BottleOfBlog

Drunk, Rich, Corrupt, Lazy, And Old

Gerald Ford struggling to overcome the unfunny perception that he was a stumbler.

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - His deliberate manner of speaking, some highly publicized mishaps and a recurring Chevy Chase bit in the early days of "Saturday Night Live" helped advance the notion that Gerald R. Ford was a bit of a klutz. In fact, Ford was one of the nation's fittest and most athletic presidents…

Journalists also reported when Ford tumbled while skiing, when he slipped and fell on some metal steps while getting off Air Force One in the rain in Austria and when he bumped his head on an airplane doorway…

In Ford's memoir, "A Time to Heal: The Autobiography of Gerald R. Ford," he bitterly recounted how a brief stumble recorded by a television camera turned into a national story.

"There was no doubt in my mind that I was the most athletic president to occupy the White House in years ... (but) from that moment on, every time I stumbled or bumped my head or fell in the snow, reporters zeroed in on that to the exclusion of almost everything else. ... (This) helped create the public perception of me as a stumbler. And that wasn't funny."

Well, it was pretty funny. 

But, no, Ford was not a stumbler.  He was not a clutz.

He was drunk.

Aside from the "long national nightmare" thing, the most memorable thing Ford ever said was:

The three-martini lunch is the epitome of American efficiency. Where else can you get an earful, a bellyful and a snootful at the same time?

And he said it during a Presidential election.  That he was a candidate in.

The guy wasn't clumsy.  He was bombed.  In the early afternoon.  In the White House. 

Really!

KING: So [Betty] was drinking in the White House, and you had enabled that. You didn't -- weren't aware of a problem?

FORD: But we were not what I would call drinkers. Her problem was a combination of prescribed medication by doctors in the White House and elsewhere, plus a few martinis or a bourbon and water during the afternoon or evening.

No, he and Betty were not what he would call "drinkers".  He would have an efficient three martini lunch and Betty might have a "few" martinis in during the afternoon, but they were not what he, the President of the United States, would call "drinkers".

I mean, just because both he and his wife would throw down eighteen or twenty four ounces of gin in the  afternoon is no reason to call them "drinkers"!  Just because Jerry considered sucking down the equivalent of a case of beer over lunch "efficient", just because the guy fell off of chairs, podiums, and airplanes is no reason to call him a "drinker"!

I've got nothing against the guy, aside from him being a lifelong bag man for defense contractors who rewarded him with seats on about a thousand different boards in exchange for selling out his constituents, or for undermining our democracy by selling the Presidential pardon in exchange for the Presidency and lying to Congress about it, or for, with his stupid Whip Inflation Now buttons, trying to convince The People that public relations was actually policy.

Also, I kind of didn't like him for establishing the precedent of pardoning government criminals before they were even indicted or tried so that:
    a)  the American People never even know the truth about Their government; and
    b)  criminals, who should be in prison, are, instead, every four or eight years are right back in their old jobs.

If Lou Reed is the godfather of punk, Gerald Ford is the godfather of the Bush administration.

But the guy died today.  And so nobody should say anything bad about him.  Because it's a tragedy.  He only lived to be ninety three.  And he was fabulously wealthy.  Without having ever done anything for the benefit of anyone other than Gerald Ford or people like him, who work so little that they can drink eighteen ounces of gin in the early afternoon.

The liberal media, the guard-dogs of your democracy, can't say enough nice things about the guy--he wasn't clumsy!  He healed the nation!  Americans approved much more of his presidency than his approval ratings might suggest!  He was probably the Greatest President who was never elected, even if he was the only one. 

And we should all lament his passing so young.

Me?  My soul must have died with him.  Because honestly?  I just can't feel bad for making fun of the guy.

I'm not glad he's dead.  I don't wish he died younger.  I hope his death was painless and as pleasant as it could be.

But the guy was kind of a jerk. 

His drinking was well known among the "liberal" Washington press corps while he was a Congressman and while he was in the White House, and they're still pretending he just slipped a couple of times and Chevy Chase confused us all into thinking Ford was clumsy.

When he really was an exceptional athlete with cat like reflexes.

And bombed by two thirty in the afternoon every day of the week.

It's nothing against Gerald Ford--except for all that other stuff I have against Gerald Ford--it's that creepy feeling that the American People are either being treated like little children who are too young to hear the true facts of life or that our "liberal" media, which went to extraordinary lengths to delve into Clinton's personal life but seems to go out of its way to respect the personal lives of Republican Presidents, might not actually be "liberal".

