While flipping channels, I came across a follow-up chat between Wallace and some other goon about the interview, and the blatant delight these two took in the Clinton blow-up was nauseating.

This of course is not the only complete reversal of positions the Republicans have allowed themselves since Clinton left office.

I always enjoy linking to stiiring defense of the 4th Amendnment by John Ashcroft.

http://usinfo.state.gov/journals/itgic/1097/ijge/gj-7.htm

The protections of the Fourth Amendment are clear. The right to protection from unlawful searches is an indivisible American value. Two hundred years of court decisions have stood in defense of this fundamental right. The state's interest in effective crime-fighting should never vitiate the citizens' Bill of Rights.

The administration's interest in all e-mail is a wholly unhealthy precedent, especially given this administration's track record on FBI files and IRS snooping. Every medium by which people communicate can be subject to exploitation by those with illegal intentions. Nevertheless, this is no reason to hand Big Brother the keys to unlock our e-mail diaries, open our ATM records, read our medical records, or translate our international communications

Knowing things like this make it so hard for me to respect Congress regardless of the party. Clinton made the right decisions here as he did with his assesments of Iraq during his admin. People like Kerry and the knee jerk Republicans just went with whatever they thought would get them votes.

If Somalia was the right thing then so was Iraq. It's amazing how many statements that Bush and Clinton have made that are almost interchangeable.

If the dems had any brains they would not be debating whether the war was right or whether we should be leaving Iraq. They would be hammering the admin on how the reconstruction has been bungled and tell us how they would run it better.

No timetable for troop withdrawls. Talk about a timetable to make things better there faster and more efficiently than the Republicans. Bush has no defense for this and it is the real offense that he should have to answer for. If handled right that's a debate I would love to hear and could even sway my thoughts.

Another thing that Clinton displayed remarkable restraint in not mentioning: Somalia was the work of George H.W. Bush.

Bush I sent in troops to Somalia in December 1992, AFTER he lost the election to Clinton. He sent them in without a clear understanding of the situation on the ground, and without a real plan. Clinton inherited the situation a month later, in all its chaotic glory.

The poor planning for the Somalia operation was a set-up. The Bush cabal knew they were on their way out, and they wanted to start the Clinton term off with a military debacle. For them now to turn around and blame Clinton for the operation - while at the same time blaming Clinton for 9/11 because it happened "only" 9 months into the Bush II regime - is the height of hypocrisy.

If only that were unusual...

squandered his brilliance for sex. He single-hanedly created the atmosphere that handed over the reminants of our once proud democracy into the hands of the compassionate conservatives. Kafka could not have written a better or more ironic novel. Like Powell's weak-kneed and tardy outrage to torture, Clinton has let too much time pass between truth and the revisionist writers of Darth Bush. So much time and energy needs to be expended to try to convinence lemmings that what the Bush propoganda is putting out there are false and totally incorrect. Where is the NY and LA Times and Washingtin Post on this. How about Blitzer and Co.? Is Olbermann the only sane voice?

Oh, and another thing, All this horse poop about Clinton having 8 years to kill OBL and Bush only 8 months. Let's be fair about this. Bush has now had an additional 6 years to hunt and kill that bastard. Let's place this into perspective:

Clinton had eight years and no freeking army chasing OBL; Clinton never had him cornored in Tora Bora and walked away; Clinton never had an army leave the country OBL was hiding in to attack a soverign nation that had nothing to do with 9/11; Clinton didn't lie to America to get us into Kosovo and not one US troop was killed there; Somalia was a peace keeping "adventure" not a search for OBL or a chase to kill terrorists or to "get even" for 9/11.

Clinton couldn't keep his zipper up and he has since paid the price for that dearly. State the goddamned facts and get them out there for crying out loud!!

I run into people who believe this sort of revisionism all the time. Heck, I work with many of them. Around the lunch table or boardroom table, someone will pipe up with something like, "Why didn't Clinton go after these guys?" And I'll point out, "Remember when he sent missiles in, and the republicans in Congress shouted, 'Wag the dog! Wag the dog!'?" And I'll get a blank look, then a slow dawning of realization.

So few people remember what happened just a decade ago, let alone further back. We keep being lied to, and believing it because we don't search our own memories - we just believe what we're told.

It reminds me of a truly great short story by Cyril M. Kornbluth called, "The Marching Morons." Its premise is that, in the distant future, people have become incredibly dumb. For example, they're told that their cars go really fast, but it's all faked up with fans blowing wind in their faces, a roaring sound coming from the engine, and a faked up speedometer. Yet the people are so stupid that they don't realize they're really going only 25 miles per hour.

At one point in the story, the government plants news items and articles that make it appear as though we've always had trips to other planets available for tourists. Immediately, everyone believes that's always been the case. They even express shock at the 'stupidity' of their marginally brighter neighbors who doubt whether interplanetary space tourism has really been taking place for years.

I often feel like I'm living in the Marching Morons universe, even more so than a 1984 universe.