Late Night Bits

Blame George! Blair at 30%

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A chunk of marble falls from the US Supreme Court, damaging a statue of Authority. What does it mean? Bush's authority eroding, or Bush & Co eroding the fundamentals of the US Constitution? Hindsight will tell!

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Ironic. Big Business turns on Bush Co. over freedom of information issues. From WSJ:

Joining the American Civil Liberties Union, organizations such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Association of Realtors and the Financial Services Roundtable are demanding changes in the antiterror law's rules on government access to confidential business records.

Corporate objections played a major role in blocking final legislative action on a new Patriot Act before the Thanksgiving break. Now, with pressure mounting to get the law passed by year end, business lobbyists say they see signs that key lawmakers are open to altering some provisions, offering companies clearer legal protections and avenues for appeal.

In particular, business groups want to inject new checks on law-enforcement requests for records on customers, suppliers and employees. Companies want government officials to shoulder a greater burden of proof in showing a connection between the documents demanded and a specific terror investigation, and they want greater power to challenge the record orders. Corporate lobbyists also want to prevent the renewed Patriot Act from toughening the law in ways they dislike.

This is a power play: business wants to be sure that its dirty secrets stay secret. Bush & Co have done nothing to improve public confidence in the wake of Enron's collapse and other major scandals, which helps explain why all that money got poured into real estate over the past five years.



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More from Seymour Hersh in the New Yorker:

Bush’s closest advisers have long been aware of the religious nature of his policy commitments. In recent interviews, one former senior official, who served in Bush’s first term, spoke extensively about the connection between the President’s religious faith and his view of the war in Iraq. After the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the former official said, he was told that Bush felt that “God put me here” to deal with the war on terror. The President’s belief was fortified by the Republican sweep in the 2002 congressional elections; Bush saw the victory as a purposeful message from God that “he’s the man,” the former official said. Publicly, Bush depicted his reëlection as a referendum on the war; privately, he spoke of it as another manifestation of divine purpose.

The former senior official said that after the election he made a lengthy inspection visit to Iraq and reported his findings to Bush in the White House: “I said to the President, ‘We’re not winning the war.’ And he asked, ‘Are we losing?’ I said, ‘Not yet.’ ” The President, he said, “appeared displeased” with that answer.

“I tried to tell him,” the former senior official said. “And he couldn’t hear it.”

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“The President is more determined than ever to stay the course,” the former defense official said. “He doesn’t feel any pain. Bush is a believer in the adage ‘People may suffer and die, but the Church advances.’ ” He said that the President had become more detached, leaving more issues to Karl Rove and Vice-President Cheney. “They keep him in the gray world of religious idealism, where he wants to be anyway,” the former defense official said. Bush’s public appearances, for example, are generally scheduled in front of friendly audiences, most often at military bases. Four decades ago, President Lyndon Johnson, who was also confronted with an increasingly unpopular war, was limited to similar public forums. “Johnson knew he was a prisoner in the White House,” the former official said, “but Bush has no idea.”