Politics

This is flat-out amazing.

Last Friday, it was announced that tomorow, Monday the 28^th^, there would be a special fundraising dinner in Columbia, South Carolina to benefit the Bush/Cheney re-election campaign. This dinner is a \$2000 per plate fundraiser, expected to raise \$250,000 (from 125 people).

The good folks over at the Dean campaign decided to turn this into a challenge, and “brought back the bat“. Their goal was to see if in three days — this weekend, from Saturday through Monday at midnight — they could match that \$250,000 goal through their grassroots fundraising efforts.

Today, just before 11pm eastern time, with a full 24 hours left before the Monday midnight deadline, they hit the \$250,000 mark.

As of 11 pm EDT, 4,629 Americans have contributed \$250,733.20 to the Dean Team vs. Bush-Cheney Challenge.

We know that many of you have waited to contribute until tomorrow, the day of Cheney’s fundraiser.

You’ll notice the second bat doesn’t have a goal. It will be up to you and thousands of other Americans to fill that bat up to whatever amount you can by midnight, tomorrow. We’ve matched the Bush-Cheney fundraising machine. Tomorrow, let’s see by how much we can surpass them.

And wait til you see what we plan on doing with the additional money you help raise tomorrow. It’s top secret, but we can tell you this — it will surprise everyone.

We’ll be giving you half hour updates all day tomorrow, beginning at 8 am.

This is what it’s all about. Not \$2000 a head dinners so the fat cats can buy their “special interests” by keeping the status quo, but by people all across the country giving what they can, because they believe in a candidate, and because they want to make a change for the better.

Just in case you were wondering how much President Bush really respected the flag:

The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.

— US Code, Title 4, Chapter 1, Sec. 8 (g)

(via John Hoke and Daily Kos)

This is great:

Bush needs to order new bumperstickers, but needs help with the slogan. Can anyone help?

(via Kirsten) Some favorites:

• Cheney/Bush 2004: Making the world a better place, one country at a time.
• Bush/Cheney: Four more wars!
• Compassionate Fascism
• Bush – because the truth just isn’t good enough.
• In Africa the elephants screw each other – In America the elephants screw the people.
• Because I’m the President, That’s why!
• Bush/Cheney – less CIA, more CYA
• Thanks for not paying attention
• Re-elect Pass the Buck and Wag the Dog in 2004 (actually mine — Kirsten tossed it up — thanks!)
• What recession? My friends are still rich.
• Bush — He Sees Beyond the Truth
• “Dictatorship sure would be easier!”
• Bush/Cheney – if at first you don’t succeed, lie, lie again
• Bush/Cheney ’04: We’re Gooder
• Bush/Cheney ’04: Because civil liberties are for wussies.
• Bush/Cheney 1984
• Bush/Cheney ’04 – Because FOX says so.
• Why Think? Vote Bush!

The full congressional inquiry into the events surrounding Sept. 11^th^, 2001 (well, minus the sections pulled by the White House) is available online.

In February 2002, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence agreed to conduct a Joint Inquiry into the activities of the U.S. Intelligence Community in connection with the terrorist attacks perpetrated against our nation on September 11, 2001. This report (available as both S. Rept. 107-351 and H. Rept. 107-792) consists of 832 pages that presents the joint inquiry’s findings and conclusions, an accompanying narrative, and a series of recommendations.

(via Lambert, who’d also like to know if there’s an easy way to convert the report to HTML…I’m clueless)

Mike Walsh’s plans to register to vote for the first time in 54 years got me wondering how many other people might finally be moved to register during this election cycle.

Myself, I’ve been registered since I was 18. When I moved to Washington, one of the first things I did was switch my registration — after two years I still haven’t switched to a Washington driver’s licence, but I can vote! I’ve also made my feelings on voting and participating quite clear in the past.

The one and only good thing I can say about Bush’s presidency is that he’s got me paying far more attention to all this political stuff than I ever have before. If that same effect can start spreading across the country as more and more of his lies and evasions come to light, and more people register to vote and participate in the political process, it can only be a good thing.

Don’t vote? I don’t want to hear it. Read my two self-links above (especially this one) for everything I have to say on the matter.

And congratulations, Mike, for deciding it’s time to stand up and make your voice heard.

While I’ve heard a lot about über-conservative Ann Coulter, I’d never bothered to read anything she wrote. From everything I’d read about her, I didn’t figure it was worth the time. Now I know I was right, and have no need nor desire to ever read anything from her again.

I just stopped by her site to see if she’d really been so brazen as to print this quote that I found on Over the Edge:

THE HOWARD DEAN campaign was forced to cancel events this week in response to events in Iraq. Donations to the Odai and Qusai Hussein Memorial Fund can be submitted directly to the Dean campaign.

At first I couldn’t believe that that was actually what she wrote, but there it is (not directly linked, but if you really want to, it’s up at http://www.anncoulter.org/columns/2003/072303p.htm right now).

Ick. And this woman has a best selling book out?

Just sad.

Lie, lie, and lie again. And if that doesn’t work, then lie some more.

In most cases, it wouldn’t matter much that a 40-year-old long-time heavy drinker refused to admit to his alcoholism, nor that years later, he continued to play word games when asked about his cocaine use. Doctors might say that denial isn’t good for a person’s recovery, but that wouldn’t affect the rest of us.

The difference in this case is that the substance abuser somehow became president of the United States. And by hiding his earlier problems, George W. Bush learned what is becoming a dangerous lesson — that his family and political connections can protect him from the truth.

(via Len)

Some major questions are popping up about the deaths of Uday and Qusay Hussein.

Firstly: Why were they killed? Why not captured?

At a news briefing today, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, squirmed his way past that question repeatedly. It was, he said, the decision of the commander on the ground based on the circumstances and his judgment — “and it was the right decision.” But was it? Who beside the sons might have better information about the one HVT that really matters, Saddam? “The whole operation was a cockup,” said a British intelligence officer. “There was no need to go after four lightly armed men with such overwhelming firepower. They would have been much more useful alive.”

(via Lambert)

Daily Kos asks some of the same questions I did when I heard the news: A four (or six) hour firefight between 200+ troops and four people?

Ok, while I’m no expert, a four hour firefight is an extremely long time to fend anyone off. You have Task Force 20 supported by a company from the 101 attacking a house. People who can move fast. Now, either they shot this house up until the mice had .223 rounds in them, there were a LOT more than four people killed inside, or Uday and Qusay Hussein learned to fight from American gangster movies.

Yes it is possible that Saddam’s murderous, heinous sons got killed in a four hour long fire fight, but then again, given the firepower arrayed against them, the idea that they lived for four hours in such a hailstorm of fire is dubious. Also, how in hell could their bodyguards survive and escape? There should be a pile of dead Iraqis around the house, not four as the news reports claim.

And last, but not least: As the military seems reluctant to release photos of the two, was it really them?

The US Army seems to be doing everything possible to enhance the myth of the dead Hussein brothers. They use a great deal of fire power to kill them, then instead of marching a camera crew in the building and splashing the pictures all over TV, play cute with it. They wanted the evidence of their deaths, they collected it, but when it comes time to prove it to the Iraqi people, they falter.

Both brothers had doubles. There is little trust in the CPA or the US military. If this is an important thing, if killing them was a major priority, proving they were dead, is even more so. It’s just another amazing half-measure in the administration of Iraq that they haven’t done so.

Too many questions, not enough answers. Of course, that seems to be the rule rather than the exception these days.