Silent Lucidity

Representative Dennis Kucinich at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, 26 August 2008

It’s Election Day 2008. We Democrats are giving America a wake-up call. Wake up, America. In 2001, the oil companies, the war contractors and the neo-con artists seized the economy and have added 4 trillion dollars of unproductive spending to the national debt. We now pay four times more for defense, three times more for gasoline and home heating oil and twice what we paid for health care.

Millions of Americans have lost their jobs, their homes, their health care, their pensions. Trillions of dollars for an unnecessary war paid with borrowed money. Tens of billions of dollars in cash and weapons disappeared into thin air, at the cost of the lives of our troops and innocent Iraqis, while all the president’s oilmen are maneuvering to grab Iraq’s oil.

Borrowed money to bomb bridges in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. No money to rebuild bridges in America. Money to start a hot war with Iran. Now we have another cold war with Russia, while the American economy has become a game of Russian roulette.

If there was an Olympics for misleading, mismanaging and misappropriating, this administration would take the gold. World records for violations of national and international laws. They want another four-year term to continue to alienate our allies, spend our children’s inheritance and hollow out our economy.

We can’t afford another Republican administration. Wake up, America. The insurance companies took over health care. Wake up, America. The pharmaceutical companies took over drug pricing.

Wake up, America. The speculators took over Wall Street. Wake up, America. They want to take your Social Security. Wake up, America. Multinational corporations took over our trade policies, factories are closing, good paying jobs lost.

Wake up, America. We went into Iraq for oil. The oil companies want more. War against Iran will mean $10-a-gallon gasoline. The oil administration wants to drill more, into your wallet. Wake up, America. Weapons contractors want more. An Iran war will cost 5 to 10 trillion dollars.

This administration can tap our phones. They can’t tap our creative spirit. They can open our mail. They can’t open economic opportunities. They can track our every move. They lost track of the economy while the cost of food, gasoline and electricity skyrockets. They skillfully played our post-9/11 fears and allowed the few to profit at the expense of the many. Every day we get the color orange, while the oil companies, the insurance companies, the speculators, the war contractors get the color green.

Wake up, America. This is not a call for you to take a new direction from right to left. This is call for you to go from down to up. Up with the rights of workers. Up with wages. Up with fair trade. Up with creating millions of good paying jobs, rebuilding our bridges, ports and water systems. Up with creating millions of sustainable energy jobs to lower the cost of energy, lower carbon emissions and protect the environment.

Up with health care for all. Up with education for all. Up with home ownership. Up with guaranteed retirement benefits. Up with peace. Up with prosperity. Up with the Democratic Party. Up with Obama-Biden.

Wake up, America. Wake up, America. Wake up, America.

(more…)

Dutch Documentary (mostly in English with Dutch subtitles) Translation of the first one minute forty seven seconds of this program.

“The war in Iraq is over. The rubble is still smoking while the first dozers are already entering the country. After the coalition forces destroyed Baghdad it is now primarily American companies who are to rebuild Iraq. An interesting point is that these companies usually have people on the payroll who have been politicians. Is this a conflict of interests or a new (global) way of doing business? One of the corporations that work this way is the Carlyle Group. On their payroll are people like : George Bush (Sr.), James Baker III, and old premier John Major. The Carlyle Group is a private investment bank which doesn’t come to the public’s attention very often but it is one of the biggest US investors of the defense industry, telecom, property and financial services. What is the Carlyle Group? Who are the people behind the name? And how much power does Carlyle have?”

48 min 52 sec

On Wednesday the Oversight Committee approved a subpoena for testimony from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice regarding the assertion that Iraq sought to import uranium from Niger. Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman opened debate on the subpoena for the testimony of Secretary Rice during the committee meeting on Wednesday.

Chairman Waxman: “The Administration’s claim that Iraq could pose a nuclear threat was at the center of its case for war. Indeed this assertion was key to the decisions of many Members of Congress, including myself, to support the resolution authorizing the use of force in Iraq. It therefore raised enormously serious questions when Congress and the public learned that there were flaws, not just minor ones but serious flaws, with the intelligence underpinning the Administration’s nuclear case.”

