I don't have too much extemporaneous commentary on these two pieces other than to point out one overriding necessity for progressives who give a damn: we must stop this man from taking control of the executive branch of our government. For the good of the country and the good of the entire planet.


The Most Important Piece of Paper in America

by Jared Bernstein
posted May 11, 2008

I hold in my hand one of the most important pieces of paper in America: Table T08-0071, an analysis of candidate John McCain's tax plan.

OK, it's not really in my hand because I'm typing, but I'm looking at it carefully, and you should too. It is a table constructed by the Tax Policy Center's steely-eyed tax analysts, and it reveals nothing less than McCain's secret plan to diminish the US government beyond recognition. If he gets his way, conservatives will finally be able to say they've achieved the goal set out by Grover Norquist: to get government "down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub."

The numbers in the table show the revenue loss to the Federal government from McCain's proposed tax cuts. In the far right corner is the 10-year total: -$5.7 trillion.

People deride the Republican candidate as "McSame," implying a continuation of Bushonomics as well as the president's foreign policy. But from the perspective of domestic policy, it's much worse. Sure, McCain extends the Bush tax cuts but that's the least of it. At $1.7 trillion they amount to less than a third of the damage.

more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jared-bernst...


McCain has missed every major environmental vote this CongressJohn Byrne
Published: Monday May 12, 2008

Wall Street Journal completely omits McCain voting record

"Sen. McCain's support of regulating global-warming gases like carbon dioxide -- the biggest environmental issue before Congress -- more closely resembles the stance of his Democratic rivals, Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton , though he disagrees with them on how such regulations should be structured," writes Monday's Wall Street Journal.

"Besides championing legislation to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions," the Journal adds, "Sen. McCain has opposed the administration's call to open parts of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas drilling, citing the refuge as a natural treasure on par with the Florida Everglades and the Grand Canyon in his home state of Arizona."

The Journal paints McCain as a maverick among Republican rank and file on environmental issues, in an article that is best misleading. While McCain has championed legislation to regulate greenhouse gas emissions in his speeches, he hasn't voted for it. And while he's opposed drilling in the Arctic, he also refused to support a ban on drilling in a 2005 defense appropriations bill.

The article also fails to mention that McCain ranks last among the 535 members of the current Congress in a rating by the League of Conservation Voters.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Revealed_McC...

First Hagee, now Rev. Fucking Moon!


Senior McCain adviser helped arrange Rev. Moon coronationNick Juliano
Published: Friday May 9, 2008


A bizarre Capitol Hill ceremony a few years ago in which the eccentric conservative publisher the Rev. Sun Myung Moon declared himself the Second Coming was organized with help from a senior adviser to John McCain's presidential campaign.

Charlie Black, a Washington lobbyist and McCain confidant, lent his name to the coronation ceremony and invited a few friends, according to newly disclosed e-mails.

"What is clear from this email is that top Mccain advisor Charlie Black is admitting that he helped plan, and would have attended, an event where a convicted tax fraud would have been crowned King Of America and declared himself the Messiah--all on U.S. Government federal property (on March 23, 2004)," writes author Cliff Schecter, who published the e-mails on his blog Friday.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Senior_McCai...

The 2008 Presidential Race: A 1972 Redux?

by Stephen Zunes
The desperate tactics employed by Senator Hillary Clinton to capture the Democratic presidential nomination from Senator Barack Obama contain some remarkable parallels with the efforts of another favored candidate of the party establishment to block the nomination of another insurgent Democrat 36 years ago. In both cases, the establishment candidate — with little chance late in the primary campaign of obtaining enough delegates to secure the nomination — committed to a strategy of not only trying to twist the rules so to pull off a coup at the convention, but engaging in systematic attacks against the front-runner in ways that appeared to be designed to weaken him in the very areas that would most benefit the Republicans in the general election campaign.

