Office of the Independent Blogger

In the Washington Post, there’s an article today about the rule of Law and the War on Terror. The Supreme Court ruled a couple of days ago against Bush’s program in Guantanamo Bay, and today the Post weighs in.

In the weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, the Bush administration secretly began constructing an emergency system to fight the war on terrorism. It asserted broad presidential power to conduct surveillance against American citizens, to harshly interrogate suspected terrorists in secret prisons, and to hold “enemy combatants” without charges or public trials. The Supreme Court demolished a central pillar of that jury-rigged national security edifice yesterday. In rejecting the administration’s plans to try a suspected al-Qaeda member named Salim Ahmed Hamdan before a military tribunal, the court majority was emphatic: The administration’s arguments were “unpersuasive,” “inapposite,” “unsound.” Even if Hamdan was as dangerous as the administration claimed, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the majority, “the executive nevertheless must comply with the prevailing rule of law.”

Justice Stephen Breyer, in a concurring opinion, spoke to the arrogant claims of presidential power made under the rubric of fighting terrorism. The court’s conclusion in Hamdan, he wrote, “ultimately rests upon a single ground: Congress has not issued the Executive a ‘blank check.’ ” The Hamdan ruling should be a cause for celebration, at home and abroad, because it demonstrates that the self-correcting mechanisms of American democracy remain healthy. Governments, as imperfect human institutions, make mistakes — especially in the pressure cooker the Bush administration faced after Sept. 11. But thanks to checks and balances from the courts, Congress and, yes, the press, this administration’s mistakes are being reversed.

I was happy to see this, as well. Democrats are pledging not to allow the Congress to raise its own salary until it raises the minimum wage. If Republicans expect families to survive on less than six dollars an hour, they can survive off of their present pay. Unfortunately, these are the only brightspots in a dark Presidency if you’re a person who believes in sound government, but it’s refreshing to have some good news, at least.

George Bush took the Japanese Prime Minister to Graceland for a summit, as the PM is a big fan of Elvis Presley, and out came this piece about Bush’s “style” of diplomacy.

But even more important than the journey to Memphis is what the trip says about Bush’s exceptionally personal form of diplomacy. Bush’s foreign policy aides insist that the idea for a Graceland visit came from the president himself, not from Koizumi. “About a year ago, the president started saying to us as staff, ‘I would like to take him to Graceland,’ and we all thought he might be joking,” said one senior administration official, who insisted on anonymity in talking about Bush’s foreign-policy discussions. “But as he repeated it several times to us, we realized he indeed thought it was a great thing to do.”

Call me a buzzkill if you will — I’d prefer the term “Buzzsaw” thank you very much — but this “one on one” diplomacy is not George Bush’s style. By the article’s admission, it is an act he engages in with but a handful of leaders, and only with those he considers friends, a caveat that damages the effectiveness of this diplomacy. If you’re only on good terms with your friends, and only willing to play friend-ally-diplomat with only those you are already friends with, then you’re bound to have problems.

Unlike the article, however, I think this type of diplomacy is excellent and should be engaged in with every world leader who you are on good diplomatic terms, and even those with whom we have rocky relations. That is to say, if we have a problem with the Turks over troop positioning in Iraq, that’s no reason not to engage their leadership openly and personally. If we take Kim Jung Il out to lunch at an Old Country Buffet, that is when we have problems. That is, at least, my take on the abstract and theoretical of personal diplomacy. George Bush, being George Bush, finds ways to pour gravel on even the smoothest roads.

There are other limits to this kind of diplomacy: a surprising reluctance to delve into sensitive problems. Given the nature of their friendship, it’s remarkable to note that Bush and Koizumi don’t talk much about Japan’s precarious diplomatic position in its own region. Even as Koizumi has grown closer to Bush, Japan’s relations with China and South Korea have deteriorated. At the heart of those tensions are Japan’s limited steps to acknowledge its wartime atrocities, as well as Koizumi’s visits to the Yasakuni shrine that honors the military, including war criminals. To this day, the White House prefers to leave such delicate issues to the Japanese and suggests that China has been stoking nationalist feelings against Japan for purely political reasons.

This isn’t a failure of one-on-one diplomacy: it’s a failure of the President to talk to his friends about serious issues. If Bush would rather sit around playing XBOX with world leaders, that’s one thing, but it’s not a reason to knock the style of diplomacy. Personally, I am a firm believer in this type of diplomacy, and I’ve always found it best to engage people upfront and personally rather than through second-hand back-channels. I, however, have never had a problem being frank with my friends and discussing things of a serious nature with them, while Bush is a man who would rather let all problems fester as they’re ignored — case in point: Korea, Iran.

It seems that his list of incapables grows by the day.

Might I be trite, and suggest that he invite NATO and the representatives of the European Union over for supper, and ask them to be dear old boys and give us the help we need in Iraq?

By largely going it alone in Iraq, we rapidly transformed ourselves from liberator to occupying power. All burdens have fallen on the Americans, but our credibility is too tarnished to handle them. Neither world public opinion nor American political dynamics will allow us to stay there long enough to stabilize Iraqi society, even if we could. No one country has either the resources or the credibility to do the job alone. We need direct and long-term engagement by other major countries, including a credible multilateral military force, and we need it fast.

To organize such help the administration would need to accept three painful truths: (1) that neither George W. Bush nor his successor will be able to finish the job in Iraq; (2) that the current “coalition” is not close to being the serious international presence needed to stabilize Iraq in the coming years; and, perhaps most difficult, (3) that even for the United States some sort of international legitimacy is essential to maintain viability, both domestic and international, for the long term.

Experience in the Balkans and elsewhere shows that this sort of political-military engagement takes years to complete. Ten years later, we are still in Bosnia and are far from dealing with the tensions in Kosovo. But one former Yugoslav republic has already entered NATO and the European Union, and one more is in the wings. The Balkans have been stabilized, the United States has handed most of the responsibility to the United Nations and the European Union, and the long process of integration is underway. Would that we could foresee such a future for Iraq and its neighbors. But we can’t. We need to look beyond past disputes and find a means to put in place a structure that would make such a long-term commitment possible.

The administration’s bipartisan commission on the use of intelligence in Iraq could be helpful in this regard. If its members focused on the practical lessons of the Iraq invasion, they could perform an essential service by helping to define the next steps. One important action would be to build an informal consensus among major countries on the need for a stronger international presence. This job might not be as difficult as it seems. Models of such structures can be found in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan. Each was tailored to fit a specific situation. No one wants to see Iraq dissolve. Experience shows that most countries do not want to usurp the central role of the United States, especially where military responsibility is concerned. With goodwill on all sides, it should be possible to find a consensus.

I don’t understand George Bush, and it might be best if I stopped trying to. It might have to do with the fact that I can be bothered to read, but I see all of these articles in the press about how to fix the situation in Iraq, and what to do, and yet Bush can’t seem to take action other than inaction. Staying on the course is no longer viable — does he really think it is?

A few weeks ago, I said Bush was Richard Nixon Reloaded. Now, in the Washington Post, that message is being echoed.

Let’s give credit where credit is due: Nobody knows how to take the worst political hand imaginable — responsibility for a failing war — and turn it to their own advantage like the Republicans. That was the defining political accomplishment of Richard Nixon in Vietnam. It may yet be the defining political achievement of George W. Bush in Iraq. Nixon, of course, had an easier time of it. When he took office in 1969, he inherited a war that his Democratic predecessors had made and that had long since descended into a blood-drenched, stalemated disaster. He could have opted to end the war early in his term, particularly since neither he nor his national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, believed it was winnable. But by continuing the conflict, and even expanding it into Cambodia, he enraged the 40 percent of the nation that wanted us out of Vietnam. Millions of demonstrators took to the streets; some of the student movement embraced a wacky, self-marginalizing anti-Americanism; and mainstream Democrats grew steadily more antiwar.

And by nurturing such deep divisions in the body politic, Nixon created the very kind of political landscape on which he was a master at maneuvering. Just 10 months into his presidency, Nixon was championing what he termed the “silent majority” of his countrymen against the protesting hordes. Democrats railed against the war in Vietnam; Nixon railed against the demonstrators and Democrats, whom he gleefully conflated, at home. It was an asymmetric conflict, and Nixon won it going away, defeating George McGovern in 1972 by more than 20 percentage points.

Today Republicans in general and Karl Rove in particular have resurrected the Nixon game plan. They are not mounting a point-by-point defense of the administration’s plan for Iraq, not least because the administration doesn’t really have a plan for Iraq. When Senate Democrats brought two resolutions to the floor last week, each calling for a change in our policy, the Republicans defeated them both, but they pointedly failed to introduce a resolution of their own affirming the administration’s conduct of the war. That, they understood, would have been a loser in the court of public opinion. Instead, they walked a tightrope: not really defending the war per se but attacking the Democrats for seeking to end it. This was Nixonism of the highest order.

It’s an interesting parallel, and now that I think of it more, it runs a tad deeper than just language, than a love for domestic wiretapping. I think it’s all-too-painfully-possible that Bush simply has no clue what to do in Iraq anymore, and, you know, I’d buy that about our Nixonian President, and his political party, since they want to do such hackneyed things as “condemn” the New York Times for publishing a story using an official Congressional resolution to bring shame upon their house.

Why don’t we just start marking the homes of editors and take their first-borns whenever they step out of line? It sure would save us the trouble of dealing with freedom of speech.

The Times’ newspapers in LA and New York joined the Wall Street Journal recently in publishing the news that, hey, we’re collecting banking information of terrorist organizations and monitoring certain transactions. The fact that we are waging a war on terrorist financial lines has been well-known since Price of Loyalty came out, and it was a common sense bit of common knowledge before then. Bush, however, is furious about it, and says that this old (and, in the recent articles, ambiguous) news will help terrorists in the war against us. I don’t see how you can buy that. Does the Administration expect people to believe that al-Qaeda is shocked by the news that we might be going after their money by going to certain unnamed banks?

The Nation has its own take on why Bush is so upset, and why he’s so selective with his indignation over leaks. It mentions that the military has leaked news of troop withdrawals, and Bush has been easy going about that, despite the fact that it gives away future military movements. The article speculates that this is because the news of withdrawal might be politically palatable; more news of Bush spying? Not so much.

What’s the bottom line? The cynical Bush White House has always seen the “war on terror” as a political tool. The president and his allies – heeding the advice of White House political czar Karl Rove – regularly tailor their responses to new developments to benefit their domestic political fortunes while undermining the prospects of their political foes. Leaks about plans for troop redeployment are fine with the president because they could help him and his congressional allies politically. Leaks about the administration spying on citizens, on the other hand, are “disgraceful” because they could cause the president and his Republicans acolytes political harm.

Right-wing newsmagazines are just as willing to engage in a battle over the leaks as Liberals, however. The Weekly Standard, for one, has written what it calls “the case for prosecuting the New York Times.” We’ve heard this song and dance before, and personally, I’d like to dance to it. By all means, tell the Attorney General to take the New York Times by the hand and mosey on down together to the Courthouse.

I’m all for a resounding victory for Free Speech.

George W. Bush isn’t a fan of the environment, and caring for nature has never been on his agenda. But there’s an old saying, and it goes, “Just because that’s the way things are, doesn’t mean it’s how things have to be.” George W. Bush has waited a long time, but he’s finally decided to seek sweet change. He has decided to join a group of nations in pursuit of the sweet goal that is saving the whales. It’s a start, isn’t it? Truth sure is stranger than fiction. Now if only he’d care about the environment and other endangered species, we’d have ourselves a President!

The Iraqi Prime Minister this weekend revealed a twenty four point plan to bring peace to their country. I’m glad that someone outside of John Kerry has a plan (as he’s so fond of reminding the masses), and I’m even happier to see that their plan isn’t a total sham.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday offered an olive branch to insurgents who join in rebuilding Iraq and said lawmakers should set a timeline for the Iraqi military and police to take control of security throughout the country. The prime minister made no mention of any timetable for the withdrawal of U.S.-led forces in a 24-point national reconciliation plan he presented to parliament. The plan would include an amnesty for insurgents and opposition figures who have not been involved in terrorist activities, but he never explained how authorities would distinguish that, reports CBS News correspondent Lee Cowan. Al-Maliki stressed that insurgent killers would not escape justice.

The “amnesty” point is the one most focused on by the press, but I’d point out that it’s a skillful move, and one that has often been used with civil wars and insurgencies. You offer your enemies peace and kindness in exchange for them joining you. Considering that the insurgents believe themselves to be losing the cause, as was shown in Zarqawi’s memoes, it is paramount that they have a place to go if they leave the insurgency.

