How Will The GOP Spin General Odom

We’ve all become accustom to Bush and the GOP calling us defeatist, non patriotic and traitors regarding our opposition to Iraq.  Well let’s see how Bush and the GOP spin General Odom’s statements against Iraq. Will the General suddenly be classified as a traitor?

From the Gavel:  “To put this in a simple army metaphor, the Commander-in-Chief seems to have gone AWOL, that is ‘absent without leave.’ He neither acts nor talks as though he is in charge. Rather, he engages in tit-for-tat games…I hope the President seizes this moment for a basic change in course and signs the bill the Congress has sent him. I will respect him greatly for such a rare act of courage, and so too, I suspect, will most Americans.”
- Lieutenant General William E. Odom

Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.) has served as Director of the National Security Agency and Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the Army’s senior intelligence officer. In his address, General Odom discusses why he believes President Bush should sign the conference report on the Iraq Accountability Act.

Got Anymore Shoddy Solutions for NOLA?

Congress appropriated $5.7 billion to rebuild New Orleans’ flood protection systems.
Thanks to the Associated Press for revealing that when the Army Corps of Engineers solicited bids for drainage pumps for New Orleans, it copied the specifications — typos and all — from the catalog of the same manufacturer that they awarded the $32 million contract to. GAO is looking in to this and will not comment.
The defective pumps were supplied by Moving Water Industries Corp. of Deerfield Beach, Fla., and installed at NOLA canals before the start of the 2006 hurricane season.
Oh my, MWI employed former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, (President Bush’s brother), to market its pumps during the 1980s, and top MWI officials have been major contributors to the Republican Party.
The Army Corps of Engineers’ mea culpa is shallow considering the job was obviously rigged for the benefit of a certain company (by a politically connected insider like Jeb).
In May 2006 a Corp Inspector warned that the pumps were faulty.
Then a whistle-blower, Bob Purcell, who was an FPI salesman at the time the bids were taken, asked the Corp, “Are you folks aware that the specifications that you folks put out was a copy of the specifications in the MWI catalog?”
Purcell complained “We were forced to meet someone else’s specifications in entirety.” He said the contract consultants did not cooperate with FPI, and that MWI was given “a head’s up” about the job. That was evident by MWI’s order for pump engines before the contract was even put out to bid.

Purcell, a former MWI employee, is also a plaintiff in a federal whistle blower lawsuit accusing MWI of fraudulently helping Nigeria obtain $74 million in taxpayer-backed loans for overpriced and unnecessary pumping equipment. The U.S. Justice Department has joined the suit as a plaintiff.  Was Jeb’s hand in this, too?

Aren’t we so lucky that America’s Royal Family is so arrogant that they don’t even try to cover their paper/money trail!  Shoddy work in Iraq, shoddy work in NOLA, shoddy is the nicest label I can offer to America’s dumbest criminal syndicate.  How long can the voting public allow this?

Hey! Let’s Outsource the President!

Today’s New York Times front page article pleads for someone with brains.

Stephen J. Hadley, President Bush’s national security adviser, is in the market for someone who “has Star Power” — with the hope of saving Iraq.

“Mr. Hadley is interviewing candidates, including military generals, for a new high-profile job that people in Washington are calling the war czar.”

My previous post (SAGAW) may proffer some candidates that for you, Mr. Hadley.  Our military service academies make sure their graduates are thoroughly familiar with the U. S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.  They are educated to be leaders.  They are educated to analyze and deduce solutions to untenable situations.  They also have better ideas about what presents real or imagined threats. Sorry, those decisions were already made by GOP royalty, but they might have more of a clue how to redirect and protect our human resources.  They may not be experts in navigating the convoluted political quagmire they will inherit, but they have educated intellectual tools to work with, unlike …..

If the corporations who rule this country can outsource their workforce and the president outsource a Commander-In-Chief, then, why can America’s voters outsource the president?

Where Did America Come From?

Anyone take time to read the Declaration of Independence lately?

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it.

Thanks to Service Academy Graduates Against the War, for reminding us that it is not always the military chomping at the bit to “kill somebody”.

It is too clear that the corporate dollar squeezes the blood out of the citizens of this planet to increase its bottom line. Those CEO perks are so very expensive, of course someone must pay.

I share a grateful message I sent to SAGAW:

I enjoy reading your enlightened observations into this country’s foundations and recognizing the core principles that created what we call the United States of America. It saddens me that so few take the time to research and understand this document. We take for granted what other countries call privileges, we call “inalienable rights“. I see a decline in what this country is supposed to stand for. Your page resurrects hope that recovery from today’s insanity is possible. We face a long and treacherous road to recovery. Your members represent an educated leadership that has not sold out. I encourage your participation in guiding this country out of a political fog and back into sunlight.

Tony’s Heartwarming Return

How can such a likeable guy like Tony Snow work for this administration?

It was a heart warming return for Tony at his first news event. Choking up, as he recounted the support he has received from the media, almost made me forget who he works for. After all, he is just the messenger. This administration is trying, excuse me, trying hard, to put a human face on a truly inhumane White House.

You have claimed so often that your job is HARD, your decisions are HARD, and the Americans who employ you just don’t understand, King George, your face saving efforts are too thin to cover your crimes. Oh, but that is such another blog post, your Highness.