Libby, Wislon and Plame

Well I’ve had my legal staff at the prestigious law firm of Dewy, Screwem & Howe check out the Libby indictment. The boys at DS&H have gotten back to me and informed that the indictment does in fact meet the Lex criteria outlined in the post below. The indictment is in fact substantial (30 years in prison and over a mil in fines is substantial) and the fact that even Dewy could follow the charges, indicates that it is indeed clear. While Mr. Libby remains innocent, if the indictment is accurate, it would appear that he took some liberty with the truth while talking to the FBI and the Grand Jury. But in a legal system where a catchy phrase, “If the glove doesn’t fit. You must acquit.” trumps DNA evidence, anything can happen at trial.

Now the dopes in the MSM have turned an indictment about lying to the FBI and the Grand Jury into a question about going to war in Iraq. Huh? Seems to me a case about lying to the FBI and the Grand Jury is going to center on what Libby said to the FBI and the Grand Jury and how that differed with what Libby knew to be true. It seems to me the judge in this case is unlikely to begin the trial by saying, “The first thing we have to do is have the President and Vice President in here to restate their reasons for going to war in Iraq.”

The next thing the heroes in the MSM are attempting to accomplish is to make the indictment out to be more than appears. The question the MSM keeps asking is, “What was Libby trying to hide?” Well how about the obvious answer. The time tested answer. Libby lied to save his butt. Libby believed he was in trouble and fabricated a story to keep himself out of trouble. Now, it appears that the only trouble he was really ever in any danger of was fabricating a story. There was no underlying crime.

The MSM also remains hung up on Rove. Rove, they remind us three times every five minutes, is still under investigation. The story goes that the prosecutor is trying to flip Libby to get Rove then Bush. Not likely. 22 months of investigation and no indictment. What are they going to do in the next 22 months that couldn’t have done in the last? Fitzgerald needs to charge Rove or clear him or he’ll become a partisan hack. The MSM hails him as a non–partisan hero because has never declared a party affiliation. Well for 20 years in the Marine Corps Lex never registered as a Republican or had a single political bumper sticker attached to his car. But Lex has always been a Conservative. So Fitzgerald is something, he just hasn’t told us what. How he handles Rove will give us a clue.

So what’s it all about. It’s about bringing down W. The MSM and Libs are really depressed that Libby is the only one that has been indicted. They will continue to beat the drum. Fitzgerald is the new Bill Burkett. The indictment is the new National Guard memo in the MSM’s effort to destroy the president.

And what has Lying Joe been up to? Well, he’s penned a piece for the LA Times titled “Our 27 months of hell.” In that piece Wilson comes off sounding like a guy who dashes out of the front door in his PJs to grab the morning paper during a snow storm, hears the front door slam behind him as he locks himself out of the house, then he bitches about being cold. Both Wilson and the PJ dope’s discomfort were caused by their own stupidity. Wilson and his wife conspired to undermine U.S. foreign policy. Wilson’s stupidity was not in opposing the president’s policy. His stupidity was lying about it. Nobody other than her lying sack of excrement husband was responsible for outing Plame. Wilson argued loudly and publicly that VP Cheney sent him to Niger. Not so.

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence notes the following:

“Some CPD officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador's wife "offered up his name" and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador's wife says, 'my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.' This was just one day before CPD sent a cable DELETED requesting concurrence with CPD's idea to send the former ambassador to Niger and requesting any additional information from the foreign government service on their uranium reports. The former ambassador's wife told Committee staff that when CPD decided it would like to send the former ambassador to Niger, she approached her husband on behalf of the CIA and told him 'there's this crazy report' on a purported deal for Niger to sell uranium to Iraq.”

Next’ lying Joe says the Iraqis never bought yellow cake from Niger and the president was misleading the people with the now famous 16 words in the Sate of the Union. Well, Joe the 16 words never said that Iraq bought the yellow cake. The 16 words said Iraq tried to buy yellow cake - a fact that the source, British Intelligence, still stands by today. Again from the SSCI report:

“[Wilson's] intelligence report indicated that former Nigerien Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki was unaware of any contracts that had been signed between Niger and any rogue states for the sale of yellowcake while he was Prime Minister (1997-1999) or Foreign Minister (1996-1997). Mayaki said that if there had been any such contract during his tenure, he would have been aware of it. Mayaki said, however, that in June 1999,(REDACTED) businessman, approached him and insisted that Mayaki meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss ‘expanding commercial relations’ between Niger and Iraq. The intelligence report said that Mayaki interpreted ‘expanding commercial relations’ to mean that the delegation wanted to discuss uranium yellowcake sales. The intelligence report also said that ‘although the meeting took place, Mayaki let the matter drop due to the UN sanctions on Iraq.’"

Now the guys in the White House had a lying rouge CIA operative shouting misinformation to the press. The MSM gleefully lapped up the lies because they made Bush look bad. The guys in the White House went about setting the record straight about a craven pompous lying ass. But the MSM could care less about Wilson’s lying. After all, that lying served their purpose. If there were true justice in all of this, Plame and lying Joe Wilson would be thrown into the prison cells right next to Libby’s.

Friday round up

Miers gives Bush an assist
Harriet Miers is out. There’s a thing in basketball called an assist. That is where one player unselfishly gives up the ball to an open player for an easier shot at the basket. Bush tied to give the Senate an easy shot. They missed. Now Harriet Meirs has passed the ball to the president for a slam dunk. I’m still for the Janice Rodgers Brown v. Ted Kennedy - worthy of pay per view - show down. But Bush will find a not so controversial pick with clear Conservative credentials, which can be discarded right after confirmation. Oh yeah, it’ll have to be woman.

Lamestream Media targeted by al Qaida
Where’s Eason Jordan when you really need him. A former CNN big shot, Eason got into hot water when he suggested, without a shred of evidence, that the US military was targeting “journalists” in Iraq. Lex opined that the fact that there were still “journalists” stealing oxygen in Iraq was proof positive that Jordan was full of excrement. Had the military targeted “journalists” they’d all be dead. But al Qaida did target the blabbering class this week and you could almost hear the, “after all we’ve done for them” lament from the “journalist.” Because they remained focused on themselves, they missed the story…again. The attack was a colossal failure. The first car bomb was shot up and stopped short of its target. The next two could not navigate the rubble left by the first, and were also detonated well short of the target. The ensuing ground assault that was supposed to take over the hotel left the terrorist attackers dead in the street. But the context of the bombs going off was overshadowed by the spectacular pictures of…well…the bombs going off. Lost in the cool footage was the utter failure of this attack and the professional response of the Iraqi security forces. Our brave media, as our brave media is wont to do, tried to turn the attack into some kind of Wally Cronkite “we can’t win the war because the enemy has failed so miserably” Tet Offensive moment. It’s the pictures, not what happened, that counts. What happened was that the terrorists got their butts whipped…good.

