Saturday, March 31, 2007

Shorter George Bush: Lying Is Honesty (5:09 pm)

Multiple and repeated falsehoods are “no credible evidence of wrongdoing.”

AP reports:

President Bush again came to Alberto Gonzales’ defense Saturday, saying the attorney general is ”honorable and honest” and has his full support.
(…)
”I will remind you there is no credible evidence there has been any wrongdoing.”

posted by Brian Zick | start the discussion

Saturday Cartoon (6:46 am)

Corny Concerto

A 1943 Merry Melodies cartoon, Corny Concerto was created as a genuine homage to Disney’s epic Fantasia, albeit in the form of parody. Director Bob Clampett, a comedic genius, used the basic premise of synchronizing cartoon action to music as the foundation to produce very funny sight gags. It’s Warner Bros. cartoon humor as ballet.

Story: Frank Tashlin
Animation: Robert McKimson
Musical Direction: Carl Stalling

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

Friday, March 30, 2007

Connecting the Dots; Duke to Dick (9:05 pm)

Laura Rozen at The American Prospect reports:

On or about August 30, 2002, just a month after receiving the $140,000 contract from the White House/OVP, “Wade paid $140,000 … to a third party” for a yacht he gave Duke Cunningham.

Above and beyond the fact that a specific sum of money contracted by Dick Cheney’s office was used expressly to bribe Duke Cunningham, Duke and Dick also have in common a friendly relationship with the money conduit Mitchell Wade.

Wade, who pled guilty to bribing Cunningham, worked in Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney’s Pentagon from 1991 to 1993. In 2002, Wade’s company MZM got its first ever federal government contract, a one-month, $140,000 paycheck from the White House, allegedly for providing computers, office furniture, and specialized computer programming services to the Office of Vice President Dick Cheney.

Wade’s company subsequently got three more contracts from the White House and tens of millions of dollars in contracts from the Defense Department and other federal agencies, many of them for classified intelligence work.

And it was intelligence contracting scams for which Cunningham got busted. When Prosecutor Carol lam was fired, she had just indicted Brent Wilkes (a defense contractor and big money Bush/Cheney donor) and CIA executive director Kyle Dustin Foggo. Her investigation had only just begun.

Could Carol Lam have been canned because she was also sniffing around the Office of Vice President Dick Cheney?

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

GOPocrisy (4:06 pm)

The White House has conveniently exempted GOP members of Congress from criticism in doing exactly the same thing for which it has attacked Speaker Pelosi and other Democrats. Think Progress reports that the White House today lashed out at Speaker Nancy Pelosi for daring to visit Syria in the coming days.

White House spokesperson Dana Perino:

I do think that, as a general rule — and this would go for Speaker of the House Pelosi and this apparent trip that she is going to be taking — that we don’t think it’s a good idea. …

I’m not sure what the hopes are to — what she’s hoping to accomplish there. I know that Assad probably really wants people to come and have a photo opportunity and have tea with him, and have discussions about where they’re coming from, but we do think that’s a really bad idea.

But a delegation of Republicans is currently visiting Syria.

Michael Lowry, a spokesman for Representative Robert Aderholt, said that the Alabama lawmaker will visit Syria as part of a Republican delegation led by Representative Frank Wolf, a Virginia Republican. Wolf is the top Republican on the House appropriations subcommittee that funds the State Department.

Furthermore, Republican David Hobson (R-OH) will be traveling with Pelosi and other members of Congress.

Moreover, as the AP reports, “Earlier this month, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Ellen Sauerbrey held talks with a senior Syrian diplomat on how Damascus was coping with a flood of Iraqi refugees, the first such talks in the Syrian capital for more than two years.”

Perino wasn’t available to comment about Republican trips to Syria.

posted by Brian Zick | 3 comments

Henry Writes a Dear Susan Letter (11:56 am)

Paul Kiel at TPM Muckraker reports:

Much to the chagrin of the White House, House Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) wants to hear from Susan Ralston.

Waxman has invited Ralston - Jack Abramoff’s former personal assistant, who became Karl Rove’s assistant in 2001 - to appear before the committee on Thursday, April 5, to answer questions about Abramoff’s access to the White House.

