Deep Trunk

Bush as Tanya Harding

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 18:53:00 +0000

As a liberal (as George Lakoff will tell you) I am a optimist.

I prefer to look at the Bush from a positive point of view. For those of us who read and remember history, much of the strife of the 20th Century was caused by the collision between the rise of Germany, starting in the 19th Century when it leapfrogged England in industrial technology. The rise of Germany which lead to the First World War, which lead to the rise of the Soviet Union and the Second World war, was paralleled by the rise of Japan. Both of them clashed with the United States and in its victory, it became the Superpower. I, and apparently Brad Delong, and I suspect many other smart people believe that China and perhaps India will become the dominant powers of this century.

Based on the history from the 20th Century, there was a real risk that the United States, in its arrogance and greed, would try to prevent this from happening. There was the serious risk of a major catastrophic clash between the superpowers. George Bush has saved us from that.

Item 1) Military
Starting from the beginning of his administration, his fiscal and foreign policies have ensured that the military that costs us more than the combined military of the rest of the world are now feared by no one.

1) Who will fear the strategic defense system that can't knock down a single missile carrying a fog horn, a beacon, clown shoes and having made an appointment in advance.
2) Who will fear the armed forces that have served multiple tours in Iraq but under the leadership of The Man Call Pretraeus, can't do more than dodge do it yourself explosives which chew up $100,000 humvees using off peak cell phone minutes.
3) Who will fear the 600 plus overseas military bases which apparently serve to provide housing for the hundreds of Generals needed to command the hundreds of bases.
4) Who will fear the navy that must stay clear of speedboats and the dreaded zodiac ship killers.

No, the realpolitik world leaders and staff will start making Gulliver outsourcing jokes.

Item 2 Economics
Bills come due eventually. If we ever threaten the Chinese, they can call in our debt. This would not have happened as quickly or a severely as it did without the tax cutting and war spending of Bush and the Republicans.

Item 3 Moral High Ground.
Ironically, the Republican's don't believe in the Moral High Ground just as they don't believe that Global Flooding will happen. So the fact that we have lost it is not important to them.

In conclusion, We, the people of the United States, pose less of a threat to the world than we did before Bush v. Gore. You can thank the Supreme Court for keeping the 21st Century as peaceful as it will be. Think of what a major war with China in 20 years would cost vs the relatively minor costs of under 10,000 American dead (including the non-combat deaths) and under 50,000 maimed Americans and possibly under 1,000,000 Iraqi dead and $3 trillion in cost.

We have given the world to the Chinese with small risk to the rest of the world. Bush and the Republicans have kneecapped us.

Perhaps that was the Neocon dream all along. Leo Strauss would be proud.

Schaffer: Nothing; Right; Extreme Right

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 23:01:00 +0000

The Denver Post's Schaffer Runs On Promises Made Good is a gift of a headline. What it means is that because he said he wouldn't stick around (term limits) and didn't, he fulfilled his promise. The fact that he did nothing for his constituency except posture doesn't come up until you get into the article.

The whole thing centers around giving him a pass for being an ineffective congressman with his term limits pledge being an acceptable excuse. Rather, accepting a term limits pledge is a symptom of him being ineffective, not the cause.

"I just don't remember him being terribly engaged in the [Resources] committee," Hefley said.

Schaffer just didn't even try at governing. Where he did throw all his energy was being a hyper-partisan. As a member of the "GOP Theme Team" his job was to get on the house floor every morning and engage in one-minute partisan rants. His other major accomplishment was voting for the Iraq war so that he could leave Congress the next year to work for an oil company in Iraq, reaping the spoils of that vote.

As a member of the House Resources Committee Schaffer could have made a real difference in reducing our dependence on foreign oil by expanding our use of renewables, increasing efficiency, and responsible extraction here at home. Instead, he worked to start a war of choice and then left Congress to profit from that war, all the while increasing our dependence on foreign oil.

He was such a lousy legislator that he was one of only 9 House members to vote against beefing up airline security after 9/11. We're talking basic things like x-raying every bag and strengthening cockpit doors. Who is Schaffer representing exactly?

So far his campaign has been to have surrogates chant "Boulder Librul". As his record and positions ("14th-most-conservative member of Congress in the past 70 years.") begin to emerge, he has neither accomplishments nor clear principles except do nothing and get out to a 6 figure oil industry job. As a Senator, we might as well elect a black hole.

Horse Gone, Schaffer wants to close Roan Plateau Barn door

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 19:17:00 +0000

Will Schaffer's supporters who have consistently written off the Roan
Plateau as "scrub land" not worth saving follow suit?

