what bush has done away from the public eye

most people aren't watching the EPA or NASA as the bush (mid)administration obliterates rules that fit their warped sense of design and purpose.

The NYT reports below the fold that NASA's chief called for "scientific openness" throughout the organization. The story updates the paper's earlier front-page scoop that some NASA scientists say they were being urged to tone down or edit reports to match Bush administration thinking on climate change and the big bang. The LAT reports inside that the EPA's internal advisory committee is furious that the agency's new rules on smog aren't tougher.

Letter(s) Of The Day

today we're treated to two, both on the same topic: democrat leadership? what leadership?

Molly Ivins, in her Jan. 21 column, perfectly describes my feelings about the Democrats in Congress ("Grow Some Spines, Democrats, and Maybe You'll Win"). I have been a lifelong Democrat and have never been so frustrated with politics and politicians.

Ivins is correct. The Bush administration has bullied its way through these past several years in office and shows no sign of stopping. The Democrats only seem able to stand around and wring their hands. The first person who stands up espousing the beliefs of the majority of Americans will get my support.

—Anne Webber, West Des Moines.

and

Yes, Molly Ivins, your call to Democrats to stand up and be heard is desperately needed. The "political center" is an illusion. It is where you go when you win an election based on your values. Then, you move toward center because you now represent your base and those who did not vote for you.

The current administration has not done that. It has divided the country by moving toward the right and not recognizing the needs of those who voted against it.

Democrats, silence is not golden. Shout out the outrage you must feel at what is happening to our America. Being careful lost two elections. We must not lose another one. "Liberal" is a good word.

Republicans, you were once a respected party. You must be aware of what is happening: lies about Iraq, allowing the the use of torture, destruction of the environment, spying on innocent Americans, the hate that other countries now feel about us, threats of further invasions. Where is your outrage?

—I. G. Shadduck, West Des Moines.

attribution

Joke of the Day

HEADLINE: Bush says he understands Americans' worries

http://www.irishexaminer.com/breaking/story.asp?j=73308084&p=733x8386&n=73308464

FARPOINT.FACTOID

Currently, the Defense Department says it is spending about $4.5 billion a month on the conflict in Iraq, or about $100,000 per minute.

Current spending in Afghanistan is about $800 million a month, or about $18,000 per minute.

--SOURCE

cop sues cop

from the nytimes:

Now the officers, through their union, are suing the city, charging that the police procedures at their demonstrations — many of them routinely used at war protests, antipoverty marches and mass bike rides — were so heavy-handed and intimidating that their First Amendment rights were violated.

remember, whatever the whitehouse says, think opposite

the White House's new commitment to alternative energies:

The Energy Department will begin laying off researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the next week or two because of cuts to its budget. ... The budget for the laboratory, which is just west of Denver, was cut by nearly 15 percent.

i guess the times today goes on with explaining that most of the responsibility lies with congress.

what happened to supporting the troops?

Nobody fronts Iraq, where the U.S. reported the deaths of four GIs and a Marine. And about a dozen Iraqis were killed by two closely coordinated car bombings in Baghdad. The NYT calls it the "worst attack in the capital in weeks."

--today's papers

i guess 'the worst attack in the capital in weeks' doesn't merit front page news any more .... how sad.

Letter Of The Day

fter reading Philip Schneider's fearful screed about Iran's (non-existent, minimum-10-years-off) nuclear threat (Jan. 17 letter), I was left to sadly concede one fact: America has ceased to be the "home of the brave." We are now the "home of those who send others' children to die and kill anything that scares us a little." At least during the Cold War, we feared a nation that posed some semblance of a threat to us. Today we fear anyone who says "Boo" too loudly. I hope Schneider is going to send a good deal of his kin to Iran for the invasion so my son can stay home this time.

-Larry Wohlgemuth, Vietnam-era veteran, Ankeny.

attribution

IT'S CALLED COVER-UP

The prosecutor in the criminal case against U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff said in a Jan. 23 letter not all e-mail was archived in 2003, the year President George W. Bush's administration exposed the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame.

