mjh’s blog

Republican Class of 2004

In case you thought things were uglier, or less classy, this year than in 2004, remember this:

peace,
mjh

Duhbya Salutes America

see the youtube video

The New Republicans Will Fix Things The Old Republicans Couldn’t — yeah, right

It isn’t often that public outrage peaks so close to an election, but this is a rare moment in history when "we the people" can exact a price from the political leadership that has duped, scammed and lied to them, contributing mightily to the current financial mess. …

If the public wants real reform, it will penalize the people and the party that failed to provide it. Voters can do more than "throw the bums out." …

Amen, Cal Thomas. Let’s throw out the bastards who have dominated the political scene since 1980. Let’s get those bums who ran everything from 1980 to 1992, returned to power in 1994, and then, following a squeaker in 2004, declared a mighty mandate and a generation of GOP rule to come. Oh, but let’s see who Cal wants to replace the bums with:

They can throw these bums out and replace them with freshmen Republicans who will take office with a reformer’s zeal and rebuild the government’s financial house before the Potomac fever virus infects them. With John McCain and Sarah Palin already committed to reform (as opposed to Barack Obama’s nonspecific "change"), the combination of a new Republican administration and a Republican Congress that has been chastened by its defeat in the 2006 election and imbued with a new zeal to change the way Washington works, could produce a revolution that would have made our Founders proud. …

While Republicans could have done much more when they held a congressional majority under a Republican president, they now swear they have learned their lesson. With the public engaged as never before, even Republicans wouldn’t be able to get away with business as usual this time.

Let the revolution begin! Judgment Day should come on Nov. 4.

Cal Thomas

So, Cal’s argument is: (1) the Democrats are the bums and (2) Republicans will fix things before they are re-corrupted and (3) even if you don’t trust Republicans, they’ll be on good behavior if you watch them closely. Ignore 1994. Ignore every year from 2000 to 2006.

Today, I heard a McCain supporter opine that Democrats want to do everything themselves and it takes someone like McCain to work with both sides of the partisan divide. A divide continually enlarged by Republicans strategists, culture warriors and leaders. Well, in the face of the economic crisis, Dems are working with Republicans. We all know from experience, Republicans were not so generous in their heyday. Recall Tom “The Hammer” DeLay and his ilk. We’ve been throwing the bums out for 2 years and have one more big push. Good riddance. peace, mjh

Mission Accomplished

From Think Progress:

Over on the Wonk Room, Matt Duss recalls this line from Osama bin Laden’s surprise late-October 2004 videotaped address:

And even more dangerous and bitter for America is that the Mujahedin recently forced Bush to resort to emergency funds to continue the fight in Afghanistan and Iraq which is evidence of the success of the bleed-until-bankruptcy plan with Allah’s permission… And it all shows that the real loser is… you. It’s the American people and their economy.

The CIA judged that Bin Laden’s videotaped message was an effort by al Qaeda to deliver four more years for President Bush, thus helping them recruit a new generation of terrorists.

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/09/25/bin-laden-bleed/

From the Archives

www.bushinbox.com has picked up something I wrote three years ago. (Thanks, Jon.) See http://www.bushinbox.com/rove/289/ .

For more in this vein, see http://www.edgewiseblog.com/mjh/category/nada/dump-duhbya/ and http://www.edgewiseblog.com/mjh/category/election/

peace,
mjh

Study says most corporations pay no U.S. income taxes | U.S. | Reuters

 Study says most corporations pay no U.S. income taxes | U.S. | Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Most U.S. and foreign corporations doing business in the United States avoid paying any federal income taxes, despite trillions of dollars worth of sales, a government study released on Tuesday said.

The Government Accountability Office said 72 percent of all foreign corporations and about 57 percent of U.S. companies doing business in the United States paid no federal income taxes for at least one year between 1998 and 2005.

More than half of foreign companies and about 42 percent of U.S. companies paid no U.S. income taxes for two or more years in that period, the report said.

During that time corporate sales in the United States totaled $2.5 trillion, according to Democratic Sens. Carl Levin of Michigan and Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, who requested the GAO study.

Study says most corporations pay no U.S. income taxes | U.S. | Reuters

I Feel the Incentive to Give this Guy the Finger

Michael Boskin, former head of the President’s Council on Economic Advisers under Present George H.W. Bush, concludes that Senator Obama’s proposed increased top tax rates would decrease the incentive to work and cause serious problems in the economy.

Huh. I thought being stinking rich decreased one’s incentive to work. If you’re poor, you have the greatest incentive to work: starvation. Unless, of course, you’re completely demoralized by the belief that only the Rich have rights and opportunities.

Are Republicans and Independents really going to swallow the whole Tax and Spend bullshit yet again? Can they really ignore the fact that, indeed, we *need* to spend some money on something besides endless war, and, gasp, maybe the Rich are in a position to help? peace, mjh

Think Progress » FLASHBACK: Ten Years Ago, Bin Laden Demanded Barrel Of Oil Should Cost $144

Think Progress » FLASHBACK: Ten Years Ago, Bin Laden Demanded Barrel Of Oil Should Cost $144

In a 1998 interview, Osama bin Laden — the terrorist who organized 9/11 — listed as one of his many grievances against the U.S. that Americans “have stolen $36 trillion from Muslims” by purchasing oil from Persian Gulf countries at low prices. The real price of a barrel of oil should be $144, bin Laden demanded.

