House Passes War Bill: $162B More For The Destruction Of Iraq And Afghanistan

The House of Representatives [sic] has passed a bill which would fund the continued occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan well beyond the twice-unelected president's scheduled date of departure. And that's the good news.

Republicans [...] applauded the passage of another war funding bill without a deadline for troop withdrawals, something Pelosi and many Democrats had sought [sic] since early last year.

"The measure provides this critical funding without bogging it down with politically motivated surrender language," Boehner said.

"Politically motivated surrender language"! These monsters are so transparent, they'd make me laugh if their actions weren't so deplorable. But that's the good news.

And now the bad news: the Democrats are calling it a victory!

Included in the bill that funds continued war without a deadline, are three provisions which president Bush has already threatened to veto. With apparent support for an override in Congress, the House has "stood up" to the president on those points.

"He is reversing three distinct veto threats and signing them into law. If that ain't a victory, I don't know what is," said Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), chairman of the House Democratic Caucus [photo].

Bush can reverse any of those clauses with signing statements, so what difference does it make to him?

The bottom line: the Democrats, who control the House of Representatives [sic] and therefore the national purse-strings, have chosen to spend another $162 billion -- $540 per person -- over the next year, to keep killing people you've never met, in wars of aggression in foreign countries, which are being fought on false pretexts. And

"If that ain't a victory, I don't know what is,"

according to the so-called leader of the so-called opposition party.

Nothing in my lifetime, and probably nothing in American history, has shown as clearly as the so-called Global War On Terror just how easily corruptible and utterly corrupt the American political system is.

But even having seen it -- even seeing it more clearly every day -- we continue to drift along, sliding ever closer to the edge of a horrible abyss.

What's another $162 billion? How many more innocent people will that kill? Enough?

No! It's never enough! Next year they'll need more, and they'll need even more than they needed this year. And even if we've got a Democratic president, even if we've got a solidly Democratic Congress, will they dare to vote against it?

You must be joking.

This is the same Rahm Emanuel who denied funding and national exposure to any Democrat who was fortunate enough to win a primary but not smart enough to toe the party line. So Bob Bowman (who supports 9/11 truth) and Clint Curtis (who supports electoral integrity) were on their own for the general election, while Cynthia McKinney (who supports both) was torpedoed in the primary.

And he's running the national Democratic caucus.

All we can do at this point is drop to our knees and beg for mercy.

Arizona Congressman Arraigned For Corruption; Party Affiliation A Secret

Arizona Congressman Rick Renzi [photo] pleaded not guilty Tuesday to federal charges including insurance fraud, extortion and money laundering.

Lupita Murillo reports for KVOA News 4 Tucson:

Congressman Renzi arraigned in federal court

On February 21, Renzi and his former business partners were indicted after a lengthy investigation.

It focused on the land development and insurance businesses owned by Renzi's family.

Renzi and his business partners James Sandlin and Andrew Beard are all accused of concealing at least $733,000 that Renzi allegedly took for helping seal the land deals.

Renzi and Beard are also accused of embezzling more than $400,000 in insurance premiums to fund Renzi's first congressional campaign.

Renzi says he's not resigning his position. That's the message congressman Rick Renzi sent to his constitutients from court.

Congressman Renzi sat stoically next to his attorneys as he entered his 'not guilty' plea.

The judge released Renzi on a promise to appear in court and didn't set bond.

Renzi was ordered by the judge to stop at the U.S. Marshall's office to be fingerprinted and photographed.

Outside the courthouse, Renzi and his team of attorneys were met by the media. Renzi's attorney did all the talking.

Reid Weingarten told the media, "There is a presumption of innocence in this country and it applies to congressmen. And Congressman Renzi is fully prepared to continue serving his constitutients [sic] while we fight for his rights in court. And there's plenty of rights to be fought for."

The FBI spent 26,000 man-hours on this case.

Prosecutors declined to comment.

I don't mind commenting.

How is it that I can read this whole article without once finding any allusion to the name of the political party to which Rick Renzi is attached?

Why can I go to his website, and read "About Rick", and still find no mention of his party affiliation?

Could it be because he's an elephant? YES.

Are the elephants so rotten that they no longer publicly identify themselves as such? YES.

Are the American "news" media sufficiently corrupt to go along with this distortion-by-omission? YES.

