Iraq War Blogswarm: Three Trillion Lies And Still Going Strong

Today, as we mark that dark mid-March day in 2003 when President Bush, complete with a raised fist pumping air like he was about to go into the final playoffs to give "'em one more for the Gipper..." gesture and dispatched the first soldiers off to war, the cold, harsh light of day makes it a heluva lot easier to see all the lies.

After all, it was not just one single lie that Bush used to get us into Iraq but a multitude of them, including:

weapons of mass destruction everywhere>

doctored intelligence reports that led to the outing of CIA covert operative, Valerie Plame Wilson, because Bushies did not like that Wilson's husband, former ambassador Joe Wilson, would not pretend Niger "yellow cake" uranium story was true

Saddam was about to launch a campaign to make kittens and puppies in perfect little American suburbia all sick

the war would take a few days to a few weeks, completely pay for itself, and there is "absolutely no way" to lose it

the entire world sees the war as right which is why we had to pay them and bully them into joining the "coalition of the willing"

actions in Iraq certainly won't distract us from catching Osama bin Laden, regroup al Qaeda, or exhaust our resources for the global war on terror

Need I list more?

Howard Fineman Falls Over Himself Gushing About John McCain

Yes, this man - well, genetically male anyway - actually earns income as a chief correspondent for Newsweek AND as an MSNBC political consultant. I mean, the lady lobbyist McCain "helped" back in 2000 probably never wrote something so flowery and aquiver as Fineman wrote here about McCain.

Excuse me, please. I need a very long, very hot shower. And mouthwash.

Despite All The BushshitBullshit, Women in Iraq Still Suffer

Ashley Wright details some of the terrible stuff happening in Iraq that particularly target women. Mind you, before our invasion in March 2003, Iraq was perhaps the most "progressive" of the Islamic cultures toward women. But we put a stop to that! Just like Bush claimed we attacked Afghanistan to "help the women and let girls go to school" while women are at more risk there than ever before, and many (most?) girls have again disappeared from schools under threat of death.

How the bloody hell did we make Iraq even worse than it was under a brutal dictator like Saddam Hussein? Sadly, the answer falls under the category of our own brutal dictators, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

The Truth Serum Version of Bush's State of the Union Speech Tonight

[Mind you, I don't think truth serum ever was - or is today - Bush's drug of choice ("Want a little noseful more cocaine coke with that whiskey, George?"]

Considering Bush has been known – mature, wise fellow that he is – to flip the finger at press and photographers, a part of me wonders if, on the occasion of his final State of the Union delivery tonight (Monday), he might just tell the truth, certain that no one can do a damned thing about all the misery, injustice, and death he has wrought. God knows the man looks for opportunities to smirk ever more insultingly.

So here's what I think he would say if truth serum were administered to him just before the speech:

Good evening, you pussies and ingrates:I could give you my usual bullshit about how I gotta hard job and I work hard (damned, I say that a heluva lot) but we all know if damned good 'o me to bother to put in eight hours a WEEK between my naps, ball game watching, riding my mountain bikes OVER old ladies, and planning for the vacations I take ev'ry few days.

But anyways... I won't make this long 'cos you don't wanna hear it and frankly, I like to pretend to get into bed real early like so I can hide my drinkin' and druggin' I'd make certain you'd do federal time for. So let's get this sucker over with.

Too effin' bad if you don't like the job I've done; it was never up to you anyway. And mixed in with all the lies was a little truth, anyway. Like when I said I wanted to make America an ownership society – not my fault if you thought YOU would be the owners when I really meant Saudi nationals, wealthy Kuwaitis, and scores of other rich for'ners would come in and buy everythin' up 'cos I made sure you can't afford to breathe.

As for Iraq, boo-frickin-hoo so many have died. At least they're not people I care about. My dumb-as-dirt daughters are just fine and livin' like princesses so I don't give a tinker's damn that your kid is too dumb to get into college 'cos I dumbed down the requirements for public education or 'cos I made sure they can't afford to go on to school. After all, we gotta military recruitment quota to fill and it's not like there are jobs out there for your grown kids to get; and where they can find jobs, I'll make damned well sure they are jobs that can feed a family.

Also, college ain't all its cracked up to be. Just look at me and I went to a bunch of the best effing schools in the country.

Besides, what I got planned for Iran makes Iraq look like a bleepin' Irish wedding by comparison, so I'll need your kids out on the front line with no body armor and few bullets, and not sittin' in some classroom learning liberal crap like Darwinism and math. Don't be thinkin' you can stop me from going to war in Iran either - look at all the shit you've let me get away with!

