James Carville signed LIBBY PARDON REQUEST- He has a lot of damn GALL to brand OTHER Dems as "JUDAS" traitors!

James Carville signed LIBBY PARDON REQUEST- He has a lot of damn GALL to brand other Dems as "JUDAS" traitors!
(In this video, click link below, Carville discusses his comparing New Mexico Democratic Governor Bill Richardson to Judas, on Anderson Cooper's MSNBC news show.)
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1460906687?bctid=1472379435

"Democrat" super spokesman JAMES CARVILLE was one among many signing letters requesting that federal Judge Reggie B. Walton commute or reduce the sentence that Judge Walton would mete out to former Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby, for Libby's sentence for OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, and PERJURY, at the very heart of the Bush-Cheney-Rove White House's efforts to-
#1. SMEAR a war critic by "outing" his CIA wife; and
#2. OBSTRUCT the resulting FBI investigation into that CIA 'outing' past the 2004 election, thereby enabling President Bush and Vice President Cheney to STEAL ANOTHER ELECTION.... from Democratic VOTERS _ROBBED_ of their votes in Ohio, and almost certainly New Mexico, Nevada, and Iowa as well. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB118109229732925893-nEz3UTfVbSocu7FGB6_TxP4W834_20070613.html?mod=blogs

James Carville has a lot of nerve - a lot of damn gall - criticizing any other Democrats for being "JUDAS" traitors. Carville tries to minimize the sheer spite and contempt of "Judas" metaphor in his post-facto TV appearance on Anderson Cooper's MSNBC news show -
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1460906687/bctid1472379435
....but Judas was only the TRAITOR disciple who got his master executed, and then ended his own life in disgrace by committing suicide.

This metaphor coming from a man who has made a political career railing at the abuses of power, the lies, the criminal conduct, corruption, and theft of voters' votes and taxpayer funds made by the REPUBLICAN PARTY... but then goes home to his wife, who has made a career whitewashing, minimizing, glossing over, spinning, defending, and apologizing for those very same CRIMINAL ABUSES OF POWER coming out of the Bush-Cheney White House (Mary Matlin was and is Vice President Cheney's PR spin-meister)- well, that is rich.
And it isn't just Mr. Carville's general notion, that no matter how vehement he has been over past 16 years in his condemnation of Republican abuses of power and grotesque policies... Carville always goes home to his wife and pretends that his fury and outrage were all an act, that he really didn't mean what he said that day!

For there is Mr. James Carville's signature, alongside that of his wife, calling for Federal District Court Judge Reggie B. Walton to COMMUTE or greatly reduce Lewis "Scooter" Libby's sentence for his conviction of PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE re the FBI's investigation into the CIA "outing" scandal shortly before election 2004, a CRIMINAL obstruction of justice which helped President Bush and Vice President Cheney and Karl Rove STEAL YET ANOTHER presidential ELECTION!

It wasn't just any "perjury trap" lie and conviction: Washington Super-Lawyer Libby was at the very center of the effort, from within the top 5 circle of most senior White House officials (#1.Bush, #2. Cheney, #3. President's Chief of Staff Andrew Card, #4. Pol. Affairs Director Karl Rove, and #5. VP Chief of Staff Libby) who were determined to "OUT" the undercover identity of CIA undercover officer ("NOC") Valerie Plame Wilson, in a determined effort to smear and undermine her war-critic husband's testimony about the White House's fraudulent rational (lie) to justify the Iraq war. (The "Niger yellowcake uranium ore for Iraq's WMD program" story, which President Bush KNEW was NOT true when he told the story to Congress during his 2003 State of the Union Speech.) And the OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE for which Libby WAS CONVICTED (by a sympathetic jury), was what ALLOWED Bush and Cheney to 'win' re-election in 2004; had they not obstructed the FBI investigation into that illegal 'outing', they undoubtably would have had to steal even more votes in Ohio and other states to 'win' their re-election, than they did!

James Carville's standard of "Justice" - Martha Stewart GOES TO PRISON for a perjury-trap conviction over selling $55,000 worth of ImClone stock she had NO fiduciary connection to.... VP Chief of Staff Scooter Libby gets a GET OUT OF JAIL FREE pass, for FELONY PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, at the very center of the Bush administration's LIES TO WAR, in an effort to SMEAR and INTIMIDATE administration war critics, in an illegal and criminal breach of secrecy rules that left an entire CIA undercover operation exposed to America's enemies; an effort which HELPED Bush and Cheney STEAL A SECOND presidential election!

James Carville signs, along with his wife Mary Matlin, a request that Judge Reggie B. Walton give former Vice President Dick Cheney's Chief of Staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, a non-prison sentence for his PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE CONVICTONS, download PDF, under "M" Matlin -




http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/libbyletters20070605.pdf

----------------------------------

The DSCC recently sent out a letter, over Carville's signature, requesting contributions to the DSCC, the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee. In the letter James Carville details the atrocious policies, statements, and abuses of power of various Republican senators the DSCC has targetted to oust from office in the 2008 election.
But while Mr. Carville solicits our outrage over those policies and conduct of Repub Senators, he then goes home to his wife and - then proceeds to PRETEND THAT THERE IS NOTHING WRONG with those senators and their abusive policies and tactics, after all!

Mr. Carville, it is YOUR Sincerity and dedication to a genuine DEMOCRATIC agenda that is in question - you can apparently TURN YOUR OUTRAGE on and off like a light bulb, and if your wife asks you to, you will advocate WHITE-WASHING THE VERY WORST CRIMINAL ABUSES coming out of the Bush-Cheney-Rove White House!

Re Mr. Carville's incindiary (and entitled) "JUDAS!" accusations, those who live in glass houses should not throw stones.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who ran for Congress as a Liberal Firebrand, rules as a Pelosi Neo-Con authoritarian DINO...

IF a picture tells a 1,000 words, 3 pictures tell the story of America's AWOL "democratic" opposition party... Hugs and Kisses for Bush!
(In deferring to Nancy Pelosi's "leadership", formerly firebrand "liberal" Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz is now COMPLETELY ALIGNED WITH the Bush administration, on those issues which DEFINE the neo-con, right-wing dominance of American politics, such as keeping even DISCUSSION of impeachable abuses of power "off the table," and thus away from the nightly news casts, and out of mind of American citizens.)



DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ is YET ANOTHER "JOE LIEBERMAN Democrat" - a Democrat who wins election victories POSING as a liberal, populist candidate fighting to help citizens overcome bureaucratic obstruction, government neglect, and big business abuses, but, once she attains office in Congress, she REVERTS TO AN AUTHORITARIAN, establishment conservative, support for the decades-long EMBARGO of Cuba (a Right-Wing Republican issue) agenda. Debbie is also of course OPPOSING EVEN BASIC IMPEACHMENT HEARINGS for the Bush-Cheney White House, despite the nearly decade-long list about criminal abuses of power by President Bush and Vice President Cheney. (For example, Mr. Cheney still owns HALLIBURTON STOCK, which value goes up with every billion dollar no-bid, no-oversight contract Mr. Cheney uses his power in the government to hand his "former" company, Halliburton. Bill Clinton was IMPEACHED for "lying" about a consensual, NON-CONSUMATED AFFAIR; MARTHA STEWART WAS CONVICTED of "LYING", AND SENT TO PRISON, over her sale of $55,000 of stock OF A COMPANY SHE HAD NO fiduciary or legal connection with!

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ REPRESENTS that modern American standard of "justice" - ONE STANDARD for Bush-Cheney administration friends and officials, AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT and MUCH HARSHER STANDARD for "ordinary" Americans!

Debbie Wasserman Schultz: This week's BAIT AND SWITCH Democratic fraudster, running for Congress as a "liberal," but ruling over her constituents from her perch in Congress as a Joe Lieberman pro-war, anti-impeachment, pretend-not-to-notice massive corruption in war contracts administration supporting hypocrite.

============================================

Freedom to Travel? More on the Audacity and Hypocrisy of Debbie Wasserman Schultz
by Steve Clemons
Posted March 23, 2008
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-clemons/freedom-to-travel-more-_b_92936.html


I had to laugh reading the news that Florida insurance regulators are zapping a major insurance firm because of the travel preferences of U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL-20).

Schultz apparently applied for an 'increased amount' of life insurance because she planned to travel internationally. I guess one needs more money if one dies in Tel Aviv rather than Tallahassee.


Buzz up!on Yahoo!In any case, a representative of American General Life Insurance, a subsidiary of AIG, called about her travel plans and was told by Wasserman Schultz's husband that she planned to visit Israel.

The mere question of where Wasserman Schultz planned to go allegedly violates Florida's "Freedom to Travel" statute.

Last Wednesday, Wasserman Schultz stated "Our legal travel choices should not adversely impact our ability to purchase life insurance."

Legal travel choices? Who in America says "legal travel choices"??

This sounds like what an apparatchik from the Brezhnev-era Soviet Union might have said. And the notion of a "freedom to travel" statute in Florida certainly sounds at oddes with the sound of "legal travel".

Well -- it is no surprise that Debbie Wasserman Schultz offered such a qualification of her comment and her own pretty silly claim that has tried to throw AIG out of the State of Florida.

She has worked with three of the most right-wing Republicans in the State of Florida -- Ilieana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL-18), Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL-25), and Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R-FL-21) -- to maintain the US embargo against Cuba and to tighten the noose around not only Cuban-American families hoping to see loved ones in Cuba -- but on ALL Americans.

Wasserman Schultz, despite serving as a National Co-Chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) Red-to-Blue Program has refused to campaign against these three Republicans, who are moderates in no one's books and have successfully made Cuba the only place in the entire world where the Cold War actually got colder in the last decade.

