Newsview: Withdrawal Shows Bush's Weakness

Well, this Newsview article is just the cherry on the cake olive in the Martini for Bush today:

Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers' sudden withdrawal underscores the strength of the social conservatives who form President Bush's political base and the weakness of a president buffeted by one political misfortune after another.

Her withdrawal came after restive conservatives mounted a stinging campaign against her credentials.

Heading into what may be the darkest days of his presidency, Bush still has an opportunity to regain the support of that rebellious bloc and avoid drifting earlier than usual into the lame duck status that eventually claims all second-term U.S. presidents.
...
Evangelicals, Republican women, Southerners and other critical groups in Bush's political coalition are worried about the direction the nation is headed and have been disappointed with his performance, AP-Ipsos polling has found. Core groups have grown increasingly disenchanted with Bush.

Oh my. Ok, now, for maximum glee, re-read the parts in bold. Then proceed.

I can't imagine how frustrated, disappointed, bitter, and enraged George must feel right now. He totally lost his face on this today. He appointed one of his cronies, nobody liked her, but he, stubborn as usual, said, "Trust me, she's the best candidate for the job, she'll be great. Trust me on this." But his closest allies replied with a resounding, "NO! Get rid of her!"

And today he was forced to.

The White House and its allies portrayed the withdrawal as one initiated by the nominee and accepted by a reluctant president.

After all, the former Texas corporate lawyer who was once Bush's personal attorney had been praised by the president just three weeks ago as the most qualified candidate for the post in the country.

And Specter told The Associated Press on Oct. 11 there was little chance Bush would withdraw the nomination: "Absolutely not. I think that would be a sign of incredible weakness."

How humiliating must that be. By calling her the most qualified candidate for the post, he implied anyone else will be less qualified. Nice feeling.

And Specter put it in perspective for all of us: HER WITHDRAWAL WOULD BE A SIGN OF INCREDIBLE WEAKNESS.

Well, it makes it all the more pleasing to witness...

And read what another champion of tactfulness had to say:

But Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., not a strong Bush supporter, may have offered a more candid view of conservatives like himself.

"The president in my opinion made a bad choice here," Lott told Fox News. "Occasionally that happens. She has dealt with it admirably. In a month, who will remember Harriet Miers?"

OH MY GOD!! That must have made Harriet feel just great.

So what happens next?

Democrats urged Bush to pick a moderate for the bench, but some expressed doubts that he would. "The way that political leaders move when they are facing challenges is back to their base," said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass.

Conservatives were hopeful - but not assured - that Bush would turn to one of the dozen or so experienced conservative jurists he passed over in selecting Miers.

You mean one of the dozen or so experienced conservative jurists they hand-picked he passed over.

Way to go, George, you're doing a heck of a job.

Oh well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Wal-Mart: the Evildoer

A long time ago, when I first started hearing about the horrible business practices at Wal-Mart, I stopped shopping there. I only go there if I need something only they sell or if the money I would save is so much, I just can't look the other way. Wal-Mart uses its shear size and purchasing power to squash all competitors, small mom-and-pop stores and large chains alike. They don't offer benefits (or at least nothing comparable to what similar stores offer,) underpay their employees, discriminate against women, forbid all kinds of unions, and hire illegal immigrants even thought it's against the law. Need more reasons? Here is further proof that Wal-Mart should be ostracized:

The [internal] memo calls for Wal-Mart saving money by forcing more employees into part-time work without benefits and discriminating against the unhealthy and disabled:

To discourage unhealthy job applicants, [the memo] suggests that Wal-Mart arrange for "all jobs to include some physical activity (e.g., all cashiers do some cart-gathering)."... "It will be far easier to attract and retain a healthier work force than it will be to change behavior in an existing one," the memo said. "These moves would also dissuade unhealthy people from coming to work at Wal-Mart."

How sick is that? Discourage unhealthy people from working at Wal-Mart? Hold on a second, you already don't offer benefits, don't offer any kind of health insurance, so if I work for you, I have to pay for it all by myself. And now you tell me that you don't even want me to work for you if I'm not in perfect health? Who founded this company, Hitler?

