ROSS: President Bush has reassured Americans again and again:

GEORGE BUSH (video): It’s phone calls of known Al Qaeda suspects making a phone call into the United States.

KINNE: I would say that that is completely a lie — I would call it a lie — because we were definitely listening to Americans who had nothing to do with terrorism…

Glenn Greenwald calls this “the most unsurprising revelation imaginable.” With no oversight and no legal restrictions of any kind, it would be surprising if abuse of power was not taking place on a large scale within secret U.S. government surveillance programs.

Kinne said that “US military officers, American journalists and American aid workers were routinely intercepted and ‘collected on’ as they called their offices or homes in the United States.” She also said co-workers “were ordered to transcribe these calls.” The intercepted calls included highly personal and intimate conversations and even phone sex.

Greenwald points out that these abuses of power were not simply conducted by low-level employees on their own initiative, but were ordered by the highest levels of the NSA. Ultimately, lack of congressional oversight is to blame.

Congressional leaders in both parties — including those whose statutory duty was to compel compliance by the intelligence agencies with the law — were absolutely complicit in allowing all of this to happen. They knew for years that the Bush administration was breaking the law in spying on Americans without warrants and remained quiet and supportive. Then, this year, Congress — led by Jay Rockefeller and Jane Harman — acted to immunize the private telephone companies that broke the law by enabling this spying and to expand the President’s authority to eavesdrop on Americans without meaningful oversight.

What the Bush administration did in spying on Americans without warrants was a felony, punishable with a $10,000 fine and up to 5 years in prison for each offense.

UPDATE: Think Progress has several more quotes from President Bush lying about his illegal warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens.

UPDATE: Veterans who served overseas don’t think it’s funny that government operatives eavesdropped on their private phone conversations with wives and girlfriends.

The previous low point for Gallup’s measure of satisfaction had been 12%, recorded back in 1979, in the midst of rising prices and gas shortages when Jimmy Carter was president. Gallup has recorded a 14% satisfaction level at several points — once in the senior Bush’s administration in 1992, and several times earlier this year.

The reason for Americans’ extraordinarily low level of satisfaction is straightforward: the economy. Asked in the weekend Gallup Poll to name the most important problem facing the country today, almost 7 in 10 Americans mentioned some aspect of the economy, far ahead of any other problem mentioned.

UPDATE: The Gallup Poll also puts President Bush’s approval rating at an all-time low (for Gallup) of 25 percent. This puts Bush within the margin of error of the lowest presidential approval numbers in the history of polling. One Utah readers may recall that the ARG Poll recorded a 19 percent rating for Bush last February.

You see, Greg has a new take on the phrase: “Change We Can Believe In.” For Greg, the word “C.H.A.N.G.E.” provides a convenient acronym for:

Come Help A Nigger Get Elected.

While certain of our friends at 1U will do battle over Greg’s right to use the N-word where and how he pleases, in this instance, even our friends must agree and concede there are limits on free speech, as described here and here, for example.

What a LOSER! Worse yet, America loses when folks do not speak out over such an outrage.

Friends and McCain supporters?? What say you??

These bogus arguments are absurd but have to be addressed anyway, because as usual they are being repeated all over the place. I think it’s important to get the truth out before the Republicans re-write history. If they can disseminate their lies without contradiction this time, just wait until they get busy trying to blame Democrats for “losing” the unwinnable Iraq occupation.

Michael Ettlinger at the Center for American Progress summarizes the top three right-wing lies:

It’s the Fault of the Community Reinvestment Act

The Community Reinvestment Act is a law that was designed to end the practice of commercial banks of refusing to extend credit to entire, usually minority, neighborhoods—a practice called “redlining.” The CRA imposes a duty on banks to lend to borrowers in neighborhoods in which it takes deposits. The claim is that CRA forced banks into making foolish loans to risky borrowers. There are two fundamental problems with that claim:

• The CRA was passed in 1977—over 25 years before subprime loans came into vogue. So the timing is wrong.
• The CRA only covers commercial banks and savings-and-loan institutions—not other forms of mortgage-offering enterprises. Fact is, most subprime loans weren’t made by the lenders subject to CRA.

There has been much written proving CRA’s innocence in myriad ways (see links to additional resources at the end of this column). That, unfortunately, hasn’t stopped those who can’t face up to the facts from claiming, and claiming, and claiming that CRA is the root of it all.