Ten years ago today, the price of a barrel of oil was just $11. Heading into this holiday weekend, the price of a barrel of oil rested at $144 — a thirteen-fold increase. …

Testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee last May, Anne Korin, the co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, reminded Congress about bin Laden’s goal:

[A]bout ten years ago, Osama bin Laden stated that his target price for oil is $144 a barrel and that the American people, who allegedly robbed the Muslim people of their oil, owe each Muslim man, woman, and child $30,000 in back payments. At the time, $144 a barrel seemed farfetched to most. […]

I would like to impress upon this Committee that $144 a barrel oil will be perceived as a victory for the Jihadist movement and a reaffirmation that the economic warfare component of its campaign against the West is a resounding success. There is no need to elaborate on the implications of such a victory in terms of loss of U.S. prestige and our ability to prevail in the Long War of the 21st century.

Indeed, ten years later, a mission accomplished for bin Laden.

Alecto Says:

---

Boooosh caved into OBL back 2 days before the Mission accomplished speech, or have we all forgot that the ONLY thing OBL wanted, was to remove the bases from Saudi Arabia. And on April 30, 2003 we announced we would do just that.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/ org/ news/ 2003/ 030430-psab01.htm

Think Progress » FLASHBACK: Ten Years Ago, Bin Laden Demanded Barrel Of Oil Should Cost $144

Best Line of the Day

The headline is from NewMexiKen (hattip) and the best line of the day is from Scot Key. Amen. peace, mjh

Burque Babble: Has Senator Bingaman Gotten His Civil Liberties Groove Back?

We’re all really, when it gets down to it, waiting for the electoral process to put a gigantic microfiber pillow down on the Bush Administration’s aged, Constitution-bashing head and asphyxiate the pernicious bastard. 201 days to go!!!!

I tend to favor the “head on a pike” allusion. (Totally metaphorically and non-violently, dear Department of the Fatherland.) Serendipitously, Mer’s rotating desktop background brought this goodie up this morning:

The Mouse That Roared

Little Scotty McClellan always struck me as the perfect representative of BushCo: A pasty patsy frat boy in over his head. A second-rate ad-man who believed he was part of a revolution and a generational change. (I only hated McClellan half as much as I hated Ari Fleisher.) Now, Scotty admits, he was just part of the problem, like a child on the corner watching for cops while the drug deal goes down. There is no news in BushCo’s deception or the perpetual campaign waged by Rove. The news is that a insider loyalist finally noticed the emperor has no clothes. Better watch your back, Scotty. Elephants never forget (and they carry ice picks). Don’t get on any swiftboats. peace, mjh

Wars Hard on State Dept., Defense Chief Says : NPR

Let’s just give all the money we have to “Defense” (formerly, the War Department) and let them decide what programs, domestic and foreign, “keep us safe.” It would be efficient.

Duhbya and company have so decimated the system that Defense has to beg for money for State. You can also thank Donni “Big Dick” Rumsfeld and Condi Rice. peace, mjh

Wars Hard on State Dept., Defense Chief Says : NPR

Wars Hard on State Dept., Defense Chief Says

by Michele Kelemen

All Things Considered, May 19, 2008 · Defense Secretary Robert Gates is expressing concern that the State Department has become stretched too thin by the diplomatic demands of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Gates is arguing for more resources for Foggy Bottom.

Wars Hard on State Dept., Defense Chief Says : NPR

We don’t need no stinkin’ immunity

Duhbya is desperate for immunity for the telecoms who rolled-over for him. Only they don’t even care. They’re actually insulted he things they need immunity. peace, mjh

Think Progress » Communications trade group opposes retroactive immunity.

In a letter to Congress late last week, the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) — which represents groups such as Google and Microsoft — said that it “strongly” opposes retroactive immunity for firms that cooperated with the administration’s warrantless wiretapping. CCIA President and CEO Edward Black writes:

CCIA dismisses with contempt the manufactured hysteria that industry will not aid the United States Government when the law is clear. As a representative of industry, I find that suggestion insulting. To imply that our industry would refuse assistance under established law is an affront to the civic integrity of businesses that have consistently cooperated unquestioningly with legal requests for information. This also conflates the separate questions of blanket retroactive immunity for violations of law, and prospective immunity, the latter of which we strongly support.

Think Progress » Communications trade group opposes retroactive immunity.

Authors: U.S. economy could fall casualty to wars - CNN.com

In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the “burn” rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.

Beyond 2008, working with “best-case” and “realistic-moderate” scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion — or more — by 2017.

Interest on money borrowed to pay those costs could alone add $816 billion to that bottom line, they say.

Authors: U.S. economy could fall casualty to wars - CNN.com

Surpassing Raygun

Think Progress » 452: Number of days President Bush has spent at his ranch in Crawford, TX. His stay there this past weekend with the the Danish prime minister marked Bush’s 70th visit as president. President Ronald Reagan, one of the modern presidency’s most “famous vacationer[s],” spent just 335 days at his ranch in Santa Barbara, CA.

Think Progress » 452: