Day: May 11, 2006

HUD Secretary Reassures the Public. Gee, I Feel So Much Better

Trish

PR’s Buck noted yesterday the boasting by Bush’s HUD secretary, Alphonso Jackson. Jackson proudly told a forum of Texas realtors that he pulled a HUD contract because the recipient did not support Pres. Bush.

Today, he says sorry, he was only kidding. A.P.:

Jackson, seeking to avoid a political firestorm, said he made up the story.

“I deeply regret the anecdotal remarks I made at a recent Texas small business forum and would like to reassure the public that all HUD contracts are awarded solely on a stringent merit-based process,” he said in a statement. “During my tenure, no contract has ever been awarded, rejected or rescinded due to the personal or political beliefs of the recipient.”

It’s the old courtroom question. “Are you lying now, Sec. Jackson, or were you lying then?” I’m betting the answer is, “All of the above.”

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) wants Jackson investigated.

A Major Win for Al Qaeda: Bush’s NSA Has Obtained Phone Records of Millions of U.S. Citizens

Jon Ponder

Bush Lied about Scope of Domestic Spying And Then Shut Down Investigation into Unconstitutional Program

On the same day that we learn that President Bush’s National Security Administration (NSA) has engaged all the major U.S. telecoms except one — Qwest — in data mining of millions of phone records for U.S. citizens, we also learn that the administration has closed down an investigation into the NSA by refusing to give investigators the required clearances:

“We have been unable to make any meaningful progress in our investigation because OPR has been denied security clearances for access to information about the NSA program,” OPR counsel H. Marshall Jarrett wrote to Hinchey. Hinchey’s office shared the letter with The Associated Press.

With the revelation that President Bush has spied on millions of U.S. citizens, we can add another lie to the mile-high pile of half- and un-true public statements by George W. Bush:

I authorized a terrorist surveillance program to detect and intercept al Qaeda communications involving someone here in the United States. This is a targeted program to intercept communications in which intelligence professionals have reason to believe that at least one person is a member or agent of al Qaeda or a related terrorist organization. The program applies only to international communications. In other words, one end of the communication must be outside the United States.

The objective of al Qaeda is to subvert and destroy the United States. With today’s revelations, we see that Osama bin Ladin has played President Bush for the fool that he is — manipulating Bush’s native aristocratic tendencies, goading him toward fascism and thus the subversion of American laws, as well as American ideals, including restrictions that bar the government from interfering in the personal business of its citizens.

Fortunately for President Bush, the country is in a malaise brought on by outrage fatigue over the incessant revelations of the incompetence of his administration. A normal president would have been tarred and feathered and run out of town by now.