I am no longer willing to put my faith in this American government’s ability to fix Iraq, but I’m glad to see that the Iraqis themselves are stepping it up and taking serious, measured action. We’ll see how this goes, and I can only send my best wishes and prayers.

Before I post on a number of things going on today, I’d like to reflect on a few things, and the first was the last paragraph of A Modest Proposal. “You must mull it over, Mr. President, and when you do, tell Karl he’s got himself a war cry, and we’ve got ourselves the key to all of the world’s problems, and an end to War as we know it, as well as a beginning to War as we don’t.” I supported the War in Iraq, but I’m not a believer in the doctrine of Pre-Emptive War. I was merely considering whether or not Bush has ever re-considered pre-emptive war, and then thought of it as I wrote in those italics, because that’s one of the things on my mind and it’s quite a thing to ponder, and I think he should ask himself, “What have I done?” both because he’s failing in Iraq, as shown in the Khalizad Memo, and because he’s unleashed a new form of war upon humanity. I merely supported the war, I didn’t order it, and it’s bothering my conscience. But, if I had to guess, I’d say that Bush doesn’t do reflection, bubba. He does and moves on.

The military has begun projecting troop withdrawals, starting this September and through next year, and I’m not sure how I feel about it. I do know that I’ve lost all faith in the Bush Administration to competently handle a toaster, let alone a Warzone, and I can’t say that I think it’d be a good idea to leave soldiers in Iraq until another man becomes President who can better handle it. Perhaps, at this point, it’s best if we withdraw and leave the fighting to the Iraqis. I do think it’d be better if we withdraw once their Government asks us to, rather than just because we can’t trust ourselves to handle the War, because we’ve abandoned the Iraqis before (1991, the Kurd-gassing) and I don’t want to repeat that, ever.

It’s a moral dilemma for me, and an intellectual one.

On the subject of Iraq, let’s move to the politics of the matter. Newsweek reports that DailyKos, the famed Liberal blogger who once said “Screw them” to news that American contractors had been burnt to death and then hung from a bridge, believes he can “shape” the Democratic Party using Iraq, and that angers me, actually. I’ve never met Kos, and have never been able to get any sort of response from him whenever I’ve emailed him, but I find him to be a hack, pure and simple. He’s a Liberal Karl Rove, a nasty little man who turns on Democrats that don’t support his view of Iraq, of politics, and he is trying to “take power from the elites” in the Democratic Party. You know who he is? He’s George McGovern on the Internet, and I cannot believe that Senate aides would spend their time talking to him about policy.

He has, from the beginning of his Blog, been a proponent of changing the Party — as long as it’s in his direction, to a “net-roots oriented” standard. Well let me tell you something: campaigns are still won through hard work, canvassing, and old-school grassroots politics, something that Karl Rove simply schooled us on in 2004. If Kos believes that sending mass emails and posting on a blog will lead to a new Democratic Party, or that that’s the “future” of politics — as former Howard Dean advisor, Trippi, does, too — then they’re ridiculous, and on the path that Senator Kerry is on. Kerry, if you didn’t know, has three million people on his email list. That, of course, makes him a formidable candidate. And if you believe that, I’ve got a “new way to do politics” to show you.

If we’re going to talk about changing the party, it shouldn’t be in a purge, like what Kos would have us do — and let’s be straightfoward. If Kos had his way, there’d be no dissenting views on Iraq, no pro-life people in the Party, no Harry Reids or Bill Clintons. If Kos had his way, we’d all toe the same “intellectual” line and that’d be that. He’s the Bob Shrum of “netroots” political workers, and if anyone is paying any attention to him, they’re in for the Shrum treatment.

Besides, Daily Kos’ wing of Liberalism is a combative, angry one. It’s furious Conservatism, as practiced by so many Republicans in today’s day and age, reversed into Angry Liberalism. A reactionary hatred of the opposition and inability to work with our opponents is what he advocates — and if it’s not what he explicitly says, then it’s what all of his actions signal — and that is not a path to fixing any political party.

If we’re going to “fix” the party, it should be by fixing our grassroot methods, as Dean has been advocating and doing. Remember, the 2004 election was won by a better prepared grassroots operation by Karl Rove — and that includes just about everything they did, because they did it all better than we did. Howard Dean understands that, and that’s why he’s been focusing on providing money and aid to every wing of the Democratic Party in every state. He is an excellent DNC Chairman and political strategist. Daily Kos? Not so much.

And his dear friend Arianna Huffington is a hack, too.

To round this post out, I re-direct you here. You see that article? It’s written by Richard Perle. Perle is a War profiteer of the worst kind, as is chronicled in Al Franken’s books as well as several news stories. Why would any newspaper run his opinion? It reminds me of the time that the Wall Street Journal was running Ahmad Chalabi articles at a time when he was being investigated for giving our secrets to Iran.

Such is the media, for you.

Letter to the President, June 24th, 2006.

It is of utmost importance that in this post-9/11 world we begin to plan for future wars, wars that are possible and probable along with wars impossible and improbable, for impossible is a term better suited for the logical than the senseless. As war is not always a subject of a deliberate nature, we must strive to make even the unlikeliest of conflicts possible, and from there it must be our task to turn these paths palatable to the public, as enemies lurk in every region of the world and the only manner to protect ourselves is to strike first, as has so often been articulated. To be able to effectively do this on the global stage, we must prepare for all eventualities, and for the sake of readying ourselves, we must assume everything an eventuality. The acquisition of weapons of mass destruction is inevitable by the Iranians, as it was for the North Koreans, and I’m pleased to see that the White House believed this so, for it certainly would have been a waste to engage these rogue states when they were in the budding stages of weaponry. It is better to launch a campaign aimed at depicting a nation as the enemy than it is to waste valuable time with such farce as diplomacy. I must applaud your actions, Mr. President, for you’ve done much to ensure that on the global chess board the American nation will find itself surrounded by enemies in future years. It is better to prepare for war than doddle in dialogue.

