CAN YOU SAY, "SCAMGATE?"...

I really like this one. It reveals the true depths of the GOP's native intelligence and the span of their imagination. From Sherlock Google's Daily Kos diary:

...If you were a totally crooked neo-con former CIA financier Republican who hangs out with the corrupt Delay-Abramoff crowd, what would be the most unethical, diabolical way to funnel SO much money to the Republican Party and neo-con schemes that you could take back the government from the Democrats?

Easy!

With your corrupt Republican buddies, form a slew of your own brand-new Defense Companies, submit bids on things the Pentagon never even asked for to the Delay-Cunningham network and Bingo! -- those contributions to the GOP and K Street will flow in like never before...

You can give your new false front companies snazzy names like Perfect Wave Technologies and Pure Aqua Technologies and Acoustical Communication Systems. Of course, just because you have all this taxpayer money at your disposal, you're not obliged to advertise these companies with flashy websites -- in fact, lame-looking main pages (as you'll see by clicking on those links) are better suited for front companies, so as not to attract too much attention.

However, you might want to spend a little more on office space. After all, there's always the chance that someone who isn't a corrupt Republican will notice that Perfect Wave, Pure Aqua, and ACS can all be reached by fax at 858-848-0400. Pure Aqua's location is unlisted, but I'm guessing it's the same as Perfect Wave's and ACS's: 13970 Stowe Drive, Poway CA 92064.

How creative. How brilliant.

Apparently, the only lesson the GOP has learned since Watergate is to not get caught. You'd think they would have studied a little harder on how to not get caught. And you would be mistaken...

OXYMORON OF THE DAY: MILITARY INTELLIGENCE...

Now this is horseshit -- Eric Schmitt of the New York Times writes, "New Army Rules May Snarl Talks With McCain on Detainee Issue":

The Army has approved a new, classified set of interrogation methods that may complicate negotioations over legislation proposed by Senator John McCain to bar cruel and inhumane treatment of detainees in American custody, military officials said Tuesday.

...

The addendum provides dozens of examples and goes into exacting detail on what procedures may or may not be used, and it what circumstances. Army interrogators have never had a set of such specific guidelines that would help teach them how to walk right up to the line between legal and illegal interrogations.

Some military officials said the new guidelines could give the impression that the Army was pushing the limits on legal interrogation at the very moment when Mr. McCain, Republican of Arizona, is involved in intense three-way negotiations with the White House and the Bush administration to prohibit the cruel treatment of prisoners.

In a high-level meeting at the Pentagon on Tuesday, some Army and other Pentagon officials raised concerns that Mr. McCain would be furious at what could appear to be a back-door effort to circumvent his intentions.

"This is a stick in McCain's eye," one official said. "It goes right up to the edge. He's not going to be comfortable with this"... (#)

As I recall, McCain's bill passed in the Senate by a 90-9 margin. This bill requires that military interrogations be conducted in accordance with the Army field manual. The manual goes by the Geneva Conventions, which strongly oppose brutalizing prisoners of war. Bush & Co. have long insisted that detainees in the war against terrorism are not prisoners of war. That bit of illogic doesn't seem to be working anymore, so now people in the Defense Department are trying to amend the rules. This is a stick in the eye of everyone who sides with McCain when it comes to the question of torture. It is half willful tunnel vision, half juvenile mischief.

Let's just put aside the fact that torture doesn't work for a minute. What's up with this executive branch need to have sanctioned torture techniques in place, anyway? If we do not torture, then why are these negotiations occurring? Why did McCain's bill even have to be introduced?

What this also says is that our powers that be can't measure up to our own Army filed manual -- so they're pulling it down to their level. They're dumbing down their own standards in the hope that it'll make this problem go away. It worked (for a while) when they said captives in the war against terrorism weren't prisoners of war -- maybe it'll work a second time.

Or maybe not. Bush doesn't have the 70-plus-percent popular support he boasted of four years ago. Very few Americans had ever heard of Abu Ghraib back then. There was no talk of going to war with Iraq, never mind of fighting a losing battle against an insurgency there.

But like they say, "As above, so below": Bush made up his mind to "stay the course" in Iraq, and if he has his way, we're staying in Iraq. His stubbornness has spread to his subordinates and to other parts of the government. It's been decided that the "torture option" must remain available, so now like-stubborn-minded members of the government are working to legitimize it and assure its availability.

