Hot Potato Mash

'60 Minutes' Expose On The Malicious Prosecution Of Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman

FASCISM ALERT/UPDATE: This astonishing investigative report was BLACKED OUT in parts of Alabama and New York!

UPDATE: Scott Horton's must read on the 60 Minutes piece

Part 1 (9:52)

Part 2 (3:57)

Cross-posted at Brad Blog.

60 Minutes To Air Don Siegelman Report This Sunday!

ALERT: Set your TIVO/VCR to record “60 Minutes” this Sunday (opposite the Academy Awards)!

The MSM is finally taking up the egregious case of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman who is literally an American political prisoner thanks in no small part to Karl Rove.

For much more on this shocking case check out Scott Horton's great work at Harper's and the Don Siegelman website.

UDPDATE: How is Karl Rove not in prison?

Technorati Tags: 60 Minutes, Don Siegelman, Karl Rove

VIDEO: CNN's Jack Cafferty Says Fred Thompson's Presidential Campaign Is 'Going Nowhere'

CNN's Jack Cafferty states what anyone who has watched Fred Thompson on the campaign trail already knows. Still, it's pretty funny

SILENCE IS BETRAYAL!

One hopes that with all the money the wealthiest 0.6% of Americans - who received 75% of $92 Billion in savings from Bush's generous tax policies on capital gains and dividends in 2005 - were able to get themselves a sweet second or third yacht. Of course, this is a double whammy for the other 99.4% of us who not only didn't see much benefit from Bush's tax cuts but now share in the responsibility of making up those lost revenues to the government. Some more fun stats from Citizens for Tax Justice:

*Half of all tax filers (67 million Americans) reported an adjusted gross income of less than $30,000 and received virtually NONE of the benefits from the tax cuts.

*0.6% reported incomes greater than $500,000 and received tax deductions averaging $81,204 and accounted for 73.4% of the total tax savings.

*13,776 tax filers with gross incomes greater than $10 million or 0.1% of all filers, received 28.2% of the total benefits averaging $1,876,280 each!!!!!

Read the two page report from CTJ (PDF)

Meanwhile,

*The number of Americans living in extreme poverty has grown 26% since 2000. In all, 37 million Americans, or about 12% of the country, now live with “low food security,” uh, poverty.

*2 out of 5 elderly Americans live on less than $18,000 a year including social security.

*Low income Americans with disabilities experienced 50% cuts in their housing programs.

*Half of all IRS audits are now conducted on Americans making less than $25,000 per year.

For more dismal statistics on the rich poor divide see one of my earlier BRAD BLOG posts.

Thankfully Bush recognizes a problem when he sees it and before leaving on his month long vacation stressed that we need a new round of corporate tax cuts to make sure US corporations stay competitive!

In all fairness, it takes huge balls and a lot of propaganda to convince anyone that what the country needs is more corporate giveaways to the rich. That is a tall order that will require great effort by Bush. And it will be essential for him to recharge his batteries over a long vacation before the big sell. And if it means that he crushes Ronald Reagan's two term vacation record with 17 months to go in office, so be it.

Plus, nobody wants to be in the Capital during the God awful month of August when temperatures regularly hit a humid 100 degrees. Perhaps it was the heat that allowed Congressional Democrats to pass the new FISA law - which seems to get worse and worse by the day - before leaving on vacation. But Washington heat ain't nothing compared to Baghdad heat, huh, Tony Snow:

“You know, it's 130 degrees in Baghdad in August.”

Which helps explain why the Iraqi parliament is taking the month off as well. Surely our troops, a record 162,000 strong in Iraq, will get the month off too, right?  I mean, one suspects that with all their gear, outdoor work and combat, the misery index (weather, though both work) would be worse for our troops than say an air-conditioned Oval Office, uh, speed boat.

