Bush's New Secret Police State

With all this shifting and reorganizing of America's police and intelligence services, it is easy to miss what looks like the beginnings of an executive branch secret police service:

President Bush ordered another shake-up of the nation's intelligence services yesterday, forming new national security divisions within both the FBI and the Justice Department and, for the first time, putting a broad swath of the FBI under the authority of the nation's spy chief.
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Civil liberties advocates immediately criticized the changes at the FBI, arguing that they represent a radical step toward the creation of a secret police force in the United States. Many Justice prosecutors and FBI agents had also fiercely opposed the changes but were overruled by Bush's homeland security adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, officials said.
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"Spies and cops play different roles and operate under different rules for a reason," said Timothy Edgar, national security counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "The FBI is effectively being taken over by a spymaster who reports directly to the White House. . . . It's alarming that the same person who oversees foreign spying will now oversee domestic spying, too."

Americans may miss it but the BBC sees it clearly:

The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says Americans have long resisted the growth of domestic intelligence agencies, believing they pose a threat to civil liberties.

Well duh! The FBI was bad enough in its earlier incarnation that kept tabs on labor leaders, bugged civil rights groups, disrupted anti-war organizations, sent threatening letters to Martin Luther King suggesting he commit suicide, engaged in entrapment and provocatureing - and all the while pretending that the Mafia didn't exist (because J. Edgar Hoover got to vacation and gamble on the Mafia's tab as long as he looked the other direction).

The only saving grace about this situation is that the FBI has historically proven to be so incompentent one can only hope that any secret police embodied within it will be equally useless.

Zogby Shows More Citizens Favor Impeachment

In a testiment to how swiftly sentiment has turned against the Bush administration and its policies, a new Zogby poll shows not only that Bush's approval ratings actually fell further after his recent speech but also:

In a sign of the continuing partisan division of the nation, more than two-in-five (42%) voters say that, if it is found that President Bush did not tell the truth about his reasons for going to war with Iraq, Congress should hold him accountable through impeachment. While half (50%) of respondents do not hold this view, supporters of impeachment outweigh opponents in some parts of the country.

Last year only a handful of Bush opponents dared mention impeachment. And now? Members of Bush's administration like to chide their opponents as members of the "reality based community" while proclaiming that they - the Bushies - make "their own reality." Well, that may be true - but it sure looks like it isn't the reality they intended.

"Fourth Generation Warefare" vs Bush

Our Wartime President is busy imagining himself fighting a kind of war that doesn't exist any more. Baghdad is not Stalingrad. In WWII Russia, though the battle was in a complex urban environment, it was a case of one formal army confronting another, with civilians trying to stay out of the way. In Baghdad today, one sees one formal (and hyperdefensive) army facing a rebel force that looks just like the civilian population (because in many cases it IS the civilian population). This long but worthwhile essay on Fourth Generation Warefare is one of those pieces we must all work through and internalize. We are in a new age; time to own up to it.

Bush is Totally Out of Touch

In his speech last night aimed at recovering some of that lost momentum in the Global War on Terrorism, Bush demonstrates once again that he is totally out of touch with reality. As Billmon says:

To paraphrase Leonard, the psychotic Marine in Full Metal Jacket: We (or rather, our troops) appear to be in a world of shit.

Under the circumstances, the mindless chants of "failure is not an option" are starting to sound like the desperate prayers of the terminally ill. Failure is always an option -- particularly for morons who launch a war of choice under the impression that they can't possibly lose it.

Anyone who actually watched this pathological exercise must have been struck by how psychotic Bush seemed - how seriously divorced from the world around him and all its inconvenient facts. I can only imagine that those who have in the past supported him must be sqwirming uncomfortably now. If they continue to pretend that he is "in charge" and that things in Iraq are "on the mend" they will have their own mental problems to deal with.

The Bush Administration has lost it. And most of the country knows it. Game over.

The Majority vs Bush

New Poll: Disapproval of Bush at high point.