Now that the BLM has given away the Roan, why is Bob Schaffer endorsing Governor Ritter's plan to save most of the Roan Plateau from drilling. Will his Oil Lobbyist supporters admit that the Roan Plateau is worth saving?

We know Oil Man Bob Schaffer hasn't changed the tune he's been singing
since he left the Congress to work in the oil industry. He is just
pandering for votes on the Western Slope because he knows it's a hot-
button issue. It's also a cheap pander (as a commenter already noted),
because the BLM has made its decision, the governor is powerless, and
only an act of Congress signed by the President can change course.

Denver Post - Get me Rewrite

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 19:42:00 +0000

So Zappero does a real analysis of the Denver Post article saying that Bob Schaffer - 14th most Conservative since 1937 is the same as Mark Udall being in the middle of the main wing, right in the middle from far left to pure moderate, of the Democratic Party. Middle, MIDDLE. Of course it is critical for the Post to paint Mark as moving his positions to pander to the moderates. Facts? We don't need no stinking facts to show Mark is moving. We, The Media, just state it as in

both of whom are pitching themselves as moderate these days but have voting records that strongly refute that description.

Read Johne's update which refutes this as far as Mark goes but, but, but, he uses data. That's so bloggerish.

I would have not been as polite. Suggested Post Ledes are:

Although Bob Schaffer is the 14th most Conservative since 1937, it's the same extreme as Udall being 509th most liberal. Because.

Bob Schaffer is the 14th most Conservative since 1937 which makes him a lot like Udall on the left wing, only right wing and not. Besides what's 6 standard deviations from the mean among friends.

Bob Schaffer - the 14th most Conservative since 1937 is so conservative he would be a caveman, if he believed in cavemen, or dinosaurs, or anything before 5000 years ago. Mark Udall on the other hand ranks right in the middle from far left to pure moderate. Two peas in a pod.

Don't Pay Between the Bells

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 23:20:00 +0000

The background for the Bob Schaffer and Colorado taxpayers waste story by the way is the famous Schaffer proposal to dock teachers pay during class changes.

So you have Bob Schaffer, the Vice Chairman of the board, a supposed fiscal
conservative, sit idly by and allow the board to spend that kind of
taxpayer money. That's a fact that you don't need any expense reports
to verify. And we know that he was at these lavish dinners, they were
billed as official meetings of the state Board of Ed according to that
AP piece. He could have sounded the alarm, stomped his feet, called a
press conference, but he didn't.

Instead, he pitched a fit over teachers getting paid during passing
period and voted to overrule the Denver Public Schools' decision to close a failing charter school owned by one of his largest U.S. Senate
contributors (David Brennan).

Basically he's a fiscal conservative only if the tax money isn't going
to him or his patrons.

Schaffer Can Hide His Position But Not His Restaurant Tab

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:37:00 +0000

The Board of Ed has been in the news of late because the state legislature has cut their funding in response to their lavish spending.

Bob Schaffer and Colorado taxpayers waste

-Bob Schaffer doesn't stand up for the taxpayers of Colorado - he
approves of spending thousands of our taxpayer dollars on his meals at
restaurants that average Coloradans can't afford.

-As Vice Chair of the Colorado State Board of Education, Bob Schaffer
has been dining extravagantly at taxpayers expense

-Over the course of the last year, Schaffer and his colleagues on the
Board submitted reimbursement for over $60,000 for travel expenses
that included $60 valet parking, $200/night hotel rooms and even
snacks like Cheetos.

Schaffer Lack of Leadership

-Bob Schaffer stood idly by not worried about the taxpayers' hard
earned money while eating his prime rib. He showed absolutely zero
leadership. And he thinks he should be my Senator?

Now, you may read the articles and say, he spent the least but that's not the issue, for a fiscal conservative, so concerned about saving taxpayers' money, silence is agreement. He's silent on a lot of course.

-It may be reported that Schaffer requested the least amount in
reimbursements, but we do know that he was sitting down for the feasts
with his colleagues that one of them expensed.

-He knew it was going on, why didn't Schaffer take a stand and stop
this unnecessary lavish spending of our money?

