November 13, 2007
Chalabi Returns to Prominence and Power in Iraq
Christian Berthelsen, The Los Angeles Times, November 12, 2007
Baghdad- Ahmad Chalabi sits in the conference room of his compound in the Green Zone preparing to meet with Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the No. 2 U.S. military officer in Iraq.
Sunlight streams over expensive Persian carpets and modern Iraqi furniture. Chalabi wears a sober charcoal suit, but there’s a touch of the dandy in his lime-colored polka-dot tie.
Chalabi professes not to even know what the meeting is about. The general, he says nonchalantly, requested it.
As advertised, an imposing figure sporting fatigues and a shaved head strides through the door a few minutes later. “Thank you for seeing me,” Odierno says.
Ahmad Chalabi, it would appear, is back.
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The Dark Side of Mike Huckabee
Max Brantley, Salon, November 13, 2007
The Pony Express has reached us here in the Arkansas backwoods with the latest journals from the big cities. So the country correspondents have taken a break from hand-setting lines of type to read the Beltway boys and girls rave about our former governor, Mike Huckabee.
“Easy to like,” wrote Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter. “Who Doesn’t Heart Huckabee?” said the headline over Gail Collins’ column in the New York Times. And those are restrained commentators. If you Google the names Ronald Reagan and Mike Huckabee in tandem, I understand you get better than 600,000 hits.
OK. I exaggerate. I have a phone and a computer (and it’s 208,000 hits). But you’d think from national press comments that our friendly state is unreachable by phone or Internet. Do national commentators do homework? Or is a smiling, shoe-shining parson all it takes to generate such fluff?
Come to Arkansas. You’ll have to look hard to find a long-term political analyst who’d subscribe fully to the national media narrative about the latest man from Hope — fresh face, funny, nice.
Mike Huckabee is fresh to you, maybe. Funny? If barnyard humor is your shtick of choice. Nice? Well, he did do some good things in his 10 years as governor, but … read on.
Before we begin, though, a word of warning to any reporters who might want to repeat, on air or in print, any of the facts recounted below. Huckabee does not take kindly to journalists who practice journalism.
November 12, 2007
A Beautiful Corpse: Sixteen Sure Signs That The Regressive Right Is Over
David Michael Green, OpEdNews, November 9, 2007
Lordy, lord, it’s been a mean season, hasn’t it? And a long one, too.
We human beings (those bipeds lucky enough not to have been born a conservative or killed by one, that is) have suffered through the endless depravity, stupidity, duplicity and incompetence of the radical right for what now seems like forever. It’s been awful, and it’s been depressing, and that’s putting it mildly. To have had even a fraction of a heart this last decade means to have lived in Hell.
Finally, though, the end is nigh. The signs are all there. The regressive right is cracking up, a complete and utter victim of its own success at winning power and of its own absolute failure in wielding it.
The markers are everywhere, bubbling just below the surface. Here are sixteen of them, sure signs if ever there were that the era of destructive government is (nearly) over:
* FOLLOW THE MONEY: If you know anything about how American politics has been played over the last century, you know that the concept of Democrats out-fundraising Republicans is about as likely as likely as George W. Bush getting an honorary degree from anybody besides Bob Jones U. It could happen, to be sure (especially in some freaky parallel universe), it’s just that it just ain’t very likely. But guess what? It’s happening now, and it’s a sure sign of the regressive apocalypse (where do I order tickets for that party?). What is even more telling than empty GOP coffers is that even the big corporate money is going to Democrats. Imagine Enron contributing to Al Gore’s campaign, and you’d just about have the picture. Is it possible that the healthcare industry had a recent change of heart and decided that guaranteed national healthcare is now more important than corporate profits, after all? It would be possible (though massively improbable), if they had ever had a heart to begin with. A much more plausible explanation is that the lobbyists for these fat-cats who are paid to sniff out power can see which way the wind is blowing, and that it ain’t to the east anymore, ladies and gentlemen. Even the finance, insurance and real estate industries are funneling more money to Democrats than to the Reprobatlicans. (Talk about your truly bizarro parallel universes! This is the stuff of science fiction novels.) House Democrats have $28 million in the bank right now, while the GOP has $1.6 million for its congressional races (no, that’s not a typo). When did that ever happen?
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Dems Are Not Lost! – Grim
In response to We Are Lost II By Gerry Fern, a recently posted post, I say you dems are not lost, you simply need to quit being so angry and hateful!
The answer to your problems is not to piss away energy and valuable hot air trying to impeach GW but to forge ahead with a positive agenda for the country, and by that I don’t mean socialism, such as the govt take over of medicine (though I quickly admit, it needs improvement).
So what exactly do I mean? I’ve said it before and here ‘tis again, a few of my suggestions:
A House Divided, or Why It No Longer Matters to Woo the Religious Right
Pat Robertson (R-Nutcase) made a startling move a few days ago by endorsing former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-Walkin’ ‘Round in Women’s Underwear). Given that Focus on the Family head James Dobson (R-Anti-Feminist) said that he will encourage his listeners to vote for a third party candidate if Giuliani wins the Republican nomination, we are seeing the Religious Right marginalizing itself in a way that none of us could have expected or even dared to hope for.
Admittedly, Robertson’s following is much less than Dobson’s, and he is seen in some religious circles to be avaricious and insane rather than spiritual, but his unforseen endorsement of Giuliani could be the split needed to completely marginalize the Religious Right. If they are seen as the lunatic fringe and robbed of their assumed power and influence, it no longer matters which party they support. Quite frankly, no one will care.
The Tattlesnake — Here’s Your Hat, You Little Tucker, and Who’s Following Olbermann? Edition
Goodbye TV Dinner Boy as MSNBC Drifts ‘Funny Left’
Tomorrow Will Be Another Day — Without Tucker: Just got the good news that perennial MSNBC pain-in-the-rump Tucker Carlson is soon to be Gwine with the Wind, back to the Swanson plantation down home, oh lawzy, lawzy. Seems I’m not the only one who can’t stomach this pinheaded Connivy League huckster who claims wide-eyed that he’s a libertarian while he lugs water jugs for the Bush neocons. Rejoice and burn your bow-ties, people! And don’t worry about Tuck; he’ll have his very own fevered little column at The Corner and his family’s frozen TV dinner money to keep him from starving in the gutter. Hey, Friar Tuck (or is that Tired F…?) — say hello to Dennis Miller on your way down!
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