Guest blogged by David Edwards
President Bush took a few questions while speaking today in Panama.
While campaigning in October of 2000, Bush said “We will ask not only what is legal but what is right. Not what the lawyers allow but what the public deserves.” Today Bush was asked if he had upheld this promise to the American people. Instead of offering a straightforward answer, the president stonewalled with the familiar “We are cooperating with the investigation…” deflection.
Bush was also asked if the Red Cross would be allowed to inspect the “secret prisons” which have been recently reported in the Washington Post and other publications. While the president didn’t answer this question directly, he took the opportunity to strongly imply that he supported torture as long as it was conducted via legal methods and loopholes. He seemed to give the impression that torture was necessary tool when used to protect the American people.
IF SADDAM HUSSAIN ISNT GUILTY, WHY ARENT YOU CALLING FOR HIS RELEASE ANS RETURN TO POWER?
There you have it, folks…Bush’s first admission that laws do not and will not stand in the way of WHAT HE THINKS THE PUBLIC DESERVES.
Thus, if Bush thinks the public deserves to be lied to about going to war, that’s what he’ll do.
If Bush thinks the public deserves to have its electoral system corrupted by fraud, that’s what he’ll do.
If Bush thinks the public deserves taxpayer-financed propaganda from paid shills in behalf of his administration’s policies, that’s what it will get.
If he thinks the public deserves public servants drawn from his cronies, chosen only on that basis and without regard to qualifications, that’s what it will get.
He’s the sole judge of what the public deserves, not laws passed by Congress and signed by earlier presidents. He decides. Friends, George W. Bush has just told us (though he’s too dense to realize it) that we are no longer a nation of laws, not men. We’re a nation of one man who places himself above the law, and isn’t afraid to say so…in effect, a king.
Thank you, Mr. President. You might have given us key evidence to use at your impeachment trial.
Muddium Lite #1
Your question addressed to Snottie will be answered next year. There is an investigation going on, and Snottie and Scootie have incriminated themselves enough for one year.
Besides Snottie never said that Saadaam was not guilty, what he said was that Libby and Rove had nothing to do with anything ever and it is ridiculous to even think otherwise.
The neoCons give mouth to the use of "foreign law" by the Supreme Court. Some of them go so far as to say it is treasonous. It was brought up again this week on Meet the press by a neoCon from Kansas.
Our country is founded in large part on foreign law, and not only that, the law of enemy foreign nations.
For instance, when you read the US Constitution and see the term "common law", it means the law of an enemy nation we were at war with. It still refers to the same nation even tho we are no longer at war with them.
Even the law of juries came from that enemy nation we were at war with. Some folk were put to death as traitors for dealing with that enemy nation from which we derived a substantial part of our law.
So, the reality is that we should only use laws that are good and fit within the framework of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution.
In other words we should not care where a law comes from, what we should be concerned with is whether it is good law or it is bad law.
The administration is prosecuting an individual based upon bad law (torture, forced self incrimination, no lawyer, no bail, etc, done for us by a country that won’t even let women drive cars). The individual being prosecuted was tortured by agents of a foreign government pursuant to foreign law (link here).
The neoCons and neoConvicts are so deep into demockcrazy and hypocrisy it is shock and awe embarrasing.
Medium Wrong WTF?
The promoted neoCondi "Mushroom Cloud" Rice once said there would be an investigation into Cheney’s boy Chalabi:
"More than 17 months after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice publicly promised a full criminal inquiry, the Federal Bureau of Investigation hasn’t interviewed Mr. Chalabi himself or many current and former U.S. government officials thought likely to have information related to the matter, according to lawyers for several of these individuals and others close to the case." (Raw Story link here).
The promo pattern of this admin is quite consistent. Do something damaging to security and you get a promotion.
Chalabi leaks info to Iran and he is now climbing his way up the "Iraqi" government. Libby and Rove leak US secrets which harm the WMD effort, and they are heros in the neoCon underground who must be protected at all costs.
I’m continually amazed at the man’s lack of ability to give a straight answer. Fortunately, most of America is too. So let’s get busy and work in Congress and in the Statehouses to guarantee that they can never steal another election with computer fraud. Contact your elected folks and support Voter Verified Paper Ballots!
The liberal way.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/993...site/newsweek/
Lets see:
Bush said Iraq was an imminent threat.
