Month: September 2006

The GOP are ramping up government spending by a whopping 9 percent in 2006 – despite pledges by Bush of fiscal responsibility. Well, we know what his word is worth. Now they’re up to it again for 2007. Money quote from Heritage:

the Senate is preparing to bust fiscal year (FY) 2007 discretionary spending caps by at least $32 billion to:

1. Reimburse the Pentagon for the $9 billion raided from its budget earlier this year and given to domestic programs, as well as fund additional defense and border security programs ($26.8 billion in total);

2. Fund another massive farm subsidy bailout despite high subsidy levels and a booming farm economy ($4.2 billion); and

3. Reimburse NASA for funds that lawmakers had diverted into parochial pork projects ($1.0 billion).

And in addition, lawmakers have promised $2 billion to $3 billion more for the labor, health, and education programs.

If that doesn’t make conservatives stay home or vote Democrat in protest this fall, what will?

A Chicago reader writes:

Just a quick note concerning your item on the "Liberals Hate It" billboard for a Chicago Radio Station. I suspect that this billboard is a direct response to several billboards for a rival radio station all featuring Al Franken’s photograph and the message "Liberals Love Us." I doubt that these signs reflect an increasing polarization as good healthy capitalism.

Or both.

It seems to me that, in the context of partisan squabbling about who bears responsibility for not doing enough to stop bin Laden before 9/11, no one said it better than Richard Clarke.

Above is a cartoon in official Hamas weekly "Al Risala," according to Palestinian Media Watch. They also include last Friday’s sermon by a Hamas religious leader, Dr. Osama Al-Mazini. Money quote:

"The second message is for the criminal Benedict the 16th, the Vatican Pope. For this ignorant and stupid Pope, who has no one to attack besides Islam and the Prophet [Muhammad], may the Creator have mercy on him and protect him. He [the Pope] characterized Islam as a cruel religion, and characterized Muhammad, may the Creator have mercy on him and protect him, as a cruel man, spilling blood, who strove to kill. This hostile Pope refuses to apologize to Muslims; and, instead of apologizing he blames the Muslims for not understanding, thereby adding crime upon crime. This arrogant Pope sees the Muslims as too inferior that he should apologize to them. To this arrogant Pope – criminal and arrogant – this message is from Allah the Elevated and the Exalted, as it was said: ‘Think not that Allah is unaware of what the wicked do. He but gives them a respite until a day when eyes will stare (in terror).’ [Sura14:42]"

Ah, yes, a threat of murdering the Pope with scriptural backing. But Islam is all about peace, right?

A reader writes:

Are you concerned because you think that gays will be waterboarded. That’s all I can figure out. You’re irrational.

He got his talking points right, didn’t he?

It’s from C.S. Lewis’ "That Hideous Strength":

Deputy Director Wither: "… As you are aware, I always deplore anything that is not perfectly humane; but that is quite consistent with the position that if more drastic expedients have to be used then they must be used thoroughly.  Moderate pain, such as any ordinary degree of endurance can resist, is always a mistake. It is no true kindness to the prisoner.

The more scientific and, may I add, more civilised facilities for coercive examination which we have placed at your disposal here, might have been successful.  I am not speaking officially, Miss Hardcastle, and I would not in any sense attempt to anticipate the reactions of our Head.  But I should not be doing my duty if I failed to remind you that complaints from that quarter have already been made (though not, of course, minuted) as to your tendency to allow a certain ‚Äî er ‚Äî emotional excitement in the disciplinary or remedial side of your work to distract you from the demands of policy."

"You won’t find anyone can do a job like mine well unless they get some kick out of it," said the Fairy [Hardcastle] sulkily.

Deputy Director Wither has found his allies at National Review. Lewis even foresaw the euphemism designed to obscure evil: "coercive examination." Funny, I thought they liked C. S. Lewis at NRO. Funny, I thought they called themselves Christians. It’s odd how Christianists will brook no compromise on an issue as esoteric as the moral status of a zygote or the right of two gay people to love each other – but torture legalized by their own president? No problem. Torture away, guys. Karl told us it could win a midterm.

Another now-tragic protest from the traditional wing of the military:

Retired Brig. Gen. James P. Cullen was chief judge of the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals. "I grew up in an Army where the rules were very clear and where serviceman and women had no question about what their obligations and responsibilities were under both the Geneva Convention and our domestic law," he said. "When you have a winking-and-nodding policy [as was the case at Abu Ghraib], that just brings about the consequences that we came to view at [the prison]."

What further fuels the officers’ outrage is that the policies they believe have undermined the military were mostly formulated by men, like Bush, who have not seen combat.

"[Vice President Dick] Cheney made mention in the days after 9/11 that he wanted to operate sort of on the dark side," Cullen said. "Here was a guy who never served, and now something terrible had happened, and he wanted to show that he was a tough guy‚Ķ. So he’s going to operate outside the rules of law. Bad message."

And now a proposed bill allows the president to operate outside the law. That’s the "compromise."

"The Army’s top officer withheld a required 2008 budget plan from Pentagon leaders last month after protesting to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that the service could not maintain its current level of activity in Iraq plus its other global commitments without billions in additional funding.
The decision by Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army’s chief of staff, is believed to be unprecedented and signals a widespread belief within the Army that in the absence of significant troop withdrawals from Iraq, funding assumptions must be completely reworked, say current and former Pentagon officials.

‘This is unusual, but hell, we’re in unusual times,’ said a senior Pentagon official involved in the budget discussions. Schoomaker failed to submit the budget plan by an Aug. 15 deadline. The protest followed a series of cuts in the service’s funding requests by both the White House and Congress over the last four months.

According to a senior Army official involved in budget talks, Schoomaker is now seeking $138.8 billion in 2008, nearly $25 billion above budget limits originally set by Rumsfeld. The Army’s budget this year is $98.2 billion, making Schoomaker’s request a 41% increase over current levels." – Los Angeles Times, today.

"No, no. The enemy is changing tactics, and we’re adapting. That’s what’s happening. I asked General Casey today, have you got what you need? He said, yes, I’ve got what I need," – president George W. Bush, September 15.

Did he just pull the same trick as his "read-my-lips" dad?

The L.A. Times continues an investigation into unconscionable and covered-up torture by the Special Forces in Afghanistan. Money quote:

Within days of the Wazi killing, an 18-year-old Afghan army recruit named Jamal Naseer died after being interrogated at the team’s firebase in Gardez, about 25 miles to the north. Multiple witnesses say his body showed signs of severe beating and other abuse. His brother and six others also held at Gardez say they were tortured.

The commander over all Special Forces in Afghanistan at the time, then-Col. James G. "Greg" Champion, said in a brief interview that neither death was reported up the chain of command. Champion, a National Guardsman who has since been promoted to brigadier general, said he did not hear of the deaths until 18 months later, when he learned that The Times was investigating.

Under this president, America has become a nation increasingly known for torturing, murdering and disappearing "terror suspects." Some, of course, can see what is in front of their noses:

"Two unreported deaths in a few days are a clue that something’s wrong" with that team, said a military official familiar with the incidents, who asked not to be identified.

In the future, when history is written, just remember: it’s not that we weren’t told what was going on. It’s that we looked the other way.