This goes to show that when Bush supporters claim that Congress had the same intelligence that the President or even the Intelligence Committee members did, when they voted for the AUMF, that that intelligence was cherry-picked and blatantly and knowingly FALSE. And the CIA tried to warn them twice in memos and once via telephone call. Those warnings were ignored by Rice and Hadley.

But why stop at Condoleezza Rice with the subpoena? Get Stephen Hadley under oath too.

27 March, The Situation Room, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer asked McCain why Americans still aren’t able to safely leave the Green Zone in Iraq, the senator replied that Blitzer was giving three-month-old talking points.

Michael Ware (in Baghdad) : “Honestly, Wolf, you’ll barely last twenty minutes out there. I don’t know what part of Neverland Senator McCain is talking about when he says we can go strolling in Baghdad.”

More here and here.

Maybe he should go walk around without an armored humvee and attack helicopters outside the Green Zone… just sayin’.

Actually, now that I think about it, he was pwn3d twice in the same day (on the 27th). No wonder his spokespeople didn’t have much to say about the MySpace page incident.

New Rule – Traitors don’t get to question my patriotism.

What could be less patriotic than constantly screwing things up for America? You know, it’s literally hard to keep up with the sheer volume of scandals in the Bush administration. Which is why I like to download the latest scandals right onto my IPod. That way, I can catch up on this week’s giant fuck up on my drive into work.

In fact, Bush has so many scandals he could open a chain of “Bush Scandal and Fuck Up” theme restaurants. Hmmm, should I get the Harriet Miers Meatloaf, or the Katrina Crabcakes?

You know, not to generalize, but the 29 percent of people who still support President Bush are the ones who love to pronounce themselves more patriotic than the rest of us. But just saying you’re patriotic is like saying you have a big cock. If you have to say it, chances are it’s not true. And indeed, the Party that flatters itself that they protect America better is the Party that has exhausted the military, left the ports wide open, and purposefully outed a CIA agent, Valerie Plame. That’s not treason anymore, outing a spy? Did I mention it was one of our spies?

And how despicable that Bush’s lackeys attempted to diminish this crime by belittling her service, like she was just some chick who hung around the CIA. An intern really. Groupie if you want to be mean about it.

No. Big lie.

Valerie Plame was the CIA’s operational officer in charge of counter-proliferation. Which means she tracked loose nukes. So, when Bush said, as he once did, that his absolute, number one priority was preventing terrorists from getting loose nukes, okay, that’s what she worked on. That’s what she devoted her life to. Staying undercover for 20 years. Maintaining two identities every God-damned day. This is extraordinary service to your country. Valerie Plame was the kind of real life secret agent George Bush dreams of being when he’s not too busy pretending to be a cowboy or a fighter pilot.

CIA agents are troops. This was a military assassination of one of our own done through the press, ordered by Karl Rove. He said of Valerie Plame, quote, “She’s fair game,” and then Cheney shot her.

George Bush likes to claim that he doesn’t question his critics’ patriotism, just their judgment. Well, let me be the first of your critics, Mr. President, to question your judgment and your patriotism. Because let’s not forget why they did it to her. Because Valerie Plame was married to this guy Joe Wilson who the Bush people hated because he busted them on one of their bullshit reasons for invading Iraq. He was sent to the African country of Niger to see if Niger was selling nuclear fuel to Iraq. They weren’t. It was bullshit. And he said so. In fact, his report was called, “Niger, Please.”

Valerie Plame’s husband told the truth about their lies, so they were willing to jeopardize an entire network of spies to ruin her life. Wow. Even the mob doesn’t go after your family.

Mark Twain said, “Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.” And I say Valerie Plame is a patriot because she spent her life serving her country. Scooter Libby is not because he spent his life serving Dick Cheney. Valerie Plame kept her secrets. The Bush administration leaked like the plumbing at Walter Reed.

In the year 2008, I really think that Hillary Clinton should run for president on a platform of restoring honor and integrity to the Oval Office.

I don’t agree with Bill about Hillary, but it would be somewhat ironic. BTW, even if you don’t get HBO, you can do a search at YouTube for “maher” and then order by date posted, and that should get you some results for video posted from his show. He’s also keeping a somewhat regular column over at the Huffington Post.