Indictments today?
Who knows? It’d be cool if this whole thing was turned on the perpetrators. “The Justice Department today received sealed indictments on Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Wilson - aka Lying Joe Wilson and Valerie (Flame – Plame – Wilson, pick one). Joe was indicted for being a pompous, lying ass. Valerie was indicted for running a covert CIA operation against the United States. Al Franken and Chris Matthews have been placed on suicide watch.” Not likely but what fun, if only prosecutors had a sense of humor.

Let me try to clear up what Senator Kay B. Hutchison said. She opined that she hoped that the prosecutor wouldn’t come down with an indictment on some minor charge, like perjury or obstruction. The Left gasped –HYPOCRITE!!! But she went on to define what she called perjury as simply forgetting something or the sequence of events that happened two years ago. Her mistake was using the words perjury and obstruction incorrectly. I agree with her. If the prosecutor comes down with an indictment because Libby or Rove didn’t know what the meaning of is is, then he’s a dope. If they lied or obstructed, then it’s so sad too bad. But he has to know that what he does is going to disrupt the government during a time of war. It’ll be closely scrutinized. Given the stakes, I’d hope that charges, if any, are substantial and clear.

Bush, NY Times, Washington post, England, France, Russia, Australia, Italy, The UN, Liebermann, Daschal, Gephardt, Kerry, Gore and Clinton lied.

The headline about says it all. With Plamegate evolving into a vehicle for Libs, Dems and the MSM to attack the president’s basis for going to war in Iraq in the first place, we should attempt once again to lay to rest their constant bleating, Bush lied. Our kids died.

The two people who read this page regularly know that Lex has pointed out the hypocrisy of the Bush lied meme from early in the 2004 campaign. When part-time Vietnam War participant and full-time war hero John F-in Kerry was bellowing on and on about Bush “misleading” us into war, Lex cut and pasted Messer Kerry’s own words supporting President Clinton’s actions in Iraq and the likelihood that Iraq possessed WMD from the congressional record. Clinton and Kerry’s words were nearly identical to those used by President Bush in the run up to the second Iraq war. So who lied?

Now, with Plamegate, Libs, Dems and the MSM want to act as if Google doesn’t exist. They want to pretend that they never said the things that they said about Iraq dating back to 1998. They would have us believe that George W. Bush is the only one who ever said that Iraq’s quest for WMD was dangerous. Luminaries such as Chris Matthews, everyone on CNN, and the three network evening news clones, are billing Plamegate as part and parcel of the White House effort to “mislead” the country to war. There faulty thinking - and memory – goes something like this:

The administration knew the Iraq intelligence was suspect.
Joe Wilson knew that the Iraq intelligence was suspect.
The administration had to destroy Joe Wilson by outing his wife so that the country could go to war.

There’s only one obstacle with this scenario – which plagues the MSM again and again – the truth. The damn pesky truth keeps getting in the way of their good stories. Here it is:

The administration relied on the exact same body of intelligence that led Bill Clinton, with the support of the Democrat party and MSM, to the brink of war. That body of intelligence was shared by the world at the time, even those who opposed the Iraq intervention.
Joe Wilson’s trip actually CONFIRMED that intelligence.
Joe Wilson got into a POLITICAL battle with the White House when he lied repeatedly in a NY Times OpEd piece. (Those lies were exposed in the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report.)

The real question of the day has been missed by Matthews and nearly everyone else. Lex has asked the question several times, if the world thought/knew Saddam had WMD and even Saddam thought he had WMD (UN reports of stockpiles before the war), where did it go? Even the Keystone Cops have some curiosity about what happened to the loot after they catch a thief. The Libs, MSM and Dems are all quite happy to say, “Look, because you can’t find the loot, you arrested the wrong guy. It doesn’t matter that you have 20 eye witnesses, finger prints, the get away car and surveillance video that all say you’ve arrested the right guy. If you can’t find the dough, you must let him go.” There’s a little Johnny Cochran for you, at the end there. RIP

Every time some Lib uses the fact that no WMD were found to pummel Bush, I ask, “Well, if the world thought Saddam had WMD and even Saddam thought he had it, instead of pretending Saddam never had the WMD in the first place, which we know to be a false premise, shouldn’t we be asking ourselves what happened to it?”

I think that Karl Rove has had all of the WMD in Iraq collected and buried. One week before the mid-term elections President Bush, wearing a flight suit, will personally dig them up in a photo op with a Mission Accomplished banner in the background. Democrat mass suicide will follow.

The number 2,000 in context

At dawn on September 17th, 1862 Union and Confederate forces met near the sleepy little Maryland town of Sharpsburg. By 5:30 that evening casualties from both sides totaled over 23,000. That’s nearly 2,100 casualties per hour. 8,000 men fell in the struggle for Miller’s cornfield alone. Rifle fire from both sides was so intense that not a single stalk of corn remained standing after about an hour. Union General Fighting Joe Hooker summarized it in his report with these words, "In the time I am writing, every stalk of corn in the northern and greater part of the field was cut as closely as could have been done with a knife, and the [Confed.] slain lay in rows precisely as they had stood in their ranks a few moments before." Further south, Confederate reinforcements were pummeling Union forces at place called Dunker Church.

But that was just the start. At mid-day, troops under the command of General D.H. Hill held the Confederate center by occupying a sunken road. The natural defense helped Hill repulse several Union assaults over a four hour period. Union forces were finally able to break Hill’s defense by gaining a position from which to deliver a murderous enfilading fire onto the Confederate defenders. However, after pushing Hill from his defenses, the union forces were too exhausted to press their advantage. After the battle, the sunken road became known as Bloody Lane.

Late in the day at the Lower Antietam Bridge, located at the southern end of the battlefield, Union General Ambrose Burnside was impaling his forces against stubborn Confederates defending the bridge. This was later seen as a foolish maneuver, because Antietam creek was only waist deep to a man and could have been crossed with little effort at nearly any point. Burnside finally drove the Confederate defenders back and took “his” bridge. That caused Lee to withdraw his forces from the field at about 5:30 pm. The Lower Antietam Bridge is now known as Burnside’s Bridge.

