Justice

The best thing I've read on line this week:

"Michael Vick goes to jail, loses millions, and now is on house arrest for torturing and killing a few dogs. George Bush tortures thousands, kills a million, loots the treasury and retires to a gated community in Dallas."

One of my great hopes for the future is that I will be able to come back and amend this post.

Fallout

In the wake of the recent arrest of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich there appears to be a number of people who my also be losers in this scandal. Number one on the Republican hopeful list is , of course, President Elect Barack Obama. The Rethug machine is already trying to put Obama in the Blago camp. "Tarred" as you will, with the taint of Illinois politics in general. Jesse Jackson Jr. has been outed as Senate Hopeful #5 and has had a presser where he insisted he had no designs to buy the Senate seat.
There is one person who has no direct connection with Blogo's corruption but is the one who is going to get the biggest screwing out of it: Former Illinois Governor George Ryan. Ryan was convicted of corruption several years ago and has been in prison since 2007. He currently resides in a federal correction institution in Terre Haute. He has been prominently listed as one of Bush's number one pardon choices. No less than Dem Senator Dick Durbin has pushed for George's release. Some how it seems unlikely that even the increasingly out-of-touch Bush White House would be tone deaf enough to pardon the previous Felonious Governor in the wake of his own Justice Dept trying to send the current Gov to the same big house.
So, it would seem, Ryan will take it on the chin. Or, considering his current living situation, lower.

Joe Hill rolls over

The ever idiotic Doughy Pantload hit his usual stride today with a column on schools. The topic was on the Obama girls going to a private school but of course the real topic was bashing the left. His target? Teachers unions. Once again the left is the direct off-spring Hitler, as we see in this quote:

The main reason politicians adopt a policy of malign neglect: teachers unions, arguably the single worst mainstream institution in our country today.

It seems amazing than any children get educated with the evil teachers unions strangling the life out of public schools.
The thing to remember here is not the attack against the teachers' unions, but that the right and all the supporters thereof are ramping up their pogrom against all unions. The number one target right now is the UAW. The talk of bailout for the big three auto makers is bringing out the meme that it's the labor costs that are causing their failure. The big lie this week is that auto workers receive $70 plus dollars an hour for their work. In reality the figure is about $28. (If that sounds like a lot, remember that's about $56000 a year for a 40 hour week/50 week year) While the right remains quite quiet about the white collar sharks getting millions (sometimes billions) in pay from companies that get bailout money, they can not talk enough about how the union worker is dragging the same companies down.
The real need in this country is not fewer unions but universal health care. It's the health care costs that are driving up the labor portion of auto making (the other costs are materials, debt service, and management pay) and it's not going into the workers pocket. The one good thing about the economic collapse is that maybe major manufacturers will finally jump on to the Universal Healthcare bandwagon. We can only hope. (And, of course, lobby your congress critter)

All the news that fits

I saw this in my local fishwrap yesterday. In case you don't find the economic news grim enough. Wasn't ther a war goin on a couple of months ago? (Click title for photo)

Oh Oh!

Three months ago to the day, I wrote about VP selection and suggested that the real powers behind the Bush administration would go to a dark horse. I said at that time they might look for a Bush-like politician to set up for another run at securing both the election and a second shot of fulfilling the NeoCon agenda. When Caribou Barbie came up as the choice I thought initially I was wrong and that they were going for the Hail Mary just to maybe save the election.
After a few days of Alaska watch, I started to think maybe I wasn't so far off to begin with. Her style of governance bears a striking resemblance to the Bush Whitehouse. The moment you get in office you demand total loyalty to Dear Leader. Anyone who doesn't start fawning from day one either gets the boot or is marginalized. Her speech at the Convention was a study in Rovian obfuscation. Attack your opponent, lie about your record, and keep repeating whatever line of crap you want your followers to mimic. Jeff Yang at Salon yesterday had a great article that spells it out much better than I ever could.
I'm getting a sinking feeling that this election could be a lot tougher for Obama and the Dems to win then many people think. Palin doesn't have to be bright or a great politician. She has others to do that for her. If the Rethugs can continue the story line of her being the fresh new reformer and with her fundie cred bringing in the Christian wingnuts, she might just be capable swinging the election in McStain's favor. I think the next few weeks will be some of the most interesting politicking you've ever seen.
Oh, and by the way: Grampy, if you do win in Nov, I'd be real careful around all the staircases in the Whitehouse. You never know when the Moose killer is behind you.

