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I am sure most of you have been to a musical performance where the sound level is gradually increased without you even realizing it in order to prepare you for the main event. I call it the concert theory. Looks like it can be applied to other arenas as well.

The further the administration drops in the polls the more threatening the rhetoric around dissent becomes. The statements Donald Rumsfeld has been making are a few decibels higher these days.

For instance: Rumsfeld had this to say on America's moral superiority and blameless innocence in world affairs.

Rumsfeld:

"Can we truly afford to return to the destructive view that America — not the enemy — is the real source of the world's troubles?"

The message here is clear. The act of self-examination, of either self or your country is destructive to America.

The Times does its second hit piece on the Donald this time by Paul Eaton a retired Major General who was in charge of training Iraqi troops:

Mr. Rumsfeld has put the Pentagon at the mercy of his ego, his cold warrior's view of the world and his unrealistic confidence in technology to replace manpower. As a result, the Army finds itself severely undermanned — cut to 10 active divisions but asked by the administration to support a foreign policy that requires at least 12 or 14.

The Grindstaff Chronicles

No Brilliance in This State of the Union Address

President Bush's talk to the nation was so lackluster it put many people to sleep. He said nothing of substance, and the speech will always be characterized more for the shameful facts about his administration that he left out than for anything he did say. Somebody forgot to tell Bush that a State of the Union speech is supposed to be a report on the nation's condition. It is supposed to report to We The People what the government has done in the previous twelve months, and that was glaringly missing. Just as glaringly missing, squandered: our treasure.

Oh My!

Government is rotten,

Where's the trash bin?,

But wait this doesn't taste that bad,

I think I can stomach it,

At least until it comes back up,

Then I'll just swallow it again.

The disgraceful but predictable Amerisraeli campaign of defamation and lies against President Ahmadinejad of Iran continues unabated. Words and phrases are plucked out of the context of long speeches, without any attention to the overall gist and purpose of each speech, merely to be used as ammunition for propaganda against someone whose only crime is that he does not, nor does he plan to, bow down to the will of the Western politico-financial complex, either in action or in spirit, but rather plans solely to follow the dictates of his conscience regarding the good of his nation as well as that of the region at large.  Mohammad Khatami, the former President of Iran, again and again urged a “dialogue of civilizations.”  Khatami’s own mentality, however, was captive to the Western monologue.  Ahmadinejad’s monumental task is to turn the monologue into a true dialogue.  As the West is completely unaware of the existence of a point of view other than its own, Ahmadinejad faces the task of using harsh language to try to break through the legacy of decades of brainwashing.

Liberals may well accuse McCain of having served as a useful tool for the Bushites on the torture issue, in that, by diverting the public's attention away from the real problem — the US Administration’s preposterous definition of torture — he has made it impossible to discuss the issue that really should be discussed. But that is only one part of the story. Yes, it is true that Bush can now simply claim that the US "does not torture," skirting completely around the question of what he means by the word "torture." The Bushites have manipulated the definition of torture so as to make it meaningless. And it is true that, meanwhile, activities that any rational person would consider to be torture will continue as before.  (read more at http://alse.blogspot.com )

The Grindstaff Chronicles
Catholic or Calvinist, Europeans Put Bush-Cheney to Shame

Many years ago, the Belgians arrested and brought to trial 18 men connected to Al-Qaeda. Tonight, we don't wish to go into the labyrinthine details of these arrests and trials. Why? Because we have only one point to make tonight: the Europeans are finding, arresting, and bringing to trial terrorists legally, without the American perversion of torture. The Europeans don't need to resort to medieval or Nazi methods, as Bush and Cheney seem to. Of course, the Europeans don't have a horrendous, toad-like Azteco-american Attorney General frothing at the mouth, just dying to by proxy use his obsidian knife to cut out the still-beating hearts out of the "terrorists" who under the system designed by the Devil's spawn cannot have valid, in the open to the world trials in a humane, timely manner.

Grindstaff Chronicles
Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered Am I
Fully satiated after a day of intemperate wining and dining, with a few days off to recover and walk it off, life on the farms and ranches out here is returning to normal. We discovered that we really are quite lucky to live way out here: nobody was tempted to find the nearest big town to do what most of the country seems to enjoy: going shopping like lunatics the day after Thanksgiving. No ma'am, it just isn't interesting when you consider it's a four and a half hour round trip excursion. Now, for food and our wine, well, then it's worth it, but to get squished to death like a worm, no sir. Thanks, we'll pass.

