With the decay of the right-wing-revolution becoming more and more apparent all around, some of these movement conservative leaders and agitators are starting to loose their focus.

This is truly disgusting.

That's right, the drug-addled children of Marxists who somehow still control our government are too weak to confront "The Muslim Threat" and we should just kill 100 Million of "them" or so... and by the way this Duke rape case is and example of a "dirtbag whore" making accusations and wouldn't be an issue if it weren't for the "lesbian feminist movement."

Oi. I would call this shit just plain crazy if it weren't so ugly and venomous and listened to by about eight million Americans on a weekly basis. If the hegemon becomes most militarily active in its period of decline, there must be some parallel for the cultural warriors within a political movement.

This campaign season is going to get ugly.

Let's think about the big picture.

There have been a bevvy of scandals swirling around the White House for years. The truth is that with the GOP in charge of congress, it's unlikely that anything substantive will happen. With Bush hovering in the mid 30s for approval, and the GOP congress fairing little better, will any Democrats come forward with a "hold them accountable" message? I think in some districts it could work, but it seems unlikely to emerge as a national narrative.

I think it would work. I think this will be a base election, and I think most Democrats and Independents want to see Bush held accountable. I think some republicans do too. "Suponea Power," baby.

I have a few friends in and around DC and plugged in various ways, and everyone seems to think we should take the possibility of a bombing campaign against Iran very seriously. I think this could be pretty unpredictable. The long-term effects would probably be pretty bad, but it's hard to say how the short-term politics would bounce. It might give them a boost.

Think about it. If Bush were to start pulling troops out of Iraq this summer -- which is a good idea, especially if you're going to bomb Iran, which will make Iraq a lot harder to hold -- he'd get a bump. If the White House followed with a full-court fear-press on Iran in the fall, given the way the press is already acting, it might just go over. If this is the calculus, they'll be looking for 2002 redux, maybe with a little October Surprise for Dobson and his legons of exurban evangelicals.

Other big picture stuff... Michael Moore's movie about health care should drop this year. Heath care was big in polling for Democrats, and Energy is up across the board. Iran figures strong in there too.

Bush's Administration is increasingly full of unpopular people. Ditto the GOP congress. Change is unlikely. With DeLay and Abramoff and who knows who else, out and Rove by all accounts occupied saving his own fat ass from Fitzgerald, the machinists are falling down on the job, and the grand coalition is collapsing. Cheney has like a 20% appoval rating. Rumsfeld is going the same way, but Dubya has his back:

I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the secretary of defense.

He's the decider only as long as Congress plays along. We don't live in a monarchy, yet.

You need to know science.

That's an animation from the Union of Concerned Scientists (who just leapfrogged most of the polical pack of 2006, son), which explains how the blast of a "bunker busting" nuke attack on one of Iran's remote nuclear facilities could still kill 3 million, and put ten times that up for a fatal cancer risk.

We have got to stop the hating. Found this via Billmon, who's apparently been raised from his slumber by all this

Pass it on

Tracking the possibility of an upcoming air-war with Iran (which might or might not include "bunker busting" nuclear weapons and would be followed by who knows what), I think one of the most discouraging things is that after the past three years I really don't feel like there's much I can do about it.

Glenn Greenwald: Does the debate over Iran matter?

[W]e can have all the lofty and vigorous debates we want over whether a military offensive against Iran is desirable, prudent, disastrous, crazy, etc. But ultimately, nothing we think - or our representatives in Congress think - really matters, because these decisions, under this administration, are "for the President alone to make." We could refuse to authorize this military offensive, or even enact legislation banning it, and none of that would matter in the slightest. It's worth remembering that in our country today, the President is the "sole organ" in all such matters, and he has full, limitless, and un-limitable authority to do whatever he wants.

If the administration really resolves internally - whether for political reasons or bloodlust or some crazed Steyn-like beliefs or any combination of those or other motives - to attack Iran, is there any doubt that they will do that no matter how much opposition there is? One thing is clear - they believe they have the power and authority to do that unilaterally, and that they need no further authorization of any kind beyond the President's will.

This is where we're at. It might be an interesting showdown if Bush went to Congress for some kind of authorization, but short of a truly massive and resounding rebuke, I don't think our "representatives" really have any power here. Given that a strike on Iran would be calculated to maximally improve the GOP's changes of retaining control of the House and Senate, I think the majority party would play along.

As for we the people, well, if we had mass protests that were even larger than the current immigration rallies, maybe something might happen, but I think that kind of turnout is unlikely. Roll that 9/11 b-reel, crank up the fear machine, talk about mushroom clouds and how "they" can't be trusted, and a cricial mass of the citizenry will go along initially. Even if mass protests were to happen, given the nature of the Media (who will likely cheerlead any march to war) and the Bush Administration (which, we must remember, considers protesting citizens a kind of "focus group") and the continuing disconnect between Establishment Democrats and the now-majority of Americans who are (with regard to Iraq at least) anti-war, I think it's doubtful that such demonstrations would do anything to alter the course of events.

It's in pappi's hands, baby. This is what you get.

The immigrant groups killed it. They have shown more political savvy in the past month than the entire non-establishment Left has in the past six years. Getting up and reciting the pledge of allegiance? Oh snap; a protest that works.

