Lydia Cornell: UPCOMING GUESTS on our show: Bill Press & Senators Tom Daschle, Arlen Specter and Lincoln Chaffee

Saturday, April 12, 2008

UPCOMING GUESTS on our show: Bill Press & Senators Tom Daschle, Arlen Specter and Lincoln Chaffee

MUST READ!!

WHO ELSE LIED US INTO INVADING IRAQ? Behind Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand

In the summer of 2005, the Bush administration confronted a fresh wave of criticism over Guantánamo Bay. The detention center had just been branded “the gulag of our times” by Amnesty International, there were new allegations of abuse from United Nations human rights experts and calls were mounting for its closure.

The administration’s communications experts responded swiftly. Early one Friday morning, they put a group of retired military officers on one of the jets normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney and flew them to Cuba for a carefully orchestrated tour of Guantánamo.

To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

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Trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. - John Adams

Don't miss the HBO miniseries JOHN ADAMS, produced by Tom Hanks Playtone Prods. This is a riveting production that vividly depicts the struggle in giving birth to our nation. Abigal Adams is one of my favorite revolutionary heroes.
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More on the ABC Obama- Clinton debate debacle below... Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopolous spent 50 minutes on embarrassingly petty attacks and blatant character assassination — mostly aimed at Obama. It makes you wonder which side the mainstream media is on.
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Progressive Valerie Bertinell's book remains firmly on the New York Times Bestseller list...

If you missed it last Monday, check the archives for our interview with Valerie Bertinelli on the award-winning Basham and Cornell Radio Show heard weekday mornings at 8 a.m. on 1230 AM KLAV in Las Vegas, and simulcast worldwide on the web.

Valerie Bertinelli. Then: bubbly sitcom star and America's Sweetheart turned tabloid headline and rock star wife. Now: actress, single working mother of teenage rock star, and weight-loss inspiration to millions.

UPCOMING GUESTS: Bill Press, Senators Tom Daschle, Lincoln Chaffee and Arlen Specter. If you live in Vegas you can tune in Live or go to our website and listen in the audio archives.

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on KLAV 1230 AM Radio live in Las Vegas. Again, all shows are simulcast worldwide on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at Basham and Cornell Radio If you've missed our show, check out the audio archives. We have interviewed John & Elizabeth Edwards, Dennis & Elizabeth Kucinich, John Dean, Pat Buchanan, NBC Bureau Chief in Tel Aviv Martin Fletcher, Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage, Congressman Charlie Rangel,Valerie Plame, Christine Pelosi, Dahr Jamail, Senator Mike Gravel; Senator Byron Dorgan; bestselling authors Greg Palast, Paul Krugman, Greg Anrig.
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Let's get Obama and Clinton together! An unbeatable ticket...

Debate moderators abuse the public trust every time they ask trivial questions about gaffes and 'gotchas' that only political insiders care about. Enough with the distractions—ABC and other networks must focus on issues that affect people's daily lives."

Did you watch ABC's prime-time character assassination of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton last night?

The day after this disastrous "debate," Americans are shaking their heads in disbelief at what they witnessed, sarcastically speculating whether ABC News decided to launch an early roll-out of the Republican "swift boat" campaign. Editor & Publisher called it "perhaps the most embarrassing performance by the media in a major presidential debate in years."

"Moderators George Stephanopolous and Charlie Gibson spent the first 50 minutes obsessed with distractions that only political insiders care about--gaffes, polling numbers, the stale Rev. Wright story, and the old-news Bosnia story. And, channeling Karl Rove, directed a video question to Barack Obama asking if he loves the American flag or not. Seriously."

It's worse than that -- the video question specifically asked Obama about his thoughtful reluctance to wear an American flag-pin lapel. Apparently, wearing a flag pin is a legitimate symbolic proxy for whether or not a person is patriotic enough to be President. Questions about global warming, the economy, and the war? Mere trivialities in ABC's bizarro world.

Sad News: I received this letter from my friend Alison on Saturday:

"I am writing to you to let you know that my brother, Mark Metherell (also
the brother-in-law of Henry and Tori Cloud if you know them) was killed yesterday by a roadside bomb in Iraq while on a mission.

He leaves behind his loving wife, Sara Metherell, and their 1 year old adopted daughter, Cora. Please keep them in your prayers. They were the love of his life. He was kind and compassionate as evidenced by his many good friends.

Mark was an ex-Navy SEAL. I couldn't have asked for a better brother. He was the only son of my
parents, Pam and Alex Metherell. Please keep them in your prayers as well.

Mark Metherell is a true American hero, who died in service to this great country. God Bless him and his family.
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More on Valerie Bertinelli:
We all knew and loved Valerie Bertinelli years ago when she played girl-next-door cutie Barbara Cooper in the hit TV show One Day at a Time, and then starred in numerous TV movies. From wholesome primetime in America's living rooms, Valerie moved to late nights with the hardest-partying band of the decadent eighties when she became, at twenty, wife to rock guitarist Eddie Van Halen. Losing It is Valerie's frank account of her life backstage and in the spotlight. Here are the ups and downs of teen stardom, of her complicated marriage to a brilliant, tormented musical genius, and of her very public struggle with her weight.

Surprising, uplifting, and empowering, Losing It takes you behind the scenes of Valerie's acting career and marriage, recalling the comforts, friendships, and problems of her television family, her close relationships with her parents and brothers, the stress and worries of being the wife of a rock star, and the joys of motherhood. Like many women, Valerie often remembers the state of her life by the food she ate and the numbers on her scale. So despite her celebrity, Valerie's voice is down-to-earth, honest, and appealing. Funny and candid, Valerie recounts her attempts to maintain a healthy self-image while dealing with social pressures to look and act a certain way, and to overcome career insecurities and relationship problems, all of which will be familiar to the hundreds of thousands of women who struggle every day with these same issues.

From marital turmoil to the joys of a new career, from being named among Penthouse's ten sexiest women in the world to overhearing whispers about her weight gain in the grocery store, this is Valerie's inspiring journey as she finds new love, raises a terrific kid, and motivates other women as a spokesperson for Jenny Craig.

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern). All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at Basham and Cornell Radio

Labels: Basham and Cornell, Bill Press, Tom Daschle, Valerie Bertinelli

133 Comments:

Lydia Cornell and Valerie Bertinelli on the same radio program? All we need is Erin Moran and Jill Whelan and my childhood dream team would be complete

By MCH, at 12:22 PM
Hmm, have you seen Erin Moran recently?

By BARTLEBEE, at 2:48 PM
I'm not being mean here. She was on some reality thing where she was just a mess.

She's not little "shortcake" anymore.

:|

..aaaaaaayyyyyyyyyy......

By BARTLEBEE, at 6:59 PM
Valerie Bertinelli on the other hand is looking pretty sweet.

By BARTLEBEE, at 6:59 PM
It's Obama, stupid: Carter and Gore to end Clinton bid

DEMOCRAT grandees Jimmy Carter and Al Gore are being lined-up to deliver the coup de grâce to Hillary Clinton and end her campaign to become president.
Falling poll numbers and a string of high-profile blunders have convinced party elders that she must now bow out of the primary race.

Former president Carter and former vice-president Gore have already held high-level discussions about delivering the message that she must stand down for the good of the Democrats.

