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I didn’t intend for this entry to seem as if I were going through a potpourri of points and moving on, but that’s how it works. It’s an unintended consequence of reading that occasionally you’ll muse, but it’s not a bad one. Let’s go, shall we?

Mark Warner has bowed out of the Race for President, 2008. I never really thought he could win it, as I consider others like Bayh, Vilsack and even Clinton stronger than a one-term Governor, so I’m not too terribly disappointed.

Besides, if he were the Right Man for the Presidency, he’d run. Men who are Right for the Job have the Drive for it and Lust it. It’s not cool in political circles to say that a man should want to be President so much that he’d run at the chance, but that’s what a President should do. It means that they’re focused on doing the Job and doing it Right. George W. Bush thinks of himself as a Martyr who was pushed into the Presidency by God. We all know how that turned out. The only Presidents I can think of who didn’t really want it was Truman and Washington, but they’re exceptions to the Rule. (Others have wanted it too much, and yes, there is such a thing: Kennedy and Nixon are strong examples. But, in the end, to be an effective President you have to want to be President. Not that that’s the sole requirement; it certainly isn’t.)

My dear Slate magazine is running an article about the Axis of Evil and how it came to be; to me, it’s representative of my most followed Law in Foreign Policy: the Law of Unintended Consequences. Whatever you do, there will be a Consequence that you do not intend; you must, therefore, do everything you can to preempt and prepare and attempt to envision all potential outcomes. George W. Bush didn’t do that when he gave his Axis speech, and we can trace the outcome in the mushroom clouds over North Korea and the nuclear plants under Iranian sand hills.

In his first State of the Union Address in January 2002, George W. Bush deployed the expression “axis of evil” to describe the governments of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. Critics jumped on the president for his belligerent rhetoric. But the problem with Bush’s formulation wasn’t his use of the term “evil,” a perfectly apt description of the regimes of Saddam Hussein, the Iranian mullahs, and Kim Jong-il. The real issue was with the “axis” part. With the reference to the Axis powers of World War II, Bush suggested that there was some sort of alliance or cooperation among these three enemies of the United States. His turn of phrase indicated that they represented a unitary problem and implied that in taking on one, America would be dealing with all three.

Nearly five years later, we can see the damage caused by the president’s too-cute slogan and the muddled thinking behind it. By failing to distinguish clearly among the overlapping security threats presented by rogue states, nuclear proliferators, and supporters of terrorism, Bush helped bring his own nightmare to life. Thanks to his foreign policy, many of the world’s dictators do now function as a kind of anti-American axis, in a way they didn’t when he made that speech.

Let’s look back at the members circa 2002. Though they shared an interest in proliferating and were all brutal violators of human rights, the regimes in Iraq, Iran, and North Korea posed distinct and very different problems for American foreign policy. Saddam’s Baath fascists in Iraq were shooting at American planes in the no-fly zone and defying the international community over sanctions and inspections. But as we now know, they weren’t major sponsors of terrorism, and were nowhere near building, buying, or giving nukes to others. The theocrats in Iran, on the other hand, had a long history of backing anti-American terrorists and presented a longer-term proliferation threat. North Korea’s Stalinists were stroking their fuel rods, menacing the South as usual, and counterfeiting dollars, but not supporting terrorism. All three regimes were hostile to the United States, but their animosity wasn’t synchronized in any meaningful way.

Now, consider the axis today. Our attacking Iraq prompted Muammar Qaddafi, a Little Brother of Evil, to put up his hands and surrender his nuclear effort. But Iran and North Korea drew from Bush’s idealist invasion the realist lesson that only a nuclear deterrent could preserve them from regime change. Kim, in particular, seems to have taken the point that the American war machine could instantly pulverize his tanks and missiles massed along the DMZ. This meant he needed to accelerate his deterrent efforts by trying out his Pacific-spanning Long Dong missile and cramming for a nuclear test. Bush’s adamant policy of nondiscussion made matters worse, ensuring that neither country would slow down or back away from its atomic rush. He might just as well have announced a prize for the first successful detonation.

But the president’s biggest act of axis-enhancement was tying up our military in Iraq and antagonizing our allies. While the global cop was busy in Baghdad, the world’s other worst villains staged a jailbreak. They understood that Bush couldn’t readily respond to their provocations with force. The opportunity cost of occupying Iraq has also been felt in Syria and Sudan, among the other places where evil has gone unchecked for want of effective American leadership. At another level, our Bush- and Iraq-inspired unpopularity has spurred an informal new post-Cold War anti-American International, with Hugo Chávez, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and George Galloway running for General Secretary.

There are a lot of people in Washington that I’d like to sit down with over a nice dinner, gauge who they are, and how they consider things, really. Mainly in foreign policy circles, but Senators, too, and that even includes soon-to-be-ex-Senator Rick Santorum, who is running for dear life in Pennsylvania and seems to have taken to flashing a Sympathy Card in his attempt to get re-elected. Poor guy, but, I’ve always been sure that Santorum would lose. Pennsylvania’s a Conservative Liberal state — meaning that it’s purple, but a darker shade of. It isn’t because of the gay-comments that Santorum is losing — it’s because of Bob Casey. Casey is the strongest candidate in Pennsylvania to win any election, and I knew this one was over from the start. Not that he’ll be guaranteed victory in 2012, when he runs again, but in 2006? Unbeatable.