So Lex, why the history lesson? Well, I’m angry about the MSM reveling in the fact that our casualties in Iraq have reached 2,000. I do not mind the references to the figure. I do mind the total lack of context. The MSM reports the number - fine – but it’s only to segue to Bush’s falling support in the polls. Even that is misreported in that Zogby has the president back UP to 45%. The 2,000 figure is used to segue to Cindy Sheehan and the anti-war non-movement. The 2,000 figure is then used to segue to Plamegate and the non-stop beating of the MSM meme, Bush lied, our kids died.

So what should the MSM be doing? Well, reporting the number is fine, although I’m not quite sure why 2,000 is different from 1,500; 1,999 or even 1. But that number needs to be reported in the context of what those lives have achieved:

- Deposing a megalomaniac as the head of state of country that dominates a region vital to our national security
- Exposing the oil food scam and the deceit of France and Germany
- Exposing countless mass grave sites
- Freeing 25 million people
- Establishing the first constitutionally elected democratic government in the region
- Establishing a military foothold in a country that borders Iran and Syria
- Establishing THE battleground for killing terrorist

The Battle of Antietam is known as the bloodiest single day of combat in American history. It is also, to this day, known as a decisive battle in that it defeated the heretofore invincible Robert E. Lee and pushed his Army of Northern Virginia out Union territory. It is also remembered as the Union victory that allowed Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. It was also the battle which convinced Lincoln to relieve General George B. McClellan as commander of Union forces. That move inspired McClellan to run against Lincoln in the 1864 election. Context is everything. 23,000 dead! Oh my we need to quit the war! That was a fashionable way of thinking 1862. Draft riots, political infighting and treachery that makes today’s Democrats look sane ensued. Through it all Lincoln stood firm.

2,000 dead. Report it if you must. But give it the context it deserves. Each one of those volunteers died for something greater than themselves. I just don’t know how to capture the essence of their sacrifice and we might not even know the full meaning of that sacrifice for 50 years. But we can be sure that they didn’t die for Bush’s poll numbers, Cindy Sheehan or Valerie Plame.

The national discussion on race relations

In his book My Lie – The life and times of a narcissistic dope, Bill Clinton notes that one of his biggest regrets was the unfinished work he left after two terms as president - the things that time just never allowed him to get to. For instance, on his “to do list” right after diddeling the help, stealing everything not nailed down in the White House and ransacking Air Force One, things for which there was ample time, was the note, “hold a national discussion on race relation.” As America’s "first black president", Clinton was well situated for such a discussion. But alas cigars, bongos and bombing aspirin factories between Grand Jury testimony ate up all of his free time. Like all of the hard things on Clinton’s list, such as actually fighting a war on terror after declaring one, time just ran out on the national discussion on race relations.

Who the hell cares and what does that have to do with the events of the day? Well there are any number of things. First, there’s New Orleans. New Orleans was a city controlled for 60 years by the Democrat vote buying machine. Democrats, who could bus tens of thousands of black voters to the polls in two hours on election day, couldn’t bus them to higher ground in front of a deadly hurricane moving at 12 miles an hour for a week. After the hurricane, pictures of black faces, weather looting or in dire straights at the Superdome, filled the TV news coverage. CNN reported that the looting was necessary do to the federal government’s indifference toward poor black people. Yeah, food and water maybe, but what does one need with two TVs in city with no power? Who cares - it’s all whitey’s fault. Black mayor, police and fire chief, Democrat control for 60 years, New Orleans should have been show place for liberal results. And it is, poverty, slums, poor schools, lack of civil control, corruption etc. etc.

Next, Bill Bennett tries to hold a philosophical discussion on black crime. His words are taken out of context, twisted and played over and over by clueless, mean spirited Lib MSM in an effort to smear Mr. Bennett as a racist. Too bad the entire transcript was available for anyone curious enough to look into the matter. The end result, for all but those earning a living as a race baiter, was an exoneration of Bennett and further proof that the MSM cannot be trusted on anything important.

Then there is Toledo, Ohio. Who to root for in that one? It’s like watching a fist fight between Al Franken and Michael Moore. You just hope they beat the crap out of each other for hours. So the Nazis show up in Toledo to protest black gangs. The black gangs get irritated and riot burning down some guys home and place of business, after looting it of course. Wouldn’t it have been nice if these two groups just met in ally somewhere and fought to the death? Instead TV dopes blame the mayor for allowing an exercise of free speech. “Why, that rally should never have been allowed to happen. There’s too much free speech going on in Toledo.” The black mayor got it right when he told rioters, “You have given them exactly what they wanted.” What should have happened was that the pointy headed Nazis walked down empty streets guarded by police while descent people gathered in a different part of town for a music and arts and craft show.

Last, the NBA has established a dress code that some players call racist. Hmm. Why is that? NBA owners pay millions upon millions of dollars to the players. Is it too much to ask that players show up to work looking like basketball players instead of extras from some M TV hip hop video? Why is it racist instead of business? Because we have been conditioned to believe that when something does not go our way, there has to be some nefarious reason for it. When whitey doesn’t get the job, it’s not because he’s a 50 something drunk with a checkered employment record. It’s because of affirmative action. If blacky gets canned, it’s not because he can’t get to work on time two days in row. It’s because the boss is a racist. The simplest reason is usually the correct one. I find it hard to believe that basketball execs got together to devise some racist dress code. It’s business. It’s their money. If the players don’t like it, they can quit. There will be no player mass exodus from the hardwoods.

Yeah, it’s too bad Bill Clinton was so “busy” that he never got to that national discussion on race relations.

Table set for Conservative mid-term victory

As Patrick Fitzgerald readies his indictments it’s good to know that we all be coming together. Why would we all be coming together over the indictment of some government officials? Well, we know that the Libs and Dems hate these things right? Why else would James Carville have declared war on Mr. Fitzgerald? Why would a whole host of other Libs and Dems be assailing the cost and time Mr. Fitzgerald has spent investigating a crime that never occurred? Why would George Soros have founded the new group Let’s Move on again? WWWHAAAT!? You say none of that has happened. Well then Rep and Con partisans certainly have done it right? NO!? How can this be?

Well, I’ll tell you how it can be. Conservatives are conservative first, Reps second.* If someone in the White House has done wrong, they need to go. If Libs and Dems are using prosecutors’ offices to run phony baloney indictments against Rep leadership then the new media will expose them.

