the 'drip drip factor '--grand stories on DU today.

[rodeodance]

I have noticed the stories today on DU--which say to me that the BushCo gang is unraveling.
--Add that CNN just said 7 more US troops have died in Irag since Friday (media story posted says 6 this weekend).
---then add the Cindy S. stories to this mix.
Busho Inc is in trouble.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1700458

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/08/14/wirq14.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/14/ixworld.html

Bush slaps down top general after he calls for troops to be pulled out of Iraq
By Philip Sherwell in Washington
(Filed: 14/08/2005)

The top American commander in Iraq has been privately rebuked by the Bush administration for openly discussing plans to reduce troop levels there next year, The Sunday Telegraph has learned.

President George W Bush personally intervened last week to play down as "speculation" all talk of troop pull-outs because he fears that even discussing options for an "exit strategy" implies weakening resolve.
Gen George Casey, the US ground commander in Iraq, was given his dressing-down after he briefed that troop levels - now 138,000 - could be reduced by 30,000 in the early months of next year as Iraqi security forces take on a greater role.

The unusual sign of US discord came as Iraqi politicians and clerics drafting a new constitution continued their own wrangling over autonomy demands by various factions.......



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1700590
Sun Aug-14-05 07:57 AM
U.S. Lowers Sights On What Can Be Achieved in Iraq- WASH. POST

Edited on Sun Aug-14-05 07:59 AM

Administration Is Shedding 'Unreality' That Dominated Invasion, Official Says

By Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 14, 2005; Page A01

The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad.

The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.

By Robin Wright and Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 14, 2005

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...

"What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning." (more)
http://tinyurl.com/dwybp

http://www.daytondailynews.com/localnews/content/localn...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2007296&mesg_id=2007845

>>
>> Sat Aug-13-05 06:52 PM
>> Original message
>> Bush: Can't meet Cindy because he must "go on with my life"
>>
>>
>>
>> Cox News Service
>>
>> CRAWFORD, Texas - President Bush, noting that lots of people want to talk to the president and “it’s also important for me to go on with my life,” on Saturday defended his decision not to meet with the grieving mom of a soldier killed in Iraq.
>>
>> Bush said he is aware of the anti-war sentiments of Cindy Sheehan and others who have joined her protest near the Bush ranch.
>>
>> “But whether it be here or in Washington or anywhere else, there’s somebody who has got something to say to the president, that’s part of the job,” Bush said on the ranch. “And I think it’s important for me to be thoughtful and sensitive to those who have got something to say.”
>>
>> “But,” he added, “I think it’s also important for me to go on with my life, to keep a balanced life.”
>>

[rodeodance]

1. add to this list: Frank Rich to Bush, in the NYTimes: "This war is over"

add:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4343213

Sat Aug-13-05 08:49 PM
Original message
Frank Rich to Bush, in the NYTimes: "This war is over"

Edited on Sat Aug-13-05 08:58 PM by understandinglife
Someone Tell the President the War Is Over

By FRANK RICH

August 14, 2005

LIKE the Japanese soldier marooned on an island for years after V-J Day, President Bush may be the last person in the country to learn that for Americans, if not Iraqis, the war in Iraq is over. "We will stay the course," he insistently tells us from his Texas ranch. What do you mean we, white man?

A president can't stay the course when his own citizens (let alone his own allies) won't stay with him. ....

But our current Texas president has even outdone his predecessor; Mr. Bush has lost not only the country but also his army. .....

<clip>

WHAT lies ahead now in Iraq instead is not victory, which Mr. Bush has never clearly defined anyway, but an exit (or triage) strategy that may echo Johnson's March 1968 plan for retreat from Vietnam: ....

<clip>

Thus the president's claim on Thursday that "no decision has been made yet" about withdrawing troops from Iraq can be taken exactly as seriously as the vice president's preceding fantasy that the insurgency is in its "last throes." The country has already made the decision for Mr. Bush. We're outta there. Now comes the hard task of identifying the leaders who can pick up the pieces of the fiasco that has made us more vulnerable, not less, to the terrorists who struck us four years ago next month.

Link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/opinion/14rich.html?p...

[seemslikeadream]

2. Abramoff being arrested because he was considered a flight risk

was nice to hear also.

