Dowd:

At the very same moment the father was pushing peace, the son was treating the war as a fait accompli. At the American Enterprise Institute, he finally coughed up the real reason for war: trickle-down democracy.

Ha! You know, Dowd may be incredibly irritating what with her, "I hate everything" approach to politic snipery (she is the political world's version of Joan Rivers, only much funnier), but that doesn't mean she isn't damn good at coming up with a clever turn of phrase. "trickle-down democracy" perfect.

So now the Bush administration is spying on security council members who represent the swing votes in the upcoming vote? Lovely. Just Lovely. Didn't we have a President who resigned once because of things like this? And will this be covered by the American media? Or will it be spun down just like every other negative story about these yahoos is spun down? Rhetorical question of course. Whatever happened to my country?

Lies, Damn Lies, and George W. Bush

Ampersand has the dirt via the FAIR bulletin: the Bushies selectively quoted the testimony of an Iraqi defector, hyping the parts they liked and ignoring the parts they didn't (such as the part where he said that all of Iraq's WMD have been destroyed). Oh well, I guess they can be forgiven considering how much they want this war. It's hard not to be selective in your interpretations in situations like this. Even CBS news is guilty of it as well.

Sean-Paul comments on Bush's speech last night and the emerging dream of a post-Saddam democratic Iraq as a beacon of light to the middle-east.

Far be it for me to gloat, but that is exactly what the President is now saying: "Leaders in the region speak of a new Arab charter that champions internal reform, greater political participation, economic openness and free trade. And from Morocco to Bahrain and beyond, nations are taking genuine steps toward political reform. A new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations in the region." The President is not the only one taking this to the road. Rumsfeld gave a speech at the Hoover Institution discussing the difficulties of putting together a coalition to invade Afghanistan before 9/11 happened. On the basis of the evidence we supposeldy had before 9/11 he says: "[I]magine if the president of the United States had had that three or four, five, six, eight, 10 scraps of information possibly, and had gone to the country and the world and said, "We need to invade Afghanistan and overthrow the Taliban and stop the al Qaeda from using Afghanistan as a terrorist training center and root out the al Qaeda terrorist network and other terrorist networks all across the globe, or we run the risk of suffering a September 11th-like attack." How many countries would have joined us in a coalition? Many? Any? Unlikely." He's right. It is an ineffective way to fight a sparse global network of terrorists. It simply won't work. Clinton already tried it. And look at the blame the Right has heaped on him for it. Rumsfeld follows that up with a discussion on the risks of not acting. Read it and you'll see a post-Iraq strategy emerging. The goal of being in Iraq is to compel nations in the region to act in our favor. It puts pressure on the Saudi's, the Iranians, and the Syrians because we are there, patrolling the neighborhood. This is why I support the proposed invasion of Iraq. It isn't the best strategy. But it is the best of a lot of bad choices. It is far from the solution, either. My only concern, and one that is emerging among the conservabloggers, is that this administration will do the same thing in Iraq it did in Afghanistan.

This is the argument that has won Bush the support of people like Thomas Friedman. And, as ideas go, it's not a bad one. Who wouldn't love to see a democratic Iraq being an inspiration for a wave of democratization throughout the middle-east? (Well, not the Saudi royal family and certainly not bin Laden). But, again, the problem always comes down to one if implementation. After all, communism was a "nice idea" (everyone working for everyone else in a worker's paradise) that sucked in reality. Can we trust in the abilities of our leaders to actually make this dream a reality? Can we trust them that this dream is what they really want and that they aren't using it as a gloss on their real motives? I don't trust Bush on either count. He is incompetent and he is corrupt and he will almost certainly screw this up like he has screwed up nearly everything else he has ever done. Given the choice, I'd rather live with Saddam.

Matthew Yglesias has a post up that attempts to explain why he thinks it is still necessary to go after Iraq even considering the fact that the Bush administration has pretty much bungled the lead-up to war.

With all this said, I agree with Ken Pollock that it probably would've been better if the administration hadn't started taking us down this road at all. Regime change needed to happen within the next few years, but perhaps we could have found a more opportune time. That said, if we back down now that's going to make it all-but-impossible to try this again in a couple of years. In addition, it'll make using pure deterrence against Saddam that much harder, since he'll see himself as having "deterred" a US invasion without even acquiring nuclear weapons. So having come this far, I think we still need to do it.

