FYI: Union of Concerned Scientist’s ‘Bunker Buster’ Animation (turn on speakers)
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_security/nuclear_weapons/nuclear-bunker-buster-rnep-animation.html
For a bit of political humah, watch this video
clip
Air
America’s Randi Rhodes cracks CNN’s Lou Dobbs ‘on camera’ decorum re: Nuclear Testing and Josh Bolten’s hobby
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/04/19.html#a7970
The
other noises you hear are Republicans rushing for the exits amid the latest
poll numbers crashing. Today even FOX News shows Bush at 33%. As much as I
dislike and distrust Pres. Bush and the warhawk theocrats, I am concerned about
the weakened respect for the American office of the presidency, and by
extension the weakening of goodwill, trust and stature of what is good about American
power.
While
some cringe at the idea of impeachment, I’m not so sure it would be entirely
negative: both Bush and Cheney lied. Rearranging the deck chairs inside the White House isn’t
going to save this administration now, or the waning credibility of US foreign
policy. A short term with Speaker
of the House Dennis Hastert as President can’t be any worse than this. But nothing
good happens unless Congress changes hands. kwc
A Crisis Almost Without Equal
Republicans and Democrats alike are starting
to face the prospect of what it means to have GW Bush as their commander in
chief for another 33 months - in a time of war, terrorism, and nuclear intrigue.
How can the press contribute to confronting the crisis? First: recognize it
exists.
By Greg Mitchell, Editor, Editor & Publisher, April 19, 2006
No matter which party they generally favor or political stripes they wear,
newspapers and other media outlets need to confront the fact that America faces
a crisis almost without equal in recent decades.
Our president, in a time of war, terrorism and nuclear intrigue, will likely
remain in office for another 33 months, with crushingly low approval ratings
that are still inching lower. Facing a similar problem, voters had a chance to
quickly toss Jimmy Carter out of office, and did so. With a similar lengthy
period left on his White House lease, Richard Nixon quit, facing impeachment. N
The alarm should be bi-partisan. Many Republicans fear their
president's image as a bumbler will hurt their party for years. The rest may
fret about the almost certain paralysis within the administration, or a
reversal of certain favorite policies. A Gallup poll this week revealed that
44% of Republicans want some or all troops brought home from Iraq. Do they
really believe that their president will do that any time soon, if ever?
Democrats, meanwhile, cross their fingers that Bush doesn’t do something really
stupid -- i.e. nuke Iran -- while they try to win control of at least one house
in Congress by doing nothing yet somehow earning (they hope) the anti-Bush
vote. Meanwhile, a severely
weakened president retains, and has shown he is willing to use, all of his
commander-in-chief authority, and then some.
No wonder so many are starting to look for a way to shorten or short-circuit
the extended crisis period. Republicans demand a true shake-out at the White
House. This week at Vanity Fair online, Carl Bernstein is calling for a
Watergate-style congressional probe of possible high crimes and misdemeanors.
Even Neil Young is weighing in with a soon-to-be-released song that urges,
“Let’s impeach the president -- for lying.”
But rather than push impeachment for partisan reasons, the Democrats will
actually put it off -- for partisan reasons. An unpopular president helps their
drive for votes in November, and everything else is secondary.
So let’s assume, as Nixon might put it, that we do have George Bush to kick
around for another almost-three-years. How worried should we be about the
possible damage he might inflict -- and what can the press do about it? Consider Thomas Friedman’s column in
The New York Times today, and its implications.
Friedman, who still supports the Iraq war, opens by declaring that given a choice between
a nuclear Iran and an attack on that country engineered by the White House, he
would choose the former.
That’s how little he trusts the diplomatic and military chops of Bush, Rumsfeld,
Condi and Co. He cites “the level of incompetence that the Bush team has
displayed in Iraq, and its refusal to acknowledge any mistakes or remove those
who made them.”
But then he goes on: “I look at the Bush national security officials much the
way I look at drunken drivers. I just want to take away their foreign policy
driver's licenses for the next three years. Sorry, boys and girls, you have to
stay home now -- or take a taxi. ... You will not be driving alone. Not with my
car.”
The problem -- the crisis -- is that Bush and Co. likely WILL be driving the
“car” for 33 more months.
Friedman knows this: “If ours were a parliamentary democracy, the entire Bush team
would be out of office by now, and deservedly so. ... But ours is not a parliamentary system,
and while some may feel as if this administration's over, it isn't. So what to
do? We can't just take a foreign policy timeout.”
Perfectly said. Again, the crisis, even if he didn’t call it that: “We can’t
just take a foreign policy timeout.”
Friedman, however, is very late in doubting the competence of this crew, and he
still backs away from the scary wider view. What to do? he asks. He suggests
that Rumsfeld depart, of course, and then he gets into specifics of how
diplomacy might work re: Iran. That leaves hanging the reality of Bush
continuing to serve as Master and Commander of the Iraq war and all other
foreign policy into 2009.
I don’t have a solution myself now, although all pleas for serious probes,
journalistic or official, of the many alleged White House misdeeds should be
heeded. But my point here is simply to start the discussion, and urge that the
media, first, recognize that the crisis - or, if you want to say, impending
crisis - exists, and begin to explore the ways to confront it.
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002383107
