Friday, September 30, 2005

Judy Gets Out of Jail

Judith Miller agreed to testify before a grand jury today. She held a brief press conference after being released from jail, where she spent the past 85 days for her prior refusal to cooperate in the investigation into the CIA leak that made Valerie Plame a household name.

During a very short speech, prior to taking very few questions, Miller continued to play-up her role as a conscience-driven martyr, reminding the media that she "would have stayed in jail longer" had her source not finally provided the "personal, explicit, voluntary waiver" Miller required before agreeing to testify.

But her fellow reporters were not easily led. One asked why she didn't ask for the waiver sooner and said that her source, Scooter Libby, had told reporters that he would have provided whatever she needed, if she had merely asked for it.

Miller got a little huffy at that. I guess she didn't like the implication: that there was absolutely no need for her to have spent even one night in jail. That would make her seem a little stupid, wouldn't it?--or worse--like she may have deliberately landed herself in jail so she could:
a) delay the investigation into the leak while the White House scrambled to position itself;
b) build sympathy for her plight, which would translate into anger at the prosecutor; or
c) allow her to work out a deal (remarkably like the one she got) that allows her to limit her testimony to her conversation with Scooter Libby and stay mum about everything else that she did, knows and/or has heard.

(Personally, I vote for d--"all of the above").

But Judy held her own and said that she could not speak to that issue because that was all handled by her lawyer. I guess we are expected to believe that Miller spent 85 days in jail because it did not occur to her (or her lawyer) to call Libby and ask for a waiver. A second waiver, that is. She already had a waiver, but that waiver wasn't the waiver she wanted.

And it makes no difference to Miller, apparently, that her source is possibly guilty of a federal crime. She sees nothing mitigating in the fact that she is not protecting a whistle-blower or victim or even an average citizen from people who might be tempted to take revenge on her source as a result of her testimony; she is preventing a high-level figure in the White House, who may have committed a felony, from being brought to justice.

With characteristic self-righteousness, Miller has managed to convince herself (if no one else) that she is doing something noble. But what she's actually doing is obstructing justice and actively enabling the Bush White House to do the same.

As she was clear to point out today, it was the combination of the "personal, explicit, voluntary waiver" provided by Libby, and the agreement to testify regarding her conversation with Libby BUT NOTHING ELSE, that finally opened the door to reason.

I strongly suspect it's not the Libby waiver that is key here. Rather, it's the narrow subject matter to which she has managed to limit her testimony, thus allowing her to feign cooperation and moral integrity while continuing to withhold the most crucial evidence in this investigation: her own actions in the lead-up to the possibly felonious disclosure of Joe Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, as a covert CIA operative.

As Arianna Huffington pointed out some weeks ago, Miller is a White House favorite. She is also the woman for whom her employer, the New York Times, had to apologize after they repeatedly printed her stories confirming the WMDs claims made by the White House in the lead-up to the Iraq invasion. Turns out those stories were un-substantiated White House propaganda.

Ms. Miller, as a result, had a little egg on her face, and one of the people who helped to put it there was none other than former ambassador, Joe Wilson. It was Wilson's refusal to let the Bush administration get away with inserting unfounded claims about an Iraq/Niger uranium deal in the President's State of the Union address that got the White House and Miller hot under the collar. So together they plotted to discredit Joe Wilson. As Karl Rove, Machiavellian White House manipulator extraordinaire, told MSNBC's Chris Matthews "Joe Wilson's wife is fair game."

Things were starting to look pretty bad for the White House when that got out, but the administration has, so far, managed to convince all but the most savvy media members that by not using Ms. Plame's name, they didn't break the law.

They are coasting along on the assumption that we are all so ridiculously literal as to believe that saying "Joe Wilson's wife works for the CIA" isn't blowing her cover because her name wasn't used. Unable to take the most obvious next step in critical thinking, they apparently expect the public to be similarly dimwitted; and, therefore, unable to reach the most obvious of conclusions: that Joe Wilson only has one wife. And at least one of her names is Mrs. Joe Wilson.


Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Evidence of a Cover-up in the Lead-up to 9.11

Whenever left-wing activists talk about the Bush administration's complicity in the terrorist attacks of 9.11, most people simply roll their eyes. It's not that it hasn't occurred to us--it's just that we can't go that far unless we have some kind of evidence; it' just too horrific to think about. It's bad enough if we acknowledge the incompetence and inefficiency of an administration we see demonstrating incompetence and inefficiency, daily. But there is still a glimmer of hope in most of us, I think, that makes us resist the temptation to believe that our leaders would actively enable a terrorist plot, in order to justify their predetermined course.

That said, the recent announcement that a secret intelligence group called Able Danger, was prevented from informing the FBI of 9.11 hijacker Mohammed Atta's arrival in the United States, and his ties to Al Qaeda, before 9.11, is pretty disturbing. More disturbing than that, however, is the news that the 9.11 Commission was advised of the attempt to inform the FBI about Atta, and they chose not to include it in their final report. But fortunately, a few brave men are refusing to participate in the cover-up.

Today, a Senate Judiciary Committee, headed by Republican Senator Arlen Specter, will be meeting to discuss this subject. But the military analysts and officers scheduled to testify will not be doing so. Tuesday, Bryan Whitman, a Defense Department spokesman, said the open environment of the committee was not an "appropriate" forum for a discussion of the operation known as Able Danger. (It is worth noting that Defense Department lawyers are the ones allegedly responsible for blocking Able Danger from providing information about Atta to the FBI in the first place--back in 2000--almost a full year before the tragedy of 9.11).

Here's an excerpt from today's New York Times:

F.B.I. officials, who answer to the jurisdiction of Mr. Specter's committee, have confirmed that the Defense Department abruptly canceled meetings in 2000 between the bureau's Washington field office and representatives of the Able Danger team.

The Pentagon had said that it interviewed three other people who were involved with Able Danger and who said that they, too, recalled the identification of Mr. Atta as a terrorist suspect. Mr. Specter said his staff had talked to all five of the potential witnesses and found that "credibility has been established" for all of them.

Specter plans to go ahead with the meeting today, on the off chance that it "may produce a change of heart by the Department of Defense in answering some very basic questions."

Yes, we can always hope, can't we?

--Laurie Fosner

Monday, September 19, 2005

ABOUT FACE: The momentary "liberalization" of George W. Bush and the new-found (though short-lived) efficiency of our bureaucratic federal government

It's taken me a while to process recent events. I got behind over the Labor Day weekend. I was only gone three days but when I returned to several hundred emails and a dozen "must see" news and information programs, I knew it would take a couple of weeks to catch up completely.

In light of that, it's very difficult for me to believe that when President Bush takes 52 days off he doesn't get behind. Then I remembered that our president has people to do his work for him. All he has to do is show up where he's supposed to, and say what he's supposed to say.

That's part of the reason I was sure Bush would use the recent massive FEMA failure as an excuse to put more of the burden for protection of the people on state and local governments. His supporters have long called for a more limited role for federal government. What a great opportunity for them to point to the bureaucratic nightmare that FEMA has become, as an excuse to scale back all large federal programs.

But Bush didn't do that. In fact, he gave what some are calling a "liberal" speech. I watched a replay of it the other night. I was pretty surprised--particularly in light of his behavior in the lead-up to that speech. Here's a recap of what preceded Bush's sudden about face:

President Bush didn't know about the devastation in Louisiana until somebody showed him a DVD of the mess--this was days after the hurricane hit--thus proving that his awareness of current events does not extend beyond what his staff chooses to share with him. (Bush's ignorance of real world events also explains why he sometimes needs to wear a wire: whenever his work requires his extremely limited awareness to expand instantaneously, somebody has to be able to feed him information, on the spot. That's why Dick Cheney had to sit with Bush when he went before the 9.11 Commission. They couldn't use a wire for that because, thanks to internet media, the public was already onto him).