The guiding goal of foreign policy is to turn what might appear a farce to the unknowing — to those without access to classified information (of which there should be plenty, given that the public is generally incapable of grasping the deepest of information available to us, anyway) — into a master plan taking into account the need for newer, bloodier war, a need that exists in every sphere of our world. How better to maintain influence than to defeat an enemy, how better to unite a public than in war? That is where your brilliance lies, for while some cynics may reference you as a “divider” you are the ultimate uniter. You have brought the American public together in the way that only a tragedy can, and it will likely be this way for years to come as war engulfs us on foreign shores. In future years, because of your actions, we shall come together as a public to defeat our opponents on the global stage. If that praise sounds dramatic, it shouldn’t, Mr. President, for history is the greatest passion play, and it is a business that you make a killing in.

War as a tool in public policy has long been used by others, and in that respect you are no innovator, but your sheer nobility distinguishes you from all those who have come before. While such men as Andrew Jackson have used the power of patriotism to destroy an entire culture, and Franklin Roosevelt attempted to mold the American state into a socialist empire, you have done nothing but embolden our law enforcement agencies to protect us. More than that, however, you took action — bold, brilliant action — to prepare the public for future wars, and indeed you have not just prepared them for the concept but introduced them to our enemies, as well. Your foresight will be judged by historians in hindsight as the mark of an intuitive man with a subtle grasp on the globe, for you not only managed to show the public that Iraq, which has already been disposed of, for all intents and purposes, is on the wrong side of history, Iran and North Korea are as well, and happen to be worthy of future conquest. Not only that, but you have set the table so as to make it possible that, someday, we will engage them in War. Well played, sir, but I’ve a recommendation with an importance running behind none.

It is my recommendation that we add a new nation to the “countries we could be at war with” list, to the “countries we should be at war with” list, and that you take immediate action to prepare the American public and provoke the power of Peru. Peru is a country that we absolutely should be at War with, and I take the position that their growing status in the world poses a problem for the future of Democracy. I don’t believe that many people have talked it up yet, and that is because there is a fundamental logical gap to be found in the minds of bureaucrats everywhere. You, surely, have experienced their blunders firsthand, what with the poor advice given you repeatedly by the paper-pushing eggheads at the Department of State and the overly conservative hacks at the Central Intelligence Agency, but I commend you for taking the advice of young Wolfowitz and his peers instead. Listening to those was an act that few would have taken, and that not enough give you credit for having done.

Being a foreign policy visionary, I believe you will appreciate what I am arguing about Peru, but we must be unequivocal and righteous: we’ve got to invade Peru. It is paramount to American survival, to the pursuit of life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We are in pursuit of a pursuit, and happiness is like safety is like democracy: you’ve got to want it real bad, because it won’t come without a fight, and the place to have that fight is undoubtedly on the shores of Peru. Now think about this as I dust off the spider webs and “common sense” and “conventional wisdom” — Osama bin Laden has evaded capture, as we unfortunately know. We didn’t find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, although we know that that is far more complex than it seems on the surface, and damn those who have had the gall to insinuate dishonesty on our part. If they saw what we see, they’d have a different understanding of the world, but it’s best not to harp on the harbingers of misfortune. The harbingers of misfortune are to today’s day and age what the nattering naybobs of negativity were to Spiro Agnew, a man destined for the Presidency who was driven from his waiting perch by those who would tempt fate. His life and time is a lesson of itself, however: those who allow others to tempt fate are broken by inaction. The natural conclusion of that lesson is to always tempt fate, and that we must do. In Peru!

The WMD and Osama bin Laden connection might seem like a stretch, and it becomes a bit moreso if you take it into Peru, but that’s a connection that absolutely exists and that we need to emphasize in the coming two and a half years of your President. Those WMD in Iraq didn’t just get up and leave by themselves. Not even we have WMD which are capable of transmitting themselves, or at least I don’t believe we do. I will admit, my own genius is a tad tempered by my own occasional shortcomings. I never would have imagined, living my life before you, that someday the White House would be occupied with such a cool, calm, inspiring grace as you’ve displayed during your term. I’ve never longed to help a man mold history more than I do with you, Mr. President, and so I present my own analysis of al-Qaeda’s fugitive leader and the Weapons of Mass Destruction that love him: they eloped in the general direction of Machu Picchu: it was bin Laden who took them! I’m not sure exactly how, but my reasoning suggests that he hid them in his beard — oh, a joke, Mr. President! Surely we all enjoy the humor that is found in the occasional crack about facial hair, much like we all enjoy a good dosage of bravado.

Osama’s calculation was that the United States would look foolish because of the whole debacle, and he knew that only in Machu Picchu Peru could he be safe. He figured that, hey, nobody pays attention to that part of the World as it is, and there he went. Unfortunately for him, I have discovered his secret, and I urge you to take that course and stay it. You have been brilliant in setting up future war, but the time is now to begin a new one. While some of the more foolish among us call for war in Iran (or fear it), we should take them by surprise. The Peruvians, too, for those who are not with us are against us, and being against us is no good. There’s WMD in Peru, and bin Laden too! Machu Picchu Delenda Est! Whatever we do, we must never hold off on the invasion of Peru!

You must mull it over, Mr. President, and when you do, tell Karl he’s got himself a war cry, and we’ve got ourselves the key to all of the world’s problems, and an end to War as we know it, as well as a beginning to War as we don’t.

When it came to negotiating with Iran three years ago, from a position of strength, the Administration decided that Iran was collapsing and they would wait for it rather than discuss with the Mullahs. When it came to negotiating over four years ago with the North Koreans, the Bush Administration decided that the North Korean regime was bound to collapse and so it avoided talks with Kim Jung Il. In neither case was there a collapse, and with both countries we wound up negotiating years later from a lower perch.

When it came to deciding how much bad news in Iraq was too much, I decided to cling to the ever-fewer positives that I could find and blind myself because I believed in the cause. And I do believe in the cause, by all means. If I had the choice between invading Iraq and not invading it, yet again, with all things the same as they were in 2003, I’d do it, but it’s everything thereafter that was bumbled. Since the War began, I have waited for competence from the Administration, and I’ve waited for results, and from that I have learned that it is one thing to wait for the sun to rise before you go out for a morning jog.
It’s another to wait for Haley’s Comet before you begin to exercise. I am tired of waiting for that comet.

If yesterday’s article weren’t enough to cause me bitter feelings over the way the War has been handled, over the fact that we have failed the Iraqi people by not planning properly or acting effectively, this happened today.