And the Franklin indictment

[rodeodance]

3. add: London Times: Britain keeps distance from talk of strike on Iran

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1699998

Sat Aug-13-05 10:15 PM
Original message
London Times: Britain keeps distance from talk of strike on Iran

August 14, 2005
Britain keeps distance from talk of strike on Iran
Andrew Porter and Tom Walker


THE foreign secretary Jack Straw sought to distance Britain yesterday from comments by President George W Bush that he would not rule out a military strike against Iran.

It came as diplomats gave warning that British attempts to solve the crisis prompted by Tehran’s resumption of its nuclear programme last week were doomed to failure.

Bush raised the temperature by giving an interview to Israeli television from his ranch in Crawford, Texas. Asked if he would consider force, he replied: “All options are on the table.” He added: “The use of force is the last option for any president and you know we’ve used force in the recent past to secure our country.”

The Foreign Office reacted swiftly. “Our position is clear and has been made very, very clear by the foreign secretary,” a spokesman said. “We do not think there are any circumstances where military action would be justified against Iran. It does not form part of British foreign policy.”

So soon after the invasion of Iraq, which has led to so much political turmoil for Tony Blair’s administration, Straw is anxious not to be seen trying to talk up any future forays. But some rightwingers in Washington have criticised Straw’s position, saying that every time the foreign secretary rules out any remote chance of military action the Iranians know there is no need to compromise....


http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1734191,00...

[seemslikeadream]

4. Maybe the press will get to the REAL reason Gen. Byrnes was let go

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4340706

[rodeodance]

5. UN nuclear watchdog rebuts claims that Iran is trying to make A-bomb

pre-emptive strike for Cheney--
add to the drip drip

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1699657

Sat Aug-13-05 06:58 PM
Original message
UN nuclear watchdog rebuts claims that Iran is trying to make A-bomb

UN nuclear watchdog rebuts claims that Iran is trying to make A-bomb
By Anne Penketh
Published: 14 August 2005

<snip>

Iran is about to receive a major boost from the results of a scientific analysis that will prove that the country's authorities were telling the truth when they said they were not developing a nuclear weapon. The discovery of traces of weapons-grade uranium in Iran by UN inspectors in August 2003 set off alarm bells in Western capitals where it was feared that Iran was developing a nuclear weapon under cover of a civil programme. The inspectors took the samples from Iran's uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, which had been concealed from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for 18 years.

But Iran maintained that its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes, and that the traces must have been contamination from the Pakistani-based black market network of scientist AQ Khan. He is the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb.

The analysis of components from Pakistan, obtained last May by the IAEA, is now almost complete and is set to conclude that the traces of weapons-grade uranium match those found in Iran. "The investigation is likely to show that they came from Pakistan," a Vienna-based diplomat told The Independent on Sunday.

The new information, which strengthens Iran's case after last week's contentious IAEA board meeting in Vienna, will be a central part of the next report to the board by Mohamed ElBaradei, the IAEA chief. "The biggest single issue of the past two years has now fallen in their favour," the diplomat said. The meeting of the 35-nation board, which ended last Thursday, urged Iran to suspend the uranium-related activity at its Isfahan plant, which many fear will be the first step towards building a nuclear weapon.

(... continues ...)


(From the (UK) Independent on Sunday, at http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article... )

[rodeodance]

6. What's the Bush Admin. Hiding? Everything--Tribune Media Services

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2007731

What's the Bush Admin. Hiding? Everything--Tribune Media Services

Absolutely blistering read.....not much more after the edit, so read the whole thing! Summarizes a lot of the crap nicely for those who are still in love with Bushco....


http://www.herald-mail.com/?module=displaystory&story_i...


Saturday August 13, 2005
What's the Bush administration hiding? Everything
By Robyn Blummer
Tribune Media Services

President Bush has made it a point to bring as much opacity to his administration as possible. To Bush, the public has a right to know . . . very little. His White House is downright allergic to open government.

We saw it with the John Bolton nomination. Bush claimed he wanted his nominee as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations to receive an up or down vote in the Senate, but not enough to turn over the State Department documents that would have brought light to some of Bolton’s controversial actions. Had that material been released, the Democrats blocking Bolton’s confirmation promised to let a vote go forward. But Bush would rather snub the Senate and appoint Bolton during a congressional recess than let the public see the truth of Bolton’s record.

