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Wednesday, May 14, 2008 12:00 AM

Tom Friedman's latest declaration of war

The nation's leading foreign policy pundit finds the new Soviet Union.

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  • Wednesday, May 14, 2008 06:31 AM

    Russia, India and China will get it all...

    Petroleum, natural gas. McCain pisses on Russia, we isolate Iran while the Neo-cons try to create a subterfuge association outside of the UN to deal with vetoes from China and Russia specifically for this issue. Sounds like par for the course for our bold foreign policy agenda. All that's left is Israel to bomb Syria and Iran and we wage war on the Axis of Evil by proxy. Bring the popcorn ...

    Be sure to check out Scott Horton's Interview with Sid B. over at No Comment.

    Here is the money paragraph:

    "My last point applies here. Bush, Cheney, et al. sought to create an unaccountable and unfettered executive. In order to do that they kept the Congress under their heel (when Republican) and at bay (when Democratic), as well as exploiting and intimidating a craven and status-driven national press corps. Following the dictum that people are policy, Bush & Co. used the power of presidential appointment to fill the administration with more than loyal Republicans. Bush built a regime, not just an administration. For example, the appointments of Federalist Society lawyers from the commanding heights of the Department of Justice to counsel offices of every department and agency was intended to install cadres of a new ideological clerisy. Professional standards have been construed as mere instrumentalities of conscious “liberal’ ideology, a counterpoint and obstacle to power. Cherry-picking information to support a priori political conclusions has pervaded government methodology from intelligence on weapons of mass destruction to climate change.

    Once again, a new government would have to have extensive understanding of the federal apparatus in order to reconstruct it. The Congress cannot do the job, even if it conducted the most far-reaching investigative hearings and maintained diligent oversight. Only a president can truly fix the executive branch. The Bush model of a president who casts himself as a big picture man, while dependent on advisers for working the actual machinery, inevitably leads to a president who would soon find himself in control of neither."

    http://harpers.org/archive/2008/05/hbc-90002915

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