Go to consortiumblog.com to post comments

Order Now

Archives

Bush End Game
George W. Bush's presidency since 2007

Bush - Second Term
George W. Bush's presidency from 2005-06

Bush - First Term
George W. Bush's presidency, 2000-04

Who Is Bob Gates?
The secret world of Defense Secretary Gates

2004 Campaign
Bush Bests Kerry

Behind Colin Powell's Legend
Gauging Powell's reputation.

The 2000 Campaign
Recounting the controversial campaign.

Media Crisis
Is the national media a danger to democracy?

The Clinton Scandals
Behind President Clinton's impeachment.

Nazi Echo
Pinochet & Other Characters.

The Dark Side of Rev. Moon
Rev. Sun Myung Moon and American politics.

Contra Crack
Contra drug stories uncovered

Lost History
America's tainted historical record

The October Surprise "X-Files"
The 1980 election scandal exposed.

International
From free trade to the Kosovo crisis.

Other Investigative Stories

Editorials

Editor’s Note: Readers had thoughts about the news media’s treatment of Barack Obama, why the energy crisis has grown so bad over the past three decades, and other serious challenges facing the United States:

WHAT Liberal Media?

So the media corpSE is all over Barack Obama for being an "arrogant", “uppity”, “pompous”, “a fancy bearing tea drinking celebrity” candidate according to the media, along with every other word to describe Obama as the “Elitists” Candidate!

Uhh, what about “Elitists” McCain who has Seven Houses, doesn’t bother to pay his house taxes on one of them for four years, buys $500 shoes, has a Billionaire Wife, flies around in her private Lear Jet – and then makes a speech titled "President McCain in 2013", detailing everything he had accomplished as President by 2013?

None of this is "Elitists" or "Pompous" according to the media?

     Dick Move of the Week - McCain Attacks
     http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=178207&title=dick-move-of-the-week-mccain&byDate=true

How much of this video has been reported?  Over and over again!

And let’s not forget all the media being over McCain's house around Memorial Day in his backyard for a BBQ, not to mention the time when the AP got McCain those doughnuts before the "questions"!!

     No news, just ribs at McCain barbecue
     http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/03/03/mccain.bbq/index.html

     AP writer rips Obama, gives McCain doughnuts (true story)
    http://www.jedreport.com/2008/06/ap-scribe-who-s.html

And lets not forget how many times the media slammed Obama for not wearing a Flag Lapel Pin?  If it was SO important, why don’t these same media correspondents wear THEIR Flag Lapel Pins?

     Flag Pins: Who Wears 'Em?
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/23/flag-pins-who-wears-em_n_98054.html

What Hypocrites!  But don’t forget folks, we are surrounded by “That Liberal Media”, who love to keep telling us all those “DNC” Talking Points!  Yeah, right!

"Liberal Media"?   What Liberal Media??

Tom Wieliczka
Windsor Locks, CT

--

Mr. Boskin is also on the board of ExxonMobil. 

He is the chiseler who crafted the concept and practice of "core inflation" that is systematically swindling Social Security recipients - among other things. 

See Williams' www.shadowstats.com.

Dan & Dee Fritz

--

The days of Fred Friendly and Edward R. Morrow when the news room had guts are long gone. News whether it be good or bad has become entertainment. The news media like so many things in America has been broken by the quest for money and celebrity status. Anchors are no longer reporters with ethics. They are entertainment figures vying for personal attention and social status that spend enormous amounts of time dealing with trivia every day while the hard real and often ugly stories are ignored. This is the opinion of a seventy-five year old who has watched America cross the Rubicon again and again during the Administration of George Bush.

Lyle Sykora
Lake Carroll IL

--

I will always appreciate you guys at the [Washington] Post. Just last week I had decided to vote for Nader. But now with Milbank's misquotation hatchet job about Obama, it seems you turds are really, really afraid. So I have changed my mind, thinking, if the Post is so afraid of him, maybe he is worth voting for.

So Milbank misquotes Obama -- are you soon going to make Fox's "mistakes" confusing Obama for Osama? We have an office pool at work each with a date beginning with Sept 1st about when you or the Times will start pulling this fetid rabbit out of your hat -- and a minion then calls him UPPITY. Why don't you just pass out the bullets??!! You truly have become unamerican, even treasonous, to allow such vitriol to slime through your pages. You've come a long way baby; next stop, Hell.

May the Post rest in peace, or at least just rest. Not that you will, but it is good to see folks that think of themselves as powerful influences exposed for what they are; small people who are so very afraid of something that might be good for this country.  That's the definition of an American asshole. Starting with Milbank and the rest of Editorial.