Actually, while George W. Bush smashes records for vacation days our troops are getting tours of duty extended from a year to 15 months. And it is a bit odd that Bush would take off so much time right before the crucial General Petreaus report on Iraq. Especially since we are amidst:

“the inescapable calling of our generation”

Oh, I almost forgot that the greater troop levels were the result of Bush's January “Surge” plan. You might recall that the new plan came after great deliberation and partying during which time hundreds of our troops lost their lives:

Ultimately Bush decided upon following neocon Fred Kagan's (fresh off a “very cool” chinook helicopter ride over the Potomac) “Surge” plan which called for an additional 50,000 troops, uh, 35,000, no, 30,000, wait, 50,000, no, 30,000, hold on,  31,500, stop, 20,000, then 35,000, oh, let's just say more troops.

But here's the thing, while Bush and the lawmakers are getting much needed R&R, our depleted troops are dying in the heat of the Iraqi desert by the droves.  Long time reporters in Iraq write about the grim picture. According to our own ambassador in Iraq, electricity in Baghdad can be counted on for “an hour or two a day” which is down from six hours earlier in the year and 16-24 hours under Saddam. Even the Brits admit the Surge will not succeed.

But none of this or the rising troop deaths can dissuade the Bushies who have already kicked up the propaganda so many notches that Emeril Lagasse must be envious. Sadly, the American people continue to buy into it. And the real big propaganda push will not hit until September.

Sadly, the truth is that there is nothing that Petraeus could say that would change the course of the war. As Eugene Robinson wrote in the Washington Post:

But if you think Bush is going to care what Petraeus's report says in September, get out of the sun immediately and drink lots of water. You're delirious.

Clearly Bush will continue this unjust, horrific war until the end of his presidency. And nothing from escalating American and Iraqi body counts to American geopolitical strategy can change his decision which was made long ago. W. has even stated that his presidency will be judged on the long term outcome of Iraq. And since pulling out or significantly reducing troops is akin to failure, Bush ain't budging. In other words, he's passing the buck to the next president. 

This alone is immoral and it is patently absurd that a decision of this magnitude should rest with a man with such an obvious conflict of interest. And since everyone knows this, it is also immoral for the American people to standby and leave the decision to Bush.

And that would be true even if Bush were a moral person. The fact that he is not just makes the situation that much clearer. Lest we forget that he:

*Continues to push legislation to further enrich the super wealthy at the expense of the most needy in society.

*Imposes anti-condom policies throughout Africa which has led to a remarkable rise in HIV/AIDS.

*Ordered the use of grotesque torture methods capable of causing severe psychological impairment on terror suspects.

*Signed a secret executive order authorizing the policy of “extraordinary rendition” which allows the CIA to kidnap any terror suspect from anywhere in the world and transfers them to prisons to be tortured and sometimes killed in countries like Uzbekistan and Egypt.

*Invades countries under false pretenses to further enrich the military industrial complex and his corporatist cronies.

Sick. Martin Luther King Jr. had it right when he said that “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” How can anyone read that short list of transgressions above and not believe that time is now?

 

More pertinent words of wisdom from Martin Luther King Jr.:

*In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

*When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

*Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

*Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

*The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

We Americans like to think ourselves noble and a country that has done great things for the world. We stopped Hitler for crying out loud. Yes, but that was a couple of generations ago. And by remaining silent, this generation is burying the memory of the “Greatest Generation.”  And our lack of action, for whatever reason, is as immoral as George W. Bush's action.

It is imperative that we wake-up to our faults and correct them before it is too late. For example, a glance at the two pictures below describe a world turned upside down by American military spending and penchant for war and killing:

Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Martin Luther King Jr.

More on these at Paulitics

We Americans seem to be the only ones oblivious to our faults. The entire world has been telling us we are ill for some time. The general consensus around the globe is that the US is a greater threat to world peace than even Iran and North Korea! And our best friends, the Brits, believe that only Osama bin Laden is a greater threat to world peace than the United States.

We are a sick country whose leaders continue to exploit our weakness. And our continued silence is immoral. We sit silently while our government exchanged our leader of the free world status with leader of rogue nations lambast. And if the people will not stand up united and force our leaders to listen to our will, we will become the “infamous generation” whose silence enabled George W. Bush and the corporate elite to destroy the Republic.

“Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed” (Jared Diamond)

“The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers” (Paul Kennedy)

*Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.“ --Martin Luther King Jr.

STOP THE SILENCE! SPEAK OUT NOW!

IMPEACHMENT WEDNESDAY: WOULD PRESIDENT PELOSI BE DISTINGUISHABLE FROM PRESIDENT BUSH?

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse for Democrats and the Democratic leadership comes this from the Washington Director of the ACLU, Caroline Fredrickson, responding to criticism that there was no organized lobbying against the new FISA bill that greatly expands Bush's power to spy on Americans:

Much of your criticism is unwarranted: we worked FISA and hard (and have been since December 2005).  We reached out to Democratic leaders -- we met with Pelosi and with Reid -- we spoke with the staff from every leadership office. They did not listen to us. It was dem leadership who scheduled the vote on these particular bills. Why be mad at us and not at them? We met with them. They rebuffed our arguments.

We weren't notified that the bill was moving until 6 days before when Rep. Harman let it slip on Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer. We gave it the full court press: with action alerts, meetings with Members of Congress and Senators and their staff.

Pelosi and friends spent the entire week negotiating with the DNI and cut out ALL the civil liberties groups - not just the ACLU. Senator Rockefeller led the effort on the Senate side (with McConnell). The bill only passed because a) 41 dems crossed the line in the house, after the “liberal leadership” could NOT muster up its own party to assert its 30 seat majority, and b) most importantly, Pelosi, our “liberal leader” scheduled the bill in the first place. She could have put any bill on the schedule and she chose the Administration's. We worked this hard, and somehow you blame the ACLU?

Wow. Damning to say the least for Pelosi, et al. One wonders if Pelosi put impeachment back on the table which the House acted on and the Senate followed with convictions, would we notice any change in governing by our new president?

Read more at Open Left

WARRANTLESS SURRENDER & WAR CRIMES

Glenn Greenwald: “It is inconceivable on every level that the Democrats would capitulate in this way and it is disgraceful beyond what can be adequately described.”

Marjorie Cohn: “This is a Congress that has remained terrorized by the Bush administration since 9/11.”

Marjorie Cohn: “It takes the power out of judges hands and puts it in the power of Alberto Gonzales and the Director of Intelligence.” 

Glenn Greenwald: “Two months earlier James Comey testified before the Senate that he and Aschroft and others had discovered that whatever it was that they were doing from 2001 to 2004 was so illegal, so unconscionable, that they had all decided to resign en masse from the government unless that behavior seized immediately.” And Greenwald interviewed Senator Chris Dodd this weekend, “and I asked him whether or not Senators had any idea of how they had been using this secret spying in order to spy on Americans - what these additional programs are, what it was that they were doing that made James Comey and John Ashcroft threaten to resign from the government - he has absolutely no idea nor do the other Senators.”

In other words, Congress passed a law for which it knows nothing about but that we know was so unconscionable that John Ashcroft threatened to resign over it. And if that is not scary enough, the rubber stamp judges of the FISA court have been replaced by Alberto Gonzales.

Marjorie Cohn: “Even though I am a criminal defense attorney, I quite enjoyed writing up a sample indictment of Alberto Gonzales for War Crimes. He's a war criminal because it was memos that he signed and policies that he put into place, that he convinced Bush to put into place, that led to torture of prisoners in US custody.”

“Torture is illegal under our law. It's illegal under three treaties we have ratified -- the Geneva Conventions, the Convention Against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. And notwithstanding the Bush administration's distaste for treaties and so-called international law, our Constitution has a provision called the Supremacy Clause and it says that treaties shall be the supreme law of the land. That means that treaties are US law. And pursuant to those treaties we have enacted two federal US statutes -- the Torture Statute and the War Crimes Act. Under the War Crimes Act, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions constitute war crimes. So torture is illegal, all the time. And, in fact, the Torture Convention says, no exceptional circumstances, even a state of war can ever be used as a justification for torture.”

And yet we torture at Gitmo, Abu-Ghareb, all around Iraq, Afghanistan and at CIA black-sites.