All of this is true. But I still can't get around the fact that it is Bush that is in charge of this effort and that he is such a monumental screwup that, in the balance, a world in which Saddam is allowed to continue to rule in Iraq is better than a world in which Dubya leads the charge to remove him from power. There is no option right now available to us that does not suck. The best we can hope for is to go with the one that sucks the least and, for me, that means no war on Iraq while Bush is in charge. (All of this, of course, with the caveat that external events might change my current thinking on this matter).

Atrios has a post up about an articlea woman wrote about her treatment by pro-war forces when she tried to hold up an anti-war sign during a recent visit to Atlanta.

I never chanted, raised my voice, confronted anyone or was disrespectful to those around me. I simply held my sign and stood my ground. The abuse came first from a small group of homemakers standing near me, their small children dressed in red, white and blue. "Go home! You don't belong here," they said. All around me folks began to speak up, and it wasn't long before a large group of people crossed the street with banners and flags and began aggressively yelling "Go USA!" Bob, a young man with a ball cap and a sign reading "Drop Bush, Not Bombs" came and stood with me for support. The really frightening stuff began when a television cameraman stopped and asked me why I was there. As soon as the crowd saw the camera pointed at me, they went wild. I was trying to express myself and they screamed at me and over my voice. A man stood behind me making obscene gestures as I spoke. The reporter tried three times, unsuccessfully, to get a picture without obscenity. One woman spat in my hair. The journalist gave up and moved on. The mob did not. Men and women violently screamed in my face and Bob's. It stopped just long enough for the president's motorcade to pass by and then erupted again. We were told to " Get the f--- out of the country," had obscene gestures pushed in our faces. An elderly man told me to "Go to hell!"

I would like to contrast this with what I observed during the Jan 19th march in Portland. Over 20,000 anti-war demonstrators marched through the streets of Portland. Along the way, the crowd passed an old man in an army uniform standing on a corner holding a sign saying simply, "support our troops". He never said a word to anyone and, for all the times I went back to check on him, I never saw anyone give him the least bit of grief. This is not to say that no one in the anti-war crowd ever harasses pro-war demonstrators. I just offer this little anecdote as a contrast to the story above. Take from it what you will.

IPS Releases Report on U.S. Arm-twisting Over Iraq War (Washington, DC, February 26, 2003). As U.S. officials intensify their arm-twisting offensive to gather support for a war on Iraq, the Institute for Policy Studies is releasing a new study today that examines the specific levers of U.S. military, economic, and political power. The study, entitled "Coalition of the Willing or Coalition of the Coerced?," looks at how this leverage applies to each current member of the UN Security Council. It also analyzes the power the U.S. government exerts over the broader group of countries that the Bush Administration has dubbed the "Coalition of the Willing." Although the Administration refuses to release a list of the members of this coalition, the authors compiled a list of 34 nations cited in press reports as supporters of the U.S. position on Iraq. Major findings:

• Although the Bush Administration claims that the anonymous "Coalition of the Willing" is the basis of genuine multilateralism, the report shows that most were recruited through coercion, bullying, and bribery.
• The pursuit of access to U.S. export markets is a powerful lever for influence over many countries, including Chile and Costa Rica, both of which are close to concluding free trade deals with the United States; African nations that want to maintain U.S. trade preferences; and Mexico, which depends on the U.S. market for about 80 percent of its export sales.
• The populations of the countries in the so-called "Coalition of the Willing" make up only about 10 percent of the world's population. Opponents of the U.S. position currently include the leading economies of four continents (Germany, Brazil, China, and South Africa).
• President Bush could make or break the chances of Eastern European members of the "Coalition of the Willing" that are eager to become members of NATO. In order for these nations to join the military alliance, Bush must ask the Senate for approval.

The authors of the 13-page study include: IPS UN and Middle East expert Phyllis Bennis, IPS Director John Cavanagh, and IPS Fellow Sarah Anderson. According to Bennis, "It's hardly a new phenomenon for the U.S. to use bribes and threats to get its way in the UN. What's new this time around is the breathtaking scale of those pressures -- because this time around, global public opinion has weighed in, and every government leaning Washington's way faces massive opposition at home."

