Author: Trish

I Owe $30,000 — And So Do You

Trish

I just found out I’m deeper in the red than I thought. But at least I’m not alone. Every single American is right there with me, thanks to a Senate vote today to increase the national debt to $9 trillion. We’re all paying the price for Bush’s bad decisions, like tax breaks for the rich, pre-emptively going to war in Iraq and a delayed response to Hurricane Katrina.

It’s the fourth such move increasing the debt limit by a total of $3 trillion since Bush took office five years ago.

The measure allows the government to pay for the war in Iraq and finance Medicare and other big federal programs without raising taxes. It passed hours before the House was expected to approve another $91 billion to fund the war in Iraq and provide more aid to hurricane victims.

The partisan vote also came as the Senate continued debate on a $2.8 trillion budget blueprint for the upcoming fiscal year that would produce a $359 billion deficit for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.

…It’s the fourth such move increasing the debt limit by a total of $3 trillion since Bush took office five years ago.

So how much is $9 trillion? Well, it’s got 12 zeros, but…

“It’s hard to understand what a trillion is. I don’t know what it is,” confessed Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg, a New Hampshire Republican, this week when debating the government’s staggering fiscal obligations.

This is so going to screw up my credit rating…
Comment by: mikefromtexas

It doesn’t help that the standard hand-held calculator comes nowhere close to computing numbers in the trillions. About the best it can do is 99,999,999.

John Nolan, a mathematics professor at American University in Washington, said… “But in terms of practical numbers it’s just overwhelming.”

So he conjured up a spending spree, something Americans might be able to relate to. “If you spent a million dollars a day for a million days (2,739 years),” you’d hit $1 trillion, Nolan observed…

The federal government has been on a spending binge. Just since 2002, the Republican-controlled Congress has had to hike the Treasury Department’s credit card limit four times, for a total of more than $3 trillion.

Allowing Bush’s tax cuts in the first place was idiotic but continuing to squander America’s former wealth this way is criminal. The worst part is we’re all going along with it. Is it O.K. if I post-date my check?

Bush Apparently Unaware He Ran For Office, Not Sure of City Where He Lives

Trish

Somebody hand this brain trust a mirror: I couldn’t believe my ears when Bush said this in his “Things are great in Iraq” speech yesterday.

And my decisions on troop levels will be made based upon the conditions on the ground, and the recommendations of our military commanders — not artificial timetables set by politicians here in Washington, D.C.

Hello? Anybody home? Will someone please tell our president that he holds the highest — let me just pause for emphasis here — elected office in the land, which he “won” by running against other people who ran, and these people who run for offices in our country are referred to as “politicians.”

Also, not to put too fine a point on it, but the White House is located right where all those politicians are, in Washington, D.C. That means Bush, who lives in the White House (for now), is in Washington, D.C.

Let’s review: the decisions on troop levels in Iraq will be made a politician in Washington, D.C.

Jeez.

Bush Team Can’t Even Make an Ironclad Case Stick: Moussaoui to Avoid Death Due to Govt Bungling

Trish

Let’s face it. Even if Bush Co. found bin Laden, they’d probably still blow it, just as they are with Zacarias Moussaoui.

“In all the years I’ve been on the bench, I’ve never seen such an egregious violation of the court’s rule on witnesses,” U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema said…

Brinkema said a lawyer for the Federal Aviation Administration had violated the rule by reading the transcript of the first day of the trial and discussing the case with several potential witnesses who were due to be called by both the prosecution and the defense…

The defense already had requested a mistrial following an error by the government during the questioning of an FBI witness.

“This is the second significant error by the government affecting the constitutional rights of this defendant,” Brinkema said. “More importantly, it affects the integrity of the criminal justice system of the United States.”

Obama Zings Cheney at Gridiron Dinner

Trish

Sen. Barak Obama (D-Ill.) got some great ones off at the annual Gridiron Club dinner in Washington Saturday night.

“The truth is, I’m terrified to be here,” Obama said…They’re serving drinks and I’m standing about 30 yards from the vice president.”

At the Gridiron Club dinner, with President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney a few seats away, Obama delivered the Democratic response to an audience of hundreds of journalists and dignitaries Saturday evening…

“The truth is, I’m terrified to be here,” Obama said at the beginning of his remarks. “Not because you’re such a tough audience, but because they’re serving drinks and I’m standing about 30 yards from the vice president.”

“Mr. Vice President, I know you came here expecting to be a target, which, it turns out, may prove easier for you than shooting at one,” Obama said. “But I do want to thank you. For years, we Democrats have succeeded in doing little more than shooting ourselves in the foot.

