Those are six of the standard steps in the White House six step response to just about everything from the 9-11 Commission to creating a Homeland Security Department to crafting virtually all legislation (except for tax cuts for the super-rich, on which the White House never, ever concedes, grudgingly or otherwise) to the current NSA surveillance scandal. As WaPo reports, the White House has grudgingly appeared to concede to Congressional oversight, by agreeing to brief the House and Senate intelligence committees on details of “the program”. Of course, everything these committees does is… a secret… and they are stacked by...

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to give the current whitewash version of the President’s massive program to spy on his (domestic) political enemies under the catch-all of “protecting us from dark skinned terrrrrrrrorists.” Let’s not mince words: there is now no doubt that the President and his minions have decided to spy on a massive number of Americans in a program that is almost designed to be ineffective at intercepting actual terrrorists, certainly when viewed in the context of this WaPo report noting that of an estimated 5,000 Americans spied on, “the program” yielded less...

The President’s budget, weighing in at an absurd two and three quarter trillion dollars, was released, and as predicted, features more war spending, less social spending (sort of) and more tax cuts (yee ha!) Nothing terribly unexpected: the President is running to his base, who, by and large, don’t like social programs that benefit anyone earning less than $200,000 per year, like defense spending, and love tax cuts… so that’s what it is. With bogus deficit projections, contending that the deficit is somehow less than the unbelievable half a trillion dollars per annum that it actually is. As I constantly...

The House of Representatives Republican Caucus (a/k/a Caucus Nostra) got together to select their new Majority Leader… and the future indictment goes to… Congressman John Boehner (R-OH). As Julia reminds us here… the new face of the Republican Party leadership of the House bears a striking resemblance to… the old face… Let’s just say that the great service that folks like Jack Abramoff and his clients have come to expect from the House GOP leadership will continue as before, unabated, with no slowdowns, and no apologies, and seemingly no other repercussions (save Bugs DeLay having to do his fighting in...

The President used the occasion of a Friday afternoon just before the Super Bowl to announce that he was asking Congress for an additional $90 billion, of which $70 billion will be for additional war funding (mostly in Iraq) and $20 billion or so for additional Katrina funding. Naturally, no discussion whatsoever of reversing tax cuts or anything in the nature of paying for any of this was, or will be, forthcoming. They say a billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money. As recently as my last post, I noted the passage of budget cuts...

The Republican controlled House did what you’d think it would when it came time to try to make a half-assed and meaningless attempt to control the insanely out of control federal deficit: it imposed a meaningless-in-the-big-picture $40 billion cut over five years piled on the backs of the poorest Americans. The TLB Act (TLB stands for “tough love… bitches”) passed 216-214; around a dozen Republicans were permitted to vote against the measure to save face (presumably in tough races from blue states). The rest had to join in reducing federal expenditures to student loan programs (investing in the future), welfare...

The President delivered a respectfully long 50-minute or so State of the Union speech tonight. I commend the Loquacious Pup who directed me to stop listening to it so that she could better hear the Proud Family Movie. She may be but a small child… but she has her priorities in better order than I do. The parts I did listen to were… uninteresting. I noted the usual pandering to St. Laura Bush nee Welch… btw… you did all know she once killed a man, right? [standing ovation.] Anyway, I listened to the war president rattle off nonsense about a...

In the clearest demonstration possible that they are not obstructionists, Senate Democrats, in a pathetic excuse for the first fillibuster of a Supreme Court nominee led by that pathetic excuse for a senator and presidential candidate John F. Kerry (D-Davos) failed in their efforts to prevent debate from closing by a vote of 72-25, all but assuring that Justice Sam “Rubber-Stamp-for-the-Executive” Alito can march in with the Supreme Court at tomorrow’s State of the Union. On the sunny side of the ledger, (1) John Kerry’s days as a purported national leader should wane rapidly and (2) if the Republicans complain...

Regular readers here know of my keen interest in all things Gitmo, these days. So it will come as no surprise that I find this piece in the Washington Post documenting the “mysterious” case of former Guantanamo Bay detainee and now resident of Morocco Abdallah Tabarak to be of above-average interest. It seems that after around three years at Gitmo, Tabarak was released by American authorities to Morocco in 2004. What our Government contended Mr. Tabarak did (as a basis for holding him) was that, aside from serving as one of OBL’s personal bodyguards, Mr. Tabarak helped facilitate OBL’s escape...

You know its not just going to be a good year… it’s… the Year of the Dog [talking or otherwise]! That means, boys and girls, that the next twelve lunar months at least will be a welcome respite from those dismal political times we’ve had, and the economic treadmill that many have been on; we’re coming off of the year of the Cock, and before that, the year of the Chimp (no wonder you know who won in 2004; it was his year!) So long dreary times… hello year of the dog! Not even the seeming inability of my favorite...