Definitely worth a look.

Please read this story and tell me in what possible way this can be interepreted other then as proof that there is a bias against liberalism in the establishment media?

Commentary: The Surrender Of MSNBC Written by Rick Ellis, Wednesday, February 25th, 2003 While the official announcement wasn't a surprise to anyone working at the network, MSNBC officially canceled the primetime show "Donahue" on Tuesday, citing disappointing ratings. ... Although Donahue didn't know it at the time, his fate was sealed a number of weeks ago after NBC News executives received the results of a study commissioned to provide guidance on the future of the news channel. That report--shared with me by an NBC news insider--gives an excruciatingly painful assessment of the channel and its programming. Some of recommendations, such as dropping the "America's News Channel," have already been implemented. But the harshest criticism was leveled at Donahue, whom the authors of the study described as "a tired, left-wing liberal out of touch with the current marketplace." The study went on to claim that Donahue presented a "difficult public face for NBC in a time of war......He seems to delight in presenting guests who are anti-war, anti-Bush and skeptical of the administration's motives." The report went on to outline a possible nightmare scenario where the show becomes "a home for the liberal antiwar agenda at the same time that our competitors are waving the flag at every opportunity."

Did you read that? This memo specifically says that allowing a "liberal antiwar agenda" onto the airwaves is a bad thing. In other words, Donohue wasn't fired because his ratings were bad (Chris Mathews are as bad, if not worse). He was fired because the execs at MSNBC would be embarrased to have to defend anti-war rhetoric appearing on their network during a time of war. And this would be bad because...? Hell if I know.

Previously I pointed out an old article from 2000 about research that suggests that incompetence can lead to self-confidence because the incompetent are to incompetent to realize they aren't competent (got that)? Well, Max Sawicky found a quote that concisely covers the bases on this matter:

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." -- Bertrand Russell

Thanks Max. Update: Dre in the comments adds this:

"The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. " -- Yeats

Josh Marshall has been posting teasers about an article he has unearthed that talks about one of the Democratic candidates playing "rough and tumble" with race politics.

Who is the mystery Democratic presidential candidate? The one tagged in the previous post as having his own history of rough-n-tumble race politics? Well, not to paraphrase a certain former senator from Wisconsin, but I have in my hand a copy of an old magazine article covering an earlier point in the candidate's political career. And here's one choice tidbit. It's a quote from a John Metcalf, one of the candidate's campaign workers at the time ... "[Candidate X] has gotten a lot smarter in the last couple of years," says Metcalf. "He learned to play dirty pool. Hell, there are a lot of ethnics out there who want to keep the n----rs on their side of the river. It's a racial issue. There are a lot of bigots in that district and someone has to represent them, let's face it." Let's be clear: that's not a quote from the candidate, but from one of his campaign workers. But the rest of the article paints a similar, if less inflammatory, picture of the style of politics in question. More soon.

I'm not a big fan of teasers whether it is on the evening news or on the web. If you have something to reveal then reveal it. If not then wait until you do. So, I plugged part of the quote Josh gave into google and found the article he is referring to. It was printed in the Cleveland magazine back in April 1972 and recently reprinted as part of their 30th anniversary retrospective. The mystery candidate is none other than Dennis Kucinich. Here's the link for the article, but it didn't come up for me. However, here is the link for the version of it in the google cache. Sorry to pull a Drudge on you Josh. :-) Update: Looks like Atrios beat me to beating the scoop. Ah well. :-)

The lazy dog media:

