Dems Defeated in Iraq War Vote. Again. Its Time to Turn Off the Funding Spigot. Now.

Once again, the Dems failed to get to the magic number of 60. That's how many votes are needed to invoke cloture and quash any filibuster attempt.

Lindsay Graham summed up the Reep position thusly:

The idea of winning the war in Iraq is beginning to get a second look,"

That's effin' crazy talk. Winning; did he really say winning? What is winning? Some years back it was the dominoes of democracy throughout the Middle East. These days, its staving off the Al Quaeda lunatics from destroying the rest of the free world. My the goalposts have moved, eh?

Can we afford to trust the buffoons and war pigs who led us in this mess and now are forcing us to wallow in this misery called Iraq? They have been wrong each and every time since they started beating the war drums. Now, they expect us - no, check that; they are daring us - to trust them again this time. Sorry, the kool-aid is packed away, folks.

There is a way for the Dems to finally snatch victory from the vastly unpopular BushCo cretins, and to salvage some small amount of credibility with the American people (the latest poll I saw put congressional approval at 11%).

How? Simply stop funding the damn war. Its really that simple. The threat of de-funding the surge and Blackwater mercs will have BushCo crawling and groveling to the Dems finally promising bipartisanship on the war effort, after all.

Oh sure, the war pigs will fulminate and rage at first. But they will come around - if the Dems grow a spine.

War pigs win another round

No Sifting These Tea Leaves: Greenspan Knows Iraq War All About the Oil

Its the oil, stupid. Color me NOT surprised.

Greenspan speaks

Commuted: Scooter Libby

Unreal. How much lower can this administration sink?

Play the BushCo Anti-Missle Defense Game

Enjoy the game

Here

The Pope is a Dope

And with apologies to David Peel, he might be smoking dope, too.

In a speech to Latin American and Caribbean bishops at the end of a visit to ... Brazil, the Pope said the Church had not imposed itself on the indigenous peoples of the Americas.

Dear Pope, put down that crack pipe. I suggest tying out Richard Mann's highly readable 1491 to get a clearer view of just what the Spanish conquistadors did when they visited and, uh, conquered, the new world.

The pope was really trying to bring a message that the gap between the rich and poor is wrong, and he also just had to stick his nose in Hugo Chavez's grill. Now Chavez may deserved the criticism - or at least some of it. However, the dopey Pope's remarks put Chavez squarely on the side of the native Latin Americans. So much for the Pope making inroads in public sentiments.

This dust-up is oddly similar to the bloviatings of BushCo in their attempts to isolate and even overthrow Chavez. Some of the reasons might be correct (NOT counting the coup attempts), but the actions have pushed Chavez ever more into a dictatorial role. How's that for a sel-fulfilling prophesy? Plus, as sky-high gas prices benefiting the oil barons, Chavez also reaps the windfall.

So the next time the Pope - or BushCo - wants to take on Chavez, they ought to make damned sure they are keeping their own asses clean. And read up on local history.

Al Gore: You Da Man!

From Al's new book:

Gore stops short of flatly calling for the impeachment of Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, he certainly gives the impression that in his view such a move would be well deserved. He calls the president a lawbreaker, a liar and a man with the blood of thousands of innocent lives on his hands.

Most of Gore's ire stems from, not surprisingly, the war in Iraq, a war that Gore opposed from the beginning. Bush, he writes, "has exposed Americans abroad and Americans in every U.S. town and city to a greater danger of attack because of his arrogance and willfulness."

"History will surely judge America's decision to invade and occupy (Iraq)…as a decision that was not only tragic but absurd," Gore writes.

Al goes on to make the argument about the Iraq War that I've been making for years. BushCo is either lied about the reasons for war or is genuinely incompetent. In either case, at least IMO, BushCo deserves nothing short of impeachment and hard time in the slammer.

George Bush: A Really Bad Week

Alas, poor George. Life it tough, the bubble got burst, and the news of the week is worse. There are the typical stories of the week; these will be covered. But the more important part is the subtext of an ever-increasing view this is a failed presidency, the legacy is lost, and the Republican Party is doomed for a decade or more.

The Week's News

Retired Generals who served in Dubya's War are now airing commercials opposing the war in contested congressional districts - aimed at getting some wishy-washy reeps to shit or get off the pot on Iraq. The ads are hard-hitting, and mark the first time that generals who served in the war are going after BushCo and Neocons.

