds oppose George W. Bush’s troop surge; most oppose it strongly.

It all makes for a continued hard slog for the president: Just 36 percent approve of his job performance overall, very near his career low of 33 percent last month. Bush hasn’t seen majority approval in more than two years — the longest run without majority support for any president since Harry Truman from 1950-53…

Bush is paying the continued price of an unpopular war. Sixty-four percent now say the war in Iraq was not worth fighting, up six points from last month to a new numerical high. (It was 63 percent in October.) A majority hasn’t said the war was worth fighting since April 2004, and it’s been even longer since a majority has approved of how Bush is handling it. Sixty-seven percent now disapprove; 55 percent disapprove strongly.

Did Cheney Use Iran-Contra ‘Lessons Learned’ to Keep Iran War Plans Secret?

Jon Ponder

One revelation in Seymour Hersh’s New Yorker article about Vice Pres. Cheney’s not-so-secret plan to attack Iran bears more scrutiny. It involves Elliott Abrams — a Reagan Administration official who got caught in the Iran-Contra scandal, pleaded guilty to withholding information from Congress and was later pardoned by the first Pres. George Bush.

“One, you can’t trust our friends. Two, the C.I.A. has got to be totally out of it. Three, you can’t trust the uniformed military, and four, it’s got to be run out of the Vice-President’s office.”

With a record like that, it should be no surprise that the current Pres. Bush has every confidence in Abrams, who currently serves as his Deputy National Security Advisor for Global Democracy Strategy. Hersh suggests that Abrams has been helpful, at least indirectly, in providing Cheney and his team with a primer on how to operate secret government operations, as he, Oliver North, John Poindexter and then-Sec. of Defense Caspar Weinberger did during Iran-Contra — but, unlike them, without getting caught:

Iran-Contra was the subject of an informal “lessons learned” discussion two years ago among veterans of the scandal. Abrams led the discussion. One conclusion was that even though the program was eventually exposed, it had been possible to execute it without telling Congress. As to what the experience taught them, in terms of future covert operations, the participants found: “One, you can’t trust our friends. Two, the C.I.A. has got to be totally out of it. Three, you can’t trust the uniformed military, and four, it’s got to be run out of the Vice-President’s office” — a reference to Cheney’s role, the former senior intelligence official said…

[A] Pentagon consultant added that one difficulty, in terms of oversight [over Cheney’s operations], was accounting for covert funds. “There are many, many pots of black money, scattered in many places and used all over the world on a variety of missions,” he said. The budgetary chaos in Iraq, where billions of dollars are unaccounted for, has made it a vehicle for such transactions, according to the former senior intelligence official and the retired four-star general.

“This goes back to Iran-Contra,” a former National Security Council aide told me. “And much of what they’re doing is to keep the agency out of it.” He said that Congress was not being briefed on the full extent of the U.S.-Saudi operations. And, he said, “The C.I.A. is asking, ‘What’s going on?’ They’re concerned, because they think it’s amateur hour.”

As is all too obvious, since we know about the secret plan, either Cheney’s war planners did not follow Abrams’ advice, or they consciously chose to leak their plans in order to unnerve their counterparts in Iran.

In any case, it’s worth noting that Our Liberal Media is completely untroubled by the fact that the U.S. government is set to foment a full-scale sectarian war in the Middle East between between Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia.

“Lessons learned,” indeed.

Cheney Unhurt in Taliban Bomb Attack

Jon Ponder

The Taliban in Afghanistan have claimed credit for a suicide bomb attack on a military base during a visit by Vice Pres. Dick Cheney that killed more than a dozen people. However, Cheney was unharmed:

There were conflicting reports on the death toll. Provincial Gov. Abdul Jabar Taqwa said 20 people were killed, while NATO said initial reports indicated three fatalities, including a U.S. soldier, a South Korean coalition soldier and a U.S. government contractor whose nationality wasn’t immediately known. NATO said 27 people also were wounded.

It was unclear why there was such a large discrepancy in the reports.

Didn’t we vanquish the Taliban before we went in Iraq? Oh, I guess not.

Hersh: Cheney Has Secret Plan to Start War with Iran

Jon Ponder

Iran-Contra redux: New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh has learned that Vice Pres. Cheney has a secret plan to set up an “open confrontation” with Iran. As part of the plan, the Pentagon is now ready to start bombing within 24 hours of a signal from the White House.

