Does the United States Even Have a Government Anymore?

I noticed that the current crop of Obomba Scandals!!!!! opened up almost immediately after the Correspondents' Dinner in April, almost on cue, and that the leading Obomba Scandals!!!! (Benghazi, IRS, Spying on the AP) had been in the hopper for quite some time. They were not "news," they were rehashed previous stories, pumped up to Frenzy Level 12. All of them had been reported on previously -- some, like Benghazi, becoming memes.

Suddenly, we saw the spectacle of Washington, particularly the White House, scrambling and babbling and doing its level best to both inflate and deflate these Scandals!!!! -- depending on which political team was being played for at any given moment. Polling the rabble was constant. Interestingly, none of these Scandals!!!! were resonating much with the public, so another one was introduced, Spying on a FOX reporter!!!! That got a momentary rise, but then even it seemed to settle into the background noise.

These Scandals!!!!! were not catching fire with the unwashed masses, and the White House seemed to be handling each one deftly. Rope-a-Doping Issa was easy. Calling for heads to roll was easy. Some sacrificial heads were offered up, "reforms" were launched, the Frenzy died down.

Then there came the Snowden Thing from the Guardian, and All Holy Hell broke loose -- at least for a time -- as the Nation's Sekrits!!!! were Exposed!!!! EVERYONE WAS BEING SPIED ON ALL THE TIME, AIYEEEE!!!! Run for your lives, Children, we're all going to DIEEEEEE!!!!

Yes, well. When the AP Surveillance story was being pumped up, I, among others, pointed out that everyone was subject to intrusive surveillance, had been for a long time, and now it seemed the AP was demanding an exemption. Why should they be exempt when the People are not? At what point do we turn this around and demand that the universal and blanket surveillance that everyone is under be curtailed?

I thought it was interesting at the time that quite literally no one was paying any attention to the fact that universal surveillance had been institutionalized thanks to the abrogation of responsibility by Congress, and it had been going on for years. Supposedly anti-terrorist, the surveillance was obviously in place to protect and defend the Overclass from interference by the Rabble. The obvious proof was in the OWS surveillance revelations that never got a lot of media but which are really quite shocking, especially for the granular level of surveillance of OWS and the coordination of surveillance and suppression by government and corporate interests throughout the land. This indicated that when it comes to perceived threats to the Ruling Class, the 1st, 4th, and 5th Amendments to the Constitution are essentially inoperative. And there is a vast ground level surveillance apparat in place, coordinated out of Washington, to ensure that it is so.

And nobody pumping the Scandals!!!! seemed to care. The only thing that mattered to them was that the media was being spied on: OUTRAGEOUS!!!! Except the Public didn't care about that. The Big Media had so little credibility with the public that whether or not reporters were being tailed by gumshoes was utterly irrelevant to most people. The public indifference toward the media's whining about being spied on seemed to come as a shock to the insular Big Media Club. How dare the rabble not care!!!?

Yes, well. That's how it goes when you betray the public's trust over and over and over again, which was how the Big Media had been operating for the entirety of the last decade and more -- at least since the Judicial Coup of 2000, and many would say since well before that, given all the phony Scandals!!!!! the Big Media < cough NYT cough > manufactured and marketed during the Clinton Apocalypse. The Post-Modern Media was as thoroughgoing an embarrassment to the concept of a Free Press as had ever seen the light of day, and that was saying something, considering how appallingly bad media had been in previous eras.

But just as that Scandal!!!!! was dying down thanks to public indifference, the Snowden Thing popped up at the Guardian and it was like manna from heaven to the parched and starving Big Media. Finally! Something to catch and hold the interest of the masses! Hurrah!

And of course what it was about was exactly what the previous failed Scandals!!!!! were not: the universal surveillance of everyone all the time, something that most people can actually relate to, though they may not be particularly opposed to it  -- depending on whether or not people they know are caught up in the Programs.

Yet the Snowden Thing is faltering, partly because of the somewhat bizarre nature of the skip tracing that's (apparently) taking place to apprehend the culprit. Much the same thing happened with Julian Assange, as I was reminded last night when Frontline re-ran their "WikiSecrets" program from 2010. The similarities between the Assange/Manning Thing and the Snowden Thing were remarkable. I was reminded of a lot things, including own my minor involvement in the story. Oh dear, what had I done?

At any rate, in looking back, not only on that but on the HBGary Thing that would come up not long afterwards, I felt the kind of disorientation I sometimes feel when things seem to be entering the Twilight Zone. Or is it Chinatown?

In this case, I'm asking, "Does the United States have a government anymore, or are Our Rulers just winging it?" And if they are, just who are they?

Obama and his Team? Uh, well, that's been debatable from the outset, as we saw when he set out to do certain things, like shut down the Guantanamo Gulag, and immediately he was beset by harpies, led by the contemptible daughter of One Dick Cheney, Ruler Imperial Forever or Something.  Every time she -- or he, now that he has someone else's heart -- opens their piehole, all of Washington, and particularly the White House, trembles. It is obvious as sin that they are, literally, in charge. But on whose behalf?

They -- House Cheney --  are able to publicly order Obama around like a string puppet. It's shocking. Congress is supine in the face of their bluster. WTF? As for the courts, ha. It's not simple corruption with the courts, it's something orders of magnitude worse, for We, the People have neither standing nor influence over issues like law and justice and so forth. At least in a corrupt judicial system, the People have some say, some of them even have some control, and if you know who they are, which you probably do, you at least have a chance.... in the current system, though, the People are kept completely in the dark, it's all a Big Secret.

Is there a government in the sense the public understands the concept of "government" any more? Or has what once was the Government become entirely a matter of certain private interests contending with one another to operate the levers of power on their own -- private -- behalf, either ignoring or exploiting the People in the process?

Is there really any question about it any more?

When I see the devolution of these issues into hatred for one or another of the political actors in the drama -- whether it be Obama or any other -- I shake my head in disgust. Obama and Bush were strolling around Africa together the other day, as if they were old buddies, much as Clinton and Bush stroll around together these days, and what's necessary to see here is that it -- the Presidency at the least and the governing class the Presidency serves is a continuum, not a discreet series of individuals to be hailed or excoriated in turn. Banging on about how wonderful or awful whoever sits on the Throne of Office may be simply gets nowhere. It's a form of venting to be sure, but beyond that, what good is it?

If, as seems to be, government is out of the People's hands altogether, and our public-private-partnership surveillance state fully intends to keep it that way forever and ever, amen, what, then, must we do?

That is the question for which we have no universal answer as yet, though many, many answers are being sought and experimented with. Sometimes the answer is right there in front of us, sometimes it has to be the product of struggle great or small, sometimes there is no answer -- or as is often the case, the answer is "no."

Submission and compliance and required economic extractions are all Our Rulers really want from us in any case.

As long as they believe they have that, we are, of course, free.

Lame

Markos and Arianna squared off against "Baby Dick" Cheney (heh) and George Will during last Sunday's "This Week" rountdtable hosted by former Salon writer Jake Tapper, now the It-Boy of the Sabbath Gasbag Shows.

Well.

To say it was pathetic is to be charitable. Oh. My. God.

Markos sat almost as quiet as a mouse during most of it. Will was cross, as he tends to be. Liz Cheney went into her usual venom and bark routines and either charmed or intimidated both the "liberals" on the panel, she lied openly, and routinely diverted attention from the topics at hand. She defended Daddy. Arianna appeared to be... star-struck.

What was so pathetic, though, is that Cheney wasn't crushed like a bug by either of her "opponents." If anything, they collapsed under her withering denunciations, some of which, it was clear, she was having fun throwing out -- like chum to sharks who wouldn't bite.

Cheney was treating the "liberals" like chew-toys. And for their part, they had nothing like her firepower. It was pathetic.

This was quite a contrast to Glenn's appearance on the same set a few weeks back, but the dynamic was different then, too. Glenn went after one of the "liberals" on the panel, Greg Craig, who was supporting the nomination of Elena Kagan (Glenn claims as a representative of the White House. Though I have asked for it, not a shred of evidence has been forthcoming that that is so. Consequently, I discount the accusation...). Glenn did not go after George Will or Ed Gillespie, the anti-Liberals and Republican tools on the panel.

There was a moment of potential fire last Sunday when Arianna mentioned Halliburton and its corruption and fines and whatnot. This caused the Cheney hackles to rise, but Liz's repost wasn't followed up. So it just fluttered in the wind for a bit and was gone.

Sad.

Won't somebody pull a "Have you no shame?" moment on this woman, "Baby Dick?"

