Jay Haynes

LIES!!!!!!

President Asked Aide to Explore Iraq Link to 9/11

The White House acknowledged Sunday that on the day after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush asked his top counterterrorism adviser, Richard A. Clarke, to find out whether Iraq was involved.

Mr. Bush wanted to know "did Iraq have anything to do with this? Were they complicit in it?" Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, recounted in an interview on CBS' "60 Minutes."

Mr. Bush was not trying to intimidate anyone to "produce information," she said. Rather, given the United States' "actively hostile relationship" with Iraq at the time, he was asking Mr. Clarke "a perfectly logical question," Ms. Rice said.

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The conversation — which the White House suggested last week had never taken place — centers on perhaps the most volatile charge Mr. Clarke has made public in recent days: that the Bush White House became fixated on Iraq and Saddam Hussein at the expense of focusing on Al Qaeda.

Lifting the Shroud

Lifting the Shroud

Shinskei, Wilson, Foster, Clarke

When Gen. Eric Shinseki told Congress that postwar Iraq would require a large occupation force, that was the end of his military career. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV revealed that the 2003 State of the Union speech contained information known to be false, someone in the White House destroyed his wife's career by revealing that she was a C.I.A. operative. And we now know that Richard Foster, the Medicare system's chief actuary, was threatened with dismissal if he revealed to Congress the likely cost of the administration's prescription drug plan.

The latest insider to come forth, of course, is Richard Clarke, George Bush's former counterterrorism czar and the author of the just-published "Against All Enemies."

On "60 Minutes" on Sunday, Mr. Clarke said the previously unsayable: that Mr. Bush, the self-proclaimed "war president," had "done a terrible job on the war against terrorism." After a few hours of shocked silence, the character assassination began. He "may have had a grudge to bear since he probably wanted a more prominent position," declared Dick Cheney, who also says that Mr. Clarke was "out of the loop." (What loop? Before 9/11, Mr. Clarke was the administration's top official on counterterrorism.) It's "more about politics and a book promotion than about policy," Scott McClellan said.

$87 billion

Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall

The Dems were clear at the time that they weren't going to let the $87 billion go unfunded. They were trying to force a change in how it was funded and force some assurances that the administration would cut loose some of its more hopeless policies -- both of which would be vastly better than what happened.

Combat Pay

Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall: March 14, 2004 - March 20, 2004 Archives

The text narration says: ""No body armor for troops in combat. No higher combat pay. No to better health care for reservists and their families. No -- wrong on defense."

What's most bracing about this narration is that this is actually a pretty factual statement if the target is the president, not Kerry.

Now, one claim really stands out here. The ad says Kerry voted no to "higher combat pay."

This is truly a milestone in the long bilious history of gall.

If you watched this debate at the time you'll remember that last summer the Bush administration went to great lengths to cut combat pay for troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan in order to save money for other priorities. They only relented when Democrats, Republicans and most of all military-oriented publications likeArmy Times expressed so much outrage that they had no choice but abandon the effort.

Here's a snippet from an article which appeared on August 15th, 2003 in the San Francisco Chronicle which gives a brief glimpse of their ignominious retreat ...

The White House quickly backpedaled Thursday on Pentagon plans to cut the combat pay of the 157,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan after disclosure of the idea quickly became a political embarrassment.

The Pentagon's support for the idea of rolling back "imminent danger pay" by $75 a month and "family separation allowances" for the American forces by $150 a month collapsed after a story in The Chronicle Thursday generated intense criticism from military families, veterans groups and Democratic candidates seeking to unseat President Bush in 2004.

And so the White House which was pushing to save money by reducing combat pay for troops currently serving in two combat zones is now challenging Kerry's national security bona-fides by alleging that he opposed increases in combat pay.

Sometimes you try to dress it up or package it in some artful way. But the truth is irreducibly blunt: lying and indifference to a factual record often no further away than the google web site is the hallmark of this administration.

Up is down.

Weak on Terror

Op-Ed Columnist: Weak on Terror

This reluctance dates back to Mr. Bush's first months in office. Why, after all, has his inner circle tried so hard to prevent a serious investigation of what happened on 9/11? There has been much speculation about whether officials ignored specific intelligence warnings, but what we know for sure is that the administration disregarded urgent pleas by departing Clinton officials to focus on the threat from Al Qaeda.