Practically speaking, we have to start with the premise that President Bush is unaware of pretty much everything that's going on in the world, outside his own small sphere; that is, unless one of his peeps gives him some sort of briefing. Or, unless he happens to catch something on TV, which is also becoming more and more tightly controlled by friends of the Bush administration. (Giddy with their obvious success in keeping the president in the dark, they've decided to try their manipulative schemes on the rest of us).

Yet, regardless of the degree to which the men controlling Bush also control the media, there is no question that Bush himself is carefully guarded. It became painfully clear on that fateful day, when we watched in horror--a nation united behind a single common theme--as President Bush patted Michael Brown (then head of FEMA) on the back and said "Brownie, yer doin' a hell of a job."

In that perfect moment, Americans of all types came together--irrespective of political affiliation, social class or religious beliefs--we were one that day, as we cringed with universal embarrassment, while our president shared with the entire world how totally clueless he is.

While his minions scurried to blame the disastermath on looters, the victims of the hurricane, and anybody insisting that there are questions that need to be answered, now, not later; President Bush was frantically searching for a crash course on "How to clean up a clusterfuck the size of which you have, heretofore, only imagined."

But what about Iraq? Surely, he sees what that's become? I think not. As close as I can figure, the bad news in Iraq doesn't show up on Bush's radar at all. Bush gets his news from the people who put us there. And they are, coincidentally, the same people who have the most to gain by keeping us there. They don't talk about the things that aren't working out the way they'd planned, because for them it's all good. The more destruction, the longer we stay; and the longer we stay, the more money they make. They tell Bush exactly what he needs to hear in order to get him to stand at a podium and announce, with absolute conviction and authority: "We must stay the course." And to Bush that makes perfect sense. Based on the information he's getting, we're doing alright in Iraq.

Our president is arguably the biggest single victim of political censorship in the history of the United States. If we received nothing more than the same small portion of reality that Bush is dosed with each day, we would probably see things much the way he does.

But now it's beginning to look as if the administration's strategy has backfired. When Bush failed to rush to New Orleans and comfort the people who were victimized by the flood, when he decided to use a fly-by over the disaster area as a way of getting a "real look" at the carnage below, he demonstrated a harsh indifference to reality on the ground--one that left the majority of Americans outraged.

To the millions who watched and waited as Bush blithely ignored the call for help, it mattered not one bit that his delayed response was the inevitable result of a system that relies on a team of advisors to keep him informed. Their failure to apprise Bush of the extent of the damage, until several days after the fact, does not make the American people feel any better about Bush's ability to protect them. Nor did it help his cause when his horrid mother stood in the Houston Astrodome and claimed that the folks taking shelter there had actually "done very well for themselves" because they "were underprivileged anyway" and now they might get to stay in Texas.

When the Bush indifference surfaced, amid the back-drop of New Orleans, both the public and mainstream media were already mad as hell. They weren't willing to sugarcoat the facts to make the administration look good; nor were they willing to join the party that makes excuses or points to victims in order to deflect blame from themselves. Everybody was talking about the failure of FEMA--even FOX News. As a result, Bush saw a whole bunch of stuff he wasn't supposed to see. He saw angry, hungry, tired, poor people--mostly of color--and they were all asking the same question: is anybody coming to help us? It was the first time in the history of George W's presidency that he saw, in living color, the full effect of his own ignorance and ineptitude.

And right on the heels of Cindy Sheehan, can you beat that? After all that extra driving they had to do to bypass her every day, just when Bush was about to head back to Washington to get away from her, Hurricane Katrina hit and forced him to see the reality of a failure of government that has left the entire world asking "how could something like this have happened in the United States?"

Then something truly surprising occurred: In the midst of all of this, President Bush, who usually refuses to admit even the possibility of making a mistake, did something truly radical. Bush accepted responsibility. In his own words: "To the extent that the federal government failed, I take full responsibility." He went on to talk about the racism that has led to poverty in America and vowed to "do what it takes" to rebuild New Orleans, to fight racism and end poverty, and make a better world for our children's future.

