“It is our fractious, independent debate that makes us strong because it is the power of ideas that wins the day in political movements.” The “power of ideas” Mike writes…what ideas I ask? Ideas like the governor from Alaska, maybe Mitt from Massachusetts or the idea that they have NO ideas? The GOP, guilty as charged, with having few thoughts back then and even fewer now.
The election debacle leaving the GOP scratching its head has been chalked up to karma by some observers. Others believe that the Rubicon was crossed in a slow sloop. Regardless the metaphor the consensus rendered the same — an ill wind has blown through the right’s camp.
It’s natural to dub it karma but karma is too easy. It doesn’t fit. Sad fits, sad or pitiful and that’s worse than karma. What’s happened is more like the evil wind that a Jonestown survivor narrated in a documentary that he describes blew in just before the members of the Jonestown cult were forced to drink cyanide-laced Kool-aid. That survivor headed for the hills and lived to tell about it. In this election survival story the survivors are the American people who will live another day and vote in another election and play activist to battles worth waging. If the right wants Web war then the left should oblige.
And speaking of war, if you ask Google about the latest war on the pristine areas of Utah, for one, there will be thousands of hits. But it is worth noting that this is nothing new. Bush has been after Utah and trying to open up the state to the oil and drill gang since 2002. The Bush brand has worked every angle of the open call of the thug to the wild and free.
The proposed sale, which includes famous areas in the Nine Mile Canyon region, would take place Dec. 19, a month before President Bush leaves office. The targeted areas include parts of Desolation Canyon, White River, Diamond Mountain and Bourdette Draw.
The bureau has sought to open these public lands to energy exploration since 2003...
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Dave Nalle
While I do find these meandering rants amusing, you seem to have trouble telling the difference between the Bush administration and the 'right' much of which opposed Bush longer and harder than anyone on the left. They see the fall of Bush as an opportunity to reclaim the GOP for real Republican values which have been ignored for a very long time.
Oh, and one more technical note. That geothermal energy they're talking about in Utah? It's an ecologically safe source of renewable energy. What a terrible thing to promote.
Dave
2 - pablo
Yep Nalle, Hatch, Conryn, Sensenbrenner, Bhoner, Lyndsey Graham, and company have fightin that evil Bush for years, hehehehe.
[Personal attack deleted by Comments Editor] you have absolutely no clue what is going on politically in this world, although you sure think you do. you like most of your republican ilk are your own worst enemy, constantly over reaching in your tenuous grasp for power, what you fail to understand however is the Obama and Pelosi, and Conryn and Hatch all work for the same banksters that are not only fleecing the american people but bringing this country to its knees on PURPOSE, and your naivete is only matched by your smug ignorance. Oh thats right I forgot the Bilderberg billionaires get together for tea and cause they are lonely. hehehehe
3 - Glenn Contrarian
Dave -
If the 'right' has fought Bush longer and harder than anyone on the left...then could you please tell me who on the 'right' has supported the impeachment of Bush for any of his many, repeat many, impeachable offenses?
4 - Clavos
Obama and Pelosi, and Conryn and Hatch all work for the same banksters that are not only fleecing the american people but bringing this country to its knees on PURPOSE...
Utinam.
5 - Heloise
Dave they want to cut the mountaintop off for the reserves there. That is NOT renewable. Bush smush he was elected using the neocon Bible of compassionate conservatism. We need to keep Bush and his criminal activities ever in mind, always and forever that is the point. The GOP elected him and had no one else to proffer in his stead?
That tells you something now doesn't it? Bush would have been the man again if it were possible. That's what it tells me. As long as the Hannity and Coulters of the world (with wired shut jaw) rail against the Dems it matters not who they are railing in favor of, or if they oppose Bush...
Heloise
6 - Lee Richards
The right elected Bush twice and happily supported his record deficits, his optional war, his Supreme Court picks, politicized Justice Dept., tax cuts, torture policies, etc., etc. So much for opposing him, "longer and harder than anyone on the left" as Dave claims.