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:36:00 +0000

Speech after long silence. It is pretty clear the media is in the tank for the Rethuglicans so this blog may be useful.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Tue, 03 Aug 2004 14:59:00 +0000

Annotated New York Times LedesI

Reports That Led to Terror Alert Were Years Old, Officials Say

By DOUGLAS JEHL and DAVID JOHNSTON

Published: August 3, 2004

WASHINGTON, Aug. 2 -Much of the information that led the authorities
to raise the terror alert at several large financial institutions in
the New York City and Washington areas was three or four years old,
intelligence and law enforcement officials said on Monday. They
reported that although they had not yet found concrete evidence that a
terrorist plot or preparatory surveillance operations were still under
way, the success of the Democratic Convention and Senator Kerry's
overflow rally attendances on the campaign trail mandated the Sunday
warning. They reported that they had not yet found concrete evidence that a terrorist plot or preparatory surveillance operations were still under way but the warning provided an opportunity to slow campaign momentum and
entice Howard Dean into a critical comment.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Sun, 25 Jul 2004 00:58:00 +0000

Hollywood Strikes Again

How dare the media run another thinly disguised Bush Bashing Hollywood film again ?

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
PBS 6 Jul 24 09:00pm

Movies, 135 Mins.

***+ (Rated PG-13)

A Korean War hero's commanding officer discovers he and his platoon were brainwashed. Directed by John Frankenheimer. Adult Situations.

Cast: Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh, Angela Lansbury, Henry Silva, James Gregory, Leslie Parrish, John McGiver, Khigh Dhiegh, James Edwards, Douglas Henderson, Albert Paulsen, Barry Kelley, Lloyd Corrigan, Madame Spivy, Joe Adams, Whit Bissell, Mimi Dillard, Anton von Stralen, Francoise Fabian.

Director(s): John Frankenheimer.

Producer(s): George Axelrod, John Frankenheimer.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Tue, 20 Jul 2004 19:56:00 +0000

Another Cluster Cheney

I told Karl that I had it handled and they didn't need to launch Operation Fry Berger
but no Big Dick had to march down to the Senate and give them direct orders, as if Gordon Smith, Saxby Chambliss,
and Rick Santorum don't know how to run a smear.

I pleaded with Karl that I had the whole 9/11 commission report under control. Almost no one was going to pin it on us. I mean the Times PHILIP SHENON had it blamed on Clinton one day and Congress the next.
Anyhow we got ink for LORI ( Leak, Outrage, Resignation and Investigation) (although Tom Davis better pray someone doesn't notice that "Burning a CIA Agent" is worse than "Bringing Work Home"). Nobody has even thought out what will happen when some Democrat asks Berger how National Missile Defense would have prevented 9/11.

Big Dick left too many footprints and Scotty already got caught in one lie. Now the clumsy timing has even the NPR and the Times connecting the dots. The story is too simple and the leak too obvious. The Democrats are turning it into the 9/11 leak story. And now Terry McAuliffe files a Freedom Of Information Act for White House/Ashcroft traffic. Lots of luck.

Well they didn't listen to me before launching Operation Doom Plume

1) Clinton Aide Took Classified Material

2) The strange cases of the Berger memoranda and the Wilson mission

3) 9/11
Attack and Distract

4) G.O.P. Blames Clinton for Intelligence Failures

5) 9/11 Panel Is Said to Sharply Fault Role of Congress

6) A Kerry Adviser Leaves the Race Over Missing Documents

7) FBI Probe of Berger and Clinton Papers Sparks GOP Outrage

8) House Panel to Investigate Berger Case

9) THAT WAS THEN, THIS IS NOW....Tom Davis

10) 9/11 Shameless Hypocrisy

11) Critics See Politics in Berger Probe Disclosure

12) Kerry Camp Accuses White House of Berger Leak

13) CNN transcripts Start with BLITZER: "Brian Todd, thanks very much for that report. Samuel Berger is represented by another White House veteran. Lanny Breuer was a special counsel to President Clinton in the White House, a one- time federal prosecutor. He is now a prominent defense attorney specializing in white-collar cases. Lanny Breuer joining us now live."

14) White House Knew of Inquiry on Aide; Kerry Camp Irked

15) Grand jury probes CIA leak

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 19 Jul 2004 22:55:00 +0000

Big Scare

As Atrios has pointed out we really dodged the bullet when TIMOTHY L. O'BRIEN did his writeup on the Riggs Bank. It ran a jillion column inches, a real New York Times' "Print All the News that Fits" and it never mentioned Bush's uncle or long time supporters. Even Bandar Bush is suddenly unrelated. Thank god for the Liberal Media.
I was just imagining the headline we would have gotten if it were Clinton; "Clinton Uncle's Bank: Strong Ties to Terrorism". I mean Starr would have been knock, knock, knocking on the White House door. When I showed Karl how white white white our wash was, he give me a coupon for the GOP Auxiliary Support Corps. Luckily no one and certainly no reporter reads Atrios.

