Remember this?  Presnit-wit Bush and all his neo-con buddies saying over, and over, and over and over, and, you get the picture...  
"When the Iraqi's can stand up, we will stand down.  There will be no timetables!"

If I heard that once from someone in the Bush Administration or their "media" contingent, I heard it five thousand times.  So, what happens when the Iraqi's stand UP faster than Bushie and the boyz want them to?  Bushie continues to try to stand ON them to keep them down.

WASHINGTON — A Justice Department plan would loosen restrictions on the Federal Bureau of Investigation to allow agents to open a national security or criminal investigation against someone without any clear basis for suspicion, Democratic lawmakers briefed on the details said Wednesday.

. . . .

I realize everyone is desperately seeking revenge for the last eight years, but eventually we will have to come to terms with the fact that we are not going to see the current administration investigated or punished to any great extent.

What will happen is what ALWAYS happens. A few low level flunkies will take some heat and maybe even do some short stint in a country club prison. The real movers and shakers responsible for the reprehensible nature of the Bush Administration will be beyond the reach of justice.

The fact that they have broken the law is immaterial, and no amount of wishing and hoping, wailing and gnashing is going to change that fact. I realize this is a viciously unpopular stand at the moment, but I believe in beating the rush: Get. Over. It.

And you what the real kicker is? That's what is best for the United States.

And so it begins. Via Ben Smith:

Scott McClellan advises Obama, in an interview with my colleague Daniel Libit, not to investigate the Bush administration — because it would, McClellan says, damage Obama's image. (Not that former Bushies have anything at stake in that choice.) [...]

[W]hen asked what advice he would give to a President Barack Obama or Democratic Congress on the matter of handling former Bush officials, McClellan speaks now of the perils of probing the past.

“If Obama were to win,” he said last week, “that would be an issue his administration would have to face early ... because he’s pledging to be a uniter, not a divider — without saying those exact words we campaigned on in 2000. He’s pledging to change the way Washington works, and if Congress were to pursue that, it would be very divisive.”

He continued: “That could be very problematic for his presidency right off the start.”

Investigations would be "divisive." Good Lord. I'd praise myself for predicting that exact sentiment weeks ago, but it's just too damn obvious.

I have no doubt that every pundit in America will be echoing that line come January. No doubt whatsoever. The Bush administration is over, let's just forget all about that stuff and get on with our lives.... screw torture and DOJ scandal, the Democrats have to rise above such divisiveness and petty thoughts of, you know, accountability for illegal acts. Blah blah fucking blah.

Accountability is for little people. That's the be-all, end-all message of the Bush administration. From Enron to Plame to FISA to the DOJ to torture, there is no larger philosophy at work. I'm in charge, so fuck you. And the odds are that the Dems will go along, Obama included, because that's the easier path.

Am I the only one here who's been slowly devolving into the feeling that this whole "trying to make government better" thing has been a useless exercise, at this point? Nothing like repeatedly being told by the press, the pundits, the government, the political opposition and your supposed political allies that any talk of good government, or rational decision making, or even, fuck it, consequences for illegal acts is just cruel partisanship and/or pie-in-the-sky dreaming.

I expect members of the Bush administration, McClellan included, to make frequent and urgent-sounding arguments that members of the Bush administration shouldn't be investigated after they've left office. But I almost can't wait to see how many of the usual "serious" hacks and lifelong politicos go along with it. You know, just to make sure it's not "divisive."

  (you place the CD into the player)

  (sounds of ocean waves rumbling)

  (soft, piano music begins playing)

OBAMA: Welcome to the Self-Help Hypnosis Series.  I'm Barack Obama, and I want to help you overcome your problem of voting for idiots.

By Candace Talmadge / North Star Writers Group

The Washington Post reports today:

The Justice Department has proposed a new domestic spying measure that would make it easier for state and local police to collect intelligence about Americans, share the sensitive data with federal agencies and retain it for at least 10 years.

The proposed changes would revise the federal government's rules for police intelligence-gathering for the first time since 1993 and would apply to any of the nation's 18,000 state and local police agencies that receive roughly $1.6 billion each year in federal grants.

"So what else is new?" you may ask.  After all, the Bush Administration's attack on civil liberties and privacy has been unrelenting since they day took office.

But the next part of the report is what caught my attention:

 

So I hear on Free Speech Radio News today that US special forces trained the same exact Georgian troops that invaded South Ossetia just days or weeks before the invasion.  And so then I looked and found an article from 1 month ago which discusses these US servicemen obeying their orders to train Georgian troops, the same Georgian troops that turned around and invaded South Ossetia.

This is an outrage and of course begs the question:  what exactly was the Bush administration's involvement in the instigation and lead-up to this invasion during the Olympics and right before an election.

This is of course classic "wagging the dog" before an election.  And who has more motive than the criminal Bush administration to wag the dog?

There's a news article today floating out there that says the Russians are telling their people that the war was started by Dick Cheney to prevent Obama from becoming president.  Is this what really happened?  Let's take a look at some events and facts to see if this might be possible. See you below the fold.

There will be wars... and rumors of wars.

It’s not enough for the Pentagon to have the best; the newest, and the most destructive weapons (and the most of them) on the planet. No, the Pentagon has to have the most lethal weapons that can strike anywhere, anytime against anyone -- then not have to lay claim to any such strike(s) -- for the sake of political expediency. It’s just what the doctor neocons ordered for trying and unstable times like these; a highly effective weapon that delivers its payload anonymously -- the perfect compliment to McCain’s war du jour mentality.