Who's Watching Your Back?

Buried on the bottom of the eighth page of the Sunday Chicago Tribune is an article entitled U.S. proposes to ease domestic spying rules.I caught the story as a blurb on MSN's online news on Saturday and thought that it would drop into obscurity like most of these sorta dry administrative manoeuvres. The Times story was a slightly more informative than MSN, but below the fold on page eight does not a raise even a ripple.
The gist of the story is that The Bush administration has redefined the role of local police departments in the Global War On Terror. Now, any local police department that receives federal aid (over 18000 state and local) will be allowed to collect intelligence on groups and individuals that they believe to be engaged in terrorism or supporting any group that helps terrorists. This information will be held for up to ten years and forwarded to Homeland Security. Effectively, local police departments will be required to spy on citizens on the basis of any type of suspicion. Not since the sixties and seventies have we had the spectre of local police becoming "Red Squads" and combing the activities of anti-government groups and individuals. Except today we have "Enemy Combatants" and Gitmo.
As I was mentally composing this post, Keith Olbermann on Countdown covered this story. I was glad that it is getting wider distribution, but both KO and the Trib believe that this is a move by the Bushies to institutionalize domestic spying. Certainly you can't have a hard time believing that the administration that wipes it's butt with the constitution would have any compunction against wider domestic spying but I have one little problem: There appears to be a very good chance that the next President of the United States is going to be a colored guy named Barack.
I somehow have this really tough time imagining that the Bush handlers really want to leave this police state to a Democrat. Particularly this Democrat. So what does this lead you to believe? That the Rethugs think (or worse, know) that they are going to win in November.
Occam's razor says that this is just another of this crowds' ongoing movement towards the police state and that it's just part of the momentum that's been built up over the last seven years but I just can't shake the fear that this election is going to make the last two look fair. Only November will tell.

I Solemnly Swear...

I viewed a recording yesterday of Nancy Pelosi at a book event in California. This was a pay-to -get-into event which should have been filled with the faithful and of little notice the world at large. What made it noteworthy was that about thirty protesters attended the event along with the supporters. As protesters, this group broke the pattern of chanting and disrupting the event and went right to the heart of the matter and demanded that Pelosi justify her position vis-a-vis the prosecution of crimes by the executive branch. At one point Pelosi states: "I take an oath of office to uphold the constitution of the United States and don't tell me that I don't do that,” A fuller account can be seen at Democraticunderground

I will pause here to offer this: The oath Nancy Pelosi swore to when she took office as a member of the House of Representatives.

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God."

The central, nay only, requirement of this oath is the preservation of the rule of law, to defend the constitution of the United States. This is what Americans have fought and died for since it's ratification. And note that it includes domestic enemies, a phrase that was added after the civil war to remind members that not just foreigners can endanger the liberties that the constitution promises us all.

As long as Nancy Pelosi hold the office of Speaker of the House, every time she appears in public someone needs to stand before her and say:

Madame Speaker, The President of the United States and the Vice-President of the United States have, by their own admission, broken the laws of the United States to a level which may be construed as Treason. They have admitted to actions which the world has deemed War Crimes. Why have you not followed the oath of office to which you swore, and brought these crimes before the body of which you are leader? Why have you shirked your duty and ignored your oath and not sought the impeachment of these officials as is required by the Constitution? Why have you stated that you will not even consider impeachment even though the oath you swore requires you to? How can you stand before the people of the United States and the world and refuse to do that to which you swore?

If Nancy Pelosi finds that she can not appear in public without someone asking her these simple questions maybe the time will come where she actually has to answer these questions.