1) Writing with Blinders On at the Times

2) At Riggs Bank, a Tangled Path Led to Scandal

3) The Bush-Riggs Connection

4) The Bank of Dad

5) Who is Bandar Bush

6) Sex pros get
ready for party

7) Google search: atrios credited lott

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 19 Jul 2004 16:24:00 +0000

Vacation and the Polls

This whole story about not taking Vacation because it looks bad was one of those rare times when Bush actually disagreed with Karl.
The last time I can remember was that Iraq thing. Karl had to splain it to him.

Luckily we don't have to manage Bumiller, and in this case we didn't even have to lie. We didn't do any polls. That's why God created the RNC.

I think their question was

"Some Democrats claim that our President takes too much vacation. Should the President do research to find out what the American people think about this ?"

1) When a Campaign Intrudes on Vacation By ELISABETH BUMILLER

2) Fake Turkey

3) "Oh Lucy! - You Gotta Lotta
4)target="_blank">Bush Use of Polls Talking Points Memo

5) The Other War Room President Bush doesn't believe in polling---just ask his Pollsters. By Joshua Green

6) Poll-itics as usual A Republican National Committee flack gets defensive -- and evasive -- as reporters try to pin down how much President Bush spends on pollsters. by Joshua Micah Marshall

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 19 Jul 2004 14:53:00 +0000

Thank God for the Liberal Media I

Sorry I haven't written for a while but as we put more people on damage
control, I am now dealing almost exclusively with NY Times non-political, non-war stories. Economic stories, like how we are all doing so well. I also monitor the left occiptal lobe of the blogosphere. It's a twelve step program. First getting them to stop mentioning facts (which tend to have a liberal bias.) As they say on the Daily Show, you have to focus on the positive: all the stories about incompetence they don't write.

So I couldn't stop the Times from publishing their Hourly Pay in U.S. Not Keeping Pace With Price Rises workers get "Cheneyed" story, (permlink) but I got them to say in the second sentence.

Though wages should recover if businesses continue to hire,
three years of job losses have left a large worker surplus.

This puts it squarely back in genius of the market territory because Kerry's policies mean more jobs (permlink) doesn't look good. Of course Political Animal pointed out there are exceptions like
CEO's pay rising by 27% (permlink). I tried to tell Karl, we should argue that with what we did to Martha and with all the mergers and consolidations that there was a shortage of CEO's but then Gretchen had that damn article about CEO's making out like a bandit when they get took over. Anyhow Angry Bear talked about the whole
CEO thing.

I was able to keep the overtime scam both in quotes and
actual
data out of the article as well as the whole flipping burger job
quality story including the fact
that 97% of the job growth is in temp jobs. I mean Kerry has it broken
out by
state and they didn't even mention it. Karl has assured
everyone
that they only have to keep them on until after November. Thanksgiving
will be different this year.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Wed, 31 Mar 2004 19:58:00 +0000
So Karen got on Morning Edition today to explain why the spread of democracy isn't going as well as it should and the ~~flip flop~~ decision on Rice misleading under oath. Turns out they hate us because of Baywatch and if we followed Bush's moral values everything would be okay. She follows a great dialectic of soothing you by saying three true things and then sneaking in the false conclusion.

Incidentally my quote of the week nominee is from a CNN story about

Cheering residents in Fallujah pulled charred bodies from burning vehicles and hung them from a Euphrates River bridge.

Crowds gathered around the vehicles and dragged at least one of the bodies through the streets, witnesses said.

Residents pulled another body from one of the cars and beat it with sticks.

Also in the Fallujah region, five American soldiers died in a roadside bombing near Habbaniya, the U.S. military said.

The quote is in the words of Coalition Provisional Authority spokesman Dan Senor said those who exulted over the attack "are not people we are here to help"

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Mon, 29 Mar 2004 17:51:00 +0000

Managing the Press

It's going to be critical to manage the media as we get down to the wire in the election. Hopefully, we can learn from building Democracy in Iraq.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Fri, 26 Mar 2004 18:47:00 +0000

Get Me Rewrite.

NYTimes has to have the lede rewritten again:

Under mounting pressure from Democrats about its response to the investigation into the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the White House offered Thursday to have Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, answer more questions from the Sept. 11 panel. At the same time, President Bush forcefully denied accusations that he had ignored the severity of the threat from Al Qaeda.

The White House announced late Thursday that Ms. Rice was willing to appear before the panel again, but only in private and to avoid perjury, not under oath. Some Republicans said that Mr. Bush was being undercut by the perception that a senior White House official would not cooperate, while his aides were out pummeling Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism chief who has accused the Bush administration of not heeding warnings before Sept. 11."