What we don't pass on though is Schuyler's always delicious cocktails. Today he served Black Russians, made with "handmade" Tito's Vodka and Kahlúa. For those who don't like alcohol, he made Fruit and Ginger Ale, an English mulled drink which he serves chilled. We used his cocktail to welcome back Marie Christine and her husband Jean-Paul, who had been back in France for a couple of years and returned the day after Thanksgiving. They returned to their beautiful horse farm, which had been leased to a couple for these past two years.

Summary:
Bush had a chance to go to Asia and win friends and keep old friends. Even before landing in China, he insulted and antagonized 1.3 billion people, citizens of the world's newest financial, political and diplomatic behemoth. Not very smart, considering that Bush has hocked us to the hilt, and China holds the pawn slips. Too bad the United States, unlike other countries, doesn't have a system by which heads of state can only travel abroad with permission of their legislative branches. Read the entire newsletter at The Grindstaff Chronicles website.

Summary:
The swinish, corkscrew logic, or illogic, being followed by this White House is alarming. Daily, they change their rationale for their invasion of Iraq, and daily, members of the "administration" contradict each other on what and what isn't being accomplished in Iraq and on whether Al Qaeda is or isn't being contained.

Right now, it seems that the only people acting coherently are Al Qaeda. Scary, huh?

Read the entire Grindstaff Chronicle here.

Grindstaff Chronicles

Cocktails Await

Farm and ranch work never ends, but let me tell you, it's a heck of a lot easier when it isn't so hot. These days of autumn are glorious, and ending them with all the neighbors gathered in the great room, sipping one of Schuyler's new concoctions, well, you can't beat it. Tonight he made us Perfect Manhattans, using rye whiskey, sweet and dry vermouth, and Angostura bitters. At the drinks table, he had a pitcher of nonalcoholic fruit juices.

Out, Out Damn Spot, Cried Lady Macbeth

Jim was telling us what Lady Macbush would famously say: "The poor? The dregs of humanity? Why should I trouble my beautiful mind with such filth? Besides, I don't have to, my two lovely holier-than-thou, dysfunctional sons take excellent care of them, if you get my drift," she foxily said as she dried her hands (even though she couldn't get all the blood off.)

The Grindstaff Chronicles

From President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Farewell Address to the NationJanuary 17, 1961:

"Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

THE BOYS OF SUMMER The boys of summer came up against the lady of summer called Katrina and the boys ran for their hidey-holes. George Bush is surrounded by sycophants and boys playing at being men as policy makers. For the vast majority of these bureaucrats as policymakers it is more OJT (on-the-job-training) than hands-on experience. It is indeed true of the President who stumbles through his tenure often looking like the proverbial ‘deer in the headlights.’ It is also especially true of Michael Brown the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Like his boss George Bush, Brown comes to his latest position via a trail of dubious distinctions, failed attempts, and good-old boy ass-kissing patronage, rather than hands-on real life experience. Like Bush, Brown is a graduate of the Marie Antoinette School of “compassionate conservatism.”

