BUSH'S HOUSE OF CARDS COLLAPSING

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Fri, 17 Feb 2006 21:25:10 -0800 (PST)

BUSH'S HOUSE OF CARDS COLLAPSING

 

 

 

 

BUSH'S HOUSE OF CARDS COLLAPSING

By Bill Gallagher

 

 

DETROIT -- The frauds and deceptions are unraveling

every day and cascading truths are forcing the

Busheviks to do more of what they do best: lie. We now

have the first eyewitness account from a CIA officer

confirming what the reality-based community has long

known -- that President George W. Bush and company

cherry-picked and distorted intelligence to make their

phony case for war in Iraq.

 

Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were not only

aware that the identity of an undercover CIA operative

was leaked, we now are learning they ordered the

treasonous deed themselves. Oh, yes, another

eyewitness account provides the testimony.

 

Bush lied through his teeth when he said he didn't

even know corrupt former lobbyist Jack Abramoff. In

fact, Bush met with him personally about a dozen times

at the White House, and at countless fund-raisers

where Abramoff helped buy the favor-seeking crowd.

 

Bush forgets warnings of terrorist attacks and natural

disasters, but he always remembers the big money

people. Bush allowed Abramoff access to the White

House and invited him to visit the Crawford ranch.

Abramoff has the photos and e-mails to prove it.

 

The U.S. attorney general denies any wrongdoing and

says the president can make his own rules, even when

Congress has enacted a federal statute prohibiting

warrantless electronic surveillance.

 

We now know -- through another eyewitness account --

that Bush and his minions lied about when they were

warned about the breach of the New Orleans levees.

 

It is stunning to realize the lid was blown off all

these monumental lies in a single week.

 

On top of that, our squirmer in chief had to endure

Coretta Scott King's funeral, where he had to listen

to criticism of his war and his assaults on the

Constitution.

 

Cheney was forced to leave his bunker and defend

lawlessness, declaring that " we have all the legal

authority we need " to trample on the Fourth Amendment

and wiretap anyone without probable cause or judicial

review.

 

The vice president made his wild assertions on

" NewsHour " with Jim Lehrer. Cheney, in a rare

interview with someone other than his pal Rush

Limbaugh, was in legal limbo, declaring the president

can do as he damn well pleases in matters of foreign

policy and national security. Congress, Cheney

claimed, only has the right to " suggest " in these

matters.

 

A CIA veteran said the Bush administration engaged in

the " politicization " of intelligence relating to Iraq.

Paul R. Pillar, who recently retired from his post as

the CIA's top counterterrorism analyst, reviewed

assessments on Iraq from 15 agencies in the

intelligence community.

 

In an article in " Foreign Affairs " magazine, Pillar

provides a scathing indictment of the White House

interference, revealing that " it has become clear that

official intelligence was not relied on in making even

the most significant national security decisions, that

intelligence was misused publicly to justify decisions

already made. "

 

All those Saturday morning visits Cheney and his top

aide, " Scooter " Libby, made to CIA headquarters in

Langley, Va., paid off for the cabal that had already

decided to invade Iraq.

 

" If the entire body of official intelligence on Iraq

had a policy implication, it was to avoid war -- or,

if war was going to be launched, to prepare for a

messy aftermath, " Pillar wrote. " What is most

remarkable about prewar U.S. intelligence on Iraq is

not that it got things wrong and thereby misled

policy-makers; it is that it played so small a role in

one of the most important U.S. policy decisions in

decades. "

 

Pillar joins the growing list of truth-tellers:

Richard Clarke, the former White House

counterterrorism chief; Paul O'Neill, former secretary

of the Treasury and National Security Council member;

and Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff for former

secretary of state Colin Powell. They all say Bush,

Cheney and Rumsfeld first made the decision to attack

Iraq, and then fabricated the reasons and

justifications for what they were going to do.

 

Libby is preparing his defense, which will pivot on a

claim that he was just following orders. Murray Waas

of the " National Journal, " who did the finest

reporting on the CIA leak investigation, has learned

that Libby has already testified to a federal grand

jury that he was " authorized " by Cheney and other

" superiors " to disclose classified information to

reporters in order to " defend the Bush

administration's use of prewar intelligence in making

the case to go to war with Iraq. "

 

Libby's twin titles at the White House were chief of

staff to the vice president and special assistant to

the president. Bush and Cheney had to know what Libby

was doing. My theory is that Condoleezza Rice, then

the national security adviser, had a hand in

encouraging the treachery.

