Sadly, the Bush Legacy lives on...BP, Pentagon-gate, overpaid corrupt officials

Just from a few items reported in the LA Times today...it appears that the Bush Legacy just keeps on giving:

1. PENTAGON ACCOUNTING. The Defense Department has never accounted for billions of dollars given to and entrusted to it. The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction was created in 2004 to oversee $53 billion appropriated by Congress for reconstruction. For the most part, there are no records, and billions have not been accounted for at all.

2. CITY OF BELL. The Mayor, Manager, and Council of a charter city were exposed for giving themselves high salaries and benefits, while cutting back services and depleting municipal resources to do it: $787,637 to Robert Rizzo as City Manager, $457,000 to Randy Adams as Police Chief, etc. Documents show that the employment records go back to 2003 when the wholesale looting began.

3. BLAGOJEVICH. The trial of this former Governor of Illinois is concluding. Among other evidence was the $12,000/month income for his wife who performed no services and had no qualifications for a real estate firm, Rezko.

4. WIKILEAKS re Afghanistan War. New documents have been outed from the secrecy under which they had been wrapped which "offer insight primarily into the war-fighting of the recently departed George W. Bush administration". [A10] The document reveal the deliberate killing of two Reuters journalists in July 2007 , and the absence of any leadership from the Bush administration. Any. Basically the documents reveal the fact that what administrative officials were telling us was pure fabrication. The troops on the ground were not trained for what conditions they found, and the mission was compromised from the beginning.

5. LEVERAGED BUYOUT OF TRIBUNE. The court-appointed examiner in the Chicago Tribune's bankruptcy determined that the 2007 leveraged buy-out was marred by the "dishonesty" of its senior management--to the extent that the $8.2 billion transaction was a fraudulent conveyance [AA2].

UPDATES:

6. ARLINGTON CEMETERY. During the 8 years of Bush appointees "taking charge" of the government which they openly despised, the displacement of remains and records at Arlington occurred. Over 6000 are in disarray. No one is being held accountable, but even worse, it is astonishing to see that the appointees who were paid to be responsible have such little honor that they do not step forward, take responsibility, and devote themselves to correction of this sad state.

7. SPILLED OIL. Not just the spill in the Gulf, but simultaneously, there have been spills in Alaska, and even in the Great Lakes region. The scale of this depredation is significant, but it pales in significance to the scale of the ignorance, incompetence, and mindless denials of the Bush-Cheney-Rowe appointees and the Limbaugh-Breitbart-Fox network of idiologues who continue to rant with such indifference to science, honor, responsibility, and recovery.


Once the Government is dismantled and its positions filled with blind idiots, the predators come out of the bushes and actively destroy what is left. The destruction is far worse than mere entropic neglect -- it is pillage driven by the open invitation for spoil. After 8 years of irresponsible authorities, society now pays the price.

The Invasion of Iraq - Clear Error; an equipoise of Idiocy

There is a part of me still carrying DE OPPRESSO LIBER in my pocket. This is not only to honor my Green Beret brother, Hayden, but also because I know there are many victims of tyranny whose only hope is that someone will SHOOT the tyrant. There is no "dialogue" of words which a tyrant can understand. Tyranny is all about Power. Getting physical. That is the only language which tyrants speak.

So many of us were openly in favor of invading Iraq after 9/11. We were told, by the Bush Administration, that it was an appropriate action to take. We were dealing with a tyrant who was oppressing the people of Iraq, and he had clearly telegraphed his intentions to extort wealth from others. Thus, the Bush "rationale" appeared to be plausible.

It is now time to be Real Clear about Why the invasion of Iraq was exactly the Wrong Thing to do.

Those of us who thought that the President of the United States had a Plan and was surrounded by intelligent people who could understand Public Policy, were not only misled by the express lies of President Bush, but also by our own assumptions. But our assumptions were informed by the lies. For this, the Administration is quadruply responsible -- they were idiots (making decisions without information), they held Public Office only to benefiting themselves (in the actions and failures to act), they made us believe a "scapegoat" was the danger, and they lied to us.