13-1-1

As he searches for a new strategy for Iraq, Bush has now adopted the formula advanced by his top military adviser to describe the situation. "We're not winning, we're not losing," Bush said in an interview with The Washington Post.

We're tied.

The assessment was a striking reversal for a president who, days before the November elections, declared, "Absolutely, we're winning."

Young Republicans go crazy for the Flip Flopper in Chief!

In another turnaround, Bush said he has ordered Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to develop a plan to increase the troop strength of the Army and Marine Corps, heeding warnings from the Pentagon and Capitol Hill that multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan are stretching the armed forces toward the breaking point. "We need to reset our military," said Bush, whose administration had opposed increasing force levels as recently as this summer.

A "turnaround" from Bush?  That's not possible!  After all, the ol' Straight Shooter himself told us:

Let me tell you something else about the presidency -- (applause.) One other thing about this job that I have is that when you say something, you need to say it clearly so people will understand, and you better mean what you say…

See, I think when you say something you better mean it...

I would find a " turnaround" from Bush very surprising. 

I mean, are we talking about the guy who was against Nation Building before he bullied our country and the world into what will be the longest and costliest nation building evah?  From the guy who against the Department of Homeland Security before he created it?  From the guy was for counting every vote before petitioned the Supreme Court to stop counting every vote?  From the guy who was against offering North Korea a deal before he offered North Korea a deal?  From the guy who was for a patient's right to sue before he was against it?  From the guy who opposed a Constitution Amendment on gay marriage before he supported it?  From the guy who was for cutting Air Marshals from domestic flights before he opposed it?  From the guy who supported cutting combat pay and benefits for our troops before he opposed it?  From the guy who opposed firing Rumsfeld before he fired Rumsfeld?

I find it hard to believe that the ol' Straight Shooter, who says what he means and means what he says, would flip flop!

Maybe he really does mean what he says.  That would certainly explain the garbled, brain addled nonsense that comes out of his mouth on a regular basis.

After all, who can really say what a "peeance, freeance" Iraq actually is?

Maybe it looks exactly like the giant, fucked up, unfixable thing it is.

We Still Get To Keep Those $300 Checks, Though, Right?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- President Bush will soon seek about $100 billion in additional emergency funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a House report Wednesday…

In a broad report criticizing Republicans' fiscal decisions, Democratic staffers on the House Appropriations Committee and House Budget Committee also noted that Congress has already appropriated about $379 billion for the war in Iraq…

The emergency funds, which likely would be submitted by Bush to Congress in early February, would be in addition to $70 billion already approved for the two wars in the current fiscal year, which began October 1…

The $100 billion, if submitted and approved by Congress next year, would be in addition to the record $447 billion the Pentagon is receiving this fiscal year for all military operations.

A trillion dollars.  It's going to cost a trillion dollars.

And our new Saudi overlords are not going to pick up the tab.

Tell me that funny thing again about Republicans cutting our taxes.

I never get tired of that one.  It's a fucking hoot.

Time Flies When You Learn Slow

WASHINGTON - President Bush said Wednesday he would "not be rushed" into a decision on a strategy change for Iraq, saying that in a round of consultations he heard both some interesting ideas and some "ideas that would lead to defeat…"

Although the White House had initially suggested that Bush would deliver his speech on Iraq strategy before Christmas, he has decided to delay it until early next year.

Defending that decision, Bush said, "I will not be rushed into making a difficult decision ... a necessary decision."

Which is funny.  Because, as Senator Byrd pointed out in 2002, Bush rushed Congress into a difficult decision to authorize a war.

The Senate is rushing to vote on whether to declare war on Iraq without pausing to ask why. Why is war being dealt with not as a last resort but as a first resort? Why is Congress being pressured to act now, as of today, 33 days before a general election when a third of the Senate and the entire House of Representatives are in the final, highly politicized, weeks of election campaigns?

… 33 days until election day. Now we are being told that we must act immediately, before adjournment and before the elections. Why the rush?

And, in March of 2003, Bush rushed the United Nations and the world into a war.

THE PRESIDENT: Inspection teams do not need more time, or more personnel…

Anything that's debated must have resolution to this issue. It makes no sense to allow this issue to continue on and on, in the hopes that Saddam Hussein disarms…

So more time, more inspectors, more process, in our judgment, is not going to affect the peace of the world. So whatever is resolved is going to have some finality to it, so that Saddam Hussein will take us seriously.

And, in March of 2003, Bush rushed the American people into war.