You aren't worth a signature. You aren't worth the ink you use anymore.

Chardaker

--

So let’s get this straight: McCain for months complained how unpresidential it was that Obama hadn’t traveled to the war zones. Obama goes abroad, and comes home looking very presidential, to the point that McCain complains it’s presumptive for a mere candidate to appear presidential. I’m thinking Gulliver’s Travels, the little midgets bring down a true giant of a man. Death by a thousand stupid remarks.

Will

--

Pease use your "bully pulpit" to spread the word that John McCain can't refute:  The war in Iraq is over.  We are now, and have been for several years, in an occupatiion.  We won the war, so withdrawing cannot be a defeat.  Senator Obama needs to hammer this fact every time the surge comments and timetable comments are spouted by the McCain camp.

Ken Staples

--

It is useful to compare Gore's July 17, 2008 Energy Goals speech with Carter's July 15, 1979 speech.

Select the audio for Carter's Energy Speech - July 15, 1979 and skip the first 21 minutes:

 http://www.jimmycarterlibrary.gov/library/audio/

The corresponding Carter video is available here:

http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/speeches/detail/3402

The key parts of Carter's Six Point program are transcribed below:

"Point one: I am tonight setting a clear goal for the energy policy of the United States. Beginning this moment, this Nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977—never. From now on, every new addition to our demand for energy will be met from our own production and our own conservation. The generation-long growth in our dependence on foreign oil will be stopped dead in its tracks right now and then reversed as we move through the 1980's, for I am tonight setting the further goal of cutting our dependence on foreign oil by one-half by the end of the next decade—a saving of over 4 1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day.

Point two: To ensure that we meet these targets, I will use my Presidential authority to set import quotas. I'm announcing tonight that for 1979 and 1980, I will forbid the entry into this country of one drop of foreign oil more than these goals allow. These quotas will ensure a reduction in imports even below the ambitious levels we set at the recent Tokyo summit.

Point three: To give us energy security, I am asking for the most massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our Nation's history to develop America's own alternative sources of fuel—from coal, from oil shale, from plant products for gasohol, from unconventional gas, from the Sun.

I propose the creation of an energy security corporation to lead this effort to replace 2 1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day by 1990. The corporation will issue up to $5 billion in energy bonds, and I especially want them to be in small denominations so that average Americans can invest directly in America's energy security.

Just as a similar synthetic rubber corporation helped us win World War II, so will we mobilize American determination and ability to win the energy war. Moreover, I will soon submit legislation to Congress calling for the creation of this Nation's first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000.

These efforts will cost money, a lot of money, and that is why Congress must enact the windfall profits tax without delay. It will be money well spent. Unlike the billions of dollars that we ship to foreign countries to pay for foreign oil, these funds will be paid by Americans to Americans. These funds will go to fight, not to increase, inflation and unemployment.

Point four: I'm asking Congress to mandate, to require as a matter of law, that our Nation's utility companies cut their massive use of oil by 50 percent within the next decade and switch to other fuels, especially coal, our most abundant energy source.

Point five: To make absolutely certain that nothing stands in the way of achieving these goals, I will urge Congress to create an energy mobilization board which, like the War Production Board in World War II, will have the responsibility and authority to cut through the redtape, the delays, and the endless roadblocks to completing key energy projects.

We will protect our environment. But when this Nation critically needs a refinery or a pipeline, we will build it.

Point six: I'm proposing a bold conservation program to involve every State, county, and city and every average American in our energy battle. This effort will permit you to build conservation into your homes and your lives at a cost you can afford.

I ask Congress to give me authority for mandatory conservation and for standby gasoline rationing. To further conserve energy, I'm proposing tonight an extra $10 billion over the next decade to strengthen our public transportation systems. And I'm asking you for your good and for your Nation's security to take no unnecessary trips, to use carpools or public transportation whenever you can, to park your car one extra day per week, to obey the speed limit, and to set your thermostats to save fuel. Every act of energy conservation like this is more than just common sense—I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

Our Nation must be fair to the poorest among us, so we will increase aid to needy Americans to cope with rising energy prices. We often think of conservation only in terms of sacrifice. In fact, it is the most painless and immediate way of rebuilding our Nation's strength. Every gallon of oil each one of us saves is a new form of production. It gives us more freedom, more confidence, that much more control over our own lives."

PS: Reagan removed Carter's solar collectors from the White House roof and tossed them in a dumpster within about twenty four hours of his inauguration. 

Reagan starved the government's SynFuels Corp. to death within two years of taking office.  Congress had agreed to authorize as much as $80 billion dollars to develop the technologies and industrial processes to extract oil from shale and to efficiently convert coal to liquid fuels.  That is about four times the money spent to go to the moon.