In 1972, the leader late in the Democratic primary race was South Dakota Senator George McGovern who — like Obama — had galvanized youthful voters, anti-war activists, small donors and other party progressives in a grass roots campaign that had brought new life and energy into a party which had narrowly lost the election four years earlier with a weak pro-war candidate at the helm. At the start of the campaign, the Republicans had looked vulnerable in November, with an unpopular war dragging on and an incumbent administration beset by scandals. However, as the liberal Midwestern senator defied expectations by running up a string of primary victories, former Vice-President Hubert Humphrey — who, like Clinton, seemed to feel that he was owed the nomination and the chance to be president — sought to both discredit McGovern in the eyes of voters and re-write the rules for seating state delegations at the party’s convention that summer.

The Credentials Fight

In 1972, rather than a winner-take-all system as in previous statewide presidential primary elections, Democratic Party reformers successfully encouraged virtually all primary states to agree to divide their delegates roughly proportional to the popular vote. In the case of California, however — then the last major state to vote in the primary calendar, in which Humphrey had been predicted to win a plurality — Humphrey’s supporters prevailed over McGovern backers and other reformers in rejecting proportionality, getting the state party to agree that all of California’s delegates be assigned to the winner of the primary.

Much to the chagrin of the party establishment, however, it was McGovern who ended up winning the California primary and all of the state’s delegates. Several weeks later, however, Humphrey and his influential supporters convinced party leaders to retroactively assign the delegates proportionally. This dispute was critical since, if McGovern was able to keep all his delegates, he would have a sufficient number to be nominated on the first ballot. With California’s large delegation split proportionally, however, he would fall just short of an overall majority, thereby enabling party bosses to hand the nomination to Humphrey on the second ballot. With the credentials battle still undecided, two separate delegations came from California to Miami for the convention, with neither delegation allowed to be seated until the convention as a whole voted on the issue the night before the balloting for president. Despite this desperate effort to, in McGovern’s words, “put Humpty-Dumpty together again,” the delegates in the convention hall voted to allow McGovern to keep all of his delegates. As a result, Humphrey withdrew his name from consideration and McGovern was nominated by an overwhelming majority.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/0...

The whole article is great, but this particular section caught my attention:

Sleepwalking toward the oil precipice
by Dave Cohen

It's Worse Than You Think

Although the foregoing paints a bleak picture, the situation is actually worse than you might think. OPEC's reference case may now be viewed as overly optimistic. Some points to consider are listed below. Things get a bit complicated in #1 and #3, so please be patient.

1. OPEC's average monthly production in 2008 (from the IEA's April Oil Market Report ) is 32.28 mmb/d, so you might say "Well! OPEC is producing more to ease the tight world market." OPEC is mostly adding to its total average monthly output by acquisition, not greater production in the core "OPEC 11". Angola joined the cartel in early January, 2007. Ecuador joined in November, 2007. There are now 13 countries in OPEC. Average monthly crude output was 29.71 mmb/d in 2006, and 30.66 mmb/d in 2007 adding in Angola's 1.61 mmb/d (= 29.05 mmb/d for the "OPEC 11"). Take the 2008 output number of 32.28 and subtract the total for Angola and Ecuador, which now adds up to 2.4 mmb/d. The total for the "OPEC 11" is 29.88 mmb/d. This number has hardly moved over the last 27 months.

The adjusted OPEC reference case total of 30.7 mmb/d in 2010 implies production of 28.30 mmb/d from the core "OPEC 11" if we assume current output levels for Angola and Ecuador. This is actually a decrease of 1.41 mmb/d from the 2006 level before either country joined the cartel.

Summing up, total output from the usual suspects—Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Algeria, Venezuela and the others—is assumed to be below the 2006 level in 2010 in OPEC's 2007 reference case. OPEC's Table 1.5 shows that the call on its crude is actually lower in 2010 than it was in 2005.

2. How much of this OPEC production will be available for export? Less than there used to be according to CIBC's OPEC's Growing Call on Itself. Consumption is rising in the Persian Gulf countries and elsewhere. Read the CIBC report and The Sierra Club Solution for a discussion of the export trends (ASPO-USA, January 30, 2008).