Glenn Greenwald: “The greatest threat, the truly unresolved issue is whether we will have a military confrontation with Iran prior to the end of the Bush presidency.”

Amy Goodman: “And yet your explanation of the Democrats and how they are dealing with the president at his lowest polling ever -- perhaps in modern polling history, still caving in bill after bill.”

Glenn Greenwald: “What is so baffling about it is, i think people forget that immediately before the midterm election in 2006, Karl Rove's strategy was to force a vote on the military commissions act and warrantless eavesdropping.” And Democrats voted against both and the Republicans tried to make a huge deal about Democrats being weak on terror. “And the Republicans got crushed with that strategy. And Democrats refuse to realize that that strategy no longer works. Americans are largely immune to this fear-mongering.”

Marjorie Cohn: “The war was premeditated, deliberate, violation of the law. The UN Charter, also a treaty, also part of US law says the only two instances where a country can use force against another is in self-defense or when the Security Council agrees.  And there was never any evidence that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to us or any other country...and the Bush administration knew that...they intended to invade Iraq since way before 9/11. And now it's really clear why they did that. And that is to install huge permanent military bases, the biggest in the world, and the biggest US embassy in the world in Baghdad. And to privatize Iraq's oil. They are trying to push through this Iraqi oil law that even Congress is touting as a benchmark for Iraqi progress and it would give control of 3/4 of Iraq's oil to foreign oil companies.”

“It is very important not to say that the war was a mistake, the war is being fought incompetently. The war is illegal and it is also immoral. It is killing thousands of US soldiers. It is killing tens of thousands of Iraqis and draining our national treasury. And the majority of American people know this. But Congress has not caught on yet. ”

Don't Believe The Hype - US Not Leaving Iraq Anytime Soon (Updated)

The 104-acre $592 million US Embassy in Iraq will staff more than 1,000 people and cost $1.2 billion per year to operate. 

Norman Solomon writes at AlterNet that no major presidential candidate for either party is seriously speaking about getting our military out of Iraq. Instead, we are witnessing a replay of the same lies designed to placate the populous about an eventual pullout, all the while a military buildup is in the works. Solomon writes:

Scratch the surface of current media scenarios for a U.S. pullout from Iraq, and you're left with little more than speculation -- fueled by giant dollops of political manipulation. In fact, strategic leaks and un-attributed claims about U.S. plans for withdrawal have emerged periodically to release some steam from domestic antiwar pressures.

This is the same playbook, according to Solomon, followed by the Bush administration before the 2004 election:   

Nearly three years ago -- with discontent over the war threatening to undermine President Bush's prospects for a second term -- the White House ally Robert Novak floated a rosy scenario in his nationally syndicated column that appeared on Sept. 20, 2004. “Inside the Bush administration policy-making apparatus, there is strong feeling that U.S. troops must leave Iraq next year,” he wrote. “This determination is not predicated on success in implanting Iraqi democracy and internal stability. Rather, the officials are saying: Ready or not, here we go.”

The embassy will be 6 times larger than the United Nations compound in New York

The hype about leaving Iraq was b.s. then as it is now. What's of particular interest is what Solomon writes is the reason behind the half-hearted calls for withdrawal by Democratic candidates:

Those candidates know that powerful elites in this country just don't want to give up the leverage of an ongoing U.S. military presence in Iraq, with its enormous reserves of oil and geopolitical value. It's a good bet that American media and political powerhouses would fix the wagon of any presidential campaign that truly advocated an end to the U.S. war in -- and on -- Iraq.

The nearly completed US embassy monstrosity.

What this all means for Iraq and our troops in Iraq, in the run-up to the 2008 election, depends on where you sit:

The disconnect between public opinion and elite opinion has led to reverse perceptions of a crisis of democracy. As war continues, some are appalled at the absence of democracy while others are frightened by the potential of it. From the grassroots, the scarcity of democracy is transparent and outrageous. For elites, unleashed democracy could jeopardize the priorities of the military-industrial-media complex.

