Thanks, I couldn't have done it without your help.

A Day In The Life Of Sarah Palin

Palin’s pastor, Larry Kroon, introduced David Brickner, director of Jews for Jesus, on Aug. 17, according to a transcript of the sermon on Sarah Palin's church’s website.

Brickner described terrorist attacks on Israelis as God's "judgment of unbelief" of Jews who haven't embraced Christianity.

"Judgment is very real and we see it played out on the pages of the newspapers and on the television. It's very real. When [Brickner's son] was in Jerusalem he was there to witness some of that judgment, some of that conflict, when a Palestinian from East Jerusalem took a bulldozer and went plowing through a score of cars, killing numbers of people. Judgment — you can't miss it."

MAKE MONEY AT HOME!

Palin Billed State for Nights Spent at Home

Taxpayers Also Funded Family's Travel

By James V. Grimaldi and Karl Vick, Washington Post

ANCHORAGE, Sept. 8 -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has billed taxpayers for 312 nights spent in her own home during her first 19 months in office, charging a "per diem" allowance intended to cover meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business.

Palin, who earns $125,000 a year, claimed and received $16,951 as her allowance, which officials say was permitted because her official "duty station" is Juneau, according to an analysis of her travel documents by The Washington Post.

She wrote some form of "Lodging -- own residence" or "Lodging -- Wasilla residence" more than 30 times at the same time she took a per diem, according to the reports. In two dozen undated amendments to the reports, the governor deleted the reference to staying in her home but still charged the per diem.

Palin: Iraq War and Pipeline -- God's Will

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin told ministry students at her former church that the United States sent troops to fight in the Iraq war on a "task that is from God."

In an address last June, the Republican vice presidential candidate also urged ministry students to pray for a plan to build a $30 billion natural gas pipeline in the state, calling it "God's will."

Palin asked the students to pray for the troops in Iraq, and noted that her eldest son, Track, was expected to be deployed there.

"Our national leaders are sending them out on a task that is from God," she said. "That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there is a plan and that plan is God's plan."

A video of the speech was posted at the Wasilla Assembly of God's Web site before finding its way on to other sites on the Internet.

Palin told graduating students of the church's School of Ministry, "What I need to do is strike a deal with you guys." As they preached the love of Jesus throughout Alaska, she said, she'd work to implement God's will from the governor's office, including creating jobs by building a pipeline to bring North Slope natural gas to North American markets.

And she can do all this while speaking in tongues.

Spitzer Resigns Over 4,000 Iraq War Dead

New York Governor Elliot Spitzer took full responsibility for the more than 4,000 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq and announced he would resign.

Spitzer barely held back tears as he told reporters, "By lying about weapons of mass destruction that don't exist, I have violated any sense of right or wrong."

The man elected by a 69% landslide in 2006 said no one could, in good conscience, continue to hold office after causing "so many needless deaths and diverting half a trillion dollars of our national treasure."

Spitzer said he would spend the rest of his life making his transgressions up to his family and the voters who placed their trust in him. He added that he also hoped to clear brush as a pennance.

$3 Trillion Iraq War

Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has written "The Three Trillion Dollar War," a book with chilling details of how we've spent our treasure on an unprovoked war now longer-running than our involvement in World War II.

Stiglitz, who served for four years on Bill Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers and another three as chief economist at the World Bank, puts the cost of the Iraq war in context by detailing what one of these three trillions could have paid for:

• 8 million housing units or
• 15 million public school teachers or
• healthcare for 530 million children for a year or
• scholarships to university for 43 million students

Three trillion could have fixed America's social security problem for half a century. America, says Stiglitz, is currently spending $5bn a year in Africa, and worrying about being outflanked by China there: "Five billion is roughly 10 days' fighting, so you get a new metric of thinking about everything."

$16bn The amount the US spends on the monthly running costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - on top of regular defense spending

$138 The amount paid by every US household every month towards the current operating costs of the war

$19.3bn The amount Halliburton has received in single-source contracts for work in Iraq

How Republicans Spend Your Tax Dollars

WASHINGTON, Nov. 13 — President Bush vetoed a $150.7 billion spending measure that would have funded education, health care and job training programs, saying it contained money for too many of the special projects known as earmarks. But he signed a $459 billion bill to increase the Pentagon’s nonwar funding.

Iraq General Calls War Unwinnable

Iraq War Is `Nightmare' With No End

By Demian McLean, Bloomberg News

Retired Army Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, who led U.S. forces in Iraq, criticized American leaders for placing partisan gain at home above victory abroad and consigning America to a "nightmare with no end in sight."

The Bush Agenda Is Working

These two sentences on the front page of the Wall Street Journal sum up the success our underestimated president has had during his two terms.


The richest Americans' share of national income hit a postwar record. The top 1% earned 21.2% of all income in 2005; the bottom 50% made 12.8%.

Iraq Death Toll Accelerates

When President Bush vetoed a bi-partisan bill in June to fund stem cell research, he said fetuses (even those about to be thrown in the trash) represent human life, which is sacred, and cannot be used to further science.