I was stunned. I didn't believe him, but I was still stunned. How could I not be? How could anyone have possibly known that President Bush was planning to appear, live, in Jackson Square, New Orleans and channel Franklin Delano Roosevelt?

It was a dramatic change of course for Bush--one meant to convince the public that his understanding of the situation and his desire to personally correct the errors that led to such a catastrophic failure would actually lead to government programs that would lift the poor and disenfranchised out of poverty, once and for all.

Of course, Republicans are mad as hell because they're worried that he's going to make good on his promise and spend all their hard-earned money bailing out lazy poor people. And Democrats are mad because they know it's all just talk. Nothing has really changed. The "liberal" speech Bush gave at Jackson Square was just one more example of hypocrisy in action.

But you have to hand it to the Bush administration--they know how to put on a good show. When something is really important to them, they can turn the federal government into a machine so efficient it makes Martha Stewart look like a sloppy housekeeper. While hundreds continue to beg for food and water, electricity and a clean place to live, Bush and his crew demonstrated a turn-about in government efficiency that was nothing short of miraculous. As Tom Engelhardt points out in his latest Dispatch:

Without a single mishap, the rescue team delivered to central New Orleans its own generators, lights (not just the warm-glow ones for the President but the HMI movie lights to set the cathedral in the background ablaze), the camouflage netting that was needed to hide from viewers any sign of the surrounding devastation, and even its own communications equipment. And then there was the matter of crowd control - okay, maybe not exactly crowds in depopulated New Orleans, but soldiers from the 82nd Airborne were effectively deployed, just in case, "to keep regular citizens several blocks back."

Naturally, when his speech ended, President Bush drove out of sight, taking the lights, the cameras and the action with him. Again, from Tom Engelhardt:

. . . an hour after he was done and gone - rescues of this sort being limited affairs - the area was "plunged into total darkness again, to audible groans. … It may be true that, for a week or more, this administration couldn't get a bottle of water to a diabetic grandmother, but when something was actually at stake - what reporters far and wide referred to as the "rebuilding" not of New Orleans but of a presidency, or simply of the presidential "image" - efficiency, coordination, and togetherness were the by-words of the day.

Yeah, nothing's changed. But Bush did surprise me. I've got to give him points for that.
-- Laurie Fosner

Saturday, September 17, 2005

Family Values

One of the unavoidable side effects of a natural disaster is that it tends to take up all our attention. As a result, many other, equally important, issues get sidelined. One such issue is gay rights, and more specifically, same sex marriage.

A couple of weeks ago, lawmakers passed a bill that would legalize same sex marriage in California. But Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger says he will veto it "in honor of the will of the people." Schwarzenegger says he's all for gay rights, but believes a vote (five years ago) in which Californians chose not to honor out-of-state same-sex marriage, indicates disapproval of same-sex marriage, in general.

Meanwhile, a pair of proposed constitutional amendments that would ban same-sex marriage in California and revoke the spousal rights already granted to domestic partners, is slated for the 2006 ballot. Yet even as California appears to be moving backward in the struggle for human rights, the Spanish Parliament has taken a giant step forward.

Last month, the Spanish Parliament voted to legalize both gay marriage and adoption of children by gay couples. Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero spoke prior to the vote. Here are excerpts from Zapatero's speech, sent to us from Paul Toulmin (thanks Paul):

We are not legislating, honorable members, for people far away and not known by us. We are enlarging the opportunity for happiness to our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends and, our families: at the same time we are making a more decent society, because a decent society is one that does not humiliate its members.

Today, the Spanish society answers to a group of people who, during many years have, been humiliated, whose rights have been ignored, whose dignity has been offended, their identity denied, and their liberty oppressed. Today the Spanish society grants them the respect they deserve, recognizes their rights, restores their dignity, affirms their identity, and restores their liberty.

It is true that they are only a minority, but their triumph is everyone's triumph. It is also the triumph of those who oppose this law, even though they do not know this yet: because it is the triumph of Liberty. Their victory makes all of us (even those who oppose the law) better people, it makes our society better.

