ABQjournal Opinion: Letters to the Editor
Government and Bridge Failed State Full of Deficient Bridges

AMERICA HAS built more transportation infrastructure per capita and per unit of gross domestic product than any other member of the G8. We may not be capable of maintaining it all, because we are enthralled by the mantra of “low taxes.” We are paying the price in lives lost at home and in Iraq. …

This is the cost of the success of Republican adviser Grover Norquist— famous for his widely-quoted comment that he would shrink government “down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub”— and let America fall apart. [mjh: I hope Norquist drowns in his own violent metaphor someday.]

That’s what the Republicans have done ever since Ronald Reagan was elected and Norquist founded the misleading “Americans for Tax Reform” (for the rich). Now we pay the price. Highways fail. People die. A Republican governor and president prove again they don’t know how to run and sustain a country, a war and a highway system. Remember how we haven’t recovered from Katrina, yet?

We can’t keep cutting taxes and expect success. We are a great country and we need to pay the real cost to keep it great— and fight our wars. That means we pay taxes today. We do not borrow against our children and we do not let America fall apart.

JOHN HOOKER
Los Ranchos
de Albuquerque

Amen. The penny-pincher’s credo is: “You’ll get my fair contribution to the commonwealth when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers — until we eliminate Death Taxes!”

The fair-and-balanced Journal, mindful of the accusations of its liberal leanings — pause to snort, howl, laugh, wipe tear from eye — answered Hooker’s thoughtful letter with another:

Can’t Pin Collapse on Bush

… Don’t these whiny Democrats have anything better to come up with? The liberal politicians in Washington don’t know how to lead, so they shift the blame of everything that goes wrong in this country over to conservatives. That is dishonest and disingenuous on the part of Democratic politicians. …

KIM BERGET
Albuquerque

Once again, I have to wonder if the conservative view isn’t really some bad joke from liberals attempting to make conservatism appear brain-dead. But, no, they really believe what they think.

Shall we ignore that Republicans ruled the land from 2000 to 2006 and 1980 to 1992 before that? (And acted like a guerrilla army in the years between.) Hasn’t the “conservative view” been very thoroughly tested and discredited? Had enough yet? mjh

Karl der Grosse has left the White House for the last time. The man who “architected” a generation of Republican power (hah!) and handed Bush the huge political capital he claimed after 2004 just rode off into the sunset. Mission accomplished.

No doubt he’ll be back as Bush’s last nominee to the Supreme Court. Gotta finish stacking the deck to protect Duhbya and Dick from all the shit that’s coming down in the next decade.

It’s disheartening to hear that Rove’s departure may strengthen Cheney’s hand, as if that were actually possible. With luck, an emboldened Cheney will reel out just enough rope for his own hanging. (Note to the Fatherland Defenders: I’m being purely metaphorical. I wish Dick and Duhbya long lives full of regrets.) mjh

PS: If you think I hate Rove — well, you’re right, but see what conservative godfather Dick Viguerie has to say about Karl.

Richard Viguerie on Karl Rove’s Resignation:
Good News for Conservatives

(Manassas, Virginia) The following is a statement from Richard A. Viguerie, author of Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause (Bonus Books, 2006), on the resignation of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove:

“Karl Rove’s departure from the White House is good news for conservatives. We may—may—have a more conservative Bush presidency with Rove back in Texas. [mjh: Shudder. Be afraid, be very afraid.]

“As President Bush’s chief political advisor, Karl Rove was a master in the care and feeding of conservative leaders, keeping them mostly silent as the Republican Party moved Left during the Bush presidency. [mjh: ROFLOL.]

“He used the usual carrot and stick to do this. The carrot was access to the White House—and conservative leaders proved just as vulnerable as others to the lure of a photo op with the President, lunch in the West Wing, or a returned phone call from Karl Rove. The stick was fear—speak out, and not only will you lose any hope of access, you will be branded as an extremist, or someone who’s helping the Democrats by speaking out. [mjh: Fear? I thought that was the heart of the Republican worldview — live in fear at all times.]

“Using both carrot and stick, Karl Rove was able to silence or get the support of most conservative leaders as President Bush and congressional Republicans greatly expanded the size and reach of the federal government, including (but certainly not limited to)…

* No Child Left Behind
* McCain-Feingold
* Prescription drug benefits
* Nation-building on a scale never attempted before
* Farm subsidies
* Steel tariffs
* Massive federal deficits

“Yes, Karl Rove was a political genius—he was, after all, the successful architect of Bush’s election in 2000 and reelection in 2004. But as the President’s chief policy advisor, Rove was the architect of George W. Bush’s betrayal of the conservative cause.

“Karl Rove’s biggest failure was to leave the White House without achieving his stated goal of establishing the Republicans as America’s permanent governing party. To even mention that today—after the 2006 elections, President Bush’s plummeting poll numbers, and the GOP’s bleak prospects for 2008—brings embarrassment or laughter, depending on your political viewpoint. No wonder Karl Rove wants to forget about those boasts.