"They're in discussions," a source close to Carter told Scotland on Sunday. "Carter has been talking to Gore. They will act, possibly together, or in sequence."

An appeal by both men for Democrats to unite behind Clinton's rival, Barack Obama, would have a powerful effect, and insiders say it is a question of when, rather than if, they act.

Obama has an almost unassailable lead in the battle for nomination delegates, and is closing the gap with Clinton in her last stronghold, Pennsylvania, which votes on April 22.

Clinton remains publicly defiant, insisting she will continue the battle with Obama all the way to the Democratic convention in August – when superdelegates, or party top brass, will have the chance to add their weight to primary votes.

But the party's top brass have concluded her further participation in the race can only harm the party as Republican nominee John McCain strives to take advantage of her increasingly bitter battle with Obama.

Both Carter and Gore occupy the rarefied position of elder statesmen – in addition to their White House past, both are winners of the Nobel Peace Prize, giving them additional gravitas to carry the party with them.

Neither of them is likely to object to the role of bringing down the curtain on Clinton. While neither man has formally endorsed either her or Obama, both have clashed in the past with the Clintons.

Gore blames his loss to George Bush in the 2000 presidential election on the impeachment of Clinton triggered by his White House affair with Monica Lewinsky.

Carter, who has carved out a successful career as an international mediator, is believed to detest the flashy style of the Clintons. He recently told an interviewer that his entire family are committed Obama supporters.

A number of options are being considered by the higher echelons of the Democrats, but they fall roughly into two categories. One is for Carter and Gore to go to Clinton privately and ask her to step down. The other is for both men to appear in public and endorse Obama – a move which would see a majority of superdelegates go with them.

The campaign to force Clinton to make an early exit is being masterminded in Congress, home to the most influential of the superdelegates. Senate Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have called on superdelegates to hold an unofficial congress in early June to anoint a winner, rather than waiting for the convention in Denver.

Pelosi has drawn withering fire from the Clinton camp for saying that these superdelegates must follow the national vote, with Clinton insisting that they should "vote with their conscience".

All I can add is it is about time.

The Clintons would rather destroy the party then let somebody else beat them, and she isn't the future of the democratic party.

By clif, at 9:13 PM
Voltron said ... "May take a while. Last I heard Carter was off to have tea with his good buddies in Hamas..."

It's called Diplomacy. You know, that thing that leaders are supposed to use?

By MCH, at 6:58 AM
Heard about that reality show but haven't seen it. However, I did catch the little reuinion on the Today Show a few weeks back and Erin looked pretty good there

By MCH, at 6:59 AM
My friend's brother was killed in Iraq yesterday, by a roadside bomb.

Please keep his family in your prayers. His picture is posted on the front of blog.

Please caucus today for your delegate if you live in Southern California.

By LydiaCornell, at 3:03 PM
I am sorry to hear about Mark Metherell. My thoughts are with his family. I am pretty nervous for my own son because of those damn things.
Valerie while the layman may think has had a privileged life she made it hard and I am glad to see she is doing well!

By an average patriot, at 3:35 PM
That was so sad about Mark Metherell, awful...please let us know if there is anything we can do, or an account set up for his family.....so so sad....

Namaste...

By enigma4ever, at 8:11 PM
Pope won't break bread with Bush

The White House has scheduled a dinner next week in honor of Pope Benedict XVI's first visit to the United States, but one guest will be conspicuously absent from the proceedings: the pope himself.

There are no competing events listed on the pope's schedule, and the White House was unable to explain Benedict's absence from the dinner.

Man you have to be some sort of world class a$$hole if the Pope don't wanna break da bread with ya,

either that or a world class war criminal.

By clif, at 11:36 PM
This pope has known of a few world class war criminals in his time.

By clif, at 11:42 PM
No benefit

By clif, at 11:43 PM
AP and Enigma -- thank you for your kind words. I gave a tribute to Mark on today's show before we ran the Valerie interview.

America is gaining its senses. The Dalai Lama filled 50,000 seats in Seattle for the Compassion Conference -- and The Green Event was filled to capacity.

We are taking it outside, gathering our forces for peace.

By Lydia Cornell, at 9:52 AM
Lydia
I think America is starting to get it. I see in PA. the people are saying they are peeved and are not backing away from Obama. Nor are the newspapers or the Super Delegate both of which he has picked up since the latest disinformation campaign.
Anyway speaking of the compassion conference. Last night between Obama and Hillary, I am not sure how it went or what they called it exactly but I was happy to see that McCain turned down his invitation to it.

By an average patriot, at 1:20 PM
Lydia:
thanks for mentioning the Dalai's trip to Seattle- the Seeds of Compassion Conference at Seattle....good news , I am so glad that it sold out and filled- warms my heart- and I know that now more than ever he NEEDS our support...

I will listen to your show tonight...( I listen to them from the archives ;-)

Valerie's Book is excellent by the way ( I am reading that and "Escaped" by Carolyn Jessop at the same time- they are both excellent books about Women Finding themselves- their idenities......)

By enigma4ever, at 3:41 PM
The Coming War with Iran:

It's About the Oil, Stupid

World civilization is based on oil. The world is running out of oil. The oil companies and governments are not telling the truth about how close we are to the end. Dick Cheney knew about peak oil back in 1999 when he spoke to the London Petroleum Institute as Halliburton CEO. He predicted it would come in 2010. After that it's just a matter of years before it runs out. Whoever controls the remaining oil determines who lives and who dies.

Sixty percent of this oil is under a triangular area of the Middle East the size of Kansas. In that speech Cheney said: "The Middle East with two thirds of the world's oil and the lowest cost, is still where the prize ultimately lies."

This small Middle East triangle encompasses the northeast of Saudi Arabia, all of Iraq and the southwestern part of Iran, along with Kuwait, Qatar and the Emirates. The US controls Iraq. It has friendly governments in the other states.

Iran is the exception. The US now surrounds Iran.

Controlling an area the size of Kansas shouldn't be a problem for the U.S. military, except that it is heavily populated and many people in the triangle don't want the Americans there and are willing to fight.

It's been known for at least thirty years that America needs alternative energy sources. But instead of an alternative energy plan we got the invasion of Iraq by oilmen wedded to a dying business, willing to kill hundreds of thousands to cling to the last drop. The US is never leaving the region or withdrawing from Iraq. McCain is right about staying, but 100 years is too long. The oil won't last that long.

Iran is next. Lieberman set up Petraeus to testify last week that Iranian-backed groups are murdering hundreds of American servicemen in Iraq. On Friday Gates called Iran's influence in Iraq "malign" and Bush said if Iran keeps meddling in Iraq "then we'll deal with them." They are building their case for war with resolutions in the Senate and at the UN. It's only western Iran, from the Iraq border to 150 miles inside the country that the U.S. will have to occupy. That's where Iran's oil is. But the U.S. will have a nasty battle on their hands in Iran even if they restore a Shah-like puppet in Tehran 30 years after the revolution.

The Saudis would not mind seeing the Iranian regime go. But the Saudis may also be on the list. The US may have to destabilize and control Saudi Arabia some day too. The Wall Street Journal a few years ago revealed that in the 1970s under Nixon, Kissinger had plans drawn up for the US invasion and occupation of the Saudi oil fields. Those plans can be dusted off.

The American oil wars are being launched out of weakness, not strength. The American economy is teetering and without control of the remaining oil it will collapse. There will be massive chaos in any case, when only enough oil remains for the American elite and whomever they choose to share it with.

