A partial look back at the events of the past year from FilmstripInternational.com.

From daveyork0.

Retrospective montage on the subject of the lowlights and legacy of both terms of George W Bush, 43rd President of the United States.

Via my Newshoggers colleague Anderson comes this:

By a vote of 180 in favour to 1 against (United States) and no abstentions, the Committee also approved a resolution on the right to food, by which the Assembly would “consider it intolerable” that more than 6 million children still died every year from hunger-related illness before their fifth birthday, and that the number of undernourished people had grown to about 923 million worldwide, at the same time that the planet could produce enough food to feed 12 billion people, or twice the world’s present population. (See Annex III.)

The Bush administration, speaking for the U.S.A., therefore must consider it tolerable that 6 million children die every day - children who could be fed if we weren't wasting billions on stealth fighters, littoral combat boondoggles and non-effective defense against non-existant ballistic missiles from Iran.

Just so you get that, here it is again:

In favour: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brazil, Brunei Darussalam, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Cape Verde, Chad, Chile, China, Colombia, Comoros, Congo, Costa Rica, Côte d’Ivoire, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Denmark, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Estonia, Ethiopia, Fiji, Finland, France, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Grenada, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Latvia, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Malta, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Micronesia (Federated States of), Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Republic of Korea, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russian Federation, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Tajikistan, Thailand, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United Republic of Tanzania, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Viet Nam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

Against: United States.

Merry Christmas to the World from Dubya and his chums - who are currently geeing up the notion that an increase in defense spending (say, to 4% of GDP) would be a great economic stimulus package! Actually, it wouldn't - defense spending "drains resources from the productive economy" and costs more jobs in other sectors than it creates.

How much better an economic stimulus - both for America and the world - it would be to mobilize American might for good instead of destruction, Dubya and his fellow travellers remain silent upon.

George Tenet, Drunk in Bandar's Pool, Screaming about Jews.

- Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic

You have to give BushCo credit - they're creative! They've managed to come up with new ways to obscure and even cover their tracks on just about everything:

The Bush administration's novel approach to budgeting for and financing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has made it very difficult to discern the true costs of the conflicts, a new report by the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments concludes.

Historically, the United States has covered the costs of war through the annual appropriations process. Supplemental appropriations were used to cover only initial, unanticipated phases of major conflicts. But the Bush administration relied exclusively on supplemental appropriations to cover the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan until 2008 -- seven years after U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan and five years after they entered Iraq.

The reliance on supplemental funding creates a misleading picture of overall requirements, said Steven Kosiak, vice president of budget studies at CSBA and author of the report, during a briefing on Monday. "A sound budgeting process forces policymakers to recognize the true costs of their policy choices," he said.

I think it's only a matter of time before we discover they've not only mislead us about the number of civilian deaths, but also lied about the number of wounded and dead American troops.

I expect we'll start to hear a lot about those and other coverups, once the new Obama administration is sworn in.

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MSNBC's Contessa Brewer yesterday was discussing George W. Bush's plan to let the EPA rule against cleaning up perchlorate from Americans' drinking water, even though its toxic effects are well documented.

Even John Feehery, the "Republican strategist" brought on to explain this last-minute ugliness, admitted:

Once again, I don't know the specifics of this particular one, but it doesn't really sound good, does it, Contessa?

Brewer later returns to Feehery and asks:

Brewer: John, do you think there should be some shame in a president doing something like this? It reminds me of the big scandal that erupted when Clinton was leaving office with all the pardons. You know, why are you gonna do something in your -- the very last few weeks that just ... makes you look bad?

Simple answer: Because George W. Bush doesn't care what you think. He never has.

If you want more information on Bush's vandalism of the American political landscape on his way out the door, check out the Pro Publica site with a complete rundown.

Its first entry is on perchlorate:

At Issue: Perchlorate is a chemical component of rocket fuel that can contaminate water both naturally and, more frequently, through improper disposal at rocket test sites, military bases and chemical plants. Cleaning it up would cost billions of dollars. But the contaminant has been linked to thyroid problems in young children, pregnant woman and newborns, leaving critics concerned for the developmental health of those most vulnerable to the chemical's effects.