War and the Press Watchdogs, Lapdogs and Sleeping Dogs by WILL POTTER Journalists like to think of themselves as watchdogs, nipping at the heels of the powerful and guarding democracy. Progressive critics see them as lapdogs for the political and corporate elite. More often reporters are just tired old dogs asleep on the porch. Take a recent Sunday morning adventure at NBC studios in Washington, D.C., where I joined a pack of these wet dogs taking shelter from a downpour in the NBC lobby. The NBC staff wheeled out a TV cart so reporters could watch "Meet the Press" with Tim Russert. Russert interviewed Richard Perle, chairman of the Defense Policy Board (a Pentagon advisory panel charged with overseeing military preparedness), and Rep. Dennis Kucinich, the Ohio Democrat who has emerged as one of the few strong congressional voices against war. It's a Sunday routine: At the end of the show, reporters gather outside the front door and beg the guests for a few soundbite scraps. Until then, they sprawl out on benches in the lobby, absent-mindedly watching the interviews. This is the state of American media, the free press: reporters and camera crews watching an interview on television as it takes place just down the hall. Journalists don't like the ridiculous setup, but they don't have much choice. They have to meet the demands of the corporate media conglomerates they work for, and to do that they have to play the game. Some read newspapers. One takes notes. Another reporter talks on a cell phone to his wife. "Yeah, they're just bickering right now No, I don't know how much longer it will be." They listen to Perle beat the drums of war. It leads to a discussion of democracy. He says that it would be good if Israel were surrounded by democracies. He says it would be good if Iraq were a democracy. "Democracies," Perle says to Russert, "do not engage in aggressive wars." The dogs awake. "What? Is this guy smoking crack?" one reporter nearly shouts. Everyone laughs and nods in agreement. The reporter expressed the frustration and outrage that millions of people around the world know, and what many journalists understand, but almost never articulate. As I watched the interview, I wondered if Russert was also thinking, "What is he smoking?" I hoped he would say, "Well, Mr. Perle, either the laundry list of foreign aggressions in U.S. history (covert actions like those in Guatemala in 1954, proxy aggressions like in Nicaragua in the 1980s, and overt aggressions including Vietnam and Panama) are make-believe, or the United States is not a democracy. Which is it?" Russert never questioned the core of Perle's arguments: his assumptions on democracy, power, and violence. He moved on to the next topic. His silence spoke volumes. The dogs go back to sleep.

The journalists we see on TV and read in the newspaper know it's all bullshit. But they don't dare say so if they want to keep their jobs. You can bet that the dogs will be angrier at Potter for revealing their behind-the-scenes behavior than they will be at those who put them through this daily humiliation.

A little preview of tomorrow's column from Gene Lyons:

Hypocrisy in a politician is universally held to be a very bad thing, religious hypocrisy worst of all. Alas, to Americans holding post-Enlightenment world-views, it has come down to this: either we must earnestly pray that George W. Bush is a cunning opportunist merely throwing hay to the great lowing herd of pious cattle who confuse the evening news with the Book of Revelation, or face the prospect that the United States has embarked upon a faith-based foreign policy as distant from reality as the ranting of Osama bin Laden. Many commentators have noticed that Bush has repeatedly cast the conflict with al Qaeda and Iraq in purely biblical terms--good against evil, "the forces of darkness" against the forces of light, etc. In a speech on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, as Bruce Nolan's article in Sunday's Democrat-Gazette noted, Bush hinted that God was stage-managing the "war on terrorism" for divine purposes. "I believe there is a reason that history has matched this nation with this time," Bush said. According to Bob Woodward's book, "Bush at War" even in one-on-one interviews "[t]he President was casting his mission and that of the country in the grand vision of God's Master Plan." This observation followed Bush's pronouncement that "[w]e will export death and violence to the four corners of the earth in defense of this great country and rid the world of evil." Conquering evil is bin Laden's plan too. Even fighting beside the "socialist infidel" Saddam Hussein, he hinted in a taped statement Feb. 11, was permissible "to establish the rule of God on earth." Quoting the Koran, he assured his followers that "'those who believe fight in the cause of Allah, and those who reject faith fight in the cause of evil.' So fight ye against the friends of Satan: feeble indeed is the cunning of Satan." So have we really been transported back to the 12th century A.D. with Bush as Richard the Lionhearted and Osama/Saddam as Saladin, in a replay of the Third Holy Crusade? We'd better hope not, because although medieval prophets convinced Richard that recapturing Jerusalem from the Muslims would bring about the Second Coming and usher in the millenium, he dragged back to England defeated in 1192.

It's come to this folks. We are lead by a man who openly boasts about exporting death and violence to the rest of the world as if this were a good thing. And the media continues to see this as just more of Bush's pandering to the right-wing crowd.