If the indicted congressman were a donkey, would the media be singing a different tune? OF COURSE.

Anybody who didn't get all these answers on the first try is welcome to stay late today for some review.

As for presumption of innocence, there are more than 350 people incarcerated at Gitmo who have never even been charged with any crime of any nature, let alone betrayal of the supposedly sacred trust of public service. Some of them were captured by lawless tribesmen when they tried to escape the American bombing of their homeland, then sold into eternal captivity. And they aren't entitled to any presumption of innocence. They aren't entitled to anything -- not even a hearing!

So why does "presumption of innocence" apply to a congressman who's been indicted after 26,000 man-hours of investigation, and against the prevailing political winds, when it doesn't apply to people who have never even been charged?

Because "presumption of innocence", like every other aspect of the rule of law, is now a political weapon, to be used against enemies of the regime, and on behalf of their friends. Pakistan is the model.

House Republicans Walk Out To Protest Contempt Charges

The (Democratically-controlled) House of Representatives has cited two Bush aides -- Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers -- as being in contempt of Congress for their refusal to fulfill their legal obligations to a Congressional investigation into the hiring and firing of federal prosecutors. Josh Bolten failed to turn over subpoenaed documents; Harriet Miers failed to appear after she was subpoenaed to testify; in both cases, their contempt of Congress has seemed quite clear, and this move to cite them comes as no surprise.

In response, Republican House members, showing their deep respect for the Democrats in particular and the Rule of Law in general, stormed out and staged a photo-opportunity on the steps of the Capitol!

During this photo-op, some Republicans denigrated the Congressional attempt to determine whether (or more properly, to what extent and by whom) the Department of Justice has been transformed into a partisan political weapon.

Instead they suggested in the strongest terms that the Democrats in the House should spend their time kowtowing to the twice-unelected President's demands for a grant of retroactive immunity to all the telecom companies which have broken the law at his behest.

Julie Hirschfeld Davis reported for the AP; excerpts and additional comments follow:

House Holds Bush Confidants in Contempt

The House voted Thursday to hold two of President Bush's confidants in contempt for failing to cooperate with an inquiry into whether a purge of federal prosecutors was politically motivated.

Angry Republicans boycotted the vote and staged a walkout.

The vote was 223-32 Thursday to hold presidential chief of staff Josh Bolten and former White House counsel Harriet Miers in contempt. The citations charge Miers with failing to testify and accuse her and Bolten of refusing Congress' demands for documents related to the 2006-2007 firings.

Republicans said Democrats should instead be working on extending a law — set to expire Saturday — allowing the government to eavesdrop on phone calls and e-mails in the United States in cases of suspected terrorist activity.

If the law that's set to expire Saturday allowed the government to eavesdrop only on "those phone calls and e-mails in the United States in cases of suspected terrorist activity", we would have less of a problem. But the law allows the government to eavesdrop at will, without even the pretense of trying to stop suspected terrorist activity. Nobody would ever know who the government had eavesdropped on, or when, or why.

In fact the Congress knows very little about the situation the administration is trying so hard to legalize. It's all so secret, they don't even know what they're voting about. It's enough to make you sick, if you think about it for more than half a second. But it's fine with some of our "representatives".

Meanwhile, the White House is making sure nothing comes of the contempt citations:

The White House said the Justice Department would not ask the U.S. attorney to pursue the House contempt charges.

The White House should be cited for contempt as well, of course. But the AP can't exactly say that.

It is the first time in 25 years that a full chamber of Congress has voted on a contempt of Congress citation.

... except that the chamber wasn't exactly full, because the Republicans decided to show their lack of contempt out on the front steps.

The action, which Democrats had been threatening for months, was the latest wrinkle in a more than yearlong constitutional clash between Congress and the White House.

The administration has said the information being sought is off-limits under executive privilege, and argues that Bolten and Miers are immune from prosecution.

The administration uses the same "logic" to defend the aides and the corporations: "If they had to worry about accountability under the law, they wouldn't help us."

Rather than saying "Good! They shouldn't help you!", Congress has been changing the laws that these people have been breaking.

This has been going on and on; we are looking at only the latest example.

And this is representative government at its finest? This is the greatest democracy ever conceived?

If Congress doesn't act to enforce the subpoenas, said Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat, it would "be giving its tacit consent to the dangerous idea of an imperial presidency, above the law and beyond the reach of checks and balances."