No matter where you look, secrecy is the impulse: from the decree by former Attorney General John Ashcroft encouraging denials of records under the Freedom of Information Act by promising that any defensible refusal would be supported by his office; to the president’s executive order overriding parts of the Presidential Records Act, so that records from past administrations can be indefinitely hidden at the behest of past or current presidents and vice presidents.

SNIP

Everything’s a secret except, of course, the identity of a covert CIA operative whose husband went off script.

Keeping the public in the dark allows the advance of a political agenda without messy facts interfering with the administration’s manipulated ones. When Richard Foster, a top government Medicare cost analyst, determined that adding a prescription drug benefit to Medicare would cost $551 billion over 10 years and not the $395 billion figure supplied to Congress, he was threatened with firing if he revealed the discrepancy. When, last month, an Environmental Protection Agency report on our poor national efforts at fuel economy would have brought inopportune news for the administration just before a vote on the energy bill in Congress, the report was simply pulled until after the vote.

This is all part of a pattern that is illustrative of Bush’s view of the office he holds. Bush’s arrogant swagger is more than a cowboy affectation; it is a state of mind. To Bush, being president is not an act of public service in which you are accountable to the press and the people and are limited by the power of two other governmental branches. It is the anointing of a regent for a four- or eight-year stint. That includes the ability to imprison people at will, to offer untruths without compunction as justifications for war and to spend the entire treasury (and more) without worrying about the consequences. In that now-famous press-conference question, Bush was unable to identify a single mistake he made as president, because monarchs don’t err.

MORE

[seemslikeadream]

7. Fire Rumsfeld

That's what I've been hearing all morning.

[rodeodance]

8. Fox asked--why has he come under fire. but nothing about Firing him.

[rodeodance]

10. add: Miami Herald: Yesterday in Crawford (shrub's "my life" nonsense)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=103&topic_id=147089&mesg_id=147089

Sun Aug-14-05 09:27 AM
Original message
Miami Herald: Yesterday in Crawford (shrub's "my life" nonsense)

(snip)

''Who knew that the beginning of the end of the occupation in Iraq was going to start last Saturday in Crawford, Texas?'' said Sheehan, of Vacaville, Calif., who started the protest Aug. 6 in memory of her 24-year-old son Casey, killed in Iraq last year. ``We're here to change the world.''

In the meantime, President Bush defended staying with his schedule.

`PART OF THE JOB'

Before leaving for a two-hour bike ride with some of his staff and journalists, Bush said he is aware of Sheehan's antiwar sentiments and those others who have joined her protest near his ranch.

''But whether it be here or in Washington or anywhere else, there's somebody who has got something to say to the president, that's part of the job,'' Bush said. ``And I think it's important for me to be thoughtful and sensitive to those who have got something to say. But I think it's also important for me to go on with my life, to keep a balanced life.''........

[seemslikeadream]

12. (Newsweek) Abramoff: More Trouble Ahead?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=1700154&mesg_id=1700154


Abramoff: More Trouble Ahead?
---------------
Newsweek
---------------
Aug. 22, 2005 issue -

(snip)

Abramoff's treatment contrasted with that given his co-defendant, Adam Kidan, who was allowed to show up in court on his own. A senior Justice official says one reason was that some of Abramoff's friends and former colleagues have moved to Israel. "There was concern he could relocate to another country," says the official, who asked not to be identified because the matter involves a pending case. Neal Sonnett, Abramoff's lawyer, called the Feds' tactics "mean-spirited," and says his client is fully ready to show up in court to refute the charges, which involve an allegedly phony $23 million wire transfer to buy a fleet of casino boats.