It’s affectionately referred to at the Pentagon as the "long-range blowtorch." But the Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) is designed like no other weapon in the world. It has the ability to remain anonymous as to its source. This is the perfect tool of war-whacked imperialism.

August 13, An Undisclosed Location. Do you agree with Florida Democrat Robert Wexler and Ohio Democrat Dennis Kuchinich that Bush and Cheney should be impeached? Do you feel that the war in Iraq was conducted with the incompetence that rivals FEMA in New Orleans? Or that it was a mistake? Do you feel that rather than enhance our national security, the war - 4,000 dead, 19,000 wounded, and $1 Trillion spent, has strengthened Iran and weakened the United States? Do you feel that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, should be an effective emergency response force, or an agency of incompetence and a gold mine of patronage? Do you believe that the Department of Justice should focus on race, religion, party and politics when hiring and firing staff and investigating and prosecuting corruption? Do you work? Do you need health care? Do you want your children to be able to get an education, then find rewarding work? Do you believe in "government of the people, by the people, and for the people?"  The "DemoPunks" don't.

Here is another immigration nightmare. This is not the America I know.
My friend's husband will be deported in 90 days.  Her husband was born in Thailand and adopted as a child.  Somehow the adoption paperwork was never finalized, his parents died, and he did not even know he was not a citizen.  He had a felony conviction as a teenager, served time, then turned his life around; married, had kids, worked for Texas Instruments for 16 years.  When he applied for a college loan, he was found to not be a citizen, was arrested by ICE and put in jail (February 2007).  

Pass the tinfoil:

*  The State Department gave Russia the green light to go into South Ossetia if Georgia made a big move, thinking that the Russians had made an implied commitment to stay out of Georgia proper.  But they never told the Georgian government

*  Knowing that the Russians were baiting Saakashvili, State kept telling the Georgians to keep cool.  Nonetheless, no one who works for the U.S. government had any advance warning of Saakashvili's decision to advance on Tskhinvali.  The U.S. advisers attached to the Georgian Army were kept in the dark, and Saakashvili didn't give Washington a heads-up about his big gamble.  

*  Our satellites were so busy watching Pakistan that we didn't notice Russian tanks massing in North Ossetia.

Yes, you read all of that right.

I did a search on this and hadn't seen anything show up. If it is a duplicate, please let me know.

Update: Sorry, my local rag of a paper said it was awarded. The linked story only shows Flora as being on the shortlist. Even so, the rest of the concerns are still valid.

A new national biological lab is being built in a Flora, Mississippi, a small town of only 1500 people. This has caused a great deal of concern, as the town was among the lowest ranked among the 17 applicants.

The Homeland Security Department swept aside evaluations by government experts and named Mississippi -- home to powerful U.S. lawmakers with sway over the agency -- as one of five finalists for a new $451 million laboratory to study biological threats, according to internal documents obtained by The Associated Press.

For reasons not directly relevant to this posting, I have been going through a large number of my previous diaries, and encountered one posted 4/12/2006 entitled "Living in a bulls-eye."  As I read it I was somewhat shocked to realize how relevant it still was, given our current dispute with Iran and especially in light of the recent conflict in the Caucasus.

I had not intended to do a diary today - I have many other tasks.  But since this merely requires me to repost, I thought I would, and see if you, like me, still think what I wrote more than two years ago here is still relevant.

BTW - the original was not on the recommended list, but it was part of diary rescue.

Peace.

Cross posted from www.21stCenturyDems.org/blog

Apparently, George "the environmental President" Bush is at it again. This time he's cherishing America's natural beauty by gutting the Endangered Species Act. The Bush Administration seems to think that the "protection" part of EPA means that their job is to protect corporate profits from nasty mother nature. The Republicans already tried to do this when they had control of Congress, but since they couldn't get the votes then they'll try to do it through back-door deregulation. This is not a surprising strategy for the Bush, who has already demonstrated a historic love for secret executive orders and signing statements.

... in fact, The United States has far less control over events in Iraq than John McCain and his lapdog press corps would have us believe.

It’s a real tragedy that 147,000 American troops are essentially being held hostage in Iraq by the ever-changing political winds swirling 'round an ancient culture we know little about. Yet, after five-years this is our basic strategy, and it shall remain so if John McCain is somehow elected to the Oval Office.

Relying on current, relatively calm conditions in Iraq (as McCain is doing) to sustain the claim that the so-called surge escalation is working is a flawed strategy. Truth is; if McCain actually had half the "experience" in foreign policy that he thinks he does he’d realize there’s more trouble blowin' down the road in Iraq.

If China’s leaders took note of it, which they probably didn’t because they are too busy presenting themselves as "the Middle Kingdom" (the "middle" between Heaven and Earth) to the rest of the world, they would doubtless have been amused by Rush Limbaugh’s case of China-envy:  

See, the ChiComs need their economy growing.  They need people driving around, moving around.  They need people to be able to afford fuel, so they're subsidizing fuel.  They're not bailing people out of stupid home mortgage messes.  They're buying their gasoline for them, because they need an economy.  Know what energy means to this, the whole subject of economic growth.  So meanwhile, the ChiComs, a country certainly growing, certainly on the rise, but it ain't the United States of America.

Presumably, what Rush would like is for the U.S. to subsidize gas so that people in the U.S. could live large like the Chinese leaders and fuel our economic growth.