3. Recent Saudi statements seem to indicate an official change in policy that further confirms the Paradigm Shift position (ASPO-USA, June 20, 2007). This argument states that the Saudis and other oil exporters will not produce their oil in an unconstrained way to meet world demand. King Abdullah told us that "I keep no secret from you that when there were some new finds, I told them, 'no, leave it in the ground, with grace from god, our children need it'." Saudi Oil Minister al-Naimi validated the King's remarks in the Arab News (April 20, 2008).
Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia has no plans to embark on further capacity expansion as long-term oil demand forecasts fall and alternative fuel supplies rise, the Saudi oil minister told industry newsletter Petroleum Argus.

The holder of the world’s largest oil reserves sees no need to go beyond its 2009 capacity target of 12.5 million barrels per day “at least up to 2020,” Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Ali Al-Naimi said.

Long-term future energy demand forecasts have fallen sharply, he said in the interview given to the weekly on April 11, casting doubt on the need for more Saudi oil.

Demand forecasts have fallen as low as 106 million bpd in 2030, down from previous estimates as high as 130 million bpd. The world currently consumes around 86 million bpd.
This development adds a new wrinkle to what we already knew about Saudi intentions. See The Saudis Are Blowing Smoke Again, ASPO-USA, March 12, 2008. Saudi Arabia's (i.e. OPEC's) low demand projections could be called "a self-fulfilling prophecy" in so far as lower OPEC output after 2010 will price many consumers out of the oil markets. Worse yet, PFC's projection (graph left) shows that even unconstrained OPEC production would only boost world production to less than 100 million barrels per day by 2015 in any case! That's it, that's all there can be and ever will be based on PFC's depletion estimates for OPEC as a whole. (Look through their presentation.)

PFC's low growth case exceeds OPEC's reference case after 2009. But without substantial new contributions from the Saudis over the next decade—we have now been told there won't be any—the reference case itself now appears to be too generous. Oil minister al-Naimi is now asking us to look at OPEC's "low growth" scenario instead of the reference case as shown in Table 4.2 of their 2007 World Oil Outlook (graph left). Take the adjusted shortfalls calculated above for OPEC's reference case for each year and then add the negative number given in Table 4.2. The OPEC crude shortfalls with respect to PFC's low 1.1% growth case are now as follows: 3.6 mmb/d in 2010; 6.1 mmb/d in 2015; 13.5 mmb/d in 2020.

We have moved further into negative territory regarding OPEC's response to PFC's call in the low growth scenario. If this isn't bad news, I don't know what is.

4. If the foregoing isn't alarming enough, consider that substantial increase in OPEC production in the coming decade would require major contributions from Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela, now that we know that a 12.5 mmb/d production capacity from the Saudis is all we're going to get. (All links are to past ASPO-USA columns.) Prospects for large production increases from these three countries is unlikely for reasons peculiar to each.

We have now set realistic expectations about OPEC's future contributions. They will not produce enough crude oil in the next 12 years to meet even a minimal growth scenario. Few subjects are more important than the potential contribution of OPEC crude to world production as we move toward 2020.

http://www.energybulletin.net/43472.html

Am I reading that right? If non-OPEC is peaking and OPEC is short 3.6 mmb/d in 2010, does that not translate to shortages in two years? Or will ethanol and other non-conventional liquids production make up the difference so that we don't have 70's style lines at the pump?

Source: Globe and Mail

OTTAWA — Crude oil prices will soar to more than $200 (U.S.) per barrel over the next five years – driving Canadian pump prices to $2.25 a litre and forcing a fundamental transformation in the North American economy, says Jeff Rubin, chief economist with CIBC World Markets Inc.

In a new report, Mr. Rubin forecast a continued run-up in crude prices, despite a slowing world economy and slumping petroleum demand in United States, the world's leading oil consumer.

He said he expects crude prices – now trading at above $116 (U.S.) a barrel - to average $150 by 2010, and more than $200 by 2012. That would translate into pump prices of $7 (U.S.) per gallon in the United States, and $2.25 per litre in Canada, double the current levels.

“Whether we are already at the peak of world oil production remains to be seen, but it increasingly clear that the outlook for oil supply signals a period of unprecedented scarcity,” the economist said.



Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto...

---

I think once the price of gas exceeds the minimum wage, it's no longer a recession, it's a depression. Get ready.

Running Out of Planet to Exploit
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Nine years ago The Economist ran a big story on oil, which was then selling for $10 a barrel. The magazine warned that this might not last. Instead, it suggested, oil might well fall to $5 a barrel.

In any case, The Economist asserted, the world faced “the prospect of cheap, plentiful oil for the foreseeable future.”

Last week, oil hit $117.

It’s not just oil that has defied the complacency of a few years back. Food prices have also soared, as have the prices of basic metals. And the global surge in commodity prices is reviving a question we haven’t heard much since the 1970s: Will limited supplies of natural resources pose an obstacle to future world economic growth?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/21/opinion/...

The fuel panic begins

By BY LINDSAY McINTOSH AND ANDREW McWHIRTER

MOTORISTS laid siege to Scotland's forecourts yesterday, stockpiling against a feared fuel shortage as the country's only oil refinery continued a phased shutdown in the face of strike action.

With ministers warning against panic, a snapshot survey of garages by The Scotsman found 5am queues at the pumps, sales increases of up to 50 per cent and prices already on the rise. At least one petrol station ran out of fuel completely.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/latestnews...


Food Rationing Confronts Breadbasket of the World

By JOSH GERSTEIN
Staff Reporter of the Sun
April 21, 2008

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Many parts of America, long considered the breadbasket of the world, are now confronting a once unthinkable phenomenon: food rationing. Major retailers in New York, in areas of New England, and on the West Coast are limiting purchases of flour, rice, and cooking oil as demand outstrips supply. There are also anecdotal reports that some consumers are hoarding grain stocks.

At a Costco Warehouse in Mountain View, Calif., yesterday, shoppers grew frustrated and occasionally uttered expletives as they searched in vain for the large sacks of rice they usually buy.

"Where's the rice?" an engineer from Palo Alto, Calif., Yajun Liu, said. "You should be able to buy something like rice. This is ridiculous."

The bustling store in the heart of Silicon Valley usually sells four or five varieties of rice to a clientele largely of Asian immigrants, but only about half a pallet of Indian-grown Basmati rice was left in stock. A 20-pound bag was selling for $15.99.

http://www2.nysun.com/article/74994

Something tells me this is just the beginning. Next up, power outages.

Source: CNN

NEW YORK (AP) -- Retail gas prices set new records Friday on their seemingly relentless march toward $3.50 a gallon, and diesel prices pushed further above $4 a gallon.

Oil futures, meanwhile, surged to a new record over $117 a barrel after a militant group in Nigeria said it had sabotaged a major oil pipeline operated by a Royal Dutch Shell PLC joint venture and promised further attacks on the country's petroleum industry.

At the pump, the national average price of regular gas rose 2.7 cents overnight to a record $3.445 a gallon, according to a survey of stations by AAA and the Oil Price Information Service. Diesel fuel added 2.2 cents to a record national average of $4.168 a gallon.

The spike in the cost of fuel is hurting consumers already feeling the effects of a slowing economy, a sluggish job market and falling home values. Soaring prices of diesel, which runs most of the world's trucks, trains, ships and heavy equipment, is a major factor pushing food prices higher.

Read more: http://money.cnn.com/2008/04/18/markets/oi...

Source: The Daily Reckoning UK

Peak Oil theory gets a shot in the arm...

Russia was the new frontier for oil production a few short years ago. Not any more it seems, according to an FT report today...

Russian oil has peaked already according to Leonid Fedun, vice-president of Russian oil giant Lukoil,

10m barrels a day from the world’s number two oil producing country is as good as it gets in his lifetime he reckons. He’s 52 but given the average life expectancy of Russians that may not be too long. And it’s not going to be stable. Oil rich Western Siberia is more like Mexico and the North Sea i.e. output is sliding fast. “The period of intense oil production growth is over” claims Fedun. They’ve sucked up the oil fast and now the party’s over.

Read more: http://www.dailyreckoning.co.uk/Commoditie...