Another possible reason for the Feds' stance: to pressure Abramoff to cooperate in a broader, D.C.-based probe that could touch members of Congress and Bush administration officials. The probe centers on tens of millions in allegedly inflated lobbying fees Abramoff collected from Indian gaming tribes. But that's not all that's under scrutiny. A lawyer for another client, Tyco International, tells NEWSWEEK that it's turned over to Justice evidence alleging Abramoff defrauded it with a lobbying campaign against legislation to bar federal contracts to U.S. companies, like Tyco, headquartered in overseas tax havens. Tyco, based in Bermuda, paid $1.7 million to Abramoff's firm in 2003 and 2004—plus $1.5 million for a "grass roots" campaign to gin up opposition to the effort among Tyco's domestic suppliers. The Tyco official who hired Abramoff is the firm's general counsel, Tim Flanigan, a former White House lawyer nominated by President Bush for deputy attorney general. Tyco lawyer George Terwilliger says the firm "was a victim of a rip-off." Abramoff, he says, recommended the $1.5 million be paid to Grassroots Interactive, a group that allegedly did little work and later diverted funds for other purposes. Grassroots is "controlled" by Abramoff, says Nathan Lewin, a lawyer for Tyco's registered agent. Abramoff's former law firm has agreed "in principle" to repay the $1.5 million, says a source close to Tyco who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Abramoff, who raised more than $100,000 for Bush's re-election, allegedly told Flanigan he'd lobby White House aide Karl Rove on behalf of Tyco, says the source close to the company. Rove, whose secretary formerly worked for Abramoff, has "never spoken to about any of his clients," says a White House spokeswoman. An Abramoff spokesman and his former law firm declined to comment.

[seemslikeadream]

15. Larry Franklin The Scandal is Bigger Than AIPAC

http://www.alternet.org/story/24011/

First, the indictment says that from "about April 1999 and continuing until on or about August 27, 2004" Franklin, Rosen and Weissman "did unlawfully, knowingly and willfully conspire" in criminal activity against the United States. So far, no one has explained what triggered an investigation that began more than six years ago. But it reveals how long the three indicted conspirators and "others, known and unknown to the Grand Jury," engaged in such criminal activity. In any case, what appeared at first to be a brief dalliance between Franklin and the two AIPAC officials now -- according to the latest indictment, at least -- spans more than five years and involves at least several other individuals, at least some of whom are known to the investigation. What triggered the investigation in 1999, and how much information has FBI surveillance, wiretaps and other investigative efforts collected?

Second, the indictment makes it absolutely clear that the investigation was aimed at AIPAC, not at Franklin. The document charges that Rosen and Weissman met repeatedly with officials from a foreign government (Israel, though not named in the indictment) beginning in 1999, to provide them with classified information. In other words, the FBI was looking into the Israel lobby, not Franklin and the Defense Department, at the start, and Franklin was simply caught up in the net when he made contact with the AIPACers. Rosen and Weissman were observed making illicit contact with several other U.S. officials between 1999 and 2004, although those officials are left unnamed (and unindicted). Might there be more to come? Who are these officials, cited merely as United States Government Official 1, USGO 2, etc.?

Third, Franklin was introduced to Rosen-Weissman when the two AIPACers "called a Department of Defense employee (DOD employee A) at the Pentagon and asked for the name of someone in OSD ISA with an expertise on Iran" and got Franklin's name. Who was "DOD employee A"? Was it Douglas Feith, the undersecretary for policy? Harold Rhode, the ghost-like neocon official who helped Feith assemble the secretive Office of Special Plans, where Franklin worked? The indictment doesn't say. But this reporter observed Franklin, Rhode and Michael Rubin, a former AEI official who served in the Pentagon during this period and then returned to AEI, sitting together side by side, often in the front row, at American Enterprise Institute meetings during 2002-2003. Later in the indictment, we learn that Franklin, Rosen and Weissman hobnobbed with "DOD employee B," too.

Fourth, Rosen and Weissman told Franklin that they would try to get him a job at the White House, on the National Security Council staff. Who did they talk to at the White House, if they followed through? What happened?

Fifth, the charging document refers to "Foreign Official 1," also known as FO-1, obviously referring to an Israeli embassy official or an Israeli intelligence officer. It also refers later to FO-2, FO-3, etc., meaning that other Israeli officials were involved as well. How many Israeli officials are implicated in this, and who are they?

Sixth, was AEI itself involved? The indictment says that "on or about March 13, 2003, Rosen disclosed to a senior fellow at a Washington, D.C., think tank the information relating to the classified draft internal policy document" about Iran. The indictment says that the think tank official agreed "to follow up and see what he could do." Which think tank, and who was involved?

