The Hedonistic Pleasureseeker

Read one of my previous Synthetic Armageddon posts, The Big Lie. Then write your own post, applying Hegelian Theory to the Killer Tomato Panic of Summer 2008. Come on, it’s fun!  And it’s so easy!

Few in the financial reporting business are willing to turn over the rocks that are Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, but they’re more than willing to whisper about them:

“Nothing in the insanity of the US mortgage morass epitomizes better the recklessness, risk acceptance, and criminality than Fannie Mae. It is also the object of intense, pervasive, systematic, and very deep crime syndicate activity, some linked to US Govt agencies. In my opinion, few have given serious consideration that Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac (F&F) must be bailed out, or else a large cast of ugly dangerous people will be exposed for two decades and hundreds of billion$ of fraud, theft, corruption, and crime syndicate activity. More can be said on this point, perhaps even touching past presidents. F&F cannot be liquidated with full disclosure and resolution of colossal criminal fraud.”

- Freebuck, via The Hat Trick Newsletter, via Gold Eagle Magazine

How interesting. World Reports says the exact same thing and worse, but I fear that if I even so much as link to the website that lays it all out I’ll put my blog in danger. Shortly after Buzzflash linked to the news of the bribes and death threats and the EMPTY retirement accounts at Freddy Mac, the site crashed. When Buzzflash was restored the link had disappeared, and I couldn’t even find it in the archives! All over the financial sectors of the internet there is buzz about fraud, but without much offered in the way of specifics. NOBODY IS TOUCHING THE STORY OF THE CENTURY.

Not that it matters: The blogosphere will ensure that matters take their due course. You can dig up the sordid details yourselves using some clever Boolean logic: Start with the author of this book. Add shadow banking terminology such s offshore, off balance sheet, ENRON, Freddie and Fannie, pension funds. Then, throw in a few terms typically associated with the Mafia (death threats, extortion, fraud), terms associated with espionage (global, intelligence, analysis) and the name of a certain media mogul.

OR, you can just assume that the F&F situation is ENRON Redux, only worse because the criminal betrayals are at INTERNATIONAL level this time. If you have friends or relatives who work at Freddie Mac you might want to clean out your guest rooms. Their retirement funds have all been stolen, and there is no point in trying to chase down the thieves: They are probably already drinking Mai Tais with Karl Rove and Ken Lay.

OKAY! The ROUNDUP!

The Bad News: We’re fucked.

The Good News: All this talk of bailing out Fannie and Freddie is probably all just empty rhetoric designed to prop up the markets.

The Bad News: Fannie and Freddie WILL fail, taking hundreds of failing banks with it.

The Good News: They were going to fail anyway, and at least our tax dollars weren’t wasted to buy time for a bunch of criminals.

The Bad News: We’re all fucked anyway.

(Jag-U-Are, Rich Bitch Collection)

Hey Guys! I need you to do a little creative visualization for a moment!

Imagine you have a wife who cheats on you constantly, steals all your stuff, won’t let you touch her, and then has the gall to demand maintenance pay. Wait! There’s more! You don’t even get to divorce the bitch. You have to stay married to her and continue to give her money while she continues to shag the pool boy, rob you blind and fuck you over. WHY? Because she’s become “accustomed to the lifestyle,” and the government treats your money as if a significant portion of it were hers.

How would that make you feel? Kinda bad, yes?

Ladies, you do the same, plugging in whatever gender works for you. I actually know a woman whose unemployed husband demanded a huge chunk of her 401K when they divorced. They got married, he quit his job, and then left the marriage a year and a half later with a significant portion of her stuff, because she made more money than he did, because the whole time he was watching soap operas at home. She’s a little bitter about that.

The present plan to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac? Yeah, it’s like THAT.

“A capitalist in need is a socialist indeed.”

Most of us are under the mistaken assumption that the United States of America is a capitalist democracy. Well, it’s not. It’s a corporate oligarchy, with capitalism for the poor and socialism for the rich. How does it work? Oh that’s easy:

When we - you and I - fuck up our business and our finances, the bankers and the corporations take our stuff.

BUT . . .

When BANKERS and CORPORATIONS fuck up THEIR businesses and THEIR finances, the bankers and the corporations still take our stuff!