Meanwhile, the commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq is not a happy camper. The problem is the Baghdad surge has pushed insurgents and mini-Saddams into neighboring provinces. Operation Whack-a-Mode continues unabated.

Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. "Randy" Mixon also said that the Iraqi government had failed to help the situation in the restive [Diyala] province and that it has been a hindrance at times by failing to support local army and police forces. Diyala borders Baghdad on the east, and violence in the province has grown as U.S. troop levels have been bolstered in the capital. ... The local government is "nonfunctional" and the central government is "ineffective," he said.

...

It is rare for an officer of Mixon's rank to publicly call for more troops. When Donald H. Rumsfeld was secretary of Defense, there was intense pressure on officers to not make such requests, even privately, according to officers who served in Iraq.

Mixon was withering in his criticism of the Iraqi government, saying it was hamstrung by bureaucracy and compromised by corruption and sectarian discord, making it unable to assist U.S. forces in Diyala.

Its easy to see why Mixon is pissed. While he was talking about local and provincial pols, the Iraqi Parliament is resisting BushCo's energy plan, went against BushCo on the security wall intended to separate Sunnis and Shias, is about to go on a two-month break, and had one session cut short this week when two Sunni lawmakers started throwing haymakers at each. Call it dysfunction junction.

On top of this, an active duty Lt. Colonel publicly criticized the brass in the running of the war. (That criticism didn't occur this week - his article was published three weeks ago - but these incidents only add to the fact that Dubya isn't listening to his generals. If Dubya was listening to his generals, he might actually feel some level of confusion and nuance about how to proceed with the war. No, Dubya is resting happy inside his little bubble.


Back in the capitol, a remarkable meeting occurred Tuesday.

The [Tuesday][T]he meeting between 11 House Republicans, Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, White House political adviser Karl Rove and presidential press secretary Tony Snow was perhaps the clearest sign yet that patience in the party is running out. The meeting, organized by Rep. Charlie Dent (Pa.), one of the co-chairs of the moderate "Tuesday Group," included Reps. Thomas M. Davis III (Va.), Michael N. Castle (Del.), Todd R. Platts (Pa.), Jim Ramstad (Minn.) and Jo Ann Emerson (Mo.).

"It was a very remarkable, candid conversation," Davis said. "People are always saying President Bush is in a bubble. Well, this was our chance, and we took it."

That's really quite amazing, a reep congressman talking to the Washington Post about the "Bush Bubble." And it really appears that bubble was burst - at least for a time. After all, Cheney was in Baghadad - he couldn't protect poor, poor sensitive Dubya.

A number of reeps are now talking about reassessing the Iraq situation in September. That's when General Petraeus gives an assessment. Moderate reeps and other reeps scared shitless about the 2008 elections could start jumping off BushCo's ship. That's less than a Friedman from now.

As for the democrats, they are heaping on the pressure. The odds of Dubya getting a "clean" war spending bill appear dimmer by the day. Senator Clinton is taking a run at de-authorizing congressional approval for the war. The dems likely won't win any specific battle since BushCo does wield the veto pen. However, the dems can skillfully makes the reeps pay a price with a painful series of votes on the war. As the war continues to go down the toilet, the votes will be harder and harder and harder.

As for other news in the capitol, there really isn't any. The Iraq War has completely sucked the oxygen out of any domestic initiatives. The only domestic activity I can see is the continued drip, drip, drip of Republican corruption in Congress and the White House.


Bush's poodle - Tony Blair - is just about history. This can't mean good things for Britain's continued involvement in the war, held together almost completely by the force of Blair's will alone.

Finally, BushCo got a kick in the balls today when the big Central Asian natural gas pipeline will go through Russia - and through Central Asia as BushCo had fervently hoped. This is yet another example where BushCo's ham-handed attempts to increase influence and power drive others away - running.

Maybe this week will be better for BushCo, but I wouldn't put any money on it. Its probably safe to say that BushCo hasn't won a single week politically since the week Dubya put the plan to privatize Social Security on the table.