---

Looks like the only regions still capable of exporting are South America and the Middle East. And even the Middle East is looking increasingly suspect as a reliable source of oil exports in the future.

Monbiot piqued by peak oil planning

In the last of his series of events as Visiting Professor at Oxford Brookes University, journalist, activist and People & Planet patron George Monbiot last night declared the impending climate chaos as catastrophic.

George Monbiot last night declared recent environmental developments as cause for great concern. In over twenty years of activism, he said that he had fought against becoming too pessimistic and had always thought that although Government rarely did much to tackle problems directly, he was comforted by the thought that should a ‘serious problem’ arise then the Government would work out what needed to be done and do it. No longer.

What appears to have pushed Monbiot over the edge is the Government’s lack of planning for the end of oil. He had contacted the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (DBERR) to ask them what assessments they had made of world oil reserves and had received a succinct if frightening reply: none. He returned to DBERR to enquire what contingency plans they had put in place in case of difficulties in maintaining the supply of oil that greases the international economy, allowing us to buy food from all over the world whenever we want to and to jet off anywhere in the world on a whim, and he received the same reply. The Government has seemingly given no thought to oil production declining and eventually running out, and what we might do when that happens.

Instead, Monbiot discovered, the UK Government depends for its information upon a 2005 report by the International Energy Agency (IEA) that ridicules those who question the plausibility of an oil-powered future as ‘doomsayers’. This report, in turn, uses data supplied by the countries in OPEC (the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries). Yet this data is not reliable. When, in 1985, the amount a country could pump out each day was dependent on its stated reserves, Kuwait immediately increased its stated reserves in an attempt to obtain as much of OPEC’s daily allowance - and as much of the cash windfall - as possible. Saudi Arabia quickly followed, as did everyone else. To maintain this facade (and the proportion that each country can extract), these figures have remained pretty much unchanged ever since; Kuwait still claims to have the same amount of oil reserves as it had in 1985. So what we have is a cartel based on inflated, nationalistic, twenty-year old estimates of how much oil each country is sitting on. That situation informs the IEA’s report which, in turn, informs the UK Government.

A report published the same year by the US Department of Energy and written by Robert Hirsch is more promising for the environmentalist looking for more reasoned judgement. It concludes that the known world supply of oil is going to peak and that it will be “abrupt and revolutionary.” It goes on to say that economic upheaval is not inevitable, that “given enough lead-time, the problems are soluble with existing technologies”, but that Government intervention will be required. This intervention must come twenty years before oil production peaks, however, otherwise its impact will be negligible. This is what infuriates Monbiot so greatly: the production of oil will likely peak within the next twenty years, the evidence is there, the reports have been written and delivered and yet Government does nothing.

more...

http://peopleandplanet.org/navid5791

Slip of the Tongue

Barack Obama caught hell last week for daring to tell the truth about the ragged thing that the American spirit has become. He said that small-town Pennsylvania voters, bitter over their economic circumstances, “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them” to work out their negative emotions. He might have added that the Pope wears a funny hat (see for yourself this week), and that bears shit in the woods (something rural Pennsylvanians probably know). Nevertheless, in the manner lately prescribed for those who slip up and speak truthfully in public (and in contradiction to the reigning delusions), Obama was pressured to apologize for his statements.

The evermore loathsome and odious Hillary Clinton, co-owner of a $100 million personal wealth portfolio, seized the moment to remind voters what a normal, everyday gal she is -- who would never look down on the small-town folk of Pennsylvania the way her "elitist" opponent had -- forgetting, apparently, that the Clinton family's consigliere, James Carville, famously described the Keystone State as a kind of redneck sandwich with Pittsburgh and Philadelphia as the bread, and Alabama as the lunch meat in between.

As I mull over all this, I begin to think that Hillary is exactly what the USA deserves and, that should she manage to winkle away the nomination and get elected president, the outcome would be instructive and salutary. For one thing, she will be buried under an avalanche of political woe, beginning with the basic financial insolvency of everything in the nation except the Clinton family. Then she would proceed straight into an oil-and-gas clusterfuck that could take this society back to the eighteenth century economically.