The freedom of Americans to travel has long been considered a human right by nearly every member of Congress. When I worked in the Senate, Senators Jeff Bingaman (D-NM), Christopher Dodd (D-CT), Chuck Hagel (R-NE) and others spoke of the right of Americans to travel as a protected human right.

There are court cases that challenge the notion that free travel is a Constitutionally-protected right, but nonetheless -- it is a "fringe view" that believes that the federal government of the United States of America has the legal right to tell its citizens where they can and cannot go.

Wasserman Schultz has the audacity to challenge AIG because she feels that her "freedom to travel" has been inhibited by an insurance firm that made a phone call?!

She is complicit in one of the most significant cabals preempting the travel of Americans today and she has no moral authority or legitimacy complaining in her own case that her travel latitude has been restricted when she is directly responsible for inhibiting the freedoms of so many other American citizens.

I recommend to Congressman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to go pay a call on Republican House Member Jeff Flake (R-AZ-06) who will remind her that it is communist governments that restrict the travel of their freedom-challenged citizens. The U.S. government should not be party to such practices, he will tell her -- as will more than a hundred of her Democratic colleagues, with whom she is politicaly out of line.

Regarding this AIG claim, Wasserman Schultz should feel pretty ashamed that she can twist the state to do her bidding while she is forcing Cuban-American families to choose whether they attend a mother's funeral, or a father's -- because the legal constraints on travel that Wasserman Schultz helped to construct and supports won't allow these families to go to both.

-- Steve Clemons publishes the popular political blog, The Washington Note

Bush smirks his way through 2008, because Democratic "leadership" gives him a FREE PASS for 8 years of illegal conduct and abuse of power....

Saudi King, and Democratic 'leaders', line up to KISS President Bush.
Following the lead of of dictators is Nancy Pelosi's version of "leadership"..

George Bush is SMIRKING HIS WAY through the final act of his 2 stolen presidential terms - as one disaster after another unfolds on the world and national economic, financial, diplomacy, and war stages - for one reason, and one reason only: Because NANCY PELOSI and the COWERING DEMOCRATIC PARTY "leadership" REFUSE to make Mr. Bush FACE THE IMMEDIATE CONSEQUENCES of his serial LIES, ABUSES OF POWER, and indeed, Mr. Bush faces NO consequences for his TWO STOLEN ELECTIONS, and the Republican Party's serial DISENFRANCHISEMENT tactics.


Why Is George Still Smiling?
by Robert Scheer
Mar 24, 2007
http://www.creators.com/opinion/robert-scheer.html


That idiotic "what me worry?" look just never leaves the man's visage. Once again, there was our president, presiding over disasters, in part of his making and totally on his watch, grinning with an aplomb that suggested a serious disconnect between his worldview and reality. Be it in his announcement that Iraq is being secured on a day when bombs ripped through that sad land or posed between his treasury secretary and the Federal Reserve chairman to applaud the government's bailout of a failed investment bank, President Bush was the only one inexplicably smiling.

Failure suits him. It is a stance he learned to wear well while presiding over one failed Texas business deal after another, and it served him splendidly as he claimed the title of president of the United States after losing the popular, and maybe even the electoral, vote. It carried him through the most ignominious chapter of U.S. foreign policy, from the lies about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to the unprecedented defense of torture by a U.S. president.

The arrogance of unwarranted assurance was there this week as the U.S. dollar fell into the toilet, which, along with the debacle of Iraq and his other failed Mideast policies, pushed oil prices to record highs. The Europeans, who didn't support the U.S. intervention, are doing much better, not having to pay to guard besieged oil pipelines while U.S. taxpayers are saddled with trillions of dollars in future debt, not to mention the loss of 4,000 U.S. servicemen and women and the 30,000 wounded in a war the Bush administration had promised would be paid for with Iraqi oil revenues. Even in Baghdad last week, there wasn't enough oil to keep the lights on for more than a few hours.

But the president is happy because his legacy issue, the war on terrorism, is intact. No matter that last week the Pentagon was forced to release a report conducted over the last five years that concluded, after surveying 600,000 official Iraqi documents captured by U.S. forces, that there is "no smoking gun" establishing any connection whatsoever between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeia.

The report was so embarrassing that we taxpayers were not going to be told of its existence, even though the explosive conclusions were declassified, until ABC News forced the administration to post it on the Joint Forces Command Website.
The network reported that the Pentagon had canceled plans to issue a press release on the report or make it available by e-mail or online because, as one Pentagon official put it, the study is "too politically sensitive."

Damn right it is — Bush squandered U.S. treasure and lives in an effort that had nothing to do with the infamous attack on America. As for the real war on terrorism against the real al-Qaida, those folks are very much on the rebound — just where they were before the 9-11 attack, building their bases in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Meanwhile, back on the home front, Wall Street is crumbling, not because of planes crashing into buildings but because the outrageous knaves of finance freed from the most minimal requirements of public accountability have been permitted to destroy America's reputation in the world for financial probity.

In the name of ending what was claimed to be onerous banking regulations imposed after the Great Depression, this administration accelerated a bipartisan pattern of allowing Wall Street to betray investors with impunity while abandoning the federal government's obligation, once accepted equally by conservatives and liberals, to ensure out national solvency.

This tendency, well underway for decades to give the bankers what they wanted — codified in the Financial Services Modernization Act signed into law by President Bill Clinton permitting the banks, stock brokers and insurance companies to merge — was exacerbated by Bush's appointment of rapacious corporate foxes to watch the corporate henhouse.

They will take care of their own, which is why Bush was smiling, happily posed in that photo op between Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr. and Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke, as he announced the Bear Sterns bailout. That action was made possible only by the federal government using your tax dollars to pick up the bad debt of the banks.

Tape that picture to your wall to remind you, when you open a credit-card bill with a 30 percent interest rate — not the 2 percent the fed will charge banks — or see the increase in your adjustable-rate mortgage, of just what your government will do for the really big guys that it will never do for regular folks.

In the years to come, as millions lose their retirement income and homes, we will have occasion to remember Georgie Porgie, who kissed the taxpayers and made them cry before he ran away.

E-mail Robert Scheer at rscheer@truthdig.com. To find out more about Robert Scheer, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.

Hillary's recent campaign lie, "I was under sniper fire during my visit to Bosnia in 1996" DEMOLISHED by photos of her airport reception on that visit

Greeting ceremony, Tuzla military airport, Bosnia, March 25, 1996
Here, below, is one of many YouTube video captures of Hillary "embellishing" her visit to Bosnia as First Lady with imaginary details of "sniper fire" and ducking for cover behind armored vehicles...

In what could be the Washington Post's best article of the past dozen years, "The Fact Checker" writer Michael Dobbs DEMOLISHES Hillary Clinton's contention, expressed on the campaign trail just 4 days ago, that she visited Bosnia while hostilities were still on-going... and that even her arrival at the airport was under fire!
We are not unappreciative of the efforts towards peace and prosperity that the Clinton White House led all through the 1990s... but that does not mean that Senator Clinton is owed the nomination in 2008, nor even that her role was alway a positive one. Her recent exaggerations and distortions of her 1996 Bosnia visit, and similar misleading statements abouther NAFTA trade stand (given on the campaign trail these past weeks)remind us that no matter HOW PETTY the Republican's charges, allegations, accusations, and innuendos against the Clitons were in the 1990s (example: "Lincoln Bedroom SCANDAL!", as if the Clintons were breaking a law by having friends AND SUPPORTERS spend the night in their WH home), those innuendos or allegations always became THE news upon which the newspapers focused! Hillary's recent statements and exaggerations illustrate that she was far more than a vicitm of that process, she either prefered secrecy, could not provide a straight answer, or could not martial support outside of the White House, to put unfounded rumors in their place.

========================================
Hillary "wins" 4 Pinochio award, for grossly exaggerating her 1996 visit to Bosnia
By Michael Dobbs, "The Fact Checker"
Washington Post, March 21, 2008
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/03/hillarys_balkan_adventures_par.html

"I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."
--Hillary Clinton, speech at George Washington University, March 17, 2008.

Hillary Clinton has been regaling supporters on the campaign trail with hair-raising tales of a trip she made to Bosnia in March 1996. In her retelling, she was sent to places that her husband, President Clinton, could not go because they were "too dangerous." When her account was challenged by one of her traveling companions, the comedian Sinbad, she upped the ante and injected even more drama into the story. In a speech earlier this week, she talked about "landing under sniper fire" and running for safety with "our heads down."

There are numerous problems with Clinton's version of events.

The Facts
(Updated below)

As a reporter who visited Bosnia soon after the December 1995 Dayton Peace agreement, I can attest that the physical risks were minimal during this period, particularly at a heavily fortified U.S. Air Force base, such as Tuzla. Contrary to the claims of Hillary Clinton and former Army secretary Togo West, Bosnia was not "too dangerous" a place for President Clinton to visit in early 1996. In fact, the first Clinton to visit the Tuzla Air Force base was not Hillary, but Bill, on January 13, 1996.

Had Hillary Clinton's plane come "under sniper fire" in March 1996, we would certainly have heard about it long before now... (continued at
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/2008/03/hillarys_balkan_adventures_par.html

Dems PRETEND NOT TO NOTICE - Bush's TRILLION DOLLAR SOCIALISM BAILOUT of Wall St....

