Josh Marshall describes Bush’s response to criticism of his failed policies and strategies in Iraq:
Don’t tell me about how stupid I was to get us into this situation. Now that I’ve created a disaster this big, what’s your policy to deal with it? Sort of takes your breath away.
Pull our troops out? How’s that gonna work now that we’ve unleashed a civil war there?
What a pity — we are led by a fool.
The flap at SMU over the Bush Presidential Library locating there (how many more coloring books does a university library need?) brought to mind this latest Bush oxymoron:
Bush Think Tank
“Bush, the man who put the moron in oxymoron.”
Forgot to enclose a Christmas gift for Jemaleddin when I mailed the package to skank east headquarters at Tanglebones. The gift should be there in three or four days, so look for it Jemaleddin because it is for you.
I have another gift that I bought for you ages ago and I can’t seem to do the prep work so I can send it to you. I have identical gifts for Colin, Steven, and Michael. And heck, it’s so cool I even bought one for myself. So perhaps by your birthday I can get it done and send it to all of you.
Victor Davis Hanson over at Wingnut Central:
Why, when we are giving billions of dollars in aid to autocratic Egypt, does that government allow Al-Qaeda affiliates to broadcast anti-American propaganda on its state-run satellite? This is apparently not the normal Muslim extremism, but overt jihadist cries to kill Americans. Surely can’t the US at least smile—and put a hold of a few months on the next hand-out check, Abrams tank, or bushel of wheat?
Notice that cries to kill Americans require a strong response?
It wrong in Egypt for a jihadist to say this sort of thing. But in Wingnut land It’s O.K. If You Are A Republican. Rightwing radio host and nutcase Hal Turner:
“ANY MEMBER OF CONGRESS WHO INTRODUCES, CO-SPONSORS OR VOTES IN FAVOR OF ANY SUCH AMNESTY WILL BE DECLARED A DOMESTIC ENEMY AND WILL BE CONSIDERED A LEGITIMATE TARGET FOR ASSASSINATION…”
I’m pretty sure those in Congress who favor rewriting the Immigration laws in a less draconian way than Tom Tancredo are US citizens because you have to be a citizen to be elected to Congress.
So, of course, law enforcement is jumping all over this rightwing call to assassinate elected members of Congress? Not so much.
Asked about procedures involving suspected threats to members of Congress, the U.S. Secret Service told WND that it would be interested only if the threat involved someone the Service protects. All other cases would be referred to local police jurisdictions.
When WND’s question specifically referred to a website statement, Secret Service spokesman Darrin Blackford told WND: “We have no comment on that statement.”
Paul Bresson, a spokesman for the FBI, said he couldn’t confirm what investigations are being pursued.
“The Internet does not give anyone a license to espouse violence, but there is a certain amount of protection, First Amendment protections, that are built in and we’re mindful of those,” he said.
He called it a “fine line,” and said what the agency would do is look at all the information available and “make a determination” whether any crime might have been committed.
In the earlier situation FBI spokeswoman Debbie Weierman said such circumstances generally are turned over to a “duty agent” to review, but she couldn’t provide other information until and unless a charge would be filed in any case.
Is it wrong to call for the death of Americans? In Wingnut land it just depends on who’s doing the calling and who the victims may be.
What’s the country’s worst potential problem in the coming year? Yup, you guessed it: Democrats who treat Republicans like the Republicans spent 12 years treating Democrats.
One of my favorite bloggers from inside the tubes of the internets is Digby at Hullabaloo. So what does he say about this?
Watching tonight’s Newshour I was struck by how important both Shields and Brooks believe it is that Nancy Pelosi puts a stop to all the insane partisanship. The rancor in Washington really has gotten out of hand and people are sick of it — especially, it would appear, the Republicans who just can’t take another minute of this horrible lack of collegiality. (Those nasty Dems must be the problem, because I don’t recall all this handwringing punditude over Tom DeLay and Denny Hastert.)
…
It seems that the DC courtiers have been so moved by all the blather they’ve been dribbling about Jerry Ford’s magnificently brave decision to pardon the man who put him office that they are convinced the biggest problem the country faces is the possibility that the Democrats might not let the Republicans date-rape them again.
In a post from last summer Matthew Yglesias explains the dependence of neoconservative foreign policy on the Green Lantern Theory of Geopolitics.
I knew the neocons were deluded; I’m just now realizing that they depend upon fiction for children to get their ideas. For example, the Peter Pan theory of invincibility: if we clap long enough, hard enough, things in Iraq just have to go the way we imagined them when we were high from sniffing glue.
Jim Henley poses a hypothetical question:
Let’s say you’ve caught a suspect and you’re sure he’s a terrorist, and you’re sure there’s a nuclear bomb somewhere in Manhattan, and you’re sure he knows where it is, and you’re sure this particular terrorist has been trained to resist torture just long enough that you could never get the true location of the bomb out of him in time. But you’re also sure this particular terrorist is a pervert! And he tells you that if you’ll rape your own child in front of him, he’ll tell you exactly where the bomb is and how to disarm it. And you’re sure that he will, because your intelligence is that good in exactly that way.
That’s just the beginning of a great piece.