This would have the positive effect of forcing the American public to look elsewhere for governance than the usual parties in Washington, D.C. It's time for a national purgative, anyway. In fact, it's way overdue. Are the Democratic and Republican parties anymore necessary than the Whigs? Neither of them can really articulate the problems we face (and when their honchos slip up and come close to the truth, they're persecuted for it).

more...

http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/

Condi Must Go:

Just when you think it can't get any worse, the Bush Administration finds a new way to shock the conscience. Yesterday, ABC News reported that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice chaired explicit White House discussions about which torture techniques should be used on prisoners.

They "were so detailed" that "some of the interrogation sessions were almost choreographed -- down to the number of times CIA agents could use a specific tactic." This is the first time that we have evidence that senior officials, "not only discussed specific plans and specific interrogation methods, but approved them". Given these new revelations, Condoleezza Rice can not continue as Secretary of State.

Sign our Petition demanding that Rice resign.

http://www.truemajorityaction.org/index.ph...

Duck and Cover: It’s the New Survivalism

By ALEX WILLIAMS
Published: April 6, 2008

THE traditional face of survivalism is that of a shaggy loner in camouflage, holed up in a cabin in the wilderness and surrounded by cases of canned goods and ammunition.

It is not that of Barton M. Biggs, the former chief global strategist at Morgan Stanley. Yet in Mr. Biggs’s new book, “Wealth, War and Wisdom,” he says people should “assume the possibility of a breakdown of the civilized infrastructure.”

snip

Many of the new, nontraditional preparedness converts are “Peakniks,” Mr. Rawles said, referring to adherents of the “Peak Oil” theory. This concept holds that the world will soon, or has already, reached a peak in oil production, and that coming supply shortages might threaten society. While the theory is still disputed by many industry analysts and executives, it has inched toward the mainstream in the last two years, as oil prices have nearly doubled, surpassing $100 a barrel. The topic, which was the subject of a United States Department of Energy report in 2005, has attracted attention in publications like The New York Times Magazine and The Wall Street Journal, and was a primary focus of “Megadisasters: Oil Apocalypse,” a recent History Channel special.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/fashion/...

Not that Southern California will be an oasis of safety if TSHTF, I know I need to do more, but I've stockpiled about six weeks worth of canned goods and three gallons of water. Lots of other emergency supplies as well since I live in earthquake country. Anyone else doing any similar preparations?

THE ARCHITECTS OF WAR: WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

President Bush has not fired any of the architects of the Iraq war. In fact, a review of the key planners of the conflict reveals that they have been rewarded — not blamed — for their incompetence.
PAUL WOLFOWITZ

Role In Going To War: Wolfowitz said the U.S. would be greeted as liberators, that Iraqi oil money would pay for the reconstruction, and that Gen. Eric Shinseki’s estimate that several hundred thousand troops would be needed was “wildly off the mark.”

Where He Is Now: Bush promoted Wolfowitz to head the World Bank in March 2005. Two years into his five-year term, Wolfowitz was rebuked by the World Bank investigative committee for engineering an unethical pay and promotion package for his girlfriend and, after repeated calls for his resignation, stepped down on May 17, 2007. Wolfowitz is now a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-wing think tank that “has the President’s ear” on national security issues.

Key Quote: “The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason .”
DOUGLAS FEITH

Role In Going To War: As Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Feith spearheaded two secretive groups at the Pentagon — the Counter Terrorism Evaluation Group and the Office of Special Plans — that were instrumental in drawing up documents that explained the supposed ties between Saddam and al Qaeda. The groups were “created in order to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true.” Colin Powell referred to Feith’s operation as the Gestapo. In Bob Woodward’s Plan of Attack, former CentCom Commander Gen. Tommy Franks called Feith the “f***ing stupidest guy on the face of the earth.”