That red line going straight down is the evidence of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney LOOTING the US Treasury, almost from the moment that they stole the White House after stolen election (Florida) November-December 2000. The one brief, blue upswing, 2004-2007, was billions of investor dollars fleeing Wall St. and pouring into real estate, homes, and construction projects. That real-estate boom-cycle briefly fueled a stock market boom, as well, but now, in the first three months of 2008, the Dow Jones average (one of many averages, but a good typical indicator) is down from over 14,000 to low 12,000 range, shedding almost 20% of value in only several months... and the real estate market is now in even worse shape.

Bush, Cheney, and the masters of the universe on Wall St. have effectively looted US taxpayers of at least two trillion dollars... and because American workers and families are the golden goose upon which Wall St. fortunes are made, Wall St. now has little to show for its complicity in that mugging of America's productive economy.
---------------------------------------------------------

When do right-wing Republicans LOVE big-government SOCIALISM??

- answer: WHEN IT BAILS OUT their beloved "investor" class, Wall St. bankers, and ruling class hedge-funds operators.... all of whom would have MELTED DOWN by now if not for fed intervention - BIG SPENDING, TAX-and-SPEND, US government TREASURY intervention to save greedy, corrupt, incompetent, lying, WELFARE-SOCIALISM grabbing "capitalists"!

EVEN WORSE, the cowering US media and 'Democratic' Congressional "leadership" - - even the ostensibly "technically competent" financial media - PRETENDS NOT TO NOTICE! ONE TRILLION DOLLARS spun off of Mr. Bush's government's printing presses over the past 9 months to Bail Out Wall Street.... and the STUPID, CRAVEN DEMOCRATS and media PRETEND NOT TO NOTICE!

NUMBERS, NUMBERS, NUMBERS EVERYWHERE on Wall Street, in the government, and in the US financial media... but no one understands or can grasp on to this nice, simple, round number, ONE TRILLION DOLLARS of US Treasury bailouts for Bush's economy and Wall Street cronies, in past 9 months, alone?!!!

Our Congress and media are like the SHEEP in George Orwell's novel, "Animal Farm," who, every time some courageous dissidents tried to confront the rapcious greed of the ruling pigs, were DROWNED OUT by the raucous, chorus bleating of the sheep!

(with a due tip-o-hat to Mr. Aaron Task, for being the ONLY financial reporter we have seen, put THE most important financial news of the past year, into one simple story, where it belongs.)

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Fed Heads Back to the Well, Will It Run Dry?
by Aaron Task in Investing,
Posted Mar 18, 2008
http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/7483/Fed-Heads-Back-to-the-Well-Will-It-Run-Dry?tickers=BSC,JPM,TMA

Since September 2007, the Federal Reserve has cut the fed funds rate by 225 basis points and, in just the past 9 months, has injected approximately $1 trillion in the financial system via a combination of existing and newly created mechanisms.

Heck, just since Friday, the Fed has pledged to support a bailout of Bear Stearns, then backed JPMorgan's takeover by pledging to backstop $30 billion of Bears' "less liquid assets."

But, wait, there's more: The Fed also cut its discount rate (the rate at which it lends directly to financial institutions) and opened the discount window to brokerage firms (vs. just banks) for the first time since the 1930s.

After so much frenzied activity, you'd think the Fed would be due for a rest. Instead, Ben Bernanke & Co. are widely expected to further slash the fed funds rate at today's scheduled policy meeting.

The talk on Wall Street is anywhere from a 50 to a 125 basis point cut, with the fed funds futures market putting the highest odds on a full 1 point (or 100 basis point) cut to 2%.

The accompanying chatter on Wall Street is the Fed is pushing on the proverbial string, i.e. using the wrong tool (the fed funds rate) and using up its firepower and credibility in a futile attempt to fix a problem in the credit markets.

Worse, the "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" crowd believes the Fed is merely postponing and prolonging the pain by delaying the inevitable comeuppance for Wall Street's debt and derivatives binge. The Fed's goal, in this view, is to bailout fat-cat speculators at the expense of average, hard-working taxpayers, savers and the dollar generally.

While I certainly understand (and sympathize) with that sentiment I feel compelled to offer an alternative outlook, courtesy of Mark Dow of Pharo Management, an emerging-market-focused macro hedge fund with over $2 billion in assets.

Dow has the unique perspective of having worked at both the IMF and Treasury before heading to the buyside several years ago. From his perch (and knowledge of the institution) the Fed is "not trying to make people whole" but trying to prevent more "innocent bystanders" from becoming victims to others' mistakes. (A prime example being Thornburg Mortgage which wasn't exposed to subprime mortgages but was exposed to overnight lending markets, which have essentially frozen. Plus, the Fed didn't exactly rescue Bear Stearns' shareholders.)

"The Fed doesn't want to avoid a bad outcome – they want the unwind to occur in orderly fashion," Dow says, comparing the Fed's actions to the circuit breakers adopted by the NYSE in the wake of the 1987 market crash.

"In a panic, people make mistakes" and the Fed is trying to prevent the obvious distress in the financial markets from becoming a full-blown panic, he says. For academic types, Dow cites the economic theory of Path Dependency, which suggests the route a market or asset takes can greatly influence where it ends up.

In other words, a slow-motion train wreck that wears people down is preferable

Pelosi, Dem "leaders" GIVE BUSH ANOTHER 9 months to WRECK the US economy...

By REFUSING to stand for justice and the rule of law, Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic 'leadership' allow Dick Cheney and George W. Bush to continue their misadministration of the US economy... which is to say, oceans and oceans of Red Ink. Red ink that make the US deficits that independent candidate ROSS PEROT railed against, spending millions of his own dollars with bought-and-paid-for infomercial TV ads in 1992, look like newborn puppies in comparison. (See chart above for 1992 deficit levels.)

Here is the New York Times commentary former NY Attorney General Eliot Spitzer wrote on February 14, 2008, decrying the Bush administration SIDING WITH PREDATORY LENDERS against American consumers.. the commentary published almost exactly 4 weeks before the feds brought to public attention Mr. Spitzer's consorting with high-priced call girls.
What is important is that... THE DEMOCRATIC "LEADERSHIP" - the Hoyers and Pelosis and Rockefellers and 'yellow-dog Democrats' - PRETEND NOT TO NOTICE!

Predatory Lenders' Partner in Crime
How the Bush Administration Stopped the States From Stepping In to Help Consumers
by Eliot Spitzer, Gov. New York
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/13/AR2008021302783.html

BY REFUSING to CONFRONT the Bush adminstration, the 'DEMOCRATIC' "leadership" IS ON THE SIDE OF PREDATORY LENDERS, driving American families to bankruptcy!


And of course, almost as a humorous aside, there are the stories of new TENT CITIES springing up around Los Angeles... what during the Great Depression were called "HOOVERVILLES", but (if this trend keeps going) might soon be called "BUSH-villes"!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/13/AR2008021302783.html
("Humorous" only because the Democrat "leadership" accords no more importance to the financial losers in their tent cities, than Mr. Bush or the major media do.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/13/AR2008021302783.html

Democrat "Leaders" PRETEND NOT TO NOTICE the Bush-Cheney-Bernake (et al) LOOTING of America...

US STOCK MARKET PLUNGES, as investors react to the TRILLION DOLLAR TAXPAYER BAILOUT of Wall St. Investment Banks and Executives.
Where do we start? We start with the natural consequences of the Bush-Cheney administration's LOOTING OF AMERICA:

#1. U.S. stocks plunge on Bear Stearns bailout; wipe out week's gains
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/us-stocks-plunge-bear-stearns/story.aspx?guid=%7BDC2496D4-EC6C-43F7-B5D3-B8BE5B0E4540%7D

A slightly more informative article, "Bear Stearns Baile Out by Fed, JP Morgan" explains that

The Fed has slashed interest rates and central banks have injected roughly $1 trillion into the banking system since then, but the crunch continues.

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid={FB1471C5-8532-4893-B2A6-4869733CCD98} THIS IS BUREAUCTRIC SPEECH, for saying "The Federal Reserve Has PRINTED ONE TRILLION DOLLARS WORTH OF BILLS, TO 'INJECT' INTO THE MARKET"... i.e. into the BANK VAULTS of the MEMBER FED BANKS! PRIVATE BANKS!

The US press/media REFUSES TO EXPLAIN to its readers and the American public, that the FEDERAL RESERVE is a consortium of PRIVATELY HELD BANKS, that act as bankers, accountants, and paymasters for the federal government (the US Treasury), and that when the Treasury PRINTS UP ANOTHER TRILLION DOLLAR in bills (actually, ones and zeroes in the cyber accounts of member fed banks out there in cyberspace, but those accounts -those cyber ones and zeroes - can be redeemed for the real, actual bills and currency that the Treasury is spinning off its presses at any time) THEY ARE DEVALUING the DOLLAR BILLS THAT YOU HOLD in your wallet, pocketbook, bank account, or mortgage account.

THE ONLY SILVER LINING to this pending HYPER-INFLATION/STAGFLATION NIGHTMARE that the Bush-Cheney administration is creating, is that as commodities and assets gain in INFLATED value, at some point it will balance out the decreasing price of properties and commodity stocks from the homeowner mortgage/loan/banking/stock-market crisis.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Bush, Cheney, the US Treasury, the Fed, Wall St. and the press/media ARE ALL PARTNERS to MASSIVE, TRILLION DOLLAR _SOCIALISM_ for the wealthy, WELFARE BAILOUTS in $200 billion dollar chunks for the executives, big investors and bankers who would be GOING BUST were it not for that massive GOVERNMENT SOCIALISM. (To some extent, little investors are also beneficiaries of these massive government bailouts for investment banks and wealthy executives, but since little investors are actually getting creamed by the market, it is not so much "welfare socialism" for them.)

