By the way, you're not invited. When the President is in town for two hours and you find yourself without a few million dollars in your pocket or an 'R' next to your name on the ballot, your invitation gets lost in the mail.

President Bush touched down in Seattle today:

Bush will attend a private reception this morning in Medina to raise money for the re-election campaign of Republican Rep. David Reichert, who represents the suburban 8th District.

The midmorning reception, the president's only stop in this state, will be at the 8,000-square-foot, $10.3 million mansion of Peter Neupert, a Microsoft Corp. corporate vice president and former chief executive of drugstore.com Inc. Proceeds from the $1,000-a-head reception will go to Reichert, who is facing an aggressive challenge from Democrat Darcy Burner, a political newcomer and former Microsoft manager.

I know it's odd, but Bush flying in to help out Reichert feels a bit like his Baghdad Green Zone cameo from a few days back. Slip into hostile territory unannounced, surrounded by friendlies, then get the hell out before anyone noticed what the hell happened.

I know what you're thinking- NO, that doesn't make Darcy Burner a terrorist, necessarily. She's just one more part of that great liberal insurgency conspiracy.

I know this site is supposed to be about sound politics, and I have a tendency to focus on national issues, but I have to say this today because my belly is full. Bush authorized leaks via Scooter Libby. Essentially (and we’ll have to see how this plays out) he is the man that authorized the leak of Valerie Plame. Bush said that he would fire anyone involved in the scandal, so I’m wondering if he’s going to fire Cheney before he resigns. The men in charge of our country have authorized treason, and one more day for them in office is another day that democracy rots in its grave. Today I can truly say that I am absolutely ashamed to call George Bush my president. The son of privilege, using his lies and his stupid smirk to sell his bogus programs, wars, and agenda. There’s no way to spin out of this, and I wait with baited breath to hear his talking heads try to do so. This is truly a black day for America.

I've heard you all- murmuring in the shadows- how dare you talk about our commander in that way? What did you say? State-based impeachment eh?

This would end up a publicity stunt as much as anything but this thread on Kos is fascinating- definitely gives you that little groups of people can do big things type of feeling, and boy do we like that around here.

NOTE: Sec. 603. Inception of impeachment proceedings in the House. This refers to Jefferson's Manual-the House uses it as a supplement to its standing rules.>>
In the House there are various methods of setting an impeachment in motion:

[...] by charges transmitted from the legislature of a State (III, 2469)

If this is all correct apparently any state's legislature can pas along the oh-so-subtle suggestion of impeachment. Vermont is for lovers...of checks and balances?

It appears as though our mighty President's approval ratings have hit its lowest level ever. Only 34% of Americans approve of the job George Bush is doing, and perhaps more interestingly, most Americans now say the president does not care much about people like themselves (51% think he doesn't care).

If this is his approval rating at home, I wonder what it is abroad? I guess thats why our fearless leader is bringing about 5,000 people to protect him during his upcoming visit to India.

Remember the days of "if you're not with us, you're against us?" Boy, were they sweet. Tucked away in his nonsense about doing his part to create a civil, bipartisan dialogue, last night Bush rolled out yet another way to divide up the country: "You're either for the war, or against foreign aid."

It used to be that being against the war just meant that we hated America. Which, you know, is fine. I mean, I don't hate America, but I've got a thick skin, and I'm not going to get all hacked off if you try to tell me otherwise.

Last night, though, Bush upped the ante. Opposing the war-- and everything that goes with it, like illegal wiretapping and unlawful imprisonment and torture of detainees-- now doesn't just mean you hate America. It means that you also don't want to send aid to refugees or help girls go to school. Don't want to fight? You hate the world.

What's fucked up about this is that if in the first place we'd actually did all of this "showing compassion abroad" and "believing in the God-given dignity and worth of villagers with AIDS" stuff he was talking about last night, we might not be in the place we are right now as a nation or at least would have a lot easier time getting out of it.

