A Hit Dog Will Holler...

Want to know how effective John Brennan's pushback has been on the GOP fearmongering over the underpants bomber? Senator Kit Bond now wants him to resign.

Honestly it should be seen as a badge of honor as there is no possible way for Bond to justify calling for Brennan to resign other than some version of "he hurt my feelings".

I hope this gives the Obama administration the signal to mash the gas and not let up. Make their asses squirm!

If You Don't Know What The Hell You're Talkin Bout, Just Change The Subject!

Oh man this is classic John McCain. Caught getting it wrong on the facts of the Abdulmutallab case instead of admitting he was wrong he just angrily challenges Michael Leiter on some bullshit strawman shit. Just remember every time you criticize President Obama, that you could have had THAT asshole running the country.

Bob Barr Destroys All Of Bill O'Reilly's Fear Mongering Arguments

Facts really are pesky little things.

Deep Thought

On the one hand Republicans and NeoCons knock President Obama for trying diplomacy instead of war with our enemies because they claim you can't keep them from attacking us with just words.


On the other hand Republicans and NeoCons think the solution to keeping us safe from terrorism is President Obama saying the words "War On Terror" over and over again.

Memory Relapse

Rachel Maddow is simply the best TV pundit in the game right now and she made sure last night to tear Rudy Giuliani to shreds over his idiotic comments about there having been no terrorist attacks under Bush's watch. I and others have long not only pointed to the anthrax attacks but also the DC sniper attacks as at least two terrorist attacks that happened after 9-11 under Bush but until now you hardly if ever saw a TV journalist include the DC snipers in that context. Congressional Democrats as well as the White House should grab this bit of video and distribute i far and wide to discredit not just Giuliani, but the rest of the GOP/NeoCon fools who keep trying to have their own selective memory lapses about what really happened under President Bush with respect to terrorism.

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Please Give Me Some Of Whatever Giuliani Is Smoking!

Lets, for a moment, leave aside the fact that 9/11 happened under Bush. If Giuliani's point is that we had a terrorist attack under President Obama because of he underpants bomber, doesn't that mean we also had a terrorist attack under Bush with the shoe bomber? I mean, c'mon man, how fucking idiotic can you get?

But worse than that, why isn't the guy interviewing him pouncing all over his dumbass when he spouts this bullshit? I don't think anybody bought it, but got dammit why do we even HAVE a media anymore if they are unwilling or unable to call bullshit on such a blatant ass lie?

President Obama's Remarks About The Report On The Failed Terrorist Attack On Christmas

Update: For whatever reason the MSNBC code isn't producing the correct video when embeded so I had to grab TPM's youtube instead.

He Didn't Buy A One Way Ticket

TPM has compiled a report on what has been publicly reported about the attempted terrorist bombing on the Northwest flight Christmas day. There is at least one important correction to what has been reported and repeated erroneously all over the place since this attempted attack took place.

•The AP quoted a Nigerian official, Civil Aviation Authority chief Harold Demuren, saying that Abdulmutallab bought a round-trip ticket with cash at the KLM office in Accra, Ghana on Dec. 16. The $2,831 ticket was from Lagos, Nigeria, to Detroit via Amsterdam, he said. The return date was said to be Jan. 8, the Guardian quotes the same Nigerian agency as saying. A CBS report refers to a "scheduled two-week trip," which would be in keeping with the Jan. 8 return date. And a Dutch government report described by the International Herald Tribune (via Nexis) said that Abdulmutallab "had a round-trip ticket purchased in Ghana."

•However, multiple news outlets and commentators have asserted Abdulmutallab had a one-way ticket. That includes Time, former Attorney General Michael Mukasey in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, the Journal news pages, and Michael Gerson in the Washington Post. None of those outlets cite a source for the one-way ticket claim. The New York Times actually ran a Dec. 30 correction saying that an earlier piece "referred incorrectly to the plane ticket used by the suspect. It was a round-trip ticket, not a one-way ticket."

Now people on both sides of the political spectrum have used the notion that Abdulmutallab bought a one way ticket as a sign that the sytem didn't work because that should have been a red flag. And even further to assert that because Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, used a one way ticket, that its an even worse screw up for them to have not noticed Abdulmutallab because the situations seemed so similar.

But the truth is he bought a round trip ticket so that is one thing that was different from Reid. And when you take away the one way ticket meme then there isn't a whole lot that would make you think this was a mirror image of Reid.

There are other things that TPM dug up worth reading about as well. And as I was typing this post the official White House report was declassified. So feel free to click the links and get the truth about this incident. Obviously relying on our mainstream media hasn't worked out so well thus far.

Terror 2.0

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Terror 2.0 by Yemen
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Congressman Massa Brings The Awesome Sauce AGAIN

Congressman Massa in addition to his appearance on the Ed Show last night has now also penned a diary on dailykos.