Lawyers for defendant Lewis (Scooter) Libby this week accused prosecutors of withholding evidence the Libby camp said it needs to mount a defence.

"We are aware of no evidence pertinent to the charges against defendant Libby which has been destroyed," Fitzgerald wrote in a letter to the defence team.

But the prosecutor added: "In an abundance of caution, we advise you that we have learned that not all e-mail of the Office of Vice-President and the Executive Office of the President for certain time periods in 2003 was preserved through the normal archiving process on the White House computer system."

--SOURCE

from knight-ridder

One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.

--source

HE LIED!

new fact check makes some interesting reading

from factcheck.org, the one cheney used in his debate with edwards in 2004.

The President left out a few things when surveying the State of the Union:
He proudly spoke of "writing a new chapter in the story of self-government" in Iraq and Afghanistan and said the number of democracies in the world is growing. He failed to mention that neither Iraq nor Afghanistan yet qualify as democracies according to the very group whose statistics he cited.
Bush called for Congress to pass a line-item veto, failing to mention that the Supreme Court struck down a line-item veto as unconstitutional in 1998. Bills now in Congress would propose a Constitutional amendment, but none have shown signs of life.
The President said the economy gained 4.6 million jobs in the past two-and-a-half years, failing to note that it had lost 2.6 million jobs in his first two-and-a-half years in office. The net gain since Bush took office is just a little more than 2 million.
He talked of cutting spending, but only "non-security discretionary spending." Actually, total federal spending has increased 42 percent since Bush took office.
He spoke of being "on track" to cut the federal deficit in half by 2009. But the deficit is increasing this year, and according to the Congressional Budget Office it will decline by considerably less than half even if Bush's tax cuts are allowed to lapse.
Bush spoke of a "goal" of cutting dependence on Middle Eastern oil, failing to mention that US dependence on imported oil and petroleum products increased substantially during his first five years in office, reaching 60 per cent of consumption last year.

something i didn't know was going on

that there are lawmakers with lobbyist spouses running amok in washington. whining because they're about to lose gym privileges.

gosh, and there are people going hungry with the cuts they're proposing.

bush has fought tooth and nail

everytime congress wants to investigate something. 9/11 commission, the katrina commission, and now the spying on Americans scandal.

The NYT off-leads the White House refusing to give the Senate its internal legal opinions on the warrantless spying program. The Judiciary Committee is going to have hearings next week on the spying, and Democrats along with, apparently, the Republican chairman Specter want the docs. "I don't think they're coming out," said a DOJ official.

--from slate's today's papers

so, the republicons are out conning everybody

into thinking that bush is serious about cutting the deficit. in fact, with the $40 billion in cuts to student loans and medicaid, republicons are out making a big spectical of themselves, like this:

"American taxpayers, and anyone concerned with the nation's long-term fiscal stability, have won a great victory today."

but when you add in the tax cuts, there's actually $16 billion ADDED to the deficit. republicons. conning their way thru life.

Cartoon of the Day

http://content.todayscartoons.uclick.com/?feature=50783c5ea63744a09fc36b8d291f1e7f

Letter Of The Day

In his speech President Bush said, "I urge Congress to act responsibly and make the tax cuts permanent." The interest on the debt right now is equivalent to 40 percent of all the personal income taxes paid each year.

("But the responsible thing is to make the cuts for the wealthy permanent and borrow even more billions to do it. Because I'm the president and I can tell you up is down or down is up or we don't torture and what are you going to do about it? Heh, heh, heh.")

Bush also said, "Hindsight alone is not wisdom, and second-guessing is not a strategy." ("So please don't criticize me for cutting short my vacation and flying back to Washington to save Terri Schiavo, but not when I was given a report titled 'Osama bin Laden Determined To Strike Inside the United States.' " With Schiavo, I was relying on Majority Leader Bill Frist's tele-diagnosis that she was not brain-dead. With bin Laden, all I had to go on was the CIA.")

-Alan L. Light, Iowa City.

attribution

haha

Bush saying we need to break our addiction to oil is like the neighborhood drug dealer complaining that the kids on his block are a bunch of junkies.
--InsultComicDog

attribution

is American finally waking up?