Here's the EPA's official justification:

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The auto bailout plan is on its way to the White House, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi explained today at her press conference:

Pelosi: We are, as you know, for the past few days, in conversation about how we go forward with a package for the auto industry that produces at the end of the day -- and that means, very soon -- a viable industry for our country. It is an industry that is important to our economy, to our industrial base. There are workforce concerns that again are important to our country. And we want to be able to review the performance of the auto companies as we go forth.

In order to do that, it's important for us to pass legislation that will set criteria for restructuring and reorganization of that industry and the companies within it.

Pelosi then hands off the mike to Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the architect of the bill. Frank makes clear that the ball is now firmly in George W. Bush's court. Whaddya think the chances are he'll blow it?

MSNBC has more details on the bailout plan.

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Blogging about the Bush administration sometimes feels like a graduate course in Orwellian concepts. Ministry of Truth member...er, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice continues the "We make our own reality" legacy overhaul of the Bush administration by insisting that their hands were tied over the "faulty intelligence" of Saddam Hussein's weapons capabilities.

Perhaps unintentionally hilarious (or ironic, depending on your sense of humor), Rice assures host George Stephanopoulos that everyone agrees that there is no groupthink at the White House:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Is it fair -- is that a fair criticism of the Bush White House, particularly in the run-up to the war on Iraq? And could you have done a better job in airing dissenting views on the WMD?

RICE: Oh, we talked a lot about dissenting views. The idea that, somehow, within the Bush White House, there weren't dissenting views during this period of time is simply not true. But the intelligence didn't permit, frankly, much in the way of alternatives for the weapons of mass destruction.

Is that right? You'd think that a Stanford scholar would know the definition of groupthink:

A mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members' strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action.

Didn't she just deny the presence of groupthink with an example of it? (h/t Mugsy in the comments)

Transcripts below the fold

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As he heads into the political sunset none too soon, Bush and his minions are busily trying to repair his image so that he can move into that new house in Texas with a nice little legacy as a "misunderestimated" preznit.

Lotsa luck with that.

Apparently the meme that will resurrect his legacy will be the notion that somehow he kept us safe. First it was the Magic Dolphin lady; then the other day on MSNBC with David Shuster, Cheri Jacobus (identified by the universal "Republican strategist" moniker) did her game best:

I think history is going to look upon the George W. Bush presidency quite favorably. He has kept this country safe -- ah, since 9/11, we have not been attacked on our own soil. That is first and foremost the most important thing that Barack Obama can do as president, and I hope and pray that the Obama presidency is at least as successful as the Bush presidency in that regard.

If that sounds like a classic Republican setup, it is: First change the actual record, and then hold the incoming Democrat to a wholly higher standard that you've done your damnedest to ensure won't be reachable. After all, Bush did not keep us safe on 9/11 very well, did he? And moreover, he definitively made us more vulnerable to terrorist attack.

Brad Woodhouse responded just right:

Rewriting President Bush's legacy is going to be one heck of a task. I mean, just look at the state that America is in today. Like I say, the cupboard is bare. There's no product here to sell.

So far, Obama has only nominated one ambassador - career professional Susan Rice as ambassador to the UN. Here she is in September talking about Obama's foreign policy.

Following up on reports of Obama's intended Herculean cleaning of the Agean Stables at the Department of Defense, where the entire body of Bush-appointed deputies and under-whatevers are expected to be fired, the Washington Post now reports that the incoming Obama administration has told every single Bush political appointee as an ambassador that their services will no longer be required come January 20th.

That's an awful lot of ambassadors. An unusually high percentage of Bush's ambassador picks throughout his presidency - about half - have been "political appointees," as opposed to career foreign officers and without fail those political appointees have been big campaign donors, each raising over $100,000 for Bush and lots more for the Republican Party.

Nations that have had these, usually clueless, ambassadors foisted upon them just so that Bush could thank his biggest funders with a prestige sinecure include: Canada, Mexico, Britain, Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain, Australia, Belgium, Hungary, Ireland, Saudi Arabia, France, Portugal, Switzerland, Singapore and the European Union as well as a host of smaller nations. The United States is the only nation which habitually staffs its top diplomatic positions in other countries with check-writing rank amateurs rather than professional diplomats.

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Here's a historic picture from AFP, via the NY Times - The Iraqi cabinet has approved the current wording of the so-called Status of Forces Agreement between the US and Iraq, which will replace the UN mandate at the end of the year, with only one dissenting voice.

