In which 2006 leaves with a whimper, and at the Mouse Circus today the wingnuts got robbed.
Robbed!
I mean, the hanging of Saddam Hussein was the kind of event Wingnuts live for: A nice, Cheneyesque, canned hunt, where caged creatures are annihilated for sport.
And yet they couldn’t even marinade in a nice, blood-lust-slaking, jaggily-televised execution before heading out to Church to worship the
and blew it right off the front page.
The talk here and there was of the ugliness of “victor’s vengeance”. No one said it, but in my construction the parallels between the Iraqi Execution and the Iraqi Elections were heavily present in the room.
Both were elaborate political theater, reeking of desperation, staged and rigged under the watchful gun-sights of the U.S military to give the same patterned patina of “legitimacy” to the Bush Administration’s criminal foreign adventure that Dubya believes his pathetic signing statements and assertions of Unitary Executive Demigodhood lend his high domestic crimes.
But in the end the poison tree cannot bear healthy fruit and corrupt means lead to corrupt ends. In the end, the hanging of Saddam was botched less by the shoddy judicial work that preceded it than it was polluted by the taunting ugliness that shot it through, and the meaty and heavily-mailed fist of the Bush Administration doing what it always does: pounding on Justice’s Scale, demanding pre-cooked outcomes regardless of the facts, the circumstance or the law.
However in content and conversation, this Sunday was thin soup. No new news broken and no observable trial balloons floated.
So, realfuckingfast…
“Meet the Press" Former NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw and cylon Bob Woodward.
Brief history of the NixoFord Administration (without “L”s).
Followed by Surge Talk.
That is all.
"This Week" John Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth Edwards.
Quick footage of Ford’s funeral.
Somebody gave Cheney a nice speech to read: A text full of honors for Ford for trying to stop the very species of horrors that that Cheney tries every day to further unleash.
So irony went down into the Narrow House along with the mortal remains of the 38th President.
Footage omitted: After the services, Cheney emptying a 40 over Agnew's grave
while intoning "This is for all the brothas that didn't make it."
Edwards: Dead Saddam makes little difference.
Then it’s on to campaign and platform chatter.
On "Face the Nation" Alexander Haig, Ben Bradlee of the Washington Post, Tom DeFrank of the New York Daily News and Ford biographer James Cannon.
Another brief history of the NixoFord Administration (“L”s included).
Bradlee: It was a wonderful time to be a reporter. In addition to Deep Throat, we had Goldwater. He was a great source.
Haig: It was Hell inside the White House (in those days.) We had 90 vacancies at the top of the government.
Cannon: Betty Ford. Helluva broad. Great integrity. Great honesty.
Amen.
"Fox News Sunday" Dick Lugar, then former Gov. Tom Vilsack.
Lugar: A dead Saddam means very little. Figuring out a political solution in Iraq.
Wallace: And…?
Lugar: And I’m not real confident that anything is going to work.
Some people say “Give al Malaki a half-friedman or a full friedman and then bounce him.” But that’s not enough. Al Malaki is under huge pressure
Wallace: Surge?
Lugar: My prayer is...in the past the congress hasn’t exactly been taken seriously. Now there’s been an election and the Republicans lost. There has to be at least some study of this – by Congress and the White House – for a few hours in private where we can asks questions and find out the details.
Wallace: What if that doesn’t happen? What if he just announces it cold.
Lugar: Well that’s the usual course. Just dumping it out there and the asking Congress to comment. If that happens, Dubya can expect hearings. Subpoenas. Scandal. Public flogging.
Wallace: Owie.
Lugar: Fuck yeah. Hell, we just want to know what the hell these “surgies” are supposed to do? Training? Combat? House-to-house fighting? Mail delivery?
Lugar: I could support an increase in troops…if the Administration can explain exactly who in the fuck it is we’re supposed to fighting. And what exactly is it that these troops are supposed to do to fight them.
Wallace: 12-18% supports an increase in troops. Can an war be sustained for long with such low public numbers?
