Sarah Palin

My wife and I have agreed that if Sarah Palin ever ends up in the White House we'll leave the country and move to my family's ancestral home in Ireland. Scratching out a living in Ballymagibbon (County Mayo) is preferable to being governed by Sarah "Wingnut" Palin.

However, after discussing Sarah's resignation with my wife I've come to the conclusion that if Sarah does make a run for the White House in 2012 the Republican primaries will do her in. You've got to think that Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, Bobby Jindal and whoever else will go for the GOP nomination will take care of the Sarah problem once and for all. As the VP candidate she was somewhat insulated from the tough questions (with the exception of her disastrous TV interviews) but there's no way she'll be able to dodge them during a primary. Americans are too smart to elect an idiot like Palin but then I thought the same thing before Bush won a second term.

I'd love to pose the following question to Sarah, "So, if you were to get elected as president and half way through your first term you were to decide that you wouldn't run for re-election, would you resign so you wouldn't be a lame duck?"

The United States has Attention Deficit Disorder

I'm pretty certain that activists are still protesting (and dying) in the streets of Iran, North Korea is still planning to launch missiles toward Hawaii in less than one week, soldiers are dying in Afghanistan and Iraq, Congress is still arguing about health care reform, etc. but for some reason all of this is ignored because Michael Jackson died. So what? Aside from his success with the Jackson 5 (whose songs I remember listening to on my transistor radio while delivering the Washington Post) and his famously successful "Thriller" (from the early 80's) what did Michael Jackson ever do for the world? Nothing. I cannot believe that our media falling over themselves to give us minute-by-minute coverage of this story. Let's get back to what really impacts our lives.

New Republican Party Motto . . .

"Do as I say, not as I do." (courtesy of Governor Sanford and Senator Ensign [among others]).

New Litmus Test for "Too Big to Fail"

In continuing to question the government's involvement in the General Motors bankruptcy, George Will and others are now using market capitalization in their arguments. In a recent column Will recently asked whether Harley Davidson is now too big to fail given the fact that its market capitalization is higher than that of General Motors. Will is being disingenuous. All you have to do is look at the first quarter Forms 10-Q filed by GM and Harley to see the impact GM has on this (and the world's) economy. Harley employs roughly 9,300 people while GM has about 54,000 employees. Neither employment number includes dealerships but since GM dealerships significantly outnumber Harley's the margin gets much larger if you consider them. GM also disclosed in its 10Q that it makes annual purchases from Delphi (which GM spun off in the late 90's) in the range of $6.5 to $10.2 billion. So, you have to wonder about the impact of GM being liquidated on an already weak Delphi.

Anyone who is not George Will can see that GM has a huge impact on the economy and much more than market cap needs to be considered when deciding whether it is worth saving. That said, I'm not arguing for or against the government's bailout (and now ownership); I'm just saying that the decision should not be oversimplified in order to make a point.

Speaking of Racism . . .

couldn't you consider Rush's statement that Colin Powell only endorsed Obama because he's black a racist statement? Funny how Rush's negative statements are cloaked in patriotism but when Sonia Sotomayor makes reference to her background or that Latina women have a better perspective on certain topics than white males she's considered a racist or a biggot.

Yesterday on NPR an interviewer asked John Conyers about statements made by Samuel Alito during his confirmation hearings regarding his Italian heritage that were similar to those made by Sotomayor. Conyers said that he had forgotten that Alito had said those things; how convenient. Also convenient is how no one is mentioning statements made by Antonin Scalia about how courts set policy.

With each passing day the GOP is further marginalizing itself.

Where's the Correlation?

Yesterday, while bashing the President's speech on national security Mitch McConnell said that Mr. Obama never once commented on the fact that since September 11, 2001 there have been no further attacks on this country (meaning, of course, that enhanced interrogation techniques have, by themselves, prevented such attacks). Mitch, buddy, where's the correlation? I haven't smoked any cigarettes since 9/11; maybe that has prevented another terrorist attack. Also, the earth hasn't been hit by any killer asteroids since 9/11; maybe torture has prevented asteroids from killing us all. Also, how can Mitch reconcile his argument with the fact that were weren't attacked before 9/11?