Is tomorrow Fitzmas?

Fitzmas is a term coined by the liberal blogosphere to refer to the fact that special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald might be giving us an early Christmas (Fitzgerald + Chrtistmas = Fitzmas) this year when (or if) he comes out with criminal indictments for White House officials involved in the leak of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

Rove and Libby are the most talked about in terms of people at risk of indictments, but Cheney's name should be in that list too:

I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, first learned about the C.I.A. officer at the heart of the leak investigation in a conversation with Mr. Cheney weeks before her identity became public in 2003, lawyers involved in the case said Monday.

Notes of the previously undisclosed conversation between Mr. Libby and Mr. Cheney on June 12, 2003, appear to differ from Mr. Libby's testimony to a federal grand jury that he initially learned about the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson, from journalists, the lawyers said.

The notes, taken by Mr. Libby during the conversation, for the first time place Mr. Cheney in the middle of an effort by the White House to learn about Ms. Wilson's husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, who was questioning the administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's nuclear program to justify the war.

Lawyers said the notes show that Mr. Cheney knew that Ms. Wilson worked at the C.I.A. more than a month before her identity was made public and her undercover status was disclosed in a syndicated column by Robert D. Novak on July 14, 2003.
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But the notes, now in Mr. Fitzgerald's possession, also indicate that Mr. Libby first heard about Ms. Wilson - who is also known by her maiden name, Valerie Plame - from Mr. Cheney. That apparent discrepancy in his testimony suggests why prosecutors are weighing false statement charges against him in what they interpret as an effort by Mr. Libby to protect Mr. Cheney from scrutiny, the lawyers said.

Taking a hit for the boss doesn't get more graphic than that. Imagine if Cheney got indicted and had to resign and go to jail over this.

Ah, it's so nice to day-dream like that...

Will Harriet Miers be the gift that keeps on giving?

I previously posted about Ms. Miers withdrawing her nomination to the Supreme Court in response to the barrage of outrage coming from the rightmost quarters of the GOP, and I was my usual pessimist, until I read this post by John on AMERICAblog and I felt a little more hopeful.

I'm posting the whole thing because I can't really pick one point and not the other. They're all good:

Now that we've entered the post-Harriet world, it's time to analyze what this means.
Yes, it means that Bush will pick a far-right nutjob for the next nominee. That makes me happy. Here's why.

1. Harriet Miers' nomination was killed by the Republican party because they didn't think she was conservative enough. That means that Democrats can kill the next nomination if they think it's not liberal enough.

2. The GOP just lost all of their Supreme Court talking points. Who in the GOP is going to be able to stand up with a straight face and say "every nominee deserves an up or down vote"? Kiss that talking point good bye.

3. And who is going to be able to argue that there should be no "litmus test" on abortion and other issues? Harriet was killed because last night a report came out that she was sympathetic to a woman's right to choose. She failed their litmus test on abortion, and she was killed. That means if the next nomination fails our litmus test on abortion, we can kill the next one.

4. The Harriet debacle shows Bush to be incredibly weak. That doesn't help him at all, in anything. It will only further the public perception of him as a failing president of a failing presidency. And the weaker Bush is, the less trouble he can stir up.

5. The Democrats had the power to filibuster Bush's handful of wacky lower court nominees with impunity, there is no way they're going to have a problem filibustering those same nominees when the wacko is appointed to the Supreme Court. It will be a cake walk.

6. If Bush thought he could get a wack-job confirmed, he'd have appointed a wack-job instead of Harriet in the first place. He didn't. Nothing has changed to put Bush in a better stead now to get such a wack-job confirmed, and in fact, he's worse off because now he appears even weaker and all his talking points have been blown out of the water. So let him appoint the wack-job, and let the fun begin.

7. The religious right and "conservatives" in the GOP have shown their cards. They're nasty, vindictive, extremists who want the entire pie or nothing, and they're willing to destroy their own president if he doesn't give them 110% of everything they want. They've burned their bridges with this president, and this president is going to be around for 3 years. This should be fun.

8. Bush has shown his cards to the far right. He's not a real conservative. He doesn't like their agenda. He's embarrassed to publicly embrace it. No matter who he appoints next, they now know Bush isn't one of them and that impression - that realization - will linger for the rest of his term.

9. And finally, Bush is setting the religious right up, and that makes me smile. Yes, Bush will pick a wack-job for the next nominee, even though he knows the wack-job won't be confirmed. Bush will fight for his nominee, blah blah blah, and the nomination will fail. Then Bush will say, see, I tried - then he'll nominate Alberto Gonzales, who the religious right hates, and get him confirmed. Bush will be able to argue that he gave the religious right want they wanted and it just didn't work. Oh well, time for Alberto.

So that's why all of this makes me very very very happy. It's a big mess, and messes provide opportunities.

I guess my remaining skepticism comes from the fact that the Democrats have shown very little spine so far, so nothing makes me believe they'll finally see the light now. And if they don't, we might lose the Supreme Court for decades to come (Roberts is in his fifties, and Scalia and Thomas are much younger than the more liberal judges.)

Who should decide what medicines you can get, your doctor or just any pharmacist?

This post by John on AMERICAblog highlights a worrisome trend here in the US: pharmacists who refuse to give patients drugs legally prescribed by their doctors, like contraceptives, based on their moral and ethical judgment.

This is ludicrous. This country, because of the religious right's influence, is losing its mind. Your constitutionally protected religious affiliation freedom shouldn't be a reason for you for refusing to do your job. If you feel like your conscience forbids you from performing the duties required of your occupation, it's time for you to look for a new job, because obviously you can't be as effective in the current one as someone else would.

Pharmacists shouldn't be allowed to say, "Sorry, I'm a Catholic and my religion is against abortion, therefore I cannot sell you the pill." Anyone saying that should lose his job in a heartbeat.

My friend Fabrizio worked for a few years in Kuwait, managing an Armani store. His employees were for the most part Muslims. He told me that whenever the time for the Koran-mandated prayer came, all employees would just drop whatever they were doing, get on their knees, and pray. There was nothing he could say or do. It was what their religion mandated, and their country was based on that religion. Can you imagine the same thing happening here? No? Well, think again, because it could.

If we let people get away with not selling drugs they disagree with today, we might have to put up with them praying for fifteen minutes in front of us while our frozen food is thawing and we're in the checkout line at the grocery store tomorrow. What's gonna prevent them from doing it? It's their right to express their faith and no one can say anything about it.

I remember reading about a large Muslim community in some Midwest town here in the States where they were demanding the right to broadcast their prayers like they do in the Middle East. Over there, my friend told me, around 5 in the morning, a voice starts praying over speakers that can be heard anywhere in the city. There is no ignoring them. They are so loud, they initially scared him. How would you like the same thing happening here? Can't imagine it? Think again. The movement to obtain that right has already started, since people in that community were pointing at churches' bells at the start of the Mass and saying, "If they can why can't we?"

The more I see the effects of it, the more I wish the Founding Fathers did not write freedom of religion in the Constitution. All this wouldn't happen if the US had a national faith, like many other countries do. Why? Because the different faiths wouldn't be fighting each other to prevail.

Anyway, I digress. Point is, if you're a pharmacist, all you can say to me is, "Sorry, we don't have the drug. I can order it for you." You SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED to tell me, "My faith forbids me from selling you this drug."

If you say that, you should be fired.

The darkest days of his presidency

And let's hope the longest days, months, and years too.

Bush apparently is not a happy camper anymore. He's getting a taste of the "hard work" he's always just talking about. He's like a spoiled brat who's been enjoying life for four years, while other people were doing all the work; now, all of a sudden, those people have either screwed things up or are sick of fixing Bush's messes and are telling him he's got to start pulling his weight. And that's what pisses him off most. You mean he actually has to work, not just pretend he is? Holy crap! That wasn't part of the deal!!

He just doesn't want to be in charge anymore. He doesn't care anymore.