The fall of Bush isn't going to help principaled conservatives with real ideas reclaim the GOP until they also get rid of the far-right element that dominates the party today--the "our social agenda above all else" nuts--that voters clearly reject on a national level.
7 - bliffle
Dave is just trying to escape his own responsibility for the excesses of the Bush administration. In that he is imitating the irresponsibility of his hero: Bush.
8 - Dave Nalle
Bliffle, I have zero association with this administration and have been outspoken on this very site opposing their worst policies. You certainly have a bizarrely selective memory.
The fact that I don't want to impeach Bush and declare him to be Satan reflects pragmatism and a firm grasp on reality, but it doesn't make me his cheerleading section.
Dave
9 - Dave Nalle
If the 'right' has fought Bush longer and harder than anyone on the left...then could you please tell me who on the 'right' has supported the impeachment of Bush for any of his many, repeat many, impeachable offenses?
Opposing Bush doesn't necessarily mean impeaching Bush, though some have supported going that far.
Bob Barr, who I voted for in the presidential election, opposed Bush over the PATRIOT act and various other issues and he's certainly on the right. He lost his seat in the House as his reward from the voters. Others who fought Bush on issues like FISA, the MCA and GITMO and PATRIOT 1 and/or 2 include Jeff Flake, Roscoe Bartlett, Ron Paul, Walter Jones, Tim Duncan and a number of others.
As far as impeachment, almost no one anyone takes seriously who is in elective office in either party is seriously suggesting it, but on the right there are plenty of outspoken advocates, though most of them fall in the class of people Pablo tends to agree with like Lew Rockwell and Paul Craig Roberts.
Of course, the problem with impeachment is that you need to be able to prove 'high crimes and misdemeanors' and that's just not terribly easy with Bush. He's covered his ass pretty well.
Dave
10 - Baritone
Any consideration of a Bush impeachment is obviously moot. Can a president be impeached after he or she leaves office?
B
11 - Dave Nalle
Perhaps symbolically. What our friends on the extreme right and left are proposing now are war crimes trials for members of the Bush administration.
Dave
12 - Clavos
What our friends on the extreme right and left are proposing now are war crimes trials for members of the Bush administration.
Which won't happen, because that would open the legal door to the same treatment for the members of Congress and the Senate who supported him, both Republican and Democratic, and most of them are still in office.
And they're the ones who would have to decide to try him.
13 - Heloise
If you are considering a tankless water heater--don't listen to Rush's advice. My neighbor bought the one he recommends Rinnai and I did a little online research and got Noritz. There is no comparison as to the work done and the tanks. Noritz is the only one that is certified and it's the best...also Japanese.
When I lived in India and France I noticed that tankless is the ONLY thing in homes and places. The US is way behind the curve on this one. Why? Simply a matter of square footage. We have more space and are prone to buying things that take up space i.e., water heaters. My old one was eating up over 20 square feet of the kitchen, it's gone now. The work done is beautiful. It now hangs outside the house.
The other countries waste less of certain commoditites simply because they can't afford to waste gas, oil or water. Take Heloise's helpul advice: research tankless for yourself. Noritz is the best and get someone who installs that type. Let them get the materials because if you buy online all you GET is the heater when there are lots of other parts that go with it. Also should be enclosed if put outside the house.
Heloise
Happy Thanksgiving
14 - Dr Dreadful
I have zero association with this administration and have been outspoken on this very site opposing their worst policies.
Dave, voicing the occasional concern about a Bush policy is not the same as fighting him "longer and harder than anyone on the left".
You've spent far, far more time here as an apologist for the Bush administration than you have attacking it. Spare us the sanctimony, please.
15 - Jet
You guys have apparently forgotten my article about the GOP congress a few years back sneaking Bush immunity from prosecution for war crimes?
16 - Heloise
Dr. D you noticed that too hey? Dave is on a barge on the Denial River. How can he fix his fingers to write those words that he was a voice of opposition or that the GOP was a voice of opposition to Bush et al?
I think he is trying to distance himself from folks like Rush and Sean...more power to them, but they are just two people who would drink Sarah's dirty bath water but Heloise suspects that they have lots of (ahem male) company.