In a shocking decision to provide news analysis from people who are not old and not boring, KCPQ (channel 13 in greater Seattle) has asked a group of policy kids from the Evans School to play talking heads for an hour.

Also shocking-- they're letting me play, too!

Tune in to channel 13 tonight at 9 pm (I think they're calling the show IQ News?!). We'll be hacking the State of the Union address to pieces and hitting the local politics pretty hard, too.

And hey... if you like this kind of thing (you know, where people who you can actually relate to go on the boob tube and talk about how the news actually means something), drop your local TV stations an email. Landslides and apartment fires can't be the only news worth covering, right?

Al Gore is fighting the good fight, while most of his Democratic colleagues seem content to let the wiretapping scandal fade as the news cycle marches on. Via Kos:

The Administration's response to my speech illustrates perfectly the need for a special counsel to review the legality of the NSA wiretapping program. The Attorney General is making a political defense of the President without even addressing the substantive legal questions that have so troubled millions of Americans in both political parties...

Is there a difference?

Yep, I read The SLOG too.



Related Links:
The Stranger's SLOG - Photo of the Day

Why is this not bigger news?

Having read this several days ago, I was all a'giggle waiting for it to develop into a high profile news story this week, the Rove questioning be damned. It seems no insignificant finding that the leader of the world's foremost superpower skips around the globe assuring other leaders that he makes policy choices based upon conversations with the voices in his head.

I mean, haven't you people seen Real Genius?

Let us hope for the best. Dubya has chosen Harriet E. Miers to succeed Sandra Day O'Connor to be the third woman ever appointed to the Supreme Court.

Of course, Miers has never been a judge and has never held public office (edit: she was an elected member of the city council in Dallas for three years). And, while that may seem surprising to many Americans, it's not that uncommon in the history of the Supreme Court.

So, all we have to go off in making a judgment about Miers is the limited amount of what has been written about her and the fact that she once gave money to Al Gore.

But, hey. Maybe she's really intelligent and has great insight. Maybe David Frum, a former speech writer for Dubya, got to know Miers well in the first Dubya Administration and maybe the National Review columnist can bring us insight into the genius of Harriet E. Miers.

David Frum: 'Justice Miers?' In the White House that hero worshipped the president, Miers was distinguished by the intensity of her zeal: She once told me that the president was the most brilliant man she had ever met.

What? Who does she hang out with on the weekends? George W. Bush is the most brilliant man she has ever met? Roberts will have her fetching tea for the rest of the justices in a weeks time.

The following conversation is about to happen in the halls of the Supreme Court of the United States:

Justice Thomas: A dumbass says what?
Justice Miers: What?
Justice Thomas: A dumbass says what?
Justice Miers: What?
Justice Thomas: A dumbass says what?
Justice Miers: What?
Justice Souter: Exactly
(Ginsburg and Stevens hi-five)

Best. Reuters. Photo. Ever.

Check out the original and the "enhanced" version below.

The best part is either the fact that he ends it with a question mark (George, come on... do you not know if you need to go or not?) or looking at it with the Reuters caption.



"U.S. President George W. Bush at a Security Council meeting at the 2005 World Summit and 60th General Assembly of the United Nations in New York September 14, 2005. World leaders are exploring ways to revitalize the United Nations at a summit on Wednesday but their blueprint falls short of Secretary-General Kofi Annan's vision of freedom from want, persecution and war. In his private note to Secretary of State Condoleezza , U.S. President George W. Bush has his own freedom from want he needs to discuss."

Remember November 3rd, 2004? I do... all too well. It was perhaps a day I will painfully never forget. I won't forget waking up and hoping something had changed while I was asleep. Hoping, for a brief fleeting moment, that we would have another "Dewey Beats Truman" moment. It could happen again, couldn't it?

Of course, it wouldn't. And soon the disbelief set it. I was a stranger in my own country.

But now the whole country is beginning to see what 48% of us already knew. The Emperor has no clothes... and no brains, no ideas, no clue of what is going on in his own kingdom.