That will leave an oil-starved China and India, both with nuclear weapons, with no alternative but to bow to America or go to war.

It's not about greed any more. It's about survival. Because the leadership of this country was initially too greedy to switch from oil to solar, wind, geothermal and other renewable alternatives, it may now be too late. Had the hundreds of billions of dollars poured into the invasion and occupation of Iraq been put into alternative energy the world might have had a fighting chance. Now that is far from certain.

What is certain is that these wars are not about democracy. They are not about WMD. The coming one will not even be about Iran's nuclear weapons project. It's about the oil, stupid.

By clif, at 4:59 PM
Financial Collapse will End the Occupation:

By Mike Whitney [with comments]

“Come and see our overflowing morgues and find our little ones for us...
You may find them in this corner or the other, a little hand poking out, pointing out at you...
Come and search for them in the rubble of your "surgical" air raids, you may find a little leg or a little head...pleading for your attention.
Come and see them amassed in the garbage dumps, scavenging morsels of food...
Come and see, come..." "Flying Kites” Layla Anwar

And it won't be "A time of our choosing"

The US Military has won every battle it has fought in Iraq, but it has lost the war. Wars are won politically, not militarily. [Just like Vietnam] Bush doesn't understand this. He still clings to the belief that a political settlement can be imposed through force. But he is mistaken.[Considering he used poppy's connections to avoid service in Vietnam, and spent most of that time drunk or coked up that is easy to understand.] The use of overwhelming force has only spread the violence and added to the political instability. Now Iraq is ungovernable. Was that the objective? [From Cheney's point of view, probably] Miles of concrete blast-walls snake through Baghdad to separate the warring parties;[Just like in Israel, where the Israeli government tries to use large concrete walls to control the Palestinians] the country is fragmented into a hundred smaller pieces each ruled by local militia commanders. [Hmmm Afghanistan after the failure of the soviet occupation?] These are the signs of failure not success. That's why the American people no longer support the occupation. They're just being practical; they know Bush's plan won't work. As Nir Rosen says, “Iraq has become Somalia”. [Or Vietnam circa 1972, or Afghanistan circa 1989, or Yugoslavian circa 1991]

The administration still supports Iraqi President Nouri al Maliki, [What choice does Bush ET Al have, he can't overthrow his hand picked puppet can they? Oh right the US did that in Vietnam in 1963] but al-Maliki is a meaningless figurehead who will have no effect on the country's future. He has no popular base of support and controls nothing beyond the walls of the Green Zone. The al-Maliki government is merely an Arab facade designed to convince the American people that political progress is being made, but there is no progress. Its a sham. The future is in the hands of the men with guns; they're the ones who have divided Iraq into locally-controlled fiefdoms and they are the one's who will ultimately decide who will rule the state. At present, the fighting between the factions is being described as “sectarian warfare”, but the term is intentionally misleading. The fighting is political in nature; the various militias are competing with each other to see who will fill the vacuum left by the removal of Saddam. It's a power struggle. The [right wing corporate controlled] media likes to portray the conflict as a clash between half-crazed Arabs--"dead-enders and terrorists"---who relish the idea killing their countrymen, but that's just a way of demonizing the enemy. [How Rovian of them.] In truth, the violence is entirely rational; it is the inevitable reaction to the dissolution of the state and the occupation by foreign troops. Many military experts predicted that there would be outbreaks of fighting after the initial invasion, but their warnings were shrugged off by clueless politicians and the cheerleading media.[ like Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, who attacked Gen Shinseki for telling congress we need many more troops to stabilize Iraq after invading it. Like Cheney who claimed we would be greated as liberators NOT invaders or occupiers, but what the hell does he know he got 5 deferments from Vietnam, thought he did shoot an innocent man in the face years later. Like "Bloody" Bill Kristol who couldn't find a big enough lie about Iraq even after 5 years of failure or Judy Miller of the NYT who whored her profession in service of the war mongers in Bush's Administration] Now the violence has flared up again in Basra and Baghdad, and there is no end in sight. Only one thing seems certain, Iraq's future will not be decided at the ballot box. Bush has made sure of that.

The US military does not rule Iraq nor does it have the power to control events on the ground. [Even with all the surge talk] It's just one of many militias vieing for power in a state that is ruled by warlords. After the army conducts combat operations, it is forced to retreat to its camps and bases. [Just like in Vietnam, take a hill then return to base, and go take the very same hill next week. Only this time it is a street corner, or section of a town.] This point needs to be emphasized in order to understand that there is no real future for the occupation. The US simply does not have the manpower to hold territory or to establish security. In fact, the presence of American troops incites violence because they are seen as forces of occupation, not liberators. Survey's show that the vast majority of the Iraqi people want US troops to leave.[ like around 90%] The military has destroyed too much of the country and slaughtered too many people to expect that these attitudes will change anytime soon. Iraqi poet and blogger Layla Anwar sums up the feelings of many of the war's victims in a recent post on her web site "An Arab Women's Blues":

"At the gates of Babylon the Great, you are still struggling, fighting away, chasing this or the other, detaining, bombing from above, filling up morgues, hospitals, graveyards and embassies and borders with quesesfor exit-visas.

Not one Iraqi wishes your presence. Not one Iraqi accepts your occupation.

Got news for you Motherf**kers, you will never control Iraq, not in six years, not in ten years, not in 20 years....You have brought upon yourself the hate and the curse of all Iraqis, Arabs and the rest of the world...now face your agony." (Layla Anwar; "An Arab Women's Blues: Reflections in a sealed bottle"

Is Bush hoping to change the mind of Layla or the millions of other Iraqis who have lost loved ones or been forced into exile or seen their country and culture crushed beneath the bootheel of foreign occupation? [ No he is just trying to force them to do what HE and his neo-con ilk want, he doesn't give a good god damned what they really think, no more then he does care what we all think. Neither does Cheney he has made that very plain.] The hearts and minds campaign is lost. The US will never be welcome in Iraq.

According to a survey in the British Medical Journal "Lancet" more than a million Iraqis have been killed in the war. Another four million have been either internally-displaced or have fled the country. But the figures tell us nothing about the magnitude of the disaster that Bush has caused by attacking Iraq. The invasion is the greatest human catastrophe in the Middle East since the Nakba in 1948. Living standards have declined precipitously in every area---infant mortality, clean water, food-security, medical supplies, education, electrical power, employment etc. Even oil production is still below pre-war levels. The invasion is the most comprehensive policy failure since Vietnam; everything has gone wrong. The heart of the Arab world has descended into chaos. The suffering is incalculable.

The main problem is the occupation; it is the primary catalyst for violence and an obstacle to political settlement. As long as the occupation persists, so will the fighting. [Tell that to McCain, he thinks the occupation is a good thing, he wants decades more of it.] The claims that the so-called surge has changed the political landscape are greatly exaggerated. Retired Lt. General William Odom commented on this point in an interview on the Jim Lerher News Hour:

"The surge has sustained military instability and achieved nothing in political consolidation....Things are much worse now. And I don't see them getting any better. This was foreseeable a year and a half ago. And to continue to put the cozy veneer of comfortable half-truths on this is to deceive the American public and to make them think it is not the charade it is.....When you say that the Lebanization of Iraq is taking place, yes, but not because of Iran, but because the U.S. went in and made this kind of fragmentation possible. And it has occurred over the last five years....The al-Maliki government is worse off now...The notion that there;'s some kind of progress is absurd. The al-Maliki government uses its Ministry of Interior like a death squad militia. So to call Sadr an extremist and Maliki a good guy just overlooks the reality that there are no good guys." (Jim Lerher News Hour) [What he said.]