Unfortunately, the odds of winning the struggle for an Iraq pullout and winning back our democracy are equally bad. See the stolen elections of 2000, 2002, 2004 and 2006. Thus, instead of listening to the political rhetoric and media propaganda it is imperative to look at the facts, including:

1. JOINT CAMPAIGN PLAN: recently leaked classified plan which calls for a significant American role in Iraq until at least 2009.

2. KOREA MODEL: Bush has referred to the Korea Model on multiple occasions over the last couple of months. The US has a significant military force in Korea for more than a half century.

3. PERMANENT MILITARY BASES: Despite the recent House Bill banning permanent bases in Iraq, the US continues to build huge multi-billion dollar bases. First, the House Bill only bans new bases which should hardly be a problem since the permanent bases have long been under construction. Second, if need be, the military need only call the bases, some of which are the size of small towns, “enduring” bases. 

4. WHITE HOUSE THINKS PROGRESS IN IRAQ IS SATISFACTORY: Despite missing on 10 of 18 “benchmarks”, the Bushies appear pleased with our progress in Iraq.

5. NEOCONS & FOX NEWS ALSO PLEASED WITH IRAQ PROGRESS: Watch Fox 'News' on any given day or check out this mashup of neocon Fred Kagan I recently put together.

6. THE OIL: We are not going anywhere until the oil issue is settled. In other words, not until the Iraq legislators we installed feel sufficiently bribed or threatened enough to hand over the vast oil resources of their country to Exxon. 

7. THE BUSH LEGACY: Sure it is a joke. Everything the Bushies have touched over the last 6 1/2 years have gone the same way as Iraq. His so-called greatest achievement, No Child Left Behind, has been disastrous for education. Hurricane Katrina. Squandering the surplus and creating a ginormous deficit. Turning world opinion against Americans. Dividing the country. Torture. Corporate giveaways. Extraordinary rendition. Gitmo. Habeas Corpus. 9/11. Osama. The point being, that Bush will go down as the worst president ever even if we were to find some face saving way out of Iraq. 

But, because everyone says his legacy depends on Iraq and he clearly believes the same, what incentive does he have to throw in the towel? There might be a few people in the world willing to sacrifice their own legacy for the greater good of humanity, but Bush ain't one of them. Hell, it took the mightiest of efforts to get W. to sacrifice a single day of vacation to conduct a fly-over of the gulf region days after Hurricane Katrina hit.

8. THE EMBASSY: Like the permanent bases, the new half billion dollar plus, gigantic, architectural disgrace of an embassy (seen in the three photos above) will cost more than a billion dollars a year to run. 

Thus, the evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the White House plans are to continue full speed ahead in Iraq no matter what General Petraeus September progress report brings. And the lame attempts by the leading Democratic presidential candidates to put a stop to the Iraq war does suggest that, as Solomon writes, they fear what upsetting the media and elite power brokers would do to their candidacy and thus will continue to not rock the Iraq boat.

In other words, don't believe the hype heard throughout the mainstream media concerning a troop withdrawal or pullout. Because it's pure and simple propaganda.

Read Solomon's article at AlterNet

UPDATE: Bhc has a must read post on how the Bushies are using the “liberal” media to manufacture the consent necessary for the long term presence of significant American troops in Iraq. While the entire read is a must, I particularly loved this paragraph:

Yes, this is a victorious day for the truth-seekers at Powerline and Captain's Quarters. Michele Malkin is moist. For not only has the truth about Iraq won out, it has done so by the fey hand of “liberals,” from the “liberal” Brookings Institute, and been doled out on the pages of the “liberal” New York Times, sure to be sopped up with gusto by those northeast, latte-slurping liberals. This is good, you see, because liberals run everything, which is why the US is fighting two failing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, agitating and arming for a third with Iran, sending missile defenses to Europe to piss off the Russians in the hopes of ramping up a new cold war, sending arms to Saudi Arabia, backing the brutal actions of Ethiopian government troops in Ethiopia and Somolia, and arming rebels in Darfur. If liberals weren't in charge, why, imagine the bliss. But I digress.