I think the folks in Iraq got it right and created "the burning Bush" in effigy. Now that's what I call opposition.
Heloise
17 - Dr Dreadful
they are just two people who would drink Sarah's dirty bath water but Heloise suspects that they have lots of (ahem male) company.
Among them a certain Mr Barger, methinks...
18 - Lee Richards
Ah, the good old adolescent fantasy days of junior varsity cheerleaders and puppy-love crushes...
19 - Ruvy
Jet,
You guys have apparently forgotten my article about the GOP congress a few years back sneaking Bush immunity from prosecution for war crimes?
When I read this article originally, that was the first thing that crossed my mind. But, why should I mention it? You keep coming after me with a butcher knife for nothing.
That business about throwing rocks at beehives goes both ways, Jet.
20 - bliffle
Events of the last few months have rendered foolish the argument that we didn't have to impeach Bush previously because he only had a little time left in office.
And there's even more time to do more damage. He could bomb Iran, for example.
21 - Les Slater
Bliff,
"Events of the last few months have rendered foolish the argument that we didn't have to impeach Bush previously because he only had a little time left in office."
You must be saying this out of frustration. Things have been going bad of late but the credit balloon that began deflating last year had been going on for 25 years. Nothing Bush could have done during the last year could have reversed, or even stopped it.
"And there's even more time to do more damage. He could bomb Iran, for example."
This doesn't help your argument. Bush is no longer in charge. The Obama team already has effective veto power over the most important policy decisions.
Les
22 - Heloise
Bombay Burning--actually MUMBAI: The top floor of the world-famous Hotel Taj Intercontinental in Mumbai caught fire...
This from the Indiadan site: Indeed the top floor is burning: "a bomb explosion as terroists struck at seven locations in the metropolis late on Wednesday night.
The 22-storey, five-star hotel by the Arabian Sea was one of the targets of the terrorist attack. An explosion on the top floor soon engulfed the top floor of the hotel in fire." When did they change Bombay to Mumbai? Either way parts of Bombay Burning!
This is one place in India I've not visited but always wanted to because it is India's NYC...
I hope it's not a local group. It reminds me of when the Punjab was under seige by the Kashmiri separtists folks. This sounds way worse though.
Namaste, cheers
Heloise
Note to Dave or Eric: what's up with the comments on Desicritics? I can't get them to work at all.
23 - Glenn Contrarian
Dave -
"Opposing Bush doesn't necessarily mean impeaching Bush, though some have supported going that far."
'Scuse me, but your statement was that much of the right has "opposed Bush longer and harder than anyone on the left."
How, exactly, is the right's "opposition" actually stronger than an attempt to impeach?
Kucinich actually introduced articles of impeachment - didn't go anywhere, and I personally think the reason it didn't was the same reason J. Edgar Hoover was untouchable...but that's another topic.
THE POINT IS, Dave, that the 'opposition' against Bush by 'much of the right' (which VOTED for the guy and helped him stay in office) is pure hyperbole, because said opposition comes nowhere close to the opposition by the left. You used hyperbole to support your view, and I'm simply pointing it out.
24 - Dave Nalle
Glenn, I think suggesting trying Bush for war crimes is a whole hell of a lot more hardcore than trying to impeach him. We impeached Clinton. How much difference did that make?
And where do you get the idea that the right side of the right voted for Bush? I never voted for Bush and I doubt that those who even I consider too far right to be rational did either.
Dave, voicing the occasional concern about a Bush policy is not the same as fighting him "longer and harder than anyone on the left".
Did I ever say that I was the one who had been fighting him from the start? I've always taken a more balanced view of Bush and tried to support his good policies, reject his bad ones and look at them all in perspective. And yeah, sometimes he did need and deserve someone to stand up and defend his ideas.
Dave
25 - Les Slater
"Kucinich actually introduced articles of impeachment - didn't go anywhere..."
Dennis Kucinich is a complete fake. His role is to sucker anyone considering themselves progressive, left or even radical into thinking there is a pole within the Democratic Party that will lead in a progressive direction. It's nothing but a dead end.