The Iraqi government declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew Friday after insurgents set up roadblocks in central Baghdad and fired on U.S. and Iraqi troops outside the heavily fortified Green Zone. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered everyone off the streets of the capital from 2 p.m. until 5 p.m. Iraqi and U.S. military forces clashed throughout the morning with attackers carrying rocket-propelled grenades, hand grenades and rifles in busy Haifa Street, which runs into the Green Zone, site of the U.S. and British embassies and the Iraqi government.

Four Iraqi soldiers and three policemen were wounded, police Lt. Maitham Abdul Razzaq said. The area was sealed and Iraqi and U.S. forces conducted house-to-house searches. The fighting was unusual in its scope and intensity. There have, however, routinely been clashes along Haifa Street, making it so dangerous that a sign at one Green Zone exit checkpoint warns drivers against using it.

You mean to tell me that, after all these years, we still have insurgents that are capable of setting up road blocks by our checkpoints and attacking us? We have some serious problems, and I’m growing major qualms with this War — with this Administration, rather, this Administration that takes to deceiving like Antonin Scalia to a duckhunt. I feel like I have been living as a trapeze swinger, going from swing to swing in mid-air with little connecting me to the swing but my outstretched, reaching arms and the hope that I’ll be able to reach. Iraq is a mess, and while I haven’t given up, I am no longer willing to swing for the White House on this or anything else where the benefit of the doubt has to be given. Bush has, from the NSA to Iraq, made a fool of me whenever I’ve given him the benefit of the doubt. Never again.

In the news lately is this, the arrest of men who were plotting to blow up a series of buildings, starting with my beloved Sears Tower downtown. The plot that was disrupted was in its minor stages, apparently, but I’m happy to see it whenever a terrorist is arrested. This morning, I received an email telling me that this plot’s undoing is evidence that the aggressive response by Bush to 9/11 is working. I say, simply, that we have defeated terrorist plots, in their beginning stages and toward the end of their planning cycles in the past without using a massive and illegal wiretapping program, too. See the milennium plots for proof: the airlines-being-blown-over-the-Pacific-ocean-plot, for more details, but don’t let anyone suggest something that has no backing by any of the known facts.

Finally, I stumbled across Helen Thomas’ latest article, and it’s a piece lecturing Democrats about how we need a “new script.” I’m sorry, Helen, but the press that you are a part of needs a new script. Thomas has to either become a journalist, period, and attend press briefings and ask questions — pointed ones are fine, to be sure — or start writing editorials solely. She can’t have it both ways, and when she tries to she’s contributing to the breakdown in American society of journalism. People may say that it’s money, ultimately, but really, it’s the mixing of opinion and fact. The mixing of opinion and fact in our news programs, on our front pages — this is leading to the phenomenom of “pseudo certainty” in which every thinks they know what they’re talking about but nobody does because the news is being delivered in slants.

I can deal with carbombings and kidnappings. That, dear readers, is War. War happens to include evil acts, and that aspect of War — however disgusting it is — is just something that one has to come to terms with and understand. No War will ever be devoid of violence, and every War will have dead innocents. It’s important to keep this in perspective, because if you don’t, then your cause is shielded. If all you’re thinking is, “We’re killing innocent Germans” during World War II, there’s no way to focus on stopping the Holocaust and ending the reign of Hitler.

So, I can deal with the violence. I can understand it and even, to a point, rationalize the irrational. But when I read that my government has been lying to me, to reporters who have returned from Iraq with good news, I find myself becoming disillusioned. Look, there’ve been a ton of stories from Iraq saying that the War is going well enough and that people are doing much better. The most heart-warming thing I’ve seen in the last year was, I think, footage of Iraqi children who now had schools because of us. I’ve tried to believe that the War is going well, and because I’ve not the money to go to Iraq myself (and I would go, if I did have a rich family with the money to fund me, like Farris Hassan did) I have to rely on the reporters who report that Iraq’s well…enough, considering that it’s a warzone.

Today, though, I had my faith in the War shaken by this article.

The Washington Post has obtained a cable, marked “sensitive,” that it says shows that just before President Bush left on a surprise trip last Monday to the Green Zone in Baghdad for an upbeat assessment of the situation there, “the U.S. Embassy in Iraq painted a starkly different portrait of increasing danger and hardship faced by its Iraqi employees.” This cable outlines, the Post reported Sunday, “the daily-worsening conditions for those who live outside the heavily guarded international zone: harassment, threats and the employees’ constant fears that their neighbors will discover they work for the U.S. government.” It’s actually far worse than that, as the details published below indicate, which include references to abductions, threats to women’s rights, and “ethnic cleansing.”

Look at that article, and read through the listed items in the memo. Then note that it was signed by our ambassador in Iraq. I am a firm supporter of the War, and I want those poor people to have a better life. Reading this — something that very much suggests that to not be the case, and shows me a fool for believing it — is incredibly disillusioning to me, and it breaks my heart. I don’t think I can be counted as firm a supporter as before, as I’m having trouble believing anything from the Right about Iraq because what I just read is Wrong, and disturbingly so.

The Congressional Republican Leadership has made the decision to kill immigration reform, and it’s a misguided mercy killing. The bill was draining the Party politically, as the Right Wing demanded nothing short of a Wall and the criminalization of conversation with illegal immigrations, while the Senate, Democrats and George Bush wanted nothing but and tenderness for migrants. Republicans have made the calculation that this sort of in-fighting and constant jockeying for position was detrimental to their chances in 2006, and so they have killed the bill. It’s a flawed calculation on their part, however, as nothing is more likely to depress Republican turnout this year than having no immigration bill. The Grand Old Party wanted a Grand Old Reform (something dating back to 1960s Berlin, or 1880s America) and didn’t get it. And so the Grand Old Party won’t be getting the votes they’re used to getting.

Let me state, momentarily, that I love Korea — both Koreas. Their history is fascinating, and I think their situation to be the most complex, worst problem in the world today. A people split by foreign powers who took different paths but ultimately need to be reunited. When the day comes that I travel the world, I want to go to Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Russia, Turkey) and then the Orient, particularly the Koreas. Now that my love for the East is stated, let me say that I’ve been following the Korean crisis for years, and that North Korea’s recent threats to launch a missile test don’t quite bother me.

