ACLU Stays in the Fight

Jane Hamsher brings the welcome news that the ACLU is going to file suit against the new, and despicably flawed, FISA bill which, regrettably, passed the Senate yesterday (Kudos to Hillary Clinton for doing the right thing. Obama? Not so much).

Jane passes on this from the ACLU's Executive Director Anthony Romero:

The bottom line is that no president should have the power to monitor the phones and emails of Americans without a warrant. And no president should have the power to pardon companies that broke the law. This bill was not a "compromise," as some in Congress would like you to believe. The only thing they compromised was your freedom.

George Bush will sign the FISA bill into law in a few short days, but that does not mean our fight is over.

Our lawyers are prepared to file a lawsuit challenging this unconstitutional legislation as soon as the ink dries on George Bush's signature. This is why it is so important that all of us add our names to the ACLU's newspaper ad.

In advance of the legal challenge, the ACLU will be running a full-page ad in a major national newspaper in protest, and the first 10,000 folks who sign on will have their names included in the ad itself.

From the ACLU's own press release on the travesty:

Today, in a blatant assault upon civil liberties and the right to privacy, the Senate passed an unconstitutional domestic spying bill that violates the Fourth Amendment and eliminates any meaningful role for judicial oversight of government surveillance. The FISA Amendments Act of 2008 was approved by a vote of 69 to 28 and is expected to be signed into law by President Bush shortly. This bill essentially legalizes the president’s unlawful warrantless wiretapping program revealed in December 2005 by the New York Times.

“Once again, Congress blinked and succumbed to the president’s fear-mongering. With today’s vote, the government has been given a green light to expand its power to spy on Americans and run roughshod over the Constitution,” said Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union. “This legislation will give the government unfettered and unchecked access to innocent Americans’ international communications without a warrant. This is not only unconstitutional, but absolutely un-American.”

The FISA Amendments Act nearly eviscerates oversight of government surveillance by allowing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to review only general procedures for spying rather than individual warrants. The FISC will not be told any specifics about who will actually be wiretapped, thereby undercutting any meaningful role for the court and violating the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable search and seizure.....

...“With one vote, Congress has strengthened the executive branch, weakened the judiciary and rendered itself irrelevant,” said Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. “This bill – soon to be law – is a constitutional nightmare. Americans should know that if this legislation is enacted and upheld, what they say on international phone calls or emails is no longer private. The government can listen in without having a specific reason to do so. Our rights as Americans have been curtailed and our privacy can no longer be assumed.”

Might I remind y'all what a good and important cause supporting the ACLU is?

FISA Capitulation is Not Leadership, Senator

As anyone who reads this blog (or spends five minutes with me out here in the real world) knows, I am an unabashed and wholehearted supporter of Barack Obama for President. That said, the man is severely disappointing me lately.

It's not his call for more Faith Based Initiatives - though that's troubling, for a variety of reasons, it is not in and of itself a bad thing. As long as there's serious controls in place to prevent federal money from being used to proselytize, or to push a radical religious agenda, and that the recipients have to be held to some standards (like, not discriminating on grounds of faith or "values" or whatever), I'm okay with it in principle.

But his about-face on the issue of FISA is deeply disturbing. First off, as a constitutional law scholar, one would expect Obama to realize the stakes here. We're talking about the very fabric of of American freedom. (For some background, Kagro X at Daily Kos has a really good rundown on the issue here)

Not to mention that it's a losing issue for him in a number of ways. He has been rightfully lauded for his willingness and ability to fight the garbage which has had so many Democrats running in fear for so long. For him to capitulate on this issue reeks of that fear, fear that he'll be painted as somehow soft on terror for choosing the Constitution over the whims of the unitary executive, when in fact he, and we, know this is not the case. The American people are wise to the fear mongering strategy which served the GOP so well in 2002 and 2004.

Worse yet, he's flying in the face of his own very strong arguments, which in no small way contributed to the support he's gained from progressives who understand the stakes of the issue.

TPM Election Central has assembled a compendium of Obama's statements on FISA throughout the primary, and in particular his opposition to immunity for the telecom companies who enabled the Bush administration's flagrant law breaking. It's worth a read, if a depressing exercise. A taste, from December:

"Senator Obama unequivocally opposes giving retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies and has cosponsored Senator Dodd's efforts to remove that provision from the FISA bill. Granting such immunity undermines the constitutional protections Americans trust the Congress to protect. Senator Obama supports a filibuster of this bill, and strongly urges others to do the same."

