"Fred Thompson -- from his calm manner to his
teddy-bear-like physique -- cuts a soothing persona at a time when polls
show that voters are extremely worried about security. 'He's the biggest daddy
bear around,' chortled one longtime friend."
-- Mike Allen, wishing he was in a Mens Room stall with Fraud Thompson, Link
Excerpt: "We're going to push and push and push until
some larger force makes us stop," explained Cheney's
legal counsel David Addington, according to Goldsmith's
new book, The Terror Presidency. Goldsmith wrote that Addington "and, I presumed,
his boss viewed power as the absence of constraint."
However, "the absence of constraint" is synonymous
with tyranny, the antithesis of a democratic Republic
with checks and balances, rule of law and respect
for the will of an informed electorate.
As Bush stripped away the inalienable rights guaranteed
by the Founders in the Constitution, he kept much of
us confused with misdirection, by asserting that
he was taking these actions to defend "liberty" and "freedom."
Goldsmith encountered the administration's sophistry
in the legal opinions that were the cornerstones of
Bush's claims of virtually unlimited presidential
power in "wartime."
"As I absorbed the opinions, I concluded that
some were deeply flawed, sloppily reasoned, overbroad, and
incautious in asserting extraordinary constitutional
authorities on behalf of the President," wrote Goldsmith,
who regards himself as a conservative Republican
though with a rational bent.
"This is the most important testimony from
an American general in 40 years and they can't get the
microphones to work? -- David Gergen on CNN, hoping to
hear from General Petraeus
Osama bin Laden has released a new video, but
what does it mean?
What it means is that 6 years later Bush has
failed to get him. Osama is right about one thing.
The Democrats have failed to make any kind of
serious effort to stop the war in Iraq.
Since bin Laden says he wants Democrats to stop
the war that will make sure Democrats don't stop it.
Osama really wants the war to continue because
it's bleeding us dry and as long as we
waste our resources on Iraq then he will be able
to roam free.
Bush and the Republicans aren't serious about
getting bin Laden. Bush has said that he isn't concerned
about him. Republican presidential candidate
Fred Thompson write him off as a "symbolic threat".
This seems to indicate that the Republicans have
failed to identify the enemy.
How can the guy who caused 9/11 not matter?
One thing is clear. As long as Osama bin Laden
releases videos the job isn't done.
We need a president who is truly interested in
getting him.
Excerpt: Rudy says illegal immigration is not a crime,
prompting Romney to accuse him of not taking the problem seriously.
The two have clashed for weeks over illegal immigration,
an issue that inflames GOP conservatives who influence
primary elections. The irony is that both candidates
have in the past taken more liberal stands on the issue.
"It's not a crime," Giuliani said Friday. "I know
that's very hard for people to understand, but it's not a federal crime."
My, how Bohemian of the Republican front-runner.
I wonder how the billionaire Fascist dogs will like that?
Tell us what the hell the point of this column
is.
Does she like the Clintons? Does she hate Hillary?
What was the point? What was the column's
focus?
Did she say anything, or was she just handing
in a column under deadline?
Winner gets a pair of shotglasses or a
WPE
t-shirt or 90-day subscription - your choice.
It was EXACTLY what I like in a Bartcop radio
show...a little Jon Stewart, a little Maher,
and LOTS of original Bart. I can get all the
Daily Show & Bill Maher I want from YouTube,
but only Bartcop Radio has Bart!
I LOVED your beatdown of the monkey trying to
defend his crony tortureboy. And I learned
more about the Larry Craig thing from this show
than I did in all of the media - wonder why THAT is?
As far as the bit about staring at women's breasts,
I don't understand...they push 'em up and out,
wear plunging necklines, and do all they can
to look their best, and when we acknowledge that,
we're busted for being sexist bastards. I don't
get it.
Anyway, keep swinging that Bart Hammer - we're
down now to less than 500 monkey days left
- that is, unless you're right and he doesn't
stay the entire 2nd term.