To be sure, it’s creepy. Kim Jung Il is the world’s biggest creep this side of John Bolton, and so it’s natural to expect this sort of behavior from him. Unless we intend to give him a lot of diplomatic assurances, money and food — or if we take the hardest road and invade — there’s little leverage that we have. Kim Jung Il is unlikely to be anything more than the Madonna of international politics — an attention whore, and not much else. If he does test his missile, I’m tempted to discount its significance. We’ve known that he can build missiles and shoot them into the Sea of Japan since 1998. What, exactly, changes? Just because he kisses Britney Spears twice doesn’t mean he’s not the same old attention whore from the late 1990s.

Ultimately, the situation in Korea is one that will have to be resolved by politicians being statesmen. Provided that, if (and likely when) the Koreans test a missile again, the proper response is verbal condemnation, and that’s about it. There’s no reason for Japan to begin re-arming, no cause for American threats, no need to worry in Seoul. Kim Jung Il is creepy, not crazy. As long as the West and its Eastern Allies keep a cool head when the missile launches, everything should work out. There’s no reason to go on a warpath unless Jung assaults Korea or Japan. A test meant to show the world that he’s not a joke is something to ignore, not a reason to get your war on. Stay calm and the storm will pass.

I’m not afraid to say it: Ron Suskind is the best journalist currently covering the Bush Administration. The Price of Loyalty is a book that every American should read so as to understand the manner in which the Bush White House operates. But, before we get to his newest book, The One-Percent Doctrine, the Washington Post has insight to the Administration’s character.

Just after the lightning takeover of Baghdad by U.S. forces three years ago, an unusual two-page document spewed out of a fax machine at the Near East bureau of the State Department. It was a proposal from Iran for a broad dialogue with the United States, and the fax suggested everything was on the table — including full cooperation on nuclear programs, acceptance of Israel and the termination of Iranian support for Palestinian militant groups. But top Bush administration officials, convinced the Iranian government was on the verge of collapse, belittled the initiative. Instead, they formally complained to the Swiss ambassador who had sent the fax with a cover letter certifying it as a genuine proposal supported by key power centers in Iran, former administration officials said.

As my friends at This Century Sucks put it, why negotiate from a position of strength when you can negotiate years later in a quagmire? The Post revealed that Iran was intimidated by the fact that we’d defeated an army in three weeks that they’d stalemated against in eight years, but the Bush Administration took no note of this and merely laughed it off, assuming that Iran was on the verge of collapse, just like they did for years with North Korea. How reassuring.

Now, the Doctrine. It reveals, first and foremost, that al-Qaeda cased New York’s subway and was ready to gas it, but suddenly stopped for reasons that no one knows. That, however, isn’t what this book really reveals to the public, as it’s more about the Bush White Houses’ modus operandi. Here.

This book augments the portrait of Mr. Bush as an incurious and curiously uninformed executive that Mr. Suskind earlier set out in “The Price of Loyalty” and in a series of magazine articles on the president and key aides. In “The One Percent Doctrine,” he writes that Mr. Cheney’s nickname inside the C.I.A. was Edgar (as in Edgar Bergen), casting Mr. Bush in the puppet role of Charlie McCarthy, and cites one instance after another in which the president was not fully briefed (or had failed to read the basic paperwork) about a crucial situation.

During a November 2001 session with the president, Mr. Suskind recounts, a C.I.A. briefer realized that the Pentagon had not told Mr. Bush of the C.I.A.’s urgent concern that Osama bin Laden might escape from the Tora Bora area of Afghanistan (as he indeed later did) if United States reinforcements were not promptly sent in. And several months later, he says, attendees at a meeting between Mr. Bush and the Saudis discovered after the fact that an important packet laying out the Saudis’ views about the Israeli-Palestinian situation had been diverted to the vice president’s office and never reached the president.

Keeping information away from the president, Mr. Suskind argues, was a calculated White House strategy that gave Mr. Bush “plausible deniability” from Mr. Cheney’s point of view, and that perfectly meshed with the commander in chief’s own impatience with policy details. Suggesting that Mr. Bush deliberately did not read the full National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, which was delivered to the White House in the fall of 2002, Mr. Suskind writes: “Keeping certain knowledge from Bush — much of it shrouded, as well, by classification — meant that the president, whose each word circles the globe, could advance various strategies by saying whatever was needed. He could essentially be ‘deniable’ about his own statements.”

If this world were perfect, all reporters would be Suskind to Bush and investigate thoroughly. Since they don’t, I appreciate Ron’s work far more and will be picking it up very, very soon. For now, here’s an excerpt.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise — I’ve said it before, in more words — but I Despise (with a capital D) the French empire (with a lower case E). Yeah, you read right, France is an empire. It just so happens that they’re one without guns or balls, or true allies, for that matter. Reading history, the French have always loved, just loved, to turn on their allies or give them fits. During the second world war, they surrendered without a fight. During the iciest period of the Cold War, Charles De Gaulle gave trouble to every American effort internationally but led us into Vietnam as a request for assistance. In the 1990s, they fought Clinton in Kosovo and anywhere else that involved resolve, and they’ve done the same to George W. Bush. France loves to block non-French-inspired efforts from the West like they love to surrender, but they love asking us for assistance and receiving it because the American government either can’t be bothered to do what’s right or for some misguided reason fears the French.

When it comes to the French, they so rile me because people point to them as some sort of model society, and they surely aren’t. It’s a racist nation in ways that the United States will never again be, and it continues to imperialize. While its leaders accuse us of being on some ignoble crusade in Iraq, they attempt to pillage the continent of Africa. And when rumblings of “Those Arrogant American bastards!” come out of Europe, they’re coming from France, which bothers me because there is no nation so haughty or arrogant as France. When you take into account the fact that they’ve nothing to be proud of, no great achievement but the loss of every major war they’ve ever embarked on, that their greatest scientist was a fraud named Nostradomus, their arrogance appears unfounded and irrational, but it is really just a sign of their insecurities.

Check this out to see what’s got me so riled.

THIS spring, I visited French-speaking West Africa. Wherever I went, two things remained consistent: The French government was hated, and Africans looked to Washington for a square deal. President Jacques Chirac and his racist minions know it, and they don’t like it, and they’re trying to do something about it: Sucker America into showing “solidarity with an ally in the War on Terror.” The French want our military and diplomatic cooperation - but not our economic presence, of course. Let me translate what the parasites of Paris really mean: “Support our brutality and exploitation of West Africa, stiff-arm tens of millions of Africans yearning to be free of French neo-imperialism - and just maybe we clever Frenchmen will toss you stupid Americans a little bone now and then.” And we’re in danger of falling for it.

