Former Powell aide Bush was ‘Sarah Palin-like’ in his knowledge of foreign policy

Former Powell aide Bush was ‘Sarah Palin-like’ in his knowledge of foreign policy
In an interview with Vanity Fair for its upcoming issue on the Bush White House, Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, ripped President Bush, saying that after the 2000 election, Bush’s knowledge of foreign affairs was as poor as that of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R):

We had this confluence of characters—and I use that term very carefully—that included people like Powell, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice, and so forth, which allowed one perception to be “the dream team.” It allowed everybody to believe that this Sarah Palin–like president—because, let’s face it, that’s what he was—was going to be protected by this national- security elite, tested in the cauldrons of fire.

Congradulations to Cokie Roberts

It's official: Readers pick Congratulations to Cokie Roberts' "foreign, exotic" Hawaii comments as Most Inane
In the end, it wasn't close. By an overwhelming margin, criticism by Cokie Roberts, NPR contributing senior news analyst and ABC political commentator, of then-Sen. Barack Obama for choosing Hawaii, the state of his birth, to take his August family vacation was the most popular entry in Media Matters for America's poll for Most Inane Punditry of the 2008 presidential campaign. Readers chose Roberts' comments -- which included her characterizing Hawaii, where Obama vacations regularly, as "foreign, exotic" -- in greater numbers than her two closest competitors combined. Roberts stated: "I know his grandmother lives in Hawaii and I know Hawaii is a state, but it has the look of him going off to some sort of foreign, exotic place," adding, "He should be in Myrtle Beach, and, you know, if he's going to take a vacation at this time."

Roberts repeated her criticism of Obama's vacation destination during the August 11 broadcast of NPR's Morning Edition, asserting that Obama's choice of Hawaii for his vacation "makes him seem a little bit more exotic." She also characterized Hawaii as "a somewhat odd place to be doing it," despite acknowledging, "I know that he is from Hawaii, he grew up there, his grandmother lives there."

Media Matters readers were not alone in objecting to Roberts' remarks. Responding to Roberts' comments, Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-HI) reportedly said: "She's a bit of a fool that's the only thing you can say. ... Don't forget Cokie Roberts and the whole Washington crowd live in a kind of an incestuous relationship to one another, they talk to one another, they see one another, they know nothing about ordinary people." On August 11, Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI) released a statement in response to Roberts' comments, stating in part: "Saying our 50th state is somehow 'foreign,' does a great disservice to the hard working, patriotic Americans who call Hawaii home.

Karl Rove Destroyed My Life

Karl Rove Destroyed My Life By Paul Alexander, The Daily Beast
Last week, Al Gore sent an email message urging supporters to give money to Don Siegelman's legal defense fund. Gore is the latest in a string of high profile supporters to suggest Siegelman, the former Governor of Alabama, was the victim of a Republican plot when he was found guilty of bribery, conspiracy and fraud in 2006, and sentenced to seven years in prison.

Now, in the waning days of the Bush administration, Siegelman is trying to win back his freedom -- not to mention his good name -- in a courtroom in Atlanta. Earlier this year, an appeals court granted his release after he had served nine months, saying the Governor's appeal had raised "substantial questions" about the case against him. Siegelman's cause was helped by a bipartisan group of 54 former state attorneys general from across the country who filed a federal appeals brief supporting his bid to overturn the conviction. Republican insiders have also come forward to say Siegelman was unfairly targeted by Rove and his circle.

Making it in prison depends on one's level of tolerance. I'm used to mopping in my wife's kitchen. It was just a bigger floor.

Siegelman's appeal was heard earlier this month and the verdict will determine whether he returns to prison to finish out his sentence, or goes free.

How did a former governor -- and a rising star in the Democratic Party -- end up in a situation like this?

On June 29, 2006, Siegelman and Richard Scrushy, the CEO of HealthSouth, a chain of medical rehabilitation services with facilities both in the United States and abroad, were found guilty by a jury in Montgomery, Alabama, of federal bribery charges. A year later, Judge Mark Fuller, who had clear conflicts of interest in the case -- a company in which he holds a major stake received a $175 million government contract at one point during the legal proceedings -- sentenced Scrushy to almost seven years in prison. Siegelman got 88 months.