Courtesy Mrs. Monsky of Table Talk, in reference to a comment about Lord Of The Rings:

The Committee to Reelect Bush in 2004 has released their new slogan, soon to be seen on T-shirts and bumper stickers throughout the red states: ALL WILL LOVE ME -- AND DESPAIR!

Onionitis breaks out in the mainstream press!

News flash! God gives the go-ahead for war White House keeps details classified in order to protect deity's privacy DIANE STINGLEY Special to The Observer President Bush has authorized Secretary of State Colin Powell to convene an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council in order to present new and compelling evidence to win U.N. approval for war with Iraq: God says it's the right thing to do.

Sean-Paul has a new diagram up showing the current leanings of the UN Security Council members on a new Iraq resolution (the one the US wants). From where I read it, Bush is going to have a tough time getting the nine votes he needs to force France to make the decision whether to veto or not. If just one of Pakistan, Cameroon, or Guinea goes the other way his hopes in the UN are sunk. I guess this just proves that even minor parties like Cameroon and Guinea can have a major influence on world events.

This morning we are talking about the disintegration of Bush's credibility. But then, for many of us, Bush never had much credibility to destroy in the first place. We knew he was a liar of the first rank since well before the election debacle. But how about the greek tragedy that is the fall of Colin Powell? Powell, whether you agree with the assessment or not, was considered by many to be the most honest and trustworthy of all the people in Bush's administration. For two years he gave Bush the foreign policy cred he needed not to be immediately laughed off the world stage. Many people would think, "Well, Bush doesn't make any sense, but Powell is standing up there with him and I trust Powell so there must be something there after all." That all ended abruptly with Powell's presentation to the UN. Powell's reputation in the international community has been nearly destroyed by his failed Adalai moment. His presentation utterly failed to impress those who have expressed reservation about the U.S. course. Then it came out that the British intelligence report that Powell praised was based on a decade old plagiarized college thesis and his credibility began to sink like a rock. People began to question whether Powell had completely sold out his reputation for a campaign of lies and distortions. Well, now comes a column from Gilbert Cranberg, former editor of the Des Moines Register, that argues that Powell's report was not only a spin job but may have actually contained false information:

Powell's U.N. report apparently contains false information ... Powell's speech was accompanied by a number of graphics, including drawings said to be based on information provided by various sources. In each instance, the audience was dependent on Powell to describe the significance of the images. He also played the tapes, in Arabic, of two intercepted conversations, which the State Department translated. Powell referenced the conversations and commented on them. In the first cited conversation, between two Iraqi military officers discussing how to conceal from U.N. inspectors a certain "modified vehicle," Powell's account of the conversation squared with the State Department's translation. Powell's version of the second conversation, however, departed significantly from it. This conversation, about possibly forbidden ammunition, was reported by Powell to be between Republican Guard headquarters and an officer in the field. When Powell referred to this conversation, he quoted one of the parties as ostensibly saying, "And we sent you a message yesterday to clean out all of the areas, the scrap areas, the abandoned areas. Make sure there is nothing there." The State Department's transcript of the actual conversation makes it evident that Powell had embellished the quote to make it appear much more incriminating. Instead of being a directive to "clean out all of the areas, the scrap areas and the abandoned areas," as Powell claimed, the transcript shows the message from headquarters was merely "to inspect (emphasis added) the scrap areas and the abandoned areas." The damaging admonition that Powell said he quoted, "Make sure there is nothing there" is not in the transcript and appears to be an invention. Asked to explain the discrepancy, the State Department's press and public affairs offices said I should study Powell's presentation posted on the department's Web site. Instead of clarifying or explaining the discrepancy, the posted material simply confirmed the disparity.

Here's how Powell's states it (official State Deparment link):

SECRETARY POWELL: Let me pause again and review the elements of this message. "They are inspecting the ammunition you have, yes?" "Yes. For the possibility there are forbidden ammo." "For the possibility there is, by chance, forbidden ammo?" "Yes. "And we sent you a message yesterday to clean out all the areas, the scrap areas, the abandoned areas. Make sure there is nothing there. Remember the first message: evacuate it." This is all part of a system of hiding things and moving things out of the way and making sure they have left nothing behind. You go a little further into this message and you see the specific instructions from headquarters: "After you have carried out what is contained in this message, destroy the message because I don't want anyone to see this message." "Okay." "Okay."