I worry more about guys in the Vice President’s office, a true Conservative, than I do about anyone associated with the Oval Office. Maybe a good house cleaning of the president’s third way, compassionate conservative, “new toners” will provide an opportunity for W to bring in some in your face, rock ribbed Conservatives. One thing we know about Bush, he won’t wilt under pressure. He is still standing after five years of vicious attacks from Libs, Dems, the MSM and of late his own Con base.

That is why Cons have let this whole thing play out. We remain more curious than angry about the process. We are happy to let the chips fall where they may. Libs and Dems can be counted on to overplay their hand at every turn and impale themselves on their advantages. It is a function of their negative worldview and their negative view of America. Sooner or later candidates have to explain what they are for. And Dems are for higher taxes, quitting the war on terror, gay marriage, limiting the first amendment with regard to religious and political speech, pretending the second amendment doesn’t exist, higher fuel prices based on taxes, government funding for partial birth abortion of young girls without parental notification, environmental rights over property rights etc. etc.

Conservatives should not be considering suicide or withdrawal from the mid-term process. The table is set for another victory. The only danger is Conservatives running away from who they are or trying the third way, “Really, we’re not as bad you think” approach. Con candidates that run hard drawing stark contrasts between Con and Lib ideals will win. Third way, compassionate conservatives will lose.

The Griffin offers hope. The Griffin sends: “The elections of 2006 will be fun to watch. The libs think they have GWB on the run. Hasn't he always been misunderestimated? The GOP will hold their majority in both houses. GWB may get scratched but the libs will be suicidal...again.”

* (Remember Spector, Hagle, McCain, Snow, Collins, Chaffee, the two dopes from Ohio, crybaby Voinavich and Littleman DeWine all call themselves Republicans. The best way for one these “Republicans” to get on a Sunday morning talk show is to join three other Libs bashing the president, who is more like them than a Conservative. But you can’t get face time on network TV by agreeing with the President. Even real Conservative don’t get on unless they disagree with a particular policy.)

Let the wheels of justice spin. Bring the guilty bastards in.

Well Rove, Libby, Cheney and the intern that takes Barney for his afternoon walks all appear to be on their way to jail. For what, the gurus in the MSM have yet to determine. The MSM media only knows that these villains will be indicted on charges stemming from the non-outing of CIA chick Victoria Flame aka Lying Joe Wilson’s wife. The charges have been muddied by the fact that Flame Plame Wilson was not covered under a statute that is designed to protect the CIA’s covered agents. Essentially, she’d given up the cloak and dagger stuff long enough ago to be considered irrelevant as a covered source. She had become just another government bureaucrat driving in and out of the front gate at Langley for the whole world to see.

So Plame gets this big idea, not quite as big as Donny Deutch’s unwatched idea, I’ll send my lay about formerly drug addicted husband to Niger to drum a case AGAINST the government that employs me. That’ll move me to the top of the list for employee of the month. So Joe packs an overnight bag…with his pills. He puts his other non-essential stuff, like clothes, toiletries, CD player, cookies etc. in another bag and heads off to Niger. Pronounced with a long i and hard g sound by 98% of Americans until Plamegate where we learned it’s actually pronounced with a long e and soft g sound. Thank God the investigation got that much straightened out. Think how stupid one might have sounded at the next tea party mispronouncing Niger, a word that heretofore had never come up in anyone’s conversation.

So Joe sits around Niger tea shops sipping “tea” and talking to some government officials who confirm that Saddam had approached Niger officials about selling Iraq weapons grade uranium. Joe gets back and is debriefed by the CIA. He files no written report. Hmmm that’s odd. In the Marine Corps, we had to file a written report if we left base for an hour to visit the mainside PX. This guy travels to foreign country on Uncle’s nickel to drum up a case against his own government, but he’s not required to file a written report. Could it be that Joe’s report didn’t confirm what Plame wanted confirmed?

So what to do? Well, we’ll just lie a bit. Joe writes a story so filled with lies that only the New York Times would print it after some light editing by Jayson Blair. Dick Cheney sent me – lie. Saddam never tried to buy enriched uranium from Niger – lie. These falsehoods and others were exposed by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and signed by every Democrat and Republican on the committee. For Libs and the MSM such reports are the Bible when they excoriate Bush but are ignored when they point to the lying ways of Lib darlings like Joe Wilson or the utter irrelevance of a Lib hero and Walter Middy clone in the 9-11 debacle, some dip known as Richard Clark.

Now after two plus years the prosecutor is said to be readying indictments. For whom, on what, who knows. No prosecutor is going to spend two years of his life looking for foul play and then say, nope nothing there. If you talk long enough and to enough people inconsistencies maybe even lying is bound to come up. Think of the operator game. Tell something over and over to enough people and the original message is bound to become garbled at some point. Charges will be something so far removed from the original focus of the investigation as to confuse everyone. We can only hope that the crowd that tried to run an undercover operation against their own government is on the indictment list somewhere. But it’s a bizzaro world.

Who's on trial?

Listening to the MSM you’d think that Saddam was prosecuting Iraq. The MSM meme for the trial has emerged. That meme will be along the line that it is the Iraqi justice system that is on trial and the system must avoid the appearance of meting out “victor’s justice.” In other words, we all know that Saddam is murdering tyrant bastard, a cruel creepy villain who, along with his equally cruel and creepy sons, terrorized a nation and its neighbors for decades. But we must give the appearance that we are fair minded. So, we must not convict too quickly. We might even want to let him off on a charge or two to show that we’re fair. And, we must not execute him.

The uninformed MSM will decry the trial in Iraq arguing that poor Saddam cannot get a fail trial. Because everyone in Iraq knows what a murdering despot Saddam is, there is no way for a fair trail. Well to me, if everyone in Iraq knows Saddam is guilty, that’s in itself proof that he is indeed guilty. But it’s a bizzaro world. If everyone knows you’re guilty, you get to move your trial to an area that is more sympathetic to despots, like the Hague. Serbian President Slobodan Milošević has been on trial there for nearly three years now with no end in sight. Or maybe Los Angeles would do. There Judge Ito would have the American soldiers arrested for violating Saddam’s rights – What no Miranda? And a group of Angelino public school grads will fall for a closing argument like, “If you can’t find the gas, on conviction you must pass.” And as a fail safe, there’s always the 9th Circus to review the case on appeal.