Spencer Ackerman writes:

The Bush administration intended the SOFA process to entrench the occupation. Instead it gave the Iraqi government the means to end it. And that's the best-possible way for the war to end: with the Iraqi government -- the one we've disingenuously told the world we're in Iraq to support -- showing its political maturation to get us out the day after tomorrow. And out actually means out. The SOFA demands that every last U.S. serviceman is on a plane by December 31, 2011. Obama's plan for a 30,000-troop residual force? Officially overtaken by events. As I say, the impact of this appears not to have sunken in. The Iraqis have forced an end to the war.

But the neocons are determined to get every last day out of their war. At Commentary, Abe Greenwald spins the cabinet's vote as favorably as he can:

What happens to the claim that Barack Obama’s drawdown plan was consonant with the hopes of the Iraqi leadership? The agreement calls for American troops to be in Iraq for three more years. That’s 36 months - more than twice the length of time Obama has proposed troops stay in the country.

Nevertheless, President Obama will heed the new reality.

There is far too much resting on the successful fulfillment of this agreement for Obama to defy it. For starters, it is a watershed moment for American-Iraqi relations and Iraqi sovereignty... Tearing up a cooperative agreement so delicately arrived at would go down as a diplomatic and geopolitical travesty for the Obama administration — proving, as it would, that America’s talk of freedom and democracy is piffle.

I'm not sure that Obama couldn't stick to his 16 month deadline, if he wanted to, without contravening the agreement. As far as I'm aware (and I only have leaks to work with - no-one's seen the final wording in public yet), the agreement only says US troops must withdraw no later than Dec. 31, 2011, and makes no mention of prohibiting an earlier withdrawal.

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Periodically over the last year and a half, the Bush administration and the US military have promised to provide proof of Iranian meddling in Iraq in the form of Iranian-provided weaponry in the hands of terrorists insurgents special groups criminals. Their first effort to do so, the infamous Baghdad Briefing, fell flat on its face when even Bob Gates and then Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Pace admitted that the incredibly weak evidence it presented proved nothing of the sort. Since then, various promised "smoking gun" briefings have been announced, postponed and then cancelled. Even the previously stenographic mainstream press finally noticed there was a lot of smoke and no fire.

That seems to be because, according to a task force of investigators advising the US military in Iraq - known as Task Force Troy - the narrative of Iranian weapons flooding across the border is only hype after all. Gareth Porter writes:

According to the data compiled by the task force, and made available to an academic research project last July, only 70 weapons believed to have been manufactured in Iran had been found in post-invasion weapons caches between mid-February and the second week in April. And those weapons represented only 17 percent of the weapons found in caches that had any Iranian weapons in them during that period.

The actual proportion of Iranian-made weapons to total weapons found, however, was significantly lower than that, because the task force was finding many more weapons caches in Shi'a areas that did not have any Iranian weapons in them.

The task force database identified 98 caches over the five-month period with at least one Iranian weapon, excluding caches believed to have been hidden prior to the 2003 U.S. invasion.

But according to an e-mail from the MNFI press desk this week, the task force found and analysed a total of roughly 4,600 weapons caches during that same period.

The caches that included Iranian weapons thus represented just 2 percent of all caches found. That means Iranian-made weapons were a fraction of one percent of the total weapons found in Shi'a militia caches during that period.

The extremely small proportion of Iranian arms in Shi'a militia weapons caches further suggests that Shi'a militia fighters in Iraq had been getting weapons from local and international arms markets rather than from an official Iranian-sponsored smuggling network.

Left out of the list of Iranian-made weaponry were 350 armour-piercing explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) found in Iraqi weapons caches. Despite the lurid claims of US officials, the task group couldn't ascribe an Iranian origin to a single one. Which along with press reports about finding EFP manufactories inside Iraq explains why, since mid-Summer, we've heard nothing about Iranian-made EFPs whereas before official reports and statements were full of them.

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While progressives everywhere are basking in the knowledge that liberal Democrats now control two of the three estates of the federal government, it is worth remembering that despite the voters' mandate, the Right still controls (barely, by a one-vote margin) the third: namely, the Supreme Court. And the right-wing Federalist Society dogmatists now sitting on the court are not only capable, but extremely likely, to wreak havoc with that mandate.