There was one central transaction that sent these men to prison for all this time. Not long after Siegelman had been elected governor in 1998, he convinced Scrushy to contribute $500,000 to a political action committee, which was supporting the establishment of a lottery in Alabama to pay for higher education. At the same time, he talked Scrushy into serving on a state hospital regulatory board on which he had already served three times -- appointed by both Democrats and Republicans -- and from which he had recently resigned. To US attorney Leura Canary, the wife of William "Bill" Canary, the close friend and former business associate of Karl Rove, the act constituted bribery, for which she charged the two men. Among the many other charges, dismissed by the jury, this was the one that stuck.

QUESTION: First, was the act for which you and Richard Scrushy convicted actually a crime?

SIEGELMAN: Fifty-four state attorneys general filed a friend of the court brief stating that it has never been a crime in America for a politician or a public official to appoint a contributor to anything, whether it's ambassador or cabinet member or a member of a board or an agency. The only thing that is a crime is if you swap a position for money. And there has got to be an express agreement that's provable. Otherwise, the United States Supreme Court says it's an infringement on a person's first amendment right to freely associate and make contributions.

QUESTION: The case with you and Scrushy seems especially weak.

SIEGELMAN: Scrushy had just recently resigned from the board and the person I had defeated, Job James, had appointed one of Scrushy's vice presidents to the position. When I got elected I called Scrushy and said, "I want you to serve in my administration like you did in three previous administration." And he said, "Oh, Governor, do I have to? I just resigned from that board. Can't I get you the name of somebody?" I said, "Nope, it's either you or nobody." So he went onto the board reluctantly. And this poor guy is still in prison today.

QUESTION: Many observers believe he is because he would not cooperate with the prosecution to convict you.

SIEGELMAN: In an effort to get me, the prosecution went to Scrushy before they indicted him and said, "Just tell us Siegelman extorted the money; just tell us he twisted your arm." He said, "I can't do that because that's not what happened." They went to him after he was indicted and said, "Okay, we will give you another chance. Tell us Siegelman twisted your arm and tried to extort money." He said, "I can't say that because that's not what happened." During the trial, he was sitting at the defense table, and they came and got him again and gave him a third chance to throw me under the bus by lying for the prosecution and he wouldn't do it. This is not the way the justice system in this country is supposed to work.

QUESTION: Describe what happened to you after you were sentenced.

SIEGELMAN: Scrushy and I were taken from the courtroom less than thirty seconds after the gavel came down in handcuffs, shackles, and chains around our waist and ankles. We were put in the back of a police car and driven to Atlanta where we were taken to a maximum-security prison and put in solitary confinement. Then they moved me around the country from prison to prison until I ended up in the swamps of Louisiana......

Merry War on Christmas The Religious Right Isn't Going Anywhere

Merry War on Christmas The Religious Right Isn't Going Anywhere By Frederick Clarkson
The Defining Moment of the Culture Wars

"My friends, this election is about much more than who gets what," Pat Buchanan declared in his famously inflammatory speech at the 1992 GOP national convention. "It is about who we are. It is about what we believe. It is about what we stand for as Americans. There is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America. It is a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself."

He denounced the "radical feminism" of Bill and Hillary Clinton, stating that their "agenda would impose on America -- abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat -- that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change America wants. It is not the kind of change America needs. And it is not the kind of change we can tolerate in a nation that we still call God's country."

If this sounds familiar, it is because little has changed since these words were shouted to the world on prime-time television.

Buchanan's speech epitomizes the Religious Right's general view of the "culture war" -- as a "religious war" that manifests itself on many "cultural" fronts, most urgently abortion, homosexuality (especially, now, marriage equality), education privatization and curriculum content of the public schools.

For the aggressors in this largely one-sided war -- war is not merely a metaphor. It is far more profound and animating idea, stemming from conflicts of "world view," usually described as a "Biblical World View" against everything else. That is why we have seen decades of violence against abortion providers and against LGBT people, and almost nothing from other sides who are merely exercising their civil rights to believe differently or to seek greater equality under the law.

The more significant battles of this war will be in the states where the Religious Right's political strength is now greater than in the federal government.

