Both Ears and The Tail

Watching the occupied White House use its power to abscond with public funds for taking a Grand Tour of the Middle East, with great emphasis on the family business ties to Saudi Arabia, frankly sickens. It is catastrophic that the dysfunctional revelers who sold a bill of goods to the voters and Supremes have detached themselves this totally from reality. That fur coat the cretin in chief took from the House of Saud is weirdly reminiscent of the traditional 'both ears and the tail' award at the end of a fox hunt.

The cost is undisclosed, but we have a good idea of how totally detached from paying its bills this war criminal bunch is, from watching the war debts mount.

A nice touch from BBC, their reporter has published his diary of the trip. I will feature a few choice excerpts here.

The logistics that go into a trip like this are phenomenal.

It cost a huge amount of money - the White House is reluctant to say how much, but it is in the millions of dollars.

George Bush clearly thinks it is worth it. He left this troubled land still talking of his confidence.

Now he has to get some of his Arab allies on side to enlist their help in persuading the Palestinians and the Israelis to move forward.
(snip)
He's hoping to encourage allies of his, like Kuwait, to have some contact at least with Israel. Even before we'd stepped off the plane Condoleezza Rice had said we shouldn't expect any developments on that, but she says there is progress.

And most Arab states like Kuwait will always find it an unreasonable demand to form any sort of tie with Israel, as long as Israel occupies Palestinian land.
(snip)
It's not just the Bush White House I'm learning about on this trip. It's also the American media machine.

The people who work alongside me in the radio reporting operation are all seasoned correspondents. One is a household name in the US after years of service and renowned journalism.

And yet they all spend most of the day filing the shortest of radio pieces. So short indeed that they call them "spots"!

Sometimes they get to do longer analysis, and their work is professional and of a high standard. But it seems their stations no longer want more than a few seconds of coverage.

Sen. Hillary Clinton's remarks at last night's debate reflect my opinion very well on the trip and its spectacle.

"President Bush is over in the Gulf now begging the Saudis and others to drop the price of oil," Clinton said. "How pathetic."

"We should have an energy policy right now, putting people to work in green collar jobs as a way to stave off the recession, moving us towards energy independence."

Never again.

Last night we had the pleasure of seeing Rep. Wexler introduce his resolution to start impeachment hearings against Vice President Cheney, a first step in getting the lawless element out of high offices of our government. Cheering him on, I hope.