In the half-century since France thrust a phony independence on colonies such as Ivory Coast, Senegal and Mali, the French government and French business interests have looted everything they possibly could. To Paris, African “independence” meant business as usual, except that Paris would no longer accept any responsibility for the welfare of the local populations. It was a free ride for the Frogs, guaranteed by a French military that had failed everywhere else, but remained sufficiently competent to bully unarmed Africans. One French government after another supported pro-Paris strongmen, from the relatively benign Houphouet-Boigny of Ivory Coast, who merely bankrupted his country with nutty construction projects, to Jean Bedell-Bokassa, a literal cannibal who frequently played host to then-President Valery Giscard-D’Estaing.

But the winds of freedom have been blowing, often in unexpected places. The era of African “Big Men” is over, even if a few linger on. And Africans want real freedom this time, not French colonization in disguise. In Ivory Coast, the French utterly mismanaged a 2002 rebellion they thought they could manipulate. Their efforts at playing the factions off against each other exploded, shattering a country that had been a source of pride and great profit to Paris. Muslim or Christian, northerner or southerner, the one commonality I found among the people of Ivory Coast was that they all now hate the French.

Even in Senegal, the country that has had the most benign relationship with France, the people are tired of French bullying and condescension. Throughout the region, animosity toward Paris - especially the ham-handed government of Jacques Chirac - has reached a tipping point past which legitimate anger threatens to turn into irrational fury. In Abidjan, in Ivory Coast, I even found myself in the unusual position of defending the French, arguing that nobody could be as omnipresent and cagey as my local friend believed French agents to be.

We hear a great deal about global anti-Americanism, but, as this column has noted, much of it is superficial or concentrated among the usual suspects, while a tremendous reservoir of goodwill toward us is still overflowing in much of the world. Even those who reflexively complain about American power long for a green card. In West Africa, everyone has a friend or relative, or the friend of a relative, in one of New York’s boroughs or in Chicago. Their vision of America is of hardworking immigrants building prosperous lives impossible elsewhere. The American dream is alive and well - in Dakar or Abidjan. In contrast, West Africans know that their relatives imprisoned in the suburban slums of Paris or Lyon have no hope of getting ahead, but suffer relentless discrimination.

As a result, street-level Africans consistently express tremendous good will toward Americans (although they’re mystified by African-American heritage tourists who complain about their lot - Africans would gladly swap places). Either George Bush or Bill Clinton could win an election by a landslide in any West African country I visited. Meanwhile, the French know they’re in trouble. They know that their African victims are sick and tired of being robbed and treated as inferiors. They want the French out of their economies, out of their elections and out of their countries.

The French response is to offer “cooperation” with the United States. Implying none too subtly that “white powers should stick together, after all,” they misread the times and they wildly misread America. For our part, we can only lose prestige, influence and goodwill by being associated with the French in West Africa. But that’s the point, as far as Paris is concerned: The Chirac government wants to present a united Western front to Africans yearning for real freedom, to show them that Washington isn’t an alternative because America’s on France’s side.

This duplicity is especially dangerous, given that many French-speaking African countries have majority-Muslim populations - Muslims who are not anti-American. On the contrary, they practice tolerant, local forms of Islam and resent Wahhabi extremist efforts to “purify” their religion. Islam is deathly sick in its Middle Eastern heartland, but it’s vibrant and healthy on its frontiers, from Jakarta through Dakar to Detroit. The struggle for the future of Islam is cruel and discouraging in the Middle East, but elsewhere the good guys are winning.

By accepting the proffered French embrace in Africa, we risk needlessly alienating tens of millions of Muslims who are our natural allies in the war against Arab fanaticism. Certainly, we should cooperate with France when it’s genuinely in our interests. But, in West Africa, the cooperation Paris wants is a sham that would benefit only French neo-colonialists, while doing America’s image and cause great harm. If we really believe in freedom and democracy, we should stand up for the striving people of Africa, not for the crumpled imperialists on the Seine.

Call me crazy, but I figure that the aid given us by France in the War on Terrorism is minimal and can’t possibly be enough to justify not assisting African nations in the face of European imperialism, which is what this is. France ought to be ashamed for its actions, and Bush doubly so if he bends to their wishes. What’re they going to do if we stand for Democracy and justice — invade us? Tell people the world over that we’re an arrogant power? It is the French who are truly arrogant and haughty — and that’s why Paris isn’t hosting the Olympics, while London will.

Our foreign policy should be based on the better needs of humanity, and assisting a third-rate world power in their quest to rob a poor, troubled continent doesn’t fit that criteria. French kisses aren’t worth spit, let alone the betrayal of American values.

The Chicago Reader is a free, weekly newspaper that I pick up every Thursday as I exit the train on Western on my way home, and it runs some of the best articles I read all week. Journalistically, and editorially, it’s a solid paper and no, I haven’t gotten work advertising for them for the summer — I was just so floored by this piece that I had to mention the Reader. It’s a reporter’s chronicle of a Chicago Police Torture Scandal from decades back until today, and it goes all the way to Mayor Richard Daley. It disturbs me to read about, as torture in American society is simply acceptable, and the abuse of domestic prisoners is a hideous practice for which all the involved should face enormous consequences. That, however, wasn’t the case, as those who knew about it — including the then-State’s Attorney Daley — did nothing to stop it, and others buried it through cover-up. Making matters a tad more disgusting, those accused of torturing suspects within the Police Department have been pensioned by the state and are living off this, and, while a Special Prosecutor has been digging into the entire ordeal, the statute of limitations with regard to state laws have long passed.

So, ultimately, those who would turn our justice system into a third world prison system face no consequence unless someone can do something about it. Fortunately, there is someone who can do something about it, and his name is Patrick Fitzgerald.

Victims’ lawyers don’t expect the special prosecutor’s report to contain indictments. They speculate that Egan will say that the statute of limitations precludes state charges, and that the prosecutors’ job was made extremely difficult when so many witnesses—police officers, former prosecutors, and perhaps even sitting judges and active prosecutors—took the Fifth rather than testify before the grand jury. But Egan’s report may provide the pry bar needed to get new trials. It may also lead to federal prosecutions for civil rights violations, violations of the RICO statute, and possibly perjury. The key audience for the report, after an investment of four years and millions of dollars, may be the U.S. attorney, the person who can make a case for prosecutions on the federal level.