However, when fetuses grow up, they make fine cannon fodder for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

3,987 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq
3,949
3,931
3,849
3,760
3,753
3,739
3,706
3,689
3,613
3,586
3,496

Zero WMD

Does it Matter?

DOES it matter?—losing your legs?...
For people will always be kind,
And you need not show that you mind
When the others come in after hunting
To gobble their muffins and eggs.
Does it matter?—losing your sight?...
There’s such splendid work for the blind;
And people will always be kind,
As you sit on the terrace remembering
And turning your face to the light.
Do they matter?—those dreams from the pit?...
You can drink and forget and be glad,
And people won’t say that you’re mad;
For they’ll know you’ve fought for your country
And no one will worry a bit. --Siegfried Sassoon, 1918

Iraq Report Card: Failing Grades

New Report On Iraq Finds Baghdad Hasn't Met 11 Of Its 18 Political And Security Benchmarks

(AP) Violence in Iraq remains high, fewer Iraqi security forces are capable of acting independently, and the Baghdad legislature has failed to reach major political agreements needed to curb sectarian violence, says a report released Tuesday.

The study by the Government Accountability Office is a blunt assessment that challenges President Bush's findings on the war as he prepares to announce plans for the U.S. military campaign, which has cost the lives of more than 3,700 U.S. troops since it began in 2003.

Bremer Points Out Latest Bush Lie on Iraq

Envoy’s Letters Counter Bush on Dismantling of Iraq Army
By Edmond Andrews, New York Times

WASHINGTON, Sept. 3 — A previously undisclosed exchange of letters shows that President Bush was told in advance by his top Iraq envoy in May 2003 of a plan to “dissolve Saddam’s military and intelligence structures,” a plan that the envoy, L. Paul Bremer, said referred to dismantling the Iraqi Army.

Mr. Bremer provided the letters to The New York Times on Monday after reading that Mr. Bush was quoted in a new book as saying that American policy had been “to keep the army intact” but that it “didn’t happen.”

The dismantling of the Iraqi Army in the aftermath of the American invasion is now widely regarded as a mistake that stoked rebellion among hundreds of thousands of former Iraqi soldiers and made it more difficult to reduce sectarian bloodshed and attacks by insurgents. In releasing the letters, Mr. Bremer said he wanted to refute the suggestion in Mr. Bush’s comment that Mr. Bremer had acted to disband the army without the knowledge and concurrence of the White House.

UK General Slams Rumsfeld

The general who headed the British army during the invasion of Iraq said the approach taken by Donald Rumsfeld, the then US defence secretary, was "intellectually bankrupt", describing his claim that US forces "don't do nation-building" as "nonsensical".

General Sir Mike Jackson said Mr Rumsfeld was "one of those most responsible for the current situation in Iraq".

Crucially, the general writes, he refused to deploy enough troops to maintain law and order after the collapse of Saddam's regime, and discarded detailed plans for the post-conflict administration of Iraq that had been drawn up by the US State Department.

"All the planning carried out by the State Department went to waste." For Mr Rumsfeld and his neo-conservative supporters "it was an ideological article of faith that the coalition forces would be accepted as a liberating army."

Weapons of Destruction Missing in Iraq

Oops!
Weapons Given to Iraq Are Missing
GAO Estimates 30% of Arms Are Unaccounted For
By Glenn Kessler, Washington Post

The Pentagon has lost track of about 190,000 AK-47 assault rifles and pistols given to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005, according to a new government report, raising fears that some of those weapons have fallen into the hands of insurgents fighting U.S. forces in Iraq.

Bring 'Em On Anniversary

Bush Sets Libby Free,
Celebrates 4 Years of Success in Iraq

July 2, 2007

Days before Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby, was to begin serving a two and a half year jail term, President Bush took the only possible action open to a Republican law-and-order hypocrite. He set him free. Libby's only crime, after all, had been lying under oath to protect his boss from any involvement in leaking the name of CIA agent Valerie Plame to the press.

Perjury is not as heinous a crime now as it was in 1998, when the GOP majority in Congress impeached President Clinton for lying under oath.

Bush's ignoble action comes one day before he quietly marks one of his more macho moments: urging Iraqis opposed to the U.S. occupation of their country to just try to attack U.S. soldiers.

July 3, 2003

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Challenging militants who attack U.S. forces in Iraq, President Bush said Wednesday they would be dealt with harshly, and declared, "Bring 'em on."

For the second day in a row, Bush vowed that attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq will not shake his administration's resolve to stay in that country until a strong and stable democratic government takes root.

"Anybody who wants to harm American troops will be found and brought to justice," Bush said. "There are some that feel like if they attack us that we may decide to leave prematurely. They don't understand what they are talking about if that is the case. Let me finish. There are some who feel like the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is, bring 'em on."

When Bush made his Bring 'Em On taunt, 254 U.S. soldiers had died in Iraq.