It’s a great system, if you’re a central banker or a corporatist multi-billionaire. Remember the S&L Crisis? The Bush family made a whole pile of money with that scam. This is how the wealth transfer (from us to them) is to work, AGAIN, with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: The U.S. Government plans to buy a huge interest in these failing banks using OUR MONEY. Our parents’ money. Our children’s money. Our grandchildren’s money.

Imagine that they raided your bank accounts and used it to buy stock in ENRON a month before the company’s systemic collapse. Then Talking Heads on the boob tube said “ENRON is critical to the stability of our energy supply. It’s too big to fail.” You would have stormed the ENRON corporate offices to kick some corporatist ass. Am I right, or am I right?

Today we get some anti-bailout fussing from the smart people who know they’re about to get fleeced, AGAIN. Then George Bush insults us further by saying “This is not a bailout.”

[squinting] “You see, [muffled snicker] it’s not a bail-out, [inappropriate smirk] because although the public will assume their debt, [momentary confusion] they’ll remain private corporations. It’s a sell-out! [giddy pride] [poked in back] I mean, it’s definitely not a bail-out. [satisfied nod] Now watch this drive.”

I say let them ALL fail. These are privately owned banks. They made bad business decisions, so they deserve to fail. Their stock prices NEED to go down. The banks NEED to restructure, and the banking executives NEED to be punished for being a bunch of greedy criminals. THAT’s capitalism. THAT’S the “free market economy.” Perhaps the U.S. ought to try it sometime.

In the mean time, we get to support their lifestyles, and we don’t even get to divorce the bitches.

The notorious asshole Karl Rove, also known as “Bush’s Brain,” has been under pressure to testify in front of the House Judiciary Committee. Not surprisingly, he disappeared on the 10th for an unannounced “vacation.” He’s been located in Crimea, which has no extradition treaty with the U.S.

It figures. This is how they’ll all get away with it: Unannounced “vacations” to countries that don’t extradite. The Bush/Cheney henchmen were counting on pardons, but if Bush is impeached he won’t be able to issue any. The only way the U.S. will be able to keep the NeoCONS on campus, so to speak, is to ground all outgoing international flights until every last suspected war criminal is rounded up and “detained” in an “undisclosed location.” And we know THAT won’t happen.

I suppose the Bush/Cheney juntas have made SO many enemies that it’s only a matter of time before a family member of a tortured Abu Grahib “detainee” hunts ‘em down and shoots ‘em. I won’t cry.

H/T: The Zoo

UPDATE: The Lang Report has set up a “Karl Watch” vigil.

Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.

-Harry S. Truman

This week the traitors in Washington, also known as the U.S. Senate, sold out the Constitution again. Cowed by NeoCon scare tactics, with their pockets stuffed with wads of cash bribes campaign contributions from SPRINT, VERIZON and AT&T, the Senate passed FISA legislation undermining your Fourth Amendment right not to be subject to unwarranted search and/or seizure.

This is not a “compromise,” as some in Congress would have us believe. The only things they compromised are your personal privacy and your freedom.

(Check out the Billboard Liberation Front!)

The FISA Amendments Act allows for mass, untargeted and warrantless surveillance of all communications coming into and out of the United States. As an extra-special kick in the shorts, it hands immunity to telecommunication companies for their role in domestic spying. This means YOUR phone calls can be tapped and emails read for practically no reason at all, and there’s no chance to learn how the telecoms invaded your privacy after the fact.

Mark my words: Warrantless wiretapping is ALREADY being used to stifle dissent, blackmail politicians and destroy careers for partisan political purposes. And if you don’t think they’re reading your emails, and creating a comprehensive profile on you based upon what you write about yourself on your MySpace and Facebook pages, and especially your Plaxo profile, you have another thing coming. Are you a “Peace Mom?” Ever been to an anti-war or anti-globalization rally? There is an FBI case file on you.

In the days leading up to the House and Senate votes on the FISA bill the howling from American patriots and civil rights activists was louder than it had been in years. The Senators’ phones were ringing off the hook. Unfortunately, it was too late: The American public, Boobus Americanus, has remained parked on it’s sofa, remote in one hand and a soda in the other, for SO LONG, that once it occurred to the public that they were being spied upon Soviet-style it was too late to do anything about it. Congress had already been bought off by a bunch of paranoid, control freak plutocrats OVER A PERIOD OF DECADES, chipping away at the Constitution bit by little bit with laws and Executive Orders. Regardless, Boobus Americanus either stayed home on voting day or kept on electing it’s congresscritters over and over and over again.

