The Bush Legacy

Let start 2009 right, shall we?

You know what I’m sick and tired of?

Republicans.

That’s right, I’m fed right up to here with these small-minded, self-righteous, bigoted bastards.

I’m sick of Republicans telling me that I should love it or leave it. I’m tired of Republicans telling me to move to Canada. I’m tired of Republicans telling me what to think – or rather NOT to think, at all. I’m fed up with Republicans telling me what to believe. I’m tired of Republicans telling me who to hate. I’m tired of Republican attempts to rewrite US history in their own image. I’m tired of Republicans deciding who gets to be an American, who gets to marry, who gets life, liberty, and happiness. I am utterly sick and tired of Republicans and their creationist bible waving bullshit who keep trying to shove their pinheaded version of Christianity down my throat. I am sick and tired of Republicans who glory in ignorance and revel in stupidity and want to drag everybody else down to their unthinking level. I am sick and tired of Republicans who thump their chests endlessly about patriotism while not having ever served, not one damned day – unless it was to hide in the National Guard or behind a rich-kid’s draft deferment during Vietnam and then brag about their “service” for the next forty years. I’m sick and tired of watching Republicans gibber in fear like panicked monkeys and reject science that could save my life or let my son live forever or keep a hundred thousand people a year from losing their minds to dementia. And I am sick and tired and fed the hell up with Republicans who manage to shit all over the Constitution at every single opportunity, and then wipe their dirty asses with it on the way out the door.

Yes, I’m sick and Goddamned tired of Republicans and the Republican Party and this jackass of a NeoCon Republican President.

The single best thing about 2009 is that it begins with the end of the absolute worst administration in US history. Bush and his cronies are certain that history will vindicate their actions. Bullshit. The only way history will look favorably on this band of dipshits is if they get to write it – and don’t think they won’t try. They’ve spent eight years blaming Clinton or Congress for their own failings, but it was George W. Bush who personally sent us into an unjustified mismanaged war in two countries – oh yes, it was. Bush demanded the power to personally wage war from Congress, and he got it, and everything that has transpired since is his doing. He can blame whomever he likes, but he gave the orders. It was Bush who sent troops to war without a plan, without armor, without equipment, and without the numbers necessary to hold the ground they had taken – and it was Bush who gave the order to hide away in shame the returning body bags at Dover AFB. It was Bush who implemented torture as a national policy. It was Bush who catered to his rich friends on Wall Street while the economy collapsed. It was Bush who led us into Recession with a capital “R.” It was Bush who tore the Constitution to shreds and said it was nothing more than a piece of paper. It was George Bush’s foreign policy that is responsible for a massive rise in anti-Americanism. It was Bush who implemented faith based programs that have failed utterly to achieve any goals whatsoever and yet have cost us billions. It is George Bush’s education programs that are based on worthless testing programs and ignorance and that pander to the lowest common denominator. It was on George Bush’s watch that millions became homeless and jobless, and the US debt and deficit grew to the largest in history by an order of magnitude – fully eight years after Clinton left office with the lowest unemployment rate and a treasury surplus. It was George Bush, the failed Texas oil man, who’s energy policies led to the energy crises.

Republicans can spin it however they like, but that is George W. Bush’s legacy.

And it’s not over yet.

We’ve got twenty more days of this Neocon Republican bastard, this ignorant, uneducated, backward-assed, inbred, born-again, holier-than-thou, pudding-for-brains, squinty-eyed, pointy-toed, ten-gallon hat wearing chimpanzee of a president – and he is bound and determined to rape this country for all it’s worth right up until he hands over the keys to the Resolute Desk.

His administration got handed the single largest vote of no confidence in recent history. His approval ratings are the lowest, by a significant margin, than any other president in history. The overwhelming majority of American voters clearly, clearly, expressed disdain and disapproval of his policies, actions, ideals – and party. And this means nothing whatsoever to him. Nothing. It means nothing because Bush has never represented the people of the United States, and he has never understood either his office nor the oath he swore. George W. Bush represents the Republican party, the NeoCons in particular, and his rich and privileged friends – and the rest of us can go fuck ourselves.

Don’t believe me?

He’s handing out get-out-of-jail free cards faster than a corrupt conservative judge being backmailed for a gay kiddie porn habit – funny, how it’s his administration’s chief advisors, the holier-than-thou fundies, who need pardons, isn’t it? He’s managed to gut the Endangered Species Act in a enthusiastic display of oral gratification for his buddies in Big Coal, Big Oil, Big Agriculture, and Big Chemical. Screw the environment, screw the future, screw the National Parks and our children’s legacy – when the seas rise and the crops fail and we’re choking in our own shit, Republicans will blame Clinton – or Obama – and pray to Jebus to make it all better. He created a rule last month that limited vision and dental care for more than 50 million low-income Americans. Fuck the poor, if they can’t see and can’t bite, they can’t cause problems. He personally signed a rule into effect that raised co-payments for Medicaid, forcing families already below the poverty line to pay up to 10% for doctor visits and medicine – while handing out tax breaks for the rich. He’s pushing to get new national security rules in place prior to January 20th, rules that would lock in extra-constitutional domestic spying and repeal the backbone of Constitutional law enforcement by allowing state and local law enforcement agencies to engage in direct warrantless monitoring of American citizens, essentially becoming a new arm of US Federal intelligence operations and little different from Secret Police in a country where everyone is a suspect. Bush signed a regulation, written in secret and bypassing review by any federal agency, greatly expanding work place health and safety investigative red tape which will add years and significant expense to the regulatory process – basically hamstringing the government’s ability to protect workers from exposure to toxic workplace environments. And as a final screw you to Organized Labor who voted against the Republican’s chosen heir, Bush gutted the Family and Medical Leave Act – once again demonstrating that NeoCon fundies only give the Jesus love to ‘families’ outside an abortion clinic, once the kid is born it can go fuck itself right along with the rest of us. This same new regulation also implements a labor rule that has been repeatedly struck down by the courts and lawmakers which allows trucking companies to put their drivers behind the wheel for eleven hours, vice the current eight, and reduces the amount of downtime between sustained hauls to 34 hours – in a move virtually guaranteed to kill more motorists.

It’s true that every president in recent history has implemented “midnight regulations'” in their final days in office, but Bush is signing regulations into what is essentially an override of the Constitution at a far, far, far greater volume than ever before – and he is specifically signing regulations that specifically support the Republican NeoCon Agenda and are against what the overwhelming majority of American voters have clearly said they want by electing Barack Obama.

As a final noxious example: Bush is currently expected to sign a midnight regulation specifically designed to impose by fiat the NeoCon Republican Christian Conservative agenda on all Americans. It’s a new Department of Health and Human Services rule that allows any healthcare worker who morally objects to any medical procedure or service to legally refuse to perform it or take part in any way. This is far, far more than doctors having the right not to perform abortions or pharmacists refusing to dispense birth control pills – this regulation allows anyone involved in ‘healthcare’ to refuse service if they claim moral objection. Anyone. In other words, it allows for legal racism, sexism, ageism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, and every other form of bigotry and intolerance that is currently illegal. Under this regulation, janitors in hospitals could refuse to clean the rooms of gay patients if they object to the patient’s lifestyle, food services could refuse to feed them, the nurse could refuse to respond to the call button or refuse to dispense medication she finds objectionable. Doctors could refuse to treat women they feel are engaged in amoral behavior, such as having sex outside of marriage, or having the wrong kind of sex – the right kind being defined specifically by the healthcare provider, any healthcare provider. Ambulances drivers can refuse to respond to emergencies at gay clubs or Jewish homes or that of a black man who in their eyes is the Son of Hamm. A hospital could refuse admission to a wounded soldier, if the on-call emergency room doctor is morally opposed to violence. Sound extreme? Think about the lawsuits currently on the books, think about the stupid selfish things you see people do every day. Think about how people are treated in fundamentalist religious countries. Then tell me it won’t happen. The regulation was designed specifically to protect solely the rights of Christian Conservatives, republicans all, who object to lifestyles not approved by their particular fundamentalist church. Not the rights of all Americans, but solely the rights of Christian Conservatives. Ironically, however, because it is so vaguely worded it would allow Jewish, Muslim, or atheist doctors to refuse treatment to fundamentalist Christians as well – which the mere thought of outrages Christians Conservatives, who seem to suffer a persecution complex and are incapable of understanding the definition of the word “Hypocrisy” or that passage in their own bible about a certain beam and a certain eye. Imagine if this practice were allowed outside of the healthcare profession, firefighters could refuse to respond to a fire at a gay couple’s home. The electric company could refuse to provide service to a straight couple who were living together without being married, so could the cable company, or the gas company, and so on. Understand, the company couldn’t discriminate, that would be illegal, but you can’t refuse to hire people based on their religious beliefs and if the company didn’t happen to have any service people who were willing to perform the service… Again, tell me it won’t happen. Go on tell me again about Christian morality.

January 20th cannot come fast enough for me.

Farewell, Whateveresque

You know, this thread epitomizes why I've pretty much lost interest in Scalzi's Whateveresque.

Normally this is the type of conversation and subject matter I'd be intensely interested in - but this is also the type of conversation that seems to attract self-absorbed asshats the way flies are attracted to the shit buffet. This conversation started out interesting - and then almost immediately attracted the attention of two resident dickheads who expend a tremendous amount of time bashing each other and engaging in ad hominem attacks. And when they do talk about the subject at hand, they engage in pompous pseudo-intellectual pronouncements - the kind people make when they're either trying to start a fight, or when they are more interested in showing how big their reproductive organs are, instead of actually having a conversation. Both of these pompous jerks consistently show a complete lack of respect for any opinion other than their own. It's like being trapped on a bus with a bunch of teenagers.

