ObamaBots Anonymous

I think it's time to start preparing to ease the Obamabots back into the real world. The signs are starting to appear here and there, like signs of Spring.

Living, as I do, in The People's Republic of Portland (Hawthorne Soviet, Richmond Collective) I've been in the thick of Obamabot zombieland. During the primaries there were forests of Obama signs strewn about the landscape, houses with three and four signs in the windows, on the lawn, big banners hung across the porch railing. One guy built a lawn housing for his Obama sign, complete with turned columns and a broken pediment on the top, indicating that he intended his sign to last for generations. Shop windows on Hawthorne Blvd. were plastered with Obama signs both before and after the election (“Yes, We Did!”) coffeehouses and taverns held weekly Obama parties – some still do - and there were hordes of Obama canvassers swarming every street corner, I was accosted by six of them in one ten block stretch in the run up to the election.

All last year and well into February of this year, you rarely had a conversation without one or two Obamabots bursting into an impromptu praise-a-thon.


I think that things are beginning to change here on the Left Coast. We've had a, relatively, hard winter – snow on the valley floor several times, once it stuck for more than a week.

A short word here about Portlanders: I like them a lot, I like their weird ways, their optimistic self-reliance, their fundamental courtesy, but you'd think that folks who spend so much time in the rain would know how to drive in it – and snow! They see snowflakes come down and just hafta rush out to drive the old beater with the bald tires to see how many 360's they can do down the hill on their way to the I-5 where they can spin out in front of a oncoming semi. I swear there's a secret prize waiting for the first person to completely block the highway.

Back to the Bots: the signs are far fewer now, one by one they're disappearing, usually in the middle of the night, the cars are showing bumpersticker scraper stigmata, the eager young canvassers are now back to self-righteously assuming you care nothing about starving children or dying whales or evaporating boreal forests. No one advertises Obama block parties in the community newpapers. The “Yes, We Did!” signs have vanished, their spaces sometimes replaced with “Quitting Business” signs. The street buskers are more numerous, they now have turf scuffles with the old familiar beggars who believe they have squatter's rights to prime territory, the corner by the bank, the service doorway of the supermarket...


Late winter reflection time, the gray days when you look in the mirror a lot. I think the Obots are poised at the edge of the abyss, so...


I'm proposing we set up a 12-step recovery group for them – someone's got to do it, we can't have them wandering glassy-eyed about the landscape, arms outstretched, grasping blindly for another hit of the “O-juice”.


First: what to call it? OA is taken, I believe, (Overeaters Anonymous) so I'm proposing OBA (pronounced: obey) for ObamaBots Anonymous.





The ObamaBots Anonymous 12-step Recovery Program:


Step 1 - We admit we are powerless over our Obama addiction - that our lives have become unmanageable and that we are prone to hissy fits and screaming “I don't understand!” at inappropriate moments.


Step 2 – We have come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity but that this Power is NOT Obama.


Step 3 – We have made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of Obama as we understood Him - no, wait, we already did that... we mean we have decided that we will NOT turn our every waking thought over to Obama.


Step 4 – We have made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. We have looked into the mirror and said ”I am a moron who has thrown his/her rational thought processes out the window in favor of mindless adulation of a sociopathic, narcissistic sock-puppet.”


Step 5 – We admit to the world, to ourselves and to another human being – preferably someone who told us we were idiots to support Obama - the exact nature of our wrongs: see Step 4.


Step 6 - We're entirely ready to have a frying pan to the side of the head or a dentist with a high-speed drill or a construction worker with a jackhammer, remove all these defects of character depending on just how dumb we were.


Step 7 – We have humbly asked if there's some kind of capable Power which can remove our shortcomings and return our brains.


Step 8 – We've made a list of all persons we have harmed, and are willing to make amends to them all: you know who we are and we know you know – we prefer cash, please.


Step 9 – We have made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others - you don't get to make these kinds of judgment calls anymore, the evidence shows you're spectacularly bad at it - pay up.


Step 10 – We continue to take personal inventory and when we are wrong promptly admit it. ...we're waiting...


Step 11 – We seek, through prayer and adoration to improve our conscious contact with Obama as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of Obama's will for us and the power to carry out His will... NO, NO, NO! Stop trying to get O's Blackberry address, put down the tripleshot, soy chai latte and remember Steps 1-10... Jeez! Get a grip willya!


Step 12 - Having had a rational thought process re-awakening as the result of these steps, we will carry this message to other Obamabots, and attempt to de-program these poor fools and bring them back to reality.


I think that a whole-hearted embrace of these steps by recovering Obamabots will go a long way toward re-integrating them into the real world again. Of course they'll probably have to go to OBA meetings for a long, long time and we should be as gentle as possible with them, don't shock them by pointing out things like: all O's 'ideas' are stolen in part or as a whole from others (like Hillary) who actually had thought about how to implement their plans. This kind of shock may be too much for OBAs, cases have been known where they go directly into CDS and may require hospitalization.


Remember, they were thinking humans once, with time and care they may become so again – they can Change and there's always Hope.

The Greatest Composers - Part 1

I publish sometimes at NoQuarter and Old Grumpy Guy writes for them as well. His latest series on The Greatest Composers of All Time falls significantly short of the mark IMO, so I now feel compelled to take up his implicit challenge and proffer my own list of The Greatest Composers of All Time. Right off the bat let me say that while I may not be older, I am probably grumpier, certainly more dyspeptic and, I think, a lot farther on my way to being a true curmudgeon.


I thought about all of this and realized that, when talking about music and 'best' lists, you are immediately presented with two major problems:


First: what are your parameters? Style, era, standards? For example, the list of great blues guitarists is different from jazz specialists and, of course, so-called 'classical' music is in a category of its own.


Second: even with the best of intentions, you are the prisoner of your own musical tastes and preferences.


I mention these problems (especially the second one) because I have been both delighted and dismayed by OGG's articles and the videos of his list of the “10 Greatest Composers of All Time”. As the series progressed, I came to understand that OGG and I have a drastically different conceptions of who is 'great' and what makes them 'great'. I also came to see that I would have to write up my own list in order to have an interesting response to his, so...