. . .
"In New Hampshire, Mr. Bush showed up at an event about the economy accompanied by the widow of a pilot of the plane that flew into the north tower of the World Trade Center. Only a day earlier, television news programs were filled with images of Mr. Clarke surrounded by thankful families of other Sept. 11 victims after he apologized to them for failing to head off the attack. "

Mr. Bush prefaced his remarks by pointedly noting that the commission was looking at "the eight months of my administration and the eight years of the previous administration."

"Had I known that the enemy was going to use airplanes to strike America, to attack us, or even New York, I would have used every resource, every asset, every power of this government to protect the American people, or even New York, Mr. Bush said to a burst of applause.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Thu, 25 Mar 2004 18:39:00 +0000

It looks like Cheney is going to go to China, Japan and South Korea. He is going to demonstrate his foreign policy expertise. Hopefully, all the advance work that Neil (Bush) (+) (+) did is not going to waste.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Wed, 24 Mar 2004 19:40:00 +0000

Medi-scare

Well besides the Stonewall Commission on Operation sleep and switch, today's NYTimes center-above-the-fold lede was a medi-scare report ratchetting up the pressure for ~~higher payroll taxes~~ use fees after Greenspan took the first shot.

We have been successful in keeping Medicare and Social Security problems together (not unlike Osama and Saddam) except for a few kooks.

Even after Teacher had to correct someone's arithmatic, we still had managed to make sure that before the first Senior got a pill paid for, we had spent $540 billion on Drug companies, insurance companies, and the bribes to employers to maintain coverage. It's a real master bait and switch, plus we can raise payroll taxes which will pay for more tax cuts for our sponsors.

Again.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Wed, 24 Mar 2004 18:31:00 +0000

Why I don't worry about Job Security 2

After the accident, Karl put me on LMP (Liberal Media Patrol). I get a lot of limp jokes but boy am I doing my job. Look at last weeks NYTimes Week in Review. On the day that Clarke was spilling the beans on Operation sleep and switch, the lead above the fold article, (so embarrassing that it was cut from the online edition table of contents) on the News of the Weak in Review is about Spain and how we really need each other. The second article is an elaborate shushing of some very loud prenatal chicken enumeration that had (Caution Mixed Metaphor) come to roost the day before. The below-the-fold story was an everyone does it dirty story on In Rove We Trust. It managed to get to Clinton by the fourth paragraph and the Blow Job by the fifth. The week ahead column stayed off the Stonewall Commission and Clarke as did the week in the news.

You can't say that they don't give us what Monica gave Bill.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Wed, 24 Mar 2004 17:38:00 +0000

First drafts are a bitch.

Karl cut my script again for the Bush's spontaneous remarks:
"Well, the facts are these: George Tenet briefed me on a regular basis about the terrorist threats to the United States of America. And had my administration had any credibal plausible information, presented through appropriate channels, that terrorists were going to attack New York City on September the 11th using airplanes with those flight numbers, we would have acted. We have been chasing down al Qaeda ever since the attacks. We've captured or killed two-thirds of their known leaders residing outside of Saudi Arabia."

I did find out that Karl had given "credible plausible" to Powell for his speech before the Stonewall Commission.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 19:01:00 +0000

I'm not worried about job security. Education is the key to secure careers and if I don't contact my lawyer on a regular basis a lot of people are going to get real education. I learned from Hoover (J Edgar) who knew if you have the right materials you can make sure a lot of people get to spend more time with their families. And you know, that would make the twins and Laura very cranky.

It looks like the white Jayson Blair is not going to be a big affirmative action story, after all he spent a lot of time preaching to evengelicals and so far no one has asked the question whether our employment practices are putting too many underqualified white guy born-agains in positions of power. But enough about Bush.

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 17:21:00 +0000

You can't tell from the on line edition but the Times coverage of the worldwide peace rallys were handled as regional news and put on the obit page. The ending byline had this to say about how NY Regional a story it was "Reporting for this article was contributed by Howard O. Stier and Colin Moynihan in New York, Ariel Hart in Fayetteville, N.C., Carolyn Marshall in San Francisco, and Jennifer 8. Lee in Washington."

Score another one for our team

noreply@blogger.com (marc) — Sun, 21 Mar 2004 16:46:00 +0000

Ever since the accident, Karl has been cutting stuff out of my work. For example, the radio speech that Bush read yesterday,
: in my draft included the thrilling "Helping Iraq emerge as a free nation from our pre-emptive annexation is a global responsibility..." but no, nothing about the Neocon wet dream.