I despise such nonsense. I've got enough assholes in my life, I don't have to to go looking for them. And I'm tired of having to tell these two idiots to shut up so the adults can talk. Their grandstanding bullshit constantly drives away those that I'd really like to talk to. The forum host doesn't seem inclined to do much about it, and that's his choice of course. But frankly the whole thing just turns me off.

Bill Cosby used to tell this joke: "So I asked this guy, why do you do cocaine? And he said, because it intensifies my personality. Intensifies your personality? Yeah, but what if you're an asshole?"

That's how I often see online conversations. Like cocaine. It strips away the thin veneer of civilization and exposes what's underneath. If you're a relatively decent person, you're still a relatively decent person online. But, if underneath it all, you're an asshole - well then that becomes exceedingly clear online. If, in person, you're the kind of guy who craves the approval of others yet states loudly 'I don't care what other people think of me' or better yet, 'I didn't come here to be liked' then online you're going to be an insufferable asshole who has a pathological need to be right all of the time. If, in person, you're the kind of boorish oaf who always has to be the center of attention, then online you're going to be that irritating jerk who always has to have the last word, always. And just like cocaine, if you're addicted to it - then you've become a liability to those around you. People start crossing the street to avoid your loud, boorish, coked-up assholiness.

And sadly, that's how it is for me and the Whateveresque. The esque is like a club that's been around for too long - it used to be fun, and interesting, and cool things happened there. Then the assholes showed up and started snorting coke in the bathroom and fighting on the dance floor.

It was fun while it lasted and I may look in occasionally, but I'm not sticking around anymore.

What in the hell did I do with it?

You know you're getting older when you misplace expensive software.

I still can't find the double dammed Corel Paintshop CD. I have no idea what I did with it. This is seriously starting to harsh my mellow.

Update: I just realized that you also know you're getting older when you use phrases like "harsh my mellow." Sigh

The Rushes

You know, some things just frustrate me.

I came across this group, The Rushes, a little band out of London. Check out that first song on the mySpace player, What You Waiting For. I really like that tune, and I'd really, really like to buy the album. But it's only available, apparently, on iTunes - which for previously stated reasons, doesn't work for me. Argh!

If anybody can figure out how I can get this album, I'd be grateful.

Intermittent Internet Today

It's windy and has been raining for the last week, you know what season that is: GCI Cable Company Annual Intermittent Service Month. My connection has been down all morning. It's up at the moment, obviously. But the Modem Cable Light is blinking unsteadily. So if you don't hear from me for a while, that's the problem.

Also, a contributing factor may be the couple of small earthquakes we've had over the last 24 hours. Sympathetic fault slips from the big one on the other side of the Pacific Plate I'm guessing. I live directly on top of the Knik Fault, but so far that one hasn't moved. I can't connect to the Alaska Earthquake center long enough to find out what the full story is. Ah the joy of living in rural Alaska. We're used to it. Anyway, no interweebs gives me an excuse to clean closets today, so you know, it's not a wasted day.

I typed this up in advance, in case you're wondering, and sent it as soon as I had a momentary connection. See you all later.

Iraq, More of the Same

We're into the second day of testimony in the Iraq Hearing. The Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee called it the “most important hearing of the year.” Exactly what is so dammed important about it, I cannot fathom. As I said in the previous post, tell us something we don’t know. Let’s recap so far:

- The troop surge ordered by President Bush is: (a) working exactly according to plan. Security is better than is has been in two years, the insurgency is crushed, de-baathification is well on its way, and the Iraqi government is making significant gains. Or, (b) an abysmal failure. (c) Maybe somewhere in between.

- Troops will begin returning home: (a) eventually, but not any time soon. Withdrawal starts when the job, as the White House defines it, is done. (b) Eventually, after the Democrats take over the White House in 2008. (c) Never.

- The al-Maliki government is: (a) working diligently to build a representative democracy based on peace and harmony for all Iraqis, or (b) An ineffective, corrupt, clueless piece of shit.

- Protesters will: (a) not be tolerated, (b) provide an amusing diversion from this circus.

- Senator Craig is: (a) a repressed, hypocritical, two-faced, bullshit artist, (b) uh…there is no (b). Note, this has nothing to do with the proceedings, but it’s my blog and I think it needs to be said as often as possible.

- And finally, any statement, no matter how hypocritical, crass, defeatist, or vitriolic will be considered patriotic as long as you begin the statement by thanking “our brave troops for their sacrifice.”