Greg Palast documents some of these hard truths about the Bush-Cheney banking/fiscal/treasury nightmare far better than his fellow writers in the "major media" do, if you can wade through his muckraking writing style:
http://www.gregpalast.com/elliot-spitzer-gets-nailed/

And of course their is the obligatory Presidente Bush stating "THE DOLLAR and US economy ARE STRONG!" even as major investment bank Bear Stearns sheds HALF of its value overnight, THREATENING TO DRAG THE ENTIRE US STOCK MARKET DOWN WITH IT, propped up from losing the other 50% of its value ONLY by the Fed SOCIALISM FOR PREDATORY BANKERS and BUSH CRONY EXECUTIVES BAILOUTS.

Bush: "THE FOUNDATION" of his crumbling economy "IS SOLID"
[IF, that is, you pump in enough taxpayer subsidy Welfare Socialism for Big Bankers "liquidity" BAILOUTS for his corrupt, lying cronies.]
http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid={3ADBA892-9214-4ED8-940B-548926D1AE86}

Here is a back-handed, poorly written (gossipy) column by Wall St. market-watcher David Callaway, that (cut through his gossipy BS) states that former New York Attorney General ELIOT SPITZER was one of the VERY FEW individuals who actually has the power and ability to REIGN IN THE MASSIVE PENCHANT of Wall St. Investment banks to ENGAGE IN MASSIVE FRAUD and gold-plate worthless paper fakery. http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid={D74A985B-FE85-4DB3-BF02-9885DFB76D6C}
In this excerpt from his column, Greg Palast spells the process out. THIS IS INFORMATION that America's MAJOR MEDIA whores are either GROSSLY IGNORANT OFF (in which they are overpaid, incompetent FRAUDS), or purposely NOT TELLING AMERICANS ABOUT - in which case they are PARTY TO, COMPLICIT IN that massive investment banking frauds.
http://www.gregpalast.com/elliot-spitzer-gets-nailed/

Instead of regulating the banks that had run amok, Bush’s regulators went on the warpath against Spitzer and states attempting to stop predatory practices. Making an unprecedented use of the legal power of “federal pre-emption,” Bush-bots ordered the states to NOT enforce their consumer protection laws.

Indeed, the feds actually filed a lawsuit to block Spitzer’s investigation of ugly racial mortgage steering. Bush’s banking buddies were especially steamed that Spitzer hammered bank practices across the nation using New York State laws.

Spitzer not only took on Countrywide, he took on their predatory enablers in the investment banking community. Behind Countrywide was the Mother Shark, its funder and now owner, Bank of America. Others joined the sharkfest: Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch and Citigroup’s Citibank made mortgage usury their major profit centers. They did this through a bit of financial legerdemain called “securitization.”

What that means is that they took a bunch of junk mortgages, like the Grinning’s, loans about to go down the toilet and re-packaged them into “tranches” of bonds which were stamped “AAA” - top grade - by bond rating agencies. These gold-painted turds were sold as sparkling safe investments to US school district pension funds and town governments in Finland (really).

When the housing bubble burst and the paint flaked off, investors were left with the poop and the bankers were left with bonuses. Countrywide’s top man, Angelo Mozilo, will ‘earn’ a $77 million buy-out bonus this year on top of the $656 million - over half a billion dollars – he pulled in from 1998 through 2007.

More Pelosi Cowardice: she IGNORES Bush CENSORING DoD report, "NO CONNECTION between Saddam Hussein & Al Qaida"....

More Pelosi Cowardice: she IGNORES Bush and Cheney having the Dept.of Defense CENSOR a report finding that _THERE WAS NOT DIRECT CONNECTION between Saddam Hussein & al Qaeda_.

One can hardly avoid drawing the conclusion, that HELPING THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION OBSTRUCT JUSTICE on their many scandals, and HELPING THEM LIE and MISLEAD about the causes, conduct, and consequences of the Bush administration's 'leadership' of the War-on-Terror, IS THE TOP PRIORITY OF NANCY PELOSI and her 'Democrat' "LEADERSHIP."

Since this was the heart-and-soul of the Bush administration's rational to rush to ATTACK, INVADE, and OCCUPY Iraq - along with the related propaganda LIE of "Iraq has WMD program!" - Pelosi ALLOWING BUSH AND CHENEY to BROWBEAT THE DoD's press and media release, is, once again, ENCOURAGING THE ADMINISTRATION'S WAR POWERS.
EVERY DAY in 2008, SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI leads the 110th Congress further down the path of LIEBERMAN/ZELL MILLER authoritarian, war-mongering, Republican-wolf in Democratic-sheep's clothes treachery.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/rapidreport/2008/03/pentagon-report.html
===================================
Pentagon Report on Saddam's Iraq Censored?
Jonathan Karl, ABC news
March 12, 2008
http://blogs.abcnews.com/rapidreport/2008/03/pentagon-report.html

The Bush Administration apparently does not want a U.S. military study that found no direct connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda to get any attention. This morning, the Pentagon cancelled plans to send out a press release announcing the report's release and will no longer make the report available online.

The report was to be posted on the Joint Forces Command website this afternoon, followed by a background briefing with the authors. No more. The report will be made available only to those who ask for it, and it will be sent via U.S. mail from Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia.

It won't be emailed to reporters and it won't be posted online.

Asked why the report would not be posted online and could not be emailed, the spokesman for Joint Forces Command said: "We're making the report available to anyone who wishes to have it, and we'll send it out via CD in the mail."

Another Pentagon official said initial press reports on the study made it "too politically sensitive."

ABC News obtained the comprehensive military study of Saddam Hussein's links to terrorism on Tuesday. Read the report's executive summary HERE.

The study, which was due to be released Wednesday, found no "smoking gun" or any evidence of a direct connection between Saddam's Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist organization.

The report is based on the analysis of some 600,000 official Iraqi documents seized by US forces after the invasion. It is also based on thousands of hours of interrogations of former top officials in Saddam's government who are now in U.S. custody.

Others have reached the same conclusion, but no previous study has had access to so much information. Further, this is the first official acknowledgement from the U.S. military that there is no evidence Saddam had ties to Al Qaeda.

The study does, however, show that Saddam Hussein did much to support terrorism in the Middle East and used terrorism "as a routine tool of state power." Saddam's government, for example, had a program for the "development, construction, certification and training for car bombs and suicide vests in 1999 and 2000." The U.S. military is still dealing with the fall-out from this particular program.

The report says Saddam's bureaucrats carefully recorded the regime's connections to Palestinian terrorists groups and its financial support for the families of suicide bombers.

The primary target, however, of Saddam's terror activities was not the United States, and not Israel. "The predominant targets of Iraqi state terror operations were Iraqi citizens, both inside and outside of Iraq." Saddam's primary aim was self preservation and the elimination of potential internal threats to his power.

Bush administration officials have made numerous attempts to link Saddam Hussein and the Al Qaeda terror group in their justification for waging war against Iraq.

"What I want to bring to your attention today is the potentially much more sinister nexus between Iraq and the Al Qaida terrorist network," former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told the United Nations February 5, 2003.

On June 18, 2004 the Washington Post quoted President George W. Bush as saying: "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda: because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda," Bush said.

"This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda," The Washington Post quoted Bush as saying. "We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda."

"We know he's out trying once again to produce nuclear weapons and we know that he has a long-standing relationship with various terrorist groups, including the al-Qaeda organization," Vice President Dick Cheney said on NBC's Meet The Press March 16, 2003.

"But the cost is far less than it will be if we get hit, for example, with a weapon that Saddam Hussein might provide to al-Qaeda, the cost to the United States of what happened on 9/11 with billions and billions of dollars and 3,000 lives. And the cost will be much greater in a future attack if the terrorists have access to the kinds of capabilities that Saddam Hussein has developed," Cheney said.

''There is no question but that there have been interactions between the Iraqi government, Iraqi officials and Al Qaeda operatives. They have occurred over a span of some 8 or 10 years to our knowledge. There are currently Al Qaeda in Iraq,'' former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in a interview with Infinity CBS Radio, Nov. 14, 2002.

Cowardly Nancy Pelosi PRETENDS not to notice... ALABAMA DEMOCRATS UNDER ASSAULT by partisan Dept. of 'Justice'....

We repeat yet again: The PRETENDED IGNORANCE of Speaker Nancy Pelosi to the gross, criminal ABUSES OF POWER and CRIMINAL MISCONDUCT of the Bush-Republican Party is worth at least $200 million (almost a quarter-BILLION dollars) to the Republican smear-and fear attack media, campaign efforts, and PR/spin machine.

#1. - In 2000, Vice President Al Gore REFUSED to use George W. Bush's AWOL-during-the-Vietnam war record and other scandals, including Texas funeral-gate, Harriett Miers' role in lottery-gate, and Texas' busted budget, against then Texas Gov. Bush. The Vice President deemed that it was beneath his dignity to confront the "honor and dignity", "moral values," compassionate conservative" rhetoric of the Republican candidate, even though those were the very themes that convinced millions of Americans to give Gov. Bush their vote, and a chance to become president.

(Absent without Leave: In 1971 Air National Guard Lt. George W. Bush refused to report for duty at an Alabama Air National Guard post as ordered, during the Vietnam war, as he had previously refused a direct order to take a flight physical exam at his Texas ANG base. His Texas ANG commanders came up with the Alabama assignment in order to get Lt. Bush out of Texas, to prevent a court martial that would have been a terriic embarassment to Lt. Bush's powerful, moving-up in the Texas Republican Party father.)