Honorable members, there is no damage to marriage or to the concept of family in allowing two people of the same sex to get married. To the contrary, what happens is this class of Spanish citizens get the potential to organize their lives with the rights and privileges of marriage and family. There is no danger to the institution of marriage, but precisely the opposite: this law enhances and respects marriage.

Today, conscious that some people and institutions are in a profound disagreement with this change in our civil law, I wish to express that, like other reforms to the marriage code that preceded this one, this law will generate no evil, that its only consequence will be the avoiding of senseless suffering of decent human beings. A society that avoids senseless suffering of decent human beings is a better society.

With the approval of this Bill, our country takes another step in the path of liberty and tolerance that was begun by the democratic change of government.

Today we can offer them a beautiful lesson: every right gained, each access to liberty has been the result of the struggle and sacrifice of many people that deserve our recognition and praise.

When the decision to legalize same-sex marriage was announced, the large group of gay and lesbians in the gallery crowd could not refrain from shouting for joy at the news. As expected, authorities ushered them out of the gallery. But as they were moving toward the door, the Spanish Parliament stood up and applauded them. Here's an account of that historical moment, posted on the AmazingDreamsPublishing web site:

Naturally, when the bill passed, the queers in the gallery couldn't restrain their joy at this extraordinary event, and the chamber's president, as he'd warned he'd do, ordered them out of the gallery. Then, a remarkable thing happened -- Zapatero and the Socialist deputies rose and gave a sustained standing ovation to the gays and lesbians as they left. It was a stunning tribute to the homosexuals' sacrifice, courage, and refusal to accept less than full equality before the law -- a recognition that this was their victory. I've seen many parliaments in operation in many parts of the world at times of crucial debate -- but I've never, ever seen the parliamentarians applaud the gallery.

The deadline for the veto of the bill legalizing same-sex marriage in California is October 9. If Governor Schwarzenegger is committed to honoring the will of the people, perhaps there is time to convince our governor that our will would be to follow in the footsteps of the Spanish Parliament, by granting gays and lesbians in our state the respect they deserve--by recognizing their rights; restoring their dignity; and affirming their identity.

To write, phone or fax Gov. Schwarzennegger:

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
State Capitol Building
Sacramento, CA 95814
Phone: 916-445-2841
Fax: 916-445-4633

To send an electronic message: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO

George W. Bush is sneaking around again. Even as he announced his decision to "take full responsibility" for the failure of government to protect and assist the victims of Hurricane Katrina, he is quietly making plans to authorize the use of nuclear power in pre-emptive strikes.

Apparently, the trouble on the ground in Iraq has him rethinking his "shock and awe" strategy. Perhaps, all the angst he's experiencing at the hand of Sunnis and insurgents has him wondering how much more smoothly it all could have gone if he'd just had the authority to pre-emptively drop a nuclear bomb.

It would certainly have prevented a lot of bickering about water and electricity and such. In fact, it's probably the only sure-fire way to prevent trouble on the ground. Never mind that after setting off a nuclear weapon the only thing left in Iraq would be rubble on the ground. (Oh, and radioactivity. But I guess Bush and his buddies aren't concerned about that.)

Just think, if we'd totally obliterated all signs of life in Iraq we could have sent Cheney's buddies in to rebuild without worrying about angry Iraqis getting all worked up about unemployment, looted museums, and the like. Ah, well, you know what they say: Hindsight is 20/20.

For a frightening look at the Pentagon's draft plan, here are excerpts from an Agence France Presse article, compliments of Carl Van Dyke (thanks, Carl).

(I am awaiting a response from AFP re: their permission to post the full article. )

Published on Sunday, September 11, 2005 by Agence France Presse

Draft US Defense Paper Outlines Preventive Nuclear Strikes

"A new draft US defense paper calls for preventive nuclear strikes against state and non-state adversaries in order to deter them from using weapons of mass destruction and urges US troops to 'prepare to use nuclear weapons effectively.' "

"A copy of the draft obtained by AFP . . . outlines scenarios, under which it would be justified to seek presidential approval for a nuclear strike. They include an adversary using or planning to use weapons of mass destruction against US or allied forces as well as civilian populations."

