The Hollywood Liberal

Pentagon launches more witch hunts of Iraq war critics

Americablog
Excerpt
Marine Corporal Adam Kokesh
In this case, they’re going after an Iraq war vet for wearing camouflage fatigues during a mock patrol protesting the war that took place in DC in March. Wearing camo? Funny that the Bush administration uses active and former military, in uniform, at practically every political event they hold, but the Pentagon has no problem when it’s the Republicans using our troops for political purposes.

Remember when Colorado Republican House member Marilyn Musgrave had active-duty troops in uniform at a political event during her re-election? I didn’t hear about those service members being in trouble. Remember when Bush did it in the White House a few months back (see photo at left), he had a whole crew of folks in uniform behind him at a terribly political event mean to bash Democrats over the war.

HL’s Take
The story refers to Marine Cpl. Adam Kokesh. So a soldier that went over to Iraq, risked his life for Bush’s lies, and made it home, is now going to be discredited with an other then honorable discharge because he wants to tell the truth about what is really going on over there. It is Bush and the Republicans that dishonor the troops by treating them this way. Maybe if they listened to what the troops have to say, they might be doing a better job in Iraq, instead they blunder their way to the worst failure of all time, so they can continue to steal Iraq’s oil, while we pay over $3.00 for gasoline over here.

Ron Paul vs. the Throng The Last of the Texas Outsiders

Counterpunch
Excerpt
Put together Murdoch’s Fox News, a mid-May debate between Republican presidential candidates and the state of South Carolina and you have a hotbed of stupidity. But to the fury of the Republican organizers there was an intrusion of rational thought, in the person of Ron Paul, a US congressman from Texas, classed as a rank outsider in the nomination race.

Texas used to send true individualists to Washington DC. One of the brightest moments of my early years, visiting the nation’s capital, was watching Rep. Wright Patman, head of the House Banking Committee, tell the red-faced chairman of the federal reserve that he deserved to be locked up in the penitentiary.

Paul is the last of the breed. As a small-government tight-money Republican this gynaecologist-obstetrician (4,000 babies claimed as a career total) regularly votes No on pork barrel projects that would put money into his own district. But as a Republican in the isolationist, libertarian tradition he also votes No, sometimes alone among the 535 members of the US congress, on war funding, on laws allowing US presidents to order arbitrary imprisonment, “coercive interrogation”, suspension of freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution.

HL’s Take:
I’ve been hearing a lot about Ron Paul, but so far have not seen him in action. That will change as I will watch the Republican debate tonight, to see what he is all about. Apparently there is one Republican who is not looking to go on a killing spree, one with some brains to him. Full report tomorrow

Cheney Lies To High Schoolers About Debunked Iraq/al Qaeda Connection

Think Progress
Excerpt
Addressing about 100 wide-eyed Wyoming high school students learning about government and the political process,” Vice President Cheney yesterday repeated one of the key fabrications that helped send the United States into war.

During the question and answer session, one student asked, “I was wondering — I’m not trying to start a debate, or anything, but do you still think that the Iraq war can be won?” Cheney immediately answered “yes,” adding, “I think we’re making significant progress now.”

HL’s Take
Significant progress he says, where have I heard that before, oh yeah they have been saying it ever since they said the Mission was accomplished. How long will they be able to just keep openly lying to the American people? I guess until they are thrown out of office finally.
Here is One particular time when they said it.

Former White House Communications Deputy Tim Griffin Resigns after Evidence Ties Him to Alleged Voter Suppression

Pensito Review
Excerpt
Big media is ignoring the story that former White House Deputy Communications Director — and former RNC Research Director — Tim Griffin resigned as the U.S. Attorney in Arkansas last week after evidence revealed he was directly involved in alleged voter suppression in the 2004 elections.
This may be the first time you’ve heard of the illegal tactic of “caging” voters, but if BBC investigator Greg Palast is correct, it will not be the last.

Caging is a form of voter suppression involving registered mail. Typically, campaigns send registered letters to voters who are are unlikely to respond — soldiers serving overseas, for example. A list is compiled of the voters whose mail is returned marked undeliverable, or “caged.” On election day, when people on the caging list arrive to vote, campaign operatives are on hand to float challenges to their residency in the precinct. Palast says caging is a felony.

HL’s Take
The only way the Republicans can win the election next year is if they steal it for the third consecutive time. It is a rock solid guarantee that they are fiendishly trying to figure out ways to do that right this very moment. All they have to do is find a way to grab one of the big states that could go either way, and that could be enough. Florida in 2000, Ohio in 2004, which state will they try to steal this time? And what will the Democrats do to try to stop them? For some reason I think Hilary Clinton, if nominated, would be the best person to stop them. No way her political team which includes the master, Bill, will let them walk off with the Presidency the way Gore, and Kerry did.

And the war drags on

Denver Post
Excerpt
Congress, apparently content to explore ever-new depths in public disapproval, is on the verge of having a single member derail the most meaningful reform in years of the federal Freedom of Information Act.

How, you ask, when overwhelming majorities support the legislation in both the House and Senate?

The secret hold, of course. Ever heard of the secret hold? It’s a beauty - a real relic of the smoke-filled rooms of yesteryear, the stuffed shirts and fat cats with stogies guffawing over the latest bamboozle of the taxpaying schmucks.

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists, the nation’s largest journalism advocacy organization, used the power of the blogosphere to find out whose legislative bludgeon was buried in the back of open government. We called every senator, one by one, until at last - when it became clear he could hide no longer - Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., came blinking and grimacing into the sunlight and admitted that it was he who placed a secret hold … on a bill that addresses secrecy in government.

You can’t make this stuff up.

This is how it works in Washington: Sen. Kyl - this year’s Secrecy Champion - has several objections to the Freedom of Information Reform Act, a truly wonderful bill that would significantly improve one of the strongest tools Americans have to supervise the inner workings of government and to hold elected officials accountable.

Last week, Kyl issued a statement after he was “outed,” saying the Justice Department has strenuously objected, and that’s good enough for him.

HL’s Take:
Apparently any legislation can be put on hold if just one Senator asks for it. This Kyl guy of course was trying to keep it a secret. How much you want to bet that he was doing it for Bush?
If that bill goes through all kinds of monkey secrets could come spilling out. Some of the 80 republicans that were behind this bill may have known Kyl would block it so perhaps they went against Bush and voted for it to make themselves look good. Like they will soon have to do in their votes about the Iraq war, if they want to keep their jobs