RantDuJour

I am completely opposed to the current bill to fund the war. I am completely opposed to the official reasons given for presenting the bill to the Congress for a vote, i.e. top Dems were worried about getting ripped by the big bad gop over the memorial day weekend. Oh, boo-f’ing-hoo! Grow up. I’m not usually crass, but jeezz, Reid and Pelosi grow some balls. These guys have approval ratings in the 20s! Nobody gives a damm what they say. They have no credibility.

However, that rant having been said, let me add this. It’s clear that Congress could never pass again the same bill that they just passed that got vetoed. They could never do what my favorite candidate for president (Edwards) said that they should do; i.e. keep on passing the same bill and presenting it to bush. It was a hellof a job getting enough Dems in the House and the Senate to pass it once. It wasn’t going to happen again.

So, given that reality, what to the top Dems do? Do they pass nothing and let the pressure build? Or, do they cut as good as deal as they can now and vow to revisit the issue when bush needs another fix in 4 months. Does anyone have any doubt that the situation will be even worse in 4 months?  So, what will the political pressure be like in 4 more months? Even some of the rabid gopers have been saying that if the situation isn’t better by the fall, they might be willing to back an exit strategy. One more thing to think about, the gop knows very well that they are in big trouble and that bush is dragging them down. They want to drop him as soon as they can. The fall will be their last chance. If they drop him in ‘08, nobody will take them seriously. It’s not clear that anyone will take them seriously anytime in the next decade, but they have to believe that if they dump bush in the fall they have one last chance to prevent yet another landslide loss in Nov ‘08. Americans do not have a long memory. And, their short memory is exacerbated by beltway media that parrots the rightwing mantras.

So, in conclusion, my point is that there were not enough votes to do anything substantial with this bill right now. However, in 4 months, the oppositie will be true. There won’t be any (meaningful) opposition to a bill that starts pulling troops out. It’ll probably be a veto-proof majority. And, even if it’s not, there will be enough continuing sustaining support to continue to pass the same bill.

Dems will be hearing from their base over the next 4 months. They can’t afford to let the base get rabid on them leading up to the ‘08 elections. The only incumbent Democrat who will be immune and will continue down this deathy path will be Lieberman. But, after Jan ‘09, he will truly become irrelevant.

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So much to rant about. So little time.

Gonzales: What a full and complete idiot. And, bush, has there ever been someone so incompetent, so corrupt, so banal, so odious in such a position. He looks at what Gonzales has done (or not) and ‘concludes’ that this is all a partisan battle. It defys belief. I knew that this guy was the worst combination of stupid and evil before the 2000 election. But, even in my worst nightmare, I never envisioned him being this bad. This is really something that will take decades to fix.

On the plus side, it’s clear that most of the public now realizes what a complete and unmitigated disaster the gop is. Their approval ratings and their re-elect numbers are further down than they’ve ever been. In addition, they still have more seats to defend in ‘08. And, they’re having a tough time getting people to run. I mean, who would want to vote for such a rancid and incompetent group of people?

Even with the beltway media so blatantly in the pocket of the gop, it’s not clear that they can overcome the disaster for the gop that is coming. It’s a hurricane of historic proportions. It matters not who the Democrats nominate. It matters not who the GOP nominate. bush has left such slime in his wake that nobody will be able to pick up his sceptre.

Too bad we have to wait another year and a half to get his sorry ass kicked out.

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I’m not inclined to, as yet, chat (rant) about the Democratic candidates for President. However, I am, yet again, appalled, truly, truly appalled by what the GOP presents as legitimate candidates for president. Thinking back to 2000, I was just as appalled. (Anyone remember that famous line, “Jesus Christ was my favorite philosopher”) There was always 1996 for more pathetic gop candidates. Although, I have to admit that Bob Dole, despite his scary Stepford wife, his radical turn to the rightwing, and his regurgitation of the anti-choice and anti-life mantras, was not so, so bad. And, then, you have to go back to 1980 for the next really wide open gop primary. And, that incarnation of George HW Bush was not so bad either. Reagan, of course, was a complete disaster. But, the candidates in 2000 and the candidates this year really compare well. And, IMO, goes to show you how completely bereft of sanity the GOP is. They’re all anti-choice, except for Guiliani who can’t make up his mind and Mitt Romney who used to be, and then changed because of …what?

The only one who sounded semi-sane in the gop debate last week was Mitt Romney. The problem with Romney is that he can’t make up his mind what he believes. When he was Gov of a Democratic state, he believed a whole host of interesting things. When he announce for president, all of a sudden, he changed a bunch of philosophies. I don’t know how the gop primary field is going to think about that. But, the interesting thing to determine is whether gop primary goers will actually vote for a mormon. It’s an interesting philosophical question.

 McCain is truly insane. A doddering old man who is trying to recapture the lightening in a bottle that he had in his hand in 2000 before Bush push-polled his adopted black daughter in the south and sent him into the oblivion of ex-candidates. McCain could never regain his mo (which,  most likely, wouldn’t have lasted much longer anyway) and soon lost his mind. Trying to be ’straight-talk’ and trying to stay true to his values and trying to kowtow to the rightwing, he went insane.

 Guiliani is even more pathetic. The man has virtually no redeaming qualities whatsoever. Anyone who watched his tenure in NY would know this. But, the media, and really the beltway media (read: Chris Matthews and his ilk) are so enamoured of anyone involved in the post-911 activity that they can’t stop talking about him. But, the real Guiliani is a joke. He’s a hot-tempered, irresponsible, fascist, rascist with no real claim to fame aside from cleaning up the streets of NY with the military. Yawn.

The rest of the field are true Troglodytes. Most don’t believe in evolution. god knows that they have the same opinion of global warming as the current occupant of the White House. They’d all have cut short their vacation and flown back to Washington to sign an unconstitutional bill to save Terry Shiavo. They’re really not worth an ounce of energy discussing.