" . . . a number of scenarios allow nuclear strikes without enemy weapons of mass destruction in the equation. They could be used, for instance, to counter potentially overwhelming conventional adversaries, to secure a rapid end of a war on US terms, or simply 'to ensure success of US and multinational operations,' the document indicates."

"The doctrine also gives the Pentagon the green light to deploy nuclear weapons to parts of the world where their future use is considered the most likely . . . "

"The doctrine reminds that while first use of nuclear weapons may draw condemnation, 'no customary or conventional international law prohibits nations from employing nuclear weapons in armed conflict.'"

Check back for a link to the full document, or a full doc posting (If I get permission). -- Laurie Fosner

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Wasting Time on Roberts

Mario Cuomo got it right when he said the key to whether or not Judge Roberts will make a good Supreme Court judge is easily ascertained by asking and answering one simple question: will Roberts use the Constitution, or the Bible as his guide?

Based on Robert's own comments, five years ago, when he was not aware of the fact that today he'd be the very judge President Bush would choose to take a seat on the high court, I'd say he's very aware of his responsibility to put the Constitution before the Bible. That being the case, Judge Roberts is likely the very best conservative we are going to find for this job--given the sad fact that any nominee to be considered for this position will be hand-picked by George W. Bush.

While the democrats nitpick at Roberts this week, they are once again forgetting the most important thing: if they ask Roberts to affirm his commitment to the Constitution, over the Bible, they risk losing the Republican support of this candidate. In the end, they may satisfy their desire to feel better about Roberts as either a justice or even Chief Justice, but at the same time they will alienate all the hardcore right-wing folks who currently support him but will not if they fear Roberts will fail to push their Christian agenda.

If the Democrats were smart (alas, how can such book smart folks be so practically challenged?) they would stop trying to make Roberts prove his unwillingness to overturn precedent and his commitment to the Constitution; rather, they would listen to Robert's own words from five years ago and draw their conclusions from that. And if they still don't feel comfortable with John Roberts as a member of the Supreme Court, they should ask themselves whom Bush will pick next. If that doesn't scare the bejesus out of them, they're not awake.

To listen to both Roberts, and Cuomo on Roberts, check out http://www.notfittoprint.com/InTheirOwnWords.html.

Monday, September 12, 2005

Janice Karpinski, Meet Michael Brown

It's the fourth anniversary of the tragedy of 9.11. I had planned to do a little write-up on our progress in the so-called war on terror, but I'm finding that task more difficult than expected, given the fact that we've actually made no progress in the so-called war on terror.

In Iraq our mishandling of detainees has only increased the anger both Muslim fanatics and the Iraqi people have felt since we invaded their country. As for fighting terrorists there (so we don't have to fight them here) we've not only failed to win a decisive victory there, we've allowed the Bush administration to dismantle (or disfigure) the very agencies that are supposed to protect us should a terror attack occur here at home.

There's a very simple reason for this: in both Louisiana and Iraq people who were woefully unqualified and inexperienced for highly visible and important tasks were selected to oversee operations that, if handled badly, would inevitably result in disastrous consequences.

At Abu Ghraib prison and in New Orleans the failure of appointed individuals to foresee, manage, and curtail major disasters was not only expected by the Bush administration, it was welcomed.

Torture at Abu Ghraib prison, while under the command of Janice Karpinski, was practically designed to produce the nasty, twisted, sexually perverse abuses we saw in those gruesome photos. It was a foregone conclusion. The first step toward the inevitable occurred when Alberto Gonzales, then legal adviser to the White House, spearheaded a little campaign to interpret the law in such a way as to essentially rewrite it, giving the President the authority to detain people without evidence. In other words: if the president says a person is an enemy combatant, then we just have to take it on faith that he is.

