Khalid Sheik Mohammed confesses to 9/11...

...in a military tribunal court at Guantonamo Bay.

Here is a little of what he had to say (from the AP):

"I was responsible for the 9/11 operation from A to Z," Mohammed said in a statement read Saturday during a Combatant Status Review Tribunal at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Mohammed's confession was read by a member of the U.S. military who is serving as his personal representative.

The Pentagon released a 26-page transcript of the closed-door proceedings on Wednesday night. Some material was omitted, and it wasn't possible to immediately confirm details. The document refers to locations for which the United States and other nations have issued terrorism warnings based on what they deemed credible threats from 1993 to the present.

...In laying out his role in 31 attacks, his words drew al-Qaida closer to plots of the early 1990s than the group has previously been linked, including the 1993 World Trade Center truck bombing in which six people died.

Six people with links to global terror networks were convicted in federal court and sentenced to life in prison for that attack.

Mohammed made clear that al-Qaida wanted to down a second trans-Atlantic aircraft during would-be shoe bomber Richard Reid's operation.

And he confessed to the beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in a section of the statement that was excised from the public document, The Associated Press has learned. Pearl was abducted in January 2002 in Pakistan while researching a story on Islamic militancy. Mohammed has long been a suspect in the slaying, which was captured on video.

And we are supposed to believe everything this man says after years of imprisonment and being held by the CIA? This admission means nothing, because A) introduced in a "court" that allows no press or independent observers B) he was held for three years in secret prisons by the CIA.

We must ask ourselves (especially the fuckin' press who never gets it) if we can really accept this admission considering the circumstances. We have no idea when it was given and under what conditions. For all we know this man just simply wants it to end and this is his way out. Confess to everything.

"Daniel Pearl, oh yeah that was me. You know that crazy guy who scared you shitless last week when you were flying? I secretly communicated with him to say his Islamic prayers to keep you in fear. I instructed him though not take out his bottle of "mouthwash" and blow up the plane though. That's for next time."

Bottomline: This whole process has no credibiity, not when it is a process that has been set up by the Bush Administration and not when this was in CIA secret prisons and all of this with the knowledge of what we know now. It is what Americans who have opposed Bush for years now have been saying. We have a crisis of confidence.

A Creation in His Own Image: Ths U.S. Justice Department

President Bush is unfortunately a transformative figure, in the worst corrupt and villianous way. From Supreme Court to foreign policy to democracy to justice. The latest breaking news is that the White House IS deeply involved with the firing of 8 federal prosecutors, released because of "performance issues". Though Dems are fuckin' up when it comes to stopping our bloody world messes, they at least know a good Washington scandal when they smell one.

This has all the makings of classic corruption. Releasing prosecutors who serve at the pleasure of the president, moves to replace them with cronies who will do White House bidding to attack opposition party across the country, it has it all. One can only imagine that in the 5 years previous to this, that we would never get a full public airing of the issues around this case.

The Administration acts like this is business as usual for presidential politics. Sure it is, when you're a corrupt and dictatorial leader whose version of justice is whatever consolidates your ever-growing power. Here's the truly disturbing item that is included in today's NYT:

In early 2005, Harriet E. Miers, then the White House legal counsel, asked a Justice Department official whether it would be feasible to replace all United States attorneys when their four-year terms expired, according to the Justice Department. The proposal came as the administration was considering which political appointees to replace in the second term, Ms. Perino said.

Ms. Miers sent her query to D. Kyle Sampson, a top aide to Mr. Gonzales, the Justice officials said. Mr. Sampson, who resigned Monday, replied that filling so many jobs at once would overtax the department. He suggested replacing a smaller group, according to e-mail messages and other memorandums compiled by the Justice Department.

Karl Rove, the senior White House adviser, also had rejected the idea of replacing all the prosecutors, Ms. Perino said. But as Ms. Miers worked with Mr. Sampson on devising a list of attorneys to oust, Mr. Rove relayed to her complaints he had received that the Justice Department was not moving aggressively on voter fraud cases.

(Emphasis mine)

They wanted to replace every federal prosecutor with a subservient sycophant hack who will protect the president and do his bidding. This amounts to political thuggery, putting your people in every corridor of justice and corrput it with its vile stench.

Friends and reasoned opponents, we face the most legitimate threat to our country's unity and the sovereignty of its citizens than since the days when brothers took up arms against one another.

Is it enough to simply understand the facts? We must take the action we must to give our cowardly members of Congress some ounce of courage. Something they will not lack when they understand that they stand not alone. And they will find it deep within themselves to speak to this vicious power lest they be implicit in this corruption.

Dems are weak... not on war but resisting it.

In the face of Intimidation, Democrats wilt

If you want the weakness narrative to continue, repeatedly do this. Over and Over again, how many more times will Democrats betray America's trust?

