The Dusty Dog

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Open Letter To Mokawanis

I have also written this on his blog, but I felt the need to repeat it here.

I have to say that even though I completely respect your decision, I am going to miss you. Alot. You have certainly made my blogging experience richer. I will continue to blog about my utter disdain for the dubya administration, the republicans who support them, and the neocon terrorists who advance their cause. They are truly the worst traitors this country as ever seen. It's very depressing. I will dance when they are sent to prison for war crimes, and for bleeding the American economy dry with their lies and outright thievery. I will celebrate when they die. Yes, there aren't many people I wish dead, but I hope that dubya and all his neocon crooks lead long and painful lives. Then, just die off like the maggots that they are. For each one of their deaths will be cause to celebrate.

(As an aside, I remember when J. Edgar Hoover died. I was working in an office of about 35 people in NYC at the time that the news broke. There was a huge, HUGE round of applause and joy. One more dispiccable crook bites the dust! We danced and partied. That's the way I envision the dubya crooks goin' out.)

Mokawanis, I hesitate to delete the link to your blog, but I will. You're right. No sense linking to a stagnant blogsite. But, you have to promise me one thing......... send me a note when you return.

Be well, my friend. Keep fighting the good fight.


- above image from the No RNC Poster Project

Monday, March 27, 2006

Another Dubya Nomination


Generally, I'm not a person who cares if one has a child out of wedlock. That is a personal issue that doesn't concern me (unless of course, it directly impacts me and/or my family). Similarly, I don't care if people have extramarital affairs. That's between them and their spouses. Admittedly though, on the latter count, I generally find that affairs can be sleazy business, not pretty, and very selfish. But again, unless it directly affects me or my family, it's not my issue. It fall under the realm of personal affairs of which I have no interest.

However, what really frosts me is when the holier-than-thou, sanctimoniously self-pedestaled rightwing establishment, who have embraced this notion of "family values", and espouse the notion that anyone who does not embrace such family values is scum, or worse yet, a liberal, would then turn around and ignore anti-family values if it isn't expedient to their agenda of the day. Sounds a lot like the modus operandi of the republican neocon fascists these days, for sure.

Case in point -- our newly selected Secretary of the Interior, or as it's known in environmental circles, the Secretary of the Inferior. If I am going to uphold the family values measure of a person, then dirtbag Dirk Kempthorne fails miserably. What the freakin' hell was the dubya cockroach thinking about when he nominated this guy? Oh yeah, he wasn't thinking. He wasn't even leading. He is so out of control, as in he is not in control of our government, that likely some neocon scumbag just handed him a person and a speech, and said, "Nominate him." That is a very likely scenario. But, back to Dirtbag Dirk.

According to the Pensito Review, Dirkie has a whole lot of non-family values in his ugly closet.

But when Kempthorne was a U.S. senator, he had a reputation. If it is true, he made Bill Clinton look like a school boy. According to 43rd State Blues: Democracy for Idaho, it is widely rumored that:

* While he was philandering in D.C., he was married, of course — but he also had a full-time girlfriend from back home who worked in his office

* He and the girlfriend had a child

* When his senate career ended, his wife insisted that he give up the girlfriends, all of them, and move back to Idaho

* They moved back, but at least one girlfriend, the one with the child, returned to Idaho too

Did I need to mention that Kempthorne is a Republican?


Fact of the matter is, I still don't care about dirtbag, himself. I care more about his record as the dirtbag senator, then governor from Idaho that he really is. His record sucks. This from New West Politics article Please, Not Kempthorne:

Most enviros I talk to think Dirk Kempthorne is a reasonable guy and a good politician. He isn’t another James Watt, the icon man of the seventies who single-handedly doubled the membership of the Sierra Club, but Kempthorne has hardly been a champion for protecting our public lands. He has not, for example, come out against the Bush administration’s current plan to sell of public lands, even though most governors have opposed it. Conversely, he has close ties to industry and has even been called a “faithful mouthpiece for polluting industries.”

That’s probably an overstatement, but the fact is, Kempthorne, a former U.S. Senator who decided to run for governor instead a second term in the Senate, has consistently received a zero rating from the League of Conservation Voters—except once, when he soared up to a 6 percent rating, getting one vote correct, something about funding a rocket for the space program that nobody remembers. But he has always received a 100 percent rating from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.


