Clintons Visit Bomb Site in Jordan

Associated Press:

Former President Clinton, accompanied by his family, on Sunday visited a Jordanian hotel devastated by a suicide bomber, condemning the “destructive terror that murdered children and other innocents.”

He, his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and their daughter, Chelsea, interrupted a visit to Israel to make a brief trip to Jordan at the invitation of King Abdullah II.

The former president spoke while standing in the wrecked hall of the Radisson SAS hotel, where an attacker detonated a belt of explosives during a wedding last week.

He said the family wanted to express “solidarity with the people of Jordan and our support for doing whatever is necessary to fight against and defeat this kind of destructive terror that murdered children and other innocents.”

The Clintons walked over on a bloodied carpet scattered with broken glass, silver knives and napkins.

“These people have no respect for anyone or anything,” Hillary Clinton said of the bombers. “They believe in death and nihilism.”

More Rumors that Bush Is Drinking Again

And this time there’s video. Check out this short reel from Crooks & Liars of recent appearances by Mr. Bush and note the slurring and a wobbly exit from Marine One and the way he throws his arm over Laura’s shoulder.

Sucks to be him. I’d probably start the day with JB & ginger, too, if I were the Worst President Ever.

Here’s a thought: He could resign now, go back to Crawford and get healthy – quit drinking and spend all day working on his abs.

It’s a win-win-win. Bush would get to focus solely on himself, we’d get him out of our lives and the world would be safe from destruction due to his incompetence.

Tutu Supports Gay Bishop

I love this guy:

Sexual orientation is something that cannot be changed, and the Anglican community should support the first openly gay Episcopal bishop, Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu said Saturday during a visit to [Jacksonville’s] University of North Florida.

Archbishop Tutu told about 100 students that consistency is important when speaking out against discrimination, whether based on race, gender or sexual orientation. Immediately after the forum, Tutu explained that he does not understand religious anger over New Hampshire’s gay bishop and expressed his frustration with opponents.

“I am deeply saddened at a time when we’ve got such huge problems … that we should invest so much time and energy in this issue,” he said. “I think God is crying.”

Tutu, 74, returned to UNF, where he taught for a semester in 2003, to receive an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters degree.

WaPo: Bush’s Veteran’s Day Speech Was Filled With Misleading Statements

Lying liars: Everything George Bush knows he learned in grade school. If you’re accused of lying, the best way out is to lie some more – only this time like you really mean it.

That’s what the president did on Friday in his politically laden Veteran’s Day address. Accused of lying about the reasons he took the country to war, the president chose to lie some more – only this time with gusto:

Bush asserted that “more than 100 Democrats in the House and the Senate, who had access to the same intelligence, voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power.” Giving a preview of Bush’s speech, Hadley had said that “we all looked at the same intelligence.”

But Bush does not share his most sensitive intelligence, such as the President’s Daily Brief, with lawmakers. Also, the National Intelligence Estimate summarizing the intelligence community’s views about the threat from Iraq was given to Congress just days before the vote to authorize the use of force in that country.

In addition, there were doubts within the intelligence community not included in the NIE. And even the doubts expressed in the NIE could not be used publicly by members of Congress because the classified information had not been cleared for release. For example, the NIE view that Hussein would not use weapons of mass destruction against the United States or turn them over to terrorists unless backed into a corner was cleared for public use only a day before the Senate vote.

He also fibbed about the results of an investigation into the pre-war intelligence when he “implied that it had been proved that the administration did not manipulate intelligence, saying that those who suggest the administration ‘manipulated the intelligence’ are ‘fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community’s judgments.”

[But the] only committee investigating the matter in Congress, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has not yet done its inquiry into whether officials mischaracterized intelligence by omitting caveats and dissenting opinions. And Judge Laurence H. Silberman, chairman of Bush’s commission on weapons of mass destruction, said in releasing his report on March 31, 2005: “Our executive order did not direct us to deal with the use of intelligence by policymakers, and all of us were agreed that that was not part of our inquiry.”

At least the mainstream media isn’t falling for this Bushit like they did before the war. Better late than never! (Except for service members who was killed in Bush’s bogus war, of course.)

What the Terminator Would Tell Arnold

“It’s always easy to look back. As a matter of fact, you know, if I would do another Terminator movie, I would have Terminator travel back in time to tell Arnold not to have a special election. … I should have also listened to my wife, who said to me ‘Don’t do this.’ But anyway, the bottom line is we did it, the bottom line is that we didn’t win. See how I’m making this glass half-full? We didn’t win. We lost. The bottom line is that we’ve just got to go and now, look at the reality of this (and) shift gears, because in the end, remember I came up here for one reason, and this is to serve the people of California.”

— Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, on the defeat of all of his initiatives in the special election

GOP Reps’ Demands for Coastal Drilling Rebuffed by House Leaders

This is sick:

As the members of the House of Representatives fled Washington … leaving the federal budget process in disarray, lots of spinning was going on. The most remarkable story appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, where Representative Richard Pombo [R-CA] attributed the collapse of the Republican budget process to the fact that, after the House leadership removed Arctic and coastal oil drilling to obtain the votes of moderate Republicans, he and his fellow conservative members of the House Committee on Resources told House Whip Roy Blunt that he could not longer count on their votes for a bill that failed to contain “American energy production.”

