This is how Tony Snow, Fox News guy and brand new White House mouthpiece, elegantly made Cheney into the victim after he shot a 78-year-old man in the face back in February. According to Snow, the real culprit was the Press:

"Political hacks and members of the press forgot the importance of behaving as human beings, rather than velociraptors. When people leap to exploit misery, they create sympathy for the miserable. Meanwhile, the news media must be careful not to become the Noise Media. In this case, some reporters, openly gleeful about Cheney's predicament, became unwittingly Shakespearean - fools telling tales, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"

When its not dealing with Cheney's drunken hunting accidents, the Bush Administration is finding other ways to shoot itself in the foot. Former foot-in-mouthpiece McClellan had said that anyone responsible for leaking classified information would "no longer work in this administration". When it turned out Bush was the one who authorized the leak, Bush was technically supposed to fire himself. Of course that didn't happen, although McClellan got the pink-slip. Now they need a new voice who won't make promises to the Press like that ever again. They need a devout Bushie who, rather than answering questions, will ask the Press Corps to look within and see who they really are: not defenders of freedom of speech, truth and democracy, but small, pack-hunting dinosaurs. Enter Tony Snow, or as Bush likes to call him: Antonio Nueves (I believe Bush was intending to say Antonio Nieve, or Tony Snow en espanol). Nonetheless, this Zorro-like defender of the Bush Adminstration and Fox News veteran should be prove to be an interesting Press Secretary. I just can't wait for someone else to get shot.

Scott McClellan announced today he is resigning as Press Secretary. Big whoop. It caused quite a stir. But McClellan was just a voice of the administration, not a key player. The real news was Karl Rove losing his policy advisor position. Sure, Karl is still sticking around the White House to do some midterm election skullduggery, but his time as Bush's Brain has come to an end. Last year, I met Rove at the Whole Foods in Tenleytown. Yes, Rove shops at the same place where liberal DC vegans buy their tofu (Whole Foods is a Texas-based company, and the CEO is no liberal, although he is a vegan). Anyways, Rove and I had a nice little chat. He eventually asked for the URL of my blog, which I wrote down for him, and then I immediately went home and wrote about how terrible he is for this country. A few days later, my blog mysteriously disappeared like a prisoner in the War on Terror. That is the "Mark of Rove". Whatever he touches, he destroys. Which is why it makes sense for Rove to focus on the midterm elections. Then he can continue planting fake documents and destroying careers like he did Dan Rather's. But Rove will no longer tell Bush what to think. That will be up entirely to Cheney now. It wasn't the explosive ending to Rove I had hoped for, but its quite momentous. Of course Rove wouldn't let the Press make a big deal of it. He knew McClellan's resignation would give him some cover. He is always thinking. That's why I love Karl Rove.

"The bearded man, wearing blue jeans and a white T-shirt that said 'God Bless America,' jumped the fence outside the White House and ran across the north lawn while repeatedly yelling, 'I am a victim of terrorism!'"

-Associated Press, 4/9/06



Is it safe to say Sean Hannity and Fox News are to blame for this?

"Let us stop, look and listen. Let us not give this president or any president unchecked power. Remember the Constitution"

-Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) on voting against authorizing the use of military force against Iraq in 2002

For every Democrat that voted against allowing Bush to invade Iraq, there were two that voted in favor of it. This was amazingly stupid. Bush would have gone to war regardless of how the Democrats voted, even if they stopped the resolution from passing. A vote in Congress was just another form of casualty insurance for Bush. Perhaps down the road, if things didn't go well in Iraq, he could always say to his critics: "But you voted for it". And sure enough, Bush filed such an insurance claim in a 2004 debate with John Kerry, as millions of Americans watched:

"What my opponent wants you to forget is that he voted to authorize the use of force"

Somehow the Democrats, especially Kerry, blew a historic chance to cash in on the Right's greatest failure: Iraq. Obviously, Democratic hawks like Zell Miller or Joseph Lieberman would have sided with Bush no matter what. But the rest of bunch, not just a few patriots such as Robert Byrd or Barbara Boxer, should have bought the Party some excellent "We told you so" coverage. But, alas, the Dems failed. Just like they believed the hype about WMDs being manipulated by the White House and its associates, the Democrats thought they would be punished by the public if they didn't vote in favor of war. That's like buying insurance for the event that something bad doesn't happen. Moronic logic. The Dems should have voted as a party to "stop, look and listen". All it would have taken was more votes like Robert Byrd's, and less like Kerry's or Tom Daschle's. Unfortunately the vote of a Byrd in hand wasn't worth two in a Bush's pocket.

