Molly Ivins: "DAMMIT ALL TO HELL I told you so!!!"

[Bluebear]

AUSTIN, Texas -- Here's a good idea: Consumer groups and progressive congressfolks have joined in an effort to stop hundreds of thousands of victims of Hurricane Katrina from being further harmed by the new Bankruptcy Act, scheduled to take effect Oct. 17. This law was notoriously written of, by and for the consumer credit industry, and is particularly onerous for the poor.

The bill was passed with massive support from the Republican leadership in Congress and from a disgusting number of sellout Democrats. While it was being considered in committee earlier this year, Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee offered an amendment to protect victims of natural disasters. It was defeated, without debate, on a party-line vote. Now, Congress has a chance to rethink some of the most punitive parts of the bill. Katrina victims who were planning to file before the new law goes into effect are s.o.l. -- where they gonna find a lawyer, let alone an open courthouse?.....


Meanwhile, it's an ill wind that blows no one good, so we should not be surprised to learn the first winner out of the gate on Katrina is none other than the Halliburton Co., whose deserving subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root has already been granted a $29.8 million contract for cleanup work in the wake of Katrina. .......

Many a time in the past six years I have bit my tongue so I wouldn't annoy people with the always obnoxious observation, "I told you so." But, dammit it all to hell, I did tell you, and I've been telling you since 1994, and I am so sick of this man and everything he represents -- all the sleazy, smug, self-righteous graft and corruption and "Christian" moralizing and cynicism and tax cuts for all his smug, rich buddies.

Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention.

http://www.creators.com/opinion_show.cfm?columnsName=miv

[rateyes]

1. Molly Ivins is a great American!

Tells it like it is.

[Shrek]

2. But she she ever tell us that?

Sorry, but I've been a little skeptical ever since I saw this article from back in 2000. Not much of an anti-Bush stem-winder, if you ask me.

My fellow Democrats: Do not flee to Canada yet! George W. Bush is not stupid, and he is not mean.

(snip)

What I want to argue seriously here is that we have evidence that W. Bush learns, he learns fast, and then he is Not Bad. He has a consistent pattern of searching out father figures as mentors in each field he's tried, and he's always selected good ones. In Texas he chose (or was chosen by; let's keep that open) lieutenant governor Bob Bullock, one of the shrewdest s.o.b.s who ever walked. Let's just say that if Bush had studied politics under Lyndon Johnson or Machiavelli, he couldn't have done better. Dick Cheney is apparently the new mentor, and I'm favorably impressed, certainly by Cheney's demeanor; one worries because his voting record is so nutsoid.

(snip)

But he can learn, and if there's anything that will rivet your attention, it's the challenges of the presidency. I think that when W. Bush is there, he's paying attention, he's heard the arguments (short form please, attention span not that long), and he is Not Bad.

[IndyOp]

4. Hmmm - disappointing for sure -- maybe it's Molly who has

learned fast - since 2000... :shrug:

But, girl 'o girl - has SHE LEARNED --

I am so sick of this man and everything he represents -- all the sleazy, smug, self-righteous graft and corruption, "Christian" moralizing, and cynicism, and tax cuts for all his smug, rich buddies.

:woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:


Okay Molly -- now tell us what you *really* think!!

[garthranzz]

5. And yet in Shrub: The Short, Happy Political Life...

she makes it clear how much she distrusts him. His incompetence is evident. And in Bushwhacked, she goes even further. That's page after page of indictments. I suspect that article was post Florida wishful thinking.

:shrug:

She, Krugman and Dowd are the only commentators I read "religiously" - and in that order.

[Beaverhausen]

6. Ever read her book Bushwacked?

[lebkuchen]

32. Yes, and she did tell us so.

[Mend]

7. this is the Molly Ivins I remember way back before the first election

she was NOT alarmed by bush, painted him as a nice guy to have a beer with, although she of course didn't agree with his policies. But I am positive she used to say he was nice and relatively harmless. I love Molly but I always wondered about that and assumed it was a Texas thing.

