With all due respect to the Washington Post, but does any presidential press secretary actually have any credibility? A press secretary's job is to tell the press what the administration directs him to say. His "credibility" depends on whether his administration decides to tell the truth to the American people.

Now, the Bush presidency may be the most dishonest and corrupt administration since Ulysses S. Grant, but to grant Mr. McClellan any reputation for honesty is to ignore the nature of his job. It's the presidential spokesman's duty to toe the administration's line. Those that don't will end up "leaving to spend more time with his or her family."

So, if George tells Scott to spin a story in a particular way, Scott is going to spin it that way. He isn't a journalist trying to ferret out the truth; he's a presidential drone who has no credibility in and of himself.

The primary excuse Republicans use to justify warrantless searches and intercepts is that other Presidents have done it in the past. A President doing an unconstitutional act in the past doesn't make the current one doing an unconstitutional act acceptable. Nobody can change what a previous President did or didn't do. The only thing that can change is the present. Nixon never thought that what he was doing was wrong.

Amendments to the constitution are pre-eminent over the rest of the constitution. They are changes to the powers granted to each of the branches of government. Where a clause in the constitution conflicts with something in the amendments, the amendments win.

Any excuses that the President comes up with about the FISA courts being too slow or insufficiently flexible needs to be proven beyond the President's say-so. You wouldn't accept something like that from Bill Clinton, so you shouldn't accept something like that from George Bush.

Before you Republicans say that you support everything that the President does to prosecute the war on terror, consider this: There are no defined objectives in this war; it will never end of its own accord. I would be tremendously surprised if any of our descendants ever can celebrate a specific "VT" day. So, protect the rights you want to have when you don't like the government in power. If you want the government to use warrantless wiretaps against you because you have spoken out against the President (attended a meeting of the Republican party or wrote a post on Fark calling the new President a moran) or may be a danger to local, state or federal government (you own a gun) or supported terrorists (given money to your church in support of its prolife activities) or any of a hundred things that the government would prefer you don't do.

So, don't blindly accept that everything the President, whether Democrat or Republican, is doing will be good for you when the next President rolls around.

Personally, I've always felt that our government works best when things are divided. If the entire government is run by a single party, it creates a culture of corruption and privilege that a divided government tends to suppress. Obviously, this isn't perfect and politicians are eminently corruptible and horribly hypocritical. However, it does seem to work better than the alternatives. If one side doesn't have the power to keep the other side honest, then the other side won't be honest.

The question of what access Jack Abramoff had to those in power is in important one. However, I don't think there's a chance in hell that anybody is ever going to get a straight answer from him. The only way the country is going to get answers about Abramoff or the NSA or the Energy Commission or the abduction of foreigners for extreme rendition or the administratration's endorsement of torture and its abrogations of the Geneva Accords is under subpoena, warrant and oath.

So, while it would be nice if the the Whitehouse Press Corps would grow a collective pair, I don't think Scott McClellan would answer even then. As long as there's no downside for the administration lying, then the administration will continue to lie.

Now, if they gave the QB and receiver free pizza from one of my hometown (Kenosha, WI) pizza places, that would be something. Free Papa John's is more of a punishment than anything.

Racketeering Influence Pizza Ovens are the best!

ewaits wrote:

Feds under FERS (anyone hired after 12/31/83) earn only 1% for each year of employment. Since very few work more than 35 years, most under FERS would earn only 35% or less, nowhere near 80%. Most under CSRS earn about 65%.

The primary difference between FERS and CSRS is that employees under CSRS don't pay or get credit with Social Security, while government employees under FERS do. Social Security is supposed to make up the difference between the two pension plans. My mother just retired from the government and was covered under CSRS. She gets a pretty small Social Security check because she didn't earn Social Security credits while a government employee.

Back in 2000, a lot of people bought into McCain's "Straight Talk Express." However, he has always supported very conservative causes and has a very conservative voting record in congress. Because he was a victim of Hurrican Rove back in 2000, we give him a pass on all that and make him an honorary Democrat.

To be fair, he has varied somewhat from the Republican norm. He's had his name on campaign finance reform and he more or less stood up against the administrations toture policies. He has also been critical of the fundamentalist influence in politics.

Of course, the campaign finance reform led to the rise of 527 groups and the administration has made clear it doesn't consider itself bound to the merest stricture of the law.

Now, six years later, we have accumulated enough inconsistencies with that view that it doesn't work anymore. It isn't that he's changed as that he's made it too obvious to ignore.

So, over-all he didn't really flip-flop. The signs were always there; we just ignored them.