Author: Trish

Bush Just Keeps Saying the Same Thing: “Trust Me”

Trish

“Some are condemning the plan before it even has a chance to work.”

I don’t know about you but comments like that by Bush and his henchmen Cheney, Limbaugh, and Lieberman are really getting on my nerves. Not to mention this chestnut:

President Bush…said Friday “I’m the decision-maker” about sending more troops to the war.

He still expects us to give his latest idiocy the benefit of the doubt, a chance to work. Try it out, see how it goes. What the hey?

Bush still doesn’t get it. Even after his “thumpin’,” even after congressional Republicans hulked up and started acting like people again by voting their conscience instead of their party, and even after 70 percent of the American people said they disagree with him, he still takes umbrage when his ridiculous conclusions are questioned.

Well wake up, decider, we aren’t taking your word anymore.

White House veterans and analysts say the signs suggest a bunker mentality for a White House frustrated over its efforts to govern and pursue a broader agenda when the administration seems to face criticism of the Iraq War at every turn…

White House insiders, speaking on condition of anonymity, say an intense sense of war fatigue has set in.

Some cite a sense of regret and self-recrimination among White House officials who have evolved from a sense of being unjustly persecuted to a sense that the administration itself made critical mistakes in the conduct of the war that have contributed to the media and public lament.

I would say that from Day One this president has asked us to trust him while presenting nothing but evidence that we should do the exact opposite. I would say that, except he hasn’t asked us to trust him, he’s simply ridiculed and bullied and threatened those who don’t. He’s demanded blind faith while demonstrating incompetence and duplicity and the poorest judgement of the 21st century.

And he still expects us to give his latest idiocy the benefit of the doubt, a chance to work. Try it out, see how it goes. What the hey? After all, what’s really at stake? Only 21,500 men and women with families and loved ones and jobs and futures. Come on, America, just roll those dice. W is. And the only thing bothering him about it all is having to answer to you for it.

With Jeb Out of the Building, Secrets Out of the Closet

Trish

Jeb Bush kept a tight lid on the problems his policies created in Florida while he was in office. But Jeb’s gone now and that famous Florida sunshine is shining in the cracks once so snuggly covered.

Take privatization for example. Even a Republican state senator is appalled at the sweet deal Jeb’s prison contractors enjoyed.

After eight years of Jeb, more people are leaving Florida than moving in

Alarmed by millions of dollars in overpayments the state made to a private prison contractor, a state senator called for a criminal investigation Thursday.

[Sen. Victor] Crist asked the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to look at the contract between GEO Group of Boca Raton and the state Correctional Privatization Commission, which was disbanded in 2004 amid allegations of mismanagement and cronyism.

A 2005 state audit revealed that over an eight-year period GEO Group and Corrections Corporation of America, another private contractor, were overpaid $4.5-million.

The Correctional Privatization Commission also gave GEO $5-million in cost-of-living salary adjustments that, auditors said, were not fully passed on to employees.

At the Quincy facility, Corrections Corp., of Nashville, got $2.9-million more for facility maintenance than it spent.

The news is even worse about Jeb’s other flagships: the “A-Plus” and later, “A-Plus-Plus” education schemes. Starving public schools by diverting taxpayer funding into vouchers for private schools and penalizing budgets based on standardized tests, as well as doing away with affirmative action in public universities were all part of Jeb’s libertarian plan to undermine state-sponsored education.

And it’s all working, though not as Jeb planned. More people are leaving Florida than moving in.

In 2006, what the industry calls “outbound” moves actually surpassed “inbounds,” according to data from United, Atlas and Allied van lines. The industry had seen a steady increase in the number of customers heading out of the state in the past five years.

…The moving company statistics seem to indicate that those who are leaving are likely to be middle- and upper-middle class individuals who can afford moving vans, [University of Florida researcher Jim] Dewey said. They also could be families with children who are unhappy with the state’s funding for K-12 education, he said.

Department of Education statistics appear to support Dewey’s hunch. While state enrollment has grown an average of 51,000 students annually since 1989, regular enrollment in 2005 grew by only about 30,000 children.

The numbers were down again at the start of the 2006 school year, even in districts with normally climbing enrollment such as Orange, Manatee and Palm Beach.

In Pinellas, the decline in student enrollment was nearly twice what the district expected.

The former real estate developer governor’s policies toward growth, or should I say, “Let the party begin!” have also taken a toll.

…the spike in house prices in the last five years in Florida has made coming here less of a bargain.

“It wouldn’t be a surprise to me that there is a temporary slow down,” Dewey said. “Real estate here has gone way up.”

…Scott Brown, chief economist at Raymond James Financial in St. Petersburg, said it’s no exaggeration to say Florida is at a crisis point. “You’re always going to have the weather attracting people, and it’s still a very business friendly environment,” Brown said. “But it’s a difficult issue. It’s a very serious concern for Florida.”

And yet there are those who actually miss Jeb’s trademark sneer. Check back in another year or two and I bet even they will be glad he’s gone.