(CBS) Americans continue to express patience with the pace of U.N. weapons inspections and want United Nations backing for any military action against Iraq. But that is not the approach they believe the Bush Administration is taking…

Americans are willing to wait for the support of the international community before taking military action. The public’s desire to secure U.N. approval for action remains strong…

The public also urges patience with the inspections process, as it has for months: 60% say give the inspectors more time right now…

Not only do most Americans want to wait for U.N. authorization, most also continue to believe the U.S. should take its allies’ views into account on the Iraq question…

That was a poll taken 13 days before Bush attacked Iraq.

Despite sixty percent of Americans saying we should not rush into a difficult decision.

And now, nearly four years later, Bush wants to take his time, he wants to weigh his options, he wants to listen to debate.  He's open to interesting ideas.

But he won't be rushed.

The time to not rush into an important decision was before he started a war.

After all this time, if Bush is forced to do anything, it's only rushed because he took four entire years to appreciate the disaster he rushed the American people into.

Pathetic

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah has warned Vice President Dick Cheney that Saudi Arabia would back the Sunnis if the United States pulls out of Iraq, according to a senior American official.

The official said the king "read the riot act" to the vice president when the two met last month in the Saudi capital, Riyadh…

Asked about the meeting, a senior Saudi official -- who spoke on condition he not be named -- ruled out using terminology such as "warning" or "threatening." He said, "I believe the Saudi position was clear, that things might deteriorate or drift in Iraq, and then the kingdom will find itself forced to interfere…"

The Saudi king told Cheney that his country would be forced to step in and support "like-minded Sunni Arabs" if the situation in Iraq fell apart and the Sunnis' safety was in jeopardy, the senior U.S. official said.

The monarch said he would "intervene aggressively on one side absent an American presence," the source said.

And all these right wing nuts blow a gasket over the United Nations...

The citizen soldiers of the greatest democracy in the history of the world, the citizen soldiers who once defeated Hitler, Mussolini, and Hirohito--at the same time--are now mercenaries for the Kingdom of Saud.

I love this new American Empire thing these Bush guys are doing.  They're making us all so proud.
 

So Much For The Experts

President Bush heard a blunt and dismal assessment of his handling of Iraq from a group of military experts yesterday, but the advisers shared the White House's skeptical view of the recommendations made last week by the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, sources said...

Well, "blunt and dismal" sounds good.  These days, with this administration, "blunt and dismal" are almost synonomous with honest.

But it's the experts thing that's kind of curious.  We hear a lot of experts, giving their expert opinion on Iraq.  But are they experts?  Because the Washington Post calls them experts?  Because Faux News calls them experts?

I don't know.

I do know that, if you walk into a court of law and want to give expert testimony, you have to prove to the court that there's some objective basis for believing that your opinion is more likely to be right than wrong.

Personally, I think that unless you stood up publicly, in the fall of 2002, and stated, without qualification, that invading Iraq was a bad idea, you're not a fucking expert.

But that's just me.

So what do the military experts say?

The group disagreed on the key issue of whether to send more troops to Iraq, with retired Gen. John M. Keane arguing that several thousand additional soldiers could be used to improve security in Baghdad, and others expressing doubt about that proposal, according to sources at the meeting. But the five agreed in telling Bush that the Army and Marine Corps both need to be bigger, and also need bigger budgets.

Of course!  It's ingenious!  Only military experts, who have spent their entire lives in our four hundred billion dollar a year military, who have extensive, lucrative, and often conflicting close personal and business relationships with the many companies who do hundreds of billions of dollars of business with our military, could all agree that, whatever else is unclear and debatable, one thing is certain:

The military needs a bigger budget.

The Bush catastrophes of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq--the catastrophes that at least a generation of Americans is going to have to spend blood and money to try to fix--were predicated by two dozen guys with box cutters.

Razor blades.  And plastic knives.

There is not now, nor has there ever been, one flimsy bit of evidence that spending more money on the most expensive military in the history of the universe would make one single American more safe from the "Islamofascist" threat of terrorism.

That is, after all, the whole point of terrorism--it's a way to attack countries without having to engage their militaries.

All I Really Needed To Know To Be Preznit, I Learned In Kindergarten

President Bush perusing his illustrated version of the bi-partisan Iraqi Study Group Report.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 10 — Nearly four years after the invasion of Iraq, the United States still does not understand the enemy that American troops are fighting, according to last week’s report by the Iraq Study Group…

Bureaucratic obstacles in the American government and a failure by the Bush administration to make the issue a top priority have left the United States with gaping holes in its understanding of the insurgency, the report found…

…“Congress has appropriated almost $2 billion this year for countermeasures to protect our troops in Iraq against improvised explosive devices, but the administration has not put forward a request to invest comparable resources in trying to understand the people who fabricate, plant and explode those devices.”