The war in Iraq was lost before the first shot was fired. [But those who have never been to war and avoided it like the plague, don't seem to understand that. they think war is just like on TV or the Movies where Rambo, John Wayne or some other celluloid hero can save the day and win the war singlehanded, just like on 24. They don't do reality or real world situations very well, they try to create their own reality, and we all know that people who make up things instead of dealing with reality are dealing with a fantasy world. Too bad the death and destruction they keep creating is so very real to the rest of us.] The conflict never had the support of the American people and Iraq never posed a threat to US national security. The whole pretext for the war was based on lies; it was a coup orchestrated by elites and the media to carry out a far-right agenda. Now the mission has failed, but no one wants to admit their mistakes by withdrawing; so the butchery continues without pause.

How Will It End?

The Bush administration has decided to pursue a strategy that is unprecedented in US history. It has decided to continue to prosecute a war that has already been lost morally, strategically, and militarily. But fighting a losing war has its costs. America is much weaker now than it was when Bush first took office in 2000; politically, economically and militarily. US power and prestige around the world will continue to deteriorate until the troops are withdrawn from Iraq. But that's unlikely to happen until all other options have been exhausted. Deteriorating economic conditions in the financial markets are putting enormous downward pressure on the dollar. The corporate bond and equities markets are in disarray; the banking system is collapsing, consumer spending is down, tax revenues are falling, and the country is headed into a painful and protracted recession. The US will leave Iraq sooner than many pundits believe, but it will not be at a time of our choosing. Rather, the conflict will end when the United States no longer has the capacity to wage war. That time is not far off.

The Iraq War signals the end of US interventionism for at least a generation; maybe longer. [Just like Vietnam did.] The ideological foundation for the war (preemption/regime change) has been exposed as a baseless justification for unprovoked aggression. Someone will have to be held accountable. There will have to be international tribunals to determine who is responsible in the deaths of over one million Iraqis.

This looks just like the end to Vietnam.

A president trying to get the local government to take over for US troops, but the locals don't have as much invested in the political-military fight as the invading country, so they refuse to fight like the occupiers want them to.

Vast sums of financial capital are being diverted out of the country as the economic situation worsens and the worlds energy system goes through a very disruptive period.

The US citizenry, by a large majority, wants an end to this illegal insane foreign policy.

The US government keeps talking about some type of victory, but the locals DON'T see victory as the Americans do: In fact the locals are even more divided then the Americans are at home.

Historically no total military victory over a local population to force political change as divided as Iraq's are has been achieved with out some sort of actions which could only be termed as genocide for the losing party.

That I hope is not what some think of when they keep the illusion of a victory in Iraq alive.

The bright boys of the GOP have pegged their futures on 100 years McCain?

Good luck, because he has to explain what "victory" looks like in Iraqi terms.

How many of Motaqa al Sadr's followers have to be shot down in cold blood to achieve it?

Is the beginning of apartheid which has begun in Baghdad the lasting legacy of such a victory?

Does McCain propose a separate Kurdish region as they want, or is he willing to use the US military to force them into Iraq?

What happens when the future Iraqi government allies itself with Iran, over throw the government of Iraq again?

And just how welcome in the middle east does he think the US will be during these 100 years?

He wants 100 years to "solve" these issues, but we don't have the credit with our banker countries we borrow from for 100 more years.

No wonder McCain doesn't understand this, he don't do economics, he said so.

But then again Karl Rove admitted GOPers don't do reality they MAKE it up to create an alternate reality with out drugs I think.

Which is why the US is stuck in Iraq, an alternate reality has crashed and burned on reality itself, and GOPers can't deal with it.

So they wanna hold on for 9 more months and hand the mess off, unless Mccain some how wins.

Then four more years of delusions and the deaths and destructions those delusions have wrought upon Iraq and it's people.

If that is the case, God help us all, especially the troops and Iraqi's who will be caught in the Kafkaesque scenario started by Bush and pursued by McCain.

By clif, at 6:18 PM
Mike you will be interested in this one;

The decline and fall of the American empire of debt

Another election year, another jeremiad from Kevin Phillips. As the veteran political commentator notes in the preface to "Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism," the new book is his fourth in six years, which is impressive production by any standard. Phillips claims he did not originally intend to mark the 2008 election campaign with yet another tome lambasting the state of America. But really, what are you supposed to do when all your dire predictions of catastrophe and imperial decline start manifesting themselves in real time? As a Cassandra ready for his close-up, Phillips has every right to pump out a quickie I-told-you-so.

What is amazing is how lucid Phillips manages to be in 200 or so pages that were assembled on very short notice. The credit crunch that paralyzed Wall Street last August is the catalyst, but Phillips is up-to-date, economically speaking, right through the end of 2007. And he's lucky, even if the country isn't -- nothing that has happened since the new year began disproves Phillips' main theme, which is that Wall Street's chickens have come home to roost. The opposite is true -- every day brings further evidence that flaws in the foundation on which the United States is constructed are cracking wide open.

In his three most recent books, "Wealth and Democracy," "American Theocracy" and "American Dynasty," Phillips obsessed over what he describes as "the scary intersection of oil, debt, and religion." He doesn't so much repeat himself in "Bad Money" (although regular readers will find a great deal that is familiar) as he delivers a masterly recapitulative summation. The dots have all been connected, the picture is now complete.

Phillips has warned for years about the inevitably malign consequences of what he calls the "financialization" of the American economy. Sometime in the mid-'90s, he writes, financial services overtook manufacturing as the biggest chunk of the U.S. gross domestic product. If you believe, as Phillips does, that all the furious activity on Wall Street masterminded by the likes of Citigroup and Goldman-Sachs and Merrill Lynch is just a bunch of speculation and froth that doesn't actually result in the creation of anything real, then there has never been a better time for triumphantly pointing out the disasters that ensue when the rest of the world also realizes that Wall Street is wearing no clothes.

This book's thesis, now that a quarter century's results are in hand, is that the eighties can be identified as the launching pad of a decisive financial sector takeover of the U.S. economy, consummated by turbocharged, relentless expansion of financial debt, and eventual extension of mortgage credit to subprime and other unqualified buyers. The two converging pumps helped to swell the housing, mortgage, and credit bubble that began imploding in the summer of 2007.

The numbers provided by Phillips for financial debt are staggering. He assesses public debt -- "federal, state and local obligations" -- as totaling around $11 trillion. But private debt -- "financial, corporate, and mortgage" -- writes Phillips, far surpasses public obligations: a whopping $37 trillion.

Is he trying to say the cure of republican right wing conservatism is MUCH worse then the claimed "disease" of liberalism?

Sounds like it.

By clif, at 6:51 PM
BTW to all the wingnut trolls the Clintons ARE no liberals and never have been, their political views are as changeable as Mitt Romney's have ever been.