“You’ve taught us a valuable lesson,” Obama added. “Aim higher.”

Even Bush took a shot, so to speak, at Cheney.

…the president said with a laugh, adding that the media blew the incident out of proportion. “Good Lord, you’d thought he shot somebody or something.”

Bush’s Chief Domestic Policy Advisor Resigns to Spend More Time With His Family — Scamming Target

Trish

If, unlike my friend Cathy, you haven’t been involved with exposing abstinence education for the evil, judgmental, pregnancy- and STD-producing sham that it is, the name Claude Allen might not mean that much to you.

On the other hand, it should.

Claude, also hailed as the New Clarence Thomas, was until recently George Bush’s chief domestic policy advisor. Shortly after Democrats blocked Allen’s nomination for an appeals court judgeship, Bush appointed him to his staff. Bill Berkowitz summed Allen up nicely.

“The man was then seen selecting merchandise throughout the store and placing items in the Target bag…The man then went to guest services where he produced a receipt and received a refund for the items he had just selected from the store shelves.

Careerwise, Claude Allen has come a long way from honing his political chops as the first African American aide to Jesse Helms, North Carolina’s long-time rabid right wing Senator. But he hasn’t moved very far from the politics or ideology of his former boss…Now, after nearly four years serving as Tommy Thompson’s Deputy Secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services, Allen has been promoted…

In a recent piece for the LA Weekly, veteran journalist Doug Ireland described Allen as “a notorious homophobe, a ferocious enemy of abortion and an opponent of safe-sex education who for years has been one of the AIDS community’s principal enemies.” Allen is also an outspoken opponent of abortion, even in cases of rape or incest, and a champion of abstinence-only sex education programs.

When Allen announced his resignation last month — citing the old chestnut about spending more time with his family — speculation was far and wide but not even Wonkette could anticipate the ridiculous reality.

It’s possible Allen left on his own accord, but the abruptness makes it rather unlikely. We have no clue, actually, why the hell he’d be forced out, especially now, when one might think Bush would want to refocus on “morality” in preparation for a midterm election which has thus far looked pretty lousy for the party…

But hell. He’s a morality-issues Christian-right Republican. So he’s probably a drug-addicted gambling gay adulterer with illegitimate children. But if anyone has proof (or a different theory, or idle speculation), we’re dying to hear it.

Oh, so close! But truth is stranger than fiction, Wonkette.

[…]

Nashville Didn’t Kick the Chicks — Can You Say “Texas?”

Trish

Fellow PR editor Jon posted today on the three-year anniversary of the defamation of the Dixie Chicks. Jon wonders, “if the Bush worshippers in the Nashville music establishment treat the unofficial king and queen of country the same way they treated the Dixie Chicks.”

Jon asks an excellent question, but there’s one problem: you go have to a lot further south than Nashville to find the guys who dropkicked the Chicks.

For one thing, the Dixie Chicks are all women, not one of America’s favorite straight couples.

Leading the charge was Atlanta-based Cumulus Media — the second largest owner of radio stations in the country — which banned the Chicks, then held the first of many rallies across the country in Shreveport, La. (just across the Texas state line) in which bulldozers smashed Chicks CDs, posters, etc.

Jumping on the bandwagon and riding it from sea to sea was Clear Channel, mega mega owner of the airwaves, which held onto the issue — and the Dixie Chicks — with a death grip.

Clear Channel is also not based in Nashville, but in sunny San Antonio, which I should mention, is in Texas. SourceWatch.org has the 4-1-1 on Clear Channel.

“The vice chairman of Clear Channel is Tom Hicks… When Mr. Bush was governor of Texas, Mr. Hicks was chairman of the University of Texas Investment Management Company, called Utimco, and Clear Channel’s chairman, Lowry Mays, was on its board. Under Mr. Hicks, Utimco placed much of the university’s endowment under the management of companies with strong Republican Party or Bush family ties. In 1998 Mr. Hicks purchased the Texas Rangers in a deal that made Mr. Bush a multimillionaire.”

“In addition, Hicks steered a controversial scheme to use the University of Texas’ $13 billion endowment for private investment. Among the beneficiaries were the Carlyle Group, the arms investment firm tied to both George Bush Snr and the bin Laden family, and George W Bush’s controversial Harken Oil drilling project in Bahrain.”

