Month: May 2007

Bush Admin Creates Big Buzz for Michael Moore’s New Film By Trying to Censor It

Jon Ponder

Just before Al Franken’s book, “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right,” was ready for publication in 2003, Bill O’Reilly became unhappy with the way he was portrayed in the book (even though Franken based the material on direct quotes from O’Reilly himself), and demanded that his employer, Fox News, sue Franken and the book’s publisher.

“The timing is amazing. You would think that we originated this. It reads like a fiction best-seller,” Weinstein said.

The lawsuit was ridiculous. It was also a magnificent backfire, generating the sort of publicity that book publishers cannot buy — turning “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them” into a bestseller, thereby simultaneously exposing and underscoring O’Reilly’s fatheadedness. If only he had followed his own advice: Shut up!

The White House political office, having apparently found nothing instructive in Fox’s experience four years ago, is pursuing a nearly identical strategy today. They are threatening serious civil sanctions against Michael Moore, one of their fiercest critics, charging he violated the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba when he filmed scenes from his new movie there.

The Cuban segment of “Sicko,” Moore’s new critique of the American healthcare industry, hits Bush hard and where it hurts. It follows a group of emergency response workers who contracted respiratory and other illnesses at the World Trade Center after the 9/11 attacks as they travel to Cuba seeking medical attention that no one will provide them in the United States. Ouch.

On the face of it, the government investigation appears to be naked retaliation against Moore, with the clumsy tactical brutality and distinct odor of authoritarianism that has become the Bushies’ trademark. On the bright side, the timing couldn’t be better. The film debuts at the Cannes film festival in about two weeks. Harvey Weinstein, the film’s distributor, can’t believe his luck:

“The timing is amazing. You would think that we originated this. It reads like a fiction best-seller,” Weinstein said. Weinstein said the investigation would only help publicize the film.

If it pursues the case against Moore, the Bush White House may well turn “Sicko” into a bigger hit than “Fahrenheit 9/11,” Moore’s skewering of Pres. Bush’s response to the terror attacks, or his Oscar-winning film, “Bowling for Columbine.”

Another unintended consequence of going after Moore on this issue is that it could reawaken interest in companies with Republican ties that have done business with embargoed countries. Particularly, when Vice Pres. Cheney was CEO of Halliburton, one of its subsidiaries had dealings with Iran.

My First $50 Tank of Gas

Jon Ponder

And the tank wasn’t even completely empty. Fortunately for me, I don’t drive often, maybe once or twice or week, and rarely go more than 10 miles even then. (And, yes, I live in the Los Angeles sprawlplex.)

What is really going on here is a multi-billion-dollar shakedown of the American people by Bush’s cronies.

It’s tempting to think that high gas prices in 2007 were part of the Bush-Cheney-Halliburton agenda when they invaded Iraq in 2003. But like most conspiracy theories around these clowns, that idea gives them way too much credit.

I doubt they invaded hoping to lower gas prices, but the fact that we’re on the brink of $4 a gallon is just another result of their incompetence at both war-making and domestic governance — combined with the fact that George W. Bush doesn’t give a damn.

Rightly or wrongly, Americans used to blame their presidents for high gas prices, and normal presidents would take action, or at least appear to, as a signal of solidarity. But Bush is impervious to public opinion — not just because he’s not up for reelection but because he was born into the aristocracy, and fancies himself a business tycoon. As such, he sees suffering by the little people as simply collateral damage to the greater good of corporate profitability.

Profitability is the salt in the wound, of course. Big Oil’s profits are through the roof. What is really going on here is a massive shakedown of the American people by Bush’s cronies.

The ultimate irony is that Republicans who hate paying taxes don’t feel a similar sense of outrage over paying extra to Big Oil for no reason other to line the pockets of fat cats.

Iraqi Parliament Majority Favors U.S. Withdrawal

Jon Ponder

Our Liberal Media seems desperate to bury this story. Via BuzzFlash.com, I found it buried inside the Washington Post site:

A majority of members of Iraq’s parliament have signed a draft bill that would require a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. soldiers from Iraq and freeze current troop levels. The development was a sign of a growing division between Iraq’s legislators and prime minister that mirrors the widening gulf between the Bush administration and its critics in Congress.

The draft bill proposes a timeline for a gradual departure, much like what some U.S. Democratic lawmakers have demanded, and would require the Iraqi government to secure parliament’s approval before any further extensions of the U.N. mandate for foreign troops in Iraq, which expires at the end of 2007

Florida’s Crist — Crank Up the Death Machine!

Buck Banks

Although Tennessee beat Florida to the punch in dropping its death penalty moratorium by offing a prisoner Wednesday, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist lost no time in getting our great state back on the state-sanctioned murder list. Florida and Tennesse were among 37 states that had suspended killing prisoners because of questions over whether lethal injection was really less painful than, say, hanging by the neck or having a couple million volts of electricity shot into your cranium.

The state has made some changes at Starke, the state penitentiary where we mete out the ultimate punishment in these here parts. They made the death chamber bigger, installed video cameras and locks for the wheels of the gurney, so it doesn’t roll when the injection is made. All that is supposed to get our average time between injection and death back down in the 15-minute range, which is deemed humane, compared with the 34 minutes it took us to off the last guy.