And more:

Recently, Kempthorne created quite a stir with Idaho’s contentious wolf-killing plan, and he opposed the Roadless Rule, even sued in an attempt to stop its implementation. He considers the rule a “federal edict,” forgetting that these are public lands belonging to all people in all states, not some people in Idaho.

Kempthorne prides himself as a consensus builder, but a few years ago, an amazing committee of timber companies and environmentalists reached a consensus and hatched a plan to restore grizzly bears in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, but Kempthorne was primarily responsible for influencing Norton to kill it, even though her own scientists in her own agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, favored it.
Yes, read that last phrase one more time. ".... even though her own scientists in her own agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, favored it." That is a hallmark legacy of the Gail Norton administration over the Department of the Interior. Now that she's stepped down from her position, having stepped into the Abramoff shit, the bushies have found another one just like her. Makes me sick. And, sad. There is so much to lose, and with these bums at the helm, the faster we lose it all, the better.

With that in mind, I point you to the source of the photo at the beginning of this article, a site called Ridiculopathy. From the article, this exerpt:

One thing the President has learned in the last five years is that the old model for public land use, with its outmoded concepts like "parks" and "restricted use zones," has turned out to be an utter failure. The federal government spends billions every year to save America's beloved wilderness, and yet adorable woodland creatures still die every day. Bush argued that the long-standing policy has not only been wasteful but counterproductive as well. He pointed to recent usage statistics for places like Yellowstone and Yosemite that appear to show that the parks are being preserved to death.

"If we keep these lands in the public trust, the public will just end up ruining them by trampling them underfoot, littering, and setting random fires," said Bush. "The only sure way to protect these pristine examples of God's country is to remove them from the public domain- in other words, to sell them off to the highest bidder."


I leave you with that......

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Scandalous Issue of National Security and Ports




Republicans are a really disgusting bunch of pandering, self-serving, and dangerous people. Particularly, those who were elected by the American people as being tough on national security. What a joke! But, I, for one, am not laughing. No one should be laughing. People who bought into their bullshit ought to just come right out and and apologize for admitting that they were duped by these selfish scumbuckets republicans who belong to and fight for the Republican controlled Congress (not to exclude the Judiciary and the Executive branches, as well). As these bastards have been selling their snake oil, they've also been selling the American people down the river, by compromising our environment, our health care, and yes boys and girls, our national security. Why am I not surprised?

As I was surfing throught the web yesterday, I came across this article that made me want to scream. I want to start shouting out in horror, disbelief and frustration. It seems that, according to Bring It On, their quick check of house resolutions over the past two years have found that there are a number of bills lanquishing in committees regarding national security and port security. Why, pray tell, are they languishing? Seems that all of these bills, yes ALL of these bills were submitted by democratic members of Congress, but without any power to bring them up for debate, they just sit and rot on shelves and desks. This is scandalous.

Instead, the Congressional majority bring up for debate, vote upon, and of course, pass such legislation as that which requires the food industry to remove warning labels from food items, then forbids states from adding their own warning labels. Why, you ask? Because some shithead dickhead republican cockroach, maybe a few of them, have family members in the food industry who will make huge profits from this really harmful bill. The bill, H.R. 4167, is called "The National Uniformity of Food Act", and a good discussion of it can be found here.

Back to the subject of this article, I was outraged that the pandering repubs are jumping faster than rats off the Titanic to distance themselves from the Dubai ports scandal. But, I do not want to re-write the article. Instead, I am quoting most of Bring It On's article here:

No doubt, the Republicans in the House are serious about protecting our ports….from the electorate. Since the story broke, they have sponsored no less than 6 House resolutions ( H.R. 4807, H.R. 4814, H.R. 4817, H.R. 4833, H.R. 4839 and H.R. 4842) to ban DPW from taking control of the port terminals. All six resolutions target the sale of ports or port operations to foreign entities.

To bad they have such an abysmal record on legislation written to protect the ports themselves. Of all the resolutions proposed since this charade started, only one focused on a more fundamental problem - the porous security of our nation’s ports. That resolution was sponsored by Rep. Edward J. Markey from Massachusetts. Yes he is a Democrat.