 

Amazingly, the White House has " lost " relevant

e-mails, in a clear attempt to impede special

prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation. Whoever

destroyed the e-mails obstructed justice and should be

charged.

 

Bush's " brain, " Karl Rove, certainly was a key player

in the plot to discredit former ambassador Joseph

Wilson for his report debunking the administration's

bogus claim that Saddam Hussein was buying enriched

uranium in Niger. That lie was so pivotal in the case

for war that the conspiring Busheviks blew Wilson's

wife's cover.

 

Waas cites " people with firsthand knowledge of the

matter, " indicating that Libby will structure his

defense on the argument " that Vice President Cheney

and other senior Bush administration officials had

earlier encouraged and authorized him to share

classified information with journalists to build

public support for going to war. "

 

After the war began, Cheney authorized Libby to

release additional classified information, including

details of the National Intelligence Estimate report,

to defend the administration's use of prewar

intelligence in making the case for war. Cheney and

his boy in the Oval Office should be indicted for that

crime.

 

" I don't know him, " Bush said of admitted felon,

influence-peddler and bagman for Republican causes,

Jack Abramoff. Bush's amnesia baffled Abramoff.

Abramoff wrote in an e-mail to Kim Eisler, national

editor of " Washingtonian " magazine, " The guy saw me in

almost a dozen settings, and joked with me about a

bunch of things, including details of my kids. Perhaps

he has forgotten everything. "

 

Hell, Bush forgot the entire year of 1972, when he was

supposed to be reporting for Air National Guard

meetings in Alabama. He still can't remember why he

skipped his required pilot's flight physical.

 

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales forgot the

Constitution when he testified before the Senate

Judiciary Committee about the administration's illegal

searches. Gonzales sounded more like a mob mouthpiece

than our nation's chief law enforcement officer.

 

Without being required to take an oath swearing to

speak the truth -- courtesy of the shameless committee

chairman, Arlen Specter, and the other gutless knaves

on the panel -- Gonzales ducked and weaseled as he

defended the indefensible. A New York Times editorial

aptly described his performance as " a daylong display

of cynical hair-splitting, obfuscation, disinformation

and stonewalling. "

 

The soft-spoken Gonzales is, in fact, an advocate of

monarchical powers for the president, and should be

fitted with the brown shirt his fondness for fascism

merits. He, too, should be indicted.

 

Michael " You're doing a heck of a job, Brownie " Brown,

the disgraced former FEMA director, got his licks in,

blaming top White House staffers for the disgracefully

delayed response to Hurricane Katrina.

 

Brown -- who did take an oath to tell the truth --

appeared before the Senate Committee on Homeland

Security and Governmental Affairs last week. Brown

said it was " baloney " for Department of Homeland

Security officials to claim they only learned of the

extent of the flooding in New Orleans on Tuesday, Aug.

30. Brown testified that, the day before, he had

informed senior White House officials of the unfolding

disaster and the dire need for more help from the

federal government. He said he probably spoke with Joe

Hagin, the deputy White House chief of staff, and he

may have informed chief of staff Andrew Card of his

concerns.

 

Either the White House staffers did not inform the

president about the crisis -- in which case, they

should have been fired -- or they did and he did

nothing. The latter is more plausible. Bush was in

California at a political fund-raiser and probably

just shrugged off the warning. Recall, his staff had

to sit him down to show him videos of the devastation,

because " Bubble Boy " had not bothered to watch it on

live television.

 

Bush works to frustrate our freedom on every level,

especially with his incessant lying and isolation from

the reality of the horrible failures his deceit and

incompetence have wrought.

 

My friend and colleague Amy Lange wrote a description

of our national suffering, which I condensed and

shaped into verse.

 

Welcome to Democracy Row

Just outside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

This is where our greatest freedoms

Once cherished -- now worn out, washed up and

Discarded like empty gin bottles -- have hit the

skids.

There's Freedom of Speech

Curled up in a ball under a tattered

American flag --

rocking Silently back and forth.

Freedom of _Expression is nearby trying to warm --

huddled under two T-shirts that read

" Support the Troops " and " 2245 Dead How many more? "

Wiretapping walks by fresh from a party at the White

House

Reeking of arrogance and undeserved superiority

He spits on Privacy and Privacy whimpers in despair.

Lies come running out like a pack of wild dogs

 

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