Sunday, December 30, 2007

FOREIGN POLICY

The Taliban in Pakistan.

C.I.A. in Afghanistan

(Well, you'd better make that everywhere and anywhere there are national interests).

Hand-picked Dictators.

Not Liberators.

If you're needed

You'll be greeted.

As friend not foe.

If you do as you're told

Then you will get some gold.

Play only by our rules

Or you will get the screws

(And water-boarding).

Our policy

Is

To spread

Democracy

With

Our

Technocracy

and

Theocracy

Of

War.

IF YOU'RE NOT WITH US

THEN YOU'RE AGAINST US.

IT'S THE OIL STUPID!





Weekend Edition


December 29 / 30, 2007

Blowback from an Unholy Alliance

The U.S. and Pakistan After 9/11

By GARY LEUPP

Immediately after 9-11 the U.S. government began barking orders to the world, especially to the Muslim world. Perhaps echoing unconsciously the Christian scripture passages Matthew 12:30 and Luke 11:23, it proclaimed, "Either you are with us, or with the terrorists." Remember those terrifying days, of omnipresent institutionalized ritualistic grief, anger and mandated unity, when any questioning was met with official indignation, threats, or punishment? When everything was supposed to be so clear? When above all, the national need to attack somebody---some Muslims---was supposed to be obvious, and the attack on Afghanistan in particular framed as common sense?

In Afghanistan, the Taliban was told that Washington would not distinguish between terrorists and the regimes that harbor them. The Taliban was of course one of the fundamentalist Islamist groups emerging from the long U.S. effort (1979-93) to topple the Soviet-supported secular regime. The Taliban in power from 1996 had netted some aid from a Washington deeply interested in Afghan oil pipeline construction, and also received aid and diplomatic support from Pakistan. Pakistan's CIA (the Inter-Service Intelligence or ISI) had helped create the Taliban in order (as Benazir Bhutto later explained) to secure the trade route into Central Asia.

The Taliban, then with U.S. aid suppressing opium poppy production with extraordinary success, and manifesting no special hostility towards Washington, was ordered to hand over 9-11 mastermind Osama bin Ladin. But Pashtun culture (far more than most cultures) mandates that guests receive hospitality and protection, and bin Ladin, a periodic visitor from 1984 and permanent resident since 1996, was no ordinary guest. He had raised or supplied from his personal funds millions of dollars for the anti-Soviet Mujahadeen (which one must always emphasize was supported by him as well as the U.S.), and fought against the secular "socialist" Afghan regime in the name of Islam. Taliban leader Mullah Omar could not simply turn him over to the Americans and maintain any credibility with his own social base. On the other hand, the Taliban did not wish to provoke an invasion. So the Afghans asked for evidence of bin Ladin's complicity in the attacks. Washington treated the request as absurd. The Afghans offered to turn bin Ladin over to an international court of Islamic jurists. The U.S. reiterated its demand that bin Ladin be transferred to American authorities immediately, knowing this was not going to happen and that it would thus have a popularly accepted casus belli.

Meanwhile Pakistan's dictator-president Gen. Pervez Musharraf was told by the U.S. State Department that Pakistan must cut ties to the Taliban. "Be prepared to be bombed. Be prepared to go back to the Stone Age," he was told by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, through his deputy Richard Armitage, if he was unwilling to cooperate in the destruction of Afghanistan's Taliban regime. Musharraf was also ordered to host U.S. troops and prevent anti-U.S. demonstrations in his country. Briefly Pakistan protested that it might be better to preserve diplomatic ties with the Taliban government, in order to influence it to cooperate with the U.S. which (one must repeat) had not hitherto had an unfriendly relationship with the U.S. But caving into the U.S. diktat, angering ISI officers deeply invested in Taliban support, risking a coup or assassination, Musharraf complied with U.S. demands. He was rewarded with the removal of U.S. sanctions imposed after Pakistan's nuclear tests in 1998, and promises of massive aid as the U.S. prepared to bomb Afghanistan, topple the Talibs and impose following their downfall a government of Afghans willing to work with Washington. This of course turned out to be a government dominated by the Northern Alliance, a collection of non-Pashtuns including Uzbek and Tajik warlords hostile to Pakistan and supported by India and Iran.