Riddle Me This

Why didn't BushCo simply order Dubya to sign the Iraq spending bill - and the issue a signing statement? Its happened before. Dubya issued a signing statement on the anti-torture bill, and on over 750 other bills.

Success in Iraq: Move Those Goalposts in Some More

Dubya and Tony Snow know what success looks like (less violence), but can't define it. How's that for lowering the expectations? We've spend $500bn, lost 3,500 American lives, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, 2 million are displaced, we destroyed the economy, a religious-based civil war is underway, the threat of a regional war has significantly increased, and we've created an environment in which terrorism is thriving and growing.

So, what we can now expect is "Sectarian violence down. Success is not, no violence." That's the new definition of success, biatch.

Thanks, BushCo, for the gift that may never stop giving.

Four Years Ago Today: Mission Accomplished

Indeed. Dubya has been told by his pupeeteers to veto the Iraq/Afghanistan (plus pork) spending bill because it contains a voluntary timeline for withdrawl from Iraq. The veto will be issued four years to the day after Dubya declared major combat operations in Iraq had ended. Nice work, BushCo.

Blue Monday

A government commission's war probe accused of "severe failure," saying the nation was led hastily into conflict without a comprehensive plan. The Bush Administration? Nope - Ehud Olmert of Israel and their foolish war on Lebanon was the target of the scathing report. Though it should be noted that BushCo and the neocons cheered Olmert on.

If anyone hasn't heard about it yet, the destroyed Oakland freeway ramp is pretty damned scary. The closure will also be really inconvenient for a lot of folks until its fixed (probably a couple of months). On a personal note, I rarely use that facility, but there's a good chance the mess will reverberate to other adjacent ramps and highways. Its a miracle no one was hurt, not even the driver.

Tony Snow is back to work today as chief lie spinner for BushCo. While I certainly wish him improved health and a long life, this man should hang his head in shame.

Tragically, over 100 US soldiers have died in vain in Iraq this month.

I've noted the lack of political reconciliation in Iraq dooms the surge to failure. The lack of economic progress has the same effect in mooting the surge. This is why Iraq is the Stupid Pointless War.

Fox News: Dumbing Down the Bias

We all know the allegations - Fox News is biased towards the right, and dumbs down the news. Are these allegations correct? Certainly the democratic candidates for president thought so when they snubbed Fox News for their first debate. And we all know that Dick Cheney appears almost exclusively on Fox (except when he's rolling Tim Russert, but I digress).

Let's take a look a what researchers and others have found. First, World Public Opinion completed a year-long analysis of news sources. Their key finding:

[T]he frequency of [Iraq War] misperceptions varies significantly according to individuals’ primary source of news. Those who primarily watch Fox News are significantly more likely to have misperceptions [about the Iraq War], while those who primarily listen to NPR or watch PBS are significantly less likely.

This comes on the heels of a recent Pew Center poll showing that Fox News viewers are among the least informed on current events.

In addition, researchers Ethan Kaplan and Stefano DellaVigna analyzed the question of Fox News bias by looking at the impact of Fox News on voting patterns. From the National Bureau of Economic Research:

[Kaplan and Della Vigna] found that the introduction of Fox News had a small but statistically significant effect on the vote share in Presidential elections between 1996 and 2000. Republicans gained an estimate of between 0.4 and 0.7 percentage points in the towns that broadcast Fox News. They also find that Fox News had a significant effect on Senate vote share and on voter turnout. Their estimates imply that Fox News convinced 3 to 8 percent of its viewers to vote Republican according to a first audience measure, and 11 to 28 percent according to a second, more restrictive audience measure.

Here's some other info on the Fox New Bias:

• Media Matters reviews a series of internal Fox memos.
• A documentary on Fox News - Outfoxed.
• Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting covers Brit Hume (from the way back machine - pre 9/11).
• Journalists have found Fox News to be, far and away, the most conservative news source.
• The public outing of terrorist who, unfortunately, wasn't really a terrorist.
• Osama, oops I meant Obama, attended a Madrassa, as reported by Fox. Nice.

Iraq Political (Non) Progress

As horrific and tragic the daily atrocities in Iraq are, I find the lack of any progress towards political stability the most distressing. As many are saying, until real progress on political reconciliation and economic opportunity are present - along with enhanced security, Iraq (as we know it) is not salvageable. I would go as far to say that winning is not only NOT possible, but it cannot even be envisioned. I ask you in all seriousness, what conditions would allow us bring our troops home? Put simply, what constitutes a win in Iraq? I honestly don't know.

