Evil GOP Bastards

Democratic Convention Recap
The Democratic National Convention has come and gone -- and in general, we give the Dems high marks. While avoiding the "negati-
vity" of Bush bashing, the Demo-
crats (especially the "Big Dog," BIll Clinton) did a good job of illustrating
the fundamental policy differences between them and the Republicans. Perhaps most notable was the scathing indictment of the Bush administration's lies by former president Jimmy Carter, whom history will recall as the most thoroughly honest and decent president of the 20th Century. Readers who missed any of the speeches delivered at the Demo-
cratic convention may view them
by clicking here .

Chris Matthews: Whore for the GOP or just a pompous windbag?
We'd love to know if there is anyone who believes that MSNBC chatterer Chris Matthews contributes anything of value to our national discourse. Matthews at some point became gripped by the delusion that talkers (such as his highly self-esteemed self) are more important than the doers -- such as the politicians he dispenses his indispensable opinions upon.

Giuliani a hero?
While we're ranting, can someone tell us what former NY Mayor Rudy Giuliani actually did on 9/11 to deserve the appellation of "hero"? As we recall, he mostly walked around looking stunned, yet concerned, without doing anything
of real consequence.

Is Bush using drugs to control depression, erratic behavior?
President George W. Bush is taking powerful anti-depressant drugs to control his erratic behavior, depres-
sion and paranoia, Capitol Hill Blue has learned. The prescription drugs, administered by Col. Richard J. Tubb, the White House physician, can impair the President's mental faculties and decrease both his physical capabilities and his ability to respond to a crisis, administration aides admit privately. "It's a double-
edged sword," says one aide. "We can't have him flying off the handle
at the slightest provocation but we also need a president who is alert mentally." MORE

Sullen Bush retreats Into
private, paranoid world
White House aides say Bush has retreated into a tightly-controlled environment where only top political advisors like Karl Rove and Karen Hughes are allowed. Even White House chief of staff Andrew Card complains he has less and less access to the president. Among cabinet members, only Attorney General John Ashcroft, a fundamen-
talist who shares many of Bush's strict religious convictions, remains part of the inner circle. White House aides call Bush and Ashcroft the "Blue Brothers" because, like the mythical movie characters, "both believe they are on a mission from God." MORE

Bush: "God speaks through me."
President Bush recently met with members of the Amish community. At the end of the session, Bush reportedly told the group, "I trust God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn't do my job.'' MORE

Ron Reagan blasts
Bush administration's lies
In an explosive essay, Ron Reagan, Jr., writes in this month's Esquire: "Politicians will stretch the truth. They'll exaggerate their accomplish-
ments, paper over their gaffes. Spin has long been the lingua franca of the political realm. But George W. Bush and his administration have taken "normal" mendacity to a startling new level far beyond lies of convenience. On top of the usual massaging of public perception,
they traffic in big lies, indulge in any number of symptomatic small lies, and, ultimately, have come to embody dishonesty itself. They are
a lie. And people, finally, have started catching on." MORE

Bush continues to withhold National Guard service records
In February, President Bush told a national television audience that he would "absolutely" authorize the release of all records pertaining to his military service after questions had arisen about whether he fulfilled his duty. Days later, the White House claimed it released every-
thing, with Bush campaign spokes-
man Terry Holt telling Fox News the documents were "black and white proof that the president served in the National Guard." But, as Associ-
ated Press now reports, the White House has only released "partial documentation" and has refused to comply with the news service's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the rest of the public record. MORE

Officials discuss how to
delay Election Day
Bush administration officials have discussed the idea of postponing Election Day in the event of a terrorist attack on or about that day, a Homeland Security Department spokesman said. The department has referred questions about the matter to the Department of Jus-
tice's Office of Legal Counsel, said
a spokesman, confirming a report
in a recent edition of Newsweek magazine. MORE