Democrat Mark R. Herring overwhelmed Republican David. M. Mick Staton Jr. today to win a special election in a GOP-leaning Loudoun County and western Fairfax County Senate district. With 50 of 52 precincts reporting, the unofficial results in the 33rd District were: Herring, 12,379 votes, or 62 percent. Staton, 7,688, or 38 percent.

--source

so, i'm lazy, retreating and negative?

i'm only negative when i talk about bush.

something else i wanna remember

bush's call to reduce dependence on middle eastern oil by 75% comes with this lil' caveat:

Since Bush took office, net foreign imports have risen from 53 percent to 60 percent. By focusing on his goal of reducing use of Middle Eastern oil by 75 percent, he singled out the share that is not rising. Oil from the Persian Gulf region now represents 11 percent of U.S. oil consumption, less than when Bush was inaugurated.

a thief operates in the night

from slate:

Many of us had never heard of a presidential signing statement until last month, when Bush used one to eviscerate the McCain Anti-Torture bill he claimed to endorse. We all saw the big Oval Office reconciliation with McCain; we heard Bush say he was dropping his opposition to the bill, which passed with broad bipartisan support (90-9 in the Senate, 308-122 in the House) and made it illegal for Americans to engage in the "cruel, inhuman and degrading" treatment of detainees held here or abroad. What we missed was the actual signing ceremony, which took place two weeks later, at 8 p.m. on Dec. 30.

Unless you spent New Year's weekend trolling the White House Web site or catching up on your latest U.S. Code Congressional and Administrative News as you waited for the ball to drop, you probably missed the little "P.S." the president tacked onto the McCain anti-torture bill. The postscript was a statement clearly announcing that the president will only follow the new law "in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the president to supervise the unitary executive branch ... and consistent with the constitutional limitations on the judicial power." In other words, it is for the president—not Congress or the courts—to determine when the provisions of this bill interfere with his war-making powers, and when they do, he will freely ignore the law.

why dont people just do something easy

every time bush speaks, think of him as saying something that is just the opposite of what he plans to do.

what iowans are sayin about last night's speech

http://blogs.dmregister.com/?p=797

Letter Of The Day

Administration officials recently fanned out across the media landscape to tell us that we should be thankful the president believes that he alone should determine which Americans need to be spied upon by their government.

While the academic legal community is virtually united in its belief that the Bush spying program is illegal and unconstitutional, political operatives for the White House hope to convince "average" Americans they should be glad.

But the president's extraordinary claim to power begs three questions we should demand answered before agreeing to this radical transfer of power:

First, since the National Security Agency can spy on Americans for 72 hours before telling a judge about it, how is the involvement of federal judges a problem?

Secondly, if a president can ignore federal laws he alone determines to be unconstitutional, how can he ever break the law? And why give this or any future president this unchecked power when it doesn't appear necessary?

-R. Ben Stone, executive director, American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, Des Moines.

and

We don't help companies meet their social responsibility when we give them tax breaks as revealed in the Jan. 20 article regarding Rockwell Collins ("Rockwell Gets $11 Million in State Aid"). The wealth of the corporation is supposed to strengthen the community by contributing to the health, education and welfare of the community, not weaken it. Free markets work morally when those who gain from it share their revenues with all.

-The Rev. Denny Coon, Des Moines.

attribution

the trouble with medicare part D

is that nobody's on the same page.

i'm on the phone with cms now and he had to wait at last :20 now

:30 now

what amazes me is how unprepared they all are. from the pharmacist down to the clerk at the other end of the phone. these lawmakers made a mess of things with this thing, and it's going to blow up in their faces at election time.

what has happened is the little guy's prescription bill has doubled from $1 co-pay for generic to $2 co-pay for generic (from $3 co-pay for brandname to $5 co-pay), while the more fortunate see their costs go down.

unbelieveable, but then again, we have a republican administration in charge.