Gahddamn, aren't you glad the grown-ups are in charge?

TWO DOWN, THERE YOU GO...

From Josh White and Charles Babington of the Washpost, "House Supports Ban on Torture":

The House gave strong support yesterday to a measure that would ban torture and limit interrogation tactics in U.S. detention facilities, agreeing with Senators that Congress needs to set uniform guidelines for the treatment of prisoners in the war on terrorism.

On a 308 to 122 vote, members of the House supported specific language proposed by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz) that would prohibit "cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment" of anyone in the custody of the U.S. government. Though lopsided, the vote was largely symbolic and does not put the language into law.

The vote specifically instructed House negotiators to include McCain's language, word for word, in the fiscal 2006 defense appropriations bill, a decision that is not binding but carries significant political weight.

The House also supported a McCain provision that would require officials in any Defense Department detention facility to follow the interrogation standards in the Army's field manual on interrogations. That manual is currently being revised... (#)

I wrote yesterday that the field manual was being amended out of a combination of wounded vanity, stubbornness, and plain old immaturity. But I think Atrios hit it much closer to the mark: It's about normalizing S&M. Since the whips-and-chains crowd isn't any better at confronting inner demons than it is at practicing self-restraint, my guess is all 122 Housecreatures who voted for "cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment" are Republicans. I'll have to check to be sure, though...

* * *

"OFF BY ONE" UPDATE: The final vote had 107 Republicans for banning cruel and inhuman treatment of prisoners of war, and 121 for limited use of it. So a slight majority of House Republicans would like to see S&M go a little more mainstream. On the Democratic side, they all opposed torture except one: Jim Marshall of Georgia (3rd district). There's one in every family, I guess...

I Can't Believe I'm Doing This...

The next forty-five days may turn out to be the longest forty-five days in my life when all's said and done. But for one last stretch, I'm going to blog on behalf of the Democratic Party. I may take it further than that, or not, I don't know yet. Hell, that I'm even going this far is kind of a surprise to me. And Lord knows I'm just about permanently fed up with politics.

There is just too much at stake for me to ignore. It's been that way for many years. But now things are really starting to spin out of control. The government bailing out the American Insurance Group is just the most recent and most glaring example of how rotted from within our system is, and since the only vehicle for addressing this situation appears to be our own government (after all, look who AIG, among others, cried "Help me! Help me!" to first), then I think it matters a hell of a lot what kind of people we have in the government to address this situation. I am anything but fond of Democrats, but for fuck's sake, what's the only alternative? The Republicans? What good are they?

They don't care about governing. They don't care about solving problems. All they care about is maintaining what power they have, so they can continue enriching themselves at the expense of the rest of us -- and covering their asses when the inevitable consequences of their selfish intentions start hammering the rest of us. I've had enough of their self-serving shit to last me until time ends. I want no Republicans to win in November. I want no Republicans in Washington at all. I want that party to go the way of the Whigs -- or, and this would be more fitting, the Edmund Fitzgerald.

But that won't happen. So I'm left with two choices in November: vote for applying a tourniquet to my hemorrhaging society (Obama), or vote for more bloodletting (McCain). This is not a tricky decision to make -- the bleeding has to stop. The bleeding must stop. And like it or not, there's only one chance we have at stopping it. Unlike some of my readers, I do not want to see my country collapse. It's possible that a collapse might be just what it needs before it can pull itself back together. I really don't know. But I do know that I'm not one to believe that you necessarily need to hit bottom before that can happen -- grabbing me by the scruff of my neck and forcing me to gaze downward into the abyss is enough to get your message across, believe me.

Obama and Biden have to win this election. That's all there is to it. Right now, I don't like their chances. But I manage to take some heart from my own track record. I've made three endorsements over the years, and my record is 2-1. My first endorsement was for John Kerry for President in 2004. He lost. But I endorsed Tim Kaine for Virginia Governor in 2005 and Jim Webb for the US Senate in 2006, and both of them won. For that matter, I endorsed Barack Obama in the Virginia primary this year. He not only won this state, he won his party's nomination. So in that sense I'm 3-1. Maybe my luck will hold out.

Til further on...