Lugar: The Preznit needs some well-informed friends. He needs to have people in Congress who are strong advocates for whatever the plan is. He needs to explain in detail what he plans to do. How many troops. What they’re going to be responsible for. What’s the mission.
(Actual transcript for you fussy purists is as follows:
WALLACE: It seems pretty clear that President Bush is leaning towards some kind of 'surge,' of sending additional US forces into Iraq. Do you support sending in more troops to Iraq?
LUGAR: Well, I don't know whether I do or not. And I say that because my prayer is that President Bush will take the advice that has come frequently, and that is, with people being there on the take-off, they have to support you on the landing. In the past the administration has been inclined, not to disregard Congress, but not to take Congress very seriously. I think this time Congress has to be taken seriously, there's been an election, Republicans lost the election. There's going to be a change in leadership on my committee, and likewise on the House side. What I would advise, would be maybe a retreat, it could be right here in Washington, but for several hours, in which the Foreign Relations Committee, just to take our group, really studies, what is the President's plan? Understands, specifically, who is to be trained, how would the politics affect what we've just been talking about...the devolution of the country, the oil money, or anything else. In other words that there be at least be at least some study of this by all of us, before suddenly we are all asked to comment: 'Are you in favor or surge, are you in favor of withdrawal?' Six months, three months, all the clichés. These are not going to be very relevant.
WALLACE: But you're saying do this before the President addresses the nation.
LUGAR: Yes, that would be advisable.
WALLACE: And what if he doesn't? What if basically, you know, he calls a group of you in, has the meeting around the cabinet room...
LUGAR: Which is the usually course.
WALLACE: Yeah, then what?
LUGAR: Then he can anticipate, not endless hearings, but a lot of hearings, a lot of study, a lot of criticism. In other words, as opposed to having a Foreign Relations Committee that really now is well-informed, understands, may not agree, but understands how you get from place to place, we have an assortment of invitations, demands for subpoenas, all sorts of situations in which Administration figures perhaps reluctantly come to the committee, or don't come to the committee, or various other experts discuss..
WALLACE: You're saying this could get ugly.
LUGAR: Yes, it could. And it need not.
Then...Vilsack!
Vilsack: I believe the generals are right: America needs to get out of the middle.
Wallace: You oppose a timeline, and yet you’d pull out of Baghdad, etc. And how would that stop the violence?
Vilsack: We can’t stop the violence you pinhead. What about "We're Fucked" can't you process?
Vilsack: Where did all those billions and billions of reconstruction dollars go?
Wallace: Do you think that the first new Preznit in a 9/11 world needs loads of foreign policy experience?
Vilsack: We had all the experience in the world when this White House decided to cut and run from Afghanistan and go make its Stoopid War in Iraq.
Wallace: But...uh...9/11? Huh? Huh?
Wallace: Do you have the courage to take on the anti-energy independent forces inside the Democratic Party.
WTF?
Wallace: Answer the question! You gotta do some things the evil Democratic interest groups won’t like. Like drilling in ANWR.
Vilsack: Fuck you. More drilling doesn’t do squat, not because of special interests but because of simple arithmetic.
Wallace: Most people don’t want to vote for you for Preznit. So…
Vilsack: I’m a reacher-outer.
On “Chris Matthews”, where is every day is “Eau du Hillary’s Panties” at the Matthews Perfume counter.
Would you like a sample?
No.
Just a schpritz?
No. Get that shit away from me.
And then you get a face-full.
And since the topic is Hillary – forever Hillary – and Obama, he stocks the shelves with Journo Brother Number One – Clarence Page – and The Ladies. Noron vs. Katty.
Matthews: You ask an educated woman about Hillary and you get one of those complicated answer. Very nasal and very “sophisticated”.
Feh.
Nothing here, although Noron gets the award for “Last Use of The FoxNews ‘Some might argue…’ Verbal Stalking Horse in 2006.”
Next up: My shot at the Most Invisible Story of 2006.
