With all due honoring of MontanaMaven's diaries Who Can Stop the Shape Shifters? Naomi Klein, You're Freaking Me Out and Shock Doctrine II: Sacred Friedmanism vs Mongrel Capitalism from November 11th, there is so much that we can learn from Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism.  The first we need to learn is that the actions of BushCo are not the inconsistent actions of a blithering idiot and his Dark Lords.  Secondly, we need to finally recognize what it is that they are doing, and why.  Thirdly, we need to get out of our SNITCH mode and actually start to take back the country.

There is a one-line joke about brain farts that applies to carpenters, machinists and do-it-yourselfers.  It goes more or less like this, "I keep cutting it, but it is still too short!"  This has happened to more than one of us, where our thinking process tells us that the fix for the piece being too short is (our brain gets the idea that it is actually too long? or is it just crossed wires?) to cut it again, and that we need to do the opposite of what is really needed.

At some point in the future the Noble Experiment that is the American Democracy, now 231 years old and counting, will cease to exist.  It may be by conquering invaders (hard to figure at this time), by coup, by internal decay, or by some mechanism we cannot now foresee.  To paraphrase someone who was on the side of the little guy, but who is certainly persona no grata in the political discourse at this time, there must be permanent revolution.

But revolution may take many forms.  

(Please: If this has been diaried, could someone inform me so I can delete it?  Thanks!)  I could have entitled this, "Idontrecallitis" is beginning to spread, like a bacterial infection.

Evidently Dick Cheney told Larry King, that he "Had no recollection" whether or not he was the one - as reports had indicated - who had directed Gonzo to go to Ashcroft in the infamous March 10th showdown in Ashcroft's hospital bedside, and get the AG to sign off on the program (whichever one it was as it is turning out).

With Gonzo and his skipping record "I don't recalls" before the Senate Judicial Committee and Cheney now contracting the same condition, it seems someone needs to find a treatment for it.  But the real story is what that really means, "I don't recall" or "I have no recollection".

I was reading drational's insistence that we all should be wary of accepting Greg Palast's 'facts' at On Why Greg Palast is Dangerous, and ended up comparing drational's arguments to the global warming issue.

I long ago tried on dkos to do something of the same about global warming and got abused for my concern.  People were NOT welcoming any rational discourse on the topic at the time.  I generally don't post anything on that subject here anymore.  This is the first I've touched on it in a very long time.  (Trying to un-convince someone of their misconceptions is a waste of time.) The quality of actual facts backing up global warming being anthropogenic are quite a bit less locked-in than what Palast uses to back up his claims that those are Rove's emails - but people here aren't ready to be discerning about that issue yet.

Reading georgia10's diary from Jan 01, 2006, entitled Ashcroft, Domestic Spying, And Why This Scandal Won't Go Away, there is this astute observation that needs revisiting, after James Comey's testimony last week about the race to Ashcroft between himself and Alberto Gonzales and Andrew Card in March, 2004:

To understand how deep-seeded [the] legal reservations were, I remind you that Comey refused to authorize and Ashcroft was "reluctant" to authorize the program in 2004. This was after the program had been in place for some two and a half years. This was after Ashcroft had presumably authorized the program ever 45 days since late 2001.

Continue this below the fold...

Today we have Charles Rangel hammering on George Tenet, like everyone else was doing a week ago, because he didn't call Buhs on the intelligence about Iraq.

A few weeks ago, it was jump all over Hillary week, because she did or did not do the right thing about admitting Bush's lies leading the Senate to OK
the AUMF.

When it turned out that Brownie had actually informed Bush of the Katrina situation, almost nothing was said about it.  To this day, even though it does appear that Brown did a credible job of things, he still takes the brunt of it.

I expect this one to go over like a lead balloon, but I couldn't help but wonder if any of the WTC conspiracy guys are going to acknowledge that fire can cause structures to collapse.

One of the main arguments given by WTC conspiracy folks is that the jet fuel only burns at too low a temperature to possibly have caused the collapse of the two towers on 9/11.  

But if that is so, then what caused the collapse of the freeway today... Oil Tanker Fire Causes Collapse of Freeway?  The tanker was carrying gasoline, which isn't as volatile as jet fuel.*  If the freeway could collapse, why couldn't the two towers?  Will the skeptics allow now that maybe the WTC collapse was maybe caused by the heat?  At least in part?