Put even more strongly, from his own lips:

I strongly oppose retroactive immunity in the FISA bill.

Ever since 9/11, this Administration has put forward a false choice between the liberties we cherish and the security we demand.

The FISA court works. The separation of power works. We can trace, track down and take out terrorists while ensuring that our actions are subject to vigorous oversight, and do not undermine the very laws and freedom that we are fighting to defend.

No one should get a free pass to violate the basic civil liberties of the American people -- not the President of the United States, and not the telecommunications companies that fell in line with his warrantless surveillance program. We have to make clear the lines that cannot be crossed.

Indeed. There are lines that should not be crossed, and it was Obama's clear enunciation of that point which helped to win me over to his candidacy. I can't express how much I miss that guy already.

There's a reason the largest group on mybarackobama.com is made up of supporters pleading with him to stand firm to the principles he stated so strongly and so often during the primary season. Running to the center in a general is to be expected, abandoning core constitutional principles is not. If you're a supporter of Obama, I urge you to join this group. At over 14,000 nearly 17,000 members so far, the sheer numbers may make him see the light. Or at least see that his supporters cannot be taken for granted.

We expect him, indeed whomever is President, to do the right thing.

A Victory for the Constitution

In a 5-4 decision (hmm, wonder who came down on which side....not), the Supreme Court has ruled that, contrary to the criminal Bush administration's claims, the detainees in the limbo of Guantanamo do indeed have the constitutional privilege of habeas corpus.

The US Supreme Court Thursday ruled detainees held in the US military base at Guantanamo Bay have the right to appeal to federal courts in a blow to the Bush administration.

The court ruled that detainees in the US jail in southern Cuba "have the constitutional privilege of habeas corpus," in the third ruling on Guantanamo against the current administration of President George W. Bush.

By a vote of five to four, the court found that even if the base was officially on Cuban territory, it was in fact operating as if it were on American soil and therefore the detainees had the same constitutional rights as all Americans.

Score one for the forces of light, justice, and the American way.

UPDATE: From the NY Times write-up on the decision, this quote by Justice Kennedy:

“The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times,” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the court.

Exactly. American ideals are easy to stick with in good times. The true measure of our mettle comes in times of severe trial. Anyone who's willing to set aside the founding principles on which this nation was founded for immediate expediency - or illusory "security" - should be ashamed.

Yes Justices Roberts, Alito, Scalia and Thomas. That would be y'all.

More on Impeachment

Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) signs on.

I will now expand my efforts to secure impeachment hearings in the Judiciary Committee for these new Articles of Impeachment against President George W. Bush.

Many of the charges against President Bush are well known – and would shock the conscience of everyday Americans if only the national media would be willing to report on these stark facts.

The Articles present a stunning narrative of offenses that have go well beyond previous crimes committed by any US chief executive. In fact no President or Vice President in history has done more to undermine our constitution.

These charges are broad, with 35 separate allegations including the deliberate lies regarding WMDs that led us to war and the approval of illegal wiretapping of American citizens. The Articles also include new allegations of high crimes – including the explicit approval for high Administration officials to violate treaties and US law banning the use of torture.

The Democratic Party gained a majority in the House and Senate due in large part to our promises to end the corruption of the Republican majority and to hold the Administration accountable to the law. This courageous bill is a crucial step towards fulfilling this promise, but – like the Articles against Cheney – they require your support to convince Democrats and open-minded Republicans to support this bold but necessary action.

Kucinich Introduces Articles of Impeachment

Raw Story reports that Rep. Dennis Kucinich is presenting 35 articles of impeachment in the House this evening:

The House is not in order," said Kucinich to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), upon which Pelosi pounded her gavel.

"Resolved," Kucinich then began, "that President George W. Bush be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and that the following articles of impeachment be exhibited to the United States Senate. ...

"In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of president of the United States, and to the best of his ability preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has committed the following abuses of power..."

First up?

Article 1 - Creating a secret propaganda campaign to manufacture a false case for war against Iraq.

That's as good a place to start as any.

UPDATE: By way of AfterDowingStreet.org, we get Kucinich's full document covering all 35 articles.