Bob in SC,
home of Miss Teen USA star geographer Caitlin
Upton
Bob, good point about the necklines.
I guess when Miss Teen USA does her swimsuit strut
we men are supposed to look away so as not to objectify her?
Excerpt: Hillary, Obama and Edwards have suggested that
there is little difference among us on Iraq.
This is not true: I am the only leading Democratic
candidate committed to getting all our troops out quickly.
The American people need answers. If we elect
a president who thinks that troops should stay in Iraq for years,
they will stay for years -- a tragic mistake.
Clinton, Obama and Edwards think that a complete
withdrawal of all American forces would be "irresponsible."
On the contrary, the facts suggest that a rapid,
complete withdrawal -- not a drawn-out, Vietnam-like process
-- would be the most responsible and effective
course of action.
Our troops are great, but they cannot win someone
else's civil war
I have an idea: Why don't the FOUR of you get together - without
a moderator brandishing a flashing
red light and a itchy-finger on the stopwatch and duke it out like
four adults with brains?
Or would it be wrong to let us see a REAL debate?
Don't invite Mike Gravell or Crusty the Clown or Rex the Wonder Horse
- just the four of you.
Excerpt: Four years ago Bush, exploiting the political
bounce it got from the illusion of success in Iraq,
pushed a cut in capital-gains and dividend taxes
through Congress. It was an extremely elitist tax cut
even by Bush-era standards: the nonpartisan Tax
Policy Center says that more than half of the tax breaks
went to Americans with incomes of more than
$1 million a year.
Needless to say, administration economists produced
various misleading statistics designed to convey the
opposite impression, that the tax cut mainly
went to ordinary, middle-class Americans. But they also insisted
that the benefits of the tax cut would trickle
down - that lower tax rates on the rich would do great things for
the economy, helping everyone. Well, Friday's
dismal jobs report showed that the Bush boom, such as it was,
has run its course. And working Americans have
a right to ask, 'Where's my trickle?'"
The GOP has been running on this liw sincw Reagan
- 27 years ago.
"If you give the super-rich more money, they
juuuuuuuuuuuuuust might hire you."
The idiot American voter falls for this every
time - why?
Because the Democrats can't explain why giving
the super-rich more moiney doesn't help.
How can the Democrats be so stupid year after
year, election after election, decade after decade?
"That cop who arrested Larry Craig? Well, let's just say he was no
Baretta!"
-- former comedian Dennis Miller, attempting a joke on Leno,
For those of you under 50, Baretta was a
cop show starring wife-killer Robert Blake.
That show ran from 1975
to 1978, and 29 years later Miller uses it as a reference.
Excerpt: This week, we mark the sixth anniversary of the
9/11 attacks. And where do we stand?
Let's see. Osama bin Laden is still at large,
and continues to taunt us. Al-Qaeda and its sympathizers
continue to plan attacks on Americans and our
allies. Top foreign policy experts say that we are losing
the war on terror. And Americans feel less safe
today than ever before.
All this despite our having to take our shoes
off in airports.
All this despite the fact that I am not allowed
to carry shampoo on an airplane.
All this despite Bush's insistence that only
Bush can keep us safe, and that a vote
for John Kerry would have been a vote
for the terrorists.
And all this despite Bush's assertions that we
are fighting thems over there
so we won't have to fight them over here.
Bart, uhhhh...excuse me ..i am confused...you
dont..actually..think we should bomb iran...???
You ..who are soooo almost always..right?
Look...just because some guy in iran says a lot
of meaningless stupid stuff ...nooooo country is going to attack israel.
A country with a zillion nukes....they wouldn't
want their country turned into a lump of glass....let iran build the damn
thing.
It would be much less costly than another failed
war ...
sooner or later..every country will have nukes.
carol
I like the idea of Iran being nuke free. The main
reason they're in this nuke arms race
is because Bush put them on his "To do" list
and assured them he's going to invade.
I think any Democratic president could handle
this with words.