The U.S. bombed; the Taliban fell, for the most part retreating to ancestral villages and lying low, monitoring the situation, seeking opportunities for resurgence. Few Americans at the time questioned the Bush administration's ready conflation of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, but the two were and are appreciably different. Al-Qaeda is a mostly Arab but multinational global network of Islamists hostile to the U.S. and its policies towards the Muslim world, growing in strength due to the continuation of those policies; the Taliban is a primarily Pashtun organization reflecting traditional Afghan Muslim fundamentalist values and fiercely opposed to foreign domination. The former is sophisticated, headed by well-educated men; the latter is largely illiterate, headed by clerics learned only in Islamic literature. The former wants to attack multiple targets to foment a generalized confrontation between the West and Islam; the latter wants to mind its own house and maintain Afghan traditions with all their xenophobic, medieval, patriarchal, misogynistic, anti-intellectual appeal.

A mix of Taliban militants and al-Qaeda forces resisted the U.S. invasion; hundreds at least escaped into Pakistan's Federally-Administered Tribal Areas and North-West Frontier Province. Having driven bin Ladin and his followers out of Afghanistan, the U.S. declared a great victory and without skipping a beat moved on to invade and occupy Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9-11. The latter crime inevitably produced outrage globally, but particularly in Muslim countries like Pakistan, where the prestige of bin Ladin, already high in 2001, has soared ever since. (A recent poll showed his approval rating at 46%, compared to Musharraf's 38% and Bush's 9%.)

Preoccupied with establishing an empire, U.S. leaders lost interest in al-Qaeda. Indeed in March 2002 President Bush referring to bin Ladin declared, "I truly am not that concerned about him." As for the al-Qaeda forces in Pakistan (whose very existence close U.S. ally Musharraf denied), they were Pakistan's problem. The U.S. had unleashed a huge problem on the Pakistani state by invading its neighbor, toppling the Afghan government, and forcing al-Qaeda to relocate into Pakistan where sympathetic tribesmen (who have always resisted firm incorporation into the state) offered them safe haven. Pashtuns straddle the boundary of the two countries; Pakistani Pashtuns are largely sympathetic to the Taliban, and now a Pakistani Taliban is growing in strength in the Taliban and elsewhere.

Thus the "good war" in Afghanistan preceding the generally discredited war-based-on-lies in Iraq was in fact a very bad war so far as Pakistan was concerned. It brought Afghanistan a new warlord government, in which opium is again the chief commercial crop, prettified by a "democratic" election and the appointment of a longtime CIA contact, Hamid Karzai as president and de facto mayor or Kabul. It is increasingly challenged by the recrudescent Taliban and new recruits who have regained control of much of the south. Karzai from his weak position keeps offering them peace talks, which they reject, demanding the invaders leave before any negotiations.

For the U.S. the "good war" has meant 474 soldiers dead (116 so far this year); "coalition" dead have increased every year since 2003 and almost as many European troops have died during the last two years as Americans. Support for the Afghan mission has declined in Europe as its relevance to "counter-terrorism" becomes increasingly unclear and its character as an unwinnable counterinsurgency effort becomes more apparent.

The war in Afghanistan saddled Musharraf with a mounting Islamist rebellion in the Swat Valley and elsewhere; grave dissatisfaction within the military at the unprecedented deployment in the frontier provinces (where troops have performed poorly and unenthusiastically against Islamists); and personal unpopularity related both to his ties to the U.S. and to his abuses of power. Adding to his woes, the U.S. military struck targets within his country (without his consent, he claims), and threatened to take further action against Taliban or al-Qaeda forces in Pakistan. Then the Pakistani Chief Justice opposed his bid to run for president again, and needed to be arrested, causing a nasty political crisis. In an embarrassment to Musharraf the Supreme Court ordered the justice's release. In the meantime supporters of former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif clamored for their return.