Biden on McCain's Planned Lawbreaking

From a press release Sen. Joe Biden issued yesterday (emphasis my own):

“Senator McCain has now not only joined the company of President Bush – but also President Nixon – in taking the position that as President he would consider himself above the law. In 1978, I helped draft the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) which made clear the exclusive legal steps the President must take in order to conduct national security surveillance. President Bush chose to ignore the law and now it seems Senator McCain will continue this policy. Once again – there is no daylight between President Bush and Sen. McCain.

“I said during the FISA debate in 1978 that “it is not necessary to compromise civil liberties in the name of national security.” That’s as true today, even in a time of war, as it was then. We all share the goal of capturing the terrorists and protecting national security and we can do that without violating the privacy of the American people. Like President Bush, Sen. McCain is presenting the American people with a false choice—national security or civil liberties. We need a President who understands that we can have both. It’s what our values and our Constitution demands.”

Can't Come Soon Enough

One of the key defining criteria on which I based my support of a presidential candidate was to what degree he or she would be able - and willing - to do the hard work of repairing the unbelievable damage done to America by the Bush administration, specifically the wholesale shredding of constitutional principles we've witnessed over the last 7 years.

It's really nice to know I've made the right choice. From Reuters' Tales from the Trail blog:

During a fund-raiser in Denver, Obama — a former constitutional law professor at the Universiy of Chicago Law School — was asked what he hoped to accomplish during his first 100 days in office.

“I would call my attorney general in and review every single executive order issued by George Bush and overturn those laws or executive decisions that I feel violate the constitution,” said Obama

Other goals for his first 100 days: work out a plan to withdraw troops from Iraq; make progress on alternative energy plans and launch legislation to reform the health care system.

Can you imagine an America where the President is not only not an idiotic megalomaniacal ideologue, but is actually a highly intelligent, thoughtful and patriotic constitutional law scholar?

"Go for a head shot..."

You know, I got into a heated discussion with good friend the other night at a local watering hole, and over the course of the conversation, talk turned to the craziness of the mid-nineties, with the Patriot movement, the militias, and right-wing media openly advocating sedition and violence. Timothy McVeigh was a fruit of those times, and he killed 168 people.

And yet, trying to get people to recall the mindset of that time - the open, seething hatred for the Clintons and the federal government - is very hard indeed.

It's like the blunt force trauma of 9/11 has wiped that far less effective, but still very real domestic terrorist element - with numbers, at the time, which rivaled those of al Qaeda before 9/11, and before George Bush swelled their ranks by essentially doing Osama's bidding - from the collective consciousness. In fact, over the Bush years, we've seen those elements absorbed back into the fold, with what used to be radical ideas softened and become part of the wider GOP narrative.

And of course, there's no need to advocate the overthrow of a government you're welcomed into, even if you have to use the back door.

Anyway, as we all know anything anyone a presidential candidate has ever associated with says is directly attributable to the candidate him or herself. The media, John McCain, and Hillary Clinton have all stressed that argument against Barrack Obama. He's been hounded to hell and back to account for Louis Farrakhan, Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers and everything they've ever said or done.

The other two? Not so much. McCain shrugs off John Hagee's vile comments and the press sees something shiny off to the side and chases it. For all her talk of being thoroughly "vetted," there's been suspiciously little talk of all the many skeletons in Hillary Clinton's closet (not to mention tapping that old 90's Clinton-hatred). Perhaps such talk will go better in the fall. October, maybe.

But in yesterday's Chicago Tribune, Steve Chapman writes about John McCain's "old friend" G. Gordon Liddy:

What McCain didn't mention is that he has his own Bill Ayers—in the form of G. Gordon Liddy. Now a conservative radio talk-show host, Liddy spent more than 4 years in prison for his role in the 1972 Watergate burglary. That was just one element of what Liddy did, and proposed to do, in a secret White House effort to subvert the Constitution. Far from repudiating him, McCain has embraced him.

How close are McCain and Liddy? At least as close as Obama and Ayers appear to be. In 1998, Liddy's home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Over the years, he has made at least four contributions totaling $5,000 to the senator's campaigns—including $1,000 this year.

In fact, McCain gushes praise for Liddy, saying on an appearance on his radio show:

Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain sounded like one. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family," he gushed. "It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

Hmm. McCain obviously shares the the "principles and philosophies" of Gordon. He said so, in his own words (and I know, John McCain is of the opinion that reminding him of his words is a libelous act, but still).