The core of the problem is an unintended consequence of another failed Cheney gambit, the invasion of Iraq.

While Pres. Bush is undoutedly aware of Cheney’s plan, which is referred to internally as a “redirection,” according to Hersh, Cheney is firmly in charge:

The key players behind the redirection are Vice-President Dick Cheney, the deputy national-security adviser Elliott Abrams, the departing Ambassador to Iraq (and nominee for United Nations Ambassador), Zalmay Khalilzad, and Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi national-security adviser. While Rice has been deeply involved in shaping the public policy, former and current officials said that the clandestine side has been guided by Cheney…

The fact that Cheney’s activities are being kept secret from the Congress is eerily similar to the Reagan administration’s secret dealings in the Iran-Contra scandal — a fact which may have prompted the recent resignation of John Negroponte, a player in the Contra affair, as National Intelligence Director.

The core of the problem is an unintended consequence of another failed Cheney gambit, the invasion of Iraq. Under Saddam, the Sunni minority controlled Iraq, which made it a stable, if totalitarian, bastion between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran. Democratic elections in Iraq turned control of Iraq over to the Shiite majority, leading to the unintended consequence of an ongoing regional power shift toward Teheran.

This power struggle is being played in the Iraq civil war, where both Shiite and Sunni insurgents are being funded by their respective co-sectarianists in Iran and Saudi Arabia, respectively. The Saudis, with their huge oil reserves, are famously risk-averse however, and they are demanding that Cheney fix what he broke.

As a result, Cheney’s team is rattling its sabers at Shiite-controlled Iran, even though the insurgents killing and wounding U.S. troops in Iraq are primarily Sunnis allied with the Saudis:

“This is all part of the campaign of provocative steps to increase the pressure on Iran. The idea is that at some point the Iranians will respond and then the Administration will have an open door to strike at them.”
— Flynt Leverett, former Bush administration National Security Council official

Flynt Leverett, a former Bush Administration National Security Council official, told me that “there is nothing coincidental or ironic” about the new strategy with regard to Iraq. “The Administration is trying to make a case that Iran is more dangerous and more provocative than the Sunni insurgents to American interests in Iraq, when — if you look at the actual casualty numbers — the punishment inflicted on America by the Sunnis is greater by an order of magnitude,” Leverett said. “This is all part of the campaign of provocative steps to increase the pressure on Iran. The idea is that at some point the Iranians will respond and then the Administration will have an open door to strike at them.”

In the Iran-Contra matter 20 years ago, Congress was kept in the dark about Reagan’s efforts to send weapons and supplies to the Contras. Secrecy was required because Congress had expressly forbidden the administration from dealing with the Contras.

In 2005, a group of Iran-Contra veterans got together in Washington to review “lessons learned.” Elliot Abrams, who was tried, convicted and then pardoned for his role in Iran-Contra, led a session that reached four conclusions about how to run secret government operations without getting caught:

“One, you can’t trust our friends. Two, the C.I.A. has got to be totally out of it. Three, you can’t trust the uniformed military, and four, it’s got to be run out of the Vice-President’s office” — a reference to Cheney’s role, the former senior intelligence official said.

But at least one Iran-Contra figure is opting out, according to Hersh:

I was subsequently told by the two government consultants and the former senior intelligence official that the echoes of Iran-Contra were a factor in Negroponte’s decision to resign from the National Intelligence directorship and accept a sub-Cabinet position of Deputy Secretary of State. (Negroponte declined to comment.)

The former senior intelligence official also told me that Negroponte did not want a repeat of his experience in the Reagan Administration, when he served as Ambassador to Honduras. “Negroponte said, ‘No way. I’m not going down that road again, with the N.S.C. running operations off the books, with no finding.’ ” (In the case of covert C.I.A. operations, the President must issue a written finding and inform Congress.) Negroponte stayed on as Deputy Secretary of State, he added, because “he believes he can influence the government in a positive way.”

Last Sunday, the Times of London reported that a handful of top U.S. military brass had threatened to resign if the U.S. attacked Iran. It is possible their threats were prompted by learning about Cheney’s plan — which, see number three above, is apparently not so secret anymore.

Assuming Seymour Hersh’s reporting is correct, and his track record is among the best — and based on the record of Cheney and Bush from 2002, we have to assume they will start a war in Irans sometime very soon — even though it is hard to fathom, then as now, why they are hellbent on igniting the cataclysm.