Make no mistake, before it is all over, our glorious MSM freaks will be glorifying Saddam, vilifying Bush for Abu Ghraib – again – and portraying the Iraqi court as an American kangaroo court. The loony tunes in MSM will replace the long list of Saddam’s atrocities committed against his own country and the region with a list al Qaida grievance against the U.S. No matter how fair, the MSM will depict the trial as a show trial. When justice is handed down, the MSM will do its level best to see that Saddam remains a dictator in waiting in a jail somewhere or worse becomes a martyr when the hangman’s noose tightens around his worthless neck.

Were I king for a day there’d be free beer. Everyone would have to drive an American car and Saddam would be found guilty in about an hour. The court would come to order with the words, “Bring the guilty bastard in.” Followed by, “Saddam you are guilty. You have 30 minutes to convince me that you are not. If you fail to do so, I will sentence you to be stripped naked and tied to post where every woman in Iraq will have the opportunity to spit on you and hit you five times with a three foot hickory switch. If you survive that, you will crawl on your hands and knees to Abu Ghraib while escorted on a dog leash by Lynndie England. There you will become the base of an inverted human pyramid of 400 naked men the construction of which will be broadcast by al Jazeera. If you survive that, you will be turned loose on the busiest street of Tehran naked except for a billboard that reads ‘Allah was a pedophile’ on one side and ‘All Iranian Ayatollahs are Assaholas” on the other. Any questions? Now bailiff, bring me my headphones and turn up the volume on my Toby Keith CD while this piece of human debris defends himself. When Toby’s done, so are you.”

The Bible needs no stealth

There’s this thing called “Intelligent Design.” Intelligent Design (ID) is the assertion that the universe exhibits characteristics of resulting from an intelligent cause or agent, not an unguided process such as evolution. (Look at Lex’s Jan 14 “Too many coincidences.”) Now, people are using ID as a subterfuge to get the Bible back into the public schools. First, it’s interesting to note that public schools were first founded to teach the Bible. The Bible used to be the only text in public schools and all lessons were grounded in that text. So, we’ve come full circle, now the Bible is about the only text not allowed in a public school. Columbine murders Harris and Klebold, as matter of free speech, could shout passages from Mein Kampf, while decked out in their now famous black trench coats. But a student openly carrying a Bible in school is still likely to be descended upon by uninformed school officials spouting nonsense about the Constitution’s nonexistent “separation of church and state” clause. The Bible “thumper” is likely as not to be expelled as some sort of dangerous religious nut.

So now a group of people are trying to sneak God back into the schoolhouse under a cloak called Intelligent Design. It seems to me you get this kind of idiocy, both throwing God out of and then trying to sneak Him back into the schoolhouse, when local school boards cede their authority over those schools to state and federal politicians and courts. There are great arguments for teaching the Bible in school that do not require stealth.

- It is the greatest, most popular, widely read book in recorded history.
- It is the foundation for western law.
- Its influence has shaped the history of the world.
- Its stories are depicted in the works of the masters of all ages.
- It is the most referenced document in the history of the world.
- It is the most quoted – in and out of context – document in the history of the world.
- It has refused to go away for 2,000 years and is not likely to in the next 2,000.

How can a school interested in educating young people ignore this book? People who want the Bible back in the schoolhouse don’t need to play this dopey ID game. They should forcefully argue for openly bringing it back based on its place in history. They should argue that we don’t ban certifiable garbage from the school library, why are we banning the Bible. Last and most important, they should argue that it is their school not the state’s, the fed’s or the court’s.

Success in Iraq? Damn! Get that Rove story ready.

I knew that the Iraq elections were going well and the Tom Delay indictment wasn’t when CNN kept leading every hour Saturday with the likelihood that Karl Rove was going to be indicted. Then on Sunday the media template was set. Before offering uninformed opinions on the Plame investigation, talking heads opined on the Iraq elections. “Well yes we had these election but they don’t really mean anything.” “The Constitution is receipt for civil war.” “This vote isn’t the important one. The really important vote will be in December.” “The vote will only encourage the insurgents.” And on and on

It is hard to understand how the MSM thinks. A good news story emerges in Iraq. Yet the MSM - when it reports - cannot help but portray the events as insignificant or worse. We all know what the coverage would have been like had bombs been exploding at polling places all over Iraq. The sad thing is that the MSM’s approach was predicted two posts below on Friday. Anyone with half a brain knew the MSM would never hail the elections as progress. The good news in Iraq had to be pushed aside, minimized, ignored and bastardized by the MSM. “There’s good news in Iraq. Damn! Not on our news show. Get that Rove piece ready.”

The more I see of the MSM in action, the more I’m convinced that they would be quite happy to see America fail in Iraq. Their happiness in failure is rooted in a loathing of America. It is their mindset that America really did let black Americans die in New Orleans simply because they were black. Or that America is a force for evil in the world - that any problems that exist in this world are a result of America’s wealth and influence. But whatever loathing they have for America is dwarfed by their loathing of a president that see as a know nothing, hick, hayseed, cowboy, religious freak intent on destroying the world for oil profits. None will call them anti-American, treasonous bastards, but it is difficult to see how their behavior would be any different if they were.

This is all Bush's fault! 

Here's the deal

Sexism
Laura Bush says sexism has raised its ugly head in the Harriet Miers nomination. She’s right. If Harriet were Harry Miers he’d still be shlubbing away unnoticed in the White House. Whatever else her qualifications, the important one is an XX chromosome pair.

Joda
The wise one, Arlan Specter, said he might call James Dobson before the Judiciary Committee to find out what Karl Rove told him in a telephone conversation. Dobson, if called, ought to tell the Joda of the Senate, “Senator it’s none of your business what I talk about to anyone. I am a private citizen of this country. I am under no obligation to tell you or anyone else about my private conversations. By the way senator, I heard that your wife and Ms. Miers once spoke at luncheon, what did they talk about?” To which Specter is likely to reply, "Tell us you must, if confirm her we will." Specter is a Lib who holds in himself in higher esteem than anyone else. He may look like Joda but that's as far it goes.

Smurfs
The Smurfs were wiped out by UNICEF this week. That’s right. The loveable little blue guys got the Smurf bombed out of them during an air raid in a cartoon designed for adults. The point was: War hurts the children. Holy Smurf! Ya gotta be Smurfing me. No kidding. I never knew. I wonder why the Smurfs were victims of an air raid? Why not show the happy Smurf children loading onto a school bus when Suicide Smurf blows them all up? How about al Qaida Smurf chopping off Poppa Smurf’s head in grainy home video? Needles to say, I won’t be looking for pennies for the UNICEF cups this Halloween.

