And Then There's Fox News Who Proves There Are People Just as Dumb As Bush and Dana Perino

[As my mother used to tell me on an hourly basis as a child, "If you had a brain, you'd be even more dangerous."]

On the heels of ridiculing White House spokesprostitute person Dana Perino, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Countdown tonight points to a Fox news host (phonetically, his name seems to be Brett Baer but I cannot find him listed on Fox's - cough cough cough choke WHEEZE - news site to verify this) who would LOVE to one day be as smart as Perino.

Namely Mr. Baer, when discussing the GOP presidential nominee debate in Florida last night, refers to late President Abraham Lincoln (1861-64) in a manner that made it ABUNDANTLY CLEAR he had no idea of HOW Lincoln left office.

In a box, Mr. Fox host... in a box. ("Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?")

Hasn't been a good week for Fox - or the idiots who watch it - considering how Bill O'Reilly insisted there are NO homeless vets (instead of perhaps as many as 600K+ homeless vets out there) and then blamed vets being homeless on the only candidate talking about helping such folks, Democratic candidate John Edwards (with O'Reilly conveniently forgetting his comment earlier that if there were ANY homeless vets, he personally would make certain they got housing forthwith). Reilly ALSO demanded an apology from David Letterman for suggesting Bill O has never met a lie he wouldn't gladly repeat for his own gain.

And then there was John Gibson ridiculing the untimely death of actor Heath Ledger only to, rather than apologize for his comments, indicate that it was the people who said that they didn't like his callous, caustic commentary who were the problem.

No self-respecting under-rock-sliming snake with an IQ of ZERO or less would be caught dead in the company of these people. Sheesh.

Military Suicides Soar While Bushies & Pentagon Look The Other Way

In case you haven't heard, Bush's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have brought active-duty military GI and veteran suicides to some of the highest - if not THE highest, since the Bush Administration and the Pentagon have steadfastly ignored the issue altogether - levels on record. Here:

The parents of an Iraq war veteran who committed suicide and members of Congress on Wednesday questioned why there's not a comprehensive tracking system of suicide among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.

Mike Bowman, of Forreston, Ill., said his son, Spc. Timothy Bowman, 23, is a member of the "unknown fallen" not counted in statistics. His son, a member of the Illinois National Guard, took his own life in 2005 eight months after returning from war. Bowman said he considers his son a "KBA" — killed because of action.

"If the veteran suicide rate is not classified as an epidemic that needs immediate and drastic attention, then the American fighting soldier needs someone in Washington who thinks it is," Bowman said.

This Veterans Day

I think it's important to consider that IF Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney truly respected our American service men and women, many of them now vets, than they would NOT be talking about another bloody, useless, war without end with Iran - worse than our endless wars with Iraq and Afghanistan rolled together.

Instead, it's telling just to remember how hard Bush fought to keep from fighting in Vietnam while Dick Cheney, speaking of this time and his many evasions of the draft: "I had other priorities."

Homelessness And Vets: More Than Just A Crying Shame

With a new study out that shows that American veterans account for 25% of the country's homeless comes two questions that are far more than academic:

1) What do we do to our soldiers that they end up this way?
2) Why are so many Americans now homeless - and many of them are homeless WHILE working more than one job because housing here is so expensive - and why are we allowing the numbers to soar higher each and every day?

Other stats show that we have NEVER seen an epidemic of homelessness like this among people WHO WORK, who pay taxes. So why under Bush has this flourished?

Well, I know the answer to that.

A Must Read

This is from Wes Clark (Retired NATO Supreme Commander and 2004 Dem presidential runner), but I've heard great reviews of this book from many sources. I won't like reading about it, but I feel it's my duty as a citizen of a country that sees war as a tool of empire.

I have just finished reading a book that was so compelling and moving that I wanted to urge you to buy a copy, while helping a worthy cause. "The War I Always Wanted: The Illusion of Glory and Reality of War," by Iraq and Afghanistan Veteran Brandon Friedman, captures the feelings of war with uncanny perception. Among the many excellent war memoirs by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, Brandon's stands out as the best. I couldn't put it down.

Beauty For The Brave

Whether you do it because Father's Day weekend is rolling in or just because it's a great thing to do for those who have given so (too?) much, please check this out and participate, the information coming here from Cernig and the Newshoggers:

My good friend Mr. M at Comments From Left Field just emailed me asking for my support in spreading the word about a worthy cause. Very worthy, and I'm happy to oblige.

we at Comments From Left Field have decided to support the "Beauty for the Brave" campaign. 100% of the proceeds go to Fisher House which is an organization that builds homes outside of military hospitals so that family members can have a place to stay free of charge while their loved one receives treatment for injuries incurred while serving overseas.

Me, I don't know if I could have fulfilled my time in the service without the support of the people I call family, and I had it easy. Imagine coming back from Iraq, no legs, or an arm missing, learning how to walk again, or how to reenter life as left handed when you have been a right hander for all of your life.

Now imagine doing it alone.That is the kind of scenario that Fisher House seeks to avoid, and I for one support them completely.