Snapshots from the Culture War in the States

Here are a few snapshots from real-life politics in the states in 2008 and what they portend for the future:

* Anti-marriage-equality initiatives prevailed in Arizona, Florida and California in 2008. Fueled with funding from politically animated Mormons, Catholics and Protestant evangelicals at the urging of religious leaders, the initiatives passed, and for the first time in American history, rolled back a court-ordered civil rights advance.
* While Rhode Island and New York recognize the validity of same-sex marriages from other states, the 1996 federal Defense of Marriage Act allows states to refuse to recognize the validity of same-sex marriages. The Supreme Court has so far declined to hear constitutional challenges to DOMA. So far, 30 states have passed anti-marriage-equality initiatives; and 10 states passed statutory DOMAs.
* New York and New Jersey: The conservative religious coalition that passed the stunning reversal on marriage equality in California plans to take the battle to these eastern states.
* Constitutional Convention initiative in Connecticut: Every 20 years, the state is required to have an initiative asking the voters if it is time for a state constitutional convention. Following the state's Supreme Court legalization of same-sex marriage, the Religious Right and the Catholic Church seized on the initiative, purchasing a large, last-minute TV ad campaign. While this effort was unsuccessful, we can expect further battles in Connecticut.
* Failed efforts to get other anti-abortion or anti-gay initiatives on the ballot: Montana, Arkansas and Massachusetts. Even in losing, the Religious Right has considerable capacity to keep its issues on the front burner.
* Texas: The elected State Board of Education appointed three prominent "intelligent design" advocates to a six-member science-review panel. The chairman of the SBOE wrote in an op-ed, "Science education has become a culture war issue" and that the claims of scientists "will be challenged by creationists."
* Alabama: The State Board of Education, under pressure from the Religious Right, recently approved a controversial Bible study curriculum as an elective.
* Louisiana: In 2008, the legislature approved the use of "supplemental" materials in public schools, that appears to open a backdoor to the use of creationism and intelligent design materials banned from science curricula by the U.S. Supreme Court.
* Kansas: Control over the elected State Board of Education has flipped back and forth between the Religious Right and moderate Democrats and Republicans since the late 1990s. In 2010, five seats are expected to be contested.
* Iowa: Shortly after the 2008 presidential election, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, a Religious Right Roman Catholic, headlined a high-dollar fundraiser for the Iowa Family Policy Center, the state political affiliate of Focus on the Family. The event was seen as a foreshadowing of the 2012 Iowa presidential caucuses.
* Alaska: Republican Gov. Sarah Palin, who was vetted by the Religious Right-dominated Council for National Policy and forced onto the Republican Party presidential ticket, has emerged as a party leader along with such Religious Right figures as Jindal, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (currently a Fox News program host and a former presidential candidate) and, arguably, Mitt Romney (a Mormon who has moved toward the Religious Right since serving as governor of Massachusetts).

These snapshots suggest not only that the Religious Right remains strong in the Republican Party, but that it intends and is capable of, waging and winning theocratic battles against LGBT and women's civil and human rights, as well as disrupting secular public education. The religious war Buchanan described has shown that it can transcend the wins and losses of any given election season. The only way the culture war could be over, or nearly over, is if one or another side is clearly winning or losing, its capacity to wage the war has been significantly enhanced or degraded, or it is about to call a truce or to surrender. None of these things is happening.

Innovations

At a national meeting of the American Catholic bishops held shortly after the election, many declared there was no acceptable compromise on abortion and denounced the pro-choice views of President-elect Barack Obama. Some condemned Catholics who had argued it was morally acceptable to back Obama because he pledged to reduce abortion rates.

Focus on the Family has rolled out a new "Truth Project," a religious and ideological indoctrination program that is currently touring the country targeting young people of "college age." In addition to the usual fare of family issues and sexuality, the project aggressively promotes intelligent design. Analysis of current polling shows a slight trend toward tolerance among young, white evangelicals concerning some of the issues of the culture wars. While many pundits take that as a sure sign of change to come, the Religious Right is looking at the same data. And Focus on the Family and the millennially militant organization The Call, among many others, intend to aggressively contend for that demographic.

They Lied About Iraq in 2003, and They're Still Lying Now

They Lied About Iraq in 2003, and They're Still Lying Now by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
Triumphalists are getting off on Iraq again, intoning hallelujah songs as they did after staging the fall of Saddam's statue then again and again, sweet lullabies to send us into blissful sleep and wake to a new dawn. The composers and orchestrators - Blair, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Straw, Hoon and Rice - still believe history is on their side.

Bush visited his troops at Camp Victory in Iraq this month and said: "Iraq had a record of supporting terror, of developing and using weapons of mass destruction, was routinely firing at American military personnel, systematically violating UN resolutions ... Iraqis, once afraid to leave their homes are going back to school and shopping in malls ... American troops are returning home because of success." Only one shoe and one without a sharp stiletto was hurled at him by Muntadar al-Zaidi, an Iraqi who begged to differ.