If Fitzgerald can prosecute, he should, absolutely. I have total faith in Patrick Fitzgerald, and it makes me proud to have a US Attorney in my state to be proud of.

One thing that I frown upon in politics is the practice of besmirching someone’s military service or lack thereof. Unless a person has dodged a military draft — such as Dick Cheney, for instance, or Bill Clinton — and then constantly supports War in the face of diplomacy, I think it’s unfair to belittle them as “Warmongers” or “Chickenhawks.” Today John Murtha, the renegade, ultra-Liberal Representative from Pennsylvania, attacked Karl Rove by saying, “He’s sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside, saying stay the course. That’s not a plan.” And John Murtha is sitting in his air-conditioned office, on his big bloated backside, saying “Withdraw from Iraq!” which isn’t much an improvement.

Murtha is a fool, and I thought I’d share that viewpoint. For practical reasons I haven’t criticized him before — this is a Democratic blog, after all, and I beg your forgiveness to those of you didn’t catch the crack in the tagline! — but this was such a moronic and hypocritical statement as to provoke me. Since we’re breaking the silence, Murtha has said he has ambitions of being Majority Leader, should Nancy Pelosi become Speaker of the House. It wouldn’t be much of an ideological shift there — Murtha is Nancy with testicles — but I have to say that I hate the idea of him leading us. Frank Rich joked recently that, for Democrats, “It’s better to have the courage of bad convictions than no courage or convictions at all.” I think Murtha is one who would take this advice to heart.

I’ve a few thoughts to share, and we can call it an idle bit of musing on the matter of voter turnout. A friend and I had this discussion earlier, as I’ve had it with so many others. Many people in our country belittle the fact that “only” fifty percent of the people who can vote vote, and a lot of people phrase it by saying, “Nobody votes!” My answer to this is that it’s unfair, and ignorant if not mean-spirited, to say that Over a Hundred Million People are “nobody” or should be dismissed as “not enough.” The way I look at it is that a Democracy is a Democracy because the people have the choice to vote or not to, and that’s to be praised. That so many take the effort to vote is excellent.

Should our elections have compulsory voting? Should President Bush be ashamed that only half of the people voted, or should we take pride that our country has over a hundred million voters per cycle? Should we be ashamed that certain European countries have near-100 percent turnouts? We can look to foreign numbers as we wish, but France wouldn’t have voter turnouts as high as they do if they had as many citizens as we. And considering everything, our elections are an accomplishment to be proud of. Except the one in 2000 (and I’m only half-joking!).

The glass is half-full, and that’s all right.

If there’s one thing I hate, it’s a popular convention that’s demonstrably wrong, or a Historical Anecdote that proves to be proof of nothing. The Washington Times is a paper that makes a living disemminating falsehoods, and they don’t disappoint in their latest article assailing Newt Gingrich, which you can find here, and it is an article in which they endorse Tom Tancredo for President. That alone should give one a good glimpse into the article’s quality, but let’s continue, shall we?

Both Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Clinton benefited from the 1990s adjournment of character as a desideratum for public life. Very cleverly, candidate Bill Clinton in the 1992 campaign managed to banish character as a campaign issue. He portrayed the topic as a Republican dirty trick, and the journalists swallowed it. Eight years later it became clear why Mr. Clinton was desperate to render the question of character a topic unfit for public discussion. By then Mr. Gingrich too needed this dispensation.

Journalists swallowed that? I was under the impression that the media went after President Clinton’s personal life gun-ho, but I guess I’m a silly Liberal. Newsweek didn’t allow Michael Isikoff to waste his talents to pursuing the President’s sex life, no siree, because the press bought his argument that character didn’t matter! As for Newt Gingrich, who the article later says was banished from the GOP for adultery? Totally untrue. He was welcomed with open arms even after he divorced his first wife while she was in the hospital recovering from cancer surgery, and he only stepped down after Larry Flynt threatened to publish the news of his second mistress to the world. He didn’t step down because the Republicans realized he was filth.

And, dear readers, remember this in ten years when some other revisionist wants to rewrite history and argue that Tom DeLay was pushed out of Congress for his corruption, and kicked away by Republicans who had more integrity than to accept him. This is the exact same situation but flipped, except that instead of sleeping with aides, Tom DeLay was caught playing footsie with Jack Abramoff.

In Florida this weekend, a book about how nice Cuba is was banned from Miami-Dade grade schools. I’ve really got no opinion on the issue, although I think that schoolboards have a right to determine what books they want in their libraries within reason. I don’t think this is a huge threat to any Constitutional rights, however, but the ACLU does. “The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida was preparing a legal challenge, executive director Howard Simon said. He said the board should add more material with differing viewpoints rather than remove books that could be offensive.”

It’s humorous to me — is the suggestion there that the schoolboard should have more books on Communist Cuba so as to give the kids a different outlook? They’re gradeschool students, for God’s sake! Give them a copy of Martha Speaks and leave it at that!

This week, in a quiet and meek move that I wouldn’t have noticed had it not been for the excellence of Bruce Reed, Michael Gerson left the White House. Gerson was Bush’s speechwriter, the faith-based man who believed Bush to be noble, brave and intelligent, who sought a high moral purpose for George and served as his Peggy Noonan. Bruce Reed declares this to mean that compassionate Conservatism is dead, and I echo that but modified: it’s dead in the Bush White House, and has been for awhile. For what it’s worth, I think that the 2000 Bush Brand of Politics is dead in the present Republican Party, but I can see someone like Giuliani pretending to be hugs and kisses instead of money and incompetence.

Either way, it’s a telling development that even Gerson would have enough of things in the White House.

To close, I urge you to take a look at this.

Fort Sam Houston has received 1,300 utility service termination notices for delinquent bill payments, which officials blamed on a major budget shortfall. CPS Energy warned commanders at the post to pay $4.2 million by Wednesday or risk losing power. The post is three months behind on its bills, but both Army and utility officials said the two parties were talking and no cutoff was imminent.

As This Century Sucks asks, what has the Bush Administration done to our military? They’ve McGoverned it!