Facing the darkest days of his presidency, President Bush is frustrated, sometimes angry and even bitter, his associates say.
...
"He's like the lion in winter," observed a political friend of Bush. "He's frustrated. He remains quite confident in the decisions he has made. But this is a guy who wanted to do big things in a second term. Given his nature, there's no way he'd be happy about the way things have gone."
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Presidential advisers and friends say Bush is a mass of contradictions: cheerful and serene, peevish and melancholy, occasionally lapsing into what he once derided as the "blame game." They describe him as beset but unbowed, convinced that history will vindicate the major decisions of his presidency even if they damage him and his party in the 2006 and 2008 elections.

He's totally delusional. Does he really think history will look at him positively? He's already considered one of the worst presidents ever, if not THE ABSOLUTE WORST, so I don't think he'll be regarded as a good one down the road. Yes, Reagan and Clinton had their detractors in the opposite party too, but Bush has detractors in his own ranks now. That's much worse to overcome.

I certainly wouldn't be surprised to find out he actually has started drinking again. And it would suit him right, if you ask me.

2,000 and counting

The number of US soldiers killed in Iraq keeps mounting and there is no end in sight:

Experts think the country's increasingly regional-oriented politics will fuel the insurgency and even spread it further inside Iraq. Others put forward a simple, disquieting scenario: So long as U.S. and other foreign troops remain in Iraq, the insurgency will continue.

"It will become more chaotic," predicted Magnus Ranstorp of the Swedish National Defense College in Stockholm, Sweden. "It is obvious that the United States is in Iraq to stay. If this is the case, the Shiites will likely join the Sunnis in the fight."

If that isn't a nightmarish scenario then what is? There are 3 main ethnic groups in Iraq. So far the insurgency has been fueled by the Sunnis, the smallest in size. Imagine if the Shiites, the largest, were to join them in the fight.

Nothing seems to abate Iraqis willingness to fight, not elections, not a constitution, not freedom from Saddam Hussein, not democracy. Insurgent attacks continue or increase after each and every milestone Bush puts in front of them. Isn't it clear that what they want is for the US military to leave?

This little venture of Bush could turn out to be even worse than Vietnam for the US. It might actually supplant Vietnam's long-lasting image as America's lowest point in the public's collective consciousness.

Nice legacy you're building there, George. You're doing a heck of a job.

Administration officials keep lying to cover Bush's and their own incompetence

So, it seems like not every country is in as bad shape as we are in preparedness measures to fight an eventual bird flu pandemic:

Canada has one of the most enviable national pandemic plans in place, with stockpiles of the coveted antiviral drug Tamiflu and an action plan among provincial and federal health officials. Having learned from the SARS epidemic, which claimed 44 lives in Toronto in 2003 and cost the city $1 billion in lost tourism, Canada is ahead in such preparations.

See, some politicians actually do learn from past history and mistakes. Not Bush though. He spends his time bike riding and cutting branches in his ranch. God only knows what the hell he does all day long in his office.

But Prime Minister Paul Martin said the developed nations have an obligation to the poorer ones to share pandemic plans, influenza testing and any drugs that might ward off a global tragedy caused by a mutant strain of H5N1 avian flu, which has already killed dozens of people in Asia.
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As the conference prepared to convene — with Canada having said it would back an anticipated proposal by Mexico calling on wealthier nations to put aside 10 percent of their flu vaccines and future drugs to fight a pandemic for poorer nations — European health officials met in Copenhagen to review that continent's readiness.

How smart would that be? We can have millions of doses of vaccines, but if the pandemic takes over large swaths of Asia, Africa, and South America, there will be no safe haven, because of the ease of spread of the disease. Now let's see what argument the Bush administration puts forth to try and stop this plan from ever being implemented.

This CNN article was also interesting:

As the scare over bird flu intensifies, Europe and Asia are ordering clampdowns on the movements of birds and people.

Hong Kong's border with China, one of Asia's busiest, might be sealed if the deadly H5N1 bird flu starts spreading from human to human, according to the South China Morning Post newspaper.

The H5N1 strain first surfaced in Hong Kong in 1997, then re-emerged in 2003 in South Korea, before spreading to Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, China, Indonesia, Cambodia, Russia and Europe.

