Billmon:

A determined and ruthless Democratic administration. Heh. That’s about as likely as that one-legged Latvian midget I was talking about.

Fear of God

—

The Empire Strikes Back

• Nov. 1: Drudge exclusive: Top Democrat Senator suspected of serial rape of Panda bears
• Nov. 2: Time: Bush’s secret plan to win in Iraq
• Nov. 3: New Osama video urges to vote for Democrats: "The only chance to win"
• Nov. 4: Iran tests new long range missile – Basra within possible reach!
• Nov. 5: Saddam convicted to death by Iraqi court
• Nov. 6: NYP: Hillary poised to legislate mandatory use of condoms
• Nov. 7: Only few difficulties as voters line up. Rove: "Long lines are not a concern."
• Nov. 8: Hastert demands recounts
• Nov. 9: Bush: "I have not been on the ballot"
• Nov. 10: Rumsfeld resigns – former Senator Lieberman (R-CT) nominated as new Secretary of Defense

Billmon:

Wrong to Be Right

Billmon:

We’re sending 52-year-old soldiers to die in Iraq.

Catch-52

Billmon:

We were all complicit. I was complicit. Because I was afraid — afraid to sacrifice my comfortable middle class lifestyle, afraid to lose my job and my house, afraid of the IRS, afraid to go to jail.

But not nearly as afraid, of course, as the thousands of Iraqis who have been tortured or murdered, or who, like Riverbend, are forced to live in bloody chaos, day after day. Which is why, reading her post today, I couldn’t help but feel deeply, bitterly ashamed — not just of my country, but of myself.

Down the River

Billmon:

So I guess we can bid (or swear) a final farewell to Ken Lay. You got away with it after all, dude.

I just hope he thought to convert his wealth into gold coins — or better yet, a safety deposit box full of diamonds. Because where Kenny’s going, paper money has a tendency to catch fire.

Deadbeat

Billmon:

Would we be better off if we let the FBI and the politicians play cops and robbers and left the running of the empire to a British-style cadre of foreign policy professionals — the kind of people who not only can tell the difference between Sunni and Shi’a, but could write PhD dissertations about it?

Empire of Ignorance

"We will answer brutal murder with patient justice," Bush said. "Those who kill the innocent will be held to account."
[…]
"The president can now, with the approval of Congress, indefinitely hold people without charge, take away protections against horrific abuse, put people on trial based on hearsay evidence, authorize trials that can sentence people to death based on testimony literally beaten out of witnesses, and slam shut the courthouse door for habeas petitions," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero.
Bush signs terror interrogation law

"The government will make use of these powers only insofar as they are essential for carrying out vitally necessary measures…The number of cases in which an internal necessity exists for having recourse to such a law is in itself a limited one." – Hitler told the Reichstag.
[…]
Hitler needed 31 non-Nazi votes to pass it. He got those votes from the Center Party after making a false promise to restore some basic rights already taken away by decree.
Hitler’s Enabling Act

12 Senate Democrats and 32 House Democrats voted for the bill as well.
A ‘Clear Message’

Billmon:

The Dauphin stamps his little foot and says "non" …

A Royal Pain

Billmon:

Have the shredders been working overtime at Chez Weldon over the weekend?

The Knock on the Door

Billmon:

Cutting and Running

News and views …

Billmon:

Now why the RNC would want to program a gay hologram, and then keep him in the closet, is beyond me.

Ken and Jack

For a while now, a reader at Josh Marshall’s TPM named s DK is doing the weekend blogging there.

He is quite good, better than Marshall in my view. But then today he writes:

I was under the impression that U.S. air strikes in Iraq had dwindled to only very occasional, discreet sorties months if not years ago. Fighting an insurgency with air strikes is like performing heart surgery with a chain saw. Apparently, though, that’s exactly what we are doing.

Yes, DK, thanks for saying so. Air strikes in Iraq are definitly underreported and the are a chain saw.

Cont. reading: Naivete

The London Sunday Times has prominently placed an Iraq piece on its homepage: Iraqis call for five-man junta.

Reading that headline one might envision a report about large demonstrations in Baghdad’s streets, editorials in Iraqi papers and discussions on Al Jazeerah. But next to claiming that a coup is widely discussed in political and intelligence circles in Baghdad (Iraqi or U.S. circles?), there is only one person cited in favor of it:

Dr Saleh al-Mutlak, a prominent Sunni politician, travelled to Arab capitals last week seeking support for the replacement of the present government with a group of five strongmen who would impose martial law and either dissolve parliament or halt its participation in day-to-day government.

Put aside that Iraq is already under martial law. Saleh al-Mutlak is a Sunni parliament member and a former Baathist. Of course he does not have any interest in democracy in a country where his constituenty is a minority. But he also does not have the power to do a coup himself.

The article also cites Ahmed "Crook" Chalabi, who says:

“The only person who can undertake a coup in Iraq now is General George Casey (the US commander) and I don’t think the Americans are inclined to go in that direction,”

I believe that Chalabi is right on the first part. At this point, only the U.S. can initiate a coup in the green zone. But the second part seems wrong.

Commentator annie points to an interview with David Brooks, a journalist with a direct line to the White House. Brooks says about the U.S. administration:

I think they’re looking at policy options. One of those options is trying to replace the current government which seems to be doing nothing.

The Sunday Times headline "Iraqis call for …" is just an attempt to prepare the public for a coup that has already been decided on in Washington.

The spin from now on is no longer democracy but what the Iraqi’s call for. At least as long as such calls fit the administrations plans.

Even for Bush followers, it will not be easy to spin themselfs from the much hyped democracy support into a junta support, but because this is an emergency and certainly temporarily and only to further security and because the Iraqis call for it, this just needs to be done and will be done.

And, by the way, setting this example in Iraq is also a good test of such political tactics and it is a mass conditioning training for a later time, when the Sunday Times might write: "Americans call for …".

Billmon:

A White House spokesman said the story was "unacceptable."

Unacceptable

Billmon:

Maybe there is hope for my beloved would-be adopted homeland after all.

True North

Open Thread …

Billmon:

Paranoia Watch

Billmon:

[B]ut losing Weldon’s seat might at least help crack the GOP’s iron grip on the public trough here in Delaware County, particularly if it’s followed by an indictment of both Weldon and the local machine boss. That would be entirely for the better.

The Very Naughty Caterpillar