January 2006 Archives

I wasn't born in Colorado, but I did spend a very large chunk of my life there.

NSA Expands, Centralizes Domestic Spying

In truth, NSA is aligning its growing domestic eavesdropping operations -- what the administration calls "terrorist warning" in its current PR campaign -- with military homeland defense organizations, as well as the CIA's new domestic operations Colorado.

Translation: Hey Congress, Colorado is now the American epicenter for national domestic spying.

In May, Dana Priest reported here in The Washington Post that the CIA was planning to shift much of its domestic operations to Aurora, Colorado.

The move of the CIA's National Resources Division was then described as being undertaken "for operational reasons."

The Division is responsible for exploiting the knowledge of U.S. citizens and foreigners in the United States who might have unique information about foreign countries and terrorist activities. The functions extend from engaging Iraqi or Iranian Americans in covert operations to develop information and networks in their home countries to recruiting foreign students and visitors to be American spies.

Aurora is already a reconnaissance satellite downlink and analytic center focusing on domestic warning. The NSA and CIA join U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) in Colorado. NORTHCOM is post 9/11 the U.S. military command responsible for homeland defense.

The new NSA operation is located at Buckley Air Force Base in Aurora, at a facility commonly known as the Aerospace Data Facility.

According to Government Executive Magazine -- thanks DP -- "NSA is building a massive data storage facility in Colorado, which will be able to hold the electronic equivalent of the Library of Congress every two days." This new NSA data warehouse is the hub of "data mining" and analysis development, allowing the eavesdropping agency to develop and make better use of the unbelievabytes of data it collects but does not exploit.

Yep, this will fit right in with Focus on the Family down in C. Spgs.

This site is the number one search result for "Hammas".

How weird is that?

So exactly when did attending the elite, must attend economic summit of the world become a means to deride and poke fun at Senator Kerry? Not really clear on the rules laid down by the Heathers that make up the media, but I am quite sure that having our Senators attend the Wold Economic Forum in Davos is actually a good thing - something to be proud of. Certainly not something to use to undercut his call for a filibuster.

Really. Sweeping aside the snarky explanations, it's really quite amazing that somehow John Kerry is to be laughed at because he had the misfortune to be in Davos, Switzerland with the cream of the world's best minds when it came time to call for a filibuster against Alito.

Ha Ha Ha.

Of course you've already had your fill over the dust up regarding the Washington Post's Deborah Howell. The finger wagging reaction by Jack Shafer is pretty hilarious for its high drama. It's quite the amazing contrast to the reactions to the "righty bloggers and commenters" by the media Heathers. If I recall correctly, that reaction consists of bed wetting, hemming, hawing and - of course - polite discussion with eyes cast down.

But even worse than this patronizing shot across the collective bow of the left wing blogosphere is Jack Shafer's almost pathetic comments left on Crooked Timber and Matt Stoller's post over at MyDD:

I didn’t call what bloggers wrote a “riot.” I called the wild postings that appeared in the comment section of the post.blog after the lefty blogs directed their readers to go to there as the riot.

It's like Deborah Howell all over again - only in plaid.

Surreal.

And speaking of surreal - well, Surreal Politik, that is - you just have to laugh at the half assed democratic attempt at cloture. Yea, a few paragraphs ago I was just wagging my finger at the media dicks for making fun of "Swiss Miss", but this is more the dark laugh of a condemned man realizing the comical way in which he'll die - not the merry tinkling of laughter that emanates from the Heathers as they shred the flesh from your body.

Really, what's up with these jokers? The president's approval rating is stuck - literally - at 41%. On every issue that the democrats' use as their signatures - abortion, environment, minimum wage, windfall profit tax, repealing Bush's tax cut, civil rights, etc. - the American public is solidly behind them - well over 66% in most cases. But to watch the democratic party, you'd be thinking that the president was the most popular ever and the public universally rejected their platform by a 2 to 1 margin. What is it going to take to get these jokers off of their lazy asses and find some calcium to stuff into that flaccid member one would normally refer to as a spine? I mean, Harry "give 'em hell" Reid just apologized for comparing the GOP to organized crime. I guess Harry and I have a different definition of what constitutes "Hell".

(Oh, and for a delicious bit of what we in the trade like to call irony, check out the quote from Senator John "DeLay? Never met the man" Cornyn: "Researching, compiling and distributing what amounts to nothing more than a campaign ad on the taxpayers dime raises serious ethical questions." Yea, serious ethical questions. Kind of like the ones raised by - oh, I don't know - the Administration using government money to pay journalists, op ed columnists and such for government propaganda. But hey, it's okay if you're a republican.)

Yea. Whatever.

Maybe if we just simply stop apologizing for these losers and start demanding better from them we might start getting somewhere. Pretty much every time something big like the filibustering of Alito (hey, what about the questioning of Alito - that was pretty important, too), the usual left wing blogs and net roots get really fired up and start stoking the boilers with high octane coal - for that extra special heat. Then, when the Democrats inevitably fold, we all stand around with that shocked look on our faces when we realize that - yet again - we're standing around with a wet leg and a bag of shit in our hands.

My lord. If they're going to fuck us over they should at least kiss us, don't you think?

