Ron Reagan tells it like it is

Big Brother:

On Larry King Live last night, Ronald Prescott Reagan, or Ron Reagan, Jr. as he is known, was about as plainspoken as a guy could be. He said he was surprised by the uproar caused by his eulogy at his father's burial, since he wasn't aware that he was talking about George W. Bush. However, he said, if people thought he was talking about George Bush, he very well "might have been talking about George Bush." He said (pointedly twice) that it is "simply shameful " that stem cell research is still being debated on any grounds, and, when asked, that he "may well" become a spokesman on the issue. He said his father "would never have gone into Iraq. He would have been more interested in going after Osama Bin Laden, who actually planned the 9/11 attacks. The war was a big mistake." He said, "America was lied to." He said that he thought people were willing to wait for up to eight hours in line for two minutes viewing of "really nothing more than a box", because they were aware that what they had in Ronald Reagan could never be had with "the current occupant of the White House." He said the pictures from Abu Ghraib "make you feel slimy, unclean. bhrrrrrrrr!" (as he wiped the imagined slime off his arms). He said he is no authority on the Republican Party, as he is not a Republican and does not "hang out with Republicans much," but that, since he was asked, in his opinion the Republican Party has become "mean" and beholden to the "religious right." He put the blame on the current bipartisan atmosphere in Washington on the Republican Party. He said he would not run for public office, not only because he's not interested, but also because he's an atheist and "according to polls, you can't be elected to office in this country if you're an atheist." He said he and his mother are not so interested in the political labels of "conservative" and "liberal", but more interested in taking the right position on any given issue. And he said that he "would not be supporting" Bush in this year's election. Although the transcript of the interview is not yet available on cnn.com, I'm using quotation marks to illustrate how plainspoken Reagan was, and how recall of his marks feels verbatim. None of the callers challenged him on his politics; they were more interested in how the family was doing, and how Ron felt when he first learned of his father's illness, if he had talked to his father about it, what his death was like, and how he felt when he saw the crowds as he walked up Constitution Ave. This seems to suggest that a large number of the viewing audience were supporters of President Reagan. I wonder what they thought of his son's outspokenness, which he claimed his father would have supported, as he never heard his father claim that only conservatives have a right to speak out about what they see as the truth.

Good news from the Washington Post

I can't almost believe my eyes... Kerry actually overtakes Bush on terrorism. I honestly never imagined that, at least on this issue, Bush would ever slip this far. Down where he deserves to be, at least according to just about every objective source I've ever read on the subject. And I wonder if the press release from the coalition of retired diplomats and military officers had any effect on this? One can only hope, and can only assume, that for John Kerry, with news like this, the sky's the limit.

Calling Cheney's Bluff

Big Brother:

It's getting kind of fun listening to and reading Bush and Cheney continuing to claim a "longstanding relationship" between Iraq and Al Qaeda. They are starting to look and sound foolish. Well, I reckon they've gone beyond "starting to" but I've been giving them the benefit of the doubt -- yes, I have! -- and have been listening to their story through a good Republican filter. And here's why. The administration claims that there is not a "wedge" between what they say and what the commission staff report said. On CNBC on Thursday night, when "Capital Report" co-host Gloria Borger asked Cheney if he had information that the 9/11 commission did not, he replied "Probably" (as Ms. Borger said on "Washington Week" the following evening, "And that clears it up.")

Even so! 9/11 Commission chairman Thomas Kean and Vice Chairman Lee Hamilton were models of propriety on Sunday morning when they were interviewed by George Stephanopoulos on This Week. They both maintained that the staff report does not disagree with the administration, but that they may have a different understanding on the nature of the ties between Al Qaeda and Saddam's Iraq.

I say, Fair enough. But they -- in utter fairness -- say that they expect the vice president to make available the information he has so that they can clarify the commission's position in their final report. It's about the most polite "gotcha!" I've seen in politics in a long time.

But here's why it's all so sublime. Maybe Bush and Cheney are right and everybody else is wrong. Maybe they do have more information. Maybe they will make it available to the 9/11 commission, and there will be a shift in its position on the Al Qaeda/Iraq connection in the final report. But even if this all happens, Bush and Cheney have subjected themselves to at least a week of looking foolish. And even if they do release more evidence, they will go from looking foolish to looking secretive and obstructive. Either way, the perception of Bush's credibility takes a blow. And, as they say, in politics, perception is the truth.

Parsing Iraq and 9/11

I'm too busy to write anything today so Big Brother's filling in:

I don't understand why the mainstream media isn't making more of the letter President Bush sent to the the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate on March 18, 2003. After all the administration is saying that they never claimed that Iraq had anything to do with September 11. But the second clause to the letter Bush maintains that he has determined he is justified in going to war "acting pursuant to the Constitution and Public Law 107-243 is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001."

Now, there are bloggers who are talking about it. But for some reason, they act like this is questionable evidence, that the letter isn't quite making a justification of war based on retaliation for 9/11. For instance, Demagogue says that the use of the word "including" in the second clause was "cute, but it can scarcely be denied that Bush conveyed to Congress -- as the sole substantive justification for the war -- the notion that Iraq 'planned, authorized, committed, or aided' the 9/11 attacks. Otherwise, why include that phrase in a resolution, and a presidential determination, that were directed solely at the question of whether to invade Iraq? Plausible deniability is one thing, but the implication here is quite clear."

What's the problem? This is the letter the President sent to Congress justifying an invasion of Iraq. If September 11 had nothing to do with it then there is no reason for the second clause. And, as Iraq is a sovereign nation and not a terrorist organization, it must be included in the second part of the second clause. I don't see what's confusing about this at all. The administration is lying (big surprise!) Not only has Bush made an explicit claim that Iraq had anything to do with September 11, he made the claim in the letter sent to Congress on the eve of the War on Iraq!

Something is seriously wrong in DC

If you don't subscribe to Salon, you're going to have to do the Salon daypass to read this article about the coronation of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon as Emperor of the United States, an event that took place in a federal Senate building, but it's kind of worth it in a sick way... For a thumbnail sketch of how out-of-kilter things might seem to be in DC these days...