As I said, tell us something we don’t know. After watching this painful nonsense for two days, I have come to the following conclusion: the entire farce was staged as a bi-partisan effort to provide a source of quotes for both parties’ presidential candidates. Let’s take a look at a few, shall we?

"Changing the definition of success to stay the course with the wrong policy is the wrong course for our troops and our national security. The time to end the surge and to start bringing our troops home is now — not six months from now." Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.
Thanks Barak, you’re a prince. While I understand your basic gist here, you’ve got no business using the “our troops” card as justification for cutting and running. You want to pull out? Fine, but do it because that’s what you think is right, not for us. Don’t use the military as an excuse, that’s the coward’s way out and you’re better than that. Also, I’d like to know exactly how bringing our troops home now will improve our national security, unless you mean play on public sentiment to get elected President?

"I don't think there is any doubt that it's good news that he feels we will be able to withdraw some troops ... To change the strategy from the surge would be a terrific mistake." Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.
What? As usual, McCain will say just about anything to get elected. I'm surprised he didn't advocate torture and a border fence.

"Our troops who have performed heroically and have done everything they've been asked to do in Iraq have no business refereeing an Iraqi civil war ... It is up to the Iraqis to make the decisions as to how they will stabilize their own country." Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y
It’s up to the Iraqis? Well, jeez, Hillary, but if you were paying attention you’d know that the Iraqis had a stable country before we came along and blew it up. I’m not saying it was admirable, I’m saying it was stable. Right or wrong, we made this bed and we have to lay in it. But at least you invoked “our heroic troops” before saying something crass, so I guess you get a pass on this one.

"General Petraeus' report strengthens my conviction that we can achieve our objectives in Iraq and that we must not withdraw precipitously. He and Ambassador Crocker gave a candid assessment, and I believe General Petraeus when he says that the security situation is improving and momentum is now on our side." Ronald Reagan, ur, sorry, Fred Thompson.
Well, Fred, if you consider the vague and evasive statements we’ve been listening to for two days “candid” I guess you really are the second coming of Reagan. Good luck with that.

"I am saddened, but not surprised, by the recommendations of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker on Iraq. I do not question the integrity or competence of these gentlemen, but the strategy George Bush and Dick Cheney have asked them to execute has failed. The course General Petraeus has recommended we take — more of the same — is unacceptable, irresponsible and dangerous." —Gov. Bill Richardson, D-NM
Uh, Bill? Just so I’ve got this straight, you don’t question Gen Petraeus’ integrity or competence, but you think his professional recommendations are unacceptable, irresponsible, and dangerous? Exactly what, then, is your definition of competence? Because I thought it was something else.

"Today's testimony from General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker confirms the progress being made by our troops in Iraq. This is good news for Americans and Iraqis. The importance of a successful conclusion to Iraq must be weighed in light of the global threat of violent Jihad and terror. America must continue its commitment to the strategy General Petraeus is executing." Mitt Romney, MA-R
Well, at least it’s good news. But that’s Mitt for you, a glass half full kind’ve guy.

"Congress must now decide whether they will serve the American people or simply follow the same Beltway mentality that has led to more inaction on Iraq. Even in the face of rising American causalities, greater civil unrest and no political progress, the Congress continues a false debate about whether President Bush should be granted more time. President Bush's Iraq strategy has failed, and Congress must not cave. Congress must support our troops by using every tool available to force the president to agree to a withdrawal." John Edwards, D-N.C.
My money is on “follow the same Beltway mentality,” John. I’ll put a fiver down on it.

"The fact that there are questions about General Petraeus' report is not surprising given that it was brought to you by this White House. In contrast, independent report after report indicates that the whack-a-mole strategy has made this the bloodiest summer of the war. And by the general's admission, the so-called surge has not achieved its goal of political progress." Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn.
Chris gets extra points for using the term “whack-a-mole strategy.”

“General Petraeus has failed to give Congress an independent assessment of the Iraq war. His statement sounds like the president's talking points," Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-OH
Jeez, you think, Dennis? You ever heard of the Chain of Command? The General damn well better be on the same sheet of music as his CINC, or he’ll be collecting a retirement check. But, of course, when you’re President you’ll let your Generals disagree with your policy in front of Congress, right? Dumbass.

"Our brave American service men and women are sacrificing daily for a policy that has no end in sight. A policy of more of the same is no strategic vision, strains our military to the breaking point, and enables Iraqi leaders to dither endlessly instead of reaching a political consensus over the future of their country," Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.
Uh, What? I stopped reading after “Our brave Americ….” My chest was too swelled with patriotic fervor and my eyes were too full of tears to finish. Hey, Chris, leave us out of it. No seriously, shut the fuck up about the military.

"This stall taken?" Sen Craig, Idaho-Big Gay Republican