Short of eating a live infant on the Senate floor, in front of C-Span cameras, this administration can do anything it wants and Congress will not do one damn thing about it. There is zero leadership in Congress.

This is another demonstration as to how politically inept the Democrats are. As the White House pushes the envelope, lying regularly and refusing to testify (hell, claiming not to be part of the exec branch!) it makes Congress look terrible. Then liberals, rightly so, start to think that the Democrats aren't so hot either and voters become less likely to turn out.

No matter how clear the lesson shown by the GOP, the Dems won't take it: feed your base, win over and over; ignore your base and lose (or squeak by if the nation HATES your opponent).

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No doubt, some will claim without 60 votes the Senate is powerless, but that's not true. They could shut down everything, issue subpoenas left and right, find officials in criminal contempt, etc.

I know that there are a lot of people like you who find rocking the boat distasteful regardless of who the captain is. How else could otherwise educated Germans let Nazis take over without a fight?

But I think you are wrong that people would not want see the Democrats exercise leadership. If the Executive Branch can give Congress the finger with a 29 percent approval rating and the Congress does nothing, that hurts Democrats. Look at the polls: the Democrats had something like a 48 percent approval rating after taking office. After months of doing nothing they now have a lower approval rating than Bush. Who do you think stopped supporting them in the polls? The "center" as you define it? Of course not -- it's what should be their base.

You are not the base, magno. And you are not the center for that matter (they are people who don't pay attention -- not Lieberman types like you who exist only in the media and DC). The public appreciates leadership. That's why the GOP wins even when they are leading us off a cliff. The Democrats should give it a whirl.

By the way, thinking for yourself and expecting leadership is not "being shrill."

Even the Democrats’ efforts to make Bush look bad help the right-wing agenda:

1) Bin Laden is probably dead and has been since late 2001. Even if he's not, he is clearly no major player in the diversity of violent groups fomented by our nation’s actions. Making us "focus on al Qaida" is another way of legitimizing the fear the war-mongers need to advance their agenda (it doesn’t matter to GE or Exxon if Bush is loved or hated by history).

2) Making Bush look like he isn't paying attention to evil Iran also spreads fear, and legitimizes the idea that war on Iran is a reasonable option. Again, whether Bush looks good or bad is really not important for the neo-con in late 07, so long as pre-emptive war and Iran-as-a-target are preserved.

The Democrats make the mistake of thinking bad press for Bush is the same as fighting what Bush represents; the result is that you have Democrats who will extend Bush's policy, only criticizing Bush's handling of that policy -- i.e. "Bush wasn't an effective imperialist."

Or maybe it's not a mistake at all? Maybe there is only one party -- a war party -- with a pro-choice faction and a gay bashing faction.

PS: Notice how the Democrats threatened to take away aid to Iraq if the Iraqi government didn’t privatize their oil – they don’t say that, course, it’s just called “oil revenue benchmarks.” Who do they work for? Is the Democratic base writing and calling Congress asking that Exxon and Shell get that oil?

Would have sat through another 30 minutes if that would have made it a better movie -- and I think it could well have.

As for using the time that was available, I'd say good job. While I missed a lot of the missing parts of the book, I have to admit that the film moved as fast as it could and covered as much ground as possible while still maintaining a coherent story.

Of course it is about control of resources -- virtually all wars in the history of our species have been about that. Why are we allies with worse nations than the ones we hate? (Venezuela, Iran and even the Hamas-led Palestinians are more democratic than our allies Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Indonesia.)

Everything we say about our priorities is bullshit. We might respect democracy and human rights, but only after addressing our own oligarchy’s wishes. Rwanda is a shame, but Palestinians are terrorists; widely elected Chavez is an anti-democratic force, but unpopular and dubiously elected Bush speaks for democracy itself.

And this isn’t just Bush’s line, it’s also the media and the Democrats, who are in need of some serious ass kicking if we expect them to represent “progressive values.” While the Dems criticize "Big Oil" in Congress, they also threaten to withhold reconstruction funds from Iraq -- a nation the United States destroyed -- unless Iraq passes an oil privatization bill that the nation does not want (of course the Dems NEVER refer to the bill as an oil privatization bill – it’s a “hydrocarbon bill” – or worse, a “benchmark”).

Which leads to the question: do we live in a democracy? It's not like the Democratic base is urging the privatization of Iraqi oil -- it's the same people who have sway over Bush who are doing that. Punch and Judy may have beat each other up, but it was the same puppeteer working them from behind the scenes.