I read something humorous this morning in Time. Perhaps you read it, too. Can Dick Cheney save the Republican Party? In a word, No. Now I’d like to ask my own question: Can Dick Morris Save Foreign Policy and the GOP? In a word, DickMorrisisapieceofshit. His latest column urges Bush to seize Korea — a crisis of his own making — and turn it into a political plus. How shameless. He should go back to sucking toes. Maybe then we wouldn’t have to hear him.

Sad thing is, I’m sure someone in the White House is listening.

I told you, Dear Readers, that on Tuesday I would be taking a trip to Planned Parenthood, and I did. We’re talking about the Planned Parenthood on 11250 South Halsted, in Chicago, and you can find information on them here (for those of you wondering the when and wheres). That webpage, with information on their hours and location, is wrong. (Chicago)Bare with me. See, Tuesday, I check out the site, and it says that they close at four: “great!” I thought. “I get out of school at 3:10! I’m geographically close, and I can get there!” I wrangle up a ride and off we go to the Abortion Clinic, and guess what? It’s closed at 1:30. Nobody’s there but for two old women sitting at their desks (likely thinking about how much they’d like to have an abortion or better yet, watch one) and I knock/ring the bell. They look up, and that’s it. Just ignore me for a few minutes, and pretend we’re not there. We had to leave, empty-handed.

Now, see, my dear Readers, I was driven mad by this. Planned Parenthood is an International company with tons of means; you’re telling me they can’t afford to keep their damn website in check so that it doesn’t mislead me about working hours? Perhaps it has magical HTML that makes it legible to women but does its best to mislead men so as to protect the sanctity of a woman’s right to choose what hours she can show up to a “Reproductive Health Clinic”? I wrote them an email about it and they simply said, “We’ve been having some problems with the site [I see no technical problems: just updating problems, thanks, Misleaders — and yes, there’s a hell of a difference between being lazy and, I don’t know, being hacked] but we’re open [Wednesday] until 4:30, if you’d care to drop by.” They really said, “If you’d care to drop by.” Durr durr.

Yesterday, Wednesday, I decided to call them as soon as they opened, which was 8:15. I called at about eight sixteen, and nobody answered. Worse, a machine answers that tells me to call back during working hours! For an occasionally literal man like me — I think that certain things should always be literal, like, uh, “Meet me there!” and “We open at 8:15″ — that’s like saying, “Oh, you’ve paid the price I asked for? Well, we’re doubling it, sorry!” Don’t tell me to call back during working hours if I did call during working hours! Now, I couldn’t possibly sit around waiting to call back, because I had to get to class and go about my business. After awhile, though, I found some time (I made some time) and made a call to Planned Parenthood.

You’ve got to understand, though: I’m not buying contraceptives for me. I haven’t had sex in forever (last November, really, but who’s counting the months of…?)! The situation is, A friend of mine came to me with a problem and I’m here to help. My job is to get things done, you know? Be there for my friends. Help them through their troubles. Now, understand: my goal here was to get Morning After Pills, and so finally, when I call them, and get in touch with their emergency operators, I ask them about certain procedures. I ask, “My girlfriend [I lied about who was who to protect myself and friends] can’t make it with me to the clinic today; can I pick up her pills for her?” and they said, “No, she has to be here to be counseled and fill out paperwork.” Which of course puts a strain on my day, as I was going to pick them up for her because my friend can’t make it. But, what’s the point of that? “Counseling” re: emergency contraception?

Do they have to counsel you before you buy a condom, too? “Please, sir, careful! They may rip, which may or may not put pressure on your penis, and which may or may not lead to you ejaculating inside the vaginal orifice! That may or may not lead to pregnancy, and that may or may not lead to an abortion, which may or may not lead to a happy Doctor at this very clinic!” I mean, really. Is that necessary? What a bureaucratic waste. Counseling for a pill — though it’s not just the counseling that bothers me, but when I asked them how much time that’d take, they said, “Thirty minutes to an hour.” They can do it over the phone in three minutes — believe me, I had to sit through their stupid “Order Birth Control Over the Phone Line!” just to get through to someone who could talk to me about it because you’ve got to listen to the machine to talk to someone and you’ve got to make the solemn promise that you’ve considered all options! — but take half an hour-to-an-hour face to face?

One thing I found very notable, however, is that this is an organization called Planned Parenthood but there’s only focus on the Mother part of that equation. I’m no chauvenist, but I do believe that my penis + your vagina = baby. That might be a crude calculation (isn’t there semen and eggs involved in the equation, Algebra Teachers?) but it’s basically true, and while I understand that it’s her uterus, they’ve gotta understand that it’s uterus not uteryou. You know? I’ll bet that, if I were a woman, those two ladies at the front desk would’ve come over and let me in and said, “What d’you need babydoll? We’re here to pamper you up! We’ll suck out your fetus’ and have you lookin’ pretty for the prom, too!” (I kid the Rude and Misleading Clinicians. I’m sure they would first ask you to fill out a ton of bureaucratic paperwork and counsel you about the dangers of sex and pills (”careful not to choke on it!”) before they offered to abort your fetii.)

Fortunately or unfortunately (depending how you look at it), my friends who have their problem and I — we decided that, we’ll wait it out, although that decision was sort of made for us. We lost valuable time on Tuesday because their website lied to me, and then Wednesday the girl was incapable of going with me to the Clinic. Positively, however: she’s close to her menstrual cycle, and, hey. We’ll find out what’s what soon enough. Besides that, it’s getting late after the initial sexual contact (Saturday), and so there’s little that can be done but to wait it out. From there, my friends will have to decide what they’re going to do, if it turns out that she’s pregnant. I think I did everything I could, but a part of me feels bad. (Before anyone asks, I most certainly did make sure that my friends understood that I won’t a) do this again and b) that they should be ashamed to be in this situation. Don’t be so irresponsible in the future, I said.)