“Rove failed in that goal primarily because he attempted to advance the Republican Party by using raw, naked political power and bribing voters. He copied the Democrats and was more successful than them—for a while. But then conservatives and independents caught on to his game. We started rebelling, first over Harriet Miers and most recently over the amnesty bill. Meanwhile, the Republican Party had lost its “brand” as the party of small government.

How do we recover from the Rove Era? We have to reject the bribing of voters and instead build on President Reagan’s legacy. We must re-establish the conservative movement (and the Republican Party, if it wishes to survive) as the movement and party of ideas, empowering people instead of government, and with a strong national defense but no more nation-building.

“Bush’s brain” will soon be gone. Let’s hope that wiser counsel prevails in the White House in the future, but let’s not depend on that. We conservatives have work to do.” [mjh: Shudder. Be afraid, be very afraid.]
–30–

NOTE to EDITORS: Richard A. Viguerie pioneered ideological and political direct mail and has been called “the funding father of the conservative movement” for his role in helping build dozens of conservative organizations. He is the author of Conservatives Betrayed–How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause (Bonus Books, 2006).

I hope Dick Viguerie joins other conservatives in calling for the impeachment of Bush and Cheney. mjh

PPS: Please (re-)read my Left Undone, a series of four blog entries. If it seems over-the-top, consider the genre and the time — right after Karl declared a generation of Republican power was at hand.

Bush Down to His Base of Support, By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — To see the type of person who still backs him, President Bush need only look in the mirror. The president fits the composite of today’s Bush supporter: a conservative, white, Republican man, an evangelical Christian who goes to church regularly. …

The only subgroups where a majority of people give Bush the nod are Republicans (67 percent), conservatives (53 percent) and white evangelicals who attend religious services at least once a week (56 percent).

These are the same three subsets of voters who support Bush on Iraq.

White evangelicals as an entire bloc – regardless of how often they report going to church – have been a reliable support group for Bush since he first set foot in the Oval Office.

The Writer’s Almanac from American Public Media

It was on this day in 1912 that Teddy Roosevelt was nominated by the Progressive Party to run for President, an election that went on to define the Republican Party for the rest of the 20th Century.

Republicans had dominated politics ever since the Civil War. A Republican had been in the White House for 44 of the previous 52 years. They were the party of civil rights and, under the presidency of Teddy Roosevelt, the Republican Party became the party of environmental conservation, antitrust laws, and consumer protection.

Teddy Roosevelt was one of the most popular presidents in history, the youngest too. He was 42 when he took office. He was the first president to ride in an automobile and in an airplane, and the first to visit a foreign country while in office. He was a naturalist. He was an author of history. He published almost 50 books (books by this author).

After he’d served two terms, he announced that he would not seek a third term. He handpicked his successor, William Howard Taft, and then went off on an African safari. But when he got back, Teddy Roosevelt found that Taft had moved away from progressive principles and aligned himself with the conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Teddy Roosevelt ran against Taft in the primaries, won the primary in Taft’s home state of Ohio, but eventually it was party insiders who picked the nominee, and they gave it to Taft. And so Roosevelt called for the creation of a new progressive party and accepted its nomination on this day in 1912. It was nicknamed the Bull Moose Party because Roosevelt said, “I am as strong as a bull moose, and you can use me to the limit.”

He was in a three-way race with Taft and Woodrow Wilson, campaigning on a platform that called for income taxes, inheritance taxes, the eight-hour workday, and voting rights for women. He drew huge crowds wherever he went. In Milwaukee, October 14, 1912, on the way to give his speech, he was shot by a man six feet away, the bullet deflected by the speech in his pocket, along with a metal eyeglasses case. Roosevelt went on to give the speech, but Woodrow Wilson won the election. Despite Roosevelt making the best showing of any third party candidate in American history. He came in second.

And one of the results of his Progressive Party campaign was splitting the Republican Party between conservatives and progressives, and the progressives have never been in charge since.

http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/programs/2007/08/06/#tuesday

It was on this day in 1974 that Richard M. Nixon resigned the office of the presidency, the first American president in history to do so. His policies as president had been rather liberal. He began arms control agreements with the Soviet Union. He eased relations with China. He established the Environmental Protection Agency, expanded Social Security and state welfare programs and tried to create a national health insurance system.

Weapons Given to Iraq Are Missing – washingtonpost.com
GAO Estimates 30% of Arms Are Unaccounted For
By Glenn Kessler, Washington Post Staff Writer

The Pentagon has lost track of about 190,000 AK-47 assault rifles and pistols given to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005, according to a new government report, raising fears that some of those weapons have fallen into the hands of insurgents fighting U.S. forces in Iraq.