I'm going to digress here. bin Laden has been pissed at United States since we set foot in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and then encouraged Sudan to throw him out of that country. Not being satisfied with simply blowing something up in this country Osama waited until Bush was in office and then attacked NYC knowing that Bush could not resist going after Iraq and settling old scores. Osama knew that we would divert attention from Afghanistan and that Iraq would become what it is today, a quagmire that has served to recruit more fighters for his cause.

Back on topic; what about the boobs in NYC who were planning on blowing up Synagogues and shooting down military aircraft using Stinger missiles? Was that plot interrupted by the use of enhanced interrogation methods? NO! It was good old fashioned police work.

Continuing the tradition of the Bush administration, Cheney and the rest of the GOP leadership ignore evidence that contradicts their arguments and plow on as though they're infallible.

The Case for Torture

The use of torture or "enhanced interrogation techniques" has dominated the news lately with Dick Cheney vigorously supporting such techniques (is anyone surprised by this?) claiming that thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of lives were saved with information obtained by waterboarding, walling and other harsh techniques (ok, let's just say torture). Cheney can make this claim because no one can refute it and any information that supports it is probably classified. However, an FBI interrogator who was involved with the questioning of Abu Zubaida has stated that Zubaida was providing valuable information through the use of traditional interrogation methods and, in fact, shut down once the torture started. So, who do you believe? I'll cast my lot with the guys who were there since Cheney is just covering his ass.

This past Sunday a Washington Post columnist who supports the use of waterboarding used an Israeli example how just how useful it can be. Several years ago an Israeli soldier was kidnapped and Mossad got their hands on the driver of the car that was used in the kidnapping. Using harsh techniques the Israelis were able to discover where the soldier was being held and mounted a rescue operation that was unsuccessful as the soldier died during the operation. This argument seemed counter intuitive to me; the ultimate goals of the torture was to determine the location of the soldier and to rescue him. The mission failed. The real question is whether the soldier's location could have been determined through traditional interrogation methods and whether the location would have been learned quickly enough to effect a rescue. Guess we'll never know. Also, although I tend to support Israel you have to remember that this is the country that destroyed Beruit and much of southern Lebanon after Hezbollah kidnapped/captured three Israeli soldiers. So, no one should attempt to explain this country's use of torture by using Israel as an example.

Recently Jesse Ventura (can't believe I'm using this guy to support my argument) was on Fox & Friends and pretty much emasculated one of the hosts during a debate about the use of torture. Ventura, a former Navy SEAL, stated that during SEER (Survival Escape Evasion & Resistance) training that he had been waterboarded and he believes it's torture. The now-gelded host asked if Ventura is OK now, implying that as long as there is no lasting evidence of the technique it can't be considered torture. So, I suppose that means beatings with rubber hoses (that leave no marks) can now be added to the list of approved interrogation techniques. The best point made by Ventura, however, was when he asked why police departments don't use waterboarding or walling on suspected gang members in order to obtain information on gang activity. Here in Raleigh and Durham we have escalating gang problems that have resulted in increased robberies, murders and drug activity (i.e. a threat to the good citizens of our cities). Ventura answered his own question when he said such techniques are illegal and any information obtained while using them would be inadmissable in court.

Lastly, what does the need for harsh interrogation techniques tell us? The same thing; that for the last 16 years this country has not spent the time and money necessary to develop human intelligence assets (HUMINT) in the Middle East. The bottom line is that if the Clinton and Bush administrations had placed the proper emphasis on Middle East HUMINT September 11, 2001 would have been just another day and we wouldn't be fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. While Bill Clinton was spending his time responding to impeachment procedings or Ken Starr's fruitless investigations into Whitewater and Travelgate Osam bin Laden and his network were getting stronger.

Torture is not just wrong, it's illegal and it's a harsh reminder of this country's screw ups.