Bush said Iraq had WMDs
Bush said we will get bin laden dead or alive
Bush said mission accomplished (well the banner behind him said it, those two words are too long for him to read)
And now he says "We don’t torture".
Shouldn’t we believe him?
https://bradblog.com/Images/emoticons/laugh.gif
:laugh:
No. We do torture. As a matter of fact, that isn’t in dispute. The only question is, "How high up does the responsibility fall?"
If Scottie is confronted with this, his only possible way out would be to claim that Gonzales’ definition of torture doesn’t preclude whatever has been done. Of course, Gonzales is a puppet…relying on him is rather like asking Mortimer Snerd what Candice Bergen ate for breakfast as a child.
"we do not torture"
"those pics from Abu Gharab were only fraternity pranks, just some harmless hazing by a bunch of crazy kids"
"What are you complaining about, they had lemon chicken with rice pilaf and two fruits"
I cannot believe these ingrates and their obvious contempt for the world and their intellect.
Thank you Bush for making our Country the laughing stock of the world.
Is this a bad dream? Is this really happening? Is that really our president? Is he really making excuses for the use of torture?
What the fuck happened to my country?
Check out this VIDEO documenting American use of White Phosphorous and Napalm in Fallujah. It was produced by RAI 24, an Italian news network. WARNING: The Report is Very graphic!
Medium Thick is just a Brick head. Move along, nothing to see here.
It’s the Same Old Lies & B.S.
Over&Over&over&Over Again
Just A Diferent Day 4
the Bu$h Family & Friends
.
So I Will Re- the below
& It’s TRUTH
.
WHEN IN THE COURSE OF HUMAN EVENTS
.
IT BECOMES NECESSARY for the PEOPLE of the United States
TO ALTER or ABOLISH the United States Government
as it exists in the year…
2001 / 02 / 03 / 04 / 05 / 06
.
Using the Authority, Law, and Intentions of the Constitution
and the Declaration of Independence.
.
And Now the People Step Forward
and Charge High Treason,
and Show that Democracy in its roots today,
.
Is Corrupt.
.
And that the Constitution has been Altered and Betrayed
in Favor of…
A Small Group of Millionaires,
.
Over Another…
the Governed,
.
the People of the United States.
.
And that the Election Process is UN-fair
and has been
Overwhelmed
and Monopolized
by Millionaires
and their
millions of dollars
.
BU$H = TREASON … Continued at
…
http://www.RogerART.com
.
SEE on left… LINK ( 2 ) to
( Re-Written ) Declaration of Independence
SEE ALL ( these words in ) 15 + PAINTINGS at…
http://www.rogerart.com/20_PATR...0DEMOCRACY.htm
Enjoy Em, Copy Em, E em As Another PROTEST image & words
Thank U, RogerART.com
JAIL EM ALL… NOW
.
Adolph Hitler did much the same thing back in the early Thirties with the Nuremberg Laws. By creating "laws" that disenfranchised entire groups of German citizens, ole Adolph was free to do whatever. Ya see, it was all legal…. just like it is today. Want legal cover for the most egregious of crimes? All ya got to do is codify it……… which leads me to the PATRIOT ACT.
The similarities between these two "laws" is pretty fuckin’ scary.
I’m sorry, Medium [has his head]Right[up his ass].. who said Saddam was "innocent"? And what does that have to do with the United States violating humanbeings in ways akin to what Saddam is being accused of doing?
Pot, this is Kettle.. Kettle, this is Pot.. may the two morons forever call each other names..
Funny how Shrubby said "once the American People see the facts".. yet this is the MOST SECRATIVE ADMINISTRATION IN HISTORY.. uh.. duh? see what? You fuckers won’t let out any memos, and have signed orders to lock up all official papers indefinately? despite the laws that make your presidency papers available in 12 years?
I can’t see how any human being with an IQ over 50 can’t despise this administration.. I just don’t get how stupid or self-loathing you must be to support these criminals and war-hate-mongering-homophobes..
LMAO Medium Moron at #8
Read that link.. you’re showing what happens when the government IGNORES poverty.. 20% unemployment.. no healthcare, limited amounts of food.. and brutality by the ruling class over the "lower classes".. -thats- what causes "revolutions".. Yeah, France is in a mess.. and there may well be a full scale revolution soon..
It’s not "the liberal way", as morons like you put it, it’s the way of the OPPRESSED.. Guess what shit-for-brains, we were oppressed once too, WE revolted as a Country.. and, like France, if you ignorant shit-bags keep fucking over the poor of this country so you can get richer on their backs and blood, we’ll have revolutions here to.
