Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann discuss their history of working in the Bush administration and how the nuts in power (my characterization) have long been planning this upcoming war with Iran. It's in Esquire magazine and is free to read online here.

One of the nice things about being a pundit is that your words still remain even when they seem (to those with any sense) embarrassing later on. William Kristol may be wrong about everything all the time, but he's also been consistent on many of his positions. Say what you will, but he's no flip-flopper...

In today's New York Post, there's an article about Iranian defector Ali Reza Asghari, the ex-Deputy Defense Minister. He's now defected and has brought with him a "treasure trove" of documents and maps that will halp justify an attack on Iran.

Dennis Kucinich is on WHUS radio being interviewed by cell phone. He's running late to his meet-and-greet appearance at the University of Connecticut. Some of us might feel that in an ideal world, maybe the guy would have a chance to win. As I listen to his interview I'm starting to wonder if he might be able to do so in this world.

This was actually from Sunday, October 30th, but it doesn't seem to have been diaried. According to an Egyptian-born now Canadian-national aerospace engineer and former US pilot, Hossam Shaltout, Saddam Hussein was ready to give in to all US demands before the invasion but was rebuffed by the US.

Though many CIA agents will concede that torture does not work, never mind the moral implications, our leaders have long been really into it. The torture debate is nothing new.

Back in the Vietnam war, the US built detention centers in which the South Vietnamese would use various methods to extract information from the enemy. Allegations of mistreatment of innocents led to Congressional investigations...

We all know Donald Rumsfeld would like us to see this Iraq war as a struggle on par with that against the Nazis. Sure, it's rarely if ever mentioned that Bush's own Grandpa dealt with the Nazi regime all through WWII. I suppose that would only be treasonous if a Democrat did it (though it might be considered so if our "liberal media" were to pick up on it). But Rumsfeld and Cheney's senses of irony are just as dulled as Bush's is, if not moreso...

In today's Hartford Courant, It is made pretty clear that President Bush, like most Connecticut Republicans, would like to see Joe Lieberman win back his Senate seat in November. While he doesn't outright endorse Joe, he does outright refuse to endorse his own party's nominee, Alan Schlesinger. Obviously he wouldn't want Ned Lamont to take the seat, so that leaves just one guy...

In his latest column, Charles Krauthammer argues (shock of all shocks) that Israel has every right to defend itself (well duh...), and that its actions have not been "disproportionate." at all. While the actions of Israel might seem to many to have gone too far, I find Charlie's logic and use of examples rather interesting either way.

As we all know, Joe Lieberman is trying to seem all calm and unconcerned about Ned Lamont's challenge for the CT Democratic Senator nomination. Meanwhile, he makes silly anti-Lamont ads with cartoon bears suggesting that Lamont is merely a proxy candidate for Lowell Weicker. This is all because Weicker has offered his support to Ned and is helping him fundraise: clearly then he MUST have been behind Ned's very idea to run, right? In another commercial...

The latest Greg Palast book Armed Madhouse will tell the tale of ChoicePoint's latest exploits. We might remember them from such election roll purges as Florida in 2004...Apparently they did such a great job removing convicted Democrats from the voter rolls, they got the contract to supply the government with our personal data!

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For a long time, many have thought that Dick Cheney was the "real" President of the US. With Executive Order 13292, Cheney even has powers equal to the office of President to classify and reclassify information. Few if any people in America think the VP (much less this one) should be empowered with such authority. Bush has essentially abdicated his throne to this apparent supervillain whom many always thought was really running the show...

Has anyone seen this column from Barry Saunders at the Raleigh News and Observer? He postulates that:

Just as surely as a fish wrapped in a bulletproof vest means "Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes," that shotgun blast to Whittington's face was meant to convey that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby had better bite his tongue and forget about testifying against Cheney, his former boss, in the Valerie Plame spy case.

What'll it be, Scooter: a case of amnesia or lead poisoning?

We all know Sean Hannity is a bully and a hypocrite. He would (perhaps has) believe it no big deal that newspapers are printing comics offensive to Muslims, but oh THE OUTRAGE that Tom Toles has caused with this comic! Anyone with critical thinking faculties can see that this comic is not in any way meant to disparage our troops or amputees! And Hannity brings on Ted Rall (while Colmes sits still as a statue) and verbally berates him (about his Pat Tillman comic from two years ago), shouting him down and not giving him a chance to even speak (a tactic beloved by Bill O'Reilly as well of course)...

It's been reported now by the Guardian, that Bush had decided that with or without a second UN resolution, the US would invade Iraq. Here's one snippet:

Mr Bush told the Mr Blair that the US was so worried about the failure to find hard evidence against Saddam that it thought of "flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft planes with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in UN colours". Mr Bush added: "If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach [of UN resolutions]".

Will this get the same media blackout the Downing Street memo did? This has since been covered in more detail by this post. At this point, at best I'd be merely seconding what he quite ably said!

   Remember the Bulgegate scandal, when President Bush cheated during the debates with John Kerry by having someone (perhaps Karl Rove) feeding him talking points through an earpiece? Remember the wires snaking down his back? Well...it seems he's still at it. This speech about Sam Alito seemed pretty strange right from the start and seemed good fodder for sampling for a song...The process of listening to the speech many times during production of this track eventually brought home the fact that Bush is still wired! The evidence of this is the intro to the track or can be heard about 20 seconds into this video. Bush seems to tell the voice in his earphones to "shh." Unless someone else has a good explanation why he would stop in the middle of "he is well qualified" to throw in a "shh," it would seem quite clear that he still needs outside help, even to appear to be a real President.

Last May, Congress and Senate both approved the Real ID bill that establishes establishes a national ID card...The bill was snuck into a military appropriations bill to fund US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan; there was no real debate and certainly no media coverage before the vote took place. It has gotten scant coverage since, though the possibility for loss of civil liberties and great abuse with this ID program is very real, and the program is unfunded and non-negotiable. Perhaps most frightening, the program will be under the watch of creepy torture-supporting and apparent terrorist-shielding homeland security chief, Michael Chertoff! This is scary stuff.