#2. In 2004, Senator John Kerry REFUSED to use President Bush's comments "I'M NOT THAT CONCERNED ABOUT... bin LADEN ANYMORE" against the president in Kerry's 2004 campaign... despite those comments being posted for the entire world to see on the official White House website. (comments about 1/3rd way down from top of page.)
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020313-8.html
MoveOn.org even made 30 second and 60 second videotaped ads JUXTAPOSING President Bush's flagrant "Get bin Laden"/"I'm not that concerned about him anymore" comments... and Kerry and his campaign REFUSED to notice, or develop their own, similar, one-punch-knockout, campaign winning ads.
(MUCH LESS the president trying to make election-eve VIDEOS of bin Laden from Afghanistan... as PROOF or BRAGGING POINT OF HIS, Bush's MASTERFUL LEADEDERSHIP of the War on Terror?!)

#3. In 2002, Senate Majority Leader TOM DASCHLE threw the ENRON investigation into Senator JOE LIEBERMAN's Government Affairs Committee.... where the most pro-war senator in the entire senate (and thus the Cheney-Bush administration's biggest fan) QUASHED an aggressive, competent investigation into Enron's manifest financial fraud.
Senator Daschle ALLOWING the treacherous Senator Joe Lieberman to wet-blanket a meaningful, active Enron investigation ROBBED Democratic candidates, voters, and activists of their best campaign issue in 2002 - the OPPORTUNITY to TIE President George W. Bush to the CORRUPTION and FRAUD of his number one campaign donor. Enron and its Chairman, Ken Lay, were THE BIGGEST CONTRIBUTORS to George W. Bush's two Texas gubernatorial campaigns, his 2000 Republican primary campaign, his 2000 Republican presidential campaign, his 2000 Florida recount battle, and the 2001 Bush-Cheney inaugural committees.
For ROBBING Democratic voters, candidates, and activists of their best issue in the 2002 election, not only did Senator Daschle preside over the Democrat's LOSS OF THE SENATE MAJORITY.... but he also lost his own re-election campaign, despite the stunning incumbent advantage AND the concentration of power he brought as a SENATE MAJORITY LEADER to a small, rural state!

#4. THIS YEAR, SPEAKER of the House NANCY PELOSI is FOLLOWING SQUARELY in the LOSER, non-confrontational, "PRETEND NOT TO NOTICE CRIMINAL ACTIONS from the abusive Republican administration" path of her Democratic "leadership" predecessors.

But in the case of Speaker Pelosi IGNORING the POLITICAL LYNCH-MOB ATMOSPHERE enveloping DEMOCRATIC legislators (and former Governor Don Seigelman) in Alabama, Speaker Pelosi's Dereliction of Duty is not only an example of GROSS INCOMPETENCE... it is an example of CRIMINAL dereliction of duty.

============================================================

Alabama Democrats are Under Attack in Alabama
by Larisa Alexandrona
Posted March 11, 2008
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larisa-alexandrovna/alabama-democrats-are-und_b_90913.html

If you are not familiar with the Don Siegelman case, then you have some catching up to do. See HERE and read through the links.

Now for the latest nightmare -- the brown-shirts arrive. Honestly, this is so unreal, I have no words (emphasis mine):

AL -- Alabama Democratic Party Executive Director Jim Spearman today called in to question the method by which U.S. Marshals attempted to serve legislators subpoenas to appear to testify in a grand jury proceeding. Reporters were apparently tipped off by calls stating U.S. Marshals were coming to the Alabama Statehouse to serve some legislators. "The drama surrounding these actions and the U.S. Department of Justice's disruption of a legislative session for the routine serving of a summons to appear in court sends a poor signal to Alabama citizens who are already complaining about partisan political interference into the federal prosecution of former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman," says Spearman.

These ladies and gentlemen have not been charged with a crime and could have been served by other means in their local communities, not in Montgomery during a legislative session in front of TV cameras and reporters." Spearman stated. State law actually prohibits serving members of the legislature while they are in session. Section 29-1-7 of the Alabama Code protects members from this kind of action by U.S. Marshals yesterday. In fact, the Marshals could have violated this law by their disruption of the session and have been charged with a misdemeanor.

Thursday's action only strengthens our resolve to insist that the U.S House and Senate as well as the U.S. Attorney General immediately launch an inquiry into Alabama's federal justice system to assure Alabama citizens that politics and partisanship have not been used in prosecutions or in the serving of subpoenas. If Republican operatives had any advance knowledge of yesterday's serving of subpoenas at the Statehouse, they should have to testify before Congress under oath." Spearman concluded."

Exactly. This a subpoena to appear before a grand jury (and strangely, for quite a few Democratic state legislators). This is NOT a failure to comply with a subpoena (like Miers, Rove, and Bolton have done). So why were US Marshals used as part of this spectacle and on whose authority?

Once again I ask, why are Democrats the target of these investigations? Where the hell is Congress? When will these police-state tactics be enough finally? Or do we just wait for the rest of the brown shirts to arrive?

Time to head to Alabama folks, a state in our union that appears to be under siege.

I am not very good at organizing anything, but perhaps this request might just be enough. Let's go to Montgomery and occupy every corner of it with our peaceful bodies and shut the city down. No business. No government. No school. Nothing, but orange scarves and ourselves, just simply sitting it out until Congress finally acts. If you care even just a little about defending the Constitution -- as is your duty as a citizen of this country -- I ask that you now show your patriotism in a peaceful way and get up, get in your cars, get on a plane, get on a train, but just get going. If you do not, then your words of outrage are nothing but hollow complacency and you deserve to lose the most precious of freedoms. I am not a Democrat. But I am an American. Are you?

Pelosi's Dereliction of Duty and Cowardice, could rise to level of International WAR CRIME, if Cheney, Bush attack Iran "CRIME AGAINST PEACE."

IT IS AMAZING how similar to George W. Bush NANCY PELOSI is. Bush surrounds himself only with admirers, sychophants, and the party faithful, fires those who dare voice dissenting opinions, and thinks that his legacy is one of "Freedom", "liberty" and democracy for America - stolen elections, trashed votes, intimidated media, gross, in-your-face corruption, and torture and unlimited, Stazi-esque surveillance not-with-standing. (And Bush gets away with labelling his opposition as "terrarist sympathizers!" even as he and his Vice President, Dick Cheney, export the Halliburton engineering company to Dubai, and, worse, TRIED TO SELL US PORT OPERATIONS to a consortium headed by Gulf state dictators, KNOWN to be a source of FINANCIAL SUPPORT for BOTH Palestinian AND IRAQI Sunni TERRORIST GROUPS !!

Nancy Pelosi plays ENABLER to these Cheney & Bush serial abuses power and of the US Constitution, but because she has surrounded herself with war-lobby, defense contractor, inside-beltway, big-business, AIPAC, media-conglomerate, financial industry LOBBYISTS (etc., ad naseum) SHE THINKS SHE IS DOING A GOOD JOB!

Damn right, Speaker Pelosi, THIS IS PERSONAL. You are COMPLICIT in the Bush administration's OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, from keeping the partisan political lynching of Alabama Gov. Don Seigelman off the front pages, to keeping the other Purge-gate US Attorneys out of the news, to doing NOTHING to censure Bush for his COMMUTATION of the Libby CONVICTION, for PERJURY and OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE from within the TOP-5 CIRCLE of the White House! (Bush, Cheney, Rove, Card, Libby), to keeping Representative Conyers from holding EVEN BASIC HEARINGS to determine IF ANY impeachable offenses had been committed -

- THAT is OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE!

And, if this White House gets their next wish, it will be a MASSIVE, ILLEGAL, MASS-MURDEROUS US BOMBING ATTACK on a country that we already organized a COUP against, in a region that now despises America for acting as the Soviet Union did during the Red Army invasion of Afghanistan.

NANCY PELOSI - writing the blank checks, TAKING UP WHERE THE BELOVED RED ARMY left off!

==============================================================
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/lindorff/072

The Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier battle group is in place there, and loaded to the brim with strike aircraft, Tomahawk missiles, and even nuclear weapons. It was long ago reported that air bases with aerial tankers had been put in place in Central Asia north of Iran, ready to refuel B-2 stealth bombers flown from the US or Diego Garcia islans in the Indian Ocean.

All the elements, that is to say, are in place for a massive air assault on Iranian targets, designed to destroy its nuclear program, cripple its military command and control, and -- at least this is a stated Cheney goal -- to lead to the overthrow of the Iranian government by its own people.

It is, of course, the strategy of madmen.

The U.S. has no forces to send into Iran. All they can do is bomb it. And bombing a country doesn't lead its people to rise up. It leads them to rally 'round the flag. Especially when the civilian casualties of our not-so-"smart" bombs start to soar.

If such an attack were to happen, we can kiss goodbye to six years of domestic peace, such as we've had. The Iranians have considerable capability to inflict damage on U.S. targets of interest, both overseas and here in the domestic U.S. using assymetrical warfare techniques. The worse part: they'd be completely justified in doing so, since any attack on them would be a CRIME AGAINST PEACE -- the gravest of all international crimes.

"Madam Speaker, it's Exxon on line 2, Diebold on line 3, and Blackwater on line 4!"

Pelosi ALLOWS Bush Administration OBSTRUCTION of JUSTICE to fall deep from front page headlines.. just IMAGINE a Repub Congress letting Clinton staffe

IS NANCY PELOSI IN THE PAY of the REPUBLICAN NATIONAL PARTY??