Bush Was Very Cranky on Latin America Trip

West Wing leak: Remember how the Bush White House used to be virtually leak-proof about the goings-on around Dear Leader? Well, somebody inside the bubble is talking now. And since it comes from the GOP’s top propagandist in the Capitol, it must be true:

The crowning indignity for Bush was the Friday night state dinner starting at 10 p.m., an hour when the president normally is in bed.

President Bush was furious with the staff preparation for last week’s inter-American summit in Argentina where his trade proposals ran into unexpected opposition.

The president was reported as particularly unhappy with the work by his National Security Council staff in getting ready for the meeting. That added to Bush’s distress in Buenos Aires, dealing with violent street demonstrators and hostile fellow presidents led by Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and including Argentina’s Nestor Kirchner.

The crowning indignity for Bush was the Friday night state dinner starting at 10 p.m., an hour when the president normally is in bed. He left the dinner early, but it was midnight by then.

Bush Defiles Veterans Day Speech with Political Attack

What was he thinking? We can only assume that Bush/Rove message team meant the president’s Veteran’s Day speech today to play to their pro-military base. Maybe it worked. Perhaps using a solemn occasion to launch a counter-attack against his political enemies successfully rallied the hyper-patriotic guts and glorys crowd.

For everybody else, it came across as inappropriate. And that’s the problem with constantly having to shore up your base: You risk alienating Independent voters.

Typically, the president defends himself against charges of lying by telling more lies. From ThinkProgress:

In his speech today, President Bush claimed that members of Congress who voted for the 2002 Iraq war resolution “had access to the same intelligence” as his administration. This is patently false.

Nevermind that much of the intelligence offered to the public and to Congress was inaccurate and misleading, or that according to the Downing Street memo and other documents, such intelligence was likely intentionally “fixed.” It is simply not true to state that Congress received the “same intelligence” as the White House.

ThinkProgress offers back up and sourcing on each of these facts on their site:

  • Dissent From White House Claims on Iraq Nuclear Program Consistently Withheld from Congress:
  • Sen. Kerrey: Bush “Has Much More Access” to Intel Than Congress:
  • Rockefeller: PDBs, CIA Intel Withheld From Senate:
  • War Supporter Ken Pollack: White House Engaged in “Creative Omission” of Iraq Intel:
  • White House Had Exclusive Access to “Unique” Intel Sources:

Jeb Consoles Arnold and Fellow GoOPs

Leave it to Jeb to look on the bright side. Florida News’ Mike Vasilinda, in a blurb called “The Jebinator” quotes the sunny* Florida governor’s words of hope for Arnold and the nation.

Florida’s Governor doesn’t seem to have much political clout on the left coast. Jeb Bush helped California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger raise money to try and pass four constitutional amendments. But voters in the golden state said no to all four, plus 4 others that were on the same ballot. Bush says the terminator didn’t do so well.

“Arnold took it on the chin, but he’s a strong guy and he’ll get up again,” Bush said. “Here’s an example of someone who was doing right in his mind and took on some very powerful interests. And while he didn’t win, I hope that doesn’t discourage him or others to do the same thing. It was…in terms of the Republican Party it’s not a great day, but two Democratic governors were replaced by Democrats. There was no net gain.”

No one said there was, Jebby. But everyone without exception is saying the recent elections showed Republican domination has peaked and is on the way downhill from here. And that sounds like the definition of a “great day” to me.

*Note to non-Floridians: Yes, this is sarcasm.

Who You Callin’ a Republican? Them’s Fighting Words!

How do you smear a progressive Democrat? Call him a Republican. An email, labeled a hoax, proclaims Tom DeLay’s support of Florida candidate for governor and state senator Rod Smith.

How bad is it when the way to make someone else look bad is to say they are like you?

The e-mail sent to Smith supporters mixes crude innuendo with suggestions that Smith — campaigning as a moderate Democrat — is a closet Republican. Smith’s campaign calls the missive “crude and juvenile.”

But the e-mail seeks to poke fun at Smith, who often says he’s the only Democrat in the race who can appeal to Republicans and independents, as well as to conservative Democrats who have fled the party in recent years.

DeLay, the faux e-mail from ”Republican Rod” says, endorsed Smith because of his “reliably conservative voting record.”

Smith’s campaign said it hasn’t spent much time tracking down the origin of the e-mail, which refers to Smith as “The Mallet” — a play on DeLay’s moniker in Congress, “The Hammer.”

Since I am more amenable to the other guy, U.S. Rep. Jim Davis, I would hate to think – and have a hard time believing – his campaign is behind this. They of course deny it.

The really tantalizing thought is that Republican strategists – and there are some nasty ones in Florida – cooked this up. How bad is it when the way to make someone else look bad is to say they are like you?