Or is she just too frightening?

EEEEEEK!!!!

Part of the episode below:

Where the Cheneys At?

Where are the Cheneys, Father and Daughter, who used to be on all the shows all the time roasting Obama over hot coals and spitting venom at all and sundry. Haven't seen hide nor hair of either of them for months.

Where are they and what are they up to?

Of course they may feel they don't need to be on the Warpath for the time being because so much of what they said was necessary for the Government to do -- ie: protecting the Cheneys asses first and foremost, preserving and extending unlawful Bush Era power grabs and autocracy secondarily, blasting Muslims to pink mist whenever the spirit moved them -- has pretty much been instituted in whole or in part. In other words, the Cheneys spent most of 2009 running around screaming that there were a bunch of wusses in the White House and we we all gonna DIE! And then they stopped.

Quiet as mice they are.

But since most of their demands have been met, what do they have to yowl about?

This is how the Good Emperor Barack has chosen to rule, and for him, I think it has been fairly effective. For the rest of creation, not so much.

The Wars continue unabated, though troop presence in Iraq is being reduced in order to increase troop levels in Afghanistan. Pakistan is still under attack from drones. Same with Somalia and the Yemen. Threats and imprecations against Iran have, if anything, redoubled, and plenty of diplomatic double-crossing is the order of the day (viz: the deal brokered with Iran by Brazil and Turkey and denounced by DeeCee, even though it is what was wanted by the Palace.) Indefinite detention and rigorous interrogation of terror suspects is the policy position of the White House as detailed in the latest National Security Strategy statement, so the dismissal of the Constitution and the tyranny of the Bush years continues without a break. There is no investigation, let alone prosecution, of the criminals who infested the White House in the previous administration, military commissions have resumed in Guantanamo, and not only that, but Government attorneys at the DoJ and DoD seem happy as clams, unlike the case under the Bush/Cheney regime when at least some of them would resign rather than put up with more tyrannical impositions. They don't do that any more. Indeed, lawyers who defend terror suspects are now to be investigated, intimidated, and thwarted from doing their jobs as a matter of DoD policy. YAY! The banksters are fatter and happier than ever, oil is gushing uncontrolled into the Gulf of Mexico and the People are groaning under a heavier and heavier burden of poverty and despair. Social Security and Medicare are about to be cut, and everyone is about to be forced to carry private health care insurance, adding further to the People's burdens.

What's not to like?

So why should the Cheneys have to emerge from their undisclosed lairs?

They got what they wanted just by barking and growling some on the teevee.

Brilliant.

A reminder

Franken isn't in the Senate, and Lieberman is.


Franken may get a meeting with Joe Biden, but Lieberman has the ear of The President.



It was Lieberman, along with his pal Little Lindsey, who convinced Obama to withhold the additional photos of abuse of captives in Iraq and Afghanistan.

And this man (and his spawn) is on my teevee all the time now, when he couldn't be bothered to show his face or reveal his location during most of the Bushevik reign of error.




He -- and she -- is on the teevee so often, it seems, that as far as the newsreaders are concerned, he IS (still) the Vice President. This is not an honorific in their eyes, this is an actuality. The man never left office as far as they know, and given the control he apparently still has over the levers of government power, who's to say they're wrong?

Questions?

The Shadow

For some time I've been riffing on the notion that Button Dick Cheney has no intention of giving up power to any new administration which may - - or may not -- be elected by vote of the People of the United States of America. In fact, he's spent most of his career setting up a Shadow Government, placing his moles throughout the Federal service and running things his way from deep in his bunkers and undisclosed locations, only to emerge now and again to snarl and belittle all who question his guidance and wisdom.

My sense is he fully intends to continue in that role. No matter who winds up "elected." He's not going away. You don't work so intently to transform the very nature of American government to suit yourself only to let it all go when some other yahoo is selected by the American People or some other Special Interest to rule.

Especially when you don't have to give up any power at all.

Nope, Cheney will be with us, like an albatross, till the bitter end.

Chaos v Calm

A hurricane -- called Ike -- is ravaging the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana, putting the lives of hundreds of thousands of people who did not evacuate in jeopardy, destroying or damaging billions of dollars worth of property, disrupting supplies of gasoline and oil, and otherwise causing chaos for millions of Americans.

