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Banned
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Here is some of what I have been reading....and taken together, it is, IMO, a highly probable "round up" of what we have to "look forward to", and why.
I predict that it won't be long until you are wondering, "what was I (and congress....) thinking", by not considering impeachment of both Bush and Cheney, as a credible remedy and a way to change to a saner, safer, constructive foreign policy and a constitutionally restorative course, on January 11, 2007....
Quote:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/blument...urce=whitelist
Shuttle without diplomacy
After signaling support for James Baker's Iraq proposals, Condi caved and stood faithfully by the president's failing policies -- assuring her irrelevance, and that of the State Department.
By Sidney Blumenthal
Jan. 10, 2007 | James Baker, the consummate Republican political operator over the past 30 years, did not expect that President Bush would accept the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group he co-chaired simply on its merits. Baker's hidden political hand was unrevealed in the report's dire analysis or in its urgent suggestions for diplomacy or force redeployment. Baker summoned as witnesses the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the military commanders in Iraq past and present (including the recently named commander there, Gen. David Petraeus) and even British Prime Minister Tony Blair. But he understood that enlisting all of these formidable figures was insufficient. Baker privately negotiated with Bush, but he did not rest solely on his own powers of persuasion to convince the president, as the report put it, that the "situation is grave and deteriorating" and his policies are "not working."
Ultimately, Baker's political strategy counted on the decisive intervention of one person in the president's closed inner circle -- who sees him alone and could not be kept from him, and on whom he has become dependent for support and trusts implicitly -- to deliver the bad news that continuing those policies would only deepen the disaster and explain that he had no way out except to change course......
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Quote:
http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001861.php
Woodward Book Underestimates Cheney's Influence
« "Surging" is No Plan: Concerned Americans Plan Picket Action at McCain/Lieberman Appearance | Main | Evaluating the President's Iraq Escalation Proposal »
January 07, 2007
Woodward Book Underestimates Cheney's Influence
While the book exposed a lot of the systemic rot in the Bush administration's Iraq-related decision-making process, there were several things wrong with Bob Woodward's State of Denial.
To discuss one of these, Woodward was duped about the diminishing power of Vice President Cheney and his team. Woodward clearly spent a lot of time with Defense, State, and intelligence officials, but he failed to see the forest for the trees in his analysis of who was driving and influencing America's national security portfolio.
Clearly, the President is important and calls a lot of the shots, but the key question that Woodward never gets to is who really controls the national security bureaucracy. As former State Department Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson so clearly put it on October 16, 2005, a "Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal" hijacked the national security decision-making process. Woodward puts most of the responsibility for failure on Rumsfeld with a weak President and national security team too frequently acquiescing to Rumsfeld's outrageous behavior.
But what Woodward completely misses is that Dick Cheney is the only figure in this presidential administration who has followers -- or what one might otherwise call disciples and acolytes.
The President has no followers -- or very few. They just don't know what his "world view" is. Some are loyal to the persona of George W. Bush, but that is different than knowing what the President would think about some policy or situation. Rice has few followers in the administration. Hadley none. Rumsfeld was despised, and his brilliant "snowflake" strategy helped keep everyone on edge and also helped him evade accountability at every turn. Such types don't generate "followings."
George Tenet, John Negroponte, and others in the intelligence community never cultivated a crowd dedicated to institutionalizing and pursuing their policy prerogatives.
The closest anyone came to challenging Cheney's many followers was Colin Powell who with Richard Armitage and Lawrence Wilkerson at his side tried to breed "sensibility" and "caution" among those who made national security policy -- but at the end of the day, Powell and his team tended to matter when they were in the room and didn't matter when they weren't. Any followers he had dissipated with his departure from the Bush administration.
But Cheney's followers populate the entire national security bureaucracy. He has allies, spies, and fellow travelers in State, Defense, the CIA, the NSA, the DNI, the DIA, all of the uniformed services, and throughout the government. They know his world view and don't need instructions on what to do or what he might think. They know it. They know he wants a war with Iran -- and his team of followers are doing what they can to move us in that direction.....
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Quote:
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2007/In...hose_0108.html
Officials believe White House chose new Intelligence chief in effort to darken Iran Intelligence Estimate, broaden domestic surveillance
01/08/2007 @ 1:27 pm
Filed by Larisa Alexandrovna
<b>Nominee's company audited SWIFT banking spy program</b>
The nomination of retired Vice Admiral John Michael "Mike" McConnell to be Director of National Intelligence is part of an effort by the Vice President to tighten the Administration’s grip on domestic intelligence and grease the wheels for a more aggressive stance towards Iran, current and former intelligence officials believe.
If confirmed, McConnell will replace current National Intelligence Director John Negroponte, who was tapped Friday to become Deputy Secretary of State under Secretary Condoleezza Rice. According to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, Negroponte’s exit followed a lengthy internal administration battle between the Office of the Vice President and the two-year-old Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
According to officials close to both men, two issues surround Negroponte’s departure and McConnell’s nomination: a forthcoming National Intelligence Estimate on Iran – which the White House could use to buttress a case for military force – and pressure from the Vice President to augment domestic surveillance.
Negroponte had resisted both efforts. Tensions soared after Negroponte made a public statement last year that countered the administration position that Iran was an immediate threat and that its alleged nuclear weapons program was in an advanced stage.
“The NIE on Iran is at issue,” said one former senior intelligence officer close to Negroponte.......
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