"Our people in uniform have been subjected to these cynical and pernicious falsehoods day in and day out," Cheney said yesterday.

It was just the part about whose cynical and pernicious falsehoods our troops were continually subjected to that he didn't get quite right...

Bush & company have from day one engaged in blaming the other guy claiming, "it's not my fault." It is never their fault; it is the democrats or whomever happens to call them on their game. They attack the messenger while never addressing the issue and then repeat it over and over and over. It is said if you hear something repeated enough times it becomes conventional wisdom.

Basically they are waging a psychological war on the American public. Their technique is quite effective; it is a mixture of brainwashing (repetition) while simultaneously creating a distraction (look over there) and then blame others for what they are guilty of -- in other words they just switch it around. And when possible they make sure the distraction will illicit an e_motional reaction. E-motional people do not think rationally.

No one wants to believe the Bush administration is calloused enough to mislead and fabricate evidence that would take us into war. The adage, "you can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time" seems apropos now.

The problem for the WH is most of the public are finally becoming cognizant of that now -- while others remain in denial. It is for those reasons they have managed to keep the public divided -- not as evenly as before, but still divided. It is called "divide and conquer." Those in denial and those who aren't.

"Rights must be more than the grudging concessions of dictators; they are secured by free dissent and the participation of the governed."

George W. Bush, Second Inaugural Address, January 20, 2005

I've been amazed at how long the Bush junta has gotten away with defying the old adage "those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones". Their truly unusual strategy has rather been to throw stones at the drop of any piece of headgear, with gross abandon, while claiming it's their opponents who're doing the flinging.

Why have they been allowed to get away with it? Are the American press simply too polite to point out the Glass House's error? Are the American people just too softhearted to return the misguided missiles to their originators?

Or are we all just anticipating a bit of prime schadenfreude once all of the lithic pigeons have come home to roost? Like watching a car race, waiting for the crash...

I am just so tired as seeing the troops, who are doing their best under extremely difficult circumstances being used as human shields by this Maladministration to protect a failed policy and a war based on out and out lies.

Bush, with his "with me or against me" attitude, reminded me of this article from a few years ago.

http://www.counterpunch.org/wormer1011.html

I don't think that Bush is mentally healthy. Hopefully, Congress will finally start doing its job and reel him in. After this fiasco is over, I hope that a lesson is learned, and it becomes almost impossible for a POTUS to commit troops to massive military campaigns. If a "war" becomes necessary, then let Congress declare war.

Provided this fiasco ends...

I'm in the Air Force, currently deployed to the desert. When I hear people calling for troop withdrawl or questioning the reasons for war I don't feel that America is turning their back on me. I don't know of any people I'm working with who feel that either. To me, that's how it should be in America. You should be able to question the President's decisions, you should be able to voice your opinion. That's a big reason I enlisted in the first place, to defend the right to speak up.

Sen. Hagel has it right and Cheney is wrong. I only hope that at the end of all this mess the American people see the light and I don't find myself sitting in Iran a couple years down the road.

"There is one difference," I [Gilbert] pointed out. "In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars."

"Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

Once again, Tim Grieve, well said. Well done, thank you.

Sen. Chuck Hagel couldn't have put it any better. The remarkable thing about his comments is that they were not political. He spoke of the obligations, rights and resposibilites of the American people and the congress together. Mr. Bush's terse and definitive reply to the question of who he agreed with Sen. Hagel of Vice President Cheney was in effect a great big "fuck you" to the American people. I've said it before and I'll say it again, he was pelted with eggs on the way in, and he'll be pelted with eggs on the way out.

Everyone's dancing around the point instead of coming out and saying it. The following phraseology is a little crude, but it's the best, most concise way to say it: Bush didn't have the balls to go to war, he had a hard on to go to war.

See, ties it all together quite nicely, doesn't it? We can stop worrying about who got what intelligence when and get down to brass tax. Bush wanted war. Period. End of Story.

Now just translate that into something you can say on TV.