Staging or common sense
President Bush staged his presser with the troops yesterday. Or that’s what the dopes in the MSM would have you believe. Reading the entire text of the event I could not discern where exactly it was that anyone told anyone what to say. It was more a question of who was going to answer a certain question and who would hand the microphone to whom. The MSM would have us believe that the president’s handlers were there scripting the whole thing and running it like a puppet show. And the puppets of course were our troops – who the MSM proclaim at every opportunity that they support and respect. But the MSM has such a low regard for our troops that they portray them as dupes and props for the president incapable of being, at the same time, informed and supportive of their Commander in Chief. The MSM expects a Mayor Nagin approach to these things - no coordination or preparation, blame someone else when it falls apart. The idea that someone would show up five minutes early to tell the troops what to expect is “staging” to the MSM. It’s common sense to the rest of us. News FLASH to MSM! I’ll bet someone was telling the president what to expect as well.

Iraqis Vote
Either way the Iraqis win. Either way the MSM will portray the vote as a loss. CNN has already set up a strawman that says the worst possible outcome would be narrow victory. Huh?

Schroeder takes cheap shot - now that it's safe

Outgoing German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder blasted our president saying, "I can think of a recent disaster that shows what happens when a country neglects its duties of state towards its people." That’s bold talk for the socialist German uberleader who presided over the crumbling of the German social welfare system, wrecking of the German economy, an economy that on a good year barley reach 2% growth, unemployment figures not seen since the war, a flood of Muslim immigrants willing to procreate like rabbits to replace an older and declining German population, the decline of his party, his own political defeat and the comic failure of the EU Constitution.

Tipping his hand of a future career as a comedian, Schroeder went on to crack wise, "My post as chancellor, which I still hold, does not allow me to name that country but you all know that I am talking about America." That comment received laughter and applause from a group of Germans either too young and ignorant to recall the 50 plus years that America kept the Soviet bear from their door - those are the not so bad Germans – or the really bad Germans like Schroeder himself, old enough and educated enough to know that every advancement Germany has made over the last 50 years has been on the back of the Americans.

Had Germany been forced to devote 50% of their GNP toward their own defense from the Soviets, they would still be cleaning the WWII rubble out of Stuttgart streets. Instead of defending themselves, they acted like a scrawny weakling hiding behind America as if it were its football star big brother. Now, after 50 years of big brother’s protection, the scrawny pencil neck punk little brother has morphed into a flabby, weak, grossly overweight man. Germany has received trillions of dollars of security from the Americans which they in turn poured into a welfare state. Now the Soviets are gone, the Americans are leaving, and the social welfare Ponzzi scheme is collapsing. Safe from any real threats and knowing that if needed big brother will still rescue him the little brother now turns on his older successful brother. Little brother Schroeder taunts big brother, “Oh yeah, I may be weak, broke, fat, ignorant and ugly, with no real hope for improvement, and all of my friends may be losers like me, but a tornado just knocked a tree through your house. Not so high and mighty now are you. Na nan Na nan phoo phoo.’’

The good news is that Schroeder is gone. A majority or at least a plurality of Germans - the good Germans - realized that the welfare system as it is currently structured, is untenable. But like a loud mouthed drunk asked to leave the fest tent, Herr Schroeder has to make a one last loud scene before two bouncers grab him and escort him out.

Miers will need a crash course

Arlen Specter thinks Harriet Miers will need a “crash course” in constitutional law. And that’s probably true. To find a requirement for every state to provide abortion on demand in any of the eleven plainly written pages of our Constitution or its amendments requires some sort of high brow education that teaches one to place one’s own judgments and preferences over that of the founders as expressed in the constitution. To read the 1st amendment and conclude that it prohibits religious displays in the public square requires not only a “crash course in constitutional law” but special glasses, as well, to read the secret text between lines that trumpets “separation between church and state.” The rest of us cannot find that phrase anywhere within the visible text known to mere mortals outside the Supreme court. Harriet Miers will need a “crash course” to learn how to use the Supreme Court’s divining rod that will point to that part of the Constitution that supersedes the 1st amendment’s guarantee to free speech in failing to strike down Hardball co-host John McCain's campaign finance bill. Miers will need a “crash course” in crystal ball reading from Madam LaRue so that she may interpret the public takings clause in manner that allows cities to redistribute private property to the highest bidder. Harriet will need a “crash course” in Tarot card reading so that she may understand how to read the equal protection clause in a manner that allows the government as a matter of law to actually place one group of Americans ahead of another based solely on skin color or sex.

I have no idea how Ms. Miers would rule on any of the big questions of the day. I don’t think that having someone on the court that provides a less rarified reading of a rather simple document is a bad thing. Some Supreme Court rulings remind of a group of Lieutenants asked by a Captain how they might erect a flag pole for a new camp. The more the Lieutenants talk, the more men, equipment and money it's going to require to accomplish a rather simple mission. After a few minutes, the Captain steps in and says, “Gentlemen, the correct method to erect a flag pole for our camp is to go to the Gunnery Sergeant and say, ‘Gunny put up a flag pole.’” The Supreme Court, it seems to me, is a lot like the group of Lieutenants. They seem to go out of their way looking for the most complicated reading of a simple document in an effort to show everyone each is the smartest person in the room. None wants to be the one to say, “You know, I cannot put my finger on the part of the Constitution that guarantees a right to same sex marriage.”

George Bush the Conservative

When the misinformed call George Bush a conservative, I have to laugh. George Bush is conservative just like Bill Clinton was a Liberal. Bill Clinton was only as Liberal as his poll-driven third way politics would allow. Clinton never tried to do anything big because his cautious politics and scandal ridden administration would not allow it. While Bush is the exact opposite of Clinton – in addition to the obvious moral way - in that Bush follows principle rather than polls and never plays little ball, they seem to be alike in the way they disappoint the base.

For example: Bush has signed a disaster of campaign finance law. Bush supported an assault weapons bill that placed more emphasis on a weapons appearance than its function. Bush cut taxes which, as always, increased government receipts, but Bush refuses to veto a single tax bill which spends every dime and then some of the increased revenue. Bush slapped temporary protectionist import taxes on foreign steel. Bush let Ted Kennedy write the education bill. Bush refuses to do anything serious about our porous borders and immigration policy. Bush promises more money to rebuild New Orleans than it would cost to give every man woman and child displaced by Katrina $250,000. And now, the last straw for Conservatives, Bush has a chance - not once but twice - to nominate a rock rib in your face conservative judge to the Supreme Court but has not taken advantage of the opportunity.