On the fourth anniversary of his unfortunate remark, the U.S. death toll was 3,584.

Fly Osama

Osama bin Laden May Have Chartered Saudi Flight Out of U.S. after 9/11

Washington, D.C.-- Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released new documents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) related to the “expeditious departure” of Saudi nationals, including members of the bin Laden family, from the United States following the 9/11 attacks. According to one of the formerly confidential documents, dated 9/21/2001, terrorist Osama bin Laden may have chartered one of the Saudi flights.

The document states: “ON 9/19/01, A 727 PLANE LEFT LAX, RYAN FLT #441 TO ORLANDO, FL W/ETA (estimated time of arrival) OF 4-5PM. THE PLANE WAS CHARTERED EITHER BY THE SAUDI ARABIAN ROYAL FAMILY OR OSAMA BIN LADEN…THE LA FBI SEARCHED THE PLANE [REDACTED] LUGGAGE, OF WHICH NOTHING UNUSUAL WAS FOUND.” The plane was allowed to depart the United States after making four stops to pick up passengers, ultimately landing in Paris where all passengers disembarked on 9/20/01, according to the document.

Overall, the FBI’s most recent document production includes details of the six flights between 9/14 and 9/24 that evacuated Saudi royals and bin Laden family members.

U.S. Keeps WMD Team Spinning Wheels

U.N. Team Still Looking for Iraq's Arsenal

Though Work Is Seen as Irrelevant, Security Council Can't Agree to End It

By Colum Lynch, Washington Post

UNITED NATIONS -- More than four years after the fall of Baghdad, the United Nations is spending millions of dollars in Iraqi oil money to continue the hunt for Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction.

Every weekday, at a secure commercial office building on Manhattan's East Side, a team of 20 U.N. experts on chemical and biological weapons pores over satellite images of former Iraqi weapons sites. But the inspectors' primary mission -- ridding Hussein's regime of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons -- has become irrelevant since a U.S.-led coalition toppled the Iraqi leader and discovered that his government had destroyed its most lethal weapons shortly after the 1991 Gulf War.

Rewind to 2004: Ooops! No WMD

Kay: No evidence Iraq stockpiled WMDs

January 26, 2004

(CNN) -- Two days after resigning as the Bush administration's top weapons inspector in Iraq, David Kay said that his group found no evidence Iraq had stockpiled unconventional weapons before the U.S.-led invasion in March.

"My summary view, based on what I've seen, is we're very unlikely to find large stockpiles of weapons. I don't think they exist."

Bush Ignored Pre-War Intelligence

A lot of folks die.
At lasts the war ends.
The world is made safe
For Dick Cheney's friends.
-Calvin Trillin

Analysts Warned of Iraq Chaos

By Walter Pincus and Karen DeYoung, Washington Post

Months before the invasion of Iraq, U.S. intelligence agencies predicted that it would be likely to spark violent sectarian divides and provide al-Qaeda with new opportunities in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a report released by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Analysts warned that war in Iraq also could provoke Iran to assert its regional influence and "probably would result in a surge of political Islam and increased funding for terrorist groups" in the Muslim world.

The intelligence assessments, made in January 2003 and widely circulated within the Bush administration before the war, said that establishing democracy in Iraq would be "a long, difficult and probably turbulent challenge." The assessments noted that Iraqi political culture was "largely bereft of the social underpinnings" to support democratic development.

The report was released the same day President Bush signed a $120 billion war funding bill from Congress that includes benchmarks for the Iraqi government.

In a statement attached to yesterday's 229-page report, the Senate intelligence committee's chairman, John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.), and three other Democratic panel members said: "The most chilling and prescient warning from the intelligence community prior to the war was that the American invasion would bring about instability in Iraq that would be exploited by Iran and al Qaeda terrorists."

Time to Pull the Plug on Iraq

Q. Why did the Democratic majority in Congress delete troop withdrawal language from the bill funding Bush's war?
A. They'd rather win the White House in 2008 than end the war now.

Poll: 76% Say War's Going Badly
Record Number In Survey Say Getting Involved In Iraq Was Mistake

(CBS) As President Bush and Congress hammer out an Iraq war funding bill, a CBS News/New York Times poll shows the number of Americans who say the war is going badly has reached a new high of 76%, rising 10 percent this month to 76 percent.

Even a majority of Republicans, 52 percent, now say the war is going at least somewhat badly – a 16-point increase from the middle of April.

Cheneys Pose with Little Bastard

This was the day when Monica Goodling testified before Congress that her former boss, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, is a liar. Like many others, this was a day when more U.S. soldiers died in Vice President Dick Cheney's WMD-free war. Somehow, Cheney and wife Lynne found time in their busy schedule this day to pose for a photo op with their latest grandchild.

The Cheneys' daughter Mary delivered an 8-pound, 6-ounce baby boy on Wednesday, the first child for her and her female partner of 15 years, Heather Poe. In keeping with hypocritical right-wing family values, Dick Cheney vowed that he will fight to the death to see that this grandchild has only one legal parent.