Ten weeks into the Baghdad crackdown, seen as a last effort to avert Iraq from sliding into civil war, there are few signs parliament will pass the laws before it recesses in July.

But Iraqi politicians complain that U.S. domestic politics are dictating Iraq's political progress and said many of the laws that Washington wants to see sail through parliament face deep mistrust among Shi'ites, Sunni Arabs and ethnic Kurds.

"If a law is not acceptable to our constituents there may be a backlash. We have to do what we want, not what Washington wants," said Haider Ibadi, a lawmaker from Maliki's Dawa party.

Ibadi cited as an example a plan to allow thousands of former members of Saddam's party to return to public life.

The plan is a longtime demand of once-dominant Sunni Arabs, now the backbone of the insurgency. But some of Maliki's Shi'ite allies, whose community was oppressed under Saddam, are fiercely opposed to having Sunnis back in government and military posts.

"We can't pass a law that gives pensions to ex-Baathists while those who were oppressed (under Saddam) have not received compensation. That is subject to a huge problem," Ibadi said.

A law to share Iraq's oil wealth hit a major hurdle after oil-rich Kurdistan said it objected to its annexes as unconstitutional and threatened to pass its own measure.

So there you have it. The more things stay the same in Iraq, the more they stay the same.

Golbal War on Terror: Can Someone Tell Me What Winning Looks Like?

Color me confused. We invade Iraq to clamp down on terrorists (never mind there were no Saddam connections to terrorists interested in destroying the USA, nor any connection between Saddam and the 9/11 hijackers), yet terrorism is way up.

A State Department report on terrorism due out next week will show a nearly 30 percent increase in terrorist attacks worldwide in 2006 to more than 14,000, almost all of the boost due to growing violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. officials said Friday.

Remember back when BushCo told us sweet lies that a free Iraq was going to be a shining city on a hill whereby democracies would sprout and flower throughout the Middle East? A veritable dominoes of freedom would topple the despots and sheikdoms. Now we are told by the same that leaving Iraq will cause a chain-reaction of wars and civil strife all over the Middle East.

Never mind that Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority are about as close to chaos as one could reasonably imagine...

George Tenet: Insta-Swift Boat Victim

Well, that didn't take long for BushCo to Swift Boat ex-Cia Director George Tenet.

[S]enior White House counselor [Dan Bartlett] on Friday dismissed former CIA Director's George Tenet portrait of a Bush administration that rushed to war in Iraq without serious debate. "The president did wrestle with those very serious questions[.]"

...Bartlett ... suggested [Tenet] might have been unaware of the breadth of the prewar debate that led Bush to dismiss other options, such as diplomatic means, for reining in Saddam Hussein.

On one hand, I love seeing Tenet get the Swift Boat treatment; Its richly deserved. OTOH, its instructive yet again to see another former apologist/sycophant grow a conscience.

Update: Tenet already has a retort, as published in today's NYT:

Mr. Tenet described with sarcasm watching an episode of “Meet the Press” last September in which Mr. Cheney twice referred to Mr. Tenet’s “slam dunk” remark as the basis for the decision to go to war.

“I remember watching and thinking, ‘As if you needed me to say ‘slam dunk’ to convince you to go to war with Iraq,’ ” Mr. Tenet writes.

Preview of Tenet Interview on 60 Minutes

I found this at First Draft:

CBS has a preview of Tenet's interview on 60 Minutes this coming Sunday....

Tenet says what bothers him most is that senior administration officials like Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice continue using "slam dunk" as a talking point.

"And the hardest part of all this has been just listening to this for almost three years, listening to the vice president go on 'Meet the Press' on the fifth year [anniversary] of 9/11 and say, 'Well, George Tenet said slam dunk' as if he needed me to say 'slam dunk' to go to war with Iraq," he tells Pelley. "And you listen to that and they never let it go. I mean, I became campaign talk. I was a talking point. 'Look at the idiot [who] told us and we decided to go to war.' Well, let's not be so disingenuous … Let's everybody just get up and tell the truth. Tell the American people what really happened."