But Bush doesn't need to spend any money unnerstannin' these people!  Bush totally unnerstans 'em!  They hate us for our freedom!

For all of the time they spent learning about America's war in Iraq, the Iraq Study Group failed to study the war at its most critical level: that of the grunts. Nothing makes this clearer than the report's appendix, which lists scores of men and women interviewed for the report, but none below the rank of lieutenant colonel.

So, we don't understand who we're fighting and we don't understand how we're fighting who ever we're fighting, and we have no idea how we feel about whatever way we're fightiing who ever we're fighting.

Well, I'm glad we paid for that.

We should have this whole thing wrapped up by Christmas.

Stupidity Used To Justify Idiocy

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush on Monday opened three days of intensive consultations on Iraq, saying the United States and countries across the Middle East have a vital stake in helping the fragile government in Baghdad succeed…

"And the reason why that's vital," he said, "is because Iraq is a central component of defeating the extremists who want to establish safe haven in the Middle East, extremists who would use their safe haven from which to attack the United States."

Bush lets bin Laden go, pulls military and intelligence assets out of Afghanistan, declines to take out Zarqawi,  attacks a country that had no terrorists in it and nothing to do with September 11th, turns Iraq into a training ground for and net exporter of terrorists, invites the leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq to the White House for a little heart to heart about achieving "victory" in Iraq, and then tells the American people being in Iraq is vital to defeating extremists who want to establish a safe haven to attack the United States.

If we had never gone to Iraq, there'd be no terrorists in Iraq.  If we had never gone to Iraq, the extremist Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq wouldn't be the largest most powerful political bloc in Iraq.

If we had never gone to Iraq, and, instead, finished the job in Afghanistan, extremists and terrorists might never have established their own safe haven and "mini-state" from which to train to attack the United States.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Islamic militants are using a recent peace deal with the government to consolidate their hold in northern Pakistan, vastly expanding their training of suicide bombers and other recruits and fortifying alliances with Al Qaeda and foreign fighters, diplomats and intelligence officials from several nations say. The result, they say, is virtually a Taliban mini-state.

I've said it before, modern Gee Oh Pee foreign policy is like a Looney Tunes cartoon:

Probably the best way to illustrate "blowback" is the old Loony Toons cartoon where Porky Pig or Elmer Fudd or some damn cartoon character checks into a hotel. But he can't sleep because there's a mouse in his room, munching on a cracker. So he, whoever he is, calls the front desk and complains, and the front desk sends a cat to his room. The cat gets rid of the mouse, but then he can't sleep because the cat is meowing in the window. So he calls the front desk and the front desk sends a dog to his room. And the dog gets rid of the cat, but then whoever he is can't sleep because the dog is taking up the whole bed. So he calls the front desk and the front desk sends an elephant to his room to chase out the dog. But then he can't sleep because the elephant is taking up the whole room. So he calls the front desk and the front desk sends a mouse to scare off the elephant.

You don't believe me?

The links among the various groups date to the 1980s, when Arabs, Pakistanis and other Muslims joined Afghans in their fight to drive the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan, using a network of training camps and religious schools set up by the Pakistani intelligence agency and financed by the C.I.A. and Saudi Arabia.

The training continued with Pakistani and Qaeda support through the 1990s, and then moved into Afghanistan under the Taliban. It was during this time that Pakistanis became drawn into militancy in big numbers, fighting alongside the Taliban and hundreds of foreign fighters against the northern tribes of Afghanistan. Today the history of the region has come full circle.

Pakistan's punishment for training, aiding, and sheltering al Qaeda and the Taliban?  The Bush administration provides them with a three billion dollar military assistance loan.  But to make sure that doesn't upset the balance of power in the far East, the Gee Oh Pee provides India with a sweet deal for nuclear co-operation, as well. 

So now, we have to provide billions of dollars to Pakistan, the worst nuclear proliferator in the history of the world, to combat psychopathic extremists, which Pakistan, the United States, and Saudi Arabia trained, and which the United States let go, and which Pakistan now harbors.

And we have to provide nuclear co-operation with India to preserve its balance of power with Pakistan, since we just gave Pakistan three billion dollars worth of military aid.

And, we have to maintain an army of one hundred and forty thousand American troops in Iraq to defeat the terrorists and extremists our invasion turned loose after we let the Taliban and al-Qaeda slip into Pakistan so that we could invade Iraq.