Conservatives especially HATE the ACLU, turning the acronym into a synonym for traitor. What an asinine reversal. Sure the ACLU chooses some weird cases to fight, but they’re fighting on Constitutional principle, and they are doing it for YOUR SAKE. You snooze, you lose, folks. So NOW you care?

If this bugs you the way it bugs me, consider becoming an ACLU monthly donor, and stand up for your rights.This is why the ACLU challenged this unconstitutional law the moment President Bush signed it. If you’re a so-called “conservative” who EVER dissed the ACLU without understanding what it was all about, consider DOUBLING your donation as penance for being an IDIOT.

Boobus Americanus

(by Ed Griffin)

It’s more than mortal man can bear.

Those terrorists are everywhere:

on land and sea and in the air.

Network TV bill of fare

daily warns us to prepare

for bugs and bombs and poison air

and other things enough to scare

the bravest man to deep despair.

They hate our liberty, or so we’re told,

our way of life so uncontrolled,

our rich, our poor, our young, our old.

I guess their hatred just takes hold

and burrows in and makes them bold

enough to kill and die and spend their gold

and set in motion plans untold

to get us ALL . . . or so we’re told.

Seems strange to me they don’t resent

the other guys who represent

a way of life with free consent

or those who are benevolent.

The only ones they seem intent

to devastate to great extent

are those who’s aero-planes were sent

to bomb their homes with such torment.

Never mind, the war will stay.

We’re going to fight this all the way.

But there’s a price we have to pay

to keep the enemy at bay.

Let our leaders take away

our lives and liberty TODAY,

and then our fears will go away

that they’ll be lost some future day.

My phone is tapped. My mail is read.

They know the thoughts inside my head.

The money I deposited

is now reported to the Fed.

They chip my hand, dispense my bread.

I think they watch me go to bed.

I don’t object. I’m glad instead

to be controlled until I’m dead.

CHORUS

And so I very happily

let them take my liberty.

No matter what they do to me,

it’s all for my security.

You see, you see, you see?

I’m just as glad as I can be

to let them take my liberty.

No matter what they do to me,

it’s all for my security.

(Source: I thought this last image was from an article in Rolling Stone called “Fear Factor”), but I went back and it’s not there)

Moi, the Hedonistic Pleasureseeker, is fussy about my water.

I usually drink distilled water or spring/mineral water as I refuse to suffer the proven adverse mental health effects of fluoridated tap water. Yesterday I was overjoyed to discover that the township that I live in does not fluoridate it’s water supply. WOOT!!!

Unfortunately, between 60 and 70 percent of the country is not so fortunate. Americans are more likely to encounter fluoridated water in large towns and cities than in smaller, outlying townships. Since most of humanity clusters in urban areas guess what? Unless you take special efforts to remove the additives from your water you’re probably drinking crap, and a Brita filter won’t cut it, either. No matter what the ads tell you, the filters you buy at the store WILL NOT remove fluoride from your tap water.

So what’s wrong with fluoride? I’m glad that you asked.

Calcium fluoride is naturally present in some mineral waters and even some foods, but that’s not the chemical you should be worried about, because what’s being put in America’s water supplies is not calcium fluoride. Do a little digging and you’ll discover that it’s something much, much worse. In fact, the so-called “fluoride” being dumped in 60-70% of our drinking water is so poisonous that only a few parts per billion are apparently enough to lower our children’s IQs. Influential operatives sliming the corridors of power have known this all along, which TOTALLY pisses me off, SO . . . Full report after the jump, and it’s NOT a Hedonistic Pleasure.

(more…)

Stewart: Do you watch the news that we’re watching?

Logan: No

Stewart: In the United States? Do you see what we’re hearing about the war? So, we might actually know everything?

Logan: If I were to watch the news that you hear in the United States I’d just blow my brains out because it would drive me nuts.

(WILD APPLAUSE)

This is the interview that earned Lara Logan the relentless mainstream media smearfest taking place right now. “What? She’s not a virgin?” The douchebag media moguls are punishing her for telling the truth of how morally bankrupt we’ve ALL become, thanks to THEM. That’s right: Our shitty, treasonous, useless mainstream media. Logan called them out, and now she’s getting “the business.” Like we care about the sex lives of war correspondents; It was a freaking war zone for chrissakes.