In spite of all the ragging I do of the organization, I’m happy that Planned Parenthood exists. I just have contempt at the moment because their bureaucratic nature and errors cost me precious hours. But, at least, they help other people. Just not me. Or men, overall. Or people that like to be informed rightly by organizations and their websites. I can’t say I enjoyed my time with Planned Parenthood — and by the way, that Clinic I went to? It’s closed on Sundays and Mondays. How’s that for nonsense? What’s the point of that? Stupid hours! People spend their weekends having sex; not dealing with the after-effects! Close for the weekend if you must, but don’t close on Mondays! — but, hey, I didn’t have to. And I’m sure that PP doesn’t care. They will one day when I run for office and one of them runs into this article and decides to call me a misogynist or Gay because I don’t like bureaucracy, but I’ll deal with that when we get there (note to the future: I’m not a misogynist or gay: I certainly believe in the right to choose and birth control. Just not bureaucracy at Halsted).

Related, sort of: my knee is doing eh. It’s torn up from the insides, and my MRI was an explosive mess. Literally. I mean that, as in, My knee felt like it was being burnt from the inside. Doctors explained to me that it was a mixture of gory circumstances that caused me pain in my left knee during an MRI that is supposed to be painless. I went to the Doctor last Thursday because they were supposed to tell me my MRI results and then tell me what we were going to do about it, but the Doctor called in sick and cancelled. Now that was infuriating, too: he’s a Doctor. He’s not supposed to get sick!

But really. Unless he was dying, or incapacited (which I very much doubt), I’m miffed, as my appointment was moved up by ten days (to Monday), and that’s more time for me to suffer. It aches while I sleep!

Long is the way, and hard, that out of hell leads up to light

Two people I’m proud of today: Tony Snow and Salman Rushdie. Snow replied to a question from a reporter asking him to admit mistakes by saying, “Oh my God, it’s a silly question!” A little straight-forward banter never hurt anyone (but, so you know, they’ve made plenty of mistakes, although I do understand and agree with a President who wants to protect his current policy during a tense standoff; that said, I have no faith in Bush’s abilities or those of his handlers). Salman Rushdie, on the other hand, said that “veils suck” in response to Muslim dress. It’s nice to see a man who isn’t censoring himself, despite the fact that he was once in a ten-year-hiding because Iranian hitmen wanted to kill him for insulting Mohammed in a book.

By the way, if you’re planning on going to Denmark, don’t. I hear it’s bad out there!

Kim Jung Il said today that sanctions would be considered an act of War, and that raises concerns everywhere. South Korean troops are preparing for a possible invasion, and the Southeast of Asia is preparing for all sorts of War. Ultimately, the results of this all will come down to China.

China’s current relationship with North Korea is sexual in nature: temporary and ultimately unsustainable, because you can only have meaningless sex for so long before the two involved parties have to go their separate ways. It’s called a One-Night-Stand for a reason, and someone in the White House has to explain this to the Chinese (I hear they don’t talk about sex over there, which is part of why everyone there is having it). Here’s the situation: the Chinese need to keep Kim happy so as to prevent him from allowing refugees to leave his country and flood China. Further, Kim gives them leverage with the US: “If you don’t do as we’d like, we’ll stop helping with the North!”

The Chinese, however, are not willing to go to War over him and they aren’t backing him as he thinks they are. China is playing a game, and will find itself pregnant at this rate if it continues straddling. It needs to tell the Koreans, unequivocally, that it will not support them in a War. It can do this privately if it must, but it can’t continue giving Kim the impression that he can do as he wishes because the Chinese are right behind him. Because that is what is fueling North Korea, and if the Norks were to be told, “You are not going to have any assistance from us in a War,” which sounds about right to me (unless the Chinese are willing to sacrifice their Economic well-being for the next fifty years — which they very well might be: I once told a friend that I don’t fear China long-term because that is a country that enjoys self-destruction very much, and always has, historically).

Quite the situation we’ve got here. And not a single competent man around in any of these countries to help solve it.

You guys want to know something nifty? I’m taking a trip to Planned Parenthood this afternoon. Details will come later or tomorrow, but they will come. We’ll see how things go. Let’s get to the meat of this coconut, though, and not savor tomorrow’s.

George W. Bush’s White House is in even worse shape than it may appear to be. Know why? Take this story in, first, and then I’ll explain.

Suddenly, like the fierce “blue northers” that sweep across Texas each autumn, the political winds have turned bleaker for Republicans - and President Bush’s private mood has blackened accordingly. Just two weeks ago, as gasoline prices plummeted and his tough-talking terror counterattack began moving poll numbers his way, Bush turned bullish on the November elections. “He’s on scent and he’s driving hard,” a longtime political confidant of the President reported early this month. “He’s got the microphone and thinks he’s controlling the political debate.”

First Lady Laura Bush, who is even more in demand than her husband on the political stump this cycle, also was telling aides she thought the tide had finally turned. Now, however, friends, aides and close political allies tell the Daily News Bush is furious with his own side for helping create a political downdraft that has blunted his momentum and endangered GOP prospects for keeping control of Congress next month.

This is Clintonian and Nixonian and Stupid at the same time. First of all, Laura Bush’s opinion should never be consulted about politics and it isn’t because she’s a woman. I know plenty of women I trust with politics and advice, but not her. Sorry, but I’m sure George himself won’t tell you that he married her for her brain, and if he says he did, he’s lying.