That’s not all. A quick check of House Resolutions over the last two years show several Democrat sponsored port security bills introduced:

1. 1. HR 1731.
To improve the security of the Nation’s ports by providing Federal grants to support Area Maritime Transportation Security Plans and to address vulnerabilities in port areas identified in approved vulnerability assessments or by the Secretary of Homeland Security.
Sponsor: Rep Harman, Jane [CA-36] (introduced 4/20/2005)

2. 2. H.CON.RES.428
Title: Recommending that Congress not provide funds for fiscal year 2005 for the deployment of ground-based, strategic, mid-course, ballistic missile defense system components that have not met operational testing requirements and, instead, provide needed funding for programs designed to keep America’s ports secure from terrorist attacks.
Sponsor: Rep Harman, Jane [CA-36] (introduced 5/17/2004) Cosponsors (None)

3. H.R.2376
Title: To prevent and respond to terrorism and crime at or through ports.
Sponsor: Rep Millender-McDonald, Juanita [CA-37] (introduced 6/5/2003) Cosponsors (None)

4. 4. H.R.3456
Title: To deter and punish terrorism and crime at United States ports, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Bell, Chris [TX-25] (introduced 11/6/2003) Cosponsors (None)

5. H.R.3788
Title: To amend title 46, United States Code, to modify requirements applicable to the National Maritime Transportation Security Plan with respect to ensuring that the flow of cargo through United States ports is reestablished after a transportation security incident, to require the Secretary of the department in which the Coast Guard is operating to develop and implement a secure long-range automated vessel tracking system, to aid maritime security, efficiency, and safety, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Sanchez, Loretta [CA-47] (introduced 2/10/2004) Cosponsors (None)

6. H.R.4355
Title: To strengthen port security by establishing an improved container security regime, to expand on the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002, to strengthen the Coast Guard port security mission, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Sanchez, Loretta [CA-47] (introduced 5/12/2004) Cosponsors (38)

All of the resolutions are sponsored by Democrats. All of the resolutions are designed to improve port safety. All of them are still lingering in committee hell, never to see the light of day.



This country is in the crapper right now, folks. It really is. If some modicum of sanity is not brought back very soon, we're flushed. It's that simple.

Friday, March 10, 2006

Spread the Word


Go to this site and get everyone you know to pressure your Congressional delegations to sign House Resolution 635 calling for an impeachment inquiry. Time is everything and we need to get ALL of the Congressional democrats (some republicans also would be nice) to sign the resolution:
"Congress (may) establish a select committee with subpoena authority to investigate the misconduct of the Bush Administration with regard to the Iraq war detailed in this Report and report to the Committee on the Judiciary on possible impeachable offenses."


This is important.

The Selfishness of Republicans

I was listening to the radio (AirAmerica on XM satellite radio, to be exact) yesterday while driving home from work. I always do that. It's a kind of one half hour of down time before I get home and begin the task of feeding the animals and taking the very dusty dog out for a walk. She loves her walks. Of course, it's no wonder. She's been home all day, alone with the cats, mostly sleeping and likely quite bored. I get home and all the animals (amazing how a mere three animals can seem like a huge herd) get excited, are thrilled to see me, as I am the focus of their domestic animal lives, and want FOOD. Back to the radio discussion.

Sam Seder was filling in for Randi Rhodes, who was on vacation. She is a rabid left wing, anti-neocon, bush-hating person. So is Sam. So am I. I enjoy talk radio. I learn alot about the politics of the day, because we sure as shit ain't gonna read or hear about the finer details from kiss ass mainstream media. Anyway, this caller called to say that he's a republican, apparently only to provide some opposite viewpoint on the show. He said that he supports the president and always votes for GOP candidates. Sam began questioning him about what exactly does he support about the dubya regime? Sam brought up the Dubai ports deal, and the caller admitted he wasn't happy about that. Sam brought up the handling of Katrina, the deficits, the Iraq debaucle, etc. The guy finally admitted that the only thing that he likes about the dubya dummy is his stance on abortion.

Herein lies the rub. This extremely stupid caller, and believe me when I say STUPID, finds that the only thing that he supports about the dubya cockroaches is the one thing that will have absolutely zero impact on his own personal and puny life. Economics will affect the caller and the rest of us significantly. The war in Iraq affects us all. The deficits, health care, the environment, the corporate pollution and corporate welfare, to name but a few things, have huge effects on the lives of every American, and in fact the entire world. Abortion only affects those who are saddled with the usually emotional decision about what will affect them, and only them for the rest of their lives.