This is a man, who in addition to his role in masterminding the Watergate break-in (for his role in which he served four years in prison) and being an all around, well-known whack-job, rose to new heights as a right-wing radio host in the 90's (emphasis added):

In 1994, after the disastrous federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, he gave some advice to his listeners: "Now if the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms comes to disarm you and they are bearing arms, resist them with arms. Go for a head shot; they're going to be wearing bulletproof vests. . . . Kill the sons of bitches."

He later backed off, saying he meant merely that people should defend themselves if federal agents came with guns blazing. But his amended guidance was not exactly conciliatory: Liddy also said he should have recommended shots to the groin instead of the head. If that wasn't enough to inflame any nut cases, he mentioned labeling targets "Bill" and "Hillary" when he practiced shooting.

Given Liddy's record, it's hard to see why McCain would touch him with a 10-foot pole. On the contrary, he should be returning his donations and shunning his show. Yet the senator shows no qualms about associating with Liddy—or celebrating his service to their common cause.

Indeed.

So, other than Chapman, who tried and was refused comment on the matter by the Straight Talk Express, who in the American media will start to ask some questions about the "principles and philosophies" the Senator shares with a man who - much more recently than the Weather Underground - was openly advocating violence against Federal Agents and encouraging violence against the President and First Lady?

Indeed.

Gore Vidal. Bravo.

“Benjamin Franklin was shown the new American constitution, and he said, ‘I don’t like it, but I will vote for it because we need something right now. But this constitution in time will fail, as all such efforts do. And it will fail because of the corruption of the people, in a general sense.’ And that is what it has come to now, exactly as Franklin predicted.”[...]

[...]“We have been deprived of our franchise,” he says. “The election was stolen in both 2000 and 2004, because of electronic voting machinery which can be easily fixed. We’ve had two illegitimate elections in a row ...

“Little Bush says we are at war, but we are not at war because to be at war Congress has to vote for it. He says we are at war on terror, but that is a metaphor, though I doubt if he knows what that means. It’s like having a war on dandruff, it’s endless and pointless. We are in a dictatorship that has been totally mili-tarised, everyone is spied on by the government itself. All three arms of the government are in the hands of this junta.

“Whatever you are,” he goes on, “they say you are the reverse. The men behind the war in Iraq are cowards who did not fight in Vietnam – but they spent millions of dollars proving that John Kerry, who was a genuine war hero whatever you think of his politics, was a coward.

“This is what happens when you have control of the media, and I have never known the media more vicious, stupid and corrupt than they are now.”

The Most Important Criminal Case in American History

Go. Read. Now.

"We may stand witness to a definitive American moment of democracy. The son of a New York doorman probably has in his hands, in many ways, the fate of the republic. Because far too many of us know and are aware of the crimes committed by our government in our name, we are unlikely to settle for a handful of minor indictments of bureaucrats. The last thing most of us believe in is the rule of law. We do not trust our government or the people we have elected but our constitution is still very much alive and we choose to believe that destiny has placed Patrick Fitzgerald at this time and this place in our history to save us from the people we elected. If the law cannot get to the truth of what has happened to the American people under the Bush administration, then we all may begin to hear the early death rattles of history's greatest democracy."

Deja Vu All Over Again

From the NY Times earlier today, this Reuters report:

Fighting broke out in Baghdad and the holy city of Najaf on Wednesday between rival Shi'ite militias, raising fears of a renewed uprising by radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi army against the U.S.-backed government.

At least eight people were killed and dozens wounded, health officials said, in street battles in Najaf involving pro-government Badr Organization fighters and supporters of Sadr, who has joined Sunni Arabs in denouncing a constitution the Shi'ite-led government is preparing to force through parliament.

The head of the Badr Organization denied it was involved.

The interior minister dispatched police commandos to Najaf and announced a curfew in the city on state television.

Christopher Allbritton, as always, writing from Baghdad, gives more contextual details (and earlier than Reuters, I should add):

Baghdad — Earlier this evening, Najaf police units, led by a Badr Organization commander, descended on Moqtada’s office in Najaf, located on the main street approaching the Imam Ali Shrine. In the clash, Moqtada’s office, only four meters from the shrine, was burned to the ground, according to Abu Hazzim, who worked in the Najaf office and fled for his life to Sadr City. He says 23 people have been killed, most of them Moqtada’s supporters, while media reports put the number between five and eight. Iraqi Army and police have been involved in the fighting. Many of the police and army units in the south are packed by Badr militiamen with more loyalty to the party than to the state. As I write, clashes continue.