Gordon Brown, also in Iraq, spun his own fairy tale of Baghdad, where everyone is living happily ever after and British soldiers come home proud heroes. The reality is that some of our soldiers are broken - physically and mentally - fighting this illegal and unpopular war and that too many did terrible things in the land of endless tears. General Sir Mike Jackson now blames the Americans for their "appalling" decisions. And yet he too insists the campaign was a success.

Even the choral backers of Bush and Blair, once oh-so-influential, sound tinny now, out of tune. In a new book, The Liberal Defence Of Murder, Richard Seymour names many usually enlightened individuals who cheered on the disgraceful crusade and have now gone silent. Others who supported the adventure have escaped through passages of ingenious exculpation. Most Tories, for example, now say they were hypnotised by the Government's false dossiers.

Really? Even hard-of-hearing Mrs Kirkpatrick down the road - she's 79 - understood that we were being deceived. The UN weapons inspectors Hans Blix and Scott Ritter both told us there were no WMDs. Ken Clarke said this weekend: "I opposed the Iraq war. I'm not sure whether anybody believed Saddam had weapons of mass destruction that were a threat to anybody. Most American spies didn't believe that, most British spies didn't believe that and most of the Foreign Office didn't believe that".

Nor did the Opposition but it still backed Blair because Conservatives love wars and one against a swarthy potentate was irresistible.

So to Iraqis, the beneficiaries of our noble "sacrifices". This week Nahla Hussein, a left-wing, feminist Kurdish Iraqi, was shot and beheaded for her campaigning zeal. Fifty-seven Iraqis were blown up in Kirkuk. Christians in Mosul are being savagely persecuted and sharia law has replaced the 1959 codified entitlements given to women in family disputes. Women in Iraq have fewer rights today than under Saddam. Yes, there is some normality in parts but tensions between Shias and Sunnis are explosive. When troops are withdrawn next year, expect more bloodshed. The resources of Iraq, meanwhile, are being plundered.

For these blessings, one million Iraqis had to die and their children still suffer from illnesses caused by our weapons and our war. Five million Iraqis are displaced and, of these, the US took in 1,700. It is easier for an Iraqi cat or dog to gain entry to the land of the free. Try Baghdad Pups, which offers (for a hefty fee) to get the adopted pets of US soldiers into America. In 2007, 39,000 Iraqis sought refuge in the EU countries and we took in 300. Sweden, which has no responsibility for the havoc, gave refuge to 18,000.

I have been talking to exiled Iraqis in London. One young man has a child whose mother killed herself after giving birth during the war. He both loves and hates this country, as did Bilal Abdullah, the NHS doctor convicted for dreadful plans to blow up people in the UK. A beautiful Iraqi woman told me her nephew gave plastic flowers to our soldiers when first they went into Basra. Last year, they shot him dead, mistaking him for an enemy.

On Friday, I met an Iraqi artist, Yousif Nasser, whose studio has become a hub for other exiles, artists, musicians and the mentally ill seeking art therapy. A gentle, melancholic man, he showed me his series titled "Black Rain", enormous works depicting the violence in Iraq: "There are no bodies, only pieces, bits, of a little bit of this and that. People don't buy my pictures - they are too dark. How can I tell you what has happened to my country? I have no words, only these images."

I have words, too weak and inadequate to carry the rage felt by millions at the renewed arrogance of the villains who first devastated Iraq and now garland themselves. Lies, lies and now delusion. There is no glory to be salvaged in this desert.

Cheney Lays More Pardon-Pipe

Cheney Lays More Pardon-Pipe by David Latt
The current administration faces a potential tsunami of lawsuits and indictments once it leaves office. For the past 8 years the Bush administration has used claims of Executive Privilege and the power of intimidation to fend off Congressional and prosecutorial investigations, but once out of office their ability to protect themselves will be greatly diminished.

In a series of legacy interviews, soon to be ex-V.P. Dick Cheney argues that history will regard the actions of the Bush administration positively. In an interview with The Washington Times, he turns to the example of Gerald Ford who was vilified for pardoning ex-President Richard Nixon before any zealous prosecutor could pursue him for Watergate-related crimes:

President Ford made a decision that was extraordinarily unpopular at the time when he pardoned former President Nixon. He suffered -- he dropped 30 points in the polls in one week as I recall.