In a bizarre article drug whiner in chief John Walters, apparently "exasperated by pessimism about the war on drugs'' said: 'Washington is awash with lobbyists hired by businesses worried that government may, intentionally or inadvertently, make them unprofitable. So why assume that the illicit drug trade is the one business that government, try as it might, cannot seriously injure?'Perhaps inadvertently, Mr. Walters may be asking the right question. The main problem is that he may not be able to accept the answer. As Walters indicates, many businesses are hiring lobbyists to influence legislation in order to remain profitable. The problem with the drug industry is that it is illegal, and the profitability of the industry is a direct result of that prohibition. As per The Economist, , the drug industry can buy 610 KG of coca leaves for US$610 from poor Bolivian farmers, and process it into one KG of cocaine powder, a product carrying a price tag of US$110K once it hits the eager nostrils of users. With profit margins like that to preserve, the last thing the drug lords want is legalization. Indeed, given the economic results of prohibition, paraphernalia is starting to suspect that lobbyists are hired by drug lords to support prohibition, rather than the opposite. As per a recent report endorsed by 500 economists, including right-wing legend Milton Friedman, legalization of marijuana alone would save about US$7 billion in government expenses, while taxation would bring in at least US$2 billion in revenues. Do you really think drug lords want that money to go to the government? Actually, would drug lords even exist under legalization? The answer, provided by the example of alcohol, is straightforward. Who drinks moonshine nowadays?Of course, fact-based policy is not what Walters is about. Having studied political philosophy at the University of Toronto is apparently credential enough for Walters to describe the drug war in "Lincolnian" language: 'There are certain requirements of civilization -- to keep the better angels of our nature in preponderance over the lesser angels.'Paraphernalia agrees. We also like better angels in preponderance over our lesser angels (whatever that means). We just don’t think we should send angels to jail. Then again, maybe Walters is occupied feeding his own lesser angel: the lust for power and the fat budget that comes with his position.

cross-posted on Bionic Octopus

 

Hillary Rodham Clinton is a disgrace, a hypocrite and an insult to feminists everywhere. Discountenanced as I am to find myself in agreement on any point ever with New York Republican spinster (not that kind, in fact he recently married his [male] partner; looove me the gay Repubs) Arthur Finkelstein, one this one point and this one alone I heartily concur: Hillary must go.

 

Not, I hasten to add, for the reasons given by Finkelstein's delusional mouth-frothing campaign: viz, that HRC is 'a confirmed left-wing radical and life-long liberal who long ago sold her soul to the divisive, radical and ultra-liberal special interest groups who see everyone as "victims" and want to use your tax dollars and the power of the state to make things right.'

 

A quick visit to opensecrets.org reveals a distinct lack of surprises about the campaign finances of the Chief Ogre of the Bankruptcy Bill, Senator Grassley (R-IA), and the Chief Collaborator of the Right-Wing Democrats, Senator Biden ("D"-DE).

Grassley

Top contributor since 1989: Wells Fargo. 52 grand. Pretty cheap, to destroy bankruptcy.

Top contributor in 2004: a shadowy lobbying outfit named DCI Group. (Wells Fargo was #2.) Do lobbyists give money to Senators just for general access? Or do they give money to Senators because there's a client paying them? And who might that client be? And why isn't that disclosed? Very interesting...

Crossposted from Quintonotes:

This evening, I went to a special screening of the documentary Control Room at which Josh Rushing, the Marine media liaison featured in the film, appeared in person to answer questions for the audience. Rushing is now an ex-Marine, and he travels the country speaking at schools and to community groups. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but his answers were sophisticated and, for the most part, well informed. He and I do not see eye-to-eye on every issue he spoke on, but to be honest, I found him to be much more leftish in his thinking than I had anticipated.

The most interesting subject raised during the evening was the question of why CENTCOM’s press relations people did not discuss strategic information with reporters during Operation Iraqi Freedom as much as they had during the first Gulf War. According to Rushing, the fact that reporters were imbedded with the troops made all the difference. During Desert Storm, journalists had not been on the ground to report on specific tactical information about US troop actions as they were during Iraqi Freedom. It was safer for Schwarzkopf to tell journalists strategic-level data about American forces than it would have been for Franks to do so a decade later. If Franks had done so, the “enemy,” as Rushing called Iraq’s armed forces under Saddam, would have been able to put the tactical data (from imbedded journalists) and the strategic information (from CENTCOM press briefings) together to create a full picture of American military planning and action.

Kansas City Star | 02/20/2005 | A law to close a loophole:
Just one week after the Stinnett abduction, U.S. Rep. Dennis Moore, a Kansas Democrat, contacted Graves' office, suggesting that the two work together on Amber Alert reform that he felt was necessary.

“This is an issue near and dear to my heart,” he told Graves in a letter. “I hope that we can work together on maintaining and improving the integrity of the Amber Alert system.”

Moore had helped establish the system in the Kansas City area.

Moore made repeated attempts to contact Graves in recent weeks, a Moore aide contended Friday, but Graves never returned his calls. Moore also was frustrated by Graves' appearance with Talent at the Saturday news conference, which Moore was not informed of.