George is falling into the trap that Failing Presidents often do. He seriously believes, apparently, that he has to go out on the stump to fight for his Republican allies, and he’s blaming them, not himself, for the problems that have befallen him politically. This is a costly, and silly, error. This is exactly what happened to Bill Clinton in 1994. Simply: Bush can not afford to do such a thing as campaign this year. He is not wanted; he is not welcome, and in response to the bold, he is not controlling anything. Every speech he gives puts him on the news, and that reminds Americans of his 34% approval rating. This puts undue pressure on Republicans, and he’s too egomaniacal to understand that. Karl Rove, too, deserves serious blame and condemnation for not explaining it to him.

In situations like the one George W. Bush is in, you only have one choice, and that’s to shut your mouth and do your job as President. It isn’t to campaign because campaigning will accomplish nothing positive for your party, and at this point, this late in a Presidency with these approval ratings so low and the party bound to lose seats (if not control), your best bet is to do your job and stay above the fray because it’s right politically and because there are certain things for the President to work on (Iraq, hello!) and because it’d be better for your legacy, too, in later years.

How silly of the King. How juvenile a mistake of his Turd Blossom. How pathetic of this White House.

Briefly, I’d like to redirect everyone to what will become Forgotten News under the shadow of North Korea. A Russian investigative journalist was shot to death in what was certainly a bid to censor. I’m considering journalism as a career, and I just thought this deserved mention as a reminder of what the rest of the world is like before we begin to criticize the American government too heavily for its government-press interactions.

Now, North Korea! North Korea! The Norks have tested nuclear weapons. The rest of the world, of course, is concerned about it and condemning the Norkean action. Some believe that this will lead to a Chinese intervention and change of heart, from backing the North Koreans unconditionally to becoming more wary of Kim Jung Il and his tendency to, ah, alarm everyone in the world. I’m not convinced that this will happen in the long-term, but I am certain that China is alarmed by this and will, now, make moves to at least publicly support the United States. But given China’s fear of the North Korean border opening so that refugees can leave and enter the overpopulated hellhole, I can easily imagine the Chinese standing by Korea in private or, at least, vowing to protect them from real punishment (which would be War, in the end).

Further, I think that this will lead Japan to remilitarize but in a limited sense. More airplanes; more bombers. That’s about it. I certainly don’t believe they’ll begin amassing a massive army and I’d be stunned if they went to work on their own nuclear weapons. The imagery, of course, of remilitarization (however limited) will remind people of the Second World War, but I don’t think this goes that far, not in reality, although it might in perception.

However, I’m not entirely sure that Japan will begin to remilitarize. I’d have guessed that their course of action in 1998 and, really, they didn’t then, and I don’t believe for sure that they will now. I think Japan will be prudent and restrained and ignore, on a military-level, the provocation of North Korea, and that this, too, shall pass. It’s in the, What should we do department that I find myself confused, because in North Korea, there are no good options. War will lead to the destruction of South Korea’s Seoul; anything short of that is unlikely to do anything about regime change and the Program.

Deterrence and containment seem to be the only options. All I know is, that it’d be disastrous to say, “Let’s go to Pyongyang and disarm them!” which means, of course, that Dick Cheney is talking that very option up right now in the White House.

Congressman Mark Foley isn’t just a pervert: he’s a stalker, too, drunkly lurking by the Congressional Page’ dormitory in the middle of the night in hopes of gaining entrance (in more ways than one). Congressman, notably the House’ Speaker Dennis Hastert, have been bumbling all over of late, and that, coupled with the War, George Bush and Mark Foley will, I think, tip the scales in favor of Democrats this November. But, as Jonathan Chait rightly points out, we shouldn’t allow this to distract us from the other, Realer failures of the GOP.

Which I don’t think this does, though. I think that this brings the Republican Party full-circle in failure. They can’t protect Afghanistan or our mission in Iraq; they can’t protect surpluses or the environment; now they can’t protect teenage boys in their own Congressional offices. That, more than the technical aspects of public policy, is something that all Americans can understand.

That’s enough, for today, on the sexual aspect of 2006 Politics. Let’s talk about this, one of the odder blog entries I’ve read anywhere of late.

The Vanity Fair magazine published last year an investigative article alleging that the American Turkish Council (ATC) and the Assembly of Turkish American Associations (ATAA) had conspired, among other things, to make illegal campaign contributions to the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, in return for blocking a congressional resolution on the Armenian Genocide.

The article also mentioned that Turkish agents had infiltrated the highest echelons of the U.S. government.

The main source for some of the Vanity Fair revelations was Sibel Edmonds who had worked as a Turkish translator for the FBI. Unfortunately, she could not disclose most of what she knew on this sensitive subject, as she is legally prohibited from making public the confidential FBI documents that she had translated in the course of her work. All attempts by U.S. courts or Members of Congress to get out the full facts have been quashed by the Bush Administration, using the cover of protecting national security.

There have been several disclosures in recent months, mostly from anonymous sources, which shed further light on this matter. A few days ago, investigative journalist Wayne Madsen posted a special report (WMR) on his website which included alarming allegations about the extent of illegal activities by Turkish groups in the United States. As the report is based on confidential intelligence sources, there is no way of independently verifying its content.