Bush Negotiates With Terrorists

Contrary to the offical position it looks as though this administration has begun back channel communications with the "enemy."

Oil Game Shows That Bush Hasn't Made US More Secure

An article in Thursday's Washington Post reports on a recent simulation conducted using former senior government officials:

The United States would be all but powerless to protect the American economy in the face of a catastrophic disruption of oil markets, high-level participants in a war game concluded yesterday.

The exercise, called "Oil Shockwave" and played out in a Washington hotel ballroom, had real-life former top U.S. officials taking on the role of members of the president's Cabinet convening to respond to escalating energy crises, culminating in $5.32-a-gallon gasoline and a world wobbling into recession.

Some of us wonder why it is only now that this kind of thing is being paid attention to. People forget that a quarter century ago President Jimmy Carter warned that catastrophe awaited us if we didn't break our (even then) dependence on foreign oil. Not only did we not achieve energy independence, we actually allowed ourselves to become more dependent - with bigger houses to heat and cool, SUVs, even more distant suburbs to commute to, electronic goodies hungry for electircal power, and increased air travel.

Now all of that is about to change. The global scramble to secure scarce resources - especially energy resources like oil and natural gas - has entered a new phase. Thanks to the rapid industrialization of China, India and other formerly third world countries, there is increased competion with the US, EU, and Japan for what energy resources are available, thus driving up the price and impacting everything dependent on energy - which is just about everything in the global economy.

"The American people are going to pay a terrible price for not having had an energy strategy," said former CIA director Robert M. Gates, who took on the role of national security adviser. Stepping out of character, he added that "the scenarios portrayed were absolutely not alarmist; they're realistic."

The underlying situation dramatized in the exercise -- and accepted by most energy analysts -- is that tolerances are so tight between supply and demand, that even small disruptions in the delivery of oil and natural gas can cause cascades of unpleasant developments.

And this simulation only considered the impact of oil on the world economy. When the simulation was first planned last year, oil was at $40 a barrel. This week the price of oil reached $60 a barrel. And that is just one factor in the increasingly interconnected and fragile global economy. What about the effects of global warming? What about the effects of an overdue world-wide flu pandemic? What about another terrorist attack on the "homeland"?

Face it, we are vulnerable, and largely because of our long term policies. Rather than pursuing mutually supporting goals with other countries and regions we have narrowly defined our "national interests" and engaged in decades of deception at home and intimidation abroad to secure those interests. We now find ourselves with a huge foreign trade deficit financed by consumer spending based on debt - a housing bubble about to burst - and creditors (especially China) who are not likely to be willing to put up with our shortsighted policies much longer.

The coming financial meltdown will be painful for the entire world, but those of us who have been most cushioned by the plenty of consumer products and cheap energy will feel it most. There is nothing the Department of Homeland Security can do to make this nasty situation better - and nothing Osama bin Laden could do that would be as bad.

Bush and Business Friends vs Citizens

Well, if there was any question about whether America's priorities were the rights of private citizens or those of corporations, the Supreme Court settled the issue today by ruling that government can seize the property of citizens in order to further private economic developemnt:

It was a decision fraught with huge implications for a country with many areas, particularly the rapidly growing urban and suburban areas, facing countervailing pressures of development and property ownership rights.

The 5-4 ruling represented a defeat for some Connecticut residents whose homes are slated for destruction to make room for an office complex. They argued that cities have no right to take their land except for projects with a clear public use, such as roads or schools, or to revitalize blighted areas.

As a result, cities have wide power to bulldoze residences for projects such as shopping malls and hotel complexes to generate tax revenue.

Local officials, not federal judges, know best in deciding whether a development project will benefit the community, justices said.

I think this really sucks. In case you don't remember, this is how George W. Bush made his fortune - through the public seizing of private land to build the Texas Ranger's stadium (and its attendant development).

