Blog of Mass Destruction:

The neo-conservative cult that has placed a stranglehold on America's foreign policy affairs is a relatively recent phenomenon. Bush the Elder and pre-pacemaker Dick Cheney, had both previously rejected the idea of regime change and a U.S. military occupation of Iraq during the 90's. Since that time and with the opportunity of 9-11, neo-conservatives, new conservatives led by such luminaries as Bill Kristol and Richard Perle, have pushed to mainstream the radical, extremist foreign policy philosophies that have resulted in the current quagmire situation in Iraq. The thinking once regarded as foolish and dangerous military adventurism has now, under the presidency of Bush/Cheney, been mainstreamed. In just 7 short years pre-emptive wars of choice and American occupied middle eastern territories has, somehow, become the accepted foreign policy norm.

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I would challenge you to find in mainstream media's coverage of Iraq today any serious discussion of how the pre-emptive attack of Iraq, itself, was misguided, illegal or in some way the wrong thing to do. Media mouthpieces will wring their hands about mistakes being made after the attack was well under way. But never, or almost never, is there a thoughtful presentation explaining how attacking Iraq was the wrong thing to do in the first place.

Read the full post.

There’s been some discussion this week about whether Hillary Clinton, despite a record of reliable Democratic partisanship, might actually prefer that John McCain win in November if Barack Obama is the Democratic nominee. This occurred on the heels of a Gallup poll that showed that a whopping 28% of Clinton supporters are prepared to vote for a conservative Republican if Clinton doesn’t win her party’s nod, a far higher percentage than that of Obama supporters.

Full post at The Carpetbagger Report.

Warrantless wiretaps. The Patriot Act. Presidential secrecy. For seven years, civil libertarians and open-government advocates have felt they've been wandering in the wilderness, with few allies in Congress and a White House that only gets bolder in its contempt.

But now, with "change" the watchword in both Democratic presidential bids, and top committee heads in Congress flexing forgotten oversight muscles, activists are daring to look to 2009 as the Promised Land, where a new president joins with a fed-up Congress to lead America into a new era.

"A lot are talking about the post-Watergate Congress of 1974," said Marc Rotenberg, who heads the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "There is a real feeling we may have proposals for the kind of sweeping government reform that Congress pushed through after the Nixon impeachment in July 1974."

Read the full story.

Blog of Mass Destruction:

Pat Buchanan's take on Obama's speech:

America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.

Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.

My late father had a dash of white exceptionalism sprinkled over his thinking that was similar to Pat Buchanan's. My dad used to say similar things about those slave days in America. He used to tell us boys that many slaves were treated very well, taken care of quite nicely by their beneficent owners. Suggestions that slaves in America "had it good" and that whites had somehow done blacks a favor by enslaving them were suggestions I found silly and a bit dishonest. I always thought that the concept that people owned by other people "had it good," was quite a stretch. It simply never rang true.

Full post.

If you support McCain, wouldn't this make you happy?

McCain should check in with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. Looks like the meme is changing.

The fat lady is clearing her throat.

2010?

Let the healing begin.

Buckeye State Blog:

After 16 years of defending the Clintons against this very man, I get to watch as she goes to sit with him to get her shot at smacking Barack Obama.