What'cha gonna do? Impeach me? Muhahahahahahahahaha.

No matter what anybody tells ya, the economy's just FINE. Know how I know that? Cos all my fat cat friends and family are a heluva lot richer now than they were when I first came into office. And if you're a lot poorer because of it, don't look at me. I can't understand how poor people think, like I've said before. And you ought'a see how rich I'll be from sweetheart deals – not to mention my huge tax breaks – once I leave office.

You're gonna be supportin' me and mine for the rest of our effing lives – and trust me, we got a MUCH bigger standard of living than you.

And to those who say I do nothin' but lie, so? It's not like the media cares enough to point 'em out. And if you're watching MY favorite NEWS Network, The Cartoon Network uh.. Fox, then you're too damned stupid to notice my lies any ole way.

In closing, let me tell you something my mama, Bitching Barb, always told us kids: “If you're gonna get screwed, you might as well close your eyes, lie back, pretend to enjoy it, and then charge 'em triple for the honor.”

Now get the F outta here so I can toke. The White House ain't the people's house anymore.. It's MINE, beatch, and I want you GONE. ::insert extra smirk here::

President Bush: "(The Devil) Saddam Made Me Do It (Iraq)"

Well, we've heard every possible excuse from the president and the rest of the Bush Administration on how they could have been so terribly wrong about weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and the threat the Iraqi leaders presented to the U.S. So now, after a government audit documented 935 separate lies about Iraq - and the American economy affected by a war with Iraq - from the Bush Administration, what makes more sense than for the Bushies to turn around and blame Saddam? Well, that is, it makes about as much sense as anything else this murderous, greedy, deceitful crew does, anyway.

What marvelous timing that the FBI agent who supposedly was the one to interrogate Saddam Hussein after his capture in Iraq in December 2003 picked NOW, in light of the lie report, to disclose highlights from his seven-month-long interrogation of the Iraqi dictator, hanged just before the end of 2006.

However, for the Bushies to quickly spread the story that it was Saddam who lied and fooled them does NOT appear to be a particularly flattering spin on events. For it to matter, we would have had to BELIEVE what Saddam was saying in the first place - and we had no reason to do that, did we? After all, we expect our enemies - and America's greatest enemy of all, President George W. Bush - to lie to us. So why did the Bushies magically choose to believe the WMD/threat lies (if Saddam told them rather than the U.S.)?

Also, according to Colin Powell, and Dick Cheney, et al, they had "military intelligence" and well more than ample evidence from "trusted sources" that WMD was EVERYWHERE in Iraq and that the nation, which could barely afford to operate at all, was ready to launch suicide camel rocket SCUBA divers to blow up the West Coast (remember?).

Well, as usual with the Bushies, the truth changes faster than Bush's "reasons" for going into Iraq in the first place, and none of the stories/versions makes as much sense as that we went in there for the oil, and got a lot more (and not in a good way) than we bargained for.

Why can't the Bushies do something truly unique just ONCE? As in, tell the truth? Wait. I know why. Because to them, the truth is just something to spin into something worse. Lessons we need to keep in mind as Bush keeps ramping us forward to war with Iran.

White House Spokesweasel Dana Perino: "What's Cuba?"

Believe it or not, she's far dumber (or to her boss, Bush, “dumberer”) than she looks and behaves (and those who follow White House press room sessions knows that is QUITE a feat given her past history). Ms. Perino, never short on attitude OR lies OR ways to blame everyone else for what the White House does wrong, not only claimed the 935 certified lies found by a government accounting agency in remarks by Bush and the White House leading up to the Iraq war were really mistakes made by those "other coalition members" who "forced" the Bush Administration to go to war in Iraq (which, uh... would be the Bushies themselves), came up with a new stunner this week.

Namely, Dim Dana announced – and seemed quite proud of the fact – that she had no bleeping idea what the Cuban Missile Crisis was. Yeah, you could cite her age (though I know all about it and I wasn't even old enough for a pacifier when it happened), but this event was a seminal one in modern American political history, is at the heart of our supposed rabid hatred of Castro and Cuba, and is at the core of our horrific anti-Cuba (but pro-rich-Cuban-exile bizarro behavior) policies.

But Dana, like her boss, the so-called MBA-holding history major (Bush), is sure that being deadly dumb as denuded, uranium-polluted dirt is a GOOD thing.