It’s the fault of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are private institutions that were set up by Congress. Their primary job is to be a secondary market for mortgages. That is, a lender originates a mortgage and then sells it to Fannie or Freddie. The idea is that by providing a secondary market for mortgages, mortgage originators can originate more loans. They sell them, which gives them the capital to loan again. The essential claim of the ideologues is that these institutions led the way into the mortgage crisis by lending money to those who couldn’t afford it. They blame a law that requires Fannie and Freddie to support affordable housing and then jump to the fact that Fannie and Freddie ended up going bust and are now in conservatorship under the U.S. Treasury.

These facts do not, however, add up to any causal nexus with the mortgage crisis. This too has been rebutted thoroughly, but to touch on the most important points:

• Fannie and Freddie did not guarantee and securitize subprime loans. Such loans didn’t meet their conforming loan standards. In fact, as the subprime market was building, Fannie and Freddie lost market share because they were under stricter standards. Thus, their participation in the secondary market did not assist in the creation of the subprime market.
• It’s true, however, that Fannie and Freddie were damaged by the subprime crisis because everyone in the housing sector was damaged by falling home prices and, more significantly, the two companies branched out into a broader investment portfolio. In that portfolio were included mortgage-backed securities that hurt all of those who purchased them. Fannie and Freddie weren’t the biggest players in this and, most importantly, started this practice very late in the game. In fact, the subprime market had already started to go bad when they started their purchases (which speaks poorly for Fannie and Freddie’s decision making, but precludes them from responsibility for the crisis).
• Fannie and Freddie were supposed to be more closely supervised than other lenders—with their own regulator, which was supposed to keep a special eye on them because they are important institutions. Those regulators, who were part of the Bush administration, failed along with the rest of the Bush regulatory apparatus to stop the problem.

It’s the fault of immigrants

Finally, there’s this idea that it’s all the fault of illegal immigrants (Hispanic illegal immigrants to be specific). The Center’s David Abromowitz takes this one on deftly. The bottom line: Facts show that Hispanics received only about 20 percent of subprime loans. And, needless to say, most of them are not in the country without documentation.

Conclusion

I’d like to say “nice try” to those who are attempting to shift the blame for the mess we’re in to whatever programs, institutions, or people they find handy. But, really, they’re so far off the mark that one can’t even give them points for cleverness. All they have going for them is bombast– they say it confidently and often and hope it sticks even if it is dishonest. It would really serve the debate better for them to stick to their ideological guns. It would be an excellent time to have serious discussion over the appropriate level of supervision over the various markets that comprise our economy.

Check out Ettlinger’s complete post and his sources for more information.

What really happened: In the 1990s, after the Republicans took control of Congress, Senator Phil Gramm and an army of lobbyists were able to enact the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act which largely deregulated the banking industry and allowed banks to merge with securities firms. John McCain strongly supported and voted for the bill, which passed with a veto-proof majority. After that, Gramm slipped an amendment into an omnibus appropriations bill which deregulated the trading of financial instruments and allowed banks and brokers to trade mortgages as if they were stocks and bonds. Passed without any debate in either the House or Senate, this opened up the floodgates to massive trading of sub-prime mortgages.

More here: Foreclosure Phil. “Who’s to blame for the biggest financial catastrophe of our time? There are plenty of culprits, but one candidate for lead perp is former Senator Phil Gramm.”

Just to annoy jdberger, you can also refer to my One Utah post from last December: A Rising Tide Lifts All Yachts.

A nearly unanimous vote for Obama unapologetically called a “split” on FOX

“We are here to stand up for the unborn, to stand up against the dogs of hate who defend abortion on demand,” Wimmer said. [snip]
The supporters said the cost of the fight will not be an issue. Wimmer said that a group based out of Washington, D.C., which he would not identify, has committed to doing all of the legal work defending the bill for the state.

Cause, you know, that can’t turn out badly for Utah. **cough**Vouchers**cough**

What is Carl Wimmer smoking? “Dogs of hate who defend abortion on demand”? Is that some kind of free association quote from the AmTaliban Weekly Reader?

I stumbled upon this article and re-print it here. It is essentially one that I have been writing in my head for years. This one was published 2 weeks ago after Charlie Gibson, Palin interview.

