Everything -- from WMDs to "Mission Accomplished to "Dr. Germ & Mrs. Anthrax" -- was a lie, and it's time to put the President and his cronies on trial.
PHILADELPHIA (apj.us) -- It just galls me to listen to pundits and politicians on both sides of the aisle argue over whether or not it's a good idea to pull our boys and girls out of Iraq "sooner" rather than "later." To me, that discussion just obscures the awful, far more important truth: the liars surrounding President Bush, and perhaps even he, simply made up a series of "facts" to justify a little jaunt into Iraq that has cost us two thousand dead American kids, 3,200 fatherless children, 35,000 dead Iraqi civilians (at the rock bottom least), and just for good measure another 20,000 or so American military and civilian "casualties" -- you know, guys wandering around Walter Reed Hospital without arms and legs.
As if to bold and underscore the plethora of lies that have come from the lips of the President over the past five years, 24 of 25 former Saddam Hussein top officials were released with "no charges filed" against them after serving two years in Baghdad jails.
Included in this group was Dr. Rihab Taka, better known as "Dr. Germ," and Huda Salih Mehdi Amash, a.k.a. "Mrs. Anthrax" -- both nicknamed at some White House Texas Tea Party where the bourbon must have been gushing. You remember "The Germ" and "Mrs. Anthrax," who was also the five of hearts on the Neocon-marketed deck of American's Most Wanted playing cards? Well, now the duo are "Dr. Gone to Paris" and "Mrs. I'm outta here, baby!"
The two are fleeing -- free as birds.
Why?
Because they didn't do anything that they can be charged with.
Does this ring a bell?
No bio-weapons, no other weapons of mass destruction, no nuclear program. Nothing.
Similarly, results of the Iraq national elections began tricking out yesterday and today, and they echo another White House lie -- the assertion that White House "Atta Boy" Ayad Allawi had a chance of a sno-cone in hell of winning political office.
Allawi is holding at about 14% of the votes thus far; he will be lucky to gain 20% of the total, and has already been relegated to the first Iraqi post-Saddam political dumpster in favor of a bunch of Islamic fundamentalists who hate George W. Bush and want the United States out of Iraq as quickly as possible, if not before.
Heckuva job, Mr. President! You've made it abundantly clear that we aren't ever going to be greeted with rose petals, as was predicted by Dick "Dick" Cheney and Secretary of War Donald "Gramps" Rumsfeld decades ago (or so it seems today). Even in supposedly more "secular" Baghdad, the religious zealots that play as "Shades of Iran" are picking up close to 80% of the vote, making it very clear that infidel American occupiers are not wanted.
Even more laughable is the "progress" -- or, more accurately, the lack thereof -- made at the polls by your old friend and co-liar Ahmed Chalabi, darling of PNAC, the Pentagon and Mr. Rumsfeld himself. Wily Ahmed fueled the mythical fire against Saddam and was a driving force (or a bought-and-paid-for fibber) behind the guarantee that we would crash into Iraq without looking first.
So far, Chalabi has garnered less than one half of one percent of the vote! I guess that means he won't get his "guaranteed" seat on the new Council of Representatives, the Iraqi name for Parliament.
Now that we know Iraq will be ruled by a coalition of fundamentalist Shi'ites, why not simply say a few gracious "Allahu akbars" and exit promptly?
Well, you'll have to ask Mr. Bush, who believes that Iraq is a "key" to "fightin'" the "war on tairists" -- most of whom we haven't heard from or seen in four years -- no thanks to Mr. Bush and his Homeland Security Clown College, which hasn't been put to much more of a terror test than pilfering two tons of fingernail scissors out of the purses of innocent granny airline passengers at a cost of about $1 billion a week.
To make things even more tragicomedic, we now find Mr. Bush on our television screens morning, noon, and night trying to move his embarrassing poll numbers above 40% by – you've gotta love this -- admitting that everything he, Rumsfeld, Condolleeza Rice, Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Doug Feith and former Secretary of State Colin Powell said after September 11th, 2001 were lies – well, almost everything, to be fair (and balanced).