[Vox_Reason]

13. Read "Bushwhacked"

A pretty scathing indictment of years of B*sh evil and incompetence from someone who's known him for decades.

[Mend]

18. "Bushwacked" was published in 2003...."Shrub" in 2000

Sorry, but go read the review on Amazon or Barnes and Noble....before the first election, she was not totally against bush and even praised his educational policies. Honest.

[Vox_Reason]

21. Granted.

I wasn't arguing with you that Molly wasn't as anti-Bush pre-2000; just recommending the book, really.
:toast:

[AnneD]

28. Let's add a little perspective...

Bush was an ok gov because, frankly, we don't give our govs too much power. He did give teachers a raise (alway a good thang when you rank 38th in the nation) and encouraged higher standards in education (again a good thang).
HOWEVER, when he and Rove got to DC they joined Cheney, Rumsfield, et al, our once amiable neutered gov grew a more arrogant attitude and a set of cold brass balls. Truly the Peter Principle (puns intended) in effect.
Personally I disliked Bush as an arrogant spoiled party boy and member of the lucky genes club that tried to live up to daddy's rep and never will. I have never ever voted for a Bush because I have read through them from day one. I guess Molly was being more charitable than I ever would have been.

[KayLaw]

10. I confess

I'm too lazy to read the article, but I remember her writing that he didn't steal the 2000 election, and that Bush wasn't so bad. . . and something about him liking cats. Okey-dokey, then. . .

[I Have A Dream]

16. She wrote this after he already "won" in 2000. The last paragraph...

of the article is as follows:

I could be wrong, of course, and if Bush's first nomination to the Supreme Court is Edith Jones (who recently held that if your lawyer sleeps through your trial, at least you had one, so what the hell difference does it make?), run for the border; Canada is our most important neighbor to the north.

She didn't support him for president. She was just saying that maybe we're wrong about him so we should not move to Canada yet. (We weren't!)

The link to the article is here for anyone else who might be interested:
http://www.time.com/time/poy2000/mag/ivins.html

[proud2BlibKansan]

19. Interesting final paragraph

I could be wrong, of course, and if Bush's first nomination to the Supreme Court is Edith Jones (who recently held that if your lawyer sleeps through your trial, at least you had one, so what the hell difference does it make?), run for the border; Canada is our most important neighbor to the north.

[jackster]

20. self delete

[mattclearing]

25. That article was also part of her book Shrub, which detailed

the stories of Harken Energy, Arbusto, the National Guard issue, the Rangers Stadium land grab and a number of other issues the national public had no idea about when Bush ran for President.

That's a very selective quote from a body of work that was wholly damning.

[Tigress DEM]

26. Many times. Bushwhacked includes stupid stuff he did in 2001

including forestalling signing energy assistance extension until Feb 01 so it didn't go into effect until Apr 01 and people froze to death due to his incompetence and stupidity.

[Demoiselle]

31. She was condemning W all the while he was Texas governor....

AND she warned us about him all through the 2000 election. I've collected most of her stuff about him.... Taken with everthing else she's written about him, this column is an "outlyer", to use pollster vernacular. And note, please, she says "Do not flee to Canada YET!" (My caps.) This was published after the Supreme Court decision, for sure, trying to keep us all from slashing our wrists. Please cut her a break.

[jmowreader]

33. The weasel phrase from hell: "when W. Bush is there."

What saves Molly's bacon here is that W. Bush has NOT been there since January 2001.

George W. Bush does not want to be president. Oh, he wants the title of president, but he doesn't want to "be" the president.

[bluestateguy]

3. I say I told you so all the time

When soldiers are killed in Iraq, when gas goes up to $3, when the deficit goes up to 500 billion.

I say it a lot, and I frankly hope it makes people angry too.

[Hissyspit]

17. No WMDs, no connection to 9/11, there will be an insurgency, THREE

possible Supreme Court replacements, 9/11, the attacks on science, the stolen elections.