We could make Iranm the same deal we made North Korea - we'll give
them
a reactor if they let us inspect things and shelve all this talk about
nukes.
Bush can't be trusted - he loves war and he love to kill people.
The whole world knows that.
Many news sources have presented one of Ahmadinejad's
phrases in Persian as a statement that
"Israel must be wiped off the map", an English
idiom which means to cause a place to stop existing.
Juan Cole, a University of Michigan Professor
of Modern Middle East and South Asian History,
translates the Persian phrase as:
"The Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem
(een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must
[vanish from] the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye
ruzgar mahv shavad)."
"Ahmadinejad did not say he was going to wipe
Israel off the map because no such idiom exists in Persian"
and "He did say he hoped its regime, i.e., a
Jewish-Zionist state occupying Jerusalem, would collapse."
The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI)
translates the phrase similarly:
"[T]his regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem]
must be eliminated from the pages of history." [End Wikipedia excerpt]
My note: MEMRI is staffed almost exclusively by
Israeli interpreters.
Wil Burns
Wil, I don't care about that.
People who attempt to portray Iran as less-than a mortal enemy of Israel
are crazy.
On people writing about their candidates on the blog - they need to
register at the blog
("Register" under the "Meta"
category in the right column) then send jim@bartcop.com their registered screen name so we can allow them to post (unless the
post is unacceptable.)
You don't actually get a password - you just get permission to post
once you are registered.
Bart, I forwarded that article to my 30 year old
son in the Navy.
I'm his Mom, I love him and want him to live
as long as possible.
In fact, after reading about the beneficial effect
these feminine parts provide for males,
can't help but wonder if there's a male body
part that'll have the same benefit for us females.
Anyone happen to know?
Kathy
A hundred years before either of us were born, poets were writing lines
like,
"She makes my heart skip a beat."
Remember the old Popeye cartoons when Olive Oil would walk by,
and Bluto's heart would zoom 2-3 feet out of his chest and thump real
loud?
Increasing one's blood circulation certainly benefits the body.
The say that the Democrats don't have the votes
to stop the war but that isn't true.
Bush is going to come to Congress wanting another
50 billion dollars.
Democrats have the votes to not give Bush any
more money.
If you fund the war you are supporting the war.
I'm tired of funding the politicians who are
funding the war so I refuse to give money to
politicians of either party who keep voting for the war.
This week they are going to lie to us again and
tell us that we're winning. We are not winning
because to win we have to defeat the people who
we are trying to liberate. After 5 years we are told
over and over that we are almost there when the
reality is that it keeps getting worse and worse.
The time has come to shut it down and get out
of there.
If you really want to stop the war then cut off
the money.
I go livid every time I hear somebody NOT in the
Bush Misadministration referring to this latest Iraq escalation as a "surge."
The media, the democrats, Senate, the House,
they all are parroting the word, seemingly without realizing that the word
was cooked up in some advertising agency because
"escalation" would bring back bad memories for too many people.
If only people would drop "surge" and start calling
it what it is--an escalation--this idiot surge thing would laid bare for
the folly that it is. Meanwhile, every time I
hear the word, I have to resist the urge to throw chai at my television
or radio
--especially when it comes out of the mouth of
a Democratic senator or representative.
I find myself yelling at the radio: "Stop with
the surge crap! Every time you use the word 'surge' you are playing
their game by their rules and you'll never win!
Call it what it is: escalation. Throw the word in their faces!
Don't let them use it witnout correcting them!
Every time some Republican jackass uses the word 'surge,' stop them
and say, "You mean escalation..." and see how
far they get If you lat them own the language, you've lost!"
By that point I'm usually cleaning tea off my
television screen.
Keeping swingin'
KJ in CA
Excerpt: Fred's arteries were blocked. The wonder wasn't
that Fred was able to walk; the wonder was that he was alive at all.
But, the doctors concluded, Fred could be fixed.
A triple bypass would do the trick, they reckoned.