Well... OF COURSE her BIGGEST DONORS - the FINANCIAL (credit, wall St., lending, banks, insurance, and other companies) industry, the war (defense) industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the health care industry, etc., are the SAME DONORS who underwrite the Republican Party. And according to Washington DC career insider (and former Republican Party presidential nominee) Pat Buchanan, Speaker PELOSI is behind the Congressional APR OVAL of the pending IRAN ATTACK PLANS.
So it is indeed a fair question to ask, "WHY does Speaker Pelosi ALLOW the administration's BLATANT scorn, CONTEMPT FOR, and OBSTRUCTION OF a duly lawful CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENA to FALL FAR, FAR, FAR from the FRONT PAGE HEADLINES where, undoubtably, any REPUBLICAN Congress and REPUBLICAN press/media would put them.

IS the speaker MERELY INCOMPETENT? Is she an argument AGAINST women in powerful leadership positions?
Or is she CONFLICTED and/or CORRUPTED by her donors, who are getting her to TURN A BLIND EYE TO what would undoubtably have Republicans up in arms, and demanding impeachment hearings, were the shoe on the other foot?

Either way, it is clear that under Speaker Pelosi's guidance, Americans who vote for DEMOCRAT "LEADERS" can EXPECT SECOND CLASS representation.

=====================================

House Files Contempt Lawsuit
[Has there ever been a more ANEMIC headline in American press history?]
by Pete Yost, AP
March 10, 2008
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/10/house-files-contempt-laws_n_90745.html


Compare other versions »

WASHINGTON — The House Judiciary Committee filed suit Monday to force former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten to provide information about the firing of U.S. attorneys.

The lawsuit filed in federal court Monday says Miers is not immune from the obligation to testify and both she and Bolten must identify all documents that are being withheld from Congress.

In a statement announcing the lawsuit, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers said, "We will not allow the administration to steamroll Congress."

Conyers said he is confident the federal courts will agree that the Bush administration's claims to be immune from congressional oversight are at odds with constitutional principles.

The House committee early last year subpoenaed Bolten for documents and Miers for testimony in trying to make a case that the White House directed the firing of nine U.S. attorneys because they were not supportive enough of Republicans' political agenda.

Bolten and Miers refused to comply.

On President Bush's behalf, White House Counsel Fred Fielding said such information is private and covered by executive privilege.

The House passed the contempt citation by a 223-32 vote that most Republicans boycotted.

A week and a half ago, Attorney General Michael Mukasey said he would not refer the House's contempt citation to a grand jury and that neither Bolton nor Myers had committed a crime.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., then announced she had given the Judiciary Committee authority to sue Bolton and Myers in federal court.

The lawsuit says executive privilege _ intended to protect the confidentiality of advice from the president's closest advisers _ does not cover documents that don't involve the president.

The privilege also does not cover documents whose contents are widely known, previously released or that were the subject of extensive, previously authorized testimony, the lawsuit adds.

The lawsuit says the White House is making a blanket claim of executive privilege, despite the administration saying that the president was not personally involved in communications subpoenaed form Bolten.

It says Miers' conduct is inconsistent with representations that the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel made to Congress in 1971 when OLC was being run by future Justice William H. Rehnquist.

Rehnquist told Congress that a witness intending to invoke executive privilege may not simply ignore congressional subpoena and fail to appear.

Conyers said the administration "simply will not negotiate towards a compromise resolution, so we must proceed."

PELOSI's decision to seek a CIVIL LAWSUIT vs AG Mukasey REFUSAL to HONOR CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENAS is cowardly, shorsighted, and counter-productive...

Speaker of the House - nominal "leader" of Congress - NANCY PELOSI's REFUSAL to use ANY MEANS other than LITIGATION (long, drawn out civil lawsuits) against the Bush administration/Mukasey "Justice" Department OBSTRUCTION OF CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENA, is COWARDLY and COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE to the Democrat's long-term political goals of wresting power (congressional majorities) and combating the "NARRATIVE" that Conservatives know what is best for America. (When, left to their own, laissez-faire devices, Conservative policies historically result in RECESSIONS if not GREAT economic DEPRESSIONS.)

Unless, of course, Ms. Pelosi more closely identifies with her "top 2%" economic status, than she does with the fight of rank-and-file Democratic voters for jobs, wages, health-care, a free and competent press/media, health-care, access to higher education, clean food and water, an education system based on science and rational investigation and not authoritarian interpretations of the bible and church...
IF Ms. Pelosi is indeed a "MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE" Republican out to RUIN the Democratic Party, in the near-term and long-term, her PATHETIC decision to resolve administration CRIMINAL OBSTRUCTION of JUSTICE by RESORTING TO LITIGATION will indeed be a "successful" Republican-in-Democrat's clothing agenda.

==================================================

Democrats: Impeach, or Face Humiliation in November
Written by R.W. Behan
by Richard W. Behan
http://atlanticfreepress.com/content/view/3540/32/

If the Democrats persist in stonewalling the impeachment of George Bush and Richard Cheney, they invite a humiliating defeat in the presidential election this fall.

For more than a year, the Democrats have gamed the system of Constitutional democracy, refusing to impeach—“It would be too divisive”—in order to assure a Democratic victory in 2008. But the year produced some surprises, and now their scheme stands an excellent chance of backfiring.

A year ago, John McCain’s candidacy languished. Today he is the Republican nominee and a formidable opponent. A year ago, Hillary Clinton’s nomination was “inevitable. Today she clings to a minuscule possibility of succeeding in her vitriolic campaign against Barack Obama, who holds a commanding lead in pledged delegates.

The savage nature of the contest is polarizing the Democratic party—to Mr. McCain’s considerable benefit.

And the Democrats’ refusal to impeach has now become a grave liability: it adds enormously to Mr. McCain’s advantage.


Failing to impeach leaves unchallenged and intact the manufactured, distorted “reality” the Bush Administration has imposed on the country—of a perilous and fearful world, necessary warfare, and unending militarism. This is the result of seven years of conscious and effective propagandizing by the Administration, to justify its monstrous deceit: the so-called war on terror. But this bizarre “reality” of fear is now the base-datum of political discourse.

The fear-mongering has succeeded. “Keeping America safe in the war on terror” remains a slogan of great power, and it bolsters Mr. McCain’s stature—and his campaign—with political potence.

Current tracking polls show the general election tilting slightly toward Mr. McCain. Can he sustain and widen this advantage, and win in November?

Start with the pall of fear and a decorated war hero, and add a Bush Administration announcement, say two weeks before voting day, of a red-alert terrorist threat; a Democratic victory is far from certain. Now add the full court press of a Republican presidential campaign—spin, hype, smear, attack ads, deception, Swiftboating, and voting fraud; a Democratic victory is in greater jeopardy still.

Finally, add the Fox television network, which Mr. McCain can reliably include as part of his campaign staff. A recent AP story reported the Fox network is now the most popular in the country, averaging two million more viewers per week than its closest rival.

In an election drama staged by the Bush Administration and produced by Fox television, a Democratic success is remote.

The point of major vulnerability here is George Bush’ staging: the base-datum of fear, militarism, and warmaking.

If this staging can be deconstructed, the way is clear for a Democratic victory, and for desperately needed new trajectories in both foreign and domestic policy, as well.

But the staging is deeply embedded. Not a murmur of protest was registered when President Bush said in his State of the Union speech, “The advance of liberty is opposed by terrorists and extremists—evil men who despise freedom, despise America , and aim to subject millions to their violent rule

Following along faithfully, Mr. McCain decries the Democratic candidates’ pledge to bring the troops home. “I believe that would have catastrophic consequences,” Mr. McCain said. “I believe al Qaeda would trumpet to the world that they had defeated the United States of America , and I believe that therefore they would try to follow us home.”

Worldwide, al Qaeda numbers some 18,000 operatives in 60 different countries, according to the UK ’s International Institute for Strategic Studies. Suppose in fact they “try to follow us home.”

By what means of transportation will 18,000 terrorists reach the homeland of 303 million people—who are protected by the mightiest military in history? Also unexplained is how, thereafter, we might be made “subject to their violent rule.” But the imagery and the words are now widely accepted—rarely scrutinized—and they can’t be quickly deconstructed.

Successful deconstruction can be done only with an abrupt, even explosive eruption of truth, done in full view of the mass media.

The Congressional Democrats have a unique institutional ability to do this. George Bush and Richard Cheney must be impeached. There is no other forum where their hideous violations of law and the public trust can be displayed—and their staging collapsed—with such immediacy, visibility, and integrity.

The Bush Administration distorted reality to justify and rationalize its signature violation: their so-called “war on terror.” The Administration’s true priority, however, was not counterterrorism but Middle East energy assets, according to countless news stories, books, and testimonials (shamefully few of which appeared in the U.S. mass media). They were all written by people constrained by libel laws to tell the truth.

Truth about a standing offer from the Taliban to surrender Osama bin Laden, awaiting President Bush when he took office. Truth about the Bush Administration spurning the offer three times before September 11, 2001, and twice thereafter.

Truth about the Bush Administration meeting repeatedly with the Taliban in early 2001, unsuccessfully negotiating a pipeline route in behalf of the Unocal Corporation. Truth about the Administration notifying Pakistan in July of 2001 “…military action against Afghanistan would go ahead by the middle of October.” Truth about the Administration finally telling the Taliban, “ Accept our offer of a carpet of gold or we bury you under a carpet of bombs”—five weeks before 9/11. Truth about repeated written proposals to invade Iraq , spanning the two Bush Administrations and made by four people who served in both—prominently including Richard Cheney. Truth about their triumph when the National Security Council, seven months before 9/11, formalized the commitment to invade Iraq . Truth about Richard Cheney’s Energy Task Force studying maps of the Iraqi oil fields in March of 2001. Truth about the Administration designing the privatization of Iraq ’s nationalized oil industry, fully a year before Congress authorized military action.