Stolen elections (by either party), destruction of the environment, disregard for human life, all in the name of profits.. WILL be your undoing.. Call it "liberal" all you want, some call it "freedom" and "fairness".. Keep spewing your vomitous hate-speach and keep up the fight to maintain a divided society. When they come with pitch-forks to YOUR house, don’t expect me to lift a finger to help you..
ROTFLMAO – Give ’em Hell, Savanster #18!
I don’t know anyone who thinks Saddam Hussein is innocent or wants to see him acquitted.
But the charges against him have nothing to do with 9/11 or the United States of America. They have nothing to do with nuclear weapons (or as Bush would say, "nook-you-ler weapons." They have nothing to do with Osama bin Laden or uranium from Niger.
They have only to do with crimes against his own people, going back to the days WHEN WE SUPPORTED HIM AND SOLD HIM WEAPONS TO FIGHT IRAN, WEAPONS HE ALSO USED TO KILL HIS OWN PEOPLE.
Don’t forget, just today Bush said “We do not torture”: Of course the definition of torture has become slipperier than a Republican’s ass ever since the Alberto V05 hearings last winter. You remember Alberto: A lawyer who told Bush what was "legal" and "right", like torture was OK as long as it didn’t result in "organ failure" and happen on US soil.
Every morning I wake up thinking that I cannot possibly hate this administration any more than I did yeaterday then I go blog-hopping after work and am proven wrong.
Interesting, the wording he uses there: "…to that end–in this effort, anything we do is within the law." Am I the only one whose grasp of rhetoric and linguistics finds that downright hilarious (in a really cynical way), in that it certainly implies, according to (my understanding of) english grammarical sentence structure, that they can do whatever they want and the lawmakers are just following along behind, legislating according to their actions…?
Of course, this tells us volumes about his feelings regarding his position of natural superiority, not only here in America, but relative to the rest of the entire world as well, in that it:
A) implies that his attitude is that he can punch you in the face, legal or not, because as soon as he has done it, the law embraces his actions and it becomes universally accepted simply on matter of principle, and [the logical implication of that is…]
B)it betrays his delusional ego and its half-cocked, half-baked, completely incoherent belief that he is just naturally, without question, vastly superior to mere mortals, whose actions must be dictated to them by his own, holy actions. Actions which are so obviously consecrated from on high as to, themselves be the makers of the ultimate law.
This is all supported by the fact that, to compare this diatribe to one from say, a year and a half ago, he is obviously more brazen and condescending about his feelings regarding anyone who cannot see the glorious truth of his actions simply on the merit that the actions are HIS. To consider this within the context that his war and foreign policies are being questioned and attacked from everywhere…and yet he feels no need to play the politician and smile and grab a baby to kiss for the cameras while cooing the nation to sleep soothingly with ideas of sure victory and supreme ordination of our righteous work…AND THIS IS IN A FOREIGN COUNTRY, NO LESS…the entire response, in all of its divine emanance and diplomatic sensitivity, so deftly navigated the tightrope between offended innocence at such an accusation and the type of malicious contempt that , with a wave of its hand condemns its enemies to burn at the stake (or even in eternal fire and brimstone…), he might as well have cartwheeled out to the middle of the rope, stopped to have a smoke and wrestle a grizzly bear, then summoned a flaming chariot to carry him the rest of the way across. He should be in the circus. God knows, I’d have lost my balance and fallen off the tightrope for sure by the summoning of divine transportation, if not a little before…he never even flinched or wavered. I guess it’s time we consider the horrific possibility that, given the lithe, ballsy way in which he executed that meneuver, he may, in fact be some sort of deified being who’s been sent to set us all straight and entertain us with a three ring circus…maybe die for our sins, should the fancy strike him…WAIT! Too bad my dear friend, Freddy discovered, and subsequently published the finding, that God is actually dead well over a century ago…whew! That was a close one there for a sec…
#13 Just finished watching the video. Shocking!!
Everyone in America needs to watch this. Make copies and give to everyone you know. We are using chemical weapons on these people. Not just DU. American’s will never see this. We have a media blackout so see it while you can. Follow the Bulldogs link or go to Dailykos..1st Diary by paper tigress. M4
The creeping index of fascism. This article discusses a recent poll that should light a fire under anybody who values their freedom.
