On the bright side, we've really sharpened our obliviousness skillz

Did someone say we're at war?

"There's something preposterous about a nation that has been 'at war' for almost a decade, yet insists on remaining completely oblivious to the implications ..."

On the other bright side, Get Your War On is sort of back.

next to "Barack Obama..."

is there a scarier, more un-American sounding name in Congress than "Rahm Emanuel?"

CHICAGO (AP) -- Barack Obama's fellow Chicagoan Rahm Emanuel, the hard-charging No. 3 Democrat in the House, has accepted the job White House chief of staff, Democratic officials said Thursday.

One of Obama's first decisions as president-elect was to ask the Illinois congressman to run his White House staff. The selection of the fiery Democrat marked a shift in tone for Obama, who chose more low-key leadership for his presidential campaign.

Who is with the terrorists now? Hand-picked U.S. military officials...

Gitmo jury gives bin Laden driver 5 1/2 years

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - A U.S. military jury gave Osama bin Laden's driver a surprisingly light sentence on Thursday, making him eligible for release in just five months despite the prosecutors' request for at least a 30-year sentence to deter would-be terrorists.

Salim Hamdan's sentence of 5 1/2 years, including five years and a month already served at Guantanamo Bay, fell far short of the life sentence he could have gotten for aiding terrorism by driving and guarding bin Laden. It now goes for mandatory review to a Pentagon official who can shorten the sentence but not extend it.
~

tough times for plutocrats (cont'd)

Rich begin feeling the pain in down economy

They are investing more conservatively, spending less on luxury goods and are being more thrifty with their credit cards. Many are asking their personal shoppers and private-jet travel providers to seek the best deals rather than over-the-top extravagances.

Wishing Senator Lieberman would go sell used cars...

So I'm at Huffington Post while I eat some Cap'n Crunchberries (the best version of that cereal, I believe) and I come across this asshat:

Lieberman Rips Obama: His Lack Of Conviction Puts Nation In Peril
July 15, 2008 02:23 PM

Despite rumblings that his advocacy for John McCain could lead to his ouster from the Democratic Party, Joseph Lieberman continued on Tuesday to take broad swipes at Barack Obama.

In a speech before the Center for U.S. Global Engagement, Lieberman described the presumptive Democratic nominee as a politician who was consistently wrong on foreign affairs and whose policy proposals -- had they been put in place - would have put America at great risk.

"I've been following Sen. Obama's comments in this campaign and particularly in the last months since the primaries were over," said Lieberman. "And I wish he would just say that the surge has worked. He doesn't have to give credit to John McCain or anyone else. He can give credit to General Petraeus and the troops who have carried it out. I wish he would acknowledge the surge is working, rather than changing his position on how and when we should exit Iraq, without acknowledging that these are changes of positions that are understandably based on conditions on the ground. A president's credibility is based on the courage of his or her convictions, his or her acceptance of reality, and consistency of views are critical elements of national leadership. A president who squanders those does so at our nation's peril."

Lieberman's remarks came just hours after Obama had delivered a foreign policy address of his own, in which the Illinois Democrat reiterated his desire to see a responsible phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq and a greater emphasis on the conflict in Afghanistan.

Working off of Obama's address, Lieberman accused him not only of being unwilling to acknowledge the success of the troop surge, but also for being inconsistent in his foreign policy approach. The 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee then offered nearly half a dozen direct questions to the Illinois Democrat that mimicked, in large part, talking points that the McCain campaign has been using with great frequency.

"Sen. Obama said this morning that he wants a foreign policy that is tough, smart and principled," said Lieberman. "This afternoon I want to ask my colleague who I respect and like a couple of direct questions: Was it tough when Sen. Obama voted to order U.S. troops to retreat from Iraq on a fixed timeline regardless of the recommendations of our military commanders or conditions on the ground? Was it smart when Sen. Obama opposed the surge and predicted that it would fail to improve our security? ... Was it tough and principled when Sen. Obama said he would be open to changing his plan on Iraq after going there and talking to General Petraeus, which I think was the right position, only to change that position hours later after being heatedly criticized by organizations like MoveOn.org? I say respectfully the answer to all those questions is, no."

************

I wish I could say I was at a more intelligent site, or more obscure, to keep up my indiecred - but whatever - I was so pissed off (I'm listening to Elf Power! And The Only Ones! - really really indie) - I just wanted to scream about this asshat, and maybe watch as a cosmic hand of higher order slapped off the idiotic sense of right he wears on his face like a lapel pin. All I could do was write his office. I feel weak and annoyed right now. He just deserves to have shit thrown on him. Everyday.:


Sen. Lieberman,

I just wanted to let you know what a poor Senator you are and how typically shallow your stances are in the McCain campaign. Lack of convictions? Do you mean like the tax breaks McCain now favors? Or his views on gays?

And your "I told Obama I was in the Civil Rights" - could you be more condescending?

I used to hope that Senators might be a little smarter than the average guy in the street - used to believe that just perhaps we elected those among us we felt best represented us - you disprove that theory so spectacularly that it depresses me.