Quote of the WeeQ

"It now appears that the Attorney General was not being straight with the Judiciary Committee and he has some explaining to do,"
--Senator /Russell Feingold (D-Wis)

attribution

in their own words

"Iraqis are demanding a timetable for U.S. withdrawal, and most believe that the U.S. has no plans to leave even if the new government asks them to," said Steven Kull, the director of the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, which conducted the poll. "This appears to be leading some to even support attacks on U.S.-led troops, even though many feel they also continue to need the presence of U.S. troops awhile longer."

"If you put it all together, it's clear there is a center of gravity, not towards immediate withdrawal, but for the U.S. to be there in a way that affirms their intent to withdraw eventually," he said. "There is real consensus on that point."

NO SHIT SHERLOCK

they do not want us there longer than necessary, and i'm sure the majority of the iraqis also believe that America never did have any exit strategy. they don't plan on abandoning their investment. gimme a break. these are republicons. they bought and paid for iraq how many times over?

what do the anti-abortion folx really want?

more women going underground to have abortions? because, just because the right thinks abortion is wrong, doesn't make it so.

and that's the problem we're heading into .... getting to where just because they say so, it's supposed to make it so. that's arrogance to the upteenth level.

but it just dawned on me that abortions are going to happen, legal or not. what about the women who's pregnancy isn't wanted. should she have to suffer just because someone's morals were tweaked? that's arrogance to the uptennth level.

that's the reich-wing junta. that's the RNC.

today's papers, what a hoot it was today

i'm quoting from today's papers a lot today because, frankly, they deserve every recognition they can get. they're usually not as great as they were today... maybe it's just all the right headlines that came to pass. but today's papers is a must read. every day.

for once, PROOF that bush did it

The WP notes inside that the few safety improvements federal mine regulators are now considering might sound familiar. That's because they were among the "18 proposed safety rules" already in the pipeline in 2001 that the "Bush administration abandoned or delayed implementation of."

when we don't know who we kill

isn't it about time we either change guns, or put them down?

As the WP fronts, al-Qaida big dog Ayman Zawahiri shows up in a video taunting President Bush and, more important, proving he wasn't killed in the U.S. airstrike earlier this month that targeted him. CBS News has this intriguing rollback: "Now U.S. officials say they just aren't sure who they killed that day."
(also from today's papers)

Quote of the Day

"It would be a mistake to view the collective will of the Palestinian people in electing Hamas in fair and free elections under occupation as a threat. For meaningful dialogue to occur there should be no prejudgments or preconditions. And we do desire dialogue."
-- Mousa Abu Marzook

it only seems fair to be sure to pass along the short bio the post used:

The writer is deputy political bureau chief of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas). He has a U.S. doctorate in engineering and was indicted in the United States in 2004 as a co-conspirator on racketeering and money-laundering charges in connection with activities on behalf of Hamas dating to the early 1990s, before the organization was placed on the list of terrorist groups. He was deported to Jordan in 1997.

attribution

i'm sorry, but those words didn't seem to come from a terrorist.

does this mean bush is now playing nice

and negotiating with other countries, like... um, a professional? one with some sense of give-and-take? with emphasis on the give? also from today's papers

The deal on Iran was made at a diplomats confab in London, where the U.S., EU, U.N., and Russia also agreed that they won't hand money over to a new Hamas-led government unless Hamas recognizes Israel and renounces violence. Which, again, was fudgier than it seems: The diplomats all agreed that aid can continue so long as a caretaker government is in place. And the BBC sees even more of a fudge factor, saying the diplomats didn't demand immediate action from Hamas but rather "a commitment to these things in the future."

then, i saw the next paragraph:

The Post, which off-leads the Hamas bargaining, calls the deal a "compromise position between U.S. officials and their European counterparts."

ahhh, so it wasn't really bush's doing at all in the first place. europe pushed him.

then there's the following paragraph:

The Palestinian government is almost totally dependent on foreign aid, largely from Europe. (The Post mentions in passing that "little U.S. aid" goes directly to the Palestinian government.)

since they get very little money from us, why would we think they would bend to our every whim?

understatement of the day

in bold:

USA Today's lead previews a House Republican proposal that would force Native American tribes to abide by the same campaign-finance restrictions as corporations and unions. As it stands, the tribes can basically give unlimited contributions. Sure would have been nice if USAT had explained why Republicans landed on this proposal.
--

today's papers

listen to this from a bush sympathizer

"He isn't afraid to take a stand for what he believes in," Brady said. "He does what he thinks is right."
--source

soooo, that's all it takes for this bush sympathizer to gleen about her president? why, she should also be praising osama bin laden, if that's her qualifications.