They have been a little more successful at getting the corporate controlled media to spin for them, but then again Hillary did the bidding of Wal-mart when she was on their board for all those years, I wonder how much Bill did for them, like getting china to open up for trade .... so Wal-Mart could send so many factories there for cheap sweat shop goods?

Like sitting back while Greenspan allowed the tech bubble to inflate the economy and claiming credit for such a strong economy; just like Bush set back and claimed a strong economy while all it really was, was Greenspan lowering the price of credit to inflate the housing bubble so many Americans could take out their equity and spend it on cheap trinkets from China and vacations or new SUV's which are about the most costly thing the use now.

No wonder why the Clenis and Poppy Bush are such good friends, the Clenis is the son Poppy wishes he had instead of the stupidest person to ever sh*t in the white house.

By clif, at 7:02 PM
According to the Colbert Report, Chris Matthews wants to run for Arlen Spectors senate seat in 2010.

After all the years of TV he was on, that would be an interesting campaign.

By clif, at 8:57 PM
clif said...
Mike you will be interested in this one;

The decline and fall of the American empire of debt

Another election year, another jeremiad from Kevin Phillips. As the veteran political commentator notes in the preface to "Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism," the new book is his fourth in six years, which is impressive production by any standard. Phillips claims he did not originally intend to mark the 2008 election campaign with yet another tome lambasting the state of America. But really, what are you supposed to do when all your dire predictions of catastrophe and imperial decline start manifesting themselves in real time? As a Cassandra ready for his close-up, Phillips has every right to pump out a quickie I-told-you-so."

Just ordered it Clif............Kevin Phillips books are outstanding!

By Mike, at 10:50 PM
Another interesting book that is timed perfect for the election that i intend to read is this one........

Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict

By Joseph Stiglitz

Readers may be surprised to learn just how difficult it was for Nobel Prize-winning economist Stiglitz and Kennedy School of Government professor Bilmes to dig up the actual and projected costs of the Iraq War for this thorough piece of accounting. Using "emergency" funds to pay for most of the war, the authors show that the White House has kept even Congress and the Comptroller General from getting a clear idea on the war's true costs. Other expenses are simply overlooked, one of the largest of which is the $600 billion going toward current and future health care for veterans. These numbers reveal stark truths: improvements in battlefield medicine have prevented many deaths, but seven soldiers are injured for every one that dies (in WWII, this ratio was 1.6 to one). Figuring in macroeconomic costs and interest--the war has been funded with much borrowed money--the cost rises to $4.5 trillion; add Afghanistan, and the bill tops $7 trillion. This shocking expose, capped with 18 proposals for reform, is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand how the war was financed, as well as what it means for troops on the ground and the nation's future. (Mar.) Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.

By Mike, at 10:51 PM
Hillary Clinton is such a pathetic insincere dishonest liar with absolutely zero credibility or integrity who has the judgement of a turnip.........Did you guys see how insincere and dishonest she sounded last night.

She CLAIMED she is SUCH a person of faith that she cant think of one experience where faith played a meaningful role in her life....................BWAHAHAHA what a phony!!!

Then Hillary started babbling about how her father took her hunting yet couldnt remember what age she was when her father taught her to shoot and didnt think it relevant or significant.....................BWAHAHAHA!! the fearless varmint hunter must have been channeling the dishonest pandering Mitt Rommney that would say or do ANYTHING to get elected...........Since this experience was so memorable and life altering important i wonder if Hillary took her daughter hunting and taught her how to shoot if it was REALLY that meaningful to her.

To top off the hippocrissy of Clinton she, a person who earned over 110 million is accusing Obama of being an elitest.............sounds kind of like the Orwellianrepugs trying to paint teachers earning $40,000, college professors and Hollywood writers and actors as elitists rather than CEO's making 400 million a year, or the Media Moguls, and Corporate and media emperors and oligopolists who lord over the working class and manipulate and shape public opinions to suit there interests and self serving agendas with their deceptions and media sorcery.

By Mike, at 11:07 PM
Oh, and last but CERTAINLY not least I forgot the judgement and electability issue..........Hillary Clinton has shown continually poor and horrific judgement from "DAY ONE"

There should be mental and intelligence tests to qualify people to be President and bottom line an ass clown who sings songs about bombing other countries, or one who makes a parody, a mockery and a joke at a White House dinner about not being able to find WMD when this war that is based on nothing but a pack of lies, has resulted in over a million uneccessary deaths and countless soldiers disabled and maimed and is projected to have squandered over 3 TRILLION dollars that we dont have and have gone into debt and mortgaged our childrens and grandchildren's future and our own retirement to fund should not be considered qualified to run for or remain president just as a hippocritical fool who from DAY ONE uses piss poor judgement giving a lying ideologue who had been beating the war drums for over a year and using Orwellian, Nazi tactics and talk to manipulate us into a uneccessary war of choice the authority to go to war...........further she defended said stupid decision and played the fearless chickenhawk untill a few months ago when it finnally dawned on the dunce that 80% of America is against the war and she couldnt get elected playing a hawk so she flipflopped and PRETENDED To be a peacnik from day one..................Then to top it off after using negativity and veiled rascism (futher examples of poor judgement she tells a whopper of a bald faced lie about running with her head down while under sniper fire then has the gall to behave JUST LIKE THE IDIOT IN CHIEF and make a joke out of a Presidential Candidate (her) telling a whopper of a lie and getting caught red handed..............didnt a certain presdident get impeached for lying............funny we got another one that thinks lying and acting like Karl Rove and GWB makes her MORE electable................BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!

I've had enough of these Orwellian fascists using McCarthy and Nazi talk to tar and feather their opponents as elitists, hating their country, hating the troops, in league with the terrorists and wanting the terrorists to win..........you'd think people CLAIMING to be patriots would wanna talk and act more like Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson etc......than Hitler, McCarthy or Big Brother..........or at least their own lives on the line fighting the wars they crave rather than sending others over to fight and die then claiming that sending the troops over to die and cutting their benefits and health care is supporting them while trying to bring them home safely and get them increased pay and care is NOT supporting them.

By Mike, at 11:32 PM
My prediction is Clinton will be FORCED out by the beginning of JUNE..........she will be given the choice to try to unite the party and help Obama win or she will be destroyed.........how it plays out will come down to wether she is smart enough to look at the big picture and play ball or wether she remains a greedy bitter person who puts her own greed and ambition over the good of the country and the party.

By Mike, at 11:38 PM
Remember after 9-11 When George W Bush told us all just to go shopping?

Well I guess America is just not patriotic enough according to Bush's standards;

Retailing Chains Caught in a Wave of Bankruptcies

The consumer spending slump and tightening credit markets are unleashing a widening wave of bankruptcies in American retailing, prompting thousands of store closings that are expected to remake suburban malls and downtown shopping districts across the country.

Since last fall, eight mostly midsize chains — as diverse as the furniture store Levitz and the electronics seller Sharper Image — have filed for bankruptcy protection as they staggered under mounting debt and declining sales.

But the troubles are quickly spreading to bigger national companies, like Linens ‘n Things, the bedding and furniture retailer with 500 stores in 47 states. It may file for bankruptcy as early as this week, according to people briefed on the matter.

Even retailers that can avoid bankruptcy are shutting down stores to preserve cash through what could be a long economic downturn. Over the next year, Foot Locker said it would close 140 stores, Ann Taylor will start to shutter 117, and the jeweler Zales will close 100.