UPDATE II: Pentagon Announces 20,000 more troops headed to Iraq

Nearly 20,000 U.S. troops based in the United States will begin departing for Iraq in December as part of the regular rotation of combat forces there, the Defense Department announced Tuesday.  These Army and Marine Corps units are not related to the buildup of American troops announced by President Bush in January, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.

UPDATED DC MADAM PHONE LIST INVESTIGATION

   

Updated as of 3:00pm Wednesday

Please add notes in comment sections. Will be adding more numbers from other billing periods tonight. Thanks.

Be sure to check out CLG for the latest.

Say It Ain't So, Brian Ross!

Brian Ross has historically been one of the best investigative reporters in the mainstream media -- the key word being “historically”.  More recently he has been at the forefront of a couple of stories that not only bring his credibility into question, but make him appear to be nothing more than a corporate and government toady or hack.

First, back in September 2006, Ross was spreading a bunch of b.s. about Khalid Shaikh Mohammed at the same time that the Bush administration was trying to get its pro-torture legislation through Congress. See the video mashup above I made to evidence the ridiculous claims he was making which could have been debunked merely by visiting Wikipedia. Certainly having Ross on the case helped the Bushies get their law passed.

More recently, Ross was set to reveal the blockbuster names on the DC Madam's phone bill but seemed to get cold feet at the last minute despite endless teasers advertising the blockbuster 20/20 News report all week long.  The actual video that aired can be found at right after following the link. But the report came and went with a thud with Ross even stating at one point that, “there were no members of Congress that we could find on these phone records.”

But today the DC Madam posted her phone bills online (see here and here) and already Senator David Vitter (R-LA) has been linked (admitted) to using the DC Madam's services. Thus, it appears that Ross was, once again, less than truthful.

Say it ain't so, Brian!

Technorati Tags: brian ross, coporatism, dc madam, propaganda

RFK Jr. Gives One Of The Greatest American Speeches EVER

 

UPDATE: Video taken down at YouTube but can still be watched at BRAD BLOG! One of the best speeches you will ever hear. Hat tip to Agent 99. Rough transcript at Brad Blog.

Technorati Tags: ANWR, big oil, bush, coporatism, corruption, democracy, environment, exxon, fascism, foxnews, iraq, middle east, morality, msm, oil, rfk jr, video

BREAKING: JUDGE RULES IN FAVOR OF D.C. MADAME

This is oh so strange. You might recall the case of the D.C. Madame who threatened to release the phone numbers of all her clients which was said to include some rather prominent members of the D.C. establishment. Then Brian Ross of ABC News was given the list and was going to reveal some of the blockbuster names in a Friday show. But the outrage from Fox “News” and others - how could ABC destroy so many families? - seemed to get to Ross whose blockbuster airing came and went with a whimper as he revealed no new names.

Now it turns out “The Government has twice applied to this Court ex parte for Temporary Restraining Orders (”TROs“) preventing Defendant from selling the List or from distributing copies for free.” You may be asking, as I am asking, what the hell is the Government doing getting involved in this case apart from the regular prosecution of Palfrey and why do they give a crap about her list? Actually, the judge wanted to know the same thing:

At oral argument, the Government was asked whether the List contained the telephone numbers of unindicted co-conspirators. After a significant silence, Government counsel agreed that the answer to the Court's question was “yes.” One cannot help wondering why the Government has exhibited such a strong interest in protecting a list containing the telephone numbers of unindicted co-conspirators, i.e., the women who the Government alleges provided the illegal sexual services and the men who the Government alleges sought and obtained such illegal sexual services.

As the Government was unable to answer this question and kept changing its legal argument for why the judge should keep the list under seal, the judge ruled in favor of the Defendant's request to quash the TROs.  Surely, she threw the Government a bone by publicizing her ruling on July 5, during the holiday week. Still, now Palfrey is free to make the lists public.

Hence, the only remaining question is how many days it takes the prosecution to make her case go away. As there is no way the Government goes to all the trouble it did, inventing phony arguments and all, if it were not protecting someone of significant import. And the Dick Cheney in me says that it would just be easier to make the whole case disappear.