So, despite my better judgment, I'm pretty much pulling the plug on all my donations to the Democratic party. I'll still vote for them - I mean, what fucking choice do I have? I remember 2000 and my vote for Nader - not making that mistake again. But I'm pretty much pulling the plug on the party. Really, the investment simply isn't worth it. Sure, I'll continue to give to democratic causes - still down with that. Even individual candidates. But even Howard Dean isn't going to be able to pry open my check book for this party any more.

I'm just tired of being played for a chump by a pack of losers who couldn't even stand up straight if they had a 2x4 thrust up their ass.

Don't really know what's going to become of this country. The course we're heading on seems to end up in a well traveled, but rather evil, destination that many other countries before us have visited. Who knows? Maybe some bizarre collective wake up call will be answered by the voting population and the mythical populist uprising will occur and a bloodless revolution will yet again restore the balance of sanity to the body politic.

But I'm not holding my breath. Even local hero Barack "Media Darling" Obama can't seem to get his fucking act together. Rather than actually tell us what the democratic message is, he whines and bitches about the lack of a message from the democrats. Well Jesus Christ, mister. Get your overpaid staff on this right away and fucking lay it out. Don't go on national TV and reinforce the republican party line! I mean, how fucked up is that?

Sure, if the dems start showing a spine, I'll jump right back into the fray. But really, what's the chance? They've had five fucking years and they still can't manage to keep 40 Senators in line for one fucking day to piss on George's SOTU parade. A president who's approval rating is 41%, I might add.

Geez Louis. I don't know when they got neutered, but lord almighty did someone snip off the Cahones of the democratic party. Might I suggest that someone rent a pair until we can get back on our feet again?

Update: Hey Moe, it takes a certain special man to gloat about such things. Myself, I just hope I'm taken *after* you so I can laugh my fucking ass off as you finally sell the last of your so-called libertarian ideals out the door for a last cigarette. You are so pwned by the religious right, dude.

Von has an entry up which is emblematic of the pattern which is yet again playing out in the American body politic.

According to Von's World^tm, the whole problem is with the Democrats. You see, because they're such wimps and the party base is composed of people like Atrios, we simply won't have a real debate about what to do about Iran. So, it's up to those staunch centrists who - you know - don't have a clue themselves about what to do about Iran, to beat up some more on the Democrats because they don't have the balls to beat up on the Republicans. Republicans, who I might add, own every branch of government - from the congress, to the executive, to the judicial.

I guess this really is just an expression of the helplessness that Von feels with respect to Iran. It's pretty darn clear that the Republicans are going to use Iran in pretty much every way they can for political gain. It is an important problem - Iran, that is - but the simple fact is that the Democrats aren't going to have much of an input to the solution - whatever their resolve is. The simple fact is, this Administration, and Republicans in general, are going to use Iran as a stick to beat back the taint of scandal that clings to them like a thick coating of tar.

And rather than undertake the Sisyphean task of trying to take the fight about Iran to the people where the issue will be decided, Von decides to preemptively beat up the Democrats. I guess this is a form of transference. Von is impotent to take on the people that matter, so he beats up a chained dog in frustration.

Pity.

And SOOOOOO predictable.

Update II: Do check out Glenn Geenwald's trip down alternate history lane.

Imagine a world where Saddam is still in place, sputtering around impotently and in check by stringent inspections. There has been no WMD debacle in Iraq. Our decades-long alliances are intact. Our military has been engaged only in precision strikes against actual terrorists where they are found -- rather than occupying a country of 25 millions Muslims plagued by brewing sectarian civil war -- and is therefore primed, energized, and fresh. And U.S. credibility on issues like these is what it was before we invaded Iraq, rather than what it is now. The credible threat we could pose to Iran under those circumstances is in a different universe than the virtually non-existent threat we can pose now.

Can we at least avoid being subjected this time to the childish notion – already being peddled by the same people who were wrong about essentially everything as they pushed us into invading Iraq – that anyone who does not rush to embrace the most militaristic solution possible for Iran is an appeasing, irresponsible coward who should not be taken seriously? Just look at what that mindset has wrought.

Update: Atrios points to this bit by Josh Marshall which is particularly relevant.

The problem was that there was no Iraq policy in the abstract. That was just a fantasy. There was Iraq in 2002 and 2003 with President Bush et al. calling the shots. Any discussion of the issue which didn't take those key facts into account was just a parlor game, no more than words. What's more, the existence of a cadre of commentators from the political opposition who espoused a policy that looked a lot like the president's actually gave him a great deal of cover. It made his policies look more reasonable. It greased the skids for its implementation.

So with Iran.

The prospect of a nuclearized Iran seems far more perilous to me than anything we faced or seemed likely to face with Iraq. But for those of us trying to think through how to deal with this situation, we have to start from the premise that there is no Iran Question, or whatever you want to call it. There's only how to deal with Iran with this administration in place.

Do you trust this White House's good faith, priorities or competence in dealing with this situation?

Based on everything I've seen in almost five years the answer is pretty clearly 'no' on each count. To my thinking that has to be the starting point of the discussion.

A sad pun which reflects a sadder mess.