Together in colossal denial

About 99.99 percent of the world's inhabitants who have access to a television set know that George W. Bush dwells in a sealed bubble of denial. But the bubble must have a back door, because wife Laura got in there with her husband this morning. Asked by MSNBC's Nora O'Donnell what she thought about poll results that show 80% of Americans disapprove of George's handling of Iraq, the First Lady blamed the media. To quote Her Ladyship: “I do know that there are a lot of good things that are happening that aren’t covered. And I think that the drum beat in the country from the media, from the only way people know what is happening…is discouraging.”

So which drumbeat is she listening to. Maybe it's Karl Rove up in the White House attic with a set of bongos. The drums of reality come through like this:

As of today, 3,161 US troops have been killed in civil war-torn Iraq. Tens of thousands - or much more likely hundreds of thousands - of Iraqis have been killed. 100,000 Iraqis are fleeing their country every month (UN estimate), with 1.8 million of them now living in other Arab countries. (700,000 are in Syria; 500,000 are in now-overwhelmed Jordan.) About two million Iraqis are displaced in their own land. And while the Iraq occupation continues to erode the US military in obvious ways, a volcanic Afghanistan is bubbling toward what will probably be a massive spring offensive by the already resurgent Taleban. (Yes indeed, that is the country just beyond Iran that saw The Decider pull out US troops in 2003 in order to create his Iraq debacle - the same Afghanistan from which emanates at this time no less than 90% of the world's heroin.)

Wake up, bubble people, and redeem some of your legacy. Come out and work with Congress to set an Iraq withdrawal timeline.

Let's hope

It seems the word is just starting to spread that Democrats in the Senate are working toward revisiting the Iraq war authorization that - sadly, stupidly and disastrously - passed four years ago. Apparently they want to try to pass a resolution to limit further military action in Iraq. Let us hope.

The last elections made it clear that the majority of Americans are fed up with the Iraq war and occupation. What confounds me is the fact that somewhere between 28 and 34 percent of Americans still have some trust in the Bush cabal. Unless they wear blinders and ear plugs, they have to know about the lies that have been spewed from the White House since well before March 19, 2003. (Of course it never stops. Now Cheney is describing the British pullout from Basra as a sign of success, although even the Pentagon still lists Basra as a particularly violent region of Iraq where Shi'ite tribal militias are at each other's throats.)

Well, maybe it is this 28 to 34 percent that just dwells in a perpetual state of hypnosis, the most recent dangling, swaying watches being the pathetic Britney Spears and the even more pathetic, men-manipulated, dead but not yet buried Anna Nicole Smith.

If most of that minority wakes up, imagine the possibilities. Think impeachment.

Brilliance in Iraq

Wednesday, Feb. 14: The new security offensive touted by The Decider began in Baghdad.

Friday: Prime Minister Maliki declared the crackdown a "brilliant success."

Yesterday: Condoleeza Rice said in Baghdad that the security operation was off to a good start.

Yesterday: Two Americans were killed in Baghdad, one shot and the other killed by a grenade thrown at his vehicle.

Today: Two car bombs at a Baghdad open-air marked killed at least 60 and wounded at least 131.

Today: Those bombs were quickly followed by a car bomb tht killed two and wounded 10 in Sadr City.

This operation is about as brilliant as the surging Decider himself.

If only he would wake up and bring the troops home from this fiery civil war arena. Otherwise, Congress had better find a way to do it. Fast.

Purging Bush's surge plan

Probably anyone reading this blog already knows about today's House vote on Bush's "surge" of troops to Iraq. The vote against the Decider's plan is "non-binding" but surely will impact the White House and its political allies. 246 (including 17 Republicans) voted for the "no surge" resolution, 182 (including two Democrats) voted against. Today the Senate will take up precisely the same resolution.

At this time, 63 percent of Americans are against the surge. (Gallup poll last weekend)

In the midst of the debate, we keep hearing from Bush's cheerleaders that the surge will support the troops already there. But previous "surges" have just seen the death rate continue to rise (3,133 American troops killed as of yesterday).

The clear way to support the troops is to bring them home from the killing streets of a sectarian civil war.

Even worse than I thought

In the US torture debate, we have all heard about "extraordinary rendition." A just-released EU report defines extraordinary rendition in these words: "An individual suspected of involvement in terrorism is illegally abducted, arrested and/or transferred into the custody of US officials and/or transported to another country for interrogation which, in the majority of cases involves incommunicado detention and torture".