Larry Craig: "It Ain't Easy Bein' Hypocritical"

Oops. What IS it with the "moral" and "family value" Republicans who can't keep their zippers up at the same time they insist anyone else engaging in much less heinous behavior deserve to be struck dead by God AND the American system? There is absolutely nothing wrong with being homosexual and by no means is homosexual synonymous with pedophile (most of whom are heterosexual, btw) - unless, of course, you're a gay who insists that other gays deserve to be stoned - but am I the only one who wonders if Craig may have pulled this on one or more unsuspecting males below the age of consent?

From the Buzzflash team:

Well, it looks like Larry "I am Not Gay" Craig -- who has remained a senator despite his initial promise to resign as of September 30 -- has been caught by Idaho's most influential paper, the Idaho Statesman, and left without a stall to stand on, so to speak.

In a December 2nd article, accompanied by graphic audio accounts of gay sexual encounters with Craig, the Idaho Statesman (owned by McClatchy Newspapers) provides the names and stories of four men who appear to undercut Senator Craig's claims that what happened in a Minnesota washroom was due to him being a victim of "profiling."

We're not familiar with older, tall white guys from Idaho being "profiled" a whole lot, and apparently the long-standing rumors about Craig are once again being confirmed. Craig has shunned and ridiculed the Idaho Statesman since it first began exploring Craig's hypocrisy on his sexual preferences (he has been a big anti-gay stalwart). But the newspaper has kept on the beat, so to speak, and documents its article about the post-Minneapolis revelations about Senator Craig with graphic audio clips.

Will Impeachment Resistance Cost Nancy Pelosi Her House Leadership Seat?

As Anonymous points us to in comments, there is an effort underway to remove House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from her leadership role due to her resistance (and she's hardly the only one) to bringing impeachment proceedings against either Bush, Cheney, or the entire Bush Administration.

Considering recent polls say that about 70% of Americans believe the Bush Administration has committed "high crimes and misdemeanors" and more than 50% believe they warrant impeachment proceedings, it's harder and harder to understand why the Dem leadership in Washington is so desperate to keep votes like Dennis Kucinich's impeachment motion against Cheney off the floor.

One Thing NOT To Be Thankful For This Week

Karl Rove's new "fair and balanced" column for Newsweek has debuted. Newsweek actually has the nerve to claim it gives balance to political issues. And - wonder of wonders - his first topic is "how to beat Hillary Clinton next November."

Excuse me?

Not even still-Bush-supporting Republicans can possibly believe that line of bull.

The LIE Of Rudy Giuliani's Moderate Progressive Nature

Lies and damned lies.

The myth that Rudy Giuliani is not only the most progressive of the GOP wannabes running for his party's 2008 Republican presidential nomination but SOOOO moderate even Dems would vote for him is one big lie. Glenn Greenwald in his Salon blog tackles this and is brave enough to call a heinous lie just that. Here's a snip:

The most transparent and destructive fallacy being recited by our Beltway media class is that Rudy Giuliani is a moderate or centrist Republican. Examples of this fallacy are everywhere.

The Washington Post's Jonathan Weisman yesterday twice asserted during his "chat" that Giuliani was a moderate -- first rejecting the notion that the GOP is purging moderates by citing the fact that "the frontrunner in the presidential campaign is Rudy Giuliani, an abortion rights, gay rights, gun control advocate," and thereafter claiming that GOP political operatives want Giuliani as the nominee because "they think Giuliani will mobilize moderate Republicans and independents who lean Republican." Today, his Post colleague, "mainstream" enforcer Shailagh Murray, insisted that while Ron Paul is well outside the mainstream, Rudy Giuliani is squarely within it.

The very idea that Giuliani is a "moderate" or a "centrist" is completely absurd. Regarding the issues over which the next President will have the greatest influence -- foreign policy and presidential powers -- Giuliani is as far to what is now considered the "Right" as it gets. His views on foreign policy are far more radical and bellicose even than Dick Cheney's, and his view of presidential powers makes George Bush look like Thomas Jefferson.

This whole "moderate" myth is grounded exclusively in Giuliani's non-doctrinaire views of social issues. But that's pure fallacy. Political ideology doesn't function like mathematics, where two numbers situated on opposite extreme poles can be averaged together to produce a nice, comfortable number in the middle.

