WTF Is It Now?!?

Ashcroft Knew - and Covered Up

(snip) In retrospect, the single official responsible for the most dramatic failures of Sept. 11 turns out to be none other than Attorney General Ashcroft himself. Ashcroft has kept an uncharacteristically a low profile in recent days, and no wonder. No bureaucracies have ever looked more fatally entangled in red tape than the FBI and INS, both of whose bucks stop at the attorney general's desk. And if news accounts are accurate, shortly after Sept. 11 Ashcroft learned of Phoenix FBI agent Williams' prescient investigation but kept that crucial, embarrassing information from both president and public. Instead, he rushed forward the massively repressive USA-Patriot Act and immigrant sweeps, knowing that such measures were a fig leaf to cover naked incompetence.




Choking on Teflon

(snip) The Bush Administration and its allies have shamelessly exploited Sept.11 to get what they want, from mountains of new pork at the Pentagon to Fast Track authority for negotiating new foreign commercial agreements. The latter passed the House by one vote last December, after a threat from House speaker Dennis Hastert: "This Congress will either support our president -- who's fighting a courageous war on terrorism and redefining American world leadership -- or it will undercut the president at the worst possible time."

They have been quick to question the patriotism of their opponents, and it has worked. The Democratic leadership was cowed into silence, which gave President Bush very high approval ratings -- they remain at 76 percent. Many observers attribute these results to the "War Against Terrorism," but this is exaggerated. A public that hears only praise and no criticism will predictably answer "yes" to pollsters who ask whether the President is doing a good job.

This unfortunate dynamic has encouraged a President who couldn't get a majority of the popular vote to govern as though he had won an overwhelming mandate from the electorate. Vice President Dick Cheney has lashed out hard at his critics, calling their actions "thoroughly irresponsible and totally unworthy of national leaders in a time of war."

But it's not working any more. The Democrats softened their rhetoric, but Senate majority leader Tom Daschle is still demanding that an independent commission be set up to investigate what our government knew and did before Sept. 11.

Mark Weisbrot seems to be one of those "glass-half-full" people. I just don't have his faith in the pink-tutued, lily-livered, lapdog Dems. It only takes one harsh word and they run away, peeing in fear.