Florida’s New Jeb Trying to Befriend the Press

Trish

The man who pledged to voters to be as much like Jeb as possible without surgical alterations is making some changes. Gov. Crist-Crossin’ Charlie has changed his mind again, this time for the better.

Reporters’ comfort and happiness were rarely concerns of Bush, who notably locked reporters in his office in 2000

Crist also ended Bush’s tradition of meeting with the media at the bottom of a spiral staircase in the Capitol basement before the biweekly meetings of the Florida Cabinet. The meetings became mini-melees as a dozen or more TV and newspaper reporters crowded Bush. The image on TV stations around the state was similar to a “60 Minutes” encounter, complete with a sense of tension.

Crist has moved those meetings to an office where reporters can sit and the governor can appear more statesman-like with a new sign containing a picture of the Old Capitol behind his podium.

“A little change of venue,” Crist said Thursday. “I wanted to have this [room] open to visit with you, make sure you’re comfortable and you’re happy.”

Reporters’ comfort and happiness were rarely concerns of Bush, who notably locked reporters in his office in 2000 when they wouldn’t leave lawmakers who were staging a sit-in to discuss an issue with Bush.

No Protection for Surge Troops — or the Ones Already There

Trish

The problem with having a commander in chief whose only personal consideration in fighting a war was how to get out it is becoming clearer. Bush keeps sending troops off to fight in his private war of aggression without armor or protection.

Most of the 21,500 troops President Bush has ordered to Iraq as reinforcements will not have access to specialized blast-resistant armored vehicles

…the Pentagon’s effort to protect its troops against roadside bombs is in disarray, with soldiers and Marines having to swap access to scarce armored vehicles and the military unsure whether it has the money or industrial capacity to produce the safe vehicles it says the troops need.

On Jan. 10, The [Baltimore] Sun reported that most of the 21,500 troops President Bush has ordered to Iraq as reinforcements will not have access to specialized blast-resistant armored vehicles because they are in such short supply.

…In congressional testimony and interviews last week, senior Army and Marine Corps officers acknowledged that they are struggling just to meet the needs of service members already in Iraq. Even if the Pentagon can find millions of dollars not currently budgeted, and even if it can find factories to produce the armored vehicles, most U.S. troops in Iraq will not have access to the best equipment available, as President Bush has often promised.

The Army acknowledged last week, for example, that it is still 22 percent short of the armored Humvees it needs in Iraq despite heated criticism in 2004 and 2005 over the lack of armored vehicles. Army officials said it will be another eight months before that gap can be filled.

Maybe part of the problem is the current leadership’s decision to use big-ass, tough-looking Humvees. Didn’t wars used to get won without those?

To augment its fleet of armored Humvees, the military is intent on buying thousands of new armored vehicles whose V-shaped hulls deflect blasts from beneath upwards and outwards, unlike the flat-bottomed Humvees that absorb the blasts. These Mine-Protected Vehicles, or MPVs, designed and manufactured for years by South Africa and other countries, have a proven record of surviving powerful blasts.

Based on requests from commanders in Iraq, the U.S. military needs 6,465 MPVs, according to Lt. Gen. Stephen M. Speakes, the Army’s top supply officer. Under the current program, the first portion of those vehicles wouldn’t be delivered to Iraq until March 2008 or later, even if the services can find the funding.

Let’s hope most of the troops will be elsewhere (and I don’t mean Iran, North Korea, or Afghanistan) by March, 2008.

None of these facts will keep Bush from continuing to lie like a rug. Let’s all pledge to drink a shot during tomorrow night’s State of the Union address every time he mentions how dedicated he is to providing the best protection for our troops in the field.

Ex-FEMA Head Says Bush Targeted Democratic Louisiana Governor

Trish

If Michael Brown is lying, he sure is good at it. Despite White House denials (by a third-tier spokesperson), Brown’s latest tidbits about the handling of Hurricane Katrina — and taking over Louisiana operations — sound awfully credible.

“Certain people in the White House were thinking we had to federalize Louisiana because she’s a white, female Democratic governor and we have a chance to rub her nose in it”

Some in the White House suggested only Louisiana should be federalized because it was run by a Democrat, Gov. Kathleen Blanco, Brown told a group of graduate students at a lecture on politics and emergency management at Metropolitan College of New York.

Brown said he had recommended to President Bush that all 90,000 square miles along the Gulf Coast affected by the hurricane be federalized, making the federal government in charge of all agencies responding to the disaster.

“Unbeknownst to me, certain people in the White House were thinking we had to federalize Louisiana because she’s a white, female Democratic governor and we have a chance to rub her nose in it,” he said…

Blanco reacted sharply on hearing what Brown had said.

“This is exactly what we were living but could not bring ourselves to believe. Karl Rove was playing politics while our people were dying,” Blanco said through a spokeswoman, referring to President Bush’s top political strategist. “The federal effort was delayed, and now the public knows why. It’s disgusting.”