That isn't how political ideology works. A warmonger with authoritarian impulses and liberal positions on social issues isn't a "moderate" or a "centrist." He's just a warmonger with authoritarian impulses and liberal positions on social issues.

Even Giuliani's allegedly "liberal" positions on social issues are completely overblown. Outside of judicial appointments, Presidents actually have very little impact on issues such as gay rights, abortion and gun control. Other than judicial appointments, what impact has George Bush had on those areas? Virtually none.

Yet when it comes to the one instrument Presidents can actually use to shape social issues -- judicial appointments -- Giuliani's decisions will be anything but liberal. He has said repeatedly that he would "appoint judges like Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Alito, Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas" -- the most conservative justices on the Court. And his closest legal confidants are the by-product of relationships he formed at the Reagan DOJ -- people like Ted Olson and Michael Mukasey -- and his appointments are almost certainly going to comport loyally to Federalist Society dogma.

Jim Hogue's "The Ballad of Ladder 5" And The "9-11 Truth Movement"

I know many - and it's not just Dems - remain with serious questions about the events of September 11th. While I'm not trying to stir up a brew here on a Sunday, I did want to point to a bit of political poetry offered up by a Vermont local actor/activist Jim Hogue about 9-11 you can find here.

You can listen to Hogue's often politically-centric program, The House on Pooh Corner, streaming live at WGDR online every Monday from 8:30-10 AM ET.

Bush: "To Prove I'm Relevant, I'm Ready To Let Your Sick Kids Suffer!"

Just when you thought it couldn't get anymore bizarre and bastardly at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue....

That Bush thinks he's relevant must be of great comfort to parents of sick kids this president BOASTS he wants kept from any kind of meaningful health care coverage. For a man who proves day in and day out (those few days Dubya bothers to pretend to work, that is), his comment today he is PROUD to veto the Dem-pushed provisions for government-aided health care for children (Ricky Shambles posted powerfully about it here (aka Schipstorm) at All Things Democrat earlier this week) to prove his relevancy as a president reaches a whole new subterranean L-O-W.

I overheard a woman today, a woman I have heard defend Bush right and left (and man, is he ever to the right), an ardent conservative Republican who does not believe in social programs to help anyone who makes less than 100K, completely lose it upon learning of the president's latest lunacy. "How does taking away basic health care from poor kids make him a better president?" she demanded in complete consternation as she literally threw up her hands.

Even this loyal GOPer seemed to see through the ridiculous fog of lies the Bush-buttkissers put up about how rich adults were using the kids' health care and how those from families earning $85K or more were "swindling" the system when people who cannot afford rent and food should pony up $400-800 a month in health premiums. Anyone with half a brain (OK, Bush doesn't qualify even by that lesser standard) has been appalled at the tighty righties' miserable position on this.

If the latest Bushism sounds even worse than the classic Ebenezer Scrooge bit from Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" who, when asked to help the poor at the holiday season, inquires of the do-gooders if the debtors' prisons still operate since his taxes support those institutions, you aren't far from the mark.

Writes Dan Froomkin of The Washington Post on this matter:

Asked how he found himself vetoing a children's health insurance bill that had passed Congress with bipartisan support, Bush insisted that using a veto is "one way to ensure I am relevant."

When a reporter followed up and asked Bush if he felt he was losing leverage and relevance, Bush replied: "I've never felt more engaged and more capable of getting the American people to realize there's a lot of unfinished business."

Which, let's be blunt, is hard to believe.

For seven years now, everything that has come out of Bush & Cheney's mouth has been hard to believe. No, correction: impossible to believe. Nice that they'll take a stand on the fallen bodies of sick kids, eh?

Gives a whole 'nother sick meaning to No Child Left Behind.

As Rome And Bridges Burn (And Collapse), Bush Fiddles But Without The Talent of Nero

[Ed. note: For more on this issue, read my posts here and here.]

As a person of faith, I happen to believe in the power of prayer. I make no bones or apologies about this. I also have no desire to shove it in your face, whether we think alike or not.

However, when President Bush finally appeared, sandwiching in time for a comment about the tragedy on the I35W bridge across the Mississippi River in Minneapolis Thursday evening - hard to schedule between his naps, bike rides, Condi Rice still helping him read "My Pet Goat" (he's still trying to finish it lo these six years since he began it on the morning of 9-11 but, written for small children, some of the words probably prove quite a challenge to him) along with (of course) his myriad lies and machinations - Bush was once again quick to cite that he was praying and telling us we should do so as well.