How did people become so selfish? What is it about republicans when they think they can dictate how we go about handling our own personal lives, from abortion, choices in death, who we love, and how we marry? What is so fucking wrong with these people that they set aside the obviously rotten corporate politics that are destroying the fabric of American society, though admittedly, are "not happy about that" and hang their collective hats on personal events that have absolutely nothing to do with them?

I hate republicans. I really do. I hate everything they stand for. I hate their collective stupidity. I hate their mob mentality. I hate their exclusionary club frames of reference. I hate republicans. I hate their decidedly obliviousness to the economic downward spiral that this country is traversing. I hate their sicko love of guns and violence. I hate their "smaller government" thinking, because that is as bogus as an $43 bill.

Bush's approval rating has hit an all-time low this week, at under 40%. Who are these idiots who still support the guy? Why are they such morons? Explain to me why the Congressional republicans have to scurry away from their beloved dubya cockroach in order to have any chance of winning in November's elections. Doesn't that alone indicate that they know that the idiot they've propped up all these long five years is a criminal? If they knew/know that, then what drove them to support him? Doesn't that fact alone send some kind of message to "mainstream" Americans? And, of course, let us not forget dubya's dick, who is likely the biggest crook in the White Wash, I mean House, right now.

Well, this was a vent. I'm just disgusted by republicans. Did I mention how much I really hate them?

Saturday, March 04, 2006

Whose Side Are You On, People?


I cannot help but wonder why anyone, even conservatives, support this administration given the latest reports that illustrate in the finest of details that Bush and Cheney lied to the American people about the Iraqi threats, and weapons of mass distruction, and the fraudulent Niger documents. It's all out there now. Do we really have to wait until the Dems take office to begin impeachment proceedings against these traitors? In fact, I really do believe that if any Congressional representative, from either the House or the Senate, still supports dubya and his dick, then s/he, too, is guilty of treason against the American people. The lines are being drawn, and history is being written. Whose side are you on, people? Those who stand for democracy and the American people, or those who stand for fascism, repression and global war crimes, including mass murder?

This article, Administration: What Bush Was Told About Iraq, is out there for the world to read; for everyone to see. Doubt is gone. This entire administration is complicit in war crimes, crimes of aggression, and lying to the American people. Read some excerps, then please go read the entire article.

Two highly classified intelligence reports delivered directly to President Bush before the Iraq war cast doubt on key public assertions made by the president, Vice President Cheney, and other administration officials as justifications for invading Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein, according to records and knowledgeable sources.

The first report, delivered to Bush in early October 2002, was a one-page summary of a National Intelligence Estimate that discussed whether Saddam's procurement of high-strength aluminum tubes was for the purpose of developing a nuclear weapon.

Among other things, the report stated that the Energy Department and the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research believed that the tubes were "intended for conventional weapons," a view disagreeing with that of other intelligence agencies, including the CIA, which believed that the tubes were intended for a nuclear bomb.

The disclosure that Bush was informed of the DOE and State dissents is the first evidence that the president himself knew of the sharp debate within the government over the aluminum tubes during the time that he, Cheney, and other members of the Cabinet were citing the tubes as clear evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program. Neither the president nor the vice president told the public about the disagreement among the agencies.


In other words, dubya and his dick cherry-picked the intelligence they wanted to support the Iraqi invasion, while never disclosing that there were dissenting opinions within the intelligence community. That's treasonous. The burning question is Why? Why were they so hot to trot our troops into Iraq? Here's more:

The second classified report, delivered to Bush in early January 2003, was also a summary of a National Intelligence Estimate, this one focusing on whether Saddam would launch an unprovoked attack on the United States, either directly, or indirectly by working with terrorists.

The report stated that U.S. intelligence agencies unanimously agreed that it was unlikely that Saddam would try to attack the United States -- except if "ongoing military operations risked the imminent demise of his regime" or if he intended to "extract revenge" for such an assault, according to records and sources.


When World War II was over, I can imagine the German people who supported Hitler's reign of power, hate and death were scurrying like rats to attempt to prove that they did not support Hitler. They knew that the world was going to hold them accountable for their support of that madman, and to this day, people deny (whether true or not) that they ever supported the Hitler regime. I see a parallel history here in the United States of America. Who ever would have thought that, as a nation of the "free world", we could have collectively sunk so low as to support our dubya regime madman? In a million years, I would have never believed it. Now, it is playing out before our very eyes. For many more, it's playing out before their very lives.