In his final word, the CIA's top weapons inspector in Iraq said Monday that the hunt for weapons of mass destruction has "gone as far as feasible" and has found nothing, closing an investigation into the purported programs of Saddam Hussein that were used to justify the 2003 invasion.
I'm sure there's lots of red faces in wingnutville tonight.
But they can all atone by enlisting in the Army or Marines. It's bad form to let others suffer for your own mistakes.
We should have never been there in the first place and the media and the American public let a currupt administration lie to us when listing reasons for invading Iraq. Our safety was never at stake. Hopefully we will learn this time to challange our leaders no matter the Party.
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Friday, April 15, 2005
The Filibuster War: Presidential Ambitions and Fealty to the Extreme Religious Right
We have to fight against the overreach of the Republicans so that we as the sensable Party can save the Republic. (Stolen from www.dailykos.com)
Either as a trial balloon, or in earnest, the Senate Majority Leader Tennessee Republican Bill Frist, in a move that cannot be separated from his 2008 Presidential ambitions, is actively discussing the nuclear option for the elimination of the filibuster rule:
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is all but certain to press for a rule change that would ban filibusters of judicial nominations in the next few weeks, despite misgivings by some of his fellow Republicans and a possible Democratic backlash that could paralyze the chamber, close associates said yesterday.
To the credit of the WaPo reporter, Charles Babington, he puts Frist's true motivations in the second graf of the story:
The strategy carries significant risks for the Tennessee Republican, who is weighing a 2008 presidential bid. It could embroil the Senate in a bitter stalemate that would complicate passage of President Bush's agenda and raise questions about Frist's leadership capabilities. Should he fail to make the move or to get the necessary votes, however, Frist risks the ire of key conservative groups that will play big roles in the 2008 GOP primaries.
And we know Frist is playing to the extreme Religious Right which now controls the Republican Party (See Terri Schiavo law). The NYTimes headlines its story on the Frist nuclear gambit as "Frist Set to Use Religious Stage on Judicial Issue":
As the Senate heads toward a showdown over the rules governing judicial confirmations, Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, has agreed to join a handful of prominent Christian conservatives in a telecast portraying Democrats as "against people of faith" for blocking President Bush's nominees.
Fliers for the telecast, organized by the Family Research Council and scheduled to originate at a Kentucky megachurch the evening of April 24, call the day "Justice Sunday" and depict a young man holding a Bible in one hand and a gavel in the other. The flier does not name participants, but under the heading "the filibuster against people of faith," it reads: "The filibuster was once abused to protect racial bias, and it is now being used against people of faith."
For the past few days, there has been a debate on "values" and how to play the issue politically. Frankly, I find it a boring debate that misses where we now stand in the political wars. For some time now, I have advocated a Lincoln 1860 strategy. Many folks have interpreted this as a "Screw the South" approach. It is not explicitly so - though it is certainly possible that the upshot is to weaken Dem chances in the short term for winning in the South. It is my view that this is giving up nothing as we are not going to win in the South in national elections anytime soon anyway.
But the point of my suggestion is the absolute necessity of drawing the proper contrasts between the moderate, rational and sensible policies of the Democratic Party with those of the Extreme Right Wing fringe-controlled Republican Party. Abraham Lincoln's 1860 Cooper Union Address, with some modifications in brackets, provides us with the proper perspective:
Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the warning against [factions] given by Washington in his Farewell Address. . . . Bearing this in mind, and seeing that [a cultural divide] has since arisen upon this same subject, is that warning a weapon in your hands against us, or in our hands against you? Could Washington himself speak, would he cast the blame of that [divide] upon us, who sustain his policy, or upon you who repudiate it? We respect that warning of Washington, and we commend it to you, together with his example pointing to the right application of it.
But you say you are conservative - eminently conservative - while we are revolutionary, destructive, or something of the sort. What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried? We stick to, contend for, the identical old policy on the point in controversy which was adopted by "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live;" while you with one accord reject, and scout, and spit upon that old policy, and insist upon substituting something new. . . . Not one of all your various plans can show a precedent or an advocate in the century within which our Government originated. Consider, then, whether your claim of conservatism for yourselves, and your charge or destructiveness against us, are based on the most clear and stable foundations.
. . . It was not we, but you, who discarded the old policy of the fathers. We resisted, and still resist, your innovation; and thence comes the greater prominence of the question. Would you have that question reduced to its former proportions? Go back to that old policy. What has been will be again, under the same conditions. If you would have the peace of the old times, readopt the precepts and policy of the old times.
. . . Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.
And such it is with the extreme Right Wing fringe controlled Republican Party. Beholden to its fringe elements, it will exercise the "nuclear option." The Republicans will destroy the "tried and true."
In short, they "will rule or ruin." These are dangerous times. Not only due to the threats to our security from terrorism and the disastrous Bush foreign policy. But, we face a Republican Party as extreme as the secessionists of Lincoln's time, prepared to discard the form of government laid down by the Founders - prepared to destroy the separation of powers and an independent judicial branch.
It is time that moderate Democrats of good faith understand that war has been declared and shots are being fired. It is time they recognized the threat to our national institutions and that the time for half measures has passed. It is time for Democrats to stand up.
Either as a trial balloon, or in earnest, the Senate Majority Leader Tennessee Republican Bill Frist, in a move that cannot be separated from his 2008 Presidential ambitions, is actively discussing the nuclear option for the elimination of the filibuster rule:
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is all but certain to press for a rule change that would ban filibusters of judicial nominations in the next few weeks, despite misgivings by some of his fellow Republicans and a possible Democratic backlash that could paralyze the chamber, close associates said yesterday.
To the credit of the WaPo reporter, Charles Babington, he puts Frist's true motivations in the second graf of the story:
The strategy carries significant risks for the Tennessee Republican, who is weighing a 2008 presidential bid. It could embroil the Senate in a bitter stalemate that would complicate passage of President Bush's agenda and raise questions about Frist's leadership capabilities. Should he fail to make the move or to get the necessary votes, however, Frist risks the ire of key conservative groups that will play big roles in the 2008 GOP primaries.
And we know Frist is playing to the extreme Religious Right which now controls the Republican Party (See Terri Schiavo law). The NYTimes headlines its story on the Frist nuclear gambit as "Frist Set to Use Religious Stage on Judicial Issue":
As the Senate heads toward a showdown over the rules governing judicial confirmations, Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, has agreed to join a handful of prominent Christian conservatives in a telecast portraying Democrats as "against people of faith" for blocking President Bush's nominees.
Fliers for the telecast, organized by the Family Research Council and scheduled to originate at a Kentucky megachurch the evening of April 24, call the day "Justice Sunday" and depict a young man holding a Bible in one hand and a gavel in the other. The flier does not name participants, but under the heading "the filibuster against people of faith," it reads: "The filibuster was once abused to protect racial bias, and it is now being used against people of faith."
For the past few days, there has been a debate on "values" and how to play the issue politically. Frankly, I find it a boring debate that misses where we now stand in the political wars. For some time now, I have advocated a Lincoln 1860 strategy. Many folks have interpreted this as a "Screw the South" approach. It is not explicitly so - though it is certainly possible that the upshot is to weaken Dem chances in the short term for winning in the South. It is my view that this is giving up nothing as we are not going to win in the South in national elections anytime soon anyway.
But the point of my suggestion is the absolute necessity of drawing the proper contrasts between the moderate, rational and sensible policies of the Democratic Party with those of the Extreme Right Wing fringe-controlled Republican Party. Abraham Lincoln's 1860 Cooper Union Address, with some modifications in brackets, provides us with the proper perspective:
Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the warning against [factions] given by Washington in his Farewell Address. . . . Bearing this in mind, and seeing that [a cultural divide] has since arisen upon this same subject, is that warning a weapon in your hands against us, or in our hands against you? Could Washington himself speak, would he cast the blame of that [divide] upon us, who sustain his policy, or upon you who repudiate it? We respect that warning of Washington, and we commend it to you, together with his example pointing to the right application of it.
But you say you are conservative - eminently conservative - while we are revolutionary, destructive, or something of the sort. What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried? We stick to, contend for, the identical old policy on the point in controversy which was adopted by "our fathers who framed the Government under which we live;" while you with one accord reject, and scout, and spit upon that old policy, and insist upon substituting something new. . . . Not one of all your various plans can show a precedent or an advocate in the century within which our Government originated. Consider, then, whether your claim of conservatism for yourselves, and your charge or destructiveness against us, are based on the most clear and stable foundations.
. . . It was not we, but you, who discarded the old policy of the fathers. We resisted, and still resist, your innovation; and thence comes the greater prominence of the question. Would you have that question reduced to its former proportions? Go back to that old policy. What has been will be again, under the same conditions. If you would have the peace of the old times, readopt the precepts and policy of the old times.
. . . Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.
And such it is with the extreme Right Wing fringe controlled Republican Party. Beholden to its fringe elements, it will exercise the "nuclear option." The Republicans will destroy the "tried and true."
In short, they "will rule or ruin." These are dangerous times. Not only due to the threats to our security from terrorism and the disastrous Bush foreign policy. But, we face a Republican Party as extreme as the secessionists of Lincoln's time, prepared to discard the form of government laid down by the Founders - prepared to destroy the separation of powers and an independent judicial branch.
It is time that moderate Democrats of good faith understand that war has been declared and shots are being fired. It is time they recognized the threat to our national institutions and that the time for half measures has passed. It is time for Democrats to stand up.
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