Where He Is Now: Feith voluntarily resigned from the Defense Department shortly after Bush’s reelection. He is currently writing a memoir of his Pentagon work and teaching a course at Georgetown University “on the Bush Administration’s strategy behind the war on terrorism.” The Defense Department’s Inspector General found that Feith’s secretive groups at the Pentagon “developed, produced, and then disseminated” deceptive intelligence that contradicted “the consensus of the Intelligence Community.” These groups are still under investigation by the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Key Quote: “I am not asserting to you that I know that the answer is — we did it right. What I am saying is it’s an extremely complex judgment to know whether the course that we chose with its pros and cons was more sensible.”
WILLIAM LUTI

Role In Going To War: Luti worked under Douglas Feith, overseeing the Office of Special Plans, a Pentagon intelligence shop used to produce intelligence supporting the Bush administration’s claims about the threat represented by Saddam Hussein.

Where He Is Now: In May 2005, Luti was promoted to Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Defense Policy and Strategy for the National Security Council.

Key Quotes: A Pentagon official on Luti: “It’s very difficult to inform people who already know it all.”;”Basically, he didn’t like other people’s information if it didn’t agree with his opinion,” a former DIA analyst agreed.

more...

http://thinkprogress.org/the-architects-wh... /

In addition to this link, my friend Barry wrote a very eloquent letter to me that expresses my feelings perfectly:



Another Irag War Milestone

It's official. 4,000 American soldiers have now lost their lives in Iraq.

Remember that each one of these soldiers was someone's child. Raised with love and care by their mothers and fathers, who are now devastated for the rest of their lives, along with their brothers, sisters, grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, cousins, wives, husbands, friends, and colleagues. They are not "just a number", as stated by a press secretary for the Bush Administration.

For old times sake, let's review:

The reason the Bush Administration started the Iraq War was:

Saddam had nuclear & biological weapons.
Proven to be UNTRUE.

They then changed the reason to: Saddam was involved in 9/11.
Proven to be UNTRUE.

They then changed the reason to: al-Queda was operating in Iraq.
Proven to be UNTRUE.

They then changed the reason to: Saddam was mean to some of his people.
TRUE, but who gives a shit?

MANY leaders are mean to their people (Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Cuba, Burma, many Central American countries, many South American countries, many African countries, some Asian countries, and some Eastern European countries).

And you can include George Bush and Dick Cheney, who ignored the plight of the victims of Hurricane Katrina, who do nothing about our health care crisis, who do nothing about the gouging of American citizens by the energy companies, who trashed our environmental regulations allowing corporations to once again pollute our air, water, and land, who wrecked our budget surplus, who ignore the problems regarding the health and education of our children, who allow American corporations to give our jobs away to people overseas and illegal immigrants here, and on and on.

Was it really worth the lives of 4,000 (so far) treasured American souls to remove ONE person from office?

Is it worth the $600 billion (so far) they've spent? Just imagine how many AMERICANS that money could have helped. How many schools, clinics, and homes for the homeless could have been built. How many food banks could have been stocked. How many uninsured people could have gotten proper medical care.

Iraq is now one of the most dangerous places on the planet. It wasn't before the invasion. Iraq is now one of the most unstable countries on the planet. It wasn't before the invasion. Iraq is now a safe haven for Al-Queda and other terrorists. It wasn't before the invasion.

And where are the other cheerleaders, planners, and operators of the Iraq War -- Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, Karl Rove, Paul Wolfowitz, George Tenet, David Bremmer, etc?

Oh, they've all "cut & run", and are now off enjoying the bounty of American life. http://thinkprogress.org/the-architects-wh... /

4,000 of our soldiers will NEVER be able to do that.

For anyone who supports the Iraq War, the Bush Administration, and the deaths of 4,000 American soldiers, you should go live in a country that shares your attitude, and the philosophies of the Bush Administration, like Russia, China, North Korea, Iran...

I'll even give you a ride to the airport.

~Barry~

Sorry, but I am just sick to fucking death of all the "Get Over It" threads here. How many times has that ingratiating phrase been used by reich-wingers to throw the electoral theft of the past eight years in our face?!

JUST STOP IT!

Let's remember who the real enemy is and how to keep them from stealing yet another election. When we take this country back, then we'll have a real target say "Get Over It" to.