I TOLD YOU SO and you are right. It pisses people off and I don't have many friends anymore. But I keep being proved F*CKING right. It doesn't make me HAPPY or anything. Oh well, never had many friends to begin with anyway, so...

[CoffeeCat]

8. The local NOLA politicians need to DEMAND...

...that Hall-itosis-burton get the fuck out of the state!!!

I share Molly's outrage!

Why the fuck is Halliburton allowed to do this????

They don't even hide their corruption and greed any longer. They just swoop in and start raking in the cash.

Everyone in this country should demand that Halliburton get the hell out of the Gulf!!!

(I never swear, except on this site!)

[Jane Austin]

9. Maybe Louisiana has a law about not doing state business with

companies that have defrauded citizens of that state - - and that would be everybody there.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

11. Talk about Hair on Fire!!! Molly Ivins did everything a person could

possibly do to alert the country and the media about George Bush. The biggest question for me will always be - why did the media as a whole make such a concerted effort to give him a pass?

[WiseButAngrySara]

12. Molly expresses my opinions so beautifully! Kick and recommended!

:kick:

[glitch]

14. So, he doesn't have a good heart, God bless him?

Sorry, but every time Molly said it I cringed. It gave him an out I felt he did not deserve.

This is so much more like it, it sings to me:

"I am so sick of this man and everything he represents -- all the sleazy, smug, self-righteous graft and corruption and "Christian" moralizing and cynicism and tax cuts for all his smug, rich buddies."

Self-righteous graft and corruption are totally incompatible with a good heart.
I think now I'll be able, and happy, to listen to Molly again.

[Hissyspit]

15. Molly, that is basically my conversations for the past few years:

With friends, family, students, enemies... "Look, I don't to mean to be sanctimonious or to say I told you so, but I FUCKING TOLD YOU SO!!!" AND STILL YOU ARGUE WITH ME, and nit-pick, etc.

I know how she feels. I have been in I TOLD YOU SO mode for quite a while.

[faithnotgreed]

22. kick for molly and so much truth

[Just Me]

23. Haven't we ALL been patiently yet passionately INFORMING others,...

,...that this circle of corruption are greedy, evil bastards who don't give a rat's ass about America or her people?

I seriously identify with where she is coming from. I HATE doing a, "I told you so". But, damnit to hell, people were refusing to listen, refusing to acknowledge what was right in front of their noses!!!

Damn!!! Molly, I know EXACTLY where you are coming from!!!

[txindy]

24. An awful lot of us in Texas said the same thing long before 2000

But we had no way of getting the word out back then. At least, no way that is as effective as DU or the message boards and blogs that exist today. I personally told EVERYBODY I knew outside of Texas to NOT vote for the fake cowboy, but many responded with, "But...." and they'd list all of his carefully-choreographed propaganda, like NCLB. :eyes:

I could spend every minute of every day saying, "I told you so," but I would just succeed in driving myself even battier than I am right now. ;) The anger at people who did not listen when they were warned again and again has not gone away. In fact, it has gotten much, much worse. I respect those I know who have admitted they made a big mistake voting for that criminal, but I'll never stop being angry at them for what they helped enable. The death and destruction (of all kinds) has been too great.

[fortyfeetunder]

27. I share Molly's anger

The bankruptcy bill hasn't even been touched lately. And I fear it will go into effect and screw nearly every Hurricane Katrina victim who was on the edge or brought to the edge.

[Cyrano]

29. I love Molly. She once said that if everyone had read "Shrub,"

she wouldn't have had to write "Bushwhacked."

Molly Ivins (and Willy Nelson) are just a couple of the reasons I can think of that Texas shouldn't be destroyed by fire and brimstone.

[dogday]

30. Molly is Mad

I love her writing and yes she is right.

[fearnobush]

34. "Dammit all to Hell" This what happens when a Chimp is in control.

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