Tonight on the way home from work I was listening to NPR (XM Radio) and they were gassing about how “awful” it was that the world of print media was disappearing. Here the MSM thought they had us all under control! Yet we just bypassed them by going to the internet. WAH. Well boo fucking hoo! The MSM assclowns have no one to blame but themselves. There will be a PARTY AT MY PLACE! if corporatist ass kissing newspapers begin to fall like dominoes and the “news” programs on television fade into irrelevance.

Now, pay attention: The Fourth Estate failed us by failing to hold our government accountable, so why are we giving them our money? When we all “switch to digital” next year, consider just letting your television go blank! Use it to watch DVDs instead, and get your news and entertainment from outlets that deserve your business. I’ll be canceling my cable this weekend, and I’ve already canceled the newspaper I’d only just begun to receive. Die, mainstream media motherfuckers, just DIE already. We won’t miss you.

(Yeah, I have PMS. Two senators got email from me today, but just wait until I get these media people on the phone! Some words just need to be spoken.)

NeoCons are more than just evil: They’re also a bunch of cowards.

Several alternative news sites, news aggregators and web logs critical of U.K., European, U.S. and Israeli governments are frequently hacked or victims of Denial-of-Service attacks. These onslaughts are so pervasive, large-scale and aggressive that they are likely financed by people with very deep pockets: Either the governments themselves, their private sector puppeteers, or their hired henchmen.

(What we call NeoCons here in the U.S. are called NeoLiberals in the U.K. I suppose that in this context “neo”= “new” = “has nothing to do with the original.” Basically, they are all frauds.)

In my opinion, frequent cyberattacks are a pretty good indicator that these news and opinion sites are telling the truth: Why else would such extreme efforts be put into shutting down the discourse or silencing free speech? What are the financiers of these hacking attempts afraid of?

Think about it: If the information posted at these alternative sites is misguided or incorrect, honest representatives of the blameless governmental body should counter with: “You are mistaken, here is the truth, and here are the links to our evidence.” Why? Because it’s the cheapest, most effective way to counter an unfavorable message with a better one. It takes an awful lot of money, time and people-power to just plain shut down the opposition.

Bottom line: NeoCon attempts to stifle alternative websites are pathetic and will fail in the long run. NeoCons may be evil, sneaky and rich, but they are outnumbered by regular folks hellbent on telling the truth.

The letter to America that can be read after the “jump” is written by bestselling author Congressman Paul. His latest book, The Revolution: A Manifesto, has been on the New York Times bestseller list for months without a peep from the mainstream media. Imagine how popular the book would be if the man got some press! I have the book; it’s blessedly concise (read: short), and it’s good.

From the Campaign for Liberty, SOMETHING BIG IS GOING ON. Dr. Paul has written another letter that lays it all out for us. There’s a big storm brewing and it’s a comin’ our way, and we will be faced with some important choices. What will we do? Will we:

1. Look to the governments and bank controllers of the world to “save” us (ahem: Hurricane Katrina anyone?)

OR

2. Put our OWN thinking caps on and get busy OURSELVES. Maybe authoritarian government, fiat money and centralized banking control weren’t such good ideas after all.

(more…)

(Fox News closes the barn door after the livestock escapes)

To find out what’s really going on in the economy, the LAST place you want to look is the mainstream news channels! Two places I like to visit are shadowstats.com to see how the U.S. Government “lies with statistics,” and the Daily Reckoning to laugh at the Mogambo Guru’s rants.

Here’s something interesting: Three market crashes, including the one we are presently suffering, superimposed. During the bubble periods shown here stocks rose more than 350% in 6 years. During the crash the market fell more than 50% in 3 years. After the crash markets were volatile for at least 10 years.

Barclays warns of a financial storm as Federal Reserve’s credibility crumbles

Last Updated: 12:01am BST 28/06/2008

Have your say Read comments

US central bank accused of unleashing an inflation shock that will rock financial markets, reports Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Barclays Capital has advised clients to batten down the hatches for a worldwide financial storm, warning that the US Federal Reserve has allowed the inflation genie out of the bottle and let its credibility fall “below zero”.

“We’re in a nasty environment,” said Tim Bond, the bank’s chief equity strategist. “There is an inflation shock underway. This is going to be very negative for financial assets. We are going into tortoise mood and are retreating into our shell. Investors will do well if they can preserve their wealth.”