Now, I'm certainly not going to say it's inappropriate for the leader of the free world to pray. However, I rather expect that same leader to do MORE than pray. And I sure as hell don't need him telling ME to do so since the decision to pray, or not, is one that is intensely private and personal.

Time and again, whether on the subject of September 11th or the horror he's caused in Iraq (and Afghanistan, and Pakistan, and here, there, and everywhere), the U.S. Constitution he and pal Alberto Gonzales have used for toilet paper, or whether his favorite Texas team wins the playoffs, Bush shoves prayer at us like he's our moral compass (well, he does seem to believe he sits not just at the right hand of God, but on His - or Her - lap, fiddling dangerously with the control panel, wondering what happens if he presses that big red button - indeed, as Gonzales says he serves at the pleasure of the president, our president thinks God serves at the pleasure of Bush's "decider" omnipotence). Why bother to actually lead when you can just spout prayer and then return to his nap, right?

Let me suggest that Bush should be looking at the nation's infrastructure; for example, the thousands of OTHER bridges out there ruled as structurally questionable if not more so than the one that collapsed yesterday. And not just LOOK at the infrastructure and rush to award lucrative no-bid/no-work/no-good-results contracts to his bestest pals in exchange for money in Bush & Cheney's pockets, but start implementing a real plan to address these issues. The ever-accelerating decay of the nation's infrastructure did not begin with the Bushies, but in the name of the ridiculously incompetent "Homeland Security", everything thing else has gone to goo while he sees terrorists everywhere but where we have the greatest concentration of terrorists these days: namely, HIS administration.

Much Better: Arrest Impeach Supporters Rather Than Indict A Lying, Thieving President

It's amazing, really.

A president who stole two elections, lied us into countless wars (the one in Iraq and the ridiculous one he labeled "War on Terror" are but two), violates the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Convention on a daily and egregious basis, has made our country far less safe (and our risk from terrorists seems almost microscopic compared with our grave and present risks from the Bush-Cheney minions who are themselves terrorists), has killed the American dollar (still in freefall throughout the world) along with countless soldiers, civilians, and so-called enemy detainees, goes scot-free.

But cops arrest a 74-year-old man for selling Impeach Bush buttons at a Maryland farmer's market. Cindy Sheehan and nearly four dozen other Americans have also been arrested this week for impeachment efforts.

Feel any safer? I don't.

Torture And The Laws Bush Won't Even Pretend to Follow

At the same time he stands by his unmitigated nerve to cry foul against Russia in 2001 for its human rights abuses (talk about the skanky pot calling the Putey-Put kettle black), Bush wants everyone to notice he's "making illegal" what was already illegal to do but which he practices with all the fervor of a Republican Christian moralist paying a dominatrix for kinky sex (can you say William "Morals Czar" Bennett, anyone?).

Thus, may we assume (oh, yeaaaaahhhhh!) that President Bush signed a new law designed to "stop" torture in interrogations used against detainees and so-called terror suspects using invisible ink, with his fingers crossed behind his hand, AND with a signing statement that says, "this law applies only to Democrats and others not named Bush & Cheney"?

Meanwhile, the CIA is now allowed to return to interrogating whoever the hell they want, after many appropriate (and too many unasked) questions arose about how they conducted them.

With Bush, The Damned Lies Keep Coming After HE Refused to Give Troops a Pay Raise

The words Bush and lies go together as surely as hot fudge sauce and vanilla ice cream, Halliburton and stealing/overbilling, Cheney and nasty secrets, government and crime, not to mention Republican "Christian moralists and kinky prostitutes. So why should this surprise us? Well, except that Bush and his GOP loyalists have refused for 4+ years to properly equip our troops and that just a few weeks ago, they insisted soldiers did NOT need a pay raise and would block any measure to give them one:

President Bush, ratcheting up a fight with Congress over Iraq, accused Democrats on Friday of conducting a political debate on the war while delaying action on money to upgrade equipment and give troops a pay raise.

"It is time to rise above partisanship, stand behind our troops in the field, and give them everything they need to succeed," Bush said in the Rose Garden after meeting with veterans and military families.

Bush spoke two days after Senate Republicans thwarted a Democratic proposal to pull out troops from Iraq. Bush said that instead of approving money for the war, "the Democratic leaders chose to have a political debate on a precipitous withdrawal of our troops from Iraq."