I for one am sick and tired of these Bush-era chicken hawk politicians that never served in uniform attacking Democrats on National Security when in fact, they are largely to blame for our Nation's current national security problems. Apparently former Vice President Cheney and the likes of Senator Jim DeMint actually believe that they can score political points by forcing America to remember the incredible failures of the previous Administration and to that I say - "Bring it on." I have no problem running against their record of global economic failure, avarice, corporate greed run amok, no-bid insider contracts, and disastrous foreign policy decisions that left us isolated on the international stage at the very moment when we needed to count our allies. I welcome the opportunity for the Vice President to relive his glory days. And I welcome the opportunity to call him out and debate him one on one. Personally, I think it's time for Vice President Cheney to either put up or shut up.

If it were up to me the DNC, DCCC and the DSCC would print out his diary and hand it out to all their members to memorize so the rest of the Democrats in Washington can learn how to attack Republicans where they live instead of hiding their heads in the sand and hoping it all blows over. I hope the Democrats who remain silent on this issue are just opening themselves up to the very same attacks that President Obama is facing now, later. You can either attack now and put them on the defensive, or get attacked later and look like a weakling. Your choice.

Rachel Gives Democrats The Blueprint

Now the question is if they will follow...

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If You Want Something Done Guess You Gotta Do It Yourself

Since Congressional Democrats have basically been mute over the GOP attacks on President Obama after the Northwest flight 253 attempted terrorist attack, the White House decided to pushback themselves.

Hard...

The Same Old Washington Blame Game
Posted by Dan Pfeiffer on December 30, 2009 at 03:34 PM EST

There has been a lot of discussion online and in the mainstream media about our response to various critics of the President, specifically former Vice President Cheney, who have been coming out of the woodwork since the incident on Christmas Day. I think we all agree that there should be honest debate about these issues, but it is telling that Vice President Cheney and others seem to be more focused on criticizing the Administration than condemning the attackers. Unfortunately too many are engaged in the typical Washington game of pointing fingers and making political hay, instead of working together to find solutions to make our country safer.

First, it’s important that the substantive context be clear: for seven years after 9/11, while our national security was overwhelmingly focused on Iraq – a country that had no al Qaeda presence before our invasion – Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda's leadership was able to set up camp in the border region of Pakistan and Afghanistan, where they continued to plot attacks against the United States. Meanwhile, al Qaeda also regenerated in places like Yemen and Somalia, establishing new safe-havens that have grown over a period of years. It was President Obama who finally implemented a strategy of winding down the war in Iraq, and actually focusing our resources on the war against al Qaeda – more than doubling our troops in Afghanistan, and building partnerships to target al Qaeda’s safe-havens in Yemen and Somalia. And in less than one year, we have already seen many al Qaeda leaders taken out, our alliances strengthened, and the pressure on al Qaeda increased worldwide.

To put it simply: this President is not interested in bellicose rhetoric, he is focused on action. Seven years of bellicose rhetoric failed to reduce the threat from al Qaeda and succeeded in dividing this country. And it seems strangely off-key now, at a time when our country is under attack, for the architect of those policies to be attacking the President.

Second, the former Vice President makes the clearly untrue claim that the President – who is this nation’s Commander-in-Chief – needs to realize we are at War. I don’t think anyone realizes this very hard reality more than President Obama. In his inaugural, the President said “our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred.” In a recent speech, Assistant to the President for Terrorism and Homeland Security John Brennan said “Instead, as the president has made clear, we are at war with al-Qaida, which attacked us on 9/11 and killed 3,000 people. We are at war with its violent extremist allies who seek to carry on al-Qaida’s murderous agenda. These are the terrorists we will destroy; these are the extremists we will defeat.” At West Point, the President told the nation why it was “in our vital national interest” to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to fight the war in Afghanistan, adding that as Commander in Chief, “I see firsthand the terrible wages of war.” And at Oslo, in accepting the Nobel Peace Prize, the President said, “We are at war, and I am responsible for the deployment of thousands of young Americans to battle in a distant land.”

There are numerous other such public statements that explicitly state we are at war. The difference is this: President Obama doesn’t need to beat his chest to prove it, and – unlike the last Administration – we are not at war with a tactic (“terrorism”), we at war with something that is tangible: al Qaeda and its violent extremist allies. And we will prosecute that war as long as the American people are endangered.

I couldn't really find a way to excerpt that post by Dan Pfieffer and I hope they don't mind but I thought it important enough to quote the whole thing. Of course if there were some Democrats in Washington willing to hit back themselves, this post wouldn't be necessary. But as we have seen by now with the health care fight, Democrats in Washington are still looking for a spine.

Meh

Now This Is Rich

Andrew Sullivan has taken to his blog to demand accountability in the form of Janet Napolitiano getting fired over the attempted bombing on Northwest flight 253 on Christmas. He can't actually come up with anything she did wrong but its his contention that SOMEONE must be fired in order for President Obama to prove he isn't like Bush. Mind you as far as is publicly known this was a failure of intelligence sharing which falls a lot more under DCI Dennis Blair's watch than it does Napolitano, but you don't see Mr Accountability Sullivan asking for HIS head.