Bush vs Peak Oil

For all those who thought 'peak oil' was an empty scare we have oil prices hitting a record high of $60 a barrel - and stocks sliding as a result, and this on the same day that a Chinese firm announces a bid to buy UNOCAL the California petroleum company at the heart of much of the Afghanistan controversy prior to the US invasion (Afghan 'President' Karzhi's former employer).

Given that we have a huge debt and the Chinese have a hugh surplus - of dollars - thanks to our shortsighted business practices of the last few years, we are probably seeing the first move in a game we cannot possibly win. It is the hand we have dealt ourselves, so this shouldn't come as a surprise.

Isn't it great to have an "oil man" as President? If he's as good a CEO for America as he was for his own companies, the next Great Depression should be right around the corner.

Bushco as Profligate

In the days leading up to the return of Iraqi "sovereignty" the US Coalition Provisional Authority went on a mighty spending spree with billions of dollars still unaccounted for.

There was a time when war profiteering was considered shameful. With this crew, it's just business as usual. It seems that no matter how overtly Halliburton and other "friends" of this administration fuck up, the Bush administration is always there to cover their backs.

So, who's looking out for you? It sure ain't Bill O'Reilly.

Bush and the China Syndrome

Maybe our Salesman Prez is too young or too unobservant to make the connection - but his PR pitch for 'nucular' power plants has him pictured in a setting that is imprinted on millions of minds as the prelude to disaster. The image of Bush gesturing in the middle of nuclear power plant control room looks so much like the set for the significant scenes of "The China Syndrome" that it's scary. And hearing him pitch "more safe, clean, reliable electricity" makes one think of Ronnie Reagan the TV pitchman par-excellance.

This is what the American presidency has been reduced to - a pitchman for an otherwise unsaleable product. I wonder how much play this scene will get on NBC (owned by General Electric - a major manufacturer of 'nucular' power plants and other things radioactive - submarines etc).

And another thing - that movie has such wrong connotations for GWB and his agenda - it starred Jane Fonda. Don't you just love unintended irony?

The End of the World As We Know It

Once the inevitability of Peak Oil and its consequences have been internalized there is no going back to any innocent belief in a rosy future of sci-fi goodies and ever increasing technological powers. One does, however, really pay attention to the price of crude oil (today at a record high of $59 a barrel) but also one starts to note current events in light of predictions made by those paying attention decades ago. For example, today I came across this article by Jay Hanson, written almost a decade ago and imagining what a ruthless power would do if it recognized that the west was about to run out of cheap and available oil while OPEC was moving into a dominant position; he suggests that:

After the Cold War was over, low oil prices made it difficult for the Saudis -- and oilman President George Bush's friends -- to make ends meet because OPEC members were cheating on quotas.

The obvious solution to OPEC cheating was to sequester an entire country: Iraq. In order for our scheme to work, Saddam would have to remain in power and the UN would have to embargo his oil. That's exactly what we did.

We only need to keep Saddam in power for a few years -- till the rest of the world's oil production "peaks".

World oil consumption rose by 2.4 percent in 1996 to 69.55 million barrels a day (BP America, June 19, 1997). Thus, we seem to be on the Petroconsultants' high scenario, with OPEC output hitting an 18-year high of 27.39 mbpd in August of 1997 (Reuters, Sept. 7, 1997). It seems reasonable to assume that global production will soon be unable to keep up with surging worldwide demand, and that global oil production must peak by the year 2005.

SPECULATION
Once global oil peaks, and we NEED to start pumping Saddam's oil, I expect Americans to invade and OCCUPY Iraq. Moreover, profits will flow to friends of George Bush -- not some wild-eyed, gun-waving crackpot like Saddam.

Sort of right on the money - except that the Iraqis seem to have their own mind about who is going to be pumping that oil - and it isn't likely to be us.

Even Insects Hate Bush

Check out Avery Ant and his One Minute Rant. A great put down of our pompus POTUS.

Bush vs Freedom of the (Algerian) Press

Bush and his pack of yalping curs constantly chant about FREEDOM and LIBERTY - but only in reference to certain countries. For others it is a subject never broached. Consider the situation in Algeria - and the the odd silence from the Bushies.