The Beauty for the Brave campaign is simple. It merely asks people to point out one beauty product that they use on a regular basis, and go without once. Lipstick, moisturizer, anything. Skip it for just one shopping trip, and instead use the money to donate instead.

In case you haven't caught the other links, go here.

So Much For Our Military Veterans

From Campaign for America's Future (the blog), and like all things Bush, it ain't pretty and it's failing miserably:

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales isn't the only Bush cabinet official worrying about his job.

Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson, deemed "a Brownie situation" by Sen. Claire McCaskill, is also worrying as the Walter Reed scandal continues to unfold.

Trying to get ahead of the knives, Nicholson launched a (wee bit belated) review of 1,400 VA medical facilities, in an attempt to show he's on top of things.

The review was released yesterday, finding more than 1,000 incidents of subpar conditions -- including bug infestations, suicide risks and asbestos.

The spin from Nicholson's crew of hacks? Nothing to worry about!

From the W. Post:

VA officials said ... that the department's $519 million maintenance budget this year should address the "shortcomings."
For the moment, let's leave aside the question of whether there actually are sufficient funds available to fix problems.

Nicholson's own argument is, in essence, that while these problems have festered for two years on his watch, he's been sitting on the funds that could have addressed them.

These folks really inspire us to trust them, don't they? ::urp::

Veteran Dies After Refused Treatment At VA Facility

Monty at Buzzflash brings us this terrible story from Democracy Now about just how well vets - and active duty soldiers - get (mis)treated under the Bush Administration.

Paul Krugman: "Valor and Squalor"

In his Times column today, Dr. Krugman turns his ink-loaded scalpel toward the Bush-worsened debacle surrounding care for our wounded troops at Walter Reed and other military hospitals. Read it all here or be satisfied with my thick sniplet:

When Salon, the online magazine, reported on mistreatment of veterans at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center two years ago, officials simply denied that there were any problems. And they initially tried to brush off last month’s exposé in The Washington Post.

But this time, with President Bush’s approval at 29 percent, Democrats in control of Congress, and Donald Rumsfeld no longer defense secretary — Robert Gates, his successor, appears genuinely distressed at the situation — the whitewash didn’t stick.

Yet even now it’s not clear whether the public will be told the full story, which is that the horrors of Walter Reed’s outpatient unit are no aberration. For all its cries of “support the troops,” the Bush administration has treated veterans’ medical care the same way it treats everything else: nickel-and-diming the needy, protecting the incompetent and privatizing everything it can.

What makes this a particular shame is that in the Clinton years, veterans’ health care — like the Federal Emergency Management Agency — became a shining example of how good leadership can revitalize a troubled government program. By the early years of this decade the Veterans Health Administration was, by many measures, providing the highest-quality health care in America. (It probably still is: Walter Reed is a military facility, not run by the V.H.A.)

But as with FEMA, the Bush administration has done all it can to undermine that achievement. And the Walter Reed scandal is another Hurricane Katrina: the moment when the administration’s misgovernment became obvious to everyone.

The problem starts with money. The administration uses carefully cooked numbers to pretend that it has been generous to veterans, but the historical data contained in its own budget for fiscal 2008 tell the true story. The quagmire in Iraq has vastly increased the demands on the Veterans Administration, yet since 2001 federal outlays for veterans’ medical care have actually lagged behind overall national health spending.

To save money, the administration has been charging veterans for many formerly free services. For example, in 2005 Salon reported that some Walter Reed patients were forced to pay hundreds of dollars each month for their meals.

More important, the administration has broken longstanding promises of lifetime health care to those who defend our nation. Two months before the invasion of Iraq the V.H.A., which previously offered care to all veterans, introduced severe new restrictions on who is entitled to enroll in its health care system. As the agency’s Web site helpfully explains, veterans whose income exceeds as little as $27,790 a year, and who lack “special eligibilities such as a compensable service connected condition or recent combat service,” will be turned away.

Rozius has the rest.

Photos From a Marine Iraqi War Vet's Wedding

Bag News Notes brings us a photo of a couple getting married after the Marine, Ty Ziegel, returned from serving in Iraq. I think you should look at it, and ponder the question posed there.

I wish Ty and his new bride every possible happiness, but I grieve for what Bush's war of empire has done to this brave young man. The photo will tell you exactly what I'm talking about.

Army Times: Military "Fudges" Disability Status to Save Bucks

I've been posting stuff about the truly evil way the Bush Administration and the Pentagon have treated the troops they want to carry out their war of empire for as long as I've blogged so, sadly, I'm none too surprised at this in The Army Times.

While Republicans Insist Democrats Want to Cut Support To Troops, It's Bush's Pentagon Bankrupting Our Soldiers

We've heard numerous additional reports the last few weeks - and stretching back right to the October 2001 start of aggression against Afghanistan and our March 2003 entry into the Iraq War - that the Pentagon, which just keeps collecting more money for nothing but defense contractors and consultants who can get nothing right, is not equipping or supporting our troops.

Now comes this report in the Washington Post about the deplorable conditions under which our war-injured American troops face and must suffer through once Bush's constant state of war fells them:

Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan’s room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Thanks to Think Progress for the pointer.