The natural thing for a beleaguered strongman to do in such circumstances would be to declare a state of emergency and assume emergency powers. But the U.S. State Department told him no, don't do that, let Bhutto come back, work out some accommodation with her. Let the two of you share power and erect an anti-terrorist united front. So Musharraf hesitated until November, when he did indeed declare a state of emergency, meeting with Washington's public disapproval. The U.S. threatened to cut off some non-military aid if he didn't quickly lift martial law and hold elections in which Bhutto might compete. Musharraf negotiated with Bhutto, trading cancellation of corruption charges against her for his agreement to respect the constitutional provision that disallowed him to be both president and military officer at the same time.

Quite possibly Musharraf was thinking, "These people, who have already done so much to destabilize Pakistan, now want to destabilize it further by forcing me into this." But he did, and Bhutto got killed, maybe by his people (cui bono?), maybe by al-Qaeda, maybe by homegrown Islamists angered by Bhutto's Washington ties, which are even more intimate than Musharraf's.

Maybe Musharraf will now cancel the election. Maybe he will hold it, arranging to win big. Either way, Washington analysts agree his position is weakened by the assassination. Pakistan, more or less stable as of 2001, has in the interval been knocked off balance by U.S. action in the region. Told it must be for or against the U.S., it was obliged to obey, with grim results.

Unprecedented militant Islamism. Unprecedented support for bin Ladin and al-Qaeda. Unprecedented support for the Taliban. Unprecedented Taliban-like attacks on Buddhist monuments, parts of Pakistan's cultural heritage. The assassination of a popular pro-Western political figure on whom the U.S. State Department had placed its bets. Anti-Musharraf rioting in the wake of the assassination. Dire consequences indeed of Musharraf's alliance.

Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's merciless chronicle of the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, Imperial Crusades.

He can be reached at: gleupp@granite.tufts.edu




Weekend Edition


December 29 / 30, 2007

Call Off the War Dogs at the New York Times

Stop Meddling in Pakistan!

By JACOB G. HORNBERGER

I've got a better idea: the U.S. government should butt out of Pakistani affairs -- as well as the affairs of Iraq, Iran, Korea, Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba, and all the rest.

My gosh, what does it take for interventionists to finally realize that the solution to the messes that interventionism causes is not more interventionism but rather no more interventionism?

Does anyone need to remind the Times of the messes that U.S. interventionism has produced in the Middle East, especially in Iraq? Or how about U.S. interventionism in Pakistan itself? After all, it's not as though the U.S. government has not been involving itself heavily in the internal affairs of Pakistan. Don't forget that ever since 9/11 the Bush administration has been funneling millions of dollars in U.S. taxpayer money into the coffers of Pakistan's unelected dictator, Pervez Musharraf, and his military goons.

Exactly what "badly battered democratic institutions" in Pakistan is the Times referring to? The fact that a brutal military dictator took power in a coup and has been in charge of the government ever since? The fact that this brutal military dictator has instituted martial law in the hope of retaining his grip on power? The fact that this brutal military dictator has dissolved the country's Supreme Court and jailed justices, judges, and lawyers for refusing to toe his line?

Pardon me, but since when does a military dictatorship constitute a "battered democratic institution"? I always thought that dictatorship constituted the absence of democratic institutions.

What business does the U.S. government have meddling and intervening in the internal political affairs of Pakistan? After all, wouldn't the feds go ballistic if some foreign regime -- say, in Cuba or Venezuela -- involved itself with the internal political affairs of the United States?

Oh, and by the way, at the risk of asking a discomforting question of the neo-cons: Do you still maintain that President Bush invaded Iraq to spread democracy (after the WMDs failed to materialize), given his longtime ardent and enthusiastic support of Pervez Musharraf, one of the most brutal unelected military dictators in the world? And just out of curiosity, are you more pleased with the results of U.S. interventionism in Pakistan than you are with the results of U.S. interventionism in Iraq?

One problem with the Times and so many other interventionists is that when it comes to interventionism, hope springs eternal. No matter how big the mess that previous interventions have produced, the eternal hope is that the next intervention will prove to be the magic elixir that finally makes things right.

It will never happen. Interventionism is an inherently defective paradigm. No matter what the Bush administration does to intervene further into Pakistani affairs, the result will only be worse, especially for Americans, than the situation that currently exists.

