If the rightwingnuts really wanted to give this nonsense some legs, they'd take Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, and all the other wackos off the air and claim the FCC made them do it. A complete shutdown of Faux News for a few months would help make it more convincing.

I thought the Republican party, especially the most conservative members, were against foreign intervention and nation building. Just like they hate big governement and laws that interfere with individual liberties and families.

Everything that Republicans claim to stand for is exactly that: Something they claim to stand for. All you get is the claims. Forget about them actually doing it.

By which we mean, "as we undertake a massive marketing campaign to figure out what form of rebranding works best."

Heck, we wrapped the shit in gold foil and tied it in ribbons. Maybe it would sell better if the product name was something other than "Shit".

... is because Republicans are constantly pandering to people who want it to be news. This really shouldn't be a matter of public interest at all, except maybe in the gossip columns.

Pence knows damn well what he's doing. He'd love it if Obama took the bait and the result was yet another hideously expensive endless war. That would finally give Republicans a comeback when people bring up Bush's screwed up* wars.

* = One pointless war, and one half-assed war that was never properly finished.

Then why does Cheney call for the EIT documents to be released? You have an opinion about Cheney and that's fine but Obama could be rid of that whole issue with little effort by releasing the documents Cheney requested.

I think Cheney is playing "Heads I win, tails you lose".

Cheney has cherry-picked a few documents that might be interpreted as supporting his position. He'd like to see just those released, but not any others that might make him look bad (heads I win).

Obama could play into Cheney's hand by releasing just what Cheney wants, or he could release a lot more data to paint a more accurate picture. Unfortunately, that would reveal more about the extent of the abuse than Obama would like (tails you lose) and Cheney knows Obama won't do that.

It's very clever move by Cheney.

BTW, I don't buy that "safety of the soldiers" argument. By not releasing the evidence, we play into the hands of anyone who wants to claim that the abuse was much worse than anything that has been revealed so far.

See the effect of the MSM propaganda on you?

Sorry, but I don't buy it.

I think Obama is trying to suppress release of information about abuse of prisoners because it is far more systematic and extensive that we yet know.

Cheney is a psychopath and a pathological liar, and I think everything he says in public is carefully chosen solely to advance his agenda. Cheney is a member of PNAC, and PNAC has wanted to invade Iraq for a long time. They tried to persuade president Clinton to take action against Iraq. The letter they sent to Clinton was still up on their website as recently as a few days ago. I think the decision to invade Iraq was made even before the Bush was sworn in. They were just waiting for an excuse, and Bin Laden handed it to them on a silver platter.

This would leave no doubt where we stand as for liberties, human and civil rights.

I think we have left no doubt about where we stand as for liberties, human and civil rights: They all go in the flusher when political expedience as on the table.

We tortured people to get "evidence" supporting Bush's pointless invasion of Iraq. We continually try suppress information about bad things we have done (torture and indiscriminate use of force against civilians) because they would make us look bad. We whine and kvetch about other countries spying on their own citizens while doing exactly the same things in the U.S.. There's very little we can criticize others for doing that we haven't done ourselves.

We gave up our right to criticize when we started acting just like the parties we would criticize. I think we have to clean up our act before we preach from the "liberty" soapbox.

There have been thousands of Iranians in the streets pleading for Obama to make a statement,take a stand and support the idea of a people's free will not being denied by thugs.

There's a little practical issue here. If we want constructive engagement with Iran about their nuclear activities, it might not be a great idea to infuriate the current Iranian leadership by officially supporting their opponents.

I'm not claiming to know what is "The right thing" to do. I'm just pointing out that it isn't as simple as some people would like it to be.

$500 million was a HUGE amount of money in the 1930s.

Yeah.

I just did a quick search for historical figures that hadn't been adjusted to constant dollars. What I found says that in 1930, the U.S. federal budget as $10 billion and the U.S. GDP was $91 billion.

If these numbers are correct, a single $500 million bond would have funded 5% of the entire 1930 U.S. federal budget.

... Leon Panetta hit the nail on the head. I think Cheney is a dangerous psychopath who probably does wish for another attack that would vindicate his position.

Ironically, although Krugman does confess that part of "the reason why I am so depressed" is the he's not sure that stabilizing the financial market is "sufficient"...

I think he's right to be worried. The U.S. doesn't really have an economy anymore. For decades, it has consumed more than it produced and financed the difference with debt. Getting the banks back on their feet is pointless when there aren't enough potential borrowers who will use the loans to create wealth.