And here is how it is in the official state department transcript of the conversation (official State Department link):

Iraq: Failing to Disarm: Transcript of Iraqi Conversation -- Ammunition Lt. Col: Sir ... Col. Yes. Lt. Col: There is a directive of the [Republican] Guard Chief of Staff at the conference today ... Col. Yes. Lt. Col. They are inspecting the ammunition you have. Col. Yes. Lt. Col. for the possibility there are forbidden ammo. Col. Yes? Lt. Col. For the possibility there is by chance, forbidden ammo. Col. Yes. Lt. Col. And we sent you a message to inspect the scrap areas and the abandoned areas. [no "make sure there is nothing there"] Col. Yes. Lt. Col. After you have carried out what is contained in the message ... destroy the message. Col. Yes. Lt. Col. Because I don't want anyone to see this message. Col. Okay okay. Col. Thanks. Lt. Col. Goodbye.

What's amazing about this is that the evidence of Powell's distortion is right there in the official State Department transcript. Yet it took weeks for someone to notice this discrepency. Cranberg concludes:

Powell went out of his way to assure the Security Council of his report's integrity: "My colleagues, every statement I make today is backed up by sources, solid sources. These are not assertions." Granted, Powell could not reveal the identities of spies and other hidden sources. Unnamed sources when cited by the government, however, may be no more credible than anonymous sources generally, and they ought to be regarded as especially suspect. Nevertheless, columnists at The New York Times and The Washington Post accepted everything Powell said without a smidgen of skepticism, calling it a "masterful indictment" (James Hoagland) "that would convince any jury" (William Safire). Nor am I aware that any news organization has called attention to the government's evident fabrication.

(Link to this story courtesy of the Daily Howler).

Yet more examples of thuggish diplomacy

U.S. officials using back channels to push for U.N. votes By DAFNA LINZER, Associated Press Published 3:22 p.m. PST Monday, February 24, 2003 ... "The order from the White House was to use 'all diplomatic means necessary,'" another U.S. diplomat said. "And that really means everything." The wording of the order is a twist on "all means necessary," - the diplomatic terminology that authorizes going to war. In the past three weeks, U.S. and Mexican officials said, on condition of anonymity, that Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman and Kim Holmes, the assistant secretary of state for international organizations visited Mexico City. Mexican diplomats described the visits as hostile in tone and complained that Washington was demonstrating little concern for the constraints of the Mexican government whose people are overwhelmingly opposed to a war with Iraq. "They actually told us, 'Any country that doesn't go along with us will be paying a very heavy price,'" one Mexican diplomat said. Charles Barclay, spokesman for the State Department's Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, said neither Grossman nor Holmes had traveled to Mexico. Even so, he said, "we've expressed our opinion to Mexico on how important this issue is and we hope for their support. Certainly there has been no arm twisting," Barclay said. Mexican diplomats stood by their account of the trip and the conversations.

So. Not only are we threatening our allies we are lying about those threats. Welcome to Pax Americana.

Sean-Paul has an interesting post up about a Strafor report that, if true, could throw the entire Bush war operation into chaos. The report says that Hussein has agreed to the French/German/Russian plan and has agreed to turn over the missiles that Blix has ordered destroyed. This is all good news. But there is also a report that Blair has "received the idea favorably". It may be that Blair has decided to grab his last chance to save himself from going over the cliff with Bush. If he does then Dubya will be in the most awkward of positions. There is the real danger that Bush will go ahead anyway just in order to preserve his manhood. In which case, the world needs to find a way to let Bush retreat while still saving face. Now THAT is what I call a diplomatic challenge!

It seems that lies are the theme of the day around the blogosphere. Here's an essay by P.M. Carpenter that discusses the woeful state of Bush's credibility. And what about the Democrats? When it was evident to many, even before the election, that Bush has a credibility problem, the Democrats acted like he could be trusted. Now they are finally starting to push the theme of Bush's "Credibility Gap". They are, as usual, a few years behind the curve. The gap was what Bush had two years ago. Right now it is more like an abyss.