Either we ain't patriotic "enuf", or SOMEBODY has screwed up the economy real bad.

One question, according to Bush's logic;

If too many stores go bankrupt, does that mean Bin Forgotten wins?

By clif, at 12:11 AM
Warning LANGUAGE which would make a drunken sailor embarrassed;

Obama Says That Poor People Are Pissed; Everyone Goes Nutzoid:

(a gentler part)

Obama wasn't looking down on anyone or disrespecting the workers of America. He was acknowledging something real about small towns where the factories have closed, where the economic centers have been shuttered, and where the people have been told that a tax cut for millionaires is what's going to get them their jobs and economic security back. Obama's giving those people voice and agency: when you are disempowered, you seek other means to have power, whether it's through the gun or through the disempowering of others, or through the comfort of faith, which promises you oodles in heaven for your sufferings on earth.

By clif, at 12:39 AM
CLif: so Matthews is running..welp that will be a bitter contest ?? won't it...and yeah, we all are to blame for the economy- we did not shop enough....right....

MIKE: about Hillary- do you really think she can think about WHAT she is doing- I don't think she cares about uniting the Party- her whole campaign is baout Dividing us right now as a people...really sad....BTW did you see her talk about the GUN issue- and how children should be learning about guns- i could not believe the Media walked right by her saying that....so she thinks children should be around guns ????WHAT....and the media went mute....I don't think she cares about the people...day by day it is MORE about her...this weekend we saw that she will drink for a Vote, keep Mark Penn on her staff, make a big stink because Obama acknowedged people are Bitter, and she even got cozy with NRA folks....What NExt??? you have to wonder....what vote will she seek ? retired Felons? nuns with guns? ( I am joking .... but you gotta wonder...)

Lydia: I was serious if you hear anything about fundraising for the Iraqi hero I would glad put a messege on my blog...thanks for sharing Valerie with us.,..

By enigma4ever, at 12:57 AM
Lydia, I so wish I had more time to listen to your great shows. On the rare occasions that I can, they are a treat.

By TomCat, at 12:13 PM
Thank you tomCat and Enigma.

There is a huge LABOR MARCH today all over L.A. and Orange County.

By Lydia Cornell, at 1:42 PM
No Enigma, your right, Hillary doesnt care about uniting the party..........all she cares about is whats best for HER.....................and because all she cares about is whats best for her she MAY start to play ball if she realizes that the consequences of burning bridges with just about EVERY key power person in the Democratic party just could blackball Shillery and Billary and destroy her political career and put an end to Billy Bob's 110 million in lucrative speeches.

I honestly dont know if they are smart enough to look at the big picture and get past their arrogance and megalomanical greed and phony sense of entitlement........but i'll tell you this if Obama wins there will be a changing of the guard and new alliances and power bases will be created and it would not be wise for the Clinton;s to be outsiders who are banished and relegated to peeking in from the outside.

By Mike, at 2:34 PM
Valerie Bertinelli Really looks good..........I look forward to catching the Interview as well!

By Mike, at 2:35 PM
You are about to witness the Clinton's become marginalized and see a changing of the guard in the Demacratic party...........what i think will be interesting is whether the Clinton's retain ANY relevannce at all or they become blackballed outcasts due to their pathetic deplorable behavior that is just like Rove's and the slimy repug operatives and minions who answer to Bush and Rove.

By Mike, at 2:47 PM
Thank you Mike, that is so sweet. Meant to thank you for your kind comments sooner.

xoxo

By Lydia Cornell, at 5:09 PM
Mike:
I thought about what you wrote, and you know you are right....there will be a changing of the Guard- and even in the past 24 hours Barney Franks and even Wait for it...yes Gov.Rendell have been talking more realistically about Hill' s Number 2 Position....really interesting....

( also Biden kind of "hinted" at it on Keith O. tonight as well....that Hill will have to get in sync.....and behave...he didn't say "it" but he definently hinted...)

I am sick of the Bickering- we shpuld be talking about things that Matter ( not us here- the talking head pundits...the Media...)

I have a new post up tonight about Hill's Dinner Experience last night- it showed me that Pa. People are Moving past the Bitter Dialogue...

But this past week - she has talk about kids and guns and no one batted an eye, we got to see her drinking with the boys ( which btw I don't see HOW that makes her a "better" candidate.....?) What an awful week...the Anniversary of the VT Tech Killings is coming up...Iraq is as bloody as ever....and the New Foreclosure Numbers are horrendous...and FOOD is through the Roof...So many things for all of us to talk about....and Focus on....

( okay half way through Val's Book- Excellent- just like she is talking to you sitting on the bus- she is very funny.....Btw Mike I am not sure there are enough pics for you ;-)

Hope all is well Lydia- Hope the Marches went well....( I check the news, but did not see anything...)

( oh, one last thing Lydia- just to let you know the Media /AP said there were protests in Seattle- my ex lives there and he said that was Baloney...he also said that it was packed everyday at the events , atleast 300,000 people saw the Dalai.....really good news on that front- FULL attendence , Standing Room only at the Compassion Conference).....

Namaste....

By enigma4ever, at 6:28 PM
I think we have just entered a NEW political era and are about to see a sea change in both political party's

Remember one of the last big change elections, in 1980 when Reagan started the Conservative revolution in particular, do you remember the 1980 debate with Jimmy Carter when Reagan just backhanded Carter and totally diminished him with his "There You Go Again Mr President"...............well Obama just did that to Clinton with his Annie Oaklie comment.

Fol;ks to coin a TV phrase Shillerie Clinton just jumped the shark its over..........i think by Early June at the latest it will be over and Obama can work on uniting the party to pummel the Angry old man.

I honestly havent been this hopeful about this election since Thanksgiving before Clinton started her divisive Rovian smear campaign of lies.

By Mike, at 7:04 PM
Enigma, Lydia, I can FEEL the change I know in my gut things will work out i havent been this positive since around Thanksgiving BEFORE Clinton started her divisive Rovian smear campaign..............i think Obama will win it all.

By Mike, at 7:06 PM
enigma4ever said...
Mike:
I thought about what you wrote, and you know you are right....there will be a changing of the Guard- and even in the past 24 hours Barney Franks and even Wait for it...yes Gov.Rendell have been talking more realistically about Hill' s Number 2 Position....really interesting....

( also Biden kind of "hinted" at it on Keith O. tonight as well....that Hill will have to get in sync.....and behave...he didn't say "it" but he definently hinted...)

I am sick of the Bickering- we shpuld be talking about things that Matter ( not us here- the talking head pundits...the Media...)"

I've noticed those SAME things Enigma over the last 3 weeks or so and the trend is gathering momentum...............Clinton is FINISHED.

Some of the Superdelegates are hinting at whats coming...........we need to let them know the will of the people by voicing our opinions in the blogs..........THEN the Superdelegates will ALL jump in unison and end this fiasco and make it clear to Clinton and her cult of thugs the way things are gonna be.

By Mike, at 7:12 PM
The US is never leaving the region or withdrawing from Iraq. McCain is right about staying, but 100 years is too long. The oil won't last that long.

And the USSR was going to control the Middle East from their Afghani bases.

We're leaving Iraq. Whether we leave of our own volition or we leave because our country fell apart, we're leaving.

By Jolly Roger, at 9:03 PM
The Department of Defense has released its latest American military casualty numbers for those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the figures reveal non-fatal casualties that go well beyond the more than 4,000 U.S. troops who have died so far.