The article goes on to excerpt reports, and the reports say that Turks are infiltrating the government and American society to find nuclear weapons and the technology to build them. Worse, though, is the news that the Bush Administration is covertly helping them. It’s a very weird story — what would the Turks want nuclear weapons for? “Leverage with Greece” just doesn’t fit right to me — and we’ll see what, if anything, comes of it. I just don’t understand the situation, at all. This is a whacky White House, deadset on proliferating weapons in India and, apparently, Turkey, but shocked when Iran and North Korea do what they do. (Not that I’m justifying those two nations — I’m a sharp critic of both those nations and their leaders — but I do think that these men are trying to destroy the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, at the rate they’re going.)

Today, I had a Debate Tournament. I was not around for most of the day, and now, in the eve, I shall be pitching — as in, “Baseball” — for awhile, and afterward I intend to spend sometime with a friend or two. I haven’t much time today, but I’d like to talk about a few things, first being this article abou Sienna Miller calling Pittsburgh “Shittsburgh,” something that I didn’t particularly need to read (how trivial a matter this is) but that I came across by accident and, since it asks, at the end, Do you think Sienna should have apologized or do people just need to lighten up? I thought I’d answer.

People don’t need to lighten up about this: they were insulted, and have a right to be offended. Sienna Miller needs to man up about this and say, “I don’t like this city. There aren’t enough late night party spots (that’s why they filmed parts of Queer as Folk in Toronto while claiming it was Pittsburgh!) or good places to find drugs, which I need to fulfill my petty celebrity life. Oh, the humanity!” Instead, Sienna apologized for her comments through a publicist, saying, “I want to apologize for my comments which seem to have been misconstrued and taken out of context.” Right. (I, for one, like Pittsburgh. It’s a beautiful town. I, however, hate phony apologies. People need to stand by themselves more often.)

John Warner is a guy who should stand by himself (being a Senator and all) and is, and I can say that I’m quite proud of him, at least for today, as it’s always nice to see a man criticize his President and not back down.

Speaking to reporters on Thursday after returning from a trip that included a one-day stop in Baghdad, Mr. Warner said the United States should consider “a change of course” if the violence there did not diminish soon. He did not specify what shift might be necessary, but said that the American military had done what it could to stabilize Iraq and that no policy options should be taken “off the table.”

With the blessing of the White House, a high-level commission led by James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state, is already reviewing American policy in Iraq. But the commission is not scheduled to report to Mr. Bush and Congress until after the November elections, a timeline that the White House had hoped would enable Mr. Bush to avoid public discussion of any change of course until after voters determine which party will control Congress next year.

Now, Mr. Warner’s comments are pushing up that timeline, forcing Republicans to confront the issue before some are ready. In an interview on Friday, Senator Susan Collins, a Maine Republican who has been critical of the administration’s approach in the past, said there was a “growing sense of unease” among other Republicans, which she said could deepen because of Senator Warner’s comments.

Ms. Collins, who is the chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, echoed Mr. Warner’s calls for a shift in strategy in Iraq. “When Chairman Warner, who has been a steadfast ally of this administration, calls for a new strategy,” she said, “that is clearly significant.” She said the current approach, which she attributed to Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, had not led to an overall reduction in violence or any prospect that American troop levels would come down soon. “We’ve heard over and over that as Iraqis stand up, our troops will stand down,” Ms. Collins said. “Well, there are now hundreds of thousands of Iraqi troops and security forces, and yet we have not seen any reduction in violence.”

Truth to power, Senator. Just don’t mistake that as power for you, because I don’t want you to run for President, and you don’t want it, either (you’d lose, trust me). So long as you’re speaking on principle, not on politics, I’m with you all the way.

A left-leaning reporter, a White House inside and former Senior Bush White House aide came out this week and criticized Bob Woodward’s State of Denial. I’ve just started reading Woodward’s work, and while I certainly believe him when he says that Card was pushing for Rumsfeld’s ouster and other such charges, I will say this: his reporting is biased in favor of those who allow him to be their gadfly. Prior Bush books of his were biased in favor of the Administration because the White House welcomed him. For this book, Bush and Cheney decided against giving Woodward an open path into the White House, and his tone shifted accordingly like a scorned lover.

Yesterday, the Congress passed a few bills regarding military tribunals and spreading FISA to apply to terrorists. That isn’t all, however, as they authorized funds for the US to build a 700 foot fence across the Mexican Border, but what they don’t mention is that they also put in provisions that ensure it’ll never be built.

But shortly before recessing late Friday, the House and Senate gave the Bush administration leeway to distribute the money to a combination of projects — not just the physical barrier along the southern border. The funds may also be spent on roads, technology and “tactical infrastructure” to support the Department of Homeland Security’s preferred option of a “virtual fence.”

What’s more, in a late-night concession to win over wavering Republicans, GOP congressional leaders pledged in writing that Native American tribes, members of Congress, governors and local leaders would get a say in “the exact placement” of any structure, and that Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff would have the flexibility to use alternatives “when fencing is ineffective or impractical.”

The loopholes leave the Bush administration with authority to decide where, when and how long a fence will be built, except for small stretches east of San Diego and in western Arizona. Homeland Security officials have proposed a fence half as long, lawmakers said.

“It’s one thing to authorize. It’s another thing to actually appropriate the money and do it,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.). The fine-print distinction between what Congress says it will do and what it actually pays for is a time-honored result of the checks and balances between lawmakers who oversee agencies and those who hold their purse strings.

Don’t you love Republicans? Dishonest with Democrats. Dishonest with themselves. Dishonest with America.

Now, a couple of things. I did a search for “Foley gay” so as to find a link to the exact revelation that Foley’s gay (no duh) and this article came up, entitled, “Foley is no pedophile!” Amazing what people will say sometimes, isn’t it? And so, I decided I’d do a Google search and find out what Jeff Gannon is up to, and, predictably, all of the gay prostitute’s entries on his blog were about Foley. I didn’t have to look too long to find the nonsense that made him George Bush’s favorite “reporter” last year, as he provided it on his site in the first paragraph.