Yes, bad things happen all over the world. They always have and always will. But U.S. interventionism only makes the United States part of the messes and also makes the messes worse. When will Americans finally wise up and realize that our Founding Fathers, who counseled against foreign entanglements and foreign meddling, were right and that the neo-con interventionists are flat wrong?

Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.



Saturday, December 29, 2007

SUICIDE TRANQUILIZERS AND THE WOMAN WITH RED HAIR




I left Colorado one winter and went to Florida with some friends.
Colorado was all snow...ice...
And
Burrr...
COLD!
I guess there were five of us.
No women went.
All of us pitched in to pay for gas and oil.
This particular truck really liked to drink the oil.
I think most of our money paid for its oil addiction.
Dan was the owner of the truck and he did the driving.
He was a good driver.
It was smooth-sailing to Florida.
I remember the wonderful smell of the tropical warmth as we got closer and closer to Florida.
It was better than any dream.
Florida was not the first time that I had seen an ocean.
(I lived in Boston the summer of '68 and visited Revere Beach.
I was not too impressed.
It was gray and polluted.)



All of us needed work.
We were all broke.
We stood on a street corner and a man in a big cadillac stopped and rolled down his window.
"You guys want to work?"
One harmonious yell of yes was given.
The man said,
"Get in."
He sped off.
It was a waterbed factory.
Blue waterbeds.
Blue and smelly plastic.
Our duties were two-fold:
Either pack waterbeds into boxes or pull apart waterbeds that had just come "out" of the waterbed machines.
Sometimes the plastic was still warm when you separated the waterbeds at their seams.
When I packed the beds into boxes, I sometimes would write little poetic messages on the boxes.
I don't know if the people who got the boxes liked this or not, but I enjoyed doing it.
Only Dan had a place to sleep.
He slept in his truck.
I slept wherever I could.
Hotel lawns.
The beach.
It seemed like I stayed up most of my days and nights when I wasn't working.
I enjoyed walking up and down the beach.
Watching.
One night I met a woman who was wearing a long fur coat, and had on one of those huge hats with a lot of feathers that women used to wear.
She had long, red hair and dark, green eyes.
We started walking on the warm sand.
Talking.
About what I really don't recall.
She offered me some tranquilizers.
I swallowed a couple.
The warm ocean breeze, the pounding waves, and walking with this beautiful woman that had red hair and green eyes, bathed my senses in pleasure, especially when we kissed.
We kissed a lot.
She looked at me and said,
"You look like Clint Eastwood."
I was going to disagree, but figured that I shouldn't spoil a good thing.
I even started to talk like Clint Eastwood.
What a cool dude.
It turned out that she had two children, and was separated from her husband.
The night that I visited her apartment she played George Harrison's song My Sweet Lord.
The song was appropriate for the mixed-up emotions I was having.
She and I didn't stay together and we went our separate ways.
But it was fun while it lasted.
Her name was Jackie.


One moonless night as I was sauntering down the beach, I squinted my eyes and saw a person out in the middle of the crashing waves, standing on a large rock.
I yelled,
"Hey, what are you doing?"
He replied,
"I'm going to kill myself."
I shouted back,
"Don't do that. Come here and I'll buy you a cup of coffee."
That did the trick.
He got off of the wave-battered rock and walked over to me.
"Thanks", he said. "If you hadn't showed up I would have jumped."
I bought him a cup of coffee.
We didn't talk that much.
Then he walked away.
I don't know if he tried to kill himself again.
Maybe he did this as a way to get people to buy him food and drinks.


IT'S ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES!

Thursday, December 27, 2007

WAR BUSINESS AND LIES

"War is the father of all and the king of all."
Heraclitus




New wine is ready to be poured into the same old bottles.

The Democrats will replace the Republicans.

The Corporate Puppet Masters will still rule the roost.

The White House is just an imperial Bed & Breakfast place for the new leaders.

War is good business.

The business of America is business.

Do you get it?

War is ancient.

War is eternal.

Get it?

Peace is for pansies and fools.

Get it?



They came.

They saw.

They lied.

They lied.

They tortured.

They bombed.

They lied.

They lied.

They came.

They saw.

They bombed.

They tortured.

They lied.

They lied.

They lied.