Full disclosure: here are my 'credentials'. OK, I'll admit it – I was a child star. Actually I was a boy soprano and soloist at St. Thomas Church Choir School in NYC for four years. During that time I recorded commercial records, sang on national TV under the direction of Leonard Bernstein and performed at Carnegie Hall with Leopold Stokowski (St. Matthews Passion). I have sung the Bach Magnificat in D, the Beethoven Mass, the Brahms German Requiem, among other masterworks. My professional career came to a crashing halt at age 13 when my voice cracked and I was no longer in demand (the horror!, the horror!). While this may not qualify me as a musical expert, it does mean that I am not entirely an amateur when it comes to music. In addition, my father has been a professional musician all his life, working in film, TV and Broadway and I have been an amateur pianist and flautist as long as I can remember.

Next, there are my definitions: when I talk about great music, I'm pretty much talking about western music from the Rennaisance up until about 1950. I apologize in advance for any insult to other musical traditions and I have great love and respect for many other musics – Indian Ragas, for example... but, western classical music stands head and shoulders above every other musical tradition in human history because of the development of its musical system, organization of multiple musicians into an organized musical entity with written musical orchestrations which ensure that the composer's work can be faithfully rendered – this is unique to western music.


And last, there is my process: OGG has chosen to make his choices as the

“10 Greatest Composers of All Time” - with tongue somewhat in cheek, I suspect. With all due respect, I just can't rank composers that way. Instead, I've chosen to select the 10 “Best of the Best” and present them in chronological order so that I can attempt to explain why this or that person was so singularly important at that time in musical history. I've also (a la OGG) mentioned the “Best of the Rest”, mainly because there are so many extraordinary composers who bring us nothing but beauty, not to acknowledge them would be a crime.


I also have one major bone to pick with OGG – no Russian composers! In fact, an almost complete dearth of Romantic composers on his list! Tch, tch! For shame, Sir! In my list I have endeavored to redress his unfortunate omission(s).


N.B.: These are my choices and I make no apologies, just as OGG has his choices – you are free to make your own.


I have divided this series into three parts in order keep everyone awake and on tenterhooks. You may notice some glaring(?!) ommisions, don't worry, all will be addressed (or perhaps redressed)... don't like my list? Have at it!



Best of the Best


From the Renaissance to the Baroque


Claudio Monteverdi (1567 – 1643)

Generally regarded by scholars as one of the most important musicians ever. His work consists mostly of madrigals and operas (he was a singer and gambaist (the Viola da Gamba was a Renaissance viola-cello). Monteverdi was instrumental in transitioning western music from the Renaissance polyphonal style to the Baroque especially with his invention of the Basso Continuo. This advance loosely corresponded with the transition of musical notation from neumes to staff and key, which made the specification of pitch possible.


Go here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monteverdi for the Wikipedia entry on Monteverdi with links to samples of his work.


Antonio Vivaldi (1678 - 1741)

Opera impressario, priest, violinist, asthmatic. He wrote operas, concerti, sonatas and various liturgical music including the widely known and loved Four Seasons concerto and the great Stabat Mater. He was daring and inventive, he alternately delighted and scandalized his musical audiences... and, like most non-rockstar musicians, he died a pauper.


Go here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivaldi for the Wikipedia entry on Vivaldi with links to samples of his work.



Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750)

If the aliens came down and said “Earthpeople, show us your best.” I would show them Johann Sebastian Bach. Now, having revealed my massive prejudice, let me explain why...

First, on the technical side (forgive me, that's my field) JSB championed Well-Tempered tuning. This is a system that alters the tuning of some of the 12 notes of the octave so that modulation from one key to another can be accomplished seamlessly, without jarring dissonance. Because of Bach's support, Well-Tempered tuning has become the dominant tuning system in all of western music. I cannot overemphasize the importance of Well-Tempered tuning to all that followed. Try to imagine a 120 piece orchestra playing the Beethoven Symphony No.9 with the first and second violin sections playing with slightly different tunings – including so-called 'pure' tunings and with the brass and woodwinds following tuning systems of their own...


Second, JSB was a complete musician, writing a cantata a week for St. Thomas church in Leipzig, books and books of teaching materials (The Well Tempered Clavier among others), fugues, toccatas, partitas, sonatas, concertos, orchestra and choral compositions almost without number... ok, there's over 1100. Father of some 20 children (not strictly a musical accomplishment but it kinda solidifies his rockstar status). Further, JSB didn't make his reputation in church – his legacy would have disappeared into the fishwrap of history if Felix Mendelsohn hadn't resurrected it (but that's another story). JSB made his reputation as a master of improvisation, i.e., in modern parlance: a jazz musician. He was famous for it – Frederick the Great asked him to improvise on a theme the monarch provided, he did and later wrote his variations down, which became “A Musical Offering”.


Third, most important of all, JS Bach was that rarest of musical geniuses, a mathematical/musical savant. Running through all of Bach's work but especially in the great organ works, the toccatas, fugues and passacaglias; Bach takes us step-by-step through each ineluctable variation, each building on the one before, each revealing a new perspective, a new truth... until at the last, the great resolving codas take us to the bedrock of the music itself, all that must be said has been said, we are at rest. Listening to the Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor is one of life's great experiences.


Stay tuned for Part 2...

A New Series: The Obama Orwell Watch

In which items will be noted and stored which indicate the true nature of Obamanation.


Item 1:

On January 6th, the day after Obama was officially certified as the next POTUS, Jose E. Serrano (D-NY) introduced H.J.Res 5, which states:

JOINT RESOLUTION
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to repeal the twenty-second article of amendment, thereby removing the limitation on the number of terms an individual may serve as President.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years after the date of its submission for ratification:
`Article--
`The twenty-second article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.'.

The bill has been referred to the Judiciary committee, which is exactly where it would go if it were to be studied and reported out to the House floor – or buried forever in committee consideration. We'll see.


Item 2:

On January 14th the LA Times published and artiocle entitled:

“Retooling Obama's campaign machine for the long haul”

Full story here.


Wherein the LA Times details the creation of a permanent Obama-only political cadre dedicated to pressuring 'Democrats' to fully and continuously support Obama. This organization is entirely independent of the DNC and is focused solely on re-electing Obama and pushing his agenda.

...stay tuned...

Ragnarök

Ragnarök – the world tree, Yggdrasil uprooted, the road to Hel opened, the Bifrost bridge destroyed and Asgard forever rent asunder from us, Jörmungandr, the Midgard serpent bound around the world – writhes free, Fenris breaks his mighty chains and Garm, the Helhound is loosed at last. Heimdall sounds his horn as the Aesir assemble – Odin, Thor, Tyr and Freyr come forth, the lesser gods fill in their ranks and the heroes from Valhalla at last fulfill their ancient oaths to fight the hordes of frost giants: Jotunn from Muspelhiem and Niflheim – the cities of Fire and Ice that mark the ends of the Ginnungagap – the Void. The Aesir know it is the Last Battle and they know that they, too, will die. It is the end of the world, it is end of the gods, it is the end of all things...

Whew! If you want a real end-'o-times apocalypse scenario - don't waste time with the Greeks or the Romans, don't even bother with Yaweh or Revelations – go due North, the Norsemen have that story all sewn up.


Why talk about this now? Well, we've seen the financial folks running around these past few weeks saying 'the sky is falling, the sky is falling' till they're hoarse. The international markets are jittery and the usual suspects (Russia and China) are twisting the knife as much as they can. The election is only two or three weeks away and it looks like it may be very, very close – again. You'd think that by this time the US electorate would be able to tell a con man when they see one...

So what else is new? Well, as they say, there's good news and there's bad news and then there's the really ugly stuff:

The Good News

Even the Vikings weren't completely despondent about the future, Ragnarok notwithstanding – there was a 'morning after'. After the last battle, when all the elder gods are dead and the earth has sunk beneath the waves, it rises again, green and beautiful, self-stocked with amber waves of grain. Vioarr and Vali, Odin's sons, appear (somehow), as do Mooi and Magni, the sons of Thor as well as Baldr and Hoor – all the younger gods are suddenly present to order the Sun and Moon upon their ways and bring order to the universe. The general sense of good feeling is increased when it seems that none of the Jotunn has survived to make mischief, not even one of Loki's sons. Worse luck in my opinion, it looks to be rather boring in the Norse 'brave new world'. Oh, and there are some brand new humans, Lif and Lifhrasir, available to repopulate the earth.

All of the above is in aid of saying that, despite our fears, our anger and our rage. Things will likely muddle along for quite some time – certainly for our lifetimes and probably for our childrens' as well. A colossus like the United States doesn't fold like a cheap suit, it takes time to let the air out. Even spectacularly bad mangement like W's (and likely Gumby's as well) can only do so much damage.

“Don't Panic!” as THGTTG*used to admonish. We'll survive. Even if we, as a nation, elect another grinning idiot. BushCheneyPaulson represent a class of predatory ferals, they see only their own needs and desires and have no conception that they represent another or owe anything to someone other than themselves. BHO belongs to this group by deed as well as by avocation.
Nonetheless, his impact will be limited by factors already in play (see below) not to speak of his total lack of vision, jellyfish leadership potential and an interest level approaching that of a sponge. Vapid suitracks may con their way into power but their elemental stupidity prevents them from doing nearly as much damage as they could wish.


The Bad News
The bad news on the political front is that BHO could win – more incompetence at the helm, possibly a fascist coup, definitely democracy in serious jeopardy.
On the international front we have the usual crew of tinpot dictators: Chavez, Ahmadinejad, Putin as well as the military/fascist juntas in Burma, China and elsewhere. The end result of seven years of misrule by BushCo is that we have lost the respect of the world and what's more, we have lost our claim to the moral high ground so the jackals think they are in the ascendent.

The bad news on the financial front is truly staggering – you think $700 Billion is a lot for the mortgage banker bailout (actually the true cost of this is more like $1.5 Trillion)? Here's the part of the iceberg below the surface: the companies that insure those mortgage notes, like AIG, are on the hook for $62Trillion if this all goes south.

The big bad news is that, in this world, economics and politics are joined at the hip.

Ok, let's take these in order:
BHO could win – let's not forget that this is the country that elected Richard Nixon – twice; elected Ronald Reagan – twice; and George W. Bush – twice. With this extensive track record of electing grinning idiots, why wouldn't we elect Barack Obama?
So, what does that mean for real Democrats (I don't count Obamabots as Democrats)? In the best case scenario it means that we've lost the party and will have to form another – I've been advocating this for some time now.

In the worst case it may mean we have to form a resistance movement, if as I suspect, Obama will move to take the country in the direction of an authoritarian dicatatorship. If you think I've gone 'Area 51' on you, I refer you to the current power grab inherent in the so-called 'bailout bill' that just went through Congress: Paulson wanted no oversight, no questions and no redress, just total control of more money than anyone has ever had in the history of the world. See also, the Patriot Acts I & II, see The March to Iraq, subset: WMD, sub-subset, ref.: mushroom cloud. Yes, these are all Republican perfidies but listen to any of Elmer Gantry's BHO's speeches, see 'The Triumph of the Swill' production at Invesco Field, note adoring crowds, also note US flags in the trash.
No, I don't think he'll try to dissolve Congress or use the First Brigade Combat Team of the Third Division under NorthCom – now stationed in the territorial US for use in quelling 'domestic disturbances' - to stage a military coup d'etat (not enough troops yet to stage a successful operation on a country the size of the US). He won't have to, the pitifull compliance of the Congress to GWB's every whim has set the standard for the stature of future congressional representatives: on bended knee.

Oh, and by the way, I think we've already seen the 'October Surprise'. I know it's supposed to be the one that the Republicans use to swing the election their way but let's look at the facts on the ground:

GWB and his cronies hate, and have always hated, John McCain and everything he stands for i.e., reform.

Why would they back a candidate who promises reform and transparency?

Cheney and company believe in a closed-door informational system, viciously attack anyone who has the termerity to question them in any way, believe in unlimited autocratic power for the executive and have no qualms about using propaganda, misdirection and outright lies in defense of their actual, hidden, agenda.

...remind you of anyone? Of course it does.

Add to this the fact that the big transnational money donors who usually back Republican conservatives surreptitiously moved to back a particular Democratic candidate starting early in 2007, guess who?

Notice also the peculiar silence from BushCo on all fronts... this is usually the case when things are going your way – no complaints.

If you look at it with your critical thinking cap on the puzzle pieces fall into order:

Our several wars are simmering along quite nicely:

Iraq is in wind-down status; we've paid off enough of the Sunni tribal leaders to avert them from starting a civil war and...

Our proxy war with Iran is taking up the slack: the Imams are keeping al-Sadr on a short leash in return for us muzzling the Israelis. I notice that there's been a virtually complete lack of activity on either side of the latest 'Intifada' for more than a year now, interesting isn't it? Even such activity as there was, got absolutely zero attention in the press – other fish to fry, perhaps?