Mark Foley is a creep and House Republican leaders forced him out of Congress when evidence of inappropriate behavior came to their attention. It appears that Hastert and Company took action in a timely fashion. The same cannot be said for the George Soros-funded Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, ABC News, gay activists and Democrats.

Amazing.

Read an interesting column this morning in the New York Times about Henry Kissinger’s contributions to the Bush White House, an article prompted by Bob Woodward’s State of Denial, and it gives us further insight into the failures of this Administration. Now, don’t get too excited — it isn’t as if the Administration is listening to him, and, frankly, it might be better that they don’t!

On the surface, it sounds implausible: why would former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, the world’s best-known proponent of balance-of-power diplomacy, give advice to the Bush administration, whose professed strategy and ideals run contrary to his philosophy? And, conversely, why would the president and his aides consult Mr. Kissinger? After all, their National Security Strategy of 2006 dropped the idea that America should even pursue a balance of power. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice declared last year that the United States has abandoned 60 years of trying to “buy stability at the expense of democracy” in the Middle East. What could possibly be more un-Kissingerian? Mr. Kissinger has warned for decades against placing too much emphasis on democracy, human rights or moral values in foreign policy.

Yet Bob Woodward’s new book, “State of Denial,” describes how Vice President Dick Cheney has met with Mr. Kissinger at least once a month, and President Bush has talked to Mr. Kissinger frequently. The book portrays the 83-year-old Mr. Kissinger as the single most frequent outside adviser to Mr. Bush on foreign policy. The meetings are not some recent innovation; previous news reports have indicated Mr. Kissinger advised the administration back in Mr. Bush’s first term, too.

My first thought on this matter is, What does it matter if Kissinger is talking to them? It’s not like they’ll listen to him! but that’s snarky and a little naive (though true). The simple truth is that Kissinger was a part of the Nixon-Ford Administrations, and from there, he is close friends with Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. Couple his friendship with those two men and the fact that they run the White House with far more authority than anyone other than Rove, and you can see exactly why Kissinger still has a voice with these men. Add in the fact that Kissinger doesn’t criticize the White House publicly, and he likely keeps it to himself privately (being the gadfly that he is), and you know why he’s welcome at Pennsylvania Avenue. (The Cabal of this Administration runs back to the Ford Administration, for the most part.)

The part that confused me was, originally, the question of why Kissinger would talk to the White House when their Administration is 180-degrees turned from his ideology, but that has a simple answer: he’s a gadfly, and he can’t let go of government. He loves the State Dinners and the glow of the Oval Office as he purrs in his husky German accent, Oh, Vister President, ve must zoo zis! (I don’t count myself as a fan of Kissinger or his ideas.)

Another interesting story today is this one, in Newsweek, about Barack Obama’s potential Presidential run. I’ll be brief: I don’t want him to run, I don’t think he can win if he runs, and I’m not as big a fan of his as others. Dick Durbin is my guy, as far as Illinois Senators go, but beyond that, I just — I don’t like it when Senators who are ultimately unaccomplished believe that they should be President because of their intelligence and wit. Beyond that, Obama reminds me of Jimmy Carter in that he’s an intelligent, young man with idealism everywhere, good charisma and popular appeal, who decides that the Presidency can be his and that he’s got the tools to handle it. I’m not so sure that an Obama Presidency wouldn’t go the same way as Carter’s did, and besides, he’s not been in politics long enough to handle the Presidency. It’s not necessarily his age, but his experience, that curbs my enthusiasm.

You might call me a Tory, but I’ve always enjoyed the British government’s relationship with its people. It’s open, and it’s cordial. It’s honest in ways that ours will never be, and I like that about England.

Once settled, it is straight down to business with a question from Christopher, 11, who wants to know if Number 10 is bigger than it looks. Relieved to be avoiding questions about Iraq or police inquiries into cash-for-peerages, Mr Blair replies enthusiastically: “Yes — I mean a lot bigger, we call it, like, the Tardis.

There are several flats and there’s about 250 or 300 people that work here … people are in and out of your flat the whole time.” Huq asks if he ever wishes he could have a bit more privacy. “Sometimes yeah,” the Prime Minister replies dolefully. Next up is a question from Rima, 14, who stumps Mr Blair with a question about who is the most important person to visit Number 10.

“I suppose the best known would be Nelson Mandela and Bill Clinton,” he replies, before remembering that the current US president is pretty important too. “George Bush is obviously er …,” he stutters before asking an aide: “Has George Bush actually been here, yeah, no he’s been here, yeah … and then you get other people that come in from time to time.”

With the Prime Minister still reeling, Huq slips in a sly question about whether he ever cooks for the family. “Can you cook even?” she demands. A flustered Mr Blair insists that he can, though admits that his children probably would not be very complimentary. “I think if I, if I had more time, I kind of feel I could be better at it,” he says. Brushing aside Huq’s rather impertinent question about whether he has mastered beans on toast, he adds: “The best dish I can, I can cook sort of spaghetti bolognese or something like that probably.”

The one touch of gravitas in the interview, pre-recorded in June, is a question from Amy, 12, who wants to know his best and worst experiences. Mr Blair chooses the events on July 6 and 7 last year. “We won the Olympics one day, and then we had the bombs the next day, which was an extraordinary high to a low.”