The hearing will also be a good opportunity for Waxman to press for more details about White House employees’ use of outside email accounts provided by the Republican National Committee. Ralston used such outside accounts when corresponding with Abramoff, even writing to him once, “I now have an RNC blackberry which you can use to e-mail me at any time. No security issues like my WH email.”

posted by Brian Zick | 2 comments

Bush Just Never Stops Lying (11:45 am)

Think Progress reports: Bush Caught Hyping False Iraq Spending Deadline.

Renewing his veto threat on Wednesday, President Bush told Congress “the clock is ticking for our troops in the field“:

BUSH: Congress continues to pursue these [withdrawal] bills, and as they do, the clock is ticking for our troops in the field. Funding for our forces in Iraq will begin to run out in mid-April. Members of Congress need to stop making political statements, and start providing vital funds for our troops.

And lo and behold, what a surprise… /sarcasm>

A new report from the Congressional Research Service makes clear that Bush’s deadline is completely fabricated:

In a memo to the Senate Budget Committee dated Wednesday, the congressional analysts said the Army has enough money in its existing budget to fund operations and maintenance through the end of May — about $52.6 billion. If additional transfer authority is tapped, subject to Congress approving a reprogramming request, the Army would have enough funds to make it through nearly two additional months, or toward the end of July. Using all of its transfer authority, the Army could have as much as $60.1 billion available.

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

Inside Account of How Bush DoJ Was Used as Partisan Tool to Serve GOP Interests (8:24 am)

Joseph D. Rich was chief of the voting section in the Justice Department’s civil right division from 1999 to 2005. He now works for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. He wrote this op-ed in today’s LA Times, “Bush’s long history of tilting Justice.”

THE SCANDAL unfolding around the firing of eight U.S. attorneys compels the conclusion that the Bush administration has rewarded loyalty over all else. A destructive pattern of partisan political actions at the Justice Department started long before this incident, however, as those of us who worked in its civil rights division can attest.

I spent more than 35 years in the department enforcing federal civil rights laws — particularly voting rights. Before leaving in 2005, I worked for attorneys general with dramatically different political philosophies — from John Mitchell to Ed Meese to Janet Reno. Regardless of the administration, the political appointees had respect for the experience and judgment of longtime civil servants.

Under the Bush administration, however, all that changed. Over the last six years, this Justice Department has ignored the advice of its staff and skewed aspects of law enforcement in ways that clearly were intended to influence the outcome of elections.

It has notably shirked its legal responsibility to protect voting rights. From 2001 to 2006, no voting discrimination cases were brought on behalf of African American or Native American voters. U.S. attorneys were told instead to give priority to voter fraud cases, which, when coupled with the strong support for... read more

posted by Brian Zick | 1 comment

“My Sweet Lord” (6:28 am)

Update: Larry McShane for AP reports: Chocolate Jesus show canceled.

A planned Holy Week exhibition of a nude, anatomically correct chocolate sculpture of Jesus Christ was canceled Friday amid a choir of complaining Catholics that included Cardinal Edward Egan.

The “My Sweet Lord” display was shut down by the hotel that houses the Lab Gallery in midtown Manhattan, said Matt Semler, the gallery’s creative director. Semler said he submitted his resignation after officials at the Roger Smith Hotel shut down the show.

The six-foot sculpture was the victim of “a strong-arming from people who haven’t seen the show, seen what we’re doing,” Semler said. “They jumped to conclusions completely contrary to our intentions.”

BBC reports:

A New York gallery has angered a US Catholic group with its decision to exhibit a milk chocolate sculpture of Jesus Christ.

The six-foot (1.8m) sculpture, entitled “My Sweet Lord”, depicts Jesus Christ naked on the cross.

Catholic League head Bill Donohue called it “one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever”.

The sculpture, by artist Cosimo Cavallaro, will be displayed from Monday at Manhattan’s Lab Gallery.

That would be this Bill Donohue, professional victim and controversy manufacturer. And anti-muslim, anti-homosexual, anti-Semitic bigot.

Here are a couple more “worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever,” which have been produced by confectioners appealing to the religious trade.

Chocolate Jesus lollipop ($5.00) from the Christian Religion IN CHOCOLATE selection at The Chocolate Experience.

Chocolate Jesus or Mary from the Religious Chocolates available at Chocolate Fantasies ($5.50 each).

One wonders what Donohue thinks of Tom Waits’ song “Chocolate Jesus.”