Jeers to insomnia. Feh.
I'm one of quite a few Kossacks who aren't going to make it to YearlyKos, but I want to make use of today's Cheers and Jeers to ask those Kossacks who are going to Vegas at the end of this week to carry a message and a question from me to Democratic Party VIPs attending YK: people like Barbara Boxer, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Howard Dean. (This is not a complete list of Democratic muckymucks, by the way. To the best of my knowledge, the list also includes General Wesley Clark, Governor Tom Vilsack, Governor Mark Warner, Representative Brad Miller, and Representative Kyrsten Sinema, as well as some midterm-election candidates.) If I've missed anyone, feel free to correct me.
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Anyhow. I could probably write a freaking
tome about the comments I would have for these folks, were I to be present at YK, and the questions I would want them to answer -- not avoid, not dance around, not spin, but
answer, fully, directly and truthfully. However, I'll limit myself to the foremost issue on my mind, and let the rest of the C&Jers augment the list in the comments if they so desire.
My number-one issue: Impeachment.
Here is my take on the impeachment question. Even if someone like Al Gore or Russ Feingold (my lips to God's ears) were to win the Presidency in 2008 and were to do everything in their power to restore checks and balances -- to restore the Constitution itself -- without Congress doing its part, what's to guarantee that someone else isn't going to come along 4 or 8 or 12 or 20 years later and pull the exact same fascist 'unitary-executive' crap that the Bush Crime Family has pulled? We can't count on the judiciary -- SCOTUS allowed the Repugs to steal the election for Dubya even back before he started packing the Supreme Court with his hand-picked toadies, erm, justices. We can't count on free and fair elections -- not when the past two presidential elections were stolen from the voters. Congress is all we have. And what are they doing for us? Nothing, that's what. Not a goddamned thing. In my opinion.
What's it going to take to restore the Constitution? When I ask myself that question, the one and only answer that comes to me is to publicly, formally, legally, once-and-forever criminalize what the Bush Crime Family has done. And that means -- at the very least -- impeachment and removal from office for both Bush and Cheney. Stop a minute and think about it, folks. Think about what happens if Dubya and Dick aren't impeached. If what they've done to the Constitution that they both swore to uphold isn't treated like the heinous, traitorous crime it is, then even if we had 8 years of Al Gore or Russ Feingold, doing everything possible to fix what the Bush Crime Family broke by voluntarily restoring power to Congress and to the people, what if, in 2016, someone like Bush -- except not as stupid -- were to come into office? What if we were to end up with someone with the Bush Crime Family's neofascist ideology combined with, say, Tom DeLay's integrity and Bill Clinton's intelligence and charisma, and an unchallenged (by the other two branches of government) legacy of Presidential powergrabs to boot? Can you even begin to conceive of how totally screwed we would be? How screwed our Constitution would be? Huh? Can you?
So here is my question, to Nancy Pelosi, to Barbara Boxer, to Harry Reid, to Howard Dean -- to all of them. How do they intend to save this Republic if the Democratic Party, assuming they win a majority of seats in the House and/or Senate in November, is going to take impeachment off the table after the midterms? How do they intend to restore Congress to its rightful place in our governmental system, and make sure it keeps its place? How do they intend to undo the damage that's been done, and to prevent something like this from ever happening again?
I want to know how they are going to do it. I want them to convince me that they can do it. I want them to convince me that they will do it. And if they can't convince me of that, then I want them to give me one goddamn good reason why they deserve to keep their jobs.
There are lots of other questions to be asked:
About why the Dems have rolled over, time after time after time, on the invasion of Iraq and CAFTA and the bankruptcy reform bill and the Patriot Act (I and II), on John Negroponte and John Roberts and Sam Alito and General Hayden.
About whether or not they will change, really change, the way campaigns are financed in this country, and about what they intend to do about Republican Election Theft Syndrome (H/T to Baldwiny).