 Michael Seitzman

Sarah Palin Naked

She said “nucular.” Twice.

I realized three things tonight. For one, if you are a McCain/Palin/Bush voter, you and I do not have a difference of opinion. We have a difference in brain power. Two, she really is as ignorant as I feared. And, three, she really is kinda hot. Basically, I want to have sex with her on my Barack Obama sheets while my wife reads aloud from the Constitution. (My wife is cool with this if I promise to “first wipe off Palin’s tranny makeup.” I married well.)

Now, I want to be clear and speak directly to those of you who LOVED that Palin interview. You’re an idiot. I mean that. This is not one of those cases where we’re going to agree to disagree. This isn’t one of those situations where we debate it passionately and then walk away thinking that the other guy is wrong but argued well. I’m not going to think of you as a thoughtful but misguided person with different ideas who still really cares about the country and the world. No, sorry, not this time. This time, if you watched that interview and weren’t scared out of your freakin’ mind, then you’re mentally ill, mentally disabled, or mentally disturbed. What you are NOT is responsible, informed, curious, thoughtful, mature, educated, empathetic, or remotely serious. I mean it.

But I like to think that anyone can change.

Stop voting for people you want to have a beer with. Stop voting for folksy. Stop voting for people who remind you of your neighbor. Stop voting for the ideologically intransigent, the staggeringly ignorant, and the blazingly incompetent.

Vote for someone smarter than you. Vote for someone who inspires you. Vote for someone who has not only traveled the world but who has also shown a deep understanding and compassion for it. The stakes are real and they’re terrifyingly high. This election matters. It matters. It really matters. Let me say that one more time. This. Really. Matters.

What the Democrats did: Went along with demands from Bush and the Republicans (not to mention a swarm of lobbyists) for a quick fix that would send the National Debt soaring to more than $11 trillion. All they asked was for 80 or so House GOP members to vote for it.

Apparently, that was too much to ask. Neither President Bush, nor Rep. Boehner, nor Senator John McCain could persuade members of their own party. The House of Representatives voted to kill the bill, 228 to 205. Even though the bailout was proposed by the Bush administration, 60% of Democrats in the House voted for this bill but only 33% of Republicans.

In an “oops” moment if there ever was one, McCain and his top aides rushed to take credit for the bailout compromise hours before the vote failed and stocks tanked.

Why did the GOP abandon Bush? It was clearly the fault of the Democrats…

House Republican Leader John Boehner said in a press conference, “I do believe that we could have gotten there today, had it not been for this partisan speech that the Speaker gave on the floor of the house. I mean, we were — we put everything we had into getting the votes to get there today, but the speaker had to give a partisan voice that poisoned our conference, caused a number of members who we thought we could get to go south.”

Matt Yglesias offers what I think is the real explanation for what happened:

The House conservatives …sank the plan by accident. They were trying to double-cross the Democrats. First, they wrung lots of concessions out of Democrats at the negotiating table as the price for delivering 80 votes. Then, by not delivering 80 votes and forcing Pelosi to pass the bill as a partisan Democratic bill, they were going to wage a demagogic anti-bailout campaign. But Pelosi refused to be played for a sucker and so the conservatives inadvertently sank a bill that, all evidence suggests, they actually wanted to pass. They just wanted to vote “no” on it for short-term political gain.

Judge for yourself. Speaker Pelosi’s speech is in the continuation of this post.

Here is the speech that allegedly caused Republicans to forget about solving the economic crisis because of hurt feelings…

Rep. Pelosi’s Remarks on Floor Ahead of House Bailout Vote

“Madam Speaker, when was the last time someone asked you for $700 billion?

It is a number that is staggering, but tells us only the costs of the Bush Administration’s failed economic policies–policies built on budgetary recklessness, on an anything goes mentality, with no regulation, no supervision, and no discipline in the system.

Democrats believe in the free market, which can and does create jobs, wealth, and capital, but left to its own devices it has created chaos.

That chaos is the dismal picture painted by Treasury Secretary Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke a week and a half ago in the Capitol.

As they pointed out, we confront a crisis of historic magnitude that has the ability to do serious injury not simply to our economy, but to the American people: not just to Wall Street, but to everyday Americans on Main Street.