Truth about the Bush Administration rejecting a peaceful regime change in Iraq —by denying Saddam Hussein’s offer to leave the country for exile in Egypt or Saudi Arabia . Truth about former consultants to the Unocal Corporation serving as the president of Afghanistan and the second US ambassador there; the first ambassador was a Unocal vice president. Truth about the Bush Administration’s readiness in 2003 to finance a pipeline across Afghanistan and station troops permanently to defend it. Truth about Exxon/Mobil, Conoco/Phillips, Shell, and BP/Amoco poised today to profit immensely from 81% of Iraq ’s undeveloped crude.

The conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq are territorial wars for energy dominance, not acts of counter-terrorism. At George Bush’s sufferance, the arch-terrorist Osama bin Laden remains free, but Afghanistan and Iraq are administered today by puppet governments and dotted with permanent military bases.

The Congress has finally confronted the Administration’s duplicity. The National Defense Authorization Act of 2008 expressly prohibited the permanence of military bases in Iraq , and denied funds “to exercise United States control of the oil resources of Iraq .” President Bush nullified both provisions with a signing statement.

The “war on terror” is the mega-lie, from which all the other lies flowed—about weapons of mass destruction, aluminum tubes, mobile laboratories, Nigerian yellowcake, and Saddam Hussein harboring al Qaeda. The mega-lie brought torture, suspension of habeas corpus, domestic spying, cronyism and no-bid contracts, destruction of video tapes, outing an undercover CIA agent, “rendition,” murder and rape by contract U.S. mercenaries, and so on beyond counting. 34,000 young American men and women dead or wounded; hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghanis killed; millions of refugees fleeing their homes; economies and cultures in shambles; infrastructure in ruins; sectarian violence; a destabilized region; a half a trillion dollars squandered; America’ prestige destroyed and her citizens defamed.

Mr. McCain, the Fox network, and most Republicans reject such truths as the manic rantings of “liberals.” They accept the Bush Administration staging instead, and all the consequences as justified. No amount of journalism or literature will persuade them otherwise, but they cannot escape proof.

In a situation so severe the Democrats should seek no less, and it is in their power to provide it.

Proof can be developed in our set of public institutions only in venues of jurisprudence, through legally admissible evidence and sworn testimony, and then declared by a jury’s decision.

Impeachment is such a proceeding. There is no other way to show as well or as quickly the “war on terror” to be the Bush Administration’s monstrous deceit—and to prove it, with legally admissible evidence and sworn testimony in the House of Representatives and a jury’s declaration in the Senate.

Aside from maintaining the sanctity of the Constitution—and holding accountable a criminal Administration—three immediate benefits will accrue:

· Exposing and proving the truth will lift the veil of fear the Bush Administration has imposed.

· The proven fraudulence of the war will mandate its immediate termination.

· John McCain’s candidacy will be destroyed.

No one has been a more enthusiastic champion for George Bush’s ”war on terror” than Senator McCain. When it is displayed as appalling deceit, Mr. McCain will be shown a willing accomplice—or a tragic fool—and wholly unfit to be president.

But time is short, and the Democratic party is engaged in a civil war. With their demonstrated genius for losing elections, Mr. McCain might well stroll to the presidency. Unless he is proven to be unfit.

Democrats, impeach. Or expect to be humiliated.



For a fully documented, detailed history of the “war on terror,” see the author’s 117-page electronic book entitled “The Fraudulent War.” It is available at no cost, in PDF format, at http://coldtype.net/

Richard W. Behan lives and writes on Lopez Island, off the northwest coast of Washington state. He has published on the Internet over two dozen articles exposing and criticizing the criminal wars of the Bush Administration. He can be reached at rwbehan@rockisland.com .

COWARDLY House Democrats SET TO GIVE BUSH _ANOTHER_ VICTORY, on Telecom Immunity... WHOSE SIDE are they on??

DEMOCRATIC TREACHERY, thy name is NANCY PELOSI.

ENABLING the WAR-POWERS, POLICE-STATE POWERS, TREASURY-LOOTING powers, DEVALUE-American-savings-and-paychecks powers, SECRECY, SPYING, TORTURE, SURVEILLANCE, OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE... ENABLING the CRIMINAL ABUSES OF POWER by the Bush-Cheney White House, in furthering of WAR and POLICE STATE POWERS, is what the INSIDE WASHINGTON "Democratic" PARTY LEADERS DO for a living -

Blue Dog Democrats May Give Bush Victory on Spying
By Matt Renner
t r u t h o u t | Report
Thursday 06 March 2008
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/030608R.shtml

A plan to grant legal immunity to telecommunication companies that cooperated with potentially criminal spying would pin another Bush victory on the conservative Democratic group.
Democrats in the House of Representatives - teetering on the verge of compliance with the spy power demands of the Bush administration - have devised a plan that would give the president everything he has demanded, while keeping the majority of Democrats' fingerprints off the most controversial elements of the proposed legislation.

HEY Nancy! WHERE is your OUTRAGE?! Bush officials call YOU, YOUR 110th Congress, & Constitution IRRELEVANT re Bush WAR- and POLICE STATE powers!

Yet again, we have an SLAP IN THE FACE of the Democrats -and of Nancy Pelosi's leadership of the US Congress - by the Bush White House, and once again the press/media searches for words and terms to describe the scorn.... and ONCE AGAIN, WE CAN REST ASSURED that Speaker Pelosi WILL DO NOTHING meaningful. (Piling another dozen investigations on the overworked Henry Waxman doesn't count as 'doing something.")

<< The assertion, jointly made Tuesday by U.S. Ambassador David Satterfield and Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Mary Beth Long, drew an incredulous reaction from Democrats on a Joint House committee during a hearing on future U.S. commitments to Iraq. >>

translation: COWERING "Democratic" Speaker of the House NANCY PELOSI will ONCE AGAIN PRETEND IGNORANCE, SHIRK her CONSTITUTIONAL DUTIES, and let the Bush-Cheney White House drag America one step closer to a totalitarian dictatorship... WHILE SHE DOES _NOTHING_ substantial or meaningful to rein in the out-of-control administration.

AT LEAST THE QUISLING COLLABORATORS in Nazi-occupied Europe could fairly claim that they or their families would be killed if they didn't collaborate with the occupiers... through all of 2007 and the first 3 months of 2008, Nancy Pelosi can't even use that excuse!
=================================================

Bush officials: Congress irrelevant on Iraq

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Mar 5, 2008 12:06:57 EST
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/03/military_iraqpact_030408w/

The Bush administration says the 2002 congressional authorization to go to war in Iraq gives it the authority to conduct combat operations in Iraq and negotiate far-reaching agreements with the current Iraqi government without consulting Congress.

The assertion, jointly made Tuesday by U.S. Ambassador David Satterfield and Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Mary Beth Long, drew an incredulous reaction from Democrats on a Joint House committee during a hearing on future U.S. commitments to Iraq.

“It's the view of the administration that as long as there’s trouble in Iraq that you have authorization of this Congress to continue there in perpetuity and define trouble as you desire?” asked Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y.

“We have authorization to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq,” Satterfield replied. “The situation in Iraq continues to present a threat to the United States.”

The Bush administration also feels it does not need to seek the authorization of Congress to ratify two pending agreements with Iraq: a “Strategic Framework” that would govern “normalized” relations with the U.S., and a Status of Forces Agreement that would govern the “authorities and protections” of U.S. troops in Iraq past Dec. 31, the expiration of a U.N. resolution that the administration says authorizes their presence.

The agreements will “not tie the hands of the next president or, indeed, this president,” Satterfield said. “They will ensure that every policy option remains on the table. The size of the U.S. presence in Iraq, the missions to be performed by such forces, if forces are present, are decisions for the president and for the next president to make.”

And the president, the two officials said, can negotiate those agreements with the government of Iraq.

“You don’t intend to submit this particular Status of Forces Agreement with its authority to fight to the Congress for its approval?” asked Rep. Bill Delahunt, D-Mass.

“The secretary of defense has already testified, and I believe Secretary [of State Condoleezza] Rice has reiterated, that it is our intent and our obligation to coordinate with the members,” Long replied.

“Coordination is a lovely word, and I know consultation and notification are also words that are being used and will be used,” Delahunt said. “But I used the word, authorization,’ ” Delahunt said. “It’s the position of this administration that they do not need to come before Congress to receive authorization?

“That’s correct,” Long said.

“That’s correct,” Satterfield echoed.

During a combative exchange with Ackerman, Satterfield sought to allay the fears of critics who say the administration is trying to position itself to lock in a permanent U.S. presence in Iraq.

“The framework and the Status of Forces Agreement will not include a binding commitment to defend Iraq or any other security commitments that would warrant Senate advice and consent,” Satterfield said. “I wish to be clear: They will not establish permanent bases in Iraq, nor will they specify in any fashion the number of American forces to be stationed there. Congress will be consulted throughout the process.”

But Ackerman pointed out that if language in the November 2007 U.S.-Iraq Declaration of Principles is adopted, it would give U.S. troops in Iraq the authority to defend Iraq against an attack — which he said amounts to a license to wage war.

The principles, Ackerman pointed out, state that the U.S. and Iraq “intend to negotiate agreements” in which the U.S. would “provide security assurances to the Iraqi Government to deter any external aggression and to ensure the integrity of Iraq's territory.”

Satterfield said the Strategic Framework will not include any such commitment. At the same time, he said, “As would be the case of an attack on any friend and partner of the United States, the administration would have to consider, in consultation with the Congress, what would be the best measures to take in defense of United States’ interests in such an eventuality.”