The Court's Ruling (PDF)

More from LegitGov.org

You have created a monster, and it will destroy you!

Henry Frankenstein: Dangerous? Poor old Waldman. Have you never wanted to do anything that was dangerous? Where should we be if no one tried to find out what lies beyond? Have your never wanted to look beyond the clouds and the stars, or to know what causes the trees to bud? And what changes the darkness into light? But if you talk like that, people call you crazy. Well, if I could discover just one of these things, what eternity is, for example, I wouldn't care if they did think I was crazy.

Doctor Waldman: You have created a monster, and it will destroy you!

How the right wing corporate controlled empire created a monster and why that might turn out to be a good thing...

John Kerry calls for the return of the fairness doctrine and for equal time requirements in the media. As if anyone needed any proof that an imbalance existed in the media, a recent study evidenced that conservative talk radio accounts for 91% of total talk radio programming.  Again, nothing surprising.

But what is particularly interesting about this brief video is that it was posted on YouTube by MDRUDGE and has 180,000 views in one day -- much of them coming from the conservative blogosphere including Hugh Hewitt and Real Clear Politics.  The base of the Republican party has always been overly sensitive to such accusations about the media because they actually believe the laughable propaganda about a liberal bias. This ridiculous notion, mind you, is not shared by those at the top of the party like Rich Bond (the former Republican party chair), Bill Kristol and Pat Buchanan, among others, who all admit the idea is rubbish. 

Knowledge of the truth about media bias, of course, never stopped Kristol and his colleagues from continuously using the liberal media ploy to fool the rabid Republican base into backing their policies for war or voting for their pro corporate candidates for political office. After all, you don't cut off the hand that feeds you.  And here is where our first monster was born.

As I blogged about here, corporations require year over year growth in revenues and profits or management risks losing $$$$ as Wall Street moves to better investments. This results in more corporate lobbying, bribery, corporate welfare, government give-aways, corporate tax breaks, cronyism and corruption than the previous year. Thus, every year the corporate whores that make up the media punditry, think tanks and Fox “News” must come up with more ridiculous incendiary rhetoric to rally the base whose skepticism grows with every scandal and as their quality of life worsens with higher energy prices, education costs, health care costs and lost jobs. At this point, the right has used every trick in the book from liberal media bias, racism, the faux liberal attack on religion and Christmas, anti-gay, xenophobia, anti-Muslim, creation of an evolution vs. creationism debate, etc. to stoke the fears of its base and rally the troops to overcome the greed and corruption of the corporate-government relationship.

Enter Immigration

“Talk radio is running America. We have to deal with that problem.” — Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS)

Trent Lott was speaking on June 15 about why Congress was unable to pass immigration reform.  The problem was the rabid Republican base that he and his colleagues created to help line the pockets of corporations and themselves as well as win elections had grown into an independent force that was now derailing the corporate/government plans to secure cheap labor. And I can't stop my crocodile tears. Imagine encouraging the worst racist fears in people, not to mention, fear-mongering about the threat of terrorism, year after year for political gain and then crying foul when it comes back to haunt to you. Actually, you need not imagine it.

So now we are stuck with two monsters that must be killed. First, we have the ginormous corporations that must improve their bottom lines which requires even more heinous activity, usually with a government hand, than the year before. The amount of money at stake is so great that no human could help but be influenced by it, never mind, a member of Congress. Thus, we will continue to see more Enron's, Halliburton no-bid contracts, Big Oil billion dollar giveaways, Big Tobacco hundreds of billion dollar giveaways and a bigger portion of the country's tax bill paid by individuals rather than corporations - until this corporate monster is killed. For a current example the idea of allowing News Corp. to buy the Wall Street Journal borders on insanity but it would never be stopped by our government because so many politicians receive benefit from Murdoch's empire.