ASS BACKWARD LOGIC!

Stop and THINK about this for a minute, folks:

The people that Iran is supporting in Iraq ARE THE VERY SAME PEOPLE THAT WE ARE SUPPORTING IN IRAQ. Iran is helping the SHIITES - WE are helping the Shiites. The SHIITES are not the ones fighting the U.S.; it is the Sunnis, and the Iranians are not supporting the Sunnis. The Sunnis are the ones targeting the U.S. troops in Iraq, and Iran is NOT assisting them in any way.

ANY ASSISTANCE THAT IRAN IS SUPPYING IS ACTUALLY HELPING THE U.S. SIDE.

Period.

More after the fold...

Does "hush, hush, this is on the QT" equal "classified information"?... This diary may seem passé or premature, either one, since much of this was covered in 2005 and who knows where it goes after Libby's perjury trial.  But with the testimony of Ari Fleischer today, we now have an official court record that strongly, strongly states that Libby knew Plame was covert - AND that Libby outed her in full knowledge of that.  That will provide legal grist for further indictments of Libby, possibly Cheney, too.

Summer of 2005: the furor on the blogosphere was whether or not Plame was actually covered under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act (IIPA) and whether it was provable in court that any of the outers (intentionally plural) knew she was covert.  Both legal requirements now seem to have been met.

Fleischer seems to have opened that latter door today, and in the same statement (as it was worded in what I read) seems to have confirmed that Plame was covert, too.  In addition, there also may be sufficient evidence to show conspiracy and more that includes Cheney as well, since Cathy Martin earlier testified that Cheney wrote the leak to Matt Cooper that was to be attributed to Libby.  More below the fold...

[Nancy] Pelosi was asked what was most important about regaining majority status. "Subpoena power," she said.

Everything turns on that.  Congressional oversight is nothing without the power of the subpoena.  We all know that.  With the Congressional Committee chairmanships soon to be in their hands, the universe for the country - in fact, for the whole world - will change.

A pre-election article in The Nation by William Greider, Pelosi's Moment, covers so much of what the universe apparently will soon be.  Greider did not mention the possibility that the Senate would also have Democratic leadership.  So whatever he wrote about Pelosi of course applies equally well to Harry Reid.  More below the fold...

And what are all the adds about?  What is all the talk about?  Just about everything BUT tying the GOP incumbents to Bush.

The Repubs have deflected and deflected our attention to other things.  The Dems aren't getting one effective word out there to reomind people that the Republicans have been a disaster, and that that disaster will continue until the Democrats get in.  SURE, WE get it - but is any of OUR understanding getting across?  

It has been obvious - as it was in 2004 - that the democratic base is energized FAR more than the GOP.  In 2004, in several key states, new Dem voter registrations were more than five times the GOP, and voter intensity to get Bush out of office was HUGE.  Yet, by Election Day, the polls showed the races in most key races within a handful of percentage points.  And then, the bottom fell out for the Dems.  The GOP GOTV won out... that is the CW that we all find difficult to swallow.

Here in 2006, even more so, especially after FoleyGate broke, so many races have been moving strongly in the direction of Democratic wins - even ones the Dems weren't considered close to being competitive.  It has looked like any effort to steal the election was going to have to be so brazen that the effort itself would be the proof in the pudding...

QUICK QUIZ: WHICH of the 9/11 hijackers came across the Mexican border?  NONE.  And WHICH of them came across the Canadian border or flew directly in from Europe or the Middle East?  ALL OF THEM!

Could it all be a manipulation of the electorate?  Oh, Madre de Dios, say it ain't so, Jose!!!!

The bottom line on all this is the question, "What is REALLY different, risk-wise, NOW, versus one week ago?"

We all know the answer is: NOTHING.

...more below the fold...

But my point here is to suggest that impeachment may be more of a possibility than I myself had been thinking.

(more below the fold)

How close to the brink did we just come?

...More below the fold....

The surprise here is mainly that the MSM is the party doing the accusing.  Now, if they would only keep at it, and if only other MSM parties would join in, some grounds for impeachement might be forthcoming.

More below the fold...

It stupefies me (us all?) that no matter HOW many times Bush-nocchio is caught with his nose growing again, the general belief in the U.S. is that he is just fibbing a bit.  Lies tied to the non-declared war on terrorism are only white ones, after all...