There was just one little problem. The operation
would be $140,000. That apparently didn't include a 7-10 day
stay in the hospital, including at least a day
in the intensive care ward, which by itself runs about $50,000 a day.
They started exploring options. Getting a second
mortgage would be difficult, so they kept looking.
They finally found a hospital that could do the
operation, they said, for about $20,000.
The hospital was in Mumbai (Bombay), India.
So - if you have a heart attack with no insurance,
just go to Bombay and have the family visit you there.
"After he leaves office, Bush is going
to start a think tank. That's right, it's like Michael Vick
opening an animal shelter. Yeah, the George Bush think tank: it
only has a shallow end."
-- David Letterman
"Bin Laden is more symbolism than anything
else."
-- Fraud Thompson, Link
"The new bin Laden video reminds us that there
is no greater responsibility for a president than to protect America from attack. bin
Laden must be hunted down -- and as president, I will... My presidency will be al Qaeda's worst nightmare."
-- John McCain, on how he's different than Bush, Link
"It's not worth spending billions of dollars
just trying to catch one person."
-- Mitt Romney, who sees things Bush's way, Link
"I truly am not that concerned about him." -- Dubya,
March 13, 2002, SIX MONTHS after he vowed to hunt him down,
Link
Excerpt: The Diocese of San Diego agreed Friday to pay
nearly $200 million to 144 people who were sexually
abused by clergy members, the second-largest
payment since the U.S. abuse erupted five years ago.
The $198.1 million agreement capped more than
four years of negotiations in state and federal courts
and came six months after the diocese filed for
bankruptcy protection and just hours before the first
of 42 lawsuits was scheduled for trial.
Victims expressed relief that a settlement was
reached - but also anger that it took so long.
"They knew all along that I'd been molested, so
to put me through this is unconscionable,"
said Michael Berger of Atlanta. Insurance
will pay about $75 million.
Seriously, they're still selling the Catholics rape insurance?
Are they crazy?
It must be a money-laundering scheme - they should look into this.
I will try to send more next month but I did promise
you
that I would send some money this month.
I want to try
my hardest to help keep your site up and running.
Tammy
Tammy, your $10 donation means a lot to me.
I hope you enjoy your Bartcop radio - thanks.
Excerpt: In the beginning were the War Hawks, and much
did they counsel the powerful to do battle against Saddam.
Then came the war, and the looting, and the Heritage
Foundation hordes, and the hawks lamented exceeding
loud and many soon repented of their ways. Yea,
verily, they presently transformed themselves into Pottery
Barn Hawks, eager to fix the disaster they had
helped create and thus redeem themselves in the eyes of the
faithful. In the fullness of time, though, the
disaster ripened and flowered and became impossible of resolution,
and the hawks despaired. Success had become unachievable,
yea unto their own generation and the generation
to come after them. In short, life sucked.
So what's a Pottery Barn hawk to do?
The answer, lately, is: become a Chaos Hawk.
First, admit that Iraq is hopeless, thus demonstrating that you're
not completely out to lunch. After all, the surge
has produced only tiny gains in a few highly localized areas and
has no chance of replicating those successes
on a wide scale. The Iraqi government is dysfunctional, the police
forces are dysfunctional, the army is years away
from competence, militias are engaged in a ruthless campaign
of sectarian cleansing, infrastructure is declining,
and refugees are fleeing the country at a rate of thousands per day.
Or, turn on your TV and hear the Republicans and Bush's whore media
say how great things are going...
Excerpt: Do you agree that the government of Iraq is indebted
to, and dependent on, Shiite factions that control
death squads and militia that favor Shiite military
victory in sectarian wars that have raged for hundreds of years?
Do you agree that many of the same forces and
factions that we support through the Iraqi government
are recipients of support from the government
of Iran?
Are we not today providing money, weapons and
bribes directly or indirectly to both sides in the
Shiite-Sunni sectarian war?
In your estimation, general, on a scale of 1 to
10, what is the probability that the current Iraqi government
will legitimately seek and achieve reconciliation
between Shiites and Sunnis?
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