A Real Loss

SOB has just recently read James Weinstein's history of the American left, _The Long Detour_, and so was saddened to read that Weinstein has just passed away at age 79. He was also the publisher of the radical magazine "In These Times" which I also subscribe to. The active old guard left is a rapidly declining group in America, and we will miss the contribution that Weinstein made to our political dialogue. A good life appreciation essay is this homage by Doug Ireland.

The People vs Bush and Company

This was one of those weeks that give me some reason to be optimistic that things might change for the better. I was in attendance at the Lafayette Park rally following the House pseudo-hearing on the Downing Street Memo chaired by Rep. John Conyers. It was a relatively small crowd (at least compared to the half a million of us that shut down midtown Manahttan in February two years ago) but it was a spirited group - and, for the first time in months, clearly encouraged that things were beginning to turn. Just think:

Democrats are calling for an investigation into the facts about going to war with Iraq;

Bush's support on major issues continues to decline in polls;

the good-ole-boy corruption network that pervades all of the Bush enterprise has been put under a merciless spotlight this week with Cheney/Halliburton's connections to Gitmo and the mounting scandal there.

We could go on and on. It seems that the tide is running strongly against more Bush BS being accepted as business as usual. I don't have a clue what is going to happen - but something is. People have lost patience with this crap.

Let the games begin.

Bush vs All of Us

There have been several books raising questions about the offical story of what happened on 9/11 and none of them have been given much mainstream attention, despite raising some very difficult and potentially devastating questions that follow from the factual record. Now, a former member of the Bush administration has come forward to charge that the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings was likely "an inside job."

A former chief economist in the Labor Department during President Bush's first term now believes the official story about the collapse of the WTC is 'bogus,' saying it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7.

"If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an 'inside job' and a government attack on America would be compelling," said Morgan Reynolds, Ph.D, a former member of the Bush team who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis headquartered in Dallas, TX.

Reynolds, now a professor emeritus at Texas A&M University, also believes it's 'next to impossible' that 19 Arab Terrorists alone outfoxed the mighty U.S. military, adding the scientific conclusions about the WTC collapse may hold the key to the entire mysterious plot behind 9/11.

"It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause(s) of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7," said Reynolds about his comments that first appeared June 9 on the web. "If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The government's collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings.

It is well worth reading the entire article. There are so many disturbing facts surrounding the 9/11 situation that it can't help but raise questions - especially since the Bush administration resisted every attempt to really investigate what happened - and actually succeeded in limiting the scope of all investigation, limiting the time available for investigation, limiting the budget available, and limiting the power of congressional investigators to call witnesses and obtain documents from the executive branch. Why the restrictions? What is Bush trying to hide? What is he afraid of?

And am I the only one that is bothered by the long term business relationships between the Bush and Bin Laden family's? Or the Bush's and the Hinckley's? This - like many "coincidences" that seem to plague the Bush family and its far flung "business" dealings, just begs for some objective investigative reporting. But that is the one thing that never seems to materialize around this secretive and vindictive clan.

A couple of good websites that deal with these issues (and more) are What Really Happened? and Information Clearing House. One of the first books (and written by a respected theologian who was disturbed by the facts) to raise these issues in detail is The New Pearl Harbor by Professor David Ray Griffin. Disturbing material. Not easily dismissed and impossible to explain away.

Is America a great country - or what?

Bush Outdoes Saddam

When he can't find anything else to fall back on to justify the war with Iraq, Bush can always say that the world is a better place with Saddam removed from power. But is it? How, exactly, have we made things better? Consider:

Under Saddam, Iraqis who spoke out against the government (or were suspected of such) were taken away, imprisoned, tortured, sometimes killed, and held indefinately with no legal options available to them.