In some ways, the Hurricane is emblematic of Chaos primeval. Shakespeare used the metaphor extensively in his late period play "The Tempest." In many respects the metaphor was intended to illuminate political considerations of his time, politics becoming more and more chaotic, eventually leading to the collapse of the British monarchy and civil war.

And we see Chaos as the guiding active principle of the McCain campaign for the Presidency. More and more the Old Man was becoming less and less stable as his campaign stumbled and faltered, kind of like the Old Man's mind, through numerous rough patches. Steve Schmidt and Rick Davis were put in charge of reversing the trends -- which showed decisive defeat looming -- and they commenced their Herculean task by offering a blizzard of lies and character assassination of the Opponent, Barack Obama, a blizzard which has only intensified as the campaign wears on. The selection of Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska to be McCain's running "soulmate" as the campaign gears up for its climax caused untold uproar throughout the political firmament, uproar that hasn't ceased for a moment since the selection.

The Chaos that is the McCain campaign has almost totally eclipsed the Calm that is the Obama campaign.

And yet, once the Chaos of the storm passes, the Calm will remain. Peace will be restored. "We are such stuff as dreams are made of."

As the Chaos of the McCain campaign has intensified, the Obama campaign has come under increasing criticism from inside the Democratic firmament for its inability or unwillingness to "fight back." Obama has seen his poll numbers suffer substantially during the onslaught of Hurricane McCain, and Democrats are fearful that he is throwing away the election by not responding at all or not responding forcefully enough to the insults and lies thrown at him daily and almost hourly by the other side.

Given recent election history, it's a rational fear. Democrats have not responded sufficiently or appropriately to Republican smears, and they have lost the White House again and again in part because of it.

To see Obama now being as laid back and calm as he is while the damage is done almost unopposed by his campaign is terrifying to Democrats. We've seen this play before. And Democrats always lose.

Finally hearing the plaints of the masses, Obama promised yesterday to metaphorically release the hounds on the out of control and chaotic McCain campaign, to become "tougher" in the face of the onslaught. But whatever he did, he did not recapture the media attention. There was, after all, a Category 2 Hurricane to cover on the Gulf Coast, and did you know that gasoline prices may top $5.00 a gallon before the full extent of the storm's damage is understood?

Somehow this is good for McCain and his "soulmate," Herself of the Melting North.

And yet the Calm is what remains after the Storm has passed.

Those who complain about Obama's seemingly excessive lassitude in the face of Hurricane McCain have a point. Yet it's always seemed to me that he's approaching his quest for the White House -- if indeed he actually wants to be president -- with an almost Zen-like calm. He seems almost entirely unflappable. Often, it seems to me he doesn't really want to be president, that he has let loose of all "desire" for the office he ostensibly seeks. He simply allows himself to become the president if it should happen.

McCain, on the other hand, seems to be a furious -- yet mindless -- demand machine, swirling and twirling and making as much of a spectacle of himself as he possibly can. Surely his campaign will burn itself out before the election. Perhaps so. Perhaps not. Surely no one is fooled by his lies and charades. Perhaps so, perhaps not.

There are times I honestly think none of the candidates will ascend to the Throne, that in fact the election, if held at all, will simply be seen as a failed "exercise" and Darth Cheney will emerge from one of his spider holes or bunkers to announce that "Everything is under control, I am in charge of the Government, go on about your business, that is all."

Like Putin, he will continue to exercise his control of the Government whether as an "Interim" Leader, or a Force Behind the Throne, or something else, no matter what happens in November.

He doesn't seem to be packing any bags, does he?

Shock Doctrine indeed.

McClatchy's Landay and Strobel push back -- HARD

on the blithering of the Winter Palace chattering classes over Little Scotty McClellan's Bombshell Tell-All Book:

May 29, 2008

Memo to Scott McClellan: Here's what happened

Until now, we've resisted the temptation to post on former White House press secretary Scott McClellan's new book, which accuses the Bush White House of launching a propaganda campaign to sell the war in Iraq.

Why? It's not news. At least not to some of us who've covered the story from the start.

That's just getting warmed up.