IT'S THE OIL STUPID!

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

DOLLARS CHICKENS AND SCENTS


Money doesn't smell.
Maybe new currency has a new smell, but not the old and faded bills.
Correction:
I just opened my wallet and smelled some old fives, ones and twenties.
They had a musty-dusty scent.
Don’t try this at home.
Who knows what microbes might go up your nose?
I know.
I’m strange.
I recently bought some cologne that was reduced in price from $89.99 down to $9.99.
The price was too good for me to ignore.
I bought one bottle (BATH AND SHOWER GEL included), and noticed that there were still a few bottles of the same cologne left on the bottom shelf.
I thought to myself,
"Well, if it's good, I'll come back and buy some more."
The cologne wasn't that good, but at its reduced price it wasn't that bad either.
It's the first cologne that I've ever bought that contained human pheromones.
So far it hasn't made any difference, with or without those pheromones.
But maybe my body doesn't interact that well with this particular cologne.
I plan on going back and buying the remaining bottles.
I can't pass up that price---with or without the pheromones.
I like that word pheromones.
It makes me think of pharoah moans.
Maybe the cologne is working better than I think it is.
When I taught English at Kabul University, the United States Peace Corps paid me in afghanis.
I had to carry around a lot of afghanis.
If I remember correctly, one dollar was worth about 40 afghanis back in 1977.
Getting my "paycheck" was equivalent to getting a small basket full of afghani bills.
I felt rich having all of those bills.
One thing I started to notice was how much of this currency was covered with blood.
The blood was dry, of course, and this was before AIDS had become public, so the blood-covered money, although quite gross, didn't bother me too much.
There wasn't that much violence in Kabul, so I guess maybe the blood was from something else, like chickens or lambs getting murdered.
I once watched how a chicken is killed in Afghanistan.
A man held the chicken above a street gutter, looked up to the sky and spoke some words, then sliced the chicken's neck, above the fowl's Adam’s apple so that it couldn't tell Allah what was transpiring.
The chicken was then held above the street gutter for its blood to drain out.
The chickens in Kabul were about as big as sparrows.
Here in America certain people complain about how chickens are raised in order to get those huge breasts and bulky legs, but we should be thankful for it.
In America we seem to super-size everything.
Back to scents.
I once stopped using commercial deod0rants because of what I had read about them.
I was living and teaching on a tropical island.
Although I swam every afternoon after work, I also drank and smoked.
I'm sure that my perspiring let those around me know these facts.
On one particular day of teaching I knew it was time to turn over a new leaf, or at least return to using deodorants.
I was one of only a few teachers who had an air-conditioner, but even so my reeking perspiration could not be hidden.
I walked by one of my students who squealed, "Ooh...you smell!"
I immediately put my nose into my right armpit, and indeed, I did smell quite bad.
I said to this student,
"You're right. I'm sorry. I'm going to start using deodorants again."
After that day I started using lots of deodorants and colognes--- EVERY DAY.
I started to smell, as one teacher said to me one day, like an exotic flower.


IT'S THE OIL STUPID!

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

PEACE ON EARTH

PART I:

Children go where we send thee

Say Dubya and Cheney

How shall we send thee?

We're gonna send thee

one by one

With a gun, with a gun

One by one

With a gun, with a gun

One for the little bitty baby

That was born, born

Born in Bethlehem

Who now will fight in

Our Armageddon!

PART II:

Bush and Cheney

Dashing through the snow

In a one-horse open sleigh

Through the fields they go

Torturing all the way

Shells of bombs on bob-tail ping

Making spirits fight

What fun it is to ride and sing

A slaying song tonight.

Jingle bells, jingle bells

Jingle all the way

Oh what fun it is to ride

In a one-horse open sleigh

Sunday, December 23, 2007

READING BETWEEN THE LINES

December 20, 2007

Press Conference by the President

James S. Brady Press Briefing Room

THE PRESIDENT:

Good morning. I hope you all enjoyed the holiday reception at the White House as much as Laura and I enjoyed it. We took an inventory of the silverware, and this year only a few pieces were missing (SINCE MY UNNECESSARY PRE-EMPTIVE WAR IN IRAQ HAVE TAKEN ALL OF THE OTHER PIECES).