CBS link - here

Lets All Laugh At President Bush

Bush told [a group seniors] there is great pressure in Washington to change principles for the sake of political popularity, but he said he would not.

"It's a struggle for some. It's not for me," he said.

[Bush] showed the group a portrait of Abraham Lincoln. He said Lincoln was unpopular during the Civil War but maintained his belief that all men are created equal.

"Look what would have happened to history" if Lincoln had abandoned that principle, Bush said.

Sleep well, Dubbie. Dream of chicken pluckers and remember the rug.

Tuesday Tidbits

Pew has a new poll out; headlines the Va Tech massacre hasn't boosted support for gun control. An alternate headline would have read, support for gun control still solid. But hey, that's me. Of note, is there is NO consensus on the cause of these types of shootings.

You saw where the Newster blamed the Va Tech massacre on liberalism. Now Giuliani says we will have another 9/11 if the Dems take the White House. Way to elevate the discussion, guys. Fuckers.

Note to Karl Rove: Karl, you aren't paranoid when people really are out to get you. So, you should be really, really concerned when Scott Bloch wants to hang out inside your colon. Who is Scott Bloch? Merely a Dubya-appointed lawyer with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel. Mr. Bloch is investigating the latest Rove shenanigan. Will it stick to Rove this time? Surely his odds are getting leaner each passing controversy.

Well maybe not. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) is NOT happy about the Bloch investigation. Not one little bit.

Bloch has come under widespread criticism for his gross mismanagement and politicization of the office. Bloch is currently under investigation by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) for his mistreatment of career appointees, who have alleged the exact kind of retaliation that OSC is designed to investigate. OSC employees have alleged that Bloch has tossed out legitimate whistleblower cases to reduce the office backlog.

How very, very BushCo. BushCo really must believe we are THAT stupid.

A list of BushCo scoundrels

From AP:

A rundown of Bush appointees who left under a cloud or face conflict-of-interest allegations

•Scooter Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in a grand jury investigation into the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame. His trial also implicated top political adviser Karl Rove and Cheney in a campaign to discredit her husband, Iraq war critic and retired ambassador Joe Wilson (news, bio, voting record). Libby, who plans an appeal, is awaiting a June 5 sentencing.

• Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is fighting to hold onto his job in the face of congressional investigations into his role in the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. Two top aides have resigned in the investigation into whether the firings were politically motivated. Emails and other evidence released by the Justice Deparment suggest that Rove played a part in the process. Other e-mails, sent on Republican party accounts, either have disappeared or were erased.

• Paul Wolfowitz, president of the World Bank and a former deputy defense secretary, acknowledged he helped arrange a large pay raise for his female companion when she was transferred to the State Department but remained on the bank payroll. The incident intensified calls at the bank for his resignation.

• J. Steven Griles, an oil and gas lobbyist who became deputy Interior Secretary J., last month became the highest-ranking Bush administration official convicted in the Jack Abramoff influence-peddling scandal, pleading guilty to obstructing justice by lying to a Senate committee about his relationship with the convicted lobbyist. Abramoff repeatedly sought Griles' intervention at Interior on behalf of Indian tribal clients.

• Former White House aide, David H. Safavian, was convicted last year of lying to government investigators about his ties to Abramoff and faces a 180-month prison sentence.

• Roger Stillwell, a former Interior Department official, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge for not reporting tickets he received from Abramoff.

• Sue Ellen Wooldridge, the top Justice Department prosecutor in the environmental division until January, bought a $980,000 beach house in South Carolina with ConocoPhillips lobbyist Donald R. Duncan and oil and gas lobbyist Griles. Soon thereafter, she signed an agreement giving the oil company more time to clean up air pollution at some of its refineries. Congressional Democrats have denounced the arrangement.

• Matteo Fontana, a Department of Education official who oversaw the student loan industry, was put on leave last week after disclosure that he owned at least $100,000 worth of stock in a student loan company.

• Claude Allen, who had been Bush's domestic policy adviser, pleaded guilty to theft in making phony returns at discount department stores while working at the White house. He was sentenced to two years of supervised probation and fined $500.

• Philip Cooney, a former American Petroleum Institute lobbyist who became chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, acknowledged in congressional testimony earlier this year that he changed three government reports to eliminate or downplay links between greenhouse gases and global warming. He left in 2005 to work for Exxon Mobil Corp.