Letter Of The Day

George W. Bush is a petty, self-absorbed hypocrite who has God on his lips for one hour a week and guns in each hand for the rest of the week.



He is a liar and low-intelligence, inarticulate lout who went AWOL from his National Guard unit when it began random drug testing. Yet, he had the gall to put himself on a jet plane landing on a carrier, posing before a banner stating, “Mission Accomplished.”



He invaded a country for oil and money, and is lying to the American people about how things are going over there. He is the worst example of a “born-again Christian” I’ve ever known.



However, there is something positive I can say about him: Compared to Dick Cheney and the rest of his Cabinet, Bush is a saint.

--C.H. THORNTON, Mason City

attribution

i really picked it because i am also of the

times like these that make me wanna be in nyc

NEW YORK (Reuters) - It's not hard to spot the common theme in three New York theater offerings this season that go by the titles "Bush is Bad," "Bush Wars: Musical Revenge" and "Laughing Liberally."



The Web site for "Bush is Bad" features a grand piano falling on the head of President George W. Bush.



"Bush Wars" promises what it calls a counterattack on "the disgraceful agenda of the Bush administration." It features a dance number with Bush and Osama bin Laden taking their mothers to lunch at the same restaurant, and another with New Orleans residents singing as they await help after Hurricane Katrina, in a dig at the Bush administration's slow response.

--usatoday

my post on the local board

yes, i did a nice bowl. so sue me. the blog, they call it a blog because of the comments i guess... is the local newspaper. they have a nazi running their BBoard. got tired of that real quick. anyway, here's the blog i posted to.

if he wasn't breaking any laws, he sure was coming awfully close, and my guess is he probably stepped over the line. why else would they have been trying to push legislation to enable him to do what he did?



'side, he's one of those people who think they're above it all, that they are supreme in whatever circles they run in. since bush has always had the top position in everything he has ever done (after college), it would make sense that this guy feels that nothing can stop him if he so desires it. God knows, the people he surrounds himself with, that constant barrage of 'yes sir, anything you say sir, yes sir' has got to be taking their toll somehow. and those are probably the times when he taps his toe on the other side of the line. had there been a democratic president doing it, you can bet your sweet tooshes that we would be having senatorial investigations, on top of special prosecutors, on top of who knows what else. but suffice it to say, a republican government isn't about America, it's about protecting that government from any and all harm, including defeat at the polls. mark my words, 2006 will not see any democratic gains. until we have open source elections, we can no longer trust the powers that control the ballotboxes. a democratic return of congress would be unthinkable to the powers that be. it just so happens that the powers that be, control the secret to the black boxes.

the best reason yet to oppose alito

found on josh marshall's site:

The nomination is a sop to the president's rightwing base. The man is a rightwing ideologue. He doesn't belong on the court. There's nothing to be ashamed of in doing everything possible to prevent his being seated if there's any chance of success.

the new al-zahawri tape

in it he says:

"Butcher of Washington, you are not only defeated and a liar, but also a failure. You are a curse on your own nation and you have brought and will bring them only catastrophes and tragedies," he said, referring to Bush. "Bush, do you know where I am? I am among the Muslim masses."

-source

wanna bet georgie duznt get all pissed off like a good lil' punk and run to rummy for revenge?

FARPOINT.FACTOID

A jury consultant for the defense pointed out that of "among 280 questionnaires, 'greed' appeared 272 times and 'crook' appeared 55 times." Only 18 respondents didn't have anything negative to say about Enron.

attribution

Letter of the WeeQ

it's a new week, and already we have a winner.