Congress passed a good energy bill. The legislation I signed yesterday will reduce our country's dependence on foreign oil by increasing the supply of alternative fuel sources and increasing fuel economy standards. It demonstrates America's leadership in confronting climate change.

(AND IT COMES SEVEN YEARS AFTER I WAS ELECTED PRESIDENT BECAUSE DICK'S FRIENDS AT HALLIBURTON AND MY OIL CRONIES WANTED TO MAKE AS MUCH DOUGH AS POSSIBLE FROM THAT BLACK GOLD!)

Finally, Congress reached agreement on a spending bill to fund the day-to-day operations of the federal government. They passed this bill without raising taxes.

(BUT YOU CAN BE AS CERTAIN AS MY WAR THAT TAXES WILL EVENTUALLY HAVE TO BE RAISED TO PAY FOR MY TWO TRILLION DOLLAR LIE!)

I hope the members of Congress enjoy their holiday break; I intend to enjoy mine. We have a great deal of work in the months ahead. Next year is an election year, but that does not relieve us of our responsibility to carry out the people's business. The American people did not elect us to govern in odd years (NOR ELECT ODD LEADERS TO GOVERN IN EVEN YEARS.)

They expect us to get things done. (LIKE SPYING ON THEM AND TAKING AWAY THEIR HABEUS CORPUS.)

And now I'll be glad to answer some of your questions, starting with AP man.

Q:

Mr. President, there's ambiguity in the statement that you have no recollection about the existence and destruction of the CIA interrogation tapes. Why can't you say yes or no about the tapes and their destruction? And regardless, do you think the destruction of the tapes was a responsible thing to do?

THE PRESIDENT:

It sounds pretty clear to me when I say I have -- the first recollection is when Mike Hayden briefed me. That's pretty clear (BUT CLARITY IS NOT NECESSARILY VERITY.)

Secondly, I am confident that the preliminary inquiry conducted by the AG and the IG of the CIA,

(I JUST LOVE THESE ACRONYMS!)

coupled with the oversight provided by the Congress (AND THANK GOODNESS THAT THEY SEE THAT ALL OF MY DEMANDS ARE MET OR ELSE) , will end up enabling us all to find out what exactly happened. And therefore, over the course of these inquiries and oversight hearings, I'm going to reserve judgment until I find out the full facts.

(SOUNDS A LITTLE BIT LIKE WHAT I SAID ABOUT THE VALERIE PLAME CASE, DOESN’T IT?)

I know I'm going to be asked about this question a lot as time goes on. I'm just going to prepare you; until these inquiries are complete, until the oversights are finished, then I will be rendering no opinion from the podium.

(OR FROM THE POOPDECK AND SLAUGHTERHOUSE)

Q:

Vladimir Putin has just been named Time Magazine's Person of the Year. And he has signaled that he intends to become prime minister. You said once that he had been wily about his intentions, but now that he's made those clear, what does it say about the state of democracy in Russia?

THE PRESIDENT:

You know, I'm looking forward to seeing him (AND LOOKING INTO HIS EYES AND SEEING HIS SOUL AGAIN) at the alumni meeting of the "men of the year," or the "persons of the year." I don't know when it's going to be, but -- look, I presume -- I haven't read the article, but I presume they put him on there because he was a consequential leader. And the fundamental question is, consequential to what end? What will the country look like 10 years from now?

(AND WHAT WILL AMERICA LOOK LIKE 5 YEARS FROM NOW?)

My hope, of course, is that Russia is a country which understands there needs to be checks and balances

(AMERICA WRITES A LOT OF CHECKS BUT DOESN'T DO ENOUGH BALANCING), and free and fair elections (WITHOUT TAMPERING WITH VOTING MACHINES OR INTERVENTION BY A SUPREME COURT), and a vibrant press (THAT DOESN'T KOWTOW TO THE CORPORATE STATE OR RUBBER STAMP ANY HEAD OF STATE’S ACTIONS); that they understand Western values based upon human rights and human dignity are values that will lead to a better country (A COUNTRY THAT DOESN'T TORTURE).

That's my hopes.