Barclays Capital said in its closely-watched Global Outlook that US headline inflation would hit 5.5pc by August and the Fed will have to raise interest rates six times by the end of next year to prevent a wage-spiral. If it hesitates, the bond markets will take matters into their own hands. “This is the first test for central banks in 30 years and they have fluffed it. They have zero credibility, and the Fed is negative if that’s possible. It has lost all credibility,” said Mr Bond.

RBS issues global crash alert

Read more by Ambrose Evans Pritchard

(more…)

(For more iron designs visit What We Have Wrought)

I am so sorry that one mentally ill obsessive has managed to ruin the comments section of my blog. Obviously the man is incapable of self management, and I am bloody sick of policing him, so I’m shutting down the comments section until further notice. Apologies all around, but the gate is closed. Maybe I’ll stop by your pad instead.

(Priceless: A creative and entertaining protest at a Halliburton shareholders meeting, the year Halliburton moved it’s headquarters to Dubai. Great soundtrack!)

UPDATE!!!  The military activity may have been no more than dickwaving during a highly tense day when the Bush/Cheney/Clinton crime family was caught raiding the cookie jar (at a bank in Ireland), and subsequently forced to give up their Bad Man Ways.  Whatever happened that day appears to have triggered the massive international settlement process that’s been dragging ass for decades.  From World Reports: 

SETTLEMENT PROCESS TRIGGERED BY LAST WEEK’S EVENTS
BRUSSELS, 24th June: The ‘happenings’ that took place during the week ending 20th June 2008 finally triggered the Settlements payment process. They also reconfirmed that Bush, Cheney and the other criminalist operatives never had the slightest intention of paying out a single cent, while at the same time raiding the funds as often as they could for self-enrichment purposes, to restore the Bush Crime Family’s decimated finances, and to sustain the spigot that is used to finance the World Revolution, and the secret financing of the world governance structures, and to finance the secret projects of the US Intelligence and Military Power apparats, as well as covert operations in Iraq and elsewhere by the oil corporations and their associates.The most senior tier of payments, to the 160 countries, was completed on Saturday 21st June 2008. On Tuesday 24th June, a certain ‘licensed’ US information source mentioned that money was being pulled out of banks in New York City. Specifically, Wayne Madsen reported:

‘[Our] United Nations sources report that there has been a sudden rush in requests for foreign exchange wire transfer requests from the New York City banks’.'The sudden demand for transferring funds abroad has resulted in a 24-hour to 48-hour processing delay due to the sheer volume of requests’.

‘Foreign employees at the United Nations are transferring their money from accounts at the United Nations Federal Credit Union (UNFCU) and other New York City banks, both domestic and foreign-owned, and the move has been sudden’.

‘There has been no explanation for the sudden wire transfer activity, although the [US] rumor mill suggests fears of a sudden economic collapse and/or a US and Israeli military attack on Iran, which could touch off a wider regional conflict’.

The rumour mill was talking rubbish, illustrating how crass and inaccurate it usually is. The reason for the sudden surge in requests for foreign exchange wire transfer requests was that the country payees had at long last received their payments and were now transferring their funds out to their respective governments and central banks.

Is this GOOD news?  Well, it is good for people in 160 countries! Other payments to the aggrieved are being paid out of these 160 new accounts, so the U.S. will also be effected. Some of these settlements go back to the U.S. Farm Claims lawsuits, back in the 80’s.  I know nothing about the matter I was just a kid back then . . .

*****************************

Well! I guess I need to start a new category, since there seems to be a lot of this going on: From behind the Wayne Madsen Report subscription wall, United Nations sources are reporting a sudden rush in requests for foreign exchange wire transfers out of New York City banks. The move is sudden and without explanation.

Are mass transatlantic flights out of the U.S. next? What’s about to hit the fan?

Things that make you go HMMMMMMMM. Last year I moved Bunny’s college fund into gold and silver, and my own retirement account into international stocks, because I knew “it” - whatever “it” was - was going to hit the fan eventually. It’s a wonder our Corporatist Overlords managed to kick-the-can down the road for this long.

Bets, anyone? Stock market crash, false flag terrorist attack on “Das Homeland,” (wince) war, or both? For what it’s worth, Wall Street has been buzzing ALL DAY about an Israeli attack on Iran, which IMHO would be a colossally STUPID thing to do. Why? Because Russia will come to Iran’s defense, and then the U.S. will come to Israel’s defense, and then - BLAMMO! Bye bye Tel Aviv, bye bye Fifth Fleet, bye bye American soldiers in Iraq, bye bye what’s left of our civil liberties and our prosperity.