I couldn't agree more, and the AP article explains why (in the next few paragraphs). But Congress has already given its explicit consent to "the dangerous idea of an imperial presidency, above the law and beyond the reach of checks and balances" -- and it's done so more than once during this presidency, so although Steny Hoyer is technically correct, there's something very hollow about his words.

A bit of context on the case:

Under former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Justice Department officials consulted with the White House, fired at least nine federal prosecutors and kindled a political furor over a hiring process that favored Republican loyalists.

Bush's former top political adviser Karl Rove has also been a target of Congress' investigation into the purge of prosecutors, although Thursday's measure was not aimed at him.

Karl Rove's missing about five million emails which were all supposed to be archived. The AP won't mention that, but I might.

Greg Palast, who has obtained some of those emails, says they are extremely incriminating. That's no surprise, of course; it helps to explain both the reluctance of the media to discuss the case in detail, and it helps to explain the administration's refusal to cooperate with the investigation in any meaningful way.

Fred Fielding, the current White House counsel, has offered to make officials and documents available behind closed doors to the congressional committees probing the matter — but off the record and not under oath. Lawmakers demanded a transcript of testimony and the negotiations stalled.

Are we idiots here? Are we supposed to believe that proceedings that occur "off the record and not under oath" have any validity? Are we supposed to believe that honest people with nothing to hide would refuse to cooperate with an investigation unless they could do so "off the record and not under oath"?

It's such a transparent attempt to hide wrongdoing; Fred Fielding is another one who could be cited for contempt, in my view. And so is John Boener.

"We have space on the calendar today for a politically charged fishing expedition but no space for a bill that would protect the American people from terrorists who want to kill us," said Rep. John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, the minority leader.

I keep saying it but none of these idiot politicians will listen:

Go arrest the terrorists who want to kill us -- if they really exist!

If you know who they are and what they're planning then you shouldn't need to dessicate the Bill of Rights any further -- just go arrest them. We will thank you profusely. None of us want to die, you know.

But if you don't know who they are then you can't know what they're planning, and if this is the case then you should go directly to jail for homegrown terrorism.

We're tired of having fear used as a weapon against us. John Boehner is tired of the truth.

"Let's just get up and leave," he told his colleagues, before storming out of the House chamber with scores of Republicans in tow.

Yeah, good idea, John. That'll show the American people there's no contempt involved here. None whatsoever! And the White House can help catapult the propaganda:

"If the House had nothing better to do, this futile partisan act would be a waste of time," said Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman. "The 'people's House' should reflect the priorities of the American people, not the fantasies of left-wing bloggers."

The idea that a White House spokeswoman can be relied upon to "reflect the priorities of the American people" is just so absurd, given the current political situation ... that the standard horse manure from the standard sources seems like comic relief half the time -- except it's not funny.

Neither is it funny how the media keeps trying to make "wiggle room" for the criminal elite:

It's not clear that contempt of Congress citations must be prosecuted. The law says the U.S. attorney "shall" bring the matter to a grand jury.

Well, it all depends on what you mean by the word "shall" doesn't it? The word seems pretty clear to me ...

What "shall" we do? "Shall" we bring the matter before a grand jury? The law says we "shall". What "shall" we do with the matter when we bring it before the grand jury? "Shall" we initiate a prosecution? Or "shall" we just order pizza and beer?

Some historical precedent may be instructive:

The House voted 259-105 in 1982 for a contempt citation against EPA Administrator Anne Gorsuch, but the Reagan-era Justice Department refused to prosecute the case.

The Justice Department also sued the House of Representatives in that case, but the court threw out the suit and urged negotiation. The Reagan administration eventually agreed to turn over the documents.

But the Bush administration will never agree to turn over anything. They may decide to sue the House of Representatives, and they may decide to turn over a limited subset of carefully screened documents, but they will never satisfy the entire request from Congress. To do so, in their view, would be a bad move on two counts: It could lead to legal penalties; and it would set a precedent under which the White House would be seen as acknowledging its accountability to Congress as specified under the Constitution. And that's why it will never happen.

You may not have heard it here first, but I stand by my prediction.

As for the Republicans in Congress, they stand not only in contempt of Congress, but in contempt of the Rule of Law and of the Constitutional system of American government.