About whether or not they will put a stop, once and for all, to the corporatocratic takeover of our nation and its government.
About whether or not they will stop the assault on Americans' civil rights.
About their seeming inability to speak up, with a united voice, to and for the American public, even now when Dubya's (dis)approval ratings are being handed to them on a silver platter.
About their apparent fear of telling the truth and doing the right thing, doing their sworn duty to protect this country, its Constitution and its citizens, regardless of the possible (and probably imaginary) consequences to their own political careers.
But I'll leave those questions for y'all. Let's give our fellow YearlyKos attendees some very pointed questions to ask when the Senators and Representatives and the other Democratic hoipolloi make their appearances at YK. And for those of you who will be there, I ask you -- I beg you -- to stand up, ask the questions, and stay standing until you -- we -- get answers.
/rant
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CHEERS AND JEERS for Monday, June 5, 2006
Note to Marc in KS: You may now remove your tinfoil hat (and don your asbestos longjohns). There really is a global mutant poison ivy conspiracy.
Yesterday in History:
Sunday June 4 marked the 17th anniversary of the killings in Tiananmen Square. Please take a quiet moment to pay your respects.
Today in History:
1947 - Then-Secretary of State George Marshall calls for a plan for economic aid to war-torn Europe, thus spawning The Marshall Plan. I'm overwhelmed with nostalgia for the days when the USA was, you know, not the world's most craptacular superpower.
1963 - British War Secretary John Profumo resigns as a result of a big ol' salacious sex-and-spying scandal. Yowza.
1967 - The beginning of the Six-Day War. Wasn't Iraq supposed to be a six-day war? I could have sworn Rummy said... oh, never mind.
1998 - In a stunning example of just how fabulous those fact-checkers in the mainstream media are, both Reuters and ABC erroneously report the death of Bob Hope after Arizona Congressman Bob "Dumb-As-A" Stump announces Hope's death on the House floor.
2001 - In the last (and only) good thing to happen in Congress since Dumbya took office, Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords dumps the Repugs, becomes an independent, and gives the Senate majority to the Dems, who in the time-honored tradition of the Democratic Party proceed to take careful aim and shoot themselves in the proverbial foot.
Born on June 5: Adam Smith (1723), John Maynard Keynes (1883), Federico Garcia Lorca (1898), Bill Moyers (1934), and -- for the highbrow pseudo-intellectual crowd -- Kenny G (1956).
Died on June 5: Bobby Kennedy (1968), Dee Dee Ramone (2002), Ronald Reagan (2004).
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Half-hearted cheers to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his continued efforts to keep diplomacy on the table, and the lines of communication open, with regard to on Iran's nukes. I just wish he wasn't being so stubborn about keeping Iran's uranium enrichment program going, seeing as how we all know how well that is probably going to turn out for Iran. Anticipatory jeers to the Bush Crime Family for ignoring President Ahmadinejad and the UN, which I'm betting is exactly what they will do. Also, ay yi yi to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for threatening an oil embargo if the US doesn't, you know, sit down and shut up, a threat that of course we all know we can count on the Bush Crime Family to respond to wisely and well. Sigh.
Jeers to every rednecked right-wingnut who makes it a point of honor to mispronounce President Ahmandinejad's name. For the record: Ah-mah-DEE-nih-jad. Just like it's spelled, you smug, arrogant morons. Yes, John Gibson, I'm talking to you.
Cheers to pigeons (chickens?) coming home to roost. At the same time Dumbya is touting the Marriage Protection Amendment, it's being reported that Pickles is/has been staying at a Washington, DC hotel after a confrontation with her husband over his ongoing affair with Condoleeza Rice. Yep, you (might have) heard it here first. I'd be laughing my ass off if I wasn't desperately trying not to hurl my breakfast at the bare (no pun intended) thought of the two of them doing the horizontal cha-cha. I mean, really -- at least Monica was young and had good teeth, and at least Bill didn't look like a chimpanzee. Oh, and if anyone is wondering what a Dubya/Condi spawn-beast would most likely look like, here ya go. (H/T to Randi Rhodes for this bit o' delicious-yet-utterly-repugnant gossip.)