As of April 5, a total of 36,082 members of the U.S. military have been wounded in action and killed in Iraq, since the beginning of the war in March 2003, and in Afghanistan, where the war there began in October 2001. The 36,082 number breaks down to 4,492 deaths and 31,590 wounded. According to the same DoD "casualty" counts, an additional 38,631 U.S. military personnel have also been removed from the battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan for "non-hostile-related medical air transports."

"That's a tremendous number," said Paul Sullivan, the executive director of the advocate group Veterans for Common Sense, who believes these latest figures paint a more realistic picture of the true cost of the Iraq and Afghan wars. He is concerned troop casualties, including those who have been wounded, killed and medically transported, is now nearing 75,000.

Defense Department spokesperson Cynthia Smith, however, told CBS News the numbers must be carefully interpreted. Smith said the 38,631 "non-hostile-related medical air transports" are not casualties of war even though they are listed in the DoD's "casualty" documents because, she says, they were for "injuries not related to service, they were unrelated to combat."

Smith described the "non-hostile-related" injuries as the types that "could happen to any civilian on the street."

"Our main focus is severe trauma care in the theater," she said. For example, "if a woman needs her annual check up, we don't have the capability of doing that [on the ground in Iraq] so we would air transport her out." According to Smith, the 36,082 tally is a more "accurate" reflection how many military service men and women have been fatal and non-fatal casualties in connection to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, as of April 5.

Sullivan points out that the military's casualty reports also exclude the "enormous number [of new veterans] flooding the VA," often with medical problems developed due to the war. A January report by the Department of Veterans Affairs showed 299,585 veterans who recently served in the Middle East had been treated by the VA since 2002. Forty percent (120,049) of the Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who sought care from the VA did so for mental health disorders.

In the eyes of Bush and McCain: These are "merely" the means to a corporate end.

By Larry, at 4:05 AM
A company of Iraqi soldiers abandoned their positions on Tuesday night in Sadr City, defying American soldiers who implored them to hold the line against Shiite militias.

The retreat left a crucial stretch of road on the front lines undefended for hours and led to a tense series of exchanges between American soldiers and about 50 Iraqi troops who were fleeing.

Is this what being ready to "step up in order to step down?"

By Larry, at 4:13 AM
Bombings blamed on al-Qaida in Iraq tore through market areas in Baghdad and outside the capital on Tuesday, killing nearly 60 people and shattering weeks of relative calm in Sunni-dominated areas.

The bloodshed _ in four cities as far north as Mosul and as far west as Ramadi _ struck directly at U.S. claims that the Sunni insurgency is waning and being replaced by Shiite militia violence as a major threat.

The deadliest blasts took place in Baqouba and Ramadi, two cities where the U.S. military has claimed varying degrees of success in getting Sunnis to turn against al-Qaida.

In Baqouba, the Diyala provincial capital 35 miles northeast of the capital, a parked car exploded about 11:30 a.m. in front of a restaurant across the street from the central courthouse and other government offices.

Many of the victims were on their way to the court, at the restaurant or in cars passing through the area. A man identifying himself as Abu Sarmad had just ordered lunch.

"I heard a big explosion and hot wind threw me from my chair to outside the restaurant," he said from his hospital bed.

The force of the blast jolted the concrete barriers erected along the road to protect the courthouse, witnesses said.

At least 40 people were killed and 70 wounded, according to hospital officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to release the information.

The U.S. military in northern Iraq gave a slightly lower toll, saying 35 Iraqi citizens were killed, including a policeman, and 66 wounded. It said the blast destroyed three buses and damaged 10 shops.

AP Television News footage showed many of the bodies covered in crisp white sheets and black plastic bags in a hospital courtyard while the emergency room inside was overwhelmed with the wounded.

It was the deadliest bombing in Iraq since March 6, when a twin bombing killed 68 people in a crowded shopping district in the central Baghdad district of Karradah. The attack was also the deadliest in Baqouba since The Associated Press began tracking Iraqi casualties in late April 2005

Is this what Bush and McCain call success?

By Larry, at 4:16 AM
The New York Times' Jim Yardley writes that Chinese officials are demanding CNN apologize for Jack Cafferty's comments last week. In the April 9 broadcast of "The Situation Room," seen below, Cafferty referred to Chinese exports as "junk" and described the nation as "goons and thugs."

Finally someone at CNN speaks the truth.

By Larry, at 4:28 AM
Reuters) - Home foreclosure filings surged 57 percent in the 12 month-period ended in March and bank repossessions soared 129 percent from a year ago, as homeowners struggled to make mortgage payments, real estate data firm RealtyTrac said on Tuesday.

For the month of March, foreclosure filings, default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions rose 5 percent, led by Nevada, California and Florida, RealtyTrac said.

The rise in March to filings on a total of 234,685 properties followed a 4 percent decline in February, RealtyTrac reported.

RealtyTrac said the peak has yet to be reached.

If only the owner of that run down chicken ranch in Crawford would face such a fate.

By Larry, at 4:36 AM
Obama, Bitterness, Meet the Press, and the Old Politics

By Robert Reich

I was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, 61 years ago. My father sold $1.98 cotton blouses to blue-collar women and women whose husbands worked in factories. Years later, I was secretary of labor of the United States, and I tried the best I could – which wasn’t nearly good enough – to help reverse one of the most troublesome trends America has faced: The stagnation of middle-class wages and the expansion of povety. Male hourly wages began to drop in the early 1970s, adjusted for inflation. The average man in his 30s is earning less than his father did thirty years ago. Yet America is far richer. Where did the money go? To the top.

Are Americans who have been left behind frustrated? Of course. And their frustrations, their anger and, yes, sometimes their bitterness, have been used since then -- by demagogues, by nationalists and xenophobes, by radical conservatives, by political nuts and fanatical fruitcakes – to blame immigrants and foreign traders, to blame blacks and the poor, to blame "liberal elites," to blame anyone and anything.

Rather than counter all this, the American media have wallowed in it. Some, like Fox News and talk radio, have given the haters and blamers their very own megaphones. The rest have merely "reported on" it. Instead of focusing on how to get Americans good jobs again; instead of admitting too many of our schools are failing and our kids are falling behind their contemporaries in Europe, Japan, and even China; instead of showing why we need a more progressive tax system to finance better schools and access to health care, and green technologies that might create new manufacturing jobs, our national discussion has been mired in the old politics.

Listen to this morning’s “Meet the Press” if you want an example. Tim Russert, one of the smartest guys on television, interviewed four political consultants – Carville and Matalin, Bob Schrum, and Michael Murphy. Political consultants are paid huge sums to help politicians spin words and avoid real talk. They’re part of the problem. And what do Russert and these four consultants talk about? The potential damage to Barack Obama from saying that lots of people in Pennsylvania are bitter that the economy has left them behind; about HRC’s spin on Obama’s words (he’s an “elitist,” she said); and John McCain’s similarly puerile attack.

Does Russert really believe he’s doing the nation a service for this parade of spin doctors talking about potential spins and the spin-offs from the words Obama used to state what everyone knows is true? Or is Russert merely in the business of selling TV airtime for a network that doesn’t give a hoot about its supposed commitment to the public interest but wants to up its ratings by pandering to the nation’s ongoing desire for gladiator entertainment instead of real talk about real problems.