"President Bush and Vice President Cheney sounded more presidential than their Democratic counterparts. Senator John F. Kerry seemed the most depressed or suicidal. And Kerry's running mate, Sen. John Edwards, sounded the most like a 'girly man'... Kerry's language also was most like that of a depressed person, followed by Edwards. Edwards also was the most likely to use feminine speech patterns and 'female' words (Bush was a close second), while Cheney sounded most like a man's man..."

-Washington Post's Richard Morin on analysis of speech patterns before the 2004 Election



Lesson for '08: It's not what you say, but how you say it. Americans don't actually listen to the words that come out of your mouth. Can you name one thing Kerry or Edwards said on the campaign trail? I really can't. If you want to win, don't make long-winded, detailed speeches in a soft-spoken manner. If you actually have something important to say, the point is lost to Americans. Plus, its depressing. The thought of listening to Kerry do a speech makes me want to aim a shotgun at my mouth and pull the trigger with my pinky-toe. And sounding like a pansy never works, especially when you are doing the Republican-lite thing. Just be a strong man (or woman) and stick to your guns, even if it means yelling at the top of your lungs. I still don't understand why Iowa didn't pick Howard Dean. He would have been better than the Ambiguously Gay Duo.

"Mr. Cheney wanted me to focus on the briefing, primarily about Iraq, and what our policy was toward Iraq, what our military analysis was, security analysis was, of Saddam Hussein at that time, and not to give a so-called around the world briefing, which is standard operating procedure for incoming presidents"

-Sec. of Defense William Cohen on Cheney's specific demands for briefing President Bush

Dick Cheney is a very particular person. He prefers his room to be exactly 68 degrees and the TV must be showing Fox News. Oh, and he likes to control what the President thinks and does. So when Bush was sworn into office in 2001, Cheney wanted the outgoing Secretary of Defense to tell him about one thing, and one thing only: Iraq. Apparently, Cheney was tailoring Bush to become obsessed with Iraq in the first few days of his presidency. Much like Mugatu took advantage of the intellectually-challenged Derek Zoolander, Dick Cheney encouraged Bush to invade Iraq from day one. By December of 2001, Bush was already planning to go to war. By January of 2003, the invasion date was penciled in. Diplomacy and UN resolutions? They were insurance in case the invasion didn't go as planned. When Bush said war was his "last choice, last option", he was lying.

The idea to invade Iraq came about in the late 90s, with the creation of the Project for a New American Century, of which Cheney is a founding member. PNAC had called for a preemptive US military attack on Iraq beginning in 1997. But it wasn't until 9 months after Bush's inauguration, with Cheney in control of the White House, PNAC hawks like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz in control of the Pentagon, and the events of 9/11 that made the dream became a reality. Even though Saddam had nothing to do with that day, two-thirds of Americans were convinced otherwise. Bush didn't even need to use the old "paint a plane blue, write UN on it, and let Saddam shoot it down" trick; most Americans supported a preemptive attack.

So what are the lessons we can learn from this? Why should we be concerned about how we got into Iraq? Iran is currently ignoring UN demands to halt enrichment of uranium, just test-fired a missile that can take out a US warship, and is basically pointing its middle-finger directly at the United States. To say that Dick Cheney isn't considering an attack on Iran would be naive. Seymour Hersh of the New Yorker believes a war has already begun. But besides the occasional threat, the administration and the pro-war media and think-tanks are relatively quiet on Iran. Surely, neocons like Cheney must be scrambling to come up with a plan of attack. Afterall, they only have so much time before Iran goes officially nuclear, or Bush's term runs out in 2008. Will Cheney attempt to strike Iran's underground bunkers spread across its vast terrain? In June, the Pentagon is testing a 700-ton bunker-buster bomb somewhere in Nevada. I imagine that will be pretty loud. Until then, the silence is deafening.

Britney Spears, represented in "Monument to Pro-Life: The Birth of Sean Preston", by Sculptor Daniel Edwards: