April 2006

While Bush is still beating his war drums for Iran, we still got a growing problem in Iraq and it is getting worse:

Thirty-two bodies of Iraqi police and security forces recruits were discovered in two areas of Baghdad on Monday, Interior Ministry sources said.

All 32 were from the town of Ramadi in the insurgent heartland of Anbar province, which is fiercely opposed to the government, the sources said.

One group of 17 were kidnapped and then shot dead after they signed up for the police force one week ago. They were found in the Baghdady district of the capital.

We need to seriously ask ourselves "how many messes are we going to let Bush leave for the next President?" Even more so - Congress needs to ask this question. Bush is determined to destroy not only America, but also the world before leaving office. He feels he can do this because he hears voices in his head he calls "God".

Bloomberg is reporting that the investigation into the phone jamming scandal is now widening:

To Republicans, the New Hampshire phone-jamming incident is an isolated case of political dirty tricks that took place more than three years ago.

To Democrats, it's a scandal with echoes of Watergate that may reach all the way to the White House.

Republican leaders are facing questions stemming from a criminal case involving efforts to suppress voter turnout in a U.S. Senate election in the state in 2002. Republican John Sununu won that race over Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, helping Republicans retake control of the Senate.

The facts, on the surface at least, are suspicious: dozens of phone calls to the White House by a man later convicted in the case; the national Republican Party agreeing to pay more than $2.5 million in legal bills; phones jammed on Election Day, not only of Democrats but of a firefighters' group, in the first U.S. congressional elections since the Sept. 11 attacks. Democrats say that disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff may even be involved.

If the tables were turned and it was Democrats doing this with a Democrat in the White House you can be damn sure the Republicans would be calling for investigations and Congressional hearings. This is our democracy we are talking about here and it does demand that amount of attention. If the Republicans continue to ignore this incident then it proves they have zero respect for what our country is and stands for.

Writing on behalf of his One America political action committee, former Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards sent an email Saturday seeking signatories in an effort to expand the powers of Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate President Bush's role in the strategic leaking of information related to Iraq.

In the form letter on Edwards' site, he writes, "I urge you to extend Mr. Fitzgerald's charter to include the behavior of the President in this disgraceful affair."

The letter to supporters, while unlikely to influence the investigation, signals that Edwards continues to remain active on the political scene, and could indicate an effort to advance a 2008 presidential run.

Via Raw Story.

If Edwards is doing this to position himself for a run in 2008 or not is not at issue here. Edwards has come up with a very good plan - let the man who is already knee deep in investigating the Iraqi intelligence failure investigate it even further. We know for a fact Bush manipulated and/or ignored intelligence that would have kept us from going to war. It is time he be investigated and put on trial for it. You can sign Edwards letter here. I have also added it to the Get Active section on the left.

Looks like the Republicans are eating their young old again:

REPUBLICANS are urging President George W Bush to dump Dick Cheney as vice-president and replace him with Condoleezza Rice if he is serious about presenting a new face to the jaded American public. They believe that only the sacrifice of one or more of the big beasts of the jungle, such as Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, will convince voters that Bush understands the need for a fresh start.

The jittery Republicans claim Bush’s mini-White House reshuffle last week will do nothing to forestall the threat of losing control of Congress in the November mid-term elections.

Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard magazine and author of Rebel in Chief, a sympathetic new biography of Bush, said: “There are going to have to be sweeping personnel changes if people are going to take a second look at the Bush presidency.”

Barnes, who is close to the White House, said he believed Cheney would be willing to stand down in order to help Bush. “It’s unlike Bush to dump somebody whom he likes and respects,” he cautioned. “But the president needs to do something shocking and dramatic such as putting in Condoleezza Rice.”

I think dumping Cheney is a great idea. Then after that Bush should dump Bush, but not before dumping Condi, Rumsfeld, John Bolton and everyone else. A little shake up in the White House is not going to fix the problems we have in America. What it is going to do is by time for Bush before the next President has to come in and repair a devastation.