Under American occupation, Iraqis who speak out against the government (or are suspected of such) are taken away, imprisoned, tortured, sometimes killed, and are held indefinately with no legal options available to them. PLUS:

Unemployment has dramatically increased, availabiltiy of electrical power has declined - as has potable water and sewar services, crime has grown exponentially - to the point that many people fear leaving their homes, and all of this has helped reduce the availability of schools, hospitals, and clinics, and even the oil industry (the backstory that has driven this whole sordid affair) is in disarray and producing less than under Saddam.

Ah, the freedom! Bush and Chaney both parrot endlessly that we have "liberated two countries" when in truth what we have done is turn Afghanistan back over to the warlord regime, a bit of tribal backwardness that preceded the Taliban, and have replaced Iraq's former strongman with a new one of our own choosing. I can't imagine that Jefferson or Madison would find much in the current Iraqi political situation to be optimistic about. Can you? Bush and Chaney can - and that alone should be grounds for doubting either their sanity or their honesty.

Republicans vs Bush

With the public increasingly turning against Bush's war in Iraq, he is now facing opposition even from his own party.According to US News and World Report:

Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel is angry. He's upset about the more than 1,700 U.S. soldiers killed and nearly 13,000 wounded in Iraq. He's also aggravated by the continued string of sunny assessments from the Bush administration, such as Vice President Dick Cheney's recent remark that the insurgency is in its "last throes." "Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality," Hagel tells U.S. News. "It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq."

With talk like that coming from within the Republican tent it is going to be increasingly difficult for the President to get by with the simplistic slogans and vague promises he has relied on in the past. When he talks about staying the course people are going to want to know more about what that "course" really is. And when he says, as he did in his radio address yesterday:

"We will settle for nothing less than victory"

people may remember Viet Nam and similar claims and ask - as more should have then - what such "victory" would look like and how we would know if it had been achieved. This is not an idle question. The fabled "war on terror" does not have a coherent enemy who can surrender, negotiate a truce, sign a peace treaty etc.

Victory will be whatever (and whenever) we say it is. Let's declare vitory and get the troops home. The longer they stay the worse this will get. Viet Nam is the template. We already know the end result. The only question is how bad we are willing to have it become before we wash our hands of this mess.

Bush Continues to Lie About Iraq

George W. Bush has been unable to tell the truth about Iraq since he first began to focus his threatening attention on that unfortunate country. Yesterday, in the first speech of a new PR blitz to counteract increasing opposition to the war, Bush made a series of statements that were quite extraordinary. Some were outright lies while others simply made no sense.

He claims

"We went to war because we were attacked, and we are at war today because there are still people out there who want to harm our country and hurt our citizens".

What sense does this make? We were attacked by a small group of Saudi and other Middle Eastern religious fanatics (none Iraqi) so our response is to attack an entire country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attack - as Bush himself has admitted when pressed on the issue. That is the oft repeated argument that simply makes no sense - yet it continues to be his only line of defense. It is augmented with further nonsense such as:

"Our troops are fighting these terrorists in Iraq so you will not have to face them here at home."

As anyone who has been keeping up with the ongoing travisty in Iraq knows full well, none of the "terrorists" we are fighting are likely to have any plan - much less any way - to attack America "at home" - while they can attack our soldiers who are in their backyards. While those who do pose a threat to us - Osama and crew - are still at large and apparently not engaged in the action in Iraq. Nor is Bush really interested in them, since he has been quoted as saying that he doesn't think Osama is important and spends little time thinking about him.

I think the public is beginning to realize that the President's strange focus and odd priorities pose a real danger for us. The man is either insane or totally divorced from the truth. Either way, he souldn't be in office.

Bush vs Reality

I'm so confused. We had to invade Iraq because it was such a grave threat; its military force made us cringe. Now we are bogged down in Iraq (after defeating its very menacing forces in a matter of days) but can't leave until we train Iraqis to defend themselves - against other Iraqis. Of course, Iraqis who have not had the benefit of our training have our military pretty much penned down and restricted to occasional patrols in mass.

They are killing us because we are there but we can't leave until they stop killing us.

Does this situation really make any sense to anyone?