So.... no posts today. In the meantime, some headlines and highlights:
After Bush Leaves Office, His Budget's Costs Balloon
| For President Bush, the budget sent to Congress last week outlines a painful path to meeting his promise to bring down the federal budget deficit by the time he leaves office in 2009. But for the senators and governors already jockeying to succeed him, the numbers released in recent days add up to a budgetary landmine that could blow up just as the next president moves into the Oval Office.
Congress and the White House have become adept at passing legislation with hidden long-term price tags, but those huge costs began coming into view in Bush's latest spending plan. Even if Bush succeeds in slashing the deficit in half in four years, as he has pledged, his major policy prescriptions would leave his successor with massive financial commitments that begin rising dramatically the year he relinquishes the White House, according to an analysis of new budget figures. |
Aside from all the obvious things to say about this, the interesting variable as I see it are the Republican Senators seeking to run in 2008. Will their own self-interest trump their allegiance to the president?
Iraq Winners Allied With Iran Are the Opposite of U.S. Vision
| When the Bush administration decided to invade Iraq two years ago, it envisioned a quick handover to handpicked allies in a secular government that would be the antithesis of Iran's theocracy -- potentially even a foil to Tehran's regional ambitions.
But, in one of the greatest ironies of the U.S. intervention, Iraqis instead went to the polls and elected a government with a strong religious base -- and very close ties to the Islamic republic next door. It is the last thing the administration expected from its costly Iraq policy -- $300 billion and counting, U.S. and regional analysts say. |
Funny how the administration has been wrong virtually every step of the way, while its pre-war critics have been right just as often. No WMD? Check. No al Qaeda/Saddam ties? Check. No easy post-war transition? Check. An unfriendly and potentially more unstable regime in its place? Check. In the runup to the war those of us who suggested such things were called un-American, un-patriotic, and at times even traitors. Only problem is that we were right.
Missile Defense System Test Fails
| A test of the national missile defense system failed Monday when an interceptor missile did not launch from its island base in the Pacific Ocean, the military said. It was the second failure in months for the experimental program.
A statement from the Missile Defense Agency said the cause of the failure was under investigation. A spokesman for the agency, Rick Lehner, said the early indications was that there was a malfunction with the ground support equipment at the test range on Kwajalein Island, not with the interceptor missile itself. If verified, that would be a relief for program officials because it would mean no new problems had been discovered with the missile. Previous failures of these high-profile, $85 million test launches have been regarded as significant setbacks by critics of the program. |
We've spent $85 billion on this system, but it would be a "relief" if the failure came not from the missile but from ground support? How is that supposed to make any sense?
Bush to Request $82B for Military Operations
| President Bush is asking Congress for $82 billion to cover the costs of ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and a myriad of other internationally related expenses, such as training Iraqi security forces, aiding tsunami victims and helping military forces in other nations. |
Right, I forgot about this one. Add this to the list of pre-war criticisms that we on the left were right about. Iraq will fund its own reconstruction? Try again.
Bush Labor Department Puts Wal-Mart in "Privileged Position"
| Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer agreed to pay $135,540 to settle federal charges that it violated child labor laws in Connecticut, Arkansas and New Hampshire. As part of the agreement, revealed yesterday after it was secretly signed in January, the Labor Department agreed "to give Wal-Mart 15 days' notice before the Labor Department investigates any other 'wage and hour' accusations, like failure to pay minimum wage or overtime." |
Every time I think they can't find a new way to offend me they do. We're going to give them 15 days notice before an investigation begins into wrongdoing? What's next? Will the DEA will now give meth-amphetamine labs 15 days notice prior to conducting a raid? And if not, why not? What's the difference?
Once again the Bush administration proves that the "rule of law" is a concept well beyond their understanding.
A man called Jeff
No excerpts. AmericaBlog is driving this Jeff Gannon thing forward at full speed, and today he has some HUGE developments. Turns out Jeff is indeed a male prostitute. So... how did he get his White House pass? And how did he get access to those CIA docs? Is it all coincidence, or does this one go deeper? Interesting.
Jazz Composer Nabs Grammy After Web-Only Sales
| Jazz composer Maria Schneider took home a Grammy on Sunday for her album "Concert in the Garden," without selling a single copy in a record store.
Schneider, 44, financed her Grammy-winning album through a Internet-based music delivery service called ArtistShare that opens the financing of production to dedicated fans. |
As a musician, nothing would make me happier than to see the entire music industry implode. Artists selling directly to fans is the way forward. Middlemen? We don't need no stinking middlemen!
CRISIS? WHAT CRISIS?....
Kevin Drum has been a man on fire when it comes to the ongoing Social Security debate. Today he provides an analysis of past projections by the Social Security trustees and determines that - surprise! - the projection that currently predicts that the trust fund will NEVER default is the one based on past projection performance most likely to be correct.
Funny when the facts get in the way of a good argument, isn't it? With the Iraq war it was easy to fudge the numbers. But with a long running domestic program like Social Security, well, you just can't pull the con the same way.
Contractor said to be paid $2m in cash
| WASHINGTON -- US officials in postwar Iraq paid a Rhode Island contractor by stuffing $2 million worth of crisp bills into a gunnysack and routinely made cash payments around Baghdad from a pickup truck, a former official with the US provisional government says.
Because the country lacked a functioning banking system, contractors, and Iraqi ministry officials were paid with bills taken from a basement vault in one of Saddam Hussein's palaces that served as headquarters for the Coalition Provisional Authority, former authority official Frank Willis said. Officials from the authority, in charge in Iraq from June 2003 to June 2004, would count the money when it left the vault, but no one kept track of the cash after that, Willis said. ''In sum, inexperienced officials, fear of decision-making, lack of communications, minimal security, no banks, and lots of money to spread around. This chaos I have referred to as a 'Wild West,' " Willis said in testimony he prepared to give today before the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, made up of Democrats who want to spotlight the waste of US funds in Iraq. |
Post-war planning? Who needs post-war planning when you've got "gunnysacks"?
And oddly enough that's apparently just the beginning
When Sexuality Undercuts A Family's Ties
| Maya Keyes loves her father and mother. She put off college and moved from the family home in Darnestown to Chicago to be with her dad on a grand adventure. Even though she disagrees with him on "almost everything" political, she worked hard for his quixotic and losing campaign for the U.S. Senate.
Now Maya Keyes -- liberal, lesbian and a little lost -- finds herself out on her own. She says her parents -- conservative commentator and perennial candidate Alan Keyes and his wife, Jocelyn -- threw her out of their house, refused to pay her college tuition and stopped speaking to her. Maya, 19, says her parents cut her off because of who she is -- "a liberal queer." Tomorrow, she will take her private dispute with her dad into the open. She is scheduled to make her debut as a political animal, speaking at a rally in Annapolis sponsored by Equality Maryland, the state's gay rights lobby. |
Funny, but that's not my definition of "family values."
OK - back to sleep... Ugh.
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