It is our responsibility today, to help avert that catastrophic outcome.
Let us be clear: This is a crisis caused on Wall Street. But it is a crisis that reaches to Main Street in every city and town of the United States.

It is a crisis that freezes credit, causes families to lose their homes, cripples small businesses, and makes it harder to find jobs.

It is a crisis that never had to happen. It is now the duty of every Member of this body to recognize that the failure to act responsibly, with full protections for the American taxpayer, would compound the damage already done to the financial security of millions of American families.

Over the past several days, we have worked with our Republican colleagues to fashion an alternative to the original plan of the Bush Administration.

I must recognize the outstanding leadership provided by Chairman Barney Frank, whose enormous intellectual and strategic abilities have never before been so urgently needed, or so widely admired.

I also want to recognize Rahm Emanuel, who combined his deep knowledge of financial institutions with his pragmatic policy experience, to resolve key disagreements.

Secretary Paulson deserves credit for working day and night to help reach an agreement and for his flexibility in negotiating changes to his original proposal.

Democrats insisted that legislation responding to this crisis must protect the American people and Main Street from the meltdown on Wall Street.

The American people did not decide to dangerously weaken our regulatory and oversight policies. They did not make unwise and risky financial deals. They did not jeopardize the economic security of the nation. And they must not pay the cost of this emergency recovery and stabilization bill.

So we insisted that this bill contain several key provisions:

This legislation must contain independent and ongoing oversight to ensure that the recovery program is managed with full transparency and strict accountability.

The legislation must do everything possible to allow as many people to stay in their homes rather than face foreclosure.

The corporate CEOs whose companies will benefit from the public’s participation in this recovery must not benefit by exorbitant salaries and golden parachute retirement bonuses.

Our message to Wall Street is this: the party is over. The era of golden parachutes for high-flying Wall Street operators is over. No longer will the U.S. taxpayer bailout the recklessness of Wall Street.

The taxpayers who bear the risk in this recovery must share in the upside as the economy recovers.

And should this program not pay for itself, the financial institutions that benefited, not the taxpayers, must bear responsibility for making up the difference.

These were the Democratic demands to safeguard the American taxpayer, to help the economy recover, and to impose tough accountability as a central component of this recovery effort.

This legislation is not the end of congressional activity on this crisis. Over the course of the next few weeks, we will continue to hold investigative and oversight hearings to find out how the crisis developed, where mistakes were made, and how the recovery must be managed to protect the middle class and the American taxpayer.

With passage of this legislation today, we can begin the difficult job of turning our economy around, of helping those who depend on a growing economy and stable financial institutions for a secure retirement, for the education of their children, for jobs and small business credit.

Today we must act for those Americans, for Main Street, and we must act now, with the bipartisan spirit of cooperation which allowed us to fashion this legislation.

This not enough. We are also working to restore our nation’s economic strength by passing a new economic recovery stimulus package–a robust, job creating bill–that will help Americans struggling with high prices, get our economy back on track, and renew the American Dream.

Today, we will act to avert this crisis, but informed by our experience of the past eight years with the failed economic leadership that has left us left capable of meeting the challenges of the future.

We choose a different path. In the new year, with a new Congress and a new president, we will break free with a failed past and take America in a New Direction to a better future.”

From fifty-thousand feet all the way down to pebbles on the beach, the distribution of this anti-Muslim DVD on behalf of the Republican candidate for President evokes the Nazi rise to power.

photo credit: Kier42

From Chris Rodda. On Friday, September 26, the end of a week in which thousands of copies of Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West — the fear-mongering, anti-Muslim documentary being distributed by the millions in swing states via DVDs inserted in major newspapers and through the U.S. mail — were distributed by mail in Ohio, a "chemical irritant" was sprayed through a window of the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton, where 300 people were gathered for a Ramadan prayer service. The room that the chemical was sprayed into was the room where babies and children were being kept while their mothers were engaged in prayers. This, apparently, is what the scare tactic political campaigning of John McCain’s supporters has led to — Americans perpetrating a terrorist attack against innocent children on American soil.

My good friend Ken Bingham, is the kind of guy you want on your side in any battle. Unfortunately, he is on the ‘other’ side. But his disciplined and reliability in bringing us the latest right-wing canard hot off the starting line is appreciated and welcome.