The author of the report from the Government Accountability Office says U.S. military officials do not know what happened to 30 percent of the weapons the United States distributed to Iraqi forces from 2004 through early this year as part of an effort to train and equip the troops. The highest previous estimate of unaccounted-for weapons was 14,000, in a report issued last year by the inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. [mjh: So the real number is 13 times as many as guessed before last Fall’s election. Oh, well.] …

The Pentagon did not dispute the GAO findings, saying it has launched its own investigation and indicating it is working to improve tracking. Although controls have been tightened since 2005, the inability of the United States to track weapons with tools such as serial numbers makes it nearly impossible for the U.S. military to know whether it is battling an enemy equipped by American taxpayers. …

[T]he Bush administration frequently complains that Iran and Syria are supplying insurgents but has paid little attention to whether U.S. military errors inadvertently play a role. “We know there is seepage and very little is being done to address the problem,” she said. …

In an unusual move, the train-and-equip program for Iraqi forces is being managed by the Pentagon. Normally, the traditional security assistance programs are operated by the State Department, the GAO reported. The Defense Department said this change permitted greater flexibility, but as of last month it was unable to tell the GAO what accountability procedures, if any, apply to arms distributed to Iraqi forces, the report said. …

Much of the equipment provided to Iraqi troops, including the AK-47s, originates from countries in the former Soviet bloc. In a report last year, Amnesty International said that in 2004 and 2005 more than 350,000 AK-47 rifles and similar weapons were taken out of Bosnia and Serbia, for use in Iraq, by private contractors working for the Pentagon and with the approval of NATO and European security forces in Bosnia.

Warrantless Surrender – washingtonpost.com

Congress is stampeded into another compromise of Americans’ rights.

THE DEMOCRATIC-led Congress, more concerned with protecting its political backside than with safeguarding the privacy of American citizens, left town early yesterday after caving in to administration demands that it allow warrantless surveillance of the phone calls and e-mails of American citizens, with scant judicial supervision and no reporting to Congress about how many communications are being intercepted. To call this legislation ill-considered is to give it too much credit: It was scarcely considered at all. Instead, it was strong-armed through both chambers by an administration that seized the opportunity to write its warrantless wiretapping program into law — or, more precisely, to write it out from under any real legal restrictions.
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National Security: Congressional Capitulation On Spying

Since March, the Bush administration has been building a case for its FISA legislation. But it wasn’t clear until last week why it was pushing so urgently. On Tuesday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) revealed on Fox News that earlier this year, a judge issued a secret ruling concluding “that the government had overstepped its authority in attempting to broadly surveil communications between two locations overseas that are passed through routing stations in the United States.” Boehner noted that this court order made “a key element of the Bush administration’s wiretapping efforts illegal,” a fact the White House has attempted to conceal from the public and many in Congress. “It clearly shows that Congress has been playing with half a deck,” said Jim Dempsey, policy director for the Center for Democracy and Technology. “The administration is asking lawmakers to vote on a very important piece of legislation based upon selective declassification of intelligence.”

Like a giant stung by a tiny bee, the US went into a rage after 9/11 and declared a war without end against a small, faceless group armed with box cutters and donkey carts. After spending a fortune and setting fire to two countries, we find our enemies are more numerous and stronger than ever. Oops! DUHbya! [spit on the ground]

When you take off your shoes at the airport or stand in line behind someone buying the common ingredients for explosives, ask yourself if we’re on the right path. Do we simply have to run out the clock on the Gang that Can’t Shoot Straight (but shoots every-which-way)? Is there no holding Duhbya and BushCo accountable for MASSIVE INCOMPETENCE that exceeds all belief? Time for early retirement — there’s brush to be cleared in Crawford, while someone with intelligence attempts to fix this horrible mess. You can’t spell Wrong without Duhbya (he always is). mjh

U.S. Warns Of Stronger Al-Qaeda – washingtonpost.com
Administration Report Cites Havens in Pakistan
By Spencer S. Hsu and Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writers

Six years after the Bush administration declared war on al-Qaeda, the terrorist network is gaining strength and has established a safe haven in remote tribal areas of western Pakistan for training and planning attacks, according to a new Bush administration intelligence report to be discussed today at a White House meeting.

The report, a five-page threat assessment compiled by the National Counterterrorism Center, is titled “Al-Qaida Better Positioned to Strike the West,” intelligence officials said. It concludes that the group has significantly rebuilt itself despite concerted U.S. attempts to smash the network.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/11/
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Resolute Amid the Wreckage, By Eugene Robinson

Allowing himself to be forced to retreat from Iraq would ruin George W. Bush’s fantasy of someday being seen as a latter-day Churchill. Bush keeps a bust of the British leader in his office, and he has praised Churchill as being “resolute.”

I know he’s read a book or two about his hero, so I can’t help wondering: Hasn’t Bush gotten to the part about how Churchill, T.E. Lawrence and Gertrude Bell created Iraq at the fateful Cairo Conference of 1921? And how the object was to get British forces out of Mesopotamia, leave the fractious locals to their own devices and wish them the best?

“Our object and our policy is to set up an Arab government,” Churchill told Parliament later that year, describing the new country he had helped design, “and to make it take the responsibility, with our aid and our guidance and with an effective measure of our support, until they are strong enough to stand alone, and so to foster the development of their independence as to permit the steady and speedy diminution of our burden.”

Bush’s contribution is essentially to have destroyed the Iraq that Churchill cobbled together. …

I don’t see how anyone can realistically expect Bush to change course at this late date. It wouldn’t be “resolute,” in his understanding of the word, to acknowledge that he made a terrible mistake. What he can do instead is play for time and hope for some sort of deus ex machina that miraculously saves the day.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/09/AR2007070901398.html