UPDATE: Ham radio operators worldwide were picking up extremely high level encrypted military transmissions from the U.S. and Soviet controlled territories last Friday. Reportedly things have settled down, so . . . ? Why the U.N. bank run now?

Sitting ducks. All of us, everywhere in the world, but what can we do? Let us pray that it’s a false alarm, get drunk, screw, and listen to the Steve Miller Band. Hit it!

(Steve Miller, “Take the Money and Run”)

Overstock CEO offers $75,000 for Wall Street’s soul

(HPS Note: The original article was found at the UK Register. How interesting: It’s written by a dude who lives in San Diego.)

Posted Jun 23, 2008 08:25 PM PST AT WHAT REALLY HAPPENED
Category: COVER-UP/DECEPTIONS
Category: ECONOMY

(I don’t have my pre-Zoloft body back yet, but I’m about half way there)

It’s been a rough few days for me, and I’m baffled.

I have Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and Premenstrual Dysphoria Disorder (PMDD), so one would think I’d be super upbeat and happy this week. It’s the height of summer, and I just got my period, so why do I just want to curl up into a little ball and cry? I don’t get it.

Or, maybe I do get it. I’m lonely, DUH. My schizoid tendencies, combined with a heavy college course load, make the Hedonistic Pleasureseeker a dull, dull, DULL girl. It’s summer and I have nobody to play with. My sex life is sporadic at best and my love life is nonexistent. By choice, mind you. By choice. I think. Maybe not. I’m confused.

I’ve put myself back on the Wellbutrin to kick my initiative in the pants. I REALLY don’t want to experience the adverse side effects of Zoloft again, and so long as I’m not thinking about offing myself I don’t believe I need to. There are other things I want to try first, such as aerobic exercise, and wake therapy, both of which have been proven to have a positive effect on mood.

I have so much school work that Wake Therapy is going to come in handy. It’s 4:00 am, so I might as begin now.

In case some of you are too young to remember what Herbert Hoover’s FBI did back-in-the-day:

(1) Developed 500,000 domestic intelligence files on citizens,

(2) Assisted CIA in opening and photographing at least 250,000 first class letters and producing a computerized index of nearly 1.5 million names,

(3) Opened and photographed 130,000 first-class letters in eight cities,

(4) Assisted National Security Agency in obtaining millions of private telegrams under a secret arrangement with three telegraph companies,

(5) Forced Internal Revenue Service to develop 11,000 files on “political enemies”,

(6) Prepared a list of 26,000 people to be rounded up in case of a “national emergency”,

(7) Assisted Army in preparing intelligence files on an estimated 100,000 Americans

. . . and the list goes on. Are we having FUN YET?

Obama’s support for the FISA “compromise”

Glenn Greenwald

Saturday June 21, 2008 09:53 EDT

In the past 24 hours, specifically beginning with the moment Barack Obama announced that he now supports the Cheney/Rockefeller/Hoyer House bill, there have magically arisen — in places where one would never have expected to find them — all sorts of claims about why this FISA “compromise” isn’t really so bad after all. People who spent the week railing against Steny Hoyer as an evil, craven enabler of the Bush administration — or who spent the last several months identically railing against Jay Rockefeller — suddenly changed their minds completely when Barack Obama announced that he would do the same thing as they did. What had been a vicious assault on our Constitution, and corrupt complicity to conceal Bush lawbreaking, magically and instantaneously transformed into a perfectly understandable position, even a shrewd and commendable decision, that we should not only accept, but be grateful for as undertaken by Obama for our Own Good.

Accompanying those claims are a whole array of factually false statements about the bill, deployed in service of defending Obama’s indefensible — and deeply unprincipled — support for this “compromise” . . .

(more)

Glenn Greenwald’s Unclaimed Territory

Glenn Greenwald was once a constitutional law and civil rights litigator in New York. He is the author of two New York Times Bestselling books: “How Would a Patriot Act?” (May, 2006), a critique of the Bush administration’s use of executive power, and “A Tragic Legacy” (June, 2007), which examines the Bush legacy. His most recent book, “Great American Hypocrites”, examines the manipulative electoral tactics used by the GOP and propagated by the establishment press, and was released in April, 2008, by Random House/Crown.