So now the MSM is in a tizzy about Bush’s base being upset about his nomination of Miers to what has become know as the “O’Connor seat”, which is nothing more than quota code for “moderate woman.” Well the base has been in a tizzy since day one when Bush let Ted Kennedy write the education bill. Politics, more than anything I can think of, is the art of the possible. The Republican Party had an opportunity to nominate a hard core Conservative in 2000 in the person of Alan Keys and didn’t come close. If they had, they’d probably lost by 49 states. So as part of the far right, I am not in a funk about the Miers nomination. Why? Because, whatever else I think of Bush, I believe he’ll do his best to reign in the activist judiciary. Why? Because, he said he would, and to date he has been pretty good on this subject.

Now the MSM is pushing the notion that the Conservative base will sit out the mid-term elections as retribution for the Miers nomination. Well, I am the base, and I am not sitting out the mid-term. I have my idea why Bush nominated Miers. I believe Bush has put forth two stealth candidates because spineless Senate Republicans couldn’t stomach the fight to get a Janis Rogers Brown confirmed. The only way to move the ball in this game is through constant pressure. Libs and MSM want Conservatives to stop the relentless pressure so that they can catch their breath. We shouldn’t give them that opportunity.

Here's the deal

Gangsta mayor lays-off 3,000
Probably should have fired or laid off more, starting with himself, given the city’s storm reaction and preparation. Workers were referred to as “non-essential.” Well if they were non-essential why did they have a job in the first place? Workers were encouraged to return cars, credit cards, phone cards and other city property. Yeah right. If the workers were not in New Orleans, a contact number was given to arrange the return of the City’s property. There’s the problem right there. None of them were probably anywhere near New Orleans. They probably used the city car and credit cards to get the hell out and now no intention of returning to the entitlement pit known as New Orleans.

Looking for a hand out
Anyone else tired of seeing people sitting around complaining to the nearest TV person about how the government is not doing enough to help them? None of the “journalists” ever bother to ask the “victim” why they stayed in the path of a cat 4 hurricane or what they have done to help themselves since it hit. In an area larger than the country of England, the government is not going to be able to reach out and touch everyone affected by this hurricane. As the late Sam Kinneson said or shouted "MOVE TO WHERE THE DAMN FOOD IS!" The worst thing that probably happened was the politicians announcing the hundreds of billions of dollars that were going to “flood” the area. Given government efficiency, there won’t be enough money to fill a bathtub by the time the bureaucracy is done siphoning it off.

Death with dignity
The Supreme Court is looking into Oregon’s law allowing assisted suicide. The people of Oregon have voted twice to allow this practice. Had a state court said it was ok, I’d have rejected the idea of Dr. assisted suicide out of hand. But since the people have voted on it, I only object to the idea that the people who are supposed to be saving us are now responsible for killing us. It would be better to have one of the lowest class of people offing us than the ones heretofore responsible for saving us. I propose lawyer assisted suicide. By the time the creep got done running up the “billable hours”, the patient would likely die naturally. Also, when the inevitable law suites come around, it would be a case of lawyer on lawyer cannibalization. One guy on the radio put it best when he said, “$5,000 a month for a nursing home!!! Dad wouldn’t have wanted to live like this. He’d much rather see his family using his money to vacation in Hawaii.”

Rove to be indicted
Another weak conspiracy indictment on a Republican is likely to come down by the end of the month. After investigating something for two and half years, what respectable lawyer – yes an oxy moron if ever there was one - is going to be able to show his face on the club golf course if he can’t bring the full weight of the federal government down on some hapless government servant’s head?

Taking a meritorious day off on Monday to contemplate Columbus' discovery of the New World. Actually we're travelling. See ya Tues.

Bush knows himself and his enemy

“Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.”

“If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.”
SUN TZU
Chinese Military Strategist, Author of ''Art of War''

George Bush has read the book. His critics, Republican and Democrat alike, apparently have not. John Roberts has passed through the senate without a fight. Harriet Miers will pass through the senate without a fight. Many Conservatives wanted a rock rib, in your face type that guaranteed a knock down drag out with Libs. To many, the fight was a more important than the goal of seating Conservatives on the court. Sadly, history tells us, once seated, “rock ribbed, in your face” types are just as likely to go wobbly on the Supreme Court as the candidates the president has sent forward. So why have a knock down drag out over it?

There is nothing in the president's past cabinet and judicial picks to indicate that he does not know what he’s doing when it comes to picking people. Even the world-wide poster boy for “fall guy”, Michael Brown, is looking better everyday. But when your competence is being judged against buffoons like Nagin and Blanco, even Sheriff Buford T. Justice, the Jackie Gleason character of “Smokey and the Bandit” fame, would come off looking like a competent public servant. So, “Brownie” may not be the best example.

So Bush has avoided the fight. But why? For the answer, look at the second quote. Bush knows that when necessary or it serves their purpose, the Democrats will act as a monolithic block. Bush also knows that the Republicans will not. There are at least five “Republican” senate votes that cannot be counted on under any circumstance and Ohio twin dopes separated at birth, Crybaby Voinavich, Gang of 14 DeWine are not even among the five. So why bring on a knock down drag out fight when the commander knows that eight to ten of his generals might defect if the going gets rough? It’s always best to achieve goals without a fight but if fight you must, fight battles you will win. Bush knows the Republican senate has no stomach for a fight.

During his confirmation hearing John Roberts questioned the Supreme Court’s light docket. Roberts thought the court could and should hear more cases. John Paul Stevens is 85 years old. Given his age, Stevens may not like a heavier case load. At any rate, likely as not, Bush will have a third shot for a nominee. The best time for a knock down drag out with Democrats would be after the mid-term, as the president was leaving Washington. That scenario makes it important for Conservatives to work hard during the mid-term to off-set one or two of the wobbly Republican votes in the senate.

Chances

One of the few things that I can recall from my college days at THE Ohio State University was a philosophy discussion about the worth of life. The reasoning went that because the likely hood of any of us being brought to life at all are so infinitesimally small, life must be cherished. Consider that the likely hood of any of us being born in our current genetic make up, given the 23 paired chromosome sets in males, are 2 X 10 to the 31st power. That is a number so large only politicians are capable of contemplating it, and then only in terms of it being other people’s money that they can spend building a bridge in their district to nowhere. The number is so large that that it is inconceivable – barring twins – that there have been or ever will be two humans born naturally with the exact same genetic make up. So yes Dick Gephard we are all winners of life’s lottery. “Winners of life’s lottery” was how Dick used to describe people who earned more money than Dick did or more money than Dick thought they should.