Kerry building legal
network for vote fights
Mindful of the election problems in Florida four years ago, aides to Senator John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, say his cam-
paign is putting together a far more intricate set of legal safeguards than any presidential candidate before him to monitor the election. Aides
to Mr. Kerry say the campaign is taking the unusual step of setting
up a nationwide legal network under its own umbrella, rather than relying, as in the past, on lawyers assoc-
iated with state Democratic parties. MORE

Attendees required to make Bush pledge before Cheney speech
Some Democrats who signed up
to hear Vice President Dick Cheney speak Saturday were refused tic-
kets unless they signed a pledge
to endorse President Bush. MORE

Abu Ghraib film shows Iraqi boys being sodomized
Young male prisoners were filmed being sodomized by American soldiers at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad, according to the journalist who first revealed the abuses there. Seymour Hersh, who reported on the torture of the prisoners in New Yorker magazine in May: "I'm not done reporting on all this," he told a meeting of the American Civil Liberties Union. "The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling, and the worst part is the soundtrack, of the boys shrieking. And this is your government at war." MORE

Teaching torture: Congress keeps
School of the Americas alive
Remember how congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle deplored the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib as "un-American"? Last Thursday, however, the House quietly passed a renewed appropriation that keeps open the U.S.'s most infamous torture-teaching institution, known as the School of the Americas (SOA), where the illegal physical and psychological abuse of prisoners of the kind the world condemned at Abu Ghraib and worse has been routinely taught for years. MORE

IRS Says Americans' income
shrank for two consecutive years
The total adjusted gross income on tax returns fell 5.1 percent, to just over $6 trillion in 2002, the most recent year for which data is available, from $6.35 trillion in 2000. Because of population growth, average incomes declined even more, by 5.7 percent. Adjusted for inflation, the income of all Americans fell 9.2 percent from 2000 to 2002, according to the new IRS data. MORE

Hourly pay in U.S. not keeping
pace with price rises
The amount of money workers receive in their paychecks is failing to keep up with inflation. Though wages should recover if businesses continue to hire, three years of job losses have left a large worker surplus. "There's too much slack in the labor market to generate any pressure on wage growth,'' said Jared Bernstein, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research institution based in Washington. "We are going to need a much lower unemployment rate.'' He noted that at 5.6 percent, the national unemployment rate is still back at the same level as at the end of the recession in November 2001. MORE

DeLay's corporate fundraising investigated
In May 2001, Enron's top lobbyists in Washington advised the company chairman that then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) was pressing for a $100,000 contribution to his political action committee, in addition to the $250,000 the company had already pledged to the Republican Party that year. The money was to be directed to the Texas GOP to help their state redistricting effort. MORE

Black conservative groups run
by white Republicans
The African-American spokesperson for Project 21 caught a flat on the way to the CSPAN studio and the group's director had to fill in. And he was white. As the segment began there was an awkward Wizard of Oz moment as C-SPAN's Robb Harlston -- himself black -- turned to Project 21's Caucasian director, David Almasi, and said, "Um...Project 21... a program for conservative African Americans... you're not African American." MORE

Democrats blast GOP lawmaker's
'suppress the Detroit vote' remark
In remarks noteworthy only for their candor, Michigan GOP State Rep. John Pappageorge was quoted in July
16 editions of the Detroit Free Press as saying, "If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election." Blacks comprise 83 percent of Detroit's population, and the city routinely gives Democratic candidates a substantial majority of its votes. MORE

Christian Zionists driving US Mid-East policy
The Bush White House is coordinating Mid-East policy with radical Christian groups who view the Israeli-
Palestinian conflict through a religious prism that requires Israel to occupy all of the "promised land" in order for biblical prophesy of Armageddon and the return of Jesus to be fulfilled. Speaking on the Senate floor, Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) of Oklahoma said Israel had a right to the land "because God said so." MORE

Ted Turner: My Beef With Big Media
Ted Turner writes on "How government protects big media -- and shuts out upstarts like me." MORE