By the time of his passing a couple of years ago, opinion had totally turned on that. In fact, most people by then, even many who had been very critical 30 years before, were in agreement that in fact it was a good decision, it was the right thing to do from the standpoint of the country. ...

I'm personally persuaded that this president and this administration will look very good 20 or 30 years down the road in light of what we've been able to accomplish with respect to the global war on terror.

In the context of the interview, the focus on "the global war on terror" gives Cheney the opportunity to talk about abuse of prisoners and "enhanced interrogation techniques". Denying that either is torture, he goes on to argue that it was morally imperative for he and others to use what some have called "torture" in the pursuit of national security:

Was it torture? I don't believe it was torture. We spent a great deal of time and effort getting legal advice, legal opinion out of the office of legal counsel, which is where you go for those kinds of opinions, from the Department of Justice, as to what the red lines were out there, in terms of, this you can do, this you can't do. ...


You come to the question of morality and ethics. In my mind the foremost obligation we had from a moral or an ethical standpoint was to the oath of office we took when we were sworn in, on Jan. 20 of 2001, to protect and defend against all enemies foreign and domestic. And that's what we've done.

I think it would have been unethical or immoral for us not to do everything we could in order to protect the nation against further attacks like what happened on 9/11. We made the judgment -- the president and I and others -- that wasn't going to happen again on our watch. And I feel very good about what we did, I think it was the right thing to do. If I was faced with those circumstances again I'd do exactly the same thing.

And why is the vice president doing all the talking about the administration's record?

In terms of whether or not [I was] the most powerful and influential [vice president], I'll let somebody else make those judgments. I think, um, I do believe that the vice presidency has been a consequential office, if I can put it in those terms, in this administration. But that's first and foremost because that's what the president wanted.


He's the one who asked me to take the job, he's also the one who decided during the course of the process eight years ago that he wanted somebody who would be another member of the team, who had a certain set of experiences and so forth, who could be an active participant in the process.

If you're a prosecutor pursuing charges against members of the Bush administration for authorizing torture, then you look for a smoking gun that connects individuals with specific activities. Cheney is now on record as one of the officials who authorized the CIA to use waterboarding, among other enhanced interrogation techniques. So you have his own words to use against him.

But in this latest interview Cheney has added a twist to the argument. While seeming to be deferential to his boss, saying "that's what the president wanted," he's actually laying blame clearly at George W. Bush's feet. Whatever he, Cheney, did during the course of 8 years, he did because his president told him to do it. Cheney has laid the blame-pipe right to the door of the Bush White House.

In effect, Dick Cheney is letting George W. Bush know that if there are prosecutions, they won't stop with the VP, they'll lead all the way to the soon to be ex-president. So, in the best traditions of the Republican Party, as exemplified by Gerald Ford and his own father, George W.H. Bush, Bush better pardon all those members of the administration who could be prosecutorial targets, because if you don't, you're only opening the door for them to come after you.

Vice President Cheney has laid his cards on the table and he's a hard-nosed competitor. The only thing that would trump his play would be if President Bush does use his pardon power, but not to pardon Dick Cheney but George W. Bush. Then the game's over and Dick Cheney and the others will be left to deal with whatever history has in store for them.

Why it's legitimate to investigate the Bush lawyers

Why it's legitimate to investigate the Bush lawyers
Lawyers are often asked to offer their views on complicated questions with significant real-world consequences, and the idea that offering the wrong answer could implicate an attorney in criminal wrongdoing is a frightening prospect to many in the profession. It is not surprising, therefore, that lawyers are reluctant to condemn fellow lawyers on the basis of the advice that they give.

But attorneys are hardly the only ones who must make difficult decisions in times of war. American soldiers, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, are duty-bound to obey only lawful orders. Indeed, since the Nuremberg trials, it has been a fundamental precept of international law that soldiers must disobey orders to commit war crimes. If soldiers are supposed to differentiate between lawful and unlawful orders, why should lawyers, who are trained to know the law, have the privilege of never being held accountable if they advise unlawful conduct?

That stance seems especially unwarranted since lawyers can offer legal advice in such a way as to account for differing points of view when addressing controversial legal issues. In fact, lawyers are mandated to at least consider opposing points of view. They may, moreover, refer to moral and political considerations when advising clients, not purely legal ones. And yet John Yoo and other administration attorneys wrote one-sided arguments about crucial aspects of the coercive interrogation policy. It is perfectly legitimate to ask, given the controversial nature of their conclusions and the importance of their work, why they crafted their arguments in the way that they did.