Moqtada has put out an alert for the jaysh al-Mahdi militia to be on high alert in Sadr City, Najaf, Nasriyah, Amarah and Basra. In Sadr City and Basra, jaysh al-Mahdi members have asked to occupy/attack SCIRI and Badr offices, but so far they’ve been kept in check by Moqtada and Fatah al-Sheikh, one of Moqtada’s supporters in parliament.[...]

This may blow over or it may blow up. But these are fast moving events. Coming on the eve of the constitution vote, as well as large clashes between Sunni insurgents and U.S. and Iraqi forces in western Baghdad that are also continuing, these events can only be seen as worrisome.

Ahh, yes. The draft constitution. The unfortunate document which seems to show American soldiers are dying not in the name of freedom, but rather an Iranian style Islamic republic. To wit, the Reuters report adds:

Parliament is expected to vote on Thursday on the new constitution, although no sitting has yet been scheduled. When it was presented just before a Monday deadline, the vote was put off for three days, apparently to help tempers cool after Sunnis said they would demand further major changes.

A senior U.S. military official said his forces were bracing for an insurgent onslaught: ``We believe that the enemy is still ... intending to conduct some larger-scale operation in Baghdad associated with the release (of the constitution),'' he said.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani held another day of talks with leaders from the Sunni, Shi'ite and Kurdish communities on Wednesday to try to forge a consensus on the charter, but he looked unlikely to succeed before the vote on Thursday.

Sunni leaders said they were determined to stand firm against a document they argue would devolve too much power to the regions and which demonizes Saddam Hussein's Baath Party.

``We reject federalism in the central and southern regions, we reject it because it has no basis other than sectarianism,'' Adnan al-Dulaimi, head of an umbrella group called the National Conference for the Sunni People of Iraq, told reporters.

``Every Iraqi must stand in the way of all those who want to deepen sectarianism in Iraq.''

In Hawija, north of Baghdad, hundreds of Sunnis, joined by Sadr supporters, marched against the constitution.

Sunnis and Shia together again. Longtime readers may recall this post (Consider the Fan Hit) from April of 2004, and in what context we last saw this same coupling. Tomorrow should be a bang-up day in Iraq.

The Rising Tide

And so it begins. Well, continues, in any case.

The FBI has shut down some 20 sites which were part of an alternative media network known as Indymedia.

A US court order forced the firm hosting the material to hand over two servers in the UK used by the group.

Indymedia says it is a news source for the anti-globalisation movement and other social justice issues.

The reasons behind the seizure are unclear but the FBI has reportedly said the action was taken at the request of Italian and Swiss authorities. [...]

The seizure has sparked off protests from journalist groups.

"We have witnessed an intolerable and intrusive international police operation against a network specialising in independent journalism," said Aidan White, general secretary of the International Federation of Journalists.

"The way this has been done smacks more of intimidation of legitimate journalistic inquiry than crime-busting."

The UK site of Indymedia is back up and running but several of the other 20 sites affected are still offline.

In the US, the civil liberties group, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said it was working with Indymedia over how to react to the seizures.

"The constitution does not permit the government unilaterally to cut off the speech of an independent media outlet, especially without providing a reason or even allowing Indymedia the information necessary to contest the seizure," said EFF Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl.

A Christian Nation

The Texas GOP has decided that, in addition to being a one-party democracy, the United States is a Christian nation. How very Boykin of them. That's very good to know. Line up for the Crusades please.

Anyway, this comes to us by way of mobius at Jewschool.

Just two weeks after adopting a hard line platform at its convention in San Antonio, the Texas Republican Party is under fire from Jewish groups.

The convention, which was dominated by religious conservatives, approved platform language that calls the United States a 'Christian Nation,' and calls the separation of church and state 'a myth.'

Linda Berger of Houston, a spokeswoman for the American Jewish Committee, says the language is 'hurtful' to non Christians.

"We are being looked to as an example of a nation where all people can live and be respected," she told 1200 WOAI news. "It's very important that both political parties reflect that."

Berger said America is currently at war against intolerance abroad, and it's important that political parties here not adopt language that is 'hurtful' to U.S. citizens.

Berger asked the Texas Republican Party to 'revise' its platform.