It’s nice that the media in their country can be trusted to not give the wrong party affiliation (deliberately o’course) of a pedophile in an effort to smear those of a certain persuasion. You didn’t hear about that? Last night, Fox News’ O’Reilly Factor ran a segment on Pedophile Congressman Mark Foley, which is all fine and well. It’s a viable news story, especially when you consider the Republican cover-up of the story. That’s not the problem — the problem is that they labeled Foley a Democrat on a visual in that screen. He is not a Democrat, of course, and never has been. Someone at Fox News decided to say he was, even for just a moment, in an effort to fool viewers and minimize damage to Republicans. For all the nonsense that Republicans give about “The Clinton News Network,” they’ve never done anything remotely like this.

There is only one place, in my opinion, where people should be getting their news from: The Office of the Independent Blogger. If that’s not your sole source, however, I fully recommend a little thing called a newspaper. It’s much better than televised news, and certainly better than talk radio and The Fox Network.

If the coverage of Mark Foley is an indicator of Fox News’ credibility, this news story shows us how shallow our present government is. They designated twenty million dollars last year to a future celebration of Victory-in-Iraq/Afghanistan Day. Where I come from, the government doesn’t have to spend twenty million to be hapy about a successful war. It doesn’t cost money to pray and send your thoughts into the universe, after all, and it doesn’t cost twenty million to give a speech declaring victory. A speech declaring victory can cost you your credibility in the eyes of the World and your own people, but not twenty million dollars.

The greatest thing you can have is your credibility, moreso than any dollar sum. Credibility, your abilities and love, and not necessarily in that order, either. Jack Abramoff doesn’t believe that, and neither does his friend Karl Rove, who has to know that history will judge him and his Boy poorly for such things as this, the latest chapter in Abramoff’s Saga.

From: Jack Abramoff
To: ‘octagon1′
Monday, March 18, 2002 8:31 AM
Subject: RE: Sunday

I was sitting yesterday with Karl Rove, Bush’s top advisor, at the NCAA basketball game, discussing Israel when this email came in. I showed it to him. It seems that the President was very sad to have to come out negatively regarding Israel, but that they needed to mollify the Arabs for the upcoming war on Iraq. That did not seem to work anyway. Bush seems to love Sharon and Israel, and thinks Arabfat [sic], is nothing but a liar. I thought I’d pass that on.

Jack Abramoff knew all about the War in Iraq a long time before anything was going down. It must be nice to be the President’s advisor’s friend. You know all about upcoming wars and can direct your clients to companies, like Halliburton, that they can invest their patriotic dollars into. This century sucks!

I’m going to operate this blog by a slightly different format on occasion. No, I won’t start blogging sports (although I’d like to mention that my dear Barry Zito dominated the Minnesota Twins and beat the Unbeatable Johan Santana in his house, where he’d won over twenty straight games! PS: if the New York Yankees win the World Series this year, I’ll vomit) and I’m not going to go into miscellaneous nonsense (there is no room for Ms. Cleo’s questionable Jamaican origin, let alone newly revealed Lesbianism) but I will be writing about history and crime when the bill fits. The bill fits today, in the Pennsylvanian story of a gunman who held the girls of a school hostage before shooting them in a line. It’s absolutely disgusting, and I think it illustrates to us a need to have a tougher justice system. Not more gun control — notice: in Colorada, the Colombine boys broke a ton of Gun Control laws. What’s one more? — but overall, I’m not a fan of the speed of our justice system, or the way it works. For all intents and purposes, this is a bastard of a man, a self-confessed former and future Child Molester, and he should rot in jail for the rest of his existence. Edit: he should, but he killed himself. The following is merely a commentary on our legal system using him, if he were alive, as a good example. Any other number of examples may include the man who shot Reagan for Jodie Foster.

But, the thing is, this man will plead insane — at least, he certainly can — and if he does, he’s going to get a softer sentence. That bothers me, and I hate nothing more in Law than the Insane Plea. It reminds me of the “Rehab Trick” in Fame (see, recently: Mark Foley [and here, at this ABC page, are further IM conversations between him and the page in which he offers to get the boy drunk], Mel Gibson. Diversity!): you do something real bad, claim you’ve got a drinking problem and go into rehab. Nobody now talk about you being a child molester, nobody notices that you’re a Nazi from Australia: all of a sudden, you’re a drunk (which is cute in its own way, right? That’s why our laws against drunk driving are so weak) and then it blows over, you check out of rehab, smile, decline publicity for a couple of weeks, and boom, you’re on your feet. What a world.

In other news, Bill Frist says we should embrace the Taliban into the government of Afghanistan. He says, “We’ve got them here, why not there, too?” (Really, he simply believes that, if you can’t beat them, you should let them join you. I suppose that’s how the Republican leadership decided to welcome Mark Foley into its midst.)

Truthfully, I don’t think it’s a bad policy idea to allow ex-Taliban members to serve in positions of power in Afghanistan. At the least, I don’t think it’s bad to allow them to run for offices and, if they win, accept that. That doesn’t mean that the Afghans should start appointing ex-Taliban to the judiciary or anything like that. That would be crazy: allowing them to work their way into politics and perhaps the police force, ex-Taliban that is, is Democratic. It’s what we should’ve done immediately in Iraq with Baathists rather than boot them from their jobs. But, hey, it’s an election year, so I’m all for the Democrats using this to beat the Republicans into the ground as “soft.” The Majority Leader wants to give in to the enemy! (They’d do it to us.)

Besides, it isn’t like the Republicans have been good on Afghanistan at all. They’ve abandoned that place and that should be covered more frequently, so any attention placed on the Republican mishandling of Afghanistan is fine by me.