Their motives are clear for all to see. They're not even smart enough to pretend they don't hold our entire system of government in utter contempt.

They're not smart enough to hide this, either: The Rule of Law would impede them if they didn't undermine it -- the same as it impedes all criminals.

But justice isn't really blind; as we all know, the law impedes the rich and powerful much less than it impedes the ordinary working man. And the people -- politicians and their backers -- who are trying to strip the law of its teeth are among the wealthiest and most powerful of all.

One might think they could buy all the freedom from accountability they would ever need. But they have chosen to dismantle the Rule of Law, rather than simply purchase some freedom from it.

This gives you some idea of the magnitude of their crimes.

Homegrown Terrorism: Bush Uses Threat Of Violence To Coerce Congress

We've been up to our eyeballs in a War on Terror for the past six years and we still don't even have a good clear definition of terrorism. Fortunately, a new bill is coming to the rescue. The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007 defines "Homegrown Terrorism" as

the use, planned use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual born, raised, or based and operating primarily within the United States or any possession of the United States to intimidate or coerce the United States government, the civilian population of the United States, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.

There are eight clauses here, each held together with the word "or". I have numbered them for future reference.

[1] "the use, planned use, or threatened use"
[2] "of force or violence"
[3] "by a group or individual"
[4] "born, raised, or based and operating primarily within"
[5] "the United States or any possession of the United States"
[6] "to intimidate or coerce"
[7] "the United States government, the civilian population of the United States, or any segment thereof"
[8] "in furtherance of political or social objectives"

First let it be noted that clauses [4], [5], and [7] restrict the defined terrorism to that involving American targets and American terrorists. By omitting clauses [4] and [5], and removing all mention of the United States from clause [7], one could derive a slightly reasonable definition of terrorism in general:

the use, planned use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual to intimidate or coerce any government, any civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.

This is not an excellent definition because it leaves out one element which is necessary to distinguish terrorism from warfare. Terrorism is a crime against innocent civilians. Resistance against an attacking or occupying army can hardly be called terrorism. But this omission doesn't impair the current analysis, so I won't quibble at the moment.

Let it also be noted that each clause need only be satisfied once. For example, a simple threat would be sufficient to satisfy the first clause; similarly for all the other clauses.

There are many ways in which I could select one part from each of the eight clauses, and put my selections together to form a description of some variety of homegrown terrorism. My description wouldn't cover all cases of homegrown terrorism, of course; but any incident which fit my description would be, by definition, "homegrown terrorism".

Now, look at this, from the Associated Press:

Bush Presses House on Surveillance Bill

President Bush pressured the House on Wednesday to pass new rules for monitoring terrorists' communications, saying "terrorists are planning new attacks on our country ... that will make Sept. 11 pale by comparison."

Bush said he would not agree to giving the House more time to debate a measure the Senate passed Tuesday governing the government's ability to work with telecommunications companies to eavesdrop on phone calls and e-mails between suspected terrorists. The bill gives phone companies retroactive protection from lawsuits filed on the basis of cooperation they gave the government without court permission — something Bush insisted was included in the bill.

"We need the cooperation of telecommunications companies," Bush said. "If these companies are subjected to lawsuits costing billions of dollars, they won't participate, they won't help us."

It is highly fanciful to believe that if companies were held accountable for breaking the law, they wouldn't break the law anymore. Nonetheless, it is very easy to understand that companies will break the law more readily if they know they won't be punished for it.

And meanwhile, President Bush is without doubt

[3] "an individual"
[4] "born, raised, and based primarily within"
[5] "the United States"

The bill he's pushing will eviscerate the rule of law -- it will make anything you do legal, no matter how depraved, if the president says he wants you to do it -- and that's why he can't drum up any support for it without invoking the fear of "new attacks on our country ... that will make Sept. 11 pale by comparison".

So that's what he's been doing. He is invoking

[1] "the threatened use"
[2] "of violence"

And why?

About 40 lawsuits have been filed against telecom companies by people alleging violations of wiretapping and privacy laws. But the House did not include the immunity provision in a similar bill it passed last year.

The Senate passed its measure with bipartisan support, Bush said, and the House should pass it as well before the current law expires at midnight on Saturday, Bush said.

"The time for debate is over," he said.
...

"Congress has had over six months to discuss and deliberate," Bush said. "I will not accept any temporary extension. They have already been given a two-week extension."