"All that we're trying to do as the American Jewish Committee is to make them realize that language like that leaves other groups out," she said.

The majority of Texas Jews consider themselves Republicans, and the GOP is also well represented among Buddhists and Muslims in Texas.

**Update**: Here's the link to the actual Texas GOP Platform (PDF format). The two sections appear on p. 8 of the PDF, and are reproduced below:

Christian Nation – The Republican Party of Texas affirms that the United States of America is a Christian nation, and the public acknowledgement of God is undeniable in our history. Our nation was founded on fundamental Judeo-Christian principles based on the Holy Bible. The Party affirms freedom of religion, and rejects efforts of courts and secular activists who seek to remove and deny such a rich heritage from our public lives.

Free Exercise of Religion – The Party believes all Americans have the right to practice their religious faith free from persecution, intimidation, and violence. While recognizing one’s freedom from religion, this recognition should not limit others’ free expression of their religious beliefs. Our Party pledges to exert its influence to restore the original intent of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and dispel the myth of the separation of Church and State. We support the right of individuals and state and local governments to display symbols of our faith and heritage. We call on Congress to sanction any country that is guilty of persecuting its citizens because of their religious beliefs.

Hypocrites and Parasites

Yesterday evening on CNN, Paula Zahn, without even a hint of irony, segued from Bush's anti-gay marriage statement yesterday to a retrospective piece on Brown vs. Board of Education. As though there were no similarities whatsoever. Let's see what the president had to say:

TOPEKA, Kan. - President Bush (news - web sites) marked a half-century of school integration at the symbolic home of the movement Monday, saying "it changed America for the better, and forever."

"Fifty years ago today, nine judges announced that they had looked at the Constitution and saw no justification for the segregation and humiliation of an entire race," Bush said at the opening of a national historic site at Monroe Elementary, a former all-black school in the heartland of the school desegregation effort.

"Here on the corner of 15th and Monroe, and in schools like it across America, that was a day of justice, and it was a long time coming," the president said.

Yesterday as well, the president issued an official statement regarding the now-legal marriages in Massachusetts:

May 17, 2004

STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

The sacred institution of marriage should not be redefined by a few activist judges. All Americans have a right to be heard in this debate. I called on the Congress to pass, and to send to the states for ratification, an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of a man and a woman as husband and wife. The need for that amendment is still urgent, and I repeat that call today.

George, I know at this point it's become little more than lip-service on your part, a role you assume to further snow the masses, but you should remember that God is very real indeed, and he's not fooled by Rovian BS. You will all be held accountable for your words as well as your actions. Good luck with that.

Sleight of Hand

While everyone is (understandably) up in arms over the Saudi royals playing the game of American politics, using their control over oil prices to dictate hopeful electoral outcomes, there is a much bigger and (again) impeachable offense here, and one that cannot be brushed aside as easily. We now know from Woodward's book that Gen. Tommy Franks was given a blank check with which to begin setting the stage for the Iraq war the president said he wasn't planning for. Of course, this was before the serious misinformation push began, before the spectre of mushroom clouds were pushed on the public by the administration, and therefore appropriating open-ended support for an Iraq-directed military build-up would have been a hard nut to get congress to swallow. Soution: act as though Bush's wistful longing for the ease of a Bush dictatorship was not (another) mis-statement by the president, but an executive order.

From CBS:

Woodward reports that just five days after Sept. 11, President Bush indicated to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice that while he had to do Afghanistan first, he was also determined to do something about Saddam Hussein.

”There's some pressure to go after Saddam Hussein. Don Rumsfeld has said, ‘This is an opportunity to take out Saddam Hussein, perhaps. We should consider it.’ And the president says to Condi Rice meeting head to head, ‘We won't do Iraq now.’ But it is a question we're gonna have to return to,’” says Woodward.

“And there's this low boil on Iraq until the day before Thanksgiving, Nov. 21, 2001. This is 72 days after 9/11. This is part of this secret history. President Bush, after a National Security Council meeting, takes Don Rumsfeld aside, collars him physically, and takes him into a little cubbyhole room and closes the door and says, ‘What have you got in terms of plans for Iraq? What is the status of the war plan? I want you to get on it. I want you to keep it secret.’"

Woodward says immediately after that, Rumsfeld told Gen. Tommy Franks to develop a war plan to invade Iraq and remove Saddam - and that Rumsfeld gave Franks a blank check.

