Summer Bits
I was listening to the radio yesterday and heard something new. There's a movement, who knows how big, to draft Al Gore as the next Democratic candidate for president. Well, that's fair, though I don't think he's actually willing to run. The radio ad sounded like it had been recorded in someone's basement using a cassette recorder. I had to laugh, though, when I heard the tag line: "He won it once, and he can do it again." Amen to that.
Item #2. I fear we're going to see the following scene every day during the remainder of the Bush administration. Former officials with vague connections to the political side of the White House are suffering from group amnesia, a little like those bad soap opera plots. Today, it was Sara Taylor, former political hack, who made an effort to match Alberto Gonzales' record for memory failure in regard to the US attorney investigation. And just in case she did remember, she had a written demand from the White House counsel that she not answer certain questions anyway. It seems like a pretty smart strategy - what's to talk or write about when nothing gets revealed?
Item #3. Remember the Democratic threat to de-fund the Vice President's office based on Mr. Cheney's bizarre claim that his office is not part of the Executive Branch? The plan to de-fund may not finally succeed, but it did pass one vote in committee. Could you imagine Cheney & Co. hiding their faces (to keep everything secret, of course) going in and out of a closed-down department store space in a shaky end of Washington D. C.? It would be a little like requiring his Veepness to hunt birds in season like "the public". How icky.
Item #4. Mr. Chertoff, the Secretary of Home Security nicknamed "Skeletor" for his lean and hairless visage, opined yesterday that there might be terror plots aimed at the US this summer, but gave no evidence or further explanation. Such announcements in the past have tended to show up when the President's popularity dipped. Someone should produce a chart of terror alerts as compared to Bush's popularity. My guess is that the two charts would form a kind argyle pattern. You don't think so? Bush's positive numbers yesterday reached 29%, a new low.
Item #5. Just to remind folks that someone hasn't forgotten. No apology has yet been offered to Valerie Plame or Joe Wilson for "outing" Mrs. Wilson in violation of the law as a CIA employee who had worked under the cover of a shell company called "Brewster Jennings". I'm also not aware of any apology to dead former B-J operatives' families as a result of assassination leading from the government-led leak. But that, too, is no doubt a secret, right?
Item #2. I fear we're going to see the following scene every day during the remainder of the Bush administration. Former officials with vague connections to the political side of the White House are suffering from group amnesia, a little like those bad soap opera plots. Today, it was Sara Taylor, former political hack, who made an effort to match Alberto Gonzales' record for memory failure in regard to the US attorney investigation. And just in case she did remember, she had a written demand from the White House counsel that she not answer certain questions anyway. It seems like a pretty smart strategy - what's to talk or write about when nothing gets revealed?
Item #3. Remember the Democratic threat to de-fund the Vice President's office based on Mr. Cheney's bizarre claim that his office is not part of the Executive Branch? The plan to de-fund may not finally succeed, but it did pass one vote in committee. Could you imagine Cheney & Co. hiding their faces (to keep everything secret, of course) going in and out of a closed-down department store space in a shaky end of Washington D. C.? It would be a little like requiring his Veepness to hunt birds in season like "the public". How icky.
Item #4. Mr. Chertoff, the Secretary of Home Security nicknamed "Skeletor" for his lean and hairless visage, opined yesterday that there might be terror plots aimed at the US this summer, but gave no evidence or further explanation. Such announcements in the past have tended to show up when the President's popularity dipped. Someone should produce a chart of terror alerts as compared to Bush's popularity. My guess is that the two charts would form a kind argyle pattern. You don't think so? Bush's positive numbers yesterday reached 29%, a new low.
Item #5. Just to remind folks that someone hasn't forgotten. No apology has yet been offered to Valerie Plame or Joe Wilson for "outing" Mrs. Wilson in violation of the law as a CIA employee who had worked under the cover of a shell company called "Brewster Jennings". I'm also not aware of any apology to dead former B-J operatives' families as a result of assassination leading from the government-led leak. But that, too, is no doubt a secret, right?
posted by Mark at 11:11 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home