I saw some anti-immigration lady in Phoenix on, nice-seeming at first, kind of looked like Maria Schreiver, except then she got the crazy-eyes and started calling this "the genocide of America." Hey there, cryptoracistcrazy-pants.

This one's over, as it should be. People who think this is going to be the end of America sound about as dated as people who said the same when the Irish came to New York.

Sy Hersh:

A government consultant with close ties to the civilian leadership in the Pentagon said that Bush was “absolutely convinced that Iran is going to get the bomb” if it is not stopped. He said that the President believes that he must do “what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do,” and “that saving Iran is going to be his legacy.”

One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that “a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government.” He added, “I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, ‘What are they smoking?’ ”

Holy crap. This article is terrifying. I heard Drudge debunking it by overplaying the bit where Hersh notes that some plans call for tactical "bunker busting" nukes, but that's a bit of a red herring. In fact, it scares me all the more that no one really denies that there's a good chance that some attack will happen.

Attacking Iran would almost certainly have catastrophic consequences. However, if the debate is between "they're going to get the bomb!" and "well, maybe they won't get it for another six years," I think the war pigs will win. It seems like both sides are spoiling for conflict. Hope I'm misreading everything.

No surprise here, but still:

The first data to document the effect of President Bush's tax cuts for investment income show that they have significantly lowered the tax burden on the richest Americans, reducing taxes on incomes of more than $10 million by an average of about $500,000.

We now officially have a regressive tax structure, even on the income tax. The interesting thing is that it's the runaway ultra-wealthy (earners of $10M or more) who screw the sorta-wealthy (earners of between $200k and $10M) who are actually paying a higher rate than the uber-right. People in the middle class on on the bottom also get fucked becase social services are deteriorating -- causing myriad other costs to emerge -- and their share of the tax burdin, while still less than those above them, is on the rise.

This also doesn't take into account the effects of sales taxes and property tax, which proportionally fall more heavily upon working and middle class folks.

With this, and the end to inheritance taxes, it looks like we're on our way towards that post-capitalist crony kleptocracy we've always wanted. Huzzah!

I find this utterly terrifying:

It is believed that an American-led attack, designed to destroy Iran's ability to develop a nuclear bomb, is "inevitable" if Teheran's leaders fail to comply with United Nations demands to freeze their uranium enrichment programme.
...
The United States government is hopeful that the military operation will be a multinational mission, but defence chiefs believe that the Bush administration is prepared to launch the attack on its own or with the assistance of Israel, if there is little international support. British military chiefs believe an attack would be limited to a series of air strikes against nuclear plants - a land assault is not being considered at the moment.

Found via Echidne of the Snakes.

I don't think nuclear Iran is a great step forward for the world, but it might not be all bad, and I kind of think it's inevitable that more nations will get the bomb. You can't stop knowledge. And really, Iran is much less batshit crazy as a State Actor as compared to, say, North Korea. They're not on the cusp of anything anyway, and there's plenty of time to work this all out.

On the other hand, if this reportage from Britan is even remotely accurate, we're on the cusp of something much more awful. A US-led attack on Iran would have disasterous consiquences, starting with an enormous shitstorm coming down next door in Iraq, and ending who knows where. If it's a US/Israel show, then you can bet on open warfare and chaos throughout the region for the for the forseeable future.

We do not want to do this.

TIME:

Rep. Tom DeLay, whose iron hold on the House Republicans melted as a lobbying corruption scandal engulfed the Capitol, told TIME that he will not seek reelection and will leave Congress within months. Taking defiant swipes at "the left" and the press, he said he feels "liberated" and vowed to pursue an aggressive speaking and organizing campaign aimed at promoting foster care, Republican candidates and a closer connection between religion and government.

Delay was a major behind-the-scenes player in how the GOP congress worked, beginning with his tenure as whip under then-speaker Gingrich. This more or less signals the end of the "Republican revolution" that went down in 1994. 2006 is going to be an uncertain cycle, but my guess is something really fucking crazy goes down in 2008. People are trying to pretend like Hillary Clinton vs. John McCain is a done deal, but politics is far too weird a business for that to really be the story. I'm guessing another rogue billionaire or other outsider makes some waves, and that a dark horse takes at least one of the major party nominations.

Given his stated ambitions, I'm hoping he gets a cushy job and spends more time golfing. Foster care is ok, but "a closer connection between religion and government?" Do we really need that? Now?

Kevin Phillips: How the GOP Became God's Own Party.

This guy wrote the political bible for the Nixon Administration, and helped in the early days in which the modern Republican coalition was seeded. Today he warns that increasing religious fundimentalism, an energy policy that ignores reality, and an economy that's increasingly dependent on debt are threatening to lay the country low:

Conservative true believers will scoff at such concerns. The United States is a unique and chosen nation, they say; what did or did not happen to Rome, imperial Spain, the Dutch Republic and Britain is irrelevant. The catch here, alas, is that these nations also thought they were unique and that God was on their side. The revelation that He apparently was not added a further debilitating note to the late stages of each national decline.

I'm telling you. Energy Independence, a controlled end to the American Empire, and a renewal of our committment to science and technology (maybe related to the internet and health care) would clean up. Cut the fatbacks, god freaks and masters of war off from real businesspeople, actual Christians and true defenders of national security.