After a bit of background history they unleash the big guns. If it got any coverage outside the blogosphere, it would demolish -- forever -- the notion that the White House wasn't fully involved in a propganda operation to foist its war of choice on the American People, the Iraqis, and the World, and it would by itself be sufficient to taint the memory of this repugnant regime for the rest of time. Read the whole thing. But here are a couple of key excerpts:

Here's what happened, based entirely on our own reporting and publicly available documents:

* The Bush administration was gunning for Iraq within days of the 9/11 attacks, dispatching a former CIA director, on a flight authorized by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, to find evidence for a bizarre theory that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the first World Trade Center attack in 1993. (Note: See also Richard Clarke and former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill on this point).

* Bush decided by February 2002, at the latest, that he was going to remove Saddam by hook or by crook. (Yes, we reported that at the time).

* White House officials, led by Dick Cheney, began making the case for war in August 2002, in speeches and reports that not only were wrong, but also went well beyond what the available intelligence said at that time, and contained outright fantasies and falsehoods. Indeed, some of that material was never vetted with the intelligence agencies before it was peddled to the public.

* Dissenters, or even those who voiced worry about where the policy was going, were ignored, excluded or punished. (Note: See Gen. Eric Shinseki, Paul O'Neill, Joseph Wilson and all of the State Department 's Arab specialists and much of its intelligence bureau.

The disgraceful spectacle of the White House/Winter Palace and its sychophants in the Media scrambling to cover their own asses at Little Scotty's "revelations" has been very entertaining on one level, but the fact remains that the Truth is yet to be accepted by our nation's power elites, who consistently run from it like the cockroaches they are.

Millions are dead, injured or displaced. Chaos ensues. All for lies. That is the legacy of this putrid period of history.

McCain might not win...

(Cassandra Mode On)

There is a chance McCain won't win the "election" in the fall, but not because he "loses" to Barack or Hillary. No, the likelier course was laid out by Darth Crashcart in his infamous "So?" moment.

Recall, Martha Raddatz, intrepid ABC girl reporter (ah, ABC, you see!) asked Mister "Go Fuck Yourself" Himself what he thought about "2/3rds of the American People" believing the Iraq debacle is not worth fighting. "So?" [Snarl]. "So?You don't care what the American People think?" "No. You cannot let yourself be blown off course by fluctuations in public opinion."

Indeed.

As we know, "elections" represent nothing more than "fluctuations in public opinion." One cannot let oneself be blown off course by such fluctuations, can one? Observe Kenya, observe Zimbabwe. They've had "disputed elections," but the ruling party and its headmen still rule -- even if some power has been ceded to the opposition. "Public opinion" is not allowed to get in the way of the overall "course" the ruling party has set. The Cheney Rule.

Assuming an "election" takes place in this country this November, can we really doubt that the Ruling Party -- Cheney's Shadow Government -- will do everything in its (considerable) power to hold on to reins? If McCain somehow proves unsuitable to that objective, there is no way they will let him become president. Same, of course, with Hillary and Barack, though the situation is somewhat different with them, in that neither of them are due the consideration McCain is. They would simply be swept aside. Liquidated.

McCain would have to be "eased" off the stage.

Has Cheney telegraphed what to expect in November? Does he intend to continue occupying the Cheney Bunkers? Would you be surprised?

Izzat so?

Darth hawked up another of his patented hairballs yesterday as he opined on ABC that he doesn't care what you -- or anyone else -- thinks, he has a Lincolnesque "vision" and you can go fuck yourself.

Blessed man.

The exchange:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/03/19/why-does-dick-cheney-hate-the-american-people/

Raddatz: Two-thirds of Americans say it’s not worth fighting, and they’re looking at the value gain versus the cost in American lives, certainly, and Iraqi lives.

Cheney: So? [sinister smirk]

Raddatz: So — you don’t care what the American people think?

Cheney: No, I think you cannot be blown off course by the fluctuations in the public opinion polls. Think about what would have happened if Abraham Lincoln had paid attention to polls, if they had had polls during the Civil War. He never would have succeeded if he hadn’t had a clear objective, a vision for where he wanted to go, and he was willing to withstand the slings and arrows of the political wars in order to get there. And this President has been very courageous, very consistent, very determined to continue down the course we were on and to achieve our objective.

Of course he just does this to rile up the masses. But the notion that he and his cohort in the White House are somehow Lincolnesqe, persuing a "vision" is just ludicrous.

They're insane.

Simply put.

And the other thing is that he does and says these outrageous things because he knows he can and n o b o d y is gonna do a dambed thing about it. At all.

So why not?