Top House Democrats retreated Monday from an attempt to limit President Bush's authority for taking military action against Iran as the leadership concentrated on a looming confrontation with the White House over the Iraq war.

Officials said Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other members of the leadership had decided to strip from a major military spending bill a requirement for Bush to gain approval from Congress before moving against Iran.

Conservative Democrats as well as lawmakers concerned about the possible impact on Israel had argued for the change in strategy.

The developments occurred as Democrats pointed toward an initial test vote in the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday on the overall bill, which would require the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by Sept. 1, 2008, if not earlier. The measure provides nearly $100 billion to pay for fighting in two wars, and includes more money than the president requested for operations in Afghanistan and what Democrats called training and equipment shortages.

The White House has issued a veto threat against the bill, and Vice President Dick Cheney attacked its supporters in a speech, declaring they "are telling the enemy simply to watch the clock and wait us out."

Americans voted Democrats in to check Bush and now they renege on their trust. I can only think of Bush leaving religious conservatives behind after '04 as the worst political betrayal, but then again he got them closer to a Supreme Court than Dems appear willing to do with Iraq and the Middle East. Their failures are coming through on many points like minimum wage.

It is hard to contain the sweeping rage to see fear and weakness motivate our actions. America will soon feel the same way.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in a statement that America was less safe today because of the war. The president "must change course, and it's time for the Senate to demand he do it," he added.

The Iran-related proposal stemmed from a desire to make sure Bush did not launch an attack without going to Congress for approval, but drew opposition from numerous members of the rank and file in a series of closed-door sessions last week.

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said in an interview there is widespread fear in Israel about Iran, which is believed to be seeking nuclear weapons and has expressed unremitting hostility about the Jewish state.

"It would take away perhaps the most important negotiating tool that the U.S. has when it comes to Iran," she said of the now-abandoned provision.

"I didn't think it was a very wise idea to take things off the table if you're trying to get people to modify their behavior and normalize it in a civilized way," said Rep. Gary Ackerman of New York.

Several officials said there was widespread opposition to the proposal at a closed-door meeting last week of conservative and moderate Democrats, who said they feared tying the hands of the administration when dealing with an unpredictable and potentially hostile regime in Tehran.

Friends, that truly is standing strong for the people of America... Oh wait, rather the people of America who have political money to finance re-election campaigns. WEAK.WEAK.WEAK.WEAK.WEAK.WEAK.PATHETIC.

The members of Congress are not morons, and we presume that they know more than us when we elect them to represent us at higher office.

BUT...

Iran is not irrational, understand that their motives this very moment and in the near future are for sel-preservation. They will not destroy themselves to destroy Israel, no matter how much they would like. This is much like America or the Soviet Union would've loved to destroy each other but understand that the costs are too great. We hold the threat of war over Iran, unstated or otherwise. They know that we do not need to say it is still an option, and we sure as hell don't need President Bush to make the decision to launch some overnight war. War is always an option, we don't Bush making this decision without Congress. Apparently, Congress doesn't feel the same way. These are fuckin' losers.

The Emperor lost the trust and credibility and so America attempted to keep him from making the same mistake twice and elected the opposition party to power in Congress. Apparently we have been failed.

A Call to Arms: Why Blog?

It's a Beginning

This article, though from the NYT, gets an idea about the purpose and usefulness of blogging.

Instead of a journalist pontificating from afar about bloggers and their inferior roles they play in the media landscape, this article covers the coverage given to the Scooter Libby trial by Firedoglake, a superior liberal blog. I thought this got to the matter at hand: What the hell is blogging and what is it for?

Here's what a Mr. Robert A. Cox, president of the Media Bloggers Association says:

"My goal is to get judges to think of bloggers as citizen journalists who should get the same protections as other journalists get,"

This is where the future is my friends, straight back to the older days when you had a press, you had an opinion:

Even as they exploit the newest technologies, the Libby trial bloggers are a throwback to a journalistic style of decades ago, when many reporters made no pretense of political neutrality. Compared with the sober, neutral drudges of the establishment press, the bloggers are class clowns and crusaders, satirists and scolds.

What can I say? We look around us today and find the old names of newspapers, don't be surprised to find one call a Democrat or Republican. American or even European Press was rooted in partisanship. It was always a tool for informing you and yours. It is also a means of state-control. That is something we must fight with national media in Washington and in our own states.

As Firedoglake puts it:

Ms. Hamsher describes the blog as "a collective watering hole" where contributors with diverse expertise "scour every possible source for information and then pool their resources."

Blogging is not a substitute for journalism, but it is a tool to increase the information for readers and writers and get under the narrative of a established forms of media. Nothing can be more subversive. The rest stems from there.

Our Hero-in-Chief: Caption Contest

Come, you know you have something clever to say...