The indictment is rich with other detail, including specific instances in which the indicted parties lied to the FBI about their activities. It describes how Franklin eventually set up a regular liaison with an Israeli official ("FO-3") and met him in Virginia "and elsewhere" to communicate U.S. secrets.

[wicket]

9. kicked and nominated

:kick:

[priller]

11. The WaPo article is quite revealing, yet I disagree with a few things

For example, this paragraph:

The United States had high hopes of quick, big-budget fixes for the electrical power system that would show Iraqis tangible benefits from the ouster of Hussein. But inadequate training for Iraqi staff, regional rivalries restricting the power flow to Baghdad, inadequate fuel for electrical generators and attacks on the infrastructure have contributed to the worst summer of electrical shortages in the capital.

But they left off some of the biggest reasons that rebuilding has gone awry: that the CPA was filled with young, inexperienced BushBots who imcompetently managed the contracts; that the process for awarding contracts was more concerned with cronyism and paying back GOP contributors than getting the job done; that the contract winnners pocketed the bulk of the money and sub-contracted the real work to local outfits for pennies.

Curious why not one word was mentioned about the problems with the firms supposed to be doing the actual work.

[rodeodance]

17. good eye--

[roseBudd]

24. they hired home schooled evangelicals straight from the Heritage

Foundation.

[quaoar]

13. Meanwhile, on Fox

The latest on Natalee Holloway.

[ellenfl]

14. when i click on the second link, i get the message

'invalid story'. whats that about?

works now.

ellen fl

[rodeodance]

16. yes, working now--full link below (great headline btw)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/08/14/wirq14.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/14/ixworld.html

[OneTwentyoNine]

18. How would you like to be a General and get pimp slapped by Bush?

Man..that would take some profiles in courage.

Draft dodger,Chicken Hawk,AWOL and stripped of his wings Bush tells a General serving in Iraq to shut the hell up about any troop withdrawls.

[Karenina]

19. Germany Rejects Iran Military option

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1698627

[rodeodance]

20. Papers Increasingly Note Antiwar Views in Covering Funerals of the Fallen

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1701512
Sun Aug-14-05 05:09 PM
Original message
Papers Increasingly Note Antiwar Views in Covering Funerals of the Fallen

Published: August 14, 2005 11:30 PM ET

NEW YORK In a departure from past policies, newspapers around the country, with the U.S. death toll in Iraq again soaring, increasingly are reporting the antiwar sentiments of family members of the deceased in their coverage of funerals. The latest example comes from the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader on Sunday.

It concerns the funeral of Lance Cpl. Chase Johnson Comley. The story notes that “in a departure from the norm in Kentucky -- one of the reddest of red states -- some of Comley's relatives, including a few sitting in the front pews, have spoken out strongly against the Bush administration and the war that took the 21-year-old Marine's life.”

Comley's grandmother, 80-year-old Geraldine Comley of Versailles, described herself as a former Republican stalwart who is "on a rampage" against the president and the war.

"When someone gets up and says 'My son died for our freedom,' or I get a sympathy card that says that, I can hardly bear it," Geraldine Comley said. She added that she would like nothing better than to join Cindy Sheehan, who has been holding a protest outside President Bush's ranch in Texas.

http://209.11.49.220/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu...

[rodeodance]

21. hey--it has, overall, been a good day--things are a dripping!!

[rodeodance]

22. Judith Miller 'Opus' Makes the Comics Page

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x147211

http://www.uclick.com/client/wpc/wpopu/

[rodeodance]

23. Anti-war protests swell outside Bush ranch

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050814/ts_alt_afp/usiraq_050814030929;_ylt=Ani8VaY_MD6LVVfrzwfusHis0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MjBwMWtkBHNlYwM3MTg-
Anti-war protests swell outside Bush ranch

Sat Aug 13,11:09 PM ET

CRAWFORD, Texas, (AFP) - Anti-war protests swelled outside
President George W. Bush's Texas ranch, as US officials reportedly worked behind the scenes to get
Iraq's new constitution ready by its Monday deadline.

With the deadline looming for what the Bush administration sees as a key landmark in Iraq's recovery, the US has become more involved in the push to produce a draft constitution on time, The Washington Post reported Saturday.

[Independent_Liberal]

25. Drip, drip, drip...

Like a leaky faucet.

:)