We continue to run our brushfire wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan (guess who wants to ramp up the Afghan conflict?)

Essentially, the United States foreign policy agenda has already been set for the next four years, no matter who is in the Oval Office next year.

On the economic front the power of choice has, similarly, been taken away from the next president.

The current 'financial meltdown' is a completely fabricated crisis and it is a financial crisis, not an economic crisis. This doesn't mean it can't have real world consequences but it does mean that this crisis was set up and triggered for a particular purpose and at a selected time. This meltdown could easily have been triggered last year with the collapse of BearStearns but that would have had minimal political impact – too far away from the election for people to remember. But – create a crisis in late September when your chosen candidate is sinking in the polls (remember that BHO was looking like a loser at that point) and, voila! you revitalize the Democratic candidate's campaign – the threat of domestic economic disaster being both a traditional Democratic election issue and revving up the anti-imcumbent party resentment to boot.

Look at the firestorm of panic promulgated by Hank Paulson and the US Treasury – Cheney's financial storm troopers - the constant push to take drastic action, instantly, with neither reflection nor examination and without regard to efficacy or consequences.

Look at what is achieved by these concerted actions: an enormous injection of cash into companies selected to survive (selected by Paulson, no less) with the promise of as much more cash as they want, whenever they have another hissy fit.

Look in the dark corner of this mess, look right where they don't want you to: what is being done to correct the problem? What is being done to make those bad loans whole? What is being done to turn the ARMs into reasonable fixed rate mortgages that the home 'owners' could actually afford to pay?
Answer: nothing

Oh, an actual fix has been suggested by, among others, one Hillary Rodham Clinton. Based on the old HOLC idea that FDR used to begin rebuilding the US economy in the '30s. Go out and take in all that bad paper, guarantee it, make the payments affordable, turn it into good paper. This restores confidence to the financial markets because, mirable dictu, the loans are actually good loans now.
Yes, this has some cost but it's far less than the $700 billion extortion we've just experienced, not to speak of the next round coming to your neighborhood soon (just need to get that pesky election out of the way).

Want to really jump start the financial markets? Go back over the last two years and make those 2 million foreclosed loans good as well, put those people back in their homes and paying their mortgages again.
Yes, of course it's more complicated than just that, but that's where you start.

You'd think this idea would spread like wildfire after all it's already been shown to work, but instead we get: [crickets]

This is because the whole point of the exercise has been to continue the economic policies of BushCheneyPaulson into the foreseeable future – and it's been wildly successful. The next president, whoever he is, will be absolutely hamstrung on economic policy. By the nature and extent of the financial choices that BushCheneyPaulson have made in the last year the course of economics for the next four years has been completely determined. The next president will be unable to get out from under the consequences of these decisions, he will have no choice but to follow the BushCheney economic plan as it plays out.



The Really Ugly Stuff

The really ugly stuff begins to make itself felt when you start extending your view.

In general I think we have “misunderestimated” GWB+Co. Looked at in the light of what's good for the United States, they've been a catastrophe, easily the worst administration in our entire history, right enough... but looked at by their own lights they've not only accomplished everything they set out to do but they've actually managed to extend their administration's policies over the next four, possibly eight, years (if Gumby is elected).

Add to that their other subversive activites: suborning the Justice Department by stocking, and topping, the department with incompetent, ideological political hacks, they've managed to destroy the credibility of the 'brand'. No one for the next 20 years is going to look at the US Justice Department with anything other than thinly-veiled contempt. This isn't good for us but it is good for people who despise democracy.

The discrediting of government agencies. BushCo, over the last 7⅝ years, has made a fetish of demoting, degrading and dismissing crowds of public servants and replacing them with incompetent, ideological political hacks (No, Johnny, it's not just the Justice Dept, anymore). This is all part of the neocon political agenda which says that government is always bad, always wrong and always intruding on your property, er, privacy.

Note FEMA – revitalized under the demon Clinton and made into a useful government agency for helping citizens when natural disaster strikes. The gutting of FEMA began on day one of the GWB's reign, with results for all the world to see. This kind of sabotage has been going on wholesale throughout the entire civil service... and through the federal judiciary as well. Competent judges are harrassed and hounded by well-funded, outside 'interest groups' to be replaced with cadres of ideologically correct know-nothings.

Oddly enough one of the great shibboleths of the foaming-at-the-mouth right wingnuts was the inclusion of emergency powers granted to FEMA in the event of, well, an emergency. These folks fairly blew the tops of their heads off ranting about posse comitatus and the rights of the individual under the Constitution, they sat with 'locked and loaded' street sweepers waiting for the black helicopters and FEAM assault teams to break down their doors.

Fast forward a few years: Patriot Acts I & II, the sequential gutting of FISA, 'Gitmo' and where are those stalwarts now? Apparently, the danger has passed... but wait: early this year in an utterly unnoticed action, FEMA powers to usurp Consitutional rights were transferred out from FEMA to... the White House. So now vast powers to suspend the Bill of Rights, commandeer transportation systems, declare martial law and control and censor all communications media are fully under the control of the Executive branch. No oversight by the Legislative branch, no resourse to the Judicial branch.

Next we have the dismantling of the Posse Comitatus Act:

Major Craig T. Trebilcock of the JAG wrote in October 2000:

"The Posse Comitatus Act has traditionally been viewed as a major barrier to the use of U.S. military forces in planning for homeland defense. In fact, many in uniform believe that the act precludes the use of U.S. military assets in domestic security operations in any but the most extraordinary situations. As is often the case, reality bears little resemblance to the myth for homeland defense planners. Through a gradual erosion of the act’s prohibitions over the past 20 years, posse comitatus today is more of a procedural formality than an actual impediment to the use of U.S. military forces in homeland defense."

This is pre-911, folks.
After, it gets even worse:

"Public Law 109-364, or the "John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007" (H.R.5122) (2), which was signed by the commander in chief on October 17th, 2006, in a private Oval Office ceremony, allows the President to declare a "public emergency" and station troops anywhere in America and take control of state-based National Guard units without the consent of the governor or local authorities, in order to "suppress public disorder."

A revision of the bill was enacted in 2008 purporting to somehwat limit the Executive's powers but GWB's signing statement averred that he had no intention of respecting those limitations.

Look, I could go on for pages about this stuff, in fact there's probably a book in here somewhere (like the proverbial pony). The point is: we're looking at a new future and it extends way past the horizon. I've written elsewhere about this but things have really changed, it's no longer just about you and me and the folks on the block, it's no longer about Demmican or Republicrat, it's no longer even about America vs the world.

Like it or not, we are all citizens of the planet now and the new conflict will be on that global stage, it will also be an enveloping conflict: the Jihadis are a global phenomenon, so are the transnational corporations. Neither of these groups has any love whatsoever for democracy, truth, human rights or the rights of individuals.

The ecological balance of the planet is a global phenomenon, pollution transcends all boundaries, melamine in your milk gets from China to your baby formula faster than you can say “This tastes funny.” So does Avian flu...

At the same time that all this is going on, we are on the brink of profound change rooted in our understanding of technology. It will soon be possible to make the kinds of changes we'll need to make to move us out of the mess we've made of things. But these changes will need to be coordinated and accessible on a global scale, that means we'll have to cooperate on that kind of scale, which means we'll have to change the way we interoperate – on a global scale.

Everyone has a stake in this, so all the stakeholders need to be recognized. In like wise, everyone has an ox to gore and that needs to be recognized as well.

How we handle this will define life on Earth for the next hundred years, at least.


A last word here to talk about my writing 'style'. Anyone who's read my articles has noticed that I use a lot of historical and mythological references. I do this for several reasons: the historical references are obvious, Santayana was right: “Those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it.” My observation is that very few of us study history at all – we always seem to be repeating our mistakes. It may be futile but I keep thinking that I must include the historical references so that the curious can follow up and get a better underpinning for their own critical thinking.

As to the mythological themes I sometimes use, I think that the pantheons of gods and demigods (both past and present) provide us with the opportunity to objectify our aspirations, our capabilities... and our fears. Jung (among others) understood this well, though I won't go so far as to call upon the 'collective unconscious' for any insight.

And... they're fun. By using them I can try to give readers, and myself, a little laugh now and then.

*”The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”by Douglas Adams

A Little Light Reading

A young colleague asked me to draw up a list of books I liked... he had no idea what he was in for.

Great Books and Shows

I don’t know your level of intellectual involvement, so I’m going from the ground up – no insult intended

Cultural Classics

The Iliad & The Odyssey

Get the translations done by Stanley Lombardo, he’s done them as performance pieces and the language is very modern and non-stilted. These are both extremely important to understanding how we got where we are.

Anaximenes, Anaximander, Heraclitus, Democritus and Thucydides

on general principles, learn about life, the universe and everything.

Euripides, Aeschylus, Sophocles

Every plot under the sun was invented by these guys.

Plato

Because this is where dialectic begins, this is also where critical thought begins.

Aristotle

Because this is where dialectic ends (until Marx), the man had an opinion on everything – and he was usually right. Defined western thought for a thousand years and more.

Ovid – “Metamorphoses”

The most subtle use of Latin - ever.

Julius Caesar

Clear, insightful, explicative… bloody, cruel, awful... brilliant, perceptive, prescient... shall I go on?

Lucretius, Marcus Aurelius

On general principles: Lucretius for the most beautiful Latin ever written and especially Marcus Aurelius 'Meditations' for the view of the Empire in Autumn.

Augustine – “The City of God”

To find out how one severely fucked up (probably sexually abused) priest proceeded to fuck up the entire western world for a thousand years or more…

Shakespeare

If you read nothing else, Shakespeare would give you a complete education. Also the most beautiful period of the English language.

Spinoza

Proved you didn’t need god to justify your existence.

Leibniz

Proved you could be god if you wanted to (and re-invented The Calculus on the side – Archimedes did it first).

Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations

Proved you didn’t have to be god if you understood markets.

BTW “The Invisible Hand” so beloved of ‘free’ market aficionados is mentioned only once in 1200 pages and even then in a very narrow context.

Locke, Hume, Rousseau

Progenitors of the Enlightenment, midwives of the American and French revolutions – some real thought here.

Darwin - The Origin of the Species

Everyone claims to have read this book but very few actually have, beautifully written by an excellent observer. Every religious fanatic should be required to read this, it will pretty much shut them up once and for all.

Nietzsche

High priest of German Romanticism (aside from Goethe), thought deeply, wrote beautifully and was barking mad, nonetheless, read “Genealogy of Morals” and “Thus Spake Zarathustra”
BTW “ubermensch” means “overman” not “superman”. He was referring to the ethical and moral qualities of the evolved human being, the fascist fanatics, as usual, got it completely wrong.

Von Clausewitz

Though a mere lieutenant in the Jaeger-Prussian army, his writings on the principles of war in simple, elegant prose have made him standard reading for warriors for two hundred years.

Bertrand Russell - Principia Mathematica

The last great re-invention of mathematics and written in Latin, no less. He and Alfred North Whitehead pretty much rewrote mathematics from the ground up at the start of the 20^th century. Also was the first of the great modern peace activists.

Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky on general principles

That pretty much covers my range of Great Western Thought. There are many more of course, but I think these represent the best of the best. Frankly, I think that anyone who wants to understand our culture should read as many of these folks as they can or just read Will and Ariel Durant’s 26 volume tome “The History of Philosophy” as an alternative.

…now on to more fun stuff

Speculative fiction

The earliest SF writers are an astonishing lot:

Cyrano de Bergerac – From the Earth to the Moon

Jules Verne – 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

H.G. Wells – War of the Worlds

But science fiction didn’t really arrive until…

The pulp authors – 30s and 40s authors who wrote the original space operas, cited for their adventurous imaginations not their technical or scientific rigor

E.E. “Doc” Smith

The Lensman series – everything George Lucas ever did, he stole from this.

Edgar Rice Burroughs

The Martian Series – just wonderful, completely off the scale as fantasy

There are many others here worth reading but these two are the class of the field.

The new guard (now old I suppose)

These are the first wave of serious speculative fiction writers who appeared in the late 40s and early 50s. A lot of these authors wrote short stories, novellas and novels that they realized later were connected in some way. You will often find ‘timelines’ with the various stories plotted along the way. These were mostly done after the fact but recognized the natural commonality of the tales. Some of these folks are in here for one or two of their tales only but they deserve their place nonetheless. I haven’t put in many from later periods, partly because I haven’t read them and that is mostly because they are derivative and boring. (So I’m a curmudgeon, sue me).

Arthur C Clarke

'Childhood’s End', 'The Deep Range', 'Tales from The White Hart', '2001'

Clarke invented the concepts of: geo-synchronous orbit satellites, re-usable orbital shuttles, tethered lifting ribbons, setting space colonies at the L3 and L5 points, and many other technologies.

Robert Heinlein

'Stranger in a Strange Land', 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress', 'I Will Fear No Evil', 'The Green Hills of Earth', 'Starship Troopers', 'Friday', 'The Tales of Lazarus Long' and many, many others.

Bob Heinlein is not really a great writer, in fact he’s not a very good writer at all – he is, however, an absolutely wonderful storyteller with a keen eye for human foibles and a fearless advocacy for human freedom.

Isaac Asimov

'The Foundation Series', 'I Robot' and about 140 other books both fiction and non-fiction

Prolific and sometimes profound Asimov is always interesting. His intelligence and imagination have a huge range and depth.

Frank Herbert – Dune

The Dune series is probably the most complex political SF series ever. Intricate, complex, intriguing and exasperating.

Ray Bradbury

‘R is for Rocket’, ‘The Martian Chronicles’, ‘Dandelion Wine’, ‘Green Hills, White Whale’

Wonderful, evocative writer with a unique style, a peculiar look at the world and an unbounded imagination.

Larry Niven

'Protector', 'Ringworld', the Polesotechnic League, The Long Night

Great hard science type writer, the description of a realistic space battle complete with Bussard ramjets and using a neutron star in a battle maneuver in “Protector” are priceless.

Orson Scott Card

The Ender series – a series of six (?) books all revolving around a ‘first contact’ gone awry and the ramifications that ensue, “Speaker for the Dead” is especially good. Very empathic, try reading “The Lost Boys” with the knowledge that he has an autistic son.

Note: Quite a few of these authors run hot and cold, some of their books are really great while others are junk. If you’re not sure, ask me.

Robert Silverberg

Wrote three great books: ‘Dying Inside’, ‘The Stochastic Man’ and ‘Up the Line’. The Majipoor stuff is crap.

John Brunner

Great British writer, always provocative, ‘Stand on Zanzibar’, the unbelievably prophetic ‘The Sheep Look Up’ and many more… doesn’t like America very much but his critiques are spot on.

Phillip K. Dick

You already know him from 'Bladerunner', he wrote some great books: ‘Ubik’, ‘A Scanner Darkly’, ‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep’, wrote some others that are crap: ‘Clans of the Alphane Moon’, etc. Sad to say he kinda went round the bend at the last ‘Valis’ and ‘The Transmigration of Timothy Archer’ are pretty much paranoid-schizophrenic nightmares.

Ursula LeGuin

‘The Earthsea Trilogy’, ‘The Left Hand of Darkness’, ‘The Dispossessed’ A woman’s view on SF. She really understands dragons.

Philip Jose Farmer

‘Riverworld’ and a great many others. Farmer wrote a lot of really out there stuff, alien thought, alien-human sex, underworld/netherworld. Sometimes very erotic, sometimes very disturbing.

R.A. Lafferty

Unique style, off the wall imagination, funny and scary, never what you expected. Mostly short stories, well worth finding/reading.

Harlan Ellison

Insulting, irascible, insanely intelligent. Most famous for ‘Repent, Harlequin, Cried the Tick-Tock Man’

Theodore Sturgeon

Short stories that bite: ‘Occam’s Scalpel’, ‘If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?’ Author of Sturgeon’s Law: “90% of Everything is Crap”, his stuff is in the other 10%.

Cordwainer Smith

Brilliant, odd, funny, awful, charming, gut-churning… just the titles tell a tale: ‘The Burning of the Brain’, ‘Scanners Live in Vain’, ‘The Lady Who Sailed The Soul’, ‘The Ballad of Lost C’Mell’, ‘The Game of Rat and Dragon’. All the stories meld into a timeline/evolution of man and near-man over thirty thousand years of change.

Kim Stanley Robinson

‘Red Mars’ ‘Green Mars’ ‘Blue Mars’ trilogy. How Mars will really be terraformed and the interplanetary politics involved. Very well done, a little dry but essentially a manual for how to do it.

J.R.R.Tolkien

‘The Lord of the Rings’ Trilogy

IF you haven’t read this, read it right away… no the movie doesn’t even come close, in fact, try to forget the movie completely. This is the oldest, and by far the best, of the fantasy genre. It helps that Tolkien was a gifted writer, it helps that he was a professor of linguistics at Oxford, most of all he is original and creates layer upon layer upon layer to give his created world authenticity and credibility.

Robert Jordan

‘Wheel of Time’ series

Not the greatest of writers but I got snagged and if you’ve got a week or two to throw away get the series and read it through, he’s still writing the last two but has amyloidosis and may die before it’s done. Strong on magic and the Source, female characters very strong but basically batshit crazy, pretty much a typical ‘guy’s eye’ view. Some good moments.

Update: Robert Jordan died late last year and the last book of the series is being completed from his extensive notes

George R.R. Martin

“The Song of Ice and Fire’ series

Blood ‘n Guts sword-and-sorcery epic. You can see the denouement a mile off, but it’s the journey that counts. Pretty good characters, involving and interesting, each in their own revolting way. He has a nasty habit of killing off or gruesomely maiming anyone you might actually get to like. The Dragon Empress is a hottie.

William Gibson

‘Neuromancer’ etc

He’s here because he got famous for work that a lot of other people actually did before him, nevertheless his stuff is a good read, in a techno-punk, dystopian sorta way.

Neal Stephenson

‘Snow Crash’, ‘The Diamond Age’, ‘Cryptonomicon’. ‘The Baroque Cycle’

The first three are brilliant, prophetic, warp-speed, up to the nanosecond books chock full of excellent writing, total contemporaneity (wow! what a crappy neologism). What William Gibson wishes he were.

‘The Baroque Cycle’ is a 3,000 page romp through the 18^th century, lots of fun characters, oh and BTW you'll learn about the origins of scientific methodology, modern economics and how to deal with syphilis if you don't have access to penicillin.

There are others out there working in associated fields, such as:

Graphic novels

Neil Gaiman and ‘The Sandman’ series. Neil is a cult figure for many – not my cuppa

Frank Miller and, basically anything he’s involved in: ‘The Dark Knight’ (Batman), ‘Sin City’, ‘Elektra Assassin’ and many others. Frank's also a cult figure, I like him.

Movies

‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ intelligent SF (see also ‘This Island Earth’ made in the same year for a hilarious comparison

‘Forbidden Planet’ Monsters from the Id! Aaiieeee!! Still really good SF (although stolen wholesale from ‘The Tempest’) Note the very young Leslie Nielsen in a dramatic role.

‘Alien’ Ridley Scott’s version of: ‘There’s a Mouse in the House’ it’s seven feet tall, drips slime and wants to eat you, nevertheless… it has the all time greatest role for a woman since ‘Ninotchka’ Sigourney Weaver plays Ripley, the uber-competent second mate of the ‘Nostromo’ (look it up, see Joseph Conrad). Makes you proud to be a human being.

‘Aliens’ James Cameron cut his teeth on this one, did Jimmy. Not much for story but it’s in the running for the greatest action flick of all time, and we get to see Ripley be even more heroic.

‘Bladerunner’ Ridley Scott’s staggering SF opus, still arguably the best SF film ever made. Note the very young Edward James Olmos (since Miles Davis’ death, officially the ‘Coolest Man on the Planet’ see below: Battlestar Galactica)

I won’t go on about the films, you’ve probably seen a lot of the newer ones: long on SFX, short on intelligence. The one good thing about low budget films is that they make you think harder.

You might try comparing versions of ‘Solaris’ Tarkovsky vs Clooney, not as lopsided as you might think although Clooney is merely good while Tarkovsky is (was) a genius.

TV

Oddly enough some pretty good SF has leaked through into the boob tube (no, I’m not talking about 'Blake’s Seven' or 'Red Dwarf')

'Doctor Who' is an acquired taste but has some good moments (I prefer David Tenant in the role).

Obviously, 'Star Trek' is legendary, you should really watch some of the early episodes, hilarious, complete with space-bimbo of the week. There were some very good ones though: ‘City on the Edge of Forever’ (written by Harlan Ellison, see above) and ‘Space Seed’ with Ricardo Montalban as Khan, one of a genetically enhanced breed of ‘supermen’.

Actually ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ was pretty good as a series, good actors, good writing. See ‘Inner Light’ and ‘Metaphor’ and the dark ‘Yesterday's Enterprise’.

I liked ‘Babylon 5’ quite a lot but didn’t get excited about ‘Firefly’. I liked ‘Andromeda’ but detested 'Star Trek Voyager'.

This is a little off topic but I’d like to nominate ‘La Femme Nikita’, the TV series as an actual SF show notwithstanding their conceit that it was real-world, it definitely wins as the most paranoid television series ever shown, the tension was palpable in every episode, every relationship, every movement… the relief when each show was over was like serotonin overload.

But pride of place for best TV SF ever must go to 'Battlestar Galactica' (no, not the original series done back in the eighties, although watching that one is absolutely hilarious, I fall off my chair every time they push the “Turbo” button on the Vipers). The new one is fabulous, highly charged, rife with conflict, brilliantly written, superbly acted and confirms that Edward James Olmos (as Commander Adama) is the “Coolest Man on the Planet” (the honor used to belong to Miles Davis but even Miles can’t hold onto this one when he’s dead). To get a feel for this show see the episode “33 Minutes”, after your heartbeat slows down and you stop sweating, give me a call.

That’s about all I can think of for now, I’ll send more if/when I smack myself in the forehead and say ‘Why didn’t I think of that one!”

Once again, you may know all of these, I certainly don’t mean to presume that you don’t and no condescension is either overt or implied.

Have fun,

Craig

There definitely will be more added to the list, as I went over this several more candidates appeared iin my memory...

A Distant Sound of Thunder

In the old, old days before the cities and the highways, before the smokestacks and the chimneys, before we knew the sea and the sun, the sky and the stars for what they truly are - even in those ancient days - we knew what leadership was and we know it still. We feel its presence - the ancient Greeks said "the God is near" when they felt it, we know its absence too...


From the gods and demi-gods of Sumer: Enki and Innana through Gilgamesh with his friend and nemesis Enkidu to the heroes of the Iliad: "god-like" Achilles, Ajax, Hector, Diomedes and Odysseus, there is a common thread. In our ancient dreams we draw forth the leader from among us, we invest them with our trust and our collective honor and we demand one special thing from them...


Those whom the gods choose, we anoint with oil, we clothe with gold and in their honor we burn precious Frankincense from Ubar... Why?


Through the ages we have had many leaders - not all of them good, nor any of them perfect. They have a few attributes in common: some can mesmerize a crowd with thrilling rhetoric, some speak softly and move quietly along their way, some beguile with dreams of wonder or 'cry havoc' on an oppressor, stirring us to do what we had thought we could not do. There are some who revel in chaos or who are possessed by a holy fire; they send their acolytes to oblivion with promises of paradise ringing in their ears - they, too, are leaders. And there are some who have the power but, sadly, have nowhere to put it, no plan or one plan too many...


Most often we find the qualities of true leadership - in the place we would look first: the military. Leadership in the military is not an option, it is a bare, stark necessity. And, like courage, it need not be displayed because it is assumed. Woe to the young JG who fails this test, if he's lucky he may just be shouldered aside by his NCO, if not he may wake in the middle of the night next to a live grenade.


Here's the thing:


Leadership is comprised of many qualities: responsibility, courage, wisdom, experience, judgment, instinct, passion, vision, perseverance, loyalty... among others. But it is founded upon one quality only: sacrifice. All leaders understand this innately but most skew the interpretation to stand it on its ear, they think it must mean your sacrifice. These are always the bad leaders, the narcissists, the warmongers, the tinpot dictators, the power-mad politicians who will sacrifice anyone and everyone to gain their grail. They never seem to achieve it... and because of this fundamental misunderstanding, they never will.


True leadership, is based on self-sacrifice, on the willing gift or, as the Greeks put it, "the sacrifice that goes, consenting". In the elder days this was literal truth, in times of emergency, of war, of drought or famine, plague or pestilence; the king was called by the god to sacrifice himself for the people.

Oedipus, the King of Thebes sent to the Oracle at Delphi to ask Apollo what to do in a time of great drought and famine. He expected to be called to account for the city's sins and, in a way, he was. The Oracle told him to "seek out the unclean thing"; he did, and found himself.


We do not demand that our leaders hurl themselves from high places any more nor immolate themselves in the sacred fire nor battle dragons in their lairs. The nightmares are different now: the mushroom cloud, the ravening packs of corporate wolves, the manic hordes of religious madmen (perhaps not so different after all) but the bedrock principle of self-sacrifice remains the defining characteristic of leadership.


Why is this important?


It is important because the tale of history hangs on simple choices, choices that, in retrospect, look freighted with overt meaning but which looked innocent and simple at the time - simple as a hanging chad.
It is important because we have two exemplars in front of us right now, showing both sides and qualities of leadership. The one who spoke on Tuesday showed us elegance and grace, intelligence and compassion, aspiration and accomplishment. More than that, she exhibited all the qualities of the good leader: she shared with us and invited us to share with her and most of all she spoke of her dedication and continuing commitment to core principles and to the common good. Every idea was based on internal conviction and was applied to an external solution. This is the good leadership model: showing by thought and by action, the path forward and speaking the magic incantation: "Follow me!"


The other exemplar we will hear tonight and, if the past has any instructive value, he will, once again, tell us his story, tell us that he is the one he has been waiting for. He will use the rhetoric that attempts to make the 'other' into himself, subsuming his followers into his own ego, demanding that sacrifice to himself and then speaking of his dreams, his hope, his change. But there will be an emptiness in his words, as there always is, the hollowness of his core deprives his words of value, the emptiness of his principles is revealed as his lofty rhetoric falls flat. Because there is no internal transcendence of self, his speeches are devoid of power and worse, they show us his inner emptiness. This is why we recoil when he speaks.


One can also tell something about a leader by the company s/he keeps, by the actions of his/her followers and by the environment s/he chooses.


Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers and Tony Rezco are not role models we want for our children, what they have in common is a willingness to suborn the good will of others in search of power. The actions of Axelrod, Pelosi, Dean and Brazile are wanton in their blatant contempt for democracy and savage in their zealotry.


The strutting, preening, pompous parade that is the Obama presentation will reach its climax tonight with his investiture at Invesco Field where, before 80,000 adoring acolytes, he will emerge from the colonnades of a faux Greek temple to accept their adulation. The histories of mad Roman emperors comes to mind. But that pales beside the modern mirror - an instantaneous comparison will rocket to the mind of anyone old enough to remember "Triumph of the Will". Perhaps there is no one on his staff who can remember those times - or has even seen the movie...


The faux presidential seal, the replacement of the US flag on the tail of his campaign plane with his branded logo, the 'beer and sausages' rock concert in Berlin - not at the Brandenburg Gate, a symbol of hope and freedom, but at the Siegessäule, the "Victory Column" used, among others, by Hitler to celebrate his victories over neighboring states. All these ornate trappings, the egregious excesses, the arrogance and contempt... all bespeak a man who knows his reach has exceeded his grasp, they are all an attempt to create the very thing they lack, to engender the confidence in others that is not manifest in the self.


There are many paths to self-knowledge, they all require hard work on the inner self to achieve that knowledge and they all require us to give up what we love best: ourselves. Musashi - the master swordsman of Japan, tells us in his "Book of Five Rings" that victory is only achieved when we can look into the Void.


The problem in general is that there are different types of people who grow or acquire leadership capabilities - being a leader is not a guarantee of good humor, good judgment or good sense. Certainly there is a quantum of talent involved in leadership, and there are a shelf full of books that will teach you everything you ever wanted to know (and a lot you didn't want to know) about how to practice leadership. A leader can be dedicated, passionate, loyal to his cause... and utterly evil (Pol Pot for instance) or he can have those same qualities and be regarded as a secular saint (Lincoln for instance - unless you're from the South).


The essential quality of the man or woman will always make itself manifest - you are known by the company you keep, by the deeds that you do and by the quality of the relationships that you form. If your relationships are about trust and honor, respect, consultation and mutually beneficial collaboration - the god stays with you and, sometimes, you will hear the distant sound of thunder.


If, on the other hand, your relationships are all about steppingstones to power or about power itself, then you may indeed ascend the rungs of power over the bodies of erstwhile friends and enemies alike - but the only sound you are likely to hear is the echo of your own thoughts...


"Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad." - Euripides

A Crack in the StoneWall?

Today Ray McGovern, a boyhood friend of Colin Powell's and a 27-year veteran on the CIA's internecine wars published a challenge to Secretary Powell to, finally, come forward and tell the truth about his infamous UN speech on Iraq go here, for the original article.

In his letter, McGovern charges Powell to speak or be tarred forever as a participant in the Cheney-Bush debacle that is Iraq.

“If you were blindsided, well, here’s an opportunity to try to wipe off some of the blot. There is no need for you to end up like Lady Macbeth, wandering around aimlessly muttering, Out damn spot…or blot.“

McGovern goes back to their boyhood friendship to remind Powell of the code of honor they both grew up with:

“On those Bronx streets, rough as they were, there was also a strong sense of what was honorable —honorable even among thieves and liars, you might say. And we had words, which I will not repeat here, for sycophants, pimps, and cowards.”

And he reminds Powell (and us) of the price we have paid for this folly:

“With 4,141 American soldiers — not to mention hundreds of thousands of Iraqi citizens — dead, and over 30,000 GIs badly wounded...”

In withering detail, McGovern recounts the fraud perpetrated on the American public and on the world by Cheney-Bush, and he clearly states “J'Accuse!” directly at both Bush and Cheney for deliberately foisting this fraudulent war upon us:

“But when President Bush was first told of Habbush’s report that there were no WMD in Iraq, Suskind’s sources say the president reacted by saying, “Well, why don’t you tell him to give us something we can use to make our case?” “

McGovern goes on to say that the investigative work of Sydney Blumenthal and Ron Suskind has been instrumental in meticulously laying out the process and progress of lies, step by step. And, apparently, the coverup goes on to this day:

“It was, no doubt, pure coincidence that President Bush made a highly unusual visit to CIA headquarters, also on Thursday, before leaving for Crawford on vacation... [snip] given the record of the past seven years, it is reasonable to suggest that he also wanted to assure malleable Mike Hayden, the CIA director, and his minions that they will be protected if they continue to stiff-arm appropriate congressional committees, denying them the information they need for a successful investigation. “

McGovern winds up his letter by challenging Powell to step up and tell the truth – and thereby repair his deeply tarnished reputation – or remain silent and, by that silence, let us know that he was part of the deception after all.

Your choice Mr Secretary, we're waiting...