Dmrohner

--

Though I am a great follower of Consortium News, I am greatly surprised that you keep putting so much stock in ANYTHING that John Conyers does or doesn't do. As a matter of fact, not a single progressive web site or blog has been alerted that Mr. Conyers' wife, Monica Conyers, is knee deep in her capacity as a Detroit City council member. She is being presently investigated by the FBI for taking bribes in a sledge hauling contract awarded to Synegro waste management as are other members of the Detroit city council. I do not believe for a second that this investigation has not dampened John Conyers zeal in going after the impeachment of the crimes of the Bush administration. The Monica Conyers story has been the lead item on local Detroit media for almost a month. Why has no one put two and two together and realized that that may play a huge role in Conyers lack of cajones in going after this rogue president?

Kkj1031

--

Keep in mind that Iraq is an occupied country. Of course it is an illegal, U.S. military occupation but all the same Maliki and all those who haven’t been driven out or into the rubble of the countryside are nothing more than pawns. The solution starts with getting the hell out immediately. Yes, chaos will reign but that was a given once we attacked and invaded and started the occupation 5 years ago. Chaos is already there. We broke it and it won’t fit back together again. We should pay for all eternity.

Jim Steeves/Albuquerque

--

Here I condense SEVERAL TRILLION DOLLARS of Republican economic looting, and years worth of lawbreaking, criminal abuses of power, and contempt for working-stiff American voters and taxpayers, down to that page or two,  all united by the concept of DEMOCRATIC WEAKNESS in the face of REPUBLICAN OUTRAGES and (even) CRIMINAL CONDUCT that usually goes unpunished and often even not mentioned.

With "Circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each photo"! 

(PS:  "Liberal" scold Thomas Franks - author of "What's the Matter with Kansas?" - tries to answer the same question -  "How do Conservatives GET AWAY WITH SO MANY ATROCITIES?" in his latest book-length examination of the subject, "The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule"
http://www.buzzflash.com/store/reviews/1211

Thanks to Democrats.com for  keeping the gross Bush-Republican abuses of power front-and-center, at least in the view of those Americans who are paying attention despite the Democratic Party "leadership" and "major media's" efforts to whitewash and cover up those abuses of power, and/or outright criminal conduct.

Below the _not_ so short comment  I added to my Democrats.com petition to Congress to give the Judiciary Committee hearings on Bush administration lies-to-war  scheduled for this coming Friday a stronger, fuller, and more comprehensive mandate. 

I try to lay out that since the stolen (Florida) election of 2000, Democrats can be relied on to agree with, whitewash, and bury Republican abuses of power, even in those instances, such as stolen election 2000,  when voter disenfranchisement (through clear and systematic disenfranchisement techniques)  are clearly criminal and warranting prosecution.

AS I try to lay out, the historical view of the Bush-Cheney administration will be that their political victories were not the result of any great political competence, but as a result of sheer political bullying, using the power of the federal purse and corporate media to intimidate, marginalize, and demean any genuine opposition party function of the Democrats.

 In short, EVERY  Bush-Cheney-GOP political win has been A DIRECT RESULT of DEMOCRATIC POLITICAL INCOMPETENCE,  each such Republican win further empowering the Republicans to Loot the US Treasury....

....Just as the S&L bailout, following 10 years of Reagan-Bush Sr.  "DEREGULATION!"  mantra, cost American taxpayers One TRILLION Dollars - at least $500 billion dollars in 1980s money, before finance charges incurred paying off those deficits.

It is sad to say that every political victory of the Bush-Cheney-Republican administration over the past 8 years has come as a result of Democrat Party leaders  being unable to voice an articulate and energetic opposition to repeated Republican lawbreaking.

In short, Bush administration / Republican  victories are not marked by Republican greatness or even competence, but by Democrat incompetence.   

That Democrats gained a slim majority in the 2006 mid-term elections was not an exception to this rule - Democrats only won the majority in 2006 because of a long string of Republican _convictions_ for fraud, corruption, and bribery, including Senator Bob Ney, Rep. Randy 'Duke' Cunningham,  Republican super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and Bush-Cheney premier campaign donor Enron Chairman Ken Lay, the latter convicted of fraud in the titanic meltdown of that company.   Democrats were and are unable to do what this one paragraph just did - LINK those Republican leaders and lobbyists as parties to fraud, bribery, and corruption.

(Democrats can't even publicize Vice President Cheney's ongoing financial ties to Halliburton company,  a company whose stock price goes up with every billion-dollar no-bid, no oversight contract the Bush-Cheney administration hands to it,  even though Martha Stewart was sent to prison for "lying" about her sale of just $55,000 in ImClone stock, a company she had _NO_ fiduciary connection to!)