• Darleen Druyun, a former Air Force procurement officer, served nine months in prison in 2005 for violating federal conflict-of-interest rules in a deal to lease Boeing refueling tankers for $23 billion, despite Pentagon studies showing the tankers were unnecessary. After making the deal, she quit the government and joined Boeing.

• Eric Keroack, Bush's choice to oversee the federal family planning program, resigned from the post suddenly last month after the Massachusetts Medicaid office launched an investigation into his private practice. He had been medical director of an organization that opposes premarital sex and contraception.

• Lurita Doan, head of the General Services Administration, attended a luncheon at the agency earlier this year with other top GSA political appointees at which Scott Jennings, a top Rove aide, gave a PowerPoint demonstration on how to help Republican candidates in 2008. A congressional committee is investigating whether the remarks violated a federal law that restricts executive-branch employees from using their positions for political purposes.

• Robert W. Cobb, NASA's inspector general is under investigation on charges of ignoring safety violations in the space program. An internal administration review said he routinely tipped off department officials to internal investigations and quashed a report related to the Columbia shuttle explosion to avoid embarrassing the agency. He remains on the job. Only Bush can fire him.

• Julie MacDonald, who oversees the Fish and Wildlife Service but has no academic background in biology, overrode recommendations of agency scientists about how to protect endangered species and improperly leaked internal information to private groups, the Interior Department inspector general said.

Monday catch-up

Just getting back from a short vacation in Tucson to see the folks. Tucson is an interesting place. On one hand it is the liberal epicenter of an otherwise libertarian-to-conservative state. On the other hand, Tucson is a sprawling mess, destined to become another Phoenix. For the uninitiated, Phoenix makes Los Angeles seem positively urban and transit-oriented.

Perhaps I'm not being clear enough, dear reader. Phoenix is mostly an awful shithole. I'm really saddened to see Tucson traipse down the same route. Well, that's life in a state where developers rule the roost.

I can't see how Arizona's growth patterns are sustainable. The largely empty expanse between Phoenix and Tucson is slated to grow by a million or more persons over the next 20 years, making the swath from Phoenix to Tucson - and down to Nogales (Green Valley is also growing rapidly) one ginormous suburban wall of sprawl.

The development patterns are really a shame because Arizona's geography is second to none, and it has a unique culture centered on its desert environs. However, that unique culture is easily missed amidst the national retail chain store heaven that is Arizona today. What's amazing to me is the 48th state will not be celebrating its centennial for another five years.

A link here to a news analysis largely debunking the flypaper strategy. The flypaper strategy supports the idea that all the foreign nuthead jihaddis would converge on Iraq for the big showdown against the big bad U.S. of A. The problems is - for the USA - is they forgot to bring their tanks. The second is there are only 250 or so foreign fighters in Iraq. In either case, the flypaper strategy is as stupid as it is cynical. After all, the US presence in Iraq has displaced over two million Iraqis.

Watch out Sheryl Crow. After taking on Karl Rove at the Washington Press Sycophants Dinner, the reeps slime machine will go after her like O'Reilly on a falafel. Already Drudge links to an article on Crow's view that we should be limited to one toilet paper square per person per visit. Nice way to misrepresent Drudgie; Crow was simply trying to discuss wasteful consumption.

Our space cadet president has "increased confidence" in Gonzo after Friday's hearing. Almost too strange for words.

And finally, CBS radio suspended a pair of shock jocks for making fun of Chinese on-air. Maybe CBS would have done so anyway, but I have to think that the Imus debacle has now limited what constitutes acceptable speech these days. In general I consider myself fairly libertarian on free speech issues; I would never say idiots JV and Elvis don't have a right to say pretty much what they want. However, I also don't like having to listen to asshats like this on the public airwaves. Hat's off to CBS for suspending these two idiots. Simply getting dolts like this off the airwaves elevates the public discourse.

I am hopeful the Imus affair has finally cast a light on what goes on on AM radio these days. Is it possible to be compelling without resorting to ethnic and racial slurs and blatant misogyny? I sure hope so. And I can't wait for the day when the real demons of the airwaves - hatemongers like Michael Savage and Rush Limbaugh - get their comeuppance.