Cheers to a working law enforcement/justice system. Jeers to said system being somebody else's. Over the weekend, 17 people were arrested by Canadian authorities on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack somewhere in southern Ontario, Canada. They haven't been declared enemy combatants, they haven't been rendered to some secret torture farm somewhere in Bumfarkistan, they've actually already appeared in a Toronto court. Next: Canada goes straight to hell in a handbasket for being "soft on terror".
Jeers to being in desperate need of a good beating with an irony stick. The owner of Geno's in South Philadelphia, one of the city's best-known purveyors of Philly cheesesteaks, wants his customers to order only in English. Said owner, a gent by the name of Joseph Vento, is the grandson of Italian immigrants whose ability to speak English was limited at best. I guess if they wanted to drop by the grandkid's place for a sammich these days, they'd be SOL.
Jeers to Ann Coulter, who has hired Dumbya's Florida vote-count attorney to defend her on her very own felony voter fraud charges down there. Gosh, will this case destined for the Supreme Court, too? Maybe if she offers Clarence Thomas a blowjob, she'll be able to avoid jail time. (Okay, I just totally grossed myself out. EWWWWWWWWW.)
Cheers to more Rethuglican asshattery. Turns out the "pro-family" GOP candidate in the California 51st has some, erm, family issues of his own. I know, I should probably be jeering him, but I just can't. I'm lovin' it too damn much.
Cheers to geology, one of my favorite nerdy pastimes. Scientists have announced that they believe a meteor hit the planet some 250 million years ago (that would be about, oh, 500 years ago for you creationists) that caused the largest mass extinction in Earth's history, and may have created the Australian continent. The crater created by this meteor strike is under Antarctica and is twice as big as the crater in the Yucatan that was caused by the meteor strike thought to have brought about the end of the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago (which, in biblical time, is about 1930).
Cheers to artistic discernment. After seeing that Ebert and Roeper gave The DaVinci Code two thumbs down, the government of Pakistan banned the movie. Seriously, I just love it that there are so many people in so many parts of the world who are so very up in arms over (or, conversely, who take as the gospel truth and become utterly obsessed by) a fictional book/movie. Hey, guys, it's pretend. You know, like WMDs, or Republican ethics.
Speaking of movies, cheers to Capote, which I finally saw over the weekend. Amazing film that left me feeling very somber. I've gotta read In Cold Blood again. It was one of those books that I got my hands on and read whilst still young and impressionable. I gotta wonder about something -- my mother would not let me see an R-rated movie until I was 17, but she never restricted my reading subject matter when I was a kid -- I had unfettered access to every book she owned, including such childrens' classics as The Devil's Dictionary, Atlas Shrugged, In Cold Blood, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, etc. -- all of which I'd read by the time I hit pooberty. Oh, and the first book I sat up all night reading on my first night alone in my first apartment, at age 19? Helter Skelter. I shit you not.
A-hem to the moronic Troll Wars garnering DailyKos some rather unflattering attention out there on the internets. Sigh to my sneaking suspicion that those who most needed to learn something from said Troll Wars quite possibly didn't.
Speaking of the Contagious Festival, and in honor of Baab, cheers to this little gem about the Princess.
Cheers to a recent study that reveals that Canadian men (and New Zealander women) have the best sex lives, while British men have the worst. I'm a little puzzled as to where Canadian women (and New Zealander men) fit into the scheme of things here. Not to mention British women. I'm actually forcing myself not to think too much about the implications of this study, because it's making me a bit light-headed.
That's it for today's Cheers and Jeers from your fabulous guest hostess. What are you cheering and jeering (or ranting and raving) about today?