But one thing hasn’t changed — the three-chemical combo that Florida has used for years to put down the ultimate offenders. Turns out it took 34 minutes for Angel Diaz to die, not because of the chemical mix, but because the needle was pushed through his vein and the drugs were absorbed slowly rather than quickly. Besides, we haven’t had any official post-execution complaints about the potion from the guilty ones.

I have a suggestion. Screw the moratorium. Ban execution in the United States. We’ll save piles of money on prosecutions and appeals, the perps will still be terminated in prison and we won’t be a member if the real Axis of Evil — the four nations that account for 92 percent of the world’s executions: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and us.

Sussing Out Bush’s Never-Ending Surge

Buck Banks

Political analyst Craig Crawford equates the pattern the Bush administration has established with Congress with Muhammad Ali’s infamous boxing tactic he used against George Foreman — the “ropa dope.” By laying back on the ropes, Ali was able to prolong the fight until Foreman wore himself out whaling away on him.

The White House might be preparing the way for another “ropa dope” of Congress.

Crawford sees the same kind of tactic at work in George Bush’s surge, which seems to somehow keep getting extended. As Crawford sees it:

Back in December, when Bush announced his new Iraq strategy, his GOP war supporters — and even the White House itself — had pinpointed this summer as the soft deadline for determining whether it is working. But early last month the president announced that the troop boost would not even be completed until June, thus buying a few more months.

House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., among others in their party, are now settling upon September as a deadline. But the White House might be preparing the way for another “ropa dope” of Congress. Yesterday the Pentagon announced that another 35,000 troops were notified that they are likely to be heading to Iraq by December. That suggests that, come September, the White House will be asking for a reprieve until the end of the year — and possibly beyond.

Bush Nominee to Replace Call-Girl Scandal Figure Made Infamous Racist Remarks

Jon Ponder

To replace Randall Tobias, the State Dept. anti-prostitution czar who admitted using the services of the D.C. Madam (and who likened ordering a call girl to ordering a pizza), Pres. Bush has nominated Henrietta Holsman Fore, a California heiress whose record includes an infamous racist harangue:

A Wellesley College trustee’s remark that blacks preferred pushing drugs to working in a factory has precipitated an emotional debate on this bucolic campus already grappling with charges of racial insensitivity…

The trustee, Henrietta Holsman, a 1970 graduate of Wellesley who runs a manufacturing concern in Los Angeles, resigned from the board last weekend after apologizing for her comments, which also cast aspersions on the work ethic of Hispanic and white employees. But in a letter to the college newspaper, Ms. Holsman reiterated her statement that she had trouble keeping black assembly-line workers from going “…back to the street to earn more money … selling drugs.”

In her lecture, Ms. Holsman also said she had found Hispanic workers to be lazy, white workers resentful of having to work with machines, and Asians, while very productive, likely to move on to professional or management jobs. [NYT, 2/12/87]

With a statement like that in her past, naturally Pres. Bush nominated Fore to run human relations for the State Dept., a post she has held since June 2005. Prior to that, she headed the U.S. Mint.

Retired Generals’ Ads Might Be Last Straw on Iraq

Trish

If Bush means what he says about listening to the military, a series of ads featuring retired generals should produce critical mass on Iraq. Brought to us by Vote Vets, the first spot features former Iraq commander Maj. Gen. John Batiste.

Our ads are airing in states and districts of those Members of Congress who are very close to breaking with the President on Iraq, and joining the troops and American people…Mentioning them by name at the end, the local spots will call on them to “Protect America, Not George Bush.”

Batiste comes right out and says he left the armed forces in protest over Bush putting service members at risk for a failed strategy.

Following is a list of the elected officials the ads are aimed at. If one of them belongs to you, remember that nothing makes an impression on a public servant like a call from the folks back home.

They are:

Sen. Susan Collins, Maine
Sen. John Sununu, N.H.
Sen. John Warner, Virg.
Sen. Norm Coleman, Minn.

Rep, Mary Bono, Palm Springs, Calif.
Rep. Phil English, Erie, Penn.
Rep. John “Randy” Kuhl, Bath, N.Y.
Rep. Jim Walsh, Syracuse, N.Y.
Rep. Heather Wilson, Santa Fe, N.M.
Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, Springfield, Mo.
Rep. Tim Johnson, Urbana, Ill.
Rep. Mike Rogers, Brighton, Mich.
Rep. Fred Upton, Kalamazoo, Mich.
Rep. Mike Castle, Wilmington, Del.

Future ads will feature Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton and our personal favorite, Gen. Wesley Clark. Pony up some bucks, if you can, so the spots can be run nationwide.

Breaking: Bush Gets ‘Blunt Talk’ from GOP House Delegation

Jon Ponder
“My district is prepared for defeat.”
— GOP rep to Bush

NBC News is reporting that a delegation of House members called on Pres. Bush yesterday in the private residence of the White House to inform him that he has lost all credibility on the war among their constituents.

Pres. Bush was advised that he and his spokespersons should stop making claims about progress in Iraq altogether. One of the congressmen told him, “We need candor. We need honesty, Mr. President.”

Here’s a rough transcript of the NBC News report:

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