David Warren has an interesting essay up on the question of telling the truth (courtesy Jane Galt). While the column is critical of the naivete of the anti-war protestors and perhaps more generous about the motives of the Bush administration than I would be (to say the least), I generally find myself in agreement with his main point.

Notwithstanding, the sheer complexity of the State's position requires a higher order of truth-telling than would be convenient in private affairs. It is more, not less necessary, in a free country, if the electors themselves are to confront realities instead of illusions. And the power of that State rests, ultimately, on its transparency and truth. The U.S. won the Cold War because, on balance, it told the truth, and on balance the Soviets told lies. It would have won it rather sooner telling something like the whole truth on all occasions. And likewise today, truth remains the ultimate weapon of free men, as lies are the weapons of tyrants. Truth is courage, lies are cowardice, and the victory is finally to the true.

Unfortunately, we are lead by people who believe that the truth is a commodity to be doled out only to close friends and business associates (and, even then, only if they can profit by it). Otherwise, they believe in holding back the truth until forced to do otherwise. Consider how much closer the world would be in (grudging) agreement with the U.S. on Iraq if the Bush administration had just been more willing to be honest in its presentation. Instead it has adopted the attitude of the dictator that believes that questioning is a form of rebellion and must therefore be squashed. Bush is both and idiot and a liar. He is an idiot because he is a liar. Very rarely have we seen a leader so adept at doing just the wrong thing at the wrong time to piss of so many who would otherwise be sympathetic to his cause. Bush had the entire world in his pocket on 9/12/2001. He has squandered that goodwill even more effectively then his daddy did after Gulf War I. And why? Because he can't be honest for the life of him. He can't tell the truth even when the truth is no great danger to him. That is why he is an idiot. It's the lies that have driven a wedge between this administration and the world it is allegedly trying to lead. It is the lies that will ultimately destroy it. The only question remaining is whether they will destroy the rest of us in the process.

Democrats say: "Oh! We're the opposition party! Why didn't someone tell us?"

Caught on Film: The Bush Credibility Gap The Photographic History of the Bush Administration Putting Its Mouth Where Its Money Isn�t There have been some worry warts in the Democratic ranks who think that attacking Bush's character will backfire because people think so highly of the guy. Well, maybe these people need to wonder why he got such a high character quotient in the first place. Could it be because no one attacked him on his character when such attacks were more than legitimate? Naaahhh! Still, all in all, it's nice to see the Democrats finally starting to take it to the man.

Just another thought on the suggestion that anti-war bloggers don't take the threat of terrorism seriously. I think the reason why this comment struck me so wrong is the same reason I find the Bushies approach to foreign policy so offensive: it insults the intelligence and maturity of the people who may have an honest disagreement with you, thus reducing the argument to one of schoolyard taunts instead of reasoned discourse. The Bush administration is attempting to assert that they are the arbiters of what is a "legitimate" response to Saddam Hussein by suggesting that a UN security counsel vote that goes against the US is, by definition, illegitimate. They, quite simply, do not have the right to make that kind of declaration. Similarly, pro-war bloggers do not have to right to assert that the only reason anti-war bloggers are anti-war is because they don't take the threat of Saddam Hussein seriously enough. Of course there are people on both sides who are stupid immature on these matters. But is it really necessary to resort to characterizing all opposing opinion as being sub-par in order to get your own point across? I do not claim to be pure on these matters. I'm sure I've made more then my share of disparaging comments about "the other side". But I have at least tried to make a point of asserting that the arguments of those who favor an invasion of Iraq are not all asinine. Indeed, I have said repeatedly that I could support such an action if presented in the right way and lead by people that I felt I could trust. And that is what really pisses me off about this whole situation. I feel that I have no choice but to oppose the Bush administrations drive for war because I am convinced that it will produce a far more dangerous world than we already live in. But, at the same time, I know that by opposing this action I probably set back by years, if not decades, the cause to resolve Iraq question once and for all. In other words, I am in the unenviable position of making an argument that does provide comfort to Saddam Hussein even if that is not the intent with which it is given. And I blame that awful fact entirely on the ineptitude, lies, and corruption of the present administration. Anyway, I hope that "the other side" can see that the choice to be opposed to this war is not an easy one for many of us. But it is a course that many of us see as being unavoidable precisely because we take the threat of terrorism so seriously. Interesting times indeed.