“If Iraq is attacked, are you stating uncategorically that the administration will take no action?” Ackerman said.

“I can only state that the administration is responsible for the defense of the interests of the United States,” Satterfield said. “It will act in accordance with those interests, but I cannot and will not speculate on hypotheticals.”

The president cannot make an international agreement that exceeds his own constitutional authority, said Oona Hathaway, an associate professor of law at Yale University who took part in a follow-on panel. “If he acts in absence of a congressional grant, he can only rely on his own independent constitutional powers,” she said.

A typical SOFA is negotiated by the president, she noted. But anything that includes an authority to fight, as this proposal appears to do, she said, “Becomes an agreement that really must be submitted to Congress for approval either as a treaty or as a congressional-executive agreement.”

Nancy Pelosi exhibits NO OUTRAGE for Bush-Cheney violations of Law & US Constitution- but gets upset about McCain endorsement from anti-Catholic bigot

NANCY PELOSI, YOU ARE PATHETIC!

YOU SELL OUT the 110th Congress to the AIPAC war lobby, exhibit NO CONCERN for serial criminal abuses of power by the Bush-Cheney White House, allow KARL ROVE, HARRIET MIERS, and JOSH BOLTON to IGNORE Congressional subpoenas (Congress hasn't even issued Rove one yet, even though he is at the center of BOTH Purge-gate, CIA outing-gate, and the OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE in both scandals)... yet now you wax indignant that John McCain is accepting the endorsement of anti-Catholic "end times" bigot preacher JOHN HAGEE.

WELL, it's not like the Speaker is ENTIRELY IGNORANT of what is going on in American politics... just the CRIMINAL ABUSES OF POWER by Bush White House part!

HOW PATHETIC, Nancy Pelosi cares more for the Catholic Church (not exactly a helpless organization) than she does for American citizens' rights, or our late, great Constitutional government.

============================================

Speaker Nancy Pelosi outraged over McCain endorsement by anti-Catholic "end times" Preacher John Hagee
by Nico Pitti, HuffingtonPost.com
March 5, 2008
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/06/pelosi-blasts-mccain-over_n_90302.html

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the most prominent Catholic serving in the U.S. government, called on Sen. John McCain to reject the endorsement of Texas televangelist John Hagee, who has labeled the Catholic church "the great whore," a "false cult system," and linked it to Hitler's Nazi movement.

"That behavior is outside the circle of civilized debate in our democracy," Pelosi said during a Thursday conference call. "I certainly think John McCain should reject his endorsement and I'm sure it won't be long before he does."

McCain has come under heavy fire from Catholic groups across the political spectrum for appearing with Hagee last week and declaring he was "proud" of the endorsement. Subsequently, McCain told reporters that Hagee's backing "does not mean that I embrace everything that he stands for and believes," but added, "I am very proud of the Pastor John Hagee's spiritual leadership to thousands of people." [See video of Hagee speaking about Catholicism here.]

But several Catholic groups insist that McCain should specifically condemn Hagee's "hate speech" about Catholicism. Bill Donohue, president of the conservative Catholic League, charged in a statement that McCain "has shown horrendous judgment in buddying up to this bigot and spin doctor." The progressive group Catholics United yesterday circulated remarks from McCain in 2000 condemning the "strong anti-Catholic statements" of Bob Jones.

Catholics were a key voting bloc for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, supporting him over Democratic rivals Al Gore and fellow Catholic John Kerry.

On Thursday, Pelosi also used President Bush's White House ceremony with McCain to tee off on the GOP nominee. Bush's endorsement "was appropriate," she said, "because [McCain] has endorsed whatever George Bush has wanted, whether it's his failed economic policies, or his failed policy in Iraq."

She pressed Democrats to publicly highlight the sharp contrasts between McCain and his two Democratic rivals. "Even on subjects that he's good on, like global warming and the rest -- he was good on immigration and he did a one-eighty on that," she said. "I think it's fair to say he cannot be counted on, even on some of his priority issues like immigration."

Pelosi added that she viewed the prolonged Democratic primary as a positive development. "While I hope that our candidate will be chosen soon," she remarked, "I know also that the vitality of our debate will be healthy for us as we choose a nominee."

"Clinton Triumphs" of 1990s were not such political masterpieces after all...

Hillary mocks her Democratic opponent... click the link for the YouTube video..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwRnELfu1Ak

Terrific, unbaised LA Times story dissects the Hillary campaign's rendezvous with defeat... Not only does writer Jonathan Chait effortlessly DEFLATE every one of the Clintonista's laments in one short, simple paragraph, but more importantly, Chait retrospectively examines the notion of Bill Clinton's "black magic" political prowess of the 1990s, and discovers... it wasn't so magic, dramatic, or proof of amazing political talent after all:

<< The reality is less dramatic. Bill Clinton defeated a recession-weakened president with some help from a third-party spoiler, stopped the GOP from cutting highly popular social programs, won reelection during an economic boom and rallied his own party to thwart a wildly partisan impeachment crusade. None of these triumphs required unusual political skill. >>

Chait does another masterpiece dissection of Hillary's own popularity and vaunted political talents:

<< Hillary Clinton has tried to piggyback on her husband's ferocious reputation, boasting that she "beat the Republican attack machine." Of course, if anybody beat the Republican attack machine, it was Bill. Hillary Clinton wasn't on any ballot in the 1990s. True, her reputation was at stake, but that's a fight she lost: She ended that decade a highly unpopular figure. She remains one today, with about half of the public persistently telling pollsters they have an unfavorable view of her. >>

"She ended the decade a highly unpopular figure... [and] today, about half the public persistently tell[s] pollsters they have an unfavorable view of her."

IT DOESN'T GET ANY SIMPLER THAN THAT!

Here is Chait's masterpiece paragraph which, in five sentences, deflates the Hillary camapaign's (and her supporter's) whine that she has gotten unfavorable treatment from the press and powers-that-be... (even as Chait doesn't even mention Hillary cozying up to one of her lead tormenters, Fox corporation owner RUPERT MURDOCH, or that her husband's coziness with Bush Sr. is as indictive an example of the inside-beltway Democratic Party leadership's alignment with the radical right, as James Carville's marriage to lead Cheney spinmeister MARY MATLIN is.)

<< Clinton and her supporters rage on anyway because, for so long, they had no inkling she might lose. For Obama to take what is rightfully hers must be unfair. The Clintonites rage against the media (though they didn't mind when reporters parroted her claims of inevitability a year ago), the unrepresentative caucus system (though they have expressed no objection to totally undemocratic superdelegates) or sexism (while ignoring the benefits of white racial bias and female gender solidarity). The real reason Clinton will lose is more prosaic: Obama is a far better politician. >>

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-chait4mar04,0,6465402.story?track=mostviewed-storylevel

=======================================
Clinton campaign's dying light

We've seen the rage. She should now go gentle into the political night.
By Jonathan Chait, LA Times
March 4, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-chait4mar04,0,6465402.story?track=mostviewed-storylevel

'Do not go gentle into that good night. ...

Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

When Dylan Thomas wrote those lines in 1951, he did not intend them as political advice. But if he were alive today, he'd surely admire Hillary Clinton's campaigning style. (And probably vote for her: At 93, he'd be right inside her demographic sweet spot.) As the end approaches, she has not gone gentle into that good night.

Clinton has almost no chance of winning the nomination. Going into today's big votes in Texas and Ohio, she trails by more than 150 pledged delegates.

If she has an unexpectedly great day, she might gain by a couple dozen, but her best chances to gain ground will all be behind her. She could, in theory, win the nomination with superdelegates if she could narrow the gap, but that's not going to happen. Barack Obama will bring a triple-digit delegate lead to the convention, and party elites won't dare overturn that.

Clinton and her supporters rage on anyway because, for so long, they had no inkling she might lose. For Obama to take what is rightfully hers must be unfair. The Clintonites rage against the media (though they didn't mind when reporters parroted her claims of inevitability a year ago), the unrepresentative caucus system (though they have expressed no objection to totally undemocratic superdelegates) or sexism (while ignoring the benefits of white racial bias and female gender solidarity). The real reason Clinton will lose is more prosaic: Obama is a far better politician.

Republicans have long had a kind of black-magic fear of the Clintons' political potency. From the right's perspective, Bill Clinton won the presidency at a time when the GOP thought it had an electoral college lock. Then he beat back the Republican revolution and the party's efforts to defeat him.

The reality is less dramatic. Bill Clinton defeated a recession-weakened president with some help from a third-party spoiler, stopped the GOP from cutting highly popular social programs, won reelection during an economic boom and rallied his own party to thwart a wildly partisan impeachment crusade. None of these triumphs required unusual political skill.

Hillary Clinton has tried to piggyback on her husband's ferocious reputation, boasting that she "beat the Republican attack machine." Of course, if anybody beat the Republican attack machine, it was Bill. Hillary Clinton wasn't on any ballot in the 1990s. True, her reputation was at stake, but that's a fight she lost: She ended that decade a highly unpopular figure. She remains one today, with about half of the public persistently telling pollsters they have an unfavorable view of her.

Nor was Clinton able to shed her baggage when she moved to New York. In her November 2000 Senate race, she ran five points behind Democratic ticket-topper Al Gore in New York, and Gore himself was hardly a beloved figure at the time. Six years later, she pummeled a token opponent.

Has Clinton been unfairly attacked? Without a doubt. But she's also a mediocre orator who delivers themeless and not-terribly-inspiring speeches. She's a good enough politician to get elected in an overwhelmingly Democratic state, but not good enough to get elected president....
[continued at]
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-chait4mar04,0,6465402.story?track=mostviewed-storylevel