Also, we might have to enlist the aid of Syria and Iran to defeat the extremists in Iraq, which, by the way, we also invaded to lessen the influence of Syria and Iran in the mid-east.

And if we don't continue thirty years of modern Gee Oh Pee foreign policy imbecility, if we don't now do what President Knucklehead says, something bad might happen.

I gotta tell you:  me, personally?  I'm willing to take that chance.

On The Upside

In the 110th Congress, the House Committee on Government Reform will be chaired by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA).

America's Greatest Congressman finally gets The Big Hammer.

He doesn't look like a bulldog for nuthin'.

Chaos Monkey Explodes Irony, Army

ANNISTON, Ala. -- Field upon field of more than 1,000 battered M1 tanks, howitzers and other armored vehicles sit amid weeds here at the 15,000-acre Anniston Army Depot -- the idle, hulking formations symbolic of an Army that is wearing out faster than it is being rebuilt.

The Army and Marine Corps have sunk more than 40 percent of their ground combat equipment into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to government data. An estimated $17 billion-plus worth of military equipment is destroyed or worn out each year, blasted by bombs, ground down by desert sand and used up to nine times the rate in times of peace…

The depletion of major equipment such as tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and especially helicopters and armored Humvees has left many military units in the United States without adequate training gear, officials say. Partly as a result of the shortages, many U.S. units are rated "unready" to deploy…

Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army's chief of staff, is lobbying hard for more money to repair what he calls the "holes" in his force, saying current war funding is inadequate to make the Army "well." Asked in a congressional hearing this past summer whether he was comfortable with the readiness levels of non-deployed Army units, Schoomaker replied: "No."

Lt. Col. Mike Johnson, a senior Army planner, said: "Before, if a unit was less than C-1," or fully ready, "someone would get fired." Now, he said, that is accepted as combat-zone rotations are sapping all units of gear and manpower.

Good Lord!  Less than C-1--"not ready"--is now the accepted level of Army units?  How many Army units?

Nobody knows!

The Army won't say exactly.  But they don't deny this:

WASHINGTON (AP) — More than two-thirds of the Army National Guard's 34 brigades are not combat ready due largely to vast equipment shortfalls that will take as much as $21 billion to correct, the top National Guard general said Tuesday.

Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum spoke to a group defense reporters after Army officials, analysts and members of Congress disclosed that two-thirds of the active Army's brigades are not ready for war…

One Army official acknowledged Tuesday that while all active Army units serving in the war zone are "100%" ready, the situation is not the same for those at home.

"In the continental United States, there are plenty of units that are rated at significantly less than a C-1 rating," said Lt. Col. Carl S. Ey…

Last week, several House Democrats said publicly that two-thirds of the Army brigades are rated not ready for combat, and Army officials have not disputed that figure. On Tuesday, Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn., also declined to be specific, but said the Army is "very much worse off" than it was in late 1999 when the military said two of the 10 Army divisions were ranked at the lowest readiness level, C-4. At the time, two divisions equaled six brigades.

Good Lord!  Two thirds of the National Guard--twenty one brigades--are "not ready"???  And as many as six army divisions--over thirty brigades--are "not ready".  "Plenty" of them are significantly lower than C-1???

When, in 1999, the military hating Clinton regime had only managed, in eight years, to degrade two of the Army's ten divisions to under C-4???

Why is that important?  Why bring up 1999? 

Because, in August of 2000, a little acorn of failure and irresponsibility was bullshitting himself into his place in the sun, where he could blossom--turd blossom, if you like--into a mighty Oak of Catastrophe and Stupidity.

And he did it with these words:

But instead of seizing this moment, the Clinton-Gore administration has squandered it. We have seen a steady erosion of American power and an unsteady exercise of American influence. Our military is low on parts, pay and morale. If called on by the commander-in-chief today, two entire divisions of the Army would have to report, "Not ready for duty, sir."

This administration had its moment, they had their chance, they have not led. We will.

Worst President ever.

Maybe worst American ever.

Has there ever been another President whose every publicly stated goal, policy, promise, or boast has exploded in their face like a trick cigar?

It's like if Lincoln had campaigned on theatre safety.  If Kennedy had promised a convertible in every garage.  If Bush Senior had said, "Read my lips--no new taxes!"

With Bush, it's like all that--and much, much more--all wrapped up in one single retina searing, galaxy exploding, stupid super irony nova.

If Vegas had a Bush spread, you could have bet against Bush every week for six years and walked away owning Vegas.

Starting with a dollar.