One may rest assured that the Republican media machine would link those names repeatedly, daily, for months on end, driving a Democratic president involved in any way with those scandals from the White House in disgrace if not infamy, had the above perpetrators been Democrats lobbying, or members of,  a Democratic Congress and White House. 

Democratic "leaders" bought into the Republican notion that to contest the Republican claims for George W. Bush winning the majority of Florida votes in the 2000 election would provoke a Constitutional crisis.

The fact is, Republicans wanted to steal an election, and Democrats did nothing to stop them.   The Democrats went so far as to refuse to co-sponsor a post-election routine Congressional investigation sought by the Black Congressional Caucus, an entirely reasonable request given the allegations of massive voter disenfranchisement by the Republican administration in Florida during that election.

The Democratic Senate refusal to see to justice for Florida voters was an appalling betrayal of trust.

This abysmal example of Democrat leaders selling out their own constituents, in order to appease the reactionary Republican Right-Wing, is sadly the template or  pattern that Democratic party leaders have followed ever since. 

Democrats  allow  Republicans to grab the "We Support the Troops!" mantra from a silver platter - even though Republicans have voted _against_ every Veteran's funding issue on straight party-line votes,  including Senator (WA-D) Patty Murray's  $2.7 million Veteran's funding bill of 2005.   

Since gaining the majority the Democrats have been able to pass that Veteran's funding and educational benefits package, but they have NOT been able to DEFINE the Republican Party as OBSTRUCTING those veterans' issues. 

The Democrat's inability to counter this Republican narrative, or political talking points, is pathetic.

The Democratic Party "leadership's" inability to counter Republican Obstruction of Justice, perjury, and corruption of justice is beyond pathetic - it is quite disgraceful, a stain on the legacy of the 110th Congress.

Can anyone Imagine mafia overlords, tobacco company executives, WWII war profiteering executives, oil company executives, Nixon White House officials during the Watergate hearings, or Clinton White House officials during the 8 long years of "Whitewater" and impeachment hearings, REFUSING to answer Congressional Subpoenas?

That is EXACTLY the privilege that Speaker Pelosi extends to Karl Rove, Harriet Miers, and Josh Bolton,  _former_ Bush White House officials who flatly and arrogantly refuse to appear before  duly legal congressional subpoenas.    This is beyond merely shameful and disgraceful - this is party to, or complicity with, criminal Obstruction of Justice.

Speaker Pelosi's inaction effectively disenfranchises Democratic voters.  Republicans were able to turn the Clinton administration's entirely legal, overnight guest list into a "scandal,"  the so-called "LINCOLN BEDROOM SCANDAL" that had blaring New York Times and Washington Post headlines leading the media chorus, giving time, space, and legitimacy to every accusation and innuendo Republicans in Congress and the press/media could toss at the Clinton White House.

But today, Speaker Pelosi and her Congress are not even interested in what Jack Abramoff -  _convicted_ of  bribery of Congressional members  - discussed on his many visits to the White House - or who he talked to, or even how many time he visited that White House! 

The Abramoff scandal, alone, is symptomatic of the dereliction of duty of the 110th Congress to see to justice in America's executive branch leadership.    Speaker Pelosi repeated that example of ENABLING OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE, when she allowed President Bush to commute the sentence of former VP Chief of Staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby - without so much as a protest that a commutation of Mr. Libby's sentence would ENABLE his FURTHER obstruction of justice of that multi-million dollar taxpayer funded FBI investigation and independent counsel prosecution.

That is, Speaker Pelosi is party to BOTH Obstruction of Justice, AND the squandering of taxpayer money of a costly on-going federal investigation! 

Thereby not only enabling the Republican propaganda narrative (that Mr. Libby was a "rogue operator" in "outing" an entire CIA undercover operation, acting entirely independent of his VP and president superiors) and obstructing the investigation of that 'outing' past the 2004 election so to enable a White House re-election win), but potentially rolling out the red carpet for the next such appalling executive branch abuse of power.  

Once again, when the history of the Bush administration's constant, criminal, systematic, egregious  abuses of power is written, the defining factor will be the abject weakness of the Democratic Party leadership's inability to successfully counter those abuses of power. 

Thanks to Democrats.com and all those involved in confronting those abuses of power -

 Lj

To comment at Consortiumblog, click here. (To make a blog comment about this or other stories, you can use your normal e-mail address and password. Ignore the prompt for a Google account.) To comment to us by e-mail, click here. To donate so we can continue reporting and publishing stories like the one you just read, click here.

Back to Home Page