This gem has spread like fire across the Internet. When I Googled this latest smear and found an unbelievably well coordinated attack well-underway across the Internet.

Led it would appear by Drudge, this drivel from one of the most hated Republican Governors in modern history (Matt Blunt -MO) is everywhere.

Follows is the REAL story for your consideration. Please spread it around.

Reprinted from:
Blunt, GOP say Obama ‘truth squad’ seeks to squash free speech with police power

Democrats: It’s a manufactured controversy

Chad Livengood •  clivengood at news-leader.com • September 27, 2008

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — Gov. Matt Blunt and Republicans are accusing Barack Obama’s campaign of assembling a “truth squad” with law enforcement officials to intimidate Obama critics from speaking out against the Democratic presidential candidate.

Yet a top Republican National Committee official admits the Democratic prosecutors from across Missouri “haven’t specifically said” they would use their prosecutorial powers on Obama’s behalf.

Using his taxpayer-funded press office to level a political attack, Blunt issued a statement Saturday to denounce the unproven allegations.

“What Senator Obama and his helpers are doing is scandalous beyond words, the party that claims to be the party of Thomas Jefferson is abusing the justice system and offices of public trust to silence political criticism with threats of prosecution and criminal punishment,” Blunt said in a written statement.

On Wednesday, Obama’s Missouri campaign announced U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill would lead a group of Democratic lawmakers, prosecutors and one sheriff “who will be proactive in letting voters in the Show-Me State know the truth in the face of the distortions by the McCain campaign,” according to a news release.

The group includes prosecutors from St. Louis, Dunklin, Lafayette, Cass, Clay, Ripley, Audrain and Jackson counties volunteering to be surrogates for Obama on their own time.

The Missouri Truth Squad will “respond quickly, forcefully, and aggressively when John McCain or his allies launch inaccurate claims or character attacks about Barack Obama, or when they distort Barack Obama’s record or plans.”

In a conference call Saturday with reporters from battleground states, Obama national campaign manager David Plouffe said those who spread lies and mistruths about the Illinois senator have to be “held accountable,” but did not elaborate how.

Despite having law enforcement officials on the truth squad, none of them have publicly said they will invoke their official powers to enforce facts about Obama’s record.

The controversy was sparked by a KMOV televion report featuring St. Louis County Attorney Bob McCulloch and St. Louis City Attorney Jennifer Joyce saying they would respond to paid advertising twisting Obama’s record (the story was picked up by influential right-wing blogger Matt Drudge).

They never said they would invoke their powers, but Republicans say just attaching their law enforcement titles to their names for political reasons gives off a perception of a police state.

“Enlisting Missouri law enforcement to intimidate people and kill free debate is reminiscent of the Sedition Acts - not a free society,” Blunt said in his 258-word statement.

Frank Donatelli, deputy chairman of the Republican National Committee, held a conference call with reporters Saturday morning while touring the state’s offices for GOP presidential candidate John McCain.

In a telephone interview with the News-Leader, Donatelli admitted the Democratic prosecutors “haven’t specifically said” they would use their prosecutorial powers on Obama’s behalf.

“I don’t think you have to use the power. I think if you just call out somebody and you have the power, you’ve made your point,” Donatelli told the News-Leader. “It’s not that you have to prosecute a guy, but people think you might.”

Donatelli said prosecutors don’t normally join campaign truth squads because their mere presence as a campaign attack dog “has a chilling affect on people’s rights of free speech.”

But a review of McCain’s own truth squads shows he has a district attorney from New Mexico and the South Carolina attorney general ready to respond to misleading ads from Obama and Democrats in their respective states.

Democrats maintain the GOP has twisted the context of a news report to manufacture this controversy.

“It is the height of absurdity that Governor Blunt would try to deceive voters about the role of respected Missourians across the state who want to see this election be about the truth, not false attacks like the ones we’ve seen today,” said Justin Hamilton, spokesman for Obama’s Missouri campaign. “It’s clear why Missouri voters are rejecting the kind of campaign that they’re running.”

In his statement, Blunt said Obama “needs to grow up.”

“Leftist blogs and others in the press constantly say false things about me and my family,” the governor said. “Usually, we ignore false and scurrilous accusations because the purveyors have no credibility. When necessary, we refute them."