After 9/11, terrorism could no longer be ignored, and the military conducted a successful campaign against Al Qaeda's Taliban hosts. But the failure to commit sufficient U.S. forces allowed Osama bin Laden to escape. After that, the administration appeared to lose interest in Al Qaeda; by the summer of 2002, bin Laden's name had disappeared from Mr. Bush's speeches. It was all Saddam, all the time.

This wasn't just a rhetorical switch; crucial resources were pulled off the hunt for Al Qaeda, which had attacked America, to prepare for the overthrow of Saddam, who hadn't. If you want confirmation that this seriously impeded the fight against terror, just look at reports about the all-out effort to capture Osama that started, finally, just a few days ago. Why didn't this happen last year, or the year before? According to The New York Times, last year many of the needed forces were tied up in Iraq.

It's now clear that by shifting his focus to Iraq, Mr. Bush did Al Qaeda a huge favor. The terrorists and their Taliban allies were given time to regroup; the resurgent Taliban once again control almost a third of Afghanistan, and Al Qaeda has regained the ability to carry out large-scale atrocities.

But Mr. Bush's lapses in the struggle against terrorism extend beyond his decision to give Al Qaeda a breather. His administration has also run interference for Saudi Arabia — the home of most of the 9/11 hijackers, and the main financier of Islamic extremism — and Pakistan, which created the Taliban and has actively engaged in nuclear proliferation.

Some of the administration's actions have been so strange that those who reported them were initially accused of being nutty conspiracy theorists. For example, what are we to make of the post-9/11 Saudi airlift? Just days after the attack, at a time when private air travel was banned, the administration gave special clearance to flights that gathered up Saudi nationals, including a number of members of the bin Laden family, who were in the U.S. at the time. These Saudis were then allowed to leave the country, after at best cursory interviews with the F.B.I.

U.S. Videos, for TV News, Come Under Scrutiny

U.S. Videos, for TV News, Come Under Scrutiny

Federal investigators are scrutinizing television segments in which the Bush administration paid people to pose as journalists praising the benefits of the new Medicare law, which would be offered to help elderly Americans with the costs of their prescription medicines.

The videos are intended for use in local television news programs. Several include pictures of President Bushreceiving a standing ovation from a crowd cheering as he signed the Medicare law on Dec. 8.

The materials were produced by the Department of Health and Human Services, which called them video news releases, but the source is not identified. Two videos end with the voice of a woman who says, "In Washington, I'm Karen Ryan reporting."

But the production company, Home Front Communications, said it had hired her to read a script prepared by the government.

Another video, intended for Hispanic audiences, shows a Bush administration official being interviewed in Spanish by a man who identifies himself as a reporter named Alberto Garcia.

Promises, Promises

Op-Ed Columnist: Promises, Promises

Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics; Economic Reports of the President, 2002, 2003 and 2004.

Waffler-in-Chief

MSNBC - Altercation

Bush is against campaign finance reform; then he's for it.
Bush is against a Homeland Security Department; then he's for it.
Bush is against a 9/11 commission; then he's for it.
Bush is against an Iraq WMD investigation; then he's for it.
Bush is against nation building; then he's for it.
Bush is against deficits; then he's for them.
Bush is for free trade; then he's for tariffs on steel; then he's against them again.
Bush is against the U.S. taking a role in the Israeli Palestinian conflict; then he pushes for a "road map" and a Palestinian State.
Bush is for states right to decide on gay marriage, then he is for changing the Constitution.
Bush first says he'll provide money for first responders (fire, police, emergency), then he doesn't.
Bush first says that 'help is on the way' to the military ... then he cuts benefits.
Bush- "The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden."  Bush-"I don't know where he is.  I have no idea and I really don't care."
Bush claims to be in favor of the environment and then secretly starts drilling on Padre Island.
Bush talks about helping education and increases mandates while cutting funding.
Bush first says the U.S. won't negotiate with North Korea. Now he will.
Bush goes to Bob Jones University. Then say's he shouldn't have.
Bush said he would demand a U.N. Security Council vote on whether to sanction military action against Iraq. Later Bush announced he would not call for a vote.
Bush said the "mission accomplished" banner was put up by the sailors.  Bush later admits it was his advance team.
Bush was for fingerprinting and photographing Mexicans who enter the U.S.  Bush after meeting with Pres. Fox, he's against it.