Patrick Nielsen Hayden responds to Kevin Drum's comment that his "sense from reading the anti-war left is that they don�t really take the danger of terrorism and unstable states seriously.� The comment was insulting to people who have an honest disagreement about the Bushies plans for war. Patrick rightly takes him to task for it. Having said that, I do NOT consider Kevin to be in the "anti-war = loony leftist" camp of thought. I think he is trying to express an honest impression based on his reading of anti-war blogs. But I would hope he can understand why so many might find his comment insulting since it seems to suggest that only those on the pro-war side take the threat of terrorism seriously. I don't think he really believes that.

Paul Krugman makes clear what is the moral of the Turkish situation: it is the most clear cut example yet of Bush's lack of credibility on the world stage since even our closest allies consider his word to be worthless. Krugman points to another example:

Consider the astonishing fact that Vicente Fox, president of Mexico, appears unwilling to cast his U.N. Security Council vote in America's favor. Given Mexico's close economic ties to the United States, and Mr. Fox's onetime personal relationship with Mr. Bush, Mexico should have been more or less automatically in America's column. But the Mexican president feels betrayed. He took the politically risky step of aligning himself closely with Mr. Bush � a boost to Republican efforts to woo Hispanic voters � in return for promised reforms that would legalize the status of undocumented immigrants. The administration never acted on those reforms, and Mr. Fox is in no mood to do Mr. Bush any more favors.

I've noticed this as well. I've also noticed the lack of comment on this in the national press. Prior to Bush becoming President there was no world leader closer to him then Fox. Bush used his relationship with Fox to demonstrate that he wasn't entirely clueless about world affairs (the fact that Mexico shares a big border with Texas had something to do with this of course). Yet even his good buddy Fox (and his soul brother Putin) have turned against him. The only world leader of any name that is still with Bush is Tony Blair, and that increasingly appears to be simply because Blair has gone so far over the cliff with Dubya that he realizes his only hope for survival is to stick it out and hope for the best. We can but hope that there is enough muscle and enough will in the rest of the world to stop this madman.

(Link courtesy Mathew Gross)

U.S. Officials Say U.N. Future At Stake in Vote Bush Message Is That a War Is Inevitable, Diplomats Say As it launches an all-out lobbying campaign to gain United Nations approval, the Bush administration has begun to characterize the decision facing the Security Council not as whether there will be war against Iraq, but whether council members are willing to irrevocably destroy the world body's legitimacy by failing to follow the U.S. lead, senior U.S. and diplomatic sources said.

You hear that boys and girls? It is now the unofficial policy of the United States that the legitimacy of any international body is dependent solely on whether it follows the U.S. lead or not. If it dares to contradict us, then it is, by Bush definition, illegitimate. Amazing isn't? Not only does he claim legitimacy that he does not have and never will have, he also claims the authority to define what legitimacy means for the rest of the world. We really are just peons in the minds of these people.

In meetings yesterday with senior officials in Moscow, Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton told the Russian government that "we're going ahead," whether the council agrees or not, a senior administration official said. "The council's unity is at stake here." A senior diplomat from another council member said his government had heard a similar message and was told not to anguish over whether to vote for war. "You are not going to decide whether there is war in Iraq or not," the diplomat said U.S. officials told him. "That decision is ours, and we have already made it. It is already final. The only question now is whether the council will go along with it or not."

If this is indeed what the Bushies are doing then the other countries on the Security Council are obligated to vote against the resolution specifically in order to protect the integrity of the United Nations. If they cave then they will be essentially abdicating their role and allowing that the UN is nothing more than a rubber stamp for American adventurism. Bush needs to be taught that he cannot dictate to the world what will be done. And, if he tries, he should be soundly slapped. If they don't then they will be appeasing a dictator. The world awaits to see if the security council members will have spines more resiliant than those of the Democrats in congress after the 2000 election.

Apologies for the lack of updates. I plead both an increased work load, outrage overload, and the fact that I just don't feel like blogging unless I really have something to say. Just giving out links is kind of pointless when much more popular blogs usually beat me to it. When inspiration strikes again I will write again. See you then.