”Rumsfeld and Franks work out a deal essentially where Franks can spend any money he needs. And so he starts building runways and pipelines and doing all the preparations in Kuwait, specifically to make war possible,” says Woodward.

“Gets to a point where in July, the end of July 2002, they need $700 million, a large amount of money for all these tasks. And the president approves it. But Congress doesn't know and it is done. They get the money from a supplemental appropriation for the Afghan War, which Congress has approved. …Some people are gonna look at a document called the Constitution which says that no money will be drawn from the Treasury unless appropriated by Congress. Congress was totally in the dark on this."

How much will it take?

Dear Leader

***note*** What follows is an editorial piece pulled from print before publication, posted here in its entirety****

We're living in a very precarious moment in history. I don't mean to overstate the issue, and I do not. In fact, I've been known to confide to friends that while I am concerned that electronic touch-screen voting systems could easily provide an election night that would make 2000's look crystal clear, I'm not sure we'll even see an election come November.

If Bush's poll numbers continue to fall, and there's every indication they may, his campaign will pull out all stops, use every insidious tool at their disposal to bolster his standing or risk losing it all. The power of the tools a sitting president enjoys is formidable to say the least. The further along we get with this administration, the less I'm willing to put anything past them.

For instance, take Bush's recent trip to "visit" the troops at Ft. Polk in Louisiana. Old Glory, larger than life, barn-sized above hundreds of America's bravest young men and women, many seated cross legged on the floor. Bush, stepping out onto the stage, swaggering his familiar swagger and approaching the mike to thunderous applause. And then He spoke.

It was just another of many made-for-TV moment in the Bush presidency. This one, though, it freaked me out, in all honesty. I'm an avid watcher of the History Channel, and when I see world leaders staging militaristic propaganda like this, it makes me nervous. There's too much precedent, too many horrors borne of this kind of stuff.

No, this is not to say that Bush is Hitler, or Mussolini, or Stalin, or Saddam, or Kim Jung Il, or any of the other leaders who took, and still take in the Korean dictator's case, great pleasure in projecting an image of themselves at one with the military, donning uniforms now and again to further solidify the idea in the minds of those who watch. I'd never claim such a thing.

Still, he worries me. The president gives little credence to not only his detractors, but anything at all that might cause friction with his world view; he's said as much himself. We shouldn't worry, though, the president knows best after all, and will protect us from harm. To hear him tell it, there's nothing anyone could say or do to convince him he could be wrong.

Not that he's proven himself capable of this kind of protection, however. Nine years passed between the two terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The fact that we haven't seen another devastating attack on US soil since 9/11 has less to do with Bush's bravado, Tom Ridge's duct tape, or John Ashcroft's war on civil liberties than it does the fundamental truth about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

I hope this doesn't shock anyone, but they're not the manifestation of Evil, no matter how many times we're told they are. A group of criminal thugs should be treated as such, not raised to the level of Antichrist, as Gen. Boykin might say. It gives them too much credit, and we've already seen how it "plays on the Arab street." When the world's sole superpower invests this much legitimacy in Osama, he rises to folkloric, messianic, standing and his influence grows by leaps and bounds.

Of course, that's not the way Bush sees it. He too has risen to messianic heights, but by trouncing these Evildoers with a twist of his mouth, Biblical rhetoric, and the awesome power of the US Military. Relegating the perpetrators of the attacks against us to their rightful criminal status would make his actions seem far too grandiose and overblown. So instead we are a nation at war with a shadowy enemy, an enemy we should fear and to whom we should overact, fighting, as we are, this unending war, lasting for generations.

Well, another four years at least. Another four years of color-coded commandeering of the news cycle and doing whatever it takes to validate this "war presidency." After all, what does a war president do when there are no true wars to fight?

It's when I consider, and reconsider, Gen. Tommy Frank's statements to that bastion of investigative journalism, Cigar Aficionado, that I truly shudder to think any further. In between discussing his taste in cigars, he discusses what might happen in the event of a catastrophic terrorist attack involving WMD here or abroad.

In such a case, he says, "the Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we've seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy." He goes on to say we'd see the rise of a military government, and our beloved Constitution come "unraveled" The Constitution. Unraveled. Here or abroad, he says. Here, or abroad. God help us is if it's here. God help us if it's anywhere. Election year politics would be the last thing we'd have to worry about.