We’re heading into the worst economic crisis in a half century or more. Many of the Americans who have been getting nowhere for decades are in even deeper trouble. Large numbers of people in Pennsylvania and across the nation are losing their homes and losing their jobs, and the situation is likely to grow worse. Consumers are at the end of their ropes, fuel and food costs are skyrocketing, they can’t go deeper into debt, they can’t pay their bills. They aren’t buying, which means every business from the auto industry to housing to even giant GE is hurting. Which means they’ll begin laying off more people, and as they do, we will experience an even more dangerous downward spiral.

Bitter? You ain’t seen nothing yet. And as much as people like Russert, Carville, Matalin, Schrum, and Murphy want to divert our attention from what’s really happening; as much as HRC and McCain seek to make political hay out of choices of words that can be spun cynically by the mindless spinners of the old politics; as much as demagogues on the right and left continue to try to channel the cumulative frustrations of Americans into a politics of resentment – all these attempts will, I hope, prove futile. Eighty percent of Americans know the nation is on the wrong track. The old politics, and the old media that feeds it, are irrelevant now.

By Larry, at 6:23 AM
If only the owner of that run down chicken ranch in Crawford would face such a fate.

Larry it was actually a pig farm before Bush bought it, but Bush don't do horses, cows or any other farm animals, that would be hard work.

BTW it is quite interesting just how the world affairs have turned out isn't it;

The invasion of Afghanistan by the USSR in 1979 and the pronouncement of the "evil empire", by 1989 the retreat, the collapse of the Soviet Union, destitution and rape of the economy by Western business interests, the supposed victory of the American Empire and an epitaph for Russia.

Now a little over two decades later, the American Empire is in tatters, caught in the duel quagmires of Afghanistan and Iraq, considered an "evil empire" by much of the world, destitute and ready to be devoured by eastern and middle eastern business interests.

And the people who claimed to have all the answers didn't do much better in the economic realm;

In the 1980's people attacking the government touted just how wonderful the free markets would make America, and now after two and a half decades of their philosophy the entire system is lurching toward an abyss, with no real hope of a solution.

It is the most ironic state of affairs.

Sad because so many are suffering because of the arrogance greed, and stubbornness of a few, but ironic just the same.

By clif, at 7:27 AM
Hey there...
Hi Lydia, Larry, Mike and Clif, and Bartle....I am lliveblogging the Debate tonight....( I have done them all- I am thinking I need a sanity check? .....) but anyways all are welcome....

I hope I am not toooo bitter ;-)

By enigma4ever, at 3:29 PM
BTW to all the wingnut trolls the Clintons ARE no liberals and never have been, their political views are as changeable as Mitt Romney's have ever been.

Only an idiot would even try to assert that Clinton ever was a liberal.

I'm not saying we weren't a hell of a lot better off under Clinton, because we were. But the reason has more to do with the federal budget being in technical surplus than any other reason.

By Jolly Roger, at 6:58 PM
Jolly- I think you are wordpress- so I am leaving a messege for you here...I am blocked/flitered by wordpress....worst debate ever...for sure....thanks for coming over...

anyone interested....yes I did liveblog it....my head hurts...

By enigma4ever, at 8:31 PM
By Jason Linkens

Going into tonight's debate in Philadelphia, the two millionth one we've had so far this primary season, I had one significant worry: that the bulk of the time would be taken up with process questions and media obsessions, and that issues of import would end up getting sidelined. As it turns out, I was depressingly, distressingly correct. In fact, there were times when tonight's debate ventured into territory so utterly asinine that I could scarcely believe what I was witnessing.

Twas not until the nine-o'clock hour drew nigh that a single issue-oriented question was asked. The entire first hour was dedicated to silly campaign queries and scandals both du jour and d'antan. Before a single question was posed about the War in Iraq or the economy was asked, the viewing audience had to wade through the following:

Any chance at a "Dream Ticket?"

"Bitter, much?"

"Do you think your opponent stands a chance against McCain?"

"What about Reverend Wright?"

"Wait. I have an even stupider question about Reverend Wright."

"Seriously. Who were you fooling with that Bosnia shizz?"

"Hey, Hussein! Why no American flag lapel pin?"

"Hey, Sean Hannity wanted me to ask you something, Barack! I got a question on the Weather Underground! Maybe later we'll talk about the Symbionese Liberation Army!"

All of these questions have been beaten to a pulp, grim death. And neither candidate really had anything new to add to the responses they've already offered time and time again. It was as if ABC News, left out of the twenty-four hour news cycle that spawned these zombo-droid queries, needed to get in their licks on the same matters, too, just so they could feel like they'd played a part in every last one of the primary season's glittering inanities.

Why in the world George Stephanopoulos felt compelled to ask Barack Obama if Reverend Wright "loved America" after he had already been made to give another recitation of his repudiation of Wright's remarks is a question that simply defies the imagination. What sort of sensible answer can be given to that question? It would require astral projection to properly gauge another man's emotional state. And if you want to ask Hillary Clinton to account for the odd contortions she advanced on the matter of her Bosnia recollections, just sack up and ask. Don't hide behind the additional, pointless cruelty of a random voter's scoldings that Clinton lost their vote. What a wholly superfluous pile on!

And the flag lapel pin question came with this admonishment from Charles Gibson: "It keeps coming up, again and again." Well, no shit, Charlie! It keeps "coming up, again and again" because the media resolutely refuses to obtain the necessary courage to stop doing so.

Gibson and Stephanopoulos did deign to squeeze in a few questions of substance, on the Iraq War, taxes, Iran's nuclear ambitions, gun control, and energy independence. But it was quite clear that the moderators could have cared less about the content of the candidate's responses. Instead, they concerned themselves with pinning Obama and Clinton down on a series of absurd "pledges," for the purpose, no doubt, of providing the "gotcha" questions of tomorrow.

To their credit, Clinton and Obama were thoughtful enough to broach the topic of the housing market. Good thing! It didn't occur to the moderators to ask!

The string of issue-oriented questions didn't last long. The debate concluded with a question on how the candidates would "use" George W. Bush in the future. (As a hat-rack, maybe?) And the invitation to make a closing statement required each candidate to imagine how they would win the support of a superdelegate. Process nonsense to the end.

Throughout the night, ABC returned from commercials with bumpers that featured random quotes from the Constitution, because something, apparently, needed to substitute for gravitas.

Like I said, there have been several thousand of these debates. Most, I've watched. Many, I've covered or liveblogged. A few, I have sat very still, and hoped for the sweet release that only the icy hand of death can provide. Tonight was the first time I would have dearly loved to see Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama team up and turn the tables on their interrogators.

Before ABC signed off for the evening, Gibson heard a reaction from the audience and observed, "The crowd is turning on me."

If only they'd done so sooner.

By Larry, at 8:53 PM
I have posted the ABC Contact Numbers to file Complaints.

By enigma4ever, at 9:25 PM
Thanks Enigma, your comments were Righton the Money, i couldnt agree more, and i'll contact ABC!

By Mike, at 10:08 PM
BTW, isnt the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.............so since the MSM KEEPS asking Obama OVER and OVER AGAIN about Rev Wright and the bitter comment after he has answered the same close to a 100 times they are clearly insane along with being dishonest, biased and totally pasthetic and disgraceful.

By