Democrats Demand Inquiry Into Charge by Medicare Officer

Democrats Demand Inquiry Into Charge by Medicare Officer

Democrats called Saturday for an investigation of charges that the Bush administration threatened to fire a top Medicare official if he gave data to Congress showing the high costs of hotly contested Medicare legislation.

The official, Richard S. Foster, chief actuary of the Medicare program, said he had been formally told not to provide the information to Congress. Moreover, he said, he was told that "the consequences of insubordination would be very severe."

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Senior officials at the Medicare agency made it clear that "they would try and fire me" for responding directly to inquiries from Congress, Mr. Foster said in an interview on Saturday.

Mr. Foster said he had received that message from Thomas A. Scully, who was then administrator of the Medicare program. Mr. Scully denies threatening Mr. Foster but confirms having told him to withhold certain information from Congress.

A White House spokesman, Trent D. Duffy, declined to comment on Mr. Foster's statements. Mr. Duffy said he did not know if anyone had threatened to dismiss Mr. Foster.

The Senate and the House approved different Medicare bills on June 27, after being assured that the cost would not exceed $400 billion over 10 years, the amount proposed by President Bush.

Just two weeks earlier, Mr. Foster estimated that the drug benefits in a bill very similar to the Senate measure would cost $551.5 billion.

Mr. Foster said he prepared "dozens and dozens of analyses and estimates" of the cost of the legislation last year. "All our estimates showed that the cost of the drug benefit, through 2013, would be in the range of $500 billion to $600 billion," he said.

The cost estimates were all provided to Mr. Scully, and some were also sent to the White House, the Office of Management and Budget and top officials at the Department of Health and Human Services, Mr. Foster said. For example, he said, "some cost estimates were sent directly to Doug Badger," the White House official who coordinates health policy for the administration.

Mr. Duffy confirmed that the White House had received the actuary's cost estimates for parts of the bill. But he said the administration had relied on the Congressional Budget Office as "the primary authority" on the overall cost.

"For many years," Mr. Foster said, "my office has provided technical assistance to the administration and Congress on a nonpartisan basis.

"But in June 2003, the Medicare administrator, Tom Scully, decided to restrict the practice of our responding directly to Congressional requests and ordered us to provide responses to him so he could decide what to do with them. There was a pattern of withholding information for what I perceived to be political purposes, which I thought was inappropriate."

Mr. Foster, 55, was an actuary at the Social Security Administration from 1973 to 1995, when he became chief Medicare actuary.

Congressional Democrats asked the inspector general at the Department of Health and Human Services to investigate what they described as possible intimidation of Mr. Foster.

In a letter to the inspector general, they said: "Throughout the debate on the Medicare bill, the legislation's cost was a central issue for lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. The withholding of cost information may have impeded lawmakers' ability to engage in fair debate on the bill."

The request was made by Representatives Pete Stark of California, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut and Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, all Democrats, and Bernard Sanders of Vermont, an independent. Mr. Stark and Mr. Brown are the senior Democrats on powerful subcommittees responsible for health legislation.

"The administration seems to have a habit of suppressing information to serve its political purposes," Mr. Stark said. "Tom Scully told my staff that Rick Foster would be `fired so fast his head would spin' if he released this information to us."

It's a Crock!

It's a Crock!

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Bush opened the White House and Camp David to dozens of overnight guests last year, including foreign dignitaries, family friends and at least nine of his biggest campaign fund-raisers, documents show.
 
In all, Bush and first lady Laura Bush have invited at least 270 people to stay at the White House and at least the same number to overnight at the Camp David retreat since moving to Washington in January 2001, according to lists the White House provided The Associated Press.

Some guests spent a night in the Lincoln Bedroom, historic quarters that gained new fame in the Clinton administration amid allegations that Democrats rewarded major donors like Hollywood heavyweights Steven Spielberg and Barbra Streisand with accommodations there.

That scandal and Bush's criticism of it is one of the reasons the White House identifies guests. In a debate with Vice President Al Gore in October 2000, Bush said: "I believe they've moved that sign, `The buck stops here,' from the Oval Office desk to `The buck stops here' on the Lincoln Bedroom. And that's not good for the country."