On Monday night, he greeted us from no less a location than the Oval Office of the White House to explain why he was, is, and will continue to break the law by ordering wiretaps and surveillance on fellow American citizens without a judicial warrant despite a federal law which forbids such action, a law that was passed in 1978 "honoring" Richard Nixon who proved he was indeed a crook and went off to California with his own wiretapping tail between his legs.
And just this morning, Mr. Bush used wounded troops as living props in a futile attempt to make his "war on tairism" the issue of the day. It turned out to be another cheap stunt that failed to keep the cable "news" infotainment channels from continuing to report the resignation of Judge James Robinson, a Rehnquist appointee whose oversight purview included government surveillance in intelligence cases. Robinson sent a resignation letter to Chief "Supremo" John Roberts late Monday without providing an explanation; the news hit the wires last night after the evening newscasts had run their course. This morning's Washington Post reported, "Two associates familiar with his decision said yesterday that Robertson privately expressed deep concern that the warrantless surveillance program authorized by the president in 2001 was legally questionable and may have tainted the FISA court's work."
Yesterday and today, his Attorney General told us that the President could order wire taps willy-nilly because:
1) Article II of the United States Constitution reads "The President shall be the Commander in Chief of the Army, and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several states when called into active service...."
Huh? Does this mean that he commanded someone in the army, navy or militia to tap American's phones? I sincerely wonder inasmuch as this would normally be left up to the FBI, CIA or NSA - none of which is part of the army, navy, or militia of any state.
2) A 2001 Congressional resolution (based on lies) that the President is authorized to "use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks."
Double-huh? Since when is wiretapping and surveillance "force"?
Even professional talking head and famous Clinton basher Jonathon Turley, a George Washington University professor of law who now claims to be specialist in surveillance law (gee, years ago he was a specialist in Lewinsky "kneepad" law), called Bush "dead wrong" if he thinks he is in the legal clear when he wiretaps American citizens.
Turley, who will take any surprise position if it gets him on television, is a bolt-from-the-blue witness for the prosecution here -- but he is likely correct inasmuch as a ninth-grade student could figure this one out just by reading the Constitution and the Congressional resolution.
In fact, Mr. Bush has so far broken the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which specifically forbids him or anyone in government to spy on American citizens without a warrant, at least thirty times now -- and given his administration's conduct over the last nearly five years, probably many more times.
Yet Bush and the organ grinder monkeys now occupying the West Wing and heading the Justice Department claim that he has "broad" authority that "supersedes" the FISA.
Condi Rice was all over television on Sunday sputtering the same twaddle.
Mr. Bush and his coterie of slime explain his unilateral spy authorizations by whining, "It's too time consuming to get a warrant."
Right. And if you believe that, you probably believed Joseph McCarthy, Paula Jones and José Canseco.
I suggest the president have his own judge sitting next to the doomsday "football" that follows him everywhere 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. That way, the President can get a warrant on demand as easily as he trips over a bowl of pretzels in the White House.
Or does he have something to hide?
Would any judge believe him when he says that it's a matter of national security to tap Ted Kennedy's phones?
The rotten cherry on top of the White House prevarication and embarrassment cake was the release of a film made by Islamic terrorists in "Democratic Iraq" on Monday showing them shooting, point blank, through the back of the head, and then a dozen times more, Mr. Richard Allen Schulz, an American contractor who was in Iraq only because President Bush and whoever pulls his strings decided to have a little war.
So, despite all the hoop-dee-blah over on FOX "Ailes Jazeera" News about the President's rising poll numbers, it is turning out to be a disastrous week for the POTUS -- with many more to follow -- as Congress begins a secret battle with reference to impeaching him, and perhaps others in the Administration.
Yes, I wrote it.
Impeachment.
JEFF KOOPERSMITH is a political consultant, opinion research authority, policy analyst, and self-described "renegade lobbyist."