She’s In: Hail Hillary, the Ralph Nader of 2008

Trish

It’s what passes for official. Hillary Clinton has announced she is forming an “exploratory committee” to run for president. Editor’s note: When did this particular euphemism/hedge get adopted? Didn’t people just used to declare they were running? When did they start declaring they were exploring?

Anyway.

The trailblazer doesn’t usually win but she does open a door that never closes in the same way again

It seems to me that by grabbing all the true believers for whom being their idea of right is more important than being elected, Hillary Clinton will be the Ralph Nader of the 2008 elections. By siphoning off primary votes from candidates who stand a chance in the general election, she will lead us to ultimate loss in November.

The woman just has too much baggage all the way around. She will never be forgiven for marrying Bill, for being too secure to pull a Knots Landing/Desperate Housewives/soap opera maneuver and instead determining adultery isn’t a deal breaker for her, and for, as the Dixie Chicks would say, not making nice.

But maybe it’s time for a woman to be a serious contender in a presidential election. Part of me has to hand it to Clinton for being willing to chart this particular territory. What usually happens in these situations is not that the trailblazer wins but that she opens a door that never closes in the same way again.

Check her out here.

Rocket Scientists, Brain Surgeons Agree: End is Near

Trish

Really smart people think, after six years of Bush, the world is in big trouble. But Bush is probably still trying to figure out how to “bring it on” faster.

The world edged closer toward nuclear holocaust and environmental catastrophe, a prominent international group of scientists warned today, moving their symbolic Doomsday Clock ahead two minutes.

“It is now five minutes to midnight,” said Kennette Benedict, executive director of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. “This change reflects the global failures to solve the problems posed by nuclear weapons and by climate change.”

It is now five minutes to midnight on the Doomsday Clock

…The symbolism of the move is significant because the organization, which includes more than a dozen Nobel laureates, has moved the clock only 18 times since it was set to seven minutes to midnight in 1947. The clock has been closer to midnight, two minutes away after the Eisenhower administration tested a nuclear bomb in 1953. But it is also a long way from its most optimistic setting, at 17 minutes to midnight in 1991 following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Today’s change was the first since 2002.

The organization cited North Korea’s recent test of a nuclear weapon, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, a renewed emphasis on military uses and proliferation of nuclear weapons and the presence of 26,000 nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia. The organization added global warming to its concerns, saying in its statement, “the dangers of climate change are nearly as dire as those of nuclear weapons.”

Bush: Iraq “Has Still Got Some Maturation to Do”

Trish

First, Saddam Hussein is executed in such a way that even Bush feels sorry for him. Next, Hussein’s half-brother dies from having his head ripped from his body instead of from hanging. And finally, the United Nations releases an estimate that 34,452 innocent Iraqis died brutally during 2006.

So what does Bush have to say on PBS’s Newshour about how it’s going for Iraq? Oh no, he did-ent.

“…it just goes to show that this is a government that has still got some maturation to do.”

Yeah, he did. And it gets worse.

“No question, 2006 was a lousy year for Iraq.”

Let’s review.

“Lousy” is how Ohio State played against the Florida Gators.

“Lousy” is how Britney’s career has been going lately.

“Lousy” is how I feel the next morning after one too many vodka and néctar de granadillas.

“Lousy” does not even come close to describing the average of 94 random and horrific deaths every day in a country plunged into fear and darkness and violence.

And “lousy” is also how I feel knowing that this idiot isn’t done yet.

Can We Call It a Civil War Yet?

Trish

I think we’re there.

A suicide bomber and a car bomb killed at least 70 people and wounded 169 more at entrances to a once-prestigious university in Baghdad.

The strike at Mustansiriya University was a dual bomb attack. The suicide bomber detonated a vest at the back entrance of the school, and a parked car exploded at the main gate under a pedestrian bridge where students and employees get public transit.

A CNN producer near the scene said police sealed off the area and there were armed members of the Mehdi Army — the militia under the control of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr — on the street.

The university, in northeastern Baghdad, is at the tip of Sadr City, a Shiite neighborhood where there is much support for al-Sadr. It is considered to be a Mehdi militia stronghold.

Meanwhile, gunmen on motorcycles opened fire on a marketplace in the Mehdi Army-controlled Bunouk area of eastern Baghdad and killed 12 civilians. Seven others were wounded.

In the Sadr City neighborhood, a bomb left inside a minivan detonated, killing four people and wounding 10 others, the official said. The blast occurred 100 to 200 meters away from al-Sadr’s main office.

…A bomb exploded near a police convoy along a main road in central Baghdad, the official said. When police and others responded to that blast, a second bomb exploded nearby. At least 15 people were killed and 70 wounded by the two bombs, the official said.

About two hours before that incident, two police officers who helped defuse a car bomb in central Baghdad’s Karrada section were killed when another bomb hidden nearby exploded, the official said. Two civilians were also killed in the blast, and 10 people, including three policemen, were wounded, the official said.

In Baghdad’s western Bayaa neighborhood, two policemen were gunned down as they drove home after work in civilian clothing and car.

Mortar rounds hit a residential area in the Amil neighborhood in western Baghdad, wounding 10 civilians.