If the children are the future, we’re screwed.
[snip] Over the past few years, I’ve held fast to a belief that America is too sprawling, too diverse and too fundamentally committed to its Constitution to ever change its flag to red, white and black. Now I’m not so sure. It wasn’t a delayed reaction to the Patriot Act, Guantanamo, Iraq or the confirmation of torture hombre Alberto Gonzalez that did it, but a modest blip on the post-9/11 radar: a poll finding that a third of high school students think the First Amendment "goes too far."
At least that’s what they think of the First Amendment once it’s explained to them. After interviewing 100,000 teens in the largest study of its kind, the John S. and James C. Knight Foundation reports fast shrinking respect for bedrock constitutional freedoms of speech, press and assembly. Among the findings widely commented on last week—but not widely enough—only 51 percent said newspapers should be allowed to publish content without state approval. Three-quarters actually thought flag burning was illegal—and didn’t care—while almost one-fifth said Americans should not be allowed to express unpopular views. [snip]
**MORE AT LINK ABOVE**
Kira #24
Scary link. I taught my children about the Constitution. My son carries a copy of it, like Senator Byrd, on his person all the time.
The children in the article have been neglected.
Like Bush, Cheney, Scooter, Snottie, and KKKarl were about government.
MediumRight, or is it Non-ClairvoyantWrong,WTF? oh and another question, WTF ? Huh ?
Savantster I’m with Kira #19 Give e’m hell ROTFLMAO- I think some of this should be forwarded to Jon Stewart, he’d have a blast with some of your responses to the lunacy, just keep givin e’m hell man !!
RE my #6
Not only are they not investigation Chalabi for trading secrets with Iran, when he visits here soon he is going to be welcomed by Cheney (link here).
Haha Lemmethink! Non-ClairvoyantWrong!! I like that!
:blush:
Why do rightwingers think they are above the law? And why do all their freako backers think they are above the law? That’s why rightwingers have a century-long history of hating and trying to dismantle the courts. That’s why it’s so important to them, because the courts are where they don’t win, because the law is the law. No propoganda in court. Not allowed. Courts aren’t the media.
"Democrats cleaned up big in off-year elections from New Jersey to California, sinking the candidate who embraced President Bush in the final days of the Virginia governor’s campaign. They also turned back all four of GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s efforts to reshape state government. " (link here).
#12
Bulldog, you wrote…
"Is this a bad dream? Is this really happening? Is that really our president? Is he really making excuses for the use of torture?
What the fuck happened to my country?"
No offense, darlin’ but, lol! What, did you just wake up? Sounds like you had a li’l Rip Van Winkle experience there! …but I’m just funnin’ with you…
I really wanted to say that last night I caught the re-run of Bill Maher’s last show, a good one, and I just gotta post his comments from the very end:
"… voters nowadays are all about the issues that affect “me.” They need to see how Bush’s fuck-ups affect them personally.
I mean, think about it. Other than the war in Iraq, the Katrina disaster, the deficit, the CIA leak, torture, stopping stem cell research, homeland security, global warming and undercutting science, we’ve yet to really feel the negative effects of the Bush administration… [laughter] [applause] [cheers]…."
Right on, Bill!
But I think we could add a few things to that "Other than" list, like…
decimating America’s reputation in the world, giving Christianity a ‘bad name’, trampling on civil liberties, rampant cronyism appointments, rampant greed, corruption, scandal & moral bankruptcy, "losing" 9 billion dollars, pushing tax cuts for the rich & program cuts for the poor, failing to arm our soldiers, buying propaganda, destroying our voting system, allowing gay male prostitutes "journalists" the run of the White House, doing business with "rogue" nations, and having a ludicrously inarticulate & stunningly incompetent cowboy/fratboy/cokehead boor whose nickname should be Loser-Liar-Laughingstock as our PRESIDENT!!….am I forgetting anything?? Probably alot!
Just one more thing from Maher…my favorite of his "new, partisan products":
“Rove-itussin.” “For when you’re desperately trying to avoid coughing up the truth.” [laughter] [applause]
I love that Rove-itussin…they must have it in the White House by the case!!!
Dear Joan,
Thank you for the LIST! I’m copying your comment so I can keep track for the record.
Let’s don’t forget the coverup of 9/11. That will add another LONG LIST of things this administration has hanging like a dead albatross about its neck.
UNfukinBelievable, eh?
Tally-Ho!