Despite Bush's suggestion that the bill is a must-pass measure that would pay for critical war programs, the legislation is not an appropriations bill that feeds military spending accounts. Called the defense authorization bill, the legislation is a policy measure used by Congress to influence the management of major defense programs, set goals and guide the 2008 military spending bill.

Fred Thompson And Women's Rights: Demand Abortions End While Pocketing Money To Ease Restrictions

Well, former Senator (I doubt he was ever a human being, so I won't refer to him as a former one) Fred Thompson keeps proving that he has the baldfaced lying ability quite apparently required to be a "popular" Republican presidential candidate AND president. After all, only conservative compassionate Christians - as practiced by the likes of the Bushies, James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, and Pat Robertson - can break all the commandments while insisting they're anointed by God himself.

While Fred has joined the extreme nutcase fringe of fat old white men who demand the right to tell women what to do with their own bodies, The Times reports Fascist Fred pocketed money as a lobbyist on behalf of those who want to lessen draconian restrictions on abortion counseling for those centers that accept federal funding for family planning. Only, of course, Felonious Fred "can't remember" doing so.

Apparently this Republican is going to start the classic Ronald Reagan defense strategy a little early. Perhaps Fred can hire some of those philandering GOP cocaine drug dealers to help out, just like Rudy Giuliani.

Slamming The Door Shut On A Dick

According to the Washington Post, support for the impeachment of (at the very least) Vice President Dick Cheney is growing.

The Indefensible and Olbermann's Call For Bush-Cheney To Resign

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann had very strong words for the latest corrupt, self-serving, indefensible, protect-the-elite-Bushies-while-screwing-everyone-else action on the part of President Bush: commuting the sentence of convicted liar and former Cheney chief-of-staffer I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby so he does not have to serve a single day in prison for outing former CIA operative Valerie Plame in the scandal known as PlameGate.

Olbermann called Bush gutless, that Bush proved beyond all doubt that he is not the leader of the United States but the titular head of a small and very elite group for whom their protection and profit is all that matters to this White House, and more than merely suggested that not even disgraced former president, Richard Nixon, would have dared pull such a nasty trick.

Yet, as Olbermann also announced on Monday, tonight (Tuesday) he will deliver one of his scalding and scalpel-sharp Special Comments in which he calls for (demands?) the resignation of both Bush and Cheney. You should watch (8 PM ET, MSNBC).

In the meantime, even the often far-too-Bush-defensive Washington Post editorial page today calls Bush's action indefensible (meanwhile, everyone else connected with the case, including the Justice Department, rushed in to claim Bush came up with this terrible deal mostly on his own, without their consultation):

IN COMMUTING I. Lewis Libby's prison sentence yesterday, President Bush took the advice of, among others, William Otis, a former federal prosecutor who wrote on the opposite page last month that Mr. Libby should neither be pardoned nor sent to prison. We agree that a pardon would have been inappropriate and that the prison sentence of 30 months was excessive. But reducing the sentence to no prison time at all, as Mr. Bush did -- to probation and a large fine -- is not defensible.

Mr. Libby was convicted in March on charges of perjury, making false statements and obstruction of justice. Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff had told the FBI and a grand jury that he had not leaked the identity of CIA employee Valerie Plame to journalists, but after hearing abundant testimony and carefully deliberating, a jury concluded that he lied. As we wrote at the time of the conviction, lying under oath is unacceptable for anyone, and particularly for a government official. As Mr. Bush said in his statement yesterday, "our entire system of justice relies on people telling the truth. And if a person does not tell the truth, particularly if he serves in government and holds the public trust, he must be held accountable."

Bush: The "Gutless" Wonder

Virtually no one - except perhaps President Bush and Vice President Cheney - expected that this White House would rush in so soon to keep a convicted liar and obstructor of justice, former Cheney Chief of Staff I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, from having to pay any real penalty for his role in outing CIA covert operative Valerie Plame in the debacle known as PlameGate.

That Bush would subvert justice should not be such a surprise; after all, making a mockery and laughingstock out of the United States, its system of laws and government, and endangering the very people "charged" with protecting us while maximizing corruption to the great advantage of his pals is what he does best.

Yet even Bush reached a new low by delivering this announcement not in person, not on camera, not by official White House press conference, but by a press release delivered over what many are taking as a 10-day-long July 4th weekend. As MSNBC's Keith Olbermann noted Monday night, the way Bush did it proved he is entirely "gutless"; he hopes no one will notice because he expects them to be too busy drinking beer and swilling hotdogs.