[…]

Next Texas Governor Might Hold a Grudge Against DeLay

Trish

Texas politics is so interesting, it’s easy to see why George W. Bush hopped a taxpayer-funded plane home to vote today. Consider the governor’s race.

Former U.S. Rep. Chris Bell appears to have easily won the Democratic primary. Were Bell to take the governor’s mansion this fall, it would be a particularly sweet victory, since he was knocked from office after only one term by Tom DeLay’s nefarious redistricting scheme, currently up for review by the Supreme Court.

If Bell does win, he’ll have to face these challengers:

  • Republican Gov. Rick Perry, long rumored to be involved in extramarital affairs with people of both genders, and signer of the state’s Defense of Marriage Act.
  • Carole Keeton Strayhorn, better known as White House Spokestool Scott McClellan’s mom. Yes, she’s had more husbands than just Scottie’s dad, but then, that’s why we need to defend marriage. She’s running not as a Republican, but as an Independent.
  • A Libertarian named James Werner out of Austin.
  • Our favorite perennial candidate: Kinky Friedman, former rock star and very bad mystery writer. Friedman, for the younger PR readers out there, once toured the country with Bob Dylan and a band called the Texas Jewboys, which had a hit, “Asshole from El Paso.”

Kinky brings up another interesting Texas political fact. When Gov. Perry signed a bill banning same-sex marriage in 2005, he invited religious leaders for a photo op, including a “rabbi” of the Jews for Jesus variety as the representative for real Jews. He was later forced to apologize.

The day might not be far off when he’ll have to do more than say he’s sorry — he might have to pack his bag and get on down the road.

While Texans Vote His Fate, DeLay Hits on Lobbyists

Trish

Texans could vote to end the reign of Tom DeLay today. Let’s all send good vibes their way.

How is DeLay spending what could be the day that ends his reign? Like all the others: trying to get more money from lobbyists

Meanwhile, how is Tom spending this day? Pretty much like all his other days in office: trying to get more money from lobbyists.

DeLay, a Houston-area Republican, faces three opponents in the Republican primary.

It’s his first election since being forced out of his job as House majority leader amid corruption and campaign finance scandals…

DeLay won’t be campaigning Tuesday, a spokeswoman said he’ll be casting votes. He’ll also be attending a Washington fundraiser being held by lobbyists.

Katherine Harris Says Campaign is A-OK as She Cancels Stops and Grabs a Bus with Sean Hannity

Trish

While her U.S. Senate campaign rains down in chunks around her head, Florida U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris proves she can be as untethered to reality as the man she put in the Oval Office.

At the same time she cancelled campaign stops in Southwest Florida, Harris placed a conference call to supporters telling them things are so great, she�s practically picking out wallpaper for her new office.

She said television talk show host Sean Hannity is planning a Florida bus tour with her. “The campaign is really off to the races,” Harris said.

�Harris described a campaign on a roll and gaining momentum daily. She said prominent politicians, such as U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., hosted a fundraising event for her in Washington last week, proof all is well.

Back in the real world, evidence that Harris accepted bribes from the same defense contractor as California’s Rep. Duke Cunningham (whose new address is c/o Federal Prison, Taft, Calif.) continues to erode her already tenuous GOP support.

“She can’t hide and expect this to go away,” said David Johnson, a Republican political consultant�

Harris’ campaign staff declined to comment and gave no explanation of why Harris canceled the trip. They did not say how many other events were taken off her schedule.

Trying to avoid reporters is the hands-on favorite possible explanation. Harris has always had a poor relationship with the press, accusing it of doctoring live T.V. coverage during the 2000 presidential election swindle so that her makeup looked bad.

Once again, she claims the only problem is journalists.

“There is nothing to it except for the press trying to be negative.”

Yeah, that. And bribery.

[…]

PR Editor Jon Striken With Flu

Trish

If it seems a little quiet around the halls of Pensito Review, it’s because PR Editor Jon — fully one-half of our three-person team — was stricken with an exotic California disease earlier this week.

After first making sure with resident expert PR Editor Buck that what Jon, a vegetarian, has is not bird flu, he valiantly submitted to recommendations for various rememdies from both Trish and Buck. Airborne and Emergen-C were both praised, while Zicam was panned.

Later, realizing Jon is after all in California, Buck suggested he avail himself of local custom and have his chakras adjusted, his chi energy redirected, and the feng shui of his apartment realigned.

On a note of familial pride, Jon is to be commended for vigilantly avoiding OTC rememdies that interfere with the body’s natural drinking process.

If you have a favorite flu cure, or just want to send a note of condolence, please post it now.