There is one thing that conservatives and liberals have in common. No matter what’s wrong in this country, it is always the media’s fault.
And if the United States loses the war in Iraq, as it most likely will, the conservatives will blame the media.
Writes Max Boot in The Los Angeles Times:
As Rudy Giuliani prepares to run for president, it is increasingly clear he will have to revamp the global businesses that bear his name and link him to everything from jogger backpacks to nuclear power plants.
The former New York City mayor has created an exploratory committee to prepare to run for president next year, and aides concede that competing for the nation’s highest office will force major changes in how Giuliani handles his businesses.
“Obviously, there would have to be significant adjustments,” said his spokeswoman Sunny Mindel. She did not elaborate.
Nothing is as deceptively euphoric as Washington in full flower. And in the first days of 2007, the cherry trees, the Congress and the idiots of the nation’s capital were all blossoming.
We saw the blooming cherry trees — a result of botanical confusion that 70-degree winter days meant spring had sprung.
Former Rep. Harold Ford Jr. appears to be narrowing his career options, including a possible teaching post at Vanderbilt University and non-paid work with Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen.
Nationally, Ford has resumed his high-profile punditry on network and cable television, appearing Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” and Thursday on CNN’s coverage of the new session of Congress.
Ford isn’t commenting yet on what his plans are.
The Memphis Democrat ended his 10-year House tenure last week after losing Tennessee’s closest U.S. Senate race in decades to Republican Bob Corker Nov. 7.
By DOUG THOMPSON
President George W. Bush tonight will give the American people and the soldiers who serve our country the finger, choosing to ignore their will by sending more young men and women to die in his illegal, immoral and failing Iraq war.
Bush’s speech is an in-your-face rejection of the will of voters who in November tossed out the corrupt, rubber-stamp Republican-led Congress and made it clear they want a swift end to Bush’s Iraq debacle. It is a blatant “go to hell” to the American men and women who have died and will die because of his lunacy.
As public approval of his handling of the failed Iraq war continue to plummet, President Bush faces both a war weary nation and Democrats determined to stop him from sending thousands more Americans to Iraq. Fresh troops are to be in place within three weeks.
For a little over 20 minutes Wednesday night, Bush will try to rationalize why a gradual buildup of up to 22,000 additional U.S. troops, along with other steps expected to include pumping $1 billion into Iraq’s economy, is the answer for a civil war that has only gotten deadlier with no end in sight.
In remarks dripping with wit, sarcasm and the agenda of the Congress as it undertakes its promised 100 hours of marathon legislating, freshman Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., made his first official floor speech shortly after noon here Tuesday. The text follows:
“Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday, Jan. 8th, was the 72nd anniversary of the birth of the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, Elvis Presley. Elvis was a Memphian, a U.S. Army veteran, and an ambassador of goodwill throughout the world through his music and movies.
In his first hearing Wednesday as the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont plans to examine federal “data-mining” programs, the computerized hunt for terrorists that can implicate innocent people.
Consider the case of American Airlines pilot Kieran O’Dwyer of Pittsboro, N.C.
O’Dwyer said Tuesday that U.S. Customs agents detained him for 90 minutes in 2003 when he got off an international flight in New York, telling him his name matched one on a government terrorist watch list.
So much for the first 100 hours. The anti-terrorism measure sailed through the House faces a possible roadblock in the Senate where senators dont’ like its call for tougher screening for cargo aboard ships, a new way to divide federal security aid among states and other provisions.
A first wave of additional U.S. troops will go into Iraq before the end of the month under President Bush’s new war plan, a senior defense official said Tuesday. Congressional Democrats kept up their criticism of plans to add soldiers in the unpopular conflict.
Up to 20,000 troops will be put on alert and be prepared to deploy under the president’s plan, but the increase in forces on the ground will be gradual, said the official, who requested anonymity because the plans have not yet been announced.