But 2 X 10 to 31st power is dwarfed and made insignificant by the number of missed opportunities. That is the chance of the one female egg and the one male sperm that make each of us who we are getting together at all. Given the world’s population and the life cycle of a human sperm and/or egg, that likely hood probably exceeds the largest number I could find on the Internet – a duotrigintillion or 10 to the 99th power. So if you could pick you own mother and father you might be able to improve your chances of being born to 2 X 10 to 31st power. If mom and dad have to find each other, conceive you at precisely the right cycle, have the exact sperm meet the exact egg, and that those exact circumstances have to be carried out over generation after generation, the chances of any us of being here probably have to exceed 2 X 10 the 99th power times10 to the 99th power.

So what’s the point? I don’t know. The thought just struck me as I was watching Lex jr. and his buds tear across the street with their plastic swords in hand battling some imaginary enemy. Given the odds, we are truly blessed to have him and when we count our blessings, I guess we should start with the fact that we and the ones most dear are here at all.

Who knows?

I don’t know. Apparently only a few others who consider themselves “in the know” know either. The first thing out of the mouths of conservative critics of President Bush’s pick of Harriet Miers as the next Supreme Court Justice is, “I don’t know her but…” They don’t know her but they wish Bush had picked someone they know is conservative rather than Bush picking someone he knows is conservative.

Democrats don’t know Miers either so as their coming out position are shouting cronyism because, Miers served as the president’s personal lawyer. Now let me see, who was President Kennedy’s Attorney General, Bobby somebody…? Who did President Clinton have heading up his health care reform commission, Billery, Shrillery …? Democrats are also zooming in on what appears to be a rather thin resume for the position. To me that’s a good thing. The less anyone has to do with inner workings of the rule of five the better. There is a rather long list of inept, senile and corrupt justices who have served on the highest court in the land. Miers is probably better than all of them combined. Besides I remember in high school some of the best athletes never tried out for the team and some of the best musicians never played in the school band.

I don’t know any more about Miers than I did about my own favorite Janis Rogers Brown. Brown was my pick mainly because I just thought it would be a beautiful irony to watch wacko Democrats and the idiot groups that support them trying to destroy a black woman whose parents were share croppers, who snuck off of the entitlement plantations and has accomplished more than anyone asking her questions. Now those groups and conservative groups are taken aback because they don’t know Miers. Liberal groups will soon catch their breath and realize that while they don’t know Miers Bush does. They will have no choice but to fill her name into the prepared templates and try to destroy her. Republicans, who are used to killing and eating their own, will be slower to trust Bush and/or Miers. They have been burned by this process too many times.

All of this is much ado about nothing. We conservatives never know how one of our picks will hold up under the stress of liberal Washington. Many who appeared to have bonafide conservative credentials going in have folded under the constant pressure of Liberal Washington D.C. and the MSM. Remember, we “knew” O’Connor, Kennedy and Souter. The need to get along and appear to be the enlightened one has trumped the Constitution time and again. Liberal picks never seem to go Conservative but, Conservative picks it seems have a 50/50 chance of going Liberal. Given that record and the fact that few admit that they know her, maybe we ought to wait and see how Ms. Miers turns out before killing her reputation and her nomination. It may be folly in the end, but for now I trust Bush on this because he is one of the few who thinks he knows Miers.

Suicide, Bennett, Rather

Suicide bomber?
Some poor soul in Norman, OK blew himself up Saturday night outside a packed stadium watching the Oklahoma Vs. Kansas State football game. Police have dubbed the tragedy a routine suicide. Hmm, is any suicide really all that routine? And how many self tortured people go to all of the trouble to blow themselves up? Think about the amount of time, effort and research required for that method of suicide. Wouldn’t it be easier to find a tall building to leap off, a garage to park the still running car with the door closed, a razor or a gun – I mean after all it’s Oklahoma? I think something else is going on here.

Even if it's true, you can’t say that!
Bill Bennett is in trouble for stating a truism. Mr. Bennett, in order to prove the absurdity of a caller’s argument, made an absurd argument himself. Mr. Bennett said that crime could be reduced by aborting all black babies. Now Mr. Bennett is being a called a racist.

The fact that what he said happens to be true has no bearing on the argument. He used the words black and crime in proximity of one another in the same sentence, therefore he is in fact an insensitive racist - case close, end of argument. What if Bennett had said, if you really wanted to reduce crime, you would abort all white babies? That would be true too. Whites commit more crimes than blacks. Blacks happen to commit more crimes proportional to their percentage of the total population and happen to commit the largest proportion of that crime against other blacks. Too bad. You can’t say any of that without being a racist.

Also, what goes unreported or under reported was the crux of the point Bennett was making which was that you cannot justify a moral end by an immoral means. If Bennett had used NASCAR as an example like, if you want to reduce bad dancing and atrocious fashion sense you’d neuter and spay everyone at a NASCAR event, he’d be fine. He wouldn’t even have had to go on and say that such an action would be reprehensible. See, we have a sense of humor. We have not been raised to claim victimhood at every turn. And we recognize the truth even if it hurts a bit. So I wear my loud red and black Earnhardt shirt on race day, and dance at weddings after 8-10 beers. Pointing out that the shirt doesn’t really “go” with anything or that I can’t dance is a restatement of the obvious and changes nothing. Just don’t say “black” and “crime” in the same sentence.

Dan’s back.
Dan Rather is making the rounds of some talk shows. He showed up on some PBS broadcast nobody saw and Larry King. Marvin Kalb made a rather idiotic statement to Dan about how he – Rather - became the focus of the National Guard story rather than the “focus” of the story George Bush. How odd that the guy who produces fake documents to prove the President of the United States is a lying cheat 45 days before a national election would become the focus of the story rather than what the fake papers allege.* Listening to and reading the transcripts of Kalb/Rather and King/Rather got to me to thinking that that must be what a conversation between Joe Isuzu and John Levit’s “pathological liar” character on Saturday Night Live must sound like. JI: “The story is true. You can trust me.” PL: "Yeah, Yeah, George Bush killed Kennedy. Shot him from that grassy knoll. I was there and I saw the whole thing, you know. That’s the ticket.”

* To call them forgeries would insult forgers everywhere, even a school chum who forged notes from his parents to explain school absences and was only caught after his grandfather had passed for 4th or 5th time.