(AND IN CORRECT English, THOSE ARE MY HOPES.)

Q:

Mr. President, a year ago when you had your year-end press conference, the Democrats had just taken control of Congress; they said that one of their main goals was to end the war in Iraq, they were talking a lot about very contentious times ahead. As you just said, the Congress has now passed again, without strings, money for the war, and you've achieved a lot of your goals and have gotten a lot of things you wanted from Congress, without a lot of give-and-take with them by talking tough with firm veto threats. What does this say about the Democratic leadership, the way they're running Congress and your relations with the leaders?

THE PRESIDENT:

You know, I don't view -- I just don't view life as zero-sum (OR ZERO-DUMB).

So there's plenty of credit to go around (AND PLENTY MORE CREDIT TO SPEND).

And we got a lot of priorities for next year. And one of my priorities -- this is -- I understand this is a bone of contention, but one of the priorities is to make sure they don't run up the taxes on people (ONLY SPEND, SPEND, SPEND LIKE THERE'S NO TOMORROW). And my attitude is, if you run them up on one area, it will become a habit that will be hard to break, and then they'll try to run them up on other areas. (LIKE MY CAMELS AND ARMADILLOS DO WHEN I LET 'EM RUN LOOSE AT CRAWFORD).

And the reason I feel strongly about that is I don't want to undermine the economy by raising taxes

(THE ONLY UNDERMINING I'LL DO IS TO CONTINUE INCREASING THE PENTAGON’S EXPENDITURES.

AIN'T CREDIT JUST GREAT?)

Q:

Mr. President, despite the military success of the surge, there's no evidence that one of its intended benefits, making it easier for the Iraqis to form a unity government, has had any effect. Refugees won't come home from Syria. There was an opinion poll this week which said that most of the Iraqis surveyed blamed us, said things would be better when the U.S. leaves. What benchmarks can the Iraqi government meet that would change this? What do you want them to do?

THE PRESIDENT:

Well, first of all, I don't agree with your premise that there's no politics taking place in Iraq. There is a functioning government.

(ARE THE SEWERS FUNCTIONING? ARE THE GENERATORS PRODUCING ENOUGH ELECRICITY? IS THERE A FUNCTIONING WATER SUPPLY SYSTEM?)

They did pass a budget last year, and they're in the process of passing their budget this year. I am pleased to report that there's been two readings of a de-Baathification law to the Council of Assemblies.

(I WONDER IF DE-BAATHIFICATION MEANS ONLY SHOWERS ARE ALLOWED?)

Q:

You've been in office for seven years now. You must have some pretty strong opinions about what it takes to sit in the Oval Office. What is important to you? Is experience in government important? Are a candidate's religious views important to you?

THE PRESIDENT:

What's important to me will be this: the principles by which people will make decisions.

(TAKE A MOMENT TO THINK ABOUT MY PRINCIPLES.)

And I would be very hesitant to support somebody who relied upon opinion polls and focus groups to define a way forward for a President.

(OR SUPPORT SOMEBODY WHO RELIED ON TAKING ORDERS FROM GOD TO DEFINE A WAY FORWARD...OH, I FORGET, THAT'S WHAT I’VE BEEN DOING.)

And secondly I would say, how do you intend to get advice from people you surround yourself -- who are you going to surround yourself with?

(WILL IT BE WITH LIARS AND SCAPEGOATS?)

Because whoever sits in that Oval Office is going to find this is a complex world, with a lot of issues coming into the Oval Office -- a lot -- and a great expectation in the world that the United States take the lead. And so my question would be, how do you intend to set up your Oval Office so that people will come in and give their advice?

(WHEN I'M AT THE RANCH I DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT ALL OF THIS.)

Q:

It sounds like you think the principles are more important than experience or specific religious views.

THE PRESIDENT:

No, sometimes you develop your principles as a result of experience.

(AS I HAVE DONE.)

I just want to know whether or not somebody has got a sound set of principles from which they will not deviate as they make decisions that will affect the peace and security of our country

(MY OWN DEVIANT DECISIONS HAVE GREATLY AFFECTED THE PEACE AND SECURITY OF OUR COUNTRY AND THE WORLD.)