We received an unpleasant reminder of that reality this week:

The nation's need for Navy sailors to practice using sonar to guard against enemy submarines "plainly outweighs" any legal requirement to protect orcas and other marine mammals, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Wednesday, turning back environmentalists' efforts to restrict sonar use during naval training exercises.

Quoting a 1907 statement by President Theodore Roosevelt -- "the only way in which a navy can ever be made efficient is by practice at sea" -- the high court's five-member conservative majority said lower courts had improperly restricted naval exercises off Southern California.

But the justices in the majority stopped short of endorsing a Bush administration attempt to justify using a controversial White House waiver to justify the exercises.

When the lower court's ruling was announced earlier this year, it appeared to be a significant win for environmentalists, not to mention the cetaceans affected by these tests. It was also a win for the rule of law, considering the Bush administration's egregious lawbreaking in attempting to foist these tests on us.

But the court took care not to address that issue:

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And now for some good news.

Last May, White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten instructed federal agency heads to make sure any new regulations were finalized by Nov. 1. The memo didn’t spell it out, but the thinking behind the directive was obvious. As Myron Ebell of the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute put it: “We’re not going to make the same mistakes the Clinton administration did.”

... But that strategy doesn’t account for the Congressional Review Act of 1996.

The law contains a clause determining that any regulation finalized within 60 days of congressional adjournment — Oct. 3, in this case — is considered to have been legally finalized on Jan. 15, 2009. The new Congress then has 60 days to review it and reverse it with a joint resolution that can’t be filibustered in the Senate.

In other words, any regulation finalized in the last half-year of the Bush administration could be wiped out with a simple party-line vote in the Democrat-controlled Congress.

Given how often the Bush administration have sidelined Congress to push their own policies, the notion that a majority of Congress can so easily sideline Bush's last six months in office has a delicious sense of karma about it.

Crossposted from Newshoggers

The AP reports an officially unofficial leak from the Obama team that closing Gitmo is a priority for the new administration.

Under plans being put together in Obama's camp, some detainees would be released and many others would be prosecuted in U.S. criminal courts.

That's good. This bit isn't so good:

A third group of detainees — the ones whose cases are most entangled in highly classified information — might have to go before a new court designed especially to handle sensitive national security cases, according to advisers and Democrats involved in the talks. Advisers participating directly in the planning spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans aren't final.

U.S. courts handle cases "entagled in highly classified information" on a reasonably regular basis and the forms for dealing with such cases are well established. That phrase is a euphemism (or "lie", to the unsophisticated).  Spencer Ackerman has it exactly right:

If there's anything the military commissions process should have taught, it's that reinventing the legal system doesn't work, as evidenced by the bevy of military lawyers who have resigned in protest of the commissions. The concern, stripped of euphemism, is that the evidentiary basis for many trials of Guantanamo detainees -- including, in many cases, torture -- would never be admissible in any court worthy of the name. That's the Bush administration's legacy. But it can't be the basis for cheapening our legal system.

So we'll wait to see what proposal actually emerges. But consider not only that this is one of the first initiatives that Obama is pursuing -- it's one of the first that he's leaking, as well. This is as clear a signal as can be sent that the Bush era isn't just over, it will be actively rolled back. How far it actually gets rolled back we'll have to wait and see. And pressure.

If the US cannot get convictions in either civil or military courts under the full panoply of law, even if those trials have to be held partially in camera to protect necessary national security secrets as provided for in law already, then the US has screwed the pooch and tainted those prosecutions indelibly with torture, illegal rendition and kangaroo justice. Under those circumstances even Hannibal Lecter would walk - and anyone who understands why these things are anathema to normal jurisprudence would say that was a good thing as a universal standard even if no-one would be happy about individual instances.

If the Obama administration cannot see that, then they will have made themselves complicit in the massive crime that the Bush administration has perpetrated through Gitmo, Bagram , Abu Graib, and a host of secret prisons and illegal torture flights. It doesn't matter whether travesties of justice are conducted on the mainland U.S., at the resort in Cuba or in some undisclosed location - they're still travesties of justice. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet and any "hybrid" having any relationship to Bush's rigged tribunals would stink just as highly.

Crossposted from Newshoggers