The report - approved by the European parliament 382 to 256 with 74 abstentions - condemns the 14 states that went along with the CIA rendition flights. It says that the US made 1,200 (yes, that is one thousand two hundred) flights taking prisoners to countries where they could face torture.

And we wonder why so much of the world is disgusted with us.

Naming the Neo-cons

In June of 1997, the so-called Neo-conservatives laid out their imperial mission for these United States - to maximize military spending for the sake of America's "prosperity" and its "interests" around the world. (Read "wealth" and "oil.") Then, unleashing the pestilence they call their Project For A New American Century, they became the courtiers of King George upon his coronation and began to very successfully wreak bloody havoc on America and Iraq. (Is Iran next?)

So who are these Neo-cons? Here are the ones whose names I think most readers of this blog will recognize at once:

Cheney, Rumsfeld, Libby, Feith, Wolfowitz, Perle, Woolsey, Armitage, Bolton, Abrams, Bauer, Forbes, Kahlilzad, Podhoretz, Bill Bennett, Jeb Bush, and - take note, my fellow Catholics - George Weigel.

My favorite prayer ends with the appropriate petition here: "Deliver us from evil. Amen."

The neo-cons and Iran

Yesterday, in the UK's Guardian, Ewen MacAskill wrote that all the Democrats in Congress, most Republicans there, the State Department and the Pentagon are all against a Bush attack on Iran. Surely the majority of Americans are against it; look at what we voters made clear in November about Iraq. The warmongers then? Dick Cheney, first of all - as usual. And then the virtual corner bar of the neo-conservative movement, namely, the AEI (American Enterprise Institute.)

Most of the new majority Democrats in Congress have been pussyfooting about getting out of Iraq way too long already. They had best come up with some intestinal fortitude (and also get enough of their confreres across the aisle to join them) to forestall an attack on Iran.

Congress will prove to be jello if they can't block Cheney-Bush and neutralize the AEI on Iran. (Let us not forget that the AEI has been the impetus for Bush's Iraq "surge" of new troops (and not just the quoted 20,000 but up to 48,000 in all.) If we are going to apply axis of evil labels, we'd best start with the home-grown kind.

AZ and Bishop Tom Gumbleton

Many of us here in Tucson had looked forward to a talk to be given last night by Bishop Tom Gumbleton (whom I call the peace bishop.) But that never happened. Instead we only saw him via a DVD and heard him via a CD.

Here in a nutshell is the story: At age 75, he turned in his resignation as an auxiliary bishop in Detroit, as required by Vatican rules. It was accepted right away, though many bishops are kept in office well beyond 75. (An interesting example is the cardinal archbishop of Detroit, Adam Maida, who will soon be 77.) Then Bishop Tom (now 77) was also ordered to leave his parish, St. Leo's, even though he is healthy and energetic and there is no mandated age limit for pastors of parishes.

While his anti-war efforts--he was one of the first bishops to speak out against the Vietnam war and has gone to Iraq several times--have long irritated the warmonger class, other actions have put him under fire from other high places. Learning of his own brother's struggle as a homosexual, he became an advocate for gay and lesbian rights. And in January of last year, in contradistinction to the Ohio coalition of bishops, he addressed that state's House Judiciary Committee to endorse a law that would open a one-year window for victims of sexual abuse by priests to file lawsuits even if the abuse took place decades ago.

Invited by the Tucson chapter of Call To Action to speak here (CTA calls for Catholic renewal in the spirit of Vatican II), he learned that he was not welcome to speak at any Tucson diocesan property. So First Christian Church offered their sanctuary, which is where about 170 of us gathered last night--but without Bishop Tom. (He was also going to speak in Phoenix today.) A knowledgeable source has told me that the pope's US nuncio (ambassador) has declared that an outside bishop cannot speak in another bishop's geographical territory without the latter's permission. In any case, the door was barred both here and in Phoenix. And that is terribly, terribly sad.

Bush vs. 2000 scientists

The more than 2000 top-notch scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have now concluded that it is at least 90% certain that human emissions of greenhouse gases rather than natural variations are warming the planet's surface. So governments worldwide, including the EU and the UK, are calling for urgent action to stop global warming.

Well, not all governments worldwide.

Okay, let's all guess which government disagrees. Omigosh, could it actually be the Bush-Cheney petro-cabal that holds court behind the virtual moat surrounding the White House, USA? Yep. As usual. Of course.

The administration says that the report is "valuable", but they outright reject mandatory controls to reduce greenhouse gases.

Apparently they are about as able to understand a greenhouse gas as they are able to understand a civil war.

Just as apparently, The Decider is also The Denier.