Q:

Thank you, Mr. President. Good morning.

You've announced a review of the situation in Afghanistan. The last time the American people heard about a review of the war, it ended up in a surge of U.S. troops in Iraq. Can the U.S. expect a surge of U.S. troops in Afghanistan? And do you agree with many analysts who say that the real problem in Afghanistan, or a major problem, is that the NATO allies are not getting it done or avoiding the fight there?

THE PRESIDENT:

It is -- it makes sense for us to constantly review our strategies in a variety of theaters (SPEAKING OF THEATERS, HOW ABOUT THAT NEW MOVIE WITH WILL SMITH? GOTTA SEE THAT ONE.)

That's what -- that's what good governance is: You analyze the situation a year after the previous strategy to determine whether or not -- what worked and what didn't work

(AND YOU KEEP ANALYZING THE SITUATION YEAR AFTER YEAR UNTIL THE STRATEGY STARTS TO WORK; AND IF A STRATEGY DOESN’T WORK, YOU KEEP ANALYZING IT, YOU KEEP CATAPULTING THE PROPAGANDA.)

Now, it takes a while for societies that have been brutalized by tyranny and wracked by war to meet expectations. So the questions I ask on Iraq and Afghanistan are: Is there progress? Are people feeling better about life?

(OR DEATH)

And of course, we press their governments to work to come together and get budgets passed, or in Iraq's case, de-Baathification law (TAKE THOSE SHOWERS!) or oil laws.

(MORE MONEY FOR OUR CORPORATIONS!)

And those are all important. But also what's important is the human condition

(LIKE THE CONDITION IN WHICH MILLIONS OF IRAQIS HAVE LEFT THEIR HOMES IN IRAQ AND THE HUNDREDS AND HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS WHO HAVE DIED BECAUSE I WRACKED WAR UPON THEIR COUNTRY TO LIBERATE THEM FROM A BRUTAL TYRANNY).

Q:

Mr. President, thank you. If I could return a minute to the CIA tapes. I realize you don't want to discuss it at this point, but given your remarks about the struggle against ideology, how concerned are you that your administration once again faces criticism, questions from people around the world about the handling of a terrorist suspect?

THE PRESIDENT:

You know, you're trying to get me to prejudge the outcome of this inquiry. And let's wait and see what happens. Let's wait and see what the facts are. And -- look, we get criticized a lot for a variety of reasons. We're asking people to do hard things, for starters, which is intercept and find terrorists and to spread freedom

(NOT MANURE.)

And there's isolationist tendencies in this world.

(MY UNILATERAL PRE-EMPTIVE WAR IN IRAQ IS A GREAT EXAMPLE.)

People would rather stay at home.

(OR STAY AT THE RANCH LIKE I DO.)

People would rather not aggressively pursue people overseas (AS I HAVE DONE), and aggressively pursue freedom.

I understand that. We got people like that in our own country.

(I GOT WORK MORE WORK TO DO ON MY GRAMMAR, TOO.)

And the fundamental question facing whoever sits in the Oval Office is, will you use the influence of the United States to advance a freedom agenda to help others realize the blessings of liberty and yield peace?

(OR USE BOMBS AND DEPLETED URANIUM WEAPONS TO ADVANCE THE DESTRUCTION OF THEIR COUNTRY AND CITIZENS?)

So I don't want people to get the wrong impression of our country. (EVEN THOUGH I HAVE GIVEN THEM ONE.)

Listen, thank you all. Have a wonderful holiday season. Appreciate it.



IT'S THE OIL STUPID!


From

Dickheads of the Year

My picks for the biggest assholes of 2007 by Bill Maher


Come on, no list of assholes and fuck-ups could be complete without the Dipshit in Chief. Who will tell this president what everyone but him already knows? The theory of evolution. And the times tables. And where the sun goes at night. And that Iraq is going to be three different countries. And that everyone hates us and we've run our military into the ground and the Taliban is back and we still haven't caught bin Laden and the economy is tanking and we wasted eight years blowing the oil companies while the Earth is melting. We had a pretty nice house when this Cat in the Hat of presidents came in and made the mess of all time. And who's going to clean it all up — Rudy Giuliani?