Letters to the Editor
Published Letters: 146 Editor's Choice: 12
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Other priorities
[Read the article: Jenna Bush is just not the Winnebago-driving type]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In the great realm of things to be concerned about, the level of civic responsibility of the daughters of George W. Bush ranks near the bottom for me. With him as their father, whatever they do that is above streetwalking is an accomplishment. He was drunk and/or stoned for most of the time they were growing up, from blastocyst to their first drinking arrest.
We have a president who is a provable military deserter. Yet he has been Commander in Chief of all the country's armed forces for nearly seven years. That being the case, we are a country with no standards. This same president advocates torture, kidnapping, aggressive military threats and invasions, mass murder, theft, bribery, extortion, deception, spying on his fellow citizens, criminal negligence, and election fraud. A criminal sociopath, he benefits from the corruption of our judicial and legislative branches, and the cooperation from the corporate "mainstream" information media.
Bush's daughters may not be the most outstanding examples of offspring of presidents, but they never should have been daughters of a president anyway. Both the 2000 and 2004 elections were decided by vote fraud and judicial-legislative coverup. Also journalistic coverup, with the rare exceptions of Salon, Rolling Stone, and others.
There is a point made about the avoidance of military service of Jenna and Barbara Bush. They accentuate the near-total lack of service by the children of "Republican" (and "Democratic") office holders and "journalists" nationwide. Of course, there are the sons of Mitt Romney, who are doing brave service trying to get their witless father elected president.
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So many "pundits," so few Glenn Greenwalds
[Read the article: David Brooks and the deceitful tactics of the Beltway pundit]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I have long found David Brooks to be an odious presence on the "American" scene. I don't subscribe to the New York Times, so I'm not insulted by his writing. But I do watch "News Hour," and he is the "conservative" counterpoint to the "liberal" Mark Shields. This tedious interchange has been going on for years, and is a huge waste of time that could be used covering real news.
Glenn Greenwald again shows the way, picking Brooks apart point by point. This is what it takes. With a thousand more Greenwalds, maybe the punditocracy will be brought down.
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Bass ackwards
[Read the article: Perino watch]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]On the Stephanie Miller Show, Perino has the nickname "lying sack of cute." Even they say they miss Scott McCallum, who was the first of the Bush gang to receive a nickname, "Puffy McMoonface." They contended that his face would fatten when he lied.
It's all pretty meaningless, really. The Bush regime is completely criminal, so expecting anything competent or honorable, or decent from anyone in its hire is to focus on the peripheral.
The entire Bush criminal organization should be in jail. Expecting it to have a good liar representing it to the world is really having one's priorities backwards, inside-out, upside-down, topsy-turvy, and bass ackwards.
This is similar to the complaint that Bush's daughters should be "serving in 'Iraq.'" The President of the United States is a criminal sociopath, and people are criticizing his daughters for avoiding military service. They at least are one-up on their father. They aren't deserters. That makes them more qualified to be president than their wastrel father.
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It's time for good riddance
[Read the article: The collapse of Bush's foreign policy]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The most curious aspect of this insightful commentary is that it is in Salon, rather than the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, or Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, or even the TV networks. Time and again Salon scoops the "major media," yet they seem unable to learn, unable to rise to the challenge. Juan Cole does appear on PBS's News Hour occasionally, but he doesn't get seen or heard otherwise (I could be wrong about this. Having worked in the TV cable industry, I will not pay for cable. I heard about Novak et. al. on the Stephanie Miller Show).
It doesn't take a genius to figure this stuff out. All it takes are eyes and/or ears. On Fox, they're busy trying to discredit Valerie Plame, with Robert Novak, among others, claiming she wasn't "covert," wasn't an "agent."
Meanwhile, California is on fire, the southeastern "U.S." is in a drought, oil prices are going up, the economy is teetering on collapse, and we have a gang of criminal sociopaths "running" the country.
And, of course, there's the Mideast. By the time Bush's tenure is over, we might want to consider handing him over to an international tribunal for criminal prosecution for his many crimes. If we do this, we might regain some of our lost prestige and influence on the world stage. We should also hand over the Bush gang's media enablers as co-conspirators.
Though Abu Ghraib would be a fitting place for them, a more appropriate incarceration would be someplace isolated, preferably in northern Sweden or Norway. Some place where they would be forgotten. No media, no interviews, no memoirs, no reinvention of history. Just good riddance.