http://uggabugga.blogspot.com/2005/01/yahoo-message-board-post-u.html

Atrios is rightly freaked out by these two paragraphs from the Washington Post

Instead the administration plans to push major amendments that would shield interest, dividends and capitals gains from taxation, expand tax breaks for business investment and take other steps intended to simplify the system and encourage economic growth, according to several people who are advising the White House or are familiar with the deliberations.

The changes are meant to be revenue-neutral. To pay for them, the administration is considering eliminating the deduction of state and local taxes on federal income tax returns and scrapping the business tax deduction for employer-provided health insurance, the advisers said.

And people think that Boondocks kid is overstating the problem...

From talkingpointsmemo.com:

On every significant point of conflict between the Bush administration and the country's cadre of intelligence professionals, the Bush political appointees turned out to be wrong. Often very wrong, and with disastrous consequences. Sometimes the intel folks were wrong too; but when that was so, the appointees were always more wrong.

This is not argumentative or hyperbole or even up for much serious dispute.

And the upshot of all that we've seen, the result of all those struggles over the last three years is that the 'appointees' are purging the 'professionals'. Another way to put it is that the folks who were always wrong and often catastrophically wrong are rooting out the folks who were often right and sometimes somewhat wrong. The answer to politicized intelligence, it turns out, is a more thorough politicization of intelligence and the elimination of those who resisted political pressure.

If you think this is just a Washington squabble or political debating point you'd be mistaken. Because your lives, and those of your families and friends, may very well be on the line.

http://www.mnftiu.cc/mnftiu.cc/home.html

from the LA-Times: Dear rural/exurban Christian conservative voters: Congratulations on your election victory. By going to the polls in unprecedented numbers Tuesday, you overwhelmed an enormous Democratic turnout and returned President Bush to office, along with a number of very conservative senators. Now Bush is preparing to repay your efforts by moving immediately on your highest priorities: a flat tax and privatizing Social Security.

Oh, wait. You didn't particularly hanker for those things, did you?

Iraqis piled high-grade material from a key site into trucks in the weeks after Baghdad fell, four U.S. reservists and guardsmen say. LA-Times

Not sure if you've heard about this whole caging business, but here's a little story that sums up what was happening, and, ruh roh, the unholy fire that's going to rain down on all the Republican rubes who tried to pull this crap. Jail time, baby!

A humorous side note, the GOP held a "conference call" with Ken Mehlman in which campaign "Team Leaders" call in to be told what to think and get their talking points for the debate. Atrios, bless his heart, posted the number and the password to be accepted to the conference call. I got in without a problem and, after enduring ten minutes of painful smooth jazz, got to hear firsthand how the Bush campaign was going to spin [the debate].

And then, DOH, they openned the line up for questions...

By way of First Draft, excerpts from an e-mail from a foreign correspondent in Iraq:

Iraqis like to call this mess 'the situation.' When asked 'how are things?' they reply: 'the situation is very bad."

What they mean by situation is this: the Iraqi government doesn't control most Iraqi cities, there are several car bombs going off each day around the country killing and injuring scores of innocent people, the country's roads are becoming impassable and littered by hundreds of landmines and explosive devices aimed to kill American soldiers, there are assassinations, kidnappings and beheadings. The situation, basically, means a raging barbaric guerilla war. In four days, 110 people died and over 300 got injured in Baghdad alone. The numbers are so shocking that the ministry of health -- which was attempting an exercise of public transparency by releasing the numbers -- has now stopped disclosing them.

Insurgents now attack Americans 87 times a day.

A friend drove thru the Shiite slum of Sadr City yesterday. He said young men were openly placing improvised explosive devices into the ground. They melt a shallow hole into the asphalt, dig the explosive, cover it with dirt and put an old tire or plastic can over it to signal to the locals this is booby-trapped. He said on the main roads of Sadr City, there were a dozen landmines per every ten yards. His car snaked and swirled to avoid driving over them. Behind the walls sits an angry Iraqi ready to detonate them as soon as an American convoy gets near. This is in Shiite land, the population that was supposed to love America for liberating Iraq.

http://www.thenation.com/capitalgames/index.mhtml?bid=3&pid=1833

Worth reading:

http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109383994241733290

Scroll up, too, to see whatever Juan has posted recently.

And a chart to keep the players straight:

http://uggabugga.blogspot.com/2004/08/complicated-juan-cole-has-new-post.html

From Matthew Yglesias in the Sept 1 issue of American Prospect:

Reviewing Clinton’s My Life in the June 24, 2004, Los Angeles Times, neoconservative Max Boot happily concluded that "conservatives like character, liberals like cleverness." He’s right. But to state what should be obvious, the president is not your father, your husband, your drinking buddy, or your minister. These are important roles, but they are not the president’s. He has a job to do, and it’s a difficult one, involving a wide array of complicated issues. His responsibility to manage these issues is a public one, and the capacity to do so in a competent and moral manner is fundamentally unrelated to the private virtues of family, friendship, fidelity, charity, compassion, and all the rest.

I don't know if the mainstream media is covering this story, but it's pretty explosive. If you haven't heard, start with this posting by Juan Cole, and then scroll up for updates.

Another must-read from Juan Cole, called Cheney Watch

So let's get this straight. The US has 138,000 troops stuck in Iraq, which was no danger to the US homeland. They are mainly fighting local clansmen who had never before had any beef with the US, prior to the American invasion of their country.

If Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are the SS of the age, then why aren't 138,000 US troops combing Waziristan for them? Why haven't they been captured?

If al-Qaeda is the equivalent of the WW II Axis, why didn't the US liaise with Moroccan and Spanish security to prevent the Madrid bombings? How many FBI and CIA operatives do we even have in Rabat and Casablanca? Does Cheney even know the name of the Moroccan minister of intelligence? There is no evidence that he is making the fight against al-Qaeda any sort of top priority.

Cheney is lying again.

We didn't catch any of the first night on TV... we watched a movie instead: Mies vailla menneisyyttä (Man without a Past), which is really very funny, and weird. But I plan to watch the big speeches sometime this week. CSPAN's web site has them, if I can ever get through.

If you want to check out the blog coverage, a lot of it is bad. I'd recommend Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo for serious coverage. And the newly un-anonymous Duncan Black (aka Atrios) for a taste of scattered, though still insightful coverage. If he ever sobers up.

This piece by Juan Cole is well worth the read, if you've got a few minutes to spare. It's a detailed analysis of why the idea of Iran cooperating with Al Queda is just a load of crap. It's been obvious for at least a year that Iran is the next target (remember "Everyone wants to march to Baghdad, real men go to Tehran"?). Read this so you not only know why that's a really bad idea, but you'll be able to back up your argument with facts.