Category: The Middle East

He just doesn’t get it.

“Never in the two and a quarter centuries of our history has the United States been so isolated among the nations, so broadly feared and distrusted.” A bipartisan group of 26 diplomats and military men call out Dubya Diplomacy for causing irreparable harm to the republic, and the statement is heady stuff. “The Bush Administration has shown that it does not grasp these circumstances of the new era, and is not able to rise to the responsibilities of world leadership in either style or substance. It is time for a change.“

Academy Fight Song.

In a speech before graduates of the Air Force Academy, Dubya compares the war on terror to WWII. And, a day after being called out by Dana Milbank for his straw men, Bush is at it again: “Some who call themselves realists question whether the spread of democracy in the Middle East should be any concern of ours.” Is that really the central argument being made by those dubious of our foray into Iraq? I don’t think so.

Chairman Cheney Pads his Pocket.

Typical. Despite being oversight-crazy during the Clinton era, the Congressional GOP refuses to hold hearings about the “smoking gun” e-mail connecting Cheney’s office to a sweetheart Halliburton deal in Iraq. (And, as with the energy probe, Cheney’s office is stonewalling.) Good lord, what shadiness…is there no level below which these guys won’t stoop? Once again, the Bush administration and its Congressional cronies have proved themselves a national embarrassment of historic proportions.

…Wake up with fleas.

What does $340,000 a month buy you? Treason. Ahmed Chalabi, until very recently the Neocons’ favorite Iraqi, apparently tipped off Iran that we’d broken their codes. “U.S. intelligence officials two weeks ago had told CNN that Chalabi, a member of the Iraqi Governing Council, gave intelligence secrets to Iran so closely held in the U.S. government that only ‘a handful’ of senior officials knew them.” So…which of the Bushies was it? Between this and the Plame affair, the Bush administration has now displayed a pattern of disregarding and betraying our intelligence community.

Attack! Attack!

Be afraid. Be very afraid. And don’t say we didn’t warn you. Nothing changes an undesirable news cycle quite like another terror threat, does it? As the AP article notes: “The sudden warning returns the nation’s attention to terrorism, the issue that President Bush has highlighted as a central theme of his re-election campaign, after intense focus on other subjects like Iraq and prisoner abuses in Iraq. Bush has lost ground in the polls, falling in approval ratings to the lowest point of his presidency.“

To be fair, releasing pics of the possible suspects is probably more helpful in preventing a future attack than the usual exhortations to buy duct tape. And nobody want to see another 9/11, particularly those of us who live in NYC. Still, the very fact that news articles have to concede that Dubya may just be pushing the Panic button for political points proves how untrustworthy this president has become. And don’t you love how Bush officials keep suggesting that Al Qaeda wants to “have some impact on the electoral process,” as if voting Democratic means the terrorists have won? Sorry, but you’ll have to count me among the many Americans who thinks that terrorists have more to fear from John Kerry than they ever would from Dubya’s haphazard and crony-driven homeland security agenda.

Wobbly Leadership.


So apparently Dubya handles a bike about as well as he handles a Segway (or the nation)…poorly. Well, at least one benefit of this nasty scrape for the viewing public is that, when Bush addresses the nation on Iraq tonight, you’ll literally get to see the blood on his hands.

Lie down with dogs…

wake up with fleas. The US raided the compound of Ahmed Chalabi this morning, who up until this week was receiving $340,000 a month in taxpayer funds for spouting exactly the lies the Bushies wanted most to hear. In fact, Chalabi has been the Dubya gang’s favorite Iraqi for years now, but “U.S. disenchantment with Chalabi has been growing since it dawned on the White House and the Pentagon that everything he had told them about Iraq — from Saddam Hussein’s fiendish weapons arsenal to the crowds who would toss flowers at the invaders to Chalabi’s own popularity in Iraq — had been completely false.” Is Wolfowitz’s house next?

(Unfortunately Not) Left Behind.

“The problem is not that George W. Bush is discussing policy with people who press right-wing solutions to achieve peace in the Middle East, or with devout Christians. It is that he is discussing policy with Christians who might not care about peace at all – at least until the rapture.” Rick Perlstein uncovers the Bush administration’s recent meetings with Apocalyptic Christian zealots to discuss shifts in Israel policy.