Next, the new laws gave the President the authority to bypass the torture prohibitions outlined in the Geneva Conventions by excluding so-called "enemy combatants" from that protection. At the same time, the Pentagon suggested that humiliation based on Muslim taboos against sexual gratification and interaction with women would be a good thing because it would serve to "break the will” of detainees. And finally, a woman with no prior detention facility experience, or war-time service was appointed to oversee the prison. The writing was on the wall.

And now we have an even more massive failure in New Orleans: enter, Michael Brown. Brown's most notable career prior to being named head of FEMA was manager of the International Arabian Horse association. You see the pattern, yes? Hire the unqualified, inexperienced and incompetent.

According to Time magazine, Brown's resume also says he was the Assistant City Manager of Emergency Services Oversight of Edmond, Oklahoma. In fact, he was merely an administrative assistant to the City Manager--as one person put it--"essentially an intern."

Brown also claimed to be the Director of Christian Nursing Facility in Oklahoma, but an administrator of that facility has been quoted as saying "he wasn't a person anybody remembered."

Brown's academic credentials are equally suspect. Brown claims to have won a prize as Outstanding Political Science Professor at some institution or another, but a spokesperson for that institution has apparently gone on record as saying Brown was only a student there.

Meanwhile, in the disastermath of New Orleans, we hear that the head of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, and our President got the news about the levees breaking from the TV. Even after the flood, the President remained oblivious to the vast array of problems created by FEMA (yes, they actively reversed progress made by creative, hard-working, people who stepped in to help when FEMA was nowhere in sight).

Several days after the city flooded, Bush was so totally out of touch with reality that he went on camera and announced to the press, "Brownie, you're doing a great job!" I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll have reason to say it again: "The emperor has no clothes" is inadequate to describe what's happening here. This emperor isn't just naked--he's masturbating publicly.

Since the massive failure of FEMA, the citizens of this country, the non-profits without official ties to FEMA and the Red Cross, have had to work as hard at preventing FEMA from impeding their progress as they have at rescuing the living and removing the dead.

So in hindsight, it's kind of hard to imagine this same president has ever understood anything that's actually been happening, on the ground, in Iraq. He can't even keep tabs on Louisiana, when he's in Louisiana.

Now maybe that's Michael Brown's fault. You know, just like Abu Ghraib was Janice Karpinski's fault. Brown is the head of FEMA. Maybe he was supposed to notify the President and the head of Homeland Security when the levees we all thought would break finally did. Maybe Brownie is the one who dropped the ball. Makes sense. But Bush had to know that was going to happen.

Bush knew Michael Brown's career past, even if Brown's resume was a pack of lies. Bush appointed Brown to lead FEMA, based on the recommendation of someone who'd known him, personally, for years. Perhaps some inexperienced and inept White House admin could get away with failing to check Brown's references, but Bush was in close personal contact with him.

I can't help but wonder how the White House will attempt to deny responsibility when confronted with the obvious fabrications on Brown's resume. (We'll likely be treated to yet another press conference during which Scott McClellan will waste no time accusing the questioners of playing the "blame game." )

Apparently, among all the other definitions that the White House has rewritten, we can now add another: accountability is no longer the process of understanding cause and effect while calling attention to the people responsible. Accountability is now synonymous with blame; blame is a bad word; the White House doesn't use bad words. (Except when Vice President Dick Cheney uses them to insult a Democrat). Most of the time, however, bad words are strictly avoided. Hence, no accountability, for anything, ever.

As of this posting, Chertoff has moved Brown out of Louisiana, where he is, no doubt, preparing to fuck up his next task. He hasn't got the guts to admit that he pulled Brown out because of the public outcry; rather he continues to insist that Brownie is "needed elsewhere." And I'm sure he is. Wherever incompetence is needed to implement a plan to fail the American public for the convenience of the administration, I guess that's where he'll go.

But take heart, contrary to popular belief, the Bush administration is capable of learning from its mistakes. In fact, Janice Karpinski taught them a really important lesson after she publicly announced that she was the administration's scapegoat: if you set somebody up to fail, you need to make sure it's somebody who's loyal enough to take the fall without complaining.

And while you're at it, better make it a man. We all know women talk too much.