And we will continue to see more influence from the fringe but powerful group of hate first, irrational, radicals that make up the Republican base and have the power to kill legislation favored by up to 70% of the country.  Trent Lott is right to realize the danger that this monster presents to the country. And as one might expect, conservative talk radio was none to happy about Trent's comments or John Kerry's remarks and will fight back hard and dirty. Which is hardly surprising considering the hate rhetoric leaders on the right have filled it with over the years. This monster is a powder keg that wants to blow.

And of all of this might be the best thing to happen to the country. On their own, each monster poses a real threat to the country which has already been severely weakened by six years of Bush policies.  It is difficult to see how we reign in or kill either monster on their own considering the corporate monster controls much of Congress, the media and the courts but can't seem to control the radical monster. But, both monsters are showing a willingness to fight each other as evidenced by the Lott quote and reaction from the blogosphere.

We can only hope they fight to the death.

Mayors Bloomberg and Villaraigosa Interviewed

Mayors Bloomberg and Villaraigosa talk about an assortment of issues from taking the lead on the environment, partisanship and ideology.

Why So Many Americans Believe Conspiracy Theories

And people still wonder why so many Americans believe in government conspiracies:

In a collision of 21st-century science and decades-old conspiracy theories, a research team that includes a former top FBI scientist is challenging the bullet analysis used by the government to conclude that Lee Harvey Oswald alone shot the two bullets that struck and killed President John F. Kennedy in 1963.

The “evidence used to rule out a second assassin is fundamentally flawed,” concludes a new article in the Annals of Applied Statistics written by former FBI lab metallurgist William A. Tobin and Texas A&M University researchers Cliff Spiegelman and William D. James.

The researchers' re-analysis involved new statistical calculations and a modern chemical analysis of bullets from the same batch Oswald is purported to have used. They reached no conclusion about whether more than one gunman was involved, but urged that authorities conduct a new and complete forensic re-analysis of the five bullet fragments left from the assassination in Dallas.

Read The Washington Post article

DO DEMOCRAT'S FINALLY UNDERSTAND BUSH ADMINISTRATION?

Stop the

because

may finally have gone off for

in

as evidenced by

who, in a speech today at

said

Partisan politics has infiltrated every level of our federal government – from scientific reports on global warming to emergency management services to the prosecutorial power of the federal government itself. Even the Iraq War – from our entry to the reconstruction – has been thoroughly politicized and manipulated.

Recently, even those who had become somewhat inured to the intense partisanship of this Administration were shocked by the political manipulation of our U.S. Attorneys. And we have just begun to feel the impact of this scandal. Just as Hurricane Katrina exposed the issue of incompetence, the U.S. Attorney scandal has placed a spotlight on the Administration’s pattern of always placing the Republican Party’s interests before the public interest.

Now, the U.S. Attorney scandal will be to public corruption what Hurricane Katrina was to incompetence in the Bush Administration.

And the scandal has created a new context for viewing and evaluating scandals in the Bush Administration. Americans have learned just how the Bush Administration works and are discovering that under President Bush, no function of the federal government is free from the influence of politics.

And this is no accident. It’s all by design. The incidents I will list today are not a laundry list of one offs or isolated cases of corruption. There is a common denominator. Instead of promoting solutions to our nation’s broad challenges, the Bush Administration used all the levers of power to promote their party and its narrow interests.

and later

The Administration would like the press and public to believe all of this corruption and cronyism consists of isolated instances and one-offs. But I ask you:

Michael Brown. Scooter Libby. Bernard Kerik. Halliburton. Philip Cooney. David Safavian. Lurita Doan. Matteo Fontana. Sue Ellen Wooldridge. Steven Griles. Alberto Gonzales. FEMA. Iraq intelligence. Iraq reconstruction.

This Hall of Shame is no accident and these are not isolated incidences. It’s a pattern of political appointees who put partisan interests ahead of country – and were told to do so.

Unfortunately, while recognition of what's going on is a huge step forward, Emanuel's solution to the problem - ethics reform, lobbying reform and more oversight - leaves a lot to be desired. Hopefully the California Democratic Party will be able to persuade both Emanuel and

that impeachment is the logical and right thing to do.

Read Rahm's entire speech at TPMCafe