We are told Osama bin Laden "plans U.S. attacks" (Jan. 20). So, what do we do now? Bomb and attack Iraq even harder "to keep America safe"?



-Priscilla Brown, Cedar Falls.

attribution

Letter Of The Day

there were a few today, but this one wins the booby prize:

When the Sherman Hill neighborhood began to be revitalized a couple of decades ago, my brother, who lived on 17th and Woodland, commented, "They're pushing out all the poor people."



The Register has shared with us not only the information that the Randolph Hotel may be upscaled, but also that homeless folks are now in plain sight of bike-path users. I know the city fathers and mothers won't let them all be dropped on some street corner because we don't like people begging for quarters on our way for a coffee or beer. Where can we hide them? I don't know.



It's not even permissible for Lazarus to die in the gutter outside the rich man's house anymore.



-Fr. David Polich, Perry.

attribution

ready for some good news?

Bush's approval rating now stands at 42 percent, down from 46 percent at the beginning of the year, although still three percentage points higher than the low point of his presidency last November.

The poll also shows that the public prefers the direction Democrats in Congress would take the country as opposed to the path set by the president, that Americans trust Democrats over Republicans to address the country's biggest problems and that they strongly favor Democrats over Republicans in their vote for the House.

--source

i wonder what countries those are

pakistan? afghanistan for sure, but what other countries over there would bow to bush like this?

"there are a few countries where the president has decided that we can whack someone without the approval or knowledge of the host government."
--a former counter-terorism official

source

the debate on iowa's sex offender registry laws

Sen. Larry McKibben, a Marshalltown Republican and chairman of a task force that will review the 2,000-foot law this year, believes the state residency requirement for offenders has been a good thing. While the 2,000-foot law needs some tweaking, he said, "it's my personal belief that people are safer, in that there is more information out there and people are accessing that information."


"We just filed charges last week against a guy who said he lived out there at the Ced-Rel and he doesn't," Zeller said. "Prior to the law going into effect, we knew where 90 percent of the people were. Now we know where about 50 to 55 percent of them are."

--source

Letter of the WeeQ

“Chronic complainers” about livestock confinement operations in their neighborhoods are probably complaining because the environmental problems caused by these operations are chronic.
--Judy Schaper, Britt

attribution

Letter Of The Day

I am writing with a question concerning the Cerro Gordo County Jail.



I recently called the jail and inquired about donating some books for inmates and was told that the jail is not currently accepting books. When I pushed the subject, I was told that they have enough books for now.



My question is this: Exactly what constitutes enough books?



The main purpose of the Cerro Gordo County Jail, as I understand it, is to house pre-trial detainees and those who have been sentenced for misdemeanor acts. This means that most of the people within the jail will soon be released back into the community.



While I understand that their time in jail is a punishment, I personally would like to know that these people, who will soon be living among us, have the opportunity to rehabilitate and educate themselves while serving out their time.



Since the 1970s, there has been a strong shift from a focus on rehabilitation towards a more conservative focus on punishment within the criminal justice system. I am not arguing with this stance, but does an emphasis on punishment require a complete abandonment of any rehabilitative efforts on behalf of the correctional system?



If an inmate chooses to better his/her reading comprehension in hopes of someday succeeding within society or broaden his/her intellectual realm, what purpose are we serving by keeping them from that goal?



For those inmates who want to better themselves, I see no sense in denying them access to quality, educational reading materials. If citizens are willing to buy and donate more books, what can it possibly hurt for the jail to accept them.



For now, however, I simply ask this: Can there ever be too many books?

--KRISANN BERGO, Lawrence, Kan

attribution

i wonder how long it'll be before wal-mart

takes bob schieffer's interview of george bush jr. and make it into a commercial. bob got bush to say, the white house is an inconvenience because you can't go out to the wal-mart.

i'll post the transcript when it becomes available.

on edit:
speaking of which, wal-mart just did a commercial

Quote of the Day

comes today, from my hometown

“You hear about frivolous lawsuits. Why would any lawyer put $50,000 into a frivolous lawsuit if he didn’t think he could win it?”
--Jim McGuire

attribution