Republicans seem to be taking advantage, or trying to, of the fact that newspapers and broadcast stations are not airing the full details of the Foley incident as doing so might induce fines from the FCC for public indecency. Tony Snow referred to this scandal as nothing but “naughty emails” and conveniently failed to note that they were perverted emails and attempts to have sex with sixteen year old boys by a man who was in charge of protecting children from pedophiles through his subcommittee. My good friends at This Century Sucks have a good take on the matter.

Over at the Washington Post, there are good notes on Andrew Card and Donald Rumsfeld, as well as Laura Bush’s thoughts on the matter, and through this article, I’ve seen what I consider the most fascinating glimpse into the Bush White House.

Every six weeks or so, Card tried to have a private, candid session with first lady Laura Bush to hear her concerns. The first lady was worried that Rumsfeld was hurting her husband, and her perspective seemed to reflect Rice’s concern about Rumsfeld’s overbearing style and tendency to dominate. Card knew that the first lady and Rice often took long walks together on the Camp David weekends.

“I agree with you,” Card said. On one level he was trying to educate and explain, but he was also lobbying. So he outlined his problems with Rumsfeld and said he believed it was time for a change. “Well, does the president know about that?” she asked. Was Card being candid with her husband? Card said he was. “That’s why I’m arguing.” He said, however, that so far his advice on the Rumsfeld situation had been considered and rejected. “He’s happy with this,” the first lady said, “but I’m not.” Another time she said, “I don’t know why he’s not upset with this.”

Card’s relationship with Rumsfeld was always difficult. Last year, in the days after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans with devastating effect, Bush decided more troops were needed and asked Card to relay the message to Rumsfeld. “You know I don’t report to you,” Rumsfeld said. “I know you don’t report to me,” Card replied. “You report to the president. But believe me, he would like you to do this.” “I’m not going to do it unless the president tells me,” Rumsfeld told the chief of staff. Too many strains and obligations were being placed on the National Guard. Card protested that he had just talked to the president, who had made an absolute decision. “Then he’s going to have to tell me,” Rumsfeld said.

“Hey,” the president said to Card later. “Rumsfeld called me up. I thought you were going to handle that.”

That, my friends, is everything that is wrong with this White House. Before the excerpt I made, it’s noted that Dick Cheney all-but-demanded that his old best friend stay on as Secretary of Defense, while Card and Rice and Laura were all opposed to his remainder.

We’ve all heard the shots against Bush saying he’s Cheney’s pawn, and that he’s as dumb as a rock. Curious as one, too. I’ve always been sure that he’s an incompetent, a bumbler, and a bit of a moron — but I never knew it was at this level, that things were this bad, that Rumsfeld would refuse to answer Rice’s phone calls and that’d be okay with the President. That he’d be fine with his DOD refusing to speak to the National Security Advisor, refusing to take an order from the Chief of Staff, and that he’d be fine with it. Maybe I should be less surprised, but I wanted to have some faith in the President’s ability rather than none at all.

But like with the news this weekend that Roger Clemens was named as a steroid user by an admitted juicer, I shouldn’t be surprised at all, because like with his hero Roger, George Bush is what he obviously is: a man far too simple, far too dumb to count on. Truman, the man he’s most often compared to by his friends, never would’ve sent such an order with the Chief of Staff, but if he had, he’d have personally busted that DOD Chairman down if he were to give the Chief such a hard time. With George? It doesn’t matter, because Uncle Dick said it was okay. Yes, my friends, it appears that Roger Clemens is a steroid user, and who really doubts it?

While we’re on the subject of baseball, I’ve an open message to my hero, Barry Zito: Dear Barry, Don’t join the NY Yankees in the offseason. Money talks, but, please, it isn’t so loud that you ought to sell your soul. (Since I read this weekend that Jason “HGH” Giambi and his dear friend Johnny “Genital Warts” Damon were advising him to come to the Bankees, I thought I’d balance the karma and ask him to go somewhere else, anywhere else.) (Recently, I’ve found that I wish to move to Planet Zito, and for anyone wondering what that is, you should take a look, here. Cool beans.)

The more I read of the new Woodward book, State of Denial, the more apparent it becomes to me that Donald Rumsfeld will finally lose his job.

Either the day after the Midterm Elections, or in January. That’s how George Walker works. He won’t want to give anything up to the Defeatocrats before the Elections, but I reckon Rumsfeld’s done for.

Good news for Democrats coming from Montana, Tennessee and Ohio, where the GOP is narrowly trailing in Senatorial races they were expected to run away with, and I expect that the Republican Party has cost itself at least five seats in the House and two in the Senate with the recent revelations about Mark Foley’s pedophilia (the full IM transcripts can be found here, but beware) and the further, more disturbing revelation that Republican leadership knew of these incidents in 2005 yet did nothing about the knowledge that there was a child-molester in their ranks.

It’s so disgusting, in my opinion, that Donald Rumsfeld is a bully to others in the Administration, George Bush continues to be incurious to the point of oblivion (first revealed by Paul O’Neill: repeatedly reinforced by your own eyes and everyone else to ever meet him), and that Condi Rice is so pathetic as to whine to the President that Rumsfeld wouldn’t return her phone calls. I almost don’t want to read the book just because it’s going to be the final nail in this Administration’s integrity’s coffin. How sad is it that today’s Republican Party works hard at covering up the Pedophile From Florida and at ignoring phone calls from the person who coordinates national security and American Diplomacy instead of working together to pass laws for the public and, you know, keep America safe and free.