Our knowledge that we are in dire straights and in danger is continually corroborated . Now add to this, the knowledge that our Administration is not going to help, is not capable of helping, and cannot "understand" the concept of Public Good. We are in REAL danger.

The only thing that "saves" us is the fact that virtually all the so-called "Terrorists" coming out of the so-called "Islamic tradition", are ALSO idiots. They are not "real" Terrorists -- most of these losers could not terrorize a nursery school. They are incapable of fighting and so they resort to blowing up unarmed civilians and children, in their own villages. They should not be elevated by comparison with real warriors -- for example, the American Indians on their Warpaths, the kidnapped Unitarian children in the Janissary cavalry of the Ottoman Empire, the Bedouin raiders, the Roman Infantry.

Iraqis are a brave people. Many are warriors. Real warriors have a distaste for arbitrary killing of unarmed women and children -- it is not honorable, it is a perversion of battle -- marketplace bombings are not worthy of a plan, monuments will not be built in commemoration of perverts and cowards. A bombing of a Mosque during prayers is not something a "believer" could do. It almost defines "idiot" -- sort of equivalent to the bombing of Saddam Hussein's palaces by Bush, who destroyed the country he was invading.

So what we have, what we end up pinning our hopes on, is the equipoise of idiocy. We who are caught between idiots, are only saved by the fact that on both sides the perpetrators of idiocy are hag-ridden by their own ignorance, incompetence, and wild devotion to blaming others. Their attention seems to drift except when finding fault. Whether it is Bush, or Bin Laden, or their utterly depraved minions, the only thing they seem to accomplish is blame. What are they capable of building?

IRAQ and a Hard Place

Raid Juhi, chief investigative judge for the Iraqi court now trying Mr. Hussein in another case, said during a visit here on Saturday that the court had documentary evidence, and statements from witnesses, showing that at least 100,000 Shiites, and possibly 180,000, died in the 1991 repression.

OBSERVATION:

"possibly 180,000"???? In a period of months? Give or take 80,000?

Chorus of Hebrew Slaves (from Nabuco)

Chorus of Hebrew Slaves (from Nabuco) by Giuseppi Verdi. First performed at La Scala in 1842, overwhelming success. Made Verdi a reknowned figure, and the strong simple melody in choral unison, became the unofficial anthem of Italy’s liberation movement – a coded statement of defiance.

Text, evocative of Psalm 137 ("by the waters of Babylon")
by Temistocle Solera:


Va, pensiero, sull’a li dorate;
Va, ti posa sui clivi, sui colli,
Oveolezzano tepidee molli
L’aure dolci del suolo natal!


Journey homeward, desires of our nation;
Tell the hills, tell the dales of our yearning,
That with you we may all be returning
To the land of our fathers so dear

Del Giordano le reive saluta,
Di Sionne le torri atterrate...
Oh mia patria si bellae perduta!
Oh membranza si cara e fatal!

Greet the Jordan, the Lord’s sacred river,
Greet the ruins of once mighty Zion...
May we keep their rememberance forever
In the grief of our banishment here!


Arpa d’or dei fatidici vati,
Perche muta dal salice pendi?
Le memorie nel petto racendi,
Ci favella del tempo che fu!

Golden harps of the prophets and sages,
Now you hang from the willows beside us.*
Play in the memory of joys long denied us
As we tell of the times that are gone.

O simile di solima ai fati
Traggi un suono di crudo lamento,
O t’ispiri il Signore un concento
Che ne infonda al patire virtu,
Che ne infonda al patire virtu!
Al patire virtu!

Like an echo of far distant ages,
Sing of sorrow, of pain unrelenting.
God above if you hear our lamenting,
Raise our hearts and in faith make them strong.

__________________

Cf. Blake, drew/painted instruments in the trees.