Hong Kong has been a hotbed of virus alerts in recent years, including the outbreak of the SARS disease in 2003, which killed almost 300 people there. The H5N1 bird flu strain also infected 18 people in Hong Kong in 1997, six of whom died.

Consequently, Hong Kong's entire poultry population, estimated at around 1.5 million birds, was destroyed within three days. This is thought to have averted a pandemic.

What is it with Hong Kong? Don't they have any sanitary regulations in place, given the fact that all these new diseases seems to originate there?

Are we such a threat to conservatives?

Apparently so, since Republicans are once again trying to get a constitutional amendment passed that would outlaw gay marriage in the US:

Conservative members of Congress are renewing an effort to outlaw gay marriage through an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, pointing to Massachusetts as the spark in a potential firestorm of court decisions that could redefine marriage across the country.

In a hearing yesterday, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, the Republican chairman of a panel studying the proposed amendment, said Congress is racing against "imminent" action by "activist" judges to legalize gay marriage.

Funny how the GOP likes activist judges when they rule in their favor. They only attack them when the judges' decisions are contrary to their needs and wants.

The amendment effort is sweeping in scope: it would define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, aiming to rescind Massachusetts' law passed in May 2004.

Although a similar effort last year led by President Bush failed in both chambers of Congress, conservative lawmakers are hopeful the amendment will come to a vote, though no timeline has been scheduled.

In order to pass, the amendment would need the support of two-thirds of those voting in each House and then be ratified by three-quarters, or 38, of state legislatures.

Hopefully, the right-wingnuts will never be able to muster the majorities necessary to pass such a hateful amendment, because if they did, its passage at the state level would be almost guaranteed, since currently 18 states have constitutional amendments defining the institution as a union for man and woman and 27 states have statutes protecting traditional marriage.

This version of the amendment, however, doesn't seem very well written and might be too sweeping, which might doom it in Congress.

Another lawyer testifying, Louis Michael Seidman, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said the amendment is "sloppily" written and would thus grant federal judges "unchecked power" to interpret it.

"The amendment reflects remarkably poor lawyering," said Seidman, adding that the wording would actually abolish marriage in Massachusetts -- for straight and gay people alike.

Because the Supreme Judicial Court ruled that gays must be treated equally, he argued that denying gays the right to marry also denied it to heterosexual couples. "The amendment has the remarkable, and no doubt unintended, effect of abolishing marriage in the state of Massachusetts," Seidman told the panel.

I wonder what straight people in the Bay State think about that.

Critics say there are more important issues to be debating, like spiraling gas prices, the war in Iraq and rising health-care costs.

"Congress shouldn't be wasting its time taking away people's rights when gas prices are $2.89 a gallon and we owe $1.8 trillion dollars to foreign counties," said Matt Vogel, spokesman for U.S. Rep. Marty Meehan, D-Lowell. "Those are real priorities Congress should be handling."

My point exactly. The fact that the religious right in this country has been able to galvanize its constituency (and a large swath of the population at large) around the issue of gay marriage is so mind boggling, especially given the severity of the problems the country currently faces.

It's so sad that people can be so hateful and so closeminded not to see that all gay people want is the same protections straight people currently enjoy when they get married.

If they're so worried about the institution of marriage being threatened and destroyed, maybe they should concentrate their efforts on outlawing divorce.

Harriet Miers withdraws her Supreme Court nomination

So the religious right wins another battle. They showed their teeth, barked loud enough, and Bush caved. Further proof of how ineffective this guy is in the White House.

President Bush on Thursday accepted the withdrawal of Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers, according to a statement from the White House.

In her letter to the president, Miers said she was "concerned that the confirmation process presents a burden for the White House and its staff and it is not in the best interest of the country."

Now the "conspiracy theory" that her nomination was only a smokescreen comes back to haunt me. Is it possible Bush nominated a crony just so that nobody would like her, he'd have to nominate someone else, and so he'd be able to pick a staunch conservative (which is what he wanted all along) by using the excuse that at least someone will like that nominee, while no one liked this one?

We'll see.