Read Newsweek's "How Bush Blew It" and you'll see a man dangerously asleep at the wheel. A leader who gloats about not reading the newspaper. No, scratch that. He gloats about not reading. Period.

He's a man surrounded by yes men and women. Gone are the Richard Clarke's, the Colin Powell's and the Paul O'Neil's. Apparently, no one in the Dubya administration had heard about The Bay of Pigs. It's called "groupthink" people. Look it up.

Our "wartime president", our "crisis manager", has been caught with his pants down. It was suppose to be too dangerous to switch horses in midstream. Perhaps the red states can now see that it was actually too dangerous to stay on the horse when it was an arrogant, prickish idiot who was pulling our country into an abyss.

(click read more to continue)

Various news organizations are quoting former first lady Barbara Bush, while touring the hurricane relief centers with her husband George Bush, as saying This is working very well for them.

In a segment on American Public Media's "Marketplace" at the top of the show on the surge of evacuees to Houston, Barbara Bush said:

Almost everyone I’ve talked to says we're going to move to Houston.

What I’m hearing which is sort of scary is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this--this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.

EDIT 5:30pm PST: Crooks and Liars has taken the clip down. I've replaced it with a link from Skoopy.com in case you haven't seen it yet.

In case you're searching the web for this, look no further.

It's perhaps the funniest thing Mike Myers has ever done. Outside of So I Married and Axe Murderer.

Oh, and Kanye, I'm buying Late Registration today. Thanks for saying what most of us knew, but no one would say on national TV.


Click Here. Requires Windows Media Player

Thanks to Skoopy for hosting.

At times when I feel utterly helpless-- and this is certainly one of them-- I find that my only defense is to take in as much news as possible. I can't get enough.

Just in case you're the same way, I've collected my favorite articles, editorials, and resources from various news sources.

Did I miss something important? By all means, please comment with a link!!

New York Times

• Maureen Dowd: United States of Shame
• Paul Krugman: A Can't-Do Government
• Radio Interview with New Orleans Mayor Nagin
• Editorial: Katrina's Assault on Washington

Seattle Post-Intelligencer

• Melanie McFadden: Race, Class, and the Media

I stole this from Operation Yellow Elephant.

I think this speaks for itself.

Wow. I'm just stunned. If you haven't heard yet, you'll hear soon enough. Dubya's approval rating has dropped. Not just the usual drop, they've hit the elusive Watergate zone.

According to the American Research Group we're finally waking up. ARG found in their latest poll that 58% disapprove of the way Dubya is handling his job. Meanwhile, the remaining 36% are either:

• Willfully Ignorant
• North Pole Scientists, unable to get news
• Avid Fox News Fans!
• Strong supporters of the right to life (minus those living in Iraq)
• Zell Miller

From ARG: George W. Bush's overall job approval ratings have dropped from a month ago even as Americans who approve of the way Bush is handling his job as president are turning more optimistic about their personal financial situations according to the latest survey from the American Research Group. Among all Americans, 36% approve of the way Bush is handling his job as president and 58% disapprove. When it comes to Bush's handling of the economy, 33% approve and 62% disapprove.

Can someone say Orange Alert?

Get this: the P-I just reported today that President Bush is asking Washington and Oregon States' damn operators to stop spilling water over the top to let spawning salmon through.

A US District Court judge in Portland ruled a while back that the damns should spill the water, despite the $67 million revenue loss, because it's essential to protect both the health of salmon and the health of the salmon fishing industry.

Bush is asking a higher court to overturn that ruling, because he says that this is a useless waste of potential hydroelectric power, when he's got a salmon scheme that's so crazy it just might work:

A program to divert fish captured in holding tanks at the damns, where they are then trucked or barged to the Columbia River in Oregon.

We are going to spend our taxpayers' money on putting SALMON in TANKS so that they can be DRIVEN in TRUCKS down the RIVER.

Hey Mr. President! Over here! I've got a crazy scheme too:
Let the salmon fucking swim on their own.