Anybody with two brain cells can probably figure out that this is all about the bogus right wing framing of her out of context commments on Sunday but you will never get Mr. Acocountability Sullivan to admit that.

Just to remind you that Sully is basically the only blogger over at the Atlantic now who doesn't allow comments. They have a system where you have to register with the site just to leave a comment and you can be banned for inappropriate responses and yet he STILL will not allow comments. Its really ironic that a guy who won't subject himself to accountability by his own readers in the form of comments that he alone could control whether they were actually published or not, is now screaming at President Obama because he isn't being as reactionary, and in this case stupid, as he would like.

Gotta love it!

President Obama Can't Rebuke Janet Napolitano When He Is Busy Agreeing With Her

Yesterday afternoon Chris Good had a post over at Marc Ambinder's spot entitled
"Systemic Failure": A Full Rebuke Of "The System Worked" in which he used the right wing out of context framing of Janet Napolitano's words on CNN over the weekend to profer that President Obama was rebuking what she had said.

It was also a complete 180 from what Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on CNN's "State of the Union" two days after the attempted attack was foiled--that "the system worked"--a direct and total rebuke of that initial assertion.

Except, that is not what Napolitano said on CNN's "State of the Union" AND he evidently missed the part of President Obama's speech where in fact he agreed with and endorsed what she actually DID say, in context, on Sunday as is evidenced in this Rachel Maddow clip from last night.

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See when her whole quote is allowed in context and you can see that she was speaking of the RESPONSE to the attempted terrorist attack and not the events leading up to it that allowed the attempt to take place at all she sounds perfectly reasonable and in this case perfectly right. But that never stopped wingnuts from shrieking of course and so they took it out of context and ran with it for the last few days. And unsurprisingly they found someone in the quasi mainstream media realm to validate their shrieking in Chris Good who obviously didn't hear the part in the speech where President Obama agreed with her lest his whole post lose its relevance. Thankfully a commenter pointed this out to him and today he posted a retraction. But notice how he is still unwilling or unable to fully call bullshit.

Obama, as I failed to mention in that post, cast Napolitano's analysis as correct, saying that "once the suspect attempted to take down Flight 253, after his attempt, it's clear that passengers and crew, our homeland security systems and our aviation security took all appropriate actions."

Obama's "systemic failure" spoke to a different part of the security process than what Napolitano had originally addressed. When Napolitano said that the "system worked," she was talking about the response to the incident, not the cause.

"Everybody played an important role here," Napolitano said on CNN's "State of the Union." "The passengers and crew of the flight took appropriate action, within literally an hour to 90 minutes of the incident occurring all 128 flights in the air had been notified to take some special measures in light of what had occurred on the Northwest Airlines flight."

snip

I still feel that Obama's remarks in Hawaii were a response to criticism of Napolitano--to the notion that the system didn't, in fact, work to prevent the attack from almost occurring--which is something Napolitano had already said. After the protestations against Napolitano's comment, whether or not they were merited, it became somewhat necessary for the president to come out and say that the system had failed.

But to call this a "rebuke" of Napolitano was misguided.

Whether or not they were merited? Its pretty fucking simple, THEY WEREN'T MERITED. And the proof is in the fact that he had to post a retraction in the first place. But you just can't call wingnuts liars in this day and age I guess. You have to give them "the benefit of the doubt". Funny, but it didn't seem like Good gave Napolitano the same benefit of the doubt though, did he? If anything was rebuked it was the right wing framing of what she had said, but you won't get that post title anytime soon I am sure.

I guess I should just be glad he posted a retraction, because you can best believe if this was the Washinton Post no such retraction would be forthcoming. But you still have to marvel and despair at how the right wing can frame any story even in the face of evidence easily accessed to the contrary.

Wired for Republicans, Washington still is...

GOP Putting Politics Over Security

My Kingdom for a Congressional Democrat who would be willing to stand up and say the Republicans are putting politics over the security of the American people!

Well I guess for now Rachel Maddow will have to do...

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Jim DeMint, Terrorist Sympathizer

Why does Republican Senator Jim DeMint want to hinder our ability to keep airline passengers safe by putting a hold on President Obama's nominee to head the TSA?

Its because he hates America of course, and is soft on terrorism, and is an appeaser....yadda yadda yadda.

Seriously, where is our liberal version of Pete Hoekstra out there pounding this dumbass into submission?

Terrorist Attach On Airplane Thwarted

I am admittedly late on this, but evidently some guy who is now claiming Al Qaeda affiliation of some sort tried to blow up a plane headed to Detroit but failed and presumably ended up getting his ass whupped by his fellow passengers. TPM is on the case.

Treason

I know there are some people on the left whom I respect who believe that its unfair to say that there are some right wingers who are hoping for a terrorist attack on the country. However I would like or those people to take a look at this video and then attempt to say with a straight face if that isn't EXACTLY what Michael Scheuer is calling for in this exchange with Glenn Beck.




Disgusting.

That quote should get him banned from appearing on any station other than FoxNews.