You're a political opportunist who picked the wrong time to switch sides and is stuck now out of pride. I wish I could use stronger language about you, but my respect for your office prevents me.

I will only say, I pray that one day you will have no reason to regret your stances, only that they were yours, and to be thankful that smarter, braver voices prevailed.

Andrew Decker

The Nation's fears

In picture form...

Winning Hearts and Minds! (WHAM!) (cont'd!)

83 percent of countries in 2002 had a plurality of citizens judging the United States favorably; by 2006 only 23 percent of countries had a plurality saying that U.S. influence is positive.
-- "The Decline in America's Reputation: Why?" - House Committee on Foreign Affairs; Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights, and Oversight - June 11, 2008

tough times for plutocrats (cont'd)

It’s Not So Easy Being Less Rich
By CHRISTINE HAUGHNEY
NYT June 1, 2008

NANCY CHEMTOB, a divorce lawyer in Manhattan, has found that her days have become crammed seeing clients, all worried about how an economic downturn will affect their marriages.

They seem to have nothing to fret about: their net worths range from $5 million to $1 billion. A blip in the markets shouldn’t send their chateau-size Park Avenue co-ops to foreclosure or exile them to Payless Shoes.

But Ms. Chemtob’s clients are concerned all the same, she said, because their incomes have shrunk, say, to $2 million a year from $8 million, and they know that their 2008 bonus checks are likely to be much less impressive.

One of her clients recently confessed that his net worth had decreased to $8 million from more than $20 million, and he thinks that his wife will leave him. He has hidden their fall in fortune by taking on debt to pay for her extravagant clothes and vacations.

“I literally had to sit there and tell him that he had to tell his wife that she had to stop spending,” she said. “He was actually scared she would leave him because their financial situation changed so drastically.”
...

Interviews with the people who actually see the bank statements, like divorce lawyers and lenders, say their clients are definitely living on less than they did a year ago, regardless of how expansive the definition of “less” may be. Hairstylists and private jet rental companies say the wealthy are cutting back on luxuries like $350 highlights and $10,000-an-hour jet rentals. Even nutritionists and personal trainers notice a problem. The wealthy are eating more and gaining weight because of the stress.
...

THEIR spouses could leave them when they discover that their net worth has collapsed to eight figures from nine. Friends and business associates could avoid them as they pass their lunchtime tables at Barney’s or the Four Seasons. And these snubs could trickle down to their children.

“They fear their kids won’t get invited to the right birthday parties,” said Michele Kleier, an Upper East Side-based real estate broker. “If they have to give up things that are invisible, they’re O.K. as long as they don’t have give up things visible to the outside world.”

So New York’s very wealthy are addressing their distress in discreet and often awkward ways. They try to move their $165 sessions with personal trainers to a time slot that they know is already taken. They agree to tour multimillion-dollar apartments and then say the spaces don’t match their specifications. They apply for a line of credit before art auctions, supposedly to buy a painting or a sculpture, but use that borrowed money to pay other debts.
...

Other wealthy clients are cutting luxuries that they think their friends and relatives won’t notice, according to Mr. Del Gatto of Circa. At Circa’s midtown offices, he said, the seven consultation rooms have been busy with customers selling their precious gems. Some older couples, he said, are selling estate jewelry to help support their children who have lost Wall Street jobs. Bankers are paring down their collections of Patek Philippe watches. Wives from Greenwich and Scarsdale are selling 2-carat to 35-carat single-stone diamond rings. One recent client explained to Mr. Del Gatto that she was selling $2 million in diamonds she rarely wore, because her friends wouldn’t notice that they were gone.

“She said, ‘If I sold my Bentley or my important art, they would notice,’ ” he said. “That we hear, in differing examples, every day.”
...

Justin Sullivan, managing director of Regent Jet, which leases private airplanes, said most clients in real estate and on Wall Street are switching to chartered jets over private jets, and cutting their flight budgets by about 25 percent. One New York real estate developer cut his budget to less than $250,000 a year from $1.5 million a year.

“A year ago, he would have only flown Gulfstreams,” Mr. Sullivan said. “Now it’s moving to the point where he’s flying Beech jets and Learjets.”

Some wealthy New Yorkers are even cutting back on relatively smaller things. At J Sisters, a midtown Manhattan salon where celebrities like Naomi Campbell and Gwyneth Paltrow mingle with Wall Street clients, stylists and colorists say they hear about money worries all day. On a spring afternoon, a half-dozen hairstylists to the very wealthy talked about how customers are stretching their $350 highlights and $150 haircuts to every eight weeks instead of six weeks. Some women are cutting out highlights entirely, saying they would “rather be brunettes.”
...

Clay Burwell, a personal trainer to many Wall Street executives, said that his clients were also feeling the toll. A year of eating more, drinking more and working longer hours has started to hurt their health.

“They come into the gym with a dark storm cloud over their head,” he said. “They look like hell.”