And what is the point of this message?

[6] "to intimidate or coerce"
[7] "a segment of the United States population"
[8] "in furtherance of political objectives"

We know from experience that there's a double threat here. Not only has Bush threatened us all with terrorist attacks that will make 9/11 pale by comparison; he has also set up the next round of political slander: if the Democrats dare to oppose this legislation, he will say they're "soft on terror".

If I were a member of the House, I would say to the president, with all due respect (i.e. none):

Show me, in the Constitution or in any other federal law, the place where it says the president shall tell the Congress when and how to vote!

I would also say this:

Who are these "terrorists" who "are planning new attacks on our country ... that will make Sept. 11 pale by comparison"?

If you know who they are and what they're planning, then have them arrested. Bring them to justice. You'll be a hero. In fact, stopping terrorists from attacking us is the only thing your administration has ever claimed to do. So bringing them to justice is not only a way to salvage some "legacy"; it's also your job.

But if you don't know who they are, then how can you know what they're planning? And if you don't know who they are and what they're planning, then your assertion that "terrorists are planning new attacks ... that will make Sept. 11 pale by comparison" was not only a deliberate lie but also a blatant act of homegrown terrorism:

[1] "the threatened use"
[2] "of violence"
[3] "by an individual"
[4] "born, raised, and based primarily within"
[5] "the United States"
[6] "to intimidate and coerce"
[7] "a segment of the United States population"
[8] "in furtherance of political objectives"

So here's the deal, Mr. president: Either you arrest them, or we arrest you.

That's what I would say if I were in Congress.

I would also say:

The House will pass this despicable bill before midnight Saturday over my dead body!

And then they could bury me on the Monday.

Senate Votes $696 Billion More For Death And Destruction

Here's more of the type of news we've come to expect late on a Friday afternoon with holidays approaching.

According to the AP (via the New York Times),

The Senate on Friday passed a defense policy bill that would offer more help to troops returning from combat and set conditions on contractors and pricey weapons programs.

The bill does a lot of other things too, things that should never be done. But the AP can hardly afford to tell you that -- especially in the New York Times! So they spin it so hard it's more like twirling.

Typical liberal media:

The measure reflects the best Democrats could do this year on their national security agenda while holding such a slim majority.

This is hogwash, of course. The slimness of the Democratic majority is irrelevant.

The Democrats in both houses of Congress could have voted to give the war machine a hundred dollars a year if they wanted to.

But they don't.

Instead they claim they're powerless. Or they get their media whores to do it for them.

Powerless to overcome GOP objections in the Senate, the bill does not order troops home from Iraq, as Democrats would have liked.

If the Democrats really opposed the war, they would have stopped it a long time ago. All they would have had to do is vote together -- every Democrat, every time -- against any further military spending (or against anything else they didn't like).

And would be the end of it.

And there would be nothing anyone could do about it.

But instead of that -- instead of anything remotely like that, they all vote together, or nearly so, in the opposite direction!

The 90-3 vote follows House approval earlier this week and sends the measure to President Bush to sign, which he is expected to do.

I'd sign it too if I were him, even though it gives him only a year to spend $696,000,000,000. But you know he can do it, and he knows he can do it, and I'd sign it too, wouldn't you?

For the record, the Democrats still oppose the ever-increasing funding for the war machine, except when they vote, or when they talk about their priorities.

"Caring for our troops and their families must always be our top priority," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., chairman of the Armed Services Committee [photo], which helped write the bill.

Ka-boom. Who cares about the voters or what they want? Who cares about the crimes against humanity being committed by this government of ours, which will continue for another year -- and much much longer, thanks to another huge cash infusion? Who cares about trying to limit the damage this rogue pseudo-president can do in his supposedly final year in office?

The Democrats do care, of course. They share our concerns about all these issues, except when it causes a conflict with their top priority.

The bill, which covers the 2008 budget year, authorizes $696 billion in military spending, including $189 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

You can catch all the gory details from the New York Times or at my other other blog.

Here's just one more short item to make your reading experience almost perfect:

Final action on the bill comes as Democrats struggle for a way to pay for combat operations overseas without appearing to support Bush's policies in Iraq.

Where'd that one come from? Must have just slipped out, I guess.

And meanwhile the most horrible crimes continue, with the clear support of both parties.

Welcome to America's priorities.